Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

 ... you can learn from:

Triangle of Sadness (2022)

The Captain: My government murdered Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Bobby Kennedy, and John F. Kennedy.. My government overthrew good, honest, democratic leaders of the people in Chile, Venezuela, Argentina, Peru, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Panama, and Bolivia. Along with Britain, we carved up the Middle East, creating artificial geographical boundaries and installing puppet dictators. War itself became our most lucrative industry. Every bomb that's dropped, somebody makes a million dollars. You don't have to know where those bombs are exploding. You don't have to see the grieving mothers and the mangled bodies of their children. Eugene Debs gave this speech in Canton, Ohio, in 1918: 'Throughout history wars have been waged for conquest and plunder... The master class has always declared the wars. The subject class has always fought... They've taught you to believe it to be your patriotic duty to go to war and to have yourselves slaughtered at their command... When Wall Street says war, the press says war.'"

Well that speech hits home in 2026, huh? Anyway a happy birthday to the great Swedish director Ruben Östlund today! I was super sad when I read that his next movie The Entertainment System Is Down wasn't ready for Cannes this year so he's holding it off for an entire year for Cannes 2027 -- what, you're too good for another festival, Ruben?? The supposed reason is he's gunning for a third Palme d'Or -- which would break the record -- but, and I say this as a big fan, this feels terribly presumptious, Ruben. I mean you can think this sort of thing inside of your head but maybe don't let that narrative out into the world -- that shit draws the knives all on its own, my man. That said with a fantastic-seeming cast including Kirsten Dunst, Keanu Reeves, Julie Delpy, Tobias Menzies, Daniel Brühl, Lindsay Duncan, Nicholas Braun and Connor Swindells, and a right-up-his-alley micro/macrocosm class-warfare story about a bunch of people trapped on a long flight where the entertainment system goes down and they all presumably lose their minds, I'm expecting good things. Which is why making us wait an extra year is deviant behavior!

Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

 ... you can learn from:

The Matrix Ressurections (2021)

Smith: What has the world come to 

when you can't even trust a program?

I feel like one day the world will get The Matrix Ressurections for the deconstructionist masterpiece that it is, but that day doesn't seem to be today (although I know I'm not alone on this island, so cheers to those of you who agree) -- anyway a happy 41st birthday to our boy Jonny Groff today! This is kind of a weird choice of a quote to celebrate him with -- something from Looking or Mindhunter probably would've made more sense, but I actually love watching our sweet boy get to play villainous in this flick. Great fun was had! But speaking of Looking -- anybody done a re-watch lately? I have very much been feeling a re-watch coming on. In summation, this photo of a Baby Groff that I have never seen before:

Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

 ... you can learn from:

I Love You to Death (1990)

Marlon: Is that legal... having sex with a kangaroo?

A very happy 61 to Keanu today! 

(Keanu is 61 wtf.)

Merry Whatever

Hope your halls are getting decked good this season!

Well that's that for 2024! A terrifying statement to make for anybody who can see what 2025 will likely hold, given the political situation here and plenty of places abroad. But since I unfortunately cannot self-immolate at will, we'll just have to ride the waves as they come, I'm afraid. It's hard to be optimistic! But we've got the safe space of MNPP, we've got gifs of Keanu Reeves being queeny -- I'm doing my part. In all seriousness I'm going to continue to try to focus on putting some goofiness and beefcake out into the world -- if some fatalism creeps in so be it, but we'll play with our instruments as the ship sinks dammit. This is our prerogative. Flutes for everybody.

If y'all are feeling generous in return, feel free to unload a donation to MNPP here or over in the right-hand column -- note I have added a subscription button so you can donate some bucks monthly if you see fit! And I know we're boycotting Amazon right now because Jeff Bezos (like every billionaire alive) is a fuckwit piece of shit, but here is our Amazon Associates link since it's one of the few options I have to make money off this site since Google removed advertising because they didn't like all the beautiful bums I was sharing with you. HOW DARE THEY. Anyway I pledge to use those Amazon pennies to help bring down the billionaires in the forthcoming class war or whatever. One bare bum at a time, if that's what it takes! Oh and also I'll remind you that you can also buy my awesome shit on eBay! I have heaps of movie stuff listed over there -- blu-rays, vinyl, etc -- and I'll probably spend a chunk of my vacation time listing more. 

Okay enough with the clanging of the begging bells. Follow me on my socials if you don't already and y'all have a great rest-of-2024 -- we'll see you next year. (January 2nd to be precise.) 

Take Us Into the Weekend, Matty...

