tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-84377962088953266432024-03-17T20:03:14.058-07:00OscarbloggerEllaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.comBlogger129125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-25555840159365652372024-03-12T13:13:00.000-07:002024-03-16T15:18:48.420-07:00OPPENHIEMER (2023)<p><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span></p><p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgpGWV1YTWnRxn0KFQuTjzUbfdNE3_NJEndgjLvRiKP788gH5_AOvW7XNX75A6XOldKRmRKqC4mXMeY5wtjVj2NbGfIeyRny3rSHIQ_ikH1_7BkZ7sN4M_MGsFyUEE3Xkbl5PNt2EUEeWI-3lzDNyUN7pwbTaNib8e2MK0Z3tGx2kq8JqyoCR_K5HsrP8/s3454/MV5BMDBmYTZjNjUtN2M1MS00MTQ2LTk2ODgtNzc2M2QyZGE5NTVjXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyNzAwMjU2MTY@._V1_.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3454" data-original-width="2331" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgpGWV1YTWnRxn0KFQuTjzUbfdNE3_NJEndgjLvRiKP788gH5_AOvW7XNX75A6XOldKRmRKqC4mXMeY5wtjVj2NbGfIeyRny3rSHIQ_ikH1_7BkZ7sN4M_MGsFyUEE3Xkbl5PNt2EUEeWI-3lzDNyUN7pwbTaNib8e2MK0Z3tGx2kq8JqyoCR_K5HsrP8/w432-h640/MV5BMDBmYTZjNjUtN2M1MS00MTQ2LTk2ODgtNzc2M2QyZGE5NTVjXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyNzAwMjU2MTY@._V1_.jpg" width="432" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p><br /></p><p><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> OPPENHEIMER (DIR: CHRISTOPHER NOLAN) (SCR: ADAPTED BY NOLAN <span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span>FROM THE BOOK "AMERICAN PROMETHEUS" BY KAI BIRD AND <span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span>MARTIN SHERWIN) </span><br /></p><p><span><br /></span></p><p><span>The Best Picture win for OPPENHEIMER was almost completely predictable: it had already won multiple Golden Globe and National Review awards, and it was nominated for 13 Oscars, more than any other film from 2023. (It won 7 in all). It also is the kind of film that the Academy likes to give awards to: it's not just a period piece biopic, it's also about American history and deals with big, meaty issues like the morality of building nuclear weapons. Add to that the fact that acclaimed director Christopher Nolan had never won an Oscar before, and you have all the makings of an obvious victory. Personally, I didn't mind that at all; I consider Oppenheimer to be a great film, filled with excellent performances and terrific looking period recreations. From </span><span style="white-space: normal;">Hoyte van Hoytema terrific cinematography (in both color and black and white) to </span>Jennifer Lame's editing, (both of them won Oscars) this is one well made and great looking movie.</p><p>Like Steven Spielberg before him, for years now Christopher Nolan has been a director that has gotten both big box office receipts and critical respect for many of his movies. (I've been a fan since is excellent 2000 thriller MOMENTO). So much so that when he really wants to make a movie, he can get it done on the strength of his name appeal alone. Nolan had been interested in making a movie about rocket scientist Robert Oppenheimer for years and Kai Bird and Martin Sherwin's acclaimed and well researched 2005 biography about Oppenheimer, "American Prometheus" had been kicked around as a movie for years before Nolan himself read the book in 2015. He began production on it almost immediately after finishing his 2020 film "TENET. Interestingly, he worked with the Universal film studio instead of his usual home, Warner Brothers, because he was mad that that studio had released TENET in both theaters and on streaming during the pandemic. (Nolan has always been a big proponent of movies being seen on big screens in theaters). </p><p>Due to his clout, Nolan was able to make an epic three hour film that spanned decades of time and required numerous period designs. He was also able to get big stars like Robert Downey Jr and Emily Blunt to take supporting roles, while he cast his frequent collaborator Cillian Murphy in the title role. The final budget was around one hundred million dollars, and the film would, despite its length and heavy subject matter, make a hefty profit. Its national box office was over three hundred million dollars, with foreign grosses bringing it close to a billion dollars worldwide.</p><p>The film jumps around in time, from Oppenheimer's youth as a brilliant physics student to his leading a government team of scientists to make a nuclear bomb before the Germans did during World War II, with another timeline covering his life in the postwar years, when anti Communist fervor saw his government security clearance threatened.</p><p><br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSA9ONWR7XVkVl3Ya_s2HEGzRbRfMn3y63a_E0Oog4iS-FwVPF5GpAOEXae_fj05vqpZSj84NzFjyL829CwDhL2-JLHysHpS_WBZ65Mv7n3bO3FJfu62T36u2zrvBZ9zVW5hf3JW1xADs-5461zU8yrpbLMAOw-m9hESMKo0arqMdop3Pt0JLUIq_scZI/s1000/Cillian-Murphy-J.-Robert-Oppenheimer.webp" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="563" data-original-width="1000" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSA9ONWR7XVkVl3Ya_s2HEGzRbRfMn3y63a_E0Oog4iS-FwVPF5GpAOEXae_fj05vqpZSj84NzFjyL829CwDhL2-JLHysHpS_WBZ65Mv7n3bO3FJfu62T36u2zrvBZ9zVW5hf3JW1xADs-5461zU8yrpbLMAOw-m9hESMKo0arqMdop3Pt0JLUIq_scZI/s320/Cillian-Murphy-J.-Robert-Oppenheimer.webp" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cillian Murphy and Charles Oppenheimer </td></tr></tbody></table><br /><p><br /></p><p>Nolan has said part of what drew him to the film was the recent Russian invasion of Ukraine, which brought serious talk of a possible use of nuclear weapons into the world's conversation for the first time in decades. And this to me is a big part of why I think this is a great film: yes, it's about events that took place a long time ago, but the ramifications of those events are still frighteningly relevant. And the movie effectively pulls us in different directions emotionally: of course it's totally understandable that Oppenheimer and his scientific team want to beat the Nazis in developing a nuclear weapon. But when the bomb is used on Japan, there is both a sense of elation at the war's end and a fear of what a future with nuclear weapons will hold for the human race. Whether Oppenheimer himself is a hero or villain is left hanging because there's no easy answer. In perhaps my favorite scene in the film, Oppenheimer meets with President Harry Truman (Gary Oldman), who can't for a second understand the scientist's mixed feelings about the atomic bombing of Japan. While Truman seems almost buffoonish here, his assertions are not unreasonable. Again, there's no easy answer about Oppenheimer's discoveries. </p><p>As Oppenheimer, Murphy is just great. Somehow, he just seems to radiate intellect and drive as he calmly but determinedly works towards his goal. He also seems stunned and helpless in the postwar part of the film, as the same government that he did so much for turns on him. And Robert Downey Jr as as Rear Admiral Lewis Strauss, who's feelings about Oppenheimer are complicated, is also very good. One of Nolan's blind spots in his films is his lack of interesting female characters, and that problem does arise here. Oh sure, Emily Blunt as Oppenheimer's wife and Florence Pugh as his mistress both do what they can, but their roles don't go much beyond what you would expect from those characters. But that doesn't really hurt the film because this was historically a story about a group of men making big decisions.</p><p>Along with jumping around chronologically, Nolan's script also deftly explains the research the characters are engaging in without confusing the audience. And, of course, the film's inevitable build up to the first atomic bomb test is thrilling, even though we all know the result. To me, Nolan has made something really special: a thought provoking, well made and acted historical epic that's also very entertaining. </p><br class="Apple-interchange-newline" /><p><b style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13.2px;">SO DID THE ACADEMY GET IT RIGHT?</b></p><p>It's pretty obvious that I love this movie, and while I wouldn't have minded an upset win for Cord Jefferson's wonderful racial satire AMERICAN FICTION, this was really the right choice in my opinion. (And Jefferson did win a well deserved Oscar for his script).</p>Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-56021425726955841822024-01-23T18:40:00.000-08:002024-01-23T18:48:18.736-08:00THE 2023 NOMINATIONS: FIRST IMPRESSIONS<p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjpbQMn-aivIT17Ca-hn3n5Vao1R1HVmECUd1P86jtO9Cy9YGs_BExPzz89E0UEcExVwTjHS_QXEqxz7nrDno0oP5Jw-1ejKqWwlih4ubyJ-nJjlc5Jd_HsVT1dApZj30WGClSiYg37_z3CfZquKFVUFgfBbr2g4O11ClotpYXIvqbknqo_xU_C-p7f-mM" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1280" data-original-width="1920" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjpbQMn-aivIT17Ca-hn3n5Vao1R1HVmECUd1P86jtO9Cy9YGs_BExPzz89E0UEcExVwTjHS_QXEqxz7nrDno0oP5Jw-1ejKqWwlih4ubyJ-nJjlc5Jd_HsVT1dApZj30WGClSiYg37_z3CfZquKFVUFgfBbr2g4O11ClotpYXIvqbknqo_xU_C-p7f-mM=w640-h426" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p> The Oscar nominations for 2023 were announced this morning, and to the surprise of nobody paying attention, Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer dominated with a whopping 13 nominations in all. Again, that's hardly a shock, given that Nolan's film is a high profile, important historical biopic about big ideas that was a big box office hit. Add to that the fact that the highly respected Nolan has never won a Best Director award or had any of his other films win Best Picture despite multiple nominations in both categories, and it looks like Oppenheimer will win big. Among the other Best Picture Nominees, I was very happy to see that Cord Jefferson's excellent satire American Fiction is in there, and that Jeffrey Wright is also nominated for Best Actor for his great work on that film. And, as always, I was happy to see Best Picture nominations for lower budgeted, non star driven films like Celine Song's Past Lives and Justine Triet's Anatomy of a Fall; to me, bringing the attention of the public to less well known films like these is what the Oscars do best.</p><p>As for surprises, perhaps the biggest one is that Greta Gerwig's Barbie movie, while nominated for Best Picture and 7 other categories, didn't get a nomination for director Gerwig or star Margot Robbie. But before you cry sexism for Gerwig being snubbed, it should be pointed out that for the first time ever, 3 of the 10 movies nominated for Best Picture were directed by women (Anatomy of a Fall by Triet, Past Lives by Song and Barbie by Gerwig). Also, Gerwig has been nominated for Best Director in the past, for 2018's Ladybird (which I thought was better than Barbie). That said I do think that Gerwig should have been nominated for Best Director for Barbie given that the film was such a big production that became a massive hit (the biggest box office for a movie directed by a woman ever), and I would choose her over director Jonathan Glazer's nomination for the overrated (in my opinion) Zone of Interest. But there's no doubt that Gerwig's entrance into the A list of directors will mean that she will be nominated in that category again sometime in the future.</p><p>Overall, there's nothing in the list of nominees that I think is unworthy or bothersome; I've seen 9 of the 10 Best Picture nominees, and I enjoyed all of them. (I plan to see Maestro, the one I haven't seen yet, sometime soon, and I'm pretty sure that I will like it). I certainly won't complain if Oppenheimer wins Best Picture although I also wouldn't mind if American Fiction were to were to make an upset win there. (Picking between those two pictures is tough for me, because I loved both of them and they're so different). Meanwhile, Barbie will almost definitely win numerous well deserved technical awards for things like production design and costumes, and Gerwig might win for Best Adapted Screenplay to make up for not getting nominated for Best Director. So even though she won't get her Best Director award yet, she could still go home happy.</p>Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-20875669329963438132023-12-18T11:09:00.000-08:002023-12-18T11:09:02.635-08:00AN INTERESTING MOMENT AT THE AMERICAN BOX OFFICE<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcbx7I0DmxR2MMtxQaX5zglj5kYralxHkM9_iLHg330bPwBU-LKvVMqtaI1y_vcOZlv2l3bI69uTXjcnH19HkJcSKWtX7lsSsVO-2TB75SRyVFzM8EW-nIORFmpY-CjiEReNC84Q50wfQoVZ78DeglBkdv_a8Naokcw2Z3kpnFuLIjHdzGpLm23WAdESY/s2560/zbMRm6P6wPe9SQ6qJ7ZTAvCMS6e-scaled.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2560" data-original-width="1707" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcbx7I0DmxR2MMtxQaX5zglj5kYralxHkM9_iLHg330bPwBU-LKvVMqtaI1y_vcOZlv2l3bI69uTXjcnH19HkJcSKWtX7lsSsVO-2TB75SRyVFzM8EW-nIORFmpY-CjiEReNC84Q50wfQoVZ78DeglBkdv_a8Naokcw2Z3kpnFuLIjHdzGpLm23WAdESY/s320/zbMRm6P6wPe9SQ6qJ7ZTAvCMS6e-scaled.jpeg" width="213" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZp-csf-74LYj5-vwSg_iO0C5Oea80a_7zqQgYRWDSY774UW1R0BdG3gQEnGDchi6nngPfr_14EnCj9yO_ggFvWC8XaSHjMA8oJ0im6bhy4q2XC8j9TaMgAeBkTn_jeX9miqvEjZ0IeRpKjyPxdnJvQOp5a63Qnd7PhrMUUy7HSetkbYCmOw0XvK4Qqkk/s1414/MV5BYTZkNWQyMDEtMmRhNi00Nzc5LWFhNjQtMWRiOTllYmEzOWE5XkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMTMwNzYxMTUx._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1414" data-original-width="1000" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZp-csf-74LYj5-vwSg_iO0C5Oea80a_7zqQgYRWDSY774UW1R0BdG3gQEnGDchi6nngPfr_14EnCj9yO_ggFvWC8XaSHjMA8oJ0im6bhy4q2XC8j9TaMgAeBkTn_jeX9miqvEjZ0IeRpKjyPxdnJvQOp5a63Qnd7PhrMUUy7HSetkbYCmOw0XvK4Qqkk/s320/MV5BYTZkNWQyMDEtMmRhNi00Nzc5LWFhNjQtMWRiOTllYmEzOWE5XkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMTMwNzYxMTUx._V1_FMjpg_UX1000_.jpg" width="226" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Recently, during the weekend of December 8th-10th, the number one film at the American box office was writer/director/animator Hayao Miyazaki's latest (and perhaps last) film The Boy and the Heron. While this was in itself no surprise, with Miyazaki's films having been quite popular in the US for decades, what is interesting is that the number three spot on the box office list that week was Takashi Yamazaki's Godzilla Minus One, which had debuted at number one two weeks earlier.</p><p>This means that for the first time ever, Japan had two out of the three top box office movies for the weekend. While this may just be a coincidence of releasing, with the two films sandwiched by the usual big budget Hollywood releases, I like to think that it also may show that international films may finally be getting their moment in the US. (Although I suppose I should point out that both films have been shown with both subtitled and dubbed versions, with the dubbing of course making them feel less foreign).</p><p>For decades, foreign films were delegated mostly to arthouse theaters in this country, with studios assuming that American audiences just don't like subtitles and aren't interested in stories from other cultures. Sadly, there seemed to be some truth in this, with foreign films at the Oscars almost always ghettoized by only winning a "Best Foreign Film" award and only big cities showing them on the big screen. This happened despite the fact that many of the most influential films ever made are foreign films, such as Akira Kurosawa's The Seven Samurai (remade twice as the Magnificent Seven) and Frederico Fellini's 8 1/2, which has also been remade several times, while also being turned into a Broadway musical. </p><p>But the fact that Japan did not just see animated films as just children's films lead to Japanese adult oriented animated movies and TV shows (like 1988's Akira) building cult followings in the US, aided by the rise of videotape rental stores. Another big change was the surprising win for Best Picture by the Korean film Parasite in 2019, followed by the enormous success of the Korean TV series Squid Game in 2021 would seem to confirm this trend. It would seem that the continuing rate of diversification in the country has lead to an opening for films from different cultures.</p><p>But then perhaps I'm being overly optimistic, and that the box office success of The Boy and the Heron and Godzilla Minus One is not so surprising considering that both Miyazaki and Godzilla are both far from obscure in the US. (Considering the recent series of Godzilla films made in Hollywood, that character has pretty much become as much an American commodity these days as a Japanese one.) But as someone who grew up in San Francisco and has sought out and often loved foreign language films almost all my life, I hope that in the future Americans will get over their aversion to sub titles. At the very least, I hope sometime soon that there is a cable channel available in the US that only shows foreign language films. (When you consider how many versions of ESPN there are, you'd think there'd be a chance!). </p>Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-7339954425450997272023-03-19T17:22:00.000-07:002024-03-16T15:12:39.079-07:00EVERYTHING EVERYWHERE ALL AT ONCE (2022)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1mGMvMbfGdMK2T4aU1QEBzau4OeJ4Ov80s32xm9-A-IwPWBOVXpnb8sbcoyUaufMymtyx34_-c5XDXY02eW1TG_fWMwNx5ofQ4MPMEN8_EJ6DRixP9ntJ9U_dw6JbM-rr3UPlZfc0OmaWCBWy7rZ5pxwCxieeq8gOW57hw1y7-BPETmEpIGlGXdlR/s370/Everything_Everywhere_All_at_Once.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="370" data-original-width="250" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1mGMvMbfGdMK2T4aU1QEBzau4OeJ4Ov80s32xm9-A-IwPWBOVXpnb8sbcoyUaufMymtyx34_-c5XDXY02eW1TG_fWMwNx5ofQ4MPMEN8_EJ6DRixP9ntJ9U_dw6JbM-rr3UPlZfc0OmaWCBWy7rZ5pxwCxieeq8gOW57hw1y7-BPETmEpIGlGXdlR/w432-h640/Everything_Everywhere_All_at_Once.jpeg" width="432" /></a></div><br /><p>EVERYTHING EVERYWHERE AT ONCE (DIR AND SCR: DANIEL KWAN AND DANIEL SCHEINERT)</p><p> Co writers and directors Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (known as the Daniels) first started wanting to make a movie about the possibilities of a multiverse in 2010. In the next few years movies like 2018's SPIDER-MAN: INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE came out, beating them to the punch premise wise. Fortunately, they kept at it, directing their first film together (2016's SWISS ARMY MAN) before finally getting the chance to make EVERYTHING EVERYWHERE ALL AT ONCE in late 2020. And I'm sure glad they did, because they wound up making a multiverse movie that blows away every other attempt at the concept; it's a near perfect blend of martial arts, family drama, comedy and trippy surrealism. I can't think of any other film quite like it, and I love almost every minute of it. Obviously I wasn't alone, because the film won a whopping 7 Oscars, with star Michelle Yeoh becoming the first Asian woman to win a Best Actress award. </p><p>Considering the film's length and how many special effects shot were there, the fact that the film was shot in only around a month and had a budget of 27 million dollars is impressive. Its release last March saw it winning almost universal acclaim, and it was also a box office hit, making well over a hundred million dollars worldwide.</p><p> Yeoh stars as Evelyn, a middle aged Chinese mother who runs a laundromat with her good natured husband Waymond (Ke Huy Quan). At the film's start, she's in trouble: the laundromat is being audited by the intimidating IRS agent Deirdre (Jamie Lee Curtis), her teenage daughter Joy (Stephanie Hsu) is often at odds with her, and she's worried about telling her overbearing father Gong (James Hong) about Joy's lesbianism. On the way to the IRS office, Waymond suddenly starts acting differently, and he explains to her that he is now actually a different version of Waymond from an alternate universe. And he needs her help in stopping the multiverse hopping Tobu Tapaki (who looks like Joy) from causing permanent destruction to the multiverse.