Months of Meryl: Death Becomes Her (1992)

John and Matthew are watching every single live-action film starring Meryl Streep. 

 

 #19 —Madeline Ashton, a past-her-prime Hollywood actress who goes to great lengths to preserve her good looks.

MATTHEW: Meryl Streep and her good friend Goldie Hawn once came very close to riding off a cliff together. During the early 1990s, the pair had been in search of a dual-star vehicle to appear in and were initially in contention to play the titular roles in Thelma & Louise, along with one-time possibilities Jodie Foster, Frances McDormand, and Michelle Pfeiffer. Hawn and Streep actively courted Pathé Entertainment’s former C.E.O. Alan Ladd, Jr. for the parts and even tossed around ideas for a happier alternate ending. (Streep, who would have played Louise, wanted Thelma to live.) Eventually, Streep’s schedule got in the way, while Ladd deemed Hawn an iffy fit for the project, clearing the way for Geena Davis and Susan Sarandon to take on the most popular parts of their careers...

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Beauty Break: Love in the Tub

Happy Belated Valentines to you and whomever or whatever you love.

Today's Beauty Break is inspired by The Shape of Water which begins with Eliza (Oscar nominated Sally Hawkins) masturbating in the tub and that's also where her fish-man ends up as you can see in this image above.

After the jump please enjoy beautiful photos or film stills of various movie stars in bathtubs...

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Celebrating "The Fifth Element"

by Seán McGovern

Occasionally I receive a text message from my mother that The Fifth Element is on television. Why she feels the need to tell me, I'm never quite sure. Possibly because my adoration for the film is palpable, or because she like many critics at the time believes that it "may or may not be the worst movie ever made." But The Fifth Element does not need to be defended. It can only be celebreated. As Valerian launches from the imagination of Luc Besson into cinemas everywhere, now is the perfect time to celebrate France's greatest foray into a very American genre: the intergalactic sci-fi action movie.

There's a blonde Bruce Willis, Leeloo Dallas Multipass and of course - Ruby Rhod - all after the jump...

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Visual Index: Death Becomes Her's Best Shot(s)

This is as good a time as any to tell you that May is "Girls Gone Wild" month at The Film Experience. You know we love a good theme week/month at the site! And with Thelma & Louise and Madonna's Truth or Dare both celebrating 25th anniversaries this very month, it was the only conceivable plus awesome theme to build the blogging around. So we'll be celebrating reckless divas, fierce warriors, psychotic beauties, and blonde venuses all month long. Well that and Cannes hoopla of course.

And we'll start Girls Gone Wild right now with actress Madeline Ashton (Meryl Streep) and her frenemy author Helen Sharp (Goldie Hawn) who drink a seductive potion to appease their vanity with spectacular Oscar-winning results. My choice for Best Shot will be up tomorrow as I'm running behind -- when I love a movie too much it takes me so much longer! -- so I'll keep updating this gallery if you're also running late. 

DEATH BECOMES HER
Director: Robert Zemeckis; Cinematographer: Dean Cundey
Click on any of the 14 shots to read its accompanying article

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Women's Pictures - Amy Heckerling's Look Who's Talking

For some as of yet unexplained reason, 1980s American movies experienced a baby boom. Movies about family are always popular, but from about 1983 to 1995, the box office went gaga for babies. Mr. Mom, 3 Men and a Baby, Raising Arizona, and even Junior showed that for a brief period of time, there was nothing funnier or more heartwarming in Hollywood than people who didn't want kids suddenly becoming parents. Amy Heckerling jumped onto this baby buggy bandwagon with her freshman screenwriting effort, Look Who's Talking.

Talking babies are now almost passe as a conceit, thanks to Real Baby Geniuses, Rugrats, and those creepy e*trade Superbowl ads. But in 1989, the idea was new enough for Roger Ebert to point it out in his 3 star review of the film. Still, minus the talking baby (voiced by Bruce Willis and only audible to the audience), the rest of Look Who's Talking is formulaic in the classic romcom way - there's a Meet Cute, then Opposites Attract, an Unlikely Romance starts, which ends in a Romantic Reveal and the requisite Happy Ending, all of which is predictable from the minute Kirstie Alley's water breaks in the back of John Travolta's taxi.

None of this is necessarily a bad thing. Amy Heckerling's talents as a director are of the kind that we don't usually reward with golden statues or the word "auteur." [More after the jump]

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