2017: The Year in Review

It is the end of 2017, but it may as well be not be, for this year – even on the heels of last year – has felt beyond-interminable, this in spite of its many ferocious pulls in pretty much every single f---in’ direction.

That’s part of the reason I took a sabbatical from this non-sense about which, yes, I have been known to be quite serious, to become much more of aware of the world beyond the movies.

To keep tabs on the real world.

To try and keep up not only with the Kardashians, for a change, but with the people who are supposed to be representing and leading this country and, closer to the ground and to home, with my community.

Still had time to watch some films, though. Some movies and some flicks, too.

Most of ’em were good and fun, although a few were fairly awful. Not as terrible as...you know what? He’s not worth it. He is not me, he is not us; he’s got zero to do with this, and he certainly doesn’t deserve any more attention.

So here’s to the year that was, and to 2018, which, IMHO, is already full of promise.

I tell ya, it’s gonna be a good one.

Because woof.

Now, without further ado, my picks with a little silliness thrown back in for good measure.

10 Best Films of the Year (in alphabetical order):

Battle of the Sexes
The Big Sick
Call Me by Your Name
Dunkirk
The Florida Project
Get Out
Kedi
Lady Bird
Logan
The Shape of Water

Honorable Mention (tie): Beach Rats and Beatriz at Dinner

Best Directors: Guillermo del Toro (The Shape of Water), Greta Gerwig (Lady Bird), Luca Guadagnino (Call Me by Your Name), Patty Jenkins (Wonder Woman), Jordan Peele (Get Out)

Best Look: Charlize Theron in Atomic Blonde

Best Makeover: Chris Hemsworth’s in Thor: Ragnarok

Best Props: It’s myriad red balloons

Best Setting: Call Me by Your Name’s Italian countryside

Best Switcheroo: Allison Williams’ in Get Out

Best Supporting Actors: Willem Dafoe (The Florida Project), Armie Hammer (Call Me by Your Name), Andy Serkis (War for the Planet of the Apes, Star Wars: The Last Jedi), Patrick Stewart (Logan) Michael Stuhlbarg (Call Me by Your Name)

Most Welcome to the A-List: Gal Gadot (Wonder Woman)

Most Ready to Channel Ivanka Trump for a Remake of Single White Female That Ought to Be Titled Single White Nationalist: Unforgettable’s Katherine Heigl

Most Surprising: The Foreigner’s Jackie Chan (Jackie Chan!)

Best Supporting Actresses: Tiffany Haddish (Girls Trip), Holly Hunter (The Big Sick), Tatiana Maslany (Stronger), Laurie Metcalf (Lady Bird), Octavia Spencer (The Shape of Water)

Can’t Wait to See More of – Female: Danielle Macdonald and Bridget Everett, from Patty Cake$

Can’t Wait to See More of – Male: Kumail Nanjiani, from The Big Sick

Best Actors: Timothée Chalamet (Call Me by Your Name), Jake Gyllenhaal (Stronger), Hugh Jackman (Logan), Daniel Kaluuya (Get Out), James McAvoy (Split)

Best Actresses: Halle Berry (Kidnap), Cate Blanchett (Manifesto), Sally Hawkins (The Shape of Water), Brooklynn Prince (The Florida Project), Saiorse Ronan (Lady Bird)

Photos: Universal Pictures (Get Out); ScreenFellows.com (Call Me by Your Name); Warner Bros. (Unforgettable); Variety.com (Stronger).

2016: The Year in Review

A wallflower 2016 certainly was not, wouldn’t you agree.

But it was a most interesting and intriguing year, one in which new voices were heard, and quieter stories triumphantly bubbled up to the surface, and, for that matter, not a minute too soon or too late, too.

So here’s to that – to that, at the very least – and to 2017.

10 Best Films of the Year (in alphabetical order):

13th
Captain America: Civil War
Eye in the Sky
Hacksaw Ridge
The Invitation
Jackie
Loving
Moonlight
O.J.: Made in America
Swiss Army Man

Honorable Mention (tie): Lion and Queen of Katwe

Best Directors: Ava DuVernay (13th), Mel Gibson (Hacksaw Ridge), Barry Jenkins (Moonlight), Pablo Larraín (Jackie), Jeff Nichols (Loving)

Best Supporting Actors: Mahershala Ali (Moonlight), Ralph Fiennes (A Bigger Splash), John Goodman (10 Cloverfield Lane), Dev Patel (Lion) Daniel Radcliffe (Swiss Army Man)

Best Supporting Actresses: Viola Davis (Fences), Naomie Harris (Moonlight), Margo Martindale (The Hollars), Helen Mirren (Eye in the Sky), Margot Robbie (Suicide Squad)

Best Actors: Paul Dano (Swiss Army Man), Joel Edgerton (Loving), Andrew Garfield (Hacksaw Ridge), Ryan Reynolds (Deadpool), Denzel Washington (Fences)

Best Actresses: Kate Beckinsale (Love & Friendship), Jessica Chastain (Miss Sloane), Gillian Jacobs (Don’t Think Twice), Ruth Negga (Loving), Natalie Portman (Jackie)

Photos: Focus Features (Loving); Fox Searchlight Pictures (A Bigger Splash); Fox Searchlight Pictures (Jackie).

