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LLOwens's Replies
"It's taking a bit longer than I expected because it's quite complex to merge all the new archived content with existing posts created here, but I've got it covered."
I must have built, modified or refurbished around 50 computers over the past few years, but I'm very weak on the programming end. So while this may be a dumb question, I had to ask: Did you have to create an algorithm in order to merge all the content you continually add to this site's preexisting content? I myself wouldn't even know where to begin to accomplish such an enormous task.
Some of the threads I started or posted comments to on IMDb had literally a hundred replies or more, as many times the meat of the discussion occurred way down thread--so this is very welcome news indeed Jim!
Is it just me Ron, or from the time she started acting in movies that the older Kristen gets the younger she looks--like a real life the Curious Case of Benjamin Button?
When googling for Kristen news a few days ago, pics of her recently shaved head were trending, which at first glance I initially thought was photoshopped--you can never really tell these days whether pics of a celebrity are legit or not. After clicking on various links which led me to sites like the one I posted above, the first two images that popped up in my mind were Eminem and Charlize Theron from "Mad Max: Fury Road". So I'm guessing that likewise, the first impression moviegoers will have of Kristen when seeing her on the silver screen for "Underwater" sporting her buzzcut, is that she's a too cool for school, kick-ass heroine.
One of the tics she has is touching or running her fingers through her hair--so she won't be doing any of that for a while--but like she mentioned while being interviewed on the Stephen Colbert show, she'll probably be rubbing her head instead LOL!
Kristen's appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert on YouTube for those who may have missed it:
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-bZQJ3P9N0">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-bZQJ3P9N0</a>
Clicky: <a href="http://kstewartnews.com/2017/02/21/kristen-stewart-to-front-another-chanel-handbag-campaign-shot-by-karl-lagerfeld/">http://kstewartnews.com/2017/02/21/kristen-stewart-to-front-another-chanel-handbag-campaign-shot-by-karl-lagerfeld/</a>
"Lagerfeld also photographed Stewart for a handbag campaign in 2015 that also starred Vanessa Paradis and Alice Dellal. For those spots, Stewart posed with the iconic 11.12 handbag, and has proven to be something of a chameleon in her Chanel guise — ultrasophisticated one moment, sultry the next."
Kristen definitely has chameleon looks--I mean she can pull off any look from being photographed half-naked to modeling t-shits and jeans to haute couture and everything in between, while looking great with her hair in all lengths, colors and styles, including the buzzcut she's sporting now. Can't wait to see the pics!
"Patriots picked up a quarterback in the draft, a backup to Brady's backup QB in case he has to serve the four game suspension in the beginning of the season."
I thought the Patriots were going to trade at least one of their quarterbacks, most likely Garoppolo, but it seems they will keep all three Ron. Speaking of trades, the Patriots have been very busy in the off season, picking up good players such as cornerback Stephon Gilmore and receiver Brandon Cooks. While Gilmore was a Pro Bowl pick last season, Cooks has yet to be selected. So I consider him to be one of the most talented and underrated receivers in the NFL, since only three receivers, including Cooks along with Antonio Brown and Odell Beckham Jr. who had over 1,000 yards receiving, 75 receptions and 8 touchdowns in each of the past two seasons. So he'll be one more weapon to the Patriots high powered offense. Cooks is a big-play receiver who can stretch out the field or run short routes and catch passes in traffic with the best of them, making him one of the most versatile and talented receivers in the NFL. And with Gronk back, the Patriots should be much better on offense than they were this past season and hopefully their shortage at the receiver/tight end positions are a thing of the past. While the Patriots lost Bennett, they picked up Dwayne Allen from the Colts, who should make a good second option at the tight end position to compliment Gronk. There is even talk that Vikings running back Adrian Peterson is willing to take a pay cut to play for the Patriots. Now that is a scary thought if it every comes to fruition if you're an opposing team.
