"The Hours" Discussion Pt. 1: Nervous Hands, Ravenous Kisses

[Editor's Note: for the centerpiece of our 10th anniversary celebration of The Hours, I asked Joe Reid and Nick Davis if they'd like to talk about the movie and it turned out they already had. A heretofore unpublished conversation. I'm sure you'll enjoy it as much as I did! - Nathaniel ]

JOE REID: Three (!) years ago, I had planned out an end-of-decade feature for my own blog, wherein I would converse about my favorite films of 2000-2009 with a selection of writer friends. The logistics of it got away from me, but I did manage to get started. One such conversation lost to history was with my fellow Film Experience Podcast panelist Nick Davis on the subject of The Hours. With the ten-year anniversary of The Hours upon us, I thought I'd dig up this abandoned reflection and let it see the light of day.

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JOE: The Hours is absolutely on the list of movies from the past decade that I truly, unabashedly loved. I suppose there's something chromosomal about a movie starring Meryl Streep, Nicole Kidman, and Julianne Moore (and Toni Collette, and Allison Janney, and Miranda Richardson). But it's more than just watching all these fantastic actresses hand off scenes to each other for two hours. It's also the suicides and the repression!  

Of course, after signing you on to correspond with me on this entry -- and many thanks for that, by the way -- I checked up and found that your feelings on it were decidedly more ambivalent. Is this an "every time I watch it I feel differently about it" kind of thing, or is it always the same kind of mixed bag for you?

 As for me, while there are a BUNCH of aspects of The Hours I'm hoping we can touch on, for some reason, my most recent screening of the movie made me anxious to mention two things: kitchens and hands. I couldn't stop watching Nicole Kidman's hands, either when Virginia is gripping her pen with a desperately tight claw grip or deep inhaling those cigarettes. And Meryl Streep separating egg yolks as she's unraveling in her kitchen has always been a favorite image.

And that brings me to the whole kitchen thing...

kitchen melodrama and sapphic smooches after the jump...

Click to read more ...

FYC Film Bitch Awards

It's that time of year. I've starting to draw up my lists of the Best This and Best That in every category... so many categories! The Nomination Party begins on December 28th and runs through January 23rd. As per usual, I'd love to hear your input on categories that are harder to winnow down and easier to mess up on by forgetting something totally brilliant. Last year I had some issues completing things but I am happy to report that I'm not quite as terribly behind schedule this year. So hit your FYCs in the comments for the following categories:

Best Line Delivery | Action Sequence | Sex Scene |  Musical Moment | Best Kiss |  Credit Sequence | Opening Scene | Best Actor or Actress in a Limited or Cameo Role | Best Scene in General

Best Actress Film Bitch Long List: Knightley, Hunt, Wallis, Chastain, Riva, Cotillard, Weisz, Corinealdi, Fanning, Dowd, Seydoux, Lynskey, Winstead, Streep. or Williams?

You do that whilst I continue to debate the acting categories with myself... It's so crazy hard to narrow down Best Actress every year! Can I have 15 nominees just so all of these bright actresses get their due?

Armie Hammer Can Fire A Machine Gun (And Other Linkables)

FilmDetail GASP. Terrence Malick actually photographed in Cannes this weekend. Or is it a cardboard cutout?
Vulture picks the best (and worst) performances from Glee Season Two now that it's wrapped. Sound choices throughout actually.
Austin Translation the latest Pixar short La Luna wraps production.

Dan Hipp 'I am Tetsuo!' (an Akira moment)
FourFour on Kate Bush's "Director's Cut"
Gold Derby Jane Lynch (Glee) may host the Emmys
IonCinema proves that it's not just Oscars that cajole people into ridiculous predictions: herewith predictions for Cannes May 2012 edition.
Pajiba imagines worst-cast baby names from the current crop of starry couplings.
Kenneth in the (212) Justin Bartha on Matthew McConaughey's McConaunuts. What the...

