Future published author Kristin Cavallari has five favorite organic beauty brands, according to a recent post on her app titled, “My Favorite Organic Beauty Brands.” We’ve already discussed her fourth and fifth favorite brands here
It’s Sephora Natural and Organic Makeup. Kristin writes: “Did you know that Sephora has their own organic makeup line? As if we all couldn’t love Sephora enough...”
Now you know.
This has been 500 Days of Kristin.
[Photo via Getty]
As part of a newly-launched philanthropic campaign, Pornhub held a contest
The San Antonio-based mother of two seems like a surprising choice for one of the world’s largest adult websites, but Uribe has an interesting story — one that involves being the victim of an alleged murder plot orchestrated by her former boss. According to the Washington Post, Uribe had worked as an administrator at a law firm in 2011 when she reported her employers to authorities for allegedly committing felony barratry. One of the lawyers put a hit on Uribe to have her killed, but the hired hitman ended up going to the authorities instead. In June 2014, both attorneys were indicted on felony barratry charges and are scheduled for trial in April 2016.
Because of trauma resulting from the ordeal, Uribe now speaks with a stutter and suffers from agoraphobia. She told WP, “Every little thing sets me off — strange voices or the dog barking or the postman knocking. It can send me to the floor.”
Uribe told Jezebel she was limited on most scholarships because of her age and inability to physically do community service because of the disabilities she developed after the defendant was released from custody. “He was on a felony bond already and after the indictment for barratry, the hit came and I fell between corrupt selfish political cracks of the justice system in Bexar County Texas,” she said.
Uribe recently finished a two-year program at a San Antonio-based community college and will now seek a bachelor’s degree for Political Science and International Studies from Troy University in Alabama. The scholarship will help her with the necessary costs that come with higher education, but she also says it has given her “hope that there are still good people out there who do good deeds to help others, simply because they are able.”
“MaryAnn epitomizes the drive for determination and success; from her indelible personality, to the resiliency she’s shown to achieve her goals,” the announcement on Pornhub’s website reads. “She has provided for others throughout her life, even in light of immense adversity and we’re all so proud to be naming her as the scholarship recipient.”
Contact the author at marie.lodi@jezebel.com.
Image via Pornhub.
Anthony Cumia was arrested and charged this weekend
http://gawker.com/anthony-cumia-...
The video was streamed by Periscope user “DaniGolightly.” Dani Golightly is the daughter of comedian Vinnie Brand, who owns The Stress Factory comedy club in New Brunswick, New Jersey. In 2008, when she was 19, Golightly appeared on The Opie and Anthony Show.
“Hi, I’m in Long Island, I got my hand broken, I’m waiting for police to come,” the woman in the video says. “I tried to call the police, but he turned the phone off.” The video abruptly cuts away. “Oh my God, don’t hit me!” the woman yells. “Stay away from me!”
The woman in the video also claims Cumia broke her hand, and points the camera at what she claims are bruises given to her by Cumia. When she points the camera at Cumia, he intones, ironically, “Ladies and gentlemen, it’s the Anthony and Dani Show.” What sounds like an episode of Seinfeld plays on a television in the background.
H/T New York Post. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.
Tim Roth is a real and talented actor who has been nominated for an Academy Award, among other recognitions of his good work, which made it very strange to see him starring as Sepp Blatter in the FIFA-financed propaganda film
http://screamer.deadspin.com/heres-what-i-l...
So why would Roth agree to a part lionizing the leader of an organization that supports slavery
The film is awful (can’t say that because I haven’t seen it) I hated doing it, it was the wrong film but for the right reasons. I had two kids in college so I had to make a decision and it was probably poorly judged, but once you make that decision you have to follow through. It’s a hard road, being in something you don’t want to do, but I’m glad I did it for my family.
As for Fifa I thought the movie would be much more about the corruption of this guy at first. I don’t know if he is going to go down, he seems to have survived everything that has been thrown at him. There doesn’t seem to be any way you can get to them because of all those big corporations behind him. It looks the most promising though now though, it looks like he is a on a back foot now because he looks more exposed then he has ever been in the past.
Sepp Blatter does indeed look exposed, Tim, but at least he’ll always have your whitewashed portrayal of him.
Photo of Sepp Blatter and United Passions star Gerard Depardieu via AP; h/t Rob Harris
E-mail: kevin.draper@deadspin.com | PGP key
A CBS News segment Friday featured a focus group of American Muslims being questioned by pollster Frank Luntz. The segment ran about seven minutes, and a few minutes more were uploaded to CBSNews.com. However, according to The Intercept, all of the most critical Muslim voices were edited out entirely.
Luntz’s questions revolved around the conservative preoccupation with the Muslim American community taking “responsibility” for the actions of militants to claim to share their faith. (Actually, religious fundamentalists are often as likely to condemn reformers of the same belief system as vice versa.)
Two of the participants in the focus group said that concerns they raised about American militarism, surveillance, and entrapment of Muslims were edited out of the footage. New York City activist Amelia Noor-Oshiro told The Intercept she asked Luntz, “Why don’t you ask that to people who actually commit acts of terror? Why don’t you ask that to White America who are responsible for a majority of domestic terror attacks?”
