Pics of the Day

Here's a movie I have done a terrible, a truly despicable, job keeping up with and now it's out in theaters tomorrow -- Benjamin Millepied (aka Natalie Portman's hot tiny dancer husband) has turned the opera Carmen into a musical film, and it stars Paul Mescal. And where the hell have I been? Fuckin' AWOL, for shame. Anyway the trailer is right here, and I gathered up here (via) a nice assortment of photos of Paul training for and shooting the movie, which seems to've consisted of a lot of Paul wearing his trademark short-shorts while dancing and/or boxing. The magic that movies are made of! Hit the jump for it...

Paul Mescal Down Under

What a happy day this day has turned out to be! America sent Donald Trump packing, and almost as importantly ballet dancer slash Natalie Portman's husband Benjamin Millepied filmed scenes of Normal People break-out Paul Mescal dancing on the beaches of Australia in just his underwear! I thought just one of those things would have been asking for too much from this world, but both? Both on the same day? Maybe we will make it through this after all, everybody.

Millepied (who's hotness himself) isn't a first-time director but he's pretty close to one, and yet he's still managed to gather a pretty hot cast for his movie adaptation of the opera Carmen here -- Mescal, In the Heights and Scream (excuse me 5cream) about-to-be breakout Melissa Barrera, Chris Hemsworth's wife Elsa Pataky, Almodóvar queen Rossy De Palma. Mescal replaced Jamie Dornan in the leading man role -- I told you when Dornan got cast but I hadn't heard about the switch until now. And what a way to be told! This is how all casting news should be delivered -- Paul Mescal in underwear. Even if Mescal's not involved. I want him and those world class gams of his to deliver all the news to me in his underwear. Hit the jump for more...

Jamie's Pipes Are Calling

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I guess today is a day for asking, "Huh, can he sing?" because after learning Adam Driver is making a musical later this year we've gotten word that next up is male model turned movie pervert Jamie Dornan is going to star in a movie version of Georges Bizet's famed 1875 opera Carmen. (Thx Mac) Okay! If you say so! Even more the film will be directed by first time movie director Benjamin Millipied, celebrated sexy ballet dancer turned Mr. Natalie Portman. 

Now I've never seen Carmen -- full disclosure: I have never seen an opera, period -- so I don't know much about the story. But what I do know is Jamie's role of "Aidan" per the announcement isn't a character listed on the opera's Wikipedia page. I suppose they could've changed the male lead's name for this -- is the male lead the "Escamillo" character? Anyway "Carmen" herself will be Melissa Barrera, who's playing the lead in Lin-Manuel Miranda's In the Heights movie, so she can probably definitely sing. Which seems important. For an opera. Call me nuts.

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Tribeca Times Thirty

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So it's time to put the Tribeca Film Festival for 2016 to bed at last - I feel as if my brain has finally caught up to the rest of me, or at least as close a marriage as those two ever achieve, and I can sort of put what I saw somewhat into perspective. It was a pretty good year! I mean that substance wise, that the movies were generally pretty good - if we're talking accomplishment wise, I really went above and beyond: I saw THIRTY full-length films at the Festival.
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I also saw a couple of short films (I watched those in a bit of a daze and didn't keep track of them but the one called "Curve" by director Tim Egan is one I'll never forget), a couple of Q&As attached to screenings (Tom Hanks for A Hologram For the King! David Byrne for Contemporary Color!), and three of the Tribeca Talks -- the one for the new series Animal Kingdom with Scott Speedman and Ellen Barkin; I saw director Andrea Arnold reflect on her career and what's ahead; and I saw the great Samantha Bee talk about her show.
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I haven't reviewed everything I saw but I did review HALF of them, which seems like an excellent percentage. Along with what Nathaniel and Manuel reviewed of what they saw over at The Film Experience I think we gave a pretty great representation of the Fest had to offer, and yesterday Nat rounded up all of our reviews into one place - click here to see that. 

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Anyway since the number of movies I saw is so perfectly rounded out at 30 I figured I'd bite off more than I can probably chew and attempt to rank everything I saw. Since I've only reviewed half of these I will try to offer a brief thought or two on the ones I haven't spoken of, because why make this easy on myself? If I have previously written about the movie, I will just link to it. I only distinctly disliked the bottom couple of films - like I said, the Fest was really pretty decent this year. It might've lacked masterpieces, but there was gold scattered about.

