You may have heard the news that Sony plans a big-screen adaptation of Sabrina the Teenage Witch , the animated series that yielded the Melissa Joan Hart cult TV favorite from the ’90s. This time, though? She’s a superhero . “The live action film will be an origin story in the vein of Spider-Man , about a young girl coming to terms with her remarkable powers,” writes Mike Fleming at Deadline. Of course. I guess it’ll work, but I can think of at least 20 TV characters off the top of my head whom I’d sooner see grappling with hero issues: 20 . Omar Little 19 . Erica Kane 18 . Special Agent Dale Cooper 17 . The Fonz 16 . George Costanza 15 . Diane Chambers 14 . Brandon Walsh 13 . Columbo 12 . J.R. Ewing 11 . Kenny Powers ( obviously ) 10 . Butters 9 . Laura Ingalls Wilder 8 . Rudy Huxtable 7 . George Jefferson 6 . Sam the Butcher 5 . Lou Grant 4 . & 3 . Sanford & Son 2 . Carmela Soprano 1 . Squiggy Who else? [ Deadline ]
Fully-certified flop Wanderlust might have sold a few more tickets if it had actually done anything remotely interesting with Jennifer Aniston and the rest of its talented female cast . It’s obviously not new that Hollywood doesn’t quite know what to do with comedic actresses (see also Faris, Anna ). But it is a little sad in the wake of Bridesmaids ’ commercial success – and its Oscars cameo over the weekend – that the rest of the film industry still. Doesn’t. Get It. I did enjoy parts of Wanderlust , when I could peer around all the lazy, tiresome clichés about How Women Act – but it would have been so easy to avoid them! So as a service to writers and female audiences everywhere, here are five suggestions for how to write comedy roles for women that are better than what Aniston had to make do with in Wanderlust . (Spoilers and feminism ahead.) 1. Stop using us as Eve. Bridesmaids was really good at creating drama out of its characters’ own bad decisions – they screwed up, they suffered the consequences, they (sometimes) figured out how to fix things. Wanderlust just blames Aniston’s poor Linda for everything. First she convinces her husband to buy a West Village apartment they can’t really afford – a plan that fails so spectacularly that the couple has to flee New York for, shudder, suburban Atlanta. Then she convinces her husband to stay in the hippie commune with free love, rampaging nudist men, and no doors on the toilet. Ensuing marital problems? Mostly her fault! “I drank the Kool-Aid,” she tells Paul Rudd’s George during their tearful climactic reunion. His better instincts to avoid the commune, its peyote and the bared abs of Justin Theroux are all vindicated, of course. 2. Write age-appropriate characters for protagonists older than 31. Don’t get me wrong, Aniston looks fabulous. I want her wardrobe and her legs. But she’s already played an unemployed 30-something unsure of what she wants to do with her life – six years ago, in Nicole Holofcener’s much sharper Friends with Money . By now both Aniston and the 42-year-old Rudd seem a little too old to play young Manhattanites still figuring out what they want to be when they grow up. And it would be funnier if Linda really embraced the hippie commune life after leaving a steady or rewarding job, not just because she doesn’t have anything better to do with her time. Maybe it’s just the looming prospect of my own 30th birthday and all the significance that’s supposed to have, but watching the 43-year-old Aniston still trying to “pick a major,” as her husband says during an argument, was just depressing. Like watching Private Practice . 3. Give us some friends! Come on, this is pre- Bridesmaids – the entire Sex and the City franchise succeeded by understanding that women like talking to, crying to, and criticizing other women. But Wanderlust weirdly goes out of its way to avoid giving Linda any family, friends or visible non-marriage relationships she can turn to in a crisis. After George loses his corporate bonus-slave job, we’re told that the couple’s fate is dire – so dire that staying with his loud, racist brother is apparently their only viable option (at least until the commune appears on their GPS). At no point is any reference made to any sort of connections Linda might be able to turn to. Wanderlust couldn’t get Catherine Keener to film one scene as an icy careerist sister silently disappointed in her unemployed younger sibling? Or at least make a reference to Linda’s wealthy parents, who lost everything with Bernie Madoff? (You don’t get to be 43 and still picking a major without having spent your adulthood on some serious family financial support.) 