</p><p>My plot description of this film doesn't even begin to scratch the surface of what's going on here, and how multiple viewings of this film are really necessary to catch everything. (I must admit, I was bit overwhelmed by first viewing of the film, and my reaction was muted, but with each subsequent viewing I've grown more and more fond of it). The important thing is that, even when the audience is off balance, the Daniels never are; the movie slyly and swiftly moves from action to drama to comedy without ever losing a beat. I love all the different looks for the different universes (one looks like a classic martial arts film, another is like the dreamy, gorgeous style of director Wong Kar Wai), and how, despite all the craziness, the story always sticks with Evelyn and her problems, from the mundane (getting her taxes in order) to the action oriented (fighting off a roomful of baddies with a policeman's shield) to the surreal (living in a universe where all humans have hotdogs for fingers, or another in which she's merely a rock). Also, the action scenes are wonderfully choreographed and feature some amusing weaponry (Waymond wields a mean fanny pack!). </p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTjWEJUVNxjeH60aS0guqvy0SYNTnS_6u2wibvSPY6dHHskOJaMvfqtSNsG7BOjhjSJwfSIrfT-O1N5FI1orSgpNlSO8cxc8CetaPtubvdqtN7CXsbxmR-hUcj75mYoUZlfvfcmwTXRpEDywfaTLSX9Wi_fOCVTkLx2s3XMlXXqH61_Rfe_wXzNNQP/s1200/everything-everywhere-all-at-once-is-total-chaos-2-2683-1649859275-29_dblbig.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="797" data-original-width="1200" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTjWEJUVNxjeH60aS0guqvy0SYNTnS_6u2wibvSPY6dHHskOJaMvfqtSNsG7BOjhjSJwfSIrfT-O1N5FI1orSgpNlSO8cxc8CetaPtubvdqtN7CXsbxmR-hUcj75mYoUZlfvfcmwTXRpEDywfaTLSX9Wi_fOCVTkLx2s3XMlXXqH61_Rfe_wXzNNQP/w640-h426/everything-everywhere-all-at-once-is-total-chaos-2-2683-1649859275-29_dblbig.jpeg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p>At its core, I personally think this is a film about a woman realizing that she's losing her daughter to depression and possible suicide, and that she has to start caring about her more and criticizing her less. (Joy needs more joy). Along with that is her dawning realization that her toughness towards her daughter stems from her own father's harshness towards her (her family were never happy with her marrying Waymond). So she must push herself to, as her husband puts it, "just be kind" to her daughter while convincing her father to do the same. The movie wonderfully expresses this in both a special effect moment (Evelyn, Waymond and Gong all pull together to stop Joy as Tobu Tapak,i from jumping into the void) and a straightforward dramatic moment (Evelyn finally admits to Gong that Joy is a lesbian). Although the movie thankfully never spells this out, it's entirely possible that almost all of it is just playing out in Evelyn's head as she daydreams at the IRS office. Really, all the multiverses could just be thoughts that Evelyn is having about the choices she's made in her life and how things could have played out differently (making this the only martial arts movie I've ever seen that could be influenced by Ingmar Bergman's 1957 film WILD STRAWBERRIES!). </p><p>Originally, Jackie Chan was intended to play the part of Waymond, but I'm glad that he bowed out; having a well known star like Chan would have made this more of a star vehicle for him, when this story really is Evelyn's. Along with Yeoh winning, Quan and Curtis also won Oscars for their supporting roles, which is no surprise since their is a real joy to all of these performances, as each actor gets to play wildly different versions of their characters. I love the way that Waymond's change from mild mannered husband to alternate universe warrior is shown by his taking off his glasses, like Clark Kent turning into Superman, or how Curtis at one point gets to play a crazed psycho smashing down a door, not unlike the killers she's run from in her many horror roles. But even with all the quick character changes, the performances are also grounded; before the multiverse madness kicks in the family chemistry and dynamics between Evelyn, Waymond and Joy feel real and relatable, giving the audience something to hang on to when all the multiverse hopping starts. Really, if I have any objection to this film winning three awards for acting, it's that I would have given the Best Supporting Actress award to Hsu instead of Curtis. Oh sure, Curtis is great in the movie, but I think Hsu is even better, showing a wider range of emotions in her character. But that's no big deal.</p><p><b style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13.2px;">SO DID THE ACADEMY GET IT RIGHT?</b></p><p>This is one time that I completely agree with the Academy's choice, really, I can't think of any other movie this year that even comes close. It's probably the best film in years.</p>Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-81951247732363536942023-02-12T17:00:00.001-08:002023-03-19T14:51:26.806-07:00IS "80 FOR BRADY" PROPAGANDA?<p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIWFK-TVwdRFxZwq2Ao0Bg0IQW65xniBfH4n7dUwCTye4xJqzY6KWH0xBEiGanoDUujBYfQIxrziP94fociCMJVpYEOQ0d7_PKuDB6y9E9av2XfFiPZB8QxubICKJFfliVd2ImLMQ5-jLWWzrhdNVpiMs1W-7Hg8MBJnch_qg6NIoBCYtlLOA1OfVl/s1120/_would_encourage_child_to_play_sport_other_than_football_2014_2018_chartbuilder.webp" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="637" data-original-width="1120" height="364" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIWFK-TVwdRFxZwq2Ao0Bg0IQW65xniBfH4n7dUwCTye4xJqzY6KWH0xBEiGanoDUujBYfQIxrziP94fociCMJVpYEOQ0d7_PKuDB6y9E9av2XfFiPZB8QxubICKJFfliVd2ImLMQ5-jLWWzrhdNVpiMs1W-7Hg8MBJnch_qg6NIoBCYtlLOA1OfVl/w640-h364/_would_encourage_child_to_play_sport_other_than_football_2014_2018_chartbuilder.webp" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p> The recent release of the comedy film "80 for Brady" marks an interesting breaking of precedent: while there have been many movies about football going back decades, this film marks the first time that one was made that is aimed squarely at the female viewing audience. As anyone who has seen the preview for the film knows, it stars four venerable female actors (Jane Fonda, Lily Tomlin, Sally Field and Rita Moreno) and is more about the characters whacky antics as they try to get into the Super Bowl LI than football itself. Much has been made about how the film is loosely based on a real life group of elderly female football fans, and one of the film's producers is Tom Brady himself, who I'm sure is just fine with a movie being made about fans cheering for his greatness as quarterback. </p><p>The film appears to already be a moderate hit, opening at number two at the box office, but I think the NFL had a little more on their mind than box office returns when they went ahead with this film. Even someone who isn't a fan of football like me can't help but notice that the sport seems to be reaching out to female fans more and more in the past few years. In 2015, for the first time ever, a woman was hired as an assistant NFL coach, with more on the way. Women are also being hired as football TV announcers and referees. Even the fact that the planes that soar over the stadium this year will all be piloted by women for the first time ever has been widely reported on. Part of this is just due to more women breaking ground in general in the world, which is obviously a good thing.</p><p>But I think there's something else going on here: football in America is in an odd position. While the game is obviously very popular, its future maybe in doubt. While scandals like steroid use and players getting away with terrible behavior rocked the league in the past without really hurting the game, the discovery in 2004 that multiple concussions from on the field play could lead to severe mental problems, (known as Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy) for the players, hurt the game like no other scandal before it. The fallout from that discovery, lead to a congressional investigation in 2009 in which the NFL was openly accused of knowing the potential damage of CTE on its players and covering it up. Eventually the league paid out a settlement of almost a billion dollars to retired players suffering from CTE. And while some attempts have been made to tamp down the brutal nature of the game, pile ons and tackles are such a big part of it that it seems really impossible to make it safe for players.</p><p>Recent polls show that the league has something to worry about: a 2018 Gallup poll found that while football remained the country's favorite sport, its numbers were slipping (from 43% saying it was their favorite in 2006 and 2007 to 37% in 2017). Furthermore, according to the website FiveThirtyEight, between 2016 and 2017 there was a decline of 12% in children playing in youth football leagues, and an NBC poll showed an increase in parents trying to discourage their sons from playing football between 2014 and 2018. And the important number in that poll is that women are more likely to discourage their sons than men are. </p><p>Putting it simply, the NFL's future resides on convincing the mothers of America that football is a safe game for their sons to play. So the league has been doing damage control by reaching out to female fans (and trying to create more), with moves like hiring female referees and coaches, and green lighting a movie for women about the joys of football fandom like "80 For Brady". Whether this strategy will work in the long term remains to be seen, (the NFL certainly has deep pockets to spend on improving its image). Personally, I'm with author Malcolm Gladwell when he asserts that football is a "moral abomination", but every Super Bowl Sunday, with all the media buildup it gets, people like me feel like we're, well, whispering in a wind tunnel.</p>Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-78863985403465515012022-12-06T21:02:00.007-08:002022-12-09T12:22:05.738-08:00WHAT DID I JUST SEE?!<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjB_l_KqcIZNuUr27NMoWT1rYGMJnOxyuk1UTz77ZrHOVBQLygD6VKNQL4mqD-a_20u8A4uUAQ8obkTYnEH9HJ9G1UpGmVVaWt6Ls92a6aMKPtd4_HGTxMX6GAyrBnqVcW9vnXERWEQAYDkIP8UcMjz9HO3weC53w9IjXc6TYxOmA3mrEQsKrxdU035/s1024/MV5BYmMwZmUwNTgtZGNjZS00YjNlLTliMmQtZDg3MWYxYmFjODQxXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyNjMwMjk0MTQ@._V1_.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1024" data-original-width="683" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjB_l_KqcIZNuUr27NMoWT1rYGMJnOxyuk1UTz77ZrHOVBQLygD6VKNQL4mqD-a_20u8A4uUAQ8obkTYnEH9HJ9G1UpGmVVaWt6Ls92a6aMKPtd4_HGTxMX6GAyrBnqVcW9vnXERWEQAYDkIP8UcMjz9HO3weC53w9IjXc6TYxOmA3mrEQsKrxdU035/w426-h640/MV5BYmMwZmUwNTgtZGNjZS00YjNlLTliMmQtZDg3MWYxYmFjODQxXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyNjMwMjk0MTQ@._V1_.jpg" width="426" /></a></div><br /> <p></p><p>The British Film Institute poll a group of 1,639 cineastes every decade to build a list of the 100 best films of all time. Ten years ago, it was a big deal when Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo knocked perennial favorite Citizen Kane off the top spot on the list. But that's nothing compared to what happened to the top spot on this year's poll. Oh boy, is there a big change: shooting up from #35 last decade, the number one film now is the Belgium film Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles. This marks the first time that the number one film was one that was directed by a woman.</p><p>As a person who curates a blog like this and who passionately loves to watch films from all eras, I felt a little humbled to realize that I had never even heard of writer director Chantal Akerman's film. And then I found it available on HBO Max. I set aside three and a half hours of time and watched it alone with intense interest. And my reaction? Well, let me first say that I like to think that I'm open to experimental films, and movies that play with conventional filmmaking styles. I generally like directors like Jean Luc Goddard and Luis Bunuel. In other words, I expected something unusual and tried to open myself to the experience.</p><p>But this movie to me was almost completely unwatchable. First, let's talk about the style, or really, its almost complete lack of any. All of the shots in this film are at medium length without camera movement. The takes are mostly very long with simple editing. There's no soundtrack, and not much dialogue to speak of, and the sets are just normal, uninteresting looking locations. Even the color of the film looks drab and lifeless, and there are some technical flaws, like a when a boom mike momentarily dips into a shot. All of this might be alright if the story and acting were redeemable, but they aren't. In fact, there hardly is a story.</p><p>Oh sure, one does slowly emerge, in dribs and drabs. Delphine Seyrig plays the titular character, a middle aged widow who lives with her son in a small apartment. She sometimes turns tricks to get by. Honestly, that description probably sounds a lot more interesting than what's on screen. Most of this film consists of Jeanne working around her house in real time. So we have an entire scene of a woman doing the dishes in a single take with her back to the camera. Realize, there is no other sound on the soundtrack, no dialogue, no music, just the sound of her doing the dishes. This goes on for five minutes. In another scene we see her shine a pair of shoes in much the same way. Again, this goes on for some very long minutes. And what could be even more boring than that? Later in the film she does both things again in the exact same way! We also see her prepare two different meals, also in real time.</p><p>Things get even crazier in a later scene in the film in which Jeanne just sits completely still and silent in a chair. Save for some traffic noises in the background, there is nothing in this scene to let us know that we're actually watching a film instead of staring at a photo. Director Ackerman really seems to be daring the audience to keep watching, giving them nothing to hang on to. It's the cinematic equivalent of wallpaper. It beats Andy Warhol's Empire for movement, but only slightly. The next scene seems to push Ackerman's dare to the audience even further when Jeanne picks up a neighbor's baby, which cries incessantly for a long period of time, again challenging the audience to remain seated and keep watching.</p><p>So what was Ackerman up to here? Was she trying to make a point about the mundane nature of the average woman's life at that time? By showcasing the small housekeeping tasks that Jeanne must engage in, is it glorifying her work, or shoving its difficulties in our faces so that we appreciate women like her more? This has been called a feminist film, and I suppose it is (it even had an all female crew), but points about the hardships of "women's work" can be made without boring the audience. (I suppose the film's defenders would say that the boredom is the point, allowing the audience to experience the same challenges that Jeanne does). And even if the point of the film is the difficult and repetitive nature of Jeanne's life, how does that explain the scene I mentioned before in which she sits motionless in a chair for a long period of time. That she's finally resting, and the audience is supposed to rest with her? I suppose, but that point could be made in far less time.</p><p>I should mention that there is some dialogue, and that the relationship between Jeanne and her son Sylvain (Jan Decorte) has some interesting moments, although even that is hurt by the fact that Sylvain talks and acts like a teenage boy but is played by the then 25 year old Decorte. I haven't even mentioned much about Jeanne's life as a prostitute, but that's because, through out most of the film, it's incidental. Most of the time we see her greet her client (with just a few words) walk him to her bedroom, and then cut to her later showing him out. We never know how she feels about her clients, or how she wound up as a a prostitute in the first place. (Does her son know?). The film's ending (spoiler) finally shows her engaging in lifeless sex with one of her clients. Afterwards she silently picks up a pair of scissors and stabs him in the throat. The shock of the violence is jolting in a film that has been so lifeless up to this moment. But there's no build up to her action, we see no real anger or rage in what she does. Why does she stab this client? Because she's so sick of her life that she wants to take it out on someone? Or did he do something particularly horrible that we didn't see? Afterwards she sits in a chair, her hand covered in blood, unmoving for what seems like an eternity. Her face is a blank mask, although she eventually drops her head, but even that gesture seems mild given what she's done. Is she remorseful? Excited? Happy that she has forced a change into her life in the most dramatic way possible? We never really know.</p><p>Now that I have spent several paragraphs breaking down this film, I suppose that means that it is worthy of discussion, and I would encourage people to see it for themselves (although I imagine very few people will actually finish it!). But I must strongly say that I think that the emperor has no clothes and that the BFI's choice of this as the best film ever seems like an absurd joke on the viewing public. Oh sure, I understand that there is a big difference between critical tastes and popular ones, but I can't see how anyone could find this static film superior to Citizen Kane or Vertigo. Or nearly every other film on the list for that matter.</p>Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-23977940721365949042022-04-04T06:07:00.001-07:002022-04-04T06:07:51.102-07:00CODA (2021)<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgj6wqw_bePv5B-WGF_YueMtMftX2jRL2lR78eMHj5h3QCfevnnEbyXjdr-9ZKqAwpv76t0lOk5RGSvdOAQ1QZ6EY5o0JY1pq8bh8EHDLJJMsL12Gx5s7gWvzyEZyKrVVeBPUN5dzxMEcu1DmwuDHNxTpudgF-qeGuFHs8lYSqMI9JDQyI5qSaycBIN/s900/BzVjmm8l23rPsijLiNLUzuQtyd.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="600" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgj6wqw_bePv5B-WGF_YueMtMftX2jRL2lR78eMHj5h3QCfevnnEbyXjdr-9ZKqAwpv76t0lOk5RGSvdOAQ1QZ6EY5o0JY1pq8bh8EHDLJJMsL12Gx5s7gWvzyEZyKrVVeBPUN5dzxMEcu1DmwuDHNxTpudgF-qeGuFHs8lYSqMI9JDQyI5qSaycBIN/w426-h640/BzVjmm8l23rPsijLiNLUzuQtyd.jpeg" width="426" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><p></p><p>CODA (DIR: SIAN HEDER) (SCR: HEDER, BASED ON LA FAMILLE BELIER, WRITTEN BY VICTORIA BEDOS, STANILAS CARRE DE MALBERG AND ERIC LARTIGAU)</p><p>While the most recent Oscar broadcast will go down in history as "that time when Will Smith slapped Chris Rock", there were a number of other interesting things that happened. Ariana Debose became the first openly gay woman of color to win an award (Best Supporting Actress for WESTSIDE STORY), Troy Kotsur became the first deaf man to win an award (Best Supporting Actor for CODA), and, perhaps most interestingly for the future not only of the Oscars but for movies in general, CODA became the first Best Picture winner ever to play on a streaming site (Apple+) before opening in only a few theaters. Will streaming services soon be the only way to view certain Oscar winning films? Obviously the theater owners of America aren't too thrilled about that prospect, but with moviegoers heading back into theaters more and more as the pandemic seems to wind down, it has been mostly the big blockbusters that have drawn a crowd. It's clear that a low budget film like CODA is going to be seen on small screens by most people, as foreign and independent films go the streaming route. Personally, I think that that is a shame, given that I prefer those kinds of movies and enjoy seeing them on the big screen. Really, the pandemic just seemed to accelerate a growing trend of audiences only going to see big spectacle movies in the theaters and staying home for everything else.</p><p>In any event, CODA was a bit a of surprise winner, given that it was nominated for only 3 awards (Best Picture, Supporting Actor and Adapted Screenplay), while Jane Campion's Western THE POWER OF THE DOG was up for a whopping 12. Add to that the fact that CODA is the rare Best Picture winner to not even get a Best Director nomination, and its victory seemed unlikely. But then Campion's more complicated film is a tougher sell than CODA, which tells a simple, moving story with likable characters. So maybe a sweet film like CODA winning in a world coming out of a pandemic and looking for something uplifting isn't all that surprising after all. In any event, CODA is such a good natured film, so openly trying to coax tears from its audience, that I found it hard to resist, even if I also think it was far from perfect. </p><p>It tales the story of teenager Ruby (Emilia Jones) who lives with her father Frank (Kotsur), mother Jackie (Marlee Matlin) and older brother Leo (Daniel Durant). Ruby is the only member of her family that isn't deaf. They make a living fishing, with each family member helping out. When Ruby joins the choir at school, her teacher, Bernardo (Eugenio Derbez) thinks she has potential and personally trains her while encouraging her to try out for a scholarship to a musical academy. But her parents want her to stay with them and continue to help out with their struggling business.