Streaming Roulette, Dec: Sleepy Debbie, Angry Ang, and Winning Gandhi

After the jump you'll find a listing of everything that's new to streaming this month (December 2020). But first we pick two handfuls of titles and randomly freeze them with the scroll bar. Whatever comes up is what we share. Do these images make you want to see (or rewatch) the movie? (If you want to keep up with what's specifically available to stream from this film year you can read these earlier posts!)

It's me against the world. You're all I got baby.

The People vs Larry Flynt (1996) on Amazon Prime
True confession: I never understand why people thought Courtney Love was great in this (though I like Courtney Love as a musician). She's certainly raw but at least for me I can hear the lines being recited and the lack of training. But this feels due for a rewatch - perhaps for its 25th anniversary next year? How close do you think it came to a Best Picture nomination, given that it received only two nominations but they were biggies (Actor & Director)?

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The Furniture: Finding the Fear in "The Picture of Dorian Gray"

"The Furniture," by Daniel Walber. (Click on the images for magnified detail)

Watching The Picture of Dorian Gray as a horror film in this, its 75th anniversary year, is a bit of a puzzle. It’s almost unrecognizable within the genre, though director Albert Lewin does treat the revelation of the deformed painting itself as something of a jump scare. But the overall vibe is more akin to a period drama or a film noir than anything we would consider spooky today.

That is, until you think about it a little more closely.

 The Picture of Dorian Gray is an atmospheric horror film about things that don’t necessarily scare us nearly as much anymore: arrogance, beauty and the simple fact of sexuality. In this way it does actually resemble the great horror films of its time, monster movies that make much out of giant laboratories and cavernous castles, unnerving the audience through the use of production design. Dorian Gray’s home is of a piece with Dracula’s castle and the Mummy’s tomb...

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Oscar Horrors: "Goodbye, Little Yellow Bird"

In 'Oscar Horrors' we look at those rare Oscar nominated contributions in the horror genre. Daily all October long. Here's Andreas on an actress who is still very much with us and where is her Honorary Oscar, we ask?

HERE LIES... Angela Lansbury's chanteuse "Sibyl Vane," sent to an early grave by her love for Dorian Gray and trampled by National Velvet in March 1946

For The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945), Angela Lansbury received her second Best Supporting Actress nomination in as many years. (Her previous one was for Gaslight, another Victorian horror-melodrama. Talk about carving out a niche!) She plays a working-class British girl in both films, but Sibyl Vane is the polar opposite of her snippy maid in Gaslight: demure, wholesome, and tender.

These qualities captivate the still-redeemable Dorian, as does her signature song "Little Yellow Bird".

Good-bye, little yellow bird.
I'd rather brave the cold
On a leafless tree
Than a prisoner be
In a cage of gold...

Lansbury's delivery transforms the song into a leitmotif of innocence, a status it retains long after her character's death. For although the actress herself departs the film about 40 minutes in, she leaves a huge impression. This is a true supporting performance, affecting the whole rest of the film despite scant screen time. Dorian Gray is a chilly movie, preoccupied with the smooth surfaces of Dorian's mansion, and Lansbury supplies it with warmth. Her heartbroken face pierces Dorian's hardening soul, and her melancholy song haunts him all throughout his later debaucheries.

Even when he's corrupted through and through, Dorian Gray can't escape the "Little Yellow Bird." That's the lingering power of Angela Lansbury's onscreen vulnerability. With that gentle face, opening into a smile like a flower into bloom, she changes what could've been a throwaway ingenue role into something bigger—into the emotional core of the film. The Oscar may have ultimately gone to Anne Revere for National Velvet, but Sibyl remains unforgettable, a pure songbird devoured by Dorian's caprices.

More Oscar Horrors 
Monster's Inc - Animated Feature
Pan's Labyrinth - Art Direction
Them! - Visual Effects
American Werewolf in London -Makeup
Addams Family Values  -Art Direction

The Time Link Machine

The Now
Pajiba Joanna reveals 10 current tv characters she'd like to shag. Hear hear on #7 Ben Wyatt (Adam Scott on Parks and Recreation). Zoinks but I love him. And the show, too. One of those blessed TV shows that gets consistently stronger all the time, as if learning from itself rather than calcifying.
The Wrap Hugh Dancy takes the lead in Spree. I was wondering what had become of him outside of being on Claire Danes arm at awards shows.
Gold Derby Emmy categorizations. Chris Colfer (Glee) and Ed O'Neill (Modern Family) are going for supporting again despite the lead Comedy Actor category opening up a bit with the exit of Emmy slot hogs  from Monk and Curb Your Enthusiasm.
Kenneth in the (212) turns us on to a Mark Ruffalo Guest DJ program
Scene Stealers ran a fun Thor hammer photoshop contest. See the amusing results.

gif via Sonia

The Future
My New Plaid Pants Jeremy Renner would like to play Steve McQueen in a movie but JA has a better idea: Rainer Werner Fassbinder. My feelings are Yes and Hell, Yes.
Boing Boing Omelette recipe printed on an egg. Oh Technology you clever clever scamp.
IndieWire Ed Burns is never going back to theatrical releases (via Tribeca Film Festival).

The Past
Towleroad Karl Lagerfied is the new Willy Wonka.
i09 Restored uncensored version of Oscar Wilde's "The Picture of Dorian Gray" is being published. Does this mean we'll get another film version.
The Awl, like Pajiba, is feeling the lusty month of may already. 111 Literary characters in order of Bangability. Ha. You'll never believe it but Mr. Darcy is NOT #1.
BET remembers Imitation of Life
Old Hollywood on affection for former lovers via Jeanne Moreau.
Stirred Straight Up With a Twist did you know that Joan Crawford was almost named Joan Arden.