March Movie Madness 2009 - Round 1 Results Pt. B

LINDSAY LOHAN REGION

Meryl Streep 30
Nicole Kidman 0

Emma Thompson 25
Joan Fontaine 5

Shirley MacLaine 13
Susan Sarandon 17

Bette Davis 20
Laura Linney 10



ASHTON KUCHER REGION

Robert Duvall 17
Phillip S. Hoffman 13

Daniel Day-Lewis 24
Jeff Bridges 6

Ben Kingsley 17
Humphrey Bogart 13

Jack Nicholson 28
Harrison Ford 2



Duvall vs. P.S. Hoffman made for a spirited match-up, and MacLaine vs. Sarandon and Kingsley vs. Bogart could have tilted with another 3-pointer from each of the losers, but otherwise these weren't that close!

March Movie Madness 2009 - Round 1 Results Pt. A

As I explained in an earlier post, results are determined by your picks. Since there are 29 participants, a total of 29 points are available per match. NOTE: These are not your point totals; they are the scores of the matches. For Round 1, you get one point per match you picked correctly. I'll post each match-up's final score so you can see how close some of these matches are, along with the blow-outs!

KEANU REEVES REGION

Marlon Brando 20
Johnny Depp 10

Cary Grant 15
Tom Hanks 15

Denzel Washington 14
Robert Downey Jr. 16

Peter O'Toole 16
Clint Eastwood 14



PAMELA ANDERSON REGION

Julie Christie 10
Sally Field 20

Ingrid Bergman 18
Frances McDormand 12

Jane Fonda 12
Diane Keaton 18

Audrey Hepburn 24
Kathy Bates 6



A few matches came down to the wire, and a few were never in doubt.
Next groupings will be posted in the next hour.

March Movie Madness 2009 - The Conversation Before the Storm

Okay, all the brackets are in. The first round of matches will take place Monday. Check back here at 2 p.m. Eastern.

In the meantime, a conversation starter:

I have of course received plenty of grief from plenty of people over which actors and actresses didn't make the final field.

I ask you, whom did I leave out? But since there are a finite number of spots, you can only add one if you subtract one. So for every name you want to add you have to give a name to remove. And explain why.

The second discussion point is with seedings. Think someone was seeded too high, or too low? Who and why? And if you want to raise someone's seed, you have to lower someone elses.

Discuss.

March Movie Madness 2009 - The Actors & Actresses

COMPLETED BRACKETS DUE TO JEFFLKOS AT GMAIL DOT COM TODAY BY NOON FOUR PM EASTERN!

Here it is, folks. The official pairings and seedings for March Movie Madness 2009 - The Actors & Actresses. For those of you who have participated in MMM before, I'm running it same as last year in terms of scoring and determining which actor/actress moves on to the next round.

The Details:

Click the thumbnail above to see a large version of the bracket. You can download that pdf to fill in your picks.

Fill in the entire bracket, picking a winner between each actor/actress pairing.

Make your picks based on who you think the better actor/actress is.

The championship match will pit the top actor against the top actress. Don't forget to fill in the champion!

Email your picks to jefflkos at gmail dot com. 

The winning actor/actress from each matchup will be determined by... you! Which ever actor/actress gets the most votes wins each match.

Scoring is as follows: You get 1 point for each correct pick in Round One, 2 points for Round Two, 4 points for Round Three, 6 points for Round Four, 8 points for Round Five, and 10 points for the Championship.

In the event of a tie, the person who got the most correct picks in Round Five will win. If still a tie, person who got most correct picks in Round Four wins, and on back.

There is no cost to play.

There really is no prize, other than pride, for winning. I was supposed to create a March Madness Champion icon for last year's champion (Paticus), but I never did that, so I figured I better not commit to anything this year.

COMMENT! The fun of this thing over the past few years has been the accompanying comments from each round. Please comment, please be impassioned, but please don't be a big dick. Something-of-a-dick is okay, but not a big rager.

Email me with any questions, or leave them in comments

Let the games begin!

March Movie Madness 2009 - The Category

ACTORS & ACTRESSES

(or male and female actors, if you get uptight about stuff like that)

Brackets will be released Wednesday.

NOTICE: This is BY FAR the hardest bracket I've done in this thing! Holy crap! So I'm working on it, but please be patient!

Ten Most Rewatchable Movies

Paste Magazine offers the 10 most rewatchable movies.

