Xavier Samuel Five Times

Well this is a good way to get our attention, Xavier Samuel. Samuel is an actor I really like and think is genuinely talented -- even beyond looking like how he looks, which is obviously... well you have eyes -- and he's chosen interesting projects. The first thing I ever saw him in was the Aussie horror flick for the ages The Loved Ones, after all! Plus he played Frankenstein for director Bernard Rose, he made that son-swapping movie with Naomi Watts, and the last time I saw him he was DP'ing Marilyn Monroe in Blonde. Not a career for the faint of heart! And yet he never gets the attention of his contemporaries -- maybe now that he's in his 30s somebody will figure out how to make him a star? 

I'm certainly here for it! And I am taking this eye-snatching new photoshoot that he posted on his Instagram a few days ago as evidence that he wants some more attention, too. So let's give it to him. (Or he can give it to us -- I'm not picky.) Somebody give Xavier a proper good gig and we'll give you a couple more reasons why you should if we all just hit the jump for the entire shoot...

Never Knowing Who To Cling To

I probably wouldn't be looking forward to Blonde if it wasn't directed by Andrew Dominik, which I do realize is the straight-bro-film-douchiest thing I could say but I can't help it, man -- you did see The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, right? What other choice do I have? That's not to say that the other ingredients don't intrigue me -- I like Ana de Armas just fine, she has been fun in Knives Out and Knock Knock and especially No Time To Die. I can't say I have felt terribly moved by any work she's done so far, but if it's gonna happen I imagine a Marilyn Monroe bio-pic would be the moment. Speaking of I also love Marilyn and I am like most people who care about the movies still fascinated by her, and on top of that I don't think the definitive movie about her has yet been made. If such a thing can be made.

My Week With Marilyn was fine, Michelle Williams was very good, but that movie evaporated from my memory immediately after that year's Oscars. And I think Nicolas Roeg's Insignificance is a fascinating movie and Theresa Russell does a great job playing "the idea of Marilyn" but I wouldn't call that a definitive take either -- that movie's far too abstract and not really about her, not as a person, anyway. We'll have to see how much Dominik's film is legitimately about the woman then, as the trailer promises to be -- I gotta admit it is one hell of a trailer. Looks ravishing. 

Blonde comes out on September 28th. Thoughts?

Which is Hotter?

If I had once known that Stranger Things actor (and frequent MNPP presence!) Dacre Montgomery had been cast in Baz Luhrmann's upcoming Elvis movie -- don't get your hips out of swivel, he's not playing Elvis (that role went to Austin Butler, most recently seen taking a can of dog food to the head for Quentin Tarantino) he's playing Elvis frequent producer sidekick Steve Binder...

... I didn't recall that I once knew it today, when I looked at the film's IMDb page here on the occasion of big bad Baz's 58th birthday. Dacre's not the only PYT on the Presley premises -- there's also the dueling Aussie banjos of Xavier Samuel and Luke Bracey to be had (and I sure hope somebody's hadding 'em). But for Baz's sake today we'll focus right in on the top two-some, as I suspect Baz himself calls them come suppertime...

survey services

Xavier Samuel Eight Times

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I'm kind of surprised that Xavier Samuel hasn't taken off - I think he's a good actor (from playing the terrorized prom-date in The Loved Ones to a fine little turn in Whit Stillman's classic comic confection Love & Friendship last year, with a really curious and strange take on Frankenstein thanks to Bernard Rose somewhere in the middle there) and, well, look at him. 

He should be bigger. At least magazines (thx Mac) are still photographing him looking like he looks in suits like this, I suppose. Hit the jump for a few more...

5 Off My Head - Siri Says 2010

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I wasn't sure I'd have time for this today but Siri was kind to me and when I asked her for a number between 1 and 100 she gave me 10 - why is that kind? Because I have already listed my favorite movies of 2010 here on the blog before! Six years ago I was still being decent about getting my Yead-End Lists out relatively on time - heck I got my 2010 Golden Trousers (as they're called) out before the end of January! That's really kind of insane in retrospect. So if you click here you can see my TWENTY favorite movies of 2010 as they stood six years ago..... however! Yes, there's a however. My list has changed since then. Six years makes a difference, it seems. Nothing fell out of the top 20 but things have shifted around. So here are...

My 5 Favorite Movies of 2010, as of 2016

The Loved Ones

(dir. Sean Byrne)

-- released on November 4th 2010 --

Fish Tank

(dir. Andrea Arnold)

-- released on January 15th 2010 --

Black Swan

(dir. Darren Aronosfky)

-- released on December 17th 2010 --

Dogtooth

(dir. Yorgos Lanthimos)

-- released on June 25th 2010 --

Scott Pilgrim vs the World

(dir. Edgar Wright)

-- released on August 13th 2010 -- 

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What are your favorite movies of 2010?

