Celebrating "The Fifth Element"

by Seán McGovern

Occasionally I receive a text message from my mother that The Fifth Element is on television. Why she feels the need to tell me, I'm never quite sure. Possibly because my adoration for the film is palpable, or because she like many critics at the time believes that it "may or may not be the worst movie ever made." But The Fifth Element does not need to be defended. It can only be celebreated. As Valerian launches from the imagination of Luc Besson into cinemas everywhere, now is the perfect time to celebrate France's greatest foray into a very American genre: the intergalactic sci-fi action movie.

There's a blonde Bruce Willis, Leeloo Dallas Multipass and of course - Ruby Rhod - all after the jump...

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Resident Evil ...Again.

by Brian Zitzelman

One of the strangest things about Oscar month is that the movies that open during it are usually the opposite of prestige. Tomorrow sees the release of Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, the allegedly last installment of this long-running franchise. With more than a decade's worth of subpar critical reviews, it's nonetheless more notable than it might seem upon first glance.  

Superhero movies aside, R-rated action franchises haven't especially been booming in the twenty-first century, or even in the post Arnold/Stallone/Willis dominated run of the 80s to mid-90s...

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The 16 Greatest Music Videos of '16

Every day, different angles on a 2016 wrap up. Tonight Nathaniel with the year's best musical short films...

It's true. They're more commonly referred to as "Music Videos" but since they have their roots in the Movie Musical, we think of them as short film descendants of that greatest of film genres. Music videos, which exploded so spectacularly in the 1980s with the dawn of MTV but experienced something like a midlife death rather than crisis, when MTV dropped the music part of music television, have roared back to life in the past decade with YouTube Vimeo and other saviors. The medium is alive and well and arguably healthier than ever (until the next platform crisis at least).

Though Beyonce's Lemonade dominated the conversation, 2016 actually produced a remarkable number of musical shorts that one might include under the umbrella of "Women Gone Wild," a subgenre equal parts political, erotic, and psychological...

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We Are the Link

Fistful of Film a wonderful personal take on We Are the Best from a father of girls 
Section Eighty a composer discusses the Oscar-nominated film scores
Coming Soon Milla Jovovich confirms she's about to make another Resident Evil movie, supposedly the final one. She turns 40 this year and started this series when she was but 25.
KCRW Actor Craig Chester believes he's haunted by the ghost of Montgomery Clift 
Out Alexis Arquette taking no prisoners in an interview. But bizarre that she didn't know her own sister was up for an Oscar! 

 

Indie Wire the lineup of New Directors New Films this year The Tribe and White God are both featured. They feel like anything but "new" to me after a whole year of festivalling but I still haven't had the chance to see either - will they ever open theatrically or just keep doing festivals like this one for a second year?
In Contention most anticipated films of Sundance 
We Recycle Movies you should check out Anne Marie's rainbow countdown to the Oscars
The Carpetbagger welcome to Phase 2 of the Oscars. Also: Mark Schultz changes his tune again on Foxcatcher. I am not saying this snarkily but with concern: this is why we need universal health care and easier access less stigma for mental illness treatment. Something is seriously wrong with this guy 

American Sniper Mania
Grantland excellent piece by Mark Harris on why American Sniper's box office won't help its Oscar run ... "success breeds scrutiny"
Rolling Stone on American Sniper's stupidity - they use a similar comparison to Forrest Gump like the one I tweeted icymi
Movie City News David Poland doing some train of thought hand wringing on the extreme combativeness of theAmerican Sniper and Selma Oscar battle... that isn't really a battle but that people have suddenly made it into one 
Playbill ...but perhaps the worst American Sniper news is that its leading Broadway's Elephant Man revival to cancel several performances due to Bradley Cooper's awards schedule 

Off Cinema
Pajiba the one reason to keep watching Girls 
NYT John Cameron Mitchell returns to Hedwig, the role which made him and also, not so incidentally, brought us a brilliant film director. Make another movie, Mitchell! All three of yours are heaven.
i09 looks at lesser known characters in the public domain. Will any of them be revived? 
i09 they also look at the case of James Bond, now public domain in Canada! But not in the US or Europe.
Towleroad's the story of Björk's new album, released two months early. Sad she broke up with Matthew Barney. They seemed like such an iconoclast match

Links:

The Awl remembers actress Milla Jovovich's debut album "The Divine Comedy". OMG I loved this record in 1994 and I didn't know anyone else knew it.
Celebitchy Matthew McConaughey designed his own assless chaps for Magic Mike. Commitment!
IndieWire Tribeca Film Festival winners include the child soldier drama War Witch (not the first of its big festival wins) for Best Narrative Feature and Best Actress and Una Noche for Director and Best Actor(s)

Austin Translation the Not-So Dark Knight
Towleroad gay superhero Northstar, just about the only superhero the movies don't seem interested in, may be tying the knot soon 

Belle almost looked more like Ava Gardner! Sketch by Andreas DejaDeja View Belle originally had a younger sister in Beauty & The Beast. Who knew? Also Ava Gardner as an influencing model for Belle's look.
Coming Soon Looks like Colin Farrell's career is most definitely on the upswing again with a slate of new projects including possibly Winter's Tale, a period romantic drama based on the 1983 novel of the same name co-starring Jessica Brown Findlay and Russell Crowe. 
How Are You I'm Fine Thanks died (RIP). If Tom Hiddleston loved the comic you drew from him, you would too