These photos of Matt Bomer flaunting it on the set of his upcoming Hollywood satire Outcome (via) have been around for most of this week but I felt as if they'd be the perfect thing for the top of the site as we head into the weekend, so I saved them. Much like Matt Bomer exercised his glutes I exercised restraint! I'd rather have Matt's glutes than my restraint but we make do with what we do have, as ever. Outcome was written and is being directed by Jonah Hill and is a comedy about a famous actor (played by Keanu Reeves) forced to atone for his past after "bizarre video footage" from his past surfaces -- clearly Hill is tackling his own brush with cancelation and if it wasn't for these photos of Bomer my god I could not care less about this movie. But here we are! Such is the power of Matt Bomer in short shorts. Have a good weekend, everybody, and you can start it out that way if you hit the jump for several more photos of this gratuitous spectacle of perfect flesh...

Come Fly Away With Brühl

Triangle of Sadness director Ruben Östlund is definitely in a league right now among international directors like Yorgos Lanthimos who could get any damn actor they want for their movies, and so it's no surprise that the names that have been dropping for his next have been next level -- it started with Keanu Reeves, and now today we find out that both Daniel Brühl and Kirsten Dunst will be joining him in Östlund's next, titled The Entertainment System Is Down. As I told you when Keanu was announced the movie basically sounds like Lord of the Flies on a plane -- a bunch of people get trapped on an airplane and class chaos ensues. This movie, given that plot, will probably have an Airport-sized cast -- meaning the 1970 movie Airport, not that they could fill an entire airport, although the difference between those two is merely perspective. So I imagine we'll have a lot more big name announcements ahead! Östlund has apparently bought an actual 747 to film on so he'll have the space!

Keanu's on a Plane

Don't ask me why I decided to use that ancient photo of Baby Keanu for this post -- it just seems to harken back to a simpler, smilier time, I suppose. I doubt he'll have opporunity to be so uncluttered and innocent in the movie he's just signed up for today -- he is going to star in the new film from The Square and Triangle of Sadness director Ruben Östlund! It's a social satire (what else) called The Entertainment System Is Down and it is about what happens on a long airplane haul flight when, you guessed it, the entertainment system goes down. Apparently Östlund has talked about this project before, as he's been working on it for awhile. It's good to see Keanu do some comedy again though -- although I suppose when it comes to Östlund you have to put "comedy" in quotes -- since it's always been a treat the few times he's played comedy. Excuse me -- "comedy."

5 Off My Head - The Hottest Criterion Covers

They say sex sells, but the art-house media empire known as Criterion doesn't often subscribe to that notion. Sure their streaming service sometimes sluts it up with timed collections catering to such tastes. But when it comes to the actual physical media releases they put out? Let's just say they're not regularly porning up the shelves at your local neighborhood Barnes & Noble. Don't believe me? Just look at the artful but limp covers they gave us for notoriously horny movies like David Cronenberg's Crash and John Schlesinger's Midnight Cowboy:

Which is why last week's reveal of the cover art for Rainer Werner Fassbinder's Querelle (hitting those shelves in June) came at us like such a happy punch in the privates. Designed by the artist Astra Zero (follow them on Instagram here) the cover is appropriately horny for RWF's horny, horny final film, which we're ecstatic to see getting a proper release at last. But it got me thinking -- what other Criterion covers have stirred my (admittedly easily stirred) loins? So I made a list! And do keep in mind that I am extremely homosexual, so my list echoes those credentials. Make your own lists, straights! (Also clearly the Querelle one trumps everything else and should be considered #1 above all of these from here on out. It already won!)

The 5 Horniest Criterion Covers (Besides Querelle)

Claire Denis' Beau Travail -- I'm not as big a fan of Denis' 1999 erotic treatise on masculinity as a lot of you are, or as would typically make sense, given the film's notable focus on hard half-naked male bodies swinging around in hypnotic unison. But that doesn't mean I can argue with the shadowy visage of actor Grégoire Colin's bared, slick torso. I bought this disc even though I don't love the movie just because of the cover!

Jacques Deray's La Piscine -- I could have used any Criterion cover that has Alain Delon on it (his jawline on the Purple Noon cover could create a cult all on its own) but, even if a bit hetero to my linking, half-naked Alain & Romy Schneider clenched up in ecstacy is about  as hot and sweaty as these things get. Let's not get in the way of their erotic lifestyle!

Gus Van Sant's My Own Private Idaho -- Two of the most beautiful and sensitive movie stars on my early teen years at the height of their beauty and sensitivity, rocking hustler ennui while strapped to one another on the back of a motorcycle -- you can't see that the motorocycle is there in the cover image but you can probably feel it, humming between your thighs all the same. And if not, well, they sure are on top of each other huh? 

