Baby Got Backrooms

Hooray, this interminable three day work week has ended! I'm free! And it's a heckuva weekend ahead! Not because Backrooms starring the above hotness that is Chiwetel Ejiofor is out in theaters (no that picture is not from Backrooms, I actually have no idea what it's from, but who the hell cares look at him), because I already shared some of my mixed thoughts on Backrooms earlier today right here. No this is a heckuva weekend ahead because NewFest 2026 Pride Edition kicks off today! I already told you about its fantastic line-up at this link but basically I'm freaking out with excitement over one movie, and that movie is Gregg Araki's new movie I Want Your Sex. 

(P.S. That is I believe a new picture from the film there.) I am seeing a new Gregg Araki movie this weekend y'all! I have not been able to type out that sentence in twelve years. TWELVE YEARS. That's cruelty, utter cruelty, finally coming to an end. And awesomely enough I'll be making a whole day of it, this Araki-ness, because there's also a screening of the new 4K restoration of his movie Mysterious Skin that's screening at IFC Center on Saturday too, which I'll be at -- and not just me, but Araki and actor turned director Brady Corbet as well! Hot damn, what a time will be had. So stay tuned, to my socials and here -- I will surely got stuff to say soon. Have a good weekend, one and all but especially me!

Thing On The Other Side Other The On Thing

To paraphraseth the wise sage Danny Glover in Lethal Weapon,  I'm too old for this stuff -- not the movie version of Backrooms specifically, but the whole "creepypasta" phenom that birthed it. (Honestly I think that's the first time I have ever typed the word "creepypasta" in my entire life.) Not that I'm not deeply and profoundly online, as this website you're on right now is a twenty-five-plus year testament to. But I'd never even heard of the "backrooms" thing until A24 announced this movie version of it -- I just haven't gotten around to spending weeks of my life falling down Slenderman rabbit-holes on YouTube. And to be clear -- I see this as a weakness on my part! I'm aware there is this entire section of the horror-sphrere that I'm wholly ignorant of, and I don't love that -- I'm just too old to be chasing waterfalls and windmills, so I will pick up the threads when they wind their way to out my ancient decrepit person eyes and ears at this point. (I will say I read this explainer of the origin of "backrooms" this week and it was extremely helpful.)

So anyway after I heard about the idea of the "backrooms" I did go and watch a few of director Kane Parsons shorts -- only a couple though, because I wanted to have some idea of the phenomenon without going so far as to spoil the film for myself. And I found them very creepy! And Parsons does manage to translate that creepiness to big portions of Backrooms, this here Major Motion Picture out in many a theater this weekend. There are profoundly unsettling moments in here -- the section with the rope down the chute springs to mind and sends a reverberating shudder. And Chiwetel Ejiofor and Renate Reinsve, both Oscar nominated and with good reason actors, do excellent work filling out sketchy emotional throughlines for their characters, which really comes to matter in the last act. I felt for both of them in exactly the ways the movie wanted me to, and I personally think the film's final shot lands with a shockwave of uncanniness that's still turning my stomach over here now thinking about it a couple weeks later. A fine and unnerving landing.

The issue (and yes, I have issues) is that -- despite all of my general ignorance on the subject of the internet's deep well of Liminal Horror that's defined The Young People Making The Horror Movies Now -- I have actually seen and adored Kyle Edward Ball's 2022 film Skinamarink. (Here is my review, which I'm contractually obligated to mention every time it comes up was quoted on Skinamarink's poster.) Ball also started out with YouTube shorts -- Skinamarink is basically a longer version of his 2020 film "Heck" -- but Ball managed to keep in place the extreme sense of alienation that these shorts wallow expertly in. And he kept it going for a full feature-length film in a way I prefer to Parsons' more mainstream (and certainly to be more successful financially) kind of take. 

Skinamarink is admittedly experimental -- I'm fully aware that most people who watch Skinamarink can't stand it. I just was never one of those people, and I fucking love the experience of losing myself into its static nightmare space for one hundred excrutiating minutes. When its scares do come, peeking their horrible eyes out from the blackness, they have wormed their ways deep into my subconsious, my being, in ways that, I gotta say, nothing in Backrooms manages. (Save that final shot. I really loved that final shot, which in an instant telegraphs an entire compendium upon the horrors of A.I. that I was not at all prepared for. A sneak attack!) 

