Hedwig and the Angry Link

Michael Reidel Hedwig and the Angry Inch made it from stage to screen and now it's going back again. [Insert a billion exclamation points here] The cherry gummi bear on top: John Cameron Mitchell will reprise his classic role. This show is a-ma-zing live. One of the best experiences I've ever had in the theater way back in 1999 or so. You must come to NYC and see it. Between this and Rabbit Hole, John Cameron Mitchell may have an incredible 2010
MNPP alerts us to the must-read sounding book "The Girl in Alfred Hitchcock's Shower". I already want this to be a movie.


MovieLine an imaginary apology from James Cameron for making you sit through Avatar
Cinema Blend Anna Faris to get all Goldie Hawn in a remake of Private Benjamin. Hey she sold Cameron Diaz with great flair, didn't she?
The Playlist has details on Steven Soderbergh's Contagion. The cast list is almost frighteningly A-list huge. Even if it's a disaster, it'll get a SAG ensemble nod.
Just Jared Reese Witherspoon in talks to play a country singer (again). If at first you do succeed...repeat.
Banana Penis [nsfw] Did this predate An Education or is someone using movies brilliantly for safe sex promotion?
Empire State of Mind pretty fun Star Wars by way of Alicia Keys video
Popnography skewers Miley Cyrus and The Last Song and suggests a gay alternative
Blabbeando If you're tired of catty remarks about Ricky Martin's coming out, try this on for size. Definitely something to think about.
(Le Sigh)... Isabelle Huppert to guest star on Law & Order: SVU. The apocalypse is nigh. Someone please shoot me!

Finally, remember that unusual zombie movie I told you about that won the Nashville Film Festival? It's called Make-Out With Violence and if you're curious about it you can now "save it" to your Netflix queue.

<--- poster design by Family Tree

If the movie gets enough 'saves' Netflix will purchase copies to rent out. I really marvel at how many ways there are to distribute movies now and how hard it still is for filmmakers despite all those channels, even when they have a quality movie on their hands. I don't think Make-Out is a perfect movie but it sure as hell was made by people with a filmmaking eye. And it makes you want someone to give the Deagol Brothers more money to make a second feature and see where their talents can take them. This is one of the obvious drawback of film festivals... you see work by all sorts of interesting off-the-map talent and then you return to the real world and notice how many hacks are so gainfully employed by Hollywood. Not that film festivals don't have their own "keep your day job" failures ... but this movie is definitely not one of them.

Favorite 100 Movies of the Decade (#50-31)

the list #100-76, #75-51, #50-31, #30-16 and #15-1.

Awards for 2009 begin tomorrow or thereabouts.

So much cinema to love. Love it hard...

50 La Mala Educación dir. Pedro Almodóvar (2004)
Pedro's dizzying, carnal "fag noir" is one of a kind.

49 You Can Count On Me dir. Kenneth Lonergan (2000)
You know how wonderful it can be to hear a film's title worked into the dialogue? Turns out it's even better when the title warmly permeates the entire film and (just barely) goes unsaid.

48 Sideways dir. Alexander Payne (2004)
Eventually it will shake off the "overrated" tag that compromised its full bodied flavor. It's still one of the best comedies of the decade. Rrawwwr.

47 25th Hour dir. Spike Lee (2002)
Like The Painted Veil, its throwaway release in crowded December assured it wouldn't be noticed in its time. Hopefully the audience is still coming around to Lee's best film outside of Do The Right Thing (1989). This bitter drama, all past mistakes and future penance, needed time to breathe its city air, dance in its silvery dress and scream at itself in the mirror until it had to face facts.


46 Raising Victor Vargas dir. Peter Sollett (2003)
One of the most tender, well observed coming of age dramas I've ever seen. I consider it a major mark against the world that more people haven't seen it. And I'm still rooting for Victor Razuk to become a big star.

45 Idioterne (The Idiots) dir. Lars von Trier (1998, released in 2000)
Rude, tasteless, sad, funny, pornographic... and kinda brilliant. Dogme 95 may have been a short-lived cinematic manifesto but you could feel its reverberations in the cinema for years afterwards.

44 Reprise dir. Joachim Trier (2006, released in 2008)
A completely cinematic tale of two young literary friends, drifting apart while finding or losing their footing. Trier joins the frustrating list of exciting new auteurs on this top 100 who haven't directed a second film. He must.

43 Spider-Man (2002) & Spider-Man 2 (2004) dir. Sam Raimi
We're pretending that Spider-Man 3 doesn't exist. Which is good policy. The other two are pure popcorn pleasure. Spider-Man does the origin story better than any superhero film ever has, smartly using it as both puberty parallel and coming of age melodrama and #2 is one of those rare sequels that doesn't try to overstuff ... unless you mean with pleasure in which case, doubly so.