Andrew Haigh's Weekend -- Seeing actor Chris New working his way down actor Tom Cullen's naked body again this rumpled mid-coitus snapshot image slams you right back there into the middle of this 2011 masterpiece of intimacy from Haigh and you realize -- oh right that's where I have wanted to be all this time. Back in bed with those two!

Carl Franklin's Devil in a Blue Dress -- Sometimes all it takes is peak Denzel Washington in a white tank top, what can I say?

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

Runners-up: Joyce Chopra's Smooth Talk, Yukio Mishima's Patriotism, Paul Schrader's The Comfort of Strangers, Alfonso Cuaron's Y Tu Mama Tambien, Wong Kar Wai's In the Mood For Love, Stephen Frears' My Beautiful Laundrette

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

What would be your picks for Criterion's horniest covers?

Quote of the Day

"It’s a love story between two men set in the 30s that has explicit sexual content that or at least it challenges you with the sexual relationship between these two men. One is a Native American character and one is a corrupt cop in LA. It’s set in the 30s. They have to flee L.A. ultimately and go to Mexico. But it’s a love story and with a strong sexual component. And what was so remarkable is that it all started with Joaquin having some ideas and some thoughts and just questions and images. And he came to me and said, “Does this connect to you at all?” And I was like, “Yeah, this is really interesting.” And so we would just be on the phone talking and it developed into a script... [Joaquin] He had fragments of ideas and then I started to formulate them into an actual narrative. And then I brought my wonderful, brilliant friend John Raymond, with whom I collaborated with on “Mildred Pierce” into the process. Basically it was just this wonderful, organic way to create the script. And Joaquin was pushing it further into more dangerous territory, sexually."

That is the legendary Todd Haynes, director of Far From Heaven and Velvet Goldmine and Carol and the forthcoming (opening NYFF in a few weeks!) May December, dropping the deets on his next project, a "sexually explicit" gay romance starring Joaquin Phoenix, to Variety. Read the whole thing here, although the rest of it is mainly about May December and you might not want to read all of that if you are like me and haven't seen that movie yet. I find it super interesting that Joaquin is being all, "Gimme some gay sex, Todd!" But then I remember who his brother was...

... and it's maybe not so weird. Has Joaquin played gay before? Now that I think about it -- wasn't he in talks to do Brokeback back in the day? Anyway good for him, get that dick, Joaquin. I'm sure Rooney won't mind. Todd does say they don't know who will play the Native American half of the couple -- that they'll probably find an unknown -- but Todd, Todd, Todd! Martin Sensmeier is standing right there! (See my big post on Martin Sensmeier right here.) Somebody get Martin Sensmeier's agent Todd Haynes' phone number immediately!

Quote of the Day

“I have particular things I will never see. I will never see any ‘Star Wars’ films, because I resent that I know so much about them and the characters. Why is all that in my head when I’ve never actually seen one, you know? Why do I know about R2-D2 and Darth Vader and all these things when I’ve never even seen any ‘Star Wars’ film? ... I’ve never seen ‘Gone with the Wind’ and I never will, just because I feel like it’s forced on me and it’s some kind of corny thing. ... But I watch all kinds of stuff. On a plane recently I watched ‘Cruella.’ I love the ‘Naked Gun’ movies because they’re so stupid. I’m sort of amazed by the ‘John Wick’ movies, just by how many people he can kill. I haven’t seen the ‘Twilight’ movies. ... These are very subjective, just kind of stubborn things on my part. I don’t like mass things being shoved on me, but I will go see them. Like ‘The Terminator’ is a masterpiece of cinema. It’s a big action movie, essentially. So I don’t really differentiate. ...

But I have to tell you one thing I hate — and you can just do a little test yourself: watch any recent action-oriented movie and look for any shot that’s more than three seconds long. I find that really insulting and shit filmmaking: like they have to keep it moving every three seconds. And that’s the longest they’ll leave a shot on! And then cut. One second, cut! Two seconds, cut! Three seconds, cut! Man, I get a headache. I just turn it off. I’m like, Come on, man, go to film school! Watch something! Go read a book! Look at a painting! Look at something. This is nonsense. I can’t stand that."