4. Character development means more than taking off our shirts. Despite the rumors , we do not see Aniston’s breasts in Wanderlust . We’ll just have to make do with her implied breasts. And in the final overall film, yes, there are probably many more manly bits than lady parts visible on screen. That still doesn’t change the fact that Linda’s major triumph as a character is flashing a TV camera crew, in a “protest” move that was dated by the time she was born. 5. Hot women tend to appreciate hot men, or at least cute men, or at least men who have a passing acquaintance with shampoo. Real-life relationships notwithstanding, Aniston really gets the short end of the free-love stick in Wanderlust . George wants to take advantage of the commune’s partner-swapping rules and sleep with blonde, freshly-laundered Malin Akerman, who’s popped by from a Self magazine cover shoot. Linda reluctantly agrees and succumbs to the shirtless charms of Theroux. He may be dashing in real life, but unfortunately for Linda and female audiences everywhere, he spends most of the movie looking like a squirrel crawled atop his head and died. And really, doesn’t equality start with eye-candy? Maria Aspan is a writer living in New York whose work has appeared in The New York Times, Reuters and American Banker. She Tweets and Tumbls .
‘The Bodyguard’ actor relives pop diva’s first screen test in a poignant eulogy on Saturday at New Hope Baptist Church. By Rebecca Thomas Whitney Houston and Kevin Costner in “The Bodyguard” Photo: Warner Bros. On Saturday afternoon (February 18), Whitney Houston was sent to rest by family and friends at New Hope Baptist Church in Newark, New Jersey, during a stirring funeral dubbed her Home-Going. While the pop diva’s onetime leading man Bobby Brown reportedly left moments before the noon ceremony began, the pop diva’s onscreen leading man Kevin Costner delivered a poignant eulogy in her honor. In 1992, Houston made her film debut in “The Bodyguard,” a star turn that paired her in the lead with Costner in the title role. Written by Lawrence Kasdan and directed by Mick Jackson, the romantic drama followed Frank Farmer, a Secret Service agent-turned-bodyguard tasked with protecting pop star Rachel Marron from a stalker. The film would go on to gross more than $400 million at the worldwide box office, and the diamond-selling soundtrack spawned Houston’s game-changing rendition of “I Will Always Love You” , the best-selling single of all time. But according to Costner, Warner Bros., the studio behind “The Bodyguard,” not only had to be convinced that the film’s signature song should be a cover of Dolly Parton’s country tune — but also that the part should go to Houston. “At the height of her fame as a singer, I asked her to be my co-star,” Costner recalled on Saturday. Filmmakers were concerned, however, suggesting they should “think about another singer … maybe somebody white.” Though Costner conceded “nobody ever said it out loud,” he agreed that the implications were fair considering how much was at stake. The only problem was, as Costner put it, “I thought she was perfect for what we were trying to do.” Costner remained steadfast about his casting choice, even delaying production by a year so that Whitney could complete a tour. And though the actor knew he’d already all but given her the part, he submitted her to a screen test because he wanted to be “fair.” Houston, possibly the biggest pop star at the time, was frightened. Costner went to her trailer the day of the test and to reassure her, holding her hand and telling her that she looked beautiful. Still, the singer zeroed in on a million things she imagined to be wrong. Feeling insecure, Houston scrubbed her camera-ready makeup job in favor of the thick layer of cover-up she used on the road. The patina of cosmetic paint was perhaps an apt metaphor for how the megastar masked her insecurities. Of course, four minutes in, Houston’s makeup job was streaking; the singer was devastated. “I just wanted to look my best,” she told Costner. “Call it doubt, call it fear, I’ve had mine,” Costner said of the internal struggles that come with fame. “The Whitney I knew, despite her success and worldwide fame, still wondered, ‘Am I good enough? Am I pretty enough? Will they like me?’ It was the burden that made her great and the part that caused her to stumble in the end.” Houston famously battled substance abuse issues, in particular during her tumultuous 14-year marriage to singer Bobby Brown. She was found dead a week ago in a Beverly Hills hotel; the official cause of her death is still being investigated . But Costner insisted her personal turmoil should not muddy her legacy. “As the debate heats up … about the greatest singer of the last century, as the lists are drawn, it will have little meaning to me if her name is not on it,” Costner proclaimed to applause. “Off you go, Whitney, off you go,” Costner continued tears, “Escorted by an army of angels to your heavenly father. And when you sing before him, don’t you worry — you’ll be good enough.” Stay with MTVNews.com all day Saturday for continuing coverage of Whitney Houston’s funeral services. Related Videos Whitney Houston: In Her Own Words Related Photos Friends, Family And Fans Show Love At Whitney Houston’s Funeral Related Artists Whitney Houston