</p><p><br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4EFlZkzyXQBCce9FgWED8GPefTVbILN-C8AVUO4Wi3ZBM-vg725p3Eqytu1sbDhiiNTbCn4e-cnvlQBsYRz-6YrW619kWmImeXq3PZpuKMaTCbO_uwG7ajO0M--klCwN1BEXnUONbip9gyvdKfa3sdcA3wGNjKZbFpcFW-v3zI4Wk4Yr07QOubJwW/s1000/Coda-Movie.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="562" data-original-width="1000" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4EFlZkzyXQBCce9FgWED8GPefTVbILN-C8AVUO4Wi3ZBM-vg725p3Eqytu1sbDhiiNTbCn4e-cnvlQBsYRz-6YrW619kWmImeXq3PZpuKMaTCbO_uwG7ajO0M--klCwN1BEXnUONbip9gyvdKfa3sdcA3wGNjKZbFpcFW-v3zI4Wk4Yr07QOubJwW/w400-h225/Coda-Movie.jpeg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><i>Emilia Jones</i></b></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><p><br /></p><p>CODA began as a French film (LA FAMILLE BELIER) released in 2014. While the film was a hit in France, it sparked some controversy because deaf characters were sometimes portrayed by actors who weren't actually deaf. When Sian Heder was brought it to adapt and direct an American version of the film, she made sure not to make the same mistake. It didn't hurt that the first person she cast for the film was Marlee Matlin, the deaf actress who herself had won an Oscar back in 1986, and who is probably the most famous deaf actor in Hollywood. And for the crucial lead role of Ruby, Heder cast English born actress Jones, who spent months learning both sign language and how to fish. The film was shot on location in Gloucester, Massachusetts. After it was debuted at the Sundance Film Festival in Utah, it was purchased by Apple for a festival record 25 million dollars.</p><p>In a way it's not surprising to me that Heder was not nominated for Best Director, given that, apart from some lovely shots of fishing boats, the direction here is far from striking. Really, one get the impression that she knew that this film was fated to be seen mostly on smaller screens, so visuals are not a high priority here. Still, the film does have a nice sense of place, with what seems to be a realistic depiction of the highs and lows of living life as a fishing boat worker. Heder's script (for which she won a Best Adapted Screenplay award) tells the story well, but is often predictable; yes, there's a scene in which Ruby's brother is called a "freak" for being deaf, yes, the family eventually supports her singing dreams, and yes, it even ends with a group family hug. All quite formulaic. It also never explains just how the family overcomes their financial difficulties. </p><p>So, to the extent that the film works, it works on the strength of its performances: Jones is very good here, capably carrying the film and playing a teen girl who's likable without being perfect (she does yell "I hate you!" at her parents at one point). Plus she has a nice chemistry with Ferdia Walsh-Peelo as her boyfriend Miles. And most of the rest of the cast is also very good, with Kotsur's earthy but soulful performance as Ruby's dad being a standout (he pretty much won his Best Supporting Actor award for his enthusiastic signing about birth control in one scene.) The one performance I didn't care for is Derbez as Ruby's music instructor; perhaps because the inspiring teacher character is such a cliche, Derbez's performance and the script seem to play up his more eccentric behavior, making him too over the top for my taste. </p><p><b style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;">SO DID THE ACADEMY GET IT RIGHT?</b></p><p>I think that it's clear that I admire this film but don't actually love it. I think Stephen Spielberg's lovely new version of WEST SIDE STORY is a better film. I also preferred NIGHTMARE ALLEY, LICORICE PIZZA and the underrated TICK, TICK, BOOM...Still, CODA isn't a bad choice. </p>Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-91860566912337625182022-02-08T20:16:00.000-08:002022-02-08T20:16:24.927-08:00THE 2021 OSCAR NOMINATIONS: FIRST IMPRESSIONS<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEji2D5ntmsp58dttJP1un3sAV4rHLay0Gah5D6AKARckrO00JpfbEZj-OvQcfP0UkFAslpLK1Lvr5t7rNR5PfLc65NSo84M8qwHVXKru8IBrAVH3E2LbJ6H5WKY59ZZ5iHseRiiLvNevKDqcngva_nP4J37P7A0fLYLMVdNPOe1k8XZMaRqOjK3EjlK" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEji2D5ntmsp58dttJP1un3sAV4rHLay0Gah5D6AKARckrO00JpfbEZj-OvQcfP0UkFAslpLK1Lvr5t7rNR5PfLc65NSo84M8qwHVXKru8IBrAVH3E2LbJ6H5WKY59ZZ5iHseRiiLvNevKDqcngva_nP4J37P7A0fLYLMVdNPOe1k8XZMaRqOjK3EjlK=w640-h360" width="640" /></a></div><br /><br /><p></p><p> Given that the state of movies playing in theaters seems to be precarious these days (although the latest Spiderman movie is packing them in), the announcement of the Oscar nominations this morning was a less lighthearted affair than it usually is. Still, even during a pandemic, the Oscar nominations are always big news to film fans like me. Right away, it was interesting to see the Academy have ten nominations for Best Picture (last year there were only 8). Perhaps the Academy is trying to drum up interest in theater going by spreading the love? Hard to say.</p><p>In any event, there were some surprises: to me the biggest was the complete shut out of Wes Anderson's terrific THE FRENCH DISPATCH (poor Anderson has been nominated 7 times without winning!). I was also disappointed that Lynn Manuel Miranda's first rate musical TICK,TICK...BOOM was not given a Best Picture nomination (although Andrew Garfield's performance in the film is up for Best Actor ). Speaking of Best Picture, I was really surprised to see Adam McKay's DON'T LOOK UP up for that award, considering that the film's critical reception was mostly lukewarm (it got three other nominations too). Still, it was very popular on Netflix, and it's certainly a timely satire (and the all star cast doesn't hurt either).</p><p>With twelve nominations, the most of any film, Jane Campion's western THE POWER OF THE DOG seems to be the front runner for Best Picture. While I personally didn't love the film, its Oscar success makes for a nice comeback for Campion, who, after her 1993 film THE PIANO was a surprise hit that won 3 Oscars, hasn't had much of an impact in this country since. Another favorite contender for the top award is Kenneth Branagh's bittersweet, autobiographical film BELFAST, which tells the kind of simple, uplifting story about tolerance that the Academy often embraces. And then there's Steven Spielberg's new version of WEST SIDE STORY, which may have an outside chance because the Academy often favors musicals. It also wouldn't hurt to help the well reviewed film out, considering that it's box office has been underwhelming. Perhaps the Academy will want to help give a boost to the popular Spielberg. And it would be the first time that a remake of a film that won Best Picture also wins Best Picture, which would be an interesting turn of events. (And I for one thought that it was a great movie).</p><p>This year will see the return of a large crowd for the show at the Dolby Theater in Hollywood, a nice change after last year's subdued, scaled down show. Whether or not this return to normalcy will result in better ratings for the show (which have been slumping for years) remains to be seen. Either way, I'll be watching, partly just to get the sense that the world is finally returning to normal. </p>Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-70175349837193784322021-06-04T13:51:00.003-07:002023-03-19T18:48:07.640-07:00A QUIET PLACE PART II, AND THE PROBLEM WITH ALIEN INVASIONS<p><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">Deus ex machina:</span></b></p><p> <i><span style="font-size: large;">Latin, English: "god out of the machine". A plot device whereby a seemingly unsolvable problem in a story is suddenly and abruptly resolved by an unexpected and unlikely occurrence.</span></i></p><p> (There are spoilers for A Quiet Place II and other movies in this post).</p><p><br /></p><p>It's hard to know exactly when stories about alien invaders attacking earth began; clearly there are ancient carvings and painting showing humans being attacked from above by some sort of creatures, but whether they count as aliens or just mythical beings muddies the waters a bit. The first real proper alien invasion story is generally considered to be HG Wells's classic eighteen ninety eight novel, THE WAR OF THE WORLDS. All of the usual elements are there: ghastly martians in spaceships, laser beams, terrified humans and so on. The impact of the novel over the years has been huge, with two movie versions (one in nineteen fifty three, the other in two thousand and five) and innumerable rip offs, homages and parodies (not to mention one very famous radio broadcast from a young Orson Welles).</p><p>While Well's novel may have been written before the twentieth century, it really wasn't until the nineteen fifties that Hollywood starting turning out alien invasion movies. Oh sure, Flash Gordon serials that featured the titular hero battling the alien Ming the Merciless started out in nineteen thirty six, but it really took a cold war to get America to start fearing an invasion. Yes, just as Godzilla was symbolizing the dangers of nuclear radiation in Japan, alien invaders were standing in for the Russians in the US. Starting with the nineteen fifty one classic Howard Hawks film THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD, each year saw Hollywood churning out films that played on our fears of Russian invasion, with titles like EARTH VS. THE FLYING SAUCERS and INVASION OF THE SAUCER-MEN. Others, like INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS and I MARRIED A CREATURE FROM OUTER SPACE showed a fear of not only Russian infiltration, but also the turning of good Americans into godless commies. And even with the cold war cooling, Hollywood kept making alien invasion movies, from Steven Spielberg's version of THE WAR OF THE WORLDS to the just released A QUIET PLACE PART II.</p><p><br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqlkim14oCFMGXyzhAWTwPdluK3UKlqSo7iRUMIGjs9uzMQQnHPqvtJmJdN78x8UWpvVvam2JoKwBzqjzNj52AZJ9n-tjVP4oC4tmcXiEl6tqGVwhi4f0BKbgmx993Pn1J05kBDpPG_lQ/s2048/MV5BNDcyNTBlMGUtYjliOC00NDZjLWIyNTEtNWI5MDVlNDllMDljXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyNTAyNDQ2NjI%2540._V1_.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1512" data-original-width="2048" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqlkim14oCFMGXyzhAWTwPdluK3UKlqSo7iRUMIGjs9uzMQQnHPqvtJmJdN78x8UWpvVvam2JoKwBzqjzNj52AZJ9n-tjVP4oC4tmcXiEl6tqGVwhi4f0BKbgmx993Pn1J05kBDpPG_lQ/w512-h300/MV5BNDcyNTBlMGUtYjliOC00NDZjLWIyNTEtNWI5MDVlNDllMDljXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyNTAyNDQ2NjI%2540._V1_.jpg" width="512" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><i>The titular creatures from 1957's INVASION OF THE SAUCER-MEN</i></b></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><p><br /></p><p>While I have enjoyed a number of these movies over the years, there is a central flaw in almost all of them that bugs me: the part where the aliens lose. Most of the movies follow the same formula: a nice, peaceful day is shattered when aliens arrive and start blasting (or in some cases, munching) people. The human casualties are terrible, but, just when things look their blackest, one of the humans (usually a scientist) discovers the alien's Achilles heel. Their weakness exposed, the aliens are defeated and the surviving humans all cheer. I get that most of these movies play out this way because ending the movie with the aliens winning would be a big bummer, but that doesn't make it any less ridiculous*. Time and time again in these movies we are supposed to believe that an alien race that is far more advanced than ours could lose to the humans by not foreseeing an obvious flaw in their plan. Wells himself fell prey to this absurd notion by ending his novel with the almost triumphant aliens all dying from exposure to human germs. And since then aliens have been brought down by things like flashing headlights (INVASION OF THE SAUCER-MEN), a computer virus (INDEPENDENCE DAY) and, in one example of a movie embracing its absurdity, a Slim Whitman song (MARS ATTACKS!). </p><p>Now I understand that I'm not getting into the spirit of these movies, and again, I have enjoyed some of them, but it's still a stumbling block for me; I can only suspend my disbelief so far. Which brings us to John Krasinski's twenty eighteen film THE QUIET PLACE (which he also wrote and starred in). Which brought together elements from Ridley Scott's ALIEN (gooey monsters), Corman McCarthy's novel THE ROAD (post apocalyptic scrounging) and the English alien invasion movie, ATTACK THE BLOCK (toothy flesh eating aliens float down to earth), Krasinski's film added the clever premise of aliens that hunt entirely by sound, making even the simplest dropped item or misplaced foot a source of fear. THE QUIET PLACE worked effectively for its first two thirds, with Krasinski and Emily Blunt making a likable couple that try vainly to keep their family safe in a very dangerous world. But once again, I think the movie fails when Krasinski's teenage daughter, Regan (Millicent Simmonds) discovers that the normally indestructible aliens are made vulnerable by high frequency sounds. It seems more than a bit absurd that all the great scientists and researchers in the world were unable to find out what one kid armed with a walkman and a hearing aid does! This gets even more ludicrous the more you think about it: creatures with super good hearing might be weakened by loud sounds? You don't say. At one point we see newspaper headlines that write about the creatures, which means that the invasion didn't happen all at once; so there was enough time for people to report on the aliens, but not enough to discover what would seem to be their most obvious weak spot.</p><p>Still, despite my cynicism, I did enjoy THE QUIET PLACE overall, and I actually think that the recently released sequel is even better. To me the film works well because there is no time wasted on exposition or character introduction, meaning that it can get right down to the suspenseful scenes of people trying to avoid the aliens. And I think Krasinski has improved as a director, as in one sequence he effectively cross cuts between different characters in dangerous situations (due credit must also be given to editor Michael P. Shawver) to build to a very exciting climax. And as for the alien's weakness, well, even if it still bothers me, it doesn't kill my enjoyment of the film. This time I could suspend my disbelief.</p><p><br /></p><p>*Of course, not all alien invasion movies end this way, as fans of Philip Kaufman's very good nineteen seventy eight remake of INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS can attest to. </p>Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-71899100091033580782021-05-02T16:47:00.000-07:002024-03-16T15:02:19.235-07:00NOMADLAND (2020)<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9UN2ctPCWirEQexp4z6cNCCKFm0kEakSLVFGDZhYiNn_Ocu-DicXaTSfHO9DPlxtHGM8A4UFyGk3_UY2ATXYLJTGH2hJ4xAxppypzhhXs13_rrR5IXAg26XgDaB7wn4Rtgmnnxu-E398/s2048/MMV25078142F3EE931C7643E14A80BDB7FFF.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1365" height="551" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9UN2ctPCWirEQexp4z6cNCCKFm0kEakSLVFGDZhYiNn_Ocu-DicXaTSfHO9DPlxtHGM8A4UFyGk3_UY2ATXYLJTGH2hJ4xAxppypzhhXs13_rrR5IXAg26XgDaB7wn4Rtgmnnxu-E398/w636-h551/MMV25078142F3EE931C7643E14A80BDB7FFF.jpeg" width="636" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div>NOMADLAND (DIR: CHLOE ZHOU) (SCR: ZHOU, BASED ON THE NONFICTION BOOK NOMADLAND: SURVIVING AMERICA IN THE TWENTY FIRST CENTURY)<p></p><p><br /></p><p>To me, NOMADLAND was a surprising choice for a Best Picture winner; it's unassuming and soft spoken, its plot is loose, there are no big emotional scenes, it has many moments of stillness, and at times seems downright meditative. Add to that a main character who is a woman over sixty and you have a film that doesn't seem like the usual Oscar glory material. It's possible that the recent movement to diversify the Oscar voters may have led to more openness to low key independent movies than splashy, big budgeted Hollywood affairs, like Aaron Sorkin's THE TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO 7 (which I thought was going to win). Or maybe the Academy just wanted to embrace a road movie during the pandemic lockdown. Either way, I personally don't think that NOMADLAND was the best film of the year, but I do enjoy its lovely images and independent heroine.</p><p> It tells the story of Fern (Frances McDormand), a sixtyish recent widow who used to work at a now closed factory in Nevada . At the start of the movie she has decided to sell most of her belongings and live in her van, traveling from place to place to find work. In her travels she meets other people living the same lifestyle, who teach her some of the ways of life on the road. After her van breaks down, she doesn't have enough money for repairs, so she goes to visit her sister by bus. Her sister offers to let her live with her family, but she refuses, borrowing money for her repairs instead. On the road, she also meets Dave (David Strathairn) a fellow traveler who moves in with his children after becoming a grandfather. He asks her to stay with him, but she says no and hits the road once again. </p><p>Before it was a movie, it was a non-fiction book called Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century written by Jessica Bruder and published in twenty seventeen. The rights to the book were optioned by McDormand herself, and after seeing director Chloe Zhou's twenty seventeen film THE RIDER (another movie about an independent loner), asked her to write and direct it. For the shooting of the film Zhou and McDormand lived in vans like the characters for four months, and often used real people playing themselves instead of actors. Shot on a budget of around five million dollars, the film would eventually make six million in worldwide grosses (obviously the pandemic has affected its box office take).</p><p><br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="168" data-original-width="299" height="197" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqNb_GEnn7HN9VP9jgJHIZaiSWxlN_Uxdk55AkvWUFQrFBopEyjajZ57DY7c8YoOHRcDRrqb3sF95TZHcwp7Qwwm-OnxGpCHf7n0gBCKKZGa9Lo0GcNvBr_4NRqkAHV7Be0_HQxFL2Gv0/w426-h197/download+-+2021-05-02T163158.145.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="426" /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Frances McDormand</b></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqNb_GEnn7HN9VP9jgJHIZaiSWxlN_Uxdk55AkvWUFQrFBopEyjajZ57DY7c8YoOHRcDRrqb3sF95TZHcwp7Qwwm-OnxGpCHf7n0gBCKKZGa9Lo0GcNvBr_4NRqkAHV7Be0_HQxFL2Gv0/s299/download+-+2021-05-02T163158.145.