On defense they lost Ryan and Sheard and there was talk that they may trade Butler as well, which I'm hoping they don't. But you never know since there doesn't seem to be any job security for any of the Patriots players on defense, especially after Jamie Collins was traded last season. But the good news, like I mentioned earlier they added Gilmore along with defensive end Kony Ealy, which should shore up the defense. New England has also recently signed Lawrence Guy, formerly of the Ravens, who should give them another good pass rusher. I'm guessing they signed Guy, knowing they may lose on of the best blitzing linebackers in the NFL, Dont'a Hightower to free agency.
One glaring weakness on defense is their shortage of linebackers, especially after the departure of Collins and more recently, Sheard and most likely Hightower as well. So I'm guessing New England will address this need by selecting at least one linebacker in the NFL draft, as it appears this year's draft is loaded with good prospects on defense. Not so much on offense, which is the reason why I believe the Patriots were willing to trade a 1st-round pick--the first time during the Belichick era where they traded a first rounder for a veteran--for a receiver, while holding on to all their QBs, which kinda makes sense if one factors in that the Patriots haven't drafted any Pro Bowl caliber players in the first round for as long as I can remember. Why not trade for a proven veteran star player as opposed to a high-rated rookie who may not live up to such great expectations.
I recall she used the expression, "I'm like so gay dude...", on SNL which is sometimes used as a figure of speech. Some of my friends used to often use the expression, "He's so gay", which isn't necessarily meant to describe someone being homosexual in the strictest sense of the word. That being said, I believe she has dated women in her close circle of friends since she broke up with Robert Pattinson. However, like Sentient brought out previously, I highly doubt her heterosexual relationship with Pattinson was a mere PR stunt. And what about her other hetero relationships such as with Micheal Angarano? Was that too a publicity stunt? And if feigning love for a hetero partner was done with the intention that it was good for business, why did both Rupert Sanders and Kristen issue public apologies with regard to their moment of indiscretion if she was truly a lesbian from birth? Why fake damage control, if the scandal did not take place, as admitting they were involved in a scandal can have a detrimental effect on relationships, reputations, careers and film projects? Makes no sense in my opinion that all the men she had relationships with in the past were all just pretend.
Continued
"Stewart is a terrific actress, her brittle exterior barely masking whatever tempest she or her characters are battling underneath, and here, the unpredictability of what she may do next is heightened by the fact that there are no rules for what can happen." ~Peter Debruge
<a href="http://variety.com/2016/film/reviews/personal-shopper-review-kristen-stewart-1201775572/">http://variety.com/2016/film/reviews/personal-shopper-review-kristen-stewart-1201775572/</a>
"For one thing, Kristen Stewart—who was in Assayas’s previous movie, “Clouds of Sils Maria” (2014)—is such a material presence. She’ll never be a lovable actress, but neither can she be ignored; she’s so on, and so bereft of peace. She fidgets, twitches, snaps at her lines as if they were candies, and mops her hand over her face in the hope of wiping her cares away. In a movie plagued by the dead, she is the proof of life." ~Anthony Lane
<a href="http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/03/20/personal-shopper-and-frantz">http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/03/20/personal-shopper-and-frantz</a>
"Working for the second time with French director Olivier Assayas, Stewart gives a superb performance in this mysterious, compelling story, balanced cleverly between the known and the unknown. Following their work on the excellent, Cesar Award-winning Clouds of Sils Maria, the pair revisits some of the same territory -- the world of elite celebrities and the regular people who work for them." ~Jeffrey M. Anderson
<a href="https://www.commonsensemedia.org/movie-reviews/personal-shopper">https://www.commonsensemedia.org/movie-reviews/personal-shopper</a>
"Kristen Stewart played an assistant to an older movie star in Olivier Assayas’ last film, Clouds of Sils Maria, wherein she proved that she could more than hold her own against Juliette Binoche, she built a believably confusing friendship-mentor chemistry battle with one of France’s all time greats. For her reteam with Assayas in Personal Shopper, Stewart has to hold our attention on screen almost entirely alone—acting opposite a ghost, a cell phone, or in an empty apartment—and she’s absolutely brilliant." ~Brian Formo
<a href="http://collider.com/kristen-stewart-personal-shopper-review/#poster">http://collider.com/kristen-stewart-personal-shopper-review/#poster</a>
"It’s a textured perspective on the horror genre, matched beautifully by Kristen Stewart, who gives an astounding performance as a woman who’s not quite sure how badly she’s been torn apart. Watching her try to sew herself back together anyway is captivating." ~William Bibbiani
<a href="http://www.craveonline.com/entertainment/1028413-tiff-2016-review-personal-shopper-haute-couture-horror#/slide/1">http://www.craveonline.com/entertainment/1028413-tiff-2016-review-personal-shopper-haute-couture-horror#/slide/1</a>
Continued
"Now as a frightful fashionista, Twilight’s Kristen Stewart terrifies, startles at Cannes
Some in the audience just did not expect the unconventional horror-movie trajectory of Personal Shopper, in which the actress, playing a rich woman’s go-fer, advances far beyond her vampire-franchise days.
