Sight & Sound's Top 20

So many lists and awards announcements this week you'd think it was... oh, yes, it is December. Sight and Sound enter the fray now with their top 20 which is a mix of expected auteur worship titles, festival films that may or may not ever actually open. It's also very now. The oldest title here is the great German continuous shot film Victoria (which premiered at festivals last year -- we nominated it for cinematography in 2015) but almost everything else just opened or hasn't opened yet! It's to be expected but also deeply frustrating that distributors never really catch up to film buzz...

Click to read more ...

New York ♥︎s Moonlight & La La Land

The New York Film Critics Circle was founded way back in 1935 when the Oscars were just 8 years old themselves. In their first year they agreed but disagreed with the NYFCC choosing The Informer and Oscar following suit with a Best Picture nomination for that but the eventual prize to Mutiny on the Bounty. Not much has really changed since. The NYFCC aesthetics aren't anti-Oscar but they're just as likely to go slightly left of field with a more challenging option as their #1 as they are to pre-stamp a future winner. 

Here's what they chose this year...

Click to read more ...

Linkin' on Heaven's Door

Los Angeles Times Lily Tomlin's classic one woman show The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe is being relaunched in LA as a 12 person play (!)
/Film Rogue One releases its final trailer. I'm personally not watching(I like to save something for the movie theater) but it's here if you want it
Variety JK Rowling will never leave us alone. Five films are planned in the Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them franchise.
Tracking Board here's interesting news. Mark Rylance will team with Embrace of the Serpent director Ciro Guerra for a movie based on a 1980 Nobel prize winning book called Waiting for the Barbarians
Deadline Netflix in the lead to get The Helicopter Heist starring Jake Gyllenhaal

The New Yorker on Bob Dylan's Nobel Prize in literature
Interview talks to rising star Ben Schetzer (Pride, Goat, Warcraft)
The New Republic Miriam Bale on both of the new films about Christine Chubbuck, Christine (starring Rebecca Hall) and the experimental documentary Kate Plays Christine.
EW It's come to this. We know have "power lists" in magazines not of actors or producers but of superheroes. Wonder Woman is currently #1 
In Contention supporting/lead options open w/ Viola in Fences & The Bening in 20th Century
Awards Daily Annette Bening will be honored at AFI 
Towleroad Kristen Stewart talking up her current relationship with Alicia Cargile
Boy Culture Miley Cyrus on her pansexuality
Playbill There will be a live audience for Hairspray Live on NBC- website coming soon with how to apply! 

Just 4 Fun
Jezebel "I wore a tail for 1 week and learned nothing" 
AV Club Documentary Now has done a full Talking Heads parody album! 

Has the Whole World Gone Insane?
Film Comment are film critics losing sight of film in the rush for content / social media?
IndieWire interviews the man behind the satire twitter account "Arthouse Donald Trump" which was hilarious and prismatically accurate of loudmouth cinephiles and Trump
Daily Beast Billy Bush is now attempting to drag NBC down with him into the mud after his "Pussygate" suspension - classy!
Gothamist a Talking Trump Zoltar machine appears in Brooklyn spewing prophesies
THR the whole Devin Faraci (Birth. Movies. Death editor) story that blew up this week when a former colleague accused him of touching her without her consent
Awards Daily ...airs a different perspective, mourning the loss of Faraci's voice against misogyny in the fanboy community, particularly during Gaming Gate. 

Exit Video
Harry Belafonte's company produces this PSA on police brutality. Actors Michael B Jordan and Danny Glover and other luminaries star

Against The Wall from Against The Wall on Vimeo.

Natalie Portman, Round Two?

by Nathaniel R

Anyone fearing a fiasco like Naomi's Diana or Nicole's Grace of Monaco can breathe a sigh of relief in regards to the latest prestige pic about an obsessed-over hugely influential royal icon household name. Pablo Larraín's Jackie, a portrait of the most famous First Lady in the wake of her husband's assassination, is getting great ink. Variety and The Hollywood Reporter are tossing out blurb-ready words like "remarkable," "meticulous," "profound," "incandescent" and many many more slobbery adjectives. (Though it should be noted that Larraín makes tough movies that never coddle audiences which might prevent this from being a breakout.)

Anyone fearing another round of Natalie Portman Mania at the Oscars might want to tense up, though. Her reviews are truly glowing. Will Natalie get to quote her Black Swan self about Oscar a second time?

He picked me, Mommy.

Podcast: Smackdown Reflections and Film Critics on Acting

Nathaniel talks to Sheila O'Malley, one of the best film critics on acting, as they reflect on recent Smackdown adventures, the chaos of acting careers, and the problems with "best" designations.

Index (43 minutes)
00:01 Acting training, Geraldine Page, and critics who "get" acting
06:45 Glenn Close and Robert Redford Reveries in The Natural
14:00 The quality of acting fields & self-selecting "Oscar movies"
20:45 Romancing the Stone and the "realm of fantasy" versus the "gritty" farm wife movies. Why do some movies hold up so well over time?
27:00 Peggy Ashcroft and Lindsay Crouse. Plus: making out with Ed Harris.
33:00 The rumors about Swing Shift and Jonathan Demme's original cut. Did we lose a masterpiece?
40:18 Sheila's connection to Gena Rowland's Honorary Oscar.

You can listen to the podcast here at the bottom of the post or download from iTunes. Continue the conversations in the comments, won't you?  

P.S. Read more about Sheila's Gena Rowlands tribute here.

a conversation with Sheila O'Malley