At one point, Luntz asked the group whether they were Americans first or Muslims first. In a Facebook post, journalist Sarah Harvard, who participated in the group, said that she responded in kind, to demonstrate how offensive the question is, asking: “Well, are you an American or Jewish first?” That was also cut.
Harvard said Luntz clearly had an agenda. “He just wanted to create this narrative of how Muslim Americans are condemning terrorism.” That is true, of course, but it’s not the whole story.
“He’s trying to put us in a positive light but in a way that makes us feel like second-class citizens,” she said — only giving American Muslims voice to react to terrorism, not to express their own policy views.
Noor-Oshiro said that prior to being picked for the group, she was asked to fill out a survey that included one question about “approximately what percentage of the Muslim population would you think could be radicalized or are already radicalized? … It literally said, ‘Write down a percentage!’” Noor-Oshiro also said Luntz baited her by asking her what “percent of white people” are racist. When she refrained from answering the question, he told her, “This is your chance!”
“I think a lot of people were very appreciative of the fact we even got a voice,” she said. “But I don’t think they understood this voice came with conditions.”
Here is Harvard’s Facebook post in its entirety:
I’m not going to link you all to the CBS focus group I participated in, because I was disappointed to have been involved in such a disingenuous and embarrassing segment.
The segment filming took about an hour, but of course, they had to condense it to 4 minutes on air. We were later told they were going to provide a full recording or an extended interview online — which essentially was just the same thing over again. That’s what really irked me.
Frank Luntz, the moderator, asked us the most demeaning questions like “Are you an American or a Muslim first?” To which I found insulting and shouted back, “Well, are you an American or Jewish first?”
He also had silenced me and other participants who have routinely brought up the fact the government has enacted in state violence against the Muslim community — whether that may be through entrapment cases and surveillance programs — and our concerns about institutional racism. He shut me down when I said that President Obama and Hillary Clinton has killed many Muslims under the administration when we were discussing Trump, and ironically for a GOP strategist, he shut me down when I talked about how Democrats have enacted some of the most deadliest and discriminatory policies against Muslims. He also decided to stop letting me speak when I started talking about how Muslims should start focusing on combatting government policies rather than rushing to condemn terrorism or Islamophobia exclusively. They also cut out portions of where participants talked about media accountability when discussing Islam.
I felt that as a Muslim-American participant in the focus group, he tried to put all of us into boxes to fit their narrative. That’s something I wasn’t going to allow to happen. It could also be a reason why the only three Muslim women who didn’t wear the headscarf was seated outside of the camera shot or why the two black men in the panel barely got speaking time.
The edited version of the focus group interview was mainly about proving our American identity, condemning terrorism, and Trump’s bashing of Muslim-Americans. This is problematic.
He kept saying how he felt bad that no one listens to Muslims and how he wanted to give us an opportunity to talk to the general population. But how can that happen when we’re manipulatively edited to have us fit their own narrative and agenda?
I’m sick and tired of Muslim-Americans being perceived as those who are victimized or as the oppressor. I’m not here to beg people to love me or love Muslims. I love myself. I’m proud to be a Muslim. I want that love to spread throughout the entire country and I want Muslim-Americans to become more vocal about condemning the government who has made this country far less safe, free and prosperous for all of us.
I know a lot of people are not gonna like what I say, and will probably disagree with me, but I never had let that stop me from saying what I think is the truth — and I won’t stop now.
Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens was always destined for a huge box office debut. The question has been how much of a huge opening would it have? The answer came this weekend: A staggering $238 million in North America and $517 million globally.
The film is now well on its way towards the billion dollar mark. The news should come as a relief to Disney, which spent just north of $4 billion dollars on the franchise.
Variety has also put together a list of all the records that it’s broken thus far:
The Hollywood Reporter is noting that while The Force Awakens hasn’t beaten Jurassic World for its world-wide weekend debut, it’s pointed to the fact that Colin Trevorrow’s film opened in China on the same weekend, whereas The Force Awakens is still a couple of weeks away from debuting there.
On Monday, a day after a landslide buried or toppled 33 buildings at an industrial park in China, at least 91 people were still missing, according to the official Xinhua News Agency, and no deaths had been reported.
An area of more than 650,000 square feet at the manufacturing center in Shenzhen, in Guangdong province, near Hong Kong, was covered in 20 feet of mud, Xinhua reported.
The cause of the landslide was clear: a pile of debris and dirt, left over from construction and piled on a nearby hill, gave way. From the New York Times:
The Weibo page of a local official newspaper, the Shenzhen Tequ Bao, reported that the giant pile of construction debris and earth was illegal and that it had been approved by local officials. Those posts were later deleted.
Just a few miles south of the accident site, in Hong Kong, steep hillsides in populated areas are reinforced by elaborate networks of retaining walls to prevent landslides, which can occur frequently in a region pounded by heavy monsoon rains.
