The Academy Awards 2011 -- The People

The narcissism of it!  They make movies to be famous and make money.  Then they give themselves an award show to congratulate each other on how wonderful they are for making movies, being famous for making movies, and making all of that money.  Because we went to see them in their movies.  Then they make us watch the award show so they can be more famous and make more money and movies.  Why do these people need to be heard?  Who cares what they have to say.  What makes people so self-important that they think we hang on their every word...that they have anything to say that's worth listening to?!?  Ignore them.  F@#$ers.  Now, on to what you've been waiting all year for -- my thoughts!  You are welcome.

The People

Best Actor

• Javier Bardem, Biutiful -- He's good, but it's a foreign language film.  Who knows what he was really saying?  (And they don't even know how to spell beautiful...sheesh!)

• Jeff Bridges, True Grit -- What a great idea!  Put Jeff Bridges in a western setting in dirty cowboy clothes and have him play a drunken has-been.  Original.  Never been done before!  He won last year and deserved it, but as another cowboy once said: "Timing has a lot to do with the outcome of a raindance".  No rain for Bridges this year.
• Jesse Eisenberg, The Social Network -- I'll admit, the degree-of-difficulty for this role was low.  Playing a detestable character who completely lacked animation and simply talked fast and never moved his neck should be easy to pull off.  But Eisenberg had to convey a lot of emotion while locked into this very well-known persona and he pulls it off.  In another year, he gets a little gold man with no junk.  But at least he made people aware that he wasn't Michael Cera.  
• Colin Firth, The Kings Speech -- Playing a character with a disability gets you on an Oscar short li-li-list.  Playing one who needed to overcome his affliction to defeat fascism makes you a lock.  I actually want Firth to win more because of his performance in A Single Man that I believe was overlooked.  Donna said precisely the right thing:  "He's cute, but I couldn't get beyond the studder."  No risk of losing her to a dead monarch...check!  
• James Franco, 127 Hours -- This is a helluva story, so you'd have to bungle the part not to be considered for an Oscar, but Franco really surprises.  Like Social Network and King's Speech, you know exactly what's going to happen and how things will turn out going into the theater, but Franco ensured that you were on the edge of your seat the whole time.  The only complaint I have is that the video tape he replays has Kate Mara wondering if he's right about hiking naked.  I'm a dirty old man -- I can't recover from distractions like that easily.  Before you know it, I'm wishing Kate was in the brat pack movies instead of Mare Winningham.  Doesn't take much.

Best Actress

• Annette Bening, The Kids are Alright -- I am a huge Bening fan, particularly since American Beauty.  She was wonderful here, so much so that she overshadowed a terrific performance by Julianne Moore.  Lesbian mom in a love triangle is strong stuff.  But it's a fart in a windstorm compared to Natalie Portman.  She brings "lezie", as my anachronistic wife likes to say, as well, but gets to add drug addiction as a result of a domineering mother, being used by her dance director and, the piece of resistance -- she's batshit crazy.  Sorry, Annette.  
• Nicole Kidman, Rabbit Hole -- Nobody saw this movie.  Not even me.  Besides, Nicole's already got a little gold man for The Hours.
• Jennifer Lawrence, Winter's Bone -- This was a terrific performance.  You felt the burden this young lady was carrying with a crazy mother and a missing father.  But she has no chance this year.  She could've gotten it on with the kid from Kick-Ass and she still wouldn't get a statue.  
• Natalie Portman, The Black Swan -- She's already cleared a spot on the mantle, and it ain't for the cremated remains of Yoda.  This one's a lock.  It was a disturbing movie, largely due to her impressive performance, but I still haven't forgiven her for contributing to the decline of the Star Wars series with performances that had more wood than a German gonzo porn film. 

• Michelle Williams, Blue Valentine -- A terrific actress (amazing in Brokeback Mountain), but completely overshadowed this year.

