"i will be your preacher teacher, any link you have in mind"

crazy people
Radar Online Mel Gibson's lost his marbles again. His angry angry marbles.
NatashaVC explains the ridiculousness that is Lindsay Lohan's absences from her alcohol classes
BlogStage speaking of crazy... albeit a more entertaining more benevolent kind. Lea Michele seems to think she could film Glee by day and take on the ghost of Barbra Streisand at night in Broadway's Funny Girl. This is, in a word, insane.
People Bruce Willis now has his own cologne. I love celebrities. They are so shameless. Smell like me!

linkage
My New Plaid Pants "Do it, Jake"... MNPP always makes me lol.
Self Styled Siren This is wonderful. The Siren interviews Mary Astor's daughter. A must for you classic movie fans. I'm glad that Siren opens with Meet Me in St. Louis because Astor is just wonderful in that picture (my review).
Cinematical Some enchanted evening, someone decided to remake South Pacific. With and edge. I'd love some original musicals but if we have to have remakes, so be it.
Art of the Title Sequence The Emmy nominees in this category. I do love the Nurse Jackie credits. Opening titles are one of my favorite parts of TV shows and this is why I knew I made the right decision to stop watching Weeds when I saw they had dumped the "little boxes" opening.
Flick Filosopher 8 extra minutes for Avatar rerelease. Do you care? I loved Avatar but if half of those 480 seconds don't fall under the category of explicit full braided neon sex scene with jakesully and Neytiri (hotness), I'm not forking over another $20!
Just Jared uh-oh. Colin Farrell is muscling in on Tom Cruise's Les Grossman-style makeup comedy
Writing the Wrong sequels that never were (for better and worse)

Being Boring watches lots of movies while sick. Derek Jarman this time. Do you do that too?
Towleroad A Betty White calendar? Betty White is our master now.
Asian Movie Pulse and Sina are covering a new film City Under Seige starring the beauteous Qi Shu and Aaron Kwok. Sounds like an interesting hybrid of sci-fi/horror... with circus performers. Wha?
EW If you've read my Julianne Moore interview, you know that I felt for Michael Ausellio yesterday when he spoke with Connie Britton. Now, he chats with celebrities all the time so it's no biggie for him but he's been pumping for Friday Night Lights Emmy recognition forever, so it's a sweet read after the lead acting nominations finally happened.

Housekeeping note
I've recently done a bit of sprucing up of the sidebar for your infotainment. For example, I can't believe I didn't have a "search" box before. My apologies. I know people are always asking "where's ______?" It's right below the advertisement in the sidebar.

Father Figure
Finally, hat tip to Anne Thompson, but the third Chris Nolan Batman film may start shooting next Spring. The "info" i.e. rumor is culled from this Michael Caine red carpet interview.



The interwebs will surely say claim this as breaking news but considering Michael Caine also states that he doesn't even know if his character is coming back, I'd take his 'I think they're starting next April' with a huge grainlake of salt. But I like what he says about his career

I'm a father figure now. I'm Goldmember's father. I'm Nicole Kidman's father. I'm everyone's father.

It took me a second to connect him with our Darling Nicki... that'd be from Bewitched (2005). Of all the movies to remember Michael? I mean, really. That's where you want to go?
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Babs Posterized

"Hello Gorgeous!"

Barbra Streisand turned 68 yesterday. I thought we'd celebrate with posters for every movie she ever made. Because we're crazy like that. And it's fun to see someone's complete cinematic history all displayed like so.

Funny Girl (1968) | Hello Dolly (1969) | On a Clear Day You Can See Forever (1970)

The Owl and the Pussycat (1970) | What's Up Doc? (1972) | Up the Sandbox (1972)

The Way We Were (1973) | For Pete's Sake (1974) | Funny Lady (1975)

A Star is Born (1976) | The Main Event (1979) | All Night Long (1981)

Yentl (1983) | Nuts (1987) | The Prince of Tides (1991)

The Mirror Has Two Faces (1996) | Meet the Fockers (2004) | Fockers Sequel (2010)

Babs is still one of the most famous people on the planet but I'm guessing that younger generations have quite the incomplete picture of her career. I'm guessing that that picture hangs in an old fashioned frame and shows the diva in a turtleneck sweater. Somehow her expression conveys stifling self regard, political activism and mega-wealth all at once.

But when I think of Babs, I laugh. Not at her but with her. Back in the day -- before most of us were attending the movies regularly (myself included) or even alive yet (myself not included) -- she was a corker of a comic actress. She could also swing dramatic as memorably as she could change keys. But if you peruse the posters above it seems clear that her giant movie stardom shrank just as soon as she swung dramatic in a permanent sort of way.