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The 30 Movies I saw at Tribeca 2016, 

Ranked Worst To Best

30. TIGER RAID -- I found this movie easier to watch at the time than it deserved because Brian Gleeson & Damien Molony look really good all sweaty and bearded and covered with war paint while grabbing at each other, but it's positively choking on posture and cliches in place of having anything worth saying. Pretty pointless.

29. SPECIAL CORRESPONDENTS -- 

Read my review here. 

It's on Netflix now, but don't waste your time.

28. HOLIDAYS -- Read my review here.

27. SHOW OF SHOWS -- It's kind of not fair to lump this in because it was meant to be screened as a "visual experience" projected around you; it's a bunch of silent footage from circuses and carnivals in the early 20th century arranged by theme - here's some acrobats! Here's some clowns! Here's some Boxing Babies! And even if as a viewing experience all at once on its own Show of Shows was somewhat exhausting, I have to give big time credit to it for introducing me to the concept of Boxing Babies, you guys. AMAZING.

26. THE FIXER -- Nathaniel wrote up this movie at The Film Experience, or at least he focused in on the only part that will remain memorable: gorgeous leading man Dominic Rains.

He's very good too. The movie is not good though - it's nonsensical, and James Franco is downright terrible in it. And as much as I loved Franco's other movie playing Tribeca (see below) he's also the weak link in that. He needs to stop making that face. The one where he looks like he smells something so terrible that he might barf at any moment. It's his go-to and it's godawful.

25. HERE ALONE -- I actually wrote an entire review about this movie talking about how it feels like a very special episode of The Walking Dead, but I never bothered publishing it because it kept reading meaner than I intended it to be. I mean I'd rather watch these actors do their thing than I would watch another second of half of the characters on The Walking Dead, so that's a plus. But it should hit harder, and it meanders too much for its own good.

24. WOLVES -- Read my review here.

23. DETOUR -- Read my review here.

22. A KIND OF MURDER -- Read my review here.

21. FEAR INC -- Read my review here.

20. LIFE, ANIMATED -- Owen Suskind, an autistic man making his way into adulthood who used Disney movies to find his way to communicate with the world, is a fascinating character for sure. That said I might not be the most receptive audience for this movie since too much Disney Musical Theater all at once is a lot for me to deal with. And sometimes the movie seemed sliiiightly condescending towards Owen?

19. ELVIS & NIXON -- Read my review here.

18. THE LAST LAUGH -- This doc, which talks to comedians (mostly Jewish comedians) about Hitler & Holocaust Jokes, if often very very funny, but for some reason I felt as if I've heard most of this stuff before? It's a topic that's been spoken of, once and again. The best bit were the bits following an actual Holocaust survivor around and talking to her about how she finds (and prefers)  joy in life.

17. RESET -- I left this documentary - about Benjamin Millepied's short tenure as the director of the Paris Opera Ballet - with more questions than I did answers. Like how is the show ultimately received, and why the heck does he jump ship so soon after? And where's Natalie Portman dammit? That said Millepied comes off well in the film (better than I expected a man that pretty and talented to anyway) and the process of putting together the first show is fascinating enough.

16. CUSTODY -- Manuel reviewed this movie right here. Viola Davis and Ellen Burstyn are typically incredible in this movie, but it's very "Movie of the Week" feeling.

15. HIGH-RISE -- Read my sort of review here. Like I said I need to re-watch this movie and grapple with some of my issues with it, it could very much move upwards once I do. Oh and Nathaniel reviewed this right here.

14. EQUALS -- Read my review here.

13. THE TICKET -- Dan Stevens is great in this movie, about a blind man whose sight suddenly comes back. Great enough to pad over some of its aimlessness. I wish it was tighter.

12. OBIT -- Read my review here.

11. REBIRTH  -- Read my review here.

10. MADLY -- Manuel reviewed this movie right here. This anthology film telling stories of on the subject of love from around the globe has a great hit to miss ratio - I actually don't think any of the short films are bad at all, and a couple of them are straight up fantastic. My favorite was probably Mia Wasikowska's directorial debut called "Afterbirth" about a woman (played by Kathryn Beck) taking a strange journey to motherhood, which taught me that Mia Wasikowska is a straight up awesome person with a wickedly dark sense of humor that I really want to become best friends with right this second.

