If I Chose the Academy Award Winners and Nominees – 2015 edition

Tags

a girl walks home alone at night, a most violent year, academy awards, ain't them bodies saints, Alejandro González Iñárritu, alex rennie, Alexander Dinelaris, all about eve, american sniper, amores perros, Ana Lily Amirpour, andrea suarez paz, antichrist, aoife kelleher, armando bo, ava duvernay, awful nice, birdman, boogie nights, boyhood, bradford young, brendan gleeson, calvary, charlotte gainsbourg, citizenfour, damien chazelle, david oyelowo, david schultz, disappearance of elanor rigby, doc sportello, donald rumsfeld, down by law, edward norton, edward snowden, eliza hittman, ellen degeneres, emma stone, errol morris, finding vivian maier, fog of war, foxcatcher, françois ozon, frank, gangster squad, george w. bush, ghost dog, gillian flynn, gillian robespierre, glasnevin cemetery, gone girl, grand budapest hotel, in the realms of the unreal, inherent vice, interrotron, interstellar, it felt like love, iu cinema, james cameron, jenny slate, jessica chastain, jessica yu, jk simmons, joaquin phoenix, john michael mcdonagh, jonathan glazer, josh brolin, judd apatow, julianne moore, lars von trier, laura poitras, life itself, locke, lyle vincent, maggie gyllenhaal, magnolia, maps to the stars, mark ruffalo, martin cahill, martin luther king jr, melancholia, michael keaton, miles teller, neal patrick harris, Nicolás Giacobone, nymphomaniac, obvious child, one million dubliners, only lovers left alive, Oscars, party down, patricia arquette, paul thomas anderson, richard linklater, robert elswit, robert mcnamara, roger ebert, rushmore, scarlett johnasson, sean porter, selma, shane carruth, shane mac thomáis, snowpiercer, stand clear of the closing doors, steve james, still alice, the general, the master, the salt of the earth, the unknown known, there will be blood, thomas pynchon, tilda swinton, titanic, todd sklar, tom hardy, tom hiddleston, twilight, under the skin, upstream color, walter campbell, we need to talk about kevin, wes anderson, whiplash, yorick le saux, zero theorem

I’ve now seen most of the films that had a release in 2014. This makes me more qualified to vote for the Oscars than 97.548% of the Academy’s membership. With the Oscar ceremony occurring tonight, I’ve picked, as I have the previous two years, who I think the nominees and winners should be in the bulk of the major categories. Once again, the foreign film category will be left off because I simply haven’t had access to enough foreign films to make a comment on them. Those that have made it to my neck of the woods, I will say, have been very good for the most part.

As I look back over my picks from last year, I’m not sure I would change any of them, which is surprising. Usually I have an epiphany about something I overlooked.

Let’s do this…

Best Picture

Boyhood
Calvary* (winner)
Gone Girl
Inherent Vice
It Felt Like Love
Obvious Child
Only Lovers Left Alive
Snowpiercer
Under the Skin
Whiplash

Whittling down the top ten (even though the Academy only inexplicably chose 8 films this year), was difficult. Leaving out films like Birdman, Nymphomaniac, The Zero Theorem and others was tough. But alas, I may look back and see the error of my ways when I do this again next year. No film made an impact on me more than John Michael McDonagh‘s Calvary. Brendan Gleeson gives the best performance (male) of the year as a priest who receives a phone call telling him that he will be murdered in one week as penance for the sins of all previous priests who were pedophiles even though he is not one. The ticking clock nature of the narrative brings real tension and suspense and watching Gleeson‘s Father James try to navigate the uncertainty he faces about whether the threat is real or not grabs you and doesn’t let go until well after the conclusion. It’s simply a stunning film. 2014 brought us really lush, interesting and original films and I think I honored that with my top ten. Under the Skin, Jonathan Glazer‘s triumphant return to the cinema, was so visually stunning and featured a top flight performance from Scarlett Johansson as an alien trolling for men to use for nefarious purposes. Jim Jarmusch‘s Only Lovers Left Alive finally gives a meditative, minimalist vampire film that we can sink our teeth into. With incredible music and fantastic performances from Tilda Swinton (as always) and Tom Hiddleston, this is a film that should have been at the top of everyone’s list. Paul Thomas Anderson‘s Inherent Vice is top-form stuff from him as usual. The guy just makes great movies every time. Tackling a Thomas Pynchon novel for adaptation is not an easy task and Anderson made it look easy. Eliza Hittman‘s It Felt Like Love is a gritty look at a young girl coming of age in New York City. This is a film that isn’t afraid of scenarios that befall young women today and embraces them. This is a brave film and one worthy of watching. Gillian Robespierre‘s Obvious Child is another brave film that features the best female performance of the year from Jenny Slate who plays a comedian coming to terms with getting an abortion after a one-night stand. Outside of Calvary, Damien Chazelle‘s Whiplash stuck with me the most. J.K. Simmons’ likely Oscar-winning performance was picture perfect and Miles Teller‘s surprised me. I’m not much a jazz guy, but this story was really quite interesting.

Best Director

Paul Thomas Anderson – Inherent Vice* (winner)
Jonathan Glazer – Under the Skin
Eliza Hittman – It Felt Like Love
Alejandro González Iñárritu – Birdman
Jim Jarmusch – Only Lovers Left Alive
John Michael McDonagh – Calvary

This was an especially tough year to whittle down this pool. So many fantastic films out there as evidenced by my above list. So I had to cheat and add a sixth director to this group. That I had to leave Richard Linklater, Damien Chazelle, Gillian Robespierre, Ava Duvernay and David Fincher was really hard to do. But what’s done is done. Glazer just killed it with Under the Skin as he has with his other two films. Many people didn’t care for Birth, but I think it’s wonderful. The almost ten year wait for his big screen return was well worth it. Jarmusch is at his best since Ghost Dog with Only Lovers Left Alive and maybe his best since Down By Law. Every beat, every scene are calculated and meticulous. I fucking loved it. Eliza Hittman‘s gritty effort It Felt Like Love hit me like a ton of bricks, so elegant. Birdman is Iñárritu‘s best film since Amores Perros and may well be his masterpiece. The life he was able to coax out of this tale is insane. Such a breath of fresh air, really. McDonagh, like his brother, embody the age old notion that the Irish are superb storytellers. Calvary hits you on every level and does so unapologetically. It was hard to pass him over for my choice as best director, but as far as I’m concerned, as long as Paul Thomas Anderson is making movies and they are as good as Inherent Vice, The Master, There Will Be Blood, Boogie Nights and Magnolia, he will get my vote for best director. There is no single director working today that gets my blood pumping for one of their films. He’s that fucking amazing. I’m glad he sticks to material that he likes because his films don’t register on the radar of many filmgoers because they tackle material that asks more of the viewer than just their time. He makes you complicit in the actions of his films and to me that’s the experience I want from the medium.

Best Actress

Charlotte Gainsbourg – Nymphomaniac
Julianne Moore – Still Alice
Scarlett Johansson – Under the Skin
Jenny Slate – Obvious Child (*winner)
Tllda Swinton – Only Lovers Left Alive

For once, there was an abundance of really great roles for women this year. It’s a shame that the Academy didn’t delve a little deeper into films that were little off the beaten path, but I guess we’ve come to expect that. I will admit it’s hard to pass over Julianne Moore for this award especially since she has earned it 4 or 5 times by now. Jenny Slate just knocked it out of the park and it’s a shame that more comedic roles aren’t rewarded at the Oscars. Frankly, it think it’s a lot harder to be funny, but what do I know? Scarlett Johansson merits mention in this category for her performance in Under the Skin. Did we ever think that we would see her as an alien cruising for dudes? That all of scenes with her picking up guys were filmed in real time with the men not knowing that they were being filmed makes it all the more interesting. Charlotte Gainsbourg‘s performance in Nymphomaniac is among the most brave I’ve ever seen. There is plenty available to read about Lars Von Trier‘s approach to working with actors and let’s say it isn’t the most warm of environments. This story is tough and she dove right in. Loved it. Tilda Swinton brings it every time and to me, her performance in Only Lovers Left Alive is second only to her’s in We Need to Talk About Kevin. Great fucking stuff. Julianne Moore is spectacular as she always is. This, couple with her turn in Maps to the Stars, certainly merits many awards. I’m happy that she will win the Oscar finally.

Best Actor

Brendan Gleeson – Calvary (*winner)
Tom Hardy – Locke
Tom Hiddleston – Only Lovers Left Alive
Michael Keaton – Birdman
Joaquin Phoenix – Inherent Vice

Brendan Gleeson gave my favorite performance of the 90s as Martin Cahill in The General and has given so many great performances since then. And then he delivers another career defining performance as Father James in Calvary, which came as no shock to me. Largely ignored by awards talk, I couldn’t pass this one up. It is simply outstanding and indicative of Gleeson‘s efforts during his 30+ years acting. Tom Hardy is such a joy to watch. That he can take a role that is situated for 95% of the time in car talking on his cell phone and make something as special as he did is simply amazing. I can still hear him saying, “the traffic is fine…” Good shit. Hiddleston was off his ass, much like Tilda, in Only Lovers Left Alive. A musician vampire lamenting the decline of humankind’s ability to care for themselves…what more can you ask for? Michael Keaton‘s comeback film and performance are simply outstanding. It’s hard to look past him for this award as he was so incredibly good. Many people say that he is basically playing himself in this one and even if that is the case, which I don’t think he is, he’s crafted a wonderfully complex character. I think that in Doc Sportello we have found Joaquin Phoenix‘s finest performance. Stoner private detective mixed up in multi-layered hijinks is a perfect fit for him. To me, the Oscars always weight performances in biopics far too highly and this year’s crop 4 of the 5 nominations fit that bill. Boo to that. I will say this, David Oyelowo is as deserving as any of the men listed above. I thought he gave a terrifically powerful performance as Martin Luther King Jr. in Selma.

Best Supporting Actor

Josh Brolin  –  Inherent Vice
Edward Norton – Birdman
Alex Rennie – Awaful Nice
Mark Ruffalo – Foxcatcher
JK Simmons – Whiplash (*winner)

I hate it when I agree with the Academy as much as I did with this category, having three of the same nominees, but I can say that I enjoyed each of the three and agree with who we all know is going to win this award, JK Simmons for Whiplash. As Fletcher, the hardass music conductor/instructor and tormentor to Miles Teller, Simmons channels his character from Party Down and turns it up to 11. Painful to watch, it’s still hard to look away. Edward Norton is back much in the same way that Keaton rose like a phoenix in Birdman. When he’s on, he’s on and this is the best performance from him in quite some time sort of parodying his reputation as a tough-to-work-with actor. The dark horse in this group for me is Alex Rennie, who gave the funniest performance of the year to me in Todd Sklar‘s criminally underwatched Awful Nice. Rennie encapsulates the manchild better than anything that Judd Apatow has ever committed to celluloid. It’s truly a shame that more people haven’t seen this film. Ruffalo is a nice counterpoint to the other characters in Foxcatcher. As always, he really delves deep into David Schultz‘ tragic story. And lastly, Josh Brolin is fucking amazing in Inherent Vice as the meathead cop Bigfoot Bjornsen. How the Academy overlooked this one is beyond me…oh wait, it’s the Academy. The film didn’t earn $300 million at the box office. Sigh.

Best Supporting Actress

Jessica Chastain – A Most Violent Year
Maggie Gyllenhaal – Frank
Andrea Suarez Paz – Stand Clear of the Closing Doors (*winner)
Emma Stone – Birdman
Tilda Swinton – Snowpiercer

Here is another case where I and the Academy have differed greatly. It’s obvious that I have left out Patricia Arquette from Boyhood here. While I loved her performance, I think these above hit me on more of a gut level than hers. The standout performance here is Andrea Suarez Paz, the distraught mother of an autistic teenager who is lost in New York City. This was the most impactful performance of the year for me. It’s a shame that few people saw the film as it, too, is equally wonderful. I adored Maggie Gyllenhaal in Frank, so caustic yet protective. She made me laugh and cringe equally and I loved every minute of it. Jessica Chastain had another incredible year between Interstellar, The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby and her incredible turn in A Most Violent Year. She really can do it all. Get this woman an Oscar for the love of all that’s holy. Emma Stone is another gem in the cast of Birdman. She seems to make the most of the roles she is given (well, except for Gangster Squad, but then again, who did in that one?). And here we are again with Tilda for her role as Mason in Snowpiercer. Aside from JK Simmons’ character in Whiplash, she creates the most loathsome character of the year. To be able to do that requires talent, something that Ms. Swinton has in spades.

Best Documentary

Citizenfour
Finding Vivian Maier (*winner)
Life Itself
One Million Dubliners
The Unknown Known

I love documentaries and 2014 was exceptionally strong year in that category. It’s hard to disagree with the choices the Academy made for their nominees as the four that I’ve seen are quite exceptional (The Salt of the Earth is the only one I have yet to see), but my three replacements captured my interest and attention more. Citizenfour is one of the most intense films I’ve seen in some time and it will win the Oscar. It’s crazy to think that Edward Snowden had the wherewithal to contact director Laura Poitras to have her document everything that unfolded with his document and information leak. AMAZING. But, Finding Vivian Maier just edged it out in my opinion. An almost unbelievable story – a young man comes across a trove of old photographs and undeveloped film at an auction and unearths and undiscovered genius. That he is able to track down people who knew her and get a full backstory on her is just amazing. The film is very reminiscent of Jessica Yu‘s In the Realms of the Unreal which is incredible as well. That the Academy chose not to nominate Steve James‘ Life Itself about film critic extraordinaire Roger Ebert and his last days battling cancer was the most egregious error in this category. Life Itself is so touching and a really in depth look at Roger’s journey to becoming the most recognizable film critic of my generation. I had the pleasure of seeing the film with director Steve James in attendance at the IU Cinema this past fall and it was incredibly amazing. Shame on you, Academy. One Million Dubliners (see my full review of the film here) is a film that may not have made it across the pond in time for Oscar consideration, but I loved it. Ostensibly about Glasnevin Cemetery in Dublin where nearly all of its famous political figures are buried, it also becomes a portrait of one of its tour guides, Shane Mac Thomáis. A truly moving film, this one left a mark. And lastly, Errol Morris‘ The Unknown Known is the last of the group. Done in similar fashion as his Oscar-winning doc The Fog of War with former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara in front of the interrotron, The Unknown Known (read my full review here) queries controversial Secretary of Defense under George W. Bush, Donald Rumsfeld. Interesting to say the least, I really wish Morris would have pushed the envelope more with that bastard Rumsfeld. Despite this, the film was quite fascinating and certainly helped solidify my feelings that Rumsfeld is an unapologetic douchebag who truly deserves to be in prison.