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><b></b></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p>To me the most striking thing about NOMADLAND is just how real it feels. There is no attempt to sugarcoat Fern's life; she is poor and lives out of a small van, she has few possessions, and yes, she has to use a bucket as a toilet. And yet there is a beauty to her way of life, (like how she proudly shows another traveler how she has found ways to utilize the limited space of her van), and there's a dignity in her willingness to do the hard work that she needs to do to survive. I love the way that Zhou's camera moves smoothly through the gorgeous natural landscapes that Fern travels through, and the quiet way it shows Fern appreciating those landscapes while lying naked in a river or hugging a huge tree. The fact that Fern is alone in these scenes is telling; Zhou's script gives Fern no big speech about her desire to be independent because we can see it in the still moments like these. Here is a woman who misses her husband but now treasures her independence and time alone. But even more striking than the natural landscapes are the scenes towards the end of the film when Fern visits the now shuttered factory that she and her late husband used to work in. There's a striking beauty in the ruins of a once busy, now desolate building. </p><p>While Fern does make some friendships and connections, they are always at a distance. When Dave tentatively makes romantic gestures towards her, she gently turns him down. McDormand and Strathairn have a real nice chemistry; I really like the way he calmly tells her that he likes her, and the quiet way that she rebuffs him. I also enjoy the way that Dave's attempt to be helpful finds him accidentally breaking some of Fern's plates, one of the few moments of humor in the film. It's rare and refreshing to see people over sixty portrayed romantically (although they never even hold hands), but it's also no surprise to the audience that Fern doesn't move in with Dave; her independence has already been established earlier in the film when we see her turn down the chance to adopt a sweet dog (as a dog owner myself, it does bother me that she just leaves the poor pooch leashed to a bench!). The idea of a person who travels alone across the country, never wanting to settle down, is not new in movies, but such wanderers are usually male characters, and ending the film with a woman refusing to live with a man and taking to the road instead is a nice inversion of the usual cliche'.</p><p>McDormand, who is in every scene of the film, won her third Best Actress Oscar for this role, and again I find that a bit surprising given that the character is usually still and almost never raises her voice. But, to me, that's the beauty of her performance; when Fern talks about the loss of her husband, she isn't asking for pity, she's just laying out the truth of her life. When she works at tough jobs across the country, she never complains, even though her face shows the strain of her work. As I said, McDormand lived in a van for this role (and she also actually worked at some of the jobs shown on screen), and that gives her performance a sense of rightness, a feeling that this isn't just some Hollywood actress slumming. Her van feels lived in.</p><p>If the film has a flaw, it's that to me it does sometimes drags. Although I've already stated that I admire Zhou's decision to not have big emotions in the film, I do wish that there was more focus to the story. No, I don't want chase scenes or explosions, but maybe a little more about how Fern and her fellow travelers get by would have been nice. But my criticisms are mostly mild for what is a very successful film.</p><p><b style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13.2px;">SO DID THE ACADEMY GET IT RIGHT?</b></p><p><b style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><br /></b></p><p>While I think it's clear that I really enjoyed this film, I don't think that it was the best film of the year: I preferred Shaka King's JUDAS AND THE BLACK MESSIAH, Lee Isaac Chung's MINARI and, my personal favorite, Emerald Fennell's openly provocative PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN. Still, NOMADLAND is certainly not a bad choice, and it's great to see Zhao breaking ground as the second woman (and first Asian one) to win Best Director. </p>Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-13595834602416087512021-04-26T07:21:00.003-07:002021-04-26T07:48:15.676-07:00THE PANDEMIC OSCAR SHOW<br /><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtxEF9_1Oyv1Fdwd0uMsxlSpTBzwBCk76ibiHCl_6aG7bF-pDc4CArU4adh275l2dSZeyl8BRWYavKeQvDRE054C5GkF2ogHjPyMjyf8OYhOp3lLBwa_VaWzEkWp8PTcY_E0Lxb2QP_mg/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="383" data-original-width="681" height="227" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtxEF9_1Oyv1Fdwd0uMsxlSpTBzwBCk76ibiHCl_6aG7bF-pDc4CArU4adh275l2dSZeyl8BRWYavKeQvDRE054C5GkF2ogHjPyMjyf8OYhOp3lLBwa_VaWzEkWp8PTcY_E0Lxb2QP_mg/w598-h227/image.png" width="598" /></a></div><p></p><p><br /></p><p> So, how was the first (and hopefully last) pandemic Oscar ceremony like? Not bad, in my opinion. Placing the show at Union Station in downtown Los Angeles and having the attending nominees sit at tables while a DJ (Quest Love, the drummer from the hip hop group The Roots) spun appropriate tracks gave the show a loose, party vibe that was fun. And not having an official host took the pressure off one person to be constantly entertaining, which worked for me. I enjoyed the long tracking shot that accompanied the first presenter, Regina King, as she made her way into the station. And her joke about the recent Chauvin trial's outcome was well made without getting too preachy.</p><p>Most of the awards did not come as a surprise: Nomadland was favored to win Best Picture which it did, and its director (Chloé Zhao) and lead actress (Francis McDormand) were also favored and also won. The big surprise was when Anthony Hopkins won Best Actor for The Father over the late Chadwick Boseman for Ma Rainey's Black Bottom. Personally, I preferred Boseman's performance, but in The Father, Hopkins, one of the most esteemed actors in the world, showed a willingness to play a character who is sad and pathetic, breaking down in a raw and honest way at the end of the film. (And maybe the fact that many of the Oscar voters are older themselves had something to do with it). In any event, I am a big fan of Hopkins so I won't say his award was completely underserved. (At the same time I still think that Delroy Lindo was robbed by not even being nominated in this category for his great performance in Da Five Bloods).</p><p>The lack of musical numbers (the songs nominated for Best Original Song were all performed in pre broadcast special) meant that the show could indulge longer speeches from the winners, which is really a lot of what people want to see the most anyway. And there were a lot of nice moments: Zhao becoming the first Asian woman (and only the second overall) to win Best Director (for Nomadland) and her thoughtful acceptance speech was great. As was Yuh-Jung Youn, who won for Best Supporting Actress for Minari, and who joked her way through her speech in a charming manner. And Tyler Perry, getting a lifetime award, gave a moving and sincere speech; even though his movies are not my cup of tea, his graciousness was appreciated. </p><p>Oh sure, there were a few silly moments in the broadcast as well: an Oscar music trivia contest felt too much like a bar trivia night, and some speeches did go on a bit too long. To me the worst decision was to announce the Best Picture winner before Best Actor and Actress. Since the Best Picture award is the one that is remembered the most, and can add enormously to a film's box office success, building up to it seems to be the logical way to do the show. In any event, ending the show with the Best Actor award really didn't work because when Hopkins won he didn't appear and no speech was given, causing the show to peter out somewhat pathetically. Still, considering everything going on in the world, this broadcast was a fun break from the stresses of our time. Obviously I didn't agree with some of the winners (more on that when I post about Nomadland), but that's all part of the show.</p>Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-29607588419697902962021-03-15T07:01:00.000-07:002021-03-15T07:01:08.212-07:00THE 2020 NOMINEES: FIRST IMPRESSIONS<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8YgzHE3RRC4Kx59V5sTzuHFjjhY-6_0J3jYYXFMorPQRnph4cD6Pg30NW7INLMy4kiO2g8qeqaHuIJ_k89FkWGHU1KxlQjelhsDmR-vamS1G939cNbP-Yjo4dceTequzUlbuFcVBPzO0/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="700" data-original-width="1400" height="280" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8YgzHE3RRC4Kx59V5sTzuHFjjhY-6_0J3jYYXFMorPQRnph4cD6Pg30NW7INLMy4kiO2g8qeqaHuIJ_k89FkWGHU1KxlQjelhsDmR-vamS1G939cNbP-Yjo4dceTequzUlbuFcVBPzO0/w548-h280/image.png" width="548" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p>Even with all the chaos that the coronavirus has wrecked on the world, Hollywood has decided that the (Oscars) show must go on. Even with so few films playing in theaters and delays in production and whatnot, there were still enough good movies released (or streamed) to qualify.</p><p>Many of the choices were not surprising: because Hollywood loves movies about its own history, David Fincher's MANK, about the writer of CITIZEN KANE, got multiple nominations. And because the Academy is made up of older people, FATHER, a film about an elderly man dealing with dementia, also is up for many awards. It's also not surprising that Shaka King's critically acclaimed drama JUDAS AND THE BLACK MESSIAH and Aaron Sorkin's THE TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO 7, were well represented, since both were well acted period pieces about the kind of political upheaval that progressive Academy members can support. Personally, I think it's good to see nominations for low budget independent productions like NOMADLAND and MINARI, not to mention what is probably my favorite movie of the year, PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN. It's also noteworthy that Emerald Fennell being nominated for Best Director for PROMISING YOUNG WOMAN and Chloe Zhao being nominated in the same category for NOMADLAND marks the first time that two women have been nominated for Best Director in the same year. And historical precedent aside, I think they both deserved it. I imagine that both will lose to David Fincher for MANK, given that he's never won before and that it's such a good looking film.</p><p>As for disappointments, although George C. Wolfe's MA RAINEY'S BLACK BOTTOM got several acting nominations, I think it was good enough to be up for Best Picture, and I preferred it to MANK and THE SOUND OF METAL. I also think Regina King's ONE NIGHT IN MIAMI was also worthy of being up for the Best Picture award. But to me the big surprise and disappointment was the complete shut out of Spike Lee's DA 5 BLOODS. Maybe it was uneven and too long, but I much preferred it to most of the Best Picture nominees. I'm really surprised that Delroy Lindo, who's dynamic performance steals the film, is not even nominated. Perhaps because it came out to early in the year to be remembered? In any event, it's a shame. </p><p>The awards show this year will inevitably be a subdued affair, just like the Grammys and the Emmys were, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. (I'm not a big fan of all the glitzy trappings of the show itself). While it's hard to say what the favorite is, I think that MANK will probably win Best Picture because of the sheer number of nominations it received (ten in all). Despite the film's occasional historical inaccuracies, the strength of its performances, meticulous production design and stunning black and white cinematography will put it over the top. But of course, I could be wrong.</p>Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-16757757378971217702020-06-15T13:12:00.004-07:002022-12-07T18:49:17.081-08:00CANCEL GONE WITH THE WIND?<img alt="“Gone With the Wind,” starring Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O’Hara, left, and Hattie McDaniel as Mammy, has enduringly shaped popular understanding of the Civil War and Reconstruction perhaps more than any other cultural artifact." src="https://static01.nyt.com/images/2020/06/14/arts/14gone-wind4/14gone-wind4-articleLarge-v2.jpg?quality=75&auto=webp&disable=upscale" /><br />
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Recently, in the wake of the civil rights protests going on around the nation, HBO decided to remove the 1939 film of Margaret Mitchell's novel, GONE WITH THE WIND, from their downloading sight. This was understandable, given, that the film unabashedly romanticizes the days of the antebellum South, complete with happy slaves who fight for the Southern cause. A few days later, African-American film scholar Jacqueline Stewart announced that the film would return with an introduction by her that would help explain the inaccuracies of the film, and, I assume, will also explain the controversies around it. This is also understandable. GONE WITH THE WIND is, quite simply, a film that is too big, too popular (the most popular film ever when adjusted for inflation), and too influential to just pretend it was never made.<br />
It should be mentioned that it was certainly not the first film to romanticize the South. In fact, DW Griffith's THE BIRTH OF A NATION, which went even further, and which was also extremely popular, was released way back in 1915. To his credit, David O Selznik, the producer of GONE WITH THE WIND consciously tried to avoid making another BIRTH OF A NATION, as he had all the source novel's references to the Klu Klux Klan removed. Still, not making a film that sank to the level of one of the most racist movies ever made is still not all that impressive. And while both films are often defended as products of their time, it should be remembered that were also controversial and picketed at the time of their making.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="The Birth of a Nation - Wikipedia" height="640" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/61/Birth_of_a_Nation_theatrical_poster.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="414" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><b><span style="font-size: small;">Yes, Gone With the Wind could have been as bad as this</span></b></i></td></tr>
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I first saw Gone With the Wind at a special screening for my junior high school class when I was just twelve years old. My reaction to it then was actually very similar to how I still feel about it; I was dazzled by the first half of the film, with its gorgeous technicolor visuals, amazing sets and costumes and romantic, often poetic dialogue, with the fiery spectacle of the burning of Atlanta really making a deep impression on me. And then I felt that the second half of the film lapsed into romantic melodrama, with too many big emotional moments piled together towards the end. Still, I enjoyed it overall and understood why it was considered a classic.<br />
As for the film's racism, I must admit that as a white upper middle class child, it didn't really register with me. Yes, I of course knew about the evils of slavery and saw that all the black characters in the film were stereotypes, but it didn't occur how historically wrong the film was. I just accepted that its depiction of the South was accurate, and it wasn't until I read thought provoking analysis of the film years later that I changed my mind. And that is the real danger of the film. To this day, the film's view of Southern plantation life has bled into our national collective image of that time, making us think that its depiction was real. And so much of it is so alluring, with colorful fancy dress balls and beautiful, castle like mansions that it's easy to forget how those balls and mansions were paid for.<br />
And much worse than those fancy balls and beautiful buildings are the scenes that show slaves happily working in the fields or cheerfully helping out the white characters. And, perhaps worst of all, we see a contingent of slaves joining together to fight against the Union soldiers! And yes it's true that Hattie Mc Daniel made history by winning an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress, and her performance in the film is undeniably great, but just like the film itself it endorsed and influenced a stereotype that would last for decades.<br />
I think HBO is making the right move here by bringing the film back with the commentary at the beginning. This is an important and wonderfully made film that should still be viewed, but not without some context being placed on it. Personally, I always like to hear about the context of the making of any work of art that I enjoy. My interest in Fred Zinnemann's 1952 film HIGH NOON, for example, is increased by the fact that the film's story was consciously fashioned to be a metaphor for the anti-Communist witch hunts that were going on in Hollywood at that time. So people should still watch GONE WITH THE WIND, but they should also be aware about the controversy it has caused ever since it was made.Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-8894026820714757342020-02-23T09:38:00.001-08:002024-03-16T14:55:51.817-07:00PARASITE (2019)<br />
<img alt="Image result for parasite movie poster" height="640" src="https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BYWZjMjk3ZTItODQ2ZC00NTY5LWE0ZDYtZTI3MjcwN2Q5NTVkXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyODk4OTc3MTY@._V1_.jpg" width="430" /><br />
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PARASITE (DIR: BONG JOON HO) (SCR: HO AND JIN WON HAN)<br />
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The ratings may have been low for this year's Academy Award telecast, but that didn't mean that there weren't any surprises. I won't lie, when Bong Joon Ho's South Korean thriller PARASITE was announced as the Best Picture, I jumped to my feet in surprise. Even though the film had already won three Oscars (for Best Original Screenplay, Best Director and Best International Film), I just couldn't believe that the Academy had, for the first time ever, awarded a foreign film the Best Picture award. Now a cynic may point out that this could just be an example of Hollywood courting the foreign film market at a time when international box office is getting more and more important to their bottom line, and it does raise the question of why the Academy has waited so long to award a foreign film when there have been so many great foreign films made over the years. Surely, filmmakers like Akira Kurosawa, Ingmar Bergman and Federico Fellini have made movies that were the best of the year they were released. Despite all of that, I think PARASITE won simply because it was indeed, the best film of last year. It's an exciting, darkly funny and wildly violent movie with some raw social satire mixed in as well. <br />
Director Bong Joon Ho has actually been pretty well known in the American market since his entertaining monster movie THE HOST came out in 2006. Since then he has also made another excellent thriller (2009's MOTHER) and two oddball science fiction films (2013's SNOWPIERCER and 2017's OKJA). Ho first came up with the idea for PARASITE while working on SNOWPIERCER when it was originally imagined as a play. He based the story partly on his own experiences as a struggling young student tutoring for a rich family back in the '90's ("Every week I would go into their house, and I thought how fun it would be if I could get all my friends to infiltrate the house one by one." He told Atlantic magazine). The script that Ho and his co screenwriter Jin Won Han completed was also influenced by Kim Ki-young's 1960 Korean film THE HOUSEMAID and the true story of Christine and Léa Papin—two live-in maids who murdered their employers in 1930s France. Because the beautiful home that the poor family infiltrates is so crucial to the film, the entire building was created in striking looking sets in different locations. The poor family's basement dwelling was also built on sets, with production designer Lee Ha-jun visiting towns and villages in South Korea that had been abandoned and were about to be torn down to get a feel for the set design. Shot in a hundred and twenty four days mostly in the city of Seoul on a budget of around eleven million dollars, PARASITE has become a world wide hit. Along with grossing around forty three millions in the US (a very high amount for a foreign language film), it has made over two hundred million world wide.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Image result for parasite movie luck stone" height="320" src="https://static2.srcdn.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Parasite-Scholar-Stone.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="640" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><i>Kang-ho Song</i></b></td></tr>