At a news conference, the Associated Press reported, Li Yikan, the deputy secretary general of the Shenzhen city government, said that more than 900 people had been evacuated, and that nearly 1,500 people were involved in the rescue effort.
Photo via Getty Images. Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.
“Forty-four years after the Justice Department originally sued Local 28 for refusing to admit minority workers, the union no longer bars nonwhites from membership, as it once did. Instead, the federal court has found, the local has consistently denied work opportunities to black and Hispanic members.”
This evening, Miss Colombia was crowned Miss Universe, at the Miss Universe pageant. This was a mistake: it was Miss Philippines who should have been crowned (and was, eventually), but host Steve Harvey read the cue card wrong.
Here is a video of the incident.
Harvey was quick to take responsibility. “I want to apologize emphatically to Miss Philippians and Miss Columbia,” he tweeted. “This was a terribly honest human mistake and I am so regretful.”
However, neither “Philippians” nor “Columbia” are countries. The tweet was promptly deleted.
For such a ludicrous mistake to be made in as regimented a spectacle as the Miss Universe contest is essentially unheard of—especially at its climax—whether this was staged is probably an open question. Regardless, Colombia looks pretty devastated.
Update – 10:55 pm
Here’s a closer look at the cue card itself.
Contact the author of this post: brendan.oconnor@gawker.com.
Using stylish packaging, attractive ingredient descriptions such as “cold-pressed olive oil” and “Bourbon vanilla bean,” and an alluring founding story about two well-bearded, chocolate-loving siblings, the Mast Brothers were able to bring themselves to the top of the chocolate industry since their launch in 2007. Now, a blogger named Scott at DallasFood.org has published a four-part exposé about the company, in which he describes Rick and Michael Mast as the “Milli Vanilli of chocolate.”
Scott alleges the artisanal chocolate company did not originally make their products from scratch, despite the company’s claims they always have. The Mast Brothers have stated they were “bean to bar” since the beginning. In email correspondences between the Mast Brothers and various chefs and chocolate experts, obtained by Scott and provided to Quartz, the company admitted to using remelted chocolate purchased from Valrhona, a commercial French chocolate manufacturer.
From Quartz:
That June, though, Art Pollard, co-founder of the bean-to-bar chocolate company, Amano Artisan Chocolate, was introduced to the brothers as they were selling their bars at the Brooklyn Flea, a weekend flea market in New York, including a dark milk, Trinidad single-origin bar. He had already heard about the brothers, and was curious to meet them. He saw they were selling six varieties of bars. “I wasn’t accusing,” he tells Quartz. “I was just amazed they were able to pull that off right from the beginning.” Coming up with just a single new bar is “a royal pain in the butt,” he says. He asked the then-beardless brothers about their sourcing since he had had trouble getting cocoa beans from Trinidad himself. “These three bars are ones that we made,” the Masts told him. “And these other three,” pointing to the single-origin and dark milk chocolate varieties, “are Valrhona.”
This isn’t the first time the Mast Brothers have received backlash. In March, Slate published a story about the craft chocolate community’s disdain for Mast Brothers products. “If you were to ask the world’s top chocolate reviewers to rate bars, Mast Brothers would hit in the bottom 5 percentile,” Clay Gordon, an author and Good Food Awards judge told Slate at the time. “There are defects in every bar, and the chocolate is bad.” Other chocolate experts described the $10 bars as tasting “stale or moldy” and having an “unpleasant chalky texture.”
In Scott’s first post of his series, he described how his first tasting of a Mast Brothers bar did not include the common characteristics of “bean to bar” chocolate. “Each Mast Brothers bar had a flat, roasty, anodyne flavor typical of industrial manufacturers using bulk cacao from western Africa,” he wrote. “More suspiciously, the texture was as smooth and slick as store-bought couverture from a multinational behemoth, which is unimaginable from a small maker using tabletop stone grinders.”
The company responded to Scott’s claims in a letter to Grubstreet. “Sorry that you liked our chocolate more in 2007 than in later years,” it read. “Those were fun times, filled with experimentation and constant learning as we honed our craft out of our apartment. Needless to say, we were then and are now a bean to bar chocolate maker.” They also released a statement on their website.
An excerpt reads: “Any insinuation that Mast Brothers was not, is not or will not be a bean to bar chocolate maker is incorrect and misinformed. We have been making chocolate from bean to bar and will continue to do so. Through the years, we have continuously improved our methods, recipes and tastes. We love making chocolate, and we have the audacity to think that we are pretty good at it too.”
As Quartz points out, despite the Mast Brothers stressing the importance of transparency in their cookbook, they didn’t answer questions in regards to what kind of equipment they use and stopped listing the origin of the beans used in their products. “It means that it could be virtually anything,” Pollard said to Quartz.
Contact the author at marie.lodi@jezebel.com.
Image via Mast Brothers.
Hillary Clinton caused a stir over the weekend
The incident in question:
After the uncomfortable minute or so during which Clinton’s podium was noticeably tenantless, the moderator’s question for Bernie was cut off by a particular impassioned bout of applause as Hillary—calm, deadpan, and about 500 mL lighter—sauntered across the stage. “Sorry,” she says with excruciatingly practiced composure.
