Showbiz History: 12 Years a Slave, Mama Rose, and More...

5 random things that happened on this day, January 4th, in history...

1853 New York born Solomon Northup regains his freedom after abduction and enslavery in 1841 in Washington DC. The abolitionist thankfully recorded his life story in the memoir 12 Years a Slave which became an instant best-seller. Over a century and a half later, the film version by the British auteur Steve McQueen deservedly won the 2013 Best Picture Oscar. 

1903 A horrific end to a story of animal cruelty and a shameful event in the then nascent film-industry, too. Topsy, a 27 or so year-old elephant, who was ripped from her family as a baby in Southeast Asia and never adjusted well to life in the America circus, is famously electrocuted in Coney Island...

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Showbiz History: Pal Joey, Taye Diggs, Maria Callas

5 random things that happened on this day, January 2nd, in history...

1788 Georgia becomes the fourth state in the modern US. We're counting on Georgians to save our democracy by giving the Democrats control of the Senate in 2021. Volunteer or donate to Reverend Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossof to make this happen. We just did again despite a frighteningly empty bank account.

1952 A revival of the Rodgers & Hart musical Pal Joey opens on Broadway...

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Review: Guatemala's Oscar submission "La Llorona"

by Nick Taylor

Three cheers for the Boston Society of Film Critics, who kicked off this year’s wave of critics prizes with an amazingly idiosyncratic list of winners and runners-up. Capping their day off with their Foreign Language Film category, they honored Jayro Bustamente’s political ghost story La Llorona, with The Painted Bird in second place. La Llorona has been selected as Guatemala’s submission for International Film at the Oscars, making this the second of Bustamente’s films to be submitted after his astonishing debut Ixcanul in 2015. Three more cheers for Cláudio Alves, whose heroically long FYC thread on Twitter has informed a lot of my recent choices for which 2020 films to catch up with.

La Llorona’s opening credits are delivered over a black background with white text, while a woman’s quiet, hurried, forceful prayers can be heard. Our first real image of the film is a close-up on the speaker’s face, revealed to be an older white woman (Margarita Kenéfic), back straight and eyes unwavering as she stares directly into the lens and asks for protection for herself and her family against those who seek them harm...

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Review: The Twentieth Century

By: Patrick Gratton

Canadian history remembers William Lyon Mackenzie King as one of our most defining statesmen. King was the longest running Prime Minister to hold office in Ottawa, and a central ally to both Winston Churchill and FDR, in mobilizing Canada in World War II. Historians commend Mackenzie King as a central rallying cry for a divided country, whose skill set helped him reach across the aisle, mending multiple differences and helping grow Canada’s Independence even as it remained a British colony.

In his feature film debut The Twentieth Century, Winnipeg-born Matthew Rankin subverts this story. Set in 1899 and told in ten chapters, the film omits all of the soon-to-be Prime Minister’s triumphs, focusing instead on Mackenzie King’s (Dan Bierne) candidacy to be the country’s leader. Rankins shows a steady hand, confidently orchestrating a film that’s equal parts  German expressionism, 1920s melodrama and absurdist satire. The film unapologetically ransacks the mythos of the Canadian identity.

The future prime minister is depicted as a precious man-child, with an overbearing mother (Louis Negin, in drag)...

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One Score and Five Years Ago: Revisiting "The American President" at 25

by Josh Bierman

As we are only 62 days away from a new, brighter era in the White House, now is the perfect time to revisit the Rob Reiner/Aaron Sorkin classic, The American President which is celebrating its 25th birthday this week. Back when it was released, Joe Biden was still a senator from Delaware and Tronald Dump had declared a loss of $915.7 million on his tax returns. I don’t want to make this piece a reflection on the Dump years through the lens of The American President, but as we’ve found in the years since Dump took that fateful ride down a golden escalator, it’s hard to avoid him when watching something overtly political. Or is that just me?

Let’s take it back a little bit. If you haven’t seen The American President since Hillary was just a First Lady, allow me to give a refresher. President Andrew Shepherd (Michael Douglas) is in his first term with high approval ratings, poised to cruise to a reelection victory. Enter Sydney Ellen Wade (Annette Bening), an environmental lobbyist, who catches the widowed president’s eye. But the president’s popularity and reelection chances begin to wane due to their courtship...

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