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It's plot concerns a family of four, father Ki-taek (Kang-ho Song), wife <span face="sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-size: 14px;"> </span>Park Chung-sook(Jang Hye-jin), young adult daughter Kim Ki-jung(Park So-dam) and near college age teenage son Kim (called Kevin) Ki-woo(Choi Woo-shik) that are just barely surviving in modern day South Korea, squatting in a basement and doing odd jobs. When a teenage friend of the son offers him a job tutoring the teen daughter of a rich family, he jumps at the chance and secures the job with documents forging a fake education. Seeing that the family has an artistic young son, Da Song(Jung Hyeon-jun) he introduces his sister as his educated cousin and art therapist, and she too is soon hired. Then the family manipulates the family's chauffeur (Park Keun-rok) and maid (Lee Jung-eun), getting them fired and replacing them with the father and mother. But one night when the wealthy family is gone and the whole family is relaxing and enjoying their new social status , the maid returns and reveals that her husband <span style="background-color: white;"><span face="sans-serif" style="color: #222222;"><span style="font-size: 14px;">Oh Geun-sae (Park Myung-hoon) has</span></span></span> been hiding in a secret bomb shelter in the basement of the house to avoid paying his debts. She begs them to let him stay and give him food, but they refuse. A physical confrontation ensues, which gets even more tense with the unexpected early return of the wealthy family. The four of them manage to lock the maid and her husband in the cellar for the night and avoid being found by the family. The next day there is a birthday party for Da Song. When Keven tries to let the maid and her husband loose, he finds her dead and the husband crazed. After knocking Keven unconscious, he wildly stabs Kim during the party. In the ensuing chaos, Da Song appears to have a seizure, and his father begs Ki Taek to drive him to the hospital. In a fit of rage, Kit Taek stabs his employer and hides in the basement. Later, Kevin recovers from his injuries and discovers where his father is hiding. He dreams of buying the house and releasing his father.<br />
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First of all, this is a great movie to rewatch: the first time I saw I responded mostly to the thriller elements, as I found myself wondering if the trickster family would get away with their scam. And then, when everything seems to be going their way, the return of the family's maid set the movie going in a completely different direction. In a world of predictable movie formulas, there's nothing I love more in a film than a story that moves in unexpected (but plausible) ways, so from the moment that the maid revealed her husband's hiding place I was hooked! Ho has mentioned that Martin Scorsese is one of his directorial influences, but I found myself thinking of Alfred Hitchcock in the way that Ho builds suspense out of the simplest thing, like hiding under a table or walking down a long, narrow staircase without knowing what lies below. And the chaos of the climatic birthday scene is perfectly handled, with characters making sudden, shockingly violent choices that make sense upon reflection. While the script sometimes can be heavy handed (the symbolism of the philosopher's stone, which brings the poor family both good and back luck, is a bit obvious, especially since Kevin refers to it as a metaphor!), and the fact that we don't know for sure if little Da Song dies at the end or not seems like a flaw (it could go either way), it's mostly perfect in both story and character.<br />
On my subsequent viewings of the film, I was able to focus more on the more subtle elements of it: I love the way that director Ho and cinematographer Kyung-pyo Hong keep the camera sleekly panning in the enormous house, often to reveal people hiding or spying. Or the way that Kim's first visit to the wealthy household is shot likes he's entering paradise (for him, he is). The house itself, with it's enormous window view and sleek modern look, is a triumph of production design. Even the location of the basement door and the secret door beneath it is in the right place, becoming a constant reminder to the trickster family once they know what lies behind it. I also love the clever wit in the way that Kim rehearses her fake story to herself before meeting the family, and then correctly guesses just what to say to impress the mother while "analyzing" her son's art. <br />
All of the performances are great: I especially enjoy Kang-ho Song (who's a big star in Korea, and has worked with director Ho several times now, stretching back to 2003's MEMORIES OF MURDER) as the father Ki-taek. On my first viewing of the film, I found his act of violence at the end shocking, but upon repeat viewings I can see the anger and resentment simmering up under his usually taciturn demeanor. And the moment where he almost seems mad enough to strike his wife, and then laughs it off is chilling, because we never know just how much he's joking. As great as he is, my favorite performance in the movie is given by Jeong-eun Lee (who has also worked with director Ho before) as the ill fated maid Moon-gwang. At first, her character just seems like a prim and proper housekeeper, but then she becomes sad and pathetic as she begs the family to let her husband stay. Only moments later she becomes wrathful when she briefly has the upper hand on them, almost transforming on screen . She even gets some nice romantic flashback moments with her simple minded husband. This is a wide range of complex emotions that Lee nails perfectly, and she's only a supporting character!<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Image result for parasite movie Moon-gwang" height="400" src="https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn%3AANd9GcQDy1t7YzvViLgdNnRwTLP5ET5YeRxd-Nq72qVv3W9x4YX2--IS" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="310" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b><i>Jeong-eun Lee</i></b></td></tr>
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So, excellent suspense, dark humor, great plot twists and wonderful performances throughout are part of this film's greatness. But it also works on another level; biting class commentary. From the opulent home of the wealthy family to the pathetic, crowded basement that the poor family is squatting in, the contrast between the rich in the poor in not only South Korea but also the rest of the world is always present in the film. Importantly, we at first on the side of poor family as we see the terrible conditions they live in and menial work they have to do. But as their plan progresses it's gets harder to defend the way they set up the innocent servants to get fired, although we can enjoy their ingenuity as they manipulate the family into hiring them(squirting chili sauce on a napkin at just the right moment is a brilliant detail!). And we can't help but be on their side when they briefly enjoy their ill gotten gains by kicking their feet up and dreaming about actually owning a such a house while the rich family are all on vacation. The real breaking point comes when Moon-gwang reveals her husband, and they refuse to feed him and let him stay, even though it wouldn't be hard for them. So here we have an poor family that has moved up in the world refusing to help out someone who is in the same position they once were, a bleak look at how poor people moving into the middle class often ignore their roots. Even more interesting is the fact that the rich family are not bad people, but then they have the luxury of being able to afford kindness ("They are rich but still nice." Ki-taek tells his wife. "They are nice because they are rich." She replies). Class is shown as such a defining factor with these people that even the literal stench of poverty that hangs over Ki-taek can't be washed off, and it leads to a defining moment when a reminder of his scent causes him to lash out at his employer, killing him. Yes, wealth dispartiy is a tricky issue in this film, and even the title can be seen as having a double meaning, in which both the poor and the rich leech off of each other.<br />
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<b style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13.2px;">SO DID THE ACADEMY GET IT RIGHT?</b><br />
<b style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13.2px;"><br /></b>
<span face="Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif" style="color: #222222;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.2px;">Ok, it's pretty obvious that I love this movie and agree with the Academy's choice. I personally didn't think that 2019 was a particularly great year for American movies, with only Noah </span><span style="font-size: 13.2px;">Baumbach's well acted drama MARRIAGE STORY reaching greatness, in my opinion. In fact, I think the only other movies that could compare with PARASITE are all from other countries, like Pedro Almodovar's excellent PAIN & GLORY, or Céline Sciamma's PORTRAIT OF A LADY ON FIRE. And while both of those films are good, I don't think that they top PARASITE, which was not only a groundbreaking choice, but the right one.</span></span>Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-26331044336891049872020-01-13T07:50:00.002-08:002020-01-13T08:25:43.572-08:00THE 2019 NOMINATIONS, FIRST IMPRESSIONS<img alt="Image result for list of oscar nominations 2020" height="368" src="https://drraa3ej68s2c.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/07082647/eeaf9e7342a0d077a20f395dfcb8791e3d240e5afc2b69f74870afcac3979626-770x443.jpg" width="640" /><br />
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The nominations for the 2019 Academy Awards were announced this morning, and, as always, they were a mixed bag: the big surprise was that JOKER leads the pack with a whopping eleven nominations, despite the sometimes controversial nature of the film and its only somewhat positive reviews. For me, the most positive development is that Bong Joon Ho's excellent PARASITE is up for Best Picture, a rarity for a foreign film. It even garnered five more nominations, including Ho for best director.<br />
I was also glad to see that Antonio Banderas's great performance in Pedro Almodovar's PAIN AND GLORY is up for Best Actor, although I wish that Almodovar's film had gotten more nominations. (It's also up for Best International Film). I found it interesting that Robert DeNiro was not nominated for Best Actor for THE IRISHMAN despite the film getting ten nominations. Is it possible that this had something to do with the digital anti aging technology used on him in the film? Does the Academy sees this as a bit of a cheat? Perhaps, but then both Joe Pesci and Al Pacino are both up for Best Supporting Actor and that technology was used on them too. So who knows. I was also surprised and disappointed to see that Adam Sandler's gripping lead performance in UNCUT GEMS was unnominated (the film was completely shut out of nominations, which is disappointing). Perhaps Sandler has made one too many lazy, dumb comedies over the years to ever be taken seriously as an actor, and while I'm certainly no fan of those films myself, it's still a shame that his good work has been overlooked. Also shut out was Lulu Wang's well received THE FAREWELL, despite Awkwafina's good performance in the lead.<br />
Other than the surprising admiration for JOKER, most of the Best Picture nominations were predictably films that garnered positive reviews and other awards. I was a bit surprised to see Taika Waititi's only pretty good JOJO RABBIT up, but then, it's usually a safe bet for anti Nazi films to get nominations. Personally, I found Quentin Tarantino's ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD and Scorsese's THE IRISHMAN to be overlong and overrated, but given the popularity of those two directors with the Academy, there was almost no way they couldn't have been nominated.<br />
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As always, diversity is an issue in the nominations: as the New York Times points out, "the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has mounted an effort to double female and minority membership, in large part by inviting in more film professionals from overseas. But even after four years of the initiative, the organization remains 68 percent male and 84 percent white. " The big snub is that Greta Gerwig's charming LITTLE WOMEN is up for Best Picture (and got five other nominations) but Gerwig herself is not up for Best Director. Two of the nominees in the acting categories are people of color (Banderas and Cynthia Erivo for HARRIET), overlooking fine performances like the aforementioned Awkwafina, Luptiat Nyong'o in US and the two lead performers in Melina Matsoukas's QUEEN & SLIM.<br />
I've already mentioned my admiration for PARASITE, which I think should win Best Picture, but probably won't. ( It will almost certainly win the Best International Film award. ) And despite it's high number of nominations, I seriously doubt that a film as dark as JOKER could possibly win Best Picture. Martin Scorsese's THE IRISHMAN probably has a good chance, with its critical acclaim and period piece details. But I wouldn't rule out Noah Baumbach's excellent MARRIAGE STORY, with its two powerhouse lead performances. In any event, I was glad to see that none of the Best Picture nominees were as bland and predictable as last year's winner, GREEN BOOK. Whatever wins this year will be an improvement!Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-81286006198950457372019-12-02T10:30:00.001-08:002022-11-25T04:38:31.944-08:00MAD MAX: DID I MISS SOMETHING?<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Image result for mad max fury road" height="640" src="https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BN2EwM2I5OWMtMGQyMi00Zjg1LWJkNTctZTdjYTA4OGUwZjMyXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyMTMxODk2OTU@._V1_UX182_CR0,0,182,268_AL_.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="434" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><b>Hmmm, even the poster likes Furiosa more than Max</b></i></td></tr>
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Back in 2015 when the Oscar nominees were announced, I was surprised to see that George Miller's MAD MAX: FURY ROAD racked up 10 nominations (it would go on to win 6, all for technical things like editing). When I posted about this on this blog, I dismissed the film as "vastly overrated", and called Tom Hardy's lead role performance somnambulistic. When SPOTLIGHT went on to win Best Picture that year, I had no objection, thinking it a far superior and relevant film.<br />
Recently, in the inevitable rush to summarize the last decade, various media outlets (like The AV Club online magazine) have been releasing their lists of the best films of the decade. And lo and behold, Fury Road has been topping or placing highly on many of them. Now, I tend to agree with critical consensus over the ones made by the Academy over the years (I daresay that CITIZEN KANE has held up better than HOW GREEN WAS MY VALLEY!) , yet I really disagree with the critics regarding Fury Road. While I generally liked the film, the notion that it's better than say, MOONLIGHT or SELMA seems crazy to me. I could probably come up with one hundred films released in the last decade that I liked more than Fury Road. Am I too out of step? Am I snob who dismisses it as "just" an action film? (Yes, but that doesn't make me wrong!). Have the nation's film critics all been replaced by twelve year old fan boys, or did I miss something? In the interest of being open minded, I have decided to watch the film again with as little bias as I can muster. I don't like to think that my opinions are written in stone, maybe there's more to the film than I thought.<br />
First, some words about the Mad Max series in general: the first film was the debut feature of George Miller, an Australian born emergency room doctor who used actual motor related injuries he saw as inspiration for the film! Starring a then unknown Mel Gibson, made for only around three hundred thousand dollars and shot mostly in semi legal fashion around the Australian outback, it became a worldwide cult hit. Looked at years later, it holds up pretty well, especially in its opening scenes that sets up Miller's skill with a chase scene, not to mention his willingness to put his cast and stunt people in some pretty precarious situations. If the movie descends into standard issue action film cliches in it's later scenes (with post apocalyptic law man Max getting revenge on some evil bikers after they kill his wife and child), it's still entertaining given its budget. Its success led to an inevitable sequel in 1982, MAD MAX 2: THE ROAD WARRIOR (released in America as just THE ROAD WARRIOR). In my opinion, this film is the best in the series, as Miller, armed with a bigger budget, created even more impressive action scenes than the first, (the film's climax still stands as one of the best chase scenes ever) while Gibson had grown to be far more comfortable on camera and used his natural onscreen charisma to good effect. It would prove to be an even bigger hit than the first film, making an international star out of Gibson (which, looking back, may not have been a good thing!). Perhaps most interestingly for the series as a whole, THE ROAD WARRIOR was the first film to really lean into its post apocalyptic setting; in the first film, that setting was mostly a budget issue, and society overall still seemed to be functioning. But in the second film, the world is a big ugly anarchic desert with scarce resources full of road gangs willing to kill for those resources. It was a bleak view of the future, one that Gibson's cynical mercenary character fit right into; he was not unlike the famous Man With No Name that Clint Eastwood played in Sergio Leone's spaghetti westerns of the 1960's. The third film in the series, MAD MAX: BEYOND THUNDERDOME, released in 1985, toned done that bleak view, and lightened up the main character, perhaps because of Gibson's increasing popularity, or to widen the audience appeal by getting a PG-13 rating. The result was an almost maddeningly uneven film, with the first half having some of the best scenes in the series, and the second containing some of the worst. The film opens with Max, alone again, stumbling into a society known as Bartertown, a ramshackle society run on methane and led by Auntie Em (played surprisingly well by Tina Turner). The film's first half jettisons chase scenes and builds instead to a very exciting and well done man to man battle that finds Max and his towering opponent bouncing around on giant rubber bands in a huge dome. Unfortunately, the film falls apart as Max encounters a group of annoying children in the desert, and the film ends with a chase scene that merely tries to rehash the climax of the second film with diminishing results. It even ends with a ridiculous scene of Auntie Em letting Max go after wrecking half her army chasing him!<br />
After the fourth film, director Miller would go on to make other films like 1987's THE WITCHES OF EASTWICK and 1998's BABE:PIG IN THE CITY but he apparently never stopped thinking about returning to the Mad Max universe. He tried to gear up production for one as early as 2001, but first the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and then the Iraq war affected the budget and locations, and he would instead make the animated film HAPPY FEET in 2006. Finally, after years of storyboarding and delays, and the decision to recast the role of Max from the too old Gibson to Tom Hardy, Miller was finally able to start shooting in the African country of Nambia with a small army of crew and cast members, including olympic gymnasts and Cirque du Soleil members for the stunt scenes. After shooting for 120 days, Miller's wife Margaret Sixel took on the Herculean, months long task of editing the film's reported 480 hours of footage into a releasable film. (She would win an Oscar for her troubles). <br />
Surprisingly, it only opened at #2 at the US box office (behind Pitch Perfect 2, if you can believe it!) and was only a moderate hit (around $150 million in America) considering its budget. But critics and fan boys embraced it so strongly that it's reputation has swelled in social media, making it the opposite of the far more successful AVATAR, which has seen its reputation diminish over time despite being one of the biggest money making films ever. Perhaps it plays better on TV and computer screens than the 3D effects heavy AVATAR.<br />
