Posterized: Peter Pans

Today marks the 100th anniversary of the death of Sylvia Llewelyn Davies. You remember it well, I'm sure. She was dragged from her bed to watch an intimately staged performance of the new play Peter Pan, or the Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up. As the play ended and the music soared, she walked right onto the Neverland set filled with fairies and crocodiles and pirates which had miraculously sprung up in her own living room. And she kept on walking right into her own spotlit afterlife. Well that was how it happened to Kate Winslet as Sylvia in Finding Neverland at least. They took some liberties with the timeline for the movie.


Davies was survived by her five sons, who had of course served as inspiration for Peter Pan. The author JM Barrie, a close family friend, all but adopted the boys after her death, as they'd lost their father three years prior to her passing.

So for today's Posterized, in tribute to the Davies boys and their mum, let's glance at the various film incarnations of the story of that boy who never grew up.

Peter Pan (1924) | Peter Pan (1953)

Hook (1991) | Peter Pan (2003) | Return to Neverland (2004)

Those are the only five "authorized" screen versions of which P.J. Hogan's 2003 version is the winner (not that the silent feature and the Disney movie don't have their moments. The less said about Hook the better.) The 2003 version is so undervalued, appropriately fantastical and is also (relatively) true to the 1911 novel Peter and Wendy which was expanded from the stage play and is how most human beings knew the myth until Disney got a hold of it of course.

The Lost Boys (1978) | Finding Neverland (2004) | Neverland (2003)

There are numerous unauthorized versions and reinterpretrations (the most recent of which, Neverland, I included above), lots of animated version from other countries as well as two films specifically about JM Barrie and his relationship to the Davies family which star Ian Holm and Johnny Depp respectively. I wasn't a fan of Finding Neverland (2004) but someone sure was; it won 7 Oscar nominations including Best Picture.

I haven't seen that Ian Holm production but I'd love to hear from anyone who did. I had no idea that existed and I find it very odd that that means that Sir Ian Holm has played not one but two famous authors who had much discussed relationships with other people's children. He also played Alice in Wonderland scribe Lewis Carroll in Dreamchild (1985) which is about Alice as an older woman remembering her youth and her friendship with the author. I guess Ian Holm has been cast as an eccentric writer more often than that even. He's also Bilbo Baggins and played strange scribes in Joe Gould's Secret and Naked Lunch. Funny how actors get in those weird casting grooves.

How many versions of Peter Pan have you seen?
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Take Three: Radha Mitchell

Craig here with another Take Three.

Today: Radha Mitchell

Two Melindas in one for Woody Allen, a video game avatar made flesh in Silent Hill and a sensual magazine intern in High Art aside (plus central roles in The Waiting City, The Children of Huang Shi and Visitors), Radha Mitchell has peppered her career with solid, dependable and intriguing supporting roles. The leads may be few and far between, but Mitchell has delivered quality input on film and television for the last two decades. She's a genre girl at heart - an amiable trait about this Australian character actress.

Take One: Don't croc the boat, baby

Croc horror flick Rogue (2007) came out without much fanfare last year (limited US theatrical release, DVD premiere in the UK) - a shame as it was one of the more enjoyable monster movies of recent times. Essentially Lake Placid with a shade more atmosphere (but, alas, without Betty White's foulmouthed, mariticidal croc-lover), it did a forthright job of emulating Jaws, equalling Alligator and trumping, slightly, 2007's other Oz Crocodile-attack flick Black Water.

It required a dependable thespian presence, so it's no surprise director Greg Mclean went with an actress of Radha Mitchell's talents. She adds to the film a work(wo)manlike professionalism. As Kate Ryan, a boat-cruise tour guide on the waters of Kakadu National Park in the Australian outback, Mitchell steered a cast of human bait (including lead hunk Michael Vartan) away from the snapping gnashers of a stray, oversize scaly menace whilst matching the film's narrative efficacy with a cracking, fuss-free turn.

Mitchell is our tour guide through the bothersome reptile shenanigans, too. Vartan's travel writer is the audience identification vessel, but Kate's the one in the know. We trust her like we trusted Chief Brody. Mitchell plays her straight down the line, but both realistically fallible and clear minded.

Screaming, not drowning: Radha Mitchell in Rogue

Knockoff genre flicks like this are often just CV fillers in decent role droughts for many a performer, but Mitchell commands with aplomb and gives Kate a weary gravitas not always required in these types of film. Genres flicks are never beneath her - and I applaud her for this. Like other supporting actress peers such as Rosamund Pike and Rose Byrne Mitchell shows here and elsewhere (Surrogates, Silent Hill, Pitch Black etc) that she's unafraid to balance mainstream character parts with "lowbrow" sci-fi/horror genre treats...

Take Two: Not so crazy in love?

...a trend that continued earlier this year with her role in The Crazies (2010) remake - for which I adore her all the more for making. She plays Judy Dutton, the pregnant doctor wife of town sheriff Timothy Olyphant; he's ostensibly the lead, and Mitchell supports, but almost equal weight is given to both characters. She doesn't merely tag along as all crazy hell breaks loose when the townsfolk start foaming at the mouth. She's the medical head to Olyphant's authority brawn.