For those too harried to click a link, they are:

10. Goodfellas
9. Napoleon Dynamite
8. Pulp Fiction
7. Spaceballs/Robin Hood Men In Tights
6. Casablanca
5. The Princess Bride
4. The Ten Commandments
3.Animal House
2. Groundhog Day
1. The Shawshank Redemption

Their honorable mention list: Casino, Forrest Gump, Fast Times At Ridgemont High, Amelie, The Sound of Music, Inherit The Wind, What About Bob?, Snatch, Lawrence of Arabia, Hoosiers, E.T.: Extra Terrestrial, Zoolander, To Kill a Mockingbird, Pretty Woman, When Harry Met Sally, The Sound of Music, Corky Romano


I get how most of the first ten made it onto the list, with the exception of The Ten Commandments. It's one of those overdone Biblical spectacles, and Heston overacts, as usual, in the Shatner League. But Corky Romano in the honorable mentions? Somebody's smoking something. And there is ot ONE mention of a Python film. Each one of them is rewatchable as hell.

Discuss.

Movie Madness 2009 is Coming!

"Best" Films -- discuss

Also feel free to swipe it for use as a meme on your own blog. Bold what you've seen & indicate which ones you like/love/loathe.

2008 - "Slumdog Millionaire"

2007 - “No Country for Old Men”

2006 - “The Departed”

2005 - “Crash”

2004 - “Million Dollar Baby”

2003 - “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King”

2002 - “Chicago”

2001 - “A Beautiful Mind”

2000 - “Gladiator”

1999 - “American Beauty”

1998 - “Shakespeare in Love”

1997 - “Titanic”

1996 - “The English Patient”

1995 - “Braveheart”

1994 - “Forrest Gump”

1993 - “Shindler's List”

1992 - “Unforgiven”

1991 - “The Silence of the Lambs”

1990 - “Dances with Wolves”

1989 - “Driving Miss Daisy”

1988 - “Rain Man”

1987 - “The Last Emperor”

1986 - “Platoon”

1985 - “Out of Africa”

1984 - “Amadeus”

1983 - “Terms of Endearment”

1982 - “Gandhi”

1981 - “Chariots of Fire”

1980 - “Ordinary People”

1979 - “Kramer vs. Kramer”

1978 - “The Deer Hunter”

1977 - “Annie Hall”

1976 - “Rocky”

1975 - “One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest”

1974 - “The Godfather Part II”

1973 - “The Sting”

1972 - “The Godfather”

1971 - “The French Connection”

1970 - “Patton”

1969 - “Midnight Cowboy”

1968 - “Oliver!”

1967 - “In the Heat of the Night”

1966 - “A Man for All Seasons”

1965 - “The Sound of Music”

1964 - “My Fair Lady”

1963 - “Tom Jones”

1962 - “Lawrence of Arabia”

1961 - “West Side Story”

1960 - “The Apartment”

1959 - “Ben-Hur”

1958 - “Gigi”

1957 - “The Bridge on the River Kwai”

1956 - “Around the World in 80 Days”

1955 - “Marty”

1954 - “On the Waterfront”

1953 - “From Here to Eternity”

1952 - “The Greatest Show on Earth”

1951 - “An American in Paris”

1950 - “All about Eve”

1949 - “All the Kings Men”

1948 - “Hamlet”

1947 - “Gentleman's Agreement”

1946 - “The Best Years of Our Lives”

1945 - “The Lost Weekend”

1944 - “Going My Way”

1943 - “Casablanca”

1942 - “Mrs. Miniver”

1941 - “How Green Was My Valley”

1940 - “Rebecca”

1939 - “Gone with the Wind”

1938 - “You Can't Take It with You”

1937 - “The Life of Emile Zola”

1936 - “The Great Ziegfeld”

1935 - “Mutiny on the Bounty”

1934 - “It Happened One Night”

1932/1933 - “Cavalcade”

1931/1932 - “Grand Hotel”

1930/1931 - “Cimarron”

1929/1930 - “All Quiet on the Western Front”

1928/1929 - “The Broadway Melody”

1927/1928 - “Wings”

Bad Indie Film

Boy. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom is an incredibly stupid movie.

No plot! A hacked-together adventure. Racist claptrap. Whining blonde who added nothing to the story. Cute street kid who added nothing to the story. Plot holes big enough to fly a Ford Trimotor through. The sexual tension of two junior high kids on a class field trip. It was all the rage in 1984 because of the chilled monkey brains and the heart surgery and the subterranean roller coaster ride but that shit doesn't last.

