Streaming Review: "Single All The Way" (Netflix)

By: Christopher James

Holiday traditions are important. It’s the one time of the year when people slow down and get to make time for families, friends and silly comforting things. It’s no wonder goofy Hallmark/Lifetime-esque holiday movies have spawned into their own genre, with dozens coming out each week. Even within them, there’s subgenres - the so-bad-their-good comedies, what-is-happening-bonkers movies and the depressing drek.

So how does Netflix’s Singe All The Way fare within this matrix? Yes, it marks the streamer’s first gay-themed holiday movie. But does that mean that it’s the perfect bit of holiday junk food for you and your friends and family?

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Dame Judi Dench deserved the Best Actress Oscar for "Notes on a Scandal"

by Matt St Clair

Dame Judi Dench is an international treasure. The legendary actress currently has seven Oscar nominations under her belt, having won once in Best Supporting Actress for her role as Queen Elizabeth I in Shakespeare in Love (recently discussed right here at length). Should the stars align, she might add an eighth nomination to her record for her role as the lovable Granny in current Best Picture frontrunner Belfast. Even at 86 years-old, and with her deteriorating eyesight, Dench is still going strong, managing to get quality roles in an industry notoriously unkind to actresses when they reach a certain age and whose names don’t rhyme with Beryl Deep. 

Astonishingly, Dench didn’t become an official Academy darling until she reached her 60’s. Up until she joined the James Bond franchise as M in GoldenEye, and earned her first Oscar bid for Mrs. Brown in ‘97, Dench was more of a theater mainstay while working sporadically on film. Yet since that one-two punch, she's been a consistent movie presence with Notes on a Scandal being a high water mark. She deserved to win her the Best Actress Oscar that year...

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Review: Mayor Pete

By Abe Friedtanzer

Politics have become so divisive these days that campaigns are often based more on what a candidate is not rather than what they are. It’s refreshing, therefore, to see a politician whose identity is integral to their desire to achieve a certain office. This documentary’s title indicates the informality and folksiness attributed to its protagonist, a man who may actually be one of the most put-together, presentable people in the political world today. That would be Pete Buttigieg, the extremely likeable and publicly gay mayor of South Bend, Indiana who made a run for the presidency in 2020…

Being gay is not the only aspect of who Pete is, but it is a big part of it and one that broke new ground when he shared the debate stage with other Democratic presidential candidates...

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Links: Exciting Memoirs, Luscious Italians, and the Out100

• The Hollywood Reporter Paul Mescal and Josh O'Conner to star in early 20th century gay love story, The History of Sound (the curious part is that it's about America and both stars are British and the director is South African)
• The Guardian Eternals banned in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait over gay content
• People actor Kal Penn (Harold & Kumar) has come out publicly before his memoir "You Can't Be Serious" hits. He'll be marrying his partner of 11 years soon

More after the jump including a Paul Newman memoir, new roles for Joe Alwyn and Gael Garcia Bernal, Titane's Oscar dreams, luscious Italians and the annual OUT100 list...

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NewFest: Two very different international lesbian romances

By Abe Friedtanzer

Part of the appeal of the programming at NewFest is that it spotlights multiple perspectives slightly outside mainstream society, suggesting a universality to the way in which so many feel like they’re not accepted by society. The grouping of these two films in one review has a little to do with their subject matter but much more to do with the fact that I happened to screen them back-to-back and found some unexpected connections and contrasts. Let’s look briefly at Bliss and Sweetheart…

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