Their marriage appears wholesome, a stable marital centre, but deep down - especially in the way Mitchell plays her scenes, particularly when the two are alone - there's a troubling black spot fathomable within Judy. There are hints of more going on within their marriage, a past bad deed on his part perhaps that, through the way she infers a steadfast reluctance to not just be passive wifey, says more about their personal situation than what was first apparent. Judy's ever-so-slightly frosty air subtly underlines the exterior threat. The potential for the smalltown rot was already there even before the virus leaked.

She's behind you!: Mitchell needs to hire a new nanny in The Crazies

Despite all the running and panicking that's part-and-parcel with near-apocalyptic mass hysteria, Mitchell plays the role with a sly poker face. She gamely fleshes out the role, adds a deft level of nuance unlikely in the script as written. Mitchell rarely appears as merely a victim in her roles, and in The Crazies she's trooping until the end. There's a nagging question hanging over the couple by the film's close - but it goes deeper than the threat of the virus. In her own way Mitchell provides just a touch more complexity to the film.

The casting of thirty- (Mitchell) and forty-something (Olyphant) actors in the leads is a breath of fresh air from the standard teens-in-peril of most recent horror remakes. It's a bold and interesting move. Mitchell was perfect casting: she's well versed in horror genre tropes, supplies an air of everyday plausibility, and, as ever, gives it the requisite amount of gusto.

Take Three: Wonder-less woman

A room of one's own: Mitchell in Finding Neverland

Finding Neverland (2004) was a film I was less than keen on, but the one good thing I came away from the film remembering with fondness was Mitchell's performance as Mary Ansell Barrie, J.M.'s wife. The filmmakers needed a character to question and balance out all the magical, childlike whimsy going on, and Mary was the scapegoat to fit the bill.

Director Marc Forster wants the audience to share in Depp and Winslet's fanciful games, so Mary is duly posited as the antagonistic party-pooper. We're invited to view her as the - boo-hiss-boo - villain of the piece: she's frigid, unmotherly and uninterested in Barrie's sense of wonder. The couple even sleep in separate rooms: his filled with colour and adventure; her's a dark, barren void. The blame is laid at her door.

Men are from Neverland, women are from Room 101

No fair, I say. I felt for her; I wasn't taken in by all the saccharine quirkiness either. The other characters sidelined her, saw her as gloomy and selfish, and it seemed the filmmakers did too: Mary is all-too-often filmed isolated and pushed to the edges of the film frame, alone and unhappy. A dramatic construct sure, but Mary unjustly took the brunt of film's magical biases.

Ticket for one for Peter Pan please?

Mitchell's work is cut out for her and she grafts overtime to make Mary a compelling presence. Her performance was understated and conveyed with praiseworthy dignity. The piecemeal compassion doled out to Mary by the end is hard-earned, but meagre. Mitchell beautifully expresses Mary's last-minute vindication with acute skill.

Of course most of the awards acclaim centred on Depp, Winslet and Highmore but - in an echo of the film's plot - Mitchell was unfairly left out in the prize-giving (only receiving a token joint nomination from SAG). Boo-hiss-boo indeed. For me, the film's few successes lay in Mitchell's hands. Call me a whimsy denier, but I was with Mary all the way.

Deep Link: Aliens, Spidey, La Lohan and More

The Big Picture that Marc Webb Spider-Man reboot has narrowed the candidates down. I'm still not excited about a redo but I'm totally thumbs up on the idea of either Jamie Bell or Andrew Garfield... though it's weird to hear them referred to as "unknowns", you know? Alden Ehrenreich (Tetro), Josh Hutcherson (The Kids Are All Right) and Frank Dillane (Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince) are also being considered.
Cracked "Which awful redhead stereotype are you?" Starring Lindsay Lohan"time bomb", Julianne Moore "sex fiend" and others. Poor gingers!


MTV Movies Logan's Run gets a new director in Erik Rinsch. It's so sad to me that the studio had issues with handing Alien 5 over to him. That's what that entire franchise thrived on... putting fresh visionary directors on the map before they were A list: Scott, Fincher, Cameron. If the Aliens franchise is about anything beyond the Ripley badassery and the acid blood beasties, that's what it's about. It's like the third most important element of that franchise. When you have the same story every time, you have to add the auteurial shakes up or you have nothing.
NY Mag sword and sandal epics and the evolution of Abs within them. Funny stuff
Vanity Fair has 30 portraits and profiles of Tony nominees for this past theater season including familiar faces like Jude Law.
Playbill Bernadette Peters and Elaine Stritch offered the CZJ and Lansbury roles in A Little Night Music on Broadway? ohmygodohmygod. Not that either of them would ever accept a "replacment cast" situation but if this happens a ticket MUST have my name on it.
Mental Floss '9 Copyrights Given to Charity.' Interesting list. I had no idea that Peter Pan was copyright free now. You'd think there'd be a sudden influx of Pan movies.
Just Jared more pics from the set of Mildred Pierce: Kate Winslet and Evan Rachel Wood
Towleroad Madonna gets vampiric to sell sunglasses. It's very Deneuve/Hunger

Finally, the first pics of LL as LL have surfaced. Yes the alliterative Lohan/Lovelace porno biopic Inferno is coming your way... eventually. Oh No They Didn't posted the pics from photographer Tyler Shields who seems to have already removed them from his own website though there's still a lot of fun stuff there including a shoot with Glee's Jayma Mays, Zachary Quinto and plentiful rude portraits of Young Hollywood.

