You're a Real Mads Man

(See more photos from this new shoot of Mads Mikkelsen right here) Extremely excellent news today that Pushing Daisies and Hannibal creator Bryan Fuller's deliriously delightful directorial debut Dust Bunny -- the big toothed monster movie starring Mads and Sigourney Weaver -- is indeed getting a physical media release! You never know these days. And it's a 4K disc no less, which drops on April 28th, and which you can pre-order right here. Here's a look at it:

You can read my review of this movie right here -- it's a shame this movie got such a small release because it's so much fun and so inventive and colorful and everythingm we associate with the Pushing Daisies meastro, but now that it'll be available this way I'm hoping, as I said in my review, that it proves to be a cult in the making. It's the perfect gateway horror flick to show your own kids or your nieces and nephews to turn them into psychos and sickos like we are!

I am totally stealing these from @bryanfuller.bsky.social elsewhere but dig these killer photos of Sigourney Weaver bts on DUST BUNNY. Congrats to her on her much deserved Saturn nomination for Best Supporting Actor!

[image or embed]

— Jason Adams (@jamnpp.bsky.social) March 8, 2026 at 2:22 PM

Hopping Mads

Heads up that one of 2025's best movies that placed on far far far too few lists of such things has hit VOD today -- Bryan Fuller's deeply dreamy and fantastically fun Dust Bunny! You can rent it right here and I really recommend you do -- as I said in my review (probably to Bryan's chagrin since I know he makes these things hoping for a broader audience) this has all the makings of a beloved cult movie to be and I trust it will find its place in the canon in time. Especially as gateway horror for the kiddos -- this should be a movie like Gremlins was for me; one that will breed horror movie fans for life. Watch the trailer back here if you missed it -- and I have paired all of this information with a nice set of Mads Mikkelsen photos (via) because obviously.

Hey My Review of Dust Bunny is Up Here

I've posted that photo of Mads Mikkelsen before (because of course I have) but I'm latching onto some of its eye-catch to direct said same eyes over to my Pajiba review of Dust Bunny, which went up today -- from our hero Bryan Fuller of Pushing Daisies and Hannibal fame, this movie stars Mads as as assassin who gets hired by a little girl to kill the monster under her bed and, well, tell me that's not already one hell of an idea from the get-go. But then you probably know all of this as I've been following this movie's progress for several years -- the important part is it's out in theaters now and I hope y'all try to go find a screen where it's playing. It's a perfect weird little wonder -- if every weekend the multiplex was stuffed with movies this imaginative and fun and outside-the-box the film industry could be saved. If not financially at least spiritually. Watch the trailer here if you missed it before. And then go throw your money at this magical movie dammit!

Murder in a Blue World

I know you're not supposed to review the movie you had in your head, you're supposed to review the movie you watched -- the one the movie-makers actually gave you -- but allow me a minute to indulge that destructive impulse of mine first. Because the second Avatar movie, 2022's The Way of Water, really made me think I knew what we were getting next (from a franchise I have mostly enjoyed, even while acknowledging that the films are obviouly very dumb) and I was excited about seeing it. 

In WoW we see Kiri (the young Sigourney clone) start to exhibit, with wicked coolness, super-powers where she can telepathically command the strange creatures of the sea to do her bidding. Now if you know anything about Cameron's extra-filmic obsessions you know he's all about deep sea exploration -- back in 2012 he became the first human being to pilot a one-man submersible into the Mariana Trench for god's sake! 

So anyway it didn't seem an extraordinary leap for my mind to imagine that the next film really would be capitalizing on Kiri's powers and taking us deeper into the ocean, allowing Cameron and his special-effects wizards to dream up an entire world of wild new creatures down there. Just imagine! I sure did. Deep sea life has been one of my obsessions since I was a wee little kid and saw my first image of a giant squid fighting a whale (pretty sure that's the image every kid sees first). I found myself giddy over the possibilities. Cameron using his seemingly bottomless access to hundreds of millions of dollars to deliver my childhood dreams? If the Avatar franchise is for anything that is very much what it is for. (Remember how the first movie really made us feel like we were flying on the back of a dragon like nothing had before?)