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<img alt="Image result for the road warrior humongous" height="351" src="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/gecX6ofQJHc/maxresdefault.jpg" width="640" /><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiE2zLedctRLn864Q-TOHHOCHE8t6WTvf1NRdMYfo91i6BLOWo6dLJbC8dXe1BvEBbt5GnjOcuwmCxJRqERg0Ml2fru0ppKI6WkDaIx-pMFW53X7JmItmsGi63cJbiforna7k7C7d7akpzqf8s_rvSeXfGcUmDVE5jnHZYCRk8LVmeJm9zfaR7RbkbK/s2048/movies-madmax4-051515-superjumbo.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="858" data-original-width="2048" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiE2zLedctRLn864Q-TOHHOCHE8t6WTvf1NRdMYfo91i6BLOWo6dLJbC8dXe1BvEBbt5GnjOcuwmCxJRqERg0Ml2fru0ppKI6WkDaIx-pMFW53X7JmItmsGi63cJbiforna7k7C7d7akpzqf8s_rvSeXfGcUmDVE5jnHZYCRk8LVmeJm9zfaR7RbkbK/w640-h268/movies-madmax4-051515-superjumbo.jpeg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Clearly there's some overlap</i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br /><br />
In many ways, Miller seemed to consciously make FURY ROAD a throwback to THE ROAD WARRIOR: the toned down violence of the third film is rejected to bring back the harder, R rated action of the second. Story wise, we once again, have a raspy voiced, hideously masked villain (the absurdly named Immortan Joe*) who leads a cult like group of bikers. Again we have cynical wandering outsider Max encounter a society built in the chaos of the desert, focused around on rare resources (gas in the second film, water in the fourth). And again, we see Max learn to respect and aid a group of renegades against that hideous cult leader. And, or course, both films end with a smashing, crashing chase that features multiple vehicles and impressive stunts. The big change in FURY ROAD is the addition of Charlize Theron as Imperator Furiosa, who betrays Joe because of her disgust of his use of women as essentially breeding machines in his twisted little society. . Theron is definitely the best thing about the film; she's no Wonder Woman with super powers, instead her strength is driven by her sense of righteousness and steely determination. That determination give her action scenes an extra edge, since we are always aware of what she's fighting for and against, even when she's fighting Max himself.<br />
Theron and her character are so good in this film, that it actually leads to the film's biggest flaw: she's a better character than Max. Unlike him, she has to carry off a major betrayal knowing full well that it will put her own life in danger, when she could have just gone along with Joe's corrupt society. Max, on the other hand, just kinda shows up. Seriously, he gets taken captive in the first scene and spends much of the first part of the film bound up while the story unfolds around him. Personally, I found my interest in the film flagging every time the film cut away from Furiosa to catch up with our so called hero. And even when Max inevitably starts to get involved in the story, much of the time he still seems almost tangential to what's going on, spending more time reacting than being active. So here's a bold assertion: Max shouldn't be in this film all. I think a much better film could have been made with Furiosa being the main character that's just set in the Mad Max universe. I think this not only because of Max's lack of connection to the plot, but also because of Tom Hardy's performance. I already called Hardy somnambulistic in this film, and I stand by that statement. Now, I wouldn't exactly call Mel Gibson's acting in the first three films great, but he was compelling and strong enough to carry the action. Hardy often seems barely involved with what's going on around him; he grunts, points and looks bored throughout most of the film. (Honestly, given the huge amount of footage that Miller and his wife had to edit for this film, one has to wonder how Hardy could have been worse in the outtakes! Did he burp in every shot?) The weakness of Hardy is really displayed in a scene that clearly calls back to the second film: In THE ROAD WARRIOR, late in the film, a bruised and battered Max declares that he will drive the huge tanker truck in the final chase. It's a big moment for him, in that up to that point he has only shown self interest. but here he finally does the right thing, and Gibson plays it well, finally showing some humanity in his soft spoken delivery. Conversely in FURY ROAD there is a moment when Max suggests to Furiosa and her compatriots that they could fool Joe and his army by doubling back. Again, it shows Max doing the right thing for the first time in the film, but Hardy's mumbling, ridiculous line delivery kills it. He's not exactly Mr Charisma! <br />
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Losing Max would also eliminate one of the other big flaws in the film; the bratty girl character that pops up randomly throughout the film. Yes, every once in a while, Max has a vision of a little girl that cynically chides him verbally. Is this character supposed to add depth to Max? To make him more human? If her insults are supposed to be somehow pushing Max into doing the right thing and helping Furiosa, why do they feel so random? Why does he imagine the girl showing up even after he's moved towards helping Furiosa? Even worse, her presence stops the film's action dead in its tracks; great action scenes are about pacing and building to a big climax, not having some kid freeze things to a halt. And there's never any explanation as to who this kid is: in the first film Max had a son who was still a toddler and no other children. Some have theorized that she is one of the kids from the third film, although that hardly explains why Max would start thinking about her while he's in the middle of a life and death car chase!<br />
Ok, there are a lot of things in this film that I do like: although it's a repeat of The Humongous character in the second film, the messiah like hold that Joe holds over his followers is interesting and well thought out, especially since Furiosa's rebelling over his treatment of women gives the film an anti patriarchy feminist kick. I also like the idea of one of his Joe's men (Nux, well played by Nicholas Hoult) being able to break away from Joe, effectively showing that even good people can get caught up in a cult under the right conditions. And yes, as much as the kid stopping them annoys me, the action scenes are undeniably exciting and the relentless pace of the film, which is almost all chase scenes, is impressive. I do love the fact that most of the effects in the film were achieved without the usual CGI trickery, adding a realistic sense of danger and excitement every time we see people hanging off of poles while riding on speeding vehicles. But I still don't think anything here tops the ending of the second film. <br />
I went into what was my third viewing of this film after writing the first half of it, wondering if my opinion of the film would change after seeing it again. The answer is no, I still think that it's a well made, sometimes exciting film that's partly sunk by a lame lead performance. I still don't see how this movie, above all others, could be thought of as one of the best films of the last decade. <br />
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*This may be off topic, but I would like to mention just how annoying I find all the silly names in this film series. I mean: Toecutter, The Humongous, Master Blaster, Furiosa. Are these film characters or professional wrestlers?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br />Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-14219470663759550882019-11-10T21:04:00.001-08:002019-11-10T21:04:26.857-08:00THE PROBLEM WITH OSCAR BAIT<img alt="Image result for harriet tubman" height="360" src="https://gdb.voanews.com/01F04FE4-68AD-4CA3-B036-78BF7E1AC0DC_w408_r1_s.jpg" width="640" /><br />
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In the recent debate about Martin Scorsese's disparaging comments about Marvel movies, I tended to agree with his opinion that those movies aren't really cinema. In his comments, he compared them to theme parks, which I think is reasonable. But the seemingly endless stream of superhero movies aren't the only kind of movies in modern Hollywood that are problematic; there's also what are often referred to as Oscar bait films. Now, while I think the Oscar season (which comes around the last three months of the year) is really the only time when you can see movies made for mature audiences in big multiplexes, the inevitable result can be movies a little too determined to win awards.<br />
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An Oscar bait film in one that seems so calculated to please middle brow audiences, with a serious subject matter and plenty of obvious, heavy handed, uplifting moments, that it becomes smug, self satisfied cinema. Since winning an Oscar can translate to millions of more dollars at the box office, Oscar bait films seem to be actually marketing themselves to the Academy while you're watching them.<br />
The perfect example of such a film was 2017's THE ZOOKEEPER'S WIFE. From its historical setting (it's a holocaust drama) to it's too pretty cinematography, to its high minded speeches and brave, noble heroine (the titular character hides Jewish refugees from the Nazis), it's a movie that practically screams "love me!" at the audience, as it brazenly apes the far superior SHINDLER'S LIST. While disliking such a film is like kicking a puppy, its cloying nature is overwhelming. It also functions as an example of how Oscar bait can suffer from overreach; despite its obvious ambitions for award glory, the film was mostly critically panned and garnered zero awards.<br />
I bring up the subject of an Oscar bait movie because I just saw the Kasi Lemmon film HARRIET, and it practically drips with such Award desiring fervor. Unfortunately, it's just not that good of a film. I say that as an admirer of Lemmon, who's past films like EVE'S BAYOU (1997) and the sadly underrated TALK TO ME (2007) are really good. But with HARRIET she mostly stumbles. <br />
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The film's biggest flaw is that the character of Harriet Tubman in Lemmon's direction, script (which she co wrote with Gregory Allen Howard) and Cynthia Erivo's performance never feels like a real person. Instead, she functions as a symbol of nobility and bravery to such a degree she never comes across as relatable. There is one brief moment in the opening scene in which she cries a single tear; after that she all stoic determination. She is constantly making big speeches about freedom, and refusing to listen to the men around her who tell her what she can and cannot do. She never makes a wrong move and seems superhuman in her ability to lead slaves to freedom. The result is that we admire her without really feeling for her as anything more than an important historical figure. It doesn't help that the real dizzy spells that Tubman suffered from are translated here to actual visions that she uses to avoid capture. Like I said, super human.<br />
It should be mentioned this is often a problem with biopics, with writers and directors so determined to show their subjects in a positive light that they become blathering depictions of perfect people: from Gary Cooper's god like Lou Gehrig in THE PRIDE OF THE YANKEES way back in 1942 to Russell Crowe's noble James Braddock in 2005's CINDERELLA MAN, biopics too often just go too far in giving us someone to root for. It would appear that Lemmon was intimidated by being the first director to ever bring to the screen such an important figure in African American history as Tubman, so she overcompensated on the character's bravery and lost her humanity. I wish she had taken a page from the far superior 2014 film SELMA, in which director Ava DuVernay was able to show Martin Luther King Jr with complexity, displaying his flaws alongside his strengths.<br />
It also doesn't help that Lemmon fills the movie with action cliches, as Tubman makes one narrow escape after another; while I'm sure the real Tubman's life was filled with danger, I can't quite believe that she came so close to losing her life so often. Also, Lemmon clearly made this film with a young audience in mind, imagining American history teachers encouraging their students to see the film. And while this may not seem to be a bad thing, it also means that the film's PG-13 rating limits its ability to accurately display the horrors of slavery. 2013's 12 YEARS A SLAVE, with its far more brutal and realistic depiction of slave life works much better than Harriet's almost sanitized view in my opinion.<br />
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So, will Oscar go for the bait of HARRIET? I suppose it will, considering that it's important lead character is hard to pass over (Cynthia Erivo is a shoo in for a Best Actress nomination, partly because it's always a bit of a stretch to find five movies that feature women in lead roles to fill up that category). And I will say that I while I'm listing all of its flaws, I don't consider it to be a lousy movie, or even a bad one. I just wish that Lemmon weren't shooting for both Oscar glory and a mainstream audience, and instead had kept to making a more real film with more realistic characters and story. Tubman deserved better.Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-67101197136744465212019-10-28T09:49:00.002-07:002019-10-28T09:49:30.331-07:00THAT'S NOT CINEMA<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-large;"><i>"That's not Cinema."</i></span></b><br />
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Recently, famed director Martin Scorsese, in an interview promoting his latest film, inflamed the internet by saying about Marvel Movies, “I don’t see them. I tried, you know? But that’s not cinema. Honestly, the closest I can think of them, as well made as they are, with actors doing the best they can under the circumstances, is theme parks. It isn’t the cinema of human beings trying to convey emotional, psychological experiences to another human being.” When another famed director, Francis Ford Coppola, echoed Scorsese's comments, he added “Martin was kind when he said it’s not cinema. He didn’t say it’s despicable, which I just say it is." ,more uproar and backlash ensued.<br />
Now part of this is an inevitable cycle of any art form, with the older generation (both directors are over seventy) lashing out the new generation in predictable fashion. And anyone thinking that Scorsese and Coppola are making over the top critical statements should read Frank Capra's 1971 autobiography, in which the creator of films like IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE ranted that"practically all the Hollywood film-making of today is stooping to cheap salacious pornography in a crazy bastardization of a great art to compete for the 'patronage' of deviates and masturbators."(!). In other words, the old have always romantized the art of their formative years and rejected the new.<br />
When Scorsese and Coppola first began making their movies in the late 60's and 70's, most mainstream movies were definitely for adults; the end of the production code in 1968 allowed them and other filmmakers to deal with subject matter that would have been impossible just a few years earlier. This new artistic freedom resulted in movies that were both grown up and successful (Coppola's THE GODFATHER was not only a critically acclaimed film for adults, it also was the biggest hit film of 1972). <br />
But the death knell of the grown up film as big box office came long before the Marvel Movies: when George Lucas's STAR WARS was released in 1977, it showed that if you updated the kiddie serial stories of Buck Rodgers and Flash Gordon while adding top flight special effects, kids would not only flock to see them, they would see them again and again, and buy merchandise on top of that. While hugely successful films had been around since the very start of the medium, no other movie had dominated the box office for so long, or had built such anticipation for its inevitable sequels. And really, right then, the concept of a series of films as a franchise was born. <br />
Which brings us to today's Marvel Movies, which show just how much moviemaking has become about spectacle, with bigger and bigger effect scenes with one over the top battle after another. I agree with both Scorsese and Coppola that these movies are repetitive and formulaic, with individual directors subsuming any personal style they may have into a sameness that matches all the other films in the series; lack of individuality is the point. Now, film series are nothing new (between 1938 and 1950 a stunning 28 movies based on the comic strip Blondie were released!), but between the Marvel Movies and the DC movies, I can't think of a time when the main stream box office was so captured by one kind of film. Scorsese compares these kinds of films to theme parks, but think of them more like fast food: mass produced variations on the same thing. Spiderman is to Bat Man as the Big Mac is to the Whopper. <br />
Now, I'm not naive, I know that movie making is a business, and that these films make boat loads of money both in the US and overseas. The logic behind them is obvious, with the modern viewing public having so many choices of watching movies in so many formats, giving audiences thrills on a big screen with good sound is one of the best ways to entice them into the theater. This is also nothing new: back in the 1950's Hollywood responded to the rivalry of TV partly by making bigger and bigger epic movies in Cinemascope, providing images that no TV screen could equal. <br />
But the difference this time is that Marvel movies, and other blockbusters like them, are squeezing out smaller, more intimate films from screens, pushing them exclusively into art houses or home viewing, making it harder for them to catch an audience at all. Disney, which owns the Marvel movies, has gobbled up so many theaters with these films and their other (mostly uninspired) big releases that it's hard for rival studios to get a foothold.<br />
So how will this all play out? Well, for people who care about movies for grown ups, the Oscars are probably more important than ever, with the prestige of nominations and awards bringing attention to movies that would have no chance of being seen by big audiences otherwise. Really, without the Oscars, Disney could just buy all the multiplexes and only screen their films and few people could tell the difference.Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-63403261668921153392019-03-23T05:22:00.003-07:002024-03-16T12:01:46.661-07:00GREEN BOOK (2018)<br />
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GREEN BOOK (DIR: PETER FARRELLY) (SCR: NICK VALLELONGA, BRIAN CURRIE AND FARRELLY)<br />
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The past year has been a strange one for the Academy of Motion Pictures! First, back in August, there was an attempt to come up with a new category: Best Achievement in Popular Film, which was a brazen attempt to expand the audience for the awards broadcast. When that hit like a lead balloon, the Academy shrugged and shelved the idea for a later date.<br />
Then the nominations came out, and, somehow, surprise hit biopic BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY was among the Best Picture nominations, even though its director, Bryan Singer, was facing multiple charges of sexually exploiting minors. Also among the Best Picture ranks was the Netflix produced ROMA, which barely qualified due to its brief theatrical run, a decision that angered no less a personage than legendary director Steven Spielberg. Then comedian Kevin Hart was picked to host the show, but when past homophobic jokes he had made came to light, he was let go and they decided to go without a host. And then there was an attempt to shorten the broadcast by giving the awards for best editing and cinematography during the commercials, but when some prominent directors pointed out that cinematography and editing were kinda essential to filmmaking, that idea, too was dropped.<br />
