Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

... you can learn from:

A Monster Calls (2016)

Conor: Your stories never made sense to me.

The Monster: Because humans are complicated beasts. 

You believe comforting lies, while knowing full well 

the painful truth that makes those lies necessary. 

In the end, Conor, it is not important what you think. 

It is only important what you do.

Conor: So what do I do?

The Monster: What you did just now. You speak the truth.

Conor: That's all?

The Monster: You think it's easy? 

You were willing to die rather than speak it.

The wildly under-appreciated tearjerking kids masterpiece A Monster Calls came out five years ago today. Directed by J.A. Bayona -- a stepping stone in between the devastating family dramatics of his film The Impossible in 2012 and the gigantic special-effects spectacle of his Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom film in 2018 -- and scripted by Chaos Walking author Patrick Ness, who was adapting his own book (which I also highly recommend), this movie sort of disappeared into the ether when it got released in 2016 and well there was after all a lot going on in the fall of 2016, so I don't totally blame us for being a little distracted. But I hope it's gained some traction on our brains in the five years since! And if not, let's make a rediscovery of this one. It's devastatingly excellent, a fable about grief that will lift you up, slam you back down over and over until you're dizzy, and then hug you dead. It's grand!

The Commuter in 300 Words or Less

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I don't care how much my boyfriend -- or any of you people for that matter -- judges me for it, I had a whole lot of fun watching The Commuter. One of these days somebody's going to hand director Jaume Collet-Serra a truly big budget (this movie cost 40 million dollars which sure that's a lot of money but I'm talking Marvel money here) and he's going to take the lessons he's learned turning disposable trash like this and The Shallows and Orphan into pure entertainment and he's going to spin all of that into real big golden buckets of money and fun. (His next movie is Jungle Cruise, based on the Disney ride and starring The Rock and... obviously I'm wary, but for god's sake this director turned a movie starring Blake Lively and a seagull into ninety minutes of tickled endorphins, so I should know better than to doubt.) 

Anyway The Commuter probably goes on about fifteen minutes too long and you can see who the bad guy is going to be from seven cosmos over but Collet-Serra does all sorts of super things with his camera here, maneuvering around and through the space he's closed himself up in - it's real nerdy dumb fun, seeing him float us through a punch-hole in a ticket for no reason whatsoever, but it's fun all the same. One complaint: I really wish they'd made all of Vera Farmiga's phone-calls video-calls because I just wanted to see her face a little more. But ultimately, in the end, Patrick Wilson's pants were just tight enough to make up for that.

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The Last Train to Hots-ville

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Have any of you seen Insidious: The Last Key? I have not - I actually somehow entirely missed that it even came out in theaters last week! I haven't even heard a word about it. Which portends... not much, I guess. Anyway Patrick Wilson, star of the first two Insidious movies, is not in this one, but he is in the new Liam Neeson joint out today called The Commuter, which I very much probably will go see this weekend. The Commuter has several things in its favor - it has Vera Farmiga, Patrick's fabulous co-star from The Conjuring movies... which were of course also from James Wan of the Insidious franchise - these complications have complications! (Wan's next film is the Aquaman movie in which Patrick is playing the villain, so I guess Patty's his good luck charm.) 

Also getting me excited about The Commuter is the fact that it's from director Jaume Collet-Serra, who made Orphan, full stop. I know a lot of people who love his over-the-top movies point to The Shallows, which was fine, but anybody in the know was already there thank you very much. Not to mention he made the super fun House of Wax remake with Chad Michael Murray's nipples and that soccer movie with Alessandro Nivola's nipples and oh my god is Jaume Collet-Serra my favorite director of all time, you guys? And, exciting thing I just learned, he is hot too:

Ding ding, winner.

