Postedon5.17.17: “A 20something guy sat next to me during yesterday's train trip from Gare de Lyon to Cannes. About 90 minutes after departure he got up and went to the food car, an all-metal enclosure on the upper deck, mostly serving McDonald's-like eats and drinks. But instead of wolfing his food up there, the guy brought it back to our first-class haven.
Login with Patreon to view this post
On the other hand there’s nothing “normal” about wearing a zebra-skin toga or bathrobe, a sartorial statement coordinated with a white bull terrier and a black panther-like dog in the doorway.
Six and a half weeks ago the 2022 Oscar nominations were announced, and to everyone’s surprise Parallel Mothers star Penelope Cruz, whom every handicapper had written off weeks earlier, landed a Best Actress nomination. And now, people are saying, she appears to be surging and may even win the Oscar come Sunday.
All the other award-season Yodas were either Doubting Thomases or cautious fence-sitters…damp-finger-to-the-wind equivocators. If you want to make it in this business you have to have heart.
Penélope Cruz:
-Didn’t get a Golden Globe nod
-Didn’t get a Critics Choice nod
-Didn’t get a SAG nod
-Didn’t even make the BAFTA *LONGLIST*
It’s not a secret that Ginni Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, is an arch-conservative, Trump-supporting wacko. It shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise, therefore, that Thomas texted Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows numerous times on 1.6.21, calling Joe Biden’s election victory “the greatest heist of our history” and declaring that then-President Donald Trump “should not concede….this is a fight of good vs. evil.”
Obviously Mrs. Thomas should be subpeonaed to testify, as should Judge Thomas. Will this power couple be subpeonaed? It’s my personal opinion that the leaders of the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6h on the U.S. Capitol are, no offense, slow-moving pussies so I guess we’ll see what happens.
It was presumptuous of BillMcCuddy to say that “we” have all voted for Jessica Chastain for the Most Makeup Best Actress Oscar, or that we’re at least rooting for her to win. I’m not saying she won’t win, mind -- her Tammy Faye Bakker was a pretty good performance, all things considered -- but I didn’t care for McCuddy’s tone.
Login with Patreon to view this post
A week ago I reported that I’d seen the first five episodes of Elizabeth Meriwether‘s The Dropout, and that as good as Amanda Seyfried‘s performance as the discredited tech fraudster Elizabeth Holmes was and is, “I kept asking myself ‘who would be stupid enough to go into business with this creepy character…a woman who, had she been born in the 1940s, could have played an alien on The Twilight Zone episode ‘To Serve Man’? Or Ray Walston‘s alien girlfriend in My Favorite Martian?”
“Meriwether’s dialogue is reasonably pro-level for the most part,” I said, “but I can only reiterate that I couldn’t believe in the story because I found it impossible to believe in Seyfried’s Holmes. She’s just too looney-tunes, too ‘off the planet.'”
I’ve since moved past that reaction. I saw episode #6 last night and now I’m mesmerized. I have to admit that the prospect of seeing this bizarre performance artist finally receive her just desserts over the final two episodes (“Heroes“, airing on 3.31 and “Lizzy“, 4.7) seems incredibly delicious. I can’t wait to see her go down, and yet five minutes ago I was afraid to admit this for fear of accused of being accused of harboring misogynist feelings. So just to be safe, I’m going to say…uhm, how should I put this?
You have to give Maggie Gyllenhaal’s TheLostDaughter credit for ruling this particular roost — maternally speaking it’s easily the most despairing and melancholy of the 11 films in question. It’s the first semi-mainstream film to say “some women just don’t have kid-friendly instincts” or “some women are just too caught up in their creative struggles to make room for mundane mothering.” [Chart created by Vulture.]
Login with Patreon to view this post
Tom Hagen at Jack Woltz's dinner table -- the 2008 Robert Harris-Gordon Willis version on top, the 2022 4K "restoration" version below. There's nothing particularly "wrong" with preferring the 2022 version -- the oranges, candles, pale amber lampshade and carved wood panelling have good color, but Hagen's skin tone is a little pinkish...sunburn, sweat. In the 2008 version his skin has a warmer shade. More importantly, it blends in with the general color scheme of the frame. This is why I stand with the 2008 version, which Mr. Willis helped to create anyway so where's the argument?
Login with Patreon to view this post