Ultimate Addict

Full List of Oscar Nominations

2012-01-24T22:46:00.004Z

Some welcome and unwelcome surprises here, but it's all good fun.

My prediction score was 70/104. How'd you do?

Best Picture

"The Artist"
"The Descendants"
"Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close"
"The Help"
"Hugo"
"Midnight in Paris"
"Moneyball"
"The Tree of Life"
"War Horse"

Best Actress

Glenn Close, "Albert Nobbs"
Rooney Mara, "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo"
Viola Davis, "The Help"
Meryl Streep, "The Iron Lady"
Michelle Williams, "My Week With Marilyn"

Best Actor

Demian Bichir, "A Better Life"
George Clooney, "The Descendants"
Jean Dujardin, "The Artist"
Gary Oldman, "Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy"
Brad Pitt, "Moneyball"

Supporting Actress

Berenice Bejo, "The Artist"
Jessica Chastain, "The Help"
Melissa McCarthy, "Bridesmaids"
Janet McTeer, "Albert Nobbs"
Octavia Spencer, "The Help"

Supporting Actor

Kenneth Branagh, "My Week With Marilyn"
Jonah Hill, "Moneyball"
Nick Nolte, "Warrior"
Christopher Plummer, "Beginners"
Max von Sydow, "Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close"

Best Director

Woody Allen, "Midnight in Paris"
Michel Hazanivicus, "The Artist"
Alexander Payne, "The Descendants"
Terrence Malick, "The Tree of Life"
Martin Scorsese, "Hugo"

Best Original Screenplay

Michel Hazanivicius, "The Artist"
Kristen Wiig and Annie Mumolo, "Bridesmaids"
Woody Allen, "Midnight in Paris"
J.C. Chandor, "Margin Call"
Asghar Farhadi, "A Separation"

Best Adapted Screenplay

Alexander Payne, Nat Faxon and Jim Rash, "The Descendants"
John Logan, "Hugo"
George Clooney, Beau Willimon and Grant Heslov, "The Ides of March"
Steven Zaillian, Aaron Sorkin and Stan Chervin, "Moneyball"
Bridget O'Connor and Peter Straughan, "Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy"

Best Foreign Feature

"Bullhead" (Bulgaria)
"Footnote" (Israel)
"In Darkness" (Poland)
"Monsieur Lazhar" (Canada)
"A Separation" (Iran)

Best Animated Feature

"A Cat in Paris"
"Chico & Rita"
"Kung Fu Panda 2"
"Puss in Boots"
"Rango"

Art Direction

"The Artist"
"Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2"
"Hugo"
"Midnight in Paris"
"War Horse"

Cinematography

"The Artist"
"The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo"
"Hugo"
"The Tree of Life"
"War Horse"

Costume Design

"Anonymous"
"The Artist"
"Hugo"
"Jane Eyre"
"W.E."

Documentary Feature

"Hell and Back Again"
"If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front"
"Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory"
"Pina"
"Undefeated"

Documentary Short Subject

"The Barber of Birmingham: Foot Soldier of the Civil Rights Movement"
"God Is the Bigger Elvis"
"Incident in New Baghdad"
"Saving Face"
"The Tsunami and the Cherry Blossom"

Film Editing

"The Artist"
"The Descendants"
"The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo"
"Hugo"
"Moneyball"

Makeup

"Albert Nobbs"
"Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2"
"The Iron Lady"

Music (Original Score)

"The Adventures of Tintin"
"The Artist"
"Hugo"
"Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy"
"War Horse"

Music (Original Song)

'Man or Muppet' from "The Muppets"
'Real in Rio' from "Rio"

Sound Editing

"Drive"
"The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo"
"Hugo"
"Transformers: Dark of the Moon"
"War Horse"

Sound Mixing

"The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo"
"Hugo"
"Moneyball"
"Transformers: Dark of the Moon"
"War Horse"

Visual Effects

"Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2"
"Hugo"
"Real Steel"
"Rise of the Planet of the Apes"
"Transformers: Dark of the Moon"

Short Film (Animated)

"Dimanche/Sunday"
"The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore"
"La Luna"
"A Morning Stroll"
"Wild Life"

Short Film (Live Action)

"Pentecost"
"Raju"
"The Shore"
"Time Freak"
"Tuba Atlantic"

Predicting the Oscar Nominees

2012-01-23T16:27:00.002Z

The Oscar race may technically last until the end of February, but nomination day pretty much signals the end to 90% of the suspense surrounding the eventual Oscar winners. Tomorrow is the biggie, and here are my (occasionally foolhardy) guesses as to who/what will make the cut:

Best Picture

"The Artist"

"The Descendants"

"The Help"

"Hugo"

"Moneyball"

"Midnight in Paris"

"War Horse"

Alternates (if there are ten): “The Tree of Life”; “The Ides of March”; “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”

The untested new balloting system for Best Picture makes predicting a little more uncertain, but one would think that the passionate ‘best’ cries would see at least these seven films make it. I’m not buying that popular titles “Bridesmaids,” “Drive,” and “A Separation” are anything more than fringe-dwellers in this race, and I’m not ready to replace the dwindling “War Horse” with “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.” The guild-surging David Fincher film, as well as being a remake, is far too pulpy a genre pic for Academy tastes. They rarely deviate from the norm when selecting Best Picture candidates, and I doubt that the number of nominees will be high enough to see it included ahead of safer,more traditional options.

Best Director

Woody Allen, “Midnight in Paris”

Michel Hazanavicius, "The Artist"

Terrence Malick, "The Tree of Life"

Alexander Payne, "The Descendants"

Martin Scorsese, "Hugo"

Alternates: Tate Taylor, "The Help"; David Fincher, “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”; Steven Spielberg, “War Horse”

I’m chickening out of predicting Taylor for a nomination since it seems so absurd he’d be included ahead of major, major directors like Allen, Fincher, and Spielberg. Having said that, I think his film will prove more popular with the Academy than the films helmed by those other three men. Somehow, after all of these Oscar seasons, I haven’t yet given up on the unique quality of accomplishments being recognised on sheer merit alone, and therefore I think that Terrence Malick will score a lone director nod for the artistry of his divisive “The Tree of Life.”

Best Actress in a Leading Role

Glenn Close, "Albert Nobbs"

Viola Davis, "The Help"

Meryl Streep, "The Iron Lady"

Tilda Swinton, "We Need to Talk About Kevin"

Michelle Williams, "My Week With Marilyn"

Alternates: Rooney Mara, “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”; Charlize Theron, “Young Adult”

Mara is probably closer to ousting Glenn Close than anyone seems to be admitting, given her consistency throughout the precursors, but AMPAS will likely turn out to reward an Oscar comeback for Glenn, after nearly 25 years.

Best Actor in a Leading Role

George Clooney, "The Descendants"

Leonardo Di Caprio, “J. Edgar”

Jean Dujardin, "The Artist"

Gary Oldman, "Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy"

Brad Pitt, "Moneyball"

Alternates: Michael Fassbender, “Shame”; Demian Bichir, “A Better Life”; Michael Shannon, “Take Shelter”

I don’t think that “Shame” is going to float Oscar’s boat, and that might allow for Gary Oldman, who has been gaining career honours, and whose film appears as if it might be buoyed by guild and BAFTA love, to sneak in above the critically-championed Michael Fassbender. But then Leo isn’t safe either. Exciting?

Best Actress in a Supporting Role

Berenice Bejo, "The Artist"

Jessica Chastain, "The Help"

Vanessa Redgrave, "Coriolanus"

Octavia Spencer, "The Help"

Shailene Woodley, "The Descendants"

Alternates: Janet McTeer, “Albert Nobbs”; Melissa McCarthy, “Bridesmaids”; Carey Mulligan, “Shame”

Again, I’m hoping that the performance will win out. The three women listed here as alternates all have detractors to do with their films. “Coriolanus” may be heavy going, but it at least has the prestige that the others don’t.

Best Actor in a Supporting Role

Kenneth Branagh, "My Week with Marilyn"

Albert Brooks, "Drive"

Jonah Hill, "Moneyball"

Ben Kingsley, "Hugo"

Christopher Plummer, "Beginners"

Alternates: Nick Nolte, “Warrior”; Brad Pitt, “The Tree of Life”; Armie Hammer, “J.Edgar”

As soon as I watched “Hugo” it seemed a cinch to me that Kingsley would be nominated for this sympathetic, key role as cinema’s original auteur. There hasn’t been quite the wave of reaction some anticipated, but this category is still fractured and open after Globe and SAG went their separate ways.

Best Original Screenplay

“50/50”

"The Artist"

"Bridesmaids"

"Midnight in Paris"

“Win Win”

Alternates: “Margin Call”; “Young Adult”; “A Separation”; “Beginners”

Best Adapted Screenplay

"The Descendants"

"The Help"

"Hugo"

"The Ides of March"

"Moneyball"

Alternates: “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy”; “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”

Best Original Score

“The Adventures of Tintin”

“The Artist”

“The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”

“Hugo”

“War Horse”

Best Original Song

“Albert Nobbs”

“The Help”

“Machine Gun Preacher"

“The Muppets”

Best Documentary Feature

“If a Tree Falls”

“Pina”

“Project Nim”

“Semper Fi: Always Faithful”

“We Were Here”

Best Foreign Language Film

“Footnote” (Israel)

“In Darkness” (Poland)

“Monsieur Lazhar” (Canada)

“Omar Killed Me" (Morocco)

“A Separation” (Iran)

Best Animated Feature

“The Adventures of Tintin”

“Cars 2”

“Chico & Rita”

“Puss In Boots”

“Rango”

Best Art Direction

"The Artist"

"Captain America: The First Avenger"

"Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part II"

"Hugo"

“Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy”

Best Costume Design

“The Artist”

“The Help”

“Hugo”

“Jane Eyre”

“My Week With Marilyn”

Best Make Up

“The Artist”

“Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life”

"The Iron Lady"

Best Cinematography

"The Artist"

"The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”

"Hugo"

"The Tree of Life"

"War Horse"

Best Film Editing

"The Artist"

"Drive"

"The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo"

"Moneyball"

"War Horse"

Best Visual Effects

“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part II”

“Hugo”

“Rise of the Planet of the Apes”

"Transformers: Dark of the Moon"

“The Tree of Life”

Best Sound Mixing

“The Adventures of Tintin”

“The Artist”

“Hugo”

“Moneyball”

“Rise of the Planet of the Apes”

Best Sound Editing

“The Adventures of Tintin”

“Hanna”

“Hugo”

“Rise of the Planet of the Apes”

“Transformers: Dark of the Moon”

Bitesize Best Actress Oscar Profiles: Jill Clayburgh

2012-01-18T14:57:00.002Z

Jill Clayburgh in “An Unmarried Woman”

Lost the 1978 Best Actress Oscar to Jane Fonda in “Coming Home”

Grade: ***

If the sixties were all about the burning of bras and the breaking of boundaries, the seventies were more about re-evaluating relationships, gender roles, and the institution of marriage. Paul Mazursky, the helmer of wannabe-swinger comedy “Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice,” clearly had a lot to say about monogamy, returning nine years after that Oscar-nominated ensemble piece to write and direct “An Unmarried Woman,” about a housewife dealing with her husband’s decision to leave with another woman. Contrary to this period’s popular representation of women in relationships as mopey and often hysterical, Mazursky’s principal character Erica is a looser and more independent specimen when given the heave-ho. More associated with TV than film, Mazursky hired Jill Clayburgh as his plucky leading lady, a move which proved to pay dividends for both of them.

Jill Clayburgh's reaction to her husband's confession.

It’s little surprise that Clayburgh’s performance gathered so much love the year after Diane Keaton’s win for “Annie Hall”: there are many similarities to the free-spirited approach of the two characters once Erica breaks away from her jilted lover depression. With Annie it’s an ideology; with Erica it’s a defence mechanism, but both exhibit that façade of fleetiness which attracted so many cineastes of the moment. Although the humour can get very dry, Mazurky’s script has an uncanny knack of making Clayburgh’s many exchanges with questionable, erudite men feel adult and involving, and even when the actress is required to resort to insolent standoffishness she brings a wry, half-resigned tone which can gel with her director’s comic intentions.