42 4 Luni, 3 Saptamâni si 2 Zile (4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days) dir. Cristian Mungiu (2007)
This 80s-set Romanian drama about an unwanted pregnancy is relentless. But once you're on its desperate wavelength, a tense and revealing portrait of friendship, economic desperation, and life under Communism emerges.

41 The Hours dir. Stephen Daldry (2002)
An intimate birthday party thrown for actressexuals everywhere and in any time period. The actresses even make the cake and fetch the flowers themselves.

40 Mean Girls dir. Mark Waters (2004)
39 Bring It On dir. Peyton Reed (2000)
The twin titans of teen comedy in the Aughts. Never mind that their eventual imitators were dreck (especially the cheerleaders. Put those DVD spinoffs down. Mercy killing!) these films are so fetch. Eminently rewatchable, hilarious, smartly written, well directed and exuberantly performed... with spirit fingers! Who can even choose a favorite moment from either of them. I'd start listing them but then I'd never get to the next eight movies.

38 The Incredibles dir. Brad Bird (2004)
I could type a hundred words but one will do: bliss.

words are useless. Gobble-gobble-gobble-gobble-gobble! Too much of it, darling, too much!

37 The Royal Tenenbaums dir. Wes Anderson (2001)
Truth: It breaks my heart to think of this movie. And it also makes me guffaw. Both in equal measure. I don't care how many times Wes Anderson repeats himself as long as we have this movie, his masterpiece (according to me). And, besides, more directors should have a strong enough visual aesthetic that we can bitch about them repeating themselves. Do you know what I mean?

36 Birth dir. Jonathan Glazer (2004)
"You're a little liar, aren't you?"

35 Hatuna Meuhert (Late Marriage) dir. Dover Koshashvili (2001, released in 2002)
Like Vargas a bit earlier in the list, this movie became a cause for me: get people to see it! So I really should thank the person that drove me to it: Mike D'Angelo whose Time Out New York review had me rushing to it on opening weekend. Incidentally that's the same opening weekend when Attack of the Clones was making $80 million dollars. Late Marriage made $31,ooo in the same time frame but the return on investment, emotionally and cinematically speaking, was roughly 80 million times better (for me). Not that an Israeli drama about traditional family-sanctioned marriages, a stubborn bachelor, and his erotic affair with a divorcée is all that directly comparable to a movie about two callow (super)powerful teenagers embroiled in an intergalactic war but my point is this: I wish more people would support tiny foreign films when they're great. It's not actually that hard to find out which ones are (it's called "the internet") even if it is still something of a pain to find them (at least there's festival direct programs, dvd and whatnot). I long for those days I never experienced in the 1960s when Americans actually cared about them.

It's something of an Oscar past time for people to bitch about great films being snubbed in the Best Foreign Film Oscar category but this one is barely ever mentioned even though it's better than all the nominees of its year. Nevertheless that annual bitching is justified: there's 9 more foreign language films coming in the top 30 and only 1 of them won the naked gold man.

34 Gosford Park dir. Robert Altman (2001)
God how I miss Robert Altman, the world's best tour guide of crowded rooms.

33 Erin Brockovich dir. Steven Soderbergh (2000)
If only this film, which feels lifted straight from the Classic Hollywood school of dazzlingly executed star vehicles, had proved more influential than its best picture competitors: Traffic (the "hyper link film needs a sabbatical) and Gladiator (so many action films trying to ape it! Stop. You're not Gladiator!); because star vehicles will never leave us. Since they're an enduring staple of cinema, why can't they make them this well all the time?

32 Once dir. John Carney (2007)
How many films take you this close to the fire of creation? And how many films are smart enough to pull away with a bittersweet farewell, just when you think you couldn't possibly love them more.

31 Hedwig and the Angry Inch dir. John Cameron Mitchell (2001)
Though it's rarely discussed in stories about the rebirth of the musical (the story of this film decade?), it ought to be. Two vivid auteurist deconstructions (Dancer in the Dark & Moulin Rouge!) beat it to the theaters. Then Hedwig tore it up, tossing his/her wig around with wild rock n roll abandon, essentially shaking all the remaining cobwebs off the lond dead genre. Chicago dazzles (though it missed this list) but it owes its Oscars to the films preceding it. They cleared the way.

continue on to #30-16


50 best male perfs | 50 best female perfs
back to full blog

*

Decade in Review: 2001 Top Ten

What follows is my original top ten list of 2001. We'll discuss each year of the decade over the next month or two (we already did 2000). I do this because I am curious about which films "stick" and which fade and why and maybe you are too? Best year of the decade I think. The top five films would all be valid #1 film choices in some years. New comments are in red.

