One Week 'Til "Drag Race" Returns!

Chris here. We're only one week away from the return of RuPaul's Drag Race on March 24, one of our favorite shows here at The Film Experience! As if the news of Lady Gaga guest judging and a stellar interview in Vanity Fair with Mama Ru herself weren't enough to bring our anticipation to a fever pitch, we just got our first extended look at the coming season!

And while Gaga may bring the masses, the full guest judge lineup is built to produce a chorus of gay gasps in perfect harmony. Lisa Kudrow is our most gagworthy guest and hopefully giving us all the Valerie Cherish we need to survive on her episode (though I'm the slightest bit bummed she doesn't share her episode with Mira Sorvino). The B-52s will hopefully be there for a singing challenge or "Love Shack" lipsync. However, I'm most excited and intrigued for Andie MacDowell's appearance - feel free to revive that Magic Mike XXL character, Andie!

But don't get sidetracked by the star wattage as the show's popularity continues to increase (seriously: name any other show that has steadily built its fanbase in its ninth season). The show is for the queens! And the contestants this season already promise to bring a range of fresh talents and plentiful drama. From the Meet the Queens interviews, my heart already belongs to Nina Bo'Nina Brown and Sasha Velour, even if my instincts tell me they'll be the type of queens that we adore before a contoversial elimination. Check out the new trailer and tell us in the comments what queens and guest judges have you most excited!

RuPaul's Drag Race

Swing, Tarzan, Swing! Ch.7: Oscar Loves "Greystoke"

During this summer of the Tarzan reboot we've revisited past films in the long history of Tarzan on film. Four more episodes to go!

Impossible as it may be to move Tarzan away from his ultra-specific origins as a colonial era fantasy, filmmakers have tried over and over again to do exactly that. As we've seen in past installments of our "Swing, Tarzan, Swing!" series, he keeps changing with the times despite his historical baggage. We've seen starkly different depictions of his relationship to Jane from equal partners to Head of the Household suburban conformity. The Lord of the Apes even tried to get bachelor hip with the 1960s at the beginning of the James Bond frenzy. Nearly every Tarzan on television has attempted to place him closer to the actual timeline in which it aired. The new Legend of Tarzan (reviewed) works hard to downplay the racism in the myth, but it's never going completely away given that the story is, at heart, about a white man who becomes king of the jungle and often the savior of Africans in his ongoing adventures.

Tarzan works best when he's allowed to stay in the era to which he belongs. So it was a stroke of inspiration for director Hugh Hudson (fresh off a Best Picture win with Chariots of Fire) to give him the historical epic treatment in Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes (1984) even though the Ape Man doesn't belong to world history any more than, say, Batman, Superman and Spider-Man who were all also tragically orphaned (it's a superhero thing, okay?). 

The marketing was so committed to this "serious" prestige historical treatment that the poster even has a four paragraph synopsis closer to a novel than a movie tagline...

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11 Tweets: Kate Fandom, Bradley Trash, Princess Fatigue

You guys! I leave for Los Angeles in the morning and am feeling so overwhelmed. In a good way of course. Oscar season has basically gone from 0 to 60 while I puttered around my apartment not working fast enough.

In this week's tweet roundup Andie MacDowell sort of announces a very exciting new project (sex, lies and videotape is still her best work), Xavier Dolan announces his love for Kate Winslet, Adele questions DiCaprio, and Guillermo del Toro geeks out about 70s movies  after the jump...

Studying lines & very excited to get back to work leave next Monday for 7 weeks best character since Sex Lies ...lots to dig into ☺️☺️☺️

— Andie MacDowell (@AndieMacDowell3) November 3, 2015

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Halfway: Best Supporting Performances of 2015 Thus Far

½way mark - part 6 of ?
While it was a great deal of fun choosing and articulating the Best Leading work of the year (thus far) at the halfway mark, the Supporting fields prove a more difficult task. This is not exactly the norm as movies tend to have more supporting role than leading ones. But -- grossly generalizing now -- a lot of movies underuse their supporting casts, especially the women. This is particular true of summer blockbusters: Jurassic World and Terminator Genisys, for example, don't even have any supporting females. You're either a male character, a leading female love interest, or you don't exist... except perhaps in cameo form (the eternal plight of one Judy Greer). Either that or the character actors are severely underchallenged. It's easy to feel exceptional warmth for Mary Kay Place in I'll See You In My Dreams or Sally Hawkins in Paddington, for example. Both women are welcome onscreen at any time, terrific actresses, but they're not expected to do much at all other than be a warm and welcoming presence. 

Anyway, let's proceed. 

Supporting Actress: Rose Byrne & Kristen Stewart 

But...that's not playing by the rules which is to choose five performances like you're doing an Oscar shortlist (though these lists should never be mistaken for Oscar Predictions which is a different topic altogether). So let's try again.

Here we go with 4 acting categories after the jump

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Review: Magic Mike XXL

This review was originally published in Nathaniel's column at Towleroad. It is reprinted here with in the Director's Cut version. i.e. it's longer this time...

When Magic Mike opened three years ago it was something of a risky proposition. Male stars exploiting their bodies for a young male star’s dream project loosely based on his own stripping career which he felt no shame about? Who would have guessed? Cut to three years later: Magic Mike and Friends (minus The Kid and Dallas “alright alright alright”) have returned to movie theaters with much teasing and blockbuster fanfare to a relatively new pop cultural context they helped create: male objectification is increasingly the norm. Just ask Chris Pratt, the ascendant superstar of the moment (Guardians of the Galaxy, Jurassic World) who has acknowledged that his new body was key to his ascendance and that he’s all for it… the objectification.

This wondrous new world of happily exposed man-flesh makes Magic Mike XXL feel curiously demure. Usually sequels go for more-more-more but XXL (the title is a misnomer) downsizes even as the stages get larger. There’s less plot since it’s essentially a road trip movie but most curiously there’s much less nudity even if the women this time around seem a lot more eager to see it.

This withholding is smart and funny at the beginning of the film in a sensational opening dance number starring Mike alone in his workroom. [More...]

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