Dream Cast - Frankenstein

TFW your dad is the sullen youth in your relationship

Just over a week ago, on a Thursday, I was getting ready to go to work. Having just finished Ann Leckie's Ancillary Justice trilogy, I needed a new read for my commute. I grabbed my high school paperback of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein off the shelf. I'd been thinking about re-reading it for years, and recent Byronic research for something I'm writing and the fact that my sister watched and related to me the awful James McAvoy Victor Frankenstein movie made the novel fresh in my mind.

By complete coincidence (or was it - ominous music) that day, June 16, is the day some astronomers think Shelley first dreamed up the basis for her story.

From my vague remembrances of the book, I knew it was different than our popular conception of the Frankenstein story, but I had forgotten just how different it was. There's no castle, no Igor. Victor Frankenstein makes his first monster in his apartment at university and his second, unfinished monster in a crude hut in the remote Orkney Islands.

I had also forgotten (or just couldn't appreciate at the time) just how great the novel is. It's groundbreaking, compelling, thoughtful, and ambitious. Boris Karloff's monster is rooted in our pop culture, and Mel Brooks's Young Frankenstein will always be a favorite of mine, but I found myself wishing for an adaptation more faithful to Shelley's vision. Not only in theme and message, but in the 18th century setting and the powerful landscapes she describes in Switzerland, Germany, and Scotland.

Like I did with Wuthering Heights, I spent a lot of free time picking out my dream cast for my dream Frankenstein miniseries. Here are the fruits of my imagined labors:

Robert Walton - Nicholas Hoult

Who is Robert Walton? Good question! Walton is our narrator narrating other characters' narrations, much like Lockwood (who?) in Wuthering Heights. I didn't cast Lockwood in my Wuthering Heights dream cast because nobody cares about Lockwood, but I'll shrug and go to bat for Walton.

Frankenstein is actually an epistolary novel, a series of letters Walton sends to his beloved sister. He's setting off on a dangerous quest to find a shipping route through the North Pole, and is so excited! But, he tells his sister, although surrounded by men, he's sad not to have a special guy friend whose eyes he can gaze into as he reveals his feelings. :( Fortunately, one almost immediately shows up on an ice flow! This Elsa-sent buddy is none other than Victor Frankenstein, who eventually tells Walton his story. Later, Frankenstein's monster will also get the chance to unload on Walton.

Why use an actor like Nicholas Hoult for this comparatively small role? Because I think it's important to see how Walton is hearing Victor's story and what lessons he takes away from his encounter with the Monster. Although he's been somewhat blinded by his affection for Victor, does his meeting with the Monster alter his opinions? Walton doesn't put any of those final thoughts on paper, so it would be up to the actor's face to communicate Walton's mind. Any wide-eyed young actor could be slotted in this spot, but someone like Hoult could add depth.

Victor Frankenstein - Paul Dano

One thing that stood out to me about Frankenstein, when re-reading, is just how feckless Victor Frankenstein is. He's not exactly a man of action. Yes, when he discovers the secret to life, he passionately and manically works on his creature, but when it isn't what he wanted, he decides his best course of action is...avoidance. He literally just abandons his new, awake, conscious creation on the table and goes to bed. When the confused, lonely monster finds him in his bedroom, he sleeps outside and waits for the thing to leave his apartment.

This response isn't out of character for him. We've already seen him shrug off communication with the people he loves most in the world simply because it's not what he wants at the moment. Later, when a servant in his household is falsely accused of the murder of his little brother - a murder he knows his Monster has committed - he half-heartedly argues for her innocence without implicating himself in any way. When the Monster demands that Victor make him a companion, promising he'll take his new friend far from human civilization and live a vegan life in South America, Victor agrees...and then procrastinates for a year on the project while worrying about it the whole time.

Yet despite the fact that this entire disaster - which all of Victor's loved ones end up paying for with their lives - is literally of Victor's making, the depths of his despair do provoke pity. Dano could handle the range of this character - from fevered curiosity to sullen passivity to mental breakdowns - without campiness.

Frankenstein's Monster - Richard Armitage

While a green-skinned, boxy-skulled Frankenstein's Monster has become the popular image, Mary Shelley describes a creature who was supposed to be handsome - ravishing black hair, good teeth - but comes off as horrifying due to his outlandish size, runny eyes, and yellowish skin that clearly belongs to a cadaver. With some special effects (makeup, Andy Serkising, or both), naturally handsome Armitage could pull off this unsettling mix of greatness and ugliness. Also, while the Monster is usually depicted as inarticulate and lumbering, Shelley's monster has superhuman speed and grace.

The differences between the original Monster and the pop culture Monster aren't just visual. Shelley's is intellectual and complex. Just two years after his "birth," he's not only able to speak, but is a clever, erudite man who can talk circles around the sniveling Victor. His capacity to do good seems greater than Victor's, yet he is the one who chooses to murder again and again - not Victor. Like his creator, he is excellent at rationalizing his actions to himself and identifies with fallen angel Lucifer from Milton's Paradise Lost. I'd love for an adaptation to show the tragedy and humanity of this iconic creature.

Elizabeth Lavenza - Lea Seydoux

The orphaned daughter of Italian nobility, Elizabeth is adopted from an impoverished foster family by the Frankensteins as their "niece" and betrothed to Victor when they are both small children. It's an odd arrangement (like, don't do this today), but she loves her family and they love her. She keeps the family going after Mrs. Frankenstein's death and passionately advocates for the falsely accused Justine.

As with Justine (below), Elizabeth's virtue and strength make Victor's selfishness all the more visible. It would be all too easy in an adaptation to make this character a wilting violet doormat of a victim, which is why I'd want an actress of Leydoux's mettle to take the role (and be backed with a great writer and director, since this is my dream).

Henry Clerval - Sebastian Armesto 

Victor and Elizabeth grow up with their best friend, the less financially fortunate but romantically minded Henry Clerval. Happy, generous Henry loves stories about knights and heroes as a child. When he finally attains his dream of going to university to study Asian languages, he puts it off for a year without a thought to tend to Victor, who has suffered a nervous breakdown. Henry is sweet and oblivious, happily prancing across Europe on a road trip with Victor, who gloomily frets and collects body parts.