“An Unmarried Woman” always regards Erica’s arc as its driving force, and in portraying such a scrutinised personality Clayburgh feels the burden of carrying this journeywoman heft through to a climax. Nor does she deal very well with the crucial reaction scene, responding to her husband’s confession of love for another woman with simmering hurt but no concrete, impacting sense of introspective turmoil, and the payoff line that Mazursky gives her (however misjudged) goes down like a lead balloon. At key moments Clayburgh treats the character analysis with lighter fervour than needed to plumb the depths of bitterness in Erica, more gamely and sprightly than mournful or contemptuous. One wishes that Clayburgh would distillate more of that steely verve into tangible heartache, rather than throwaway flickers of combat.

There are glimpses of the spirit of Carrie Snodgress’ nominated performance (in “Diary of a Mad Housewife”) referenced here, albeit with scepticism more vocalised than internalised, and with a considerably better sparring partner in Alan Bates to work with than Snodgress had with Richard Benjamin. If Erica feels predisposed to sympathy, neither Mazursky nor Clayburgh use this as a disclaimer for her actions, and despite this she often colours Erica’s progressive approach to relationships with hues of vital self-motivation. Crucially, for a film entwined in critiquing its era’s societal norms, Clayburgh’s showing hasn’t aged so badly, and she relays the assertion of “An Unmarried Woman” that to be “unmarried” is not to be “unhappy,” with admirable care.

Golden Globe (Motion Picture) Winners

2012-01-15T21:32:00.002Z

Best Picture (Drama): "The Descendants"

Best Picture (Comedy/Musical): "The Artist"

Best Director: Martin Scorsese, "Hugo"

Best Actor (Drama): George Clooney, "The Descendants"

Best Actor (Comedy/Musical): Jean Dujardin, "The Artist"

Best Actress (Drama): Meryl Streep, "The Iron Lady"

Best Actress (Comedy/Musical): Michelle Williams, "My Week With Marilyn"

Best Supporting Actor: Christopher Plummer, "Beginners"

Best Supporting Actress: Octavia Spencer, "The Help"

Best Screenplay: "Midnight in Paris"

Best Original Score: "The Artist"

Best Original Song: "W.E."

Best Foreign Language Film: "A Separation"

Best Animated Feature: "The Adventures of Tintin"

Who'd Be in a Comedy or a Musical?

2012-01-07T00:00:00.000Z

If “Bridesmaids” miraculously manages to get itself into Oscar’s Best Picture lineup this year, it would be the anomaly of all anomalies – a broad, crass, raunchy, female-dominated film breaking the mould. Regardless of whether this happens or not, there’ll always be the nagging issue of Oscar’s general attitude towards comedy, which tends to get forgotten about when it comes to year-end awards. The implication that comedy/”light” performances are lesser fare than dramatic ones is both inaccurate and offensive, but it’s often the preconception adopted by middlebrow filmgoers.

Whatever you think about the Golden Globes, the Hollywood Foreign Press have always used their ceremony to help celebrate comedy, despite that often leading to even more guffaw at their nominations than in their drama categories. Predictably, those singled out in this section are far less likely to have success with SAG and AMPAS, and the fairly grim reality is that lively, funny, and layered performances like Kristen Wiig’s this year won’t make it past this particular precursor hurdle.

In the past ten years, the Best Actress in a Comedy or Musical category has seen fourteen nominations translate to Academy Award notices.

• Juliette Binoche, “Chocolat”

• Nicole Kidman, “Moulin Rouge”

• Renee Zellweger, “Chicago”

• Diane Keaton, “Something’s Gotta Give”

• Annette Bening, “Being Julia”

• Kate Winslet, “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind”

• Reese Witherspoon, “Walk the Line”

• Judi Dench, “Mrs. Henderson Presents”

• Keira Knightley, “Pride and Prejudice”

• Meryl Streep, ”The Devil Wears Prada”

• Marion Cotillard, “La Vie En Rose”

• Ellen Page, “Juno”

• Meryl Streep, “Julie and Julia”

• Annette Bening, “The Kids Are All Right”

*Catherine Zeta Jones received a Golden Globe nomination for “Chicago”, but a Supporting nomination with Oscar.

This is a 28% transfer to Oscar, which is relatively decent, but not considering that Witherspoon’s, Knightley’s, and Cotillard’s are arguably dramatic performances masquerading as musical or comedic ones.

The situation looks comparatively positive for women when you look at the men. In the past ten seasons only five men nominated in the Best Actor in a Comedy or Musical category have been nominated for the Best Actor Oscar.

• Nicholas Cage, “Adaptation”

• Bill Murray, “Lost In Translation”

• Jamie Foxx, “Ray”

• Joaquin Phoenix, “Walk the Line”

• Johnny Depp, “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street”

Just a meager 10% transfer from Globes to Oscar, folks. And even that’s with Foxx and Phoenix producing essentially dramatic performances in films about musicians.

There are literally too many Globe-nominated comedic performances by Actresses to list here, but I’ve trawled through the history and found some great Best Actor in a comedy nominees from days-gone-by to single out as major Oscar snubs.

Donald Sutherland in “M*A*S*H”

Lost out to: Melvyn Douglas, “I Never Sang For My Father,” James Earl Jones, “The Great White Hope,” Jack Nicholson, “Five Easy Pieces,” Ryan O’Neal, “Love Story,” George C. Scott, “Patton”

Billy Crystal in “When Harry Met Sally”

Lost out to: Kenneth Branagh, “Henry V”; Daniel Day-Lewis, “My Left Foot”; Tom Cruise, “Born on the Fourth of July”; Morgan Freeman, “Driving Miss Daisy”; Robin Williams, “Dead Poets Society”

Tim Robbins in “The Player”

Lost out to: Robert Downey Jr, “Chaplin”; Clint Eastwood, “Unforgiven”; Al Pacino, “Scent of a Woman”; Stephen Rea, “The Crying Game”; Denzel Washington, “Malcolm X”

Terence Stamp in “The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert”

Lost out to: Tom Hanks, “Forrest Gump”; Morgan Freeman, “The Shawshank Redemption”; Nigel Hawthorne, “The Madness of King George”; Paul Newman, “Nobody’s Fool”; John Travolta, “Pulp Fiction”

Paul Giamatti in “Sideways"

Lost out to: Don Cheadle, “Hotel Rwanda”; Johnny Depp, “Finding Neverland”; Leonardo Di Caprio, “The Aviator”; Clint Eastwood, “Million Dollar Baby”; Jamie Foxx, “Ray”

All of this is especially worrying given that this year has seen one of the greatest lineups in this category in recent memory; Jean Dujardin, Brendan Gleeson, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ryan Gosling, and Owen Wilson all giving smart comedic(ish) performances. The only one in with a legitimate chance (and a great one at that) of an Oscar nomination is Dujardin, which will be the first crossover nomination of the decade, and a mightily well-deserved one.

It’s a bit much to ask for Oscar to dramatically change its dirty habits, but could they at least appreciate our funnymen a little more?

Bitesize Best Actress Oscar Profiles: Marsha Mason

2012-01-05T09:36:00.004Z

Marsha Mason in “Chapter Two”

Lost the 1979 Best Actress Oscar to Sally Field in “Norma Rae”

Grade: **

When considering on/off-screen creative cinematic pairings, one’s instinct doesn’t necessarily gravitate towards Neil Simon and Marsha Mason. Tim Burton and Helena Bonham Carter are the most obvious dissenters of the unwritten “don’t mix business with pleasure” rule in this era, while Woody Allen’s doomed relationship with Mia Farrow led to an intense period of collaboration in the late 1980s. Neither of those partnerships directly resulted in an Oscar nomination for the performer, which makes Simon and Mason’s success with the Academy all the more remarkable. He penned three of her four nominated roles (in “The Goodbye Girl,” “Chapter Two,” and “Only When I Laugh”) in the space of five years, before their divorce in 1983.

Regarded as an actress who had a short shelf-life with audiences and Oscar alike, Mason was at the height of her popularity in 1979 when “Chapter Two” rolled around. Particularly dated, this romance has the early charm of a Simon script, as the courtship of Mason’s divorcee Jennie and James Caan’s widower George unfolds over the space of five snappy telephone calls. In these scenes Mason approaches flirtation with lively hints of wanting promise, but possesses that dose of cynicism associated with a weary singleton, and treats the character as she should do: a woman not inherently expecting anything, but who becomes dependent upon a man for the second time in her life. Mason shies away from telegraphing resistance as hostile or bitter, her wit less acerbic than stately, pronounced, and warmfully combative.

Both actors’ game punch and inherent likeability distract from the essential contrivance of their early exchanges, but the dialogue-heavy staginess eventually prevents them from delving beneath the surface-hangups of their characters. The injection of mawkish angst as a dramatic plot device only serves to emphasise the uneveness of the writing, more representative in George but nevertheless alienating us from both people who we thought we knew. The flaws in their relationship emerge abruptly, feel shallow, and are drawn out for far too long, that it’s no wonder Mason’s performance feels ultimately tiresome. Her tethered reactions to Caan’s muted self-pity, including one particularly epic monologue where she attempts to convince him why they should stay together, are fundamentally well-executed, but she can’t escape the compartmentalisation of her character into a reluctant confrontationalist which considerably hampers her ability to succeed in this production.

Mason is an actress with embedded self-supremacy, but it's far less suited to this role than it is in "The Goodbye Girl" and, particularly, "Only When I Laugh." She needs much more to chew on than is afforded her here, and in a looser narrative, where the occasional dismantling of her somewhat uptight persona translates as more natural than forced. Simon was a screenwriter with wild extremes of success, and as such this falls near the bottom of his hierarchy, and sadly Mason is unable to forge a path from this disadvantaged position much further than second base.

Golden Globe: Nominations and Pre-Announcement Predictions

2011-12-14T21:34:00.006Z

Picture (Drama):

• “The Descendants”

• “The Help”

• “Hugo”

• “The Ides of March"
• “Moneyball"
• “War Horse”

Prediction score: 4/5

Prediction summary: As will become apparent in the course of this post, I have a feeling that David Cronenberg's "A Dangerous Method" could do well here, given the excellent reviews and recent warm appraisal of his work by the HFPA. After the SAG shut-out, this will be a particularly big test for "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close," which should be re-titled "Extremely Late and Incredibly Cheeky." Spielberg and "War Horse" don't feel like potential winners of anything anymore, but even if it misses the Academy could still resurrect it, given the obvious advantage of its tearjerking elements.

Picture (Comedy/Musical):

• “50/50”
• “The Artist”

• “Bridesmaids”

• “Carnage”
• “Midnight in Paris”

• “My Week with Marilyn"

Prediction Score: 3/5

Prediction summary: An unusually strong category this year (especially compared to last!) to the extent where I'm only comfortable with the first three picks. After that, "We Bought a Zoo" and "Young Adult" could be outmuscled by the well-reviewed "50/50," or the A-list laden "Carnage." Or else be brushed aside by Simon Curtis' featherweight Marilyn Monroe movie?

Director:

• Woody Allen, "Midnight in Paris"
• George Clooney, "The Ides of March"
• Michael Hazanavicius, “The Artist”

• Alexander Payne, “The Descendants”

• Martin Scorsese, “Hugo”

Prediction score: 3/5

Prediction summary: I toyed with including David Cronenberg but I didn't want to go that crazy with the film. Refn is getting many notices with critics, and I reckon the Globes will be much kinder to "Drive" than the SAGs were or the Oscars likely will be. A host of names could pop up here, like Woody Allen, Stephen Daldry, or Tate Taylor.

Leading Actress (Drama):

• Glenn Close, "Albert Nobbs"
• Viola Davis, “The Help”

• Rooney Mara, "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo"

• Meryl Streep, “The Iron Lady”

• Tilda Swinton, “We Need to Talk About Kevin”

Prediction score: 3/5

Prediction summary: A Glenn Close snub doesn't seem like the smartest thing in the world to predict after her SAG nomination, but this is a hipper kind of branch. Felicity Jones appears to be more in favour than Elizabeth Olsen, and I've been convinced from the beginning of the season that somebody would give Keira Knightley something given the sheer ferocity of the performance. The other options are Kirsten Dunst and Rooney Mara.

