Sarah Polley Will Call You Fat to Your Face If You Give Her a Bad ReviewWhen New York ran into Sarah Polley the other night at the Film Critics Choice Awards, we asked the Away From Her director if she’d ever confronted a critic who had given her a bad review. “Yeah, I have,” she laughed. “He came to a press lunch for a film that I knew he hated, because there was really good free food, and it was in Cannes. He was kind of famous for doing that. And so I sort of confronted him on how much food he had on his plate; not necessarily about the review, but just how gluttonous he was.” How did he react? “He was pretty good-natured about it,” she said. “We actually ended up becoming friends.” Oh, yeah? So who was it? She wouldn’t say. We tried another tactic: Was the film one she directed or one she was in? “It was a film I was in,” she said, before floating off in that ethereal way she has. And so we put the question to you, dear readers. Who was the freeloading film critic shamed by Sarah Polley? To help you guess, after the jump, we’ve compiled some choice lines from reviewers who haven’t exactly fallen at her feet.
intel
PETA Shakes Up Anna WintourThe folks at PETA are really outdoing themselves this year. First, there were the Hairy Kate and Trashley dolls. Now, they’ve reverted to their old standby, Anna Wintour, whom they’ve stuck in a snow globe this holiday season — you know, so you can “shake some sense into her.” Inside the virtual globe, fearsome opera plays as Anna drifts through a fiery netherworld inhabited by workers in Karl Lagerfeld glasses whose job, it seems, is to skin shrieking animals and toss their carcasses into a massive pile for “pelt pusher” Anna’s future coats. It’s creepy, of course, but it’s still kind of fun to shake the globe and watch “Anna” bounce around in the snow. Until you realize that, whenever she falls, her neck bends at a disturbing angle.
PETA’s Holiday Snow Globe [PETA]
intel
‘Thursday Styles’ Today: Let’s Talk About Sex, BabySo apparently there’s a new etiquette problem facing New York’s Stylish class: People have become too willing to talk about porn in public, and sometimes their offhand pornversations can be embarrassing to their friends and loved ones. These people talk about porn as though it’s socially acceptable (maybe it is?) — and in a mere two days you’ll be able to learn all about them in the “Thursday Styles” section of the Times. How do we know this? Because a few folks here, and several people we know elsewhere, received an unsolicited, self-promotional mass e-mail from a certain “Styles” reporter looking for sources to talk on the subject, with a near-immediate deadline of tomorrow. In a subsequent “Thursday Styles,” by the way, we suspect you might learn about the new trend of reporters scooping their own work by e-mailing a good chunk of their competition about it. But that’s just a hunch.
Style [NYT]
neighborhood watch
‘If These Walls Could Talk, They’d Probably Be Screaming’Bronx: A city inspector went to the basement of 1912 Holland Avenue to check on a hot-water heater, but he ended up contacting the police because he found a crazy laboratory, complete with vials of acid, and preserved bones and organs. As one resident said, “If these walls could talk, they’d probably be screaming.” [Gothamist]
Cobble Hill: A planned new building next to the incoming Brooklyn Trader Joe’s has caused a kerfuffle – developers want to build higher than zoning permits, but Borough president Marty Markowitz doesn’t want to set a bad precedent. Mm. We’re not sure “kerfuffle” is the word he’d use. [Brownstoner]
Downtown Brooklyn: The city has decided to use its powers of eminent domain to seize 21 downtown Brooklyn lots that are said to have been a part of the Underground Railroad. Oh, and the city is also about to spend $2 million to commemorate abolitionist activity in the area. [McBrooklyn]
Forest Hills: A planned shopping center in the hood hasn’t received approval, despite signage to the contrary. The suspicious civic association, naturally, have their caftans in a twist. [Forest Hills 72]
Soho: A giant, boxers-clad poster of Michelangelo’s David dominates Lafayette, trying to get you to donate sperm. Because, you know, Lafayette has the best daddies. [Copyranter]
photo op
Rain
And then more rain tonight. And then cloudy tomorrow. And then perhaps the worst part: Rainy and hot on Friday. Feh.
company town
Lindsay Lohan, DumbstruckThe big news today in the city’s big businesses.
FASHION
• Lindsay Lohan’s Miu Miu ads keep coming — now she’s a vibrant, dumbstruck dolly. [Fashionologie]
• There’s a bimbo logjam at the top of Mr. Blackwell’s annual worst-dressed list. [Downtown Darling]
• A Paris court dismissed Karl Lagerfeld’s claim against journalist Alicia Drake. He sued her for invasion of privacy — but really, people say, because she called him middle class. [WWD]