Oscar Nominations 2019: Part 3 of 11

Part 1: Roma, The Favourite, Vice, A Star Is Born.
Part 2: Black Panther, BlacKkKlansman, Green Book, Bohemian Rhapsody.
Part 3:

Mary Poppins Returns

4 Nominations

• Production Design: John Myhre (Nine, Dreamgirls, Memoirs of a Geisha, Chicago, Elizabeth) & Gordon Sim (Nine, Chicago)
  
• Costume Design: Sandy Powell (The Favourite, Cinderella, Carol, Hugo, The Tempest, The Young Victoria, Mrs Henderson Presents, The Aviator, Gangs of New York, Shakespeare in Love, Velvet Goldmine, The Wings of the Dove, Orlando)
• Score: Marc Shaiman (South Park: Bigger Longer & Uncut, Patch Adams, The First Wives Club, The American President, Sleepless in Seattle)
  
• Song - "The Place Where Lost Things Go": Marc Shaiman (South Park: Bigger Longer & Uncut, Patch Adams, The First Wives Club, The American President, Sleepless in Seattle) & Scott Wittman
  

Director: Rob Marshall

Cast: Emily Blunt, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Pixie Davies, Nathanael Saleh, Joel Dawson, Ben Whishaw, Emily Mortimer, Colin Firth, Julie Walters, Meryl Streep, Dick Van Dyke, Angela Lansbury, Kobna Holdbrook-Smith, Jeremy Swift, David Warner

This is a charming little film. It does feel just a tad off – Emily Blunt is cute, but she doesn't quite feel like Mary Poppins. She isn't, after all, Julie Andrews. How could she be? Mary Poppins Returns is less stagey than his other films. I found that to be quite appealing. I find myself so frustrated with the sound-stage look of most of his films, and so I was delighted that this movie was underneath the lovely London sky, so to speak. But then... the biggest musical number in the movie is, of course, on a sound stage. I really cannot understand why Marshall does this. You're making a movie, sir. Go outside for Heaven's sake. Still, I was delighted that Marshall actually cast two theatre actors in his film. It's always nice when actors in Hollywood movies can actually sing. Emily Blunt doesn't have a great voice (again, she's not Dame Julie), but her voice is pretty when she uses her full voice and lets go of breathy sound. Speaking of Blunt, she just missed a best actress nomination here, and I think it speaks volume for the imagination of the Academy here that she did. Blunt was only ever going to be a also-ran kind of nominee. The Academy, in fact, consistently shows imagination and principle when voting for best actress nominees (except when it comes to Meryl Streep), and they deserve credit for that. I think this movie will win score, since Justin Hurwitz's gorgeous First Man score somehow got snubbed. And it will deserve it. Marc Shaiman's score is lovely, and the songs are mostly lovely, and this movie was pretty damn cute.
Will Win: Score

Could Win: Song

My Rating: #31 out of 66

First Man

4 Nominations

• Production Design: Nathan Crowley (Dunkirk, Interstellar, The Dark Knight, The Prestige) & Kathy Lucas
  
• Sound Mixing
• Sound Editing
• Visual Effects

Director: Damien Chazelle

Cast: Ryan Gosling,Claire Foy, Jason Clarke, Kyle Chandler, Patrick Fugit, Christopher Abbott, Corey Stoll, Ciarán Hinds, Pablo Schreiber, Shea Wigham, Lukas Haas, Ethan Embry, Olivia Hamilton, Brian d'Arcy James, Cory Michael Smith

This movie was not for me, despite Ryan Gosling's brilliant performance at this film's center. I wrote a lot about what I liked and didn't like and why I didn't think it worked, so I won't rehash that here. What I want to say about these nominations is that Justin Hurwitz's score for First Man was literally the best thing about the film, and the fact that the music branch did not nominate him is actually crazy. To have nominated Alexandre Desplat (last year's winner and now 10-time nominee) is just insanely conservative. I do not understand. The music branch tried some new things this year with its nomination process – they always seem to be doing that – and that is fine, but they need to figure out a way to become less insular. The music branch is small, and they seem to nominate the same people over and over. It's very frustrating. Hurwitz's work this year was superb. I will complain more about the music branch when we get to The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, I'm sure, so I'll stop now, but I've listen to the score for First Man more than any other score this year, and I can't imagine anyone sitting down to listen to the Isle of Dogs score more than a couple of times.