9. MAURIZIO CATTELAN: BE RIGHT BACK -- My fascination with Cattelan and his art might have colored my enthusiasm for this movie, which is kind of a straight-forward telling of his astonishing career and vision... until it isn't. It's trickstery, like Maurizio is, and it delighted me. Anyway he is one of my most favorite artists so of course I was into this.

8. PARENTS -- I missed the first press screening of this Danish movie but I was there when it was letting out, and I watched my fellow journos walk out of this thing in a straight up daze. That was enough to convince me to catch it when I could. It's a strange little film, but lovely I thought, and has some incisive and beautiful things to say about growing old with the person you love.

7. MOTHER -- Nathaniel reviewed this right here. I can't believe it was the lead actress' first performance - she's marvelous. And the movie's surprisingly funny, for something so dark.

6. CONTEMPORARY COLOR -- Read my review here.

5. HOLOGRAM FOR THE KING -- Out of all the movies I saw and didn't review this is the one that I most wish I'd written a proper review for, but I don't know that this long list is the place to do it. I very much liked this movie though, which felt like a breath of fresh air in the middle of some small dark movies. It's aggressively bright and mainstream but Tom Hanks is really firing on all engines at this point in his career when he could very much be coasting, and the last half an hour of this movie, when the sense of wandering begins to find a destination, is surprising and romantic and just absolutely lovely. Early on it often feels very Lost in Translation plus a laugh track, but it ends up just as moving in the end.

4. WOMEN WHO KILL -- Read my review here.

3. ALWAYS SHINE -- Read my review here.

2. KING COBRA -- Read my review here.

1. HUNT FOR THE WILDERPEOPLE -- 

Read my review here. What a delight.

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I Am Link

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--- Hot Nachos - Anne Hathaway was my second favorite dressed at the Met Gala and seeing her there made me miss her (she was wise to step away post-Oscar win though) so this news is exciting - she's going to star in the new movie Colossal from Timecrimes director Nacho Vigalondo! Yeah okay I'm still using Timecrimes as his calling card even though he's made two movies since then; Extraterrestrial and Open Windows were both... okay.  Oh but his segment in the last V/H/S movie was my favorite part of that movie. This new movie sounds bizarre though, in a great way. It sort of sounds like he's re-using his idea from Extraterrestrial actually, which was an on-the-ground romance set during an alien invasion that kept the alien invasion entirely in the background, only this time around it'll be a Godzilla type attack.

--- Foul A Saurus - Since this summer is the first time that a Jurassic Park movie is coming out while this blog exists you're forgiven for not knowing how excited I would normally be about such a thing versus how much enthusiasm I've been displaying, so let me spell it out: my enthusiasm should be higher for Jurassic World than it is. I should be hollering about it left right and center. But the CG in the trailers, man... it is a lousy downer.

So basically I've just been keeping my fingers crossed that they've been working on it as time's progressed and by the time the movie comes out, it'll look right. I shouldn't have to work this hard to have hope, is just the thing. Anyway this piece at Cracked about the problem with modern-day CG is on point, and expresses all the problems in depth, go read it. Loved this from the end:

"The CGI is powerful, but the people who made it clearly don't have enough respect for that power. I know I'm just quoting Malcolm at this point ... but shit. They really were so preoccupied with whether or not they could have 88 dinosaurs throwing exploding helicopters at each other that they didn't stop to think if they should."

--- Who For Hardy - I guess I forgot to link to this earlier this week, even though I was even all up in Tom Hardy's ass previously (sigh), but in that long interview he gave to Collider he apparently says he and DC are working on a secret project, which is a mixture of Ocean's 11 and Batman, among things. And it might be more than just a movie, it might be TV too. I have no idea what it could be, but sure, why not. More Tom Hardy for everybody! Anybody have any guesses though?

--- Down With Dolan - I still haven't liked a Xavier Dolan film one hundred percent without reservations, although Tom at the Farm and Mommy have come the closest. I think he's clearly improving. But there's been plenty to appreciate about everything he's done, even if it's just his deep affection for cinema that's pouring off the screen, so I don't really get the point of this article about his "Hipster Dystopia" -- they're pretty much saying what I just said but using that to rail against the clueless Cannes sycophants that propped him up in the first place? It just reads like mistaking the forest for the trees to me. Who cares who likes what when - there's good stuff in there! Just like it! You sound more posturing than anybody here.

