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Homophobe Much? What’s With All The Effeminate, Fey (And Often Blonde) Villains In Hollywood?

  • By The Playlist Staff
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  • November 8, 2012 12:01 PM
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  • 48 Comments
Features
Effeminate, campy, queenish villains in Hollywood aren't exactly a new thing. Examples go as far back as say, Claude Rains' bad guy in "The Adventures of Robin Hood” (1938), Peter Lorre as the delicate Mr. Cairo in “The Maltese Falcon,” (his business cards are gardenia-scented for crying out loud), Conrad Veidt as the SS villain in “Casablanca,” and Charles Laughton in “Mutiny on the Bounty” (1935), and can be these types can be found in plenty of eras (Vernon Wells as the leathery, Pillsbury Doughboy-esque villain in Arnold Schwarzenegger’s "Commando" is sort of known as the plump Freddie Mercury of action movie villains).
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More: Features, Skyfall, Javier Bardem, Guy Pearce, Michael Sheen, Tom Hollander

How Jaws Influenced Silva, Answering "What Is The Point Of Bond?" & More From The 'Skyfall' Press Conference

  • By Drew Taylor
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  • November 8, 2012 10:05 AM
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  • 0 Comments
Features
This weekend the latest James Bond entry "Skyfall" opens nationwide and will be rocking people's socks off from coast to coast. Directed by Sam Mendes (read our interview here) and starring Daniel Craig in his third outing as the super-spy, it's a very different movie than the previous two installments ("Casino Royale" and "Quantum of Solace"), with more color, humor, suspense, and melancholy. While attending the film's press day, we learned the principles – Craig, Mendes, producers Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli, Javier Bardem and Bond girl Naomie Harris -- detailed the making of the movie, and the various aspects of the production. Be warned, though: MAJOR SPOILERS follow. Read this piece after you see the movie. Seriously.
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More: Skyfall, Sam Mendes, Daniel Craig, Naomie Harris, Javier Bardem

Watch: The Evolution Of The 007 Franchise In A Two-Hour Supercut, '50 Years Of James Bond: The Movie'

  • By Kevin Jagernauth
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  • November 7, 2012 5:14 PM
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  • 2 Comments
News
It has been nothing but James Bond for the past couple of weeks, and with "Skyfall" finally making its way to theaters on Friday (stopping first tonight at the AFI Fest where it will be unspooled as their secret screening), here's one way you can catch up with all 22 previous 007 movies in one easy to digest two-hour sitting.
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More: Skyfall

Skyfail: The 5 Worst James Bond Films

  • By Oliver Lyttelton
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  • November 7, 2012 3:05 PM
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  • 37 Comments
Features
The James Bond franchise is the longest-running continuous series in film history and, behind "Harry Potter," the second most successful franchise in cinema history (and by the time "Skyfall" finishes up, will likely take the crown back again). And one of the most impressive things about that achivement, and I say this is as a British writer raised on Bond movies on rainy Bank Holiday afternoons, is how many of the films are simply not very good.
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More: Features, Skyfall

The 10 Best Films To See In November

  • By Oliver Lyttelton
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  • November 7, 2012 10:59 AM
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  • 2 Comments
Features
If September and October can still be considered the fallow season after blockbusters like "Taken 2" and "Argo," and critically acclaimed films like "The Master," that fallow season is certainly over; the box office saw a huge upswing last weekend with "Wreck-It Ralph" and "Flight," and that's set to continue through Christmas, with tentpoles and awards hopefuls arriving ever single week. To help you sort the wheat from the chaff, we've put together a list of the 10 best films to see over the rest of November. Check it out below, and let us know what you're looking forward to most.
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More: Features, Killing Them Softly, The Silver Linings Playbook, Rise Of The Guardians, Life Of Pi, The Central Park Five, Anna Karenina, Rust And Bone, Skyfall, Lincoln, Hitchcock

Sam Mendes Considered A Sean Connery Cameo In 'Skyfall'

  • By Kevin Jagernauth
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  • November 7, 2012 9:24 AM
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  • 0 Comments
News
As we wrote yesterday, slavish devotion of franchise "traditions" and fan service isn't always a good thing. And for better or worse, "Skyfall" has a lot of winks and nods to the past throughout the 23rd Bond adventure, but this proposed move probably would have been one step too far.
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More: Sam Mendes, Skyfall

Interview: Sam Mendes Talks Directing 'Skyfall,' Pursuing Javier Bardem For The Villain & Misconceptions About The Bond Producers' Control

  • By Drew Taylor
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  • November 6, 2012 2:52 PM
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  • 7 Comments
Interviews
This weekend, "Skyfall" is unleashed on cinemas nationwide. Almost from the very first sequence you will realize this is a very, very James Bond movie, and although it's the third in the Daniel Craig series, "Skyfall" almost feels like a hard reboot of the entire franchise, with winking nods to the previous entries and some bold expansion in other areas. The film is also laced with both melancholy and humor, both of which were absent in the hard-driven previous two.
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More: Skyfall, Sam Mendes, Daniel Craig, Javier Bardem, Features, Interviews, Interviews

The 5 Best James Bond Action Sequences

  • By Oliver Lyttelton
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  • November 6, 2012 1:02 PM
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  • 6 Comments
Features
The James Bond franchise is known for many things: the girls, the martinis, the cars, the shifting lead roles. But most of all, perhaps, it's known for the spectacular action sequences. Over the 23 films to date, 007 has punched, kicked, shot, set on fire, exploded, thrown off high things, blown out of airplanes, eviscerated, fed to sharks and come up with countless other inventive ways of dispatching the villains, while using virtually every form of transport known to man, from motorbikes to hovercrafts to spaceships in a variety of pulse-pounding chase sequences.
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More: Features, Skyfall

No, Mr. Bond, I Expect You To Die: The 5 Best Bond Villains

  • By Oliver Lyttelton
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  • November 5, 2012 1:02 PM
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  • 3 Comments
Features
Even before it's released in the U.S. this Friday, "Skyfall," the 23rd official entry in the James Bond series, is already a monster hit, taking nearly quarter of a billion dollars worldwide in its first ten days in theaters. And with good reason -- Sam Mendes' take on Ian Fleming's super-spy is terrific, and certainly ranks among the upper reaches of the franchise.
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More: Features, Skyfall

Daniel Craig Denies A Two-Part 'James Bond' Story Arc Is Next; Calls Idea "Impossible"

  • By Edward Davis
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  • October 31, 2012 5:11 PM
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  • 5 Comments
News
Here's a little bit of reality to dampen your excitement. Earlier this week it was reported that "Skyfall" screenwriter John Logan had been hired to write a lengthy James Bond story that would take place over the course of two films, "Bond 24" and "Bond 25" essentially. Considering it's never been done before and the idea would be ambitious for the Bond series, the appetites of many fans were whetted over the news.
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More: Daniel Craig, James Bond, Skyfall

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