I just went ahead and plopped down the entirety of what director Jim Jarmusch said to Believer mag about where he stands with regards to Pop Culture because -- my god, am I Jim Jarmusch? I mean I'm not the world's biggest Jarmusch fan -- my favorite movie of his is probably everybody else's least favorite, his zombie comedy The Dead Don't Die -- but he and I as people seem to have an awful lot in common. Not that I haven't seen the Star Wars movies -- I have, and more than once -- but I one thousand percent get where he's coming from. Indeed it's a lot of what I was getting at when I wrote about Barbie last week. That movie itself is fine, it's fine, but I actively resent that it's what an artist like Greta Gerwig is forced to work with by the system, and its bonanza box-office success -- while I can recognize the good stuff (A woman dominated product breaking box office records! It's not a superhero movie!) -- just depresses me. So let people sneer at things, is my point. Snobbery is sometimes good! The democratization of culture has good things about it, but the idea that everybody has to appreciate the same things and hate the same other things is exhausting. 

Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

 ... you can learn from:

Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992)

Professor Abraham Van Helsing: Civilization,

and syphilization, have advanced together.

One of the foundational films of my film-loving life, Francis Ford Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula, premiered in Los Angeles on this day thirty years ago. Which means that this is also give or take the thirty year anniversary of me kicking a hole in my mother's bedroom door because she refused to let me go see the R-rated movie I so desperately wanted to see. Ahhh memories!

Funny enough I only this year saw the movie for the first time on the big screen when the Paris Theater here in NYC played it -- it was as spectacular as expected, and the next time I'm home I might have to kick a hole in my mother's bedroom door again for keeping me from the experience for thirty full fucking years. What a movie! 

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Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

... you can learn from:

Knock Knock (2015)

Bel: It's like destiny that we were meant to meet.

Do you believe in destiny, Evan?

Evan: I'm an architect, so obviously I believe in things

happening by your own design.

Bel: Well... I do. I don't think people just pick randomly.

I think that, if we are here together, it's because there's

something we have to learn from each other.

A happy 50th birthday to Eli Roth today! Listen, I don't miss the Aughts era of "Bro Horror" anymore than any sane person would, but I still maintain that Eli Roth's early films -- meaning the original Cabin Fever and the Hostel movies -- were smarter about the xenophobia and sexism that they've been bluntly labeled with as of late. I still think those movies were sending up our shitty American instincts more than they were being a straightforward indulgence of them. That said I'll admit I haven't watched them in a decade, so maybe a re-watch would disabuse me of my romantic notions towards them? But he still made Knock Knock in 2015 and that movie's feminist as hell, and presaged the #MeToo movement pretty smartly. Plus Cate Blanchett loves working with him -- she's re-teaming with Eli for his Borderlands video-game adaptation next, alongside Jamie Lee Curtis and Haley Bennett and Gena Gershon and Cheyenne Jackson and Edgar Ramirez! (Not to mention it was co-written by the dude who made the phenom Chernobyl series!) Oh my! So who are you to question Queen Cate? In summation...

Good Morning, World

Is it really possible that Keanu Reeves did a sultry slutty hustler-tinged daguerrotype cover-shoot by Matthew Rolston for Interview Magazine in 1990 (circa My Own Private Idaho of course, but different from the issue that Keanu did with River Phoenix seen here) and I had never seen it until yesterday? Not only possible, but the devil's honest truth -- Interview posted one of their flashbacks on their site to it last night and I was like, "Wha huh?" Just like that. "Wha huh?" I even said it out loud and everything. If a Keanu wears short jean shorts and MNPP doesn't notice, did it really happen? A question eternal, finally answered. Yes, it not only exists -- it thrives. Hit the jump for all I could scavenge up...

Good Morning, World

Nobody's done me better for these "Good Morning" posts over the years than former Sense8 star Miguel Angel Silvestre -- whenever I need something, he got something. (And what a something, what several somethings, they is.) I wish I got to see him you know act as much as I got to see him you know this...

... but if not both then definitely one of these things please. These are more photos for that razor campaign I shared some photos from last week (right here), via his Insta of course. In related news did anybody catch the cameo his Sense8 character (an actor named Lito) apparently made in the new Matrix movie? The Wachowskis of course hired several of their actors from that show but sadly not Miguel, but I heard there was... 

... a theater marquee advertising one of Lito's movies, and sure enough, one google later, there it be (click to embiggen). That's fun. That's a non-obnoxious Easter Egg that doesn't stop the plot and shout at itself like let's say every single thing that happens in the last Ghostbusters movie. Anyway that also makes me realize I haven't said anything about The Matrix Resurrections since break ended? WTF, Me. I don't have a ton to say about it -- I thought it was a lot of fun and romantic and clever and ...