Leading Actor (Drama):

• George Clooney, “The Descendants”

• Leonardo Di Caprio, “J. Edgar”

• Michael Fassbender, “Shame”

• Ryan Gosling, “The Ides of March”

• Brad Pitt, “Moneyball”

Prediction score: 4/5

Prediction summary: When all is said and done, the Globes are about stars. This is one of the starriest actor lineups they can muster this year.

Leading Actress (Comedy/Musical):

• Jodie Foster, "Carnage”

• Charlize Theron, “Young Adult”

• Kristen Wiig, “Bridesmaids”

• Michelle Williams, “My Week with Marilyn”

• Kate Winslet, “Carnage”

Prediction score: 4/5

Prediction summary: Scarlett Johansson was their sweetheart in '03, '04, and '05 (remember "A Love Song for Bobby Long" anyone?) but her spot could easily go to Jodie Foster in a "Carnage" double-dip, Berenice Bejo in a category switchup, or perennial Globe favourites Julia Roberts and Cameron Diaz, who worked this year, which is usually good enough.

Leading Actor (Comedy/Musical):

• Brendan Gleeson, "The Guard"

• Jean Dujardin, “The Artist”

• Joseph Gordon-Levitt, "50/50"
• Ryan Gosling, "Crazy Stupid Love"
• Owen Wilson, "Midnight in Paris"

Prediction score: 2/5

Prediction summary: My logic: predict Johnny Depp and then if he's nominated you'll at least be happy that you got it right. Unless of course he manages to be included for his performance in the latest "Pirates of the Caribbean" instalment, in which case you can just kill me. Ryan Gosling could be nominated twice if they liked those abs in "Crazy Stupid Love"; Christoph Waltz or John C. Reilly (the Globes like him!) might find themselves here if the "Carnage" love runs free. I don't even want to contemplate a Tom Hanks nomination.

Supporting Actress:

• Berenice Bejo, "The Artist"
• Jessica Chastain, “The Help”

• Janet McTeer, "Albert Nobbs"

• Octavia Spencer, “The Help”

• Shailene Woodley, “The Descendants”

Prediction score: 3/5

Prediction summary: Will this be where Carey Mulligan lands a major nomination? She's certainly a huge star profile right now. Melissa McCarthy is the biggest lock here after that SAG inclusion, but someone else could well be ousted to make room for Sandra Bullock. Winning Globe, SAG, and Oscar two years ago isn't enough for these people. They want to canonise their Bullock at every opportunity.

Supporting Actor:

• Albert Brooks, “Drive”

• Kenneth Branagh, “My Week with Marilyn”

• Jonah Hill, "Moneyball"

• Viggo Mortensen, “A Dangerous Method”

• Christopher Plummer, “Beginners”

Prediction score: 4/5

Prediction summary: Sacha Baron Cohen is well-liked, and let's face it: this category is batshit crazy. Beyond Branagh, Plummer, and (surely) Brooks, there's no telling where the Academy is going to go. I definitely don't see a Nick Nolte nomination happening here, so it's gonna differ from the SAG whatever happens.

Screenplay:

• "The Artist"

• "The Descendants"

• "The Ides of March"

• "Midnight in Paris"

• "Moneyball"

Animated Feature:

• "The Adventures of Tintin"
• "Arthur Christmas"
• "Cars 2"

• "Puss In Boots"

• "Rango"

Foreign Language Film:

• "The Flowers of War" (China)

• "In the Land of Blood and Honey" (USA)

• "The Kid with a Bike" (Belgium)

• "A Separation" (Iran)

• "The Skin I Live In" (Spain)

Original Score:

• Ludovic Bource, "The Artist"

• Abel Korzeniowski, "W.E."

• Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross, "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”

• Howard Shore, "Hugo"

• John Williams, "War Horse"

Original Song:

• 'Hello Hello', "Gnomeo and Juliet"

• 'The Keeper', "Machine Gun Preacher"

• 'Lay Your Head Down', "Albert Nobbs"

• 'The Living Proof', "The Help"

• 'Masterpiece', "W.E." (Madonna!)

Screen Actors Guild: Nominations & Reaction

2011-12-13T19:08:00.005Z

This year the Screen Actors Guild Nominations and Golden Globe nominations occur just a day apart, giving the biggest indicator as to what/who will be nominated at the Oscars in January.

The SAG nominations are below, along with reactions and pre-nomination analysis.

Ensemble:

• “The Artist”

• “Bridesmaids”

• “The Descendants”

• “The Help”

• "Midnight in Paris"

Reaction: I don't consider "Midnight in Paris" a particularly meaty ensemble, so this is probably more about them appreciating the film. Poor "Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy" looks a goner this awards season.

Prediction score: 4/5, missing “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy” for "Midnight in Paris."

Prediction Summary: I may be dropping the ball here by not predicting “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close” for anything, but aren’t they risking things greatly with this last-gasp grab for attention? As I was reliably informed on Twitter this week, even “Million Dollar Baby” had screened for most of the press by the end of November. In any case, neither Daldry’s film, nor Scorsese’s “Hugo,”nor Spielberg’s “War Horse” seem like the immediate go-to-feature for ensemble prizes, peppered with veteran actors here and there, but essentially led by youngsters. It might finally be time for “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy”and its British thespian talent to join the precursor party, but it’s unclear whether anyone has particularly taken to the film.

“The Artist,” “The Descendants, “ and “The Help” are probably the three wisest predictions for an eventual Oscar winner, and they’ve all got sufficient enough cast lists (John Goodman, James Cromwell and Malcolm McDowell give the former a leg up here) to comfortably make this guild’s lineup. And why not “Bridesmaids,” which nearly everyone liked, and which boasts a wonderful set of comedic performers?

Leading Actress:

• Glenn Close, "Albert Nobbs"
• Viola Davis, "The Help"

• Meryl Streep, “The Iron Lady”

• Tilda Swinton, “We Need to Talk About Kevin”

• Michelle Williams, “My Week with Marilyn”

Reaction: So Glenn Close has clout! This was a game-saver, given that I don't particularly think the Globes are going to go for this film in as big a way. If they don't, this is gonna be a mighty unpredictable year in this category.

Prediction score: 4/5, missing Close for Charlize Theron, who this hurts a little but who still has a chance.

Prediction summary: This could well be what the eventual Oscar lineup looks like, but realistically this could go any-which-way-but Mara (kidding!) Davis, Streep, and Williams all look strong, while Theron and Swinton look fairly comfortable – even with characters and films that will inevitably deter some from investing fully. I’d suggest watching out for the hot trio of Elizabeth Olsen, Felicity Jones, Kirsten Dunst as spoilers to the party, or of course that veteran Actress with gender-swapping credentials, but currently without any precursor support.

Leading Actor:

• Demian Bichir, "A Better Life"

• George Clooney, “The Descendants”
• Leonardo Di Caprio, "J. Edgar"
• Jean Dujardin, “The Artist”

• Brad Pitt, “Moneyball”

Reaction: *sigh* I often find that SAG opt for blander, more uniform choices than even the Academy can tend to. Di Caprio fits the bill on this occasion, but it's nice to see Demian Bichir's accomplished performance in a tiny film gather some awards traction. This is awfully crowded, isn't it?

Prediction score: 3/5, since I mistakenly thought that those fans gunning for Fassbender and Shannon would bring about some much-needed nuance in this lineup.

Prediction summary: You would think Gary Oldman would be able to make a dent in this category, given the overdue status and immense appreciation for him in the industry, but this is going to be tough. Fassbender and Shannon appear to be sharing the spoils in the lesser-seen-actor-to-champion stakes, and so Oldman, along with Harrelson, may well have to go without. A Dujardin snub isn’t out of the question, but if it happened it wouldn’t be that disastrous for him, since the Oscar could still be his with a three-way split.

Supporting Actress:

• Berenice Bejo, “The Artist”

• Jessica Chastain, "The Help"

• Melissa McCarthy, "Bridesmaids"

• Janet McTeer, "Albert Nobbs"
• Octavia Spencer, “The Help”

Reaction: Wow. It's good to see the best Chastain performance singled out in as important an Oscar precursor as this one. They clearly appreciated "Albert Nobbs" much more than critics, although they also went for "Get Low" last year, which eventually got shuffled out of the mix. Can the excellent Melissa McCarthy hold on for Oscar, despite the crass role and inherent comedy bias?

Prediction score: 2/5, and I'm glad to be. Apart from Redgrave's snub, the guild definitely got this category as right as they could have.

Prediction summary: This “The Tree of Life” isn’t an obvious pick for an ensemble prize, but actors’ sensibilities may still be more attuned to this film than something like “The Help,” which could pose problems for Chastain’s perceived chief assault on a Supporting actress nomination. I’d be very surprised if an actors guild didn’t warm to the serious chops of Redgrave’s performance in “Coriolanus,” even if the film doesn’t have a particularly high profile.

Supporting Actor:

• Kenneth Branagh, "My Week with Marilyn"

• Armie Hammer, "J. Edgar"

• Jonah Hill, "Moneyball"

• Nick Nolte, "Warrior"

• Christopher Plummer, “Beginners”

Reaction: It's especially great to see Nick Nolte singled out for his excellent performance in "Warrior." Hammer and Hill were considerably off the radar (for entirely different reasons) but this gives them a definite leg-up. Kenneth Branagh should be fairly safe now.

Prediction score: 1/5. Disastrous, but there were an awful lot of guys in the mix. I should have predicted Branagh.

Prediction summary: With regard to Pitt, refer to what I said earlier about “The Tree of Life.” From there: Kingsley and Forster have small roles in big films, and there isn’t an awful lot of competition around. Beyond Brooks and Plummer this is rather a wildcard category.

And Then There Were 100: Best Picture

2011-12-07T16:54:00.002Z

Time flies when you're having fun. Back in May, I posted the final 100 of Oscar's Best Actress nominees I had yet to see. As that figure now nears fifty the number of Best Picture nominees left has just reached the century mark itself. I have purposely left tasty-looking options to avoid a stale anti-climax, and I've also tried to spread the films in terms of decades, although -- as you'll see -- there are rather a lot of 1920s/30s films remaining. I don't know much about many of them, so please feel free to chime in with suggestions of which to get out of the way and which to leave until last.

Here's the list:

1. *Wings (1927-28)

2. The Racket (1927-28)

3. Alibi (1928-29)

4. Hollywood Revue (1928-29)

5. In Old Arizona (1928-29)

6. The Patriot (1928-29)

7. The Big House (1929-30)

8. Disraeli (1929-30)

9. The Love Parade (1929-30)

10. East Lynne (1930-31)

11. Trader Horn (1930-31)

12. Arrowsmith (1931-32)

13. Five Star Final (1931-32)

14. The Smiling Lieutenant (1931-32)

15. Smilin’ Through (1932-33)

16. State Fair (1932-33)

17. Flirtation Walk (1934)

18. Here Comes the Navy (1934)

19. The House of Rothschild (1934)

20. Imitation of Life (1934)

21. Viva Villa! (1934)

22. The White Parade (1934)

23. The Broadway Melody of 1936 (1935)

24. David Copperfield (1935)

25. Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935)

26. A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1935)

27. Les Miserables (1935)

28. Naughty Marietta (1935)

29. Anthony Adverse (1936)

30. Libeled Lady (1936)

31. A Tale of Two Cities (1936)

32. The Good Earth (1937)

33. Alexander’s Ragtime Band (1938)

34. Four Daughters (1938)

35. Test Pilot (1938)

36. Of Mice and Men (1939)

37. All This, and Heaven Too (1940)

38. The Great Dictator (1940)

39. The Long Voyage Home (1940)

40. Hold Back the Dawn (1941)

41. One Foot in Heaven (1941)

42. Sergeant York (1941)

43. Kings Row (1942)

44. Wake Island (1942)

45. Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942)

46. Watch on the Rhine (1943)

47. Wilson (1944)

48. It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)

49. Great Expectations (1947)

50. *Hamlet (1948)

51. Father of the Bride (1950)

52. King Solomon’s Mines (1950)

53. Decision Before Dawn (1951)

54. Quo Vadis? (1951)

55. Julius Caesar (1953)

56. The Rose Tattoo (1955)

57. Friendly Persuasion (1956)

58. The Diary of Anne Frank (1959)

59. Sons and Lovers (1960)

60. Fanny (1961)

61. The Music Man (1962)

62. America, America (1963)

63. Cleopatra (1963)

64. Becket (1964)

65. Doctor Zhivago (1965)

66. A Thousand Clowns (1965)

67. The Sand Pebbles (1966)

68. *In the Heat of the Night (1967)

