How Had I Never Seen..."Blue Velvet"

We're revisiting 1986 this month leading up to the next Supporting Actress Smackdown. 

by Ben Miller

I’m not a David Lynch person.  My first exposure to anything he made was The Straight Story, the most un-Lynchian thing he ever did.  I wasn’t around the people who cared about Twin Peaks the television show, the film or the subsequent revival series.  I enjoy the levels of surreal like David Cronenberg and Yorgos Lanthimos, but Lynch is a level of bizzare I wasn’t willing to commit myself to caring about.

But, being the Oscar completist that I am, I gave a shot to Mulholland Drive, and I really took to it.  It was during the viewing of Mulholland Drive that I realized what made Lynch different from other filmmakers...

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Showbiz History: Tom & Jerry's debut, BAFTA nights, and wild Laura Dern

7 random things that happened today, February 10th, in showbiz history...

1940 The first Tom & Jerry cartoon, Puss Gets the Boot debuts. Tom & Jerry would go on to become major stars of the short film format and super stars of Oscar's animated short category! The series received 13 nominations (starting with Puss Gets the Boots) and 7 wins. 

1972 David Bowie debuts his character Ziggy Stardust at a London pub...

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Fave Costume: Dr Ellie Sattler from "Jurassic Park"

We thought it would be fun to have Team Experience share favourite Halloween costumes with you. Here's the final entry from Ginny O'Keefe

It’s DOCTOR Ellie Sattler. She went to school and got a PhD in paleontology so you better put some respect on her full name!

 Jurassic Park was the first film I remember seeing. It was on a constant loop throughout most of my childhood. As a kid I would re-enact the kitchen scene with the raptors by hiding in my kitchen cabinets and crawling on the floor hoping to be unseen by my mother who just wanted to make dinner in peace! I also saw the movie in theaters when it was re-released and in 3D back in 2013 for it’s 20th anniversary. Yes, I sobbed like baby because of the power of nostalgia. This movie has always been a huge part of my life and it helped unleash my imagination and creativity as a kid. So, of course I needed to honor it on the scariest night of the year. I just happened to honor it 26 years after its original release. A little late, but better late than never...

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NYFF: Laura Dern's first leading role and a lost Blaxploitation treasure

Sean Donovan looks at two films from NYFF's "Revivals" section...

The major film festivals of the world, New York included, take as much responsibility for cinema’s past as its future. Alongside new hyped arthouse projects, festivals program curios from the past that may have fallen through the cracks or not received their due recognition in their day. In other instances, festivals re-deploy older films to the contemporary moment in an act of deliberate commentary, the film speaking to culture in a way that feels freshly vital for 2020 (that is certainly the case of one of the selections profiled here). Over the past weekend, New York Film Fest virtual cinema uploaded two of their revival selections, Joyce Chopra’s Sundance-winning drama Smooth Talk (1985) and a Blaxploitation cult film The Spook Who Sat by the Door (1973). Both are canny, fascinating picks from the NYFF, and well worth the revisit in 2020...

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Emmy Review: Supporting Actress in a Drama

By Abe Friedtanzer

The nominations in this category were mostly expected save for the snub, once again, of Rhea Seehorn from Better Call Saul. Julia Garner, Thandie Newton, Samira Wiley, and Laura Dern have all won Emmys for these roles but only Newton and Wiley have ever competed against each other (and both lost). There’s no clear frontrunner but a handful of possibilities who could win here in a category that features a lot of very strong choices.  

I’ll try to avoid major plot details in my analysis – but if you’d like more spoiler-filled descriptions, click on the episode titles. Let’s consider each nominee…

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