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Frankenstein in 150 Words or Less

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You don't go in to a modernized retelling of Frankenstein expecting simplicity - you expect something like the upcoming Victor Frankenstein movie with Daniel Radcliffe and James McAvoy appears to be, with all the dodging of great big fireballs in the trailer. You expect too much of everything because what is modernization besides exactly that? But Bernard Rose's new Frankenstein, one of many new versions coming our way, somehow remains shockingly faithful to, well, if not the exact prose of Mary Shelley's creation than the exact essence of it, while stuffing in 3D printing to boot. It's a low-key marvel, what Rose manages, wiping away decades of dust from the machines, shining 'em up and making 'em pretty and making 'em turn on us just as quick as that. And Xavier Samuel, that pretty young thing, gives a surprisingly effective baby-man performance - a real live-wire you might say!

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Thursday's Ways Not To Die

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Candyman (1992)

Can you believe I'd never done this one before? The perfect urban legend nightmare (emphasis on "urban") rendered perfectly -- with Ted Raimi no less! -- and I sat on my hook all this time. For shame, me. I have previously given love to the similar scene at the end of this film though, the one where...

... Virginia Madsen comes full circle, so I guess I'm not a total loss. But still. And what inspired this post this day, you ask, especially since Halloween has come and gone and this would seem better suited to the October season? Could it be...

I woke up this morning like "I'M GONNA SEE PAPERHOUSE ON A BIG SCREEN TONIGHT!!!" Thanks.@BernardJMRose &.@FilmLinc for making today my Xmas

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) November 5, 2015

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Yup, director Bernard Rose is going to be at the Film Society of Lincoln Center tonight, showing two films - both my beloved Paperhouse from 1988 and his new movie, an updated take on Frankenstein starring Xavier Samuel, Danny Huston and Carrie-Ann Moss - and I couldn't be more excited. I love this city!

Hit the jump for links to all of the previous Ways Not To Die

Xavier Samuel Three Times

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Well today's just been a bust, I still haven't gotten what I want (insert snitty fit throw here) so whatever, I'm not getting anything done at this point. My hands, consider them tossed! But since what I want doubly's got to do with Xavier Samuel (the Scary Movies fest is showing both the new Frankenstein from Paperhouse director Bernard Rose that Xavier stars in as well as showing the new horror film from the director of Xavier's awesome movie The Loved Ones) here, a couple of Xavier pics to tide us all over, make everything in the goddamned world seem slightly less annoying.

I ♥♥♥ FSLC Forever

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I've really got to hand it to the folks at the Film Society of Lincoln Center here in NYC - even besides the New York Film Festival, which we're currently deeply steeped in, the programming that they're lining up for the rest of the year is... well what is the right word here? "Magnificent" seems small, compared to what they have coming. If there's a word that equals "Magnificent, Squared" then, that's what I mean. 

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They just announced their annual "Scary Movies" program and it tipped me over the edge into having to write this post now, immediately, even though I've been meaning to write it for a couple of weeks ever since they announced some other incredible programs ahead but been to busy with the aforementioned Film Fest. The thing is they're hosting a "Night with Bernard Rose" at the end of it, and they're showing both his brand new movie -- a modern-retelling of Frankenstein with Xavier Samuel...

... as well as one of the most important movies of my life, Rose's 1988 fever-dream Paperhouse. I've been posting about Paperhouse for as long as I've been posting anything - it's a cornerstone movie for me, one of the ones that crafted my adoration of the movies, and the opportunity to finally see this film on a big screen (and with Rose there, no less!) is slapping my inner 13-year old punch-drunk silly. I mean, I'm honestly tearing up about it.

The rest of the "Scary Movies" program is looking hot as heck-fire too - I've been hearing great things about The Devil's Candy, which is The Loved Ones director Sean Byrne's loooooong awaited follow up (you guys have seen The Loved Ones by now, right? It is ahhhhhmazing) and which stars a shredded-to-hell Ethan Embry. They're showing two pieces of classic 80s trash by Spanish director Juan Piquer Simón - the sleazy giallo-ish Pieces, which has the single greatest reaction shot in all of cinema...
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... and they're showing his film Slugs, which I've given love 

to in our "Ways Not To Die" series before, 

and is quite simply tremendous, just tremendous.

And that's before you take into account the fact that Slugs was filmed partially in my hometown while I was in Junior High School, and I can see places I walked by all the time up on that screen, preserved forever, covered with slugs.

But wait! There's more! Lots lots lots more! They're also screening several new horror films that I know nothing about yet -- things called The Hallow and Summer Camp and Emelie and several more - but will surely lean myself up on, and they're also showing the documentary Hitchcock/Truffaut, which brings the famous meeting between two directors (and a million film-students' "Introduction to Film Lit 101" course lists) to life, and for the heck of it they're showing several under-screened Hitch movies like Frenzy, The Manxman, and Saboteur.