Best Supporting Actress

• Amy Adams, The Fighter -- A wonderful performance that will be overshadowed by Melissa Leo in the same film, which is a shame.  I found her cloying in Julie and Julia, but she showed real chops here.  I've heard that her accent wasn't "authentic" for that part of Massachusetts, so let's hope that massive and thriving film arts community in Lowell, Mass are forgiving.  No statue, however, when you're not even the best actress in your movie.
• Melissa Leo, The Fighter -- Loved her, but I think it was the reflective crazy of the batshit family, not just her solo performance, that made it so compelling.  It just wouldn't have been that singular without the cadre of ugly-to-the-bone sisters.  Besides, she campaigned for herself.  We don't like this.  We like our actresses faux-humble. 
• Helena Bonham Carter, The Kings Speech -- It's nice to see her undistorted by Tim Burton, but she's fifth out of five in this category.  
• Hailee Steinfeld, True Grit -- In the Coen brothers' version of this classic western, Mattie Ross is the central character and Hailee carries the day.  Of course, I screwed up big time by telling Donna before the movie that she was 10-years-old (part of the sales pitch -- read: lies -- necessary to get her to watch a western).  "She's not 10-years-old.  What were you thinking?  You weren't thinking.  Ten.  Huh.  10."  Talk about distracted -- completely wiped the naked Kate Mara from my mind.  The Academy won't give it to a kid, but I think her performance was best this year.  
• Jackie Weaver, Animal Kingdom -- Loved this movie!  If you haven't seen it, please rent it.  I was a little surprised the screenplay wasn't nominated, but Jackie Weaver deservedly gets in.  She plays cool, calculating evil with a smile as well as I've seen it for some time.  Donna's not a fan of accented movies, but this one held her interest and we both loved the ending.

Best Supporting Actor

• Christian Bale, The Fighter -- This is a lock.  And I don't even like this guy.  He completely dominated the movie, sucking the air out of the room every time he appeared.  There won't be any surprise in this category.
• John Hawkes, Winter's Bone -- A compelling performance that will be overlooked because of Bale's portrayal of Dickie Eklund.  
• Jeremy Renner, The Town -- A compelling performance that will be overlooked because of Bale's portrayal of Dickie Eklund.  
• Mark Ruffalo, The Kids Are Alright -- A compelling performance that will be overlooked because of Bale's portrayal of Dickie Eklund.  
• Geoffrey Rush, The Kings Speech -- A compelling performance that will be overlooked because of Bale's portrayal of Dickie Eklund.  

Best Director

• Darren Aronofsky, Black Swan -- An admirable job, but he got his prize by getting to be on the set when Natalie and Mila made out.  Have that gold-plated, Darren, and count your blessings.
• David O. Russell, The Fighter -- A wonderful film and put together beautifully, but this movie was about outsized acting performances, not direction.  
• Tom Hooper, The Kings Speech -- This position description is like an 80s camera advertisement:  Just point and shoot.  Sorry, Hoop.  Rush and Firth did all the heavy lifting here.
• David Fincher, The Social Network -- This was a brilliant directing effort and I believe David should win.  I suspect, given the hype, that Kings Speech will carry best picture, but I'm hopeful that this will be one of those rare years ector Oscar winner.
• True Grit, The Coen Brothers --  These guys know how to make movies and they don't follow a formula.  But this is not their best work and it's not this year's best directing effort.  They should not have gotten the nomination and I should be writing about Danny Boyle here, but instead our British friend of Slumdog Millionaire fame doesn't get an indented bullet.  You got my wife to enjoy a western, but you don't get a statue.

I think Danny Boyle was robbed by not getting a nomination.  127 Hours was not a one-man show, though Franco's performance was central to its success.  This could easily have been a boring movie about an unbelievable true-life story.  But Boyle kept it gripping and entertaining, not just 90 minutes of waiting for the amputation scene.  Even his teasers at the beginning of the movie -- knowing we're all waiting for Aron to get trapped -- were clever.  The dream and hallucination scenes were well done and contributed to the story without being neon signs that the main character was "losing it now".  This non-nom was a mistake.

Academy Awards 2011 -- The Movies

 Those of you who know me and know my wife realize we diverge when it comes to movies the way Lindsay Lohan and sobriety keep their distance.  The way John Boehner and normal flesh tones observe the restraining order's distance requirements.  The way...alright, you get it.  This is the normal dialogue for the last 15 years when I suggest a movie for date night:

G: Want to see a movie?