The Song of 2016

The song of 2016, obviously, necessarily, powerfully is...Beyoncé’s “Formation.”

The surprise single – which dropped the day before last winter’s Super Bowl and which Queen B defiantly and confidently performed at the big game before dropping her latest game elevator, LEMONADE, in the spring – had it all:

A bold feministic message.

A declarative and definitive acknowledgement of self.

And a contagiously sick beat.

It was a long-con rally cry for a year that’s not yet over and, best of all, for a story – a history...a herstory – that’s yet to be fully written.

“Formation” is not only the song of the year. It is the song of the future.

Time to get, ladies people everyone. Time to get.

Indeed, time to slay:

Manning the Machine

Emmy nominee Darren Criss sure is pluggin’ away.

The erstwhile curly haired heartthrob of TV’s Glee has been glittering away as Hedwig on Broadway and beyond – I saw him in San Francisco last month, and lemme tell ya...the kid can work dem platform heels! – and, now, he’s getting back into the TV-meets-music game.

Criss is going to co-executive produce a new workplace comedy titled Royalties for Fox.

The show will revolve around the unseen and unsung heroes behind the pop stars we know and love – or, at least, the fictional version of some of ’em. Y’ know, the writers and producers and marketing people. The machine behind the talent.

Our way in as viewers will be the one-hit wonder who gets all prodigal and returns to the company in order to score a big hit once again.

Photo: SFGate.com.

American Animal

Evan Peters is branching out.

The American Horror Story player is going to star in American Animals, a movies based on the true story of four young men who thought they were in a movie and attempted a most audacious heist – the most boldly brazen ever attempted in the United States.

That’s it for details. So consider me curious.

Documentary filmmaker Bart Layton (The Imposter) will write and direct.

Photo: Evan-Peters.us.

Obviously Donatella

Sorry, Maya Rudolph – it’s gonna be Lady GaGa.

Obviously.

Ryan Murphy has cast the Golden Globe-winning Mother Monster (FX’s American Horror Story: Hotel) as fashion designer Donatella Versace on his other cable anthology-series franchise, American Crime Story. The multi-hyphenate will be featured during the forthcoming third installment of the show, the season focusing on the Gianni Versace murder (the beloved gone-to-soon designer was killed in 1997 in front of his Miami Beach home by a serial killer named Andrew Cunanan).

I can’t believe I’m saying this, but that’s some perfect casting right there. After all, Lady GaGa already played La Versace – kinda...ish – in the Italian fashion house’s Spring 2014 ad campaign.

The Versace season of American Crime Story will be based on Maureen Orth’s Vulgar Favors. That installment will follow the show’s second season, which will focus on the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

Both installments will shoot simultaneously, with the latter premiering – I presume – next year, and the former in 2018.

Photo: YouTube.com.

The Horseman Who Will

Liam Neeson (who is about to court Oscar this winter, with Martin Scorsese’s decades-in-the-works Silence) and Neil Jordan are teaming up again.

The Northern Irish actor and his Irish Michael Collins director are going to work on The Trainer, the story of a premier horse trainer in west Ireland who loses it all – including his will to live – following tragedy.

His life is basically saved by a young girl named Nadya, a refugee making a new way for herself in a strange new land.

Of course, the two bond over their shared love for equines, especially one that just may gift them the win that they both need.

So...Awards Bait Alert?

You know it.

Photo: IFTA.ie.

The Peacock Ain’t Feelin’ the Cruelty

So NBC has (wisely?) decided not share its Cruel Intentions with us.

The Sarah Michelle Gellar-led TV reboot (the pilot for which was shot on location in San Francisco) always sounded to me like a bad fit for the Peacock. I mean, if she couldn’t cuss, what was SMG’s Kathryn Merteuil supposed to do? Rely on on-screen emoji?

That woulda been hella silly.

The powers that be reportedly will be shopping the show to other networks and to the streamers (I bet).

Photo: Yahoo.com.

Country Fans Need a Beyoncé Lesson

See? No reason to get all ridikolous, country fans: Collaboration is good.

That’s precisely what the Dixie Chicks did with Beyoncé – work together to create something beautiful – when Queen B joined ’em on stage a couple of nights ago at the Country Music Awards for a very special and badass performance of the LEMONADE maker’s “Daddy Lessons,” which you can listen to and download for free here.

