Comment Party: Best Actress, 1991

by Nathaniel R

Remember Bette's dream project "For the Boys"?

We've probably done TOO much 1991 before this next Smackdown! Apologies for those of you without a particular affinity for that year but you've only got one more day of this to get through. We thought it might be fun to briefly discuss the Best Actress race of that year before the Supporting Actress Smackdown event tomorrow.

OSCAR NOMINEES

• Geena Davis, Thelma & Louise
• Laura Dern, Rambling Rose
• Jodie Foster, Silence of the Lambs ★ 
• Bette Midler, For the Boys
• Susan Sarandon, Thelma & Louise

If I remember the year correctly this lineup was basically a done deal ahead of time but for the fifth slot...

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Horror Actressing: Jodie Foster in "The Silence of the Lambs"

by Jason Adams

When I think back on Jodie Foster's Oscar-winning turn playing Clarice Starling in The Silence of the Lambs in 1991 I tend to think of a overwhelmed young woman -- Demme is constantly framing Foster as the smallest person in the room -- but one who musters up unimaginable courage. She pushes deeper into that blacked-out basement as another young woman and an injured dog shriek from the bottom of a blood-streaked pit. And I tend to think of that same small and overwhelmed young woman standing in room after room after room of big dope-faced men staring down at her, eyes narrowed, disbelieving. 

What I don't particularly tend to think of first is Clarice Starling smiling. And yet she does... Often and broadly!

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Streaming Roulette, Oct: High Life/Noon and Handfuls of Dust.

As is our practice we've selected a handful plus of new-to-streaming titles and frozen them at utterly random moments without cheating (whatever comes up comes up!). After those selections we've listed all the movies from each of the streaming channels. What should you queue up for OCTOBER 2019 ? (★ means we definitely recommend catching them and bold titles are buzzy things we haven't yet seen) 

Let's get started...

[mood music]

HIGH LIFE (2019) on Amazon Prime
Funnily enough this empty shot is exactly as I recall High Life, so much atmosphere and isolation. Humanity is over. (Except for Juliette Binoche who is just living for her disturbing role.) We expect this will end up on some top ten lists at year's end...

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Horror Actressing: Kasi Lemmons in "Candyman"

by Jason Adams

We don't talk enough about Kasi Lemmons, the actress. Maybe it's because she proved herself an absolutely terrific director in 1997 with the wildly underrated Eve's Bayou -- and she's got the Harriet bio-pic with Cynthia Erivo coming out in November -- and maybe it's because Hollywood, per their usual routine when it comes to too many black actresses, never gave her a truly great role to play with. But she's got a two-fer in the early 90s as "the best friend" in seminal horror films that she really managed to inject a lot of life into.

The most prominent one is obviously The Silence of the Lambs, where Kasi played Jodie Foster's fellow FBI recruit and friend Cordelia -- the film doesn't have much time for her but she proves a capable ally to Clarice, and as with any actress Jodie ever co-starred with the two of them had way more chemistry than with any man on the premises...

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Oscar Presenters or Buddy Comedy?

by Chris Feil

Last night Oscar did an outstanding job of pairing its presenters, delivering us stellar moments like Jodie Foster on crutches, Tiffany Haddish in Uggs, and Jane Fonda owning 51% of this damn company. At best, Oscar can take such pairings and inspire audiences to demand the two presenters appear in a film together. Especially with tradition being broken on the lead acting categories, this was a smorgasbord rife for a genre we hold dear: the buddy comedy. Here are the five buddy comedies from last night's presenter duos that we desperately need to see in 2018...

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