The Film Experience™ was created by Nathaniel R. All material herein is written by our team. (This site is not for profit but for an expression of love for cinema & adjacent artforms.)
USA Today no, Jennifer Lawrence did not have a wardrobe malfunction despite all visual evidence to the contrary. That's just the dress! Filmdrunk uncovers the MTV promo that got JLaw her SAG card - she mentioned it in her speech last night. In Contention wonders where Ang Lee is in all the who will win Pic/Dir confusion i09 do you want a documentary about the ill-fated Tim Burton / Nicolas Cage Superman movie? I sure do! Schadenfreude for days on end! Pop Elegantarium awwww a new Film Experience baby. Congratulations to mom Alexa (who writes the Curio column right here) EW Hunter Foster on Bunheads with real life sister Sutton Foster. Gah. I ♥ them both MNPP superheroes working it Pajiba Celebrity friendships you probably didn't know about. I knew a few but some really goodies unearthed here. Some of these are really surprising (Kyle Chandler & Lorenzo Lamas) others shouldn't be surprising but somehow I didn't know (Matt Bomer & Lee Pace are best friends?) and others are just delightful as in 'they stayed close after filming!' (Christian Bale & Winona Ryder?) but anyway, read it. Fun finds. Wired Is Glee stealing arrangements from indie musicians? My god I'm so glad I gave up on that show when I did and have never been attempted to return. This story is so sleazy awful.
And I'll leave you with an old video of Emma Stone shaking it shaking it shaking it.
This makes me want to watch Easy A and Crazy Stupid Love on loop right now.
Michael C. here just back from an encounter with the Spirit of Vengeance.
There is something about movies not screening for critics that makes me want to see titles I would otherwise self-deport to avoid. I think it’s the idea that they’re trying to get away with something. I want to go to prove that they're as awful as I suspect. Not rational behavior, I admit, but I feel I have to produce some explanation as to why, when my friends suggested we go see Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, I went, instead of doing something sensible like jumping in front of a bus.
Of course, my friends didn’t think the movie would be good either. These days one sees a Nicolas Cage movie for the same reason one Googles “epic fail” or watches the GOP debates: the promise of spectacular, instantly classic moments of insanity. Cage’s recent films have been so consistently bonkers that they are now a genre unto themselves. A genre wherein a drug-fueled communion with imaginary iguanas is classified as “same old, same old”.
JA from MNPP here, with a look at the latest Charlie Kaufman news. If you’re like me – and generally that’s something I encourage, since I just really think my opinions are top drawer – then you think that Charlie Kaufman’s Synecdoche New York was one of the finest films of the last decade. Endlessly rewarding and deeply moving... I’ve seen it five or six times at this point and it’s like looking through a prism, new colors and shapes forming in front of me with every new glance. So I’m primed to follow news of what he’ll be handling next. We first heard about Frank or Francisback in March but details were few and far between.
Now, notsomuch. You can read all about it over here but the general idea is this is a musical (of sorts) about a war (of sorts) between a director and a blogger that aims to eviscerate every aspect of Hollywood (of sorts). Nothing is that simple where Charlie’s words are concerned, but that condenses it into a sentence, I guess. Steve Carell is set to play the director, and Jack Black is set to play the blogger (of course he is since all bloggers look like Jack Black). Kevin Kline will be playing two roles a la Nicholas Cage in Adaptation. Speaking of Cage he’s also in this movie, playing “The Emcee,” which, name-alon,e immediately brings to mind Joel Grey’s role in Cabaret, right? And if this thing's as musical as they say it is, that can't be an associative mistake.
The first thing that strikes me here is how man-centric the cast is. Synecdoche was so heavily populated with fantastic actresses – Catherine Keener and Michelle Williams and Samantha Morton (dear god, she’s so good in it) and Hope Davis and Jennifer Jason Leigh and Emily Watson and Dianne Weist all bouncing off of Phillip Seymour Hoffman in the middle. CK’s always given women such plum goods to play with – Meryl in Adaptation! Diaz in Being John Malkovich! – that I find myself longing to hear some lady names soon. But I’m certainly ready for whatever Kaufman sends my way. And on top of this he’s also written Spike Jonze’s next movie, too! Oh, yes.