The two films are two very different takes on the Liminal phenom, and it's not really fair to compare them -- I just think that the entire idea of Liminal Horror depends on a realization of stillness, of losing yourself into a netherworld that you're being presented with, and I personally find the tack that Backrooms takes to be somewhat less effective. Introducing us to characters, with back-stories and motivations and relationships -- you know, all the stuff that makes Backrooms a "movie" -- it's just inherently distancing. Parsons' short films didn't have to indulge that stuff -- they were, thanks to their brevity and form, able to just drop us in the scary place without distraction. And yeah -- "characters" and "stories" are probably a necesarry concession to making a twenty million dollar studio film. I don't hold it against Parsons', who made a solid and respectable and oft unnerving film. I'm just ultimately a Skinamarink girlie, I guess. Toss me off the deep end with no discernable markers whatsoever and I'm in heaven, inside that hell. Now one of you young people direct me to all the YouTube shorts I should be watching, please!

Going Out on a Liminal

As a vigorous supporter of all things Liminal Horror you'd think I'd have already watched the original 2022 YouTube phenom Backrooms from creator Kane Parsons -- you can watch it here -- but somehow (i.e. I'm terribly un-hip) I missed it. And now A24 has turned the thing into a feature film that's out on May 29th, and you can watch the teaser trailer down below. I haven't watched the teaser yet because I haven't watched the original short -- so I ask y'all: should I go watch the original short? Or should I just wait for the feature? Any thoughts? I realize that none of you have seen the feature yet so who knows if it's just a big budgeted retread of the short's scares. But I'm leaning towards watching the short ASAP since I assume this new version has been made with the original's fans in mind as its base audience. Anyway with a cast that includes two of my favorite working actors, Chiwetel Ejiofor and Renate Reinsve, there's no way I'm not all up in this thing. Here's the teaser (and up top is the oddly hypnotic poster, a version of which which you can buy on A24's site right now):

The Life of Chuck in 200 Words or Less

Flat visuals, costumes, and some of the most truly inane messaging this side of a dollar store greeting card -- this movie is like somebody wrote a full length screenplay for one of those prescription drug commercials where everybody's wearing solid knits and drinking margaritas on sunny terraces as their depression turns to ash in their mouths. Truth be told The Life of Chuck may induce a cold sweat, nausea, vomiting, seizures, more vomiting, testicular regression, fire and brimstone, dry eyes, an online gambling addiction, Akathisia, simultaneous constipation and diarrhea, chest pain, heart attack, your full torso spontaneously turning into those big snapping jaws of teeth like that dude in John Carpenter's The Thing, drowsiness, coma, tinnitus, voluntary Tourettes, necrophilia, proptosis, an outburst of immediate and unrelenting misanthopy, rashes, hives, leprosy, all ten Biblical Plagues plus a few more plagues that god couldn't have even thought of at the time, sugar spikes, dry mouth, vanishing fingerprints, vanishing fingers, your image disappearing from all known photographs because this movie went back in time and stopped your parents from ever having sex, night sweats, night terrors, day sweats, day terrors, headaches, and so, so, so much suicidal ideation. Also death.

Chiwetel Ejiofor Ten Times

Although I had seen some people mention a trailer for a new version of Nicolas Roeg's hypnotically bizarre 1976 David Bowie collaboration The Man Who Fell To Earth I hadn't paid it much mind because that sounds like a fool's errand on paper, but finding out via this new interview with Chiwetel Ejiofor for Flaunt Magazine that he's the lead, well, I am having some thoughts about giving the thing a chance. We do love him so! Here is the trailer for the new Man, in case you're like me and missed it:

As seen there the Showtime series has a pretty impressive cast, including Naomie Harris, Bill Nighy (and I'm on a big pro-Nighy bend these days thanks to his career-best turn in the movie Living, reviewed here out of Sundance), Clark Peters, Kate Mulgrew, and Jimmi Simpson -- the series is being run by Alex Kurtzman, mega-rich writer and producer of Alias and Star Trek reboot fame. Anyway I've always found Roeg's TMWKTM too much too much, even for me -- not in a way that I disliked it, but I've just never really managed to connect with it. The visuals are obviously legendary... maybe I just don't enough drugs for it. Anyway I s'pose I'll give this Showtime series a shot for Chiwetel's sake -- you can hit the jump for the whole Flaunt photo-shoot...

