Yes No Maybe So 'Downhill'

by Murtada Elfadl

They went and remade Ruben Östlund’s brilliant Force Majeure (2014) with Juia Louis Dreyfuss and Will Ferrell and called it Downhill. The story, as those of you who saw the original know, is about the repercussions on a marriage after the husband cowardly runs away from the sight of an avalanche, leaving his wife and children to face it alone. The original was a funny smart satire about manhood and patriarchal responsibilities in the modern age.

After premiering at next month's Sundance Film Festival, the movie will be released on February 14th. Let’s give the newly released trailer the YES NO MAYBE SO treatment.

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Year in Review: Jason's Fave "Horror Actressing"

by Jason Adams 

It's been easy to say this for several years running now but it's been a pretty darn good year for Horror Movies. There are filmmakers out there taking risks and big swings with the genre, from art-house oddities (Midsommar) right on up to the mainstream ones (Us). And once you really dig deep -- the Horror Genre has almost always been one where the most interesting stuff has been a dirty secret whispered between likeminded folk -- the beautiful freaks really come out to play.

For the past five weeks in our "Great Moments in Horror Actressing" series I've covered five of my favorite female performances in the genre in 2019, so first let's recap those before we get to the other five -- click their names to read those earlier posts.

Sofia Boutella in Climax

Rebecca Ferguson in Doctor Sleep

Fatma Mohamed in In Fabric

Lupita Nyong'o in Us

Florence Pugh in Midsommar

And now let's round out our top ten...

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Tweetweek: Feat Old Deuteronomy (...and Burlesque ?)

Some tweets curated for you over the past couple of weeks because they amused us...

Dern v JLo is this year’s Glenn v Gaga, in that Cho Yeo-Jeong will win and gays will all be sad but ultimately not mad.

— Joel Kim Booster (@ihatejoelkim) December 10, 2019

If only Joel, if only. 

AFTER THE JUMP How actors eat food in movies, how people become gay, how Timothée Chalamet was conceived, best of the decade, and more...

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The Best Costumes of the Star Wars Saga

by Cláudio Alves

When I was a child my dad gifted me with the tapes of the original Star Wars trilogy and then took me to see The Phantom Menace when I was just five. Other kids left the theatre thinking of pod races and cool fights, but what most fascinated me were Queen Amidala's astounding costumes. As soon as I got home I started sketching ideas of what other crazy attires she could have worn and an obsession with movie costumes was born. I'd only consider dedicating my college studies to it many years later, but that didn't stop me from filling boxes full of drawings of the Naboo Queen and her mother in a variety of extravagant fashions.

In honor of the end of the Skywalker saga, let's take a look back to the franchise's many chapters in search of its very best costumes. Costume design is one of the few elements where the quality never wavered across nine movies, despite a single costume design nomination and win from the Academy (for the 1977 original).

There was plenty to choose from. To avoid any character dominating the list, the self-imposed limitation is one costume per character. 

Honorable Mentions: The many permutations of the Jedi's classic garb including Darth Maul's black version of it, Snoke's red Pretorian guard, Queen Apailana's funereal splendor and the jacket Finn got from his sexy boyfriend...

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Year in Review: Mainstream Box Office (feat. Lupita, Queen Elsa, and lots of Superheroes)

Our Year in Review party is getting off to a bit of a slow start (we launched with 50 biggest documentary hits) but we hope to speed up now and what better festive topic during the holiday moviegoing season than an audience participation one? Herewith six "top ten-to-twenty" box office hit lists regarding various subgenres of the mainstream and what we can learn from them... at least in terms of moviegoers today.

We're starting with female-led pictures because this should not be regarded as a minority or special interest topic given that half of the world's population is female! Little Women was a major late-breaking success in this arena but it wasn't the only success from 2019. Let's look at that chart first.

🔺= the movie is still in over 100 theaters. Figures are as of February 23rd

1. TOP GROSSING (LIVE-ACTION) FILMS WITH A FEMALE LEAD
(Excluding films where a male lead is just as prominent as his female co-star)

Captain Marvel

01 Captain Marvel $426.8 (Disney/Marvel, March 8th) starring Brie Larson
02 Us $175 (Universal, March 22nd) starring Lupita Nyong'o
03 Maleficent Mistress of Evil $113.9 (Disney, Oct 18th) starring Angelina Jolie
04 Little Women $107.1 (Columbia, Dec 25th) starring Saoirse Ronan
05 Hustlers $104.9 (STX, Sept 13th) starring Constance Wu & Jennifer Lopez...

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