Supposedly, and despite her vice chairwoman Huma Abedin timing her allotted tinkle time to the second, an unexpectedly long line at the ladies room (which was further from the stage than the mens) kept her from coming back on cue. Specifically, Martin O’Malley’s campaign rep beat her to it.
Now, assuming that her urinary escapade wasn’t just a calculated power play, we must ask ourselves: Do we really want the person chiefly responsible for delivering the nuclear launch codes to be subjected to the whims of an unruly bladder? In situations that demand her attention, a good president should be able to take a little pressure.
Sure, women have smaller bladders than men, and as someone who’s pushed a small human out of her cervix, Hillary’s pelvic floor muscles almost certainly aren’t what they used to be. But Saturday’s debate was only two-and-a-half-hours long, a perfectly reasonable amount of time to expect someone to remain urination-free. For instance, my own mother (who has birthed two more children than Hillary, and is also not running for president) seems to think it wholly doable.
What if Obama had told SEAL Team Six to hold on just a second, I need to take a tinkle? What if President Kennedy had left Krushchev—and the fate of the entire world—hanging in the balance while he dashed off to a too-far bathroom for a quick pee? President Johnson, to his credit, refused to let bodily functions get in the way of his duties; he regularly took phone calls and interviews while seated firmly on a toilet seat, or standing at the urinal.
While it would be great to see a woman in the White House, I’d rather have a president who isn’t willing to let a little urine get in the way of their meticulously scheduled responsibilities. Beyoncé doesn’t stop a show to dash off to the little girl’s room. Former astronaut Lisa Nowak anticipated how her bodily functions might get in the way of her goal (that goal being driving 950 miles to kill her ex-boyfriend’s new lover
And while the immature may make fun, a diaper-wearing president would be nothing to shake your head at. A diaper-wearing president is a responsible president. And if Hillary can’t even take charge of her bladder, how can she possibly take charge of America?
Contact the author at ashley@gawker.com. Illustration by Tara Jacoby.
If you thought teen millionaire Kylie Jenner voiced her unabashed support for the Black Lives Matter movement on Instagram today, you thought wrong, my friend. “Btw.. This is fake,” Kylie clarified on Twitter this afternoon. Also:
An incredible statement of non (?) non-support.
Contact the author at allie@gawker.com.
If you’re an Amazon Prime member (free trial here), and not in Alaska, you can still get free shipping in time for Christmas. We’re putting together a list of our favorite gifts under $50, with a few bonus bigger ticket items. If nothing here catches your eye, we’ve also got plenty of great gift options in our daily deals coverage.
http://deals.kinja.com/todays-best-de...
Did we miss any of your favorite frequent fixtures on Kinja Deals? Got great gift ideas of your own? Looking for recommendations in categories we didn’t cover? Head for the comments and sound off.
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Prices in the Amazon insets don’t always update in real time, if something seems wrong it probably is. Commerce Content is independent of Editorial and Advertising, and if you buy something through our posts, we may get a small share of the sale.
Amazon made your holiday shopping easy this year with a $50 tablet that’s probably all the tablet your family and friends need.
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Anker’s latest bluetooth speaker offers a killer combination of great sound, long battery life, small form factor, and low impact price tag.
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Here’s something the person you’re buying for almost certainly doesn’t have: the Antec Bias Light plugs into the USB port on their TV and reduces eye strain
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Anker makes the best external batteries money can buy, and their PowerCore+ series is keeping thousands of your phones, cameras, and even MacBooks topped off.
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Your traveling friends will love the Anker PowerPort 2, while those that spend a lot of time at desk will get a ton of use out of the PowerPort 6. If (you’re aware that) their phone supports it, they’ll love you for upgrading them to the faster charging with Quick Charge 2.0 or 3.0. If they’re likely to need extra AC outlets on their travel, go with this reader-loved
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There are a ton of tea steepers out there. We like this FORLIFE Tea Infuser because its stainless steel and has more room for the leaves than most small steepers. If you really love the giftee in question, the Breville One-Touch is the ultimate tea maker and as close to perfect
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If they don’t already own one at this point, SodaStream remains an easy and universal gift idea.
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Victorinox’s chef’s knives are one of the best values in cooking, and one of your choices for best knife. If you really like your recipient, get them this set that includes all the knives they’ll ever need
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Let them enjoy their beverages in style and save money in the process with some stainless steel straws, and keep their coffee and tea warm and classy with Bodum’s beautiful double-walled glasses.
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The Philips Wake-Up Light has been the most popular Gizmodo-recommended
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Upgrade the humans in your life who shave away from their Gillette and save them money in the process with Dorco’s new 7-bladed razor, or introduce them to a better way to shave with a Merkur safety razor and blade sampler.
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If you get the kids (or yourself) a tool that makes flossing less miserable, they’ll (you’ll) actually start flossing.
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Fraternities are America’s great menace, but is weed to blame? According to administrators at the University of Alabama, sure. AL.com reports that the university has been “quietly” drug testing frat bros since the beginning of the school year as part of “a strict new anti-drug effort.”
http://www.al.com/news/index.ssf...