I could get behind a good movie about a modern emergence of the Thuggee. This wasn't it.

Farewell, Butch

Paul Newman
January 26, 1925 - September 27, 2008

"I've got vision and the rest of the world is wearing bifocals!"

Women in Film Video

Eveyone, check out this video. Watch the entire thing twice. First try without looking at the names. The expressions through each morph are amazing and I am sad to say I did not know about half of the first 50 years of films.


Women In Film from Philip Scott Johnson on Vimeo.

R.I.P.

(CNN) - Don LaFontaine, the voiceover king whose "In a world ..." phrase on movie trailers was much copied - and much parodied - has died, according to media reports. He was 68.

Admit you've done the voice.

25 Funniest Movies Since 1983 ?

So Entertainment Weekly has a new list of the 25 Funniest Movies Since 1983.

Their lists are always good for some argument. What do you all think ?

I created a bit of a rebuttal over at my place, but I thought I'd drop the puck here as well and see what you think about their list and/or my list.

Truth is stranger than fiction

 


After I left a comment at JodieKash's place, (thanks for the pic Jodie) I thought it might make for a film discussion about art imitating life or the other way around. This wackjob's life seems to be a combination of Katy Bates in "Misery", and Stephen Kings "Pet Semetary". How many other nutters are either influencing film, or have been influenced by film for strange and bizarre acts?

In Memory of Grace and Sam Masoudi

Grace is the little one in the front wearing the pink shirt in the top photo. Sam is the dark-haired boy in the gray sports camp shirt in the bottom photo.

They were killed Monday morning when a small plane crashed into the house they were renting with their family on the Oregon coast. Grace was 8. Sam was 12. They were beautiful, wonderful children from one of the most incredible families I've ever known.

We'll miss them terribly.

The Dark Knight

.
To relate my overall experience of watching this film, I refer to one reviewer who very aptly said, “I doubt I have soaked up enough in just one sitting to even do a good job at it.”

I concur, and because I saw it in a rather mediocre theater I will head ASAP to an IMAX showing of what is arguably one of the best superhero action flicks ever. Yes, the eye candy is spectacular for those heading out for some summer blockbuster escapism. And while the film gets a bit bloated with near-endless hyperactivity and a heavy-handed sense of the importance of its tragedy, the stellar cast takes another star – the Nolan brother’s script – and makes a pretty decent drama out of a mainstream popcorn flick.

With Batman Begins Christopher Nolan reinvented the franchise into its darkest, camp-free incarnation yet, and The Dark Knight takes it up at least a notch, which saying a lot considering the bulk of comic book movie sequels or for that matter first outings. For starters you’ve got returns from Christian Bale (best Bruce Wayne), Michael Caine (best Alfred, Cockney or no), and Gary Oldman (best Jim Gordon). But it’s the newbies who steal the show, and with opening scene it’s obvious it was set up that way.

In the role of the Joker, Heath Ledger makes chaotic evil utterly charming, sprinkled grotesquely with mad intelligence. Fans of the print comic will know what I refer to in saying he has all the punch that Alan Moore gave the character in The Killing Joke. All sentiment for his demise aside, not only do I support at least an Oscar nomination (and let’s not insult the performance by classifying it as a “supporting” role) but I hereby declare that no actor should ever again feel compelled to fill the shoes of the Clown Prince of Crime. Do I gush? I can’t help it if he was joy to watch. Jack Nicholson’s Joker was great in all his campy glory and Nicholsonness, but Ledger plays the character so intensely that you believe he can persuade his henchman of the sheer fun of burning a billion-dollar mountain of cash.

Aaron Eckhart brings the best rendition of Harvey Dent to the movies, which may not seem to say much in light of his competition being a cameo by Billy Dee Williams and a godawful performance by Tommy Lee Jones. I regretted the sparse denouement of Dent’s transformation into Two Face (great special effects/makeup!), feeling the villian could have taken a more active role. I hope I don’t spoil the Dent endgame in The Dark Knight too much by saying I will be pissed if he shows up in a sequel.