Note: This list references films released in NYC in 2001, not year of production or year in which they first the hit festival circuit or whatnot.


Runners Up (in descending order): Sexy Beast, Ali, Series 7: The Contenders, The Others, Last Resort and Waking Life. I don't remember loving Ali that much... and more than The Others? I don't remember that at all. I mean Nicole Kidman was the shit TWICE OVER in 2001.

In my round up of the year I also sang the praises of Monsters, Inc, Crazy/Beautiful and Wet Hot American Summer. Even though I listed Monsters, Inc as "underrated" I still didn't have it in the top 16. That was weird, me! I never consider documentaries eligible for the year's top ten. That's a quirk of mine that I can't really defend except for to say that I don't see enough of them to fairly evaluate their merits and I find it nearly impossible to compare their merits to those of narrative features. That said, in 2001 I was wild for The Gleaners and I.

10 No Man's Land
This acclaimed Bosnian film from Danis Tanovic is a startling visceral comedy about the lunacy of war. Let's hope it beats the overpraised (if admittedly enjoyable) Amélie to the foreign language Oscar this year.

I was surprisingly prophetic there though I understand a lot of people are still mad about that underdog win.

09 The Royal Tenenbaums
A film that flirts with greatness and becomes all the more touching by missing the mark. There's one great scene after another in Wes Anderson's fairy tale document on a family of failed geniuses. The film is blessed with a beautiful team-spirit bouquet of fine performances from Paltrow, Hackman, Huston, Glover, and the Wilson brothers. They've got character.

er... I get what I was saying but I'm not so sure this film missed the mark. It's a thing of melancholy beauty and curious singular humor. Anderson's best by a significant margin.

08 In the Bedroom
Todd Field's studied and terrific debut may not be the masterwork some have claimed it to be but it's a damn good film nonetheless. Its most remarkable feature is its honest deceptiveness. You think it's a love story. Bang, It's not. You think it's a thriller. Oops, think again. It's not that the film is lying, but that we are so accustomed to certain plot trajectories that its difficult to see the film's harrowing turns coming or to immediately understand how thoroughly it undermines traditional notions of revenge or catharsis. Bonus points to the cast for illuminating the emptying effects of grief, and the rage of the broken.

Todd Field and Wes Anderson's subsequent films have made me question my love for these on occasion. I can't say that I remember In the Bedroom well but I like what I remember still. That The Tenenbaums is all the way down at #9 only goes to show what a great year 2001 was.

07 Tillsammans (Together)
The sweetest film of the year is also one of the smartest. Lukas Moodyson throws a broken family into a 70s commune and the resulting emotional, personal, romantic, and idealistic collisions that ensue expose, illuminate, and energize all involved. "Feel good" is a term often used to describe manipulative, simple-minded, happy endings and Hollywood-style sugarcoating. Thankfully, this Swedish comedy has neither of those attributes and actually feels good. It uplifts while engaging you both emotionally and intellectually.

Nobody talks about this movie (maybe because Lukas Moodyson's subsequent films have been so brutal as to be deemed unwatchable by some fans of his first movies) and in truth I don't remember it well but I do remember how I felt leaving the theater: marvelous.

06 Gosford Park
No movie this year approaches it in terms of its nimbleness and fluidity in mixing character, theme and wit. Robert Altman's return to form is wildly entertaining.


05 Mulholland Dr.
This, the critical darling of 2001 (OK, In the Bedroom came close) was the year's most familiar complete stranger. We've seen all the Lynchian motifs, images, and characters before but this time, the singular auteur fashioned something new and revelatory out of his used parts. This picture, a grand one, had tremendous "give" in it allowing for multiple correct intrepetations, thereby prompting the most fascinating critical discussions of the year. But all that aside, the truly smart way to watch Lynch's mindfuck is to just let go and give in to its undeniable and nonsensical pull. From the frenetic overexposed jitterbug opening sequence to the final silencing moment, it's undeniably gripping. Just dive into the blue box.

Subsequent years have only strengthened its grip on the imagination, haven't they?

04 Hedwig and the Angry Inch
A triple threat triumph from writer/director/star John Cameron Mitchell. That this unforgettable theatrical experience made such a successful transfer to the screen with its punk edge, subversive charm, and visceral rock spirit intact was the year's happiest little miracle.

03 In the Mood for Love
Wong Kar Wai has outdone himself. The year's most glorious foreign film has the year's best cinematography. It paints a masterful and hypnotic meditation on memory, emotional stasis, and romantic yearning. The luminous coupling of Maggie Cheung as Mrs Chan and Tony Leung Chiu Wai as Mr. Chow astonish: They're as erotic as Mulholland Dr's Nancy Drew lovers without a sex scene, as glamorous as Moulin Rouge!'s doomed bohemians without as many costume changes and in the end they're more emotionally affecting than either of those sensational couplings. Unmissable.

