Links

Vanity Fair "Introducing Caitlyn Jenner" Annie Liebovitz's great photo of Caitlyn (née Bruce) is all the rage on the internet today. Vanity Fair's cover story will be 22 pages in print form
VF Tumblr also has behind the photoshoot footage
Awards Daily wonders what the Academy's documentary branch will do about the new New York Times policy -- previously their policy was to review every single movie that opened in New York City
In Contention the screenwrite of Grace of Monaco live tweets it to "correct" the record
You Must Remember This I'm so behind on this podcast which is typically great and educational about Old Hollywood -- the latest episode is about the Manson Murders in Hollywood but don't let a ton of "Star Wars" titled episodes fool you. It's not Lucas's space opera but 40s-era stories about stars during wartime
The Film Stage looks at the 10 favorite films of Rainer Werner Fassbinder which include Johnny Guitar and Salo, or: The 120 Days of Sodom; sounds about right! The prolific gay auteur would have  been 70 this week

The AV Club with some funny news: E.L. James will basically rewrite 50 Shades of Grey to make more money oh and to tell things from Christian's perspective.
Variety bummer news: Sofia Coppola stepping off the director's chair for The Little Mermaid
The Stake urges you to remember that Point Break (1991) is "tremendous" before you see the inevitably terrible remake - while on that topic...
RedBubble has a cool graphic poster of that movie for sale
The Playlist a new tearjerker project for Channing Tatum, Two Kisses for Maddy about a widower raising his daughter 
Cinematic Corner falls hard for Furiousa and Mad Max Fury Road
Reel Talk thinks we need to start taking Nicholas Hoult seriously (as do I post Fury Road... though I was far less convinced previously)
CineMunch wonders who your favorite drunk actresses are on their latest podcast -- with gin drink recipes!
CHUD great new poster for the final Hunger Games movie. Those movies are dull but I will give them this: they've always had wonderful smarts about the teasing
MNPP's quote of the day reveals two Stephen King properties that the studios actually don't want. Weird
MNPP gets excited like Chris Pratt for Jurassic World 

Tweet o' The Week
Squarespace no longer seems to allow tweet embeds -- they say they do but they never show up at TFE anymore so this is a snapshot of a tweet from the ubiquitous Jessica Chastain herself. (About the formerly ubiquitous Bryce Dallas Howard). It is wonderful. Gingers forever.

Showtune to Go!
June is Pride Month and with Caitlyn Jenner kicking things off with that Vanity Fair reveal today let's go back to one of the most moving original gay anthems "I Am What I Am" from La Cage Aux Folles. It's only one of the greatest songs ever written about being true to yourself. (I adore that moment at the beach in Paris is Burning when the two ladies start singing it).

Sing out, John Barrowman! 

Beauty Break: China Through the Looking Glass?

Eeep. We haven't even mentioned the Met Gala which is like the Oscars of May for how many stars come out. Each year the Met Gala theme comes from the new event exhibit which this year is "China: Through the Looking Glass." It's tough to say what is Chinese inspired about many of the looks we saw a few nights ago but who cares about themes when you get THIS photo (shared by Jessica Chastain) of three of the best and most beautiful actresses on the planet. As I said on twitter...

My brain / heart / cinephilia just exploded. See you next week once i’ve collected the pieces. 

[more photos after the jump]

Click to read more ...

Interstellar Takes Top Empire Honors

Manuel here bringing you more awards from this past weekend; Nathaniel wasn't the only one still handing out awards for the 2014 film year. The Jameson Empire Awards were handed out this past weekend (as were Nickelodeon's Kid's Choice Awards which were gaga for The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1). Unsurprisingly, it was Christopher Nolan's divisive Interstellar which nabbed its two top prizes. 

Nolan was also on hand to receive the Empire Inspiration Award, which I guess was as good an excuse as any to see Jessica Chastain looking fabulous (she presented the award to her Interstellar director).

Check out the full winners list below.

Click to read more ...

We Can't Wait #6 - Crimson Peak

Team Experience is counting down our 15 most anticipated for 2015. Here's Jason...