Other highlights of The Dark Knight were the great location footage in Chicago and Hong Kong and tons of really neat explosions to go along with impressive special effects. One small peeve I have is a hoped-for correction from the prequel, where Bale’s Batman often speaks in a low rasp. Alas, in the second film it gets even worse, so much so that at times subtitles could be useful. Although he said it works, I still agree with MSNBC’s Alonso Duralde, who said it’s somewhat akin to Brenda Vaccaro doing a Miles Davis impersonation.

Here he comes to save the day

I like the idea of a super-flawed superhero, one with the power to save the world and make it a brighter, happier place but none of the desire to. That's "Hancock". Loved the concept, not so enamored of how the tale played out.

The script didn't dumb it down, literally crashing viewers into the story, forcing them to believe in the reality of its premise from frame one. Jason Bateman, magnificent in “Juno" and even better here, plays a PR man with a heart of gold and vision of a better future without coming across as a do-gooder buffoon. He delivers the wry, comedic quip like no one else. Special effects are, of course, unbelievable and, of course, over done.

Then comes “the twist” (like a virgin on prom night, I won’t give it up). My brow remained furrowed in confusion until a cover-my-eyes-at-time violent third act and return of (really) not such a scary bad guy. And all good super heroes need a scary bad guy.

Speaking of bad guys, although not a fan of the franchise, I breathlessly and sadly await Heath Ledger as the “Joker”. The trailer had me to tears at just the brief glimpse of genius and madness. Shocking really.

"We're the Stains, and we don't put out!"

Today is a monumental day.

One I’ve been awaiting years, nee decades.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, the Fabulous Stains" will be released on legit DVD September 16 for the first time. As I noted in comments, the movie shaped who I wanted to be as a teen, all punk rock, fuck you attitude, panties over fishnet hose and two-tone-hair.

p.s...watch Part II here.

My birthday falls in the month of September, for those in need of gift ideas.

I Am Legend

Do not watch this movie all alone in a big empty house.

* * *

My son and I went to see it in the theater. He got nervous when he found out it was a zombie movie. I don't think of it as a zombie movie, it's more a pseudo-sci fi thriller with intelligence and fine acting and, oh yeah, what amount to zombies. But the scene where Will Smith discovers much to his chagrin that what we are calling zombies might still have an active brain cell or two, my son needed to leave. So we left.

He was eighteen. I suppose some dads would have pulled the ah-toughen-up bit but not me. I was cool with it and we went to B&N and got some comfort coffee. This isn't only because I love and respect my kids. When I was eighteen, nineteen, twenty, I could get mighty nervous when out in the woods and the twilight started to deepen, and the shade under the trees went deep blue, and sight was uncertain, and the utter silence more frightening than any hooting owl or snapping twig. Last thing I'm going to do is be critical of someone for having a rich imagination.

* * *

Later took the wife for a movie-dinner date (we usually go for the matinee prices) and saw the whole thing. Thought it was pretty good. The premise is solid: A genetically engineered virus has been developed that cures cancer. Three years later we are treated to a shot of the flooded entrance to the Lincoln Tunnel, jammed with long-abandoned automobiles. Will Smith is one of the very few with a natural immunity -- the zombies are people whom the virus didn't kill but instead turned into ravenous beasts. He was also the chief Army scientist working on a cure. He lives alone, continuing his work, haunted by solitude, beset with increasingly disturbing flashbacks. The flashbacks give us pretty much the entire back story.

Then shit starts to happen at an ever increasing pace.

I liked the ending. I didn't like that, upon reflection, the plot had a couple gaping holes in it. But in a movie you have to economize on plot, and I guess if you keep the action going most people won't notice.

* * *

I got it for Father's Day and while my family was away from home this week, loaded me up some dinner and beer and sat down to watch it. Maybe when in the company of others I keep my emotions in check -- maybe when alone my emotions are closer to the surface -- for whatever reason, in this showing I cried during the crying parts, and became depressed at all the depressing parts, and got all nervous and scared during the exciting parts. It seems that a story about bloodthirsty ex-humans who can come out only at night is particularly evocative when viewed in an empty house on an otherwise uninhabited acre in a neighborhood full of silence and open space and slowly moving tree limbs after the sun has gone down. Who would have guessed that.

What would you like to see on a big screen?

I was just browsing this list at EW and I've seen a few of these films on the big screen (Titanic, GWTW, etc). I agree with most of the choices people presented in the list.

If you could see any movie(s) on a big screen (bigger than what's in today's multiplexes), what would you like to see and why?