And that's just the "Scary Movies" program, which runs from October 30th to November 5th. As I said at the start of this hefty post FSLC has several other programs coming over the next few months which are justifying my eternal membership devotion. Later in November they're doing a Todd Haynes retrospective, timed to the release of his latest masterpiece Carol, and judging by the retrospectives FSLC has put on before I think we can assume they'll be showing everything, EVERYTHING, by Haynes, so that's, you know, a massive fucking thrill.

After that in December they're screening seven films by David Lynch along with seven films by Jacques Rivette, directors they apparently feel cover a lot of the same ground. I can't speak to Rivette because I have maybe never seen any of his movies? I know I know, I'll fix it with this series though. It's the Lynch that's got me thrilled - outside of Midnight screenings (which I'm too decrepit to go to anymore) his films somehow never get screened properly here.

AND THEN (yes more still!) I'll be spending a big chunk of my Holidays time with them, because they're doing a gigantic retrospective of Douglas Sirk's work too! We still don't have the schedules for these last couple of series so I don't know exactly what they'll be showing but they do say "This retrospective, the largest in New York City in decades, tracks Sirk’s profoundly influential artistry from his early German films through to his most iconic melodramas, and nearly everything in between," so that sounds promising. As long as I get to see Jane Wyman run over by a car on a great big glorious screen I'll be good! Right, Rock?

In summation... just take all of my money, guys. 

I give it all, every cent, to you.

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I Am Link

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--- Big Gay Something - Say what you will about Judd Apatow (which was very easy for me in the wake of the godawful excruciating This is 40) but he's really taken to using his Hollywood powers for good, putting his muscle behind getting interesting female voices (Lena Dunham and Amy Schumer) out there, and now he's doing the same for The Gays - he's producing a big comedy that Girls star Andrew Rannells is writing with his (super hot) boyfriend Mike Doyle. Deadline doesn't mention the fact that Doyle & Rannells are together but I sure as heck-fire will. Anyway I go back and forth with Rannells (he can make me laugh, but at what cost?) but this sounds big-leagues, outside of the usually awful gay movie-making ghetto, so we should pay stand to attention. There's no word on what the damn thing is about, though.

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--- More Super - Although they proved they can make great sequels to movies that didn't need a sequel with the Toy Story films, I feel safe in saying that the only Pixar movie that's ever begged for a sequel is The Incredibles (still my favorite Pixar movie) so hearing that Brad Bird is working on the script for The Incredibles 2 finally has me very smiley inside. And outside! And in between! I don't know what that means exactly, just go with it.

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--- After Darth - Hayden Christensen has signed on to play the legendary pool party game inspiration Marco Polo, in an apparently big-budget fantasy epic co-produced with China. Rob Cohen, the auteur behind The Fast and the Furious as well as this year's epic J-Lo-in-danger flick The Boy Next Door, is directing. And I love that THR says that Christensen has got "a reputation for being choosy" with this news. Choosy like fucking store-brand peanut butter.
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--- Who's True - The first trailer for the new season of True Detective has dropped, and it's a bunch of famous people walking around, staring, and shoving. Totally accounted for is Colin Farrell and Colin Farrell's gigantic mustache, though. The show's back in June, which surprised me; I figured the wait (as much as I am "waiting" for this and not "dreading" it, give my less-than-enthusiastic reaction to the first season) would be slightly longer.
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--- Dark Wings - Here's a bunch of superhero movie junk that dropped today in one quick swoop - here's the first good look at Jamie Bell in full Thing rock regalia in the Fantastic Four reboot; it is indeed criminal how they are covering up that adorable boy again. Here's some concept art of Bryan Singer's new favorite twink Ben Hardy in angel wings for the new X-Men movie, proving we were all correct in assuming that boy was Angel to a tee. Oh and there's a glimpse of Daredevil's red costume in this new teaser; I think it looks unbearably silly but I guess no more so than every superhero costume's ever looked on a real human being.
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--- Billy Boys - I've apparently been very very bad keeping up with the casting on Ang Lee's new movie Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk - we caught it when that cute newcomer Joe Alwyn got cast in the lead, but according to The Dissolve since then the names that have also signed on include Steve Martin, Kristen Stewart, Garrett Hedlund, and now Vin Diesel and Chris Tucker. Wowza what a weird fascinating cast.
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--- The New Flesh - A few months ago I wrote a post about all the Frankensteins that were about to be coming our way - well we've just gotten our first glimpse of the Monster that inspired that post: STYD has the first picture from Bernard "Candyman" Rose's Frankenstein, which stars pretty pretty boy (not looking too pretty there though!) Xavier Samuel as the big bolted lunk in a modern retelling of the tale, with Carrie Anne-Moss and Danny Huston as the Doctors who make him that way. The movie premieres in Brussels at their film fest this weekend.

