How had I never seen... "M" (1931)?

Series Debut! As a kind of dark mirror to our "Over & Over" column, we've invited  Team Experience to fill in some of their most shameful film history gaps and tell us about their experience. We all have gaps in our viewing with over a century of film history behind us! To kick things off here's a 'Lang-delayed' encounter for Mark. - Editor

by Mark Brinkerhoff

I first became aware of M, Fritz Lang’s seminal 1931 German thriller, while flipping through Vanity Fair’s Hollywood, a weighty, sumptuous 2000 coffee table book. Therein, opposite a cuckoo photo of Doris Day with half a dozen dyed poodles, is a haunting photo of actor Peter Lorre with the following caption...

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Link: The Director's Cut

The Film Stage talks to the team behind Tangerine, the iPhone shot movie that was my favorite from Sundance
Pajiba green screen Jean-Claude Van Damme clips for you to make your own movie with
T, The New York Times Style Magazine profiles Xavier Dolan
Entertainment Junkie looks at the visual effects Oscar race
The Dissolve The Voyage of Time Terrence Malick's forthcoming film will have two versions. One with Brad Pitt's voice and one with Cate Blanchett's. I'm getting tired of multiple versions of the same thing, I must admit. It seems so indecisive. But maybe I'm just smarting because today I learned that...
The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby arrives on DVD and Blu-Ray on Tuesday and I keep hearing conflicting things. Some say it has all three versions of the film and some say it just has "Them" (which from everything I've read is the disappointing compromise). Should you be lucky enough to have access to the original two parts, which I recommend, watch "Him" first. 

Awards Daily The Visual Effects Society Winners a complete list but the three key big screen wins are Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, Big Hero 6, and Birdman. 
Film School Rejects want Edward Norton to win Birdman's acting Oscar
/Film Baz Luhrmann is developing a music-related series for Netflix called The Get Down which focuses on the rise of hiphop, punk and disco in the late 70s. Could be amazing. Cross your collective fingers
Guardian wonders which modern actresses are channeling their inner Hepburn.

(True story. Last night I had a dream in which I was doing a sisyphean task of loading and unloading bags of ice. And Katharine Hepburn was my grandma in that dream.)

Retro Pleasures
Comics Alliance a look back at the awesome production design of Batman Returns which plays that stinkin' city like a harp from hell
The Dissolve "all the weird angles of Fritz Lang's M"
Medium a piece on Gene Kelly's death two decades ago and various tributes 

Off Screen
Vox has a fascinating long read on the Men's Rights Activism and social media debates about persecution and privilege
Playbill Anthony Rapp of Rent fame has co-created the first ever BroadwayCon for theater fans. The first annual event will be held next January!

This Week's Must Read
Kyle Buchanan at Vulture demonstrates beautifully how indie Sundance break-outs and subsequent career offers for their no-budget scrappy directors are a microcosm of Hollywood's White Guy Problem. It's so true!  A young white man can go from directing an indie for less than a million to helming huge blockbusters in one short step. Buchanan has examples and no such offers greet the directors of color or those with vaginas whose breakout films are just as mainstream leaning and just as popular.