Once Upon a Time in the Link

I have been remiss at sharing good stories and posts from around the web so I hereby return to it.

Pop Matters Jose takes another look at Marion Cotillard's work in Rust & Bone and contemplates Oscar
Pop Elegantarium Alexa loves the screwball comedy of David O. Russell's Silver Linings Playbook 
Sam Hiti Once Upon a Time in the West fans should check out this artists tumblr 
The Hot Blog David Poland on the NYFCC winners
Cinema Blend two Woody Allen classics coming to Blu-Ray this January 

EW top ten lists from popular critics Owen (Lincoln @ #1) & Lisa (Zero Dark Thirty @ #1). They both choose one Oscar hopeful among their "5 worst of the year" lists, too.
E! Online Rose McGowan is the latest actress trying to achieve Michelle Pfeiffer's now immortal Scarface look 
Antagony & Ecstasy wonderful piece on Life of Pi by one of the web's best critics 
The Carpet Bagger talks to the editor of Flight about the plane crash scene 
My New Plaid Pants who wore it best: animated decapitation
In Contention I totally forgot to mention the Golden Satellite nominations. Lots of love for Les Miz but also weird nominations for films that never opened in the States like Kim Ki-Duk's Piéta so I'm not sure what their criteria is for eligibility anymore

Coming Soon Anne Hathaway recently burst into tears when asked about doing a Catwoman spinoff, adding

...assuming there was enough Kleenex in the world, I would love to do a spin-off

poll by twiigs.com

Vulture Speaking of Anne Hathaway. Sort of. a screening of Les Misérables that I would've killed to be it for Academy and Globe members. Hugh Jackman sang and lap danced for birthday girl Amanda Seyfried 
Gawker on the 13 most powerful images of naked celebrities for 2012 
In Contention Pedro Almodóvar, as you know my favorite living filmmaker, will be getting an Academy tribute in London. I'm so jealous of Guy Lodge right now who gets to attend these London events
Stale Popcorn Glenn on Australia's film award nominations (formerly AFI and now called AACTA) . The musical The Sapphires leads.
Cinema Blend Casey Affleck stayin' creepy. He aims to play the Boston Strangler in a new film 

Finally, Grease superstars of yore, John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John made a new video together for their Christmas album.

No comment. My inner child loves Livvy & Grease too much to comment. (Other than that John Travolta who not so unrecently commanded $20 million a movie maybe could have spared two hundred thousand dollar bills so this didn't look like it was made for two!)

Curio: Hannah on Thanksgiving

Alexa here. Every year on Thanksgiving I make an effort to catch Hannah and Her Sisters, one of Woody's best and certainly my favorite film with a Thanksgiving theme.  Its framing of three Thanksgiving dinners hosted by Mia Farrow's Hannah resembles the three Christmases in Fanny and Alexander (while I'm at it, I may queue that one up for Christmas). Maybe it's the elegance of this structure that makes the film great, as it holds together Woody's wonderful vignettes, especially those amongst Barbara Hershey, Max Von Sydow and Michael Caine. And this scene pretty much summarizes my philosophy of life.

E.E. Cummmings by cartoonist Louie Chin.

I wish I could drag the rest of my family away from the football to watch it with me, but I usually do so as a solitary endeavor in between baking pies. Here, after the jump, are some great little homages and artistic curios in honor of this film I never, ever tire of. 

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Curio: Articulated Dolls by Pucherito

Alexa here. If you've taken a figure drawing class you're likely familiar with articulated wood mannequins (Manny to some).  I was lucky enough to spend most of my art school figure drawing classes with real human models, but occasionally as a cost-saving measure we'd have to draw from good 'ol Manny. After awhile I wanted to burn him. Maybe that's why I enjoy the use he's been put to by Pucherito, who has transformed Manny into some cultural idols with a little paint and inspiration. 

Here are some film favorites given the Pucherito treatment, with the resulting effect of elongating the likes of Woody, Sly and Liza into the same gangly proportions. 

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From the Wilds of Woody-land

JA from MNPP here. I was looking up pictures of Peter Sarsgaard on Tumblr - don't tell me you haven't yet seen that shot of him jogging in shorts shorts making the rounds - when I stumbled upon some pics from the set of Woody Allen's new movie currently filming in San Francisco that seemd worth sharing.

What continues being delightful even when Woody's movies don't - yes I'm looking at you To Rome With Love - is seeing him mix up all the famous actors he gets to play with in surprising ways - why sure, I'd love to see Judy Davis play Allison Pill's mother! How astute of you, good sir. (TRWL needed more cast interaction - imagine if Greta Gerwig and Penny Cruz had fallen under Roberto Benigni's haphazard charms while managing their own plots!)

Seeing Sally Hawkins and Bobby Cannavale and Cate Blanchett and Louis CK all standing around gives me hope this next one will toss some of Woody's specific sort of thespian frission our way. Woody gets whoever the heck he wants in his movies - make use! (And hire Diane Keaton next time, dammit!)

'Growing Up Cinephile' by Leslye Headland

Photography by Bruce Gilbert, Provincetown International Film Festival[Editor's Note: Leslye Headland, whose debut film 'Bachelorette' opens on September 7th is today's very special guest blogger. I'm loving this memoir  -Nathaniel R]

When preparing for this guest blog, I thought about what I would’ve written about if I were guest blogging seven years ago as my blogger alter ego, Arden. Most likely I would’ve wanted to get super nerdy and introspective so here we go:

If you’re like me, movies are your life. They cheer you up. They bring you down. They connect you to people. They alienate you from others. You develop passionate arguments about the state of film today. You rehearse those arguments in your head then unleash them upon unsuspecting acquaintances during an otherwise friendly gathering. They can get you a job. (I truly believe my first assistant gig was secured by my encyclopedic knowledge of Star Wars). They can get you laid. (My number one turn-on in bed? Oscar trivia.)

As Truffaut said, we are sick people. But we weren’t always this way. What happened? Well, if you go back in your life, I bet you can find the most formative years were shaped by a handful of films. I decided to take a look at the symbiotic nature of what I watched and when I watched it.

SENTIENCE!

Love and Death (1975, dir. Woody Allen)

This is the first film I ever remember watching. I slept on the top bunk in the bedroom I shared with my sister. From there, I could see the TV in the living room and would watch films my parents put on when they thought we were asleep. Love and Death was mind-fuck for an eight year old. Absurd physical comedy coupled with Prokofiev? It looked like a grown-up film but it was funny enough to entertain a child. However all the Bergman references were unsettling. I was filled with joy and a tinge of dread. Later in life, a professor described my senior thesis directing project as “the work of a sincerely disturbed person who has an infantile sense of humor.” I blame Woody.

CHILDHOOD!

The Philadelphia Story (1940, dir. George Cukor)
Rear Window (1954, dir. Alfred Hitchcock)

 

Being brought up in a strict religious home where pop culture was shunned, it was all glamour all the time. No 80s teen movies or cartoons for me (I didn't see The Goonies til I was 27) ...

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