Who are your favorite supporting actresses of the year?

By Nathaniel R

Over the weekend Fences had its first screening in Los Angeles and Viola Davis apparently lived up to the prerelease hype so there you have your near-certain winner in the Supporting Actress category this year. (I haven't seen it yet so no comment on that until I do.) But nominations are our favorite part of the Oscar nomination circus anyway so even if the race is wrapped up and Viola becomes a record-breaker as we predicted, it's fun to keep sifting through the options.

Yes, it's that time of year when we begin to take stock and are promptly filled with anxiety about sacrificing favorites as we winnow down to the magic number of 5 for our awardage. Along with the anxiety, though, comes such appreciation for the art of the movies. It's one of the many reasons we cherish awards season...

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Tues Top Ten: Helen Reddy on TV and at the Movies

Appropos of nothing let's celebrate Helen Reddy's 75th Birthday today! The Pete's Dragon star (the original not this year's remake) was an Australian pop star who had a ton of hits in the 1970s. The only one that gets much airplay today is "I Am Woman" which still shows up in movies and on TV for an instant time capsule. You know how some songs become cultural shorthand. For a time Reddy was a movie and TV presence, too, including at awards shows -- and you know how we love those here at The Film Experience. She was Golden Globe nominated as "Most Promising Newcomer" a now defunct category for the disaster flick Airport '75 and she sang multiple movie theme songs, too!

Let's look back at 10 moments from her TV/Movie history just for kicks and star sightings...

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“Crazy Ex-Girlfriend” S1 in Ten Songs

With Crazy Ex Girlfriend returning Friday evening for Season 2, here's new contributor Jorge Molina surveying season 1's songs

Season 2 premieres Fri 10/21 at 9 pm on The CWMaking a Top 10 Best [blank] is pretty much impossible. Top 10s are never final, accurate, or objective. 

So I decided not to do one. 

After all, how could I rank and, even worse, decide on the best musical numbers of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend’s amazing first season? They all represent a different aspect of the show, and it would be unfair to compare them on equal terms.  So I instead came up with a compilation of what are not necessarily the ten better numbers, but the ones that best showcase the show’s style, tone, and humor. What would be in a “Crazy XGF 101” course.

TEN SHOWCASE NUMBERS FROM SEASON 1

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Top Ten: Loving those "20th Century Women"

by Nathaniel R

Mike Mill's terrific new film 20th Century Women, inspired by his own mother with Annette Bening further fictionalizing her, doesn't open until Christmas (disappointing as RIGHT NOW or August might've been the perfect time for it). But since it played the NYFF and we said so little, it's time to attempt to share the joy it offers. In lieu of a standard review...

Ten Amazing Things About 20th Century Women
first impressions of a film that will surely make our 2016 top ten list

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Ten Favorite Things About Stranger Things

Kieran, here.  There’s something to be said about earnest storytelling in television.  It often comes packaged in projects that are deeply flawed, but somehow those flaws contribute to what make the show a singular experience. Such is the case with Netflix’s “Stranger Things,” which premiered a week ago to much fanfare and online discussion.

Though “Stranger Things,” created by Matt and Ross Duffer very blatantly poaches elements from some very familiar markers it doesn’t resemble anything else on television at the moment. The aforementioned earnestness of this series about supernatural and…well, stranger things happening in 1983 small town Indiana could have easily served as a liability, but becomes one of the show’s greatest strengths. 

All of my defenses were up going into my viewing of “Stranger Things”. 80s-era Spielberg holds little personal resonance as it does for others. I’ve never seen The Goonies. I have a really sensitive gag reflex when it comes to inauthentic portrayals of children in movies and film. I was suspicious in the beginning, but "Stranger Things" won me over...

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