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Pugh is Park's Little Drummer Girl

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I paid a lot of attention to her co-star Cosmo Jarvis (because I know my audience and our predilection for furry little fuckboys) when Lady Macbeth came out earlier this year, but it should be known I thought that Florence Pugh in the lead role was fuckin-a fantastic. And so today's big news that she is going to star in a miniseries adaptation of John Le Carre's book The Little Drummer Girl for no less than PARK CHAN-WOOK... well that is exciting, you guys. Here's what TLDG is about via Amazon:

"On holiday in Mykonos, Charlie wants only sunny days and a brief escape from England’s bourgeois dreariness. Then a handsome stranger lures the aspiring actress away from her pals—but his intentions are far from romantic. Joseph is an Israeli intelligence officer, and Charlie has been wooed to flush out the leader of a Palestinian terrorist group responsible for a string of deadly bombings. Still uncertain of her own allegiances, she debuts in the role of a lifetime as a double agent in the “theatre of the real.” Haunting and deeply atmospheric, John le Carré’s The Little Drummer Girl is a virtuoso performance and a powerful examination of morality and justice."

Have any of you read it? This is Park's first project since The Handmaiden blew our socks off (after blowing up our knickers) last yea; Pugh meanwhile's got a ton stacked up on her late, including a WWE family comedy with The Rock & Lena Headey (okay????), that Liam Neeson movie set on a train, and being the token female in that movie starring Aaron Taylor-Johnson's gigantic beard that I told you about. I have to say that this here project with Park looks the most promising for her out of that batch. (Although I am totally into the Liam Neeson train movie, but my guess is her role isn't huge.)
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Good Morning, Gratuitous Tom Bateman

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The actor Tom Bateman is about to get a lot of exposure, and I don't just mean in the naked picture immediately below. He plays "The Guy" in Snatched, the Amy Schumer & Goldie Hawn comedy out this weekend, which is where he grabbed my attention. (More to come on that movie later this week.) But he's also one of the train folk in the upcoming Murder on the Orient Express remake, and he's co-starring in that Liam Neeson & Laura Dern thriller we told you about recently. 

Only back when I told you about it I had no idea who "Tom Bateman" was and now I do. Do I ever. Tom didn't just apparate overnight into our lives -- you might even know who he is and I'm the one slow on the uptake. He's starred in a few series - he played a Medici in that Da Vinci's Demons show and he was Jekyl himself on the recent Jekyll & Hyde show in the UK. (Right he's British, I didn't mention that. His accent in Snatched is a swooner.) 

So I think we should all prepare ourselves to stare at Tom a bunch over the next few years, is my point. And what better way to start that off then to hit the jump for a few dozen more pictures...

I Am Link

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--- Fun Fact: I still have never even sat through the entirety of the original Grease from start to finish. So I definitely have never sat through the entirety of Grease 2. But I enjoyed the heck out of reading Nat talk about the latter in his ongoing celebration of all things Michelle Pfeiffer today at The Film Experience. In random asides he brought up a couple of my most cherish pop culture memories - the two men in bed scene from thirtysomething (which is the first gay thing I ever remember seeing) and Maxwell Caulfield, because swoon.

--- Brown Football Helmet - This year marks the 30th anniversary of the play Steel Magnolias debuting here in New York, and there's an oral history of the whole thing, from original inspiration up through the big movie-star movie, right over here that I highly recommend if you're an enamored with it as I am. There are tons of great details about the film's shoot on location in Louisiana especially; loved the bit about the Dukakis signs, and of course the reminders that Dolly Parton is the nicest gal on Earth:

"We were shooting part of the Christmas scene, and this was in the dead of August, and we were sitting out on the porch of Truvy’s beauty shop. We were waiting, and there was a lot of stop and start. The women were dressed for Christmas, and Dolly was sitting on the swing. She had on that white cashmere sweater with the marabou around the neck, and she was just swinging, cool as a cucumber. Julia said, “Dolly, we’re dying and you never say a word. Why don’t you let loose?” Dolly very serenely smiled and said, “When I was young and had nothing, I wanted to be rich and famous, and now I am. So I’m not going to complain about anything.”

