50 Days til Oscar, Ally!

Ladies and gentleman.... ALLY"

Not a still from the movie. They've actually put the Ally billboard up in Los Angeles in the same location it's supposed to be seen within the movie.

You have to hand it to the Warner Bros teams behind A Star is Born publicity both during its leggy run (now with a nearly $400 million global gross on a $36 million budget) and during awards season where it has consistently performed. They keep thinking of new ways to keep the film in people's minds, too, like this funny specific stunt pictured here. Will it feel like overkill by the time Academy members are voting. To some, sure, but those are likely the people who weren't going to vote for it anyway.

Soundtracking: The Best Musical Moments of 2018

by Chris Feil

We have had another banner year for cinematic variants of musicals - from the classic (A Star is Born, Mary Poppins Returns) to the modern (Hearts Beat Loud, Vox Lux) to the unfortunate (Bohemian Rhapsody). But there's more than just musicals that have made an impact! As ever, I've had my ear towards all sorts of needle drops and clever cues where movie music has been concerned this year. You know, the kind of stuff that makes Soundtracking tick.

We've already discussed what Oscar might hold for the Original Song category this year, but 2018 was largely defined for me by songs familiar and unexpected. Join me like Charlize Theron doing Carly Rae Jepsen karaoke in Tully and sing along to the year's best musical moments...

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10 Appropriate Ways to Celebrate "A Star is Born"'s $200 Million Triumph

We're skipping the box office charts this weekend since Christmas falls on a Tuesday. The last two weeks of the year are always heavy moviegoing times as families look for entertainment breaks in between their visits and feasts and shopping. New pictures Aquaman, Mary Poppins Returns, Bumblebee,  last week's champ Spider-Man Into the Spider-Verse and costume pics The Favourite and Mary Queen of Scots (which both added hundreds of theaters) are all going to have big weeks. But the only news we care about right this very second is that, on this very day, 12 weeks into its run, A Star is Born crossed the $200 million mark on its leggy run into America's hearts.

❤️ 10 ways to celebrate A Star is Born's $200 million dollar milestone weekend

1. Stroke the outline of your boyfriend or girlfriend's nose
2. Sing along with your favorite song from the soundtrack again that isn't "Shallow"
3. Admit that A Star is Born has other great songs.
4. Watch Willam on "The Beatdown"
5. Decide who your favorite supporting character besides Sam Elliott is in the movie, even if they were shafted in the "Outstanding Cast" nomination.
6. Watch one of the other versions of A Star is Born because you probably haven't seen them all. 
7. Introduce each of your friends who enter the room with "Ladies and gentleman... Ally!" until someone makes you stop (someone surely will)
8. Wonder anew how Lady Gaga will ever top her world premiere in Venice look at the Oscars.
9. Go to a drag show.
10. Steal Sam Elliott's voice.

Florida Film Critics Circle (and more)

Given our most recent podcast conversation in which Florida film critic Alfred Soto was a guest star, we wanted to inform you of the end results of The Florida Film Critics Circle's year end "best" discussions. The Favourite took their top prize but the big story is how fully they embraced Asian cinema with two acting prizes for Asian actors and additional prizes for Shoplifters (foreign film), Shirkers (documentary), and Mirai (animated film).

The 26 member wide organization is spread out all around Florida and has been in existence since 1996, just before the boom (2002-2012) when every city and/or state decided they needed an organization, sometimes two of them!) Their full list of winners (along with a handful of other groups that announced earlier that we neglected to mention) are after the jump...

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18 Beautiful Examples of Co-Star Chemistry in 2018

Year in review list mania each day. Here's Nathaniel...

This is our fourth year of highlighting that unpredictable spark between actors that can elevate a movie whether the movie is able to catch up or not (see previously installments for '15, '16 and '17, if you're so inclined).  If only we could bottle these formulas but the thing about great chemistry is that it can't ever be fully recreated even if old movies during the studio system teach us that the same pairing can at least generate similar energy again. Why Hollywood doesn't still try to repackage successful combos of actors (rather than just all the brand do-overs) remains an unsolved mystery 

Herewith the most beautifully realized relationship energy of the year...

18 [TIE] Ben Foster & Thomasin McKenzie, Leave No Trace 
AND Josh Hamilton & Elsie Fisher, Eighth Grade (Single Father/Teenage Daughter)
There's a lot to recommend in both films, two sleeper arthouse successes this year, but neither film would have the same emotional resonance without that authenticity of feeling in the central duet. Marvel at the way Hamilton looks at or speaks to Fisher, for example, perpetually impatient to be let in on her interior life, but also nervous about intruding on her journey and walling her off yet further. Equally impressive is the difficult balancing act McKenzie plays as both dutiful daughter and emotional caretaker for her troubled father, as she grows ever more restless to escape him without losing him. What a quartet of performances...

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