Links: The Beguiled, Real O'Neals, Celebrity Politics, and More

Let's try to cover everything we haven't mentioned lately (whew). The biggest and most obvious is that Sofia Coppola, whose plans to follow up Bling Ring with a live action Little Mermaid are no more, is now supposedly working on a remake of the Clint Eastwood romantic drama The Beguiled (1971). The film will star two darlings of TFE Nicole Kidman and Kirsten Dunst. Plus Elle Fanning so Coppola already sold all the tickets to our crowd. The Clint role is as yet uncast.  They're said to be looking for a 'Chris Pratt' type but what this surely calls for is a watch of the original film to familiarize ourselves.

Let's do it together shall we? It's available on Amazon and iTunes so let's all watch it by April 8th or so and we'll discuss. Deal? 

Other News
• Playbill Julie Andrews will direct a 60th anniversary production of My Fair Lady this fall at the Sydney Opera House. Tell us how it is Aussie readers!
• Tracking Board Julia Roberts lines up another thriller Fool Me Once. Can she step off the thriller train please. She's always screaming. How about a romantic comedy revival?
• Coming Soon Naomi Watts joining Brie Larson in Destin Cretton's (Short Term 12) Glass Castle.  

• Coming Soon Kristen Wiig replaces Reese Witherspoon in Alexander Payne's next satire Downsizing
• Guardian Woody Allen's Cafe Society will open Cannes this year but what other premieres might we see there? 
• Comics Alliance First i'm hearing this but apparently April 26th is "Aliens day" and a bunch companies are going to be selling Aliens stuff, including Reebook who will be releasing replicas of Sigourney's hideous red white and black velcroed shoes from that 1986 classic
• Broadway Blog Aaron Sorkin's A Few Good Men getting the live TV treatment in early 2017 -- it's not just for musicals anymore
• /Film Channing Tatum's Gambit delayed yet again. Hopefully he'll realize soon he doesn't need to do it at all. I mean it'd be nice if ANYONE other than Leonardo DiCaprio stayed away from the superhero genre. Just for you know some variety in our top male stars
• BBC Hans Zimmer officially retiring from scoring superhero pictures after Batman v Superman 
• Cinematic Corner Speaking of. If you're not done hating on that movie read Sati's righteous fury about it. She points out something I didn't notice: Zach Snyder can't even do cameos right. He uses THREE of his Watchmen actors (Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Patrick Wilson, Carla Gugino) and I didn't realize that any of them were involved! 

i couldn't find a good video of this gay date scene but its adorbs

Recommended Reads 
• Towleroad an interview with Noah Galvin, the talented funny star of The Real O'Neals. Try this show if you haven't. It's a delight.
• MNPP Which is Hotter: Ed Skrein or Ed Skrein
• Mike's Movie Projector shares an excerpt from an old Joan Fontaine autobiography
• Film School Rejects on Superheroes needing a dash of silliness even in their "dark" outings 
• Interview talks to Sophie Okonedo about Broadway's revival of The Crucible. She plays Goody Proctor
• MNPP loved seeing Benjamin Walker in tighty whities for over an hour as Patrick Bateman in the Broadway musical version of  American Psycho and since Jason hates musicals that is more than enough recommendation for me who loves them. I hadn't yet realized that 

Can This Election Be Over Instead of 8 Months Away?
• Boy Culture agree with Matthew in this piece on Susan Sarandon's recent irresponsible political comments. I'm so ready for this election to be over and it's still 8 months away!
• Towleroad and icymi the genius Tony Kushner was a guest on MSNBC and discussed how baffling Sarandon has been about this (They're both heroes of my youth. I don't like it when mommy & daddy fight!)
• The New Yorker suggests that maybe Superman is Republicans and Batman is Democrats and now I just want to die rather than think about Batman v Superman for a second longer. DEATH TO INTERNET THINK PIECES ABOUT SUPERHERO MOVIES! (I'm suddenly dreading Captain America: Civil War and dreading a Captain America movie is not something I feel comfortable doing... at all. In other words: stop it internet!)

HBO’s LGBT History: The Normal Heart (2014)

Last week we swooned over Dane DeHaan’s pitch perfect portrayal of a self-serious gay NYC teen in In Treatment and this week we’re returning to what continues to be HBO’s most cherished LGBT theme: the AIDS crisis. We’ve talked about it here, there, and here, here, and yep, here again… Much of this project has been about discovery, but The Normal Heart is still relatively recent and so below find some words I’d dispatched when I first saw it close to two years ago.