Best Original Screenplay

Wes Anderson – The Grand Budapest Hotel
Alejandro González Iñárritu, Nicolás Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris and Armando Bo – Birdman
Jim Jarmusch – Only Lovers Left Alive
John Michael McDonagh – Calvary (*winner)
Lars Von Trier – Nymphomaniac

While it seems like so many of the films that landed in my top 25 or 20 this year were adapted from other source material, I think that the list above offers a really wide spectrum of terrifically interesting and wonderful films. Funny, serious and a mixture of both, all of these films blew me away with the quality of writing and their ability to transport me to Ireland, the mountains of Europe in the middle of last century, to Detroit and Tangiers of present day and to various decades of England. Wes Anderson does it again in his finest film since Rushmore. Chock full of familiar quirk, The Grand Budapest Hotel is typically funny and incredibly engaging and features an ensemble cast that most directors would kill to work with. As of now, Budapest‘s main competition for the Oscar is Birdman which has been flying quite high leading into today’s Oscars. A story perfectly suited for Michael Keaton‘s reemergence, Birdman mixes superhero lore, backstage theatrics a la All About Eve and magical realism to create one of the most interesting films of the year. The four writers credited on this film really knocked it out of the park. Don’t be too surprised if it takes home multiple awards including Best Picture. I can’t speak highly enough of Only Lovers Left Alive as you can tell from my asides in the above categories. Jarmusch brings his minimalistic writing (and directing) approach to the vampire genre and frankly shuts the door on it (Ana Lily Amirpour‘s A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night that also came out in 2014 helped as well), effectively torching the damage done by the shitty Twilight franchise. The winner here, and it should be no surprise, is Calvary. A deeply moving film littered with black humor, I frankly don’t think the Best Picture can possibly win without having the best script. If it does, and I’m looking at you James Cameron and the incredibly awful Titanic, then the Academy voters should have to answer for it, because there’s no reason for that to happen. As the basic building block for the film, it has to be solid. Lars Von Trier has been on fire lately, despite the ridiculous shit he says at press conferences. I really loved Melancholia and Antichrist was a thinkpiece that really stretches the audience and both will leave you think well after they’ve ended. Nymphomaniac is cut from the same cloth. Brutal and honest, like the great bulk of Von Trier‘s films, Nymphomaniac is epic in scale and among the more provocative films you’ll see at this point.

Best Adapted Screenplay

Paul Thomas Anderson – Inherent Vice
Damien Chazelle – Whiplash
Walter Campbell & Jonathan Glazer – Under the Skin (*winner)
Gillian Flynn – Gone Girl
Gillian Robespierre – Obvious Child

Rare is the year that I will pass up giving Paul Thomas Anderson the nod for best writing work. He’s been spot on with all of films before, but this is the year it happened. Inherent Vice is wonderful and he did as good of a job as one might be able to do in translating a Thomas Pynchon novel to the big screen. It’s fun and weird as shit and all I could hope for in a film. Whiplash, as noted above, is a film that has stuck with me far more than I expected. Damien Chazelle, the writer-director, made something far more tolerable for me than I ever thought possible…jazz. Well done, sir. Under the Skin is the hands down winner for me. I’d like this film to Shane Carruth‘s Upstream Color in tone, and that one blew me the fuck away. Jonathan Glazer got a bad rap for Birth, which I really loved. This film is like anything you will see this year and that’s what I look for in a script and film. Gone Girl is a movie I was surprised that I liked it all. David Fincher never fails me, so I should have known, but when a film is based on a novel as popular as Gone Girl, I had to be skeptical. I’ve not read the novel and I know there were some alterations to the narrative. Kudos to Flynn for this one. And lastly, Obvious Child rounds out the group. This script was built for Jenny Slate and the approach that Robespierre took towards the decision for the Donna Stern character to take regarding her abortion was fresh and insightful and I hope it made people think a little deeper about what it takes to make a decision like that. Filled with humor in a movie you don’t think could be, Obvious Child represents some of the best writing of the year without a doubt in my mind.

Cinematography

Robert Elswit – Inherent Vice
Yorick Le Saux – Only Lovers Left Alive
Sean Porter – It Felt Like Love
Lyle Vincent – A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (*winner)
Bradford Young – Selma

I’m a sucker for black and white photography and this year Lyle Vincent‘s work in A Girl Walks Home Alone was flat out amazing. The photography should add another level to the film and that’s precisely what Vincent achieved with this one. An Iranian vampire movie shot in B&W…how does that not sound interesting to people? Elswit, already an Oscar-winner for his work in There Will Be Blood, proves that working with the same director over time pays off in Inherent Vice. The photography was lush and he did such a great job recreating the 70s look of the film. Really a true achievement. Le Saux, a frequent collaborator with François Ozon, did such a good job shooting in the darkness that the vampires in Only Lovers Left Alive inhabited. Films shot only at night are so difficult to light and Le Saux did an incredible job. Sean Porter‘s work in It Felt Like Love was quite inspiring. His photography really gave another level of grittiness to a film that already had an abundance of grit. It served the story well and that’s what you need in the photography of the film. And last, but certainly not least, Bradford Young‘s work in Selma was inspiring. The crane shot on the Pettus Bridge is award-worthy in and of itself. Two years in a row Mr. Young has given us work nothing short of amazing (last year’s was Ain’t Them Bodies Saints).

So there you have it. Once again, 2014 had a ton of great films to offer and it’s a shame that the Academy, in typical fashion, stuck to giving accolades to their big budget fare and ignoring the down and dirty films that really offer so much more. And I will say this – if American Sniper wins even one award tonight, it is one too many. That it received 6 nominations is an absolute tragedy.

Enjoy the show and hopefully Neal Patrick Harris will be mildly entertaining. Personally, I think they should have stuck with Ellen DeGeneres. But what do I know?

Another Year, Another Fucking Mess By the Academy

Tags

a most violent year, academy awards, academy of motion picture arts and sciences, american hustle, american sniper, amy adams, atticus finch, ava duvernay, bennett miller, big eyes, bill corso, bradley cooper, brendan gleeson, cake, calvary, clint eastwood, dan futterman, dardenne brothers, david fincher, dennis liddiard, e. max frye, edith piaf, foxcatcher, gone girl, grand budapest hotel, how to train your dragon 2, inherent vice, jean-luc godard goodbye to language, jennifer aniston, jennifer lawrence, jenny slate, jessica chastain, john boorman, kathryn bigelow, la vie en rose, laura dern, lego movie, life is beautiful, male, marion cotillard, mark ruffalo, martin cahill, obvious child, paul thomas anderson, roberto benigni, selma, social network, steve carell, the general, the help, trent reznor, two days one night, white, zero dark thirty

Last week, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences blessed us with their annual masturbatory list of what their (old and white) membership thought were the best films, performances, and technical achievements of the year. In typical form,  they got it wrong and in many cases VERY wrong. Of course, they got it right in some places, too. But, as usual, the missteps fair outweighed what they got right.

So let’s get into it…

Screw Jobs

Ava Duvernay getting screwed a la Katrhyn Bigelow for Best Director for Selma. Now, I’m in the same position as I was with Zero Dark Thirty not having access to the film yet. I will be getting a screener soon as I’m voting in the Independent Spirit Awards, so I will be able to pass full judgment then on the merits of the film. However, this is a film that has been so universally praised that it is hard to figure how Ms. Duvernay was passed over except that she is an African-American woman, one of whom has never been nominated in this category. That the membership of the academy is overwhelmingly white (93%) and male (76%) makes this hard to dismiss.

The Lego Movie not getting any nominations except for that annoying ass song is really sad. This is a film that appeared on a lot of Best of 2014 lists…for the whole year, not just for animation. That is was passed over is incredibly curious. It, like Selma, above has been universally praised as well. Perhaps the Golden Globes actually predicted this when How to Train Your Dragon 2 stole the award away on Sunday night. I’m frankly baffled by all of it.

Jenny Slate being passed over for a Best Actress nom in Obvious Child might perhaps be the biggest error of all. She brought such life to her character, Donna Stern, and was able to tackle one of the most polarizing topics in America today (abortion) with grace and wit. So, it’s no wonder that the largely male population of the Academy dismissed the film and her performance. Shame on you, Academy.

Gone Girl getting NO love. I was surprised at how much I liked this one. I didn’t read the book, because why do that when you can see the movie, right? The script by Gillian Flynn, who wrote the novel, was solid and David Fincher is always on point (unless he does an Alien film). Trent Reznor and Atticus Finch‘s score was just as good as the one they won for for The Social Network. So what missed here? HUGELY popular novel, great cast, great performance, a director at the top of his game…I don’t understand. After seeing American Sniper, I honestly can’t understand how it having such a terribly sentimental and hokey script, one that literally made me laugh out loud several times because of its ridiculousness, was able to secure a nomination over Gone Girl.

Paul Thomas Anderson not getting a nom for his direction in the wildly awesome Inherent Vice. Arguably the finest director working today (he has had ZERO misses in his oeuvre), it’s hard to process this one. While not the most easy film to connect with, Anderson’s abilities are on full display and from a technical sense, this should be all one needs in a film. I guess if this is that case, perhaps Jean-Luc Godard should have also gotten a nomination for his 3D masterpiece (from what I’ve heard) Goodbye to Language.

And lastly, I would like to point out that once again, Brendan Gleeson delivered one of the finest performances of the year in Calvary and was overlooked. Smaller and foreign films are so often passed over for these awards, and I understand in a way – Hollywood hosts these “look-at-us” awards every year to perpetuate their own machine, so if foreign stars take home the prizes, the lights grow a little dimmer in Hollywood. I get that. But fuck – get this man a nomination! He deserved the award for his amazing portrayal of Martin Cahill in John Boorman‘s The General. Funny enough the award that year went to Roberto Benigni, an Italian, for his super sappy performance in Life Is Beautiful. SIGH. I fucking give up. If you haven’t seen Calvary, get there. It is my #1 film of 2014. It will blow you away.

I could go into great detail about the films they passed over, and will do so closer to the awards in February when I release my list of who and what I thought the nominees and winners should be.

Surprises

Marion Cotillard‘s nomination for the Dardenne Brothers‘ latest opus Two Days, One Night was a bit of a surprise as most people were expecting Jennifer Aniston to grab one for her lauded performance in Cake. We all know that Cotillard has the chops as she has already won an Oscar for her role as Edith Piaf in La Vie en Rose. But as I stated before, it’s rare we see actors from foreign countries get the nods. While this film is still rolling out here in the US, I can’t wait to see it. Both the Dardennes and Cotillard make great choices and the premise of this film – a woman has to convince her coworkers over two days and one night to vote to keep her job rather than firing her and splitting her salary as a bonus between them all – is one of the more intriguing of the year. I do wonder why it missed the Best Foreign film cut.

Jessica Chastain, like Amy Adams (who could have easily gotten a nod herself for Big Eyes), is somewhat of an Academy darling nominated twice already for her roles in Zero Dark Thirty and The Help. I thought she was a shoo-in for A Most Violent Year, playing a role similar to Jennifer Lawrence‘s in American Hustle.

But alas, Laura Dern took home the nod for her role in Wild. Honestly, I didn’t even know she was in the film. So, yeah, I was a little surprised.

In the “How the fuck did this not happen” category – Foxcatcher gets nominations for Best Director (Bennett Miller), Best Actor (Steve Carell), Best Supporting Actor (Mark Ruffalo), Best Original Screenplay (E. Max Frye and Dan Futterman) and Best Achievement in Makeup and Hairstyling (Bill Corso and Dennis Liddiard). How the fuck does it not garner a Best Picture nomination? I have yet to see the film, but this simply doesn’t add up.

And lastly, I’ll end with American Sniper‘s 6 nominations. I saw the film last night and I just can’t believe the Academy is as ridiculous as this. 6 nominations? Are you serious? Get out your pom-poms and let’s kiss Eastwood‘s ass some more…except not enough to give him a Best Director nod. Does this mean that the film was good enough to make the Best Pic cut in spite of Eastwood‘s direction? They did nominate him in that fucking mess that was Mystic River and he won for the awful Million Dollar Baby.

Sigh.

That does it for the 2015 edition of Hey! The Academy Fucked It Up Again.

Check out the poll below and vote for which film you think should win Best Picture:

My Impressions of the 2014 Academy Awards

Tags

12 years a slave, 20 feet from stardom, academy awards, alfonso cuaron, american hustle, amy adams, ang lee, august: osage county, barkhad abdi, blackfish, blue jasmine, bradley cooper, brokeback mountain, bruce dern, captain phillips, casey affleck, cate blanchett, children of men, chiwetel ejiofor, christian bale, dallas buyers club, daniel day-lewis, david o. russell, ellen degeneres, emmanuel lubezki, gravity, happy-go-lucky, hero, hunger, indonesia, jared leto, jennifer lawrence, jordan catalano, joshua oppenheimer, judi dench, julia roberts, june squibb, katherine bigelow, leonardo dicaprio, lisa minnelli, lupita nyong'o, matthew mcconaughey, michael fassbender, mud, nebraska, netflix, Oscars, out of the furnace, paradise now, patsey, philomena, pink, pizza delivery, place beyond the pines, ryan gosling, sally hawkins, sandra bullock, seth mcfarlane, solomon northup, spielberg, steve mcqueen, terrence malick, the 'burbs, the act of killing, the new world, tom cruise, tree of life, wizard of oz, wolf of wall street

So the 86th Academy Awards have come and gone and now that we’ve had a week to digest what happened in the Dolby Theatre on Sunday, now it’s time to sort it all out – what, if anything, did the Academy get right and what did they get wrong? Who better to tell you than your old buddy, Harmonov?

It was good to see Ellen Degeneres back at the helm. Seth McFarlane filled his role last year, but I wasn’t terribly excited about him as the host. Ellen told great jokes, skewered Hollywood quite nicely and kept the incredibly boring show rolling despite the producers’ best efforts to make it the worst show in memory. Ellen made the show fun despite the selfie non-sense. I guess some people eat that shit up. Not this guy. And I did appreciate Ellen looking like she just finished presenting a case in the House of Lords sans the ridiculous ass wig.