69. Doctor Dolittle (1967)

70. Romeo and Juliet (1968)

71. Anne of the Thousand Days (1969)

72. Z (1969)

73. American Graffiti (1973)

74. The Towering Inferno (1974)

75. Barry Lyndon (1975)

76. All the President’s Men (1976)

77. Bound For Glory (1976)

78. *The Deer Hunter (1978)

79. Heaven Can Wait (1978)

80. Tess (1980)

81. *Gandhi (1982)

82. Tender Mercies (1983)

83. Kiss of the Spiderwoman (1985)

84. Prizzi’s Honor (1985)

85. The Accidental Tourist (1988)

86. Mississippi Burning (1988)

87. My Left Foot (1989)

88. The Godfather: Part III (1990)

89. Goodfellas (1990)

90. The Prince of Tides (1991)

91. A Few Good Men (1992)

92. Howard’s End (1992)

93. In the Name of the Father (1993)

94. *Braveheart (1995)

95. Il Postino (1995)

96. Jerry Maguire (1996)

97. Good Will Hunting (1997)

98. The Sixth Sense (1999)

99. Traffic (2000)

100. Gangs of New York (2002)

The Not-So-Silent Backlash & NBR Predictions

2011-12-01T12:42:00.000Z

As the saying goes: ‘silence is golden’, but if many people have their way, the silent film that has so far won over several festival audiences and at least one major critics group, will not be crowned the best of 2011. Monday afternoon saw the announcement of the New York Film Critics Circle winners, as well as this year’s Indie Spirit nominations, both of which gave Michel Haznavicius’ “The Artist” a boost with Picture, Director, Leading Actor, and Cinematography notices. The aftermath of NYFCC’s awardage of the film with its two biggest prizes proved unexpectedly negative, the decision labelled safe, and the film denounced as a novelty by high-profile figures. “The Artist” isn’t terribly original because it’s an homage which lends plot devices from classic cinema, but it’s far more comfortable with what it is and tight in story-structure than most of the other frontrunners. It may not necessarily be a five-star film but it certainly trumps the likes of “The Descendants,” “The Help,” and “Midnight in Paris.”

It remains to be seen whether the film can build upon its New York win to mount a strong showing with the critics, which previously appeared unlikely. With its nose firmly put out-of-joint the National Board of Review votes for their ten best films today, and although “The Artist” seems within the mould of their admittedly old-fashioned preferences, I’m going to hold off on suggesting it can set the ball rolling for a sweep. This year feels like more of a scattered, spoil-sharing prospect after last year’s uniform endorsement of “The Social Network” – especially with voting bodies seemingly at war with one another. All things considered, “Moneyball” remains the best-reviewed film with realistic awards potential, so it makes sense for it to win a prize from a significant voting body (whatever your view on the NBR, their opinion carries weight).

The top ten is a minefield to predict, but you can be assured that they like political dramas, so this could be a handy get for the dwindling “The Ides of March,” and they always include Clint Eastwood’s films so expect “J. Edgar” to pop up here despite the disastrous reviews. From there, it gets tricky. Who knows if they’ll even remember those earlier acclaimed films “Beginners,” “Jane Eyre, “ and “Win Win”? Are “Melancholia,” “Martha Marcy May Marlene” and “Take Shelter” a bit too far outside of the box for this group? Your guess is as good as mine.

Picture: “Moneyball”

Alt: “The Artist”

Top Ten:

“The Artist”

“Beginners”

“The Descendants”

“Hugo”

“The Ides of March”

“J. Edgar”

“Midnight in Paris”

“Rise of the Planet of the Apes”

“The Tree of Life”

“War Horse”

Director: Martin Scorsese, “Hugo”

Alt: Terrence Malick, “The Tree of Life”

Leading Actress: Michelle Williams, “My Week with Marilyn”

Alt: Elizabeth Olsen, “Martha Marcy May Marlene”

Leading Actor: Brad Pitt, “Moneyball”

Alt: George Clooney, “The Descendants”

Supporting Actress: Jessica Chastain, “The Help,” “Take Shelter,” “The Tree of Life”

Alt: Vanessa Redgrave, “Coriolanus”

Supporting Actor: Christopher Plummer, “Beginners”

Alt: Kenneth Branagh, “My Week with Marilyn”

Screenplay: “Moneyball”

Alt: “The Descendants”

Animated Feature: “Rango”

Alt: “Chico & Rita”

Foreign Film: “Certified Copy”

Alt: “A Separation”

Documentary: “Project Nim”

Alt: “The Interrupters”

Review: The Descendants

2011-11-30T19:01:00.003Z

The Descendants

Directed by Alexander Payne

Starring: George Clooney, Shailene Woodley, Matthew Lillard, Judy Greer, Robert Forster

Grade: C+

As maudlin voiceovers go, Miranda July’s cat-on-a-deathbed soliloquy in “The Future” has competition for the prize of ‘most annoying of 2011’, as George Clooney’s opening gambit in the wearily-spirited “The Descendants” may narrowly beat it out. In a speech in which Hawaii is characterised as a pillar of heritage, Clooney’s Matt King divulges to the audience the exposition that director Alexander Payne (“Election,” “About Schmidt,” “Sideways”) neglects to integrate into the narrative insightfully – which is that Matt’s wife Elizabeth is in a coma as a result of a boating accident, and that he’s struggling to take care of his two daughters. A fine premise for a film, given Payne’s history of resisting the urge to plumb the tearjerking sensitivities in his scripts for emotional effect, but as “The Descendants” proves: there’s always one exception to the rule.

Burgeoning talent Shailene Woodley’s entrance into the story as inebriated, frolicking teen Alexandra gives her the tag of the problem child, but is dismantled fairly soon after the daughters are rounded up to hunt down their dying mother’s fellow adulterer. The film charts Matt’s attempts to deal with the revelations of his wife’s recent behaviour, and his confrontation with the reality that many of his questions about their life together may well be left unanswered. In the midst of crises Matt’s relationship with his two daughters slowly comes together, revealing them to be a genuine unit, even as the early scenes had threatened to expose this as a hiding to nowhere. The genealogical angle employed to give the title added meaning sees Matt and his shareholder relatives in negotiations to sell the expanse of land on the island belonging to their ancestors, providing him with a secondary avenue in which to determine what ‘family’ means.

“The Descendants” boasts an unlikely setup for a comedy, but its blackness comes off as largely honest. The use of the Hawaiian setting to illustrate the film’s theme of disconnection works effectively in mirroring the tenuous nature of the frayed relationships within the family, and, whether as a result of having to make do with being thrown together or through the guidance of a director looking to develop the premise through the skills of his actors, the ensemble of “The Descendants” find a way to somewhat authenticate this band of people. There’s a makeshift sense of construction to their interactions which works within the film’s dramatic arc, and Payne’s presentation of familial solidarity-in-progress at least finds a way to resonate uniquely and effectively. Much of this can be attributed to the supporting performances surrounding Clooney, whose instincts for dry comedy have always felt like a neutered form of his zany “O’ Brother Where Art Thou” shtick. He has soulful moments but mostly relies upon the presence of Krause, Miller, and particularly Woodley alongside him, whose layered performance looks set to grab awards attention.

The problems lie in the strange tone of the film, and the tendencies of the humour to cheaply play to the audience. With alarming regularity, Clooney and his troupe go island-hopping at the drop of a hat, aided by tag-a-long Californian oaf Sid in the designated role of an outspoken jackass. There’s more than an element of “Little Miss Sunshine” to this family-outing setup, diluted by the morbidity and emotion of the predicament, but nonetheless indicative of Chabrol-style whimsy, alienating us from the characters as much as it draws us to them. Payne isn’t shy when it comes to big confrontation scenes, but he often uses directness to further the story when it doesn’t seem best appropriate, and his and Clooney’s attempts to extricate empathy for Matt occasionally fall on deaf ears.

There's something of Alexander Payne lurking in "The Descendants," beneath its unmistakeable plotting, infantile humour, and precious advocacy of togetherness. It has the midlife crisis-element of “Sideways,” the adolescent angst present in “Election,” but, more than anything else, exhibits the caustic charm of "About Schmidt" – albeit with a touch more humanity and considerably less nudity. Like Almodovar with the maligned “Broken Embraces” Payne’s auteurial gaze rakes over old ground, but lightly riffs rather than wickedly satirising, and ultimately feels like a backwards tread. However well its assemblage of young actors can pull off ‘artfully precocious’ with rounded aplomb, “The Descendants” surely represents this filmmaker’s most flawed work to date.

Bitesize Best Actress Oscar Profiles: Anna Magnani

2011-11-24T12:40:00.003Z

Anna Magnani in “Wild Is the Wind”

Lost the 1957 Best Actress Oscar to Joanne Woodward in “The Three Faces of Eve”

Grade: ***

Despite the pedestrian warbling of Johnny Mathis in the titular signature tune, “Wild Is the Wind” has clearly been made with the intention of ruffling feathers. The decision to cast impassioned actors Anthony Quinn and Anna Magnani (Mexican and Italian-born respectively) can only help but add intensity to a story of unhealthy attraction and morbid obsession. It’s especially interesting to see the rural side of America explored in a narrative which, in its subversion of burgeoning coupledom, traditionally lends itself more to white middle-class suburban woe, with newly-united pairing Gino and Gioia undergoing domestic turmoil. George Cukor, in a rare outing from the studio, mirrors an earthy setting with the tempestuous nature of the film’s romance, and one suspects that he didn’t have to work too hard to get these particular actors to comply with the theatrical entanglement in the script.

We’re immediately aligned with Magnani’s Gioia, who enters the film as a stranger to the rural American paradigm, and must learn to co-exist with Gino and adapt to his way of life. Early scenes in which Magnani is afforded the freedom of her Italian accent underpin the emotional alabaster of this woman, her tentative interaction with the farm folk invoking the magnitude of the cultural leap she’s taking. While the film dismantles this language barrier in order to usher the plot towards more scandalous intentions, and the ever-clearer themes of lust, identity, and belonging, Magnani is able to shape the experiental pitfalls of the woman and strongarm some identifiable, go-getting charm into her homemaking character.

Yet, particularly when the script is intent on generating issues for the couple, the hypersensitivity of Gioia as a fiery, stubborn woman isn’t always condusive to the development of the character, and in the repetitive instances of kitchen-based barneys Magnani doesn’t deviate much from bouts of severe frustration. This actress’ trademark physical imposition can restrict access to Gioia’s internal conflicts, too definite when confronting her husband over his many failures, with less of a tremulous sense of edge or self-doubt than somebody relatively new on the scene. This is a woman apparently governed by her impulses, but whom demonstrates emotional maturity only when the story suits, and with scene partners Quinn and Franciosa straddling wildly uneven extremes of angst, Magnani must shoulder most of that burden herself.

Magnani reacts to the kindling of her tryst with farmhand Bene with too much visible horror – an approach which makes the character appear too fickle, and somewhat neutralises the tragedy of her missteps towards the end of the film. She does, however, bring a naturalistic candour to this desolate landscape, and feels at home within the Tenessee Williams-esque elements of the narrative more than anyone else involved. The misguided theatrics of her performance dilute the nuance, but it’s an acceptable climax to this woman’s brace of Academy notices.

Bitesize Best Actress Oscar Profiles: Fay Bainter

2011-11-17T14:33:00.012Z

Fay Bainter in “White Banners”

Lost the 1938 Best Actress Oscar to Bette Davis in “Jezebel”

Grade: ***

Perhaps the greatest comment on behalf of Edmund Goulding's understated “White Banners” is that it makes a great advertisement for small-town America: a place where issues can be presented and overcome with grace and solidarity. It must be conceded that, after the initial cosiness of the home is established, there’s a heavy dose of earnestness to this accessible melodrama. What makes the film in many ways superior to similarly moral-driven pictures is in the performances – of and either side of Fay Bainter – who help to shape it into a worthwhile model of family life.