I'd love for Lohan to be able to pull this off but acting is like anything else. If you aren't committed to it, how are you going to get great at it?

Decade in Review: 2003 Top Ten

As you may have noticed, I will not be done with my Decade in Review until sometime into the new year. Hopefully we'll wrap up shortly after the Oscars; You know how distractingly all-consuming the Oscars can be! I hope you'll stay with it even though the rest of the media will move on any second now. They're always in such a rush. No stopping and smelling of the flowers. I've still got to update that "Actors of the Aughts" project for final compilation/statement. For now, let's move on to 2003. What follows is my original top ten list, based on films released in NYC in 2003. If I have anything new to say that'll be in red after the original text.


Special Mentions: The Cremaster Cycle and Angels in America
Most Underappreciated: Hulk (Ang Lee), In the Cut (Jane Campion), Anything Else (Woody Allen), Charlies Angels: Full Throttle (McG) and Casa De Los Babys (John Sayles)
I stand by all of these but for Anything Else which I don't much care for. I was making lots of excuses for it because I was still hanging on to my fading then favorite writer/director. Now that Woody has recovered some of his lost mojo, I can happily let that one go.
Top Ten Runners Up: The Man Without a Past (Aki Kaurismaki), Elephant (Gus Van Sant), The Triplets of Belleville (Sylvain Chomet), and Yossi & Jagger (Eytan Fox) which, if you don't count Return of the King, is the best homo movie of the year!

10 X2: X-Men United (Bryan Singer)
Tacit proof that sequels needn't be creatively dead retreads, inferior duplicates, or worthless blights on the cinemascape. X2 is so assured, exciting, breezy and fun that it is easily twice the film that the original was. Yet, for all of that...for its sheer popcorn enthusiasm, it is deceptively easy to dismiss. Only problem in doing so, though, is that it holds up. Multiple viewings and I'm still not bored. Chalk full of memorable imagery: Nightcrawler's attack, Wolverine's flash memories. Crackling dialogue and campy mutant "coming out" speeches sit comfortably along dead serious pleas for tolerance. Bravura action sequences, Magneto's escape, Wolverine vs. Deathstryke, and of course the attack on the Xavier's School. And that's not to even mention the pleasure of one of the year's best ensembles: Hugh Jackman continues to glow in the spotlight and thrill as Wolverine, that unlikely duo Sir Ian McKellen and Rebecca Romijn Stamos make the year's most deliciously naughty pair, Halle Berry is wisely pushed to the background, and Alan Cumming steps into my favorite X-man's shoes and doesn't disappoint as teleporting blue freak Nightcrawler.

My second or third favorite superhero flick ever. Spider-Man 2 is tops but Superman II is awesome, too. It's always the twos!

09 Peter Pan (P.J. Hogan)
Dec 7th, 2004 marks the the centennial of the first production of J.M. Barrie's play Peter Pan, or the Boy Who Would Not Grow Up and though it may seem shocking to see in print, P.J. Hogan's new film is, I believe, the first major time since that a boy has been cast as the stubborn impish lad. Imagine that! It's the first simple unmistakable sign that director and co-screenwriter P.J. Hogan (Muriel's Wedding) understands the material in a way that others don't, particularly those famed Pan fetishists Steven Spielberg, who dropped the gooey atrocity of Hook on us, and Michael Jackson, who built the Neverland ranch and threatened publicly for years to make his own movie version of the Barrie classic starring: Himself!!! Whatever one can say about Michael Jackson, he was not a boy at the time but a full grown man. No business playing Peter Pan in other words.

So, I found it rather disorienting this Christmas when a faithful rendition of the Barrie work arrived, and most people collectively shrugged. One gets the sense that J.M. Barrie's classic is no longer widely read. That quite possibly and unfortunately, people have replaced the play and book with the watered down Disney animated film as the definitive Pan. (Which is about as accurate a representation as Ariel replacing the original Little Mermaid text.) What a loss. Like the most enduring fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm, the actual story of Peter Pan is full of difficult truth, rough edges, and adult subtext. They're all here in this enchanting film.

Hogan's new Pan movie boasts the best Wendy performance I can recall (courtesy of the young and obviously talented Rachel Hurd Wood), the nastiest --and therefore most accurate -- Tinkerbell you'll ever see (mimed to fine effect by French hottie Ludivine Sagnier), and terrific cinematography courtesy of Donald McAlpine (Moulin Rouge!). Oh, the cleverness of this production. Perhaps this year's upcoming J.M. Barrie biopic, starring the great Johnny Depp, will remind folks of Pan's classic status, and turn people back to this unduly dismissed film.

Unfortunately the JM Barrie biopic that followed (Finding Neverland) was a dull snoozer. It did nothing for the reputation of this still undervalued family film.

08 The Barbarian Invasions (Denys Arcand)
Though I have yet to see The Decline of the American Empire, writer/director Denys Arcand's sequel to that 80s international hit felt like a family reunion nonetheless. It's not entirely pleasant, of course. Neither are family reunions. As critics have remarked, some of the characters are nearly monstrous in their selfishness, egotism and bitter regret. But this is also why, in the end, the film works. It feels honest. Its cynical undercurrent -liberalism is dying or already dead and these lefties are dinosaurs - is painful, but also arguably true in the global spread of uncompassionate capitalism. But the human face Arcand still locates in the love between Capitalist son and Liberal father thankfully transcends politics. Invasions has an impressive grasp of how political idealogies both power and limit us.