“And every gay man who refuses to come forward now and fight to save his own life is truly helping to kill the rest of us.” — Ned Weeks

Anger fuels much of The Normal Heart and the play/film’s ability to showcase such raw and seemingly useless feeling is one of the more extraordinary things to come out of Kramer’s life and work. Curmudgeoney as Kramer and Ned Weeks may come off, their anger is not only justified but necessary. It makes for a tacit and probably unintentional meta-nod to have the Hulk himself play him. [More...]

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YNMS: Money Monster

Chris here with more trailer happenings. One of the good things about Phase 2 of Oscar season is that we finally start seeing trailers for spring/summer films targeting adult eyeballs and reminding us that we start all over again with a new film year in March.

Here we have May's Money Monster, which finds Jodie Foster behind the director's chair again. It's her return to features following those well-received TV directorial turns with Orange is the New Black and House of Cards. She's brought the extra star power with Julia Roberts and George Clooney front and center against Unbroken's Jack O'Connell.

Take a look for Yes No Maybe So after the jump...

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Julia, Stone’s Snowden & Pixar’s Sanjay: News Roundup

Mondays, am I right, Julia?

Manuel here trying to catch up with plenty of news from this past week but somehow not feeling many of them, maybe I'm having a case of the Mondays? I wanted to kick the week off with some more Julia news (is everyone replaying that Secret in Their Eyes trailer for that one perfect gif-able moment?) but somehow typing “Roberts signs on to Garry Marshall’s Mothers Day” was enough of a letdown that I stopped typing. I mean, sure, we could joke that we can’t wait to see Julia in Marshall’s next film, MLK Day, but 30 Rock beat us all to it.

So why don’t we instead focus on the moody teaser for Oliver Stone’s Snowden?

Intense, right? That cast list alone (Gordon-Levitt, Woodley, Leo, Quinto, Wilkinson, Ifans) looks wonderful, but then flashes of W. keep haunting me and well, let’s just say it leaves me wanting. Can’t start Monday on that note, now can we?

Trust Pixar (currently making bank but somehow unable to dethrone those genetically modified dinos) to finally give me something to be excited about this morning. After what’s easily their worst (worst, I say!) short film (seriously, guys, I do not lava Lava!) they might be priming themselves for a gorgeous surprise this Thanksgiving. From a description of the short Sanjay’s Super Team set to premiere before The Good Dinosaur this fall:

“The seven-minute short begins with young Sanjay watching cartoons and eating cereal in a bland, beige room as his father jingles a bell, beckoning him to join in meditation. Reluctant and bored by the ceremony, Sanjay begins daydreaming a kind of ancient, Hindu version of The Avengers, with the gods appearing like superheroes. As the daydream progresses, the color, light and animation of the film grows increasingly dazzling and cosmic, and Sanjay grows closer to understanding his father's inner world.”

"Sanjay's Super Team" is directed by Sanjay Patel, a long time animator at Pixar. [image src]

We’d seen some concept art but now we have two gorgeous images and I have to say, I am eagerly awaiting this short probably even more so than the photorealistic dino adventure that will follow it. I mean, look at those big eyes! Those bright colors! Those kickass character designs! 

Are you excited that Pixar seems to be actively trying to redress its diversity problem with characters like Riley, Sadness, Joy, and Sanjay? Are you still trying to forget you ever watched Lava? (If I watch Inside Out in the theaters again, I will definitely be skipping that gender normative sitcom of a short).

Yes No Maybe So: Secret In Their Eyes

It might be time to revisit the last Argentinian winner of the Oscae which triumphed over an absurdly strong Foreign Language Film shortlist in 2009. For those still smarting from the losses of Un Prophete and The White Ribbon, bad news: The Argentinian film could be coming back for more Oscars.

Not really.

Sort of.

It's been remade for English language marketplaces as Secret In Their Eyes. And though extremely mainstream genres like murder thrillers generally don't pique Oscar's interest (unless there's the patina of class via subtitles or world class filmmakers behind the camera) you never know. Though we generally disdain remakes of foreign films -- we can read so who needs 'em? -- they've cast three very watchable actors as the central trio: Chiwetel Ejiofor in the Ricardo Darin role, and Julia Roberts and Nicole Kidman as the women in his life / workplace. 

Let's break down the trailer after the jump...

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