Of the ensemble Bainter’s Hannah remains most noticeably intriguing, predominantly because her character is less receptive to, or dependent upon, the influence of others, and her role as the film's insistent maid intentionally places her as the figurehead of the household. There are elements of self-righteousness to Hannah, which Bainter uses to allude to back-story – both within her half-hidden arc and outside of it. She finds ways to show how this woman has grown from her experiences, developed into a makeshift matriarch, turned dedication and presence into a valuable commodity to suit her needs. Long before the sympathies of the character are revealed, Bainter manipulates without offending – partly because she encounters little to no resistance, but also because she’s very difficult to distrust.

But for all of these minor successes this method also works against her, and the nature of the film’s narrative in the first hour essentially limits the amount of impact that she can achieve. The dedication to a storyline involving Claude Rains’ inventor character consigns the performance to flashes of matronly self-lionisation which ultimately inhibit her greatly, and there isn’t enough teeth-sinking opportunity in the prolonged middle portion. “White Banners” takes until the hour mark to endeavour to really upset the apple cart, this coming in the form of an incrementally hinted-at revelation from Hannah’s past, which colours our view of her considerably, and allows this actress to finally furrow grief into a guarded pillar of efficiency.

Bainter admittedly furnishes guilt and regret with a degree of plaintive mechanism in the final segment, but she does extricate emotion through revealing the character’s outlook to be more malleable and ambiguous than previously suggested. Her performance crystallises when the moment she has anticipated for most of the film eventually arises, and her concession of weakness when others force her to confront these issues from a different plain of thought brings added depth to Hannah. She’s given inklings of this before, but there’s mild surprise to the way in which she deals with the fraught collision of events that threatens to destruct. It can’t quite boost the resounding impact of her performance from congenial warmth to serviceable excellence, but it’s nontheless befitting of this emotionally intelligent, unendingly modest feature.

Review: Anonymous

2011-11-11T13:13:00.006Z

Anonymous

Directed by Roland Emmerich

Starring: Rhys Ifans, Jamie Campbell Bower, Sebastian Armesto, Vanessa Redgrave, Rafe Spall, David Thewlis, Joely Richardson, Derek Jacobi

Grade: C+

Whatever our preconceptions about history, it’s easy to take them for granted. When you begin to study the subject you realise that there is rarely a uniform view about anything, and that notions of ‘truth’ are much more murky and uncertain than they appear on the surface. An unlikely purveyor of oppositional theory, Roland Emmerich is more at home with adhering to the expectations of an audience than going against them, but nevertheless helms this tale of fiction’s indubitubly reprised hero William Shakespeare, who has his name on works as iconic as “Hamlet” and “Romeo and Juliet,” but does that categorically mean that he wrote them? Emphatically, Emmerich suggests that he didn’t, and that instead these plays were written by the then-Earl of Oxford, Edward De Vere – an accusation which represents one of the many theories as to the identity of the true author.

If all of this sounds like a far-fetched attempt at rewriting the history books, then consider this: RSC stalwarts Derek Jacobi and Vanessa Redgrave both star in “Anonymous” and advocate its claims. Beyond this film there is weight to the discussion, but Emmerich, protective of the mantra that entertainment supercedes debate, opts to forego cultural responsibility and craft a film that flaunts the factional warfare of Elizabethan politics rather than scrutinising the subject at hand. William Shakespeare (Spall) is portrayed as an illiterate, lecherous fool, and De Vere (Ifans) as the nobleman skirting the stigma of the artist’s profession. The Earl produces the plays, using poet Samuel Johnson (Armesto) as a go-between, and relays a left-wing political voice which opposes the royal aides who surround elderly Queen Elizabeth I (Redgrave).

A story littered with scandalous accusations of sex, betrayal, and incest, “Anonymous” is far too overstuffed and, frankly, ridiculous to achieve any rounded view of history. The goals of the film are in allaying facts and providing a gung-ho impression of Elizabethan England as a haven for self-interested charlatans, and as such asserts that the truth may be even stranger than fiction. But it’s self-parodical in its radicalism of history as laden with hateful, preposterous characters and cross-generational romances, integrating soapy melodrama into the narrative without riffing on artistic tropes the way that “Shakespeare in Love” did thirteen years ago. It’s probably the trashiest representation of the era since at least “Mary, Queen of Scots” in 1971, proffering snap political decisions as the catalyst for emotional grandstanding.

While many will scoff at Emmerich’s commercialisation of 16th century life, the film’s sheer audacity as an anti-history lesson, estranged from logic, is one of its key attributes. There are storylines and plot twists in “Anonymous” which defy belief, but watching them unfold is often tremendous fun, with Redgrave in fine form as the frothy, culture-loving monarch, and Ifans statuesque as the haughty, melancholy puppetmaster observing from the sidelines. There’s a great deal of character brought to the film, which likely benefits from shying away from straight-laced drama and a self-important tone. The inevitable problems emerge from interloping figures, cliched subplots, intercutting between timeframes (all of which have plagued Emmerich’s films before) and primarily the framing of the theory as a viable option in the first place. It’s difficult to imagine that anybody watching “Anonymous” would entertain this impression of Shakespeare as anything other than a fictional fancy, since so much within its approach spurns intellectual engagement for other exploits.

For Emmerich, “Anonymous” may have initiated a departure from his usual disaster movie blockbusters, but as a competent cinematic storyteller dependent upon familiar narrative beats and clichés, this isn’t a million miles away from his usual fare. Unfathomably, he has fashioned high-brow into low-brow; turned one of the most prestigious periods for literature into a crowdpleasing piece of frippery about profligates and schemers. It’s a loose cannon of a picture, enjoyably frothing with issues and intrigue, but often clumsily executed and manically curtailed in its final third. “Anonymous” even does its best to destroy the credibility of the argument it's founded upon. But for all of that, and irrespective of whether you view this as the work of a hack, a heathen, or a dillettante, it commands admiration for the gall of the venture alone. The world of the theatre may be shown up for its deception here, but it has rarely felt this alive and well.

Review: The Adventures of Tintin

2011-11-04T16:03:00.005Z

The Adventures of Tintin: Secret of the Unicorn

Directed by Steven Spielberg

Starring: Jamie Bell, Andy Serkis, Daniel Craig

Grade: B

If there’s a filmmaker more closely associated with the art of nostalgia than Steven Spielberg then his name eludes me. J. J. Abrams’ “Super 8” was an attempt to wrestle sentiment from Close Encounters and E.T. but, as “The Adventures of Tintin” proves: only Spielberg knows the workings of his own ouvre. When this project came to light the assumption that it would be a live action adventure was quickly hushed by an announcement that this was to represent this director’s first foray into the realm of animation. The finished product is somewhere in the middle of both, with the use of motion capture technology providing a hybrid clash of cartoon action and human instinct.

Hergé’s Tintin books are beloved in Europe, where they’ve gained more exposure, and where the continental sensibilities of this crime fighting, globe-hopping hero have more obvious appeal. The African country of Morocco is the destination for “Secret of the Unicorn,” which sees Tintin (Bell) as an already-established sleuth drawn into the mystery of the Haddock family, and the lost cargo of their long-since sunken ship. Accompanied by his dog Snowy he encounters one of their descendants, Captain Haddock (Serkis), but is continually thwarted in his mission of retrieval by the vengeful, greedy aristocrat Sakharine (Craig).

There’s a delicacy to Tintin as a character which makes him seem knowing, but an ultimate show-off, and it’s this vague arrogance that allows for the key elements of the quest to be outlined to an infant audience. As is the case with so many mystery stories aimed at kids (Nancy Drew, The Famous Five etc.) the story hinges on foreseeable plot points, which frequently feature objects or clues as the catalyst for revelations. And still, the thoughtful approach towards themes of heritage, kinship, and masculine inadequacy (there are barely any women in this film) extend “The Adventures of Tintin” into universal territory. In the mould of “Raiders of the Lost Ark” Spielberg shifts the dramatic onus upon uncovering historical truths, and uses the exotic setting as a handy platform for action sequences – one particular street chase a marvel in choreography and execution.

Shifting focus towards a more nautical-themed adventure allows Tintin’s burgeoning relationship with Haddock to take centre stage, and kingpin of the filmmaking medium Andy Serkis to have a ball as the incompetent drunkard with a heart. But ultimately, it’s a shame that Morocco doesn’t greatly contribute to the crux of the mystery, given the amount of television episodes dedicated to interweaving foreign intrigue into the story’s crimes and motives . Moreover, the ending of the film is a tad anticlimactic in the ease at which it shows us what we’ve essentially seen before, and then leads into the promise of a sequel with a very similar goal to this adventure. If the heavily-suggested sequel goes ahead then one expects the follow-up will have to considerably build upon “Secret of the Unicorn,” which lays the groundwork but likely won’t emerge as the model of attainability. It’s stoking the embers rather than blazing the world alight, and setting out its stall for a franchise.

This quirkily-conceived detective adventure meshes well with Spielberg’s cinematic tropes and represents a return to form which – however brief with the hotly-anticipated “War Horse” ready to emerge – will encourage those who had lost faith. It’s worth noting that many of this film’s shortcomings could also be said of the book and TV series adaptation, which itself is a confirmation that Spielberg has done right by this franchise. Some will simply be unable to fully invest in the neither-here-nor-there motion capture technique, but in terms of narrative and character “The Adventures of Tintin” captures the charm of the man, his friends and enemies, and the casual nature of criminal investigation as enlightening, brisk fun. Forget horses for a while, and instead turn your attention to the antics of one man and his dog.

LDN

2011-11-04T14:06:00.000Z

As it’s been just over a month since my last blog post, I’d like to take this opportunity to state that, yes, I am still alive. If you take a look at the sidebar you’ll notice a section dedicated to the London Film Festival, which I had the pleasure of attending for the first time this year on behalf of InRO, and which has been the chief reason for my absence from the blog during October. I’m going to endeavour to compensate for this by posting full and capsule reviews of several of the titles I saw there in the coming weeks, including highly-anticipated awards contenders “The Artist,” “The Descendants,” and “Coriolanus.”

In the meantime, following this post is a review of "The Adventures of Tintin," which was not a part of the festival, but deserves attention nevertheless.

Review: Julia (1977)

2011-10-05T00:57:00.002+01:00

Julia

Directed by Fred Zinnemann

Starring: Jane Fonda, Vanessa Redgrave, Jason Robards, Maximillian Schell, Meryl Streep

Grade: B

Fred Zinnemann's "Julia" sure is an odd duck. It's so odd that it doesn't feel like Zinnemann made it at all -- less formal and glamourous than his Fifties' work, quirky and clunky as if Frank Perry or Jerry Schatzberg were at the helm. It's set during the war but you rarely think of it as a period film, of-the-time in its quadrant of uncertainty and incoherence yet stylistically appealing in its lack of an assured gaze. Based on the memoirs of playwright Lilian Hellman there's a distinct impression that this passage of her history represents but a misty swarm of ideas and feelings within the book, which is a sentiment that's echoed onscreen.

"Julia" is a rare period drama where you have to put in nearly as much as you get out. Lilian and Julia enter the film with a childhood bond that permeates the surface of mere adulation into something more spiritual and undefined, a couple of early sequences dedicated to hints of exposition. Alvin Sargent's script then lurches forward to a fag-chuffing Jane Fonda looking stressed at her typewriter, and a stately Jason Robards as her friend and advisor Dashiel Hammett. Lilian is marooned in her beach house and grasping for inspiration, precluding an outside world which is coming to terms with major political unrest. While Julia participates in resistance projects, Lilian approaches the global situation with her words, thoughts, feelings, and indelible ink.

There are so few passages in which we're told what somebody is thinking or feeling, or made to sympathise with one political cause or another -- even as a fascist-set drama rightly never has to justify lambasting its subject matter. We're making sense of the characters and what they represent, but we aren't following them like puppy dogs. We merely watch while events revolve around them, and observe their fragmented distillation of fear. This isn't a smooth, linear story of arcs and lessons -- it's an oscilloscope of connection-through-disconnection, and a portrait of how one's life isn't so designated and remedial a journey. How we're indecisive, wary, blameful, duly responsible, even as what goes on around us feels so unapproachably abstract. The fate of the writer is perhaps an even bigger burden; what is progress without improvement, enlightenment, and approval? What are we without labels or goals?