---  After Life - Somebody yell at me about writing up my thoughts on Life, the sci-fi movie with Jake Gyllenhaal and Ryan Reynolds, please; while I wait for that here's word that Jake is re-teaming with Life's director Daniel Espinoza on a movie called The Anarchists vs. ISIS, which is based on a Rolling Stone article about the true story of "a ragtag team of American volunteers, socialists and outcasts who are fighting alongside the Kurdish militia known as the YPG to beat ISIS in Syria and establish an anarchist collective amid the rubble of war." You can read the original article right here. Or just wait for Jake's pretty face to make it all more palatable, whatever.

--- Earn the Dern - As Big Little Lies finishes up its stellar season and as we wait for Twin Peaks to start in a few weeks Laura Dern's got to find something to do, and she's having no trouble at all, thankfully - she's going to play the lead in Justin "King Cobra" Kelly's movie about phony hipster author JT Leroy, for one. That will co-star Kristen Stewart. And then, because she likes nothing more than mixing shit up she's going to co-star opposite Liam Neeson in another one of his revenge thrillers; she's playing "the wife" (god I hope it's more than that) in Hard Powder, which has Neeson chasing down the drug cartel that murdered his son.

--- But Speaking of Big Little Lies  I hate that people are even asking the question whether that wooden plank Alexander Skarsgard swung around on this week's episode was really his dick or not - if you have to ask that question you have never seen a penis in your life. If you want to see pictures of the fake fake thing click here (link NSFW not for the fake penis but for actual real gay pornography on the sidebars) but I'm not polluting up MNPP with that phony filth. Go real or go home, Alex! (My home, I mean.)

--- There & Here - And let's talk about a different Shirley Maclaine movie now! I got a bit pissy regarding somebody else's thoughts on Hal Ashby's masterpiece Being There on Twitter the other day, so In was glad to read Mark Harris' piece on the film for the new Criterion release, which is more in line with how I read the film. Choice bit:

"Being There asserts itself as a parable about innocence, cynicism, and limitless credulity. We invest people with unspeakable power by reinventing them as reflections of our hopes and our vanities, and it is thus terrifyingly possible for us to endow a complete imbecile who watches TV all day with qualities he has never possessed. This idea will never go out of style; as a cautionary tale, Being There is elastic enough to feel as if it is perpetually about our moment, as long as our moment includes campaigns, elections, and politicians."

---  Hot Potatoes - All of the headlines about Mike Newell's new movie (with the cumbersome title of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, which is after a book I am told) are grabbing onto the grab-bag of Downton Abbey actors he's cast in it, but clearly the more important story is the word that it will have a heatwave of dude hotness in the triumvirate of Michiel Huisman, Glen Powell, and Matthew Goode sharing the screen. Somebody get me onto that set, please!

--- And Finally I haven't had a chance to read this one yet but The Guardian chatted with actress Hanna Schygulla about her work with Rainer Werner Fassbinder earlier this week (thx Mac) - I guess they're doing a whole retrospective on the director at the British Film Institute this month, which she'll be taking part in. Also I cant remember if I mentioned this previously but RWF's 1972 TV series Eight Hours Don't Make a Day is being re-released and should play the US sometime this year. That's probably my number one cannot miss event of 2017 (besides Trump's impeachment and arrest, of course).
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Hello? Is It Tree You're Looking For?

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The day it came out I devoured Patrick Ness' book A Monster Calls much like a giant monster tree devours little boy's imaginations. But it wasn't until I saw the story put on screen that I connected it with one of my favorite childhood films, Bernard Rose's underrated 1988 masterpiece Paperhouse. In that film a little girl's literally fevered imagination drags her into the strange netherworld of her own design via a landscape she draws, and through this dark and scary process she manages to work out some dark and scary familial issues that she otherwise wouldn't have been able to get a handle on. 