If I had a gazillion dollars I would have this movie projected on my bedroom wall 24/7. Who needs photos, wallpaper, art or paint? Just these visuals on loop, forever.

02 The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
Pure magic. Peter Jackson's new film sets the bar high. Released just one month prior to it, Harry Potter looks even more factory-like next to it. The Fellowship of the Ring recalls the grandiose Star Wars magic minus the bad acting and none of the eventual dissappointments of an embarassing Episode One. Fellowship is compared to many films but the one it looks prettiest sitting next to is Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. In just two short years, two signature adventure epics for The East and the West have arrived that dwarf everything their genre has offered for years. Both films will likely inspire future filmmakers who are now but starry eyed children discovering the enormous magic of the cinema while watching them for the first time.

01 Moulin Rouge!
It's no secret that I've always adored Bazmark productions. (Strictly Ballroom and Romeo + Juliet were also top ten entries in their years.) But Luhrmann and his troupe topped themselves this time. With the final film in his Red Curtain Trilogy celebrating 'real artificiality,' Baz delivered his masterpiece. A lot of ink has been spilt covering Bazmark's divisive musical fantasia and I could certainly spill a lot more, but I think this revolution of a musical sums itself up quite well and accurately in one of its first numbers.

Spectacular! Spectacular!
no words in the vernacular
can describe this great event
you'll be dumb with wonderment.

More than any film in 2001 this film hit my nerve center of cinephilia: I got completely lost in the daring aesthetics, inspired performances, music, dance, and romance. I was stunned, flabbergasted, thrilled, moved, entertained, and drained all at once. When it was over I could only applaud, buy the soundtrack, and return to the theater repeatedly. To paraphrase another song from the film: come what may... come what may.... I will love this film until my dying day.

I wasn't kidding.

**
* *
What were your favorite pictures from 2001?
Do they hold up now? Do you agree that 2001 was the best film year of the decade? For the record the films I was not at all crazy about that quite a few other people love include: The Devil's Backbone, A.I. Artificial Intelligence, A Beautiful Mind, Shrek, Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone and Ghost World.
*
*

Music Meme

I hesitated to play this intermittently popular game but I needed a movie break this morning. This game has a no cheating policy for the host -- what comes up when you click play on your iPod or iTunes is what you post no matter how embarrassing or strange (I cheated a little. I have a lot of stuff on my iPod that's not really songs per seor only clips or whatnot) and a no cheating policy for the guessers -- no googling the lyrics. You guess the song and artist from the first sentence "_____" indicates the title is in the first sentence and has been removed)

Wouldn't you know, that it's not really a movie break. At least six of them are from movies and a couple of others have movie connections.

Can you guess the songs from their first line?

01 "I stumble in the night, never really knew what it would've been like" "For Whom the Bell Tolls" by The Bee Gees guessed by Rizz
02 "______ brings sunshine to my house most every day. _____ brings her friends over to my house to play. "
03 "Is there a way out of this? If there is I don't see it. Can Heaven and Hell coexist?" "Dark Side of the Sun" by Tori Amos was guessed by Guy.
04 "Cover me with shades of disbelief. Can happiness be someone else's dream?"
05 "When the earth was still flat, and the clouds made of fire..." "The Origin of Love" from Hedwig and the Angry Inch as guessed by Garen. And lookie here. Original Hedwig star and creator, the all around brilliant John Cameron Mitchell (also of Shortbus fame), just performed it again last week. Very exciting. Here he is.




06 "______ porque estás como ausente, Y me oyes desde lejos..."
07 "When no friends can't be down, and my girl is out of town"
08 "Yeah, I, I got to know your name. And I could trace your private number, baby" "You Spin Me Round" by Dead or Alive. Guessed by Dave. Apparently some mixes don't start with this line. But mine did ;)
09 "Gumsum gumsum gup chup, gumsum gup chup. Halchal halchal ho gayi teri, honth hai tere chup"
10 "You want all my love and my devotion." "One Night Only" from Dreamgirls as guessed by Noecito
11 "She said something like I wanna go down where the river's wild. He said take me then I want to drown deep in your violent eyes..."
12 "I gave up looking for a reason to live with things just the way they are. I came around. Used to be easy to get to. And they got to me just about every way"

