I sometimes forget that the characters in my “stories” have had previous acting jobs. Which means that this adorable Brit:
Went on to become this Georgian corpse-killer:
While we can all agree that Andrew Lincoln is totally dreamy (even if he’s grown a bit skeletal himself since he started his Walking Dead stint) I think after tonight’s episode I’m firmly on Shane’s side – if you’re not busting zombie heads, you clearly have no interest in survival anymore.
I’ve been curious about Amber Heard for a few months now. She’s gorgeous, and in a Nylon Guys interview she said something interesting: That horror movies are “sometimes the only real platform for a young woman to act. Horror films give you the opportunity to be tough and independent and to fight, to kick, to kill, to cry.”
I get that (I’m only taken seriously when I kick, kill and cry too) so I was excited to see The Ward on Netflix. It’s the first film John Carpenter’s directed in nine years, it stars this kicky blonde girl who thinks she’ll have a platform to act, and it’s set in an insane asylum, which I always find fascinating.
Amber’s character Kristen ends up here after she burns an empty farm house. She arrives at the asylum with no memory of her past, disoriented and surly. Eventually she meets the other girls in the ward. They’re nice enough, but they fit stereotypes so perfectly it starts feeling a little contrived. In this clip you can see Zoey (the nympho), Sarah (the infantile one) and Emily (the kooky tomboy) – and Kristen, who is just kind of pissed off.
The “Alice” everyone’s getting worked up about is a rotting girl-corpse who devises different ways to take out the girls, one by one.
Really, the movie would be better without Alice.
I know that having a ghoul lurking around makes everyone question their sanity in thought-provoking ways, and quick cuts to rotting flesh make for good shocks, but the ghost aspect actually detracts from this film. The best scenes here involve the (living) girls interacting with each other, or the various ways the nurse, attendant and doctor exert their authority and coerce them into submission – there are two great electroshock scenes, one a little deadlier than the other. And when Kirsten has her interviews with the doctor, she does act – and yell and fight – and she doesn’t need a monster to make that happen.
Despite an 11th hour twist (why do screenwriters always add those? to make us watch the movie again) there’s not all that much to recommend The Ward. I love a nice 60s aesthetic, and the actors are good when they get a chance to act, but the story is awfully sparse. Instead of learning more about the inmates, we see them showering with a corpse hiding in the steam. Instead of figuring out whether the attendant is molesting his charges, we see endless creepy pans across the long asylum halls.
You know what? Go watch Halloween, and then watch Girl, Interrupted. That way you’ll see two good movies instead of a mediocre one.
I’m posting this without much comment. There’s all this ridiculous controversy about this singer – “Her lips are fake!” “Her music’s inauthentic.” Which is all bullshit, as Gawker will tell you. I love her stuff, and her videos are REALLY evocative of the kind of mid-century nostalgia I live and die for.
Yesterday was National Coming Out Day, a great opportunity to stand up and be counted. Sadly, the following people forgot to mark their calendar. Damn! Technically, these boys could come out any day of the year. So here’s hoping.
Warning: Nude dudes below. It’s PG-13 though. You can handle it.
It took me a while to explain to a straight friend that what he thought was a “Deep V” was more like a droopy crew neck. This SNL digital short should set that misconception aright…
American Horror Story premieres tonight at 10pm on FX, and let’s all pray to the gods of the F train that I make it home in time…
You may have noticed I have a thing for horror (see: The Woman In Black, The Prowler, a billion other things on this blog) and this show will try to make a case for serialized horror, versus something feature length. There aren’t many predecessors in this genre – the only one that comes to mind is Dark Shadows, a Gothic soap opera that aired on NBC in the late 60s/early 70s (that series is now being recast as a film, directed by Tim Burton, starring (surprise) Johnny Depp).
AHS follows an unfaithful psychiatrist and his wife and daughter as they move cross-country, mostly to try to repair the family after Daddy (Dylan McDermott) is caught cheating. The daughter is a especially awesome, as she sort of resembles Lydia from Beetle Juice. She smokes at school, and spits in the face of the girl who tries to stop her, and when the realtor mentions there was a murder suicide in their prospective home, she immediately replies “We’ll take it.” She’s like the ginger from Suburgatory with more Gothic bite. Here’s the 30-second spot they’ve been airing on TV.