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--- Her Hotel - I've probably missed some announcements since I last posted about Matthew Bomer & Cheyenne Jackson and then Wes Bentley all booking leading roles in the upcoming season of American Horror Story but I do believe that yesterday's word that Kathy Bates is coming back gives us our first Grande Acting Dame of the show. (No, Gaga does not count.) Ryan Murphy says she's "running the hotel" so I hope that makes her the main character a la Lange. Also I hope she holds a sledgehammer at some point.
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I Am Link

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--- After Briefs - Underwear Model goes legit! Calvin Klein crotch-jockey and sex-beard-enthusiast Travis Fimmel's been trying this acting thing long enough that I guess he's proven he's more than just a shapely pair of buttocks (although he sure is that too!) so he's been hired to act opposite Greta Gerwig and Julianne Moore now. Okay? Okay. Rebecca Miller (yes, daughter of Arthur and wife of Daniel Day-Lewis) is making a rom-com called Maggie's Plan, and they're all in it. Also Ethan Hawke and Bill Hader.

--- Doc Daze Two - The second half of Glenn Dunks and Daniel Walber's conversation on the documentaries of 2014 is up over at The Film Experience; they talk about the Roger Ebert doc Life Itself and the Oscar-nominated pair of Last Days in Vietnam and Citizenfour in this one. I'm still really surprised by how uninvolving I found Citizenfour to be.

--- Boys For Tina - Christopher Abbott, who jumped ship off Girls for a movie career, actually seems to be doing pretty well for himself (he's no David Caruso, at least) - he got good notices for a movie at Sundance and now he's just landed a role in Tina Fey's new movie, The Taliban Shuffle; yes this is also the movie that we told you will star Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as Tina's main piece. Surround yourself with man-meat, Tina. You go. Lena will understand.
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--- Sausage Fest - There's an interesting piece at Vulture today on Sundance's "White Guy Problem" that I found myself nodding along vigorously to; summed up here: "[The Studios] swoop in, pluck up all the white-guy directors, and leave all the talented female and nonwhite helmers to fend for themselves. If you're a white dude who made a micro-budget Sundance movie with some visual panache, you're sure to end up on studio short lists; if you're not, you'll struggle to even get financing for your next project."

--- River Folk - Ryan Gosling's directorial debut Lost River screened at Cannes last Spring and didn't get too much love, but Ryan Gosling directed it so it's coming out (it'll be VOD, I think) - The Playlist has the first clips and some new pictures from it. It stars Matt Smith, Christina Hendricks, Saoirse Ronan, Ben Mendelsohn, Eva Mendes, and Agents of SHIELD's adorkable Iain De Caestecker.

---  Gal Fridays - Carrie-Anne Moss, who really should've carved out a better career for herself than starring in endless death scenes in volcano movies, has just joined the cast of Netflix's next Marvel series AKA Jessica Jones. This is the one that comes after Charlie Cox's wee-zipper show, and stars the always-welcome Krysten Ritter as a lady-reporter slash hero of some sort.

--- After The Disco - Kate Beckinsale is slipping out of her 3D rubber-suit and trying to be an actress again, and what better way than re-teaming with the folks who gave her her most memorable stab at being considered an "actress" - she and her Last Days of Disco co-star Chloe Sevigny are going to star in Whit Stillman's new movie. The name that jumps out at me is Xavier Samuel but then we were just staring at his ass like a week ago, so he's there on the tip of our tongues (we wish).

--- Fantasy Freak Out - A trio of fantastical short stories by George RR Martin are being turned into a single movie called In the Lost Lands and it's already got Milla Jovovich and Justin Chatwin (mmmmm furry Justin Chatwin) on-board to star. Picture sorceresses and werewolves and barbarians and so forth. The sky will be purple, their breastplates will heave.

--- Pack Mentality - Wow anthology horror movies really are the everything right now - there's that movie Tales of Halloween we told you about previously, with a bunch of directors tackling interconnected stories on a single Halloween night (speaking of STYD has a couple new pictures from that); there's the female-director anthology XX (which just got a pretty groovy poster, seen there); and now there's Holidays, which will have a bunch of horror segments about different holidays from different directors, including Kevin Smith (blecch) but also the dudes that made the terrific Starry Eyes.

--- And Finally, Hooray Final Girl is doing a VHS Week! All week long Stacie Ponder will be yes pondering a movie a day - yesterday she hit up the godawful-sounding 1988 flick Shadow Dancing; the movie may sound godawful, but per usual Stacie makes the awful sound fun. You'll want to hear about Christopher Plummer's fiery niblets.
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