It's about the healing power of putting our worst selves out there - of using our imaginations to sort out the bad stuff rumbling inside of us. Ness' book got that, and J.A. Bayona's film of that book does too. Grief and rage and pain can be beautiful and expressive things - they're as vital and necessary as any other human experience; they show us who we are, deep deep down, and what matters. Life is nothing without them, and it's irritating that you even have to make the case that Art has a duty to explicate such things, but too much of life and the art meant to express it is sugarcoated and spoon-fed; people don't want to seem dreary. Christ forbid you're dreary!

I don't want to make A Monster Calls sound like a slog; it's got several gorgeously animated sequences that look like raining water-colors, and it's got Liam Neeson voicing a strangely well-gluted plant-person (Seriously, check out that tree's butt - somebody spent a lot of time and paid a lot of attention and spent a lot of money towards developing that tree's butt) for god's sake. Lewis MacDougall, all of thirteen years old, gives an incredibly effective performance as a bullied kid with too many ideas whose world is collapsing around him, and Sigourney Weaver and Felicity Jones gives him great support as the ladies in his life who can't help him until he, cue strings, learns to help himself, and until he learns to confront the great big demons with really impressive butts that are tearing up his insides.

People Talking Without Speaking

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Nobody making movies quite understands the absurdity and the sacrifice of Faith like Martin Scorsese does. To believe in a higher power when all logic and reason points towards its absence is absurd, on the face of it and under its bones too - but even I, as a non-believer, can see that it's the leap (do not say "leap of faith," do not say "leap of faith") that is what they consider the Divine. It's the sound of voices echoing out of the emptiness - it is listening to nothingness and finding your answers inside of it.

Silence is almost entirely about coming to terms with that, and Scorsese has clearly wrestled with those questions his entire life - not just in his previous religious films like The Last Temptation of Christ and Kundun and his non-religious films like Bringing Out the Dead, but as a person, as a human being; the experience poring over these existential quandaries lives inside every frame of the film. (Sidenote: Roger Ebert's book on Scorsese talks a lot about the director's faith and I definitely recommend reading it.) 

It is a serious and beautiful movie, thoughtful and moving and well-acted - one's atheism shouldn't get in one's way of trying to understand why people feel the need to believe, and what tolls it takes on them; what madness and beauty they find from their struggles with making sense of an inexplicable world. Scorsese makes religious movies for everybody, open to saints and skeptics alike - unlike the cloying "spiritual" treacle that often passes for "Christian Film-making" (I saw the trailer for The Shack the other day and nearly set myself on fire halfway through it) Marty's religion is all knotted up, an endless untangling series of questions without answers, of emotional turmoil and devastation and horror too, and those sensations translate to anybody walking through the door.

I Am Link

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--- Fifty Inches - ET talked to Jamie Dornan about a few things, including the next season of The Fall and his upcoming horror-drama The 9th Life of Louis Drax with Sarah Gadon, but of course the takeaway is the part where they ask him if he's gonna show his dick in the Fifty Shades sequel and he pleads the fifth. Oh Jamie, we've already seen the damned thing! What can it matter now? Just walk around without any pants on all the time at this point. Seriously. Do.

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--- Wiser Kid - Stephen Cone, the director of the terrific (and queer) two-some of films The Wise Kids and Henry Gamble's Birthday Party, is currently shooting his third movie, hurray! It's called Princess Cyd and it's about a girl from South Carolina who spends the summer with her aunt in Chicago and falls for a local tomboy. Cone gives good quote about his fascination about the relationships between young people and adults at that link so don't miss it; he's such an interesting and curious filmmaker.
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--- Dead Eyes - This is a pretty nerdy bit of business about John Carpenter's classic The Thing but if you're nerdy on that movie you'll want to click on over to the Blumhouse website where they've maybe gotten a handle on the movie's ambiguous ending thanks to cinematographer Dean Cundey, who did an interview for the new blu-ray release of the film where he talks about a lighting trick they used to denote who's a Thing and who isn't a Thing.
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--- Norma Jean - Assassination of Jesse James director Andrew Dominik has that Nick Cave doc coming out so he's doing press and he's talking about his next film, which is that Marilyn Monroe movie (I hesitate to call it a bio-pic because it sounds like he's doing something more interesting than that term implies) Blonde -- Netflix has picked it up so there is forward momentum but it sounds like Jessica Chastain's off of it; no word on the lady who'll step into her place. Playing Marilyn is a tricky business, so I hope she's sturdy.