When thinking of whom I would cast as this character, I couldn't help but remember how - in a matter of moments - Armesto made hapless, puppy-eyed Lieutenant Mitaka memorable in Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Sadly, Frankenstein's Monster will finish what Kylo Ren started. :( 

Justine Moritz - Morfydd Clark

Justine, a young woman scorned by her mother and brought into the Frankenstein family as a servant, becomes an early victim of the Monster when he frames her for murder and she is sentenced to death. Her grief and bewilderment is heartbreaking, and it would be easy to make this minor character a one-note victim. However, her ultimate courage in the face of death is in contrast to Victor's continued cowardliness. I'd trust Clark, from Love & Friendship and Josie Rourke's Les Liaisons Dangereuses, to show both innocence and strength.

De Lacey Family

After being abandoned by Victor and chased by terrified villagers, the Monster hides out near a cottage. The inhabitants are the De Lacey family, and Shelley gives them a rich backstory. They are an aristocratic French family living in exile in the German countryside, and they consist of the blind patriarch, daughter Agatha, son Felix, and Felix's Arab-Turkish fiancee Safie. Despite suffering hardships that have left them in poverty, they are a loving, kind, musically gifted group. By spying on them for a year, the Monster learns how to speak, how to read, and the basics of human history. He comes to love the family and desperately wants to be accepted by them. Alas, his introduction to them goes horribly wrong, and he is rejected out of fear again.

I'd cast grizzled, stately Hugo Weaving as De Lacey; Adele Exarchopoulous and Jamie Bell as his two dutiful children; and Mandahla Rose as joyful Safie.

Mr. and Mrs. Frankenstein - Ralph Fiennes and Sheryl Lee

Mr. Frankenstein is a loving father who is distraught as he watches his oldest child descend into depression and then more severe mental illness. He's at a loss to determine the cause (no one suspects their child has learned the secret of sparking life and used it to make an eight-foot-tall creature that keeps killing people), but he doesn't give up on his son. At one point he has to travel from Switzerland to Ireland to pick up a hysterical Victor from a small-town prison, and he's completely supportive the whole time.

Even though Sheryl Lee's scene in Winter's Bone was brief, I was drawn to her warmth. I can see the Twin Peaks star as the matriarch of this adventurous, welcoming family. Given all that happens, it's probably a blessing this character dies of scarlet fever before everything goes to hell.


Image info:
Header image: Richard Armitage in Robin Hood, Paul Dano in War & Peace
All actor headshots: IMDB

Dream Cast - Wuthering Heights

I wish we were together, enjoying nature and pwning noobs.

I don't ask for much. Just for a Wuthering Heights miniseries exactly to my liking. I say miniseries because Emily Brontë's 1847 novel is really too much story, with too many characters aging from childhood to adulthood, to fit into a movie. Try to pack it in 90-120 minutes, and you end up with weird compressions of time that result in adult Heathcliff and Cathy crawling around in bushes to spy on neighbors. And/or with the movie simply ending with Cathy's death.

After being displeased with various adaptations, I've brainstormed my ideal cast to act in my ideal miniseries format. These are only the adult versions of the characters, however. I'll leave some dream child actor casting agent to cast that part of my dream cast. I can delegate in my dreams.

Heathcliff - Oscar Isaac 

Heathcliff and race has always been a thorny issue. In Brontë's novel, although he later has a blond son, Heathcliff himself doesn't seem to be white: characters throw around Indian, Indian-Chinese, Spanish, and from the Americas in general as suggestions for his background (he doesn't speak English when found as a small child, so no one knows). In practice, Heathcliff mostly gets cast as a brunet white guy. (As a notable exception, Andrea Arnold's 2011 movie version has a black Heathcliff.) It would be great to see an Asian or Latino actor finally get this iconic role. Far from being the complained of "forced diversity," it would seem to be what the author intended.

I'd cast dynamic hearthrob Oscar Isaac, of Guatemalan and Cuban parents, as Heathcliff. He has an impressive resume, and this role would let him dig into a tortured psyche. Really tortured. Heathcliff isn't simply a "bad boy" romantic hero type - he's cruel, dangerous, and vengeful. Incapable of a healthy relationship, he instead has an obsessive codependency with Cathy that continues even after her death. We're talking spending quality time with her long-dead corpse levels of obsession. As far as he's concerned, he and Cathy are the only people on Earth; everyone else is disposable (except maybe Hareton later on).

I trust in Oscar Isaac to tackle the acting challenge of catching a falling baby and then looking furious and disappointed because it's his mortal enemy's baby and it would have been great revenge to let it go splat.

I would also consider: Dev Patel. Dude's grown up nicely.

Catherine Earnshaw/Linton - Emily Blunt

A dark-haired beauty who wants to be a wild nature girl forever? I think the range of Emily Blunt, who can play prim fashionistas and rugged FBI agents with equal aplomb, is perfect for the role, which requires haughty poise punctuated with fits of violence. Cathy manages to mostly pass as a fine lady of the English countryside for a few years, but not without bouts of depression. She doesn't want to be a model wife and mother - she wants to gallop around on horseback with soul mate Heathcliff and pinch and kick the hell out of people when she's angry.

I would also consider: Brie Larson.

Nelly Dean - Shirley Henderson

Our narrator by proxy, maid Nelly has witnessed and survived all of the dramas of the Earnshaw/Linton/Heathcliff families. Although a servant, she's raised alongside Hindley, Cathy, and Heathcliff. She is Hareton's nursemaid for the first years of his life, Cathy's confidante for life, and the second Catherine's caretaker. Humble but resilient, practical but caring, I could see Henderson (best known as Moaning Myrtle) in this role.

