Linkland Express
Saturday, July 14, 2012 at 7:43PM The Onion "Katie Holmes Glad She Can Finally Practice Scientology in Peace." Hee!
The Advocate has a historical interview piece on the making of the gay drama Making Love (1982) a landmark movie for Hollywood. I had NO idea that Kate Jackson was originally set to play Meryl Streep's role in Kramer vs. Kramer (1979). Crazy huh?
My New Plaid Pants Gratuitous Harrison Ford. I totally forgot to celebrate Mr. Indiana Jones while the rest of the internet was doing so. Like most people who were alive during the 70s and 80s I kind of love him. JA's post has some really fun young Harrison photos. How have I never seen Frantic?
First Showing Daniel Radcliffe will star in Horns, adapted from Joe Hill's novel
EW has a gallery of the "50 best movies you've never seen" but I've seen 20 of them so they lie! That said some of those are awfully good pictures like the two Lukas Moodyson films Together (2000) and Lilja 4Ever (2002) and the recent Fish Tank (2009). My 30 unseen do include a few I've always meant to watch.
PopWatch The Eisner Awards, aka the comic book Oscars were given out in San Diego. A big day for Marvel's blind superhero Daredevil who was always pretty great in the comics but was pretty terrible when he hit the big screen...
Battle Pug was the winner for best digital comic so that one is easy to check out.
Salon Andrew O'Hehir revisits Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, two films he had issues with, on the eve of the release of, well, you know...
Spielberg and Zanuck on the set of JAWSFinally, RIP to legendary film producer Richard D. Zanuck who died on Friday at the age of 77. I can't even remotely say that I love his filmography given that Driving Miss Daisy (1989) and Alice in Wonderland (2010) -- two pictures which caused me great personal pain via their Oscar and Box Office might -- are chief among his hits. But I have to tip my hat for his efforts to champion a then unknown Steven Spielberg in the 1970s. Perhaps it was Spielberg's destiny to become the world's most popular filmmaker and no one person could have changed that. But if anyone could be thanked for getting Spielberg started beyond the man himself, it would be Zanuck. He basically launched the young filmmaker with the one two punch of Sugarland Express (1974) and mega-hit Jaws (1975), Spielberg's first two theatrical releases.
Oscar Trivia Confusion: According to the New York Times, Zanuch also holds a peculiar Oscar record. He's reportedly the only son of a Best Picture Oscar winner (his father was legendary film producer Darryl F. Zanuck) to win Best Picture himself (for Driving Miss Daisy). But according to the IMDb, Zanuck Sr. never won the Best Picture Oscar though his AMPAS track record is nothing to dismiss given that he has three Irving Thalbergs.
Reader Comments (8)
One little twist of casting fate over 30 years ago, and perhaps we would have watched Kate Jackson, America's greatest actress, scoop up her third Oscar for her sassy yet trafic portrayal of Margaret Thatcher. We'll never know.
Zanuck Sr. was head of 20th Century Fox when they won Best Picture for How Green Was My Valley (41), Gentleman's Agreement (47), and All About Eve (50). I'm pretty sure he was the (sole?) credited producer on all three (and, thus, Oscar winner), but IMDb only credits the Oscar wins to "20th Century Fox" rather than Zanuck. Odd.
That EW list is interesting. All the ones on it that I <have> seen (about six or seven), I didn't care much for, like Eve's Bayou for example.
the kate jackson story always makes me ponder how entire careers are based on the whims of casting and luck/fate/circumstance. so sliding doors...
Frantic is well worth seeing. Ford and Polanski!
Cinemateo: According to Wikipedia and other sources, the Best Picture Oscar was given to the stiudio until 1950, and has been given to the producer since then. if this is the case, it would mean that Zanuck is not considered the winner for those three Best Pictures from Fox.
Frantic is terribly underrated, Nat. You should def. check it out. It's pretty similar to The Ghost Writer as far as Polanski movies go. It's a really easy old-fashioned feeling watch. Polanski doing Hitchcock! Anyway thanks for the link!
Enter the Void was atrocious, but I was glad EW shortlisted Century of Self and Last Night, which truly did have a perfect, thought-provoking ending (wonderfully ambiguous like Birth, with no easy answers -- thank God!).