--- But Speaking of Hipster Cannes, Natalie Portman's full-bulged babydaddy Benjamin Millepied is going to be putting on a ballet thing at the French fest's opening tomorrow set to the music of Vertigo by Bernard Hermann. (thanks Mac) I am forced to imagine judges Xavier and Jake Gyllenhaal sneaking off as the music swells and their eye-fucking becomes too much to bear to make sweet passionate love on the sand. I'm just forced to picture that!

--- Hard Cover - I really really reeeeeally want the fancy new collector's edition of Daniel Clowes' Eightball comics that is about to be released, it looks so so pretty. If every single one of you goes and buys yourself a copy on Amazon then maybe I can make enough residuals from your clicks to buy myself a copy, so go do that, is my point. Anyway Clowes talked to BoingBoing about how he and Fantagraphics worked together to make such a pretty pretty object.

--- A Man To Love - We've glared on our own at Karl Glusman, the hot new actor on the scene, right here and right here - he's starring in Gaspar Noé's porny new movie Love as well as Roland Emmerich's Stonewall movie as well as Nicolas Winding Refn's Neon Demon. Up and comer! Anyway over at The Film Experience Nathaniel went even further with a great bunch of gratuitous-ish stuff to ogle. Love the quote from Noé, calling Glusman "the ultimate 3D babymaker." Oh and that shot to the right there is the first image from Love, which you can see in all its NSFW-ness over here.

--- And Finally earlier today I posted three trailers to upcoming horror TV shows but as one commenter pointed out the only horror TV show worth actually being excited about is Hannibal's third season return on June 4th, and oh my god have you seen the Gillian Anderson poster and have you watched this crazy Korean promo for the show yet?
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I Am Link

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--- Blood Red Shoes - Vera Farmiga is going to star in the ballet dark-comedy Prima, as a mother "who will stop at nothing to realize her daughter's ballet dancing dream;" she'll be starring opposite her Orphan co-star Peter Sarsgaard as the daughter's "devil in dance shoes" instructor. And on top of all that the choreography will be from Mr. Natalie Portman, that hot piece Benjamin Millepied. I hope Ben's in it, and reenacts this part from The Black Swan, only with Peter as his crotch-groper. That's what I hope. By the way I am sort of addicted to ballet in real life now - that shit is tons of fun! And those dancer's bodies - my goodness

--- Lick It Up Baby - As I said in my last post today where I celebrated the Dead Gay Sons in Heathers, I am going to see the off-Broadway musical in a couple of weeks, so this conversation here with the dudes who turned the movie into songs (thanks Mac) is pretty much perfect reading for today.

--- Tree Stand - The last time I mentioned A Monster Calls, the upcoming horror flick from the director of The Orphanage and the writer of the great Chaos Walking books, I mentioned that Liam Neeson was rumored to star as the, well, I guess the monster. Now we have confirmation. Felicity Jones is playing the mother of the kid who's the main character who meets the monster, which is in the form of a tree in his backyard. I am guessing Liam will be doing voice-work then, and not wearing this (although that would be soooo awesome).
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--- Sweet On Honey - We finally have some new information on Andrea Arnold's next movie (her last being the lovely Wuthering Heights) - we already knew it was going to be her first US-based film and was going to be about a teenage girl going to work for a magazine and getting sidetracked with party-time; now we have a title, American Honey (better than the rumored one of Mag Crew) and the news that Arnold will be shooting it this Summer, and casting's underway now. I'm guessing she'll be hiring unknowns since that's how she usually rolls, and to great effect too. (Speaking of, where the hell are all of Katie Jarvis' jobs dammit?)

--- Byrne On Fire - Looks like I am definitely going to see Neighbors this weekend; they'd prodded me with enough Zac Efron beefcake into curiostiy, but now that we've got word that Rose Byrne's part is much more than just "Wife Way Too Pretty For Schlumpy Funny Guy" and she's got stuff to do, well sign me up, I love Rose Byrne. Says The Playlist:

"She has proven herself to be a fearless comedic performer, one who is absolutely awe-inspiring in this movie. Rose Byrne is second banana no more."