Anyway there's one scene in the disastrously boring and redundant Avatar: Fire and Ash where Cameron sort of goes there, unleashing a carnivorous pod of deep sea squid monsters -- well I guess it's two scenes since these creatures show up twice, but the second is really just more of the first. These creatures are very cool! And in so being only serve to highlight what the film is lacking otherwise -- imagination.

Because the entire story of Fire and Ash is been there, done that two times already, was sorta bored the second time so there's no excuse to be doing this all yet again, dude. We're introduced to a new colony of Na'vi, an aggressive deep-jungle tribe who worship fire and become obsessed with humankind's weaponry, hellbent as they are on killing everybody and becoming top of the heap. Which leads to a bunch of scenes we've seen a dozen times already with the kids getting in danger and fighting on sinking ships and yadda yadda so very many yaddas. 

There is one other highlight -- Oona Chaplin absolutely murders it as the leader of the Ash people, Varang. Pure camp, slinking around, hissing and shrieking, being a total vamp (she fucks!), one imagines if the Avatar franchise ever comes anywhere near drag culture it will be to celebrate sweet psychotic Varang. 

But as I said on Bluesky right after my press screening a few weeks back (seen below), all I could think wading through the unbearable sludge of Avatar: Fire and Ash's three-plus-hour runtime was the word "enough." I have had plenty. More than plenty. I am positively sick with plenty. James Cameron, we're begging you -- make something else! Cameron's ability with crafting an action sequence remains exquisite -- these scenes all look great and move great individually. We've just really seen enough of this blue shit, James! Enough for several lifetimes, and enough for several clone's lifetimes after those.

Oh guess that AVATAR embargo broke. I considered just writing one word: ENOUGH. I liked the first two but watching this one in a post-AI-poisoned world, a longing for reality overwhelmed me from the first frame & nothing rose above. Oona Chaplin and the squids are great. Otherwise... well, ENOUGH.

[image or embed]

— Jason Adams (@jamnpp.bsky.social) December 2, 2025 at 1:35 PM

I'm Not Mads, I'm Just Drawn That Way

One of my most anticipated movies of not just 2025 but the past several years is out today -- Pushing Daisies and Hannibal creator Bryan Fuller's Dust Bunny which stars Mads Mikkelsen as a hit-man who gets hired by a little girl (Sophie Sloan) who lives in his apartment building to kill the monster under her bed. You should go see it! I mean it! And I will have more words than that piddling bit of sage advice to share in order to convince you, just... not quite yet. My review's a little delayed due to a bevy of unforeseen circumstances (the sprained ankle I'm still dealing with is just one of them but it's had a helluva butterfly effect) but I will indeed be writing about the movie soon. Until then just take my couple of words for it -- it's a delightful, funny, rampaging charmer, clearly destined to be a cult classic for all those people adventurous enough to take a chance and wander into its weird little one-of-a-kind-world. Bryan is very good at making those! Anyway I've shared it before but here's the trailer, and stay tuned for more from me in the next few days on this wonderful, wonderful film.

We All Need a Little Mads Sometimes

We got a trailer for Bryan Fuller's film Dust Bunny last month along with word that the film is coming out on December 5th -- now we have a clip! Watch it above -- or don't because watching clips from movies out of context is usually a bad idea. I allow people to make up their own damn minds. I am just happy to take the chance to remind you that Dust Bunny is coming and that's a good thing to look forward to. We need those. I myself am seeing it next week at the Brooklyn Horror Fest and you will surely hear my opinion then, so stay tuned for that. 

Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

 ... you can learn from:

The Year of Living Dangerously (1982)

Guy: Goodbye, beautiful.

Jill: Watch out for the melodrama.