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--- Learn Me Good - Harmony Korine is now set to direct Tampa, an adaptation of Alissa Nutting's apparently darkly comedic and controversial book about a teacher getting involved with a teenage student. Anybody read it? I could've sworn I'd posted about this story before because I went out and bought the book awhile back, but I can't find that post so I don't know what inspired me to buy the book way back when. Maybe one of you encouraged me to read it? I don't know. I still haven't read it though. But hooray for Harmony!
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--- A Monster Delays - One of my most anticipated movies remaining this year, JA Barona's A Monster Calls, just got delayed a full two months from October 21st to December 23rd! Damn damn damn! It's supposedly a good sign towards the quality of the film that the studio wants the movie in awards competition or something but I could give a rat's, I just want to see the thing already. It also seems like a strange bet to me - if the movie's as good as the book it will involve some fine acting but a movie starring a great big CG tree-monster isn't exactly in the Academy's wheelhouse. Here's the trailer, if you wanna cry.

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---  And Speaking of Movies I Am Looking Forward To, the folks over at The Film Experience (except not me, I missed this one) did a list of the movies playing film festivals this fall that they're most looking forward to and I can't really disagree with anything they included, so it seems my participation was moot anyway. I wouldn't change a thing! Okay my enthusiasm for La La Land isn't quite as high as theirs is (musicals, ya know) but I still plan on seeing it. Oh and PS I am seeing one of the movies listed here tonight! Whee!

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--- And Finally I don't really know what inspired Bryan Fuller to say these things while talking to the folks on a podcast about American Gods, his forthcoming Neil Gaiman adaptation... well, besides Bryan's brilliance when it comes to massaging the internet press (of which I include myself, cuz here I am!) ... but I gotta quote these passages here because... obviously.

"We have so many visual effects that involve digital erections... We have conversations, ‘Well, should we get [a] dildo and strap it onto the actors, is that going to be more cost effective? Or is it easier just to give them digital erections?"

Bryan, Bryan, Bryan! The cheapest boner is a real boner! Boners are free, and abundant. But seriously there are several candidates in this cast that I hope he's talking about becoming members of the Boner Club but mostly I  hope we're talking about lots of Ricky Whittle boner action (oh Ricky Whittle)... and PS to myself I should really be doing a better job keeping up with Ricky's Instagram, as that picture above makes abundantly clear. Goddamn, goddamn, goddamn.
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Patrick Wilson For All The World To See

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Pic of @patrickwilson73 reading a book is hotter than a dick spread in Playgirl. So thank u @Nick_Offerman. Thank u. pic.twitter.com/W8Wf8MW9kJ

— Dagmara Dominczyk (@Dagword) April 4, 2016

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Bless actress and Wilson-wife Dagmara Dominczyk for her Twitter account, where she lobs bombs of delight like this while also being the only reliable source on the internet for continued Patrick Wilson Appreciation -- I went looking for new pictures o' Patty to attach to this actual news story about him and she was the only place running that game proper-like. I mean... 

... she gets it. (I am trying not to lean into that pun but it's hard, you guys, it's hard...) Ahem. Anyway yes we have Patrick Wilson news! And it's good news! Him and his work-wife Vera Farmiga have both just been added to The Commuter, the new movie from director Jaume Collet-Serra of Orphan and more recently The Shallows fame.