And let’s face it, folks – the “Hero” theme this year was as fucking awful as the “Musical” theme from last year. The montages were boring (way too much Tom Cruise) and the Pink/Wizard of Oz tribute was preposterous. With Liza Minnelli sitting in the audience, we get Pink to do this? Come the fuck on. And let’s be serious, why do the damn thing at all, right?

The pizza delivery may well have been the high point of the non-award shenanigans. Should I really have enjoyed watching Jennifer Lawrence scarfing down a slice of pizza as much as I did? Who am I kidding? I didn’t really care at all, although I think we were all secretly waiting for her to drop it on her dress.

So on to the awards…

While it seemed that Gravity, who had swiped seven awards up to the time when Best Picture was announced, might pull off the win, I’m happy to say that the Academy got this one right with 12 Years a Slave taking home the Oscar. I’ve said for months it was the strongest film of the year and it’s nice that the voters actually agreed. I do wonder, especially in light of the two anonymous Academy voters saying they voted for 12 Years a Slave without having seen it, if Ellen was right when she quipped that either “a)12 Years a Slave will win Best picture or b) You’re all racists.” I think I saw all but 8 or 9 of all the films nominated in every category. That I, a professional (well…let’s not rush to judgment there) with a 40-hour+/week job and two kids, was somehow able to see nearly all of the films nominated makes me question the Academy and the voting all the more. Get your fucking act in gear Academy. Anyhither, this was a two-pony race for the last few weeks with American Hustle falling by the wayside.  I will say this – get a documentary into the Best Picture category. There is too much going on in that arena of film to be denied consideration. I will address this later on.

It was great to see Alfonso Cuarón pull out the win for Gravity, but I will still pulling for Steve McQueen. Cuarón more than deserved one for Children of Men, one of my favorite films of the aughts. Likewise, McQueen should have had one for Hunger as well. I feel certain that we will see more from them both in the future that will merit awards consideration. There was no villain for me to root against in this category this year like there was with Spielberg last year. I would have even been fine with David O. Russell winning for American Hustle, which came home with a goose egg, winning no Oscars in the ten categories it was nominated. Shame, really, because it was very good. And a quick note – Cuarón is the first man born of Latino heritage to take home the Best Director award (McQueen would have been the first African-American to do so), so this was a historic night. Let’s not lose sight of that. In a category that has been cornered by white men (Kathryn Bigelow and Ang Lee are the only two from minority populations to have won this award), Cuarón‘s win was historic. I feel like this was lost somehow.

The Best Supporting Actress category was another that was mildly close until the voting ended. Academy voters had a choice – award Hollywood “it” girl Jennifer Lawrence with back-to-back Oscars at age 23 (obviously the youngest to do so) for a performance in American Hustle that I wouldn’t even consider one of the best five of the year (it was still good, though) as an ignored New Jersey housewife or give the award to Lupita Nyong’o for her brave performance as Patsey, a tortured slave and the object of affection for her brutal owner. Seemed like a no-brainer and I’m glad the Academy chose wisely. So often they fall on the wrong side. June Squibb and Sally Hawkins were both sentimental favorites of sorts knowing that neither had a chance. Hawkins‘ turn was nothing short of amazing and to stand out when acting alongside Cate Blanchett in what amounts to her signature starring role is no small feat. She charmed again just like she did in Happy-Go-Lucky. She is simply fantastic and I always look forward to how she crafts her characters. June Squibb gave us without a doubt the funniest performance in any of the acting categories. I was so glad that they showed the cemetery clip from Nebraska for the nominees sequence. I laughed heartily at that scene. Julia Roberts…you can suck it. If ever there was a token nomination, this is a great example. Still building her characters exactly the same as she did 20 years ago, it’s good to see the Academy recognizing the range in her work. What a fucking joke. There were at least ten performances that deserved a nomination over hers. And this is why I can’t help but to question the merit of the Academy voters. Sigh.

The Best Supporting Actor was a race that was wrapped up months ago with Jared Leto taking home the Oscar for his role as Rayon, the transsexual business partner of Ron Woodroof in Dallas Buyers Club. It was a great performance, but I still say this award should have gone to Michael Fassbender for 12 Years a Slave. Both of the films were important as were the roles and performances, but Leto‘s performance didn’t leave anywhere near the impact that Fassbender‘s did. And let me point this out…Jordan Catalano now has an Oscar. Who’d a thunk? I thought this was the weakest set of nominations in the acting groups with Jonah Hill and Bradley Cooper both stretches to be honored alongside Leto, Fassbender and Barkhad Abdi, who I thought was just fantastic in Captain Phillips. I thought that Casey Affleck (Out of the Furnace) and Ryan Gosling (Place Beyond the Pines) were the two better choices in this category.

This one was settled months ago as well and it’s hard to get mad at this pick. The story was important and the performance was spot-on (this is hard for me to admit), but to me it wasn’t even his best performance of the year (see Mud people…for serious). My vote would have gone Chiwetel Ejiofor in 12 Years a Slave. Obviously I’ve made no bones about it being what I believe to be the best film of the year and its success was steeped in the three key performances – Ejiofor, Nyong’o and Fassbender (Sarah Paulson‘s is nothing to scoff at either). Christian Bale landing a nod here was worthy, but not the strongest of his career. Despite American Hustle scoring 10 nominations, it seemed that Bale was lost in the shuffle of everything else. I thought DiCaprio shone quite brightly in The Wolf of Wall Street, which is also very hard to admit. Bruce Dern took it on the chin for his age at every awards show, but he was fantastic, although if you’re going to laud him, his work for The ‘Burbs should be heavily considered.

This was the toughest one for me to choose who I wanted to win. When I saw Cate Blanchett in Blue Jasmine this past summer, I knew it was a performance to be reckoned with, standard for her. She brings it every time and is without a doubt my favorite actress working today. However, Amy Adams is just as consistent and I thought her performance in American Hustle was the best part of that film. She has been nominated five times and has been deserving of the award every year. She will get hers at some point in what I believe is the very near future, but this one was tough. Meryl Streep broke the record for most nomination by an actor/actress for her role in August: Osage County, an over the top performance that really doesn’t stack up against most of the other 17 she’s received. We get it Academy, you love Meryl. We do, too, but seriously, it dilutes the importance of the nomination when you give her one for every fucking performance. STOP. Sandra Bullock was okay in Gravity, but once again, I don’t think she’s got a tremendous amount of range and frankly without the special effects to keep the eyes busy, I doubt she gets a nod. Judi Dench was good in Philomena, but she is like Meryl in that if it’s a serious role outside of the Bond films, she’ll get a nod. Her Irish accent needed some work as well.

And with Blanchett’s win, we did get to see this:

Her and Daniel Day-Lewis together on the same stage…I’m surprised the world was not swallowed in a vortex of badassery because that’s precisely what this is. Worth watching the show for this one shot alone…

And I just wanted to say how happy I was to see Emmanuel Lubezki finally win and Oscar for cinematography. His work with Terrence Malick in The Tree of Life and The New World as well as his photography in Cuarón‘s Children of Men were all the best nominated in those years. Now, if we can just get Roger Deakins one, all will be right in the category.

And I would be remiss if I didn’t once again say that Joshua Oppenheimer‘s The Act of Killing losing the Best Documentary Feature award to 20 Feet from Stardom shows what pussies the Academy can be. That The Act of Killing was not nominated for Best Picture was tragedy enough, but losing this is truly unconscionable. This is a film that will (and already has) affect long term change in Indonesia and helps opens people’s eyes to an atrocity that had American backing (although this isn’t explicitly said in the film) and makes us question our roles as accomplices in acts as despicable as what occurred in Indonesia in 1965 and the lasting effect it still has. Watch the film, people. Get to Netflix asap. I don’t want to take anything away from 20 Feet from Stardom because it is a fine film, one which I enjoyed very much, and the stories of the backup singers in it are compelling, but it just doesn’t even compare on any level to the reach that The Act of Killing has had and will have. I was lucky enough to sit in a room with Oppenheimer last week and have him explain this film, his motivation for making it and how it affects us all and came out even more convinced that this film losing this award is an artistic tragedy. Much in the same way they passed up Brokeback Mountain and Paradise Now, the Academy went with the safe bet. I can’t abide that. Film is a medium that can provoke thought, start discussions and cause people to act (see Blackfish). It’s at its best when it does so. The Academy missed an opportunity to bring forth discussion.

Another year in the books and another year until I get to bitch about something that really has no relevance to the world outside of a group of super rich people jerking each other off over taking at least $8 from us each time we visit the theater to see one of their creations. Funny that.

If I Had Chosen the Academy Award Winners and Nominees – 2014 Edition

Tags

12 years a slave, a seriouis man, abdellatif kechiche, academy awards, adam stone, adele exarchopolous, ain't them bodies saints, alfonso cuaron, ama, american hustle, amy adams, andrew bujalski, andrew cohn, anne hathaway, atom egoyan, barkhad abdi, beasts of the souther wild, before midnight, ben richardson, bending steel, Benoît Debie, blackfish, blue is the warmest color, blue jasmine, bradford young, brie larson, captain phillips, casey affleck, cate blanchett, children of men, chiwetel ejiofor, chris wonder schoeck, coen brothers, computer chess, dallas buyers club, damsels in distress, daniel day-lewis, daniella kertesz, dave carroll, davy rothbart, dazed & confused, don logan, duplass brothers, emmauel lubezki, errol morris, eternal sunshine of the spotless mind, ethan coen, ethan hawke, frances ha, ghalia lacroix, gladiator, gravity, greta gerwig, hal hartley, harvey weinstein, her, inside llewyn davis, invisible war, jared leto, jeff nichols, jeff pope, jennifer lawrence, joaquin phoenix, joe swanberg, joel coen, john ridley, joshua oppenheimer, julie delpy, june squibb, kristin scott thomas, lisbeth salander, lupita nyong'o, magdalene sisters, matthew mcconaughey, medora, melissa leo, memento, michael fassbender, mud, mumblecore, nebraska, no such thing, noah baumbach, only god forgives, oscar isaac, Oscars, out of the furnace, philip seymour hoffman, philomena, reddit, richard linklater, rooney mara, ryan gosling, sally hawkins, sarah polley, schindler's list, searching for sugar man, seaworld, sexy beast, shane carruth, shipping news, short term 12, solomon northup, spartacus, spike jonze, spring breakers, steve coogan, steve mcqueen, stories we tell, terence winter, terrence malick, the act of killing, the fighter, the place beyond the pines, the sweet hereafter, the wolf of wall street, tilikum, titanic, tom cruise, tree of life, tye sheridan, undefeated, united states of tara, upstream color, werner herzog, whit stillman, world war z

So we are less than a week away from the Oscar ceremony, so I now feel like it’s my turn to chime in on what I think the best films in the major categories were and who should win.

I did this last year and felt pretty good about my choices. In hindsight, the only change I would make is that I wish I listed The Invisible War in both the Best Documentary Feature and Best Picture categories because the more I think about it as a film and the impact it has had, it should have merited more consideration. I think it’s a stronger film than Searching for Sugar Man, which is still a fantastic film.

Let’s do this:

Best Picture

The Act of Killing
Ain’t Them Bodies Saints
American Hustle
Blue Is the Warmest Color
Frances Ha
Gravity
Her
Inside Llewyn Davis
12 Years a Slave* (winner)
Upstream Color

I listed 10 films instead of the nine that the Academy nominated because I felt that these 10 represented the best films of the year, although there were plenty that could have slid into contention. I’ve try to make it painfully obvious that 12 Years a Slave is the best film of the year. From top to bottom, it is lush with fantastic acting and technical merit. Steve McQueen, whose two previous feature films were equally good, is at the top of his game here. As is typical, the Academy chose bigger studio fare over edgier films. The Act of Killing is a film that equals the power of 12 Years a Slave and I find it ridiculous that the Academy didn’t give it consideration in this category. Chicken shits. Maybe if Harvey Weinstein had been pushing it, it would have ended up with the nod. Gravity is a film that I struggled with, moving it off and keeping it on this list repeatedly. Ultimately, I decided it deserved a spot. I think Alfonso Cuarón makes really fantastic films (I think Children of Men is criminally underrated), but ultimately it had too much of a Titanic-in-space feel to it to have me slot it in the top spot. The effects are insanely mesmerizing, though, which is something Cuarón is very good at handling as a director (once again, see Children of Men).  I still can’t believe that the Coen Brothers‘ Inside Llewyn Davis was essentially shut out. What a joke. This film can easily be seen as a companion piece to the Best Picture-nominated A Serious Man and Oscar Issac‘s lead performance is simply stunning. Upstream Color is a film that would likely put off 9 of every 10 viewers, so it’s no surprise that it was not nominated for the Oscar. I would argue it is the most inventive film of the year and another triumph for writer/director/actor Shane Carruth who is joined as ably by Amy Seimetz.

Best Director

Shane Carruth – Upstream Color
Joel & Ethan Coen – Inside Llewyn Davis
Alfonso Cuarón –  Gravity
Steve McQueen – 12 Years a Slave* (winner)
Joshua Oppenheimer – The Act of Killing* (winner)

As stated above, McQueen brought his A-game to 12 Years a Slave. This film is to slavery films what Schindler’s List is to Holocaust films. It’s that important and McQueen is a large part of that. Some say he is a sadist, that he revels in the pain that his films portray. I don’t agree with that. While his films do depict a tremendous amount of pain, they do so with a distance that allows the viewer to see these acts and reflect on their heinousness and how they apply to the world at large rather than situating the viewer in the position to view the film just to watch them squirm. McQueen gives it to us raw, but trusts us sort out what we see. I appreciate that. I can’t speak highly enough of Joshua Oppenheimer‘s work on The Act of Killing. It is a film that will forever stick with me and the effort and extent to which he went to create this film is just astounding. This is a film that enlightens, sickens and never redeems, which is an important lesson since life is often reflects this same pattern. That this film is a documentary is all the more amazing. Oppenheimer and co-producers Werner Herzog and Errol Morris (two of the finest documentarians in the history of the genre) did an AMA on reddit just yesterday which is chock full of worthy insights about the film. Check it out, here. They do a far better job at describing the film and its virtues.