I've always loved that line so much -- "Watch out for the melodrama." This is such a great film, one of Peter Weir's best (and fuck if that ain't saying something, given Peter Weir's career), and no I will never let what a racist piece of shit Mel Gibson turned out to be rob me of this movie's glory so don't ask. Can it really be that this movie doesn't have a blu-ray release? Or at least an American one? Much less a 4K???? Just an old DVD!!! This is criminal! Actually what I need is for Curzon to put out one of their big beautiful box-sets of Peter Weir's filmography like they have for Lars Von Trier and Michael Haneke. Prized possessions, those beauties. 

Anyway long story short -- it's Sigourney Weaver's 76th birthday today! And we love her more than chocolate milkshakes so we wish her a very happy day. I'm going to be seeing her next new movie in a couple of weeks, and it's not just any ol' "next new movie" -- it's Bryan Fuller's Dust Bunny! As I told you it's screening at the Brooklyn Horror Fest here in NYC and I'll be there. See? There are good things still in the world. I too was beginning to wonder...

5 Off My Head - Brooklyn Horror 2025 Time!

Starting next week we'll be entering the annual "very quiet round these parts" portion of the calendar as I plunge head-first into the fall film fests -- first it's the New York Film Festival, then there's the autumnal edition of NewFest, and then kicking off on October 16th there's the Brooklyn Horror Fest, which I've been covering since year one. This is year ten! By the time Halloween comes I'm always completely blown out but it's worth it every time so I keep it up anyway, despite the years of my life I've no doubt lost to cinematic exhaustion. Anyway today BHFF announced their new line-up and you can see the entire thing right here, but I'm going to zero in on a few titles (five specifically) that I'm most excited about seeing. A few of the movies they're showing I've already seen at earlier fests this year (Tina "daughter of Geroge" Romero's queer zombie flick Queens of the Dead is a hell of a lot of fun) -- in fact one of them I've even reviewed! You can read my thoughts on the brilliantly surreal head-trip Buffet Infinity right here. But let's get to the rest!

5 Brooklyn Horror Tiles to Devour

Dust Bunny -- Obviously! Duh! This kiddy horror flick from Pushing Daisies and Hannibal genius Bryan Fuller screened at TIFF yesterday and they also dropped the trailer (right here) -- it stars Mads Mikkelsen and Sigourney Weaver and I haven't shut up about it for a very long time. And it looks like this will be my first opportunity to see it before it hits theaters on December 5th!

Boorman and the Devil -- This documentary about the making of John Boorman's disastrously-received Exorcist sequel just premiered at Venice last week and got a really good reception. Also the queer horror community being as small as it is we here at MNPP know some people who worked on this (including director David Kitteredge) and we've been hearing about its making for what feels like forever! Put it in my eyeballs!

This is Not a Test -- Although the official page for this (the Opening Night) movie on BHFF's website doesn't mention its queerness, Variety's article on the line-up does -- either way we dug director Adam MacDonald's former feature Pyewacket a lot and we're always on board a high-school-set zombie movie. 

Tinsman Road -- A new found-footage horror film from homosexual director Robbie Banfitch, director of the found-footage freak-out The Outwaters. I was slightly mixed on that one (although it has some excellent scares and atmopshere) but we support our people! Meaning "gays" but also "found footage horror movie lovers."

Violence -- Looking forward to this one mainly because it stars Rohan Campbell, who was done dirty by David Gordon Green's Halloween Ends. He was good in a terrible role, and we're giving him a second chance. Does it hurt that he's hot as hell? Of course not. We are but human.

-----------------------------------------

There are a heap more movies worth seeing so make sure you scan the entire line-up at the link, and if you're in NYC between October 16th and 25th then you owe it to yourself to celebrate the Hallow-season with some of these frights! Badges are on sale right now; individual tickets go on sale this Friday at Noon!

Behold the Dust Bunny Trailer!