Will Win: Visual Effects
Could Win: N/A
My Rating: #43 out of 66

Zimna Wojna (Cold War)

3 Nominations

• Director: Paweł Pawlikowski
• Cinematography: Łukasz Żal (Ida)
  
• Foreign Language Picture: Poland (Ida, In Darkness, Katyń, Man of Iron, The Young Girls of Wilko, Nights Days, The Deluge, Promised Land, Pharaoh, Knife in the Water)

Director: Pawlikowski

Cast: Malek

For me, Cold War isn't quite as great as Ida, but I think this is mostly because of the subject matter and not because of the work the director is doing. Pawlikowski is obviously a superb filmmaker. This is an epic story, and it is told economically and beautifully. All of the actors are absolutely excellent, and Joanna Kulig probably should have been in the running for best actress. Yalitza Aparicio is great, but Kulig's performance in this is really searing. Pawlikowski's best director nomination was perhaps a surprise to some folks; it wasn't to me. The directing branch frequently does things right and selects excellent filmmakers from around the globe. Occasionally a stinker gets in, but usually they do things well. It's great to see Łukasz Żal here again too. His work is just so good. In short, the fact that this has 3 nominations speaks very highly of the Academy's choices this year. These are discerning, excellent nominations. I don't think Cold War can win any awards on Oscar night, but good for Pawlikowski. I can't wait to see what he'll make next.

Will Win: N/A

Could Win: Actor, Film Editing
My Rating: #28 out of 66

Oscar Nominees 2015: Part 3 of 12

Part 1.
Part 2.
Part 3 of 12:

Interstellar

5 Nominations

• Original Score: Hans Zimmer (Inception, Sherlock Holmes, Gladiator, The Thin Red Line, The Prince of Egypt, As Good as It Gets, The Preacher's Wife, The Lion King, Rain Man)
• Production Design: Nathan Crowley (The Dark Knight, The Prestige) & Gary Fettis (Changeling, The Godfather: Part III)
• Visual Effects
• Sound Mixing
• Sound Editing

Director: Christopher Nolan

Cast: Matthew McConaughey, Jessica Chastain, Anne Hathaway, John Lithgow, Mackenzie Foy, Michael Caine, David Gyasi, Casey Affleck, Topher Grace, Matt Damon, Ellen Burstyn

Ok, so I wasn't the biggest fan of this when I first saw it. (It's a time-travel movie, but it swears it's all about love.) But it's grown on me since then, and I keep ranking other things below it, because Interstellar was pretty to look at, even if so much of it was silly and half baked. Hans Zimmer's score, it should also be noted, is my favorite of this year's nominees. It won't win, but I find myself listening to it at work. It's very, very good; one of my favorite Zimmer scores in recent years, and one of this year's best. The effects, too, are top notch, and I expect them to go home with the Oscar.

Will Win: Visual Effects

Could Win: Sound Mixing, Sound Editing

My Rating: #47 out of 74

Mr. Turner

4 Nominations

• Cinematography: Dick Pope (The Illusionist)
• Original Score: Gary Yershon
• Production Design: Suzie Davies & Charlotte Watts
• Costume Design: Jacqueline Durran (Anna Karenina, Atonement, Pride & Prejudice)

Director: Mike Leigh

Cast: Timothy Spall, Marion Bailey, Paul Jesson, Dorothy Atkinson, Joshua McGuire, Karl Johnson, Lesley Manville, Martin Savage, Jamie Thomas King, Karina Fernandez

