Penelope Cruz – This Had Oscar Buzz

225 – Murder on the Orient Express

All aboard, listeners! This week, we’re looking at Kenneth Branagh’s recent attempts to take on Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot with 2017′s Murder on the Orient Express. Directed by and starring Branagh as the French investigator, the film assembled a gobsmacking assemblage of stars (from Michelle Pfeiffer to Judi Dench to Penelope Cruz to Johnny Depp) for one of Christie’s most iconic whodunits that looked to be a splashy blockbuster. Though the film was a box office success enough to launch a new franchise, the film received a ho-hum critical response and never got close to achieving the Oscar embrace received by Sidney Lumet’s 1974 version of the material.

This episode, we talk about Branagh’s underwhelming approach to the material and how the film doesn’t give us movie stars acting opposite movie stars in the way that we want. We also discuss how Death on the Nile compares to this film’s lacking sense of fun, Michelle Pfeiffer’s acting nominations, and the 2017 Saturn Awards.

Topics also include Ingrid Bergman’s Orient Express Oscar win, the film’s odd trailer punctuated by Imagine Dragons, and the mustache.

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165 – The Counselor

There are few names in modern literature with more prestige than Cormac McCarthy, and his work has been adapted into the likes of Best Picture winner No Country for Old Men. For his first produced original screenplay, he partnered with one of the most prestigious names in movies and our most discussed director, Ridley Scott. Together they brought an all-star cast led by Michael Fassbender for a tale of violence and hubris called The Counselor. With scenes of Cameron Diaz humping a car and Brad Pitt being slowly beheaded by a mechanized wire lasso, The Counselor was immediately dismissed by (most) critics and audiences for its interminable plot and excessive violence.

This episode, we talk about film adaptations of Cormac McCarthy’s work and Ridley Scott’s upcoming twofer Oscar hopefuls this season in House of Gucci and The Last Duel. We also discuss offensive onscreen representations of Mexico, Fassbender’s hard-to-place screen persona, and bastardization of the MTV Movie Awards.

Topics also include Ridley Scott trailers, Bardem’s styling in the movie, and “The Continental.”

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083 – Captain Corelli’s Mandolin

For this week’s episode, we have another quintessential prestige picture that flubbed with Oscar: it’s-a Captain Corelli’s Mandolin! Coming off of a Best Picture win with Shakespeare in Love, director John Madden returned with a WWII romance set on a gorgeous Greek island between recent Oscar winner Nicolas Cage and next-big-thing Penélope Cruz. But this love story was instantly derided for its tepid sparks and cringe-worthy dialect work from Cage, making it more of a punchline come Oscar time than the viable contender it seemed to be before release.

This week, we look back at Madden’s very THOB-friendly filmography and the behind-the-scenes business maneuverings that crossed this film with Miramax. We also take an extended look at 2001′s acting categories and imagine what a Best Picture ten could have been in the year of A Beautiful Mind and the first Lord of the Rings installment.

Topics also include Cruz’s busy 2001 amid her relationship with Tom Cruise, how movie-going was impacted by 9/11, Christian Bale’s butt, and prostitute pasta.

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056 – All The Pretty Horses

This week, we have a deceptively titled film that was also sold deceptively to audiences in 2000. Billy Bob Thornton’s Cormac McCarthy adaptation All The Pretty Horses was supposed to be an old-fashioned romantic epic filled with sweeping landscapes and big emotions – but what audiences got on Christmas morning was a bleak western about cowboys who just wanna cowboy. Famously, the film was cut down from a 3.5 hour epic into two hours by Harvey Weinstein and it still makes for a very scattered and lethargic movie.

For this episode, we take a look back at both Matt Damon and Penelope Cruz’s star personas, his as a go-to leading man with a string of pre-Bourne bombs and hers as an unfairly treated tabloid figure. We also look at the back stage stories that were depicted in Peter Biskind’s Down and Dirty Pictures, Lasse Hallström as unexpected benefitor of Horses’ failure, and the Oscar year that was capped brilliantly by Björk’s swan dress.

And for listeners clamoring for our thoughts on the beginning of the TIFF lineup, we spend the beginning of the episode discussing what we’re most excited for, including Harriet, Marriage Story, and Meryl in a Blossom hat.

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