Somehow, briefly loving this movie this movie never convinced me to watch its predecessor and I almost never think of it. If I could redo the list I'd move it out and raise one of the runners up into the top ten. But which?

07 The Company (Robert Altman)
One of the most relaxed intuitive films I can recall seeing. It seems instinctually to be looking at its subject, the world of the Joffrey ballet, from just the right angle at all times. And yet for all this precision it never breaks a sweat. It's smartly lensed by cinematographer Andrew Dunn, gorgeously edited by Geraldine Peroni, and all masterfully guided by that supremely confident auteur Robert Altman, who makes it his own. Who needs a traditional plot when in the hands of a master?

You may have heard that this was Neve Campbell's pet project for some years. Some pet projects are worth the effort. First, she had the good sense to hire Altman, who has always had a way with community as protagonist. And then, bucking star convention, she showed an even more impressive lack of vanity. She slips comfortably into the film's dancing ensemble, showing off her considerable skills while never unbalancing the film with showboating. I suspect it goes without saying but it's easily the best thing she's ever contributed to the cinema or television.

06 Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (Gore Verbinski)
I know next to nothing about ships and seafaring ways but I do know what an anchor is for. No ship can do without it. Dropped from its holding place within any waterborne structure it will stop its ship from veering dangerously off course by weighing it down. An anchor then, even when employed figuratively, implies the element which keeps any vessel in place. As in "that plot structure really anchored the film by allowing the drama to unfold in unexpected but sturdy ways" or "The actress's intimate and perceptive performance anchored the film to reality -when the plot holes threatened to do it in" or some such...

What Johnny Depp is to Pirates is the polar opposite of an anchor. But, never worry, this ship is still safe. One of the world's most gifted actors seems to be, to borrow from Peter Pan, spreading pixie dust across an entire film. There will be no traditional course for this bloated movie ship. It is soaring now, like some wild-eyed adventurer, up into the heavens. It defies reality and the conventional mediocrity of its origins. One has no idea where it's going --to ruin? to the exalted rare realms of classic adventures like Raiders of the Lost Ark or The Adventures of Robin Hood? No matter. The journey is the reward. When you've got the Performance of the Year steering your course, who needs the dead weight of anchors? Wherever this ship is taking you -- go, man, go!

I wish this had been in my Best Picture nominees (the top five). It never gets old. I don't need to ever see either sequel ever again but my love for the original is undiminished. Whenever it's on I end up watching.


05 Raising Victor Vargas (Peter Sollett)
Apart from In America, this is the most warmhearted picture of the year. It glows with the dedication and communal love and effort of its amateur cast (all giving professional level performances) and its debuting writer/director. To call the man in question, Peter Sollett, "one-to-watch" would be an understatement. That 'glow' of which I spoke is also given literal visual form by ace up-and-coming cinematographer Tim Orr (All the Real Girls, George Washington). Vargas is a deeply pleasurable, funny, and humane look at a struggling Dominican family on the Lower East Side and their wannabe Casanova, Victor (Victor Razuk), who spars continually with his religious Grandmother, hilariously played by Altagracia Guzman. See it.

04 thirteen (Catherine Hardwicke)
"Zen Chicken" is this divisive film's most seemingly random bit -- the unhappy makeshift family gathers giggling around a bird that never loses his balance, no matter which way he's tipped or turned. This scene became, as the year progressed and the film grew in my heart, my favorite moment. The film's detractors will tell you that it is too histrionic, unhinged, and immature to qualify for the awards it is intermittently courting. It's not that these claims are false, just that they're misdirected. The ragged hormonal surges of adolescence, the hysteria of teenage whims and social constructions pulse strongly and appropriately, I'd add, (credit to the film's director and co-screenwriter Catherine Hardwicke) through the film. Its jittery, confused and angry moodshifts (embodied by Evan Rachel Wood) are always threatening to topple the whole affair into tabloid sensationalism. And there, in the same overcrowded movie house is the deep fierce reserve of tough maternal love (in the form of Holly Hunter) which could also in lesser hands topple the film in the other direction into After School Special messaging. In the meeting of these two spectacular performances the film transcends both tabloid exploitative "the kids are not all right" indie zeal and After School Special tough love messaging. This film is special. This film has balance. It's a Zen Chicken.

Thirteen deserved more accolades than it got, I'm 100% certain. But I may have gone a wee bit overboard in my love. Still... tis a pity that it was Keisha Castle-Hughes that became the youngest Best Actress nominee ever when Evan Rachel Wood was right there on view, running circles around actresses twice her age.

03 Lost in Translation (Sofia Coppola)
What else is there to say? It's so distinctive and perceptively modulated that the very not-at-all-universal particulars of the situation (i.e. the ennui of a has-been still wealthy movie star and the boredom of a privileged young girl) melt away to get at the universal feeling of dislocation. The perplexing condition of being lost in your own skin is a great movie subject but undoubtedly hard to film. Credit goes to Ms. Coppola herself as writer/ director, the terrific and essential chemistry between Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson and Lance Acord the cinematographer, for helping us to see a major metropolis in the same way the characters would be seeing it.

