Tues Top Twenty: Halfway Hotties (Best of 2014)

The power of list compels me! Yes, yes, I need to move on from halfway mark madness (we've previously covered best visuals, best acting, best sounds, and best movies) since they're already out of date and it's been so busy what with chart updates (in progress), Emmy nominations, Smackdown panel announcements, Dawn of the Planet and Apes, Boyhood. We need to be back in THE NOW. But I'm dragging my feet mostly because I really like what 2014's been giving. I'm crushing on it hard and thinking about asking it to go steady. 

This is the final halfway mark list. A shorter version of it was published in my column at Towleroad which happens to be "a site with homosexual tendencies" but I've significantly altered it for you because you are all movie mad and the best moviegoers are polysexual when it comes to lusting after big screen beauty.

Why aren't old favorites in this list?
This list is dedicated to Steve Rogers' impossibly broad shoulders and Natasha Romanoff's awesome cleavage (it was generous of Scarlett to unzip for that helicopter scene, don't you think?) but here's the thing. Doing the same shtick over and over again is not sexy. It's like choosing between missionary style and horizontal with man on top. So I've determined that people are totally ineligible if we've seen them do their character multiple times so no franchise babes that aren't newbies or signifantly altered.

Why isn't Marion Cotillard's Immigrant on this list?
Because we'd feel guilty if we lusted after beautiful Polish immigrants who are tricked into becoming sad whores to provide for their sickly sister.

20 HOTTEST ACTOR/CHARACTERS OF 2014 

20 Tom Hiddleston as “The Great Escapo” in Muppets Most Wanted
Boyfriend Material?: Great sense of humor. Into light bondage to spice things up. Looks fiiiiine in a pair of longjohns. Is, to date, the only performance in the Muppets 35 year franchise that’s likely to cause pervy crotch-focused gifs on the internet.
Dealbreaker: Probably in a Russian gulag for a reason

19 Nick Thurston as “Blue Eyes” in Dawn of the Planet of the Apes 
Boyfriend Material?: "Blue Eyes" is right... so soulful. This one's for the plushies... but not the bears. Blue Eyes hates the bears. Easily manipulated (a plus for you control freaks). Plus scars can make you strong / give you character. 
Dealbreaker: Limited conversationalist. Daddy issues.

18 more AFTER THE JUMP...

Click to read more ...

Linkbusters

The Daily Beast the sexual politics of Ghostbusters, 30 years later
The Wire the career of Lorraine Toussaint before Orange is the New Black 
BFI let's kill the buzzword "hybrid" when it comes to documentaries 
/Film there might be a sequel to Neighbors... which wouldn't surprise anyone
Variety Kino-Lorber has picked up one of Sundance's buzziest titles A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night, an Iranian vampire movie, for US distribution (Glenn's review icymi)

In Contention on an new animated contender from GKids, Boy vs. World 
Pajiba celebrates Emily Blunt's greatness as an action star in Edge of Tomorrow
Guardian The director and his muse will try for more Oscars in 2016 with a biopic called Joy about the creator of the Miracle Mop. She was 12 years out of college with 3 children when all this stuff happened. Eventually Jennifer Lawrence will be old enough for the parts David O. Russell keeps casting her in.  
MTV Channing Tatum still super excited about Gambit prospects. Everyone wants their superhero dollars
AV Club rumors abound that it's either Benedict Cumberbatch, Tom Hardy or Jared Leto for Doctor Strange. I worry that Marvel has no clear vision of what they want. What connects any of those actors beyond fame? Very different gifts and styles. (I love Hardy as an actor but he seems like a terrible fit for that character)

Off Cinema
Variety on the explosion of new TV shows in summer now that the game has changed
Cinema Blend Steven Spielberg wants to turn Bryan Cranston's tony winning performance into a tv miniseries
Playbill shares the Tony "In Memoriam" segment that strangely didn't air 
Playbill collects all the Tony performances in one place (seriously, it's like no one even needs to watch live tv anymore) 

And finally I just want to say a big congratulations to Peyton Reed for his new gig.  I've been rooting for him ever since the one-two punch of Bring It On and Down With Love, two stylish, absorbing, joyful, funny movies with a real vision behind them. I was bummed when his proposed retro version of Fantastic Four was cancelled in the Aughts and for what: A low-rent generic lousy f/x heavy version? But it's been so long since he was in the news that I figured his career was over. But now he'll direct Ant-Man. There's been a lot of online sniping calling him a hack, even from sites I otherwise like, but those writers should really think before they type and consider his filmography. There's some "for hire" business yes, but he's a good director. It's an unexpected choice but a good one... even if I'm still deeply suspicious of the project considering Wright's departure and Marvel's current game plans.

