THR's Screenwriter Roundtable

Chris here. I hope you're having a relaxing and safe holiday weekend!

Earlier this week, hiding among the constant updates on the reams of money The Force Awakens is floating in, we got this year's Screenwriters Roundtable! You'll remember from November that we had some feelings about this year's Actress Roundtable and I'll confess that I found this year's Actor Roundtable underwhelming in lineup and discussion. However, the Screenwriters edition is often the loosest and freshest each year - with its selected participants typically on point.

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Women's Pictures - Celine Sciamma's Tomboy

A young boy moves to a new town with his family. He's a goofball, a caring older sibling, and a shy kid. On his first day on the block, he runs into a girl and introduces himself as Mikael. She introduces herself as Lisa, and invites him to play a game of tag with her friends. Later, as he's taking a bath with his younger sister, his mother calls him Laure. She laughs and tells them: "Girls, get out of the bath!" It's almost 20 minutes into the movie before Celine Sciamma upends the expectations of her audience. In Tomboy, Sciamma examines how identity is constructed through performance in childhood, specifically in regards to gender.

The main character of Sciamma's 2011 film is still in that period before hormones kick in when all kids are basically agender in appearance. What separates genders from each other is how they move and how they present themselves.

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Holiday Podcast Part 1: The Ballot Rush

Nathaniel, Nick, Katey, and Joe all return for a two part discussion -- something you can listen to while you're travelling for the holidays, a gift from us to you. This was recorded on December 13th (apologies for the delay) so it predates the Critics Choice nominations and subsequent Star Wars kerfuffle which is why we don't discuss those. But we're here to talk precursors and more. (Part Two will be up tonight)

42:30 minutes 
00:01 The Big Short is suddenly a factor. Why?
07:30 Helen Mirren in Trumbo and Woman in Gold
11:00 Sarah Silverman and Best Actress
15:00 Randomness and SAG voters
22:00 Spotlight and the Globes
24:30 Rooney Mara & Alicia Vikander & BFCA
32:00 Best Director & Picture Possibilities
35:00 Original Song Contenders
40:20 Weird Stats plus Hair and Makeup

Further Reading for Context:
SAG Nominations
Globe Nominations
Original Song's 74 Contenders
Oscar Charts

You can listen to the podcast here at the bottom of the post or download from iTunes. 

Holiday Podcast Pt 1

Best of '15: Hunkalicious Screen Beauty

Our Year in Review party continues! Cue mood music.

Since The Film Experience obsessives over actresses almost daily, the actors could use a little spotlight from time to time. So this entry into our year in review party is a beauty break starring the year's best man candy in cinema ...with a little TV thrown in for extra flavor.

15 A superhero... but which one?
Any of The Avengers will do but if actors are going to be expected to be on special diets and grueling workout routines daily for those spandex ready bodies, you'd think Marvel would let them go shirtless for more than 10 seconds each movie. Chris Evans is still the most delicious among them but we'll give this round to Paul Rudd for the sleeker non-steroidal fitness regimen (which we hope becomes more the norm because Henry Cavill's Superman body is so cartoon weird; it's like a giant chest and shoulders with random stick appendages and face).

Runner up goes to Chris Hemsworth When Wet: in that silly pool of visions in Age of Ultron; shipwrecked and starving but still somehow maintaining the workouts in In the Heart of the Sea; or even just those carefully wet stray Blackhat bangs

Fourteen more people or categories after the jump. But fair warning... it's slightly nsfw. So it's a good thing you're on Christmas break. In the immortal words of Tina Belcher...

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While We Wait for Carol...

The natives are growing restless.

Greetings friends. Chris here, the newest member of Team Experience. Like I'm assuming many of you, I live far away from the lucky 16 theatres currently housing Todd Haynes' return to the big screen. So I'm happy with even the slightest shift that brings Carol's glacial release to my local screens. Non-US readers have an even longer wait. We've all become the human embodiment of that inescapable Rooney Mara image.

It's worth noting amid all our impatience the cautionary tale told this year by the likes of Steve Jobs and The Diary of a Teenage Girl: going too wide too soon can result in a quick crash and burn in this increasingly crowded marketplace. So let's take a breather and feel grateful that Carol has a distributor like The Weinstein Co. focused on reaching a passionate audience, even if it means waiting longer than we want. After all, the film is still the film no matter when we see it.

Meanwhile, I've got 10 fun homework assignments to keep you occupied while you wait...

 1. Read Patricia Highsmith's novel (also published as The Price of Salt). The film is not a page-to-page adaptation, so some surprises will still be ahead - including more of our titular love interest!

2. Rewatch the Todd Haynes filmography! I'll do the leg work for you: Velvet Goldmine is availble on Netflix Instant, Poison and I'm Not There on Amazon Prime...

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