13 "May god bless you and keep you always..."Forever Young" by Bob Dylan guessed by Lev.
14 "Marilyn Monroe ain't got no rock and roll. Ain't got the means to make a scene..."
15 "________ a minstrel show. It makes you laugh. It makes you cry. You go. It just isn't the same on radio. It's all about the makeup and the dancing and the Oh... " "A Pretty Girl is Like..." by the Magnetic Fields guessed by Hazel Shade.
16 "Hey, you Hov... Tell 'em! Hip Hop better ___. Yeah, turn the muh'****in' music up"
17 "Called me up today. Should've stood in your way"
18 "My daddy was a rag-time trombone player..." "Jazz Baby" from Thoroughly Modern Millie guessed by eDot and PoliVamp.
19 "Hey old friend let's look back on the crazy clothes we wore. Ain't it fun to look back to see it's all been done before..." "Come So Far" from Hairspray guessed by PoliVamp

20 "______ points the spire of the steeple. But God's work isn't done by God. It's done by people." "Up, Up, Up, Up, Up" by Ani DiFranco guessed by Deborah
21 "I was born a world ago on top of rocks and under snow"
22 "There was a time when I was in a hurry as you are. I was like you..." "Have You Never Been Mello by Olivia Newton-John guessed by Paul Outlaw
23 "Darling how can I stay here without you? I have nothing to ease my poor heart. This old world would seem sad, love, without you. Tell me now that we never will part..." Nobody guessed this one but it was EmmyLou Harris and here's Meryl Streep doing that same song "Gold Watch and Chain"



24 "_______ and her age stood still and she danced twice a day in the vaudeville" "Queenie Was a Blonde" from The Wild Party guessed by StinkyLulu
25 "I should write a song about you and all the shit that you do" This was "Crash and Burn Girl" by Robyn as guessed by Josh

"omigod you guys"

My friend just finished his civic duty as a jury member the other day and as he was leaving the courthouse what thanks did he get? This eyesore driving past the court house, bending and snapping...

I don't want my MTV. Wasn't that horrific Grease reality series enough?

I use to love the movie Legally Blonde and my friend (who snapped this pic) and I both still say "I object!" in Elle voice (don't pretend you don't) with some regularity... but the sad diminishing returns --it's best not to speak of this "Broadway musical" and I use the term lightly-- have so turned me off. It's like all those straight to video Disney "sequels".

Good vs. Evil: Theatrical Blondes

It's so gross that MTV, which has always ignored rock stage musicals that might have actually fit into their vague subject matter chooses THIS as the one stage piece to get excited about and force upon millions. My theory is if you're a tastemaker and you have a captive huge audience, you really ought to try to promote good work that your audience might actually like if they were given the opportunity to sample it.

MTV could have done wonders for Hedwig and the Angry Inch back in the day. Or Spring Awakening recently. Or... any number of shows with true rock and roll spirit, raucous youthful energy and artistic ambition. Not that MTV has a purpose beyond serving the corporate dollar.

BLECH.

*

Tuesday Top Ten: Wigs

tuesday top ten: a weekly series for the list lover in you and the list maker in me

Time for the Tuesday countdown. In celebration of Halloween, this week's list focuses on a subject that's been on my mind since screening the notably "wiggy" Elizabeth: The Golden Age in which Cate Blanchett emoted beneath a parade of hair pieces. Thus, I give you:


Top Ten Movie Wigs
10 "Hedwig" in Hedwig and the Angry Inch (2001)
John Cameron Mitchell's German rocker grabbed that "Wig in a Box," helping to kick-off the return of the movie musical with style. The Farrah Fawcett hairdo, with an edge.

09 "Amadeus" in Amadeus (1984)
I'd like to consider Tom Hulce's Mozart a distant relation to Hedwig. They certainly share a certain flair when it comes to wigging out.

08 "Ron Burgundy" in Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy (2004)
Will Ferrell has made his career through kitschy bad hair. In the case of this smug portrayal of a 1970s news anchor, his hairpiece (it is a rug, right?) is frighteningly similar to one my father used to wear.

07 "Bernadette," "Mitzi" and "Felicia" in The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert(1994) The costumes took the prize at the Oscars, but each of these lovely drag queens (brilliantly embodied by Terence Stamp, Hugo Weaving and Guy Pearce, respectively) topped their sparkly duds off with fantastic and outrageous faux hair.

06 Owen Wilson as himself in anything. Yes, I know he's not wearing a wig, but he makes the list because he's got the kind of hair I'd most like to see copied by others hoping for that perfect crown of California sunshine. Farrah, eat your heart out.

05 "Hobbits, Elves, Wizards and Men" in The Lord of the Rings (2001, 2002, 2003)
Whether it was the eighties-like curly mullets sported by the Hobbits, the "never had a bad hair day, EVER" tresses of the Elves, the unruly locks of "Galdalf the Grey" (replaced by the sleek style of "Gandalf the White," who apparently discovered conditioner when he made his return), or the greasy rocker look of "Aragorn," nearly every character in the trilogy was be-wigged.

