Trailer Leftovers: "Alien", "Snatched", and "Apes"

Chris here, still nursing our holiday hangover. To go with the massive amount of films descending upon the multiplexes at the holiday season, there is always an equally large amount of trailers to catch up to. Let's revisit the gluttony by reheating some trailer leftovers we've yet to discuss here, including Goldie Hawn's comeback vehicle Snatched, the hyperviolent & NSFW first look at Alien: Covenant, and the next installment of those damn dirty Apes!

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Going Crazy and Coping With 2016 Films

Year in Review. Every afternoon, a new wrap-up. Today Chris on films that represented the tumultuous year...

It's a comfort to know that even in no-good-horrible-very-bad years such as this that the movies will always be there to sustain us. However this year the movies seemed to reflect our troubled times right back at us - from racial divides in Zootopia to global communication breakdowns in Arrival. But these very films that embodied the awful also provided us with ways to cope with the ceaseless catastrophe that was 2016.

It should come as no surprise to have more than one horror film on such a list, but let's look at some examples...

The Witch
The Crazy: Look what nightmares can be wrought from living in a bubble, even a self-induced one. Is this even our reality or just perception?
How to Cope: Go join that coven! You go. You got this, girl!

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Box Office Christmas: Star Wars, Hidden Figures, and More...

Star Wars is just going to be a thing every Christmas as ubiquitous as Santa one supposes. Rogue One continued to dominate the box office though if you ask your editor here it's kind of... dull (*dodges tomatoes*) and people wouldn't care much about it if it wasn't "a Star Wars". At the very least it's a bummer that it turned out to be just an exact prequel to the original Star Wars -- it really ought to have had an Episode III½ header -- and not a stand-alone adventure with some fresh ideas about that galaxy far far away.

Box office charts with a few points of discussion after the jump. What did you see this weekend? 

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The Furniture: Fame Flattens Your Dreamgirls, Boys

"The Furniture" is our weekly series on Production Design. Here's Daniel Walber...

 This probably goes without saying, but movie musicals tend not to take place in the real world. Gene Kelly doesn’t just serenade French children in An American in Paris, he leads the cast through a dream ballet of wild abstraction. The oddness of public singing is often just the door to an even more fantastical world. Even those about actual musicians, who need no special excuse to croon, often break free from realism.

In this context, Dreamgirls is a bit of an odd duck. Director Bill Condon tries to split the difference. Some of the songs are entirely within the context of a real performance, while others incorporate non-musician characters and non-realistic settings. The back and forth can be a bit confounding...

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Female Performance Heaven Across Mediums

Our Year in Review is doubling up now, two "best of" lists a daily to wrap up. This afternoon Matthew Eng exercizes his actressexuality.

Here are 25 scenes, songs, shots, reactions, line-readings, gestures, and whatnot that have stuck with me the longest from some — but not all — of my favorite female performances across film, television, music, and theater this year. Remember these? They are... in alphabetical order:

01 Kate Beckinsale and Chloë Sevigny’s bravura comic badinage is the main engine driving Love & Friendship, which only ever threatens to turn softhearted when these two catty soulmates are finally forced to part. Beckinsale and Sevigny carefully modulate their straight-faced hauteur during this fond farewell, but refuse to let even an ounce of sentimentality disrupt their regal self-possession. It’s one final, triumphant occasion for game to recognize game.

02 “Value,” the sixth episode of Donald Glover’s extraordinary first season of Atlanta, opens with an extended showcase scene of friendly rivalry between the luminous Zazie Beetz (as long-suffering public school teacher Van) and one-episode wonder Aubin Wise (as her childhood pal, now an “Instagram escort”). Both actresses tear into the scene with a comical trenchancy that scores its necessary laughs but also establishes a layered and fleetingly poignant background of affectionately-waged one-upmanship.

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