Streep Finally Listens, Gets Real Director.

We've been harping on Meryl Streep's extraordinary lack of interest in working with A list directors who might actually, you know, direct her for a decade. She's finally working with one. She's now attached to Ricky and the Flash and, juvenile sounding title aside, it sounds like a potential winner.

She'll play a rock star trying to reconnect with her estranged children when her career peters out. The script is by clever Diablo Cody and in the director's chair, none other than Oscar winner Jonathan Demme. He's quite gifted with actresses having previously directed arguably career best work from actresses as diverse as Anne Hathaway (Rachel Getting Married), Melanie Griffith (Something Wild), and Jodie Foster (Silence of the Lambs). He also guided Michelle Pfeiffer, once his favorite actress, in her best romantic comedy outing (Married to the Mob). More...

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"And Emily..."

(Great Moments in Screen Bitchery, #91, Meryl Streep in The Devil Wears Prada)

Yes, No, Maybe So: "The Giver"

Normally we don't cover "teasers" in the Yes No Maybe So trailer series but we'll make an exception with The Giver because it is trapped somewhere between a short teaser and a full length trailer. And because we might not want to talk about it again, if this 'traiser' is evidence. Despite two of the world's greatest actors (Jeff Bridges & Meryl Streep) helping it along our appetite is not whetted.

The movie, based on a fantastical YA bestseller (aren't they all?), is about a boy living in an utopian future that is actually a dystopia. SURPRISE! La Streep plays the Elder, who likes to be the figurehead of the repressive harmonious society and Jeff Bridges, her mirror on the other side, who helps our young hero to see the truth.

The trailer and our YNMS breakdown after the jump

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Linksy

IndieWire the winners at SXSW Fort Tilden (narrative) and The Great Invisible (doc). You may recall that Short Term 12 was the big discovery last year so let's hope Fort Tilden hits theaters soon. But mostly I'm leading with this because the still released has kittens in it. Kittens!

But mostly I led with that because the first still released has kittens in it. Three. Kittens. Kittens, I say.

KITTENS

Ahem. Some links...
LA Review of Books Charles Taylor on Meryl Streep's recent string of gorgon roles and particularly August: Osage County. Really interesting article but Streep fanatics should steer clear since it is merciless. (Slightly confused about what this essay is doing at a 'Review of Books' since none are mentioned.) 
Golden Globe I hadn't seen this before - celebrities fav movies. Turns out Robin Wright loves Werner Herzog, Carey Mulligan loves Steven Spielberg, Emile Hirsch has very Oscar-bait taste, and Julia Roberts loves The Mexican most of her own ???
MNPP [NSFW] Jake Gyllenhaal on the set of Everest
The Playlist on Steven Soderbergh's King of the Hill Criterion release and his dissatisfaction with his post Sex, Lies and Videotape pre Out of Sight period 

Towleroad "Hodor" (Kristian Nairn) on Game of Thrones comes out in an interview 
Movie City News on "popcorn time" and piracy
The Wrap supposedly four actors fighting for the Doctor Doom role in The Fantastic Four: Eddie Redmayne, Sam Riley, Domnhall Gleeson, and Toby Kebbell. I'd say that wasn't a great get considering the face will be covered with a metal mask... but then origin stories, you know, they'll have some time before the face plate.
Variety uh-oh chest thumping Celine Dion could be back at the Oscars again in an Original Song performance. She gets a duet with Miss Piggy "Something So Right" in the new Muppets film 

Finally...
I don't normally post any fundraiser things beyond the site's own need for funding, detailed here. For instance, I had to make a ruling on no campaigns for indie movies simply because I get so many requests every week it'd be a part time job just putting up those posts with no added value for you the reader. But for movie theaters I'll make an exception. Brooklyn is home to so many cinephiles it'd be a pity if they lost another old theater. So if you want to help save the Brooklyn Heights Cinema -- which needs to update its equipment or be shut down -- here's the info!

Beauty Vs Beast - SlayerFest 2014

JA from MNPP here with this week's new edition of Beauty Vs. Beast! As I noted over at my site last week, today is the 17th anniversary of the first ever episode of Joss Whedon's televisual masterpiece Buffy the Vampire Slayer - "Welcome to the Hellmouth" aired on the WB on March 10th 1997, and some of us have been whooping it up inside that Hellmouth ever since.

If you're a fan you know what happened on Buffy's 17th birthday - let's just hope we can all make it through today without anybody's ancient Gypsy curse being activated by sexual relations. That Angelus, he was a nasty one... but Glorificus did her damage too, The Master and the Mayor - an endless list of memorable villains.

But it's Buffy's dark mirror that's always revved our engines the hardest... 

Welcome to SlayerFest '14!!!

poll by twiigs.com

Only one can make it out alive! The too good blonde, the too bad brunette - make your pick and then we'll all skip class and stake some vamps and dance crazy at The Bronze til the sun comes up and dusts our boyfriends.

"previously on..."
Before y'all hit the comments and give us your reasonings though, a look back at last week's (literal) face-off - we were talking the spray-painted ladies of Death Becomes Her, and sure enough, confounding nobody's expectations - MERYL WON. Team Madeline blew a shotgun hole through Goldie's Helen with about 2/3rds of the vote. (As if we needed to puff up Meryl's chest anymore!) As Rob put it in the comments:

"Hel does have a special place in my heart for eating frosting out of its container with her fingers while rewinding the footage of Madeline dying on film but over and over again. But, in the end, gotta go with Madeline, because FLAWLESS."