A long long long awaited happy day here at MNPP HQ as Pushing Daisies and Hannibal creator and friend-of-MNPP Bryan Fuller's feature-film directing-debut Dust Bunny is premiering at TIFF tonight! No as I just said in my previous post I'm not in Toronto so I'm not there to see the movie yet but I'm still psyched for our friend and can't wait to see this myself. Starring Mads Mikkelsen as a contract killer who's hired by a little girl named Aurora (Sophie Sloan) to murder the monster that lives under her bed, we all don't have to feel as if we're missing out on seeing the movie tonight in Canada -- they just dropped the first trailer! Watch:

Goosebumps! It looks fuckin' incredible. Pushing Daisies meets The Matrix! Even better we-ve got a release date too and it's so much sooner than I expected -- it's out December 5th! Holy shit! It all looks spectacular but most of all I cannot wait to see what the monster that Bryan created looks like. This man's imagination is unparalleled. Also -- hey Sigourney...

Dust Bunny Lift Off

This news has been a long time coming -- Bryan Fuller's directorial debut Dust Bunny has given us our first official look and a release date! There you'll see stars Mads Mikkelsen and Sigourney Weaver -- down below you'll see the full image with child actor Sophie Sloan who I believe is the actual lead of the film. Anyway it's definitely serving some Pushing Daisies realness with all of the hyper-saturated pageantry on display, which obviously makes us very happy -- anything that makes us think of Pushing Daisies is gonna do just that. See all of my previous posts on this movie here -- the news had trickled to a slow drip for a long time which I do believe had to do with one studio getting swallowed up by another yadda yadda boring business shit I will not bore you with. All we need to know -- it's hitting theaters on December 12th! Draw a bouquet of flowers on that calendar square because we're getting gifted!

The Forever Alien / Aliens Debate

As I mentioned last evening yes I have seen the new Alien movie and yes you will hear my thoughts on it soon enough -- but before we get there I have a question, an utterly impossible question. I cannot answer this question myself, because whenever I try my body litterally splits itself in half and my innnards and skin sacks flop to the floor, halved. Nobody wants that. So I ask you people out there in the great beyond...

online polls

I'm no great fan of Ridley Scott nowadays, but I concede that he earned his rep as a master filmmaker once upon a time with his first few films and Alien is I think his crown jewel -- it's a perfect horror film with the series' greatest cast of characters. That said James Cameron's sequel is every inch as good to my eye, just scratching a very different kick-ass action movie itch. Anyway these two movies and the Giger-fueled nightmare worlds they built are the reason why this franchise will always rank among my favorites, and I am entirely incapacitated when asked to choose. So I am making you choose. And feel free to make your case in the comments.

People who defend Ridley Scott as still being a good filmmaker are... just not right

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) August 14, 2024

On a related note I re-watched Prometheus and half of Alien: Covenant last night and lord what slop they are. Beautiful looking slop, but good grief Ridley can't string together a coherent experience anymore. I do love staring at the utterly gorgeous cast of Prometheus though, and the scene where the snake thing kills Rafe Spall & Sean Harris is absolutely top tier horror.

Pic of the Day

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Jason Adams (@jasonaadams)

My review will be up on Friday or thereabouts so don't ask me what I thought just yet, but I did indeed see the new Alien movie Alien: Romulus last evening and the Alien nerd who lives inside my face was very excited about that fact, as seen above. They handed out facehuggers at the screening and I spent the entire movie staring at that thing at my feet, just waiting for it to pounce. Anyway I'm suprised to see after a quick scouring I haven't posted any of the trailers for this movie somehow? Inexplicable. So here's the trailer:

It's out Friday! Actually I'm sure they're dropping it late Thursday to grab some extra dough so maybe you'll see it before you even can read my review. But do come back and check, because I will have things to say. Plenty. And no none of them will be about how f'ing hot director Fede Alvarez is, but damn he sure is...

The Year of the Dust Bunny

I keep forgetting to direct y'all to Bryan Fuller's Instagram where he's been sharing a steady stream of Dust Bunny set photos of Mads Mikkelsen & Co -- the Pushing Daisies and Hannibal creator's feature film debut, click here to read my previous informative posts about Dust Bunny, which I've gathered is a childhood imagination horror film a la Pan's Labyrinth or my beloved Paperhouse. But I only know vaugely, as I'm trying to keep myself unspoiled. Still no release date on this but I can't imagine a world where it's not out this year. Hell I can't imagine us not having a trailer in the next few months. Oh and did I mention it co-stars Sigourney Weaver? Be excited!