Hindley Earnshaw - Burn Gorman

Cathy's obnoxious older brother becomes cruel when his father favors adopted brother Heathcliff over him. Later he becomes a drunken gambler when his wife dies in childbirth, and his dire financial straits allows Heathcliff to buy Wuthering Heights out from under him. Burn Gorman, half of the German-scientists-without-German-accents duo in Pacific Rim, was fine in the 2009 PBS version, so Burn Gorman it is.

Edgar Linton - Tom Hiddleston

The Linton family owns Thrushcross Grange, the sunny alternative to windswept Wuthering Heights. The family's eldest son - fey, blond, and emotional Edgar - starts out with a lot of the same faults Hindley has. He's whiny and elitist, and Heathcliff is disgusted when Cathy marries him. But unlike Hindley, Edgar rises to the challenge of sudden single parenthood and becomes a loving father. Tom Hiddleston would be perfect to play this proper English gentleman who is prone to tears and learns forgiveness.

I would also consider: Tom Felton. A prejudiced aristocrat who cries? He's got this. Plus, he'd get a reunion with his Hogwarts bathroom buddy.

Isabella Linton - Amanda Seyfried

When Heathcliff returns to town to find foster sister/soul mate Cathy married to Edgar, he begins courting Edgar's naive sister, Isabella. Isabella quickly falls for the handsome and now mysteriously rich Heathcliff, and they elope. Unfortunately, she soon learns she's just a pawn in his revenge scheme. Heathcliff physically and emotionally abuses her, and she runs to the south of England while pregnant.

Catherine II - Mia Wasikowska

This second Catherine is the daughter of Edgar and Cathy. Since Cathy dies shortly after giving birth, Catherine is raised by her doting father and Nelly. While less wild than her mother, Catherine still has a thirst for adventure beyond her family's estate. Unfortunately, her curiosity gets her kidnapped by Heathcliff, who forces her into marriage with her cousin, Linton. Despite Heathcliff's cruelty, Catherine never stops standing up to him. She does, however, understandably start to become mean herself in her miserable surroundings, but is guided back to kindness by Nelly's influence and her growing affection for Hareton.

Wasikowska has already starred as a Brontë heroine (as the eponymous character in Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre) and has undertaken other adventurey period roles (Alice in Wonderland, Crimson Peak). She has the right mix of girlishness and grit for this part.

Linton Heathcliff - Tony Revolori

Oh boy, these names get harder and harder to keep track of. Linton Heathcliff is the son of Heathcliff No Last Name and Isabella Linton. He is a sickly, indulged child raised by his mother near London. When she dies, his uncle Edgar tries to take custody of him, but he is thwarted by Heathcliff, meaning it's off to bleak Wuthering Heights with poor Linton. Heathcliff later forces the dying Linton to marry his cousin Catherine, so that Heathcliff can get ownership of Thrushcross Grange when Linton kicks the bucket. Tony Revolori (known for The Grand Budapest Hotel) isn't blond, but whatever.

Hareton Earnshaw - Adam Driver

Heathcliff's biggest act of revenge is taking custody of Hindley's son Hareton and raising him as a profanity-spewing illiterate farmhand, mirroring how Hindley demoted him from heir to servant when their father died. But alas, just as Mr. Earnshaw favored adopted son Heathcliff, Heathcliff favors adopted son Hareton. In fact, Heathcliff's decades-long campaign of revenge halts not due to the deaths of 1) his hated foster brother's wife, 2) the love of his life, 3) his hated foster brother, 4) his own wife, 5) his romantic rival, or 6) his own son, but because Hareton gets kinda sad.

Which is understandable! Hareton's a cutie and no one wants him to be sad! He's a rough-and-tumble guy who can throw down, but he's insecure about his lack of education and is eager to please. Despite his crassness and violence, he's unable to repress his natural kindness (he even tries to befriend annoying Linton). He and Catherine end up bringing out the best in each other: she teaches him how to read, he teaches her how to garden, etc. In the end, dead Heathcliff and Cathy get to haunt Wuthering Heights like they always wanted, and their kids get to live a less creepy life together at Thrushcross Grange.

How could it be made plausible that Poe Dameron is Kylo Ren's adopted father? I dunno. Gray highlights or something? I'm not a make-up wizard. If Dev Patel is Heathcliff, he can get "acting like an old person" tips from all his The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel co-stars.

I would also consider: Aaron Paul. As with Driver, we already know Paul can play a confused and violent young man in the thrall of an abusive father figure.

Who is the best hot farmboy Hareton?

Bonus pic of Hareton, Heathcliff, and one of their many attack dogs about to toss Lockwood (who is too boring to cast) out of Wuthering Heights like the rowdy brutes they are:

Image info:
Header image: Oscar Isaac in Ex Machina, Emily Blunt in Sicario
All headshots from IMDB
Aaron Paul with sheep: Peter Yang for Rolling Stone
Adam Driver with sheep: Annie Leibovitz for Vogue
Adam Driver and Oscar Isaac with Carrie Fisher's dog: Getty Images

Movies I Want Right Now That I Can't Have Right Now

Get it, Mia!

There are a number of movies coming up that I'm impatient to see. Some will be out in a few weeks, some in nearly a year, but they all feel like they're taking forever to get here. Here are the movies I'm most mad I can't see yet, in order of release date.

Crimson Peak

Do it for all of us, Mia

I jump when my toast pops up, so this movie will probably terrify me. But that's okay, because it's Tom Hiddleston. And, as the trailer has promised, he takes off his clothes (I'm a lot more understanding of stuff like Sports Illustrated's swimsuit annual now that so many movies cater to the female gaze). Hiddleston teams up with his onscreen sister-in-law from Only Lovers Left Alive, Mia Wasikowska, general phenom Jessica Chastain, and the guy who said "MAKO" a lot in Pacific Rim in this Guillermo del Toro haunted house movie. With a great cast, great director, and lush Gothic visuals, I'm sure the nightmares will be worth it.

Bonus Upcoming Hiddleston: Loki and the Scarlet Witch will pair up to do Southern accents in I Saw the Light, AND he's also starring in High-Rise.