04 "Elizabeth" in Elizabeth: The Golden Age (2007)
Immediately after a screening of this film, I declared that the film should have been called "Elizabeth: A Wig for all Seasons." My personal favorite was her long and luxurious look for battle. It went so well with that shiny armour.

03 "Marie Antoinette" in Marie Antoinette (2006) Living the decadent lifestyle as the doomed French queen, Kirsten Dunst and her royal gal pals wear wigs that are as tasty looking as a beautifully layered cake.

02 "Velma Von Tussle" in Hairspray (1988)
No disrespect to Michelle Pfeiffer's '07 incarnation, but Debbie Harry's Velma has one of the most gloriously loopy wigs in movie history.

01 "Mia Wallace" in Pulp Fiction (1994)
While there are certainly more outrageous movie wigs, Uma Thurman's black-haired bob (an update of the stunning look made famous by silent star Louise Brooks) is the most iconic. I think I have a special affinity for the 'do, since it turned into my lazy Halloween costume option during the mid 1990s.

Which fake hairdo is most inspiring to you? What movie-themed wigs have you sported on Halloween in the past and which one will it be this year?

4th of July Pop Quiz

Happy 4th of July!
Be safe: leave the fireworking to professionals. I'm borrowing a page from Ed & Tony today for a who said it / what's it from style quiz? Guess in the comments (and no googling, cheaters!)

1. "In America, you can say anything you want, but most important - and this I know for a fact - in America, there are no cats." -An American Tail (guessed by Gerard)

2. "The American national anthem I've noticed is a bit hazy in the middle. Cause you start strong and you finish strong, but the middle bit's a bit: And fish in the sky, and a big monkey pie." -Eddie Izzard Dressed to Kill

3. "You been taught in this country there's speech that is free But free don't get you no spots on TV" -Warren Beatty as Bulworth

4. "With you it's like... pow, pow, pow, like the fourth of July, every time! " -Norma (Lesley Ann Warren) in Victor/Victoria -guessed by Deborah of Ultimate James Bond)

5. "Late at night I would listen to the voices of the American masters, Tony Tennille, Debby Boone, Anne Murray ...who was actually a Canadian working in the American idiom." -Hedwig from Hedwig and the Angry Inch (Guesed by Aaron of Sarcasm with Light Cream Sauce)

6. "You get up on your little 21-inch screen and howl about America, and democracy. There is no America; there is no democracy. There is only IBM, and ITT, and AT&T, and DuPont, Dow, Union Carbide, and Exxon." -Ned Beatty in Network -guessed by Deborah of Ultimate James Bond)

7. "Last time I was inside a woman was when I visited the Statue of Liberty." Woody Allen in Crimes and Misdemeanors (Guessed by Marcelo)

8. "Beautiful. Beautiful. BEAUTIFUL! Oh, beautiful for spacious skies for amber waves of grain. Is that the kind of beautiful you mean? Is it _____? I'm afraid, ____, this is hardly a criticism." -The evil teacher in Carrie (guessed by Ben B)

9. "Mmm hmm. Hot as a firecracker on the Fourth of July" Robert DeNiro in Cape Fear (guessed by JD of Joe's Movie Corner)

10. "The point is there's a gulf in this country; an ever-widening abyss between the people who have stuff, and the people who don't have shit. It's like this big hole in the ground, as big as the fucking Grand Canyon, and what's come pouring out is an eruption of rage, and the rage creates violence, and the violence is real, Mack. Nothing's gonna make it go away, until someone changes something, which is not going to happen. And you may not like it, even I may not like it, but I can't pretend it isn't there because that it is a lie, and when art lies, it becomes worthless. So I gotta keep telling the truth, even if it scares the shit out of me, like it scares the shit out of you." -Steve Martin in Grand Canyon (guessed by JA of My New Plaid Pants)

11. "What's whacko about it, Mason? I'm a man in search of his true self. How archetypically American can you get? We're all trying to fulfill ourselves, understand ourselves, get in touch with ourselves, face the reality of ourselves, explore ourselves, expand ourselves." -William Hurt in Altered States (guessed by Benji, The Film Junkie)

12. "20 years old, born on the 4th of July, and don't think there weren't jokes about that my whole life, Mister, 'cause there were. 'Who's our little patriot?' they'd say, when I was younger, and therefore smaller and shorter than I am now." -Anya from Buffy the Vampire Slayer

<----13. "And in conclusion, may I please remind you it does not say R.S.V.P. on the Statue of Liberty" -Cher from Clueless (guessed by JA of My New Plaid Pants)

