Thoughts I Had While Staring at the "Table 19" Poster

Manuel here. There is nothing funnier (I guess?) than a wedding, which explains why Table 19 is the latest comedy to tackle the hilarity of seeing two people profess their love to one another in as public a venue as one can imagine. I joke, though I have to admit this sub-genre has many great examples to justify its continued deployment: Father of the Bride, Bridesmaids, My Best Friend's Wedding, Muriel's Wedding, Four Weddings and a Funeral. Heck, even Wedding Crashers and The Wedding Singer have their charm.

Will Table 19 join that esteemed group? Let's take a look at its poster:

- Can we all agree this is a pitch perfect teaser poster? It gives you a sense of tone and setting with one simple image. I do wish we'd gotten fancier nail art though.

- "Don't Fit In. Take A Number" strikes me as a better tagline for a comedy set in a deli, a butcher shop, or somewhere else where you'd take appointments. (Rather than a wedding where you just get a number assigned to you, no?)

- What I love about this cast is that it perfectly captures the very spirit of a random table at a wedding. What could they possibly have in common but mere contiguity? Just thinking of the comedic stylings of Stephen Merchant hilariously (one hopes) clashing with those of Craig Robinson is surely one of the selling points.

- The promise of Kendrick and Kudrow in a film is enough to get me to buy a ticket, though now I'm wishing Kudrow had invited the Pitch Perfect star to do an episode of Web Therapy.

- So glad Revolori (so great in The Grand Budapest Hotel) will be back in our screens. Now if only he'd dragged Mr. Gustave himself with him as his +1. They'd fit right in with the teaser poster's color scheme.

- Is June Squibb the best recent example of an Oscar nomination breathing life into a character actress' career? I didn't much care for her in Nebraska but I've been happy to see her pop here (Girls) and there (Getting On).

- January 2017? Oy. I'll try not to read too much into that release date but I already foresee it getting lost in the shuffle of the New Year cinematic doldrums (Oscar players aside).

Oh, and the trailer is up but they had me at the cast and I'm too scared to realize the parts may be greater than the sum, so take a look at give it your own YNMS in the comments.

Will be RSVPing (sorry!) Yes to Table 19?

New Posters: Beauty & The Beast, Light Between Oceans, Goat

Thoughts on three new posters as they came to me after the jump...

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Posterized: Zac Efron

Given that it's only July and this weekend brings us the third Zac Efron movie of the year (Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates), perhaps it's time for a Posterized for America's favorite twinkly-eyed twentysomething heartthrob?

Though people are touchy lately about acknowledgement of star beauty, some stars more than obviously lean into it. Efron clearly understands where his plentiful bread has been buttered, regularly getting his shirt off sometimes even as setpiece plot points (Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising). And he's increasingly becoming a living example of unrealistic body expectations. If women can feel bad about their bodies via supermodel objectification, so can men via superheroes...or actors with superhero bodies! Low self-esteem for everyone, hooray!

Happily though, Efron is also talented. He's proved to be a deft comic performer and there's still the possibility of more musicals in his future (he's been offered a role in Hugh Jackman's P.T. Barnum musical) so the immediate future looks bright.

How many of his 18 films have you seen? The posters after the jump...

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Posterized: Movies About Young Black Girls

Not every movie has a white straight male protagonist. It just seems like that since that's Hollywood's default and also the preferred proxy of most (white straight male) auteurs.

But the times are finally a-changing. This weekend features the platform release of a mesmerizing new indie called The Fits -- please see it as soon as it opens near you. I was so proud to push for honoring it on my jury at the Nashville Film Festival. Fresh perspectives on the screen can be so exhilarating. That's especially true when the execution is this confident. Remember the debut director's name, Anna Rose Holmer, since we're hoping for more great movies to come.

In the meantime, let's take a trip back through other features with young black girls as the lead character. I haven't seen the first or the last movie on this list of nine below but the rest all fall somewhere on the spectrum of good to great. 

How many have you seen?

• Just Another Girl on the IRT (1992)
• Eve's Bayou (1997) - Really need to watch this again as previously earlier this week. It was the breakthrough role for Jurnee Smollett-Bell who went on to series regular gigs in Friday Night Lights, True Blood, and The Underground. 
• Our Song (2000) - When it comes to superstar Kerry Washington, it's important to remember that I saw her first. Articles from the early Aughts are no longer online but trust that I gave her a rave review when I saw this teeny tiny indie in theaters and was startled by her total naturalism onscreen.

• Precious (2009) - Best Picture Nominee at the Oscars, and right here.  
• Akeelah and the Bee (2006)
• Pariah (2011) - One of the best LGBT films of the decade

• Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012) - Our #1 film of 2012, and also a Best Picture nominee at the Oscars
• Girlhood (2014) - terrific French film
• Annie (2014)

If you can think of other films with a child or teenage black girl as the lead character, please do share them so our list is more complete.

Posterized: Tye Sheridan

They grow up so fast *sniffle*. Tye Sheridan, the child actor revelation from Terence Malick's The Tree of Life (quite a debut) and Mud is already 19 years old and in major demand. What accounts for his mutant super power of aging rapidly is that Tree of Life actually began shooting when Tye was just 11. Malick takes forever in post production, don'cha know. Male stars don't tend to really come into their A list own until their late 20s or early 30s. DiCaprio is the grand exception to the rule but usually the ones that break out in their late teens or early 20s more commonly have career trajectories, like, oh, Chris O'Donnell. That's partially because the juicy roles for men tend to be the ones that require a 30 or 40something actor.  So it's anyone's guess as to whether or not Sheridan can build on his rather solid first five years in the movies. Are you that anyone? Care to take a guess?

While Sheridan isn't the star of X-Men Apocalypse -- the movies are STILL obsessed with making it all about Magneto, Xavier, Wolverine, and Mystique (sigh) even though we've seen that dynamic five times already (fwiw Wolverine is reduced to a cameo this time but he takes over the movie for a couple of minutes). If the franchise can ever reach for the ensemble magnificence of its source material, Sheridan would be in a great position to collect more than just a paycheck as Scott Summers, aka Cyclops, one of the most enduring and important characters in the books. (He's also onscreens right now in Last Days in the Desert which stars Ewan McGregor as both Jesus and Satan.)

How many of his 10 pictures to date have you seen? 

Next up for Sheridan, if it gets distribution, is Detour (reviewed at Tribeca), presumably more X-Men features as well as more leading roles including Friday's Child,  the crime aftermath drama Grass Stains, the Iraq war soldier drama The Yellow Birds (which he co-leads with Alden Ehrenreich), and Spielberg's sci-fi flick Ready Player One. 2017 could be the star-making year for him if two of those break out strong.