Remembering Rutger Hauer (1944-2019)

by Nathaniel R

"All those moments will be lost like tears in the rain."

Thus went the immortal words of Roy Batty, in Blade Runner (1982) as he breathed his last, betrayed by the cruel brevity of life. Rutger Hauer improvised one of cinema's all-time greatest death scenes when he was just 38. The actor, who turned 75 this past January, has now passed on, dying at his home in The Netherlands after a short illness.

Rutger Hauer first came to worldwide fame in 1973 as the star of Paul Verhoeven's Oscar-nominated sexually provocative Turkish Delight (the most successful Dutch film of all time). More buzzy international hits from his home country followed. Hollywood soon came calling as they usually do when someone who can speak English fluently has multiple imported hits...

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Goodbye, Valentina

We regret to inform you that the headscarf-loving Italian actress Valentina Cortese has passed away at 96 years of age. She first came to international fame playing Fantine & Cosette in an Italian take on the oft-adapted Les Misérables (1948). After that picture European directors came calling and so did Hollywood (including the Academy)...

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Stranger Links

• Backstage casting notice for Asian actors. As @AnnieW pointed out on twitter this can't be anything other than the live-action remake of Akira
• Cinematic Corner ten best scenes in the Stranger Things series before the new season premieres
• Coming Soon how many times does Anna Karenina need to be remade? Apparently that's still tbd since there's another one coming

More after the jump including Carice van Houten, Darth Maul, Quentin Tarantion, and news of a new Clint Eastwood film...

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No Hit Ever Dies: Cruella, Juno, Saw, Snowpiercer, and Capernaum

• Coming Soon Emma Thompson is in talks to join Disney's Cruella movie. No word on what her role is, though, since its Emma Stone playing the title character
• Playbill Leos Carax (Holy Motors) begins shooting a movie musical called Annette this summer. Marion Cotillard and Adam Driver star
• MNPP Rocketman photocall at Cannes. Fun suit, Taron Egerton
• Screen Daily how Nadine Labaki's Capernaum became a major hit in China's growing arthouse cinema market
• Variety ...and speaking of. Labaki is working on a documentary on the making of Lebanon's all time biggest hit film

More after the jump including Avengers Endgame, a reboot of Saw, recent Hollywood deaths, and the latest news from Broadway...

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Doris Day (1922-2019)

by Nathaniel R

"Legend" and "Icon" and "Classic" are all overused words in showbiz prose, and we're as guilty of anyone at letting those words fly out with abandon. But they're nothing like overstatements when it comes to the career of Doris Day, one of the 20th Century's most beloved and successful stars. She began her career as a teenage big band singer and nine years later debuted on the big screen in her most regular genre, the romantic comedy (with or without songs) via Busby Berkeley's Romance on the High Seas (1948).

She was an instant hit with audiences but it took a few more years for her true classics to emerge...

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