Charles Bramesco

Now that falsehoods have become almost entirely indistinguishable from fact in the American news media, the staffers of satirical publication The Onion can sit back and relax, having effectively taken over the industry they set out to spoof. (Full disclosure: I contribute to the A.V. Club, a division of the Onion media empire.) But instead of resting on their laurels, the originators of ‘fake news’ have set out to conquer new frontiers, having already moved into publishing and the untamed wilds of television. A new exclusive from the Hollywood Reporter indicates that not even the movie theaters of this great nation will be safe from the increasingly plausible absurdities of America’s self-proclaimed ‘finest news source.’

Our modern digital Prometheus: when the technical wizards behind the CGI of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story learned that they could reanimate deceased actor Peter Cushing to reprise his role as gaunt-cheeked Empire command Grand Moff Tarkin, they never stopped stopped to think if they should. The resultant spelunking into the uncanny valley was as polarizing as it was unexpected. Some were wowed by the boundless possibilities of computer programming and the effective triumph over the permanence of death; others immediately flashed back to high school memories of reading Mary Shelley. The debate over the ethics of artificially contriving performances from dead actors continues to rage, and a figure close to the situation has now weighed in.

It was only a matter of time. The long string of biographical depictions of troubled geniuses, an ignominious tradition more recently carried on by the likes of The Imitation Game and The Theory of Everything, had to inevitably yield an Albert Einstein biopic.

Despite volumes of scholarship from feminist theorists on its undertones of spousal abuse and insidious romanticizing of male brutality, Disney‘s Beauty and the Beast has remained a cherished childhood favorite worldwide. Kids love talking furniture, go figure. The live-action remake starring Emma Watson and an unrecognizable Dan Stevens is hot on the way to its March 17 release, and Disney has now released two new TV spots to further amp up the anticipation. In the first, embedded above, the Beast implores lovely Belle to “think of the one thing you’ve always wanted, and feel it in your heart.” We get a glimpse of the timeless ballroom-waltz scene, some barroom carousing from Gaston, and yet another look at the deeply unsettling character designs for Lumiere and Cogsworth.

More streaming services than you can shake a virtual stick at have cropped up over the past year, which makes it all the more aggravating when that one movie you want to watch is nowhere to be found. You shell out every month for Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu, Shudder, Filmstruck and a dozen more, and yet once that craving to rewatch The Lion King hits, you’re plum out of luck. What’s the point of having countless hours of programming at your fingertips for your immediate enjoyment if that doesn’t include The Little Mermaid?

The Internet Movie Database is a fount of helpful information. With a few simple clicks, users can learn who shot the Miley Cyrus vehicle So Undercover (Things to Come cinematographer Denis Lenoir), which sequel in the Hellraiser franchise featured a performance from a young Adam Scott (the fourth one), or how old Taraji P. Henson is (who looks that good at 46?!). As a repository for loose factoids from in and around the world of screen entertainment, it can’t be beat. As a source for critical perspectives on those same films, however... hoo boy. Just take a gander at any comment section for a movie’s page and marvel at the IMDb is the site where rabid anti-Ghostbusters zealots congregated to downvote Paul Feig’s movie into oblivion weeks before its actual release, and the newly-released IMDb Top 10 provides an even clearer view of its user base.

A longtime boon to children looking to placate mothers who wish they’d read more, the Captain Underpants series of chapter books was the pinnacle of toilet humor to kids in the ’90s and early ’00s.

It’s the Friday before Christmas. Those of us who aren’t currently concealing the fact that we’ve slumped over at our desks in a eggnog-hangover-induced nap have glued our eyes to the clock, counting down the minutes to a leisurely holiday break. Everyone just wants to get home, gather with family or other loved ones around a crackling fire, put on the musical stylings of Burl Ives or Bing Crosby, and have a nice mug of hot cocoa. Time slows to a crawl on the Friday before a long weekend, and we both know you’re not getting any work done today, so why not kick back with the soothing sounds of Chewbacca moaning out a classic Christmas standard?

Before the era of reality television popularized the concept of “being famous for being famous,” Hungarian-born actress Zsa Zsa Gabor elevated celebrity to its own sort of art form. She brought her European sense of sophistication to a handful of big-name films as their star, including John Huston’s Moulin Rouge. (The famed director described Gabor as a “creditable” actress.) Mostly, however, she commanded gossip headlines with her flashy and impossibly ritzy personal life. The revolving door of husbands, the uniform of furs and jewels she was seldom seen without, the way she purred “dahhhhling” to everyone she addressed — even offscreen, she was a larger-than-life character.

The one good thing that the United States Congress has ever done was pass the National Film Preservation Act in 1988, establishing a National Film Registry in the Library of Congress wherein moving pictures deemed “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant” can be securely preserved. The National Film Preservation Board can induct up to 25 new entries into the archives each year, and today Deadline brings the news of which movies will effectively achieve immortality as the Class of 2016. Lots of enduring, worthy works have made the cut, though it is with a solemn heart that I must once again report the egregious continued snub of Pauly Shore comedy vehicle Bio-Dome.