Oh and mark your calendars for March 8th, 2013 if you're so inclined. That's when they'll be releasing Sam Raimi's Oz: The Great and Powerful, one of many Wizard of Oz themed projects that is stupidly not the mega-popular half a billion plus grossing Wicked. Alas.

Finally...
did Armie Hammer really need to compare kissing Leonardo DiCaprio to operating a machine gun in that you just have to pretend to know what you're doing even though you don't?

Excuse me Armie but you know what you're doing! Unless you're marriage is really unconventional. I'm constantly bemused by this topic. Hello world? Listen up. As someone who has kissed both men (duh) and women (what? I experimented in college) I'll break it down for you: both men and women are human [GASP]. Each human being has lips and a tongue whether or not they have a penis or a vagina. I know that's hard to wrap your head around, world, but it's TOTALLY TRUE. Have you ever met someone without lips or a tongue? Kissing is kissing and the  major variable, gender-wise, is facial hair. Otherwise the differences are pretty much person to person. It feels best when you're hot for each other. It feels dumbest when you're not which any professional actor is more than well acquainted with as kissing is a basic job requirement; more basic than firing automated weaponry! The end.

MTV Movie Nominations

Whenever I hate on the Oscars and their very limited range of movie-love, I have only to glance at the annual MTV Awards to remind myself that some groups have an even teensier worldview. Once again the MTV nominations are a weird mix of movies that are actually good (Black Swan, The Social Network) movies that are super popular despite themselves (The Twilight Saga) movies that whether or not they're good or bad or better than usual or worst than usual it would never matter (Harry Potter) and movies that are deemed acceptable by virtue of either hipness, mainstream popularity, youth appeal or household name ubiquity of its stars (Kick-Ass, Easy A, Inception, Just Go With It) or movies that the MTV viewers didn't see but they like the star so it's okay to nominate him or her (Ryan Reynolds in Buried) and still look sufficiently populist and not like some stuffy film blogger. Mix and match!

Y'all know I approve of weird awards since i do pages of them myself each year so I've always been happy that the awards existed. I just wish they were more discerning. Take Inception. Makes total sense in all ways of looking at it that it would get a ton of nominations with MTV. But the KISS between JGL and Ellen Page? That was ice-water on a scale of hot, like a brother/sister makeout. Nomination that made me the happiest: Amy Adams vs. The Sisters in The Fighter for Best Fight. Maybe it's protecting their own -- SHE'S AN MTV GIRL -- but it's still a perfect decision as nominations go.

I already voted on all categories. Will you?

A "Cool Rider" Never Forgets

Don't know if you Pfans out there caught PopWrap's interview with Maxwell Caulfield of Grease 2 fame. He's doing Cactus Flower on stage now (yep the property that won Goldie Hawn that early Oscar -- though I personally didn't realize that Adam Sandler's Just Go With It was a reworking???) so he's making the press rounds. He's still an extremely handsome bloke at 51. I've noticed him billed on a couple of stage things here in New York over the years but haven't managed to catch him doing his thing.

PopWrap asks him about Grease 2 (1982) of course and I love his humble appreciative response despite the film career never really working out.

PW: Do you remember it fondly? 
Maxwell: I haven’t hit enough home runs in the film world to say, “oh yea, ‘Grease 2,’ isn’t that a cute movie?” For me, it is a very major part of my filmography. I still have my great friends from the experience and when it pops up on TV, I stick with it – it brings back so many happy memories.

PW: It was filmed almost 30 years ago and some actors can't remember projects they made 3 years ago -- do you recall shooting it? 
Maxwell: Oh yes! You’re never going to forget a liplock with Michelle Pfeiffer! [laughs] I remember being in the bowling alley and the school. I have very distinct memories from making that movie ... But I do look at it and think, “damn, why didn’t they give me a second picture?” [laughs]  But them is the breaks.

He's never forgotten his liplock with Michelle Pfeiffer? Well neither have we.

Yum!