And then there was the eventual Best Picture winner, GREEN BOOK. Based on the true story of a Southern musical tour by pianist Dr Donald Shirley in the 1960's, it had a modestly successful box office run in November, and faded into relative obscurity. But then it was nominated for five Academy awards. This was after the family of Dr. Donald Shirley dismissed the film as a "symphony of lies", and after Mahershala Ali, who played Dr. Shirley in the film, publicly apologized for not having met with his surviving family after taking the role. And of course, despite all of this, it managed to win Best Picture, quickly becoming the most controversial choice since 2004's CRASH.<br />
Is GREEN BOOK really so lousy? I don't think so, but it's a bland and safe choice for the Academy to make, which may be even worse. Or sure, it's an amiable enough mismatched buddy comedy, with some funny moments and good chemistry between the stars, but its story is predictable, its feel good attempts at being uplifting are obvious, and it can't help falling into the trap of being yet another movie about race relations in which a noble white person learns a lesson about bigotry by saving a non white person. The fact that this film would win the top prize from the same Academy that previously awarded far more powerful films about race, like TWELVE YEARS A SLAVE, and MOONLIGHT, feels almost like, well, a country that goes from electing Barack Obama to Donald Trump.<div><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><b>Viggo Mortenson & Mahershala Ali</b></td></tr>
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The film began as a labor of love for writer director and actor Nick Vallelonga, who heard stories about the relationship between his father Tony and Dr Shirley and thought it would make a good film. He interviewed family members that remembered the relationship, and listened to some old interviews with Dr Shirley and then co wrote a script with Brian Currie. Peter Farrelly, mostly know for gross out comedies like THERE'S SOMETHING ABOUT MARY and DUMB & DUMBER, was picked to direct the film (he also got a screenwriting credit). A bit surprisingly, non Italian actor Viggo Mortensen was chosen to play the lead role of Tony, while Mahershala Ali was cast as Dr Shirley. The film was coproduced by Dream Works Pictures and Participant Media and released by Universal on a budget of around twenty five million dollars. Although it did underwhelming box office at first, thanks to its Oscar win, it has grossed about eighty three million dollars in the US.<br />
Set in the 1960's, it's plot tells the story of hefty sized New York night club bouncer Tony the Lip, who, in between his usual jobs, takes an unlikely position as a driver for renowned African American pianist Dr Donald Shirley as he tours the Southern part of the country. The two get to know each other and bond as they encounter the harsh, sometimes violent racism of the South at that time, and Dr Shirley introduces Tony to the Green Book, a travel guide for African Americans traveling in the South looking for safe places to stay and eat. By the end of the film they become friends, with Dr Shirley visiting Tony's family during Christmas dinner.<br />
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Putting all the controversies about this film aside, it's simply at heart a mismatched interracial buddy comedy with the usual racial stereotypes flipped (it's Dr Shirley who teaches Tony about proper diction, while Tony teaches him about Aretha Franklin and Little Richard). Oh sure, there are some tense moments when racial tensions in the South could lead to possible violence for our heroes, but there's never any sense of real peril. We know that they'll be fine by the movie's ending, leaving even the ugliest scenes of possible danger essentially bloodless. It really is surprising to me that this film not only won Best Picture, but also Best Original Screenplay, considering it's predictable choices and easy formula of putting the characters in trouble and getting them out, and that it ends with that most hackneyed of cliches, the big Christmas dinner. Hardly an original idea! Also, a subplot about Tony considering a job with some local gangsters goes nowhere and plays up to the notion that you can't make a film about Italian Americans without some kind of reference to the mob. And then there's the infamous fried chicken scene, in which Tony buys some chicken in Kentucky and practically forces Dr Shirley to eat some, even though he's never had it before; it really is ridiculous to believe that Dr Shirley not only had never tried fried chicken before, but also has to be taught how to eat it! The fact that he holds the chicken like it's some kind of foreign object adds to the absurdity. (And it also feels like a commercial for the Kentucky Fried Chicken franchise, with the logo prominently displayed).<br />
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And if the script is underwhelming, so is Farelly's direction. Oh sure, he and cinematographer Sean Porter give the movie a pleasant enough glow (standard issue for Hollywood period pieces), and there's some nice scenery, but there are few if any memorable images or striking camera movements. It's a pretty workmanlike job. Not too surprising given that his previous film was the sequel to DUMB AND DUMBER!<br />
I've already said that I enjoy the chemistry between the two leads, and that really is the film's saving grace: Viggo Mortensen gained forty pounds to play Tony, and while at times he seems to be over doing the Italian stereotypes, he does express the more tender side of his character and makes him feel real. Mahershala Ali won a Best Supporting Actor award for his portrayal of Dr Shirley, and he is the best thing in the film. From his clipped, perfect elocution that turns into dry sarcasm when he ridicules Tony, to his sad, withdrawn loneliness and coiled anger when confronted with racism. And I won't deny that, other than the aforementioned chicken scene, I really do enjoy all the moments of Ali and Mortensen playing off each other, and I particularly like the way that Dr Shirley helps Tony write letters back home to his wife Delores. And Linda Cardellini as Dolores is also good, bringing a nice warmth and likability to every moment she's in. <br />
And finally, it must be mentioned just how much this movie resembles 1989's Best Picture winner DRIVING MS DAISY, which was also a period piece about a mismatched racial relationship that involved lots of driving. And while I think GREEN BOOK is marginally better than that film, it does seem kind of pathetic that the Academy would pick such similar films, with the implication that somehow we've progressed because now it's the white person driving around the black person!<br />
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<b style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Tahoma, Helvetica, FreeSans, sans-serif; font-size: 13.2px;">SO DID THE ACADEMY GET IT RIGHT?</b><br />
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I think my misgivings about this film are pretty obvious. My personal favorite film of the year was Barry Jenkins's gorgeous James Baldwin adaptation IF BEALE STREET COULD TALK, which, sadly, was not even nominated. But I also preferred Spike Lee's BLACK KKKLANSMAN, Alfonso Cuarón's ROMA, and Bradley Cooper's A STAR IS BORN.</div>Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-83330647992736367682019-01-22T06:39:00.004-08:002019-07-01T07:05:15.456-07:00THE 2019 NOMINATIONS: FIRST IMPRESSIONS<br />
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The 2019 nominations Academy Award nominations have just been announced, and my first impression is that the Best Picture race is a diverse mix, from big budget crowd pleasers like BLACK PANTHER (the first super hero movie to garner a Best Picture nomination) and A STAR IS BORN, to lesser known films like THE FAVORITE and ROMA. While I don't dislike any films in the list, I'm quite disappointed at the omission of Barry Jenkins's wonderful IF BEALE STREET COULD TALK, which is up for Best Adapted Screenplay (Jenkins), Best Original Soundtrack (Nicholas Britell) and Best Supporting Actress (Regina King). I suppose the Academy felt that Jenkins already had his moment when his equally great MOONLIGHT won Best Picture two years ago, but I prefer IF BEALE STREET COULD TALK to every other film on the list. I'm also disappointed that Marielle Heller's wildly entertaining CAN YOU EVER FORGIVE ME? isn't up. Plus I think Wes Anderson's marvelous animated film ISLE OF DOGS was good enough to win a Best Picture nomination along with its inevitable nomination for Best Animated Film. And while it came out early in the year, and was a low budget film, I wish that Bo Burham's EIGHTH GRADE were up for something, just for its painfully realistic view of adolescence!<br />
The Academy also embraced controversy in some of its Best Picture choices, with both Adam McKay's Dick Cheney skewering (and highly divisive) VICE and Spike Lee's Trump bashing BLACK KKKLANSMAN both defiantly nominated in the face of a conservative president. Controversial for another reason is Peter Farrelly's GREEN BOOK, a pleasant if predictable movie that, while based on a true story, has had its veracity attacked by family members of the real life character Dr. Don Shirley played by Mahershala Ali in the film. And then there's the surprise hit BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY, which has somehow wound up on the list despite the fact that director Bryan Singer has been accused of multiple sexual assault charges, and also reportedly had to be replaced during filming. This will probably prevent the film from winning.<br />
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Even though I'm disappointed about the IF BEALE STREET COULD TALK snub, I'm still glad to see Yorgos Lanthimos's oddball costume drama THE FAVORITE up, which I thought would be too weird for the Academy to honor. But I can't imagine that it will win. Which brings us to what is the most likely winner: Bradley Cooper's A STAR IS BORN (which has eight nominations altogether). It looks like a strong contender partly because of Lady Gaga's surprisingly strong dramatic performance, and partly because her costar Cooper also did a good job in his directoral debut. Add to that the fact that the film's tragic plot is one that has resonated for decades (this is the fourth official version of this story!) and that the film is a popular hit with a strong soundtrack, and I think its chances are good to win the big award. But then I thought the same thing about LA LA LAND two years ago, so what do I know?Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-85949225908200750952018-08-09T08:51:00.001-07:002018-08-09T08:59:41.816-07:00ACHIEVEMENTS IN POPULAR FILM? SAY WHAT?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Last Wednesday, the Motion Picture Academy released a press briefing concerning some upcoming changes in their organization: first, Oscar telecasts would be held to a three hour time limit, with some awards being given during commercials with a highlight reel of those awards to be shown later in the broadcast. This makes perfect sense: ratings for the show have been in decline for years, with many viewers complaining about the show's often four plus hour length. And let's face it, many of the awards are given to people who worked on films that the vast majority of the viewing audience have never seen or heard of (like Best Live Action Short Subject), or for technical things that are difficult to understand (there are two separate awards for sound editing and sound mixing!). While the people who worked on those films should win awards, cutting down the broadcast time given to their wins should make the show more entertaining and accessible.<br />
The second part of the press release is far more interesting, and potentially controversial. A new award for “outstanding achievement in popular film” has now been announced, with details to be forthcoming. It would appear that this is an attempt to broaden the show's audience by giving a major award to a block buster. In other words, the Academy is trying to make a people's choice award, one that reflects the tastes of the main stream movie going public more than the supposedly elevated tastes of the Academy members. This is not the first time that the Academy has made this kind of move: in 2009, when the box office hit THE DARK KNIGHT did not get nominated for Best Picture, the Academy expanded its Best Picture Nominees from five films to ten, making room for more hit movies. This led to films like 2015's MAD MAX:FURY ROAD getting a Best Picture nomination, something that probably never would have happened if the nominees had been held to five. Apparently, even that move wasn't seen as enough to placate the rabid fan boys who flock to the latest special effect explosion movies, and who feel disrespected by the Oscars.<br />
But is this just pandering? By implying that big money making movies are somehow in a different category than the ones that are usually nominated, they almost seem to be lowering popular films, saying that they are only worthy of winning in a separate category (although a film could be nominated for both an Outstanding Achievement in Popular Film award and Best Picture, like when Toy Story 3 was nominated for Best Animated Film and Best Picture).<br />
Once upon a time, popular films were almost always at least nominated for Best Picture, but in recent years, mainstream Hollywood movies have mostly gotten louder and dumber. Playing to the lowest common denominator, giving that all important young male demographic just what they want, while keeping stories simple to appeal to the ever growing world wide audience, has become Hollywood's stock in trade for some time now, and, to be fair, they have reaped enormous financial rewards from doing that. But should that cynical, sequel and reboot driven style that turns the cinematic art form into the equivalent of Big Macs, really be given an award for artistic achievement? Aren't the technical awards for things like special effects, editing and production design enough? (Really, when you get down to it, it's those technical people behind the scenes who create those special effects that do the real work for so many blockbuster movies, as the screen writers cough up cliches and the actors stand in front of green screens). <br />
As an avid moviegoer who mostly avoids mainstream Hollywood films until the "Oscar bait" movies start getting released late in the year, I don't like the idea of this new award; let the popular films make money and the "good" ones win awards. At the same time, I understand why the Academy chose to do this; generally speaking, when more popular movies are nominated, more people watch; they can point to high ratings for the years when TITANIC, THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING and AVATAR were nominated. But it's been nine years since that AVATAR broadcast, and the viewing habits of the American public has changed. This new award may do little to end what is a growing trend for most TV viewers, who prefer streaming formats that allow for more flexibility in their viewing habits. (The fact that the Super Bowl and the Grammys have also seen their ratings drop in recent years reflects this.) Sure, there's something exciting in watching events unfold live, but a lot of people would just rather watch the best parts on You Tube afterwards so they don't have to wade through the endless commercials and dull parts. Adding a new award will probably not buck this trend, and in the long run, I think it cheapens the Academy by forcing it to reward things like super hero movies and inane comedies. Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-39028557397304644652018-06-12T06:21:00.001-07:002018-06-12T06:21:39.029-07:00A DISTURBING TREND<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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(There are spoilers for the movie HEREDITARY here, you've been warned)</div>
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The low budget horror film HEREDITARY, written and directed by Ari Aster opened just last weekend and got a decidedly mixed reception: while critics highly praised the film (it rates an impressive 92% on the Tomato meter) audiences surveyed on the way out gave it a lowly D+ grade. As someone who is sick of super hero movies and loves independent movies, whenever critics and the general public disagree, I'm usually with the critics, but not this time! Putting it bluntly, I actively hated this film and almost walked out on it in the first half hour. Now understand, I not someone who can't stand horror movies, (I loved GET OUT from last year, and THE BABADOOK from 2014), no, my problem with HEREDITARY stems from one of the most difficult things to portray on a movie screen: violence against children.</div>
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Stories for children, have, of course, often featured children in dangerous situations in which they are threatened by evil adults, from THE WIZARD OF OZ to HARRY POTTER, but these stories have inevitable happy endings and are light hearted in tone despite the moments of danger. And more serious, realistic examples of children being threatened can work when handled in the right way, as in the powerful scene in SCHINDLER'S LIST in which children hide in out houses to avoid being sent to a death camp. No, what bothers me are recent films like HEREDITARY that are made for adults and that consciously seem to be pushing the audience's tolerance level by amping up the violence against children. Last year, Darren Aronofsky's fever dream film MOTHER (which I had some admiration for) ended with a baby being eaten. Another film, THE KILLING OF A SACRED DEER, (which I also hated), showed two young children slowly wasting away from a hideous curse that eventually makes blood pour from their eyes. </div>
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That brings us to HEREDITARY, in which, in a harrowing scene, a 13 year old girl suffering from an allergic reaction, sticks her head out of a careening car window and is literally decapitated. The moment itself is over briefly, but in the aftermath, director Aster chooses to show a long, realistic, lingering shot of her severed head on the road, being eaten by ants. Why did he choose to do this? That shot has no purpose in the plot, making its repulsiveness completely unnecessary. It's a terrible choice, in my opinion, and even though it lasts a few short seconds, it casts a pall over the rest of the film. (In case you were wondering, this was the moment that almost made me walk out). </div>
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Any time a director decides to put an image like that in my head, the movie needs to justify it, and this film falls far short of that in my opinion: although it starts out like a serious family drama, HEREDITARY eventually degenerates into a standard issue ghost/possession story with the usual scenes of people having crazy nightmares, stumbling into dark spooky rooms and choosing to do things that defy logic. Sure, there are some good performances and well shot scenes, but nothing that compensates for that horrific image. </div>
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There's been a lot of praise for the performance of Toni Collette as the long suffering mom in the film, and while I think she is very good, digging into big emotional moments with a ragged intensity, it's a better performance than the film deserves. In fact, the raw emotion she brings to the dramatic parts of the film wind up seeming silly when contrasted with her character doing things like floating in the air and speaking in a possessed voice. In a serious dramatic film, her realistic performance would work perfectly, but here it just winds up seeming ridiculous.</div>
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I've already mentioned that I loved Jennifer Kent's THE BABADOOK, which was also about malevolent spirits and possession, and also had a child put in danger. But in that film, the endangered child was central to the plot, and Kent handled it effectively and tastefully. And as for the aforementioned baby eating scene in Aranofsky's MOTHER, that film had become so completely surreal and metaphorical at that point in the film, that the baby eating seemed like an inevitable part of the story. You see, it's not the threatening of children that I necessary object to, it's the context in which it is handled in the film, and I think Aster handled it terribly here. There really is no context for me that justifies seeing a young girl's severed head being eaten by ants!</div>