At least in terms of dialogue none of the characters fully address these conflicts, and one scene in particular demonstrates how the script doesn't need to preach to transfer its thoughts. Sat in a German bar Lilian eventually makes the gruelling trip to Julia's hideout, where the two discuss what Julia has been doing in their period apart. As is in the scheme of Zinnemann's storytelling there isn't a lot of detailed information, but instead he presents a reunion that speaks volumes without having to cause a commotion. With lesser actors it's difficult to see this five-minute setup providing such a wealth of emotion, but because it's Redgrave and Fonda we get it all. Redgrave in particular has the uncanny ability to provide magnetic presence without appearing at all aware of the camera, and the nature of Julia as unconcerned with anything but her own passioned intentions lets us see her on the otherworldly pedestal Lilian builds for her.

Zinnemann insists on harking back to one lingering point of recognition: a shot of the sun setting on the sea and an unmanned boat (Kim Ki-Duk-style) in what's probably an overly poignant way of rooting us in Lilian's lost world of the writer. We're often left too entrenched in this pocket of uncertainty that the film lacks a certain level of scope and sense of the period, but it's forever enchanting and deep in maturity. "Julia" is a hotchpotch of unfocused archives amidst one woman's attempts to reconcile herself with a conventional point of meaning. Ultimate accomplishment may inherently elude this film, but bully for those involved that it manages to be as bracing as it is without succumbing to staples of the biographical drama.

Review: Sennentuntschi

2011-09-29T10:24:00.000+01:00

Sennentuntschi: Curse of the Alps

Directed by Michael Steiner

Starring: Roxane Mesquida, Nicholas Ofczarek, Andrea Zogg, Carlos Leal, Joel Basman

Grade: C

‘Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned’ is a proverb that plays a prominent role in Michael Steiner’s tongue-twister horror title “Sennentuntschi.” Having recently had its UK premiere at burgeoning horror festival FrightFest, the mythological elements of this chilling, religious shocker are promoted through titular add-on ‘Curse of the Alps,’ which helps to cement the feeling that the supernatural will feature heavily in the drama. In this regard “Sennentuntschi” does not disappoint, offering a uniquely deranged brand of melodrama, and a plot that embraces wild abandon.

Beginning with the grizzly discovery of a skeleton on a mountainside, "Sennentuntschi" flashes back to detail the whos, hows and whys behind the death of this person, and the nature of their presence in a small village in 1975 Switzerland. Keen to ante up the drama early on, this retrospective switch features an immediate introduction of conflict, one of the priests at the local church discovered hung from the bells in an apparent suicide. For the religious inhabitants of this place a man of the cloth taking his own life bears serious implications, and so the tiny populous seek to discover how this has happened, and to indict the evils behind it.

When a villager spies a mysterious young woman roaming the woods a search brings her back to the town, where the reluctant agreement is that she is an outsider here by chance. After the local Sheriff Sebastian fetches her back to the home of the Mayor, Sennentuntschi attacks his pregnant wife in a fit of panic and runs off into the mountains, prompting the villagers to assert that she is a demonic presence in their haven, and to seek out the young woman and bring her to justice.

Since back in the days of "Johnny Belinda" muting female protagonists has proved a handy cinematic device for making male exploitation appear even more deplorable. Sennentuntschi exhibits the signs of stunted social development and a lack of emotional maturity (the reason for this is later revealed) appearing as mythical and androgynous a figure as Sci-fi badass Summer Glau in "Serenity." There's something dangerous about the way Mesquida stalks this mountainside town, and Steiner promotes her as a form of mythological being, judging all around her with instinctual verve rather than adhere to the ideological framework of this place. Partly through shunning perceived "normalities" of this religiously fanatical paradigm, and partly due to emerging in the wrong place at the wrong time, Sennentuntschi finds herself hunted down, but still treats this town as her natural habitat.

Read the rest of this review at Subtitled Online

First Oscar Predictions for 2011

2011-09-26T21:07:00.003+01:00

Last Friday's release of Tomas Alfredson's "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy" was significant in more ways than one; not only is it an accomplished and riveting piece of work, it's the first major Awards-focused contender to be released this year. That's not to say that those out for a while (at least Stateside) such as "Midnight in Paris" and the audacious "The Tree of Life" aren't in the conversation for Oscars -- just that they understandably didn't position themselves in prime Autumn/Winter calendar spots.

With the Venice and Toronto festivals now over, and a mere two weeks until London's own showcase kicks off, it seems as good a time as any to dole out some tentative predictions for this year's Oscar nominees, announced in January. The next couple weeks see hopefuls like "Warrior," "Melancholia," and "The Help" released on UK shores, while the rest of the year features new work from Steven Spielberg, Alexander Payne, and Clint Eastwood.

Here is how I currently see the races shaping up:

Best Picture

"The Artist"

"The Descendants"

"Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close"

"The Help"

"J. Edgar"

"War Horse"

On the Outside:

"Tinker, Tailor, Solider, Spy"

"Midnight in Paris"

"Moneyball"

"The Tree of Life"

"We Bought a Zoo"

Best Director

Clint Eastwood, "J. Edgar"

Michael Haznavicius, "The Artist"

Terrence Malick, "The Tree of Life"

Alexander Payne, "The Descendants"

Steven Spielberg, "War Horse"

On the Outside:

Tate Taylor, "The Help"

Stephen Daldry, "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close"

Woody Allen, "Midnight in Paris"

Cameron Crowe, "We Bought a Zoo"

Is the "J. Edgar" trailer that bad? Personally, I don't think so. Di Caprio seems to be staying within a comfort zone, but that isn't surprising; it looks formal and business like, but that isn't surprising. When faced with political dramas it seems more likely to me that the Academy would choose "J. Edgar," a film about American politics and a prominent figure in particular, than the subtle aloof intricacies of Tomas Alfredson's "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy," which is more arty and hard work. The odds on Eastwood's film being better are fairly slim, but otherwise nothing suggests to me that it isn't in a strong position going into the end of the season.

As the only one of these currently released "The Help" already has the mark of success, with decent critical praise, a ton of public approval, a handy mixture of light and shade to detail the Academy-friendly topics of race and prejudice. I really can't see it missing out given all of these collective factors. "The Artist" and "The Descendants" appear to be the titles exiting festivals with the biggest buzz, while Steven Spielberg's "War Horse" has the huge Pullitzer pedigree, a World War II setting, and a 'horse and his boy' story.

The wildcard pick here is "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close," which reads on paper as fairly schematic and soapy, but it's written by Eric Roth of "Benjamin Button" approval and has an impressive cast. Lingering on the outside (this could be a list encompassing anything from five to ten nominees, remember) are the two aforementioned early-year releases by Woody Allen and Terrence Malick, both of which have many supporters and could emerge should some of those December titles falter.

Best Actress in a Leading Role

Glenn Close, "Albert Nobbs"

Viola Davis, "The Help"

Felicity Jones, "Like Crazy"

Meryl Streep, "The Iron Lady"

Michelle Williams, "My Week With Marilyn"

On the Outside:

Charlize Theron, "Young Adult"

Keira Knightley, "A Dangerous Method"

Rooney Mara, "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo"

Elizabeth Olsen, "Martha Marcy May Marlene"

Kirsten Dunst, "Melancholia"

Beyond Meryl Streep and Glenn Close, who have been hogging most of the buzz even as few people have seen "Albert Nobbs" and almost nobody has seen "The Iron Lady," this category looks to be up-in-the-air. All of the perceived main contenders have detractors: in the case of Jones and Olsen being unknowns in small, critically well-received dramas, in the case of Mara a film and persona that looks too dark and off-putting for the Academy, and in the case of Knightley divisive reviews on whether her performance hits or completely misses.

I toyed with including Knightley and Theron, who at least have been here before, but with "A Dangerous Method" seeming to lose buzz and "Young Adult" a complete unknown quantity at this stage, I decided to leave them out for now. "Like Crazy" has been building word since Sundance and Felicity Jones is an extremely likable actress in a baity role, so I could easily foresee her campaign getting stronger through the Autumn. Michelle Williams' fate is more difficult to predict, since people don't seem to be on board with her or the film at all, but once the reviews start spilling out there could be a nostalgia factor with the media. Especially since Marilyn never got an Oscar nomination herself.

Best Actor in a Leading Role

George Clooney, "The Descendants"

Leonardo Di Caprio, "J. Edgar"

Jean Dujardin, "The Artist"

Gary Oldman, "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy"

Michael Shannon, "Take Shelter"

On the Outside:

Woody Harrelson, "Rampart"

Joseph Gordon-Levitt, "50/50"

Brad Pitt, "Moneyball"

Matt Damon, "We Bought a Zoo"

Michael Fassbender, "Shame"

It'd take a significant departure from George Clooney's usual middling, wry charm for him to wow me in "The Descendants" but when you're an Academy favourite, you're an Academy favourite, and this is a sympathetic role for him. Ditto Di Caprio, who has to be favourite to win, if only because there's virtually no biopic competition, and the fact that he's regarded as overdue by quite a few. But maybe not quite as overdue as Gary Oldman (certainly if we're talking in the British quarters) and even if "Tinker, Tailor..." contains his most withdrawn and crafted performance it'll probably be enough to get him a nomination for a film that's universally-respected.

From there, Jean Dujardin has the buzz, and if "The Artist" turns out to be the real deal among arthouse audiences and the older demographic then this doesn't seem an unlikely get. Joseph Gordon-Levitt has the guarantee of a well-liked film and the hugely advantageous topic of cancer on his side, but he's still relatively young in terms of Best Actor nominees, so they could easily oversee him for older men in more high profile films -- like Tom Hanks or Matt Damon. But instead I see the fifth nominee being someone like Michael Shannon, who falls somewhere in the middle of all this mix of respectability, prestige, and acclaim. It's still a game of guessing.

Best Actress in a Supporting Role

Jessica Chastain, "The Help"

Judi Dench, "J. Edgar"

Janet McTeer, "Albert Nobbs"

Vanessa Redgrave, "Coriolanus"

Octavia Spencer, "The Help"

On the Outside:

Melanie Laurent, "Beginners"

Jessica Chastain, "Take Shelter"

Carey Mulligan, "Drive"/"Shame"

Marion Cotillard, "Midnight in Paris"

Shailene Woodley, "The Descendants"

Maybe I'm overestimating "The Help" a touch but I'm still confident about its chances across the board. Octavia Spencer and Jessica Chastain both have roles as the funny, caretaking black woman and the ditzy white woman who confounds common stereotypes of her race. Chastain has too many films out this year when you consider how difficult it is for a new-on-the-scene actress to build an awards campaign with one film these days. But the performances themselves have been so well-liked, and this film is so well-liked, that this could legitimately happen for her.

Vanessa Redgrave's continued great notices for Shakespearian drama "Coriolanus" and Judi Dench's surprisingly prominent presence in the newly-released "J. Edgar" trailer both suggest that these perennial women of awards discussion can reappear for (perhaps) final nominations/wins. It's been twelve seasons since Janet McTeer managed her sole nomination for "Tumbleweeds" but a role opposite Glenn Close's cross-dressing butler has since renewed hopes of a second Osar outing. It's a difficult pick to be confident about given that nobody particularly liked "Albert Nobbs" and McTeer's presence doesn't have the comeback factor of her co-star. She could easily be completely overshadowed.

Best Actor in a Supporting Role

Jim Broadbent, "The Iron Lady"

Albert Brooks, "Drive"

Armie Hammer, "J. Edgar"

Tom Hardy, "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy"

Christopher Plummer, "Beginners"

On the Outside:

Nick Nolte, "Warrior"

Philip Seymour Hoffman, "The Ides of March"

Ben Kingsley, "Hugo"

Christoph Waltz, "Carnage"

Kenneth Branagh, "My Week With Marilyn"

I nearly predicted the popular Christoph Waltz, since he's been singled out as the best of the "Carnage" ensemble and may be becoming known as one of those reliable 'supporting' players after his Oscar win in that category, but ultimately "Carnage" doesn't look as if it's going to be the major contender it promised to be. The only solid reviews so far have been for Albert Brooks, Christopher Plummer, and Nick Nolte - the latter of which could easily make the five but who is in a film which, ironically, doesn't look as if it's going to last the distance.

Tom Hardy gives the second best performance in Tomas Alfredson's slow-burning espionage thriller (no mean feat!), but faces internal competition from Benedict Cumberbatch; Jim Broadbent is surely going to be stellar as the baity husband of Meryl's Thatcher, and if that "J. Edgar" trailer emphasises anything, it's that Armie Hammer is going to get more to do than afforded him in "The Social Network."

