First & Last 020

Can you guess the movie from its first & last shot?

The answer is after the jump...

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Bring Your Own "Yes No Maybe So"

So many new trailers. Nightmare Alley, Pam & Tommy, She-Hulk, Spider-Man No Way Home, Dog, Marry Me, Turning Red, Moonfall. Let's watch them all after the jump...

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Vintage '47: What was going on in showbiz that year?

by Nathaniel R

Let's look at some cultural background on the year 1947 before we reach the new Smackdown event in exactly one week (have you voted yet?). Light entertainments were very popular but Post-War America and by extension Hollywood was feeling a dark undertow and anxiety. Cinema went deep into noir territory (men really didn't know who to trust or what to make of women after they'd becoming working girls during the War and the anxiety definitely showed onscreen) and offscreen things were treacherous. The infamous witchhunt for Communists began in Hollywood, cutting off the careers of many talented actors and filmmakers who wouldn't 'name names', beginning with "The Hollywood Ten". 

Great Big Box Office Hits:
A now long-forgotten picture, Welcome Stranger (reteaming the Oscar-winning stars of Going My Way) was one of the year's very biggest attractions. The best-seller turned rom-com The Egg and I was also a huge success. Other light entertainments that were audience favourites included all star comedies like Life with Father (currently streaming!) and The Bachelor and Bobby Soxer, and the Betty Grable musical Mother Wore Tights. But Oscar drifted towards more serious fare... 

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Horror Actressing: Barbara Hershey in "Insidious"

by Jason Adams

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On Wednesday the great Barbara Hershey will be celebrating her 72nd birthday, and per usual once an actress hits a certain age what's the genre that picks up the slack? The "disreputable" Horror genre,  that's who, always there to welcome these great talents into its warm, slimy embrace. I simply don't know how one could call one's self an "actressexual" and not be appreciative of all the meaty roles this genre's afforded actresses that nobody else is throwing their way. Yeah yeah maybe they're not always Chekov, but the work is there and the focus is often on women's stories and relationships, and great actresses can make anything sing.

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Ten years ago Hershey hit hard with two prime examples of this -- I'm not going to fall down the rabbit hole of whether Darren Aronofsky's Black Swan is a horror film (it is) though, because I want to focus on the other one, one which gifted Hershey with one of the decade's greatest scares...

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Can we give Patrick Wilson the Oscar for *his* Freddie Mercury instead?

We love this man.

And this queen doesn't need to lipsynch. Where is his movie musical star vehicle? The film version of Phantom of the Opera was 14 years ago and he was much less famous then. We've seen him in both of his Tony-nominated roles (The Full Monty and Oklahoma!) and he was marvelous both times and that voice is just pure melodic pleasure, transporting really. Perfect for a big sweeping romantic musical. He hasn't been on Broadway in 10 years but he's co-starred in several box office hits in that time so why aren't movie musical producers snatching him up?

WHAT IS WRONG WITH HOLLYWOOD? (A perennial question when it comes to the movie musical genre). If you were somehow unaware of his musical gifts, there are more videos after the jump because we're in a... mood.

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