Reader's Choice: Cruel Intentions (1999)

Wednesday nights are now devoted to you. We'll alternate between a Q&A and a Reader's Choice Movie. So you are essentially picking the topics each week. We started with Gattaca but y'all kept asking for Cruel Intentions so here we are again.

Believe it or not, I've never seen Cruel Intentions (1999) so I gladly accept the multiple requests to discuss. This is written and directed by someone named Roger Kumble and the name did not ring a bell. It turns out he's still working, mostly on television and he's working on a TV sequel to this very movie. I missed this news somehow but Sarah Michelle Gellar is reprising her role so this post is more timely than I meant it to be.

The credits also inform us that it's only "suggested by" Dangerous Liaisons.  That's a fancy word for adapted if you want to compete in Original Screenplay at the Oscars. (Not that this teen picture had any such designs.) I'm not sure if you know this but Dangerous Liaisons (1988) is one of my all time favorite movies. And Swoosie Kurtz is in this one, too! We begin with her as Sebastian Valmont's (Ryan Phillipe) therapist. Her broad gestures and funny notes remind us that this is a comedy. Of sorts. 

Swoosie, an unlikely victim in both Dangerous Liaisons movie

In both movies Swoosie is the mother of someone who couldn't have possibly come from her womb: Uma Thurman in the 1988 movie and Tara Reid in this movie -- so, downgrade. Tara must have been left on the editing room floor because this photo is all we see of her

His therapist is immune to young Sebastian's charms but she learns as he's leaving that her daughter wasn't. She screams at her nasty patient as he leaves the building and he flashes her this baby devil grin. [More...]

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What do you suppose Nicole gave Reese for her birthday?

Awww. Reese Witherspoon celebrated her 40th birthday yesterday with Nicole Kidman. They've been filming the miniseries Big Little Secrets of late. Curious that the photo makes it look like the wine is where the birthday candles go.

Over the weekend she also had a big star studded birthday bash so she was doing 40 right. What do you suppose Nicole gave Reese? What would you give Reese for her birthday? 

His & Hers Oscars? Happy 10th to June & Johnny

Ten years ago right about now Reese & Joaquin took the stage in movie theaters with a full sung duet as June and Johnny Cash. Both were Oscar-nominated for their ringed fire as tempestuous country superstar marrieds with Reese going on to win in a strangely non competitive Best Actress year. His & Hers Oscar nominations for lively onscreen marriages aren't anything new of course but they also aren't dependable since one of the partners is often foregrounded while the other is window dressing or is equally brilliant but just not nominated.

But of the ten double nominees who did it best in the intervening years? (I included the divorced couples just to up the numbers). You decide. To make this more exciting, judge the performances FUSED. Who wins your vote then? These are your ten options

Lead unless otherwise noted
2005 Joaquin Phoenix & Reese Witherspoon*, Walk the Line
2005 Heath Ledger & Michelle Williams (supporting), Brokeback Mountain
2010 Helen Mirren & Christopher Plummer (supporting), The Last Station 
2011 Colin Firth* & Helena Bonham Carter (supporting), The King's Speech  
2012 Daniel Day Lewis* & Sally Field (supporting), Lincoln 
2012 Amy Adams & Phillip Seymour Hoffman (both supporting), The Master 
2013 Bruce Dern & June Squibb (supporting), Nebraska 
2013 Christian Bale & Jennifer Lawrence (supporting), American Hustle 
2014 Eddie Redmayne* & Felicity Jones, Theory of Everything 
2014 Patricia Arquette* & Ethan Hawke (both supporting), Boyhood 

*won the Oscar

What of 2015?

The "His & Hers" teams of married possibilities this year are Eddie Redmayne & Alicia Vikander in The Danish Girl (Hers & Hers in that case, though she's pretending to be supporting), and Charlotte Rampling with Tom Courtenay in 45 Years. Neither of those pairs are locked up for nominations just yet. As befits this year with blessed multiple female-centric films, Vikander and Rampling both have more nomination heat than their male actor screen spouses.

NEWS: Reese, Rocky Horror & The Revenant

Manuel here trying to keep up with exciting news about several TFE faves (and one who hasn’t quite earned that title).

- HBO’s Big Little Lies, which we’ve discussed before since it’s produced and will star the unlikely power duo of Nicole Kidman and Reese Witherspoon, has “allegedly” found a director. Jean Marc-Vallée, of Wild and (more recently) Demolition (TIFF review) fame is in talks to direct the first episode of the short television series adaptation of Liane Moriarty’s endlessly readable book about suburban secrets. Confession: I read it in one sitting and can’t wait to see how it turns out. Let’s hope they sign Vallée’s contract soon since he’s wont to keep himself busy (presumably with that long-gestating Janis Joplin pic with Amy Adams).

- Orange is the New Black breakout star Laverne Cox has been tapped to play the role of Dr. Frank N. Furter, made iconic by a fishnet-stocking-ed Tim Curry in the 1975 film The Rocky Horror Picture Show, in FOX’s TV remake which unlike NBC’s attempts at television musical revivals, will not be broadcast live but be filmed in advance. Seeing as Frank N. Furter is a “sweet transvestite” the casting of Cox, an outspoken trans activist, is a fascinating case of stunt casting in it of itself though it’s already earning the “hot take” treatment in some online outlets. Needless to say, I’m curious to see Cox’s take on the role, and eagerly await who director Kenny Ortega casts as Rocky Horror. Any suggestions?

- Oh, and I couldn’t not feature the gorgeous new poster for Alejandro González Iñárritu’s The Revenant.

The film, if you've followed its pre-release chatter, has already won Oscars for Leo, Chivo and potentially everyone else associated with it. (I kid! Though, not really). We were obviously impressed with the teaser trailer and so this evocative one-sheet is no surprise but by god if it’s not pretty. Perhaps a tad pretentious in that it literally defines the title for you. Though, admit it, “revenant” is not really in the vernacular. That neither Leo or Iñárritu’s name are billed anywhere in the poster is fascinating. Is it humility (“let the film speak for itself”) or hubris (“the film doesn’t need to be sold on people’s names”), or perhaps something else?

Women's Pictures - Mary Harron's American Psycho

Anne Marie continues a special horror month on "Women's Pictures"

Fun fact: American Psycho was the single most voted for film for the horror edition of Women's Pictures. Despite that, I almost didn't include it. This isn't because of some sudden onset of squeamishness on my part, or dislike of the film. American Psycho simply isn't a horror movie, at least not by conventional standards. American Psycho is director Mary Harron's dark Juvenalian satire of American consumerism, materialism, and the crisis of masculinity in the turn of the 21st century.

Though set in the 1980s, American Psycho is one of a handful of films from the late 1990s and early 2000s that violently pokes at the concept of modern masculinity. Like American Beauty and especially Fight Club, American Psycho confronts the idea of modern man chained to a desk, unfulfilled and overburdened by contemporary consumerist definitions of success. The titular Psycho is Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale), a music-obsessed Wall Street broker in the decade where everything, from hair to shoulder pads to paychecks, was bigger. Bateman has all of the plastic markers of success: trendy apartment, good haircut, designer cloths, WASP fiance, the right friends, and a killer business card. But under his flashy, fake veneer, Patrick is all id. He wants to kill. He wants to fuck. He wants to possess. [More...]

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