ICYMI & August's 'Year of the Month'

Since I spent the last week completely absorbed in Supporting Actress Smackdown '73 (with a side of Into the Woods spazzing) I didn't have as much time to write. I'm super proud of this month's two part event (written & podcasted) and I'm so tempted to make Dana Delany's impression of Sylvia Sidney my new ringtone. I thank StinkyLulu for letting me be the Whitney to his Dolly. But here's a handful of other highlights you may have missed if you too had a busy week where one project stole your life. The team jumped in since I was smackdowning.

A Dame to Shill For cosign Jason's bigscreen/smallscreen lust for Eva Green's talent
Bergman's Ghosts Cries and Whispers is the greatest haunted house movie. But who or what is doing the haunting?
Is Lucy racist? Matthew refuses to see it
Hepburn's Hair Anne Marie shares a hairography theory
A Most Wanted Man & Guardians of the Galaxy reviewed. Michael is joining me on weekly review duties so you get two each week now + the podcast reviews

UP NEXT: I just got a new computer (it's so big I could trap Jeff Bridges inside it for decades!) and though the size of the screen is beyond glorious and will help with my writing and whatnot (particularly the whatnot) immensely, it rendered many of the ancient software programs I use to create the various entertainments on this here site unusable. Sad face. I will try to recover quickly.

Liz whips her hair back and forth

 But in August you can expect Emmy coverage & Oscar season warmups, The Giver, Love is Strange, the final episodes of "Hit Me" (cannot wait for Suddenly Last Summer and Gone With the Wind!), Anne Marie on Guess Who's Coming to Dinner and of course a celebration of 1989, our "year of the month" culminating in the Smackdown on August 31st.

• Brenda Flicker, My Left Foot
• Anjelica Huston, Enemies: A Love Story
• Lena Olin, Enemies: A Love Story
• Julia Roberts, Steel Magnolias
• Dianne Wiest, Parenhood

So queue up those four films and five performances and get your votes in (scale of 1 to 5 hearts) by August 24th. What other 1989 films should we discuss this month? 

ICYMI

Super jam-packed week here at TFE. We were possibly over-posting which brings us to ICYMI because sure you did miss something. I've put the goods under song headers this morning just because.

We Can Be Heroes
TFE got schizophrenic as Amir bitched about superhero franchises just as Anne Marie was celebrating them with live Comic Con coverage.

You're Beautiful
We gave Sandra Bullock a teensy look-back for her 50th. But I was mostly feeling love in short post form for players who get too little attention these days: Mary Steenburgen is always boss, John Leguizamo is an oft inspired clown, and on a clear day you can see Barbara Harris forever. I'm glad to know there are other fans out there of all three. 

Anticipation
I was worried that YNMS efforts were getting stale but the inspiration faucet was suddenly turned back on for Imitation Game. And how about a double feature of Miss Julie & 50 Shades of Grey?

You're History
To give the upcoming Smackdown (Thursday!) some context we looked back at 1973 in particular: The Long Goodbye, Badlands, Day For Night, Box Office Hits, and Introductions of the Supporting Actresses. (There's still a couple more goodies coming.)

That Thing You Do!
Drew Bond on a banana. Got under ScarJo's Skin. Discussed 1999 mythologizing. Drooled on Jake. Saw red.

HELP WANTED: I want to thank everyone who responded to the post about new contributors. It's going to take me awhile to get through the samples but know that I appreciate and have received.

UP NEXT: 
Cries and Whispers, The Smackdown of 1973, Masters of Sex and more Emmy Award Countdown silliness, and Patricia Arquette from Boyhood.

Help Wanted

Regular Contributor
TFE is looking for a new regular with a focus on current cinema / movie news. Must have your own voice but one that still fits with the general tone of the site (i.e. serious about cinema but never at the expense of having fun & vice versa). Interested parties should have three writing samples but the ability to be concise and right to the point in engaging bite-sized takes is best. We never cut and paste press releases here as so many sites do but sometimes that's at the expense of not covering news at all which is not an ideal solution. Are you an alchemist who can read a press release and transform it into something short and pithy that actually still gives us the news but with a point of view? 

International Correspondents
The last time I tried this I got a lot of interest from foreign readers who wanted to talk about American cinema. But that's not what we're looking for. We're looking for people abroad (with the same skill set as regular contributors: fun, concise, accessible) who are well versed in / frequently attend their own country's cinema for monthly concise peeks at film culture elsewhere. Especially in major film markets like Germany, China, Japan, Brazil, India, France, Spain, Russia, etcetera...

If You Are Jake Gyllenhaal, You're Hired

ICYMI (12 Days 'til Smackdown)

July's heat has slowed us down a bit here at TFE (I'm actually at the beach as you read this) but if you haven't been popping in each day you might've missed some goodies. Herewith a baker's dozen of the most popular and/or best posts from the past couple of weeks.

Just One of the Guys Annie Hathaway

Lee Pace Won't Kiss Amy Adams - a flashback
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes - reviewish
Catwoman and The Joker - the two best performances ever to grace a superhero movie
Movie Star Drag Kings - KStew, Hathaway and Brie Larson became "Just One of the Guys"
Kate with a Side of Bette - a special edition of the podcast w/ Nick & Anne Marie
Flashy Title Sequences, TV - we looked at an undersung Emmy category
Exodus Tease  -  More of a Cock Block, really
Robin Hood - Disney's anthropomorphic '73 version  

Halfway Mark Madness - The Complete Series
We looked at the best films of the year's first ½ as well as the best performances, best visuals, best sounds (consider them FYCs) and the hottest of the hotties from Hiddleston to ScarJo. 

UP NEXT: 
The final 2 weeks of July will be jam-packed: Nathaniel interviews Patricia Arquette on Boyhood; Anne Marie reports from San Diego Comic Con; we'll finish the Oscar charts (hey we got 4 categories updated at least!) "Best Shot" looks at Under the Skin (7/22) and Cries and Whispers (7/29); Matthew Eng returns to celebrate Sandra Bullock at 50; and we continue to look at the movies of 1973 before Stinky Lulu's Supporting Actress Smackdown returns on July 31st with our special guest panelists

ICYMI & Coming Soon at the Halfway Mark

Today marks the final day of the first half of 2014. That flashed by, didn't it? Here are five highlights from this past week while you wait for this afternoon's Smackdown (squeeeeeeeee!)

• Ten Best Dragons - from Toothless to Vermithrax
• Test Interview - filming dance sequences
• What's Wrong With Musicals? - it isn't the talent pool
• What If... The Academy had loved Do The Right Thing 25 years ago? Fight the Power!
• Welcome to the Academy - 271 new invites went out... and, as always, some are headscratchers and some are deliciously welcome

COMING IN JULY
Oscar Chart Updates are in progress and we'll post tomorrow when we start "Halfway Mark" festivities surveying the Best of the Year (thus far).

What else? July's Year of the Month is 1973... so get to watching / rewatching some of the movies from that vintage especially Paper Moon, The Exorcist, Cries and Whispers, and The Way We Were. 'A Year with Kate' will hit The African Queen and The Rainmaker... and I'll try to catch up with Seasons of Bette. We'll also return to the "Best Shot" party and wish Sandra Bullock a happy 50th.  AND (Who, ME? Overplan?) it's Reader Appreciation Month so we'll start spotlighting some of you again.

PLUS ENTICING NEW MOVIES: Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, Tammy, Land Ho!, Boyhood, Happy Christmas, Magic in the Moonlight and Lucy chief among them.