The film is also re-teaming JCS with Liam Neeson, who's starred in three of his movies previously (Unknown, Non-Stop, and Run All Night) - Liam is playing "an insurance salesman in the midst of his daily commute who is forced by a mysterious stranger (Farmiga) to uncover the identity of a passenger before the train’s last stop." One assumes Patty is the passenger in question, but I suppose there's time to suss out the details... or maybe we just wait for the movie to come out, whatever.In summation, here's a picture of Patrick that Dagmara, the world's best wife, took for his birthday...

Julian Morris Seven Times

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It's a fine time to be a fan of the fine Julian Morris - this is the second big photo-shoot of him we've seen featured in as many weeks! Click here if you missed the last one; this one is via this website The Laterals and was shot by Anais & Dax. I like that shot above enough that I'm featuring it even though the type plastered across him makes me twitch!

There's also an interview with him at the link that includes more info from him on that Liam Neeson movie he's doing about Deep Throat (the political scandal not the porn movie, sadly). And if you hit the jump you can see four more shots...

Julian Morris Nine Times

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This shoot is via Imagista and was shot by Jonathan Bookallil - there's also an interview with Julian so click over if you wanna like read and stuff. I figured I should check IMDb and see what Mr. Morris is up to career-wise and was surprised to see that he's playing journalist Bob Woodward in an upcoming film called Felt...

 ... which is about Mark Felt aka the dude who turned out to be "Deep Throat." Liam Neeson is playing the lead, and the director is  Peter Landesman, who made Will Smith's recent film Concussion. The film also stars Tony Goldwyn, Josh Lucas, Marton Csokas, and Noah Wyle, so lots of lookers up in there. I hope it's good and puts some fire in Julian's career, then. Hit the jump for six more pics...
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I Am Link

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--- Super Wolf - Now that he's been cast it totally makes sense that Tyler Hoechlin is playing Superman on The CW's Supergirl series (thanks Mac) - I don't know why his name didn't occur to me when the word was going around that the show was looking to cast the role in the first place. Supergirl is run by Greg Berlanti, the openly gay dude behind basically all of the DC superhero shows on the small screen, and it's clear he learned some vital lessons from watching the Teen Wolf series which co-starred Hoechlin. Anyway Tyler is sure gonna fill out that suit nicely!

--- Drinking Buddies - Orlando Director Sally Potter is about to start filming a new movie, which is cause enough to celebrate, but wait til you get a load of her cast - Kristin Scott Thomas, Patricia Clarkson, Emily Mortimer, Cillian Murphy, Timothy Spall, Bruno Ganz, and Cherry Jones! That is a mad good buncha actors, people. The film is called The Party and much like the Peter Sellers movie of the same title is is set at a party. Imagine that.

--- Gods in the House - The first two pictures from American Gods have arrived! See them over at EW. The adaptation of Neil Gaiman's book, which we've already talked about a billion times, is being shepherded onto the small screen by no less than Hannibal and Pushing Daisies mastermind Bryan Fuller himself, so we expect greatness. In the picture you can see Ricky Whittle (dear lord look at Ricky Whittle) as Shadow Moon and Pablo Schreiber as Mad Sweeney the leprechaun; at the link you can see a couple of shots of Ian McShane in character too.

Oh and in the past couple of days there's been several roles cast, all men of color - the gorgeous Omid Abtahi (I've had a crush on him for ages) is playing Salim, while Orlando Jones and Demore Barnes have been cast as Mr Nancy and Mr Ibis, respectively. And here below is a picture of Omid, who you'll probably recognize from one of the thousand times he's been asked to play a terrorist (like Homeland or 24, for example):

--- The Ol' Oak Tree - The first poster for A Monster Calls, one of my most anticipated movies of the year, has arrived - get a look at it over at STYD. This movie is based on the heartbreaking and beautiful children's book by Patrick Ness, which I highly highly recommend. The film stars Sigourney Weaver, Felicity Jones, Toby Kebbell, and the rich deep baritone of Liam Neeson as a tree. Watch the trailer over here if you missed it.

