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Entries in Joel Schumacher (8)

Monday
Jun222020

Joel Schumacher (1939-2020)

by Nathaniel R

Joel Schumacher and the star he made, Colin FarrellI once walked across the street in the East Village with Joel Schumacher. I didn't say anything though I immediately recognized him; as directors go he was hard to miss -- very tall with long silver hair. Anything I might have wanted to say would surely have been too belabored in a street crossing. "I love your work," is rote and in this case untrue though I loved some of his work enthusiastically in a formative (St Elmo's Fire) or camp (Batman & Robin) or moment-in-time (Flatliners, Tigerland).

Sometimes I loved his work in all of those ways at once -- Love you, Lost Boys!

It's been curious to see so much appreciation spring up on the internet today, particularly because Schumacher was never a director to inspire reverence in the masses though he made several popular pictures...

Click to read more ...

Tuesday
Jun202017

Daniel Day-Links

• Vanity Fair the interrupted erupted into crazed outrage early today over fake news regarding Gal Gadot's Wonder Woman payday. Katey clears up the confusion

Time has a gorgeously written profile of Sofia Coppola by Stephanie Zacharek as The Beguiled heads to theaters.

• Meanwhile, though, not everyone is happy with the film. Our own Murtada thinks the film lacks tension and should've switched its setting away from the Civil War. Slate details the whitewashing of the source novel that happened in both the 1971 movie and to an even larger degree in the current film. I think a couple of the Slate article complaints are overdoing it particularly when it comes to the dialogue addressing the absence of slaves -- that feels absolutely authentic as to how that particular character (Nicole Kidman's stone-faced self-serving Miss Martha) would dismiss the topic but there are enough valid ones that now I'd love to see a third version that is actually more faithful to the book because it sounds, at least in this article, like its more fascinating than either movie version. I guess we should read it.

• THR Young Han Solo loses/fires (?) its hot directors Phil Lord & Christopher Miller under the typical "creative visions" disagreements. The worrying part is that they're already several months into production. Deadline follows up with the bad news that they want Ron Howard to finish the film

• GQ Joel Schumacher looks back on the reviled camp of Batman & Robin. Has no regret about the Bat Nipples.

• Village Voice Transformers: The Last Knight wrecks Bilge Ebiri. Perfect. This review is perfect. 

 • And you have probably heard that Daniel Day-Lewis is retiring...
The Wrap reminds us that he's announced his retirement before but Variety goes with the sensational misleading "Shocker!" headline even though Daniel Day-Lewis hardly ever works by his own choice and thus it was only a matter of time before he did this. Letters of Note shares a cool story about how hard he fought for his breakout role in My Beautiful Laundrette. I personally think it's fine that he's retiring. He's clearly not a "hungry" actor anymore and actors are better when they really want it (just as people in all professions are). Also Lucy Prebble, Clarisse Loughrey, and Teo Bugbee had amusing notes to comfort us on this topic on twitter.

Naturally this means that Phantom Thread, his next Paul Thomas Anderson picture opening in December, would theoretically be his last. Cynics will tell you -- and have already told you online surely -- that this means he's a lock for the Oscar yet again. But let's not get carried away. People will have to at least really like the movie and Oscar voters will have to really want him to tie Katharine Hepburn's record for that to happen. Will they? We'll see.

Tuesday
Oct252016

Oscar Horrors: Flatliners (1990) Sound Editing

Boo! It's "Oscar Horrors". Each evening we'll look back on a horror-connected nomination until Halloween. Here's Sean Donovan on an atypical player...

I miss Joel Schumacher. Aside from two episodes of House of Cards in 2013, the man who brought bat-nipples, bat-codpiece, and lots of bat-ass to the original Batman film franchise has been largely distant from our screens today. Say what you will about Schumacher’s ability to craft fine cinematic art; his movies are fun. And for me, Batman & Robin and the gorgeously camp vampiric coming-of-age tale The Lost Boys more than earn him a spot in Hollywood’s gay hall of fame (do we have one of those?). Is there a more gloriously queer gesture than taking the Batman franchise, one of the sacred cows of straight male comic book fandom, and lathering it in trashy homoerotic leather daddy gear? 

Flatliners, Schumacher’s 1990 near-horror falls inbetween The Lost Boys and his Batman era...

Click to read more ...

Monday
Sep122016

Beauty vs Beast: I Dream of Tommy Lee

Jason from MNPP here, fighting the urge to begin and end this week's edition of "Beauty vs Beast" wth a long monologue about the past and/or the dreams I had last night (although regarding the latter Aaron Taylor-Johnson may or may not have been involved - Hi Aaron!), for one of our finest actors, Mr. Tommy Lee Jones, who is turning 70 this week.

I make reference of course to his great performance in the Coen's masterpiece No Country For Old Men, a performance which is always overshadowed (and yes, I preemptively expect the same to happen here) by Javier Bardem's big hair trigger, but not, in my estimation, rightfully so. As I've revisited the film over the years since its release Bardem's scare show has begun to sink into the background and it's Jones' work as the titual Old Man that lingers - as he delivers the dream monologue that closes the film I find myself wanting to stare at his face and all its hills and valleys and sad wisdom for another hour, and another after that. It is a gift. Or maybe you just feel more comfortable voting for someone who'd dare to threaten Kelly Macdonald...

PREVIOUSLY Two weeks back we went full goofy with a love-fest for Joel Schumacher's Batman and Robin, an admittedly awful movie that I nonetheless watch whenever it's on the TV - in a villain-off it was Uma Thurman's Poison Ivy whose green touch warmed our hearts over Arnold's Mr. Freeze. Said Roger:

"As a queer little Earth child mixing potions in the garden, Poison Ivy really spoke to me. Years later, discovering Uma was a fellow Taurus, child of Venus, made worlds of sense to me. I was in green and cherry-red love."

Monday
Aug292016

Beauty vs Beast: Ice & Ivy

Jason from MNPP here on the occasion of Joel Schumacher's 77th birthday wondering if I'm the only one who feels like his 1997 superhero flop Batman & Robin ought to be a camp classic as revered as Showgirls... or at least Valley of the Dolls. I think the fact that the movie is actively trying to be camp, but failing, throws people off... but it only makes me love it more. It's so... queer. In all the senses. Maybe it's just that Zack Snyder's endless reign of self-seriousness has made this goofy trainwreck seem more endearing, but I manage to quote this movie far more than might be sane, and if it's ever on TV I get sucked into its dopey dreadfulness every time. The same will never be true of Batman v Superman, I'm afraid. (Unless it's Holly Hunter's scenes we're talking about, of course.)

PREVIOUSLY True Story: I was at a wedding this past weekend and they gave out Jordan Almonds! Anyway last week we forced you to take sides in the Bridesmaids battle of the Century, and I am so so proud of y'all that you went with Kristen Wiig's Annie (who'd never let a Jordan Almond get her down) to the tune of 54% -- that's meant as no knock on the brilliantly funny Rose Byrne but, well, I'll let Suzanne explain:

"I know people love Rose Byrne, but Annie is such a great character. It felt like a revolutionary political act in 2011 to make a film that focused on a female protagonist who was depressed because her business failed and she was broke."