--- Un Wrapped - Andy Muschietti, the director of the surprise success horror flick Mama (which had its moments but was ultimately only okay, says me), has dropped off of a reboot of The Mummy after clashing with the folks at Universal. He wanted to make something dark, they wanted something light, wake me up when we aren't hearing this story for the thousandth time. I'll be over here with mark Romanek imagining his Wolfman movie.

--- Half Mast - Well damn, so much sexiness just got tossed down the drain - FOX canceled both Enlisted, which starred Geoff Stults and Parker Young and Chris Lowell as military brothers and got them all instagramming themselves as we documented here, and Chris Meloni's new show Surviving Jack, which we've also documented the gratuity from. All four of you guys just come over, I'll get you drunk and ease your pain, I promise.

--- Heart Broken - The best thing about this oh let's just say misguided piece on the upcoming adaptation of Larry Kramer's The Normal Heart (misguided is being so so nice on my part) is actually all of the comments - this is not how things usually work! Usually the comments sections of big websites read like troll central! But the article itself is the trolling here, and the comments take that shit to task, and spectacularly. 
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White Swan Black Swan Red Swan Oh My

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A happy 35th to Benjamin Millipied.

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Nat Ben & Me Made Three

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I mentioned this on Twitter last night in a fit of in-the-moment enthusiasm (see here and here and here!) which eludes me today, although I feel as if it ought to be documented for posterity's sake. (The posterity of immediately forgotten obscure-end-of-the-internet blog posts!) Natalie Portman and her ballet-beau with the perky arse Benjamin Millepied were at the screening of Tom Tykwer's Three at MoMA that I went to last night. They are wee little pretty people. She's obscenely pregnant. I had to fight the urge to hiss "What happened to my sweet little girl?" at her. I won that fight, but I lost the battle of trying not to stare at Benjamin's ass. It wasn't the wonderland I dreamed of, but perhaps if he'd been wearing his white tights... a law must be passed stating that ballet dancers can only wear white tights in public, don't you think? It's criminal, the unsnug jeans he felt comfortable leaving the house in. Criminal!

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I Just Spent Ten Minutes...

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... scouring the web to see if any of the stupid paparazzo bothered to train their cameras on the best view of Benjamin Millepied when he was caught jaunting about in sweatpants with Natalie Portman earlier today (via), but no, none of them did. Stupid paparazzo! These opportunities don't come along that often, you fools! Grab them when you can! That's my advice to all of you. Grab ass while you can.

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Some Sort of Lezzie Wet Dream

If I had anything resembling a train of thought today (I'm scattered like... Snickers wrappers the day after Halloween...?) I'd have set up a good and proper "HEY!"of a shout-out to the fact that my favorite film of 2010, Darren Aronosfky's Black Swan, is out on DVD today. But I don't, so I didn't. But I can offer up this (via):

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And isn't that basically the entire point?
Well that plus this, anyway:

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I'm Sad Natalie Portman Finally Won...

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... her Oscar, because it means the awards season's done and every time she won another statue she mentioned her "fiancee the film's choreographer Benjamin Millepied" (she seriously phrased it some variation of that way every time) and every time she mentioned him we've gotten a bunch of traffic here at MNPP, specifically to this post. Come on, Benji! Keep selling that ass. We need it in our lives, for myriad purposes.
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TGT10: Special Panty

The award for The Best Filling Out of
a Pair of White Ballet Tights goes to:



Benjamin Millepied, Black Swan


Give him a hand, everybody!

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The Swan Prince

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As a compliment to my post on Benjamin Millepied last week it only seems natural to post his new shots of him from an interview with Out magazine and this behind-the-scenes video of the shoot, no?

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Have you guys seen Black Swan yet? If so did you love it like I did? Is it out where you live yet? I know it did smashing in the couple theaters it premiered in last weekend, and it's out in several more cities this weekend, and I see its got its wide wide release the week after this, on December 17th. So we all can go crazy together! Hooray!
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Benjamin Millepied Eight Times

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There are a couple of spectacular shots of ballet dancer (and Natalie Portman boyfriend) Benjamin Millepied in his tights in Darren Aronofsky's Black Swan that I look forward to posting once the film's on DVD, but for now these pictures will have to do. It seems a little insane to me that as far as I can find there aren't any good shots online of his best asset, but I guess the world needs to catch up.

Oh and whilst looking up pictures of Mr. Millepied I found this picture of Vincent Cassel and knew it had found a home as well...

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