Using the teaser trailer because of the cover of Nick Cave's "Red Right Hand." Nick Cave is always a plus.

Out: October 16, 2015

Room

Entertain your captive child with Eggshell Snake(tm)!

The "princess locked in a tower" trope is ancient. And while it features in countless fairy tales and video games, it's rooted in the very real fear that if you're a woman, some asshole might kidnap you and imprison you somewhere in order to rape you repeatedly. The Cleveland and Jaycee Dugard cases are just two of the biggest headline-makers of the past few years. These horrors have been reflected in contemporary culture in various ways, including Netflix's Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, which creates bright humor out of darkness. Room, by Emma Donoghue, is a thoughtful wonder of a novel. Embracing the challenge of writing a non-cloying child narrator, Donoghue tells the story of two survivors: a young woman who was kidnapped and the son she births and raises in captivity.

I'm sharing the teaser trailer here because the full trailer is kind of an all-over-the-place mess. I hope the movie itself does the book justice.

Out: October 16, 2015

Macbeth

Did you spend all our blood money at Sephora?

If you're Michael Fassbender or Marion Cotillard and also married to either Marion Cotillard or Michael Fassbender, I'm not sure why you would strive for anything else; you have reached peak achievement. Just chill in that French-Irish sea of beauty. But the Macbeths refuse to chill when it comes to the possibility of ruling Scotland in the 1040s, even though it's not like crowns are going to get them indoor plumbing or anything else remotely good. I'm really excited for this. After the disaster of last year's Cymbeline, we need (or at least I want, because I'm greedy) a big, successful Shakespeare adaptation to follow the promise of 2014's blockbuster broadcast of Coriolanus (more Tom, no apologies) and the near-perfect 2013 Much Ado About Nothing. I'm pissed that we're getting this two months after the UK does, in December instead of October. Are they sending an actual reel of the film by dinghy? Maybe they're hoping the Christmas spirit will make Americans more likely to see Shakespeare, even if it's the play containing the famous lines:

Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

God bless us, every one!

Out: December 4, 2015  >:(

Batman vs Superman

Oooooooh, Superman's in trouble.

I think all DC fans are on pins and needles for these next two. Like most of the internet, I found the Batman vs Superman marketing pretty laughable (So grimdark! Ben Affleck? What's with the title - is the Kent family farm in a class action against Wayne Enterprises?), but I'm including the above screenshot because that's the exact moment I gained some faith in Batfleck. Seeing him run through Superman-caused destruction to save a small child and then glare at the sky convinced me that this Bruce Wayne is pissed off and motivated enough to really take on the Man of Steel.

Out: March 25, 2016

Suicide Squad

A true gentleman carries a lady when she's trapped in unusable shoes.

The "DC = grimdark" fears were further fanned by San Diego Comic Con footage of Suicide Squad set to morose music, but hopefully David Ayer's film has some actual fun in it. I mean, it is about an off-the-books supervillain task force whose members have names like Captain Boomerang and Killer Croc. But it's likely that a good portion of Suicide Squad's success will depend, fairly or not, on its two most popular characters: Harley Quinn and the Joker. Margot Robbie seems perfect for Harley (this is the character's first live-action appearance), although it's weird that someone born in 1990 will be in a romantic triangle with Jordan Catalano and the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. There's been a lot of drama regarding both Robbie's and Jared Leto's characters' design (though mostly Leto's), and to be fair, it's pretty easy to imagine Robbie Quinn and Joker Leto re-enacting this scene, though obviously Batman would never let anyone choke to death on their own vomit.

What the dynamic between them will be also has a lot of fans anxious. Interpretations of the relationship can range from "supervillains in love" to "Harley is the poster child for domestic violence." Their relationship origin story has been told various ways in the canon, but I prefer it when Harley's transformation to supervillain Harley Quinn is done by her own initiative. Is a good decision? No, but it's hers. The Adam Glass version in the "new 52" Suicide Squad comics, the most probable source material for the film, is my least favorite. Not only does Harley not have a say in becoming Harley Quinn, she wasn't even deviously planning on a trashy tell-all true-crime book while treating the Joker - her boss was. She does kill her boss and free the Joker when she finds out, but it's done in a sort of fugue state. Weak.

So I've gone on for two paragraphs while barely mentioning any of the other characters/actors, which I feel is going to be pretty typical for this movie. Sorry, guys! Viola Davis will likely be fantastic as boss lady Amanda Waller. Will Smith has the right former-military-precision/soulful-interior look for Deadshot. I'm also looking forward to seeing Catholic gangster supervillain El Diablo (Jay Hernandez) and stereotypical Aussie supervillain Captain Boomerang (Jai Courtney), whom I call Sargent Australia in my head.

Sidenote: I love that we now have a real-life DC villain marriage with Jada Pinkett Smith and Will Smith.

Here's the trailer, which was first seen as leaked SDCC footage. How do you do have a Bee Gees song in a Suicide Squad trailer without it being "Stayin' Alive"???

Out: August 5, 2016

Run, Tom, Run: Tom at the Farm

I'm new to the work of director Xavier Dolan, who is new to the world, having been born in 1989. Despite not yet reaching 30, the Quebecois Dolan recently finished his sixth full-length movie. Tom at the Farm/Tom a la Ferme is his fourth; while it was released in 2013, it only got its stateside viewing last week.

Tom at the Farm is an adaptation of the Michel Marc Bouchard play, and actors Lise Roy and Pierre-Yves Cardinal reprise their stage roles. I haven't seen or read the play (the San Francisco Public Library's copy is currently MIA), so I don't know how closely this version follows it. Regardless, it stands on its own as an artsy thriller.

After the sudden death of his boyfriend Guy, cosmopolitan Tom (Dolan) leaves Montreal to attend the funeral in Guy's distant, rural hometown. He finds Guy's dreary childhood farmhouse (a place with no cellphone reception, always a red flag in movies) and meets Guy's mother, Agathe (Roy), who doesn't know who he is, and Francis (Cardinal), the older brother Guy never mentioned, who knows exactly who he is. Guy left home at sixteen, and the story that has been relayed to Agathe from Francis is that Guy (proper name Guillaume, as Francis firmly insists on calling him) was straight and had been in a long-term relationship with a co-worker named Sarah.