--- Brain Drain - I haven't gotten a chance to read this one yet but The New York Times spoke with Charlie Cox about his currently-running play Incognito (oh I am sure they got a Daredevil question or two in there, if they know what's good for them) - you can read it over here. (Thanks Mac) There is a picture of him attached, to make the words go down smoother. I saw this play a couple of months ago and didn't love it, to be honest, but Charlie (everybody) was good.

--- Number Twos - I was going to just post this brief update (or rather non-update) from Winona Ryder about how she has no idea what's happening with Tim Burton and the Beetlejuice sequel right now (thanks Mac) but then I read this article at THR today talking about how Hollywood's current big problem is "Sequels That Nobody Wants" and I found that to be much more interesting a thing to share. And if that's the mindset that might put the brakes on a Beetlejuice 2 happening, honestly. Especially with the Burton connection, what with the Alice in Wonderland sequel being the reigning King of the Flops and all. Happy Childhood Memories be damned, I'd probably be willing to give up a Beetlejuice cash-grab if Hollywood promised to stop shitting out sequels. (HA.)
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I Am Link

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--- Sex Clown - Whoever's been in charge of Stephen King's It the past few years is absolutely determined Pennywise the Clown be played by a twink of some sort - a little over a year ago 23 year old Will Poulter was cast in the doomed Cary Fukunaga version, while today we're hearing that Mama director Andy Muschietti, who's directing the project now, has just cast Alexander Skarsgard's younger brother Bill in the role. You might know him from Eli Roth's godawful Netflix show Hemlock Grove, where he perked things up by getting his hot ass out. His brother taught him well. Anyway I kind of don't wanna be attracted to Pennywise so this news is weirding me out.

--- Marvel At That - The big news is coming hot and hard today - within five seconds of reading the previous story did I see this here headline, that The Babadook director Jennifer Kent is one of a couple of names up for the gig to direct Captain Marvel, Marvel's first superhero movie starring a (gasp) female. (I mean, can you imagine? Women don't even have penises, I don't know how they could possibly be superheroes.) And if you missed the news last night the rumor going around is that none other than Oscar winner and darling lovely Brie Larson is maybe probably going to be cast in the lead role. All I have to say about that is...

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EXCLUSIVE FIRST FOOTAGE FROM THE CAPTAIN MARVEL MOVIE pic.twitter.com/bNkH4VZmhE

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) June 2, 2016

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--- Final Forever - Stacie Ponder is requesting your attention, please! She's going to be celebrating her blog Final Girl's anniversary very soon and she'd like you to email her your Five Favorite Horror Movie Moments. Click on over to read exactly what she means, but this is your opportunity to be immortalized on the best blog in the entire world, so probably you should go ahead and do it.

--- Eastern Boys - Over at Pajiba our pal Kristy is using an interview with the actor Jack Choi, in which he legitimately bemoaned the desexualization of Asian men in Hollywood Movie-making, as a jumping off point to offer up many many suggestions of places that Hollywood could start. In other words, sexy men alert! There are several faces familiar to use here at MNPP offered, including our favorite Byung-hun Lee, whom we've gratuitized on several occasions - click here and then here for the especially good posts.

--- Skeleton Crew - It would be lovely if we could get a proper big-budget film from director Andrew Dominik of Killing Them Softly and The Assassination of Jesse James fame, since those are two of the greatest achievements of the new millennium cinematically speaking, but they both flopped kind of terribly so he's making music docs instead - that said I think a 3D concert film about musician Nick Cave grappling with the death of his son might turn out to be something extraordinary.