Questions for you

• How many of her 17 pictures have you seen?
• Isn't it weird that major stars never used to take supporting roles and now they all do?
• What's your favorite Streisand performance?
  

Babs is making a now rare return to the big screen this winter in the Meet the Fockers sequel. Will you see it?

First Hand Rose.

Jose here to commemorate Fanny Brice's birthday. The extravagant comedienne would've turned 118 today. Yes, seriously, watching her energy in films like The Great Ziegfeld (where she played herself) or listening to her vibrant musical performances it's easy to think that this woman could've lived forever.

A New Yorker born from Hungarian parents, she made a way for herself in the burlesque world and later by her association with Florenz Ziegfeld. She became a huge musical star and a popular radio personality with her Baby Snooks character.

But what remains fascinating about Brice is that she pulled off an enviable career using raw talent. Would someone like her fit in our current notions of what makes an entertainer appealing?

Sure her life was plagued with scandal (her marriage to Nicky Arnstein wasn't as tragically romantic as pop culture has us think) and that would've fit wonderfully in our tabloid loving society. But in an industry that has shifted towards the shallow, what do you think Brice would be doing if she had appeared this decade? She would've probably been relegated to supporting performances and deemed a "character actor" and her musical career would've been stalled because she wouldn't have looked good in a thong.

Casting the brilliant Barbra Streisand as Brice in Funny Girl (which brought her a much deserved Oscar for best Actress) and Funny Lady, was one of those rare moments of Hollywood genius where you can argue everything works for the best. Sure the movies are plagued with romantic fiction and invented plot twists, but as far as star charisma and talent go, Brice, and Streisand now, are in a league of their own.

"I'm crazy about'cha, without'cha..."

For you I'm strong.
I can't do without'cha
Howcha magoucha?
Don't stay too long.
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Dr. FilmBlog. Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying And Love the Gay

navel gazing averse readers please ignore this post. I beg you. Thank you, -the management.

Is the blog too gay to function lately? Too superhero clogged? I tend to follow my moods but I worry that the film experience is a bit schizophrenic when my mood swings wildly from week to week, day to day... hour to hour? Next week: various film festival offerings --they're not exactly filled with homoeroticism and superheroes (unless the press notes are wildly off target)

Lately --was it those Disney hunks, the new Madonna video, the Savage Grace screening, all that showering? -- I've felt like TFE was getting even lighter in the loafers than usual. I worried, not in a self-loathing way, but in an all inclusive movie-loving way. I love the diverse readership I've built thank you muchly but you can't be all things to all people. What's more, I highly doubt that movie blogs written by straight men ever worry that they're being too narrow in their focus as they cover their cinematic interests. But such is the life of a navel gazing movie obsessed writer who loves actresses and superheroes and talky dramas and foreign films and a bunch of other things (as Gemini moods shift and strike) and who happens to be gay.

But this morning I breathed a giant sigh of relief. It's only a phase! Unbeknownst to myself I've merely been building up to the absolute gayest day of the year and had completely forgotten about. No, not gay pride... though in my opinion they should at least move National Coming Out Day to April 24th. For you see, today is the combined birthday of Shirley "It twirled up!" Maclaine (73), Barbra "Hello Gorgeous" Streisand (65) and flamboyant designer Jean-Paul Gaultier (55), he of the Milla Jovovich bandage dresses, Bruce Willis backless orange Ts, Madonna cone bras and Gael García Bernal in Bad Education costumes or lack thereof (among many other riveting accomplishments).

T'were a lot of gay birthed on this day.

I thought my blogosphere experience couldn't get any gayer this week and then, magically (but unsurprisingly) Planet Fabulon managed to up the homo ante with a video of Liza Minelli covering Donna Summer's Bad Girls. It's not Liza Minelli's birthday today but it really should be. That'd make this day complete. To get the Gay up front and center and therefore perhaps out of my system for a few posts (it's like totally singing along and out loud to that song that's stuck in your head. It's the only way to be free of it), here's a menage-a-cinque (is that an orgy?) of abso-fabu-lutely gayish vids. The aforementioned Liza number, Babs doing "My Man" (the Oscar was richly deserved) from Funny Girl, a hypnotic Jean Paul Gaultier perfume commercial, John Barrowman (Torchwood star) singing "I Am What I Am" from La Cage Aux Folles and finally, a really well edited film montage. YouTube has a lot of poorly edited clip reels but this one, promoting the book '101 Movies Every Gay Man Should See', is really well done and features a pleasingly diverse group of films: documentaries, foreign films, American Indies and classics. Can you name them? How many have you seen?






That's a whole lotta gay. That's enough gay even for today, which is gay-gay-gay. Peace out.