Cardinal, Roy, and Dolan at an awkward funeral

Francis violently forces Tom to play out this lie, and this eventually leads to him also violently keeping Tom at the farm. Cardinal brings such a frightening, alluring mixture of subtlety and raw physical power to the brutish Francis that it's clear why Dolan brought him on for the film. While Tom's first instinct is to get away from this hick bully, he's also drawn to Francis. Francis reminds him of Guy, both in appearance, and, it's hinted, in the sexual roles they find themselves playing. When the two fall into a perfect tango and Francis asks Tom who taught him to dance, he doesn't answer and doesn't need to. This might shed some light on Tom and Guy's relationship, but more so and alarmingly, it seems to illuminate what Francis and Guy's was.

Soon, it's not just the fact that Francis removed his car's wheels that's keeping Tom at the farm. When Tom uses the farmhouse's landline to call the real Sarah, it's not a plothole that has made him forget he had that option all along despite his useless cellphone. But whether he's made the choice to stay willingly or has succumbed to Stockholm Syndrome, the farm is still a place of danger. Shortly after a revelation chillingly scored to Corey Hart's cheesy 80s hit "Sunglasses at Night," Tom must rethink his decision.

Dolan's been called narcissistic for shots like this, but he is very pretty. 

I can see Tom at the Farm being one of those "love it or hate it" pieces: it's beautiful and intense, but its lack of defined answers will be aggravating for some. This is a movie where everything is implied, and you have to put the pieces together yourself or even just say "screw it" and commit to your own interpretation with little to no evidence. What does an empty table mean? What about twin beds pushed together? Lise Roy's excellent performance feeds into this ambiguity - it's clear she's anguished, but it's uncertain what she knows about either of her sons.

Tom at the Farm is currently playing at the 4 Star Theatre in San Francisco.

Two Films from Frameline39

I was fortunate to get two free tickets for this year's Frameline39, the San Francisco International LGBTQ Film Festival. The popular festival features dozens of diverse movies, documentaries, and shorts from all over the world. At last year's festival I watched Out in East Berlin, a documentary with a wide range of viewpoints about being gay in the GDR in the years leading up to the fall of the Berlin Wall. This year I picked two international narrative films: Liz in September from Venezuela and All About E from Australia.

Patricia Velasquez and Eloisa Maturén in Liz in September

Liz in September/Liz en Septiembre

A few years ago, I had a type of thyroid cancer: papillary thyroid carcinoma. This is generally one of the most treatable cancers. The surgeon chops out your thyroid, maybe you get a little radiation thrown in, and you take a pill every morning. But despite how non-lethal my own brush with malignant cells was, post-thyroidectomy I cry uncontrollably at cancer movies. 50/50, The Fault in Our Stars, and now Liz in September are all films that have made me wipe my eyes with my Muni-germ hands.

Liz in September is a Venezuelan film from director Fina Torres. It's based on an American play, Last Summer at Bluefish Cove by Jane Chambers. Liz (Patricia Velasquez) has had an unspecified cancer before, and now it's back and terminal. However, she keeps this diagnosis secret during the beach vacation she's having with friends (an excellent supporting cast) to celebrate her 37th birthday. The tight-knit group is interrupted by Eva (Eloisa Maturén), whose car has broken down. Liz's friends give her the challenge of seducing the apparently straight newcomer, not knowing how vulnerable Eva is: her young son has died, and her husband is having an affair. Still, romance blooms as Liz teaches Eva how to scuba dive and takes her on motorcycle and boat rides. Velasquez gives a subtle, deep performance with pain and humor. Maturén, a former ballerina, is endearing in her first acting role.

I'm not familiar with Chambers's play, but Torres's adaptation is gorgeous and warm. I wanted to be at that beach and at that inn, swimming, reading, and eating fresh fruit. As beautiful as the film is, it was apparently very hard to get made - Torres explained during the Q&A that this "labor of love" was many years in the making, and thanked producer Laura Oramas for saving the production from various last-minute emergencies. Their determination is inspiring for anyone working on their own long-term passion project.

L to R: ASL interpreter, producer Laura Oramas, Patricia Velasquez, 

Maria Luisa Flores, Eloisa Maturén, director Fina Torres, emcee

All About E

On Monday night I saw All About E, an Australian comedy/drama/romance/thriller from director Louise Wadley. E (Mandahla Rose) is a star DJ who parties hard and womanizes harder. But she's also stuck with her controlling, sleazy boss (Simon Bolton) and is so determined to stay in the closet to her Lebanese immigrant parents that she has her best friend Matt (Brett Rogers) pose as her husband. Perhaps because of these constrictions, when a duffel bag of cash appears she impulsively goes on the run with it, dragging Matt along, and we soon learn that deep down, all she really wants is to play the clarinet and settle down with a farmgirl.

The film felt tonally inconsistent to me, but this might be a quirk of Australian comedic cinema. Although they hold together better as dramedies, Muriel's Wedding and The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, are similarly erratic and were both mentioned by Wadley as inspiration. All About E is a mix of realistic, authentic moments contrasted with sometimes cartoonish characters and actions fueled mainly by plot. I definitely had some questions at the end (What was up with E and her boss? Why do they still have to get in the plane?), but it's an enjoyable ride.

A lot of that enjoyment is due to the leading ladies: Rose and Julia Billington. Although Billington claimed during the Q&A that she's a "city girl," she's totally believable as a tough but heartbroken country girl riding around on a tractor. The chemistry between Rose and Billington is such that you have to root for their characters' romance, even though E is a mess. That E remains sympathetic is thanks to Rose's performance. The beautiful music by Basil Hogios and Joseph Tawadros and cinematography by Justine Kerrigan are also highlights.

