Silence Poster Reveal... and Oscar Chart Updates

Every time we received news of Martin Scorsese's Silence it's like a splash of cold water or a pinch. In other words a jarring 'oh yes, that movie' or a  'wow, we weren't dreaming it. It does exist!' thing.

Today the poster has been released and you can see a detail to your left of Andrew Garfield and Adam Driver trudging on to the shores of Japan at 17th century missionaries in search of their mentor Liam Neeson, he of frequent mentor-playing in the movies.

The Full Poster and some Best Picture thoughts follow after the jump...

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"Silence" is Shorter, Still Possibly Golden

a new image from the film - our first look at Adam Driver

In very good news for butts of all shapes and sizes, news came this morning that Martin Scorsese's Silence is no longer going to be his longest feature film ever. That dubious honor will continue to be held by the excruciatingly long winded duo of Casino and Wolf of Wall Street. It seems that Marty and his trusted editor Thelma Schoonmaker have whittled away some 22 minutes from the earlier reported running time of 3 hours and 1 minute (or thereabouts)...

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"Silence" to open on December 23rd. Which films can win attention at Christmas?

According to Variety, it's now official: Martin Scorsese's Silence is opening this year after all on December 23rd despite no trailer, no poster, no promotional materials, and a current running time of well over 3 hours. The most curious aspect of this is that Paramount already has an overstuffed plate without it: Arrival should be a major player because it's great, Fences should be a major player if it's any good at all since it has two beloved stars doing award winning roles in the first motion picture based on an August Wilson play, and Florence Foster Jenkins is, I think, underpredicted since it's a handsome production with an unusual angle on the arts that will surely appeal to voters and should expect a boost from Golden Globe attention. 

Curiously, despite twelve years of evidence that Oscar voters are definitely preferring films with October or November bows (no December release has won Best Picture since Million Dollar Baby), despite awards bodies pushing their deadlines even earlier this year, distributors are pushing the other way with force...

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Links: Separating Artists from Art, Studying Jake Gyllenhaal, Letting the Seven Samurai Go

Playlist on the complicated issues of "separate the art from the artist" in today's social media court of public opinion and 24/7 news cycles and Birth of a Nation's release
Gold Derby titles their article "OFFICIAL" and then claims to have inside intel on "hints" that Silence is actually opening this year despite no poster, trailer, release date, etcetera. This is not what the word "official" means. It will only be official when Paramount makes a statement. I'm hopeful, as the film has been in post forever, but it's definitely not official yet.
MNPP Jason offers to teach a course on "The Nudity of Jake Gyllenhaal 101" and we would like to audit the course -- Jake is always having nude breakdowns in showers.

The New Yorker has an interesting take on Bridget Jones's Baby's refusal to engage with some of the elements of the genre it helped define
Variety Carey Mulligan and Jake Gyllenhaal will co-star in a movie called Wildlife based on the novel by Richard Ford about a boy witnessing his parent's marriage falling apart. The fun (?) part is that it's cowritten by real life couple Zoe Kazan and Paul Dano who we hope aren't falling apart. Dano will also direct
AMPAS they've uploaded all the speeches from the 2016 Student Academy Awards if you're interested. Perhaps one day some of these men and women will win normal Oscars? Does anyone have any stats on that?
E! Online congratulations to Idina Menzel who is engaged to her boyfriend Aaron Lohr (who had a bit part in the movie Rent) 
Interview talks to Zachary Quinto about Snowden and more 
I Like Things that Look Like Mistakes Kyle Turner on Sia's new video "The Greatest"
The Stake on the many remakes of Seven Samurai with The Magnificent Seven in theaters 
The New Yorker looks back at the obsessive photographer behind iconic 50s magazine Physique Pictorial  - was he the early Robert Mapplethorpe or the gay Hugh Hefner? 
Boy Culture Madonna reads ageist commenters to filth on her Instagram account. I have loved this woman so much and for so long that I find a kind of regular joy that she's so endlessly superior to all the litte minds that have been trying to bring her down for the past 32 years. But on the other hand, probably best for celebrities not to acknowledge all the people that hate them. Don't give them that power!
MNPP Thursdays Ways Not To Die' memorializes generic Christoph Waltz villain in The Legend of Tarzan 

Supporting Actor Has No Frontrunner

Oh sure... Liam Neeson you say. So did I at one point. But Silence is looking like an increasingly imaginary film, don't you think? I'm not dumping him from the predicted lineup just yet though The Supporting Actor Chart has a ton of movement post-festival explosion.

The biggest chart debut goes to Peter Sarsgaard as Bobby Kennedy in Jackie (they love actors as real famous people and he's typically strong) while Michael Shannon moves on up for stealing the entire show in Nocturnal Animals. And with the eyebrow-raising news that Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk is not debuting for critics before its NYFF premiere, have we been overestimating that film? What a strange decision! 

Finally what to make of the men of Moonlight? They're all terrific but due to the triptych nature of the film, not a one of the men is in more than a third of the picture. My favorites were Trevante Rhodes (the lead character as an adult) and Mahershara Ali (a major figure in the first third) but you could fill up a whole supporting actor category with the men in Moonlight. No really. Here they are...

The Men of "Moonlight"
Mahershala Ali as Juan	Alex R Hibble as "Little"	Ashton Sanders as Chiron	Andre Holland as Kevin	Trevante Rhodes as "Black"

With apologies to Jharrel Jerome who plays Kevin as a teenager and is also really good (but we have to stick to five because them is the rules)