‘The Bodyguard’ actor relives pop diva’s first screen test in a poignant eulogy on Saturday at New Hope Baptist Church. By Rebecca Thomas Whitney Houston and Kevin Costner in “The Bodyguard” Photo: Warner Bros. On Saturday afternoon (February 18), Whitney Houston was sent to rest by family and friends at New Hope Baptist Church in Newark, New Jersey, during a stirring funeral dubbed her Home-Going. While the pop diva’s onetime leading man Bobby Brown reportedly left moments before the noon ceremony began, the pop diva’s onscreen leading man Kevin Costner delivered a poignant eulogy in her honor. In 1992, Houston made her film debut in “The Bodyguard,” a star turn that paired her in the lead with Costner in the title role. Written by Lawrence Kasdan and directed by Mick Jackson, the romantic drama followed Frank Farmer, a Secret Service agent-turned-bodyguard tasked with protecting pop star Rachel Marron from a stalker. The film would go on to gross more than $400 million at the worldwide box office, and the diamond-selling soundtrack spawned Houston’s game-changing rendition of “I Will Always Love You” , the best-selling single of all time. But according to Costner, Warner Bros., the studio behind “The Bodyguard,” not only had to be convinced that the film’s signature song should be a cover of Dolly Parton’s country tune — but also that the part should go to Houston. “At the height of her fame as a singer, I asked her to be my co-star,” Costner recalled on Saturday. Filmmakers were concerned, however, suggesting they should “think about another singer … maybe somebody white.” Though Costner conceded “nobody ever said it out loud,” he agreed that the implications were fair considering how much was at stake. The only problem was, as Costner put it, “I thought she was perfect for what we were trying to do.” Costner remained steadfast about his casting choice, even delaying production by a year so that Whitney could complete a tour. And though the actor knew he’d already all but given her the part, he submitted her to a screen test because he wanted to be “fair.” Houston, possibly the biggest pop star at the time, was frightened. Costner went to her trailer the day of the test and to reassure her, holding her hand and telling her that she looked beautiful. Still, the singer zeroed in on a million things she imagined to be wrong. Feeling insecure, Houston scrubbed her camera-ready makeup job in favor of the thick layer of cover-up she used on the road. The patina of cosmetic paint was perhaps an apt metaphor for how the megastar masked her insecurities. Of course, four minutes in, Houston’s makeup job was streaking; the singer was devastated. “I just wanted to look my best,” she told Costner. “Call it doubt, call it fear, I’ve had mine,” Costner said of the internal struggles that come with fame. “The Whitney I knew, despite her success and worldwide fame, still wondered, ‘Am I good enough? Am I pretty enough? Will they like me?’ It was the burden that made her great and the part that caused her to stumble in the end.” Houston famously battled substance abuse issues, in particular during her tumultuous 14-year marriage to singer Bobby Brown. She was found dead a week ago in a Beverly Hills hotel; the official cause of her death is still being investigated . But Costner insisted her personal turmoil should not muddy her legacy. “As the debate heats up … about the greatest singer of the last century, as the lists are drawn, it will have little meaning to me if her name is not on it,” Costner proclaimed to applause. “Off you go, Whitney, off you go,” Costner continued tears, “Escorted by an army of angels to your heavenly father. And when you sing before him, don’t you worry — you’ll be good enough.” Stay with MTVNews.com all day Saturday for continuing coverage of Whitney Houston’s funeral services. Related Videos Whitney Houston: In Her Own Words Related Photos Friends, Family And Fans Show Love At Whitney Houston’s Funeral Related Artists Whitney Houston