Best Actress

Amy Adams – American Hustle
Cate Blanchett – Blue Jasmine* (winner – tie)
Adèle Exarchopoulos – Blue Is the Warmest Color* (winner – tie)
Greta Gerwig – Frances Ha
Brie Larson – Short Term 12

This, to me, was the hardest category to pick a winner. All five of the amazing women I would have nominated knocked their roles out of the park and each of them are deserving of an Oscar for their performances. Blanchett absolutely stunned me in Blue Jasmine, but then again, she does this even in roles like hers in The Shipping News (a shitty film to be sure, but damn she was solid). She is an equal to the likes of Daniel Day-Lewis. Meryl Streep and Phillip Seymour Hoffman (RIP), all chameleons in the roles they choose/chose. Exarchopolous blew me away in Blue Is the Warmest Color, the 3-hour tale of Adele’s maturation and metamorphosis from youth to adult. The range that Exarchopolous is able to achieve in the role is truly noteworthy and I can’t wait to see more from her. Just fantastic. Brie Larson actually received my vote for the Independent Spirit Awards for her role as troubled teen facility manager Grace. She, like Exarchopolous, are throwbacks to Hollywood’s Golden Age of acting, able to convey so much emotion without speaking a single word, just by using her eyes and gestures. After cutting her teeth in Showtime’s The United States of Tara, I knew we would see great things from her. Greta Gerwig is quickly becoming one of my favorite people to watch on film. Her collaboration with Noah Baumbach in Frances Ha is just the jumping off point for many people who may not have been exposed to her earlier work in the “mumblecore” arena in works by Joe Swanberg and the Duplass Brothers as well as in Whit Stillman‘s fantastic Damsels in Distress. Amy Adams is well past getting her Oscar. She’s been in the unfortunate position the last few years to be up against Hollywood darlings like Anne Hathaway, Cate Blanchett and co-actress in The Fighter, Melissa Leo. Her day will come and hopefully, it will come soon. She is spot-on in everything she does.

Best Actor

Chiwetel Ejiofor – 12 Years a Slave* (winner)
Oscar Isaac – Inside Llewyn Davis
Matthew McConaughey – Dallas Buyers Club
Joaquin Phoenix – Her
Tye Sheridan – Mud

While not as strong of a class of performances as the women, these five performances were quite incredible. McConaughey is a lock to win the Oscar and he was truly outstanding in Dallas Buyers Club (his best since Dazed & Confused), but I truly think this award goes to Chiwetel Ejiofor for his role as Solomon Northup in 12 Years a Slave. I already said it’s the best film of the year and Ejiofor‘s performance is a large reason as to why. A strong, measured approach, Ejiofor embodies the struggle that Northup had to go trough making it visceral. Two scenes absolutely broke me while watching this – the hanging scene (if you’ve seen it, you know what I’m talking about) and when he finally gives over, singing the song to honor the fallen slave in the field. These are the two most powerful scenes in film this year, and plenty of the others come from Ejiofor’s castmates. I’ve mentioned it before, but Oscar Isaac was completely robbed for Inside Llewyn Davis. Playing another Coen Brothers lovable loser, Oscar‘s performance transcended the film and left one of the more lasting impressions for me this year. It’s unfortunate that Jeff Nichols‘ Mud has been so overlooked this year and in that same vein, that Tye Sheridan has gotten barely a whisper of praise for his performamce. Self-assured to the point you’d think he’s been acting for years, Sheridan had only acted in one film prior to Mud and that was the exquisite Tree of Life (directed by the one and only Terrence Malick). I expect great things from in the future as he has six new projects lined up or in some form of production. With the arrival of Her, I think many people can agree that we are happy that the supposed rap career of Joaquin Phoenix was a hoax. A sublime film and an equally sublime performance, it’s easy to see why Phoenix is one of the most exciting actors working.

Best Supporting Actress

Sally Hawkins – Blue Jasmine
Daniella Kertesz – World War Z
Rooney Mara – Ain’t Them Bodies Saints
Lupita Nyong’o – 12 Years a Slave* (winner)
June Squibb – Nebraska
Kristin Scott Thomas – Only God Forgives

This is a category that I literally could not whittle down to five nominees, so suck it, Academy. I would have nominated six women. That Sally Hawkins was not overshadowed by Cate Blanchett in Blue Jasmine should be a testament to how strong her performance really is. She holds her own and that is no small feat. A broken record, I know, but Lupita Nyong’o takes the trophy home in this category. As Patsey in 12 Years a Slave, she personifies the different dangers that female slaves, especially those favored by their white owners, faced – rape, torture and drawing the ire of the white mistresses. I was completely blown away by her. She is currently locked in a dogfight with Hollywood “it girl” Jennifer Lawrence for the Oscar, but truth be told, Lawrence‘s performance doesn’t hold a candle to any of the six I’ve mentioned here. Perhaps the biggest surprise here might be Daniella Kertesz. Her ballsy, hard-as-nails Israeli soldier in World War Z was one of the few bright spots of a totally uneven and often times silly movie. I could have watched a film solely about her character Segen. June Squibb made me laugh so damn hard during Nebraska and she completely deserves this nomination. Kristin Scott-Thomas goes full Don Logan is this film which was quite polarizing for the few who saw it. All the same, much fun to see her pull off a gangster. Rooney Mara is starting to show off her chops and I believe that Ain’t Them Bodies Saints is her coming out party. She did well with the Lisbeth Salander role, but she had another film to base it off of. Her we see her full potential and I look forward to seeing more from her.

Best Supporting Actor

Barkhad Abdi – Captain Phillips
Casey Affleck – Out of the Furnace
Michael Fassbender – 12 Years a Slave* (winner)
Ryan Gosling – The Place Beyond the Pines
Jared Leto – Dallas Buyers Club

FASSBENDER. It’s hard to say how much I enjoy watching this man work. As deplorable as his character is in 12 Years a Slave, he crafts one of the great villains this year. Immersive, Fassbender continues to amaze in every role he undertakes. GET THIS MAN AN OSCAR. Casey Affleck continues his triumphs as he chooses grittier roles. While the film may have been uneven, his turn was a bright spot. Barkhad Abdi in his first film role wows as the chief pirate trying to overtake the ship in Captain Phillips. I thought he would be a frontrunner for this award, but everyone knows Jared Leto has this one sewn up. It’s hard to believe Jordan Catalano will be an Oscar-winner. I must admit he is better than I thought he could be, but I think there is something to be said for the many transgendered actors out there not having a shot at the role. Ryan Gosling continues his ascent by delivering a nuanced performance as the motorcycle-riding bank robber trying to do well my his baby son in The Place Beyond the Pines. This was an overlooked performance (and film, in fact) due to its early release date last April. Oscar voters have short memories, apparently. Shame, really.

Best Documentary

The Act of Killing
Blackfish
Medora
Stories We Tell
Bending Steel

I’m not sure if it’s my age or what, but the older I get the more documentaries I watch. This is an area of film that is budding with possibility and so exciting to watch. My list of films in this category differs completely from the Academy’s. No surprise. I’ve spoken about The Act of Killing ad nauseum here, so I won’t expound on it much more. It is one of the two best films of the year and it deserves any and all accolades it gets and plenty of those that other films steal away from it. That Blackfish got no Oscar nod is one of the great tragedies of the year. The film, which details the life of killer whale Tilikum at SeaWorld (who has killed three people, including two trainers), sheds light on animals in captivity and how wrong it is. Incredibly gripping and in almost any other year, this would get my vote for the win. Sarah Polley‘s Stories We Tell is also another notable Academy Award nominee omission that deserves great praise. A story centered around the mystery of who is really the father of the director (also an accomplished actress – see Atom Egoyan‘s magnificent The Sweet Hereafter as well as Hal Hartley‘s pertinent No Such Thing). This gripping story filmed with the help of her family and the man who she thought was her father for 20 years, one can’t help but to be swept up in the tale’s twists and turns. This film is a phenomenal achievement. Medora is simply fantastic. On the surface, it’s about a struggling high school basketball team in small town Indiana, but it’s really a metaphor for the loss of small town America. Davy Rothbart and Andrew Cohn did for high school basketball what Undefeated did for high school football. It’s a shame it didn’t grab the same amount of buzz that Undefeated did. Bending Steel is a film that likely few have seen. It is still touring on the festival circuit awaiting distribution. It is about Chris “Wonder” Schoeck, an introverted personal trainer, and his quest to become an Oldetime Strongman, bending steel bars, horseshoes, tearing decks of cards, etc. A really engaging character piece about the literal triumph of man versus the elements. I can’t speak highly enough of it.

Best Original Screenplay

Andrew Bujalski – Computer Chess
Noah Baumbach & Greta Gerwig – Frances Ha
Spike Jonze – Her
Ethan & Joel Coen – Inside Llewyn Davis
Shane Carruth – Upstream Color* (winner)

When I think original screenplay, I look for thought-provoking material that pushes the boundaries of what we expect from story. It is rare that we see the really original films nominated in this category and it’s a shame. We all know that Hollywood really is a mechanism to bring in money, so the truly original films have to find a niche audience if they want to succeed, which is a shame. I’m not saying that more conventional films can’t have great screenplays, because they can. But too often are these awards handed out for lackluster films that do not innovate in the way the story is told or the situations that the characters are positioned. I mean, fucking Gladiator was nominated in this category. How good was that script really? Recycled from Spartacus with a few changes and there you go. Boo, hiss. Let’s not forget Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Memento neither one scored this award, and who can argue that those are two of the most orignal, best executed scripts of the last 25 years? So, Upstream Color to me was the clear winner in this category. It is like nothing I’ve ever seen and is a film that kept me thinking for weeks after seeing it. To synopsize it is nearly impossible. It involves a mind control powder taken from worms that is used to bilk people out of their money. Check it out on Netflix. It will blow your mind. Her is such an inventive turn for a romantic comedy/quasi-science fiction film. Spike Jonze may well win the Oscar in this category and he would get my vote in that group of nominees. Computer Chess is another film that unfortunately flew under the radar for most folks. Rare is the movie that really captures the essence of the 80s as well as this film does. From its photography to its premise (creating computer chess programs in archais computer languages to battle against each other), this film is the 80s personified. And Frances Ha‘s brilliance lies in its dialogue, captured so beautifully by Noah Baumbach and Greta Gerwig. This is great set of films, most of which too few people have seen.

Best Adapted Screenplay

Steve Coogan & Jeff Pope – Philomena
Ethan Hawke, Julie Delpy, Richard Linklater – Before Midnight
Abdellatif Kechiche & Ghalia Lacroix – Blue Is the Warmest Color
John Ridley – 12 Years a Slave* (winner)
Terence Winter – The Wolf of Wall Street

The process of adaptation can’t be easy. Usually the source material is far more expansive than one film can handle, so whittling it down to make a coherent story usually takes some license. However, when it works it can be magical. 12 Years a Slave fits this bill as I think John Ridley‘s script gives us the highest highs and the lowest lows of Solomon Northup’s journey. I was quite surprised by Philomena, I must admit. This is a film that is pure Oscar bait and it’s no wonder that Harvey Weinstein is pushing it out so hard, certainly his forte. But the way Steve Coogan and Jeff Pope fashioned the story caught me by surprise. I was entranced the entire time and wasn’t expecting that. I will say that The Magdalene Sisters is a far better film on the same subject, but Philomena is still very good. Blue Is the Warmest Color is a tremendous feat and worth every minute of the heartbreak and ebullient love. A finely crafted screenplay and worthy of a nod. Terence Winter‘s script for The Wolf of Wall St. is cheeky and smug and very representative of its protagonist, Jordan Belfort. Before Midnight, the third film in the collab between Ethan Hawke, Julie Delpy and Richard Linklater, is just as endearing as the other two, and I find it hard to believe that I would ever have said that about any of them.

Best Cinematography

Shane Carruth – Upstream Color
Benoît Debie – Spring Breakers
Emmanuel Lubezki – Gravity* (winner)
Adam Stone – Mud
Bradford Young – Ain’t Them Bodies Saints

This is a category that can literally make a mediocre film shine. Spring Breakers fits this bill. A tale of youth gone wild on Spring Break in Florida is average at best with an overinflated sense of edge by having two former Disney princesses (Vanessa Hudgens and Selena Gomez) booze and fuck and do drugs while hanging out with gangsters. However, Benoît Debie‘s photography makes this a far more watchable film. Capturing the colors and the brightness of Florida, Debie elevates this film to heights that it couldn’t have reached without it. It will be no shock when Emmanuel Lubezki finally hoists the Oscar on Sunday. Frankly, he deserved it for both Children of Men and The Tree of Life, but here he will at last taste victory. Almost shot entirely in a space setting, he is able to catch every little detail and add lushness to a landscape of vast emptiness. No small feat. Bradford Young I would compare to Ben Richardson, whose photography in Beasts of the Southern Wild was last year’s best. An up-and-comer, I expect great things. Adam Stone is a wild card here, but his ability to capture the southern river culture in Mud was incredible. And once again, I can’t speak highly enough of Shane Carruth‘s work in Upstream Color. From the palette he used to the angles of the shots, the photography was fully integrated into the film creating this fully formed organism acting like the drug culled from the worms in the film – invading you and taking over your being. This film is so damn good. Watch it, people.

So there you have it, a little long-winded, but those are my picks for the major categories at the Oscars. It’s really a shame that I can’t vote for them. I saw all but 5 films out of everything nominated for an Oscar. Chances are I would be a better judge of what should win than say…Tom Cruise, right? Oh well. If I got to vote, I’d still find something to bitch about. Agree or not with my picks, 2013 offered some truly amazing films and plenty of shitty ones.