Linkings

Observations on Film Art sees comedic framing in the movies.
The Wicked Stage -That play Bugthat y'all have heard me rave about repeatedly, the one that has a movie version coming out...well, if you're in LA please do yourself the favor and see it on stage. It's a corker. (See also: Stale Popcorn -Glenn likes the poster)
WG/WBINYT says Hedwig and the Angry Inch is returning to Off Broadway. The Zipper is a pretty memorable space here in NYC but it's also not very "concert" shaped (for those who've only seen the movie, the play is performed on a single set as if you're attending Hedwig's concert) so it'll be interesting to see what they do with it. Do NOT miss it if you've only seen the movie.
Boing Boing says no gays in myspace. whaaa?
Defamer gives us a depressing but funny update on what's going on with The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. OK I wasn't laughing so much as crying but it's good to at least hear the title again. I love the title so much. Watch that be whittled away as well...
Pfangirl likes what she's seeing in the new Iron Man photos

RIP
Gordon Scott the main Tarzan of the 1950s (I covered all of the lord of the jungles here) passed away.
Brad McGann, director of In My Father's Den has also died. He was only 43 and made only one feature. He's been suffering from cancer for years apparently. So sad.

Daniel Craig @ Shortbus

Daniel overdresses for his first trip to Shortbus. I'm guessing Justin Bond still lets him in.

The Must Sees
Shortbus, one of 2006's very best films, hits DVD today. If you're old enough (it's unrated) and it skipped your city, now's your chance. Also arriving today is the smash relaunch of the James Bond series with Casino Royale. So you've got a choice: Daniel Craig in a speedo or several adorable unknowns in birthday suits. You've probably seen the Bond flick already so discover those soulful sexual New Yorkers in John Cameron Mitchell's feisty follow-up to Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Or watch the two new releases back to back and maybe you can create some lucid fake memories of Daniel Craig in Shortbus inspired compromising positions.

Does Daniel know the lyrics to the "Star Spangled Banner"? Perhaps he'll just improvise.

New Oscarables on DVD
Bond was ignored (AMPAS is rarely shaken or stirred by Bond) so the only Oscar nominee related DVD release this week is a special edition of Ghost, the tearjerker blockbuster from 1990. Do I remember that single tear falling from Demi Moore's eye because it was a bonafide great movie moment or because the image has been replayed millions of times in movie montages?

Fast Girls
That Diaz & Law / Winslet & Black Christmas romcom The Holiday is already out on DVD, too. It took 3 months and one week. Anyone know what the record is?

After a hard day chasing international criminals, Daniel needs a take-charge woman

Song & Dance: Shortbus & Hedwig

Oops. I forgot the Friday music post. But my best friends were over and we were all laughing our asses off at the histrionic lesbo-horror of Notes on a Scandal again. God I love Judi Dench in that movie. She's just so hateful. But the movie...it's just so wrong. In too many ways to count. Anyway, so let's celebrate a far more self-actualized person, John Cameron Mitchell. He's only brought us two films but both are stunning, musical and entirely their own things. So for today's song interlude, some selections from Shortbus(2006, top ten list) and Hedwig and the Angry Inch (2001, top ten list)

From left to right. Here's Jay Brannan doing his sweet original "Soda Shop" (which he also sings in Shortbus) for YouTube viewers. Be patient ... he bitches about IMDB's awful censorship of the film before he gets to the pretty singing. Then there's a collage of performances from the entire cast at the Shortbus premiere party. Directly below that you've got John Cameron Mitchell performing the Hedwig tune "Wig in a Box" at another Shortbus event. The classic "Origin of Love" from the Hedwig motion picture closes this set. Enjoy.

Psychological Profile by iPod

Is there anything these buggers can't do? Saw this at Johnny A Go Go... You turn on your iPod. Shuffle. Play. The songs that come up answer the following questions in order (You can't change the questions and you can't skip songs. Be honest).

So here goes...

1. How does the world see you?
Cigarettes and Chocolate Milk by Rufus Wainwright. Oh no. I guess people find me addictive but bad for them. A little too sweet, fattening, harmful for you. The song ends: "So please be kind if I'm a mess" haaaaaa ha --Um. Maybe I should not go on.

2. Will I have a happy life?
The Promise by When in Rome. Oh, sweet. A song about friendship.

3. What do my friends think of me?
1979 by Smashing Pumpkins. I can't divine a meaning here but I love it.

4. Do people secretly lust after me?
Talula by Tori Amos. Maybe I'm someone's 'little fig newton'. Or maybe I'm worth losing if I'm worth something? Tori loves to play it ambiguous-like. I have to admit: I was kind hoping I'd get some nasty jam like "Drrrty" by XTina. Is this wrong?