As you know if you're paying attention (there will be a quiz) I've been offline for 72 hours. GASP! So if some of the following links are GASP 72 hours old, you will forgive. For the record I highly recommend spending 72 hours in a cabin in the woods without internet, tv or cel phones (provided there are no serial killers nearby). Highly relaxing!
Let's catch up with pieces/stories you (by which I mean "I") might have missed!
The Film Doctor on Contagion and the "die-off" scenario. Go Fug Yourself succinct funny snappy boring Brangelina Blog Stage will Broadway actress Mary Farber be a new SNL cast member? Towleroad the continuing antics of James Franco. This time painted pink for Woooo mag. My New Plaid Pants Kate Winslet... and Elizabeth Taylor Natasha VC remember a time via Pauline Kael when Nicolas Cage was sorta wonderful. I saw Moonstruck again recently and it was just ♥♥♥♥... well that's amore!
Empire Online Hugh Grant joins the already gargantuan name cast of Cloud Atlas which, if you'll recall, already has three directors. It sounds like a mess but Empire is feeling hopeful. Awards Daily on Oscar and sex. Do they really take issue with explicit films? (in short: yes) IndieWire Remember when I made that brief Oscar prediction about Shailene Woodley in The Descendants and people made fun? Well, her buzz isn't boiling or anything but it is simmering ever since Telluride. WSJ Asia Scene Deanie Ip (A Simple Life) who just won the Venice Volpi Cup for Best Actress on why she took a long break from acting...
I think nobody wants me, because I’m very difficult.
Towleroad Clint Eastwood kicks off the UnOfficial (but not for long) Armie Hammer Best Supporting Actor campaign for J. Edgar while Hammer boasts of his own chest hair The Telegraph interviews the ascendant Ryan Gosling
If I'm still acting at 46, I'll be surprised.
Say it ain't so. Of course it isn't. I wish I had kept a spreadsheet of all the alarmist things celebrities have said over the years because no one ever remembers... including me. As I typed this sentence I was about to share this anecdote about what Matt Damon said this one time in a magazine about making ridiculous amounts of money and how that would mean he would... but I've already forgotten what he said he wouldn't do anymore. It was something about quitting or not doing any press. Something silly. Because of course he went on to make gazillions and still works in front of the camera and plays to it in interviews.
Today's Must See Video Madonna on the whole silly Venice Film Festival loathing hydranges "story"
There really is nothing better than Madonna with a sense of humor about herself. It's always been her saving grace and if she doesn't locate it as often as she once did, at least it's still there! And it's great timing since she's hitting the publicity circuit with such gusto. Two of my friends/acquaintances, fraquaintances? even interviewed her: Peter and Scott. I can't imagine how either got through it. Honestly, I can't.
Finally... if you're as interested in editing as I am, you might enjoy this very thorough analysis of a key action sequence in The Dark Knight (2008).
I highlight it because, like Jim Emerson, I have always been thrown by that film's editing (the Oscar nomination is baffling to me) as it doesn't make coherent sense, spatially or time-wise. (If you don't share this pet peeve -- I realize many people enjoy contemporary cinema's rule-free freneticism of editing -- you might not enjoy this video. This is actually the #2 most prominent reason as to why I have never been a Christopher Nolan convert. I prefer action filmmakers like James Cameron and Kathryn Bigelow who never (or very very rarely) sacrifice coherency for thrills.
What are the chances that Trespass (2011) in which my beloved Nicole Kidman is soiled by association with hacktor Nicolas Cage is as terrible as Next (2007) in which my beloved Julianne Moore was soiled by association with hacktor Nicolas Cage?
Slim? I mean Next is an atrocious movie... so Trespass would have to be less embarrassing, right? Famous last words?
The only reason I saw Next back in the day was because I'm a masochist/completist with Julianne. Even Julianne herself felt sorry for me when I told her I'd seen nearly all of them.
Really? My god, you've seen some junk then!
I haven't been anywhere close to a completist with Nicki Kidman
Monday, January 28, 2013 at 4:48PM 
USA Today no, Jennifer Lawrence did not have a wardrobe malfunction despite all visual evidence to the contrary. That's just the dress!