The Oscar Nominated Short Films Are Pretty Badass

Tags

agoraphobe, alejandra lorente, alexandre espigares, ali abdullah saleh, aliza herz-sommer, anders walter, animated, aquel no era ya, avant que de tout perdre, Baldwin Li, Casper Crump, cavedigger, child soldiers, cloud atlas, concentration camp, czechoslavakia, daniel sousa, david mitchell, disney, Do I Have to Take Care of Everything?, documentary, dreamworks, edgar barens, esteban crespo, facing fear, feral, frozen, future, get a horse!, gillian anderson, greystoke, gustavo salmeron, hate crime, helium, holocaust, hosni mubarak, jack hall, jahane noujaim, jan lachauer, jason cohen, jeffrey karoff, Joanna Haartti, julia donaldson, Just Before Losing Everything, karama has no walls, lady in number 6, lauren macmullen, laurent witz, lea drucker, live action, malcolm clarke, Marijana Jankovic, Mark Gill, martin freeman, mathilde auneveux, matthew boger, max lang, Miljan Chatelain, monsters inc., mr. hublot, museum of tolerance, nominated, number9dream, OCD, oscar, Pelle Falk Krusbæk, Pitääkö Mun Kaikki Hoitaa?, pizar, possessions, prague, prison terminal, ra paulette, revolution, rob brydon, rogue, room on the broom, sally hawkins, Santtu Karvonen, sara ishaq, Selma Vilhunen, short films, shrek, shuhei morita, simon pegg, skinhead, that wasn't me, the square, The Voorman Problem, tim zall, tom hollander, ukraine, witch, x-men, xavier legrand, yemen

Since 1998, I’ve followed the Oscars very closely and for some reason actually enjoy watching the show. It usually provides fodder for me to complain about since the Academy rarely picks the films that I deem best as their best. So it goes. And in the Oscar pools that I participate in, the short film categories (live action, animated and documentary) usually leave me clueless as to who should win since I never get a chance to see them. This year, however, that has changed. I’ve been fortunate enough to get to view them ahead of Hollywood’s Big Dance and have been extremely excited to do so. I can’t imagine how many films were submitted for these awards, but I have been exceedingly impressed with most of the films that made the cut.

Animated Shorts

Get a Horse!

This is Disney’s annual entry in this category, something I’ve always thought of as weak. They (along with Pixar, a Disney-owned company) have had a stranglehold on the Best Animated Feature ever since it was introduced at the 2001 Oscars (ironically, Shrek, a Dreamworks film, won over Pixar’s Monsters, Inc.).

Get a Horse! is an interesting film as it brings the historical Mickey Mouse into the modern era by mixing animation from the original black and white films with the depth and color of modern animation with the two of them literally battling it out as Peg-Leg Pete kidnaps Minnie Mouse and tries to keep her away from Mickey Mouse. I must say, the animation as the characters alternate between the black and white world and the color world is pretty amazing. My kids absolutely adored this when we saw it before Frozen. Directed by Lauren MacMullen (nice to see Disney finally getting some women directors into the mix), Get a Horse! is the likely Oscar winner in this category. Is it the best film, though? Not in my opinion. Fun all the same, though.

Mr. Hublot

An incredibly inventive film set in some nebulous future time that follows Mr. Hublot, an agoraphobe with OCD, who works out of his home content to fix his belongings and trinkets and watch the TV rather than step out into the cold, scary world. One day, he overhears a robotic dog being dumped in the street outside his dwelling. He watches the pet over a series of days, curious about it.

When it appears that the box the dog has been using as a house is being dumped into a shredder, Mr. Hublot finally breaks out of his home into the world to rescue the dog. Seemingly too late as the box has been dumped into the shredder, the robo-dog sidles up next to him. Mr. Hublot takes the dig in, not thinking about how it would disrupt his orderly world. As time passes, the dog grows bigger and bigger, space runs out for him and Mr. Hublot is no longer able to keep his belongings in the order he wishes. So what else can he do? The rendering in the animation is out of this world and Mr. Hublot’s world is so vivid that it seems real. The final scene is rather touching, but I don’t want to give it away. This was by far my favorite of the films in this category and I would dearly love to see it pull off the surprise win on March 2. This film was directed by Laurent Witz and Alexandre Espigares.

Feral

The most curious of the five films nominated in this category, Feral follows a similar narrative as that of Greystoke – a boy is found living in the woods among the wolves by a man. He is brought to civilization and taught the ways of city folk – he’s cleaned up, has clothes to wear and is sent to school. It’s clear this is a world that is not suitable for him, however. He also seems to have special powers a la Rogue from the X-Men, able to connect with and steal the essence of other beings and objects becoming them. He deserts his civilized surroundings and retreats back to the forest where he belongs. The animation of this film is much different than the others in this category as it appears handpainted, like a Bob Ross watercolor, eschewing the CGI of Mr. Hublot and the mixture of hand drawn animation and CGI in Get a Horse! The effect is quite arresting, though. Written and directed by Daniel Sousa.

Possessions

A well told supernatural tale taking place in a forest in Japan, Possessions catches Otoko lost amidst a thunderstorm in the woods. When he sees a temple embedded in a large tree, he seeks refuge there. It is here that he awakens spirits who come to him in a variety of ways – broken paper umbrellas, a dragon formed out of debris and refuse and a ghostly beauty who showers rich fabrics on Otoko.

As a man who fixes anything, he does his best to put things right. This was my second favorite of the five in this category and really interesting to watch as it was so different than the other films. Directed by Shuhei Morita.

Room on the Broom

It seems that feature-length animated films drawing A-List talent to voice, the shorts are as well. With talent such as Simon Pegg, Gillian Anderson, two-time Oscar-nominated actress Sally Hawkins and Rob Brydon all lending their voices to Room on the Broom, one can figure this one will get its fair share of attention. Based on the book by Julia Donaldson, the story revolves around a happy-go-lucky witch who with her cat flies around on her broomstick doing what witches do. However, when her hat blows off in the wind and they go to look for it, they come across a stray dog who is chewing on it. She decides to add him to the group…much to the chagrin of her cat.

When next she drops the bow in her hair, they all go look for it. This time a bird finds the bow…and also joins the group, the broomstick running out of room. Next when she drops her wand, a frog finds it and he, too, joins the group. However, the whole time that they are dallying, a dragon she accidentally created at the beginning of the film is chasing her and it finally catches up to her. As she tries to get away, the broomstick breaks and she fears that her end is nigh. However, the four animals band together to trick and scare the dragon away. With the broom only half its size, how will it accommodate all of the animals? This film has a really cute ending and I can see why it has a large audience. I’m not really into cute, so this one didn’t do it for me. I would bet quite a bit though that many people would really like it if they were able to see it. Directed by Jan Lachauer and Max Lang.

Live Action Shorts

Short films like short fiction have usually left me a little cold. Never getting enough time with the characters or for the situation to develop, in the past I have dismissed them. This was stupid of me. The more I watch shorts, the more I’m impressed by them – by their narrative efficiency, by the quality of the writing and with the advent of better, cheaper technology, the quality of the look. And much in the same way that top tier talent are working in the animated short films, we see the same in the live action shorts. This year, where the short animated films were flights of fancy, three of the the live action nominees were unexpectedly full of heavy and pertinent subject matter.  This is an amazing crop of films with some as short as 6 minutes and others as long as 30 minutes.

Aquel No Era Yo (That Wasn’t Me)

So…wasn’t expecting what I got from this one. When two doctors, a couple Paula (Alejandra Lorente) and Juanjo (Gustavo Salmerón), attempt to connect with a rogue group of guerrillas in the jungle of Africa, the trip goes exceedingly awry. When the local warlord finds them stuck at a checkpoint, held up by two child soldiers (one can assume that they have been kidnapped and conscripted), they are taken to the guerrilla camp and interrogated along with their driver. As one might expect, things go badly from here.

Death, rape and army intervention all follow as Paula escapes with one of the child soldiers from the beginning. Scared of the surrounding the situation and the boy, who has already shown her many reasons why she should be afraid, Paula does everything she can to secure their safe passage. Book-ended by two passages showing who we are to believe is the grown up version of the child soldier telling his tale in a lecture setting, we see Paula in the crowd. Redemptive and poignant, this is a story that is of this day and age and extremely powerful. Writer-director Esteban Crespo wove a tight, white-knuckle inducing narrative in the less than 30 minute running time. This one has maybe the second best shot at winning the Oscar.

Avant Que De Tout Perdre (Just Before Losing Everything)

Avant Que De Tout Perdre hits you in the gut much in the same way Aquel No Era Yo does, but much more subtly. The film opens with Julien (Miljan Chatelain) making his way to school, but getting sidetracked, playing around and not making much of an effort to get there despite being accosted by one of his teachers. Wee receive no reason for his erratic behavior until, after ensconcing himself under a bridge, he hears a car horn and jumps into the car. A frantic woman, his mother Miriam (Léa Drucker), then picks up her daughter Joséphine (Mathilde Auneveux), who, in tears is torn away from her boyfriend.

At this point, we know something is up. They drive, carefully scanning the scene, to Miriam’s place of employ (a department store) where she resigns her position. It is then that she tells of the abuse she suffers at the hands of her husband and she must leave with the children immediately. As she goes through the process of terminating her work, he shows up unexpectedly to talk to her. Fearing for her life, she covers the best she can to throw him off any scent that she might be leaving him. With the help of her sister, who is waiting at a nearby gas station, and her coworkers, the threat that her husband poses is absolutely terrifying and palpable. This is a short film that shows you don’t need much to set up arguably the tensest moments I’ve seen in film in the past year. This is a truly incredible piece of filmmaking by Xavier Legrand.

Helium

And so continues the happy subject matter of the live action shorts category. Helium is far and away my favorite of this set of shorts. Extremely sad in some parts and incredibly uplifting in others, Helium hits especially hard for those who have children. The film takes place in a hospital where new janitor Enzo (Casper Crump) meets Alfred (Pelle Falk Krusbæk), a young boy with an unspecified terminal disease.

Enzo makes an immediate connection with the boy, who asks tough questions of Enzo, who, in turn, weaves a tale for the ages to help usher Alfred to the other side. Helping Alfred visualize where he might go after his death, Enzo tells of the magical place called Helium, a city in the sky that is attainable only by zeppelins and where the homes are suspended in the air by large helium balloons. Enzo tells him this story over several days and when Alfred is moved to a hospice-like part of the hospital before hearing the end of the story, Enzo, with the help of a nurse (Marijana Jankovic), gets to Alfred just in time. This film is magical in so many ways and it would get my vote for the Oscar. Bravo to co-writer and director Anders Walter.

Pitääkö Mun Kaikki Hoitaa? (Do I Have to Take Care of Everything?)

Much lighter fare, Pitääkö Mun Kaikki Hoitaa? brings us a tale of a comedy of errors that befalls one family as they waked up late on morning thinking that they’ve overslept for a wedding they are to attend. In the rush to get ready to go, the mother (Joanna Haartti) does everything she can to get her two kids and herself ready while her husband (Santtu Karvonen) stands by and really doesn’t help adding further frustration and anxiety for the mother.

In the course of the 6-minute long film, everything that can go wrong does (broken heal, skinned knee, dropping the plant they grabbed to give as a gift when they lost the real gift, stained shirt etc.), but at least they arrive to the church almost on time…only to find out it’s the wrong day and there is a funeral going on. Unable to leave as the entire church has turned their attention to them, they play it off as if they were meant to be there. This is a very funny short and one that took me by surprise. Directed by Selma Vilhunen.

The Voorman Problem

We’ve seen it before…a psychiatrist comes to a mental institution to meet with a patient who believes he is a god. Usually, in films such as these, the false prophet is exposed as a delusional schizophrenic. But what happens if the patient actually is a god? And how does he prove it? Well, these are the dilemmas that Dr. Williams (the fantastic Martin Freeman) faces when he meets with Voorman (Tom Hollander), who weaves a very convincing argument as to the fact that he is truly a god. How does he prove it? Well, he erases Belgium from the map and memory of everyone on the planet…or that’s what Dr. Williams is led to believe.

When he goes home after his first meeting with Voorman, Dr. Williams’ wife (Elisabeth Gray) has no idea what he’s talking about when he mentions the country and when he consults a map, where Belgium used to be, it’s just a lake. Convinced that this is some trickery on Voorman’s part, Dr. Williams goes back to the institution to interview him again. Big mistake. Hilariously funny, The Voorman Problem seems to be the odds on favorite to take home the Oscar in this category (for you kids playing in Oscar pools at home). This whimsical tale made me laugh quite a few times. Based on the novel number9dream by David Mitchell (who also wrote Cloud Atlas), it’s no wonder this movie is fantastic. Propers go to Baldwin Li and Mark Gill (who also directed) for the adaptation of this one.

This is an incredible crop of films that really take you through every emotion. I can’t help but to think that that Academy actually it right for once (I can’t believe I’m saying this…). Hopefully anyone interested in these will get a chance to see them in the theaters. A program like this with varied subjects, themes and emotions is quite satisfying as so rarely do entire feature films provide you with a spectrum such as these films do. So check ’em out, people.

Documentary Shorts

Another crop of incredible films, the documentary shorts also tackle incredibly important subject matter, and better, make it accessible for viewers who may not watch an entire feature length doc on similar subjects. All five of these films were incredibly engrossing and several left me wanting more. It is frequent that short films are made into longer films after the fact; there are at least three in this category with which I would like to see that happen.

Cavedigger

Without a doubt, this was my favorite of the group (and I think I would say of all 15 shorts nominated for Oscars) and would get my vote for the Oscar. This film follows Ra Paulette, an artist who digs caves into the soft sandstone hills of New Mexico. At first he did this as a way to commune with the earth, to occupy himself in a worthy manner and dedicate his energies to creating something beautiful that all people could enjoy. When he started getting commissioned to do other caves, he put all of himself into the endeavors. However, without total creative control of the projects, they usually were never finished according to his plans or were abandoned due to differences with those who commissioned the caves.

As he is getting older, Ra decides to dedicate himself to his last work, his magnum opus, in his own backyard. However, when a permanent setback costs him his dream, he’s left to regroup and begin again. Paulette‘s outlook on life and purpose is enviable. He doesn’t crave material possessions, he just wants to express himself in the only way he knows how – in the shaping of cave walls and creating a space that melds the earth to the human experience. I could have watched a 10-hour mini-series on Paulette and his work. That the films leaves off with him 22 months into his final 10-year project, I have hope that director Jeffrey Karoff will revisit Paulette as his projects nears completion and give us a final chapter.

Facing Fear

Facing Fear is an almost unreal story of hate, reconciliation and forgiveness and goes beyond my comprehension of how someone is able to look beyond terrible things done to them and forgive the party who inflicted pain that I hope to never know.  This is the story of Matthew Boger and Tim Zaal and two encounters that changed their lives. When Matthew was a teenager, he’s been kicked out of his house for being gay. He came to Los Angeles to seek refuge, but found little but hostility and abuse. One night he encountered an amped up group of skinheads who decided to that Matthew wasn’t worthy of sharing the street of LA with them, so they beat him mercilessly and left him for dead. Tim Zaal was one of those men.