Best Original Screenplay

"The Artist"

"Beginners"

"J. Edgar"

"Midnight in Paris"

"Win Win"

On the Outside:

"Young Adult"

"Like Crazy"

"Bridesmaids"

"Take Shelter"

Best Adapted Screenplay

"The Descendants"

"Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close"

"Moneyball"

"Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy"

"War Horse"

On the outside:

"The Help"

"We Bought a Zoo"

"The Ides of March"

"A Dangerous Method"

Bitesize Best Actress Oscar Profiles: Janet Gaynor

2011-09-19T19:21:00.000+01:00

Janet Gaynor in "Street Angel"

Won the 1927-28 Best Actress Oscar (Also for "Seventh Heaven" and "Sunrise")

Grade: ****

Firstly I have to confess to being inexperienced with regard to silent films. The vast majority of those that I have seen were forced upon me as part of university modules, and subsequent attempts to watch renowned classics (Battleship Potemkin, Broken Blossoms etc.) have resulted in abandonment. For some reason it requires more effort for me to watch a film without audible dialogue than it does for, say, a film in which the dialogue is spoken in Greek or Russian. After watching “Street Angel” I feel even more bashful about my behaviour, since it exhibits many of the most appealing features of silent cinema; foremost, the wonder of visual storytelling, and also the way in which it manages to create a score that reflects the emotive shifts of the action on screen.

Janet Gaynor is most famously the Actress to win for not one, not two, but three performances in films made between 1927 and 1928 – one of the early anomalies that make Oscar statistics a pest to compile. While lovely in “Sunrise” the film and performance failed to bowl me over, but the situation is somewhat different with Frank Borzage’s “Street Angel,” a social commentary involving a woman driven to commit a crime through desperation, and blighted by that crime later in life. Borzage and Gaynor had a healthy relationship (he made two of the three films which garnered her triple Oscar win) and her presence on-camera is one that shows complete faith between director and performer.

While the film moves at such a rapid pace in the first twenty minutes this is mainly in order to outline the predicaments of Gaynor’s Angela, who deals with familial strife and a run-in with the law. Her brush with criminality forces a shift from the unassuming, loving daughter to a more hardened, downbeat view of the world, exacerbated when she runs off with a circus troupe and becomes a star there. Gaynor reveals Angela’s attitude towards men as distrusting and contemptuous through brazen dismissal of anything mushy and sentimental, and even if Borzage is far too eager to race to Angela’s romance with incoming vagabond painter Gino then Gaynor at least bridges the gap between the reserved contentment that dominates her character.

As a victim of poverty and what’s perceived to be society’s neglect of the working classes, Gaynor sustains a level of grace which gives the internal conflicts of Angela all the more eminence. In the film’s most testing plot device she escapes from her imprisonment at a workhouse in an unlikely reversal of fortune, the moment at which she is provided with a path to freedom handled with disbelieving trepidation. In theory this is as much of a moral decision for Angela than the act which initially landed her in hot water, and Gaynor palpably details the confluence of ethical and physical necessities in her character. This whole sequences takes up less than five minutes of “Street Angel,” but you somehow feel like Angela has been without her civil liberties for far longer.

Occasionally Gaynor may too adamantly telegraph emotional pining by exerting gestures of physical pain, and for substantial periods she’s re-iterating Angela’s heartache and shame when confronting men who expect better of her. But Gaynor does this with such operatic verve and introspective worth that “Street Angel” constantly flourishes under her careful guidance as a lost yet fascinatingly self-aware protagonist whose motivations derive from passion and love. A hard-hitting, perfectly pitched scene in which she finally addresses the implications of her actions lend Gaynor the opportunity to be particularly devastating in reaction to the reality of losing what’s close to her, and she certainly does not disappoint.

By all accounts, word seems to suggest that Gaynor was one of those actresses who somewhat lost out as a result of the advent of talkies, despite a 1937 nomination for the William Wellman-directed “A Star is Born.” She’s fine as Vicki Lester, but less impacting than in “Sunrise” and especially lacks the depth of feeling of this performance, which permeates so well as an embodiment of the social victim. Having seen two of Gaynor’s ’27-’28 triple-threat of pictures the jury’s still out as to whether her and Borzage are a marriage made in (Seventh) Heaven, but based on the resounding success of their partnership here, I wouldn’t bet against it. Keep an eye on the sidebar this coming week for a peek at whether she can make it 2 for 2.

Review: Villain (2010)

2011-09-15T10:25:00.002+01:00

Villain

Directed by Sang-Il Lee

Starring: Eri Fukatsu, Satoshi Tsumabuki, Akira Emoto, Hikari Mitsushima, Masuo Keijo, Kirin Kiki, Masaki Okada

Grade: B

Japanese director Sang-Il Lee has seemingly decided to follow in the footsteps of his Korean peers with new murky crime thriller, "Villain." The film, about an unhinged young man's approach to sexual relationships, emulates the recent works of Bong Joon-ho and Lee Chang-dong - "Mother" and "Poetry" respectively - in so much as it details the impact of crime on the families of said criminals and where the blame behind their deeds resides. As a part of recent attempts to address the social and contextual factors attributed to spawning criminality, one would tentatively describe "Villain" as part of a cinematic trend, and foremost an indication that Asian cinema is providing alternatively rich perspectives on perceived societal evils.

When we first spy petrolhead Shimizu (Tsumabuki) he’s loitering at a gas station and looking thoroughly bored with existence. While he doesn’t loom as a particularly dangerous figure, his presence intimidates through what appears to be an ambivalent disassociation with his surroundings. This young man is an emotionless wildcard. And as we follow him on his journey to meet popular college girl Yoshino (Mitsushima) his thorough lack of belief in either himself or anyone else quickly comes to the fore. The night does not go well for Shimizu when Yoshino spurns his advances and takes off into the sunset with her local crush Masuo, and the discovery of her dead body the following morning raises serious questions. Is Shimizu the prime suspect in her murder?

The ensuing conflicts are separated between Shimizu confronting his involvement in Yoshino’s final hours, and the grief-stricken parents of the girl trying to gain perspective on how and why she died. When Shimizu is hunted down by police he flees home, aided-and-abetted by Mitsuyo (Fukatsu), a girl he met just days earlier in a random internet meeting. As his situation becomes increasingly precarious he and Mitsuyo develop a strong attachment, which leads them to go into hiding from the law and the world.

"Villain" achieves much emotional heft through its construction of Shimizu and Mitsuyo, two central characters with an inherently awkward lack of social skills and self-worth. Theirs is a connection founded upon solitude and necessity, both exhibiting impulsive and wildly off-kilter relationship ethics through having so far lived modest, sheltered lives. You can gauge a significant sense of backstory from even their first five minutes together, as they murmur sheepishly in a car with little sense of how to build a dynamic or engage beyond pleasantries and eventual physical gratification. Founded upon this partnership “Villain” succeeds as an interconnected would-be Shakespearian tragedy, very much a fresh take on the emotive aggression of youth but possessed with the bitter melancholia of classic works.

Click here to read the full review at Subtitled Online

Review: Cold Fish

2011-08-22T12:10:00.001+01:00

Cold Fish

Directed by Shion Sono

Starring: Mitsuru Fukikoshi, Denden, Megumi Kagurazaka, Asuka Kurosawa, Hikari Kajiwara

Grade: C+

Written for In Review Online:

Although the term ‘sleep with the fishes’ was popularised by “The Godfather” and remains synonymous with gangsters today, rarely does a crime thriller go so far as to work aqua life into its thematic makeup. Shion Sono’s “Cold Fish,” making its way into U.S. theatres nearly a year after it premiered in Venice, utilises this somewhat idiosyncratic metaphor in telling an essentially familiar story about the grubby underworld of the Japanese Yakuza. If there’s much in Sono’s film decidedly designed to rock the boat, there’s enough comic irony in the whimsically-surfaced profession of the tropical fish salesman being used as a cover for murder, greed, and betrayal.

Against all odds, this vocation is seen to be a heinously viable one, as the unassuming aquarium enthusiast Syamoto learns when he accepts the help of Murata, a worldlier kingpin of the industry. Murata enters the film as a gentle giant, handing Syamoto’s daughter Mitsuko employment and accommodation as an apparent moralistic reaction to the girl’s attempted shoplifting of an item at his store. Concern is triggered into Syamoto with every passing increase of involvement Murata poses in their family dynamic, particularly taking an interest in his wife Taeko, and he’s finally shackled by the revelation that this jovial figure is a vendor of more than pets.

Sono relays the tone of the film through the figure of Murata, who evolves from acquaintance to friend, to partner, to sociopath, to psychopath in a fairly short space of time, and is aided by the maniacal display of prolific actor Denden. His loopy mannerisms and extrovert behaviour completely align with the absurdity of a script which has few narrative surprises but plenty of murky characterisation. It’s strange to witness such a licentious community appear as gleefully profligate in their behaviour as Murata’s irksome troupe, who swap sexual partners daily and revel in dissecting corpses over a cup of coffee. Sono’s deviant representation of them eventually tires with Vampira-style segments of women French kissing in doorways, but for the most part the quirky beats and rhythms of this organisation strike a chord.

But all this comes from a film which technically has the same plot as "Wall Street," albeit with an alternatively volatile resolution. It's less suited-and-booted than bloody and berserk, but nevertheless imparts a familiar impression of mentoring through intimidation and fear. Murata and Syamoto’s relationship, while exercised to extreme degrees of dominance and submission, doesn't offer a different power struggle than we're used to seeing in films where the emphasis is placed upon enforced corruption and breeding criminality, and Sono harvests the notion that amorality is contagious without saying much more. Most of the charms of “Cold Fish” lie in Sono’s novel stylistic flourishes, and in the hazardous hues of Shinya Kimura’s grim cinematography.

“Cold Fish” treads the age-old Duality of Man path, unevenly skewed towards using this to generate grotesque horror. Syamoto’s arc is far too extreme for the film’s conceit to work on a profound level, since we only truly empathise with him in the less concisely-characterised scenes, which are few and far between. He’s the only character we’re required to take seriously and yet Fukikoshi’s performance so dominantly comprises of two erratic, forced gears, that it’s a serious stretch to believe him at all. Moreover, the dynamic of this family is lost in the way that Sono spells out the undertones of discontent with talk of backstory, reluctant to show us how Syamoto’s relationship with his wife and daughter relates to the transition of their social situation. There aren’t enough equilibrious examples to support the actions of the final act, and instead much of the action is consigned to repetitious acts of violence, and noir-esque showdowns – neither of which contributes to the humanist angle Sono races toward.

Admirably, a revenge theme lurks in the outback of “Cold Fish,” and can’t really be called a primary motivation of Sono’s action cinema – different, certainly, from 21st century Asian cinema tropes. For a while it even feels as if there are more ambiguous intentions to our hero, and the stressful gauntlet he’s subjected to. The path of this drama so uncontrollably derails into sensationalist territory without earning our understanding, and rather than feel the impact of a bitter finale we’re left to pick up the weary pieces of an explosion too rashly orchestrated. In 2008 Sono’s “Love Exposure” took four hours to sit through – couldn’t he have found more patience in concluding this portrait of unruly society?

Up to and including a shaky finale “Cold Fish” imbues danger and flair without really sustaining the core of its commentary on strained relations and an inherent strive towards fulfilling the many hues of one’s personality. And still, there’s something to be said for a film that can be slow-burning and thoroughly rabid and larger-than-life at heart. While widely asserted that blood is thicker than water, "Cold Fish" proverbially screams that actually, no, it isn't.

Review: Pigs and Battleships (1961)

2011-08-03T10:27:00.002+01:00

Pigs and Battleships
Directed by Shohei Imamura
Starring: Hiroyuki Nagato, Jitsuko Yoshimura, Masao Mishima
Grade: A-

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It might not come as a surprise to reveal that the pigs in Shohei Imamura’s curiously-titled “Pigs and Battleships” are as metaphoric as they are literal, their use as a ruse for shadier business a more-than-scathing attack on the invasion of Americanised ideology within Japanese culture. The country’s well-documented tense relationship with World War II enemy America was an ultimately destructive affair, culminating in the now-infamous atomic bombings on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Made in 1961, “Pigs and Battleships” depicts a period of eerie aftermath and cultural rebirth within Japanese society, and its adoption of a way-of-life which cultivates corruption, greed, and disloyalty.