Not to be terribly negative at the start of the new year – because any year that gifted us the Fassboner had to be a pretty good year, amirite? – but there were a handful of recurring trends in the movies of 2011 that could stand a rest as we charge ahead through 2012. First let’s list the good ones, the motifs in otherwise disparate films, from a wide range of filmmakers indie and studio-backed, new and established, that were actually kind of awesome to marinate in this past year. (Goslingmania comin’ atcha!) THE BEST MOVIE TRENDS OF 2011 Cars that go vroom ( Drive , Fast Five , Drive Angry , Senna , Cars 2 , Bellflower ) 2011 was a great year for gearheads – hell, Fast Five pretty much made the year, and it came out way back in April. Even if you can’t tell a tire iron from a lugnut, the cars of 2011 were pretty damn exciting to watch; look no further than the quivering mass of mechanical muscle that is the Mother Medusa from Bellflower for the single sexiest car-that-might-as-well-be-a-character of the year. Emo manly men ( Drive , Warrior , Fast Five , Shame ) Few things brought me as much joy in 2011 as the sight of hot, often burly grown men weeping, or at least near tears. Or, at least, you know, feeling stuff. And preferably shirtless. Sometimes with a partner of the same sex. The grand prixe of 2011 in this category goes to Warrior ’s Tom Hardy, who hulked OUT and tapped his inner feral child, all hurt and lonely and in glorious, glorious pain. Planet Terror ( Another Earth , Melancholia , Tree of Life , Apollo 18 ) Galactic dramarama, man. It never feels quite like the world is coming to an end like it does when the world is literally coming to an end. And alternately, as in Terrence Malick’s Tree of Life , the cosmos and the wonderment that is creation itself can be so terrifyingly awe-inspiring when you sit down and think about it… and think about it… and think about it. Unless you’re watching some alien attack bullshit on the moon. Forget that noise. All Things Ryan Gosling ( Drive , Ides of March , Crazy, Stupid, Love. , “Hey Girl,” NYC Street Fight) What can I say? He’s the coolest motherfucker in the world. He breaks up stranger danger street brawls, for goodness sake. He takes Eva Mendes to Disneyland! And to think, it all started down on the soundstages of The Mickey Mouse Club … Relationships, They’re Hard and Stuff ( Bellflower , Young Adult , A Separation , Like Crazy , One Day , Crazy, Stupid, Love. ) Sure, we’ll never see an end to movies about relationships. I mean, duh. But in 2011 we got a surprising batch of tales about love, falling in love, and the crazy batshit insane things we do for it. Forget the craptastic rom-coms and bad studio “relationship” comedies of the year ( The Change-Up , Something Borrowed , anything starring Sarah Jessica Parker or Katherine Heigl — and especially New Year’s Eve , which starred both Sarah Jessica Parker and Katherine Heigl). And let the two near-identically named Facebook generation rom-coms of the year ( Friends with Benefits , No Strings Attached ) pass. They meant you no harm. Now go straight to the smaller films that dropped the sometimes blissful, often painful real talk about romance, and cry a good cry: Like Crazy , Bellflower , A Separation , Young Adult . Hell, even The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo has something to say about crushing on your coworkers. Honorable mentions: Animal heroes ( Buck, Project Nim, Rise of the Planet of the Apes , Rango ), ass-kicking heroines ( Colombiana, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Hanna , Sucker Punch ), problem children ( We Need to Talk About Kevin, The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1 , Beautiful Boy ) Now for the worst movie trends of 2011…
Jay-Z rapped, “More money, more problems/Gotta move carefully.” He hasn’t been taking Biggie’s his own advice. The Brooklyn hip-hop mogul is facing a lawsuit brought on by the Workers Compensation Board of New York. According to TMZ , Jay failed to pay the insurance over a three month period in 2009. The insurance covers his domestic employees like his driver, maids, and cooks. In a response, the rapper claims to have never skipped a payment and the whole situation was brought on by a clerical error. Jay-Z better straighten this out before one of those chefs decides to cook his food with special ingredients like Octavia Spencer did in The Help . RELATED POSTS: Would Jay-Z Be Doing This If Beyonce Is About To Give Birth? [PHOTO] Pregnant Beyonce Parties With Jay-Z In New York Beyonce Lists Her Favorite Songs Of 2011!