Beyond confirming to AL.com that it is testing some members of Greek organizations, the university declined to comment about the new drug testing program. According to the site, however, brothers in at least two fraternities—Sigma Nu and Sigma Alpha Epsilon—have been routinely tested this year. Sigma Nu president Clyde Yelverton told AL.com that five percent of his brothers submit to urine drug testing through the university each week. Bros who fail or miss tests are subject to to “penalties and punishments that differ based on a number of factors ranging from substance abuse history to the type of drug detected.”
Though it’s not unheard of for fraternities to test members for drugs, this kind of mandatory, university-sponsored program is unusual. Fraternity consultant David Westol told AL.com, “I’ve heard about Alabama doing drug screening or drug testing of fraternities, but I’m not aware of any other university that’s gone to that point and using it to any great extent.”
The University of Alabama should be pleased to learn then that its drug testing program has been successful... in that it’s gotten frat bros off pot and into harder stuff like Xanax, which flushes out of the system more quickly. Current UA student and former active Sigma Nu brother James Blackwood told the site, “People can beat Xanax because it goes through your system in three days. That’s why there’s so much.” He continued:
There’s this one fraternity—really well-known on campus, attracted a lot of attention—that started getting drug-tested and it’s still talked about how this fraternity went from, like, a group of guys who functioned normally and held high position among the university and then they all just became ‘bartards’—that’s the term for people who eat Xanax bars. They all went from just, you know, regular college guys to just zombies, all doing Xanax because they couldn’t smoke pot and stuff so it was the only thing they could do.
Good grief.
Photo via UA Sigma Nu. Contact the author at allie@gawker.com.
The upper class readers of Urban Baby seem to think that the universities with the most annoying graduates are Harvard, Notre Dame, and Duke. Huh... they’re right.
First, the good news: 2015 was a fantastic year at the movies. There were great original stories, sequels done right, adaptations that match their source material and more. But for every great movie, there’s a ton of bad ones too. Here’s our picks for the best and worst science fiction and fantasy films of 2015.
Sure it’s still fresh in our minds—but can you imagine a world where The Force Awakens isn’t a movie we revisit just as much, if not more, than the year’s best movies? That enduring quality is a testament to J.J. Abrams’ ability to deliver not just an insanely fun movie, but one that’s positively brimming with lore. You want to see it again, as much as you want to sit down and talk about it. Add to that the star-making performances from the new cast—Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, Adam Driver and others—as well as heart-melting return performances from Harrison Ford, Carrie Fisher and others, and you’ve got the perfect balance of nostalgia and futurism.
Matthew Vaughn has quickly become one of those filmmakers we just can’t get enough of. His latest, Kingsman, is a hilarious, high-energy spy film that mixes James Bond cool with modern pop sensibilities into something that feels fresh but also grounded. It’s an origin story, buddy picture and epic adventure, all rolled into one. Colin Firth is great as always, but the real revelation is Taron Egerton as Eggsy, a punk kid who grows into a formidable, suave, spy. Bonus points to Samuel L. Jackson playing this year’s best Bond villain—and that includes Spectre.
If Crimson Peak was what we thought it was going to be (a gory, period ghost story) it probably would have been good. But the way it defied our expectations is what makes it really good. Guillermo del Toro crafted a twisted, gothic romance, that uses violence and horror as set dressing to show how truly gruesome marriage and family can be. Jessica Chastain is chilling as the sister with a dark secret, Tom Hiddleston is perfectly mysterious as her brother, and Mia Wasikowska is just the right amount of innocent to fit directly in the middle. Amazing production design, music and cinematography all make for a truly unsettling, transporting ride.
Ridley Scott was on a bit of a cold streak of late, but with his adaptation of Andy Weir’s popular novel, The Martian, he brought back everything we love about his films: epic scope, personal story, big action and a great sense of humor. Matt Damon’s mostly one-man show as an astronaut stranded on Mars gave audiences a human story, a dramatic story, scientific insight and lots to cheer for and laugh with. Then, on the Earth side, an all-star cast is there to play Greek chorus as we marvel as the story unfolding on screen. The result is a well-balanced blockbuster that doesn’t pander to the audience.
The fifth movie in a franchise should not be good. And it definitely shouldn’t be, arguably, the best movie in the franchise. But Christopher McQuarrie’s take on Mission: Impossible is just that. It combines all the scope and gadgets you want from these films, with a story that makes the good guys bad. And then this film adds in one of the year’s best characters, Ilsa Faust, played by Rebecca Ferguson. In Ilsa, Tom Cruise’s Ethan Hunt has not just a formidable rival, but an ally equal to himself. And that gives Rogue Nation a whole new level of gravitas on top of the great set pieces.