The idea of Kristen Stewart playing a combination ghost chaser and fashionista sounds like something from the realm of comedy.
Yet in Personal Shopper, her new film which has electrified — make that terrified — the Cannes Film Festival, it’s an artful take on the horror movie genre. Representing a new advance as an actress for Stewart, 26, the film is far more frightening and cerebral than anything seen during her Twilight vampire franchise days.
Maureen does the fittings and fetching for her boss, working efficiently but with a vague sense of resentment. Stewart puts these competing impulses across with the most subtle of words and expressions, and also small acts of rebellion." ~Peter Howell
<a href="https://www.thestar.com/entertainment/2016/05/17/now-as-a-frlghtful-fashionista-twilights-kristin-stewart-terrifies-startles-at-cannes.html">https://www.thestar.com/entertainment/2016/05/17/now-as-a-frlghtful-fashionista-twilights-kristin-stewart-terrifies-startles-at-cannes.html</a>
"Thematically this is Olivier Assayas's darkest feature since Boarding Gate (2007), though it's much better, owing largely to Kristen Stewart's mesmeric performance as a young Parisian who works as personal shopper to a jet-set model and, in her spare time, communicates with the dead." ~J.R. Jones
<a href="http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/personal-shopper/Film?oid=25691049">http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/personal-shopper/Film?oid=25691049</a>
"Stewart’s work here isn’t as revelatory as her Sils Maria turn—there’s a sizable qualitative difference between bouncing off of Juliette Binoche and interacting with an iPhone 6—but her signature self-possession serves her well in this much creepier context." ~Mike D'Angelo
<a href="http://www.avclub.com/article/singular-kristen-stewart-ghost-story-joins-booed-c-236893">http://www.avclub.com/article/singular-kristen-stewart-ghost-story-joins-booed-c-236893</a>
"Kristen Stewart is excellent in Olivier Assayas's magnificently unconventional Paris-set ghost story
Kristen Stewart has become one hell of an actress. The former 'Twilight' star was easily the standout feature of Assayas's last film, the slightly stilted study of actors 'Clouds of Sils Maria', quietly yanking the rug from under the feet of Juliette Binoche. Here, Stewart doesn't need to steal the film from anyone: she's in virtually every crisp frame of it, holding the camera's woozy gaze with her own quizzical, secretive stare and knotted body language.
Her performance is a galvanising human influence on the film, even as her character, introverted American-in-Paris Maureen, seems forever on the verge of voluntary evaporation.
And he's [Assayas] found an impeccably attuned muse in Stewart, who wears the film's curiosity with the same casually challenging stride that she does – in a key scene of sensual self-realisation – a jaw-dropping silk-organza bondage gown." ~Guy Lodge
<a href="https://www.timeout.com/london/film/personal-shopper">https://www.timeout.com/london/film/personal-shopper</a>
Continued
"In Personal Shopper, Stewart is still playing an assistant, but she’s the star, and she moves through the film with the same disconsolate detachment that she played so well in Clouds of Sils Maria.