Everyone does want to be found. I imagine a good deal of the love this film has encountered, is that in an artistic sense, Coppola's sophomore effort probably found a lot of unsuspecting audiences members. If you've been previously lost in the multiplex with no one and nothing speaking to you, this could be your film.

02 Kill Bill, Vol. I (Quentin Tarantino)
So potent is this film's movie-movie force (it's tough to imagine a stronger blend of cinematography, editing, musical / structural invention, and overall cinematic chutzpah) that I was briefly tempted to place it in the #1 spot. But then, why punish the year's best film for being only a third of its true self and simultaneously reward half of this motion picture? Didn't make sense. So the number #2 spot it gets.

blood-red is the new black

It's too early to say, with authority, if Kill Bill is all it seems cracked up to be, but I await Volume 2 with great excitement. I suspect we're looking at a subversively violent masterpiece. I don't currently believe that the film is as lacking in morality and self-critique as its enemies do. I suspect the overall circular vengeance motif will cause its anti-heroine much pain in Volume 2. But I'll keep an open mind should it fail to deliver. The final verdict awaits. But regardless, Tarantino really needs to work more. Cinema is in his blood. So much so that he can dump gallons of it onscreen visually and still keep on swinging like it's only a flesh wound. This movie's heart, thanks to Thurman's great range as "The Bride", is still beating furiously despite copious amounts of blood lost.

So... Vol II did not live up to my rather naive dreams about some sort of revenge auto-critique. I must have been confusing vengeance-loving Tarantino with another filmmaker. Er... But I still love Vol I and I'll always cherish the Elle Driver bits in Vol II

01 Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (Peter Jackson)
Gandalf the White is our sage guide throughout the great trilogy of the Lord of the Rings. One of his most famous quotes is "All you have to decide is what to do with the time that's given you" I think it's safe to say that this film's director, producer, writer, and driving force Peter Jackson chose well.

One can quibble with minor bits and pieces of each film. The Fellowship of the Ring was, after all, all beginning, no resolution. The Two Towers had awkward middle structural three-fold problems and The Return of the King is repetitive given the six hours of films we've already seen covering the Middle Earth war. The film's much maligned ending (from the strange not altogether wise choice to alter the Mount Doom finale all the way to the multiple fadeouts) has been sufficiently covered elsewhere.

But why bother with petty quibbling when the whole is this magnificent? Behold the cinema's first great fantasy epic. The film that gets both spectacle and intimacy right. Here is a filmmaker that understands that special effects and CGI are only another tool of filmmaking -not an end point. They're there to advance a narrative, deepen a characterization, and show us the fully realized world of the film. Then consider the cast -- every major role inhabited by an actor totally there and committed to serve the vision. And finally, breathe a final sigh of relief: Behold a genre series that, upon its conclusion, didn't prove itself a massive letdown for its loyal audience.

Peter Jackson "You bow to no one."

And that's that. Jackson's subsequent work has disheartened me but he'll always have this spectacular trilogy and the nearly peerless Heavenly Creatures.
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What were your favorites of 2003? Films I didn't mention here that made waves were In America, City of God, Freaky Friday, 21 Grams, Elf, Monster, Something's Gotta Give and a whole school of movies with literal waves or soggy titles like Mystic River, Master and Commander, Whale Rider, Seabiscuit, Finding Nemo and Big Fish.

Michael Jackson 1958-2009 (RIP)

I don't know what to say... two pop culture icons lost in one day. I was leaving for the movies when I first heard the news (then but a rumor) so I'm just catching up now. Like many pop stars Michael Jackson wanted to be in movies and the Peter Pan obsession in particular was one he never shied away from expressing. His Steven Spielberg / Peter Pan project never happened -- well it did but without songs and without Michael Jackson and in a different form altogether -- and neither did the movies. But, like Madonna, he was a mammoth small screen star by way of the music video.

And a mammoth star in general.

I can't say that I was ever a big fan and the sordid tabloid problems turned me off as much as anyone but it was hard to live through the 70s or 80s without having some connection to his work. Here are four of my favorites from his oeuvre. I'm not claiming they're necessarily his best but they're four that mean something to me personally or bring back vivid good memories.

And finally Liberian Girl and Leave Me Alone. I include these not because they have special significance to me but because they perfectly illustrate Michael Jackson's obsession with celebrity in general and the family he found in other celebrities. There are tons of stars in the first video (including Olivia Newton John & John Travolta "acting" together!) and it's dedicated to Elizabeth Taylor, the lone Jackson obsession to which I can fully relate. She's one of the true immortals. La Liz also factors heavily into the second video.

Madonna's statement...


Well said.

Suggested reads
Towleroad have you heard Jay Brannan's sung tribute? It's beautiful
Arjan Writes is shocked
Roger Ebert has a great piece
The Disney Blog remembers Captain Eo
fourfour Rich is as readable as ever

If all the shit that he went through couldn't knock Thriller, Off the Wall, Bad and, to whatever degree, Dangerous and HIStory out of our hearts, minds and asses, a little thing like death isn't going to, either.