5. How can I make myself happy?
Don't Fence Me In by The Talking Heads. Down with restrictions and inhibitions apparently. It looks like free love for all (but only if you can decipher whether or not you secretly lust after me based on the lyrics to Talula)

6. What should I do with my life?
Central Park from the musical See What I Wanna See. This one scares me. Very few of you will know this but the song is about a man who is a successful corporate guy who basically loses his shit, quits his job, becomes homeless and searches for God. True story: I lost my shit. I quit my job. But no way am I doing the homeless routine if I can help it.

7. Will I ever have children?
Heaven by The Eurythmics. Well Annie is whispering "I'd love to" and "just what you need" and "takes a little time" in the background.

8. What is some good advice for me?
Long Time Gone by the Dixie Chicks. Acceptance of change "and it ain't comin' back again" in other words: Let it go! Good advice.

9. How will I be remembered?
Pale Shelter by Tears for Fears. This is not flattering. I'm either the needy control freak singer or the cold and withholding lover that the song is about? If The Boyfriend is reading this and nodding his head in agreement to either one (or both), keep it to yourself. "Don't Speak!"

10. What's my signature dance song?
Juke Box Blues by Reese Witherspoon as June Carter Cash. I'm a little bit country... who knew?

11. What's my current theme song?
Miseducation of Lauryn Hill by Lauryn Hill. I'm down with this soul searching. Had to stop being what others expected me to be "And I made up my mind to define my own destiny".

12. What do others think my current theme song is?
Sleep to Dream by Fiona Apple. Stubborn, pissed off, and determined. Yep.

13. What shall they play at my funeral?
Say Ahhh... by Deee-Lite. Maybe my funeral will be attended by radical faeries and devolve into a big orgy? "Check my spot. Dig my swirl. I'm a liberated girl"

14. What type of men do I like?
The Origin of Love from Hedwig and the Angry Inch. I guess the answer is that I like my men androgynous. Is this about that time when I obsessed on The Velvet Goldmine for an entire year?

15. How's my love life?
Get Up and Go by the Go-Gos. Er...

Now I really must say goodbye and begin performing some sort of holy water exorcism on my iPod which is clearly possessed by dark forces because it knows WAY too much about my inner psyche. It's like a demon therapist without a confidentiality agreement. Yikes.

Anyway, I showed you mine. Now you show me yours. If you have a blog ... tag your it. Tell us what your iPod says about you! Press play and answer those 15 questions with the songs. Feel free to put a link to your post in the comments section.

tags: iPod, music, playlist

Thursday Triple: Drag Queens

I was going to review Kinky Boots today. That's the latest in that long line of films wherein blue collar British types do something zany to save themselves / their town / their souls. This one's about a struggling shoe factory and the friendship between a nice drag queen (dependable Chiwetel Ejiofor) and a businessman (bland Joel Edgerton). But, honestly, you wouldn't want to read it. Woulda been too bitchy. And not in the good way. That's the kind of mood the movie put me in.

T'was the kind of flick that made me think 'why would anyone make this?' or perhaps more specifically 'why would anyone make this a decade after the genre's prime?' Y'all know this kind of thing peaked with The Full Monty back in 1997. And it's 2006 now so can we please move on from the careful fantasy of the kind and asexual drag queen whose sole purpose in life (i.e. within the movie) is to enrich the lives of the straight people that said queen comes in contact with. You know the type:


Don't mistake me. I love drag queens. I just love them in the John Waters way. His famous quote: "I think families should run for their lives when they see a drag queen, not cuddle up to them. I like different kinds of drag queens. Psycho drag queens. Drag queens with chain saws."

Do-gooder drag queens are boring (not to mention unrealistic --ever met one?). Give me Jackie Beat. Lypsinka. Kevin Aviance. Kiki. The Lady Bunny. Sylvia O'Stayformore. Taylor Mac. RuPaul. Dina Martina. Etcetera. I'll have them all. I like my drag queens fierce, three dimensional, and even a little frightening, thank you very much. So, to wash Kinky Boots and its cipher queen "Lola" out of my head, here are my three favorite drag queens from motion picture history.


Hedwig. Don't you know her? She's the new Berlin wall baby. Try and tear you down. Bernadette. Terence Stamp did utterly nail his line reading of "No more fucking ABBA" in The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. God, I love him. And of course there's Divine (RIP) ...in anything.

To all of these unforgettable celluloid queens and the best drag queens working, I sing you out with a Divine hit to thank you:
"Don't ever stop doing what you're doing. Don't stop. Shoot your shot."

related posts: An Illustrated History of Gender Bending

tags: Chiwetel Eijofor, drag queens, movies, celebrities, Hedwig, Kinky Boots, Terence Stamp, Divine, John Waters, queer,