Time To Listen To John Waters Again

I was wondering just the other day what was going to happen to legend and icon John Waters' annual top ten list now that ArtForum shat the bed -- well the smarties at Vulture snatched him up, that's what! His favorite 2023 movies are listed right here -- can't believe John Waters loved Oppenheimer, but here we are! That said per usual he always picks a couple I haven't seen, no matter how hard I try and there are three this time. I tragically missed Catherine Breillat's movie when it screened at the NYFF, and I hadn't even heard of the Éric Gravel or Ulrich Seidl movies. 

That said I did actually see the one he goes out of his way to say nobody will have seen -- Pierre Creton's deliciously bizzarre gay gerontophilic romance A Prince, which played for a hot second at NYFF, and he is correct -- it's ace. Everybody should seek it out, at least if you've got a taste for strange.

And he's also doing good work when he says that Sigourney Weaver is giving "the best performance of the year" in Paul Schrader's Master Gardener -- I really don't understand why this work isn't getting more love! I thought she was phenomonal here; it's her best and most complicated work in some time. Here is my review of that movie, which I really dug. Anyway check the whole list to see what Mr. Waters has to say about all ten of his faves. Of the seven I've seen there's not a rotten apple among 'em -- although my feelings on Oppenheimer are more mixed I do think it's Nolan's best work in a long time.

Three Thumbs Up: Ridley Scott

Well I haven't done one of these, my most backhanded of complimentary posts, in awhile! Indeed it's been so long that my old computer crashed and took with it the little thumb art that I made to go along with these posts but I think we can all agree that my rudimentary photoshoppery will not be missed. Anyway my "Three Thumbs Up" series is where I force myself to choose three things I like from an actor or a director or a whatever that I'm not especially a fan of. And today's lucky person is the fella I consider wildly overrated named Ridley Scott...

If only Ridley Scott’s movies were as good as his interviews

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) November 19, 2023

... who is turning 86 today and who has another messy slop-heap of a movie in theaters right now called Napoleon. Funny enough my last edition of this series was for Ben Affleck and one my choices was his role in Ridley's film The Last Duel -- a movie I genuinely loathe, except for Ben's performance. Funny -- right, Ridley? Hardy har. Anyway Ridley has some genuine masterpieces under his belt! I don't deny that! I just happen to think those happened many many decades ago and almost everything he's dropped since then has been stylish unfocused flim-flam. That said it's not like we're talking about someone deeply untalented. He remains an incredible crafter of images and atmosphere. I'm just of the mind that he's weirdly incapable of taking anything across the finish line anymore. His scripts are often to blame, but one gets the sense that he's chasing too many thoughts down too many tangents and (even worse) by the time the process is nearing completion he's just lost interest. (Fingers crossed he does right by Paul Mecsal in his Gladiator sequel.)

That said there are three movies he's made that I think

are genuine masterpieces. So let's focus on the good!

1. Alien

2. Blade Runner

3. Thelma and Louise

-----------------------------------------

Runners-up: Legend has its moments (i.,e. Tim Curry), as does the homoerotica of White Squall, and I like Prometheus more than most people even while I need to specifiy that I dig it as fun trash, full stop. And I genuinely loved The Counselor, as I think it was a truly madly deeply psychotic story that benefitted from Ridley's kitchen-sink approach, but I haven't re-watched it since it came out. And I have heard that the longer cut is even better, but then that's become the drum-beat with Ridley -- "Watch the director's cut, it's better!" But that's certainly not true about Blade Runner, and I still find Kingdom of Heaven a big honking snooze however he cuts it. 

Let's hear your thoughts on Sir Ridley in the comments!

