Five Reasons to Watch "Portrait of a Lady on Fire" Immediately

by Murtada Elfadl

A movie event of the highest order is a click away, at least for those of us in the US. 

#1 Portrait of a Lady on Fire is now streaming on Hulu. You can watch right this very second if you want.

#2 There’s a lot of choices on streaming but this gives you the chance to swoon as you watch. Gorgeously shot, Portrait is a romance between an artist (Noémie Merlant) and her subject (Adèle Haenel) set in late 18th century France, that smolders with heat and passion...

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Lunchtime Poll: What are the oddest Best Actress wins?

Claudio recently celebrated Glenda Jackson's Oscar winning performance in Women in Love and we have to ask if you've ever seen Women in Love's trailer? We personally can't recall a time another time when critical pullquotes were wielded to shame people into praising something. Haha. Note that final blurb! 

While most Oscar wins make sense given the context of their own years (for various reasons), they don't always make any sense in the grander scheme of Oscar history and taste. Women in Love stands as one of the strangest Oscars wins in its category given the nature of the role and the acting achievement. I'd argue that Julie Andrews in Mary Poppins is another odd duck, with no correlative elsewhere in Oscar taste. Who would you name as one of the strangest Oscar wins in Best Actress history (besides those two)? And why?

Would you rather...?

Our celebrity-fantasy Instagram check-ins feel especially needed now when fantasy is all we have since we're all cut-off from human connection in our individual quarantines. So would you rather...

...do yoga with Illeanna Douglas and her dog?
...paint Amanda Seyfried's face?
...shower (outdoors) w/ Miguel Angel Silvestre?
...hike with Julia Louis-Dreyfuss and Ellen?
...get creative with face masks / protection with Claire Denis?
...have an intimate relationship (by phone) with Noah Centineo?
...foster puppies with Cara Delevigne?
...or champagne-time with Jessica Chastain?

Pictures are after the jump to help you decide.

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The Fantabulous Style of "Birds of Prey"

by Cláudio Alves

There was a time when super-hero movies were colorful circuses of artifice and joy. Remember the pop iconography of Christopher Reeves' Superman, Tim Burton's Batman or the Punk stylings of Tank Girl? It all changed with the dawn of the 21st century. X-Men brought on an era of heroes dressed in many tedious iterations of leather jumpsuits, while Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy made grittiness cool again. Explosions of poppy color were out and grim pseudo-realism was in.

The DC Comics flicks took the trend to its desaturated limit, but even the MCU is guilty of indulging in this aesthetic stagnation. Fortunately, some films break the convention, be it the Afrofuturistic haute couture of Black Panther or Aquaman's glitzy excess. We can add Birds of Prey to that elite club of stylish super-hero flicks…

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Movie Watching in Quarantine Times

by Murtada Elfadl

With all of us self isolating in quarantine the daily question of what to watch gains even more importance. Not only do you want to watch something good and entertaining but also something that will engross and really distract and take you away from the reality of the grave situation we are living in. Something soothing and comforting above all, however you never know where comfort might come from. 

Last night I thought a comedy was in order and based on Wes Anderson’s recommendation in a sweet email to The Criterion Channel I chose Arthur Hiller’s The-Out-of-Towners (1970) with Jack Lemmon and Sandy Denis. However I turned it off 15 minutes into the film. Lemmon constantly yelling his entitlement was not comforting nor funny. The rants were well written and the situations would have probably been funny in another context. But not at this time.

Last week the movie was Francois Trauffaut’s The Last Metro (1980)...

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