#dickpoop started trending on Twitter after Academy President Cheryl Boone Isaacs mispronounced his name on nomination morning. Oops. Honestly, I loved Mr. Turner and it's in my top ten, but four nominations is a lot for a film that is as difficult to love as this one is. I am surprised it did so well with the Academy. I find Gary Yershon's nomination to be especially surprising, given his score's simplicity and the relative lack of publicity that this film got. But unlike films that were latecomers to the game this year (Selma, Cake, A Most Violent Year), Mike Leigh's movie played at Telluride and had lots and lots of time to sink in with voters, steadily gaining positive buzz from critics throughout the fall. Mr. Turner probably won't take home any statues, but I am delighted that a movie I loved this much got so many nominations.
Will Win: N/A

Could Win: Costume Design

My Rating: #10 out of 74

Into the Woods

3 Nominations

• Supporting Actress: Meryl Streep (August: Osage County, The Iron Lady, Julie & Julia, Doubt, The Devil Wears Prada, Adaptation., Music of the Heart, One True Thing, The Bridges of Madison County, Postcards from the Edge, A Cry in the Dark, Ironweed, Out of Africa, Silkwood, Sophie's Choice, The French Lieutenant's Woman, Kramer vs. Kramer, The Deer Hunter)
• Production Design: Dennis Gassner (The Golden Compass, Road to Perdition, Bugsy, Barton Fink) & Anna Pinnock (The Grand Budapest Hotel, Life of Pi, The Golden Compass, Gosford Park)
• Costume Design: Colleen Atwood (Snow White and the Huntsman, Alice in Wonderland, Nine, Sweeney Todd: the Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Memoirs of a Geisha, Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events, Chicago, Sleepy Hollow, Beloved, Little Women)

Director: Rob Marshall

Cast: Emily Blunt, James Corden, Meryl Streep, Anna Kendrick, Daniel Huttlestone, Chris Pine, Lilla Crawford, Christine Baranski, Tracey Ullman, Johnny Depp, Billy Magnussen

When you look above at this list of nominations, you'll see that each of Into the Woods's four nominees has already been nominated multiple times. This is a big studio picture, and the studio paid a lot of money to hire all the best people. They did, and four of those people wound up with Oscar nominations because they are all excellent, well-known artists. But Into the Woods is a phone-in job for all four of them, as well as for most of the rest of the team on this movie. It's a lazy, boring, joyless adaptation of the stage show that is, in fact, never more than a filmed stage version of the show itself. In writing this post, I kept trying to find an image from the film that wasn't the same tired sound stage that served as the backdrop for most of this movie's scenes; they just aren't out there, though. Most of this film took place in what is, for all intents and purposes, the exact same location. As for Meryl Streep, she basically acts as though she is in a completely different movie than the rest of the cast of Into the Woods; the whole performance feels a little off kilter. I know the Academy loves her, but she doesn't need to get nominated every single year, does she?
Will Win: N/A

Could Win: N/A

My Rating: #68 out of 74

Unbroken

3 Nominations

• Cinematography: Roger Deakins (Prisoners, Skyfall, True Grit, The Reader, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, No Country for Old Men, The Man Who Wasn't There, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, Kundun, Fargo, The Shawshank Redemption)
• Sound Mixing
• Sound Editing

Director: Angelina Jolie

Cast: Jack O'Connell, Ishihara Takamasa, Garrett Hedlund, Domhnall Gleeson, Finn Wittrock, Jai Courtney, C.J. Valleroy, Alex Russell, Maddalena Ischiale, Vincenzo Amato

Honestly, it is time for Roger Deakins finally to win an Oscar. Look at that list up there! He has shot some gorgeous, gorgeous films and never won. He ain't gonna win this year, either. Jolie's film was not widely loved by the Academy, and it is a little bit of a mystery to me as to why this was so. Was it too obviously Oscar-bait for them? Did it not make them feel good enough about themselves? Was it too ethnic (Italian)? Was it that it was a WWII movie about the Pacific theatre instead of the European theatre? Who knows. In any case, the Academy just didn't go for it, and they aren't going to go for it on the big night either. I should also note my own frustration, here, that this year's very, very good war movie – Fury, which boasted excellent performances, great art direction, awesome sound mixing and editing, a great script, and realistic violence – is nowhere to be found among the nominees despite its being far superior to any of the other war movies this year.
Will Win: N/A
Could Win: N/A
My Rating: #54 out of 74

Agony

I feel like I am forever complaining about Hollywood musicals.

