GLAAD Nominees, Iceman, and Professor Marston

by Nathaniel R

This just in. The GLAAD nominations for portrayals of the LGBT community are out. This is a different group than the critics group that I vote with (the one from lgbt entertainment journalists) and their focus is less on quality -- or it has been in the past -- than on battling homophobia and fighting for inclusion. Their full name gives you their raison d'etre history: the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation. They've made significant blunders in their years (supporting I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry would still rankle if anyone still remembered the film) but let's not hold that against them since we love that their purview is so wide (music, comic books, everything) and their purpose admirable.

The film nominees go like so...

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Ranking the Golden Globe Presenters

by Jorge Molina

Oh, what a night. The Golden Globes delivered the head-scratching, Twitter-blowing night that we expect every year. Of the many things we can count on (apart from drunk speeches and Meryl being nominated), is that they are the award show that puts the most thought, or at least has the most fun, pairing up their presenters. To various degrees of success. 

So check out this second annual ranking of the Golden Globes presenters after the jump, evaluated in terms of banter, chemistry, relation to the award given, and presentation...

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My link runneth over

• Vanity Fair Carrie Fisher's best lines in The Last Jedi come from the actress/writer herself
• Rolling Stone David Fear's 25 reasons to love the movies in 2017
• Variety a "tsunami" of change in Hollywood. Netflix, MoviePass, sexual harrassment scandals, low box office. What's next?
• Vanity Fair Annette Bening, Whisper campaigns, The Last Jedi and more
• AV "TV Club" a lengthy but always engaging 17 part lookback at the year in culture and the small screen 

 

Much more after the jump including more "best of the year" lists, Strictly Ballroom, Hamilton, and female directors...

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Father Figures, the best and worst of 2017

Each day a new "year in review" piece. Here's Ben Miller...

I’ve been a father since 2012.  It’s one of the great joys in my life.  If you classified me as a person, father would be near the top of how I would want to be described.  I want to be a good father and I strive to be. 

But, generally, I don’t look to film for guidance.

Terrible fathers are a touchtone of cinema.  From Jack Torrance to Daniel Plainview, movie dads rarely get the chance to show how great they can be for their children.  2017 surprisingly provided us with a bevy of complex relationships between parents and their progeny, and the dads actually got a chance to shine.  Check out the top ten great dads in 2017 films.  (I also included five terrible fathers, because 2017 gotta 2017.)

TOP TEN GREAT DADS IN 2017 MOVIES
Spoilers for all of these films are included

01 Larry McPherson, Lady Bird (Played by Tracy Letts)
Lady Bird and her mother, the central figures in the film, aren't the only ones to benefit from Larry's warmth (we previously discussed this characterization here). Even when faced with a fruitless job interview, he smiles in the face of adversity, opting for a big bag of Doritos.  When his son comes in for the next interview, there is no animosity.  Larry straightens his tie, pats him on the shoulder and tells him to go get ‘em.  He does this while losing his job, providing for an extra person in his house, losing his daughter to college and suffering from years of depression.  God bless Larry McPherson. 

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Links Don't Apply

• Cartoon Brew the effects work in The Shape of Water
• Coming Soon The Lady Gaga / Bradley Cooper version of A Star is Born gets pushed back to October. Does this mean they think it has Oscar potential or just that it wouldn't be competitive in its previous May slot?
• The Awardist I Tonya's breakout star (the parakeet) tattle-tales on Allison Janney
• The Guardian on Jessica Chastain's emergence as a outspoken activist this year
• THR We forgot to share the news that SAG was having all female presenters this year!
• THR Their first ever "live roundtable"... honestly there are so many roundtables now I have literally not watched a one this year. Can't keep up!

• Variety MoviePass has passed the 1 million mark in subscribers
• Deadline Remember Warren Beatty's short-lived but long gestating Rules Don't Apply? It's now got legal trouble
• Deadline Sufjan Stevens was originally going to do more than just sing for Call Me By Your Name but narrate it too. (We love Sufjan but sooo glad the movie opted out of narration)
• EW Annette Bening on why she's no longer doing American Crime Story: Katrina

LIST-MANIA
• Film School Rejects best under-the-radar films you probably missed this year
• Variety top ten shots of the year via Kris Tapley
• Out R Kurt Osenlund's top films of the year including Saturday Church, Girls Trip, Atomic Blonde
• IMDb ten most popular movie pages for 2017: Blade Runner 2049, Split, Wonder Woman, etc
• The Playlist worst movies of the year. I was furious with them for putting the excellent Atomic Blonde on the list but this bit on Emoji Movie made me lol

Is it shooting fish in a barrel to put “The Emoji Movie,” a film for children that had no aspirations at any point in its creation other than to milk money out of those children’s parents, so high on this list? Perhaps. But in this case, the fish in the barrel are savage fucking piranhas that would devour everything you loved if they remain un-shot.