Linker by the Dozen

• NYT Governors Awards. Kyle Buchanan reports on the Honorary Oscars Friday night. Such a pity these aren't televised
• /Film Paramount+ has its highest watched premiere for the new series Halo
• AV Club Lin-Manuel Miranda has to skip the Oscars this year. His wife has tested positive for COVID
• Vulture Joe Reid ranks every Oscar nominee. This is lots of fun and a quick read given the 53 films

More after the jump including Parker Posey, snarky Oscar commentary, animated short, Everything Everywhere All At Once and recent reviews...

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Top Five Reasons to see "Mothering Sunday"

by Cláudio Alves

Adapted by Alice Birch from Graham Swift's novel, Mothering Sunday depicts a day in the life of a young maid in 1920s England. She's been having an affair with a rich boy before he leaves to be married off, plans are made for an afternoon of farewell sex. Throughout, the trauma of World War I haunts the nation, ghosts looming over the living who try to conceal their brokenness through social pageantry. It's all told as remembrance, a writer looking back at her youth, trying to articulate a momentous episode on the page. Cut to non-linear smithereens, the film's prone to disrupt stately historical drama with wet carnality. Flashes of lustful memory often barge their way into unrelated scenes, like rainwater flooding a basement's every nook and cranny...

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Review: the relatable, surreal 'Turning Red'

by Lynn Lee

All images in this post are from Turning Red © Disney/Pixar

Here are some things I never thought I’d see in a Disney animated movie:

-unleashed adolescent female desire, front and center (here metaphorically represented by a red panda)

-matter-of-fact references to menstruation (even though it’s also metaphorically represented, or rather superseded, by the red panda)

-a boy band and Tamagotchis (remember those?) as major plot drivers...

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SXSW: Life as Dolly Parton in ‘Seriously Red’

By Abe Friedtanzer

Just as Patton Oswalt was a draw for another SXSW film, I Love My Dad, actress Rose Byrne getting top billing in a movie about a Dolly Parton impersonator was also an appeal. Seeing a photo of Byrne as Elvis only made it more intriguing. But this is a classic example of a bait-and-switch, albeit a productive and satisfying one, since Byrne has almost no lines and barely even appears in the film. Instead, this is a story of an Australian woman yearning to find herself who does so through her undying love for the popular country star… 

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SXSW: Andrea Riseborough Shines in ‘To Leslie’

By Abe Friedtanzer

 

It's an unwritten rule that every festival must include at least one movie starring Andrea Riseborough, sometimes as many as four (that was Sundance 2018). While I’ll note that I haven’t seen one of her more recent entries – Brandon Cronenberg’s Possessor – most of her turns in the past few years have been very subdued in lackluster films like Nancy, Luxor, and Here Before. I fondly remember her standout performances even with minimal roles in Birdman and The Death of Stalin, and I’m pleased to report that her latest effort, To Leslie, gives her a superb platform again in a leading part…

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