L to R: Simon Bolton, Brett Rogers, Julia Billington,
Mandahla Rose, producer Jay Rutovitz, director Louise Wadley

Frameline39 continues through this Sunday, June 28. An encore presentation of All About E will screen in Piedmont on Wednesday, and it will screen at Outfest in Los Angeles on July 12. Liz in September will also be screening at Outfest on July 12.

A Party at the Whedons': Much Ado About Nothing

Graduate reference? Can he not swim?

After months of waiting, Joss Whedon's Much Ado About Nothing is out! Unfortunately, it looks like a very limited release so far. I get that Shakespeare, despite his endurance, isn't the biggest draw (Ralph Fiennes's fine Coriolanus got the shaft, release-wise), but although the showing I went to wasn't a sell-out, there were still a good amount of people there and the audience loved it - lots and lots of laughter. Plus, you'd think the distributors would try to cash in on that Avengers $$$, even if by resorting to misleading the uninitiated about what Much Ado About Nothing is...about.

And then the aliens attack!

But even if it doesn't have Avengers' explosions or Cabin in the Wood's horror or Angel and Buffy's vampires or even a Whedon script, the movie remains very Whedon. It's filmed in his Santa Monica house (well, mansion), which was designed by his wife, architect Kai Cole. And, as expected, the cast is chock-full of Whedon regulars. "I was expecting the 'grr...argh' at the end," a friend told me, referring to the closing-credits logo of Whedon's Mutant Enemy Productions. This isn't meant in a disparaging way. Even if familiar Whedon faces are all there, the actors stay true to the characters and the director stays (mostly) true to the story.

What I loved: 

-No need to worry about Emma Thompson/Kenneth Branagh comparisons; Amy Acker and Alexis Denisof are funny and touching as this sharp, sweet, egalitarian couple. Both mastered not only the rapid-pace banter, but their respective slapstick scenes.

-Nathan Fillion was hilarious as vocabularily confused officer Dogberry. Absolutely perfect. As I had hoped, his acting was hammy without being too over-the-top. And he was was well matched with his ensemble of wide-eyed cops.

The hammer is my sense of justice.

-Whedon's promise that they "stressed the human, not the hymen" proved true. Although Leonato's reaction seems a little extreme for just a cheating allegation (versus being devastated because his sole heir and genetic lineage is now not marriageable because a penis entered her vagina at the wrong time), Clark Gregg quickly and fairly smoothly has his character come back to senses. And Fran Kranz manages to add some depth and hesitation to Claudio's desertion.

-They handled the Shakespearean text/modern times juxtaposition really well. A few things do inevitably seem odd (duels? counts? you thought a girl died from fainting on the lawn?), but it mostly worked. Other adaptations, like Romeo + Juliet and Coriolanus, have used modern technology, but it felt more seamless here. I especially liked the TMZ-style video of Don John getting arrested.

-Speaking of which, thank you, River Tam's big brother, for not being Keanu Reeves. Sean Maher captured the villain's terseness without sounding like he was reading off cue cards. Unexpectedly, the cupcake-stealing Don John and his associates Conrade (Riki Lindhome of novelty duo Garfunkel and Oates) and Borachio (Spencer Treat Clark) were kind of...adorable. The trio is hot, mod, and a little silly. How do you not love them dog paddling across the pool after setting their evil "let's ruin this wedding, haha!" plan into motion? (Related note: how did act 1, scene 3 become "the sexy scene"? First Branagh has Richard Clifford give half-naked Keanu a rub-down, and now Whedon has a female Conrade turning "Can you make no use of your discontent?" into a come-on.)

-Really, the whole cast was great. I was happy to see Ashley Johnson, the cute waitress from Avengers, as Margaret, the maid who has no idea her sexy times with Borachio are serving a sinister purpose. As Hero, Jillian Morgese (also an Avengers extra) was innocent and likable and had cute father-daughter chemistry with Clark Gregg.

-I was impressed, and my awesome musician roommate was thrilled, that Whedon worked the play's song, "Sigh No More," into the film.

Beatrice and Hero can't believe Claudio and Don Pedro's shit.

What I was iffy about:

-They kept the act 5, scene 4 line, "I'll hold my mind, were she an Ethiope," by which Claudio promises to wed fake-replacement-Hero even if she's African. (Charitably, I suppose you could interpret Claudio as promising to wed this girl who supposedly looks exactly like Hero even if she looks nothing like Hero. Spoiler alert: it's actually Hero.) This is tricky. Obviously, we'd all prefer that the line had never been written like that, but unfortunately it was. So what to do with it? I reflexively lean towards cutting it, but I see that's objectionable. I don't know this text as well as A Midsummer Night's Dream, so without re-reading I'm not sure how much text was cut or altered besides in relation to axed character Antonio. In this version, Claudio says the Ethiope line right in front of a black wedding guest, prompting the audience to laugh at him for being such an oblivious ass. But that just makes that black extra a prop to assuage white guilt - especially glaring since the cast was pretty much all white.

-Borachio's character was sort of all over the place, but I didn't feel this was the actor's fault.

-I'm ambivalent on the flashbacks of Beatrice and Benedick's previous love affair. I think Whedon wanted to make it clear he was not onboard with slut-shaming Hero by showing that fan faves have sex too, but it puts a different spin on the budding B&B relationship. Like, why did they break up before and why will this time be different?

-The white wine (there was drinking in pretty much every scene - I thought it would end like Hamlet, just with all the deaths from alcohol poisoning) looked exactly like water, which it probably was. Maybe they could have used white grape juice? I have no idea what would look clear but not too clear on camera in black and white.

-That's about it. I really loved this, and I hope more people watch it.

Much Ado About Whedon

Sorry for the title. We're going to see that title a lot, aren't we?

