Beauty vs Beast: Motel Hell

JA from MNPP here, wishing you all a happy Monday and wishing what would have been a happy 88th birthday to the great, sadly passed Janet Leigh. She's been gone for over a decade but Janet's legacy still looms tall with several classics -- Touch of Evil and The Manchurian Candidate both come to mind -- but as it has been said we all go a little mad sometimes and color me mad when I realized that Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho has somehow never found itself "Beauty vs Beast"-itized. It's a prime pick whose time has come! Slap on your favorite wig and let's play!

PREVIOUSLY This weekend Terminator: Genisys flopped box-office-wise and according to your votes maybe they should've thought about bringing Linda Hamilton along for the ride since her Sarah Connor trounced Full Metal Arnold in our face-off taking just under 80% of the vote. Said SusanP:

"As far as I'm concerned no contest -- Sarah Connor in a walk. Plus, when you list her pros you are neglecting her most important/awesome assets: The Arms "

Beauty vs Beast: Mother Machine

Jason from MNPP here wishing everyone a happy Monday, and a happy July-4th-weekend-to-be - speaking of, hitting theaters this big holiday weekend is the latest movie in the unstoppable Terminator franchise... is anybody excited? I imagine it's hard for most of us to stir up a ton of enthusiasm five movies in and coming off of two entirely lackluster sequels, but I really love the cast that's been assembled so I will probably get suckered in one more time. Jason Clarke wouldn't steer us wrong... right? That said for this week's "Beauty vs Beast" let us look back at the last time the franchise was good with the movie every sequel since has been riding the fumes from, James Cameron's 1991 action classic Terminator 2: Judgement Day.You have one week to choose!

PREVIOUSLY Billy Wilder's birthday carried us up into the dark weird manors of the Hollywood Hills with a face-off between Sunset Boulevard's Norma Desmond and her post-dead boy-toy Joe, and Norma's stardust was too much for us to resist. She carried just under 80% of the vote! Said tom:

"While Joe seems to inspire those around him, Norma consumes them. She probably swallows them whole. You have to vote for someone with an appetite like that."

Beauty vs Beast: Down & Out In Hollywood

Jason from MNPP here, and I'm ready for my close-up - we're devoting today's edition of "Beauty vs Beast" to the late great director Billy Wilder, who was born on this day 109 years ago. If you had to pick your favorite Wilder picture, what would you go with? It's a query that'll break the brain of many a cinephile, so rich stands his cinematic legacy even all these decades later. I personally am torn between The Apartment (so glad I was able to hang out in the bar that Fran and C.C. frequent before it closed) and today's competitive centerpiece, 1950's Sunset Boulevard (aka still the greatest movie about Hollywood ever made), but cases made for a couple other Wilder films could probably convince me they were his be all everything too. Point being Billy didn't used to be big, he is big, and it's the pictures that got small without him. In that vein...

PREVIOUSLY Last week we wished Helen Hunt a happy birthday with a look back at her and Jack Nicholson's 1997 Oscar wins for As Good As It Gets -- facing them off y'all were decidely Team Carol with her thundering past a full 3/4ths of the vote. Explained Denny:

"Loved this film then and like it now, despite all the shit it gets. Jack is on fire - somehow Melvin doesn't come off like the complete and utter cliche he is on paper, and it's solely due to Nicholson's unique charisma - but it really is all about Helen Hunt and her warm, deeply lived-in performance as Carol. Yes the "fucking HMO pieces of shit" bit is great, but where the character (and the actress) really sings for me is in the quieter, more intimate moments. She somehow ups everyone's game when she's in a scene with them, and that's no small feat. But really, Carol wins just for being able to handle Melvin and all his bullshit."

Beauty vs Beast: Sidewalk Stories

Jason from MNPP here with this week's "Beauty vs Beast" -- the very first movie that I ever saw being filmed in person was on one of my first trips to New York City; I guess it must've been in the spring of 1997? There I was walking down a side-street near NYU, a wide-eyed country bumpkin in the big city, when who should suddenly be standing in front of me but Jack Nicholson. Jack Nicholson! That'll stop you dead in your tracks. Beside him was Helen Hunt and Greg Kinnear and you guessed it, it was James L. Brooks' multiple Oscar winner As Good As It Gets.

I watched them film for about half an hour (it was the scene where they were getting into the car to go on their mid-movie road-trip) in awe, and now whenever I think of this movie I think of that experience and how fundamental it was to cementing this city as where I wanted to live my life. There's magic around every corner, wedged terrifyingly in every crack of the sidewalk. Long story short today is Helen Hunt's birthday (and Greg Kinnear's birthday is on Wednesday) so As Good As It Gets it is...

PREVIOUSLY Last time around we anticipated the weekend's great big movie (movie-a-saurus) with a claw-off between the Tyrannosaurus Rex and the Velociraptor in Steven Spielberg's 1993 original Jurassic Park - ya'll love your Clever Girls and the Raptor slashed her way to the winning circle with 60% of the vote. Said forever1267:

"Velociraptors are one of the few movie monsters that really scared me while watching the movie. They aren't supposed to be smart! They're not supposed to be able to open doors! They're not supposed to be clever! Chills!"

Beauty vs Beast: When Dinosaurs Ruled The Earth

Jason from MNPP here with this week's "Beauty vs Beast" -- actually it's more of a "Beast vs Beast" this time around, as we're finally tackling the movie franchise sixty-five million and twenty-two years in the making and as much as I love all of the Ellie Sattlers and Ian Malcolms let's not fool ourselves - we go to Jurassic Park movies to see the dinosaurs of our childhood dreams be brought to (terrifying, realistic) life. Jurassic World is out on Friday and as much hyped in the trailers they're giving us a new dinosaur, the Indominus Rex. It's a genetic hybrid, spliced together from blah and blah and didn't they learn anything from the Spinosaurus fizzle in Part III? We know they need new toys to produce but we just want the classics. The originals are, as always, the best. But which is King of the Park?

Before anybody nerds out on me I know that scientists now believe the T-Rex's "movement-based vision" thing is no longer the case but hey, it's what the movie believes, so it's true for this T-Rex. You've got a week to vote! And please, no write-in's for Chris Pratt. Doesn't he have enough already?