I didn't like their version of Les Misérables in 2012, and I didn't like Nine back in 2009, and I thought Chicago was pretty good, but not very well imagined. And then there was Sweeney Todd. Oof. The Phantom of the Opera. Awful. Dreamgirls was pretty good and I remember sort of liking Hairspray – those two are better than the rest of them, but movie versions of Broadway musicals have, to my mind, tended to suck.

And the reason for this is that they are filled with Hollywood stars and all directed by Rob Marshall. I exaggerate, obviously, but here's the thing: musicals are about singing. And yet Hollywood insists on casting movie stars who by and large cannot sing, or at least can't sing very well. So the music is rewritten so that the stars can hit the notes; or worse: we all pretend that the stars can actually hit the notes of the songs (*cough* Hugh Jackman *cough*).

And so we have Into the Woods, which should have been a slam dunk, right? It's charming, it's hilarious, it's big big big, and the stage version has always made a joke of having a fake cow, fake magic birds, and a fake giantess who destroys things. This works on stage, but in the movies it could work even better, right? Giants! Beanstalks! Fun!

But... it's Rob Marshall, who only wants to direct on sound stages, and can't ever seem to blow the roof off of any movie he's ever made. Every scene feels like it was designed for the stage and never for the camera. He simply doesn't direct for the camera. It's as though he doesn't make movies at all. A guy like Kenny Ortega does this kind of thing so much better, and yet Disney hires him to do television work and they give Marshall the big-budget studio jobs. I don't get it.

There is one scene in Into the Woods that doesn't feel like it was shot on a stage, and it is (and I know everyone will agree with me about this) the best number in the entire film: Chris Pine and Billy Magnussen's rendition of Agony, which is laugh-out-loud funny and performed brilliantly. Everything else feels like a stage number, even though we are up close and personal with the performers, Marshall's Into the Woods feels claustrophobic, small town (it's not intimate we're just nearer). Imagine, for example, scenes shot in real woods with natural lighting. You won't see that in this movie. Everything is a stage.

And this "small town" feel is the thing that sticks out to me the most as a viewer. The performers can't quite manage to do the roles as written – that's just a fact. And the director hasn't really imagined the show in a new and interesting way. So I couldn't shake the feeling that what I was watching when I saw Into the Woods was a really expensive community theatre production of the show. (I said the same thing about Les Misérables: "for me the film version of Les Mis is like watching a community theatre try to put on the show, except that the community theatre is Hollywood and the audience is just proud of these actors for doing their best. It's kind of like if our own six-year-old tried to sing Jean Valjean and we decided to give the little guy an Oscar for trying so hard.") It's slightly better with Into the Woods because the singers are better, and slightly worse because Rob Marshall is worse.

As everyone who has ever worked on the show knows, Into the Woods has its problems. Marshall solves none of them. Instead, he compounds them, sidelining the show's big number "Children Will Listen", and ratcheting down the comedy by cutting the "Agony Reprise" and even the witch's funny bits. Jack's mom, too – although she is a hilarious character onstage and is played in the film by comedienne Tracey Ullman – is played completely straight and doesn't get a single laugh. And Marshall seems not to understand quite what Into the Woods is about: that fairy tales affect children deeply, that we can't plan for the future even when we think we know what we want, that the world has things in store for us that we don't understand, that people change, which means that what you wish for at one point in your life may not be exactly what you end up wanting, that even wishing itself is circumscribed by social standing and economic circumstances, and that parenting is extremely difficult even in the best of circumstances. Marshall's film doesn't discuss any of these ideas with any real depth, and when it has the opportunity to do so (with the Witch and Rapunzel, with Cinderella's lack of desire for her own prince) it squanders this time.