When, 20+ years later, Zaal, who had reformed his neo-Nazi ways, came to the Museum of Tolerance where Boger was now the manager wanting to tell his story of redemption, they both knew after a few minutes who the other person was. At first reluctant to be near one another, they eventually talked and decided to lecture together and tell their story to help others see what can be achieved by reaching understanding about how our actions affect others and ourselves. I commend both Boger and Zaal for the steps they took to achieve their reconciliation. I don’t think I could have done what Boger did. Directed by Jason Cohen.

The Lady in Number 6

at 109 years old, Aliza Herz-Sommer plays her piano everyday, not like she was once able, but hell, she’s 109. Still chock full of energy, meeting with friends daily, she draws her essence from the music she plays and listens to. Once a famed concert pianist from Prague, Czechoslovakia, Aliza has her share of stories – of love for her husband, her son and her music. However, she also has another part of her story that is encompassed in The Lady in Number 6 – she is a Holocaust survivor.

Of Jewish parentage, Aliza like so many others was whisked off to a concentration camp during WWII, but unlike so many others, she was spared the ending 6 million others like her met. And this was because she could play music so beautifully. This film tells this tale, and masterfully so, and it’s no wonder that this is the film that will likely take home the Oscar for this category. Herz-Sommer is a firecracker and she has great lucidity in telling her tale, one that is rare to hear from a primary source these days. While this is a story that has been told in documentary and live action films alike, both shorts and feature-length, Herz-Sommer‘s outlook on life is a wonder to behold. This film is a testament to her joie de vivre and it is absolutely infectious. Directed by Malcolm Clarke.

Karama Has No Walls

What could easily be a sister piece to Jehane Noujaim‘s The Square, Sara Ishaq‘s Karama Has No Walls centers itself on the popular uprising in Yemen, a country located on the southern end of the Arabian Peninsula. As the Egyptians fought to oust Hosni Mubarak, the Yemenis fought against the 33-year oppressive rule of Ali Abdullah Saleh. They too had their share of heartbreak and pain when peaceful protest came under fire by the police, army and hired thugs.

This film tells the story of several of those who fell in the protest, some of those who were injured and those who made it out alive to see a better day. As tempers flare in places like the Ukraine, films like these have a special kind of significance as they show that overcoming oppression is possible. Ishaq‘s film stitches together all the different narratives in a coherent manner and gives us a broad view of the uprising. Her usage of footage taken at the protests, some of it quite graphic, punches you in the gut and gives the struggle that so many of us take for granted a more visceral presentation. In short, this film hits you in all the right spots. Something that is very hard to do in 26 minutes.

Prison Terminal: The Last Days of Private Jack Hall

Those who are parents know the extremes we will go to protect our children. If something should happen to them that is beyond our control, how far do we go take it right, or at least right in our eyes? Jack Hall did just that – a decorated war veteran, Hall took it upon himself to seek justice for his son who overdosed on drugs and killed the drug dealer who sold the drugs to his son.

Director Edgar Barens trains his camera(s) on Hall during his last months in a maximum security prison where he will die for his crimes. Hall enters the self-created hospice program at the prison he’s at and where he is cared for by fellow inmates, those who are also incarcerated for violent crimes similar to Hall‘s. What Barens delivers is an unflinching look at death as it progresses and how those who are condemned to end their days behind the walls of a prison can die with some dignity whether you believe they deserve it or not.

And that’s the last of categories in the short film categories up for Oscars. Like I said from the outset, this is an incredible slate of films over the three categories. I was duly impressed with the quality and range of the films’ subject matter. Many emotions were brought out while watching these fantastic films and if these are indicative of the state of short films, we all have something to look forward to.

2014 Oscar Nominations – The Year the Coen Brothers Got Gypped

Tags

12 years a slave, 20 feet from stardom, 2014, a serious man, academy awards, adele exarchopolous, ain't them bodies saints, alone yet not alone, american hustle, august: osage county, Benoît Debie, blackfish, blue is the warmest color, blue jasmine, bradford young, cate blanchett, coen brothers, cutie and the boxer, dallas buyers club, dirty wars, emma thompson, gabriela cowperthwaite, gravity, her, howard's end, inside llewyn davis, james franco, jehane nouhaim, jonah hill, joshua oppenheimer, justin timberlake, karen o, la vie d'Adele - chapitres 1 et 2, lee daniels, louis psihoyos, meryl streep, nebraska, no country for old men, oprah winfrey, oscar isaac, Oscars, philomena, precious, sally hawkins, sarah polley, saving mr. banks, sense and sensibility, spring breakers, stories we tell, the act of killing, the butler, the cove, the paperboy, the square, tom hanks, wolf of wall street, woody allen

Today the morons in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences released the nominations for the 24 categories for the Academy Awards which take place on March 2. As usual, they missed the mark (according to this guy) in many different spots again this year. Let’s get down to what sucked and what didn’t…

Screw Jobs

Make no bones about this, the Coen Brothers‘ Inside Llewyn Davis getting only two nominations (a well deserved nomination in cinematography and one for sound mixing) is robbery. The Academy should be brought up on charges for this shit. A friend who is also a film professor aptly stated. “Ignoring [Oscar] Isaac‘s performance is bad, but how can it not even be nominated in any of the music categories?” Well said, Seth. This is arguably the Coen‘s best film since No Country for Old Men, and I would give an argument that A Serious Man was similarly gypped for awards back in 2010. Isaac‘s aforementioned performance is spectacular, and that he sang his own vocals is all the more amazing. Surrounded by a fantastic cast, which surprisingly includes Justin Timberlake who was at least tolerable in his time onscreen, this film deftly evokes the early 60s music scene in New York so well. I’m flabbergasted that it was basically shut out. It will lose both of its categories to Gravity. And to address the snub this film received in the Original Song category I have this to say – pick one song, any one song, from the soundtrack and you have an infinitely better choice than the four of the five chosen for that category (Karen O – I dig your song, you’re cool in my eyes). The predilection of the Academy to give nominations and awards to songs from animated films is a fucking trend that has to stop. Please. Shit is tired. Has anyone even heard of the film Alone Yet Not Alone, by the way?

The feature documentary category was where perhaps the two biggest other snubs occurred. That Gabriela Cowperthwaite‘s Blackfish and Sarah Polley‘s Stories We Tell didn’t make the cut is as criminal as Inside Llewyn Davis being nearly shut down. Both are fantastic films that have an incredible reach far beyond the screen. Blackfish has been the centerpiece of criticism focused on SeaWorld and their bullshit literally being the catalyst behind massive protests at places like the Rose Bowl Parade, the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and causing 12 of their 14 scheduled musical acts to cancel upcoming concerts at their flagship park in Orlando, Florida. This film is as pertinent as Louis Psihoyo‘s Oscar-winning The Cove with regards to treatment of marine mammals and I just can’t see how it missed out. I will say that Joshua Oppenheimer‘s The Act Of Killing and Jehane Noujaim‘s The Square are exceedingly deserving of their nominations (Act of Killing I would list as the second best film of the year and The Square would certainly make it’s way to my top 20) and I really enjoyed the other three nominees as well. I just don’t think the other three (Dirty Wars, Cutie and the Boxer and 20 Feet From Stardom) were as good as Blackfish or Stories We Tell.

I still think it’s bullshit that La vie d’Adèle – Chapitres 1 et 2/Blue Is the Warmest Color didn’t make the cut for Best Foreign Film.  Adèle Exarchopoulos being left behind for the Best Actress category is to me, the biggest acting snub of the year. I think it’s the best performance of the year in any category. That’s a hard thing for me to say since Cate Blanchett, my favorite living actress, turned in what I believe to be her best performance in Blue Jasmine, and who will likely take home the Oscar.

Surprises

Let’s start with those that can be presumed as snubs…

I have yet to see Lee Daniels‘s The Butler, but I think most people thought, including me, that it would at least get one nomination, that being Oprah Winfrey for best Supporting Actress. It didn’t. I’ve not been a fan of either of Lee Daniels‘ other films (Precious had some fine acting spots and the story was gutting, but his direction is overwrought and if you recall correctly, The Paperboy got my vote as the worst film of the year last year) but I am intrigued by this one and do plan on seeing it.

Saving Mr. Banks also got no nominations, even for Academy favorite Tom Hanks, who didn’t even get a nod for Captain Phillips. I think most people expected at least Emma Thompson to get a nomination, but the Academy couldn’t pass up a chance to nominate Meryl Streep for the 1,456th time for August: Osage County instead. Thompson has been nominated three times already (and won 2 Oscars, one for writing Sense and Sensibility and the other for her acting work in Howard’s End) so I wouldn’t put it on the same level as Ms. Winfrey‘s snub.

While it shouldn’t surprise me, I truly think that both Benoît Debie and Bradford Young should have been nominated for their photography in Spring Breakers and Ain’t Them Bodies Saints respectively. While I think Spring Breakers was a mess, an interesting mess, but a mess nonetheless, I thought the photography was wonderful. Ain’t Them Bodies Saints, however, lands squarely at #6 in my best of 2013 list (yet to be published).

The non-snub surprises would have to start with Jonah Hill earning his second Oscar nom for The Wolf of Wall Street. I loved the movie, but wasn’t too high on his performance. His teeth were sweet, though.

Sally Hawkins‘ nomination for Blue Jasmine has to be the next biggest surprise, and a pleasant one at that. I thought she was fantastic as Cate Blanchett‘s white trash sister, Ginger. Say what you will about Woody Allen‘s personal life, but the man can direct great performances. This is one of them.

Glad the Academy Didn’t Nominate…

I thought I would include this because there was buzz around it all year, but thanks to the Academy for not nominating James Franco in Spring Breakers. I’m not what you would call a Franco fan to begin with as I think his body of work is average at best, but this performance was ridiculous and didn’t stand up against those who were nominated and those who were passed over. Couple that with the fact that he reportedly based his character off of the literal worst rappers in history, I’ve got nothing for it. This might be one of the few things the Academy got right.

All right – Who gets your vote for Best Picture?:

My Impressions of Sunday’s Academy Awards

Tags

85th academy awards, academy awards, adele, adrien brody, alan arkin, amy adams, ang lee, animal kingdom, argo, beasts of the southern wild, ben affleck, best director, bill the butcher, capote, catherine zeta-jones, charlie wilson's war, chicago, christoph waltz, coen brothers, crouching tigered, daniel day-lewis, denis levant, django unchained, don mischer, dreamgirls, duran duran, enchanted, fall, gangs of new york, goldfinger, grammy, grant heslov, grosse pointe blank, hamm's, holy motors, how to survive a plague, hunger games, jacki weaver, james bond, jennifer hudson, jennifer lawrence, jessica chastain, junebug, leap year, les miserables, life of pi, lincoln, little miss sunshine, magnolia, musicals, nine, no country for old men, Oscars, paul thomas anderson, philip seymour hoffman, quentin tarantino, quvenzhane wallis, robert elswit, roger deakins, rushmore, searching for sugar man, seth mcfarlane, sheena easton, shirley bassey, steven spielberg, the assassination of jesse james by the coward robert ford, the invisible war, the master, the muppets, there will be blood, tommy lee jones, tribute, wes anderson, winter's bone, zero dark thirty

Will my foot fit in here?

So the 85th Academy Awards have come and gone. We’ve had a few days to reflect on what transpired on Sunday. The question most people ask every year is, “Did the Academy finally get it right?” Well, I can say they got some things correct, but mostly it was same old, same old with good ol’ Oscar. Which is to say, their choices didn’t align with mine. At all. Ever.

The show itself was as lame as ever. Seth McFarlane has taken a lot of heat for his performance as the host. While it was nice to see someone new charged with the hosting duties, I have to agree with his critics – AWFUL. Why anyone is surprised or upset about the misogynistic bend to his musical numbers and jokes is beyond me. It should have been expected. After all, Hollywood is an over-glorified Old Boys Club where women have taken a back seat since its inception. Precedent is there. It ain’t changin’ anytime soon, folks.

Goooooooldfinnnnngahhhh!

The 50 Years of James Bond was equally weak, with Shirley Bassey belting out her signature song from Goldfinger. Was Sheena Easton or Duran Duran too busy to contribute to this piece? I know Bassey is 76 and all, but damn – was a standing ovation really necessary? Hollywood hands those out as much as hugs are passed around at a youth gymnastics meet (reference Jennifer Lawrence getting one for falling).

Seeing this once back in 2003 was enough, damn it. Keep it in the vault.

And that tribute to musicals – was there a need to highlight musicals…of the last 10 years? Jennifer Hudson can sing. I can get with that. Trotting out the Chicago bit – why the fuck? Is this some bone being thrown to Catherine Zeta-Jones since her career has been in the shitter since the movie? Vomit. Fair play to the Les Miserables folks although it cements the reason I won’t ever watch it. This whole portion of the telecast seemed needless and really added nothing to the show. Had Les Miserables been the clear frontrunner in many of the categories, I might have understood it. But it wasn’t. So future Oscars directors and producers, heed this suggestion – cut the shit. The show is long enough as it is.

Now I have something in common with Three 6 Mafia!

Adele‘s speech was pretty awesome. I love how cheeky she’s been at the film awards shows. I can’t say as I’m a fan of the song for which she won, but it was worth it to see her accept the Oscar. 146 Grammys and now an Oscar – not a bad run for the 24-year old.

Lastly, in terms of the show itself, the camerawork was flat out awful. How many long shots of doors to the side of the stage did we get? Don Mischer, the director, should never be allowed near another Oscar ceremony. Just a mess from the beginning.

Now on to the awards…

Argo…fuck yourself.

Argo winning was no surprise. It swept every major award for Best Picture. Good on it. Had Lincoln won, I would have blown a gasket. I still think this film is average fare for the most part. I enjoyed it, but I still don’t think it was anywhere near the top five films of the year let alone the best. The Master still holds that title. Grant Heslov‘s sexiest producers comment was quite amusing during the acceptance speech. I wish Hollywood had some balls and actually saw and voted for films that will have a lasting impact on the medium. I don’t think Argo is one of those. Good for Ben Affleck, though. He has made some enjoyable films as of late and he did get fucked in the Best Director category not even getting a nomination.

Ang Lee after he crouching tigered Steven Spielberg for the Best Director win.