Pic of the Day

Writer, now-director, and friend-of-MNPP Bryan Fuller shared this image of himself with his Hannibal leading man Mads Mikkelsen today, captioning it "Back in the saddle with this guy #dustbunny" -- if that hashtag means nothing to you then let me refer you to this post from November of last year where I told you about Dust Bunny, Bryan's directorial debut about "an eight-year-old girl who enlists the help of her intriguing neighbor to kill the monster under her bed that she believes ate her family." Now if you head to the IMDb page an even more intriguing fact if you can believe it reveals itself -- IMDb says that this movie will also co-star Sigourney Weaver? IMDb is the only place I see this reported -- all of the other links when you google it are talking about it being on IMDb. So is this true? I don't know. HEY BRYAN. I know you're directing your first movie right this minute or whatever but come answer my question, please! ETA we have confirmation, via the lips of Sigourney herself! This is from a chat with her a couple of weeks ago at the New York Social Diary:

"The industry finally realized, especially in the last few years, that people are interested in seeing older women in stories, not necessarily about older people, but just as part of a good tale. I’ve never been particular about leads versus supporting parts, so I’ve been able to find such an incredible assortment of roles in the last couple of years. Now, I’m about to go off to Budapest to do a wonderful small movie called Dust Bunny. I play another person who’s not so nice, opposite Mads Mikkelsen, the brilliant Danish actor (‘Casino Royale’), with a really talented writer/director, Bryan Fuller (“Hannibal’). And I have really beautiful costumes!”

Master Joel

I first saw Paul Schrader's new film Master Gardener, which stars Joel Edgerton as a former white supremacist turned horticulturist and Sigourney Weaver as his Plantation-owning boss, at NYFF last fall.  And then I saw it again a few weeks ago, in preparation for its release in theaters today. But it wasn't until I started writing about it for my review that I was really able to suss out  how much it actually has going on beneath its surface. So I don't think I even begin to scrape off its many layers in my Mashable review, read it here, but I try. What I was really aiming for is how the film's ambiguities are its strengths, but not in the shallowly provocative way you might expect. I think Schrader's light touch -- and yes, Paul Schrader uses a light touch here! -- enriches the film in ways that become more obvious the longer you sit with it. Also Sigourney Weaver's real good, and that helps. Anyway go read my thoughts, go see the movie and let me know what you think, and here's the trailer:

I, Blue Boys

I think there's only one movie out this weekend in theaters and that movie is James Cameron's Avatar sequel, which I reviewed right here -- it's worth seeing, I think. If you can go into it with an open mind, just expecting what it is. Anyway above is a photo (via) of actor Jamie Flatters, who plays the oldest son of Sam Worthington and Zoe Saldana's characters, meaning no he looks nothing like all that in the movie, unfortunately. In the movie he looks like this:

I never know how much of those Na'vi bodies to take as real bodies -- I mean is any of that butt-cheek even based on Sam Worthington butt-cheek? What a confusing world we live in today. No wonder everything is collapsing. Anyway for me personally there won't be any going to the movie theaters -- I'm planning on re-watching White Noise and The Eternal Daughter and probably Triangle of Sadness this weekend. (All of which I have screeners of.) The boyfriend hasn't seen any of those and I'm thinking about my list of favorite movies for 2022 and could use a re-watch on all of them. If y'all watch anything good -- or if you want to share your thoughts on Avatar -- hit up the comments, and have a great weekend!

Na Na Na Na'vi I'm Living Without You

It took me about an hour into Avatar: The Way of Water to feel the question, "Why the hell am I watching another Avatar movie again?" had been answered. It wasn't like some plot switch was flipped where the story or the characters suddenly became complex -- like the first film, Cameron is more than happy to just glide along with all of the ol' War and Westerns cliches and tropes. It's not really an answer I can pin down to words. (Like the script and its dialogue, hardy har.) No it's more of a feeling -- or perhaps the lack of one. A gleeful numbness. I suppose it just took that first hour for me to stop caring about any of those things and to find myself once again submerged under the spectacular weight of James Cameron's limitless visual imagination. I'll admit upfront I was a sucker for the first movie in 2009; I went to see it three times in the theater because goddamn what an exhilarating ride it was, once that same sensory-overload took over.

