Posterized: Timothée Chalamet

by Nathaniel R

fan poster by sexysapiens'Surely young Timothée doesn't deserve a retrospective "Posterized" episode ?' you say.

'Ah but the young people are much quicker subjects,' say I who likes the prospect of only having to collect a handful of posters this week.

The 22 year-old star Timothée Chalamet was raised in New York with summers in France (his dad is French hence the accented name and his bilingual-ness). As a professional teen actor his first screen gigs were  recurring roles on Season 4 of "Royal Pains" and Season 2 of HBO's then enormously popular "Homeland" series, both in 2012. He hopped over to the movies very shortly thereafter. Though his feature film debut (Men Women and Children) flopped hard it wasn't long before he became the third youngest guy ever nominated for the Best Actor Oscar just last awards season. His new film Beautiful Boy about a father and son's torturous battle with the son's drug addicition hit theaters today in very limited release with expansions to follow soon given the starpower.

Chalamet turns 23 in December. Will The Academy give him a belated birthday gift in February for Beautiful Boy? The one they should have given him earlier this year? We don't (currently) think so but you never know.

His filmography in poster form is after the jump. How many have you seen?

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New Posters (Now With Less Floating Heads)

Manuel here to whet everyone's appetites with some recently released posters.

Fall movie season can sometimes feel much more thrilling for the way it builds anticipation than for what it actually delivers. Every year we can count on plenty of films to entertain, amaze, and awe us, but I'd wager that that number is usually lower than the number of films you were looking forward to. This is partly a math game and partly an acknowledgement of how PR and marketing savvy distributors (both big and small) have become. 

Take, for example these new posters for, respectively, Jason Reitman's Men, Women & Children (as divisive after its premiere in Toronto as the film's trailer proved here), Justin Simien's Sundance sensation Dear White People, and Jon Stewart's first feature film Rosewater. I have to admit I love these posters not only because they aren't full of floating heads or beautifully lit silhouettes, but because they manage to signal the film's sensibility. Arguably, this is what we expect from movie posters, but it's not often we get artistic posters like these that embrace the expressiveness of the medium without resorting to distractingly obvious photoshop.

Men, Women and Children clearly works overtime to let you know that it is a Reitman joint what with the imagery evoking that opening credit sequence from Juno and placing Jennifer Garner front and center; yet it also (if a bit bluntly with that tagline) lets you know what the film's core problematic is, something the poster needs to do when the title itself, unless you know the source material, gives you little to no information. How many people do you think are reading The Film Experience on their phones in this poster? 

But if Reitman's poster goes for both quirky and serious, Dear White People openly goes for laughs in a way that is keenly attuned to the racial politics of the film, with Tyler James Williams' character's equally exasperated yet sardonically knowing look letting you know precisely where the film's humor lies. (You can actually read more about the poster's design over at Vulture; turns out a fan of the film went ahead and created this design only to find it becoming the film's official poster when he sent to Simien who loved it!).

The stark color scheme, the off-center image of Gael (covering up his entrancing eyes! the horror!), the prominence of that ever ubiquitous "Based on a True Story" tagline -- or is it more a disclaimer? a promise?; the poster is clearly wanting to associate "Jon Stewart" with something other than the comedic satire he's known for, going instead for a bleak poster that nevertheless bleeds into a hopeful light in the right hand corner. I particularly love the single bullet hole above the S.

What recent posters have nabbed your attention? Has any of them already secured a spot on your movie poster wall? If you could design a poster for one of your all-time favorite films, which one would it be? 

Yes, No, Maybe So: Men, Women & Children

In the effort to get caught up on a backlog of trailers via our Yes, No, Maybe So. series, I asked the team which they'd like to do. I accidentally got two Men Women and Children completed before I had a chance to assign it as it were. So here are both Andrew and Matthew, both Maybe Sos but leaning in opposite directions to sound off on Jason Reitman’s upcoming Men, Women & Children based on the 2011 Chad Kultgen novel. It’s his immediate follow-up to last year’s Labor Day, which everyone is trying to forget about. (Successfully?) Will it return him to former critical glories. The film goes wide in the US on October 17th (facing off against Brad Pitt in Fury), shortly after its TIFF bow. Let’s make snap judgements about the trailer after the jump - Nathaniel.

Double-side breakdown after the jump

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First Round Predix: 5 Questions About Best Supporting Actress

"Actressing on the edges" is one of our favorite things, as the Smackdowns should make clear. Since most TFE readers are similarly affected with this obsession love, we assume you'll have plenty to say on the topic of "Best Supporting Actress" even before you've seen the performances and movies in question here. 

Will The Baker's Wife (Emily Blunt) cheat on her husband with a handsome Prince (Billy Magnussen)? Anything can happen in the woods

Oscar traction for the supporting categories of either gender is always hard to see in advance primarily because the size and substance of the roles in question aren't broadly telegraphed in advance the way lead characters tend to be. (It's not even always clear with adaptations of familiar material since role compositing happens and focus can shift characters from one version of a story to another.) What's more, supporting campaigns are often dependent on love for the lead actors and for the movie itself and the reverse is hardly ever true.

But speculation is fun! 

01. INTO THE WOODS
Who will win MVP reviews? This is always a pertinent question for ensemble properties when it comes to awards traction. In the first Broadway production in the 80s The Witch and The Baker's Wife were where it was at. In the revival in the Aughts people seemed more obsessed with Cinderella and, arguably, Jack. Into the Woods is funny like that, shifting focus and soul with each production. Some people though the recent short revival in Central Park with an all star cast turned the show over to The Baker (Denis O'Hare at the time who is not in the movie). Despite shifting love from viewers, The Witch (Meryl Streep in the movie) is always considered the lead role but that's only because it's the "star" part, not because the role is larger than the others. (Technically speaking Jack is probably the biggest role). If Streep goes lead that'll leave Anna Kendrick's Cinderella and Emily Blunt's Baker's Wife as our possibilities. I'm currently predicting Oscar favor to lean in Blunt's direction. Maybe that's wishful thinking and the desire to see her strangely quiet career get noisier but there's no arguing that The Baker's Wife isn't a great part (Amy Adams played it in the park recently). This adaptation could go any which way from Oscar behemoth to total flop and any actor could well be the one that gets people excited. Yes, even Little Red Riding Hood (played by the recent "Annie" on Broadway, Lilla Crawford).

After the jump four more pertinent year-in-advance questions about this year's Best Supporting Actress race...

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