Undoubtedly the most satisfying moment of the evening for me came when Ang Lee won the Best Director award over Spielberg for Lincoln. When the nominations came out and Kathryn Bigelow and Ben Affleck were passed over, I thought this category was a one-way ticket to Three-Time Oscarville for Spielberg. Maybe if Lincoln wasn’t a glorified Lifetime film, he might have won. So the Academy got this one correct, even though I’ve yet to see Life of Pi. Lee‘s prior work has mostly been of the tremendous variety, so I applaud this choice. I hold to my guns that Paul Thomas Anderson was the most deserving here.

Christoph Waltz after winning perhaps the tightest race for an Oscar in quite some time.

I have to admit that I was pleasantly surprised that Christoph Waltz won for Best Supporting Actor in Django Unchained. In a category where everyone had already won an Oscar, it was truly anyone’s award to win. I thought Robert De Niro was going to pull it out. Alan Arkin while good in Argo, gave a stock performance (at least that’s how it felt to me), one that was so similar to Little Miss Sunshine (for which he won his Oscar) or Grosse Pointe Blank, that I didn’t see what was so special about it. Same with Tommy Lee Jones‘ performance in Lincoln. I think the content of the character in which he played fueled his rise in the odds to win more than the performance itself (this, I suppose, can also be said of Waltz). Once again, it wasn’t bad, but it was nothing exceptional either. Philip Seymour Hoffman was amazing in The Master and his performance was another to hang his hat on, vastly different than his signature performances in Capote, Magnolia or Charlie Wilson’s War. It seems clear that Waltz needs to continue working with Quentin Tarantino. He’s 2-for-2 in Oscar competition in Tarantino roles.

At least she didn’t sing her acceptance speech.

Anne Hathaway winning Best Supporting Actress was as much as a given as me drinking at least one Hamm’s each night. I didn’t see Les Mis, nor will I, so I can’t speak to the performance. My wife, whose opinion can be suspect when it comes to films, gave it high marks. I guess her PhD in Theater convinces me that this was okay. I still loved Amy Adams in The Master out of the nominees that I had seen. Can someone get her a damn Oscar already? Since I first saw her in Junebug, she has consistently put out good top notch work, even though she has sprinkled in some crappy pap like Leap Year, Enchanted and The Muppets). She gets a free pass on those, though. We redheads need to stick together. I will say that Jacki Weaver is top notch and I love seeing her get accolades. Her performance in Animal Kingdom is still one of the strongest I’ve ever seen.

Leave it to a Kentucky girl to fall on her way to the stage. Must have been into the bourbon…

I have no issue with Jennifer Lawrence winning for her role in Silver Linings Playbook. She is talented and I admit I find myself interested in her performances each time I watch her, even in the shitty Hunger Games. She killed it in Winter’s Bone. I would have liked to have seen Quvenzhane Wallis pull out the upset, but alas 9-year olds don’t win Best Actress Oscars, do they? Especially in films like Beasts of the Southern Wild. Damn you, Academy. Big ups also go to Jessica Chastain for her performance in Zero Dark Thirty. She is one of the more mesmerizing people working in film today. Her day will come, I have no doubt.

I should have won this bitch for Gangs of New York.

Daniel Day-Lewis winning Best Actor for his portrayal of Abraham Lincoln was a foregone conclusion when I saw the first released still from production. After seeing what a dead fucking ringer he was for our 16th president, I knew that his performance would likely be the same – badass. And it was. The only truly good memorable thing about the film, to be honest. Without him in that role, Lincoln fails. He is without a doubt the finest actor working in the business and brings an unparalleled ferocity to each of his roles making each performance as memorable as the next (well, with exception of Nine, perhaps). I can’t speak about Hugh Jackman‘s performance, but none of the others were in the same ballpark as Lewis’. Joaquin Phoenix was very powerful in The Master and gave the second best performance of the year of those nominated.  I still believe that Denis Levant‘s performance in Holy Motors was the best of any film this year. It’s a shame that Hollywood is so one-sided in its nomination process. I do firmly believe that DDL should have already had 3 Best Actor Oscars. His performance as Bill “The Butcher” Cutting in Gangs of New York haunted me like few others ever have. That he lost to Adrien Brody that year is one of the all-time Oscar crimes.

As far as the other awards go, none really stood out as too tremendously preposterous. The writing awards did yield a surprise in Django Unchained winning Best Original Screenplay. Zero Dark Thirty seemed to have stranglehold on that award until late in the season. I still think it’s odd that Wes Anderson has only been nominated twice for this award. Rushmore, anyone? HELLL-OOOO? I think plenty of folks were upset to see Roger Deakins not win for Best Cinematography for Skyfall. He is the Peter O’Toole of cinematographers having been nominated 10 times without ever winning. And this is the man who has shot the bulk of the Coen Brothers films. He deserves an Oscar. He was nominated for two gorgeously shot films in 2008 (No Country for Old Men and The Assassination of Jesse James By the Coward Robert Ford) only to lose to Robert Elswit for There Will Be Blood. In the Best Documentary Feature category, I love that Searching for Sugar Man won, but I still think that How to Survive a Plague and even The Invisible War deserved it more. I’ve come around on The Invisible War after watching it a second time, which will be my last. That film is too gutting to watch another time. These two films have an importance that go well beyond their life as films. They are culture changers and that’s what I love best about this category.

Not too much to get up in arms about. I addressed my concerns after the nominations came out. I fully anticipate a call from the Academy next year so we can compare notes and I can tell them where they got it wrong. I’ll be sitting by the phone if you need me…

If I had chosen the Academy Award Nominees and Winners…

Tags

academy awards, ai weiwei, alan arkin, amour, amy adams, andrew dominik, ang lee, ann dowd, argo, beasts of the southern wild, ben richardson, benh zeitlin, bill murray, brad pitt, bronson, bruce willis, caroline champetier, chan wook park, chasing ice, chris terrio, christoph waltz, coen brothers, complaince, cormac mccarthy, cosmopolis, cracks, crouching tiger, dances with wolves, daniel day-lewis, david cronenberg, david france, dean moriarty, django unchained, don delillo, donald rumsfeld, dwight henry, edith scob, edward norton, enchanted, errol morris, frances mcdormand, garrett hedlund, Gökhan Tiryaki, goodfellas, harvey weinstein, hidden dragon, holy motors, how to survive a plague, i heart huckabees, i'm still here, inglourious basterds, inside llewyn davis, jack kerouac, jared gilman, jeff orlowski, jennifer lawrence, jim jarmusch, jiro dreams of sushi, joaquin phoenix, john august, jonathan glazer, joseph gordon-levitt, juno temple, kaboom, kara heyward, kathryn bigelow, killer joe, killing them softly, lawless, leos carax, les miserables, life of pi, lincoln, looper, lucy alibar, lynn redgrave, lynne ramsey, mark boal, meryl streep, mihai malamaire, moonrise kingdom, morvern callar, nicolas winding refn, one the road, only god forgives, only lovers left alive, Oscars, philip seymour hoffman, quentin tarantino, rachel weisz, rian johnson, ridley scott, robert de niro, roman coppola, ryan gosling, safe men, sam rockwell, searching for sugar man, seven psychopaths, sexy beast, silver linings playbook, spanking the monkey, stephen frears, steven spielberg, stoker, terrence malick, the assassination of jesse james by the coward robert ford, the brothers bloom, the counselor, the dark knight rises, the deep blue sea, the fighter, the grandmaster, the help, the hit, the master, the muppets, tilda swinton, to the wonder, tom hardy, tommy lee jones, tony kushner, twilight, we need to talk about kevin, wes anderson, wong kar-wai, zero dark thirty

We are three weeks (well, 20 days) away from the thing that each year, no matter what I do, I can’t take my attention away from – The Academy Awards. Each year in early January (used to be February), I hoot and howl about how the Academy has gotten it wrong with who they’ve chosen for the nominees for the best film has to offer for the previous year. “How can this happen year-in and and year-out?”, I ask myself. Well, I sometimes need a gentle reminder that Hollywood is a self-perpetuating machine whose vanity knows no bounds and that the studios need to raise the profile of their films in order to make even more money so the whole their whole operations stays afloat to offset the 987,368 teenagers, college students and tech savvy webheads who just illegally pirated versions of all of the Oscar fare as I wrote this.  Also, what would all of those MBAs with no idea what creativity and art are do without being responsible for and ruining some of the major pieces of our culture, right? Puh-leese.

I am routinely reamed by those in my circle of friends and family for passing judgement on movies I haven’t seen or books I haven’t read. However, I don’t think it takes Sherlock Holmes to figure out that the Twilight series of books are pure shit and that the film adaptations are just a condensed, distilled version of the same shit. So convict me in the highest court of that crime. That many of the Academy voters have expressed themselves that they rarely see most of the movies nominated for the awards each year, how are we to take what their votes say as anything other than biased or even bought (Harvey Weinstein, what say you?). I recall watching the Oscars in 2001 when Lynn Redgrave was interviewed going into the ceremony and she said that the only film she had seen of those nominated for that year was Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, the fabulous Ang Lee martial-arts epic, so she voted for it. Great taste, as it was undoubtedly my favorite film of the year next to Jonathan Glazer’s insane Sexy Beast; however, it pretty much sums up the Academy Awards in a nutshell. They are mostly a vanity project and by no means an accurate representation of what is the best in filmmaking. If that were the case, Dances with Wolves would never have beaten Goodfellas for anything at the 1991 Awards.

I could go on and on and on about this, so I will spare anyone reading this that diatribe. Now, mind you – I did not see every film released this year and as of yet, I still have not seen three films nominated for Best Picture (Amour, Life of Pi and Les Misérables), so this list will only cover the films that I HAVE seen. So, after careful review, here are what I think the major category nominees should have been this year with whom I perceive should be the winners:

Best Picture

Beasts of the Southern Wild
Cosmopolis
Holy Motors
How to Survive a Plague
Looper
Moonrise Kingdom
Searching for Sugar Man
The Master* (winner)
We Need to Talk About Kevin
Zero Dark Thirty

In all, 2012 had some very interesting films. I think it continued the rise of the documentary, which as a storytelling platform gets stronger in content and creativity each year. Two, How to Survive a Plague and Searching for Sugar Man, even made it into my top ten films of the year and there could have easily been one or two more sneak in. Unfortunately, I have not been able to see Amour. Something tells me it would have made this list as well. Beasts of the Southern Wild was simply amazing. With this as a first effort, I expect to see great things from director Benh Zeitlin in the future. His collaboration with cinematographer Ben Richardson is one I hope continues on for years. Without a doubt this was the best photographed film I saw all year. David Cronenberg‘s adaptation of Don DeLillo‘s novel Cosmopolis was perhaps the most pleasant surprise of the year. DeLillo is my favorite novelist and his works seemdifficult to translate to the big screen, so I was very skeptical. Cronenberg‘s script captured the DeLillian dialogue very well and dare I say this, Robert Pattinson was adequate in delivering the cadences of DeLillo’s words. I need a shower after that. Holy Motors is the year’s most insane trip and you can read my synopsis of it here. Director Rian Johnson brought Looper (his first film since 2008’s The Brothers Bloom), a futuristic time-travel noir, to the big screen and didn’t disappoint. Joseph Gordon-Levitt‘s prosthetic nose and smirk made him a dead ringer for a younger Bruce Willis. I finally got to see Zero Dark Thirty and was mesmerized. Jessica Chastain is exceedingly good and ZDT proves to be another fabulous Kathryn Bigelow/Mark Boal collaboration. As always, Wes Anderson packs on the quirk in the tale of young love in his Moonrise Kingdom. Never disappointing, Anderson delivers another fun romp with the help of his ensemble cast of Bill Murray, Edward Norton, Jared Gilman, Bruce Willis, Frances McDormand, Tilda Swinton and Kara Heyward. The Master is the film I believe is the best of the year. Its portrayal of the tumultuous (let the cliches roll…) relationship between eternal fuck-up Freddie Quell (Joaquin Phoenix) and religious (cult) leader Lancaster Dodd (Philip Seymour Hoffman) is grand in scale and chronicled exquisitely by writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson. Performances from the three major players – Phoenix, Hoffman and Amy Adams – are as good as any you’ll see.

Best Director

Paul Thomas Anderson –  The Master * (winner)
Kathryn Bigelow – Zero Dark Thirty
Leos Carax – Holy Motors
Lynne Ramsey – We Need to Talk About Kevin
Benh Zeitlin – Beasts of the Southern Wild

This category is always difficult for me to say who’s best. One thing I can say for sure is that Steven Spielberg is wholly undeserving of this award and I firmly believe he will take home his third Oscar for Lincoln, one of the most overblown films in recent memory. Anderson gets better with every movie and The Master is no exception. His ability to frame the relationship between the film’s two main characters in such a compelling way earns him this award. He probably deserved the Oscar for There Will Be Blood and he certainly deserved it for Magnolia, which I think was the best film of the first decade of the 2000s. The other four directors in this category are all deserving and created amazing films. Lynne Ramsey has made three of the most dark, original, and incredibly visceral films I’ve ever seen. Morvern Callar may be my favorite of them, but this year’s We Need To Talk About Kevin is one to be reckoned with, and is especially pertinent since the Newtown shootings this past December and the onging talk of gun control since Columbine.

Best Actor

Denis Levant – Holy Motors* (winner)
Daniel Day-Lewis – Lincoln
Tom Hardy – Lawless
Joaquin Phoenix – The Master
Brad Pitt – Killing Them Softly

As much as I love Daniel Day-Lewis and his performance in the uneven at best Lincoln, Denis Lavant‘s virtuosic performance in Holy Motors moved me the most this year. In what covers nine different scenarios in the film, Lavant literally transforms himself from beggar to deviant troll, from a dying man to a motion-capture artist among other roles. Rare is a performance that sticks with me for days after watching it. This one did. I doubt you’ll ever see anything else like it. Tom Hardy continues to amaze me in each new role in which I see him. His performance in Nicolas Winding Refn‘s Bronson is one to study for all you up-and-coming actors. His most notable role of the year as Bane in The Dark Knight Rises was certainly enjoyable as well. Brad Pitt reunited with The Assassination of Jesse James By the Coward Robert Ford director Andrew Dominik for a talky hitman pic reminiscent of Stephen Frears‘ The Hit delivering a gritty performace as Jackie Cogan. Phoenix returns to the form of his pre-I’m Still Here days matching Philip Seymour Hoffman scene-for-scene in The Master.

