Lukewarm off the press: MTV Movie Awards, Dune buzz, Norman Lloyd, etc...
Monday, May 17, 2021 at 2:19PM Sorry about our radio silence these past few days. But let's catch up with some of movie news that we missed.
• The MTV Movie & TV Awards were held with WandaVision emerging as the big winner taking home Best Show, Best Performance, Best Fight, and Best Villain. Sacha Baron Cohen, Chadwick Boseman, and Scarlett Johansson among others were also honored.
More after the jump including Dune, Disenchanted, and Lord of the Rings for TV news...
WandaVision's wins at the MTV Awards aren't surprising given that they are voted on by the public but how will the show fare at the Emmys given that it's a hybrid of multiple forms (half hour sitcom, character drama, superhero movie split up into tv parts). The nomination post has been updated with all winners.
• You may have heard that Bong Joon Ho is working on an animated feature (involving deep sea creatures and people). It's two movies away though as first he's directing an English language feature.
• In an interesting interview Ben Platt weighs in on being an Oscar short of an EGOT (at just 27 years of age!) and the debate about whether only gay actors should play gay roles.
• There are awards for everything including Male Nudity. The 7th Annual "Manatomy" Awards were announced last week with Industry winning Best TV Show, Paul Mescal "Best Nudecomer" for Normal People, and Mark Ruffalo getting a lifetime achievement prize.
• People were strangely writing Amy Adams career obituary after her second consecutive flop (Woman in the Window)... although what is a flop when it comes to streaming? It's so impossible to know. But next up is Disenchanted a sure to be popular sequel to her big fairy tale comedy hit and it's now begun production.
• Do you listen to audiobooks? I personally do not (prefer the page and no specific voices) but if you do you might want to know that Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood is getting both a novelization and a celebrity read audiobook. Jennifer Jason Leigh will do the honors.
• Amazon is spending an enormous fortune (nearly half a billion) on their Lord of the Rings tv series. And that's just for the first season (sort of)! That's a big bet for something that's already been fully explored in movie form. Not that more of the same is a bad Hollywood bet these days.
• It's not unusual for stars in forthcoming movies to act like their upcoming movie will be the greatest thing ever made (remember Vin Diesel boasting that one of the Fast & Furious installments was going to win the Best Picture Oscar or some such nonsense?). This time it's Dave Bautista talking about Dune.
• And finally, RIP Norman Lloyd, the actor / producer / director lived to an astonishing 106 years of age and his filmography as an actor though sparse (given the multi-hyphenate career) was quite good stretching from thrillers like Saboteur (1942) and Spellbound (1945) through Oscar-nominated dramas like Dead Poets Society (1989) and The Age Of Innocence (1993) and wrapped up with the Amy Schumer comic blockbuster Trainwreck (2014). Our favourite trivia about him is that he was introduced as an actor via Hitchcock and 20 years later was forging a young career as a director/producer on TV via Alfred Hitchcock Presents and The Alfred Hitchcock Hour.
Ben Platt, Bong Joon Ho, MTV, WandaVision, links, nudity
Reader Comments (21)
Good selection. Diving in the Manatomy Awards website for the love of the arts.
Are we getting a Woman in the Window review? because I have OPINIONS.
People are stupid : Amy Adams is the star of a bad film with a doomed production. Too bad for her but her performance has nothing to do with it!
Also the film is a hit on Netflix, just like Hillbilly Elegy was, so it would be very unfair to call it a flop.
Woman in the window is on the top 10 in my country, so I have no idea how it could be a flop for Amy Adams.
Isn't Mark Ruffalo too young for a lifetime achievement award?
How is Manatomy Awards in its seventh edition and I have never heard of it?
It's hard to see Hillbilly Elegy as a failure. In addition to it being on Netflix, it seems to have been well-received by audiences and earned Amy a lead SAG nomination.
If the Enchanted sequel is good, let's hope Amy Adams scores the awards traction she should have had back in 2007 for her performance in the first film.
I think the issue with Amy Adams is more that she was once one of the most reliable film stars but she hasn't been in anything that seemed worthy of her talents since Arrival five years ago. Yes, Hillbilly Elegy and Woman in the Window were/are "hits" on Netflix, but so was Tiger King. No, I do not consider Sharp Objects worthy of her talents.
Angel -- lol. i assume because it's a promotional thing for the site that hosts it and it costs money to join.
Do you have any infos about the upcoming Amy Adams movie "Dear Evan Hansen"?
@jules
How ironic that imo Adams' greatest performance is Arrival, without Oscar nomination... 😒
I thought Hillbilly Elegy was fine. Didn't deserve the trashing it got, and Adams and Close were quite good in it. Any fault is Ron Howard's. People need to leave their politics at the door when reviewing movies is my take with that one.
The Woman in the Window was bad, but I blame Joe Wright for that one. He had the best cast and a great writer and still couldn't figure it out.
"The Woman in the Window" was actually #1 in my country yesterday when I watched it... I thought it was ok but more in line of "Woman in a Train" (almost the same title) than anything else. Adams sold what she was given very well, especially her flashback/monologue is really good. I think it would work better as a stage production. That cast... WOW!
It's too early to write an obituary on Amy Adams' career. Everyone went through a flop but she's talented enough to recover.
Joseph: Eh, Hillbilly Elegy reviews are...even leaving aside politics: Gabriel Basso, at least based on this, though he looks the part, CAN'T ACT (if anyone in that movie actually deserved a Razzie nod...throw the (over-nominated, especially since it was for Hubie Halloween) Adam Sandler out for him), and it turns the movie into a study of halves. There's a half that on its own would be a B (the one with the kid, 95% of the Glenn Close stuff, and two thirds of the Amy Adams stuff), and a half that would be a D (the present day section, with basically no Glenn Close, fairly little Amy Adams, and a terrible actor), and, though some of the bad reviews probably were some level of politically motivated, I'd say MOST of them happened entirely based in Basso's performance in the present day half. Both halves, though, are unified by terrible writing, it's just the flashback half is elevated by great actors slumming it.
MTV Movie & TV Awards is the right place to honor the type of film and TV show they reward. Back in the 1990s when I wish I wasn't born yet, there were two fun categories "most desirable male" and "most desirable female" that ended up being banned because it apparently caused discomfort in the nominees and winners.
Who needs a Lord of the Ring tv show? The last trilogy was endless
Vovlagia decided to take his meds today. His daily screed is pretty lucid and accurate for once. Great job dude!
Ben looks really sexy as a brunette.
Norman Lloyd was memorable in Audrey Rose. Whenever the opportunity arises to mention Marsha Mason, I must take it.
The LOTR series predates everything seen in the movies.
I saw the Dear Evan Hansen trailer and immediately thought the reactions on twitter are going to be excellent.
I just don't understand the opinion voiced by many gay people (and I am gay myself) that only gay actors should play gay characters. In the article, Ben Platt very rightly says:
“I feel like the attitude should be, wherever possible, especially if the story is really rooted in a queer background or is [fundamentally] a queer story like It’s a Sin, we should be doing everything in our power to cast queer actors”
I think that if we're going to insist on the more "drastic" option then, by the same token, only straight actors should play straight characters. We can`t have it both ways.
Dang. At this point it seemed like Norman Lloyd would live forever. So sad to hear of his passing.