Who Wore It Best?

Since I was already feeling pretty horn-y today thanks to Lil Nas' new music-video for his song "Montero (Call Me By Your Name)" -- which sees the openly gay artist taking the advice of every Christian motherfucker who's ever put us down and going to Hell, only to have a good ass time with it (and you should read this piece at Variety, I agree with every word) -- I'm carrying that Horn-y energy over to wishing the actor Ed Skrein a happy birthday... and you might be all what? Huh? How? And I am here to remind you that Skrein and his co-star Chiwetel Ejiofor already made us wanna strap ourselves onto a giant horned beast back in 2019, in the Maleficent sequel. It was weird, but so goes life.

bike tracks

Long May Immortal Homosexuals Reign

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Ooh I missed something, a big something, when I posted those new photos from The Old Guard on Monday -- The Old Guard being Netflix's forthcoming comics adaptation starring Charlize Theron, Matthias Schoenaerts, Chiwetel Ejiofor, plus Marwan Kenzari & Luca Marinelli as a pair of immortal homosexuals. Having to do with the latter, obviously -- they also released a clip! A kissy clip! Watch:

I posted the trailer awhile back, right here; The Old Guard 

drops on Netflix on July 10th, aka a week from tomorrow!

ETA Oh wait! They just dropped an entirely new trailer 

for the film! I'll share that now too:

Pics of the Day

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A big batch of new photos from Netflix's forthcoming comic adaptation The Old Guard have dropped online today (via) -- the film stars Charlize Theron as the leader of a gang of sexy immortals who mercenary around the world... a gang of sexy immortals played by the Belgian Beefcake himself Matthias Schoenaerts plus Luca Marinelli (more here) and Marwen Kenzari (more here)...
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 ... the latter two who're playing a couple. A homosexual couple! Also in the killer cast: KiKi Layne as a newcomer and Chiwetel Ejiofor as the bad guy. We already posted the trailer (here) a few weeks back -- the film drops on Netflix on July 10th. That's just eleven days away! Hit the jump for plenty more immortal sexiness to get us there by...
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If This Is Old I Must be Ancient

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We've got the first trailer for The Old Guard today -- The Old What, you ask? The Old Guard, I said. I mean damn. I said it five seconds ago. Pay some attention. Directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood who made the ace flick Beyond the Lights a couple of years back The Old Guard stars Charlize Theron as the leader of a group of slightly-immortal mercenary warriors and KiKi Layne as a new round these immortal parts type, and all that's well and good but the real juice far as I'm concerned comes from the cast of menfolk Theron immortals around with...

... namely my main man Matthias Schoenaerts, "Hot Jafar" Marwen Kenzari (more here) and upcoming Italian actor Luca Marinelli (more here). And supposedly from what I hear those last two, Luca & Marwen, are playing a couple!

Yes please. And as if all that's not plenty (and it is, plenty) 

the bad guy is played by Chiwetel Ejiofor! We heart Chewy!

Netflix is releasing the film on July 10th!
And oh right here's that trailer:

Click here for some previously posted photos from the film,
and click here for our very first post about the flick.
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Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

... you can learn from:

Children of Men (2006)

Luke: Julian was wrong. She thought it
could be peaceful. But how can it be peaceful
when they try to take away your dignity?

Twelve years on and Children of Men feels as prescient and as timely as it ever has, which... is a terrifying thing to come to terms with, quite honestly. Children of Men is one movie you want to feel us moving away from, good grief. Well at least we've got a new movie from Alfonso Cuarón (who's turning 57 today) to celebrate amid a world gone madder - ROMA is in some theaters right now, and will hit some more supposedly over the next few weeks before Netflix drops it on their streaming service, and if you've heard the little I've said about the film so far on Twitter, well...

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There's just nothing even close. Nobody's operating at the level of excellence Cuarón is here. Nobody. I can literally say without a moment or an ounce of hesitation that Alfonso Cuarón is the greatest living filmmaker at this moment in time, period, full stop, do not pass go

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) November 27, 2018

... my praise is somewhat effusive. I was finally able to see it a second time last week and so you should expect a proper review soon. It's a movie that demands more than one viewing, but it "demands" your attention the way a blowjob does - you're more than happy to acquiesce. 