Scanners investigates the mask and the problems with adult stardom
IFC Daily collects the web obits
Gawker collects the headlines. God, the NY Post is an embarrasment
A Socialite's Life collects the celebrity reactions

Top 10 Movie Characters

I've been asked "What are my ten favorite characters in the history of movies?" Curse you Timothy! And Squish. The question is not something specific like ten favorite characters in Moulin Rouge! (easy) or ten favorite performances by an actress in the past three years or ten favorite Disney villains. No, this question is broader than Ursula's tentacle span. This is like asking someone "What are your ten favorite notes in the history of music?" Insanity. So I'm doing this off the top of my head. I'm avoiding things I talk about too much (Ursula, Lt. Ellen Ripley, Dorothy Gale and any character played by Michelle Pfeiffer). I'm also presenting in chronological order so as to avoid nervous meltings or celluloid breakdowns.

Top Ten Movie Characters

Peter Pan
The movies are full of franchise characters, but usually I stay picky only getting wrapped up for short bursts of time. Take James Bond. It totally depends on the Bond for me. And though I love vampires in general I prefer them when they're not actually Count Dracula himself or Vlad the Impaler or whatever he's calling himself now. I could definitely swing with some Tarzans but I don't seek out his movies. But Peter Pan? From the silent version in 1924 (starring Betty Bronson) the stage musical (starring whomever... though I always hate that it's a girl playing the impish boy), through the Disney cartoon right up to the underappreciated 2003 incarnation, I'll always watch him fly. Even though I sometimes regret it. Bonus points for Tinkerbell even if Disney is attempting to destroy my love for her [on Tinkerbell and Wendy]

Lucy Warriner in The Awful Truth (1937)
If I could marry Lucy and Jerry Warriner, played by Irene Dunne and Cary Grant, I would. Every time I watch the movie I fall madly in love with Lucy and fall totally in sync with Jerry. He and I become totally discombobulated. She's impossible and hilarious, sexy and maddening, baffling and endearing all at once and often at the same moment. Though to tell the truth, I could just as easily have picked Hazel Flagg in Nothing Sacred (1937), Susan Vance in Bringing Up Baby (1938), Ellie in It Happened One Night (1934) or Sugarpuss O'Shea in Ball of Fire (1941). There is no list of Greatest Anything that is complete without the screwball comedy.

Norma Desmond in Sunset Blvd (1950)
The ur diva actress and arguably the best mirror character for the cinema as a whole, reflecting back on the silents and still projecting forward and resonating today. She's a nightmare avatar of stardom curdled that forever haunts the movies. It doesn't matter how small the pictures get. She's also the unavoidable reminder of the inevitability of aging and death even for the true immortals of the screen.

Clyde Barrow in Bonnie & Clyde (1967)
I should say "Bonnie and..." but that'd be cheating. And though I love Faye Dunaway's fierce style and her eagerly swift descent into criminality, my heart tips ever so slightly to Warren Beatty's Clyde... beautiful, violent, impotent, infamous Clyde shooting and stealing his way through a short life in those dust bowl days.

Sevérine in Belle de Jour (1967)
For her perversity and beauty... but most of all for her unknowability. Few characters in cinema retain their mystique so well once the credits roll. Was Catherine Deneuve ever better? Then again... when isn't she superb? [more Deneuve]

Sally Bowles in Cabaret (1972)
Doesn't her body drive you wild with desire? I realize there's stiff competition out there but she may well be the most quotable character in all of cinema... or at least within the musicals. [on Cabaret]

Roy Batty in Blade Runner (1982)
I never quite understood the deep pathos of the Frankenstein myth until I came face to face with his futuristic descendant, replicant Roy Batty as portrayed by Rutger Hauer. With his white shock hair, adult malice and incongruous little boy pouting he mesmerized. That double emotional arc/climax stunned: the first in which he meets his physical maker and exterminates him, the second in which he himself expires knowing there's no spiritual maker to go home to. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in the rain... [more on Batty]

Freddy Honeychurch in A Room With a View (1986)
When Lucy Honeychurch's uncouth suitor George shouts "Beauty!!!!!" into the open air in this Merchant/Ivory classic, I think not of the landscape he shouts to or of Lucy, but of her little brother Freddy. I think of the young Rupert Graves and his amateur hour musicality, vivid immaturity, impossible bangs (his hair seems as eager to frolic as he is) and uninhibited enthusiasms... "fancy a bath?". What's mo --- okay, okay, it's a sexual fixation. I confess. But it's not like we all don't have them with movie characters. You think Rita Hayworth's Gilda became a classic character strictly for her personality? [previous Freddy Honeychurch]

Suzanne Vale in Postcards From the Edge (1990)
She combines three elements that are utterly amazing on their own, let alone fused: Carrie Fisher's wit, channelled through Meryl Streep's awesomeness in order to illuminate what happens to be my favorite species on earth, the Actress Neurotica. It's not exactly an endangered species but I still think we ought to set up a preservation fund to make sure they never go the way of the dinosaur. And maybe get zoos involved in case things get too dangerous for them in the wild.

Amber Waves in Boogie Nights (1998)
The foxiest bitch in the whole world. In some ways Amber Waves forever cursed Julianne Moore to be seen as "the bad mother" but if you have to get stuck in a typecasting rut, get there by playing one of the most indelible screen creations ever. Bonus points: Good actors spoofing bad acting (see also: Jean Hagen in Singin' in the Rain and Jennifer Tilly in Bullets Over Broadway) is one of the greatest pleasures of the silver screen.

Wither the Aughts? If you're on your movie-loving training wheels --there's no shame in that. We all start with movies of the here and now, whenever our here is now -- and would like this list caged into the past 10 years, well... I decided to save the current decade for a later list. Turns out this wasn't as painful as I thought but fun to create even as it fails on the definitive front. There are just too many characters to embrace.