Marlene Dietrich is one of the most talented, intelligent, and iconic actors of all time, and not just because everyone from Madeline Kahn to Madonna and Suzanne Vega has invoked her image with staggering results. The ferocious screen icon and cabaret star is the very definition of a vision , a cutting and defiant actress with gusto and guts galore. On the occasion of her 110th birthday, let’s commemorate her finest work. Though she garnered an Oscar nod for her turn in 1930′s Morocco , there can be no mistaking Dietrich’s amazing, beguiling work in 1957′s Witness for the Prosecution . As the mysterious wife of an accused murderer (Tyrone Power, in his last role), Dietrich tears up the screen with dramatic testimonies, cryptic declarations, and the icy conviction of a Teutonic high priestess. Here’s the climactic scene, wherein she reveals her entire plans to the dumbfounded Wilfred Robards (Charles Laughton). What’s your favorite Marlene moment? Follow Louis Virtel on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
Who’s excited for 2012? I said, Who’s excited for 2012? Oh. Well, it’s coming whether you want it or not, and Mayan doomsday predictions and a U.S. presidential election aside, there is stuff to look forward to. Get your calendars ready and read on for 20 dates worth saving at the movies alone. Jan. 6 : The Devil Inside becomes the millionth exorcist movie to open in theaters, thus netting a $3 million cash prize and earning the producers and 20 of their closest friends a free party and Dave and Buster’s. Jan. 15 : In a craven, ruinous grab for ratings, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association invites a suicide bomber to host the Golden Globe Awards. Jan. 20 : Coriolanus makes its official post-Oscar-qualifying debut in theaters. Take Stephanie and Louis and my words for it: You really should see it. Feb. 10 : Watch a Michael Caine paycheck role come alive as you’ve never seen it before — in the eye-popping 3-D family adventure Journey 2: The Mysterious Island . Feb. 26 : “Ziss ees for you, Uggie”: Jean Dujardin dedicates his Best Actor prize at the 84th Academy Awards to his criminally underrecognized canine co-star . March 2 : Holy shit, they really made Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters ? With Jeremy Renner, Gemma Arterton and Famke Janssen? Wow. OK. Anyway, this opens today. March 9 : Disney commences counting how much money it lost on the ultra expensive, roundly buzzless John Carter . March 23 : Fangirl civil war erupts as The Hunger Games makes its first incursion against the creaky, sparkly Twilight empire. The rest of us, faced only with the sad counterprogramming spectacle of A Thousand Words , flee to art-house refugee camps nationwide. April 27 : The crackerjack comic duo of Jason Segel and Emily Blunt Alison Brie and Jacki Weaver co-star in The Five-Year Engagement June 22 — Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter winds up a distressing month of predatorily-titled blockbusters including Snow White and the Huntsman , Jack the Giant Killer and Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted . Which is fine, because you’re going to be watching the awesome-looking , June 8-opening Prometheus for the fifth time this weekend, anyway. July 20 — The Dark Knight Rises opens! To quote Bane, the film’s excited villain: “ Fghrlkdjhafskdfbldkbsj .” July 27 : Tyler Perry’s The Marriage Counselor reaches theaters, finally exposing audiences everywhere to the subtle dramatic charms of Kim Kardashian. I smell a Verge ! Or maybe it’s just Valtrex. Aug. 17 : Boldly leaping to the front of the Oscar-season line, the Los Angeles Film Critics Association moves up its awards-voting date to Aug. 20 after seeing The Expendables 2 . Sept. 28 : The year of Taylor Kitsch — previously comprising John Carter and Battleship — concludes with the only one of his films any grown-ass adult wants to actually see: The Oliver Stone pot-cartel thriller Savages , co-starring Beinicio Del Toro, Salma Hayek, Uma Thurman, John