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There are some filmmakers who make you feel fortunate to be alive during the time they’re blessing the world with their films, and as shitty as the world is Alfonso Cuaron makes me happy to live right here, right now #ROMA pic.twitter.com/upB8pqFkzC

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) November 20, 2018

Good Morning, Gratuitous Lakeith Stanfield

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I had had every intention of only posting the above picture of Mr. Lakeith Stanfield of Get Out and Short Term 12 (and Atlanta and Straight Outta Compton and Selma and on and on) fame for our "Good Morning" gratuity (via his Instagram) but then I remembered I had a few pictures of him saved in a folder, and then a "few" turned into several dozen, because that's what I do, and here we are.

People are taking a lot of pictures of Lakeith right now, much to our pleasure and enjoyment. So let's look at what he has coming up ooh this sounds interesting - he has a movie coming out called Sorry to Bother You that also stars Tessa Thompson and Armie Hammer and Steven Yeun that is about "a black telemarketer [who] becomes successful when he discovers a way to make his voice sound like it is overdubbed by a white actor in a macabre, magical-realist Oakland." The cast list isn't clear on who's playing who though and there are several black actors in the cast so I'm not sure it's Lakeith in the lead. But it's easy to picture him in that role, right?

He also has a movie called Come Sunday from the director of Maria Full of Grace that stars Chiwetel Ejiofor as a preacher who's ostracized by his community when he starts preaching there is no Hell. Interesting projects, he has interesting projects lined up! We are glad of this, he's an interesting actor and we like looking at him... and yes speaking of let's hit the jump for those dozens of pictures I mentioned earlier...

Which is Hotter?

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(click to embiggen) When I saw it was Chiwetel Ejiofor's 40th birthday today (hey same as Cary Fukunaga!) I googled him for photographs and these two were the top pair that I had never seen before and they are both very fine additions to the collection! Which is finer? I leave that to you. But just because he's shirtless in the left one don't discount the other, because hot damn the other!

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Passing Strange

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So who's seeing Doctor Strange this weekend? I am, I am! But that Marvel acid trip's not the only new game in movie-houses - I already told you earlier you should see Loving as soon as you can, but if that's not playing at a theater near you just yet you should give the other new movie Rainbow Time, with Melanie Lynskey, a shot - it's easy too since it's on VOD! - because she is typically warm and wonderful in it. It's an odd little movie that will probably put off as many people as it draws in but I thought it was sharp and endearingly strange.

Strange is the word of the weekend, I guess. If you watch anything of interest between now and Monday (and don't die of alcohol poisoning due to our current political climate) tell me about it in the comments, and in return I offer you a few more pictures of forever lovely Strange co-star Chiwetel Ejiofor after the jump...

I Am Link

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--- Magic Man - I contemplated doing my own full post for the first Doctor Strange trailer, which dropped last night, but here all of twelve hours later it's already been thoroughly vetted and anyway it's more of a teaser than a proper trailer, so we'll just wait for the longer one. For now head over to The Film Experience for the minute-fifty-six of footage as well as the very first poster. As I tweeted last night I am surprised they didn't cram in any known entities to ground this wacky new world in Marvel-land - something like "Oh hey look Bruce Banner just walked by in a laboratory!" or "Oh hey look Agent Coulson is reading a newspaper on the corner!" - but again the time will presumably come for that. Mostly what matters is TILDA.

--- Burn Baby - Ramin Bahrani, the wonderful director of Man Push Cart and last year's fantastic 99 Homes, is maybe going to make an adaptation of Ray Bradbury's seminal book Fahrenheit 451 his next project, for HBO. Does that mean it will only air on HBO or it will be produced by them for theatrical release? I don't know. Anyway I'm not convinced that there's a good movie to be made from that book - Truffaut certainly tried but man his movie is lifeless. 

--- Stoll On Bottom - This interview with Corey Stoll over at Queerty about his role on Girls dates back to that first (eyeball bugging) sex scene he had with Andrew Rannells several weeks back, but I totally missed it somehow. And that is no good, because it's Corey Stoll talking about tops and bottoms and being naked and stuff, and that is important. Important!