The horror genre is such a tough nut to crack. It feels like everything has been done, redone, reimagined, twisted and spit out so often that originality is almost impossible. Of course, it’s not, and this year’s best example is David Robert Mitchell’s deceptively simple and utterly terrifying, It Follows. Something is coming to get you, and it’s coming right now—but it’s coming slowly, and could be anything. Mitchell’s camera is beautifully loose, keeping the audience on their toes at all times as to who the villain even is. And the story is so basic, the debate over what it’s a metaphor for becomes as rewarding a conversation as which was the scariest part. Spoiler: it’s all of it.
Pixar is known for coming up with ideas that seem obvious after the fact. And yet, few have been as good as Pete Docter’s Inside Out, which makes memorable, wonderful characters out of the emotions in a girl’s head. They live in one of the most fascinating, beautiful and vast settings Pixar has ever created—the human mind—and that’s not even mentioning the story. That’s the best part, how Joy and Sadness’s adventure through the mind, leaving Fear, Disgust and Anger in control, completely nails what it’s like to be 11 years old. Inside Out is smart, absolutely hilarious, and utterly heartbreaking, all in ways that only Pixar can do. It ranks right among the best films they’ve ever made.
Making a good comedy is hard enough. But making that comedy a good horror movie, a good character piece, a fun narrative that’s aware of itself and more? It seems impossible. And yet that’s what co-writers and directors Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi do with this amazing film. It’s a vampire comedy/mockumentary that can’t be truly appreciated on just one viewing. There’s humor that’s hilarious and obvious, but also so much nuance, it’s almost maddening. The characters are rich, the costumes and settings are beautiful, and it all combines for an absolute gem of genre-mixing. It’s a film you and your friends will be quoting late at night for years to come.
A mad genius has created a beautiful, intriguing A.I. He brings in a high level employee to test it. And from there, the mind games begin. Alex Garland’s endlessly fascinating cyberpunk thriller has it all. From a purely design standpoint, Alicia Vikander’s Ava is one of the most beautiful things on screen this year. But it’s the way she manipulates Domhnall Gleeson’s character, as he’s trying to manipulate Oscar Isaac’s character, coupled with the grand ideas of progress and change, that elevate the film. Then, in the end, the whole thing gets flipped to being about something totally different. Ex Machina never lets up, always keeps you guessing, and won’t allow you to look anywhere else because it’s all so magnetic.
At the beginning of 2015, as much as everyone was looking forward to the latest George Miller Mad Max movie, no one could have predicted it would be as good as it was. Mad Max: Fury Road isn’t just good, it’s monumental. It’s the best action movie of the year, the best genre film of the year, and maybe the best film of the year in any category. The film tells an incredibly tight, straightforward story, which leaves room for a ton of insight, both on-screen and off. Then there’s the jaw-dropping practical action and gorgeous cinematography, coloring and music. Simply put, you’ve never seen a movie like this. And on top of all that, there’s Charlize Theron’s Furiosa, a unfathomably cool, strong and multi-layered lead character. If Fury Road was about Max, it would have been great—but flipping it and making it about Furiosa is what transcends everything.
Tomorrowland should have been on the other list. It’s directed by Brad Bird, starring George Clooney and co-written by Damon Lindelof. It’s a Disney movie about the adventure and promise of the future. And yet, there’s almost nothing there. From the very beginning of the film, ideas and concepts are set up but never fulfilled. Relationships developed, but not really paid off. The film is wasted potential, wrapped in disappointment, with endless good intentions at its core. As Paleofuture’s Matt Novak said when we were debating this list, “It’s a waiter giving a lecture about sizzle and never bringing out your steak.”
The first Ted film came out of nowhere. It was raunchy, it was surprising, and it was hilarious. We expected more of the same with the second one, but not exactly the same. Ted 2 is two hours of awkward. The same jokes from the first movie, recycled into different situations. Even the seemingly interesting story— the talking teddy bear fighting to be considered a person—gets lost in a hodgepodge of odd story beats and wacky characters. There’s nothing cohesive about Ted 2 and it just disappoints you over and over again, like getting the same Christmas present two years in a row.
No, you didn’t jump back to the worst of 2013 list. Seventh Son, the fantasy film starring Jeff Bridges and Julianne Moore, actually came out in 2015. It just sat on a shelf for two years before release and was shuffled between studios. So really, the fact that no one wanted to release this movie should tell you everything you need to know. Beyond that though, the biggest problem with Seventh Son is it’s just so boring. You never care about anything going on, which is crazy when there are multiple Oscar-winning actors for you to look at, along with some big, boisterous special effects. You watch it, and immediately forget it.
The first 20 minutes of Josh Trank’s Fantastic Four are not bad. I remember thinking, “Hey, this might actually work.” The characters are interesting, the motivations are promising and it’s paced very well. But very soon after that things don’t just fall apart, they crumble like a building in an earthquake. Bad decision on top of bad decision make the film move along an impressively stupid trajectory. You should never question the smarts of these iconic characters, but here you do, right up to the most boring and pointless climactic battle scene of the year. This all hurts even more when you remember what this great cast, Michael B. Jordan, Kara Mara, Miles Teller and Jamie Bell, are capable of with a good script.
