Big Little Lies MVPs: Episode 2 "Serious Mothering"

by Nathaniel R

previously: episode 1

Top Ten MVPs of Big Little Lies. Episode 2 "Serious Mothering" 
In episode 2 we learn that Celeste's husband Perry (Alexander Skarsgård) is abusive and even their love life is violent. Meanwhile Renata and Madeline get into a screaming match in a restaurant over an upcoming children's party, and Madeline's two husbands -- the ex Nathan (James Tupper) and the current Ed (Adam Scott) -- rub each other the wrong way. 

A list of ten wonderments from this installment after the jump...

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Review: "Paris 05:59: Théo & Hugo"

This review was originally published in Nathaniel's column at Towleroad

You've seen the moment many times. Two future lovers see each other in a crowd, and something clicks. In West Side Story that moment prompts a blur on the edges of the frame, with only the lovers in focus. In La La Land, it takes the form of a camera push-in with all the lights, but for a spotlight, going out. The moment is so familiar in fantasies (and desired in reality) that there's even an old showtune about it.

Some enchanted evening, you will meet a stranger
You will meet a stranger across a crowded room.
And somehow you know, you know even then...

The last place you might expect to see it deployed is in a new French film which begins with 18 minutes of explicit activity in a sex club...

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TIFF: Isabelle Huppert is "Elle"

Nathaniel R reporting from the Toronto International Film Festival (Sept 8th-18th)

On any given day around the movie internet you will see the headine "What You Need To Know About ['Movie You Haven't Seen Yet']". It's clickbait. The sum total of what you need to know about a movie before you see it is nothing. Go to the movie theater and actually experience it. So if the promise of a new acclaimed Paul Verhoeven feature (his first since the riveting Black Book in 2006) that's been loudly labelled a "rape comedy" starring the world's most casually transgressive movie star Isabelle Huppert is enough to sell you a ticket I urge you to not read any reviews before seeing it, including this one. It's not that the film has twists that can spoil the experience if they're known ahead of time so much as it's in the way the movie is itself twisted.

Just how twisted is revealed through the careful deployment of its psychosexual landmines. And just how often they're successfully played for laughter ... albeit of the discomforting 'what am I laughing at?' variety. 

Two provocative legends (Verhoeven & Huppert) on set

Which is not to say that the rape itself is the subject of comedy...

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5 Things That The New Poster For 'Zoom' Is Lacking

by Manuel Betancourt

Let's talk about the film Zoom. Have you heard of it? It’s this international co-production film that sounds like the hybrid lovechild of Stranger than Fiction and Adaptation, a third of which is animated, starring a 2D-animated Gael García Bernal. I caught the film earlier this year so I was fascinated (read: bemused) by the latest poster that puts the Mexican actor front and center alongside undersung actress Alison Pill. And yet, compared to the earlier poster that had been revealed for the film, this new floating heads one is pretty… uninspiring to say the least. It loses all the specificity of what makes the film worth seeking out.

But you should be excited for this unique movie. Here are 5 things that the new poster for Zoom isn’t telling you...

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HMWYBS: A Sensational Diane Keaton in "Looking for Mr Goodbar"

Best Shot 1977 Party. Chapter 3
Looking for Mr Goodbar (1977)
Directed by: Richard Brooks
Cinematography by: William A Fraker

Finally with chapter 3 in our look back at the Cinematography nominees of 1977 -- a little prep work for the Supporting Actress Smackdown (last day to get your ballots in) -- a real threat to Close Encounter of the Third Kind for the Best Cinematography crown. Close Encounters won the Oscar, its sole competitive Oscar, but William A Fraker was more than worthy as a nominee for his evocative experimental work on Looking for Mr Goodbar. The cinematography (along with its swinging partner, the editing) are ready and able to capture the whirlwind moods, liberated momentum, self-deprecating humor, and multiple flashes of fear within this time capsule of the sexual revolution.

My only regret in showcasing the cinematography for this series is that good images are hard to come by. More (a little bit NSFW) after the jump...

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