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Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-61061256816001003352018-04-05T08:43:00.001-07:002024-03-16T09:52:53.126-07:00THE SHAPE OF WATER (2017)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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When Guillermo del Toro's THE SHAPE OF WATER won the Best Picture award for 2017, it was not a big surprise; del Toro's movie had been nominated for a whopping 13 awards, and had already won 3 (for del Toro's direction, its production design and its score). On the other hand, there had never been a science fiction film that won Best Picture before (somewhat amazingly, Stanley Kubrick's 1968 film 2001:A SPACE ODYSSEY was not even nominated for Best Picture!), and there was quite a bit of buzz about some of the other films nominated, like 3 BILLBOARDS OUTSIDE EBBING MISSOURI and GET OUT. Still, the Academy resisted having another upset like they had had the year before when MOONLIGHT defeated LA LA LAND, and they awarded the expected winner this time. Personally, while I find del Toro's film undeniably lovely to look out and well acted, I think it falls short of greatness, especially in its predictable screenplay.<br />
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In 1954's cult monster film classic THE CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON, there's a striking moment when the film's lovely leading lady goes for a swim in the Amazon waters, and the film's titular creature (also known as the gill man) starts to swim below her. But instead of attacking her, it follows her motions beneath her, without her knowing, copying her, clearly carrying out a sort of mating dance. Up until then, the creature had only been shown as a fearsome beast, but in that moment, its awkward desire made it seem almost likable. For a lot of adolescent boys just discovering girls but feeling too, well, monstrous, to act on their desires, it hit home. One of those adolescent boys was Guillermo del Toro, who was a horror movie obsessed, monster loving kid, that would go on turn those childhood obsessions into movies. Beginning with his first feature film, 1993's interesting vampire reimagining CRONOS to THE SHAPE OF WATER, every film he's directed has some kind of monster or ghost running through it. He says he first got the idea for THE SHAPE OF WATER while talking to writer David Kraus in 2011, and he also considered directing a straight up remake of THE CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON for Universal (allegedly, the studio passed on his pitch for the film when he wanted to end it with the gill man and the female lead ending up together!). Del Toro eventually wrote the film as a love story, and immediately wanted English actress Sally Hawkins (who had been so likable in 2008's Mike Leigh film HAPPY GO LUCKY) to play the lead. Octavia Spencer, Micheal Shannon and Richard Jenkins, excellent actors all, were cast in supporting roles. Del Toro finished the script with help from TV writer Vanessa Taylor and shot the film for a relatively low twenty million dollar budget in 2016. Powered by word of mouth as much as Oscar nominations, the film would eventually gross around one hundred and ninety million dollars, making it one of the most financially successful Best Picture winners in recent years.<br />
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Set in Baltimore in 1962, it tells the story of Eliza (Hawkins), a mute, orphaned cleaning woman, who lives in a modest apartment building in which she has befriended her lonely, gay, recovering alcoholic neighbor Giles (Jenkins). At work, she and her friend Zelda (Spencer) are cleaning out a government lab in which a scaled, man sized fish creature has been housed by security manager Richard (Shannon). Eliza finds herself drawn to the creature, despite the fact that it has bitten off two of Richard's fingers. She starts to feed it, play music for it, and teach it sign language. When she discovers that Richard plans to kill and dissect the creature, she sneaks him into her apartment with the reluctant help of Zelda and Giles. Slowly, she finds herself falling in love with the creature, and they began to have an unusual sex life. Giles also finds himself drawn to the creature and he discovers that the creature has magical healing powers. Meanwhile, Richard, enraged at the creature's disappearance, eventually tracks him down on the same night that Eliza plans to release it into the sea. Before she can, Richard shoots both her and the creature, but the creature resurrects himself and kills Richard. Then he carries Eliza off into the water, both healing her and giving her the ability to breath under water. The two of them swim off together.<br />
From it's lovely opening tracking shot that glides through a water flooded apartment and ends on Eliza, reclining in the water like sleeping beauty, while Jenkins's narrator character on the soundtrack refers to her as "a princess without a voice", de Toro establishes that this story is a modern, adult fairy tale, and throughout the film cinematographer Dan Lausten and production designer Paul D. Austerberry give the film a surreal green tinged look (even the food and the cars are green) while still realistically recreating Baltimore in the 1960's. And that fairy tale quality is extended in both Alexandre Desplat's excellent score and the use of old jazz tunes on the soundtrack, which contrast with the odd squacking noises that the creature makes. (Pat Friday singing "I know why" has never sounded so haunting!) I love the slightly crazy scene in which Eliza imagines herself singing in an old black and white Astaire-Rogers style musical with the creature making an unlikely dance partner. Since those movies were themselves often like fairy tales, it doesn't seem out of place and keeps with the overall tone of the film while giving de Toro a chance to put in an unexpected homage to old Hollywood.<br />
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However, playing out like a fairy tale makes the plot too simple at times for my taste; this is a film where I could guess almost every beat of the story from just having seen the preview beforehand. From Eliza bonding with the creature and sneaking it out, to the killing of the evil Richard at the end before the inevitable happy ending, there are no plot twists in this film that could be called surprising (although I must admit that I did not foresee an actual Communist spy being part of the story, but I also found that subplot pointless). Along with being a like a fairy tale, the movie also resembles a number of films that came out back in the 1980's (like ET, SPLASH and STAR MAN), in which innocent alien or magical creatures were threatened with horrible government experiments; at times I couldn't help but feel that I've seen this story before, right down to the creature's magic healing powers and resurrection abilities that resemble ET's. There are also questions of plausibility in the story, with a human sized fish creature somehow getting around a crowded city without anyone noticing (he even takes a trip to a movie theater!). Even fairy tales have to make sense. And I would have like to know a little bit more about the creature, especially regarding whether there are any more like it out there. <br />
Still, this film is certainly never boring to look out, and that's especially true of the magnificent job done by the effect and makeup crew on the creature, turning the old gill man from THE CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON into a modern marvel. Del Toro has said designing him was one of the most difficult things he's worked on in all of his years of film making, and it shows. It's a monster that can be both frightening and beautiful, threatening or pathetic. And clearly they learned one of the important lessons of ET: audiences will care for an alien creature as long as it has big, soulful eyes. Also, credit must be given to Doug Jones, the man in the suit, who has been working with de Toro since 1997's MIMIC; his years of playing monsters and training as a mime pay off in the way that the creature's thoughts are often conveyed with a simple gesture or turn of the head. For a monster performance, it's often subtle.<br />
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As for the other performances, most of them are very good. In Eliza, Giles and Zelda, we get a trio of lovable misfits, the kind of people who weren't always welcome in the era of the early 60's as the film often makes clear. Sally Hawkins as Eliza is extremely endearing; with her simple beauty and broad, expressive eyes, she doesn't need to talk to carry the film; from the early moment when we see her kindly bringing breakfast to her neighbor Giles, to the way she taps her feet on the floor as she walks down the hall, mimicking the tap dance routine she just saw on TV, we're completely on her side. One intriguing question arises concerning her character: we hear that she was found alone and abandoned in the water as a baby, and she has a scar on her neck that resembles a fish's gill. Therefore, one has to wonder, is she herself half fish creature and half human? That would explain why she's almost immediately drawn to the creature, even after she knows that it bit a man's fingers off. The movie never says she is, but it's an interesting idea Richard Jenkins as Giles is also very good as an unhappily closeted gay man; I love the wistful nature he has when he finds himself confessing to the creature that he feels alone too, and he's also often funny (at one point he asks of the creature "Now, is he a god? I dunno if he's a god. I mean he ate a cat, so I don't know!"). Octavia Spencer as Zelda is fine, but she really doesn't have a lot to do in the standard role of the African American faithful friend to the main character type. Still, I do enjoy her reaction in the scene in which Eliza mimes out exactly how she and creature can have sex!<br />
And then there's Micheal Shannon as the vile Richard; with his tall frame and harsh features, Shannon is usually typecast as a villain, so his casting here is no surprise. But the script gives him no dimension whatsoever, he's just a sneering, leering horrid person in every scene; even when he's at home with his family or buying a new car he seems creepy. Even worse, I find his one note performance more and more grating as the film goes on and he gets more and more despicable. (There's even a scene involving him torturing someone for information; it's ugly and unnecessary, and I wish Hollywood would get over the need for such scenes in movies and TV shows) I understand that fairy tales always have wicked characters, but it wouldn't have hurt to have given him a few moments of sympathy. While I have enjoyed Shannon in other roles over the years, the best thing that I can say about this one is that he's not quite on screen enough to ruin the film, but he definitely damages it, in my opinion.<br />
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I think it's clear that I admire this film without loving it (it's not even my favorite Del Toro film, I enjoyed 1996's PAN'S LABYRINTH more). I think that nominated films like Jordan Peele's GET OUT and Martin McDonagh's THREE BILLBOARDS OUTSIDE EBBING MISSOURI were better, and films that weren't nominated like Dee Rees's excellent post war drama MUDBOUND, Craig Gillespie's deliriously entertaining I TONYA and Lee Unkrich's and Adrian Molina's delightful COCO were also superior. Still, De Toro is a likable Hollywood personality who's been making (mostly) good films for 20 years, so I'm not exactly upset about the Academy's choice.Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-12802439465073860562018-01-23T07:10:00.000-08:002018-01-23T07:10:03.189-08:00THE 2017 NOMINEES, FIRST IMPRESSIONS<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgh7F899TUvxF8sY17Etkcnm5AJIS4DO_XxKbpDqAtUdp2_mmn09L_RJKhpu7kKiORNkI7SX7j0BX0NKAl6QpqdjUOEWGDMaUBucSgFObRm2p-54ehwpyRroiSOnX-vYxuCB2xFrl5wf8g/s1600/screen-shot-2017-09-14-at-9-49-54-am1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="445" data-original-width="780" height="227" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgh7F899TUvxF8sY17Etkcnm5AJIS4DO_XxKbpDqAtUdp2_mmn09L_RJKhpu7kKiORNkI7SX7j0BX0NKAl6QpqdjUOEWGDMaUBucSgFObRm2p-54ehwpyRroiSOnX-vYxuCB2xFrl5wf8g/s400/screen-shot-2017-09-14-at-9-49-54-am1.png" width="400" /></a></div>
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The nominees for the Academy Awards for 2017 have just been announced, and there aren't a lot of surprises, the films that are up are mostly ones that have done well at The Golden Globes and won other awards. Still, I personally did not expect that the leader in the number of nominations would be Guilllermo De Toro's THE SHAPE OF WATER, with thirteen nominations. Could this oddball romance become the first science fiction movie to win Best Picture? We'll see. I certainly am amused by the fact that a modern Oscar nominated film could be so heavily influenced by the 1954 B-movie THE CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON!<br />
The controversial 3 BILLBOARDS OUTSIDE EBBING MISSOURI is also up for an impressive seven awards, and while I imagine that the wonderful Frances McDormand will almost definitely win for Best Actress, I doubt the Academy will want to give a Best Picture award to a film that has inspired some pretty angry backlash about its racial politics. Personally, I think one of the two World War 2 set prestige movies (they would be DARKEST HOUR and DUNKIRK) have the best chances of winning, because one should never bet against any movie that bashes Nazis. At the same time, Stephen Spielberg's THE POST is a film about the power of the press, and with the nation lead by a president who has referred to the non conservative news media as "enemies of the people", it might be a good way for the mostly progressive Academy to stick a finger in his eye. Still, the fact that the film has only one other nomination (Meryl Streep is up for Best Actress, as usual) shows that there probably isn't much support for the film overall. The rest of the Best Picture nominees probably have little chance: PT Anderson's PHANTOM THREAD is probably to strange for the Academy, despite another great performance by Best Actor nominee Daniel Day Lewis. CALL ME BY YOUR NAME, the gay romance, is probably too arty for the Academy, while horror satire GET OUT is too dark. And Greta Gerwig's LADYBIRD is a low budget, realistic look at a complicated relationship between a teenage girl and her mother, hardly the kind of movie that wins Best Picture, although I'm glad to see that Gerwig is up for Best Director. <br />
As for the films left out, I personally loved Craig Gillespie's I,TONYA, and I think it should have been nominated for Best Picture, but at least it got acting nominees for it's two female leads, (Margot Robbie and Allison Janey) so there's that. I also would have liked to see Micheal Showalter's highly entertaining romantic comedy THE BIG SICK get a Best Picture nominee, but its great screenplay is up, so again, that's something. Overall, this a good, interesting mix of films that spreads love to both big budget films and low budget indies. So what will win? Well, despite it's 13 nominations, I think THE SHAPE OF WATER will mostly win technical awards, and with 3 BILLBOARDS OUTSIDE EBBING MISSOURI being too hot right now, I'm thinking that DARKEST HOUR (which has 5 other nominations besides Best Picture) has a good chance, seeing as how it's in similar territory as 2010's winner THE KING'S SPEECH. But of course, I thought LA LA LAND was going to win last year, so what do I know?Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8437796208895326643.post-86741338568795135002017-10-15T05:59:00.001-07:002017-10-15T06:00:35.625-07:00THE FALL OF HARVEY WEINSTEIN<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyiFjRjkZdO9TqNywVSFgmtjrEFOUH5t_H-MaAtyXVLA5S7otbDPbD6MjWBVNZZqWo9VmXAcsN_zo8DdX92-G0lDpA8gJwC5HANHCKMYyiftv5jteN0zoxUWw4xzB3s8nxSQdERZ4xZTk/s1600/15academy-master768.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="546" data-original-width="768" height="283" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyiFjRjkZdO9TqNywVSFgmtjrEFOUH5t_H-MaAtyXVLA5S7otbDPbD6MjWBVNZZqWo9VmXAcsN_zo8DdX92-G0lDpA8gJwC5HANHCKMYyiftv5jteN0zoxUWw4xzB3s8nxSQdERZ4xZTk/s400/15academy-master768.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , "times" , serif; font-size: 17px;">The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences</span> voted on Saturday to oust Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein. It was just the latest indignity suffered by the man who had been one of moviedom's most powerful producers. More importantly, he has also been pushed out of his position as head of his company, because of multiple charges that have been made of him sexually harassing women in the industry for years. Some of those charges extend to outright rape. The Academy moved fast to protect its image; the story of the charges against Weinstein had only broken ten days earlier.<br />
While being thrown out of the Academy is mostly just a symbolic gesture, it does show the changing attitude towards the harassment of women in Hollywood that is slowly taking place. No better illustration of that can be seen than the fact that director Roman Polanski was allowed to remain in the Academy even after he pled guilty to having sex with a minor in 1974 and fled the US. Even more amazing, Polanski won an Oscar for directing THE PIANIST in 2002! I think it's safe to say that Weinstein will not be winning anymore awards.<br />
Weinstein often held himself as an old style Hollywood producer, who was powerful, tough and demanding, but also one who could make quality films that won multiple awards. (And ironically, were often aimed at female audiences). Sadly, his sexual behavior also marks him as an old style movie mogul; a recent article in Slate magazine pointed out that the term "casting couch" was first used in Variety magazine way back in 1937. The stereotype of the lecherous producer exists for a reason: Harry Cohn, for example, was head of Columbia Pictures from 1920 up until the fifties, and he was legendary for demanding sexual favors from aspiring starlets. The sad fact of the matter is that in Hollywood you have a continuing story of pretty young women dreaming of fame and powerful men who can make those dreams come true, but only if they get something in return. Sexual harassment in that situation is almost inevitable; the good news is that now men like Weinstein will be called out for it (although it took far too long for him to fall, given that rumors about him have floated around for years), and with more and more women calling the shots at studios, things will hopefully improve.<br />
And then let's not forget the Trump factor: although conservative media is trying to hype Weinstein's fall as an attack on liberal Hollywood, it should be pointed out that Weinstein's behavior is very similar to what Trump himself has been accused of by no less than twelve women, which didn't stop the Republican party from making him their nominee. Let's face it, sexual predators exist on both sides of the political fence, as recent high profile resignations for similar charges from conservatives Bill O'Reilly and Roger Ailes prove. The good news is that something that was once shrugged off as "men being men" has now become unacceptable in the workplace, and as more and more women reach positions of power in more and more fields of business, men will have to learn to adjust or get out. If anything good has come from the election of Trump, it's that women, shocked at the victory of a man caught bragging about sexual assault, are standing up and going public about such deplorable behavior more and more. In other words, Weinstein won't be the first Hollywood mogul to be called out. You can count on it.Ellaarethaownerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14109448604806090448noreply@blogger.com0