The Film Experience™ was created by Nathaniel R. All material herein is written by our team. (This site is not for profit but for an expression of love for cinema & adjacent artforms.)
It's always boggling to consider how many people's noses a poster has had to pass under in order to get approved, and how they still are often more abysmal than you could have imagined. The floating head syndrome, men with their back to the camera, or a couple back to back are the usual unimaginative posters that fly by. But this week we seem to have been treated to three posters that have gone above and beyond the call of duty to be really really stupid.
Three disasters for three genres (horror, fantasy, dance) after the jump...
Team Experience is sharing favorite love scenes for Valentine's. Here's Josh...
It's a familiar and tested recipe to throw a beautiful period frock on an actress worth their weight in Oscars, and set her literary romantic troubles against a luscious location. Actressexuals and their mums will be clutching their pearls in the cinema on the first night it opens, and rewatching on DVD instead of reading the book for years to come. But let this not detract from The Painted Veil, the underrated and oscarless (not even nominations!) gem from 2006.
That divine poster image of Edward Norton and Naomi Watts drifting along the river is plucked from the films most beautiful scene. The scenes beauty is due in no small part to Alexander Desplat's score that rides the romance of the film perfectly. His 'River Waltz' which accompanies the scene echoes the films romantic arc, its gentle chords and progressive structure mirrors the very real struggle of Kitty and Walter as they have 'waltzed' around one another in a tricky marriage, peppered with early acts of deliberate cruelty. As they ease into the relationship, and let the rhythms of their new life together guide them, they become entwined and supportive partners. The score also playfully references Gnossienne No 1 by Erik Satie, a piece used in the film first diegetically playing in the party that Walter first swoons over Kitty passing him in the hallway, and then again as Kitty plays the tune on a rickety piano in the orphanage as he watches on. A moment of projected love, and a moment of genuine discovery of love.
And the scene is lusciously visual. Much credit to the location scouts for finding this location in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in China. Wide blue eyed Naomi and her gorgeous lace parasol, and swoon worthy Ed Norton in a crisp linen shirt, set against those towering rock faces and sprawling bamboo. It's a smorgasbord of romanticism and a perfect antithesis from their first gruelling journey, one that Walter made them make on foot, to punish Kitty. This is a rare romance that let's us fall in love the same time the characters do.
In case you've missed it, LA based producer Ross Putman has been tweeting out the funny-if-they-weren't-so-awful introductions for female characters in the scripts he's been receiving. It's a dismal glimpse into the reality of female representation in cinema, featuring a strong emphasis on how attractive the character is and plenty of 'cool girl' types who are attractive but don't know it.
JANE, 28, athletic but sexy. A natural beauty. Most days she wears jeans, and she makes them look good.
Whilst these scripts are likely never seeing the light of day (fingers crossed), it's an unavoidable truth that for every Therese Belevit there are ten Michael Bay Hot Girl who runs 2 metres behind the gawky hero.
To compare, let's look after the jump at how some of this year's iconic female characters have been introduced in their films after the jump...
Friday, February 19, 2016 at 10:00AM 