The entire nighttime city streets chase sequence in The Matrix Resurrections is probably The Action Set-piece of this year, jaw dropping, horrifying, absolutely gorgeous, and people are saying the film’s action is lackluster?? What do people even want anymorrrrr #Matrix pic.twitter.com/yXuNw97V4z

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) December 24, 2021

... had that. And our boy Groff was a hoot. It's definitely my second favorite Matrix movie now, after the first one (which remains utterly and completely perfect). Other people have written much more interesting things about it than I have to say (clearly). I recommend it though. And I also recommend you hit the jump for three more pictures, while we're at the whole recommending things...

Quote of the Day

"We have to have this physical agreement with each other, and this trust with each other – we’re gonna get a little bruised, and we’re gonna make mistakes, and that’s okay."

That's Jonathan Groff talking about doing fight-scenes with Keanu Reeves in the new Matrix movie to GQ, but taken out of context I think it's alright for us to contemplate Jonathan & Keanu talking that way toward each other about many things. Or several, anyway. I didn't think I'd read the whole GQ interview with Groff (I tend to skim) but a majority of it was spent talking about how much he likes working out now and so natch, I got sucked in. Let's hope he's got a project lined up where he gets to show off this gym-bunny phase then, since I doubt his role in the Matrix gets him out of his black suit. (I wouldn't scoff at a third season of Looking, for instance!) Hit the jump for three more GQ pictures...

Keanu Reeves Fifteen Times

I have been checking the guild screenings page for the fourth Matrix film at least twice a day for the past several weeks, just in case they've started scheduling screenings for the only 2021 movie that remains for me to see that I actually truly am dying to see -- this crawled up on me unexpectedly circa the last trailer for the film; I really didn't like the second and third Matrix films and greeted the original news of a new one with a weary shrug, but then all of a sudden nostalgia swooped in like a One-i-fied Neo and got me but good. (I blame the pandemic.)

Anyway that film's out in exactly one month so it's got to start screening for Important People (i.e. not me) relatively soon and we'll surely start getting buzz any day now. On the PR Buzz front the One himself, Mr. Keanu Reeves, has just today popped on on the cover of December's Esquire -- you can read the interview here. It's very long so I'm saving it for lunch myself, so I can't quote it at you. But I can give you the photo-spread! Hit the jump for that...

Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

you can learn from: 

My Own Private Idaho (1991)

Scott: Why, you wouldn't even look at a clock unless 

hours were lines of coke, dials looked like the signs of 

gay bars, or time itself was a fair hustler in black leather.

Happy 30 to My Own Private Idaho! Released today, 1991.

I miss River Phoenix. At least we still got Keanu.

Ooh thanks to @InterviewMag for scanning the Keanu & River photoshoot from their November 1991 issue! https://t.co/5lZjA8cqp9 pic.twitter.com/XaqCqpOn7l

— Jason Adams (@JAMNPP) August 25, 2021

Good Morning, World

Happy 57 to Keanu today! Honestly we should just made today a holiday -- September 2nd we all get to sleep in, not brush our hair, defuse a bomb on a bus, surf, have sex with three vampire brides at once, get revenge for our dog, play some guitar, meditate, and make out with River Phoenix. It's a day for everybody, really!

 

I'm sure you noticed I left any reference to The Matrix out of that "To Do" list, but that was on purpose, because I wanted to talk The Matrix -- specifically The Matrix: Resurrections, which is what they revealed the title for the fourth film to be earlier this week. Is anybody esle finding themselves crazy excited for this movie all of a sudden? The second and third films were so wonky I'd long ago lost my boner for the franchise but having re-watched the first film recently and just a general nostalgia for the Before Times (The Before Everything Went To Shit Times), well I think it's creating a perfect Matrix Storm. For me anyway. You?

Good Morning, World

Happy Monday, everyone! Gracing our week-starts with some vintage Keanu for no big reason other than, you know, Vintage Keanu. In truth I saw these old Vanity Fair photos going around over the weekend while I was laid up with a pulled muscle (minds out of the gutters) and thought about, you know, pulling another muscle. (Minds back in the gutters, then.) Pretty sure I've never posted these before, at least never in this hi-quality at least, so enjoy! let's get the week started right. Keanu is the good vibes.

Everything You Ever Need To Know About Life...

 ... you can learn from:

To Die For (1995)

Jimmy: Any time it rains, or when there's 

thunder and lightning, or when it snows, 

I have to jack off.

A happy 25 to Gus Van Sant's best movie.

All due apologies to My own Private Idaho, 

but this is a factual statement. Come at me!

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