--- Demon If You Do - The Playlist looks at the just-released soundtrack details for Nicolas Winding Refn's next flick, the modeling massacre centric Neon Demon, for hints about the movie's release - the soundtrack comes out on June 24th so they think that means the film will come out in the weeks preceding that date. They also think it will play Cannes, which will reveal its line-up tomorrow. 

--- Fist In Reverse - Prime Ginger David Wenham (mmm David Wenham) is joining the Marvel Universe! He's going to play "ruthless corporate titan Harold Meachum" on the latest Netflix series Iron Fist. Apparently his character has something to do with the death of Finn Jones' father (Finn plays the titular Fister.) And speaking of Mr. Finn Jones, EW talked to him about his training for the show and I think it's a pretty safe bet that that boy is gonna be shredded when the time comes for shirtlessness.

--- Calls & Listen - I had to search through several different websites to find a link that worked so you might want to hurry and watch the second trailer for JA Bayona's A Monster Calls, if you haven't already, because they seem to be snatching it off the web for some reason. Anyway we've been enthusiastic about this movie since way before it was just a movie, back to when it was just a book. Remember books? It is a very good book, you should read it. Anyway this movie is hitting all the pitch-perfect notes, looks like.

--- Anti Claws - This news dropped over the weekend, whoops, forgot to mention -- the bad guy in Wolverine 3 will be played by pretty pretty boy Boyd Holbrook. If you missed our big gratuitous post on Boyd click here, tis a doozy. He pretty! Boyd is a former model but he's been making a name for himself all over the place, acting-wise, but I still choose to believe that Hugh Jackman saw him first here on MNPP and that lit his, ahem, fuse. Anyway I just realized that half of this "I Am Link" post has been about bad guys in superhero movies? How strange.

--- And Finally here below is a clip from Preacher, AMC's upcoming comic adaptation starring my butt boy Dominic Cooper as the man with the white collar. (via, thanks Mac) I haven't watched it myself (I'm trying to go in to this show as mind-clean as possible) but it is apparently bonkers. The show begins on May 22nd!

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Tulip makes quite the first impression. #PREACHER is coming Sunday, May 22.https://t.co/O5KpPRfk3l

— PREACHER (@PreacherAMC) April 11, 2016

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There's Something In Red Mist

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I was just looking at what movies are out this weekend and I saw that John Hillcoat's Triple 9 is out and it reminded me that I've been getting irritable every time I ride the subway lately (which, you know, is every day - I am a pleasure to be around) because of how bad I think the subway posters, which are a variation on the above poster, are. My eyes just pass right over all of that without catching on a single thing; it's generic as generic can be. And the reason why I find that irritating is I know what Kate Winslet looks like in this movie and I don't understand how you don't design your ad campaign around this:

I mean THAT is your ad campaign. How is that image not EVERYWHERE??? Fuck Casey Affleck and Chiwetel Ejiofor and Woody Harrelson and Anthony Mackie and Aaron Paul - yes that's an insane cast but you're not utilizing them anyway with those generic military men standing around in red smoke as is! Anyway as I googled for a picture of Kate looking all blown-out and fierce in this film I discovered they did some character posters for the film, and there is a Kate poster:

It could be better, but it's better than what they are using. Seriously though I was looking forward to this movie - John Hillcoat is a... pretty good director (The Proposition is fantastic but Lawless and The Road could've been stronger), and that's a fantastic cast, and KATE - but the ad campaign for this movie's really dampened down my enthusiasm. Anybody gonna go see it this weekend anyway?  I think if I do make it to a theater this weekend (and with the Spirits and the Oscars I might not bother) it will just be to see The Witch a second time.

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Carol And Everything After

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In case you missed one of my scattered links to my reviews from the New York Film Festival as they went up over the course of the thirteen hundred and eleven weeks the festival went on for (it really felt that long by the end) Nathaniel went and gathered up all of our coverage for The Film Experience here in this post, so click on over and find links to my thoughts on Steve Jobs, The Lobster, and many more, plus what Nat & Manuel had to say on many many more. 