The movie is not completely without merit, though. Little Daniel Huttlestone, who, as Gavroche, was the best thing about the Les Misérables movie, sings the role of Jack beautifully. And although what we see while Jack is singing "Giants in the Sky" makes literally no sense, what we hear is gorgeous. Huttlestone's voice is bright and clear and honest, and I appreciated all of his scenes. This is especially important because the emotional resonance of the show rests, eventually, on Jack and Little Red.

Meryl Streep is Meryl Streep: delightful to watch, totally committed, fascinating. But... the Witch in this Into the Woods wasn't that much fun. I said already that Marshall got rid of all of her good jokes, but even the ones that stayed in ("You should see my nectarines!") fall flat here. Streep's Witch is a creepy, odd figure. She's funny when she flies at the Baker and his wife at one point in act two, but mostly, she is so intense that she is hard to take as a figure of fun. Part of this has to do with just how fully Streep is willing to disappear into the role. The role doesn't want this kind of intense identificatory acting. It needed something a bit more ironic, with a few more winks to the audience.

Oh and Johnny Depp has a single scene in this movie. Did you know that? He plays a strange man-wolf kind of creature. Why didn't they make him a CGI Andy Serkis-type wolf? I have no idea. Wolves in this wood wear zoot suits? Apparently. And – as with "Giants in the Sky", Little Red's song about the Wolf's death ("I Know Things Now") – is staged in a totally bizarre, almost surreal manner that hasn't a thing to do with the reality of the film. I do not get it.

I spent so much of this film thinking... huh?

As for Oscar, it will get a few nominations, I expect, but it will not be getting a makeup nomination, which might seem odd, given the way Meryl Streep looks throughout the film. Sound Mixing?

The Miserable Ones

This is not a review of Les Misérables; it is actually a famous excerpt from Lee Edelman's No Future. Still, because it is the first thing I think of when I think of Les Misérables, and because it is such a famous piece from queer theory, I will ask it to express at least a little of how I felt about Tom Hooper's total mess of a film:

Fuck the social order and the Child in whose name we're collectively terrorized; fuck Annie; fuck the waif from Les Mis; fuck the poor, innocent kid on the Net; fuck Laws both with capital ls and with small; fuck the whole network of Symbolic relations and the future that serves as its prop.

And now, five things I actually liked about Les Mis:

1. Aaron Tveit! Finally someone who can sing is in the movie!
2. Little Daniel Huttlestone who plays Gavroche.
3. Eddie Redmayne and Amanda Seyfried, both in good voice and both rather charming.
4. Because there are two people in the sequences with Thénardier and his wife, Tom Hooper can't shoot their scenes in the extreme-close-up style he uses in all of the other sequences. So: thanks, Thénardiers.
5. Russell Crowe, not for his voice (god help us), but because he is an excellent actor, and he understands that acting oughtn't to look like it is hard work.

I have complained before about the state of movie musicals since Chicago, so I won't go over all of that again. Suffice to say, that I think that what movie musicals need is singers, and until producers start feeling comfortable casting singers in movie musicals, we will continue to be forced to watch movies like Les Misérables, Sweeney Todd, and Nine.

Gong Li

Do you know about Gong Li? She was Zhang Yimou's muse in the 1990s when they made Ju Dou, Raise the Red Lantern, To Live, and Shanghai Triad together. She was also the female lead in Chen Kaige's Farewell, My Concubine. More recently she reunited with Zhang for Curse of the Golden Flower. She was also in the absurd USAmerican film Memoirs of a Geisha, but more importantly, she had a fantastic role in Wong Kar-Wai's 2046. She is a fierce, exciting actress, and I've always been blown away by both her incredible beauty and her onscreen power.

Love her.

2 1/2

If I am honest, I will tell you that I do not love all of Fellini's films. I am not crazy about Amarcord, really, and I couldn't really get into 8 1/2 even though it has some very cool stuff in it.

I have decided, however, that I do not like Rob Marshall's films. This evening I saw the newest one, Nine, and I was... well... in a word: bored.