Best Actress

Jessica Chastain – Zero Dark Thirty
Jennifer Lawrence – Silver Linings Playbook
Tilda Swinton – We Need to Talk About Kevin
Quvenzhané Wallis – Beasts of the Southern Wild* (winner)
Rachel Weisz – The Deep Blue Sea

This may have been the most difficult choice of all of them. Swinton and Weisz both deliver haunting performances in their respective roles. Chastain is amazing as well. I think she is the most watchable actress working today because she can even make her role in something as bad as The Help enjoyable. Jennifer Lawrence has a quality that makes me always want to see more of what she can do. I really liked her in this role. But, for my money, Quvenzhané Wallis was undoubtedly the best of the bunch. Not even 9-years old when Beasts of the Southern Wild was filmed, she explodes on the screen from the outset of the film. Her portrayal of Hushpuppy is nuanced and has a depth one might never imagine an 8-year is capable of displaying. I was completely entranced by her. I sincerely hope that if she continues acting that she is able to maintain the power that she put into this film. If so – watch out, Meryl Streep. Without a doubt, the best performance by a child that I’ve ever seen.

Best Supporting Actor

Garrett Hedlund – On the Road
Dwight Henry – Beasts of the Southern Wild
Philip Seymour Hoffman – The Master
Christoph Waltz – Django Unchained
Sam Rockwell – Seven Psychopaths* (winner)

I think this was the strongest category in terms of great performances for the year. Obviously, only two of mine match up with the Academy’s choices, the three excluded – Alan Arkin in Argo, Tommy Lee Jones in Lincoln, and Robert De Niro in Silver Linings Playbook – were relatively safe choices for the actors who had similar performances in prior roles that I just don’t think stood out. Garrett Hedlund delivered the most surprising performance as Dean Moriarty in the screen version of Jack Kerouac’s On the Road. A firecracker, he really captured the energy of Dean from the novel. I was very impressed. Christoph Waltz was great again for Quentin Tarantino in Django Unchained. They obviously work well together as Waltz took home the Oscar for their last collaboration in Inglourious Basterds. Dwight Henry was just phenomenal as the sick father to Hushpuppy in Beasts of the Southern Wild. I’m curious to see if he’ll get any more juicy roles like this one in the future. Hoffman is steady and measured in The Master, the perfect counterpoint to Phoenix‘s forceful mood swings. However, I think Sam Rockwell, one of the most underrated actors working, stole the show in Seven Psychopaths. He’s funny, frustrating, and crazy all while driving the action of the film. Just top-notch. Rockwell‘s been doing it this way ever since 1998’s Safe Men. He might be the most fun actor to watch.

Best Supporting Actress

Amy Adams – The Master* (winner)
Kara Hayward – Moonrise Kingdom
Ann Dowd – Compliance
Edith Scob – Holy Motors
Juno Temple – Killer Joe

These performances really run the gamut of roles and are no less interesting than many of the lead actress roles. Kara Heyward is so delightfully rebellious in Moonrise Kingdom, making me wish I was as cool as Suzy Bishop at any part of my life. Ann Dowd brings in the most frustrating performance of the year in Compliance as the fast food manager who allowed a female employee to be strip- and body-cavity searched as well as sexually assaulted by her fiancee because of someone prank calling acting a police officer. Edith Scob‘s angelic counterpart to Denis Lavant‘s many incarnations in Holy Motors was a true pleasure to watch. Juno Temple‘s turn as Dottie in the deliciously perverse Killer Joe nearly won me over. I have loved her in everything I’ve seen her in, from Kaboom to Cracks. But, alas, Amy Adams‘ performance as the hard-as-nails wife of Lancaster Dodd in The Master won out. No matter what the role, Ms. Adams brings a fire that is unparalleled. Her exchanges with Freddie throughout the film are extremely tense and delivered flawlessly. You might not think the woman who played the lead in The Muppets and Enchanted would be capable of such ferocity…unless you saw The Fighter.

Best Documentary Feature

Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry
Chasing Ice
How to Survive a Plague* (winner)
Jiro Dreams of Sushi
Searching for Sugar Man
The Imposter

As I said above, documentaries just keep getting better and more interesting. There were so many good ones this year, I couldn’t narrow it to five, and had trouble limiting it to six. Those listed above explore the following subjects: a Chinese dissident artist at odds with the Communist government (see review here), a nature photographer chronicling the effects of climate change/global warming on the glaciers of Greenland, Iceland and the US, the fight for AIDS activists to get access to proper medication to stave off the epidemic that rages so rampant in the 80s and 90s, the tale of Japan’s finest sushi chef, two South Africans’ search for a lost American musician who despite being a star of Elvis proportion in their home country was never known here in the US and the story of a young French man who assumed the identity of a missing Texas 13-year old.  Whew! Each of these films have far reaching cultural or social implications, but none of them in their scope, importance or depth measured what David France‘s How to Survive a Plague captured. Chronicling one of the most important chapters in the US’s recent history, France shows us the group of courageous activists who fought for AIDS rights, especially to essential medical care, and saved thousands, perhaps millions, of lives. I can’t speak highly enough of this film.

Best Original Screenplay

Holy Motors – Leos Carax
Looper – Rian Johnson
The Master – Paul Thomas Anderson* (winner)
Moonrise Kingdom – Wes Anderson & Roman Coppola
Zero Dark Thirty– Mark Boal

What’s original? What makes a script good? This is an argument movie execs and filmgoers squabble over all the time. Who’s right? Eye of the beholder, I guess. These five films represent the best of what little that’s original that gets made in Hollywood. As I’ve said, The Master, in my eyes is the best film from top to bottom. I could hardly not say it has the best script and I believe it does. PT Anderson has written the scripts to all of his films and he has gotten better with each one. Subjects and characters vary widely in his films and that’s why I think he’s so successful – he concentrates in no one particular area and he fleshes out beautiful characters (even if their beauty lies in their evil) and places those characters in scenarios that fit them. He is at the top of his form in all disciplines of the game. That’s not to say the other scripts are any less good. I connected well with The Master and it stuck with me ever since. I think Holy Motors is just as challenging of a film as The Master, but it didn’t hit me on the same level. I’m such a fan of Rian Johnson‘s work and Looper is a worthy addition to his oeuvre. Brick remains one of my favorite films. Johnson just brings extra to the table when he writes. He should have a long, interesting career ahead of him.

Best Adapted Screenplay

Argo – Chris Terrio
Beasts of the Southern Wild – Lucy Alibar & Benh Zeitlin* (winner)
Cosmopolis – David Cronenberg
Frankenweenie – John August
Silver Linings Playbook – David O. Russell

One thing most people might notice here is that Tony Kushner is absent from this list for his script for Lincoln. Two reasons why that is, even though it is an evocative, colorful script – first, the pontificating speeches made by every character in the film no matter what the situation bored me. Was everything that folks said at that time really worthy of being in the speech Hall of Fame? Secondly, if you write an ending that bad, you are disqualified. If Spielberg or a studio exec are responsible for either, let me know and I will gladly add you to the list. Even though I know the Oscar will go to Kushner or Terrio, I just don’t see how anyone could watch Beasts of the Southern Wild (see my review here) and not shout out in amazement at what they had just seen when compared to any of the other films nominated by Oscar or even by me. The arc of Hushpuppy, her father and the residents of the Bathtub is crisp with pertinent deviations that add layers to the story. It is an amazing film worthy of any award. David O. Russell continues to surprise me as he makes more and more conventional films as he gets older. His last two, The Fighter and Silver Linings Playbook are a far cry from his earlier fare like the subversive Spanking the Monkey and the existential I Heart Huckabees.

Best Cinematography

Caroline Champetier – Holy Motors
Mihai Malamaire, Jr. – The Master
Jeff Orlowski – Chasing Ice
Ben Richardson – Beasts of the Southern Wild* (winner)
Gökhan Tiryaki – Once Upon a Time in Anatolia

There were some really gorgeous films this year and each of the above had cinematography that didn’t just capture what was happening on camera, but played a vital role in the story being told. None did so more than Ben Richardson‘s work on Beasts of the Southern Wild, although Gökhan Tiryaki‘s work on Once Upon a Time in Anatolia was mesmerizing and haunting. I was blown away by both. I know documentary films never get a nod in this category, but how can one watch Chasing Ice and not applaud the effort by Jeff Orlowski? What Caroline Champetier was able to achieve in the shifting tones and scenes of Holy Motors was nothing short of Herculean. PT Anderson‘s films are such visual feasts, full of camera moves and interesting angle, Mihai Malamaire‘s efforts on The Master are as commendable as any above. I will say this: never in a million years did I think two of my top ten films of the year would have Bruce Willis in them. That’s why I love film – you never expect what you’re going to get.

As I said before, 2012 was a great year for film, especially if you stepped outside the wide releases each week and poked around for something a little different. It’s out there people. Challenge yourself. You might just enjoy it.

2013 looks to be an amazing year as we have the following new films coming: Errol Morris’ documentary on Donald Rumsfeld, the Coen Brothers’ folk rock film Inside Llewyn Davis, Wong Kar-Wai’s The Grandmaster, Chan Wook Park‘s english-language debut Stoker, Ridley Scott‘s The Counselor – a realization of a Cormac McCarthy original script, Jim Jarmusch‘s vampire flick Only Lovers Left Alive, the new Ryan Gosling/Nicolas Winding Refn collaboration Only God Forgives and Terrence Malick’s To the Wonder among many others. 

2013 Oscar Nominations – The Academy Likes Amour and Silver Linings Playbook, Right Now They Really Like Them

Tags

academy award nominees, academy awards, alexandre desplat, anna paquin, beasts of the southern wild, ben richardson, benh zeitlin, bradley cooper, christopher nolan, daniel day-lewis, dark knight, dark knight rises, edith head, emma stone, emmanuel lubezki, howard shore, jacki weaver, joaquin phoenix, john williams, johnny greenwood, kathryn bigelow, lincoln, lord of the rings, michael haneke, mihai malamaire, Oscars, paul thomas anderson, quvenzhane wallis, return of the king, seth mcfarlane, tatum o'neal, the hurt locker, the master, the tree of life, there will be blood, thomas newman, tom hooper, youngest nominee, zero dark thirty

(click image above for the total list of nominees)

The annual orgy of whining and complaining about who the Academy (hahahahahaha) of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences have nominated for their annual awards ceremony commenced this morning shortly after (and likely even during) the announcements by hosts Seth McFarlane and Emma Stone (who looked kind of dumpy – I know it was 5:30 a.m. in LA, but you’re a professional, Emma). Here are my quick thoughts on how things shook out…because that’s precisely what you need in your life, more pontificating by me about what’s right and wrong, good and bad.

Here we go!

Screw Jobs

Kathryn Bigelow pointing out Academy members who passed her over in today’s nominations.

That Kathryn Bigelow was not nominated for Best Director for Zero Dark Thirty seems absolutely criminal to me. Without a doubt, this has been one of the most highly anticipated films of the last year and even since the announcement it was going into production. Bigelow is the only woman to ever win an Oscar for Best Director (for The Hurt Locker in 2008). Hollywood has long been viewed as misogynistic (which it is) and this doesn’t help. While I haven’t seen the film yet (it opens here tomorrow), I can’t help but to think she was deserving. I may well change my mind after seeing the film. In the same category, I just can’t believe that Paul Thomas Anderson was passed over for The Master. I think it’s the best film of the year and is deserving of any and all accolades. PTA is the most interesting director working. When he makes a film, you can be guaranteed it’s one worth watching. I know that The Master isn’t typical Academy fare (meaning it’s really good), but I have to think the members of the Academy who voted on this simply didn’t see it, which is pretty typical. Oh well. They missed out. The thing is, when people talk about the movies from this year 10 years from now, they will be talking about The Master, not the completely overrated Lincoln. They will be talking about Daniel Day-Lewis’ performance, but that’s it with regards to Lincoln.

Johnny Greenwood‘s score for The Master being overlooked is unreal. The same thing happened to him with his score for There Will Be Blood. Do we really have to have the same 5-7 composers nominated every fucking year? Is there a rule that John Williams, Thomas Newman, Howard Shore and Alexandre Desplat have to be nominated every damn year? Who are they, Edith Head? Boo.

I think the most egregious error on the part of the Academy was passing over Ben Richardson‘s cinematography in Beasts of the Southern Wild. They were very kind to that film in most regards, but its cinematography was its most valuable asset. In my mind, it was the finest shot film of the year. Like last year when Emmanuel Lubezki was passed over for the award for his work on The Tree of Life, but at least he got a nomination. What a joke. I also think that Mihai Malamaire‘s work on The Master should have been recognized. As a non-white participant, I guess this should be expected. SIGH.

Surprises

I made an entire movie with this haircut and you can’t even get me one nomination?

Micahel Haneke and his film Amour getting five nominations is big, but Les Miserables director Tom Hooper and Argo director Ben Affleck getting passed over might bigger. Completely shocked by both, but not as much as Bigelow‘s snub. Jacki Weaver and Bradley Cooper (come on – really?) getting nominations and Silver Linings Playbook getting eight nominations in total was pretty surprising for a relatively conventional film with a terrible pat Hollywood ending. Editing? Why the hell would it get nominated for editing? Benh Zeitlin‘s nomination for director, Quvenzhané Wallis’ nomination for Best Actress (the youngest nominee ever at age 9 and gives a much stronger performance than former child winners Tatum O’Neal and Anna Paquin) and Beasts of the Southern Wild‘s Best Picture nomination were very pleasant surprises. One of my top 5 films of the year and deserving of all accolades. Bravo to the Academy for recognizing a smaller film. I think most people are/will be surprised by Joaquin Phoenix‘s nomination for Best Actor in The Master. This slot (or Cooper‘s) seemed destined for Ben Affleck in Argo. Good on Phoenix. He was pretty damn solid.

I will mention this – Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King won 11 Oscars when that trilogy was completed, but Christopher Nolan‘s epic Dark Knight trilogy’s final film gets zero. Interesting. Not that I think Dark Knight Rises was some incredible film, but as it goes, the trilogy is some of the best filmmaking in its genre ever produced. Just saying.

I’m sure I’ll have more to bitch about after I digest this more. Initial reactions are always fun to hold onto.

Meanwhile- Vote below!: