Links and Other Drugs

I'm so behind on movie news and readings. It will take me a week to catch up. I'm also aware that I need to revamp the Oscar predix this week. Where to even begin? Links.

IndieWire TIFF completes their lineup. I haven't been posting about TIFF much because I'm so depressed I'm not going. Maybe I'll find someone to cover it for me... [hint. hint]
NY Post will The Walking Dead be a hit for AMC? I do wonder how anyone can make the zombie story fresh these days. This looks exactly like all the rest of them, barring the horseback travel. When will entertainment's zombie addiction end?
Coming Soon a big screen adaptation of the app/game Angry Birds? I have now heard everything. This would only work as claymation. Oh god please not glossy CGI for this property.


Nick's Flick Picks His 2009 Honorees continue with Screenplays. Better late than never, especially with the intriguing but concise writeups.
Cinema Blend video of Viggo and Fassbender in costume and makeup for the new David Cronenberg picture. Oooh, can't wait to see them in action together.
Marc Malkin Meet Kurt's Glee boyfriend
PopMatters "like touching the dead" another rave for Ken Russell's The Devils (1971). I really wish they'd put this on DVD. It really is amazing in scope and the world so needs it right now given that the global addiction to religion is more dangerous than ever these days.
The Ausselio Files creative tension on the set of Diane Keaton's HBO project Tilda
Freckle Face The Musical Yes, Julianne Moore's children's book is now a stage musical. They start singing and dancing in early September
We Are Movie Geeks Readers near St. Louis, MO? You might want to check out the Black Expo later this very week. Movie legends Pam Grier (!), Louis Gossett Jr and Mario Van Peebles are all appearing.

<--- Yay. It's P&A. The filmmaker and his only real male muse have reunited. They've started shooting The Skin I'm In (2011). Here they are on a break.

Cinematical offers strange speculation about why Penélope Cruz is not in Pedro Almodóvar's The Skin I'm In which just started shooting. Um... how about, Pedro's just using a different girl this time? He does that sometimes. Nothing in P's filmography suggests she'd be uncomfortable with nudity, sex scenes or anything Pedro would ask of her really.
Moviehole Apparently Joss Whedon is aware that people are worried that there are no women in The Avengers. He assures there will be. Um, extras don't count. If you don't have The Wasp or Scarlet Witch, you have a sausage fest, plain and simple.
The Playlist First look at Uma Thurman in Ceremony. I hope this is a hit for her.
Joblo DeNiro, Norton and Jovovich get their Stone poster. I'm falling asleep.
Dial P for Popcorn more Black Narcissus images.

Please someone tell me they watched Narcissus specifically due to all this cheerleading we're doing. Blogging must not be in vain! Speaking of... Tomorrow's "Best Shot" episode is Bring It On. Are you joining us?

Finally, I saw this short at this tumblr where the author said "oh my little heart!! cute/sad shakes" and there's no saying it better. Unfortunately I can't tell you who said so. If I don't save things immediately on tumblr I never see them again. (I don't understand tumblr at all. So disposable it is!)

MARCEL THE SHELL WITH SHOES ON from Dean Fleischer-Camp on Vimeo.

My favorite part is the 'lint puppy'. I would've teared up if my ducts worked properly. One of the undeniable truths of our modern online world is that it has blown out whole new walls as window. There's just so much creativity from so many folks to discover.
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Top Ten: Antonio Banderas

Happy 50th birthday to Everyone's Favorite Spaniard™* Antonio Banderas.

He was already celebrating the big day yesterday in the port of Marbella with Melanie Griffith, the Mrs. Banderas. okay okay it was her birthday yesterday but we're not really fans [cough to put it mildly]. What is it with celebrities born a day apart getting married? Madonna & Sean did that, too!

Antonio has been fading from the limelight this past decade which is kind of a shame because he would have made a much better "Guido Contini" than Daniel Day-Lewis in Nine (2009) so why didn't he get the chance to help make it work onscreen (and make no mistake, he would have helped. You need a certain type in that role. DDL is many great things but is a charming cad really one of them?) But if you've been missing him, fear not. A mini-'Tonio revival is coming with the Broadway revival of Zorba the Greek on its way and (finally!) a reunion with the man who brought him to international fame, director Pedro Almodóvar for the movie called La Piel que Habito (The Skin I Live In) which supposedly begins shooting this month.

The Film Experience had planned a rather huge 50th celebration today in Antonio's honor, and figured to sneak in a little contemporary Angelina Jolie love via a trip back to their erotic romp Original Sin (2001) and maybe a collection of favorite photos and that sort of thing. Truth: I've never seen that erotic thriller. And why the hell not given that both of those movie stars know a thing or five-hundred about working their sexual mojo for the benefit of the camera. But plans... they do get away from you.

But since it's Tuesday, and I've been neglecting the top tens...

Ten Favorite Banderas Roles

10 "Miguel" in Philadelphia (1993)
I don't really care for the movie, Jonathan Demme's bizarrely toothless and middlebrow follow up to the stellar Silence of the Lambs, but what a boyfriend Banderas made. The movie's authenticity was always in question because it was readily apparent that Tom Hanks's lawyer had no desire to ever touch his Spanish hunk. Imagine having Miguel to yourself and never manhandling him? That's just... Well, it's actually against the law.

09 TBA: I'm reserving this spot for a second viewing of Matador, the only Almodóvar I've actively disliked. Maybe I missed something? And I've never seen Spy Kids. It's true. Is he fun in that?

08 "Zorro" in The Mask of Zorro (1998)
It's as if Banderas' ascendance forced Hollywood to remake it. He existed therefore the movie had to.

07 "Guido Contini" in Nine (Broadway revival)
I've written about Nine too much. I have not another word in me. From now on, I shall only hum the theme song.

06 "Puss in Boots" Shrek 2 (2004)
He's the one redeeming factor of this soulless behemoth franchise. Just hilarious and relentlessly charming. Oh, those eyes!!! Who can resist? I'm talking about the Puss but I totally get it if you were thinking about Tonio's brown orbs.

05 "El Mariarchi" in Desperado (1995)
<--- Cool guys don't look at explosions.

04 "Antonio Benítez" in Law of Desire (1987)
Benítez was a dangerously unstable, often naked, highly annoying young man but Antonio played him superbly. More importantly, this film was an early but substantial example of the difference between rising European actors and rising American fame-seekers. In the former case they generally understand that it's about serving the auteur, the character and the movie, not about working on your "image."

---> The truth telling image to your right is pilfered from this all time classic blogpost from Adam, a friend of The Film Experience.

Law of Desire is actually my favorite Almodóvar movie for personal nostalgia reasons. It's the second one I saw -- after the film that actually followed it Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown -- but the first I sought out because of the man behind the curtain. I was not disappointed.

03 "Ché" in Evita (1996)
02 "Antonio Banderas" in Madonna: Truth or Dare (1991)
Because this double feature captures the memorable Madonna thru-line of his international stardom so superbly. They made such a beautiful imaginary couple. At least Madonna thought so.

"I've been wanting to meet Antonio for years. I finally get to meet him and he's married. That's one of life's little fuck-overs."
____-Madonna aloud while sitting next to Antonio.

"I said 'Oh, this is such a disaster. He's married.' He goes 'Oh, in Spain it doesn't matter.' ...Is that man beautiful or what? There's got to be something wrong with him. He probably has a really small penis or something. Oh God. There has to be something wrong with him because nobody is that perfect."
____-Madonna to Nikki in the bathroom of Almodóvar's party

01 "Ricky" in Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! (1990)
Almodóvar movies are often blessed with sexual heat (Last year's Broken Embraces is a recent example of the director's gift in this arena)... but there's virtually nothing in the Almodóvar collection that's hornier or hotter than Banderas and his prisoner, the sadly undervalued Victoria Abril, attempting to climax simultaneously in this NC-17 rated stockholm syndrome romance. Even better is the shockingly moving fully clothed moment later in the movie when... no, I shan't spoil the movie. See it.

This post is free. The price you pray for reading is a word or four about Antonio in the comments. Go!

*circa 1990s. Later Javier Bardem and Penélope Cruz would war over the designation. They finally called it a draw and married.

Link & Order: Special Random Unit

The Awl "10 Reasons Why You Should Give Me One More Chance This Weekend" by that bucket of charm "Russell Crowe". (teehee)
Go Fug Yourself theorizes that Cate Blanchett stole a White House carpet
Go Fug Yourself... and welcomes Cannes crazy with open arms
Catalogue of Curiousities "floating heads of doom!"
Buzz Sugar the trailer for True Blood Season 3
Mister Hipp "He can take it." I love this illustration of Wolverine. So fun


Towleroad Elton John covering Madonna hits with scandily clad go go boys. What the hell?
Towleroad my weekly column
The Portland Mercury hilarious movie marquee. Poor Terrence Howard
A Socialite's Life Christina Ricci to join Laura Linney on Broadway in September. Interesting
Playbill Antonio Banderas returning to Broadway for Kander & Ebb's Zorba
Empire strangest bedfellows ever: Charlie Kaufman + Kung Fu Panda
/Film yes I've heard about the duleing Monroe biopics: Naomi Watts vs. Michelle Williams. Just haven't mentioned them yet since they kinda deserve a whole big post. Later. Have patience.

Finally, PopEater says goodbye to Law & Order (just cancelled) with a opening credits mashup of all casts from the franchise. I know people are sad that the original flagship series is going bye-bye. But puhleze. It lives on in 3 spinoffs and endless syndication like some unholy hydra beast. I will never be able to escape it. You've won, television my nemesis, you've won! I thank the original L&O for keeping my Broadway babies fed and in rent payments... but otherwise I kick it to the curb. See, I don't think I can take one more Linus Roache or Dianne Wiest situation wherein some gargantuan talent hides their magnificence under that particular bushel. The next great that the series plans to taint is... Isabelle Huppert. Je pleure.

Pedro & Antonio. Madonna & Me

1990 / 1991 Flashback!

As you've no doubt heard my favorite living filmmaker (Pedro Almodóvar) is reuniting with his only true male muse (Antonio Banderas). They haven't made a movie together since Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! (1990), one of Pedro's best. You don't hear this enough so I'll say it. Pedro's 1986-1990 output was arguably as rich as his 1999-2006 run-o-brilliance. So we should all be very excited about this sixth get together. Basically Pedro is the entire reason I came to love Antonio. I could never really stop loving him. Even once the Melanie Griffith years happened and I stopped following his work, I always thought of him fondly. I just kept hoping that one day Pedro would rescue him from that crap filmography. And here we go.

Now, I don't want to read too much about the new movie so I've only skimmed the articles about it. It's called The Skin I Live In (La piel que habito) and it's supposedly some sort of rape/revenge/horror deal. I'm not reading carefully because I like to be surprised. So let's talk about the past. Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! is not actually the last Pedro/Antonio film. It's just the last official one.

Labyrinth (82), Matador (86), Desire (87), Women (88) and ¡Átame! (90)

Pedro & Antonio's combined filmography

• Labyrinth of Passion
• Matador
• Law of Desire
  
• Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown
• Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!
• Madonna: Truth or Dare (if you'll allow for it. Read on)
• The Skin I Live In (forthcoming)
  

Remember that amazing scene in Madonna's brilliant documentary Truth or Dare (1991) when Sandra Bernhard asked Madonna who she wants to meet, 'Who would really blow your mind?' Madonna replies, laughing, "I think I met everybody!" But Sandra persists. Madonna suddenly mentions Antonio Banderas, 'the guy in all those Pedro Almodóvar movies.' What Madonna wants, Madonna gets and one scene later she's at Pedro's swanky party flirting shamelessly with his married Spaniard star.

You can't imagine how thrilling this sequence was back in the day. Back in 1991, the internet wasn't around to spoil every surprise from upcoming movies. There was no IMDb. There were entertainment magazines and infotainment shows. We had NO idea that Pedro & Antonio were going to get a scene in Madonna's breathlessly awaited event doc.

I was already quite obsessed with the Spanish pair but only exceptionally cool people in the US (yeah, I said it. shut up) knew who they were so it's not like they were a subject of frequent conversations. But Madonna was always proving how exceptional she was. During the late 80s and early 90s Madonna was basically greater than Santa Claus. She was constantly showering the world with extravagantly entertaining gifts.

Madge plants one on Antonio while exiting Almodóvar's party in Truth or Dare
photo source

But back to 2010. How about this new extravagant gift: Antonio Banderas wrapped up in that luscious Almodovar paper again? Me want.

You?
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We Can't Wait: YOU WILL MEET A TALL DARK STRANGER

Jose here with my orphan entry in the We Can't Wait series.

You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger
Directed by: Woody Allen
Starring: Antonio Banderas, Josh Brolin, Anthony Hopkins, Freida Pinto, Lucy Punch, Naomi Watts



Synopsis: Set in London, the movie centers around a number of people in a family, their assorted love lives, as they try to work out complicated romances.
Yes, that sounds like almost every Woody film but with him you never really know what the movie's about until it finally comes out.
Brought to you by: Sony Pictures Classics
Expected release date: September 23 in the US with a tentative premiere at the Cannes Film Festival in May.

Announced the day after the 2009 Oscars as Freida Pinto's new project, the film is surrounded by that air of mystery that always accompanies the Woodsman's work. Nicole Kidman was involved at some point (allegedly playing a hooker), dropped out and her part was given to the practically unknown Lucy Punch, then there were mix ups as to whether this was the movie where French First Lady Carla Bruni would appear. Turns out it's not... she'll be in the next Parisian-set movie with Marion Cotillard.

<--- the Punch & Tony show

Given the way in which Woody works (write while filming, film while post-producing and release while pre-producing next movie) the plot is unclear but with that cast and given the recent renaissance the director has achieved shooting in Europe this could be fantastic. I'm also dying to know what he saw in Pinto, who beautiful and all, didn't exactly show great acting chops in Slumdog Millionaire. For all we know this could turn out to be his next Vicky Cristina Barcelona or result in a flop, like the underrated Whatever Works; with Woody we always can put our hopes up for the movie he'll release the following year.

Do you think his one movie a year thing is effective or should he devote himself to a "special" project where we'd have to wait years for his next release?

"We Can't Wait: Summer and Beyond"
The "orphan" picks Nathaniel (Burlesque), JA (Love and Other Drugs), Jose (You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger), Craig (What's Wrong With Virginia?), Robert (True Grit) and Dave (Brighton Rock); Team Film Experience Countdown #12 It's Kind of a Funny Story, #11 Sex & the City 2, #10 Scott Pilgrim vs the World, #9 Somewhere, #8 The Kids Are All Right, #7 The Illusionist, #6 Toy Story 3, #5 Inception, #4 Rabbit Hole, #3 Never Let Me Go, #2 Black Swan and #1 The Tree of Life.

Best Animated Short Winner, LOGORAMA

In case you haven't seen it...


thanks to pullquote for heads up

I was a little bit sad for The Lady & The Reaper which is so enjoyable and funny. But Logorama is fun too. Incidentally that losing Spanish short is why these two made it back to the Oscars.

Mr and Mrs Antonio Banderas

But Antonio lost the Oscar. What a world. Wasn't marrying Melanie Griffith punishment enough ? Oh I kid, I kid. They made it work, huh? 13+ years now.

Final (?) Oscar Predictions

<--- Sandra Bullock goes Na'Vi. I made this just because. What's wrong with me?

You want the final predictions, don'cha? I may panic and change one or two of these on Saturday night @ 8 PM (if I don't change anything by then, these are final final). I'm still toying with calling Meryl Streep over Sandra Bullock for example in Best Actress. That's not because I want to be different but because I genuinely feel it's possible. The only award Sandra won that Streep didn't was SAG (and Streep had just won that the year before. Were they likely to repeat? But herewith my predictions on what and who will going to win the biggest movie prize of all on Sunday night.

It's also your last 24 hours to vote on the readers polls so have at them.

And for those who asked. I have updated the pages for Supporting Actress and Lead Actress to reflect that feature y'all love so much "how did they get nominated?"

Finally, here's the Spanish animated short that I'm rooting for (and predicting) for Best Animated Short. It's called La Dama y La Muerte and it was produced by Antonio Banderas. Whaddya know? I lurve the design of the Gaston-like doctor and his identical nurses. And there's plenty of good visual jokes. Cerebrus! But, that said, the short film categories are always so tough to predict...

Screen Queens: Hollywood Does AIDS

Hi everyone, MattCanada here with another weekly dose of gay cinema. This week we're looking at Philadelphia, the Oscar winning courtroom drama, essentially the defining Hollywood response to the AIDS epidemic.


I first saw this film as a kid. I must have been about seven when I watched it with my parents and it was definitely my, and probably many other people's, introduction to AIDS. For me it continues to shape how I think about the virus, the stigma, and the epidemic. Longtime Companion opened a few years earlier but this was the first mainstream prestige film to deal with AIDS and homophobia. Having two big stars in Tom Hanks and Denzel Washington must have seemed like a big step for Hollywood. All of this is well and good, but rewatching the film for the first time in over a decade, I had serious problems with its filmic construction and especially its politics. While it remains important for being 'the mainstream gay AIDS movie', the film has definitely not aged well.

The Major problem is with the Denzel Washington character, Joe Miller. Joe acts as a guide for the straight audience into the scary world of gay-ness. His arc from homophobic to mildly understanding is shown as a victory, and it is Joe, not Hanks's Andrew, who goes through a pivotal transformation. He is the true hero of the film: not only does he save the gay victim, he grows as a person, thus giving the audience someone to root for. But this leaves Tom Hanks' gay character at a mediated distance where he can be sympathised with (or pitied depending how you see it). This film was made at a different time in both Straight society's relationship to homosexuality and the mainstream gay community's stance towards the oppressions and exclusions of straight hegemony. Today, the politics seem conservative and even condescending, positioning gay men as victims needing to be rescued and protected by the good straights from the bad straights. Contemporaneous films from New Queer Cinema, especially Derek Jarman's Blue, Gregg Araki's The Living End and John Greyson's Patient Zero, are much more relevant now for an understanding of the AIDS epidemic, and the anger and response of the gay community. Philadelphia is a film from another time in mainstream culture and it's unable to transcend its dated approach and politics.

The other problems are minor in comparison. Tom Hanks doesn't give a particularly remarkable performance (in my opinion it was the weakest of that year's Best Actor nominees). It may have been a brave choice of role and a good performance, but it's not on par with other AIDS performances (Steve Buscemi in Parting Glances, the cast of Angels in America, Penélope Cruz and Toni Canto in All About My Mother).


Jonathan Demme's directing also overreaches at points, especially the Opera set piece and the courtroom scenes with canted camera angles. Demme is at his best when he keeps his stylistic flourishes to a minimum. The strength of his classics, namely The Silence of the Lambs and Married to the Mob, is the seeming simplicity of his directing, which allows for pitch perfect performances, flawless narrative progression, and a complex and inventive intermingling and subversion of genre. Philadelphia is too fussy, especially in the moments when we are most required to empathize with the characters.

There are incredible parts of Philadelphia though. The performances of Mary Steenburgen, Antonio Banderas, and Joanne Woodward are all fantastic. Mary in particular, I think, deserved a Supporting nod for transforming a one dimensional role into something memorable.

There are also two sequences in the film which are incredibly moving and show Demme at his musical best: the opening credits sequence with Bruce Springsteen's "The Streets of Philadelphia" and the closing home video section with Neil Young's "Philadelphia" overlayed. Both sequences are so simple, yet the combination of music and expressive imagery are perfect distillations of the humanity of people with HIV and AIDS. For those two sequences alone I think the film deserves to be watched and remembered.

Bruce Springsteen takes those Streets of Philadelphia to an Oscar win

I would love to hear your thoughts on Philadelphia. I'm interested to know if people remember what the discussions surrounding the film were like on its original release? Was Tom Hanks' win one of those inevitable Helen Mirren/The Queen steamrollers or more of a surprise?

Tuesday Top Ten: Bite Me!

It's Halloween Week! Though a horror movie wuss I be there's one movie monster who I'll always give it up for, the vampire. Herewith: the film & television vampires who I would find most difficult to resist. (I've restricted myself to the past 30 years because there are too many I haven't seen from earlier... like those Hammer Horror films Matt was just talking 'bout). Should these 10 suckers ever come knocking, I shan't be wearing a cross, turtleneck or smelling of garlic.

I've already discussed Seline in Underworld and that hot Mexican in From Dusk til Dawn so I'm skipping them here.

10 Dracula (Gerard Butler) in Dracula 2000 (2000)
There are abundant lists of "best/sexiest vamps" on the net, but most of them go off in directions I can't support [cough Twilight... must everything be about page views? They twinkle. In the sun. Ugh]. But The Daily Beast makes a good point in favor of Gerard Butler: Ceiling Sex.

09 Lady Sylvia Marsh (Amanda Donohoe) in The Lair of the White Worm (1988)
Anyone remember Donohoe? I had a friend who was obsessed with her in the late 80s. And I like vampires to be as interested in their own cruel beauty and fashion choices as they are into their dietary choices. Plus: Ken Russell makes indescribably weird movies. Or at least he used to.


08 Armand (Antonio Banderas) in Interview with the Vampire (1994)
He really shouldn't be on this list since I hate the way they handle his character in the movie and I hate the wig, too. Mostly I just put him here to get back at all of the idiot strangers sitting in that multiplex with me in Utah, circa 1994. They ruined so many movies when I lived there. The conservative audience was super vocally terrified that Louis and Armand were going to kiss in their big invitation/refusal scene. Stupidly, in complete disregard for the tone of Rice's vampire chronicles, they didn't. The homophobic audience was hugely relieved but Armand was not. That Louis, such a fang tease. Now Armand will have to find solace elsewhere (<-- that link is NSFW but I laughed my ass off when I saw it so I had to share.)

07 The Count (Jerry Nelson) in Sesame Street (1972-present)
Ever since a certain episode of 30Rock last season, I've found it difficult not to envision people as muppets (was anything more hilarious last season than Liz Lemon's muppet walk?)...even myself. Plus felt fangs would tickle more than hurt and I'm not so much into pain.




06 PLACE HOLDER
I think with the reinvigoration of the vampire genre, more competitors for this list will soon emerge. I'm particular fascinated by the idea of Julie Delpy and Tilda Swinton in those competing Countess Bathory movies. Watching either of them bathing in virgin blood would be quite arrestingly cinematic, would it not? Delpy's movie must have been finished ages ago. What's going on there? Why haven't we seen it? It can't be as bad as her last journey into the supernatural.

05 Lucy Westenra (Sadie Frost) in Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992)
Still one of the most spectacularly creepy vampires the cinema ever dreamt up. Thank you Francis Ford Coppola. She's game for anything with a pulse: demonic wolf men, crying babies, Winona Ryder. In fact, her appetite would make even the oldest vampires blush... and she's barely been turned. She's also on the list because her walk is more mesmerizing than most vampire's magical stare-downs. Bonus points: the actress slept with Jude Law for many years and who needs six degrees of separation when you can narrow that down to one?

04 Eric Northman (Alexander Skarsgård) in True Blood (2008-present)
I'm still pissed they're not letting him play Thor. Casting fail.

03 Spike (James Marsters) in Buffy the Vampire Slayer (-1996)
I know a lot of people hate the way Spike took over the best television show of all time towards the end and I kind of did, too. But remember that episode when Buffy and Spike were having so much sex that the house collapsed in on them? So Much Sex. That wasn't the usual suspend-your-disbelief supernatural extraganza episode. That was a documentary about what it's like to have sex with James Marsters. I'm guessing.


02 Miriam (Catherine Deneuve) in The Hunger (1983)
I'm always horrified when she doesn't make best vampire lists in favor of sparkle-in-the-sunlight bloodless mouth breathers like Robert Pattison. Deneuve forever (which is what you get if you hook up with her as David Bowie and Susan Sarandon discovered)!

Also, to the best of my knowledge, Catherine Deneuve is the only actual immortal to have ever played a fictional immortal onscreen. Points for that.

01 Louis (Brad Pitt) in Interview with the Vampire (1994)
Sure, he'd be all tortured about it but it's not like guilt-ridden sex (aka all vampiric activity) is never hot. Plus, you already know how I feel about Brad Pitt and his little death.

Which vampires would you invite in?
Even if you're not into the bloodsuckers, play along in the comment. You need to get in the mood for Halloween.
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60 Spectacular Almodóvariffic Years

.

JA from MNPP here, briefly wishing the director Pedro Almodóvar a happy 60th birthday today. His latest film, Broken Embraces starring Penny Cruz, opens here in NYC in 57 days! Coincidence? Well that'd be a lousy coincidence if so since there's nothing much coincidental about it besides the vaguest proximity of numbers. Anyway! Embraces opens here on November 11th, in Los Angeles on December 11th, and presumably trickles inward from there. Not that we Americans are precisely on the winning end of its release schedule - it's been out in Spain since March! But at least we're not Australia or heaven forbid Japan! Heaven forbid.

I know that Almodóvar is an actressexual's dream director and lavishes his female muses with the juiciest of roles and story-lines and outfits (oh those outfits), but I am going to take this moment to give a little affection towards something a little different that's integral to my appreciation of the Almodóvar Cinematic Experience - mainly, these three somethings-a-little-different:

Gael Garcia Bernal in Bad Education

Liberto Rabal in Live Flesh

Antonio in Law of Desire (see more Antonio here!)

Oh yes. Liberto Rabal in Live Flesh was especially important to my conversion as that was the first Almodóvar film I saw and looking at Rabal I knew straight away that in Almodóvar I had found someone that shared my... interests. So thanks for these and the many other pleasures your films have given us, Pedro! And here's to many, many more to come.
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Théâtre des Vampires

I wish I were at a jawdropping theatrical event tonight instead of here. Staring off into space. In the absence of excitement, I'm turning in early with a book. You?

The Art of Self-Advertising

Adam of Club Silencio here. In full anticipation for Broken Embraces (and full disgust with a US dramedy of Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown), let's play Six Degrees of Pedro Almodóvar! One rule: you can only use Pedro Almodóvar movies...


Upon re-watching his brilliant film-noir tribute Bad Education, I couldn't help but notice how many times Pedro actually pays tribute to himself and even gives advanced previews to his own films. Simple enough I suppose when one of the lead characters is based on Pedro himself (in)directly: a queer filmmaker drawn to offbeat character pieces and an explosive exposé on Catholic priests exposing themselves.

Decked out in alter-ego Pedro's production office are posters accentuating these close ties. The two worth special notice are for a film titled La Abuela Fantasma, which translates roughly to "Ghost Grandma." I can only assume this means Almodóvar was tinkering with Volver at the time - his sensational saga of a mother seeking closure beyond her supposed death. Or at the very least he was interested in making a Spanish variation on Ghost Dad.

"She's old, she's bold, and she's back from the beyond!
She also has candy in her purse."

Of course Almodóvar already gave us early glimmers of Volver way back in 1995 with The Flower of My Secret, in which he (in)directly tells of a Pedro-like author veiling her potent plotlines behind fake names. The film has our alter-ego author criticized by the angriest of agents for delivering stories that seem too absurd, without any discernible love behind them. One dissed idea is Volver down to a tee:

"A novel about a mother who discovers her daughter's killed her father who had tried to rape her? And so that no one finds out hides the body in a cold-storage room of the neighbor's restaurant?

Glad she's not Pedro's actual agent! Volver would have never seen the light of day. But by that description alone, one can barely imagine Volver's eventual richness and stunning ode to a mother's devotion.


Pedro also taps into his back-catalogue with a second dissed plotline:

"Who'll dream of people living in a seedy slum like the living dead? Who'll identify with a protagonist who works emptying shit out of hospital bedpans, who's got a junkie mother-in-law and faggot son who's into black men?"

Well, pissy agent woman, perhaps fans of What Have I Done to Deserve This? would identify with that... only replace "black men" with "creepy pedophile dentists."

Plus, even if it goes unspoken, a film like Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! certainly takes a knowing thematic leap from Law of Desire, with its "stalkers make the best soulmates" conceit. (A clingy Antonio Banderas is still Antonio Banderas.) Almodóvar's one of the few auteurs whose ideas we've seen visually and vocally gestate throughout his career. The inspired streams of consciousness for his characters eventually become the inspirational threads for his finest films. It's this kind of self-influence that leads to such personal, passionate and effortless touches on his part. It's also I'm sure what leads to his mammoth collection of devoted followers. You know the type: bloggers who make the most of insignificant details in his films.

A Call From the Vatican

I wish my distractions were as delicious as Guido's in the musical Nine... beautiful actresses on every side, serenading me.

Jane Krakowski's TONY winning show-stopper "A Call From the Vatican"
Penélope Cruz will be interpreting this for the movie version

Oh wait! Those are my distractions. The nuts and bolts of tabulating all the submissions for this Actress Psychic Contest are keeping me quite busy. I know my own Oscar predictions for 2009 are due but the delays can't be helped. Other duties call as well. None of them are as welcome as Jane Krakowski (sigh). Posting will be light tomorrow. Collective Prediction and details will be up Thursday night / Friday morning. I'll aim for a big weekend. Thanks for your patience.

Coochie coochie coochie coo...
I've got a plan for what I'm gonna do to you

Hump Day Hotties, Nathaniel's Favs!

Onesies beats twosies but nothing beats three.


Pure joy (tripled). I'm especially pleased that between them they have three Oscars!
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For the record... If we'd been doing this in the 1980s, Melanie Griffith would have occupied the same treasured room in the Film Experience mansion currently occupied by Hilary Swank in the Aughts (she won't move out!). I completely understand what Antonio Banderas has always seen in her, don't you?! The cinema was a better place when he dumped that hack Pedro Almodóvar for Melanie's possessive embraces and the opportunity to make Hollywood classics like Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever, Never Talk to Strangers, Original Sin, My Mom's New Boyfriend, Play it to the Bone, Two Much (was ever a film more aptly titled?) and The 13th Warrior.

April Fools!

¡Átame! ...and Brüno?

Antonio Banderas was on my mind. I blame Fernando in the comments. Happy b-day Fernando

Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! So many exclamation points. ¡But it's worth exclamating! Tis one of the very best films of 1990.


If you ask me this one never gets enough attention in the Almodóvar oeuvre. It's the MPAA's fault (It's fun to blame things on them. Try it). 'Round about '89/'90 a lot of specialized films were having huge problems with the ratings board. Films like The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover and Henry & June were just too much for the simple "R". Regarding the latter film, I still maintain it was the fully clothed Uma Thurman that did it in with the board. She was unbelievably smoldering in that picture. And you can't really edit a title character out of the picture, can you? In this climate was born the NC-17 rating which is still protecting fragile Americans from ever being subjected to films as permanently scarring to their psyches as....

Lust, Caution

(I'm sorry to scare you out there. Settle down, it was only an Ang Lee movie!)

There are a few violent pictures on the list of films that got slapped with 'the new X' but mostly it's sex that gets them angry enough to outlaw any parent from bringing their teenagers into the theater with them. Meanwhile, it's totally OK for a parent to bring their 5 year old into Saw XIV. "All is right with the world", he typed sarcastically.

The new victim of the NC-17 is... Brüno ???

The Wrap reports that the new Sacha Baron Cohen comedy, his follow up to Borat, got slapped with the dread rating. Perhaps reading the full (informal / gifted?) title will make the MPAA's objections more comprehensible.

Brüno: Delicious Journeys Through America for the Purpose of Making Heterosexual Males Visibly Uncomfortable in the Presence of a Gay Foreigner in a Mesh T-Shirt

The film hasn't even opened yet and Brüno's already achieved his purpose. They're visibly uncomfortable. The comedy, presumably with a few snips, cuts and resultant "R" rating, will open July 10th in theaters everywhere.
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Almodóvar Teases

The low ranking of Almodóvar's new film Broken Embraces in our "We Can't Wait" series caused bitter complaints from those who feel, like myself, that he's the best director the cinema has going. But never fear. I'll be following the Spaniard closely this year. Pedro Watch again you know.

Here is the teaser for Broken Embraces. Since it's a teaser it only has 30 seconds to sell you. It's mostly concentrating on spreading the notion that the film is about a doomed unstable romance and that its visually interesting (no surprise). Sold. It also wants to remind you how beautiful Penélope Cruz looks when her hair is all over the place in the Mediterranean style of leading ladies.



Synopsis read (to me) a little too 'thriller' or bizarre for Oscar play -- and Spain doesn't always submit Pedro anyway -- but you never know. Two readers Daniel and Ziyad also inform that Almodóvar recently made a new short film called La Concejala Antropófoga on the set of the new feature but it was pulled from the net before I had a chance to view it.

UPDATE here it is... thanks Holden



There were no subtitles but who cares? Truly cinematic auteurs are interesting without dialogue. Or maybe especially without dialogue. Then you can actually think about what the camera, production design, costumes, score and editing are doing without the distraction of plot and dialogue (the two things that are easiest to concentrate on). Sometimes you'll see a different movie altogether. I once had a friend who was positively raving about All About My Mother (before it's debut here in the States) after a summer trip to Europe in '99. I said to her "But you don't speak Spanish! Was it dubbed, subtitled?". "No. I barely understood a word," she said, adding incredulously "I saw it twice. It was wonderful."

My kind of girl.

This is old news by now but I was perusing Pedro's blog in preparation for this post (he hasn't updated in 2009 yet) when I found this hilarious bit on his birthday last September right after at trip to San Sebastian to see Antonio Banderas.

It was my birthday two days ago. I received lots of congratulations, some unexpected and original. For example, Meryl Streep sang Happy Christmas in Spanish to me over a friend’s cell phone, from San Sebastian, where she was receiving a tribute. Our mutual friend Chema Prado told her it was Happy Birthday, not Happy Christmas. Was she mistaken? I wouldn’t say that much. She was Meryl Streep and she could sing what she wanted. In the few words she sang in Spanish, you won’t believe it, she didn’t have the slightest accent.

What a great actress and what a delightful person!

Streep singing to Pedro? And the wrong words no less. Would that I could time travel and teleport to Spain in the blink of an eye.
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