Lunchtime Poll: Multiple Acting Oscars

I was all prepared to list the most Oscar winning Actors for a quickie top ten list. Until I remembered there were only six with 3 or more Oscars (for acting)

Four Leading Oscars
01 Katharine Hepburn
Three Leading Oscars
02 Daniel Day-Lewis
Three Oscars (Lead/Supporting Mix)
[Three-Way Tie]
03 Ingrid Bergman
03 Meryl Streep
03 Jack Nicholson
Three Oscars (Supporting)
06 Walter Brennan

YOUR TASK: Make it a top ten by filling slots seven through ten. Name the four actors who most deserve to join them as three-timers or the ones who seem most likely?

Beauty vs Beast: Writers Retreat

JA from MNPP here with our third week's worth of Halloween-flavored "Beauty vs Beast" treats - today we're swerving away from Wes Craven's cadre of high school students in distress to hit up a whole different kind of Final Girl fight club: jump in the Snowcat, we're heading up to The Overlook Hotel to face off the ill-fated Torrances, Wendy (Shelley Duvall) and Jack (Jack Nicholson), with their snowed-in battle for little Danny's soul.

poll by twiigs.com

You've just got one week til the cold takes over, the elevator doors swing open, and the blood gets off on the second floor, so cast your votes and let us know which Torrance you feel for in the comments.

PREVIOUSLY You screamed, I screamed, we all screamed for Wes Craven and his 1996 slasher classic Scream - would Sidney whoop those bad boys Billy and Stu's butts once again? Naturally she did - four full movies couldn't keep our Super Bitch down, this was no contest. Said Tom:

"This is my 90's! Sidney all the way. She isn't the perfect innocent virginal girl most horror movies have as the heroine. She is probably just as disturbed as the villains she defeats. She fights the darkness inside and out. No wonder there was speculation that she would be the killer in Scream 4."

Curio: Suspect and Fugitive

Alexa here with your weekly arts and crafts.   Nathaniel's banana Bond boredom from last week reminded me of a project that Seattle-based artist Kris Garland/Rakka Deer did back in 2008.  Titled Suspect and Fugitive, the series involved making one item a day from suspect (questionable) and fugitive (non archival) materials. This involved Rakka combining pop culture portraiture with food (and sometimes other materials) in new and clever ways every day for one year.

Like this pancake Cate Blanchett...

Pancake Blanchett

Maybe Nathaniel should try this.  Favorite actresses and foodstuffs maybe?  In any case, here is some more inspiration courtesy of Rakka from Donnie Darko to Doris Day after the jump

Click to read more ...

Beauty Vs Beast: Going Batty

JA from MNPP here with this week's batty edition of "Beauty Vs. Beast" - Twenty-five years ago today Tim Burton's Batman opened, and I think it might have maybe had a little bit of an effect on The Movies? Let's see - how many superhero films are set to open in the next five years? I think it's something like [edited because you can't look directly at this number, it is Lovecraftian in its ability to break your brain and instantly render you mindlessly bonkers]. Something like that. Once upon a time though this was not the case. Moreso even than the Christopher Reeve Superman movies that preceded it, Tim Burton's Batman showed Hollywood what a juggernaut these things could be - it was the biggest movie of 1989 by far (nearly 60 million dollars ahead of its closest competition, the third Indiana Jones), and I have distinct memories of everything I owned that year being covered in Bat symbols - my t-shirts, my backpack, my Trapper Keeper.

Generational arguments still break out (see: Neighbors) about who was the best Batman (yes I am old and Team Keaton all the way) but fewer people seem to argue about which Joker they prefer between Jack Nicholson and that dude who won an Oscar for his performance - that's not to say I don't know people who'll argue for Team Jack and his closer-to-the-comics hamminess. Thankfully I'm not dropping us into that mire today (although feel free to express your opinions in the comments on that) - instead we're facing the oldest question in the Bat-pantheon: Are Batman's villains always inherently more interesting, more fun, than the dude in the big black suit himself? Sound off!

poll by twiigs.com

You have one week to dance with these devils in the pale moonlight and let us know in the comments why you picked which - have at it!

PREVIOUSLY Last week's competition saw the titular Hitchcock blonde of 1963's Marnie facing off against her James Bond savior slash terrorizer slash romantic interest - judging by our comments we all pretty much agreeed that neither of these folks was anybody we'd want to be stuck in an elevtor with, but Tippi snapped the win in her bright yellow purse and sauntered away all the same. Said Tom:

"Voting for Marnie. The movie really is a snore, but Tippi Hedron really is great. This is proof she had the goods to be an actress, and it's kind of a shame nothing really happened after this movie for her."

Just Jack

JA from MNPP here with some sad news - it's being reported that Jack Nicholson has officially, if quietly, retired from acting. Given that's it's been two years since the 76 year-old made a movie it's not the most surprising news in the world, but he's taken that long between roles before and I kept hoping he'd come back with one killer role and not go out on a sour note like How Do You Know (a title whose lack of punctuation still grates two years later). Radar is quoting ye old anonymous "Hollywood insider" as saying that it's due to memory loss - that he just can't remember his lines anymore, and that's why he passed on reuniting with his About Schmidt director Alexander Payne on the upcoming Nebraska, a role that eventually went to Bruce Dern. So... there's Johnny. What's your favorite Nicholson?