Travolta, Blake Lively and Emile Hirsch. Oct. 12 : From Kevin James and his Zookeeper director Frank Coraci comes the teacher-turned-MMA moonlighter comedy Here Comes the Boom . I only bring it up because Jesus will weep so copiously that you might start filling and stacking sandbags now . Oct. 19 : Ryan Gosling. Emma Stone. Josh Brolin. Sean Penn. Gangster Squad . That is all. Nov. 16 : The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2 concludes the billion-dollar franchise, instantly prompting millions of prodigious sobbing binges. But enough about Taylor Lautner’s management team. Nov. 21 : The visionary filmmaker Alfonso Cuaron returns with Gravity , which draws a robust opening-weekend crowd with its promise of showing Sandra Bullock shot into space. Dec. 19 : Kathryn Bigelow’s as-yet-unnamed Osama bin Laden movie — working title: Banned in Pakistan — reaches theaters. Dec. 25 : A very DiCaprio Christmas gets underway with Django Unchained and The Great Gatsby . Enjoy 2012, everyone! Follow S.T. VanAirsdale on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
Who’s excited for 2012? I said, Who’s excited for 2012? Oh. Well, it’s coming whether you want it or not, and Mayan doomsday predictions and a U.S. presidential election aside, there is stuff to look forward to. Get your calendars ready and read on for 20 dates worth saving at the movies alone. Jan. 6 : The Devil Inside becomes the millionth exorcist movie to open in theaters, thus netting a $3 million cash prize and earning the producers and 20 of their closest friends a free party and Dave and Buster’s. Jan. 15 : In a craven, ruinous grab for ratings, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association invites a suicide bomber to host the Golden Globe Awards. Jan. 20 : Coriolanus makes its official post-Oscar-qualifying debut in theaters. Take Stephanie and Louis and my words for it: You really should see it. Feb. 10 : Watch a Michael Caine paycheck role come alive as you’ve never seen it before — in the eye-popping 3-D family adventure Journey 2: The Mysterious Island . Feb. 26 : “Ziss ees for you, Uggie”: Jean Dujardin dedicates his Best Actor prize at the 84th Academy Awards to his criminally underrecognized canine co-star . March 2 : Holy shit, they really made Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters ? With Jeremy Renner, Gemma Arterton and Famke Janssen? Wow. OK. Anyway, this opens today. March 9 : Disney commences counting how much money it lost on the ultra expensive, roundly buzzless John Carter . March 23 : Fangirl civil war erupts as The Hunger Games makes its first incursion against the creaky, sparkly Twilight empire. The rest of us, faced only with the sad counterprogramming spectacle of A Thousand Words , flee to art-house refugee camps nationwide. April 27 : The crackerjack comic duo of Jason Segel and Emily Blunt Alison Brie and Jacki Weaver co-star in The Five-Year Engagement June 22 — Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter winds up a distressing month of predatorily-titled blockbusters including Snow White and the Huntsman , Jack the Giant Killer and Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted . Which is fine, because you’re going to be watching the awesome-looking , June 8-opening Prometheus for the fifth time this weekend, anyway. July 20 — The Dark Knight Rises opens! To quote Bane, the film’s excited villain: “ Fghrlkdjhafskdfbldkbsj .” July 27 : Tyler Perry’s The Marriage Counselor reaches theaters, finally exposing audiences everywhere to the subtle dramatic charms of Kim Kardashian. I smell a Verge ! Or maybe it’s just Valtrex. Aug. 17 : Boldly leaping to the front of the Oscar-season line, the Los Angeles Film Critics Association moves up its awards-voting date to Aug. 20 after seeing The Expendables 2 . Sept. 28 : The year of Taylor Kitsch — previously comprising John Carter and Battleship — concludes with the only one of his films any grown-ass adult wants to actually see: The Oliver Stone pot-cartel thriller Savages , co-starring Beinicio Del Toro, Salma Hayek, Uma Thurman, John Travolta, Blake Lively and Emile Hirsch. Oct. 12 : From Kevin James and his Zookeeper director Frank Coraci comes the teacher-turned-MMA moonlighter comedy Here Comes the Boom . I only bring it up because Jesus will weep so copiously that you might start filling and stacking sandbags now . Oct. 19 : Ryan Gosling. Emma Stone. Josh Brolin. Sean Penn. Gangster Squad . That is all. Nov. 16 : The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2 concludes the billion-dollar franchise, instantly prompting millions of prodigious sobbing binges. But enough about Taylor Lautner’s management team. Nov. 21 : The visionary filmmaker Alfonso Cuaron returns with Gravity , which draws a robust opening-weekend crowd with its promise of showing Sandra Bullock shot into space. Dec. 19 : Kathryn Bigelow’s as-yet-unnamed Osama bin Laden movie — working title: Banned in Pakistan — reaches theaters. Dec. 25 : A very DiCaprio Christmas gets underway with Django Unchained and The Great Gatsby . Enjoy 2012, everyone! Follow S.T. VanAirsdale on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
I found 2011 to be a great, overstuffed year in film, though the sweeping trend of nostalgia that peaked during this awards season left me a little cold. Hugo , War Horse , The Artist , The Adventures of Tintin , The Help , even the self-aware looking back of Midnight in Paris — when it’s been such a turbulent 12 months beyond the movies, the comfort of evoking the past, especially the cinephilic past, is understandable, particularly with attendance down once again. But the features I really loved tended to be more prickly, vital affairs, about tragedy and life messily, stubbornly going on in its aftermath — ones that reminded us that film can not only be a great escape, but can also engage and reflect the outside world. 10. Shame Steve McQueen’s sophomore effort took flack from some who found it moralizing in its portrayal of sex addiction, but it’s not a film about a condition, it’s a film about damage. Michael Fassbender plays a man who’s left a traumatic childhood behind and has shored himself up in the city that never sleeps with an immaculate condo and a high-powered job that almost hide his underlying desperation and his inability to connect or open up to anyone on anything other than a physical level. It’s one of the loneliest portraits of urban living I’ve ever seen. 9. Warrior The neglected blockbuster of our Occupy Wall Street era, Warrior drapes Rocky trappings over characters and settings more immediate than you’d ever expect at a multiplex. Its two brothers, in what should have been star-making turns from Tom Hardy and Joel Edgerton, head to the cage after taking beatings elsewhere — one’s left the Marines on less than ideal terms after the death of colleague, the other’s upside down on his mortgage and unable to support his family on a teacher’s salary. Add to that the fact that the tournament in which they both compete was started by a former Wall Street type putting up the money to see “who the toughest man on the planet is,” and you have a rousing, violent fight film with a seriously bittersweet edge. 8. The Arbor Andrea Dunbar grew up in run-down Bradford council estates, drank heavily, had three kids by different fathers, wrote a trio of acclaimed plays about the life she knew and died at age 29. Clio Barnard’s documentary about the playwright brilliantly stages its interviews as their own performance, lip-synched by actors in the settings in which Dunbar and her children grew up and lived, and offering a piercing glimpse of how tragedy is taken up — her second work Rita, Sue and Bob Too was made into a film directed by Alan Clarke — and passed down, to her heroin-addicted eldest Lorraine. 