The family ends up in a beautiful, sprawling house (yes, psychiatry pays well) with a bloody past. FX recently released the first five minutes of tonight’s episode. It doesn’t tell you much about the current family, but you get a sense of the creepiness that will be going on here. Hank Steuver of the Washington Post had this to say: “American Horror Story is one scream after another. So much creepy stuff happens in the first episode that viewers will be left asking: Can I possibly watch an entire series of this? Followed, of course, by a more obvious question: Why do they stay in that house?”
People in the horror genre are dumb! That’s why they stay put. Otherwise we’d have nothing to watch.
OK, enjoy the first five minutes.
To be honest, the scariest part for me was watching those boys vandalize irreplaceable light fixtures and stained glass. They had it coming.
Just to make sure you’re not missing the gay quotient here: The show is created and produced by the makers of Glee, and Zachary Quinto (is he or isn’t he?) has a recurring role as one half of the gay couple who formerly occupied the house – you know, the ones involved in the murder-suicide…
The answer: he is.
I think they should replace the rest of the Jersey Shore cast with more of Vinny.
He’s even channeling a bit o’ Ryan Gosling a la Blue Valentine with that ukelele. And did I mention he has a blog? He does. Read it, to learn the many trails and travails of being a highly paid reality star.
First off, this is an excellent song. I mean, it’s not exactly Eartha Kitt, but it gets across the slow, sultry vibe where the high hat sounds like it’s steam rising off the sidewalk. Did you guys see Pan Am yesterday? I had to, since Mad Men is so far away and I can’t survive indefinitely without weekly doses of Mid-century Modern.
It’s not fair to compare an ABC show with AMC’s output, so I won’t. Let’s just say it’ll do the trick for now. The score was a little hokey (not the pop songs, I mean the reheated Titanic strings that started soaring during take-off) and I don’t see why they felt the need to include espionage in the first episode. They spend a lot of time talking about how airline attendants are a “new breed of woman,” and they do all sort of act like sex-savvy polyglot models, so maybe that’s an accurate statement? I also can’t wait to learn more about Christina Ricci’s character, as she’s sort of a Boho Joan Holloway type who name drops Marx and Hegel.
This scene was really nice: if you’re going to be a runaway bride, may as well travel the world.
Also I’m speculating that the pilot and co-pilot are gay for each other. You can’t tell from this picture, but all that lingering eye contact and flirty banter speaks volumes.
If you’re interested, ABC (who are packaging the show pretty nicely) have made a Pandora station, which they’re calling the “tunes of the Jet Age.” Has a nice ring to it, right?
A parting question: Would this show have been made if a.) Mad Men weren’t postponed and b.) the TSA hadn’t made air travel completely hellish and sterile?
Well, this is how I want to look all the time. I don’t know if I’m more into the idea of britches or calf-high boots, but almost every look in Balmain’s Fall 2011 collection features these things (well, technically not britches, but the rolled jean with a bit of sock showing looks just as good). There are a whole lot of these vaguely military jackets with shiny buttons, as well as big ratty scarves and layered shirts and sweaters, which gives the collection a very sexy magpie feel. In fact, sexy magpie might be the look I go for this fall.
To be fair, my coworker was pretty on point when he said “All you have to do is accessorize with a chain that carries the One Ring.” Some of the looks are a bit Middle Earth, but I think it’s because the model looks like he just left the Shire.
Scarves as scarves, scarves as belts!
Leather jacket, fur collar. Rough and tumble luxe.
The designer responsible for Balmain’s comeback, Christophe Decarnin, recently left the company. He was, after all, making $6,000 jeans. I just hope whoever takes his places maintains this level of cool. Actually, maybe you can decide for yourself when you take a look at Balmain’s 2011 Spring collection. Not sure if that’s Decarnin or not, but you can find it here on GQ.com.
Seriously, where can I get those boots?
You know what? He’s really busy. Stop hounding him.
Well, he was in Friends With Benefits, which I didn’t get to see. I did however read a review of the movie in last week’s New Yorker, which is maybe the funniest place to read a review of an R-rated sex rom-com. Or a “shag-buddies comedy” starring Timberlake, who “swings his lithe body around the room,” and Kunis, “of the almond-shaped eyes and dusky skin.” You should read the review here – we all need more lyricism in our lives.