If you think about it, I bet you remember the first time you saw both of James Cameron’s Terminator movies. They were so fresh, frightening and entertaining they became cultural landmarks. Since then though, the franchise has struggled to find its footing—and while Terminator Genisys isn’t quite Terminator Salvation bad, it’s another huge misstep. The idea of flipping the franchise on its head because of time travel was a good one, but the end result feels like non-starter. A ton of posturing to bank on nostalgia and not enough ideas that push things ahead. This is a different Terminator, but it’s not even close to what preceded it, and that makes it a crushing disappointment.
The reason video game adaptations are so difficult is they lack a personal touch. In a game, you put yourself into the main character and that gives it a whole other layer of enjoyment. Hitman: Agent 47 takes that blank slate video game character and is detrimentally true to the game. Rupert Friend, so good on Showtime’s Homeland, is painfully bland as this perfect killing machine. So much so that the movie suffers the same fate. A few action beats are okay but the plot and characters provide almost nothing to even come close to a level of human interaction needed to make a film watchable. Agent 47 is as fleeting as a bullet up into the air.
Not every story needs a prequel, let alone one of the best known stories in the world. Talented director Joe Wright tried to make something special with Pan, the first chapter in the story of Peter Pan, but what he ended up with was a busy, overly vibrant film that feels artificial at each and every step of the way. Yes the cast is good, and the effects impressive, but when a story is this engrained into the public consciousness, the musical outbursts and wild effects work against the audience’s engagement with the material. Everything just melts into a world of green screen.
Hot Tub Time Machine 2 is enraging. You almost can’t believe you are watching a movie that’s populated with such annoying, unredeemable, unlikeable characters. The jokes miss, the super-fun idea at the core is totally squandered, and just when you think it couldn’t get any worse, it gets better. And that’s the truly painful part. After watching this terrible movie, the end credits scene is vibrant, shocking and interesting, unlike the rest of the movie. You can’t help but be stunned the idea for something cool was there, but they instead decided to just be dicks.
Stop the presses! A movie starring Adam Sandler and Kevin James is really bad. What’s more surprising about Pixels, though, is a movie by Chris Columbus, with Josh Gad, Peter Dinklage and a plot that wants to pay tribute to the great genre comedies of the ‘80s is really bad. Pixels has very little to redeem it. The story is lame, characters are worse, there’s no excitement, no laughs, it’s like a movie studio vomited hundreds of million dollars onto a screen and this was a result. Okay, some of the effects look cool. We’ll give it that. But when that’s the best thing you can say about a movie with this caliber of talent behind it, it’s a damn shame.
Jem and the Holograms separates itself from every other movie this year by barely being a movie at all. Director Jon Chu cocked back and swung for the fences with an ambitious blend of new media, fan interaction, filmmaking, music, sci-fi and romance. But he not only misses, he let the bat slip, it flew into the stands and killed your parents. Almost nothing about Jem and the Holograms makes sense. It barely represents the franchise it’s reimagining, the plot feels like a 90 minute supercut of a 22 episode season, and it squanders any chance it had to grab onto its quirky, fun, girl power themes. Jem and the Holograms is a remarkable failure on every level, and definitely the worst film of the year.
Contact the author at germain@io9.com.
The only person who’s been able to humanize Megyn Kelly, a woman who once got into an argument
http://tktk.gawker.com/the-fox-news-f...
According to Politico’s Hadas Gold, the other Two Stooges are reprising their “moderator” roles as well:
Since none of the candidates are willing to answer questions or discuss policy matters in any serious detail, the best we can hope for is Megyn Kelly asking Trump some pointed things about his frothing misogyny and then him saying how the freakin’ PC police can stop bustin’ his balls, and everyone in the audience will go WOAHHHH-OHHH!!!!! again.
But no matter what, resist the urge to let Worst Human (Trump) make Relatively Better Human (Kelly) seem Good—because she is still
Contact the author at biddle@gawker.com.
Public PGP key
PGP fingerprint: E93A 40D1 FA38 4B2B 1477 C855 3DEA F030 F340 E2C7
Teens are monsters. They’re emotionally stunted, mentally deficient, and refuse to stop joining ISIS. But in between all the rampant flakka use
Considering the havoc teens so readily wreak, it’s insane that we let them engage in public at all, much less give them cars and cash. But we do. And as punishment for granting the disaffected youths of the world a modicum of freedom, they have have spent the past 12 months terrorizing everyone and everything in their hormone-drizzled paths.
In the spirit of reflection and preparedness, let’s take a trip through the year in teen-perpetrated terror. And may they spare you in 2016.
Screenshot via FOX 13.
A Florida teen fulfills his destiny and (successfully) poses as a gynecologist for an entire month before getting caught. A horrifying realization for any woman he might have come into contact with and a godsend for his future prom date.
Teen terror level: 8/10 fingerbangs
A college freshman and newly pledged Phi Delta Theta member is thrilled to spend his first spring break with his brothers—his fellow frat daddies, the beer to his bong, and the pastels to his wardrobe. He drinks. He drinks some more. He dons a pink shirt with a kitten on it. He is The Man. And then he spots it—a tiny, defenseless hamster.
