Thankful for... Nick Taylor!

This year for our "thankful for" column we're mixing it up a bit. Instead of asking our contributors to share a brief list of favourite things, I wanted to share with you, dear readers, why I love the team so and then ask them a few key questions so you can get to know them better.  NICK TAYLOR. 

Nick has been with us for about two years, and we first got to know him because he regularly voted and wrote up beautiful emails for the Smackdown. Since joining us he's looked at supporting actresses that weren't nominated. Some of our favourites include the Evil Witch in Snow White, Taraji P Henson in Hustle & Flow, and Sister Ruth in Black Narcissus. But he also pops in for contemporary festivals.

Our mini interview follows...

When did you first fall in love with the movies?

I've been into movies my whole life. Lotta Animal Planet docs and Disney movies growing up, but that feels different from the way I love and think about film as an adult...

I would say a handful of films released in 2015/2016 finally encouraged me to not just watch and enjoy films but really invest in and study them. Carol, for sure. Fury Road, Creed, Moonlight, Things to Come, sobbing through the end of 20th Century Women. Still, I think sitting alone in my dorm late one spring night, surrounded by art projects for finals that were 100% totally already finished ahead of time, and being completely enraptured by Herbert Ross's Pennies From Heaven. That was a special kind of movie magic I'd never seen before, and I couldn't get enough of it.

Which current director do you feel truly grateful for?

Since I just caught up with The Velvet Underground, I'm gonna say Todd Haynes, because I'm a basic gay, and because he keeps finding new, exciting ways to test and stretch his skills as a filmmaker.

Tis this season to be thankful. What wouldn't you have wanted to live without this past year?

1. Valencia: The Movie/S, a smart, hilarious, randy, formally provocative and endlessly creative slice of queer cinema from 2013 (rentable on Vimeo!!) that everyone should watch, and that I had the pleasure of sharing and studying for the first half of the year as the centerpiece of my grad school thesis!

2. The very first film I saw in the theater after getting vaccinated was Days of Heaven in 35mm at the Music Box and good fucking god that was gorgeous. What a picture.

3. Malignant! One of the only 2021 joints I've watched twice, and Gabriel is one of the year's best movie characters.

4. The newest season of Doctor Who is so good it makes me mad we weren't getting this level of quality in the writing (and, by extension, in the directing and acting) for the past two seasons.

5. The Boulet Brothers' Dragula is reminding me how fucking fun it is to watch great reality TV live. This season's top 5 is really spectacular.

6. There's a lot of spectacular foreign language films that have belatedly gotten a theatrical or digital release in the US this year - Notturno, The Orphanage, Quo Vadis Aida?, Sweat, This is Not a Burial It's a Resurrection, Days, What We Left Unfinished, Little Girl, Atlantis - that everyone should absolutely see as soon as possible.

7. And, y'know, if you're looking for some great English-language films, check out Zola, Saint Maud, Bergman Island, The French Dispatch, Censor, Shiva Baby, Passing, Mama Gloria, Power of the Dog. Cinema!!!!

8. Godzilla. Just in general.

9. It's been so much goddamn fun to play along with the Supporting Actress Smackdown and share my favorite non-nominated performances for each year of the month - I really can't imagine how these past two years would've been without something this fun and engaging to focus on.

10. There's just an absolutely tremendous amount of people who I've spent time with and talked to and shared things with over the past year, and maybe it was one conversation, maybe we talked a lot, maybe I haven't interacted with them in a while, but all those people mean a lot to me, and I'm very thankful for all of them. With all my heart, I hope they're doing well. 

Pick your favourites, Nick!

If you were to magically win an Oscar, who would you thank in your acceptance speech?

I mean, god willing that this would ever happen, I hope I'd already get the chance to gush about Sandy Powell, Tilda Swinton, Gregg Toland, Gordon Willis, Adam Stockhausen, Jessica Harper all across some long, protracted march to winning that Oscar. Gonna give my fellow nominees a big kiss on the mouth on my way to the podium - they deserve their love! But, y'know, I'm a sentimental bitch so my family, my sister, my boyfriend. Oh, and of course I have to blow a kiss to Lady Gaga, just like Olivia Colman. Priorities.

You're throwing a Thanksgiving dinner feast. You can invite 5 movie characters. Go!

Dorothea Fields has to be there. So do Linda Seton and Johnny Case. Those are truly the big three guests.
Claudia and Tommy Larson would also be wonderful, I bet. Lotta warm, comedic, gently neurotic personalities.

And I want the Madame Tussad's waxwork of RuPaul (or is it the real Ru????) lurking in the back and facing the corner like that guy in The Blair Witch Project, just for some extra spice. 

You can follow Nick on Twitter and on Letterboxd and we hope you will. 

Comments

[Cláudio Alves]

"Godzilla. Just in general." is the most Nick sentence ever written. I'm eternally thankful for knowing you and being able to call you a friend. Love you hun, and loved reading this :)