And now, nine thoughts on Nine, because it seems fitting:

1. Rob Marshall is known for making musicals. He made the Best-picture-winning Chicago, which supposedly rehabilitated the movie musical. And yet, both that movie and his newest star-studded musical, are constantly apologizing for being musicals. The man is sold as the best thing to ever happen to the movie musical, but his films appear to wish that they were not musicals. Instead of happening in the stories of his movies, musical numbers in Marshall's films always happen in characters' imaginations. We are forced to leave behind the world of the film and enter into the hyper-make-believe world of the musical itself. So the films actively reinforce the idea that musicalness is phony, that emotions that could only be expressed in song are just too unrealistic to be a part of real life, and yet the film cannot seem to make the "real-life" scenes as realistic or as interesting as its musical numbers, and it seems to be ashamed of its stock-in-trade. We all came to see Nine, in fact (or stayed away, as the case may be), because it is a musical. Yet the film constantly tries to make us forget the fact.

2. I know this is cinema. I know that we need movie stars to make people come to the movies. But how about making a movie star out of someone who is also a great singer? The casting in Nine is very clever and very cosmopolitan (Australia, Spain, Italy, Britain, France, and the U.S. are all represented), the actresses are all fabulous. Honestly. But this movie needed singers. Bad. And that goes for Mr. Day-Lewis, as well.

3. Nicole Kidman is my favorite thing in the picture. She is gorgeous and she has a couple of really fabulous scenes where she talks about women in film, fantasy, and basically what it means to be an actress. It's really fascinating. It's intercut with a musical number, which kind of gets in the way, and it's really the first (and only time) where I was sorry there was a musical number to interrupt a real-life scene.

4. Marshall sort of teases the audience with Fellini references. Sometimes these are fun, and sometimes not that interesting. I really wished Nicole Kidman had gotten in the fountain and done an homage to La Dolce Vita.

5. Penélope Cruz is delightful. A great actress. She is engrossing and compelling in all of her scenes. The film isn't really all that interested in her in the end, but I was rather sorry it wasn't.

6. Dion Beebe knows how to light a movie, let me tell you. You probably already knew that, of course, but it bears repeating. The musical sequence after the screening room scene is absolutely extraordinary.

7. You cannot expect a love story to emerge out of nowhere. We are not going to be attached to Contini's wife if all she does is sit around and look sad and miss him and be angry that he missed her birthday. Particularly if the man's mistress is as much fun as Penélope Cruz is in this movie.

8. The best musical number in the film is Fergie's song "Be Italian." It's fun, it's sexy, and there's sand everywhere.

9. What is this movie about? Why is there singing and dancing? Does Contini (the main character) make musical films? Why isn't any of this explained? Is it because he loved the Folies-Bergère as a kid? I don't get it. Nine, more than anything else, is interested in the derrières of its female stars and extras. This is fine, certainly (Fellini was a breast man, of course, but that's just picking nits), but the movie--like the filmmaker the movie is about--cannot decide what its story is. Is it a movie about a man's love for his wife? Is it about his relationship with his mom? Is it a movie about movie-making (8 1/2 certainly was.)? Or is it a movie about buttocks? A movie about buttocks is a good idea, I think, but if Nine is about that, we need to dump all of the other baggage. For a film that seems to understand that female movie stars act as fantasies for male viewers, it spend a lot of time investing in those fantasies.

P.S. The title of this post is out of five.

Oscar Nominees: Part One

BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN

8 Nominations: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Original Score

The Academy's favorite film of the year, and it's hard to find fault with this drama. It's respectable, well-acted and emotionally affecting. I loved this film, but I am surprised it's taken off as much as it has. I say more power to it and I'm crossing my fingers that it takes home more than two Oscars on the big night.
Will Win: Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay
Could Win: Cinematography, Score
My Rating: #2 out of 81 films

CRASH

6 Nominations: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Supporting Actor, Best Original Screenplay, Best Film Editing, Best Original Song

The Academy's second favorite film of the year, and Brokeback's only real challenge for the big prize. This film about race relations and interwoven storylines in Los Angeles has appealed to a lot of people. Jean Oppenheimer called it one of the best American films she's seen in years.
Will Win: Original Screenplay, Editing
Could Win: Song
My Rating: #65 out of 81 films

GOOD NIGHT, AND GOOD LUCK.