But that’s old news. Next up for Justin is In Time. He plays a man on the run in a future where everyone stops aging at 25, but usually doesn’t make it much longer. Time is currency, which means the haves live indefinitely and the have-nots are screwed. It’s really similar to Logan’s Run from 1976. Check out the trailer below – the clincher for me is where Pete Campbell introduces his mother-in-law, wife and daughter.
You’re at least guaranteed a film full of good-looking people.
Like The Rum Diary, this ALSO comes out on October 28 (the most auspicious day of the year (hint hint I’d like a black leather jacket)).
Again.
You might remember this post about Thompson’s The Rum Diaries from last year. Well, after a very long wait, they’ve released the trailer for the film version starring Johnny Depp. It looks really fun and surreal, and Amber Heard, the actor playing Connecticut expat Chenault, matches Depp blow for blow when it comes to good looks.
Of course the way my mind moves through this photo is (top to bottom): what a fantastic screen wall, how many bobby pins went into Chenault’s updo, does everyone wear white in Puerto Rico, where do I buy that turquoise and puce Op Art pillow? So. many. questions.
The trailer is really high-spirited – I don’t see any evidence of the darker parts of the novel (spousal abuse, some rape, some violent locals) but maybe they’re trying to trick us into thinking 1960s Puerto Rico was a blast all day, every day? It also doesn’t show Depp’s character writing all that much, except for the line “I’ve got a story for you… I’m going after him.”
One excellent omen: it’s released on my birthday, putting it in the pantheon of other films greats like Zombie Strippers and Saw 3D.
As a bonus, here’s a shot I found that was captioned: “Dr. Hunter S Thompson modeled as a youth in Puerto Rico.” I don’t really believe it, but it’s fun to imagine. Plus, his cheekbones are the spitting image of Depp’s.
In addition to fish and chips and the choral tradition, England consistently churns out top-notch ghost stories. Harry Potter stars in a film version of one: The Woman In Black.
This movie looks like a trifecta of great British things:
While I’m blathering on about magazine ads, here’s a fantastic one from Guess. Usually their ads are extreme and oversexed, and while this girl is certainly dressed to the nines, it’s sweet, not salacious.
Did people look like this in the ’40s? I mean, I know they weren’t constantly styled for photo shoots, and their waists weren’t the same circumference as telephone poles, but boy are those clothes great. It reminds me of the kind of photo The Sartorialist would shoot today (as opposed to the usual Guess fare – shirtless man in low-slung jeans humping on a woman in a studded bra with a beehive). Here are some genuine street style photos I found on The Fashion Spot.
That’s what the Guess ad is missing. HATS.
And SILK.
Tell me you’re not getting a Sex and the City vibe here. I think I spot a Samantha on the right…
You may know Chris Evans as the Human Torch: the superhero with gayest catchphrase of all, ‘Flame on!’. His Aryan looks and healthy teeth have also gotten him roles like the ‘Harvard Hottie’ in The Nanny Diaries and the jock in Not Another Teen Movie. Most recently he starred in Captain America: The First Avenger. I’ve heard the movie is pretty good until the special effects consume all the actors and plotlines like a CGI black hole. Still, I’ll see it for the pecs and the 1940s drag everyone will be wearing.
Right, but why is Chris posing with a Care Bear?
Because he’s looooves them. According to The Hollywood Reporter:
“’To be completely honest, I was watching like Care Bears and like My Little Pony,’ Evans said… But, he had his reasons for playing with the typically girl-centric toys. ‘I had older sisters, I had to, I had no choice.’”
Excuses, excuses, Chris. Those were my favorite toys, but at least I had a plastic dinosaur or two around to butch things up.
You can watch Chris’ video interview here.
And just to be gratuitous, here’s my favorite scene from Not Another Teen Movie. It happens to be a musical, which I know will be a shock to you all. I swear there’s an uncensored version of this out there somewhere which includes not just breasts but a scatalogical joke delivered on a high note, but maybe it’s just too much fun for YouTube to handle.
to have an attitude.
