Links: Misunderstood Meryl, Angry Leo, Cheap Deadpool

• MNPP All is well since Jason has seen The Witch and loves it. It's so spooky, guys. Go see it this weekend
• Pajiba "11 Things I Learned from 'Star Wars and the Power of Costume' Exhibit"
• Playbill Bull Durham: The Musical (?) may be headed to Broadway soon
• Scriptnotes how to introduce characters in screenplays without being mocked on Twitter. (For those of you are like what? This is in reference to a recent writing controversy that we spoke of right here)
• i09 says Zootopia is the best film Disney Animation has made in 20 years (!) 

• MNPP freaks out over the new Pee Wee Herman Netflix trailer
• Simply Streep Screencaps of Meryl Streep in the Florence Foster Jenkins teaser
• Boy Culture have you heard about Strike a Pose, the documentary about the Madonna documentary Truth or Dare?
• Boy Culture your semi-annual reminder that Miriam Margolyes is an international treasure and gay hero 
• Awards Daily "everyone owes Meryl Streep an apology"
• /Film Julianne Moore offered the villain role in The Kingsmen 2. This historically hasn't gone well for her (See: The Seventh Son or Hunger Games) Why Julianne? You already have tons of money.
• Hairpin "how not to write something" 
• Toyland the coolest stuff from Toy Fair 2016 including *gasp* female action figures

Deadpool at #1
• i09 everything they cut out of Deadpool to get the budget way down (which now means its going to be insanely profitable)
• /Film Rumors are that Wolverine 3 is considering an "R" rating following Deadpool's success 

And James Gunn, who did the superheroes being mocking and sarcastic before Deadpool, took to Twitter to hype his forthcoming blockbuster...

Official Photography on Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 has begun. You're very welcome. pic.twitter.com/741upZ21g7

— James Gunn (@JamesGunn) February 17, 2016

Oscar Mania
• The Guardian on why The Big Short should win Best Picture. I haven't to admit I couldn't follow this argument at all (perhaps you can?) but maybe I was just thrown because they start the video talking about surprise winners and cite Forrest Gump. Forrest Gump? Of all movies. That was a behemoth that year and couldn't lose. People say such strange things when they're talking about the Oscars!
• THR Robert Richardson and other cinematographers calling for a separate category for VFX heavy films. I absolutely agree that this is a problem - this year not so much but usually
• RED CARPET RAMPAGE. Help Leonardo DiCaprio finally win his Oscar! I tried to play this on my phone last night. It's actually hilarious. Especially the bonus round "Act Harder!" LOL...

Thoughts I Had... while staring at this photo from the set of "xXx: The Return of Xander Cage"

Thoughts I had in the order they came to me after the jump...

Click to read more ...

Links: Dolls, Dancers, Disney, and Agent Scully

Some links as we hole watching movies and writing future articles during the blizzard...

• John August on torrenting the Oscars
• MNPP remembers 5 great experiences at New York City's historic Ziegfeld Theater (about to close). Oh the memories
• Boy Culture a documentary about the dancers from Madonna's classic Truth or Dare film / Blonde Ambition tour to premiere at Berlinale
• Deadline new projects for JC Chandor (A Most Violent Year) including a remake of that extremely tense Austrian film The Robber - good luck topping the adrenaline of the original

• Awards Daily Lady Gaga will perform "Til It Happens to You" at the Producers Guild gala
• Pajiba Charlie Cox has not yet been invited to Marvel's Infinity Wars. He is waiting impatiently
• Fandor breaks down the Best Actor race
• Salon talks up Tori Amos's "Boys for Pele" (my favorite of her records) on its 20th anniversary
• Interview Magazine talks to the "unusually busy" Gillian Anderson about her recent roles
• Vanity Fair on Gillian Anderson fighting for wage equality on X-Files reunion
• Deadline a list of hot actors everyone wants for pilot season. Whenever I read about pilot season I realize how little I understand about the strange flickering alien world of television. Where people can even have whole careers without anyone seeing their work (with the amount of pilots that don't make it to series) How can the same actors be wanted for every drama? No actor is right for every role.

Disney & Girls
• Bloomberg Business how Hasbro snatched Disney's all powerful Princess line of dolls away from Mattel. They also got facial adjustments. Terrifyingly Hasbro promises to make the Disney Princesses even more ubiquitous than they already are. This article even has the story reenacted by dolls (with Avengers cameos naturally) in a video
• Sweatpants and Coffee Ooh i knew Disney was throwing up smokescreensto distract us. Turns out toymakers were 'specifically directed' to exclude Rey from toylines due to her gender! It wasn't from "secrecy" as they tried to peddle earlier. #WheresRey
• Comics Alliance ...but Black Widow will be part of the toyline from Captain America: Civil War (with a new costume)
• i09 has an interesting piece on the story work behind Zootopia and how the secondary female character, a bunny named Judy Hopps, took over the leading role from the male fox who was originally its protagonist.

Curio: Bowie Forever

Pt 1 Goodbye to Bowie via Velvet Goldmine
Pt 2 Goodbye to Bowie....and Curio, for now

Alexa here, still reeling over the loss of David Bowie. It really took the steam out of me today, as I'm sure it did a lot of you.  He was such a touchstone that it felt as if he would never die. But he lives on as inspiration.

And so too might Curio. I hope it does. If not in this exact form. This weekly arts & crafts series, which Nathaniel invited me to do years ago, has had a long run at TFE but I must move on for 2016. (Parenthood really alters the life of a cinephile.)

But back to Bowie. I've been enjoying seeing some of this inspiration filtered through the minds of others, so here are a few some beautiful and fun curios -- everything from a career spanning animated gif, to realistic dolls, and more traditional fan art.

Celebrate the icon with wide eyes after the jump... 

 

Click to read more ...

The Greatest Pick Up Line in Movie History

Mic drop. No really. 

Imagine you're Therese. It's 1952, you look like Rooney Mara, you're wearing a Santa hat, you're hawking a pile of terrifying looking but also freakishly gender-normative dolls, there's a sign behind you that says "Mommy's Baby," and you've got the span of one sale to signal your romantic viability to customer and apparent goddess Carol.

What's your move? Coquettishly mention that her daughter's chosen doll, Bright Betsy, has a capacity for secretion? No? And that's why Cate Blanchett's not your girlfriend.