An IndieWire TIFF Poll

We'll wrap up our TIFF coverage tomorrow with the full index of reviews for now I wanted to point you to IndieWire where they've published their "best of TIFF" critics survey and the results are interesting but also disheartening since they remind us that US critics rush to films that are about to open rather than to films without distributors when they hit festivals. (I'll never understand this really.) They also don't seem to care about foreign language films - only one picture from their entire top collective top ten is in a foreign language (Hungary's Son of Saul) and you have to go down into the #13 before you see them crop up with regularity.

The already wildly overrated Charlie Kaufman joint Anomalisa is #1 just barely in a photofinish with the only marginally overrated Spotlight. Hee. Lots more on the actors and a distinct Oscar possibility after the jump...

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Beauty vs Beast: Gyllenhaal x 3

Who is with me in missing Jason's Beauty vs. Beast column? He's been offline a lot this month. So here's a Beauty vs Beast in his honor, training our eyes on the one and only Jake Gyllenhaal. Or, rather, the Jake Gyllenhaals as he's versatile.

Therein lies the twist. It's All-Beautiful Jake (Brokeback Mountain & Love & Other Drugs) versus Beautiful & Beastly Jake (Donnie Darko & Jarhead) versus All-Beastly Jake (Southpaw & Nightcrawler). Who gets your vote? Ready? You're always ready for Jake. So go... Vote and Comment. Pound your keyboard so hard that you wake Jason up and he returns to us next week to resume his series.

JAKE vs. JAKE vs. JAKE

Beautiful Jake

Beauty *and* Beast Jake

Beastly Jake

Poll Maker

Previously on Beauty vs Beast...

Janet Leigh's Marion Crane beat Anthony Perkin's Norman Bates by a slim but still surprising 55% of your votes. Your love blindsided us. Jason and I both thought it would turn out differently given that Norma Bates is an immortal villain and Marion Crane is well, dead and buried (or, rather, submerged) but y'all are so predictable when there's an actress involved. Hence this week's all male challenge. There's no actress to win your automatic vote. However will it turn out? 

Ingrid Bergman is Coming. Ingrid Bergman is Coming.

Next month is the centennial of one of the greatest film stars of all time, Ingrid Bergman. 

To do the icon justice, we know we'll have to plan ahead and cover multiple films. Obviously we'll hit Hitchcock's Notorious (my personal favorite) and a few of her Oscar roles. But which lesser-discussed films should we cover? You may choose three. If you feel really strongly plead your case in the comments!

Which Ingrid Bergman films would you most like to read about (select 3)

Intermezzo (1939) with Leslie Howard

Adam Had Four Sons (1941) with Susan Hayward

Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde (1941) with Spencer Tracy

For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943) with Gary Cooper

Spellbound (1945) with Gregory Peck

Arch of Triumph (1948) with Charles Boyer

Under Capricorn (1949) with Joseph Cotten

Stromboli (1950) via Roberto Rossellini

Journey to Italy (1954) via Roberto Rossellini

Indiscreet (1958) with Cary Grant

The Inn of the Sixth Happiness (1958) in China

The Yellow Rolls Royce (1964) all star anthology

Cactus Flower (1969) with Walter Matthau

Poll Maker

Beauty vs Beast: Sidewalk Stories

Jason from MNPP here with this week's "Beauty vs Beast" -- the very first movie that I ever saw being filmed in person was on one of my first trips to New York City; I guess it must've been in the spring of 1997? There I was walking down a side-street near NYU, a wide-eyed country bumpkin in the big city, when who should suddenly be standing in front of me but Jack Nicholson. Jack Nicholson! That'll stop you dead in your tracks. Beside him was Helen Hunt and Greg Kinnear and you guessed it, it was James L. Brooks' multiple Oscar winner As Good As It Gets.

I watched them film for about half an hour (it was the scene where they were getting into the car to go on their mid-movie road-trip) in awe, and now whenever I think of this movie I think of that experience and how fundamental it was to cementing this city as where I wanted to live my life. There's magic around every corner, wedged terrifyingly in every crack of the sidewalk. Long story short today is Helen Hunt's birthday (and Greg Kinnear's birthday is on Wednesday) so As Good As It Gets it is...

PREVIOUSLY Last time around we anticipated the weekend's great big movie (movie-a-saurus) with a claw-off between the Tyrannosaurus Rex and the Velociraptor in Steven Spielberg's 1993 original Jurassic Park - ya'll love your Clever Girls and the Raptor slashed her way to the winning circle with 60% of the vote. Said forever1267:

"Velociraptors are one of the few movie monsters that really scared me while watching the movie. They aren't supposed to be smart! They're not supposed to be able to open doors! They're not supposed to be clever! Chills!"

Beauty vs Beast: Like Father Luke Son

Happy May the Fourth, everybody! Jason from MNPP here - it wasn't until this morning when Nathaniel reminded us of the annual Star Wars holiday-of-sorts that I looked back through our "Beauty vs Beast" archives and found it to be seriously Skywalker wanting, which is just unacceptable. I was maybe a little too young for the first round of Star Wars movies and definitely a little too old for the Prequels so I've never been as huge a fanatic about the series as some folks, but I enjoy the world enough that the Force Awakens trailer made me a little misty-eyed. I have my fingers and toes and lightsabers crossed that Abrams has made a good movie, one that does justice to what George Lucas accomplished and to what so many people love - the simple story of a boy and his dad, learning to find common ground.

Whose team are you on?

Team Luke Skywalker

Team Darth Vader

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PREVIOUSLY Elvira Hancock might've told Tony Montana they were losers not winners but it turns out he's the only loser in this town - Michelle Pfeiffer pretty handily trounced Al Pacino in last weeks Scarface-off. Said The Pretentious Know It All:

"Admit you didn't vote for Elvira on this blog at your own peril."