Now’s my chance, is what the teen would think to himself if his brain still had the capacity for thought. He grabs the hamster; the crowd roars. He puts it in his mouth; the hamster (probably) roars. He bites down and spits the decapitated mass of fur and brains... somewhere. He throws the hamster’s lifeless remains... somewhere. He screams. He smiles. Several days later, he gets kicked out of Ole’ Miss.
But why was the hamster there in the first place? Was it bought with the express purpose of being decapitated by a crazed teen? Was it someone’s pet? Why is the teen so happy? Some mysteries are better left unsolved.
Teen terror level: 7/10 emails from PETA
If you’re a reporter looking to write a story about vaping in any capacity, never look for answers on Twitter. Because teens use Twitter in inscrutable ways as it is, and because 90 percent of teen vaping content is inherently insincere, you will get trolled. Both by teens and by Gawker’s editor-in-chief.
The teen may have lied, but The New York Times knowingly walked into a lions den.
Teen terror level: 2/10 dank memes
Not a month after the little vaping fiasco, some 16 year-old British kid tries his luck at fooling the paper of record. And of course, it works. The Times prints a story that includes a little tidbit about Charleston Shooter Dylann Roof being obsessed with both My Little Pony and 9/11 memes based on, well, nothing really. Another victory for teens.
Teen terror level: 1/10 sockpuppet accounts
After Haden Smith decided he desperately need his ex-girlfriend back, he phoned his mother and instructed her that until she called the girl’s parents to broker a reunion, he would kill one of her prized chicken’s every fifteen minutes. Haden killed six chickens total before the authorities finally caught up with him.
On the one hand, killing chickens is wrong. On the other hand, Haden’s mother has had this coming since the day she decided to name her son Haden.
Teen terror level: 7/10 chicken nuggets
If we learned anything this year, it’s that teens fucking love ISIS. For whatever reason, the angsty, dissatisfied, parent-hating youths of the world cannot get enough of the Islamic State. On August 28
It’s almost 2016, do you know where your teen is? If not, the answer’s probably “ISIS.”
Teen terror level: 10/10 actual terrorists
We may never know exactly who these anonymous Dew Boys of summer truly are, but their complete disregard for both their bodies and the rules of reasonable beverage consumption will live on in our hearts for years to come.
Teen terror level: 1/10 vomiting teens
It’s a well-known scientific fact that every third word to come out of a teen’s mouth is a complete and total lie. But even with that knowledge, the extent and complexity of one 17-year-old girl’s Jaden Smith-centric fiction is nearly mind-blowing.
According to Chelsea Clark, the teen in question, not only had Kylie Jenner been stalking and harassing her, but the littlest Jenner even went so far as to stage a car crash in hopes of getting her out of the picture entirely. So naturally, Clark decided to take out a restraining order on the starlet. We assume the order hasn’t been difficult for Kylie to keep, since the two have never met once in their entire lives.
Teen terror level: 6/10 chemtrails
Two teenage cheeba huffers going by the acronym CWA (or Crackas With Attitude) claimed to have hacked their way into none other than CIA Director John Brennan’s AOL account. Which—while technically a Bad Thing To Do—Brennan had basically asked for by having an AOL account in the first place. Hack big or hack home, as the teens say.
Teen terror level: 3/10 rare Pepes
Violence is, for the most part, a terrible way to get what you want. And clocking a top government official is even worse. Which is why it makes perfect sense that it was a teen who took it upon himself to punch the Spanish Prime Minister directly in the face.
The reason for the punch is unknown, and his weak little fists don’t seem to have inflicted too much damage. But when you punch the physical embodiment of The Man directly in his brain, results don’t really matter all that much. Because either way, you are the perfect teen.
Teen terror level: 5/10 “you’re not my real dad”s
Contact the author at ashley@gawker.com.
In yet another classic campaign stunt, Hillary Clinton aide Chelsea Clinton has committed to a nine-month strategy guaranteed to win key votes with both women and Pinterest users everywhere. That’s right. The Clinton campaign is having a baby.
The announcement was first made via Chelsea Clinton’s Twitter and Hillary soon responded to the blessed announcement with a stilted tweet of her own.
The babe is expected this summer—just late enough to still be in its “cute phase” by the time the November election rolls around. How convenient.
Image via AP. Contact the author at gabrielle@gawker.com.
Three hundred and thirty-one days ago, former Laguna Beach star Kristin Cavallari announced that she was writing a book to be released sometime in the far distant future: “spring 2016.” She later specified that Balancing in Heels would be published in March. Guess what: former Laguna Beach star Lauren Conrad has a book coming out then, too.
Lauren—Kristin’s sworn enemy who happens to be a New York Times bestselling author—announced on Instagram yesterday that her new book Celebrate will hit shelves on March 29.
Steephaaaannn!
According to Harper Collins’ website, Celebrate is a “must-have guide to entertaining” that “shows how easy it is to throw a fantastic party.”
Balancing in Heels, as Kristin has described it
Air mail to Kristin: You have 99 days.
This has been 500 Days of Kristin.
[Photo via Getty]