Stewart, who at this point has to be recognized as a major talent, brings the same brittle vulnerability she deployed so well in Clouds of Sils Maria and 2016’s Certain Women, vacillating between the cool self-confidence of her day job and the odd performativity of trying to talk to a ghost when standing alone in a room." ~David Sims
<a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2017/03/personal-shopper-kristen-stewart-review/518919/">https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2017/03/personal-shopper-kristen-stewart-review/518919/</a>
"'Personal Shopper' review: Kristen Stewart sells it
It's a film of slow revelations, including Kristen Stewart's own.
For years, she'd been a slightly blank presence in films, a pallid screen on which audiences could project their own hopes and dreams. Was she a great actress? Or merely a great stand-in? For a long time, it seemed debatable.
She's been growing rapidly, though. And "Personal Shopper" allows Stewart an even wider range of emotions than most of her recent movies. She shows fear, yes. But also stammering nervousness, nagging grief, resignation. It's a full portrait and an often fascinating one." ~Stephen Whitty
<a href="http://www.nj.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2017/03/personal_shopper_review_kristen_stewart_sells_it.html">http://www.nj.com/entertainment/index.ssf/2017/03/personal_shopper_review_kristen_stewart_sells_it.html</a>
"Kristen Stewart's 'Personal Shopper' will get under your skin
To her credit, Stewart makes this near-one-woman show not only watchable but truly anxiety-inducing in places." ~Sara Stewart
<a href="http://nypost.com/2017/03/07/kristen-stewarts-personal-shopper-will-get-under-your-skin/">http://nypost.com/2017/03/07/kristen-stewarts-personal-shopper-will-get-under-your-skin/</a>
"When one goes to see Kristen Stewart — among the most quicksilver of her generation's performers — in Olivier Assayas's Personal Shopper, a shape-shifting, resolutely of-this-moment ghost story that features her in nearly every frame, one goes not to watch her act but refract.
I mean this as high praise.
There's a perverse thrill in watching Stewart, long an A-lister, so astutely inhabit the role of helpmate. Though deferential, Valentine doesn't hesitate to challenge Maria, delivering an eloquent defense of blockbusters when her employer slams industrial cinema — the very kind of moviemaking that made Stewart a star. ~Melissa Anderson
<a href="http://www.villagevoice.com/film/in-a-bizarre-ghost-story-kristen-stewart-haunts-herself-9743648">http://www.villagevoice.com/film/in-a-bizarre-ghost-story-kristen-stewart-haunts-herself-9743648</a>
Continued
"Review Is Olivier Assayas' spooky, entrancing 'Personal Shopper' Kristen Stewart's finest performance?
It is also, first and foremost, a testament to the eerie powers of Kristen Stewart, a movie star who has now twice pulled off the trick of chipping away at her celebrity and redefining the boundaries of her talent in the same instance.
'Personal Shopper' is a gripping portrait of solitude, which is to say it’s a hell of a one-woman show for Stewart, the rare actress who can blur into the background and magnetize the camera in the same scene. Rarely has the sight of someone quietly, urgently going about her business seemed so riveting. Stewart’s style is so unaffected that it takes a while to realize that Maureen is registering the effects of a profound, soul-shaking trauma, one that threatens to destabilize her very understanding of who she is.
Her character may not know who she is or where she’s headed, but on the evidence of her finest screen performance to date, Kristen Stewart knows exactly what she’s doing." ~Justin Chang
<a href="http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-personal-shopper-review-20170309-story.html">http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/la-et-mn-personal-shopper-review-20170309-story.html</a>
"This is a bigger issue for the supporting cast than for Stewart, who got one of her finest showcases in Clouds (also playing a celebrity’s personal assistant) and has a way of infecting scripted action with naturalism.
