The top stories of the day are actually the top stories of yesterday and tomorrow. On the one hand, we’re still reeling from the loss of Chris Marker, collecting remembrances and tributes. On the other, anticipation mounts: Sight & Sound has tweeted word today that it’ll begin posting the results of its “Greatest Films of All Times” polls tomorrow night.
For its seventh critics’ poll—the magazine’s first was in 1952, and these polls have been conducted only once every ten years—S&S has tallied “votes from 846 critics, programmers, academics, distributors and other cinephiles—for 2,045 different films.” And for its third directors’ poll (the first was in 1992): 358 directors. Many are speculating that the results of this year’s poll of critics may well be very different from those of the previous six, reflecting the drastic changes in film criticism over the past ten years brought about by the rapidly swelling ranks of online writers and the greater variety of ways to watch films. Back in April, Kevin B. Lee moderated an excellent discussion at Press Play of what we might be seeing tomorrow evening (parts 1, 2, and 3).
In other news. “Iran is thinking of boycotting next month’s Venice international film festival because of EU sanctions hitting its oil-dependent economy,” reports the AFP.
Vulture has this year’s MTV Video Music Awards nominations.
Reading. Kirk Douglas “was gambling again, but playing a good hand.” In the New York Times, Alex Cox tells the story behind Lonely Are the Brave (1962), “one of the bleakest westerns ever to grace the big screen.”
“Having created a star who had the temerity to reject him, Hitchcock made sure she paid for it.” Rosie Millard goes long with Tippi Hedren in the Financial Times.
“Waterloo Bridge [1931] is the only film that reveals the breadth of Mae Clarke’s talent,” argues Imogen Smith in the Chiseler. “In other movies she played nice, open-faced girls or mean, petulant golddiggers. As Myra she is a kaleidoscope of confused emotions.”
The Guardian‘s Anna Tims asks Jane Campion and Michael Nyman about their collaboration on The Piano (1992).
London. Close-Up presents its program What We Want, What We Believe: The Black Panther Party tonight.
In the works. From the Hollywood Reporter: “Cameron Crowe has settled on his next movie—a yet-to-be titled romantic drama starring Emma Stone.”
And here’s the trailer for Sam Mendes’s Skyfall, the next James Bond movie:
Obit. “Tony Martin, the romantic singer who appeared in movie musicals from the 1930s to the 1950s and sustained a career in records, television and nightclubs from the Depression era into the 21st century, has died,” reports the AP’s Bob Thomas. Martin was 98. “Although he never became a full-fledged movie star, he was featured in 25 films, most of them made during the heyday of the Hollywood musicals. A husky 6 feet tall and dashingly handsome, he was often cast as the romantic lead. He also married two movie musical superstars, Alice Faye and Cyd Charisse, and the latter union lasted 60 years, until her death in 2008.”
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