Now I'm playing catch-up - there were several movies I saw at NYFF that I didn't review, mostly because somebody else did. But, in the everlasting ever-wise words of Jerri Blank, I got something to say! So here let's attempt to get out quick-ish thoughts on six of them.

Brooklyn -- Calling something "old fashioned" doesn't in and of itself make for goodness, for baked apple pie feelings. There are lots of "old fashioned" things like Ku Klux Klan rallies and Jane Wyman that are the exact opposite of delicious pie. But thankfully John Crowley's Brooklyn is whipped cream sliding down a berry cobbler; it's the solid construction of 501 jeans. It's well-made and warm with lovely performances; timeless, out of time, instantly. It's like laying your head on your grandmother's lap and listening to her favorite stories as she strokes your hair, presuming you had a nice grandmother who wasn't anything like Jane Wyman. (Damn you, Jane Wyman!)

Son of Saul -- Basically Children of Men dropped into the Holocaust in the place of a fake future dystopia, with all of the horror that swap implies then amped up to eleven. There's no awe-inspiring pig balloon drifting in the distant sky here to make us wonder at an outside story, another world - just muck and bodies and more bodies, screams and the echoes of screams, under a thick cloak of encamped claustrophobia (the camera is practically strapped to the main character's scalp) -- it's the sort of verisimilitude that will wake you in cold sweats. And somehow, even as it marches you up into the face of true atrocity, it's so dynamically told that you not only can't look away, you don't want to; you're too emotionally invested in the simple act of kindness at its center. This is what critics say things like "a remarkable achievement" for.

The Walk -- Fairly relentless garbage movie. Listen there is a lightness and a sunny optimism to what Robert Zemeckis does that I wouldn't give up for all the world; we have enough Chris Nolans, thank you very much. But this movie is filled with so many bizarre choices, many of which have already been dissected at this point - the constant scenes of "But wait I have to practice my English, let us speak in English now" to get us out of subtitles, even though Joseph Gordon-Levitt's French was so much less distracting than his French-accented English; the insane "Hey there I'm just sittin' here on the Statue of Liberty" book-ends; all the goddamned juggling...

But all of that stuff I anticipated (well sort of - who could've seen the prancing on the Statue of Liberty schtick coming) since I wasn't that big a fan of Man On Wire either as the real Petit is just a relentlessly annoying human being in the real world; Roberto Benigni on a string. So what was most fatal of all from my perspective (which by value of being "my" perspective I get might not be "your" perspective) was that I was never all that traumatized by the titular walk itself, heralded by many (most) as the film's great achievement. Granted I'm not afraid of heights in the slightest, but I'm certainly capable of awe, and The Walk was a short trip to nowhere, tripping over itself the whole way.

The Martian -- Popcorn, good solid popcorn, and mostly intelligent enough to take two steps to the left and scurry out of its own machine-propelled and predestined way. Ridley Scott's being relentlessly unpretentious here - after the gasping verbal provocations of The Counselor (which I found totally fascinating, by the way) and smothering the Bible in poisoned pixels with Exodus: Gods and Kings (even that title exhausts me) throwing Matt Damon in the dirt and playing disco over it was just about doing a little dance for a hot minute, and it feels good. It feels good for too long though - I think half an hour could've easily been cut, and the news that Scott has a thirty-minute longer cut of the film that he means to release fills me with Martian ennui.

Mountains May Depart -- Zhao Tao, Zhao Tao, Zhao Tao! I just wanna sing Zhao's name, I wanna stand in a field and do a dance beside her in the snow. Depart covers maybe twenty-five years of this woman's small circle of family and acquaintances (the circle expands and contracts like stones in the seasons) but as good as most every piece is you keep wanting to find your way back to Zhao, and the film wisely respects your feelings and does. And there she is again, being great, giving the sort of gently astonishing performance that should make Meryl Streep feel like a lazy ham.

Carol -- It's funny, the first time through with Todd Haynes' Carol I didn't cry at all. If you've been reading anything I've had to say for any period of time longer than say five minutes then you probably know what an easy mark I am, tear-wise - I will literally cry at the drop of a hat. Like, what did that hat do to deserve all this violence? Why, why, whyyyy? Oh my god did I mention the hats in Carol? The hats and the scarves, the scarves! The golf-lady outfit that Sarah Paulson wears that matches the chair she's sitting in so perfectly I'm convinced her character brought the chair with her, tossed in the back of her sedan, everywhere. 