Who should I tag (i.e. punish)? I really want to see the lists that JA, Dave, Gabriel, Fox and Adam would whip up. And I tag you if you haven't a blog of your own should you like to share in the comments. And tell me what'cha think of my ten ...do we share a few character obsessions?
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"Razor Sharp"

"When I close my eyes, I see this thing. It's like this big sign...

and the name is in, like, bright blue neon lights with purple outline...

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...And this name is just so bright and so sharp that

the sign -- it just blows up because the name is just so powerful!"

Tonight Nathaniel does DisneyWorld. Enjoy wonderful guest bloggers all week!
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"Thou Shall Not Pass"

The Balrog proves no match for Tink' and Gandalf


...but Nathaniel is allowed to pass into her magic kingdom in just 3 Days
DisneyWorld awaits!

It's Tinkerbell's World...

and soon I'll be living in it.
_______ 5 Days until Nathaniel is in DisneyWorld

Day of Rest

Shhhhhhhh.... Wendy needs her rest. Her head is full of pirates and adventure (so is mine -- more on that tomorrow) and tonight -- we can fly, we can fly, we can fly.... zzzzzz

reminder: this coming week @ The Film Experience
A look back at The Piano (1993) and Network (1976), as well as the usual random celluloid musings...
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20:07 (Peter Pan)

Twins - "20:07" Gemini Edition June 11th to June 20th
Twin screengrabs from the 20th minute and 7th second of related movies


[singing] Give me a career as a buccaneer It's the life of a pirate for me Oh, the life of a pirate for me!

"Michael. John. There's a boy here who is to teach us to fly!"

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Two stills from films about the boy who never grew up. One is the widely seen Disney musical from '53. Fifty years later PJ Hogan directed a faithful book-to-screen version, which as you'll see here, takes just a wee bit longer to get us to Neverland. If you're just joining us (in which case --where ya been?) Wendy & Tink' got a write up last week. Even if you've read it you might want to click over. There were a few late entries to the "Action Heroine" celebration (including a Gallery of the Absurd painting) bringing the end total to a whopping 53 articles.

Please Note: Thanks for your enthusiasm and frequent commenting on the "20:07" project. This particular series is going on hiatus for at least a couple of weeks. But there's always something to see and read here at the experience. Stay tuned.

Action Heroine HQ

The Action Heroine Blog-a-Thon
On June 12th, 2007 the Amazons rule the blogosphere
Scroll down for a list of 50 additional participating blogs

Daughters of the Fairy Dust
by Nathaniel R

When the subject of classic action heroines comes up, you’d be safe to assume that most people conjure up instant memories of Wonder Woman, Lt Ellen Ripley (the Aliens franchise) and Buffy the Vampire Slayer before their minds wander to less famed and obsessed over examples of women who muscled their way through cinematic or literary adventures. But I think the vanishing point you need to look at for true action heroine perspective is Peter Pan. Stop laughing. I’m not talking about the many girls in green tights who’ve played this famously stubborn boy–though the traditionally gender switched casting almost makes a case for Peter Pan as an action heroine himself. No, I’m talking Wendy and Tinkerbell. It all goes back to them.

What? You don’t believe this boy can fly with that theory? I can fly try I can try I can try


JM Barrie’s Peter Pan holds a deserved spot in the literary canon. It began life as a play in 1904 before being adapted into the book Peter Pan and Wendy. Many adaptations followed in most every medium. It’s one of those famous stories you can love as a child and never outgrow as an adult because there’s so much that’s magical and insightful in the themes and the telling. The most famous film version is the Disney animated musical from 1953 but that one loses a lot of Peter Pan’s edge (particularly in the case of Tinkerbell) so I prefer the more faithful adaptation from 2003.

Early in the most recent Pan film Wendy mock swordfights with her brothers and frightens them with stories of Captain Hook. There’s a little of Little Women’s protofeminist Jo March in her –only Wendy has it better: she'll actually live out the adventure story she spins for her siblings. Wendy has a fearless spirit, as eager to fly and fight as the boys, but her peers and adversaries try to pin her down to more traditional roles. Her brothers lose the mock battle “Who are you to order me about and call me girlie?” she asks while towering over them. The Lost Boys waiting for her in Neverland also reduce Wendy to a typically feminine role. She becomes the “mother”. While Wendy dutifully fills the maternal vacuum she’s still eager to fly with Pan. It’s easy to see future action heroines in Wendy’s adventurous spirit with a huge helping of maternalization. Even the butchest and most dangerous action heroines are maternalized: The Bride (Kill Bill) and Sarah Connor (Terminator) both fight savagely because of their children. Even the Alien franchise’s iconic Ripley, though childless, is maternalized throughout the series be it through emotional adoption (Newt) or unplanned pregnancy (alien babies, ewww).

Tinkerbell is a little trickier. I recently read an article about Disney’s realization that the little fairy was one of their most popular characters. They're making plans to expand her place in the Disney universe. I’m not sure what that says about young girls today. For, you see, Tinkerbell is an anti-heroine if ever there was one. She’s not truly evil but neither is she a role model. She behaves in ways most commonly associated with uncharitable and/or sexist depictions of women. She’s fickle. She schemes. She’s selfish. She acts impulsively. She’s ruled by irrational and sometimes dangerous emotions (she even tries to kill off Wendy, her rival for Peter's love!). In short Tinkerbell is a mini mega-bitch.