Stewart makes the scenes of her character’s day-to-day life seem unrehearsed and intimate, as though the movie were peering in on someone whose thoughts were always someplace else. A lot of it is the magic of casual gesture—things she does with cups of espresso, boarding passes, keys, her iPhone." ~Ignatiy Vishnevetsky
<a href="http://www.avclub.com/review/kristen-stewart-browses-ghosts-olivier-assayas-unc-251630">http://www.avclub.com/review/kristen-stewart-browses-ghosts-olivier-assayas-unc-251630</a>
"Review: Kristen Stewart Is Entrancing as a Haunted ‘Personal Shopper’
Kristen Stewart, who plays Maureen, has something in common with other stars of Mr. Assayas’s films, notably Maggie Cheung in “Irma Vep” and “Clean” — a quality of self-enclosed detachment that becomes its own peculiar form of intensity. She possesses an uncanny ability to turn her natural charisma into diffidence. You can’t take your eyes off her, even as she seems to be making every effort to deflect your attention, to obscure her radiance, to disappear onscreen.
This time she summons ghosts, thanks to a plot contrivance that makes the most of Ms. Stewart’s elusive magnetism." ~A.O. Scott
<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/09/movies/personal-shopper-review-kristen-stewart.html?_r=0">https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/09/movies/personal-shopper-review-kristen-stewart.html?_r=0</a>
Continued
"Review: Kristen Stewart, otherworldly in 'Personal Shopper'
Thank goodness for Stewart, who deftly guides the audience along on this jumbled journey. The always evolving actress is singular in excelling at occupying this ordinary space despite her extraordinary fame off screen. That she's already played an assistant-type for Assayas takes away a bit of the fun of seeing her as a normal bumping up against the equally unreal world of celebrity, but in "Personal Shopper" she gets to go a little more wild." ~Lindsey Bahr
<a href="http://bigstory.ap.org/article/review-kristen-stewart-otherworldly-personal-shopper"> http://bigstory.ap.org/article/review-kristen-stewart-otherworldly-personal-shopper</a>
"Ms. Stewart's portrayal has the ring of truth and the urgency of terror." ~Joe Morgenstern
<a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/personal-shopper-review-reaching-across-the-void-1489080994">https://www.wsj.com/articles/personal-shopper-review-reaching-across-the-void-1489080994</a>
"Kristen Stewart intrigues again in ‘Personal Shopper’
French filmmaker Olivier Assayas has entered into a fruitful collaboration with Kristen Stewart, showcasing the former “Twilight” star in entirely new and refreshing ways. Stewart’s talent has never been in question — she commanded attention as a child in “Panic Room,” and in indies like “Into the Wild” and “Adventureland,” while also cavorting with sparkly vampires in the blockbuster young adult franchise. It seems almost a “Twilight” rebellion for Stewart to retreat into indie and foreign films, but it’s a richly welcomed one.
But far more than that, “Personal Shopper” is a testament to Stewart who, in her magnetically naturalistic performance, not only proves her versatility, but cements a signature style inextricably linked to persona." ~Katie Walsh
<a href="http://www.pressofatlanticcity.com/life/kristen-stewart-intrigues-again-in-personal-shopper/article_4c3282c7-e52f-5ba6-b6be-65714060d446.html">http://www.pressofatlanticcity.com/life/kristen-stewart-intrigues-again-in-personal-shopper/article_4c3282c7-e52f-5ba6-b6be-65714060d446.html</a>
"Stewart, who appears in nearly every scene, is intensely watchable, a coiled spring." ~Leah GreenBlatt
<a href="http://ew.com/movies/2017/03/09/personal-shopper-ew-review/">http://ew.com/movies/2017/03/09/personal-shopper-ew-review/</a>
"Review: Kristen Stewart Sets Personal Shopper Ablaze
Stewart is both laid back and ablaze here. Her eyes can be as alert as a tiger’s, but more often they seem to assay the world with the cool, lazy blink of a lizard. She moves with the grace of a boy who both plays baseball and takes ballet. At one point, in an act of sultry defiance, Maureen secretly tries on one of her boss’s costly dresses, trussing her tomboy-flapper figure in a faux-bondagey harness that’s later draped with a floating layer of black chiffon. Soft and strong, she’s garçon and femme, boy and woman, at once. You wouldn’t call her gamine—that’s too cute, too in-between, and Stewart is definitive. She knows exactly who she is: Her allure is that she keeps us guessing." ~Stephanie Zacherek
<a href="http://time.com/4696431/kristen-stewart-personal-shopper-review/">http://time.com/4696431/kristen-stewart-personal-shopper-review/</a>
Personal Shopper currently has a Certified Fresh rating of 78% on Rotten Tomatoes, with the critics consensus saying this film was, "....bolstered by a performance from Kristen Stewart that's impossible to ignore." What I found to be even more impressive is the fact that 89% of the top critics liked it. You already quoted from Peter Travers, so here's several more excerpts from other top critics working in the industry, some of whom have given Kristen rave reviews for her stellar performance:
"With this moody ghost story, Kristen Stewart continues to prove she’s a world-class actress who enthralls us by holding back.
