Netflix December: Mowgli, Dumplin', and The Lobster

A belated Streaming Roulette. We forgot to share Netflix's new offerings so here we are a week late, surveying new titles by freeze framing films at random places with the scroll bar and whatever comes up first, that's what we share. No cheating.  Whats new on Netflix? Let's see...

I killed your brother.

The Lobster (2015/2016)
"Heartless Woman" absolutely upset me in this movie... but I love the rest of the movie (including that nobody has a name except the main character) which made my top ten list in its year. The Favourite is my new favorite Yorgos Lanthimos now, though. Which is your favorite of his merciless and haunting but sometimes indelibly funny movies: Dogtooth, Alps, The Lobster, Killing of a Sacred Deer, or The Favourite?

Related: Remember that great piece Daniel Walber wrote about The Lobster's phony flowers and production design.

[whispering in foreign languages]

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Mt Linkmore

THR Shin Godzilla wins really big at the Japanese Oscars while massive anime hit Your Name takes 3 prizes. A film called Her Love Boils Bathwater (????) took both of the actress awards. Gimme.
TFE ... ICYMI Shin Godzilla came in at #18 at the US box office in terms of foreign film success last year (just behind critical darlings The Handmaiden and Elle)
Two Dollar Cinema had a fun blog-a-thon called 'Mt Rushmore of Movies' in which bloggers could just any fourpart tribute - I only hear about blog-a-thons after the fact but I'm happy some people are still doing 'em. Entries include: four characters with great beards, best movie cameos, movies where romantic leads don't end up together, and more

Much more film & TV news, videos, and linkage as well as Barry Jenkins & Damien Chazelle's friendship after the jump because this is a super long post. It's impossible to keep up as of late!

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Anton Yelchin (1989-2016)

This calendar year has been filled to the brim with unthinkables. The latest terribly sad happening: The talented Russian-American actor Anton Yelchin died yesterday in a freak accident at only 27 years of age. He was crushed by his own car on its steep driveway incline.

Yelchin was best known to general audiences as Chekov in the modern Star Trek franchise but to us he'll always be Byrd Huffstodt (the sensitive brainy teen in the underappreciated cable drama Huff) or awestruck poseur Ian (from the hipster vampire greatness that was Only Lovers Left Alive), and especially Jacob from the college romance drama Like Crazy (2011). Though Like Crazy was mostly heralded at the time for Felicity Jones's work as his British girlfriend, it was Yelchin that gave the movie its lovestruck foolish soul... but nuanced emotionally astute work by male actors, especially young ones, in romantic dramas are rarely given their just critical props. Even when miscast (when Hollywood thinks you're the next big thing they'll put you in anything, even if it's an obviously uncomfortable fit) as in Fright Night or Terminator Salvation, Yelchin was always, at the very least, watchable. 

A tiny gift of remembrance to fans which in no way makes up for this truly absurd loss: Yelchin worked so steadily as an actor that we will still see a handful of new performances released posthumously. The forthcoming films are: Star Trek Beyond (due July 22nd), Rememory (with Peter Dinklage), the family drama We Don't Belong Here (with Catherine Keener as his dysfunctional mother), the international romantic drama Porto (with French actress Lucie Lucas - Yelchin was fluent in multiple languages and it seems likely he would have pursued more international films later in life if Hollywood offers ever got too repetitive or unchallenging), and the thriller Thoroughbred (with Anya Taylor-Joy from The Witch).

He will be missed. Do you have a favorite Anton Yelchin memory at the movies or on TV? 

Nic Cage and the Curios Case of the Non-Disparagement Agreement

Manuel here bringing you what’s surely the weirdest buzz surrounding an upcoming project you didn’t know existed.

Paul Schrader’s (or rather, not-Schrader’s) new film Dying of the Light, set to open this December, is currently embroiled in one of the oddest bits of director/producer spats we’ve seen in a while. While the pic got a new trailer this week, Schrader, along with co-stars Nicolas Cage and Anton Yelchin (as well as exec producer Nicolas Winding Refn) has begun a tacit non-disparaging disparaging campaign against the film itself. In Schrader’s own words:

We lost the battle. Dying of the Light, a film I wrote and directed, was taken away from me, redited, scored and mixed without my imput. Yesterday Grindstone (a division of Lionsgate) released the poster and the trailer. They are available on line. Here we are, Nick Cage, Anton Yelchin, Nic Refn and myself, wearing our “non-disparagement” T shirts. The non-disparagement clause in an artist’s contract gives the owners of the film the right to sue the artist should the owner deem anything the artist has said about the film to be “derogatory.” I have no comment on the film or others connected with the picture.

It’s not often these behind the scenes battles go so public, though in this day and age, where social media allows a greater sense of transparency (Schrader himself took to Facebook to share the pic below), you’d think we’d get these types of approaches more often. I, for one, would love to see Nicole Kidman wearing a Team Dahan tee, wouldn’t you?

I love the picture Schrader cobbled together because it’s so patently over-the-top between Yelchin’s power fist and Refn’s too-cool glasses/come-at-me pose combo. But rather than snarking on Cage, Schrader and co., I wanted us to imagine alternate plots for the above poster.

What movie is being sold to us in this revamped Dying of the Light poster? Is it a Hangover-style comedy where we follow the hijinks that lead this foursome to all wear the same tee? Is it an indie where estranged fathers and brothers come together for one last dinner?

Tribeca: "5 to 7," Or Why Frustrated Writers Should Back Away From Final Draft

Tribeca coverage continues with Diana on 5 to 7 with Anton Yelchin & Glenn Close

Based on the imaginings of an out-of-touch, middle-aged writer-director, 5 to 7 is about a 24 year-old “writer” (Anton Yelchin) who becomes involved with the 33 year-old wife of a French diplomat (Berenice Marlohe). Brian lives in Manhattan, presumedly on his parents’ dime (Glenn Close and Frank Langella, both painfully misused), and attempts to write, his creative juices facilitated by posting a multitude of rejection letters on his wall and playing lonely man wiffleball in his apartment. Arielle also lives in Manhattan  and is oh so very “French” -- husband, two kids, posh neighborhood, and ability to balance high heels with a well-fitting dress.

Spotting Arielle in front of the St. Regis, Brian pursues her through quips that sound more like early drafts of “wit” rather than the finished product (think Woody Allen without the neurotic charm). She tosses words back at him that are meant to signify mutual attraction. When they do end up in a hotel room together (after she hands him the key), there is zip chemistry between the pair, cringingly highlighted all-the-more when Arielle tells Brian that he is a natural lover and asks whether his other lovers had told him that. That’s the crux of the problem with this film - we are told things consistently through voiceover and character iteration (Brian loves Arielle, Arielle loves Brian, Brian’s mother can see that they love each other), but we’re rarely shown anything substantial enough to back up these assertions. [More...] 

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