Matters of influence are hard to pin down but isn't there a lot of Wendy (smart, resourceful but forcibly maternalized) in most action heroines? Tinkerbell certainly equates easily with many anti-heroines –a little wild, a lot dangerous, but still a true kick to watch and impossible to hate: think Catwoman and the like. The most obvious modern descendents of Wendy and that dusty fairy are Elizabeth Swann (love interest of Pirate boys / a natural leader herself) and Calypso (fickle imprisoned magical creature who creates havoc but also saves the day) in the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. But I think you can even see a tiny bit of Wendy & Tink's DNA in rivals like the Kill Bill doppelganger amazons: there's The Bride (formidable, maternal, fond of storytelling) and Elle Driver (childish, irrational, obsessed with destroying her rival for her man’s affection –in this case it’s Bill in place of Peter)

It might be a stretch to make those last two connections but it amuses me. And you dear readers? Clap your hands if you believe in heroines and anti-heroines. Clap your hands.



READ MORE, COMMENT, SPREAD THE LOVE (of ass kicking women)

update: you can also look at the blog-a-thon by subject matter

fast women ~first blogs out of the gate
Coffee Coffee... on Cat Ballou, an action heroine that almost was
Screengrab chicks with guns -a top ten
Collecting Tokens Michelle Yeoh is one Supercop
Deep In Your Eyes on Mexican heroine "Lola the Truck Driver"
Film Otaku names the five best Asian action heroines of recent years
Damsel in Progress -The Long Kiss Goodnight schizo "mom" debate
Flickhead "Suck my dick!" said Demi to the Dude
Joes Movie Corner has a two-part contribution. You know Zhang Ziyi is there
Luke Hingis celebrates his fav' star turn: Cate Blanchett as Elizabeth
Wifely Steps takes lessons in feisty femininity from Elizabeth Swann
Cosmo Marius Miss World semi-finalists who played famous action heroines
My New Plaid Pants celebrates the only woman more badass than Ripley in Aliens. You heard that right... more badass than Ripley "Anytime, anywhere, man!"

career gals ~up at the crack of dawn, posting
Ultimate James Bond the double barreled women of Goldeneye
Way of Words "She's a Maniac..." Hollywood's nonthreatening action women
Odienator Streep puts accents into action w/ The River Wild
Pfangirl on the aborted Paul Verhoeven project Mistress of the Seas
Sell Me a Screenplay the top three heroines... and one that sucks
Stale Popcorns offers up haiku for hero(ine)s
Verging Writer Thelma & Louise took extraordinary actions
This Distracted Globe on the making of James Cameron's classic Aliens
Michael Parsons on Blade Runner's childwoman Pris
Forward to Yesterday "Inaction Heroines" on the three modes of women in studio-era action films and the women of Scaramouche


no nonsense ladies ~12:00 Noon sharp
Film Flap tips on creating an strong woman in your screenplay
As Little As... curates an exhibit of Indiana Jones's women
I am Screaming... Angelina Jolie/Lara Croft's secret weapon
Flick Filosopher Top Ten TV Action Heroines (sans Buffy!)
Low Resolution the good-bad pleasure of "Charly Baltimore"
Woodstock on Barbarella. Jane Fonda IS the queen of the galaxy
Victim of Time a tribute to Lola who ran ran ran
Rants... 'You call that scene stealing?' On Kill Bill's Gogo Yubari
popbytes a classic: Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor and the pilot episode of the new Terminator TV series

divas. they're fashionably late
Cinemathematics on "The Two Ripleys"
Heroine Content thinks Paycheck treats its heroine (Uma!) right
Lazy Eye Theaters heroines sans the action
Stinky Lulu "the makeover" in female action flicks
All About My Movies spotlights Ofelia in Pan's Labyrinth
White Board Markers "by the honor of Greyskull, she has no power"
Crumb by Crumb she roared. rampaged. got bloody satisfation
Collecting Tokens action heroines I've wanted to be
this is a blog about you "Ode to Elle"
Cinephilia is almost speechless over Lady Vengeance
Burbanked has a special edition of "womb to tomb"
Jester Tunes celebrates leather queen, gun totin' Trinity
The Listening Ear gets lost in Brigitte Lin's eyes
Dr. Insermini mi top 5 de heroínas
The Blossoming Stix Jada Pinkett Smith in A Low Down Dirty Shame
Cinebeats Tura Santana is "the real deal" in Faster Pussycat Kill Kill
Lazy Eye Theater Ode to O'Ren, the best role Lucy Liu will ever have

grande dames they make their own schedule thank you very much
Ultimate James Bond Ass Kicking Bond Girls
Goatdog "Also starring Errol Flynn..." on Olivia DeHavilland
Bright Lights After Dark Kill Hagen... some 79 years before Kill Bill
Gallery of the Absurd Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon reimagined

WHEW. That was fun. And I still haven't read them all. But I will. I only host a couple of huge blog-a-thons a year but there's always something happening at the film experience, one of the hardest working / most obsessive movie blogs in the known universe. So bookmark, link up, subscribe, tell your friends. And if you really like what you're reading at any of these participating blogs, do the same with them. Support fine blogging. [/plug plug]





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