Anyways, the trailer for Joss Whedon's Much Ado About Nothing was recently released (film opens June 21). There is jazz and all the people look the same except for Coulson a.k.a. Clark Gregg. I'm not crazy about the trailer. Despite the contemporary setting, it looks really, really similar to Kenneth Branagh's 1993 movie version, with a lovely estate playing a character in both. In fact, Whedon has said that his mansion, designed by his wife Kai Cole, inspired the production. On the other hand, we can be assured that this version will not have Keanu Reeves struggling with his lines while being massaged by incredibly good sport and fine Shakespearean actor Richard Clifford. I am looking forward to the film very much, and I'm confident Whedon will do an excellent job with it.

The 1993 cast. Keanu, you tried. Denzel, Emma, and Kenneth were perfect.
Hero, you don't have to marry Wilson from House. Really.

What I am most excited about:

-Clark Gregg as Leonato. He is perfect for Shakespeare. When I was re-reading A Midsummer Night's Dream after watching The Avengers (not related), I couldn't help but think about what I would do if I had to cast all the Avengers actors in Dream (obviously*). Gregg, I thought, would be a perfect Theseus. He's got that ability to play older, dignified, but not flaw-free men.

-Amy Acker and Alexis Denisof as Beatrice and Benedick. I looooove Emma Thompson and Kenneth Branagh in these roles, but I'm also interested to see what this talented pair does with this smart, sharp, secretly-softies couple.

-Nathan Fillion as Dogberry. What Michael Keaton did with Dogberry in the Branagh version was a perfectly valid way to play an Elizabethan/Jacobean clown character (imho), but it felt a little out of place in the film. As we saw in Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog and countless Firefly outtakes, Fillion can do a cheeseball that's a bit more restrained.

-Seeing how feminist Whedon deals with the misogynistic elements in the play. What I find so interesting about Much Ado is that it has one of Shakespeare's most positive couples (Beatrice and Benedick) and one of his worst (Hero and Claudio). I'd never want the text or intention changed, but subtle acting and directing choices can really make a difference (just think of different productions of The Taming of the Shrew). It looks like Whedon's handled that well, as he says that they "stress[ed] the human not the hymen" in the adaptation.



*For the record, here is my cast. I have a lot of time to think on the bus, ok?

Theseus: Clark Gregg. Mr. Regal.
Hippolyta: Gwyneth Paltrow. Mrs. Regal.
Egeus: Stellan Skarsgard. It's Stellan Sarksgard. The Bard's not going to be a problem for him.
Lysander: Jeremy Renner. He'd have a good level of controlled intensity when arguing his case to Theseus.
Hermia: Scarlett Johansson. Small, fierce, pretty.
Helena: Cobie Smulders. Tall, comedy chops.
Demetrius: Chris Evans. Can do the douche thing.
Oberon: Samuel L. Jackson. I'd love to hear him boom, "Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania!"
Titania: Natalie Portman. She was on a computer screen, so she counts. And she could nail this role with storminess and sensuality.
Puck: Tom Hiddleston. He could actually do just about any role in this play, but he'd be fun and awesome as Robin Goodfellow.
Bottom: Robert Downey Jr. Classic ham. Just imagine him doing the Bottom's Dream soliloquy. I'm going to imagine this whenever I'm sad.
Peter Quince: Mark Ruffalo. Mostly for the stuttering prologue scene, bless.

I have no idea what you'd do with Chris Hemsworth. I don't think you could even toss him in one of the workmen roles. Maybe Francis Flute, as a joke when he plays Thisbe? I really have no idea. He'd be a fine Lysander, but I still think Renner'd be better. Let's just go with Francis Flute.

BUT I ACTUALLY HAVE A BEARD!

Les Miz Movie Rambling

I'm fine; the bullet bounced off my corset.

So the Les Miserables movie musical finally came out, and to deservedly mixed reviews. The songs were pretty chopped up (most noticeable and damaging in "Confrontation," "Master of the House," "Look Down," "Plumet Attack," and "One Day More," in my opinion), but the sets looked great. Honestly, there was never any way crowds weren't going to come out en masse for this, and it was perfect for a Christmas pastime. Was it an instant classic? No. Did I cry? Yes. Multiple times? Yes.

Should have gotten Neil Patrick Harris and Jason Segel to coach this scene.

To get this out of the way: yes, Anne Hathaway was good. I wasn't in the "Anne Hathaway = best Catwoman ever!" camp, but man, did she give a great performance here. While I agree with a lot of Mick LaSalle's criticism regarding what happens when they make the showstopping songs intimate and whispered, I disagree with what he says about Hathaway's "I Dreamed a Dream." When she got to "but there are dreams that cannot be,/ and there are storms we cannot weather," you could hear the entire theater scrounging around for their Kleenex.

I thought Samantha Barks's "On My Own" was near perfect: belted, passionate...and still on a scale that worked for the film. But then, girl knows what she's doing. (I think the grit that Lea Salonga brings to Eponine still makes hers my favorite, though.) BTW, love this quotation from Barks from this interview: "I can't believe I actually spat in Ali G's face!"

When Eponine says "don't rob the house," don't rob the fucking house.

I love ethereal siren/angel/ghost-creature Amanda Seyfried, but there's not much to do with the role of Cosette. Ditto for ultimate trustafarian Marius. I told my mom immediately after the movie ended that I thought Eddie Redmayne sounded like Kermit, and she thought I was crazy. All the reviews seemed to love him, and I thought maybe I was just biased, but then...validation!

Congrats to Mrs. Lovett for finding a husband who's far more cheery than Sweeney Todd yet has the exact same morals and fashion sense. Seriously, never eat anything Helena Bonham Carter has cooked.

One day Tim Burton is going to wake and find that Helena Bonham Carter, Sacha Baron Cohen, Alan Rickman, and Johnny Depp have all left him for Tom Hooper.

When Javert started throwing punches at the ABC guys, all I could think was, "fightin' 'round the world!"

Sure, Tugger could have saved him from the Seine, but we
know how Tugger feels about Russell Crowe's singing.

Javert putting the medal on Gavroche's corpse was sort of maudlin and didn't really feel true to where his character was at the point (still cried, though). It also annoyed me a little bit since Eponine's corpse was right there, and in the novel she's the dead person he recognizes in a quick flash of humanity, and hey, if you're going to go back to the book and have Fantine's teeth ripped out... But I guess in the context of the musical/movie Javert and Eponine haven't really had any interaction, while Javert and Gavroche have.