6 Nominations: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Original Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Art Direction

The Academy loved this film more than anyone could forsee: more than critics loved it, too, I'd say. They love George Clooney, too. The man is everywhere. The film's appeal is easy to see, too. When I saw it, the audience applauded after the film's end.
Will Win: Nothing
Could Win: Original Screenplay, Cinematography, Art Direction
My Rating: #3 out of 81 films

MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA

6 Nominations: Best Cinematography, Best Costume Design, Best Original Score, Best Art Direction, Best Sound Mixing, Best Sound Editing

Snore. The Academy must've liked this movie more than everyone else did. It had pretty embarassing box office and was widely panned by critics. This movie is tediously boring and obvious Oscar-bait material. It looks so pretty but sounds so stupid.
Will Win: Costume, Art Direction
Could Win: Cinematography, Score
My Rating: #71 out of 81 films

CAPOTE

5 Nominations: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actress, Best Adapted Screenplay

This critically lauded indie surprised tons of people (those not paying attention) by actually being nominated for Best Picture. Many have called it slow and boring. It's a very thought-provoking and intelligent film, to my mind, but I understand people's aversion. After all, it is, more than anything else, a film anchored by a star-turn from a fabulous actor.
Will Win: Actor
Could Win: Adapted Screenplay (in an upset)
My Rating: #9 out of 81 films

MUNICH

5 Nominations: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Original Score, Best Film Editing
Will Win: Nothing
Could Win: Editing, Score
My Rating: #74 out of 81 films

WALK THE LINE

5 Nominations: Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Film Editing, Best Costume Design, Best Sound Recording
Will Win: Actress, Sound
Could Win: Editing
My Rating: #37 out of 81 films

KING KONG

4 Nominations: Best Art Direction, Best Sound Recording, Best Visual Effects, Best Sound Effects Editing
Will Win: Visual Effects, Sound Effects
Could Win: Sound
My Rating: #46 out of 81 films

THE CONSTANT GARDENER

4 Nominations: Best Supporting Actress, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Film Editing, Best Original Score
Will Win: Supporting Actress
Could Win: Editing
My Rating: #11 out of 81 films

PRIDE & PREJUDICE

4 Nominations: Best Actress, Best Costume Design, Best Art Direction, Best Original Score
Will Win: Nothing
Could Win: Nothing
My Rating: #4 out of 81 films

Triple Feature

I jammed in three movies this weekend.
On Friday, Wahima and I saw Brokeback Mountain, which, as I have stated previously, was fucking great.

On Saturday, before heading over to my friends' fourth annual holiday soirée, I caught a matinee of Memoirs of a Geisha at my local multiplex. Snore. This movie is pretty bad, to be quite honest. It's all about prostitutes one-upping one another and is very difficult to take seriously. The costumes are beautiful, stunning even, but the movie is just a snore. There's no one to root for and for all its Asian mystique, the film unfortunately feels very American. Too bad. This is a definite failure for Rob Marshall. I guess he didn't realize that the States' obsession with Japan peaked in 2003 and that feels like eons ago.

On Sunday, Tito and I saw The Family Stone, which is definitely worth the price of admission, hardly ever sentimental, and boasts an excellent ensemble with Diane Keaton as its standout. If I had to compare it to a film, I would say it's similar to Love Actually, sort of, but good. Way better than Love Actually and truly touching and affecting without being cloying. Props to Claire Danes (I love her lately and she is simply gorgeous in this film), Sarah Jessica Parker, Ty Giordano, Dermot Mulroney, Rachel MacAdams, Luke Wilson and Craig T. Nelson as well. This movie is an excellent and loving portrait of a support system and all of its quirks and idiosyncracies. I ate it up.