--- Who's Pure Now - Daniel Craig is making a twenty episode (spread over two seasons) series for Showtime called Purity, which is based on a book by Jonathan Franzen. (thanks Mac) Variety describes the story as "a morally complex story of youthful idealism, extreme loyalty and cold-blooded murder" which totally reminds me of Kramer reviewing that book on Seinfeld. "Unbridled enthusiasm" much? Anyway what this really means to me is that Daniel Craig and Eva Green, the sexiest Bond couple ever, have taken over an entire television network, and now I'm hoping for a cross-over. Daniel totally needs to show up on Penny Dreadful and make out with Josh Hartnett.

--- French Kisses - Alejandro Aja proved himself a fairly deft horror movie director with High Tension and the remake of The Hills Have Eyes, and then kind of petered out (although the Piranha remake had its moments). He's got a psychological thriller with Jamie Dornan in the can but it appears he's turning his attentions to a non-genre flick next - it's a period romance called The Marquis, about the "the doomed and passionate relationship between the Marquis Louis Henri de Montespan and his wife Athenais - the ambitious woman who became the mistress of Louis XIV."

--- Peaks Fever - They're really dragging the headlines out on this one but it's worth the hype - David Lynch's new episodes of Twin Peaks will begin to air in "the second quarter of 2017," which means sometimes in Spring, April to June-ish. I suppose eventually we'll have an actual proper date and I will share that too! Speaking of Lynch you should click over to The Film Experience today to consider the opening titles of Blue Velvet, because you literally have nothing better than that to do. I mean it. You don't.

--- Call Coming Later - If I were making a list of the five movies I'm most looking forward to this year JA Bayona's A Monster Calls would most definitely make it - an adaptation of the devastating children's book by Patrick Ness, it stars Felicity Jones, Sigourney Weaver, Toby Kebbell, Lewis MacDougall, and the voice of Liam Neeson, and the less I say about what it's about the better. I went into the book fresh and it hit me like a ton of bricks. But you can totally watch the first trailer, which keeps things pretty vague. Anyway the release date just got moved a week further away to October 21st, which is testing my patience. I want it now!
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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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Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

... you can learn from:

Kinsey (2004)

Clyde: You know what amazes me? There's no relation 

between how sexy a girl looks and her sex life. 

The ugly ones seem to get all the action. 

Clara: I always thought ugly was an ugly word. 

 Happy 45, Peter Sarsgaard! I hope your brother-in-law's 

helping you blow out your candles tonight.

The Monster Is Calling Me

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There might not be any movie coming out in the near future that I'm looking forward to more than I'm looking forward to A Monster Calls. (Find links to all of our previous posts on the film here.) Based on the heart-rending book by Patrick Ness (who also wrote the fantastic Chaos Walking trilogy) A Monster Calls stars Toby Kebbell (hey we were just talking about him) and Felicity Jones and newcomer Lewis MacDougall as a family facing adversity, with Sigourney Weaver as Grandmother (her part is probably much bigger than you think it's gonna be) and Liam Neeson voicing a great big scary tree monster. This sounds like weird stuff, but it is a beautiful and sad sad sad book and the first teaser trailer has arrived and it looks like they have maybe knocked it outta the park. I can't believe I have to wait a full year for this! It's out in October 2016.
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Good Morning, World

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I cannot for the life of me figure out what movie that picture (plus two more you'll eventually see down below) of shirtless Viggo Mortensen  is from so if anybody knows, let her rip. It's not really the reason we're here though - we're here because I saw Viggo's new movie Jauja this past weekend (it's so pretty you'll want to lick the screen but it's maybe a little too in love with its own staticity) and so I'm feeling Viggo right now which led me to...

... a set of pictures of him in the 1992 flick Ruby Cairo (also called Deception, co-starring Liam Neeson and Andie MacDowell) which I had never seen before and dear lord, this might be the hottest I've ever seen him.

How have I never seen these pictures before? Look at him! Unf. That's some prime Mortensen right there. Hit the jump for more, plus a couple more pictures from whatever that first movie is...