Showbiz History: Jane & Tom, Elizabeth Taylor shouting "Gladiator!"

6 random things that happened on this day, January 21st, in showbiz history

1973 Jane Fonda marries activist Tom Hayden (they were already pregnant with son Troy Garity, who followed his mom into the acting profession). Hayden is played by Eddie Redmayne in the Best Picture hopeful Trial of the Chicago 7 which takes place from 1968 through 1970. The couple divorced in 1990.  

1978 The soundtrack to Saturday Night Fever hits #1 on the Billboard 200 Album chart (where it will stay for an incredible six months). One week later the film will lose all of its categories at the Golden Globes even Best Song "How Deep Is Your Love" which loses to "You Light Up My Life"...

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5 days til Oscar! The Sound of Music, Cuckoo's Nest and More...

The Sound of Music won exactly 5 Oscars, lost exactly 5 Oscars, and won in a year ending in the number 5Today's magic number is 5 and it's too overwhelming a number in Oscar lore for a list of trivia items since it's the 'traditional' size of Oscar shortlists in every Oscar category with the exception of Best Makeup and Hairstyling. We've harped on that one before but we consider it brazenly insulting that Oscar views those craftsmen as the bastard stepchildren of the industry since they've never been allowed more than 3 nominees despite literally every live action film using their services. Several categories have experimented with varying sizes of their nominated lists over the years (Best Picture under the current rules, being obviously the most prominent and inconsistent *sigh* but the number five can safely be called one of Oscar's favourite things...

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In Praise of Brendan Gleeson

For our impromptu and informal Actors Month, members of Team Experience were free to choose any actor they wanted to discuss. Here's Chris Feil... on one of our most reliable character actors. 

Though Brendan Gleeson's grounded and somewhat imposing presence have made him a staple of large budget period and genre pieces they've too often kept him on the sidelines as well. Perhaps his minor breakthrough in Braveheart (1995) is what created this typecasting bias of Gleeson as the hearty rascal. But note: it's not his aggressive frame that make him such a valuable piece of each film, it's his ability to bring human reality to films that are focusing on the very big canvas. Martin Scorsese, Anthony Minghella, Steven Spielberg, Ron Howard, Danny Boyle, just begin to scratch the surface of the director who have noticed though awards bodies have yet to truly awaken to his subtle and diverse gifts...

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Burning Questions: What Is Your Stand Alone Film?

 Michael C. here to do his part to shake up the conventional wisdom.

It’s a big step for any budding cinephile when one learns to value one’s own opinion over the established consensus. If you were like me, when you were an adolescent film lover, you tended to take certain movie’s masterpiece status as gospel. If, for example, TV Guide said that Cecil B DeMille’s The Ten Commandments was a four star movie than that's the way it was. After all, you could see how great it was just by counting the extras.

Hopefully one grows out of this and learns to approach pre-certified classics with healthy skepticism. As a college student working his way through the greats of cinema, I clearly remember concluding that Dr. Zhivago’s 200 minute running time was roughly 195 minutes longer than necessary, give or take a few beautifully framed shots of snow.

But it is not much of a challenge to poke sticks at the bloated reputations of certain “classics”. More daunting is defending work that has the majority of scholarly opinion aligned against it. Just as we learn to be wary of movies that come bearing the stamp of approval, at some point we all end up falling madly in love with a title that is greeted by the rest of the world with at best polite acknowledgment, or at worst outright hostility. So on this subject I am curious to know: What movie do you stand alone in considering a masterpiece?

Any true film lover has at least one minority opinion...

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John Carter Vs... ?

In tribute to my friend JA who always gives good lulz with "which is hotter"... a few loincloth-offs (hmmm) between John Carter (reviewed) and his screen ancestors. You decide.

Criss-cross sci-fantasy menswear

poll by twiigs.com

 
excuse my typo there. Sean Connery. I'd fix it but then the poll would reset to zero. We can't have that and you know what I meant.

Emergency gun-manning in the desert whilst wearing only reddish loinclothes and boots!

poll by twiigs.com

Face paint and/or face blood* is a must have when calling your troops to war!

poll by twiigs.com

 *They bleed blue on Barsoom, bitches.