7. Certified Copy It’s never clear which part of Juliette Binoche’s antiques dealer and William Shimell’s writer’s relationship is the pretense — are they strangers who play at being married, or a married couple playing at meeting as strangers? The thesis of Shimell’s book may or may not line up with that of Abbas Kiarostami’s film — the relationship between art and reproduction, original and copy — but the figuring out, and the slippery nature of the connection the pair on screen, is delicious. 6. The Tree of Life It’s a film about a family that stretches from the beginning of the universe to a possible vision of the afterlife — if it may not be wholly lovable, its ambition alone should earn respect. But it’s the evocative immersion on childhood that lingered with me after Terrence Malick’s more grandiose imagery had faded, the tactile sense of that Texas street, the house, the endless possibility, uncertainty and wonder of being young and new to the world, the flashes of memory — the offering of a drink to a prisoner, the caress of a baby’s foot, the goading of a younger sibling to touch a light socket — that break up the more iconic moments with startling specificity. 5. Margaret Messy, vivid and wonderful, Kenneth Lonergan’s difficult production has become a critics’ cause, in part because of how tough it’s been to actually see. It’s worth the trouble, and in some ways better because of the long wait in reaching the few theaters it did — it now looks less like a movie about post-9/11 New York and more one about the city in all of its anonymous, chaotic glory, about a teenage girl’s first horrific brush with mortality and about the strange places that life leads us. 4. Take Shelter Few films have attempted to capture our age of anxiety like Jeff Nichols’s drama, about catastrophic dreams that may be caused by mental illness, but seem just as much to spring from the sense of uncertainty with which we’ve all been infected. Anchored by a stunning performance from Michael Shannon, Take Shelter presents a look at quiet breakdown spurred on by a desire to protect one’s loved ones, and pairs it with frightening scenes of monstrous storms and shadowy attackers that rival any of this year’s horror movies. 3. Into the Abyss Trust Werner Herzog to find stories so strange and moving in a terrible small-town triple murder over an automobile. The Texas of this film is recognizable, but it’s also near-mythic — a place of universally broken families, sudden violence, prison reunions and hard-earned redemption. Taken alone, the interviews with Melyssa Burkett or Jared Tolbert would be enough to make the film. As part of a kaleidoscope of suffering and hope, they’re highlights in something dark, funny and expressly moving about the persistence of human nature in the face of loss. 2. A Separation A marriage falls apart over the decision of whether or not to leave Iran in Asghar Farhadi’s magnificent drama, and encompasses in its disintegration a snapshot of the fractured nation that’s so nuanced, empathetic and complex it quickens the heart. Certainly the smartest film of the year, both as a self-contained work and in the respect it offers the audience, A Separation is unadorned by a score or flashy camera tricks — it doesn’t need them. 1. Melancholia The opposite of love isn’t hate, it’s indifference, and in Lars von Trier’s film it’s the awesome force of Kirsten Dunst’s depression-fueled disinterest that exudes a gravitational drag on everyone around here even before the arrival of the destructive planet of the title. Before the breathtaking apocalyptic imagery appears — the object looming closer in the sky, the static sparking from fingertips — Melancholia is already a devastating look at an illness that leaves you unable to connect to what life has to offer, even on an extravagant wedding day that seems to compress half a lifetime into a night. But it’s that the film turns to offer a sympathetic eye to Charlotte Gainsbourg’s anxious sibling in the second half that makes it great, and that gives it a soul. As she struggles to hold everything together in the face of approaching disaster, even Dunst’s depressive is moved to offer her a conciliatory gesture as the world ends. Follow Alison Willmore on Twitter . Follow Movieline on Twitter .
