Thursday, October 31, 2013 at 12:00PM I was all about to complete "Our Coven" -- our series of holiday witch posts -- in the traditional way when I realized that this requested review of The Witches that I'd written years ago had been lost from the internet! So we must repost with a couple minor updates. I hope you'll enjoy this look back at a key film from 1990.
HAPPY HALLOWEEN!
Celebrate with The Witches
Monday, October 21, 2013 at 7:00PM In the Stage Door series we look at current theatrical productions with our cinematic eye. Here's Jose on Romeo & Juliet
Some time within the last 14 days, I subjected myself to three versions of William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet playing in NYC. "Subjected?" you ask, well dear reader, each of them was perhaps more horrifying than the previous, leading me to ask if I wasn't an unwitting participant in some Shakespeare-meets-Halloween project. However in the name of scientific research I've come back with some results.
The versions in question are...
1) a Broadway update (the first in over four decades) starring Condola Rashad and Orlando Bloom as the infamous lovers from Verona.
2) a new film (written by Julian Fellowes) starring Oscar nominee Hailee Steinfeld as Juliet and Damian Lewis as her dad
3) an off-Broadway version with Elizabeth Olsen and newcomer Julian Cihi as the title characters.
Both theater versions feature anachronisms and are set in unspecified times, the film version inversely has a time-appropriate setting yet somehow it doesn't feel like the most old fashioned of them.
The Best and Worst of each pair after the jump...
Monday, October 21, 2013 at 2:59PM 
JA from MNPP here. We all know what happened the last time a girl named Nell wandered into the woods - no good can come from it! I kid, I kid - I know there are vehement Nell defenders out there, and I've no doubt you're all up in this actressexual's haven, so I'll step off.
I only use that Jodie Foster film as a sideways stepping stone to address today's news that Ellen Page and Evan Rachel Wood have signed up to star in Into the Forest, an adaptation of Jean Hegland's book about a pair of sisters (named Nell, a-ha, and Eva), one a ballet dancer and the other a student (I don't think I'll ever figure out which actress is playing which role!), who are forced into survival mode together when society comes crashing down around them in the not distant future. Have any of you read the book? I have not but it sounds right up my alley and I think I will go pick myself up a copy right this second. What do you think about Page and Wood playing sisters? Patricia Rozem, who previously made the womanly entertainments Grey Gardens and Mansfield Park, is directing.
Wednesday, October 9, 2013 at 9:57PM Slant Gravity, IMAX, and the horrors of front row seating
The Guardian a Carrie promotion stunt here in NYC. Imagine seeing this in real life.
The Verge the original teaser trailer to Star Wars is curiously light on Han Solo
Variety Destin Cretton, hot off the empathetic and special Short Term 12 may direct Glass Castle based on the bestseller with Jennifer Lawrence in the starring role
Deejay Italia Cher on Italian television calls Madonna a "magic bitch"
My New Plaid Pants Bubble Boy and Prisoners? Twins!
Boy Culture Josh Hutcherson is "mostly" straight
CHUD undeterred by those Prometheus reviews, Ridley Scott is moving ahead with Blade Runner 2 and may bring Harrison Ford along with him
/Film Darren Aronofsky promises huge complicated visual effects for his biblical epic Noah ... does that mean Matthew Libatique can finally win a cinematography Oscar? (that question is inspired by this recent divisive post on Gravity)
/Variety Toni Collette romantic comedy Lucky Them gets a distributor. This is how massive the TIFF selection is each year. I did not even know that Toni, one of my very favorite actors, even had a movie playing there!
Finally, /Film shares the shortlists for the new Fantastic Four cast. The weird thing is that though I like nearly every actor and actress mentioned I think most of them are pretty terrible choices for those roles. Except for maybe Margo Robbie as Sue Storm. Interesting that her career is suddenly hot after a failed tv show (Pan Am). It's gotta be buzz about her sexcapades in The Wolf of Wall Street, right? I think my problem in picturing a successful Fantastic Four movie is that that comic book property has, like Wonder Woman, a retro feel. I don't mean that as a bad thing but Hollywood definitely does and they're always worry about how to young down that type of property. But that doesn't work. Some things are just "square" you know, to use an antiquated term. They need to think more along the lines of that bang-up job Marvel did interpreting Captain America for the 21st century by rooting him first so boldly in the early 20th century where he feels so natural.
Wednesday, September 11, 2013 at 8:00PM If I'd have known that the poster to Jason Reitman's Labor Day, an adaptation of the Joyce Manard novel, hadn't made it online yet at this writing, I'd have snapped a picture of it. It's a beauty for its rarity. How many actual film stills are used for movie posters these days? It's usually either iconic floating heads or powerful star bodies. If not that then boring vertical / horizontal grids of star faces, or a mishmash collage.
Here's the freeze frame in question, that's only been slightly modified for the poster image...
Kate Winslet & Josh Brolin star in Labor Day
And that film still, the first image released, is truth in advertising. What's more -- and only faithful TFE readers will truly appreciate this -- it's the image that stopped me in my tracks during the movie and made me think "That's my choice for 'Hit Me With Your Best Shot' though I promise I don't play that game with every movie I watch.
The image is the story in a nutshell...
