It’s always fun to find out what movies inspire our favorite filmmakers, particularly when the Scorseses and Wes Andersons and the like point us away from the traditional canon and towards movies that are a little more obscure and unsung. In that spirit, the new book The Best Film You’ve Never Seen finds writer Robert K. Elder talking to 35 directors about their favorite overlooked, lost, or critically savaged films. Here’s a brief peek at what Flavorwire favorites like John Waters, Edgar Wright, Guillermo del Toro, and Richard Linklater recommended. … Read More
Kevin Smith
The Dirtiest Movie Posters of All Time [NSFW]
Late last week, the Internet collectively furrowed its brow, cocked its head sideways a bit, and then issued a unanimous “Ohhhh” and turned a little red before quickly closing the tab window as Lars von Trier unleashed the dirty/artsy poster for his latest film, the two-part, LaBeouf-enabling, unsimulated-sex epic Nymphomaniac. But how do Von Trier parenthetical genitals stack up against the cinema’s naughtier one-sheets? A roundup of some of the dirtiest movie posters to date after the jump. … Read More
15 Great Filmmakers to Follow on Twitter
Film fans on Twitter have known for a few weeks now that Steven Soderbergh has what he calls “sort of a shadow name” where he’s “posted a few things” on the social networking site; over the past 24 hours, that feed got a lot busier, as Soderbergh (under the unverified handle @bitchuation) started tweeting a novella. Semi-anonymous or not (and even if confining his tweets to novellas and absurd observations), Soderbergh joins a growing body of terrific filmmakers using the medium for film conversation, self-promotion, and peeks behind the curtain. Flavorwire rounded up some favorites back in 2010, but three years is an eternity in Twitter time, so here are a few more recommendations to add to your “following” list. … Read More
Flavorpill Guide to the Week’s Top 10 SF Events
Along with temperate weather, a surf-friendly beach, and nearby state parks for days, San Francisco is also home to a breathtaking diversity of cultural events. Between our fair city’s world-class museums, restaurants, bars, art galleries, music scene, festivals, and clubs, between all that is weird and quirky and purely San Franciscan, there’s something going down, somewhere, every single day of the year. What’s an engaged culture hound to do? First step: Check out our newly launched Flavorpill social discovery engine, where you can create and share events with friends, follow our carefully curated editors’ picks, and connect with other people who have similar interests as you. Below, you’ll find Flavorpill’s top picks for this week. Just a little bit of help as you set out into this beautiful wide world of SF’s happenings. … Read More
Great Movies With Embarrassingly Bad DVD Art
You can’t judge a book by its cover, as we’ve recently discovered with not only books, but also music. That holds true with film as well — not just with movie posters, which have their own problematic elements, but when it comes time to sell you the movie in physical form. For years, DVD distributors have uglified some of our favorite movies — often even eschewing the classy and striking movie posters for Photoshopped, Frankensteined monstrosities of their own making, designed to move units at all costs. We’ve assembled some of the ugliest and most terrifying DVD images for movies we actually like — and provided their original posters as well, just so you can see how far they can fall. … Read More
A Selection of Celebrities Who Just Couldn’t Take a Joke
By now, even those of us who tend to ignore petty celebrity gossip have read a headline that goes something like, “Taylor Swift: to hell with Tina Fey, Amy Poehler?’” And then we had to see what could possibly have prompted this response to a pair of beloved comedians whose recent stint hosting the Golden Globes earned them seemingly universal praise. Both expressed shock, and even a little regret, that Swift had taken their lighthearted jab her love life to heart — and, in the end, they looked nothing but courteous and witty, while the singer came of as whiny. But at least the debacle was fairly amusing, as it tends to be when famous people insist on taking themselves too seriously. After the jump, we’ve rounded up a few more entertaining exchanges that ensued when celebrities just couldn’t take a joke. … Read More
10 Low-Budget Films That Became Unexpected Hits
James Bond’s golden anniversary moment in the spotlight hasn’t ended yet. The twenty-third film in the spy series, Skyfall, is still counting the cash, bringing home a total of $669 million so far (with a budget of $200 million). Website Pajiba recently surveyed 007′s place amongst the most expensive movies of all time, and the titles aren’t entirely surprising, but the numbers are indeed outrageous. The comprehensive list got us thinking about the opposite end of the spectrum: low-budget films that became unexpected hits. Success is subjective, and we’ve measured each movie by its cult likability and by the numbers (not adjusted for inflation). Click through for more movies made on the cheap that became big, and tell us your favorites. … Read More
The Movies Hollywood Was Afraid to Make
Paul Thomas Anderson’s The Master opens Friday in limited release — his first film in five years, though we certainly could have been waiting longer. Anderson’s oh-so-thinly-veiled portrait of a cult leader who seems an awful lot like L. Ron Hubbard knocked around Hollywood for a good long while before the writer/director finally found outside financing (more on that later); it’s one of several films — most of them related to religion, the movie industry’s primary hot button — that had to go the indie route when the major studios were afraid to touch them. After the jump, a brief history of movies Hollywood was too scared to make. … Read More
The Morning’s Top 5 Pop Culture Stories
1. If you missed last night’s Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, Fiona Apple stopped by to perform “Anything We Want” and a cover of Paul McCartney’s “Let Me Roll It” with The Roots. She also discussed her infamous Roseland Ballroom meltdown. Watch the footage here.
2. The fact that Hans Zimmer is scoring… Read More
The Shocking Beards of Generally Clean-Faced Celebs
Now, we’re generally pro-scruff in all its forms, but his week, we stumbled across a photograph of David Bowie rocking a delicate, demure beard, and we were just a little bit shocked. After all, for all the man’s stylistic hijinks, we’ve never seen him with a beard before, and there’s something distinctly strange about it. Some men can transition in and out of beards with no drama, but some faces have become so iconic in their clean-shaven state that a beard is frankly unsettling. Inspired by Bowie, we’ve put together a collection of the most shocking beards that have popped up on the faces of generally bare-faced celebrities (whether in recent memory or in the willful days of their youth), after the jump. Click through to check out these surprising beards, and let us know if we missed your favorite (or if we’ve inspired you to rethink that summer scruff) in the comments. … Read More
Recent Features
-
6h
Hannibal Bluth, Kanye’s Inner Lucille, and Russell Brand Gets Cheeky: Links You Need To See
- 8h
- 8h
- 8h
- 8h
- 9h
-
10h
Beyond James Turrell: 10 More Great Artists Who Use Light as a Medium
- 10h
- 11h
- 12h
Popular Posts
- 11h
- 1d
Actors and Directors Who Trashed the Remakes of Their Classic Movies - 1d
- 2d
- 4d
The 50 Books Everyone Needs to Read, 1963-2013
The 50 Greatest Summer Albums, 1963-2013
5 Great Novels That Will Mess With Your Mind
The Wedding Photos of 25 Musicians in Love
