Venice Diary #07 - "The Last Duel" and the last movies of the fest

by Elisa Giudici

Michael Myers is back in "Halloween Kills"

Final day!  I hope you are ready because in this entry I am going to cover all the movies I saw in the last two days of the Venice Film Festival. Eight movies, from European arthouse cinema to Hollywood blockbusters, with some solid performances, an instant cult, and the only major disappointment of this incredible edition of the Mostra.

I'll try to keep it short because of the lack of sleep. An inside joke between my roommate and me this year was that the Filipino movie with its 208 minutes of length lasted longer than our typical night of sleep in the last two weeks...

Click to read more ...

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...

free polls

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."

Review: "Halloween"

by Chris Feil

After being reinterpreted by Rob Zombie in two grittier takes, Michael Myers returns to Haddonfield and to his storytelling roots in David Gordon Green’s Halloween. And even more importantly, so is his first survivor Laurie Strode and the indomitable woman that plays her: Jamie Lee Curtis.

This take unfurls the fortieth anniversary of the original John Carpenter film (dispensing with the narrative of all other installments) as the septuagenarian Michael escapes his asylum confines to return home and kill again. But this time Laurie is ready, perhaps too ready. She’s been waiting actually, devoting her life to preparing for his inevitable return by outfitting her home with intricate safety mechanisms and a cache of guns. The fallout has been isolating herself in a constant thrum of anxiety and becoming estranged from her daughter, played by Judy Greer. Michael’s return puts him and Laurie on their fated trajectory, this time with Laurie’s granddaughter (and the fate of her family’s survival) in the middle.

Click to read more ...

Little Crazy Boy in Mask, Why Are You Crying?

Chris here. Remake/reboot culture isn't going to be slowing down anytime soon, and you should be girding our loins for some bizarre iterations if you aren't already. Take this fall's revamp of Halloween which has been taken over by... David Gordon Green? The director is primarily known for intimate dramas and character studies, like last fall's Stronger. While Jamie Lee Curtis's return to the franchise has stoked a high level of anticipation, Green's place in the franchise remains a giant question mark. And from the looks of the first teaser poster, the director has brought his signature ennui and it looks just as weird as that sounds - like a "sorry for your loss" greeting card with a serial killer on it. In the comments, tell us what is making Michael Myers so downtrodden!

Beauty vs Beast: To Boston With Love

Jason from MNPP here with this week's "Beauty vs Beast" - the director David Gordon Green is turning 43 today, so while we wait to see what he does with his Halloween sequel-o-sorts later this year let's cast an eye  a millimeter backwards towards his last movie, the very fine but somewhat overlooked Stronger. I personally was pretty sad the movie never gained any footing during the awards season for its stars Jake Gyllenhaal and Tatiana Maslany or for Miranda Richardson in Supporting - they were all worthy in my book (and Jake made the Bronze in Nathaniel's Film Bitch Awards). But time will be kind to all of them, I think. The film isn't easy on any of its characters - it refuses to sanctify the terror victim or the "supporting girlfriend" at its heart at every turn. These are complicated people in an extremely complicated situation.

panel management

PREVIOUSLY Toss a bone up and see where it lands - last week we wished Stanely Kubrick's 2001 a happy 50 and y'all surprised me with your love for humanity of all things (this is Kubrick, people!), giving Keir Dullea's space-babe a 4% victory over the dead red eye of HAL-9000. Said MARIAH, perhaps summing many of our votes up (Keir was a piece, it's true):

"I am voting for Dave because I am a homosexual male."