Avatar: The Way of Water does it again. Its last two hours fully beat me into giddy dumb submission. Cameron remains the finest director of action scenes alive -- nobody but nobody can cut together a sequence like he can that will have you truly feeling the wind in your hair... or I suppose in this case the water. This sequel feels like Avatar times Titanic times T2 plus a dusting of The Abyss on top for good measure. He wrings immersive beauty over and over and over again from sheer ridiculousness -- nothing about this should work, but we fully doubt James Cameron at our own folly. 

I don't feel much need to drown us in plot descriptions, because who cares? Some time has passed, Jake Sully's a dad and Neytiri's his big blue mama bear, and so we've got a raft of kids to get to know -- don't ask me to distinguish them all beyond "Teen Bad Boy" and "The Littlest One" yet, save most importantly the one called Kiri, inexplicably resurrecting Sigourney Weaver into the franchise (her character died and was like turned into a tree in the original right? Don't make me look that up please). Kiri is a waifish teenage horse-girl who dreamily stares into space and starts to discover hidden powers, and Kiri is a delight. One of the twenty Avatar sequels needs to be The Kiri Movie, I demand it. Avatar: Kiri O'Clock or whatever. Cameron makes the moolah, he can name the damn thing. As long as he makes the damn thing.

Point being Avatar: The Way of Water makes even the best MCU movies look like chin dribble. Cameron is so relentlessly efficiently skilled at the busting of blockbusters at this point that I don't know why anybody would even fuss to argue. Do I want other things in my cinema, of course. Will this come anywhere near my favorite film list of the year, of course not. But goddamn it's ruthlessly epic and entertaining and a staggering behemoth of big screen wizardry to behold. So get over yourselves and just behold the thing. Forget four quadrant filmmaking -- this sucker's fifteen wide. It's speaking immersive gibberish to the whales, so blow baby blow.

10 Off My Head: NYFF's 60th Main Slate!

As I sit here swampy and miserable from the relentless August sun there's one bright light that's not making me shield my eyes out of exhausted horror -- the New York Film Festival has today announced their full Main Slate of movies and man oh man am I excited! And it's not just because when I think of NYFF I think of myself comfortably wearing sweaters in the autumnal cool of late September, but that don't hurt. It's also because once again this fest is offering up the auteurs I come for -- this fall is promising to be a great one for us movie-lovers and NYFF makes it a one-stop-shop every damn time. 

I'll share the full press release down below, but first I'm going to highlight the ten titles from the Main Slate that leapt right off the page at me. Please note I am not including here the four gala films, which were announced earlier this month -- those are Noah Baumbach's White Noise is the Opening Night film; Laura Poitras’s doc All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (telling the dueling tales of photographer Nan Goldin and the billionaire family Sacklers prescription drug empire) is the Centerpiece film; Closing Night goes to Elegance Bratton's film about queer soldiers called The Inspection (see my previous posts about that right here); and finally there will be a special screening of James Gray's coming-of-age drama Armageddon Time. I am going to focus on just the Main Slate titles for this list.

My Most Anticipated 10 From NYFF60's Main Slate

Decision To Leave (dir. Park Chan-wook) -- I have been posting about this movie for two full years now, ever since the first whisper of it weaved its way through rando corners the internet; I shared the first trailer right here. Sounding like a Noir only shot in vivid color it's about an inspector falling for the wife of a murdered man (played by Lust Caution's great Tang Wei). Anyway Park is a Top 5 Living Filmmaker for me so this one's The Event of the fest from where I stand. This is PCW's first movie since The Handmaiden six years back, for god's sake! I am thirsty!

The Eternal Daughter (dir. Joanna Hogg) -- I liked Hogg's Souvenir sequel better than I liked the first one, but I'm glad she's making something else this time, and a lead role for Tilda Swinton will do the trick just fine, thank you. 

