The Film Experience™ was created by Nathaniel R. All material herein is written by our team. (This site is not for profit but for an expression of love for cinema & adjacent artforms.)
It’s my fourth year covering the nominees for the Live Action Short Oscar, and this group of nominees is far and away the most grim, depressing, and unrelenting batch yet. Four out of five of these films are about horrible things happening to young boys. You’d think the nominating committee would have cleaved to some other topics. After a while, provided you view them back-to-back, the horror of it all becomes nearly comical. If you have a boy child under twelve years of age, you will definitely want to skip this category this year to avoid going to a very dark place. But all five directors are talented artists who know how to build suspense and tell a story with fluidity and grace. Ready?
Madre (Mother) This short won the Goya (Spanish Oscar) last year and the director and actress have since reteamed for a feature version, currently in post-production. Director Rodrigo Sorogoyen swings swiftly from an everyday conversation between a woman named Marta (Marta Nieto) and her mother to an urgent phone call from Marta’s son...
Time to start updating the Foreign Film Oscar submission charts on the regular! With the Venice/Telluride/TIFF wave about to hit we'll be getting regular news on which international films will be aiming for Oscar this season. Recently Spain announced their three finalists. They are...
The 31st annual Goya Awards (Spain's Oscars) were held over the weekend in Madrid and we'd be remiss if we didn't share the winners -- particularly considering we recently posted statistics about their all time favorite actresses. This year's big winners were Raúl Arévalo's revenge drama The Fury of a Patient Man (which took Best Film and 3 other prizes) and A Monster Calls (which took Best Director and swept the technical categories with 9 wins).
Ana Alvarez, Penélope Cruz, and Belen Lopez
Spain's Oscar submission, Almodóvar's Julieta, won only Best Actress for Emma Suarez who plays the older version of the titular character. Incredibly Suarez also won Best Supporting Actress for another film (The Next Skin) so Spain really worships her this year. (After the jump a complete list of winners as well as other gowns and tuxes...)
Almodóvar aficionados, like you and I, have been dreading this day. But every great movie face eventually only still flickers on screens and in our memories. The great Chus Lampreave, so memorable in so many Pedro Almodóvar movies, has died at 85 years of age.She had been home bound recently in Almería.
Her film career began when Pedro was just a pre-teen. She was given her first acting job by the director Jaime de Armiñán. Like many directors after him, he worked with her repeatedly, including in the Oscar nominated film My Dearest Senorita (1972). She came to international fame via her relationship with Pedro Almodóvar though. She joined his troupe early on as one of his subversive nuns in Dark Habits (1983). She was always easy to spot with those coke bottle glasses, that tiny frame and inimitable voice. Dark Habits was the first of eight collaborations with Pedro over the next 26 years in which her comic timing and deliciously matter-of-fact next door neighbor / elderly relative charisma were always put to great use. After Dark Habits she appeared in Labyrinth of Passion, Matador, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, The Flower of My Secret, Talk to Her, Volver and Broken Embraces.
RANDOMNESS • Pajiba Meryl Streep getting herself into trouble with an African comment when asked about diversity • LongReads Pregnancy in movies with Mad Max Fury Road as starting point • Inverse The Rock gleefully warning fans he'll get naked on HBO's Ballers • Funny or Die! Johnny Depp as Donald Trump. Didn't know they did 50 minute skits! • Cinematic Corner we need to talk about Harrison Ford in Witness • Library of America Carrie Rickey on The Age of Innocence • Unseen Films would like you to consider Toni Collette in Glassland • Coming Soon Gal Gadot's career before Wonder Woman • Regal Cinemas cute teaser poster for Finding Dory
CASTING & PRODUCTION • Variety Amy Schumer trying her hand at drama. She's joined the cast of the PTSD movie Thank You For Your Service which stars Miles Teller • THR Chris Weitz will write the screenplay adaptation of upcoming nonfiction book 21 Years to Midnight which centers on Obergefell v. Hodges, which eventually led to the legalization of same-sex marriage • AV ClubThe Bachelors will star JK Simmons as a widower. He and his son (uncast) meet two extraordinary women and their lives are transformed. Julie Delpy will play one of the women. We just hope this isn't yet another movie where women only exist to help the man through their character arc. • Tracking Board Goldie Hawn might finally act again... in a new Amy Schumer comedy • The Film Stage has a lot of info on Claire Denis new project High Life so it's spoilery but the film will star Robert Pattison, Patricia Arquette, and Mia Goth from Nymphomaniac
AWARDAGE • VarietyMustang tops the Lumiere Awards in France (precursor to the Césars) • THR I apologize that TFE forgot to cover the Goya awards. So much happens every week with awardage this time of year. The big winner was Truman starring Ricardo Darin (Secret in Their Eyes) and Javier Camera (Talk to Her). Best Actress had some international superstar nominees in Penelope Cruz and Juliette Binoche but they lost to Natalia de Molina (Techo y Comida) • AARP "Movies for Grown-Ups Awards" red carpet. Spotlight took Best Picture. Ridley Scott best director. Acting winners: Lily Tomlin (Grandma), Bryan Cranston (Trumbo), Diane Ladd (Joy) and Mark Rylance (Bridge of Spies). And you should know that Diane took the opportunity to speak out against Category Fraud. God bless her! And FYI, Ladd is NOT the Academy member actress I spoke to earlier this year who was angry and vowed to not for anyone pitched in the category. So people are finally if slowly starting to see this for what it is. Now, if only critics and journalists, who have such opinion-making power would stop promoting it in their own awards and write-ups!
Here is Queen Ladd on the topic.
I've already seen snippy things on line about "she wouldn't have been nominated regardless," but, FACT: We do not know this. Listen up: if we didn't have Category Fraudsters each year people would be discussing the options among real supporting actresses (because people always discuss possibilities when it comes to the Oscars) and who knows who might have gained traction without Vikander and Mara sucking up all the conversation?
BRIE LARSON WORLD • In Contention Brie and Saoirse Ronan honored in Santa Barbara • Elle Magazine more Brie. Lots more. • Pajiba ...Elle Magazine has gone a little crazy with the photoshop, though.
THEATER & TV • Playbill Aaron Sorkin writing a new adaptation of To Kill a Mockingbird for Broadway • Gothamist Sikh actor Waris Ahluwalia, from Wes Anderson's movies, was banned from a flight since he wouldn't remove his turban! • MNPP Great news for Bryan Fuller fans. The Hannibal and Pushing Daisies man will be running the new Star Trek series premiering a year from now. • Slate reviews Samantha Bees political comedy show Full Frontal. (I was really hoping she's get Jon Stewart's seat when he left The Daily Show.) • Playbill YES! Sutton Foster will be part of the Gilmore Girls reunion. Can they just have her play her character from Bunheads since they take place in the same Sherman-Palladino world? • Theater Mania Stephen King's 5 reasons you should see Misery on stage.
Monday, February 18, 2019 at 5:54PM 
