Beauty vs Beast: Scream in your PJs

Jason from MNPP here - if you went and saw David Gordon Green's Halloween this weekend did you catch that voice cameo in the classroom scene? Mirroring a near identical scene in John Carpenter's original we see the granddaughter of Laurie Strode discussing the subject of Fate in her English class, and the voice of her teacher is none other than that of P.J. Soles, aka Lynda from the first movie and a total Horror Icon. Totally! And so we feel like giving some love to P.J. today, whose seal of vocal approval must count for at least 50 million dollars of its insane opening weekend box office. Totally. Just two years before Halloween Soles memorably co-starred in Brian De Palma's Carrie as Norma, another example of "girls making really bad choices in their best friends, and so let's face them down...

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PREVIOUSLY Clearly we're on a Halloween kick, having gone the Jamie Lee Curtis route last week - only this time it was Linsday Lohan who got shivved with a knitting needle in the neck, JLC taking just under 90 PERCENT of your vote on our Freaky Friday poll. Ouch, way to kick a redhead when she's down, y'all! Said Mareko:

"Lohan is indeed great in this movie—it still pains me to think of what could’ve been had she stayed focused on her talent vs. celebrity—but Curtis is the real MVP, no question. Love that the NYT stanned for her so hard in 2003, as you do, and she should’ve *easily* scored an Oscar nom over the likes of Naomi Watts and even Samantha Morton."

Beauty vs Beast: Ye Olde Switcheroo Movie

Jason from MNPP here with this week's "Beauty vs Beast" -- this Friday the latest iteration of the freak-filled Halloween franchise hits theaters, but what of another Freaky Friday that cast the great Jamie Lee Curtis in a pivotal role? In 2003 - yes it turned 15 this past August, if you want to feel ancient) Mark Waters' remake of Freaky Friday with Curtis playing mama (then daughter) to daughter (then mama) Lindsay Lohan hit theaters, and it was a great big hit success with everybody. (I mean Jamie Lee should've snagged an Oscar nom, dammit.) So why don't we all eat a fortune cookie and repeat after me...

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PREVIOUSLY We ventured back to Wes Anderson's Rushmore last week and y'all took Bill Murray's side in a squeaker (just 53%) - said lylee:

"Team Blume only because Max is so annoying (even though they're both annoying, and Blume in some ways has less excuse to be so immature)! Really, the beauty here is Olivia Williams, whom I found very appealing in this, if a little softer-edged than in her later roles. She's still one of my favorite slightly-below-the-radar actresses out there today."

Beauty vs Beast: School's Out Forever

Jason from MNPP here with our weekly "Beauty vs Beast" -- tomorrow is the 20th anniversary of Wes Anderson's film Rushmore, and so you celebrate the battle between Max Fischer (Jason Schwartzman) and Herman Blume (Bill Murray) we shall. This was Anderson's second film (after Bottle Rocket) and an instant cult hit - it only made 17 million dollars in theaters (it ranked 97th at the box office, between The Big Lebowski and 54) but I was in college at the time and believe you me, us youngins loved it right out of the gate.

Now it's rightly heralded as a classic - you're not going to hear an unkind word from me on the hermetically crafted direction that Wes started taking his film-making after this (Moonrise Kingdom is my favorite of all his films, after all) but Rushmore does feel airy in a way that he's moved far far away from (especially with the to the millimeter specificity of his animated efforts) and it might be nice to see him sample some of this looseness again?

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PREVIOUSLY I'm real glad that Judith O'Dea got to beat back the zombie horde this one time with last week's Night of the Living Dead anniversary edition - poor Barbra has had enough to deal with. Said Nick T:

"Without getting into details, I'd say this answer was a NO BRAINER!!! Hyuk hyuk hyuk"

Beauty vs Beast: She's Got the Brainnnsssssss

Jason from MNPP here for another round of "Beauty vs Beast" and on a very special day at that - not only is today the first day of October, marking my favorite season of the year (the spookey season) but today is also the 50th anniversary of George A Romero's masterpiece Night of the Living Dead! There were "zombies" of a sort before NotLD came out - mostly folks put under "voodoo curses" or the like - but Romero refined the monster to its modern form and created billions upon billions of dollars for entertainment executives in the process. But nothing's gonna top the stark simplicity of that original 1968 nightmare.

Facing down the horde I was torn between choosing our hero Ben (the magnificent Duane Jones) or his leading (comatose) lady Barbra (Judith O'Dea) - I went with the latter because Barbra gets a bad rap if you ask me. Ben is the hero we'd like to be - Barbra is the we we're probably gonna be. People don't like to want to think we'd go into total shock in an apocalyptic situation but you know what? Watch your sibling get eaten by a strange man in a cemetery and get back to me.

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PREVIOUSLY And speaking of siblings (and now I'm picturing a zombie rampage at the March house) last week's Little Women off brought the expected results, because Amy's awful, that little book burning witch, we hate her. Jo with 80-plus percent, huzzah! Said chasm301:

"Evil finds a human form in Amy March. Only Kiki stans are voting for her. But wow I love everything about this movie. I watch it multiple times a year. Winona is perfection and the score is one of my faves."

Beauty vs Beast: Sugar & Spice & Everything March

Hello and happy Monday everyone, Jason from MNPP here with another edition of our "Beauty vs Beast" series - Louisa May Alcott's book Little Women just turned 150 this year and it's hotter than it's ever been. There was a BBC version with Maya Hawke and Emily Watson and Angela Lansbury that aired here in the US in the spring. Then this very weekend there's a modernized retelling hitting theaters. And then of course the one sucking all the air out of the room - Greta Gerwig's all-star edition set for next year, whose cast is so stacked we'd be here all day if I try listing off everybody - just look at the IMDb page.

Anyway a lot of us (even if we're excited to see all of those actors in one place and under her direction) aren't entirely sure why Greta's making this new version - not when there's Gillian Armstrong's perfectly lovely 1994 adaptation already, anyway. Winona Ryder as Jo, Christian Bale as Laurie, Susan Sarandon as Marmee, Kirsten Dunst as Amy, Claire Danes as Beth (cough cough)... these are the people I picture when I picture Little Women. And then one second later I immediately remember Amy burning Jo's manuscript and I see red...

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PREVIOUSLY I'm not sure if it was mostly Riz Ahmed Lust or if it was just that Jake's character is so (deliciously) despicable, but y'all surprised me and went and gave Riz/Rick your prize on last week's Nightcrawler contest with nearly 60% of the vote. Lou's a loser!

Anyway maybe it's just simply what Nick T said:

"Rick's just a nice cute guy who doesn't even know he's in over his head and Jake's a mean ol' lizard. Easy call."