As U.S. G.I. soldiers stop off at the Japanese harbour town where young, plucky Yakuza member Kinta (Nagato) resides, local women are plied with booze and pimped out by the authorities. While Kinta remains in charge of the local pork farming business, this is largely a cover for the power-political schemes of the town’s mobsters, who are vying with rival gangs and trying to keep officials sweet. Difficulties arise when the corpse of a local businessman is washed up on the shore, forcing the gang to deal with investigations into his disappearance and manage conflict within their organisation.

Despite Kinta’s enthusiasm for his peers his girlfriend Haruko (Yoshimura) struggles to deal with the dangerous nature of the world he has entered into, and encourages him to get a stable, straight profession. This disagreement causes a fierce rift between the couple, forcing them to escape their relationship in extreme ways, and casting into doubt whether this is the right place for them to begin their life together. Kinta himself learns that being part of the Yakuza has its distinct downfalls as well as its benefits, as many of his colleagues are keen to see him sacrificed for the greater good of the unit.

From the outset Imamura presents a glamourised impression of this town, which, with its cultural hybridism and willingness to embrace commerce, feels like it should be on a border between two states somewhere. There’s an element of Welles’ “Touch of Evil” in the way brass accompaniment and sweltering, smoky streets dominate the films’ opening, demonstrative of the thriving success of capitalism. Kinta’s pride in an early scene stresses the self-sufficient and morally-shy philosophies of a community reliant upon mutual exploitation, and a crisis of identity which reflects the director’s commentary on the disarray of the country’s hierarchal workings. These residents are governed by foreign money, and he does little to hide the characters’ motivation to aspire towards American values, caught up in a cycle of self-preservation and armed with a thirst to succeed.

“Pigs and Battleships” balances the crime and romance within the narrative supremely and shrewdly manoeuvres the journey of its characters to align with grander political concerns. Partly due to the off-kilter, occasionally infantile performance of leading man Nagato, Kinta isn’t always so relatable as a protagonist, but although he doesn’t encounter many overt threats in the film we still care about his tempestuous attachment to the feisty Haruko. Jitsuko Yoshimura, as a woman going out of her mind with worry and disillusionment at the people around her, is such a fascinating Actress, and in a similar way to Janet Leigh in “Touch of Evil” captivates by being the victim that never learns to keep quiet, die down, or give in. At some point in the midst of the film Haruko becomes its emotional centre, her fragility mirrored in the film’s sharp decline towards hysteria and unrest. As she grows to be consumed by resentment and unworthiness “Pigs and Battleships” is best served from her perspective, its second half a more sprawling story of Noir cinema’s easy dismantling of perceived strengths and friendships. A subplot involving Yakuza kingpin Sakiyama also stresses the feigned sense of grandeur that comes with the luxury of power.

“Pigs and Battleships” admittedly piles on the metaphors too flagrantly (particularly towards the end) in a finale that echoes the best and worst of Kubrick, opting for cavalry band-style music to accompany catastrophe in the way that Mickey Mouse Club booms out in 1987’s “Full Metal Jacket.” It’s a minor foible since the script exhibits such a breadth of allure – from intricate melodrama to fiery romance to ironic genre subversion – that the aesthetics going on around it merely form another layer to the avalanche. In aping a Noir structure Imamura approaches the common issue of small-town trappings with authorial verve, offering a spectrum of his setting which veers between appealing mystery and strenuous squalor.

While many of the characters on display here are essentially on a hiding to nothing, the same cannot be said for this film’s ambitious creator. “Pigs and Battleships” landed in Japanese cinemas at the time when the French New Wave and Italian Neo-realist movements were burgeoning, and Imamura’s study of Nationalism and its implication on society bears its own unique stamp, too. Occasionally overcooked, it’s nevertheless an astounding product of impassioned, effective, and thoughtful filmmaking, and finds its own pocket of time and relevance within this auteur’s carefully drawn-out filmography.

Does Angelina Jolie Justify Being the Highest-Paid Actress on the Planet?

2011-07-26T17:42:00.008+01:00

I've just been getting around to this but earlier this month Forbes released an updated list of Hollywood's highest-paid actresses, and there are a couple of surprises. As well as the usual group of renowned A-list stars from the past five years and beyond (in some cases, way beyond), there are three former TV stars and a woman barely over twenty.

It isn't really surprising to learn that Angelina Jolie tops this list, earning a staggering $30m a film. Everything she's touched lately -- from animated blockbusters to Summer action movies to period dramas -- has turned to gold. Even her 2007 biographical indie, "A Mighty Heart," a film that's heavy and relatively unforgiving, managed to make a slim profit. It's somewhat more surprising that Jolie shares first-place with Sex and the City's lead Sarah Jessica Parker, whose two TV-to-cinema projects made New Line a ton of money. To me this seems a somewhat inflated figure for an Actress who has made just eight films in the last nine years (two are scheduled for late 2011) but I suppose this represents her as someone presently sought after.

So too of-the-moment is Kristen Stewart, in the midst of filming the massively popular Twilight series, but a proven draw on the Independent circuit as well as the mainstream Tween scene. Rom-com 'Queens' Jennifer Aniston and Katherine Heigl are also in the ten, while the rest of the list largely comprises of women we've seen there before; Nineties babes Cameron Diaz, Julia Roberts and Sandra Bullock still command $15+m a movie, while 62 year-old Meryl Streep is commendably able to cling to the top ten, arguably as popular now as she was twenty-five years ago.

Official Top Ten Highest-Paid Actresses

Angelina Jolie - $30 million p/m
Sarah Jessica Parker – $30 million p/m
Jennifer Aniston – $28 million p/m
Reese Witherspoon – $28 million p/m
Julia Roberts – $20 million p/m
Kristen Stewart – $20 million p/m
Katherine Heigl – $19 million p/m
Cameron Diaz – $18 million p/m
Sandra Bullock – $15 million p/m
Meryl Streep – $10 million p/m

I'm not really a fan of this list, so I decided to play around a little and figure out some statistics in order to get a better gauge on who might be doing better with the "limitations" of their salary. I calculated the average worldwide box-office total of their movies (based on the last six released theatrically) and used their salaries to gain a VFM (Value-for-money) percentage. This represents the average amount of money they received versus the average amount of gross their films earned.

Interestingly -- but perhaps not surprisingly -- Meryl Streep offers the best value for money, receiving just 5.4% of the profit her films eventually earn. Considering her salary is three times less than Jolie's this suggests that this figure be representative of the vast inflation afforded to the top four women compared to the rest of the ten. Still, Jolie's films have tended to earn at least $100m more than the others, and so she comes in third place at a tasty-looking 8%. Aniston offers the least value for money at 27.2%, her films mainly romantic comedies with modest (but not exceptional) success.

Ranking By VFM Percentage (Based on last six movies up to July '11)

Meryl Streep – 5.4% ($186.5m)
Cameron Diaz – 7.0% ($256m)
Angelina Jolie - 8.0% ($375.8m)
Kristen Stewart – 8.4% ($238.4m)
Sandra Bullock – 10.4% ($144.7m)
Katherine Heigl – 13.8% ($138m)
Julia Roberts – 14.7% ($136.3m)
Sarah Jessica Parker – 19.4% ($154.7m)
Reese Witherspoon – 22.2% ($126.3m)
Jennifer Aniston – 27.2% ($103m)

I then decided to calculate the average Metacritic score of these films to target which actresses are making more acclaimed films for their lofty salaries. Julia Roberts scrapes a victory here, while Streep and Jolie also figure highly. It should come as a shock to pretty much nobody that Aniston's, Heigl's, and Sarah Jessica Parker's recent filmographies leave a lot to be desired.

Ranking By Average Metacritic Score (Based on last six movies up to July '11)

Julia Roberts - 63/100
Meryl Streep - 62/100
Angelina Jolie - 61.5/100
Kristen Stewart - 59.1/100
Reese Witherspoon - 49.7/100
Cameron Diaz - 48/100
Sandra Bullock - 44.5/100
Jennifer Aniston - 40.5/100
Katherine Heigl - 40.5/100
Sarah Jessica Parker - 38.5/100

As this list changes throughout the next couple of years it's difficult to see Kristen Stewart not making inroads, considering she has two Twilight movies within the next year and also the anticipated forthcoming adaptation of Snow White. Sandra Bullock has Stephen Daldry's Oscar-tipped "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close" landing at the end of 2011 and a sci-fi film with George Clooney next year, while Cameron Diaz has a celeb-packed ensemble comedy and a heist caper with Colin Firth released next year. Those two look like safe bets to return.

I don't anticipate many women entering this list; Rooney Mara looks like she's going to become very hot property, and the "Dragon Tattoo" remake will likely be successful, Marion Cotillard is working with Steven Soderbergh and Chris Nolan, and future-Catwoman Anne Hathaway has "One Day" poised to shellshock audiences next month. Beyond these, I'm not sure. Suggestions?

Trailer Round-Up: Dream House, Drive, Main Street

2011-07-23T20:08:00.003+01:00

Never mind "Captain America," "Contagion," and "The Dark Knight Rises," here's three newly-released trailers which promise vastly different things.

Dream House

I'm not entirely sure where to begin with "Dream House" as it does look at least well made. Still, Jim Sheridan is absolutely the LAST director I would have guessed would take on a script of this kind. Maybe "Brothers" was so miserable he had to cheer himself up with some thrills and spills? I'm less worried for Sheridan than I am for the actors. Why are talent like Naomi Watts, Daniel Craig and Rachel Weisz consigned to roles in supernatural horror films? In the case of Watts especially, it reads as a little desperate that she's reverting back to the genre that made her a big deal. She hasn't really had a hit since "King Kong" in 2005.

The worst thing about this trailer is that it gives away an awful lot. Was it really necessarily to divulge key plot shifts like Daniel Craig's identity crisis and his "Are my family dead or aren't they?" dilemma. It's one of the biggest adverts I've seen for the notion of limiting trailers to one minute or less. The best ones are those short, creepy teasers anyway; anyone remember that swing creaking in the trailer for "The Omen" remake?

Drive

By contrast, I'm less bothered about spending two minutes looking at Ryan Gosling, and together with co-star Carey Mulligan it's an altogether more successful example of actors picking interesting projects. The trailer for "Drive" is so exhilarating that it flies by, and the buzz from Cannes for this was immense, culminating in a Best Director win for Nicolas Winding Refn. The only film I've seen about stuntmen is the excellent 1980 comedy "The Stunt Man," which netted Peter O'Toole an Oscar nomination. While that film was more about the movies themselves, "Drive" seems to be crafting a segway for Gosling as an action hero compelled to deal with Carey Mulligan's shady husband. This is a film more likely geared towards box office than awards, but it'll surely help Gosling's bid for a nomination in "The Ides of March," which has already been announced as the opener of this year's Venice Film Festival.

I wouldn't call myself a fan of director Refn; "Bronson" is very incoherent and off-puttingly effusive in its techniques. He does, however, seem to have a unique style of filmmaking, and his projects so far are varied and filled with passion. It might be that he has found the polish to add to the shine -- those final 30 seconds of the trailer really work with the contrapuntal music and systematic editing.

Main Street

Before I suggest that "Main Street," a film about a waste-disposal tycoon trying to rejuvenate an ailing town, doesn't exactly stoke my embers, let us consider the hilarity of Colin Firth's accent in this trailer. Give Firth props for branching out from that charming, bumbling Englishman persona, but asking him to impersonate a Texan is surely a step too far. Adding the potency of acting legends Ellen Burstyn and Patricia Clarkson is shrewd indeed, and the former at least looks like a fair contender at a nostalgia-driven Supporting Actress nomination come awards season -- if the film happens to get noticed at all.

But doesn't that seem awfully unlikely from this trailer? If "Dream House" gave away a ton of plot information "Main Street" just circles around people giving pained expressions and vague assertions about life and home and belonging and.... Are you still awake? Good, because "Main Street" wants to sell you a film by prefacing each person with "Academy Award Winner" or similar, and doesn't seem concerned with sharing something about the story or the characters. Either that, or it's relying on the return of the long-lost Orlando Bloom to whet our appetite - which is a foolish move either way.