Podcast: Neighbors & Godzilla

On this week's podcast Katey Rich (Vanity Fair) returns from her wedding and Nick Davis (Nick's Flick Picks) moderates a Neighbors discussion with Joe Reid (The Wire) and Nathaniel R, (The Film Experience) while deciding whether or not to see it. Then we all talk Godzilla and Gareth Edwards' rising star in the director's chair with shades of Spielberg & Cameron.

Somehow the Cannes film festival, Grace of Monaco and the ladies of Steel Magnolias invade the manly lizard conversation. 

00:01 Katey's wedding & our weekends
03:00 Neighbors vs. 21 Jump Street (2012)
07:00 "I wish it had more jokes" - Nicholas Stoller and modern comedy
09:45 Zac Efron's "surface area"
15:00 "Assjuice," accents, gay panic
22:45 Godzilla and mass destruction
25:30 Character or Monster Driven - Which Is it?
30:00 Aaron Taylor-Johnson vs. Charisma
35:00 the sheer gorgeousity of Gareth Edwards' filmmaking
44:30 Does anyone under 40 have nostalgia for Godzilla?
49:00 Detours to the South of France and Louisiana

You can listen to the podcast here at the bottom of the post or download the conversation on iTunes. Continue the conversation in the comments... and who would you play in a staged reading of Steel Magnolias?

Further Reading Related to This Podcast
Richard Lawson on Zac Efron's dark side
Peter Knegt on the gay pandering of Neighbors
Nathaniel on The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby

 

Godzilla & Neighbors

Beauty Vs Beast: The Boy-Men Next Door

JA from MNPP here - judging by the box office receipts a few of you joined me this weekend in going to see the first big comedy of the Summer of 2014, Neighbors, which had dumb beauty Zac Efron face off against the comparatively beastly Seth Rogen. ("Beastly" is not necessarily a pejorative here, especially judging by the hearty pro-Rogen contingent that showed up when I "Do Dump Marry"'d these two alongside co-star Dave Franco over at my site last week.) Enough of us showed to bounce a superhero sequel in just its second week, at that! So since it's the hot topic this Monday morning (and Zac finally has a post-adolescent hit on him) it only seems right to devote this week's "Beauty Vs. Beast" to the boy-men at its surprisingly gooey center...

poll by twiigs.com

You've got til next Sunday to spank out your case in the comments, so have at it.

PREVIOUSLY ON

Last week we stepped into the ring with a tune on our lips thanks to the Broadway version of Rocky and asked you who KO'd who, and finally coming out with the championship this time was the titular Italian Stallion himself, with just under 60% of the vote. I think some of those votes might've been less than Stallone-inspired though, and might've had more to do with the Tony-nominated lead of the stage show; as John T put it...

"Write-In: Andy Karl (...drool)"

Box Office: Neighbors Come Out On Top

Amir here, with the weekend's box office report. Three new films were released, all of which surprised with their numbers but in different directions. Neighbors, the Seth Rogen/Zac Efron comedy beat The Amazing Spider-Man 2 to first place, and while that isn't surprising in and of itself, the fact that it raked in $51m certainly is. I quite like Seth Rogen, at least compared to other dudebro-y comedians of the moment, and Rose Byrne is a treasure, but I couldn't find the enthusiasm to drive to their neighbourhood just yet. Maybe when the film is out DVD...

Legends of Oz: Dorothy's Return turned out to be a flop of catastrophic proportions, the likes of which I don't think I've ever seen. It managed a paltry 1.4k per screen average. Mom's Night Out is yet another "faith-based" film, this time dressed as a comedy - not that Heaven Is For Real and God's Not Dead aren't (unintentional) comedies, but I digress. Moms' Night Out didn't do as well the other recent religious stuff, but its mere existence surprises me. Surely its production isn't a reaction to the success of other faith-based films, but I wonder how studios emerged with this kind of material all at the exact same moment. Further research into this shall be done soon!

01 NEIGHBORS $51.0 *new* Review
02 THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 2 $37.2 (cum. $147.9) 
03 THE OTHER WOMAN $9.2 (cum. $61.7) 
04 HEAVEN IS FOR REAL $7 (cum. 75.2)
05 CAPTAIN AMERICA 2 $6.5 (cum. 244.9) Review  
06 RIO 2 $5.1 (cum. $113.1)  
07 MOMS' NIGHT OUT $4.2 *new*
08 LEGENDS OF OZ: DOROTHY'S RETURN $3.7 new
09 DIVERGENT $1.7 (cum. $145) Review
10 BRICK MANSIONS $1.5 (cum. $18.3)

For the second week running, there was no arthouse title making waves though both Jon Favreau's Chef and Gia Coppola's Palo Alto performed respectably. I spent the weekend at home, catching up with some classics and enduring the pain of gouging my eyes out at the sight of We're The Millers. What were you up to, dear readers? Did you take your mother to a movie?