Who & What: Guillermo Del Toro directs a script he co-wrote with Matthew Robbins (the two have worked together several times but Robbins' most important credit is clearly having directed the seminal-to-me The Legend of Billie Jean - "Fair is fair!"); British playwright Lucinda Coxon (who also wrote the script for the upcoming The Danish Girl) was brought in to add "the proper degree of perversity and intelligence" to the tale.

Mia Wasikowska plays an aspiring novelist named Edith Cushing (I have to share the character names, they're too juicy not to) who gets swept off her feet by the dashing and dark Sir Thomas Sharpe (played by the dashing and dark Tom Hiddleston) and subsequently carried off to his sinister Gothic mansion full all of the requisite spires and shadows with an incestuous-seeming Jessica Chastain as the Lady Lucille Sharpe sneaking amongst them. Charlie Hunnam plays an old friend of Edith's (named "Dr. Alan McMichael" and it doesn't get much more "decent" and "boring" and "doesn't stand a chance in hell" than that) who warns her against the lot of it.

Why We're Excited About it: Del Toro's said that this is his stab at making one of his small Spanish-language movies in English and, while I'll defend the Hellboys and Pacific Rim plenty, there's no denying his greatest works have been the smaller character-based oddities of The Devil's Backbone and Pan's Labyrinth. The list of influences he cites on Peak - The Haunting, The Innocents, and The Shining - are all the precise titles we want to hear mentioned, while at the same time he says his aim is to deconstruct our genre expectations. Plus the cast is as talented as they are gorgeous (which is to say plenty) and if you've watched the pitch-perfect trailer then you've seen the spectacular costumes (those poofy sleeves!) they're running up and down the haunted staircases in as a storm blows the curtains and the fireplace goes out and man oh man do I love me a good old-fashioned Gothic haunted house movie!    

What if it all Goes Wrong? As small as Del Toro kept saying he wanted this movie to be, the trailer is BIG, full of CG ghosts rising through floors and sets seemingly built all the way up to the thunderstruck heavens -  even if it's contained to mostly the titular house and grounds I do worry that the filmmaker's well-documented giddiness over his subject might've maybe carried him away on a storm-cloud of everything-but-the-haunted-kitchen-sink and we'll lose the characters underneath those gorgeous poofy sleeves.

When: Carve your pumpkins and throw on your best velvet cape and head straight to the theater - the movie hits right when the movie should, just in time for All Hallows. Universal's got it slated for October 16th in the US.

Previously...

#7 45 Years
#8 Bridge of Spies
#9 Taxi
#10 Freeheld
#11 A Bigger Splash
#12 The Dressmaker
#13 The Hateful Eight
#14 Knight of Cups
#15 Arabian Nights
Sidebar 3 Animated Films
Sidebar 2 Tomorrowland
Sidebar 1 Avengers: Age of Ultron
Intro Pick a Blockbuster

The Witches of Huntsman?

Manuel here with some casting news. I had this fabulous idea of celebrating Leo DiCaprio’s casting in that 24 multiple personality film with a list of the 24 various personalities he’s already played. But once I started listing them alongside one another I realized Leo definitely needs to spice it up; lately, when he’s not playing a grieving wifeless man he’s playing a wealthy soulless man. Why not embrace another full-on comedic role? His turn in Catch me if You Can is still one of his best. Why so dour lately Leo?

They do make quite the beautiful trio, don't they?

Instead, let’s focus on a film that’s become more of an actressexual dream than any of us ever hoped for. Did you hear that The Huntsman film now boasts Charlize Theron, Emily Blunt and Jessica Chastain?

I’m secretly hoping the trio of actresses will make The Huntsman more of a Witches of Eastwick type film, or maybe they can all band together against the eponymous protagonist in a 9 to 5 style workplace comedy? I mean, none of us would complain about a tied-up Hemsworth, now would we? Or perhaps they can work in a fun musical number a la The First Wives Club? The mind boggles imagining this trio of ladies making the film crackle with wit and chemistry; perhaps this is much too optimistic for what is presumably another tentpole blockbuster. I mean, are they even bringing back Colleen Atwood?

What other actress trio would you love these gals to channel in this sure to be pretty (and pretty drab?) spinoff?