What makes Kristen Stewart so arresting an actress is also what makes it so hard to describe what she does on screen. There’s something beguilingly mysterious about her that you can’t quite quantify. She’s there, but she’s also not there. It’s not that she’s bored or out of it, but rather that she seems to be operating on a strange frequency all her own. We watch Stewart in part because we can’t quite understand her.
That air of ambiguity is crucial to the strong spell that Personal Shopper weaves. I’ve seen this moody character study twice now, and I can’t say I’m any closer to unraveling its meanings or determining precisely why Stewart is so terrific in it. All I know is I want to watch it—and her—again very soon.
This is Stewart’s great gift. In the five years since the end of the Twilight franchise, which exponentially raised her profile but also damaged her credibility among serious filmgoers, she has delivered a slew of terrific performances that have maximized her enigmatic quality. " ~Tim Grierson
<a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/141231/personal-shopper-shes-not">https://newrepublic.com/article/141231/personal-shopper-shes-not</a>
"Who could have possibly predicted that not only would Olivier Assayas and Kristen Stewart combine to form one of the most potent creative duos working in film today, but that they would achieve such prominence over the course of only two movies?
They have now reunited for “Personal Shopper,” and despite the high-water mark set by their previous collaboration, they have managed to out-do themselves with a work as mysterious, moving and haunting as anything that has materialized in a movie theater in a while.
Aiding immeasurably in accomplishing this is Stewart delivering what could be the finest performance of her still-developing career. Throughout the film, she is required to display any number of internal shifts in personality while still remaining more or less the same on the outside. To each shift in character, she manages to find an approach that does something wholly new and original while at the same time being absolutely real and recognizable. She saves the best for the very last with a delivery of the film’s final line that is extraordinarily evocative. To all those who still decree Stewart to be a limited actress because of her increasingly glum turns in the “Twilight” films, where she was dealing with writing and characters seemingly designed to defeat anyone with talent or intelligence, they are hereby advised to see her work here and either admit to her enormous talents or admit to the fact that they have absolutely no idea of what constitutes great acting." ~Peter Sobczynski
<a href="http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/personal-shopper-2017">http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/personal-shopper-2017</a>
"You can imagine Assayas gazing at Stewart in their last project and thinking, I would love to make a movie that dislocates her in every way imaginable and then see how she fills the void.
Tantalizingly, as it turns out." ~David Edelstein
<a href="http://www.vulture.com/2017/03/movie-review-personal-shopper.html?mid=full-rss-vulture">http://www.vulture.com/2017/03/movie-review-personal-shopper.html?mid=full-rss-vulture</a>
"The ghosts are occasionally visible and audible here, but they’re just as likely to be ethereal, and that fits in with Assayas’s storytelling, which often forces us to fill in gaps of unspoken dialogue or unexplained plot for ourselves. It’s a strategy that pays off, however, since it allows the talented Stewart to communicate so much with her expressive eyes and face.
(The shelf life on “Twilight” jokes, incidentally, has long expired: both Stewart and Robert Pattinson are out there giving interesting performances for some of this generation’s most important filmmakers.)" ~Alonso Duralde
<a href="http://www.thewrap.com/personal-shopper-review-kristen-stewart-olivier-assayas/">http://www.thewrap.com/personal-shopper-review-kristen-stewart-olivier-assayas/</a>
*There's a limit on how many words can be used in a post, so I'll continue with the reviews in my next replies.