Sunday, April 10, 2016 at 12:03PM Let's hear it for siblings, fictional and otherwise! Today is National Siblings Day so I dedicate this to my sister and brothers even though they're not movie people and won't read this. But let's look at beautiful photos of three of our favorite sets of screen siblings. Starting with the most successful of all...
Shirley MacLaine and Warren Beatty and more after the jump...
Monday, March 14, 2016 at 9:30PM 
I don't have a point other than: look at him!
Gyllenhaalic, SXSW Thursday, February 4, 2016 at 4:23PM A rather simple deconstruction concept for this poster but it works. You can't really go wrong with that face.
You may recall I was wild about Jake Gyllenhaal's performance when this played at TIFF in September, if less wild about the film surrounding it. It's now scheduled to open on April 8th.
The real question is how many more great star turns does this man have to give before The Academy gives it up for him? He hasn't even been able to snag a second nomination despite running circles around other Best Actor nominated performances.
Here's the new trailer which is a fairly accurate representation of the movie without being excessively spoilery. His wife dies at the very beginning of the movie which is the catalyst for the plot as you can see...
Are you a Yes No or Maybe So? I suspect it depends on how much of a Gyllenhaalic you are.
Friday, October 2, 2015 at 8:30PM someone wants an Oscar... someone wants an Oscar...
We say this in a sing-song teasing way but super-affectionately! For who beyond Jake Gyllenhaal among Hollywood's current leading men has earned more Oscar love than he's received? It's still virtually unthinkable that he missed the shortlist last year for Nightcrawler in which he burrowed into a character that proved far more indelible and challenging and even showy (and AMPAS loves that) than many of the actual nominees. And his work was better than almost all of theirs, too. (At least we gave him a prize right here)
Jake is in theaters right now climbing mountains in Everest but his headlining gig in the summer's modest boxing drama success Southpaw will get another go at theaters (and thus industry attention) this weekend courtesy of The Weinstein Company who just don't mess around when it comes to campaigning for gold. (Although, frankly, if they were going to do this at all, shouldn't they have y'know, announced it with more preliminary fanfare? And maybe not done it during Matt Damon's possibly record-busting weekend?)
Breaking into this year's Best Actor field might still prove difficult since his work in Southpaw isn't as memorable as his work in Nightcrawler and isn't as uniquely inspired as his work in next year's Demolition (he's so terrific in that one - pity about the delay.) On the other hand this year's competition could well thin out if The Revenant is not all that or if AMPAS voters view all the Spotlight guys as supporting, or if Johnny Depp can't reheat that super brief bonfire of Black Mass goodwill or if Matt Damon keeps sticking his foot in his mouth or if...
If if if if if if. You know how this works. Do you think he has a (long) shot?
Wednesday, September 16, 2015 at 10:00PM This review originally appeared in abridged version in Nathaniel's column at Towleroad
All throughout Demolition, which opened the 40th annual Toronto International Film Festival which closes this coming Sunday, new widower Davis Mitchell (Jake Gyllenhaal) is putting the title into action. His wife has just died, he is convinced he feels nothing about it, and he begins to tear things down and scatter their parts about. The general idea is ‘take something apart to see how it all fits together’ but he doesn’t bother with the fitting back together part.
He’s also demolitioning his own life, of course, in the process. This peculiar destructive streak starts out small with his morning routine. At first, in montage, this includes lots of preening and shaving (including his chest. *sniffle*) to turn him into a smooth starched and well dressed executive but it’s quickly abandoned. Cue: sexy scruff and increasingly erratic behavior. (Unfortunately we are not shown the return of the chest hair. Stingy move, movie!)
Everything has become a metaphor…”
…Davis intones in the middle of the picture to his confused and impatient boss and father-in-law (Chris Cooper), as an attempt to explain his new and frankly worrisome headspace. But he’s right. Everything is a metaphor in Demolition and thus, apart from Gyllenhaal’s work, the movie sparked polarized reactions. More...