Pacifiction (dir. Albert Serra) -- I'm not an expert on Serra's filmography, having still only seen Liberté, his last film, at NYFF three years back. But when i think about memorable viewing experiences at NYFF the first one that comes to mind is Liberté, which they screened for press at nine in the morning and which consists mainly of an excruciatingly drawn-out and grotesque orgy in the woods astride 17th century royal France. It stunned me in a way that was often repugnant and a week hasn't passed since where it hasn't popped into my head. (Here is my review, by the way.) Anyway this new movie stars Benoît Magimel (best known here in the US as the hockey player that Isabelle Huppert's obsessed with in The Piano Teacher) in a "gripping, atmospheric thriller" about a French bureaucrat visiting a Polynesian island that includes "a resort that caters to the prurient exoticism of foreign tourists" and yeah, this sounds like the stuff.  

Stars At Noon (dir. Claire Denis) -- I posted about this one before when it was supposed to reunite Denis with her beloved vampire boyfriend Robert Pattinson; Rob dropped out because of Bat-related responsibilities and Joe Alwyn took over the role instead. Margaret Qualley stars opposite him -- it's an erotic political thriller or something of the sort, that's set in Nicaragua? I'm picturing Denis' version of The Year of Living Dangerously, basically.

Master Gardener (dir. Paul Schrader) -- Speaking of Sigourney Weaver movies, we have ourselves a Sigourney Weaver movie! I personally consider Paul Schrader more hit-and-miss than most critics and film fans seem to but there's no denying he's a writer and a director with a vision and a voice and it feels like it's been ages since Sigourney had a real proper leading role with one of those. That said I don't know if she is a leading role actually -- she plays the owner of a fancy estate garden which is kept up by Joel Edgerton's character, and he's one of Schrader's patented "dude with a troubled past come back to haunt him" types. But let's hope Schrader feels like reminding us what Siggy's capable of!

R.M.N. (dir. Cristian Mungiu) -- Anyone who's seen 4 Months, 3 Weeks, and 2 Days knows that Mungiu is obviously a great director, but I'm in this one for the plot, which is about a rural Transylvanian butcher whose wife goes mute after witnessing something horrible in the woods. I don't think it's going to be quite as horror-themed as that sounds, but it's the closest one in NYFF's line-up to horror! 

Showing Up (dir. Kelly Reichardt) -- Kelly Reichardt has never made a not great movie, full stop. And this is his first movie since her greatest movie First Cow came out in 2019. Not only that it reunites her with her favorite star actress Michelle Williams! There is no "no" here. Michelle's playing a sculptor in Portland; Hong Chao her landlord. Plot-wise it all sounds lighter than usual, but it will inevitably crack open out hearts and smash them into a million billion pieces because that's what these women do.

Scarlet (dir. Pietro Marcello) -- Per usual most of my reasons for seeing these movies are based on "I like the director's past work" and Marcello's last movie was the great great great Martin Eden -- consider me sold. And this is a French fable co-starring Louis Garrel! Consider me double!

TÁR (dir. Todd Field) -- Field hasn't made a movie since Little Children in 2006, which is totally and entirely inexplicable. But I suppose he only made one movie before that, the indelible In the Bedroom in 2001, so we don't know him well enough to know what's explicable really. All those two movies show is he's a director who should be directing more movies. This one is a big return though, starring Cate Blanchett as an orchestra conductor who loses her shit.

Triangle of Sadness (dir. Ruben Östlund) -- I shared the trailer for this movie just a few hours ago! Watch it here! Harris Dickinson is a male model on Woody Harrelson's super-yacht, cue depraved social commentary. I'm a big Östlund fan and this one seems as tailored to my specifications as The Square was a few years back.

----------------------------------------------------

The New York Film Fest runs this year from September 30th to October 16th, and you can expect lots of coverage from your truly here and on other websites, as I have been doing for something like a full decade now? I should go check and see which NYFF was my first press-accredited one. I've been going since I moved to NYC twenty-plus years ago of course, but I think I've only been official press for about a decade? Anyway it's my hometown beloved, and I can't wait. Now you may hit the jump for the full press release with the full Main Slate...