This weekend, Paul Thomas Anderson‘s elegantly weird and gorgeously strange “Phantom Thread” goes into wide release and it truly cannot be missed. It’s another completely singular work from the filmmaker, with a story that has plenty going on beneath its refined stitching. The release of the movie means that the director is doing some final press rounds, and perhaps chattier than ever, he’s got plenty to say.

We’ve known for a little while know that Anderson wants to work with “Girls Trip” breakout star Tiffany Haddish, however, on the Nerdist podcast, he’s reveals just how much he admires the actress’ talent.

Continue reading Paul Thomas Anderson Reveals Fave Films Of 2017, Praises Tiffany Haddish, Wants To Work With Tom Hanks, More at The Playlist.

[Posted Feb. 4]

Winner prediction:
1. “Icarus”
2. “Faces Places”
3. “Last Man in Aleppo”
4. “Strong Island”
5. “Abacus: Small Enough To Jail”

Continue reading 2018 Best Documentary Oscars Predictions at The Playlist.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced the 15 films selected for the Documentary Oscar shortlist this evening. Documentary branch members will now select the five nominees from these 15 finalists that will vie for this honor at the 90th Oscars in March.

Expected titles such as “Chasing Coral,” “City of Ghosts,” “Faces Places,” “Jane,” “Icarus,” and “Last Men in Aleppo” made the cut while potential contenders such as “Step,” “Risk,” “Kedi,” “The Force,” “Jim & Andy: The Great Beyond,” “Casting Jonbenet” and “Nobody Speak” did not.

Continue reading ‘Jane,’ ‘Icarus’ & ‘Faces Places’ Among 15 Documentary Oscar Finalists at The Playlist.

Brace yourself, because there’s only five weeks and change left until the year is out, which means the awards season is going into high gear. Guilds and critics groups are going hard in the weeks ahead, and out of the gate tonight is the Producers Guild of America with their nominees for Best Documentary.

Seven films are going into battle, with HBO and Netflix commanding the race with two films each.

Continue reading Producers Guild Awards 2018 Documentary Nominees Include ‘Jane,’ ‘Chasing Coral,’ More at The Playlist.

We’re right on top of things calendar-wise, right?…

A little late to the party, but, it’s become a recurrent trend every summer for journalists to look back at the movies that were released and, well, complain. The gist of some articles would be “don’t you remember the days when they used to release great movies in the summer”? 1982 and/or 1984 are usually mentioned and, in all honesty, those were pretty great years.

Continue reading The Best Movies Of Summer 2017 at The Playlist.

Remember when “truth is stranger than fiction” used to be a thing that boring people said to fill awkward post-anecdote gaps at dinner parties and before it became the literal truth of every waking moment living in the Western world in 2017? Yeah, us neither. But of all cinematic forms perhaps it’s our appreciation of documentary filmmaking that has been most affected by the experience of living in such unsettled times — with only a few exceptions the docs we’ve been most impressed by this year have commented on the state we’re in right now, even when they ostensibly have done nothing of the sort.

Continue reading The 20 Best Documentaries Of 2017 So Far at The Playlist.

While it may seem as if our blockbuster season has already been going for a while (we’ve already gotten a Marvel movie, a “Transformers” film and a Pixar effort) we still have a ways to go. Luckily for us, July seems to offer some original content on top of characters and universes we’ve already met with new films from Luc Besson and Christopher Nolan on the horizon.

Continue reading 10 Movies To Watch In July at The Playlist.

“City of Ghosts” is documentarian Matthew Heineman’s third film to bow at Sundance, after 2012’s health care doc “Escape Fire: The Fight to Rescue American Healthcare” (co-directed with Susan Froemke), and 2015’s searing “Cartel Land,” an immersive, bone-rattling film embedded on the front lines of the drug cartel war in Mexico. This year, he brings “City of Ghosts,” to Park City, which could be described as “ ‘Cartel Land’ but with ISIS,” however Heineman’s too sophisticated a filmmaker for that facile comparison.

Continue reading Documentary ‘City Of Ghosts’ Is A Wide-Eyed, Jaw Dropping Look At The Battle Against ISIS [Sundance Review] at The Playlist.