Even with Hugo's lengthy history of the Parisian sewers and ruminations on how much it blows to drown in poop, I was somehow not prepared for the OH MY GOD THEY'RE IN POOP scene where Valjean rescues Marius. Valjean needs a "world's best dad" mug, 'cause carrying your daughter's boyfriend through rivers of poop to get him to safety is really above and beyond.

As annoying as I find the Marius/Cosette nuptials, I loved in the novel how Marius's grandpa and Valjean get so, so, so into wedding planning. If Marius's grandpa had grabbed Cosette's hands and squealed, "DRESS SHOPPING!!!" it would have taken the movie into Mamma Mia! territory, but it also would have been pretty true to the book.

Joker and Harley Quinn's biggest rivals at Villain Prom.

Yeah, they're terrible people, but when Thenardier led his wife away by the hand after they were kicked out of the rich kids wedding, it made me sad to think that in the novel, Madame Thenardier has died in prison by that scene.

Eponine's part in the "Come to Me" reprise was axed. What gives? I mean, yeah, it's kind of weird for a dying man to be visited by the spirit of the girl who had a crush on his son-in-law, but still.

Heaven = being in an Occupy Paris camp? Forever? I hope they get to stroll around the Luxembourg and have some pain au chocolat at some point.

Elementary & Sherlock

Like A.V. Club's Myles McNutt, I was hoping to go into CBS's Elementary without comparing it to BBC's Sherlock, which I recently started watching. But, as McNutt admits, as hard as one can try to not compare them, it's almost impossible not to. They're both modern-day adaptations of Sherlock Holmes, with Elementary conveniently appearing well after Sherlock had established itself as a darling of fans and critics alike. The inevitable rivalry was heightened when Benedict Cumberbatch (BBC's Sherlock's Sherlock) implied Jonny Lee Miller (CBS's Elementary's Sherlock) took the job only to sustain his LA mansion & trophy wife lifestyle, which was either cutting bitchery or a misquote. Basically, the two are going to be compared, and that might not be favorable to Elementary.

Jonny Lee Miller's Sherlock is an arrogant dick. And his Sherlock should be an arrogant dick, because Sherlock is kind of an arrogant dick. But while Benedict Cumberbatch's Sherlock's dickery comes from a place of arrogance, it also derives from his honest confusion regarding social norms and is tempered by his breathless enthusiasm and poignant vulnerability - which is why although he belittles and irritates the people in his life (Watson, Mycroft, Lestrade, Mrs. Hudson, etc.), these same people humor and protect him rather than punch him in the face (although Molly should seriously punch him in the face). And, with the help of threat-happy manic pixie dream villain Jim Moriarty, he's learning, gradually, just how much those people mean to him in return. Nothing like "Imma kill all your friends and also dance" to bring things into perspective.

They mean nothing! Now leave me to my pouting couch.

Jonny Lee Miller's Sherlock is more of just an asshole addict. Which is totally fair, considering that in Doyle's stories, Sherlock had quite the taste for you know what. But Miller's Sherlock's assholishness is laced with aggression, as seen in the pilot when he screams at a female assault victim (which, to be fair, gives Lucy Liu's Watson a great opening to shut that shit down). In last night's episode, "While You Were Sleeping," when Sherlock breaks into an apartment without a warrant in front of the police and the resident, there's a clear "fuck you, I do what I want" vibe. In Sherlock, when Sherlock technically breaks the law - for example, by withholding evidence in "A Study in Pink" - it's more of a "I am trying to solve the case and I need that to solve the case so why would I have given it to you kthxbai" vibe. Miller's Sherlock is not as immediately endearing as Cumberbatch's, but this does give the character ways to develop that are very different and still affecting. I did like how in last night's episode we saw more of how Sherlock views his addiction: he's still in denial and a bit ashamed. He's hiding his rehab stay from others, disdainful towards his group sessions, but also gently urges a drugged-up lawyer to get help while simultaneously bullying him for client information.

I think A.V. Club user Nate the Great (yes, getting into those peer-reviewed sources now) states the gist of the differences between the two series well in his/her comment on the the A.V. Club's review of last night's episode: "Elementary is a police procedural using the character names for people who haven't read [Arthur Conan Doyle]. Sherlock is written by fans of [Doyle] for fans of [Doyle], and it's a clear loving tribute." This feel absolutely true. Elementary is a procedural and could be any procedural. Joan Watson and Sherlock Holmes could be Melody Lee and Brian Smith and it would be another unconventional detective/long-suffering sidekick series, albeit with less character than Monk or Psych. Despite last night's violin shout-out, there's not much Holmsian about it. Sherlock revels in its Doyle roots in a clever way, while making something new and much fresher than Elementary despite more closely sticking to the Victorian source material.

Plaid is British, right?

That said, I adore, adore, adore Lucy Liu's Watson. Emotionally wounded yet a tough cookie, Liu subtly gives Watson strength and reservedness. Still getting over a tragedy that ended her career as a surgeon, she's a work in progress like recovering addict Holmes. And it's clear Holmes recognizes and appreciates her crime-solving talents, even if she's still doubtful of herself.

So I'm not ready to give up on Elementary yet. I think TV could use some more male/female platonic friendships, and there are parts I'm finding engaging. Will they do more with Watson's male Mary (Ty) Morstan? I'm also interested in learning more about "what happened" in London, which Watson has deduced concerned a woman. Was it Jersey girl adventuress/opera singer Irene Adler? They are near New Jersey, and Watson knows from Sherlock's father that Sherlock once loved opera, which Sherlock now vehemently denies. Or could the woman be a fem Professor Moriarty? BTW my dream fem Professor Moriarty is totally boho-frumpy and surrounded by books and drafts of Ph.D. candidates' theses while plotting crimes. I want Selma Blair in ankle-length skirts and lumpy sweaters. Just saying, Elementary crew.