Point being the second time I watched Carol all I did was cry. I cried over the scarves and the love-seats, the brooches and Rooney's pinned-up bob, the way Cate Blanchett unfolds her body like angel's wings. The film, which folds and unfolds upon itself, rewards repeat viewing with luxurious feelings, the feelings of luxury - the soft leather palm of a glove sitting on a counter and the reflection of devastating first love snot glimmering in a train window. All of it, as glorious as glorious could possibly stand to be without breaking, reassembling, and ascending unto Heaven itself, leaving us blind and sobbing and blind in its wake.

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I Am Link

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--- I Am Witch - I knew well that David Gordon Green had dropped off making the remake of Suspiria, sadly, but I'd forgotten the news that followed -- that Luca Guadagnino, the director of I Am Love (and the upcoming hotness-fest A Bigger Splash), was going to do it himself! How could I forget that? Dear lord that's amazing. Anyway he's opened up about his plans for the film with Empire; it sounds like he'll be focusing on motherhood somehow? I don't know, but he sounds like a huge fan of Argento's original. (As he oughta be.) He does say that Isabelle Huppert & Isabelle Fuhrmann are not coming along from Green's proposed version (boo)... but if he brings Tilda along, oh my god, I don't care. Tilda in a remake of Suspiria, my brain will literally break.
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--- Unholy Holiday - I have seen lots of people going nuts for the trailer for Krampus, the Xmas-themed horror flick from Michael "Trick 'r Treat" Dougherty, but I haven't watched it myself since I need no convincing, I was there the second I finished watching TRT and started waiting for whatever he did next. Not to mention that I've been clamoring for a movie to focus on the Xmas demon Krampus for a very long time, and I'm glad somebody with as much a sense of fun as he's got got there first. I will say I don't remember hearing that the thing was cast with such awesome folks as Toni Collette, Adam Scott, and Alison Tolman though - yesss!!! Oh and here are a few pictures from the film, too.

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--- Baby Man - To temper the good news, here's some crud -- Jamie Foxx, who I can't stand, has joined the cast of Edgar Wright's next flick Baby Driver, which already has Ansel Elgort (oh my god did you hear about Ansel's upcoming album as DJ Ansolo? WTF) in the lead. I really though Edgar had already filmed this movie, to be honest -- what's taking him so damned long? And enough with the shitty actors, dude. Cast somebody I can actually be enthusiastic about, please.
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.--- Ride Along - I will always take the opportunity when given to express my adoration for Quentin Tarantino's Death Proof (I just re-watched it a couple of weeks ago and god it just gets better and better, even) so here go read this fun piece at The AV Club focusing in on one specific song choice he made with the soundtrack. That soundtrack, even apart from the film, is killer.
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--- Blond Ambitions - I can't believe it's taken me this far into the week (I have to keep reminding myself that Monday was a holiday, though) to yelp my happy yelp noises towards the news that Freddie Stroma, the hot-assed dude from the super-fun Lifetime series UnREAL, has joined the cast of Game of Thrones' next season. He'll be playing Sam's brother, which hopefully will involve Sam & Gilly walking into rooms over and over again where he is standing naked in a bucket, lathering himself. That is my vision for the character, anyway.
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--- Never Come Clowns - The reviews for Cary Fukunaga's Beasts of No Nation so far have been smashing, making whatever qualms I had concerning the pitch-black subject matter fly right out the window on a tidal wave of "yeah okay this is gonna be painful but gimme gimme gimme" -- he'll probably be able to do whatever he wants next... well except for the version of Stephen King's It he fled away from, that is. The Playlist got a bunch of new info from him on what happened, and I warn you, it will make you very very sad, hearing what we won't be seeing. Fucking studio morons.
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--- And Speaking of Fukunaga, he and Chiwetel Ejiofor chatted in the new issue of Interview Magazine, you can read that here. I haven't read it yet but I look forward to them describing how they recording the chat from opposite ends of the same bathtub, massaging each other's toes as they talk. There's also a nice set of Chewy pictures, if you like to stare at beautiful men or whatever.
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--- OK Computer Again - Nobody ever really comments when I go on one of my Radiohead freak-outs so I always wonder why I bother, but fuck it, this is my blog and I'll crow about what I wanna! Ahem. Pictures have shown up that show Thom & Co are in the studio plugging away on their new album... with a string orchestra! Oh hells yes. (Thanks Mac)
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--- And Finally, a new clip's been released from Roland Emmerich's upcoming gay-history-lesson Stonewall, and sure enough after the hullabaloo that greeted the first trailer this clip is focusing in on, and I quote, "Marsha P. Johnson, the legendary activist and pioneer of the trans movement." I personally had little patience for the hullabaloo - if you wanna boycott this movie do so because the over-paid hack Roland Emmerich directed it, by all means, but I think we should probably see the movie before freaking out about what it might actually contain. Anyway here's the clip:

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Make Me A Mikkelsen

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Listen, if you are making a movie and you have a villain in your movie then you should probably just go ahead and offer the role to Mads Mikkelsen first. That's just logic. More than logic - that's sanity. Hell it might even be Existence Itself, I'm no philosopher; ask Bryan Fuller those questions. Point being, go Mads or go home! So I'm not surprised to read that Marvel and the folks at Doctor Strange: The Movie are apparently trying to get their mitts on the Madster. That said, the thought of Benedict Cumberbatch, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Tilda Swinton AND Mads Mikkelsen making up the cast for a comic book movie... that might just elicit a twinge of... something. Be it surprise, or sanity-shaking awe, whatever. It is what is is, people.

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I Am Link

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--- I Of Mordo - I had totally forgotten that there was talk of Chiwetel Ejiofor taking a role in Marvel's Doctor Strange movie once upon a time but here it is and it is true! He's playing a bad guy called Baron Mordo, which is... quite the name. Anyway for those of you keeping track, this means there's a Marvel superhero movie about to be filmed that is going to star Benedict Cumberbatch, Tilda Swinton, and Chiwetel Ejiofor. Holy shitballs.
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--- Happy Haneke - The Film Stage shares the list of Michael Haneke's 10 favorite films, which includes some Chaplin, Some Antonioni, some Psycho and Salo oh my. (Thanks Mac.) The list is topped by two Robert bresson movies, neither of which I have seen, called Lancelot of the Lake and Au hasard Balthazar - have any of you seen them? Truth be told looking through his filmography it appears that  I have never seen a Bresson film, period. The horror! What one should I watch first? Pickpocket maybe?

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--- A Kick In The Pants - A second trailer for The Man From UNCLE has been released and again, it makes me yawn. Not a second of Henry or Hammer skin, and they never not once make out - what a farce. The girls (Elizabeth Debicki and Alicia Vikander) both seem promising and fun, though. (After the one-two punch of Gatsby and seeing her on stage in The Maids I loooove Debicki, by the way.) Oh there is one good shot of somebody's butt (maybe Armie?) in rather snug pants though...
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--- Speaking Of Guy Ritchie and "it will never be gay enough for me until there is straight-up on-screen penetration" news, none other than David Beckham, soccer star, has just joined the cast of the currently-filming King Arthur movie with Charlie Hunnam. I'm guessing it's a small role, and let's hope it's super similar to the underwear commercial that Guy Ritchie shot for Becks that one time - maybe he's teaching Charlie how to run in soaking wet underpants?
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---  Hartnett Hard Body - Oh my god there are Penny Dreadful action figures! (Thanks Mac) They're made for ComiCon and there's only Josh Hartnett and Eva Green, so far... and that's the only time in the history of ever that the phrase "only Josh Hartnett and Eva Green" has been spoken or ever will be spoken again. I do want a Dr. Frankenstein one though so I can mash Josh on him.
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--- And Speaking of the good Doctor Frank, the Victor Frankenstein movie starring James McAvoy just got a release date of Thanksgiving this year, and BD shares a couple of on pictures from the set that are rather fine. (Meaning they have McAvoy & Radcliffe in them, therefore they are, by definition, fine.)

--- And Finally instead of just updating yesterday's post that had a German version of the trailer for the Lance Armstrong bio-pic The Program starring Ben Foster (which got pulled off-line, until it wasn't) here I will share the now-released American version of the trailer which is exactly the same only the type's now in English.

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