Evidently, a great backlash (with some disappointing and ugly racial undertones) met the collaboration (and even Beyoncé’s mere presence at the show), which is silly because country music is for all and of all. I believe that LEMONADE is absolutely a country album, much more than the click-bait-y confessional the media and some people made it out to be, and I think that we can all agree Beyoncé’s pretty f---in’ amazing, so I don’t get how anything bad could be said about this collab. But folks will surprise.

We have so many pressing matters to worry about these days, pettiness ought to fall to the bottom of the list, knowwhatImean?

Let’s get it together, America.

We really are and will continue to be stronger and better and funner together.

Photo: EW.com.

Dr. Jack Ryan Girl, Thankyouverymuch

When John Krasinski becomes Jack Ryan for Amazon (some sweet time next year, I should guess), Abbie Cornish is gonna be right there with him.

Indeed, the Limitless star had landed the female lead on the exactly titled Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan that producer Carlton Cuse (A&E’s Bates Motel, TV’s Lost) is working on, taking on the role of Dr. Cathy Mueller, an infectious-diseases specialist.

Yes, she will serve as a love interest for Krasinski – but did you take note of her title? Girlfriend ain’t gonna be your typical damsel.

No siree she won’t.

Photo: CelebrityHive.com.

Headed to the Yuba River Valley

Channing Tatum’s going west with Netflix.

The actor is going to produce – at the very least – Yuba for the streamer.

A western set in the Gold Rush of yore, the film was written by newcomer Eamon O’Sullivan and will be a sprawling period tale centering on two main characters.

FYI: The Yuba river valley was notorious once for its unabashed lawlessness.

So now you kinda know what you’ll be getting into, kids.

Photo: WomanWay.online.

Forever, Biblically Young

Biblical epics are tricky – but don’t think that’s gonna keep Tom Cruise from trying his luck with one.

The star is set to headline Methuselah for producer David Heyman (the upcoming Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, the Harry Potter franchise).

Up-and-coming director Joachim Rønning (Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, Kon-Tiki) is attached to helm the life story of the longest-living figure in the Hebrew Bible.

Photo: SamishLeather.com.

Hello Hello, J. Lo

It’s all turning shades of...a musical for Jennifer Lopez.

NBC has tapped the hardest-working multi-hyphenate in the industry – as you oughta know, she stars on the Peacock’s Shades of Blue – for the role of Rosie on Bye Bye, Birdie Live!, its next holiday musical presentation.

La Lopez will executive produce the 2017 title – the story of a rock singer named Conrad Birdie who travels to a small Ohio town for a farewell TV performance...and to kiss his biggest fan (enter J. Lo’s Rosie) before he is drafted into the Army – with her longtime manager and creative partner Benny Medina. Craig Zadan and Neil Meron, and Elaine Goldsmith-Thomas – whom, if memory serves, runs the triple threat’s production company – also are on board as producers.

Harvey Fierstein – who will be featured on this season’s Hairspray Live! special airing on Dec. 7 – is writing the teleplay adaptation.

Photo: Pinterest.com.

Ready to Fall a Third Time

This because like, last spring’s London Has Fallen did (comparatively) so, so well?

Gerard Butler and the powers that be are putting together an action-packed threequel to cap the unlikely franchise they launched in 2013 with the sleeper hit Olympus Has Fallen.

Angel Has Fallen will see Butler reprising his role as the indefatigable Secret Service agent Mike Banning, this time to keep himself safe from terrorists hellbent on taking him out, this, natch, in order to come down on Washington, D.C., again.

If he is to be in the movie, though, Aaron Eckhart just might die in this one: “Angel” will serve as the code name for...Air Force One.

Here’s to hoping he makes it to the escape pod we were told about in Harrison Ford’s Air Force One, huh.

Production on Angel Has Fallen is expected to get underway during the first half of 2017. A director has yet to be announced.

Someone should call on Mimi Leder.

Photo: ComingSoon.net (London Has Fallen).

Reset Time

Alrighty then.

It was a day for trailer premieres yesterday, what with the drop for the preview of Netflix’s Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life and that of (network) TV’s much-anticipated 24: Legacy, the Corey Hawkins-fronted reboot that Fox will debut right after Super Bowl LI in February.

Click here to watch the trailer for the new show, which is to co-star Miranda Otto, Teddy Sears (The CW’s The Flash), Dan Bucatinsky (TV’s Scandal), and Jimmy Smits. The story of a heroic Army Ranger (Hawkins) who turns to CTU upon his return home to the United States, for help in saving his life and stopping what could be a massive terrorist attack on America, looks like it’s gonna be one heckuva ride.

24: Legacy is scheduled to kick off with a two-night launch on Feb. 5-6.

I’ll def be watching.

Photo: ShadowAndAct.com.