The Bipolar Silver Linings Playbook

Hey lovelies. Beau here with a recent trip to the David O. Russell multiverse, which has gotten tamer than I once remembered it.

I understood Pat Solitano, Jr. and Sr., their individual and collective struggles in life. Which isn’t to imply that both are readily and consistently sympathetic characters, far from it. But as I made a pitstop at the Landmark Cinemas in Los Angeles on Saturday, on my way home from a quick rendezvous with old friends, I made it a point to sneak in while I could to catch this film. All things considered, the talent involved was what intrigued me. Who better to direct a film about one individual’s struggle with his anger than David O. Russell, who experienced a nice bout of controversy years ago when videos of him and Lily Tomlin getting into it on the set of I ❤ Huckabees rose from the ashes? Who better to take on the role of a young man suffering an identity crisis and highs and lows than Cooper; he's been stuffed and compartmentalized into so many boxes in the industry that by this point the dude should be dead from paper cuts alone? 

It’s only too ironic then, that Silver Linings Playbook is a bipolar affair...

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Yes, No, Maybe So: "Silver Linings Playbook"

I apologize ahead of time for not including the trailer we are about to discuss in the post but I have a firm policy against ads ON ads. So when movie trailers come with ads SAY NO. I will not watch a commercial in order to see a commercial. Hollywood has tricked people into thinking that trailers are free cliff-note movies but no, they are just commercials. So, I won't. I won't! And all the embeds without ads were fuzzy so I can't. I can't.

Wait, I found one just as I was about to post this. Okay embedded. For you.

"Calm down crazy," quoth Jennifer Lawrence (and the Sassy Gay Friend before her)

But yes Silver Lining Playbook trailer is upon us and so we must break it down with the Yes, No, Maybe So™ system.

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Counsel Me This

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JA from MNPP here. Have you been following the rumor-mill over Ridley Scott's next movie? Until recently just the name "Ridley Scott" had become too encumbered by bad movies for me to get excited about what he was up to.  The last movie of his that I like without reservations is Thelma and Louise, 21 years old now. So I have worried that "the Ridley Scott of today" is on a fool's errand, returning to the world of the Alien franchise... does he have anything of that caliber in him now? But that trailer for Prometheus is so good, you guys. So good! I've seen it about a dozen times and it still sends chills down my spine. Granted it's only a trailer - the movie could still be a mess. But it's been enough to draw me back into Ridley-Scott-sville.

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Aiding in me caring about what Ridley's doing next is the fact that what he's doing next is the first movie script written by The Road and No Country For Old Men author Cormac McCarthy, and that the actor circling the lead has been Michael Fassbender. That's a double-pow of awesomeness that trumps any misgivings I might have regarding Ridley. The film's to be called The Counselor, and they're selling it as "No Country For Old Men on steroids." So basically this thing will ejaculate in your eye and then slap you across the face. It's that manly! From its brief synopsis it sounds like Breaking Bad or Weeds to me, only with a fancy-pants lawyer getting in over his head with the drug-business instead of a high school teacher or sassy widow. 

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Deadline reported last night that Fassbender has signed on for sure, and the actors they're looking at for the villain - and they can't help but foolishly conjure Javier Bardem's iconic turn as Anton Chigurh (don't set the bar so high right out of the gate, you guys) - are Jeremy Renner, Bradley Cooper and Brad Pitt. I'm Team Pitt all the way. He needs another good bad guy role right about now, and I'd love to see him go toe to toe with his Basterds co-star. What says you?

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The Adventures of Linklink

You may have heard that Ricky Gervais will be hosting the Golden Globes again. I don't have the stomach to give this its own post but let it suffice to say what I already said on twitter... Gervais smug superiority is so offputting. You have to back that shit up and was Gervais the funniest best awards show host ever? No. 

Link Time
Tom the Dancing Bug on Steven Spielberg's The Adventures of Tintin
The Advocate fun interview with Dylan McDermott on American Horror Story, nude scenes and sexuality and Steel Magnolias
Ad Age wowee but those Oscar ads are expensive. $1.6 million for 30 second of air time please. 
The Playlist the competing Linda Lovelace porn star biopics. It's Amanda Seyfried vs. Malin Akerman. You'd think that was an easy call but for the news that Sharon Stone will play Mama Lovelace in the Akerman version. Sharon Stone!
Empire Will Amy Adams sign on to co-star with Clint Eastwood in The Curve, a father/daughter drama? He plays an aging baseball scout. We're betting that he won't be portrayed as indelicately as the "they're fossils!" approach in Moneyball. (A film we love, don't misunderstand. It's just hard on the old scouts.)
BuzzFeed 63 Reasons why Bradley Cooper is not the "Sexiest Man Alive". No matter what People magazine says. 
Speaking of Bradley Cooper...

In Ye Olden Times when I used to watch Inside the Actors Studio I couldn't help but make immediate "you'll never make it!" assumptions about many of the audience members seeking professional advice. So it's totally crazy to see an actual future star asking one. 

Puppet Mania
Flickr Muppet illustrations covering the whole alphabet
YouTube Clever Inglourious Basterds/Fantastic Mr Fox mashup

Finally, Drew McWeeney at HitFix had his son Toshi interview Kermit and Miss Piggy on the eve of the release of The Muppets. So cute...

It's a great angle for an interview since The Muppets biggest marketing muscle might well be partents taking their kids who missed out on the Muppet phenomenon to "meet" them on the big screen.

4 Things We Didn't Get Around To Saying This Week...

Which we really meant to. It was a sorry week in time management. So... Let's cover them right quick now.

1. The cast of Moulin Rouge! will be reunited on May 3rd on MTV for the 10th anniversary. The movie's exact anniversary is kind of confusing, so I'm choosing to celebrate the 10th anniversary on June 1st which is the date it went wide. May 30th through June 3rd is MOULIN ROUGE WEEK!

2. Congratulations to Darren Aronofsky for his Venice Film Festival Jury gig. I've always said that artists aren't necessarily the best judges of art so you can't really tell if a brilliant person at any one particular thing will have any brilliance at recognizing the brilliance in others within that same thing (hi sentence. You are too long). Nevertheless, it's always interesting to see which film luminaries the prestige festivals choose and who their jury ends up being.

3. I would pay good money for a way to watch old sitcoms with the laugh tracks removed. Why is this not an option? I literally can't watch anything with a laugh track -- with one or two exceptions -- it just takes me right out of what I'm watching.

4. It was 18 years ago this week that the death of Brandon Lee on the set of The Crow was proclaimed "negligence" That was such a sad creepy movie story back in the early to mid nineties but me and my friend Kevan, who I went to every movie at the time were really obsessed with the movie.

I have a soft spot for the movie (it's set in my hometown on a holiday I always had to explain to people "Devil's Night" once I left Detroit) though it's not exactly a great movie. And I love Brandon Lee in it. So I've been sad to hear about the rethink these past couple of weeks (to star Bradley Cooper?). Although technically a revival of this franchise isn't at all sacrilegious because it's a resurrection myth and there's no reason why the Crow can't keep raising the dead, you know?