D: How long is it?

We effectively lived apart for two years when I was working in Denver, so when I returned home, we both vowed to be different.  For me, it involved putting my family first; doing good works; taking my health far more seriously; consciously working to invest time on the right activities with our children; in short, living an examined life.  For my wife, it involved going to a movie in February.

The 'New' Donna -- Willing to Invest $8 in Our Marriage

The Academy has decided to stay with 10 nominations for Best Picture, which means Donna has to risk falling asleep during movies like Winter's Bone.  The counter is that our kids have now seen 10% of the Best Picture noms -- leaving Deidre to ask about the other 90% and me to my stock answer:

"Ask me again when you're 13"
"What's so magical about 13?!?  You always say 13.  What happens that's so special when I'm 13?!?"

Some Talmudic wisdom is needed here, followed by a pithy phrase in Yiddish, but I am lacking.

Donna was able to run the gantlet of the Nomination Preparation.  So here are my thoughts, along with my first-ever NP partner's reactions to the major category nominations.

Best Original Screenplay

I know, you were on the edge of your seat waiting for my take on the Best Foreign Short Documentary Editing Synchronization category.  We'll get to that.

I am always most amused by films nominated in this category but not in Best Picture/Director or other heavy metal categories.  These are the sleeper films that I always find myself being most entertained by (possibly due to low expectations, but hey, I'm entertained -- possibly the way you feel going through this blog...at least in terms of low expectations).  This year, the only film in this category is Another Year.  A delightful film that reminds us that beautiful movies can be made without beautiful people (take that, Brangelina!)

Another Year (Mike Leigh) -- Delightful and charming (Tom and Gerry jokes aside).  This is the Vera Drake guy (yeah, I know...the wonderful movie that no one saw).  He was nominated for Best Director in 2004 when Scorsese directed The Aviator, Clint Eastwood did Million Dollar Baby and {insert any random name here because they still would've beaten Vera Drake} directed Ray.  Still not enough dues paid to win this year.  Sorry, bloke!

The Fighter  (Scott Silver, Paul Tamasy and Eric The 'Alf-a-Bee Johnson) -- Great film, but Donna said it best:  "It's a true story.  All they did was write it down."  The credit goes to that wacky fighting family for living wacky lives.  Sorry.

Inception (Christopher Nolan) -- Mind-bending story where it's nearly impossible to know what's reality and what's only happening in the mind.  Never been done before.  Completely unique.  .  No statue here.

The Kids are Alright (Lisa Cholodenko and Stuart Blumberg) -- Cholodenko is a lesbian writing about a lesbian family.  She also wrote for The L Word.  Cue the Springsteen song...

The Kings Speech (David Seidler) - It's his first nomination, even though he's 74 years old.  He lived through the Blitz in London, his uncle was a stutterer who also went to see the therapist Lionel Logue, and his grandparents survived the Holocaust.  Jeez...just hand him the statue and let's move on.

Best Adapted Screenplay

Cue the Donna: "Shouldn't this be called 'rewriting'?"  Yes, this is the rewriting category.

127 Hours (Danny Boyle and Simon Beaufoy) -- The guy who almost died and had to cut his own arm off to live wrote the book, but these guys want to take the statue?!?  Did I mention he had to cut his own arm off?  F@#$ers.

The Social Network (Aaron Sorkin) -- Yes, it felt like an episode of West Wing, but I loved West Wing.  Give the man his little naked junkless gold thing.

Toy Story 3 (Michael Arndt) -- Arndt ain't.

True Grit (The Coen Brothers) -- I loved this version, but they were very true to the original book by Charles Portis.  Very un-Coen like.  No statue.

Winter's Bone (Debra Granik) -- Donna's reaction: "zzzzzzzzzzz".

Best Picture

The World Series Ring of Oscars (what are the Phillies doing to us -- we're not the Yankees!  We don't go into the season expecting...being favored...to win a World Series!  This is going to be a tough summer.  See, I can't concentrate already.)

The Academy stayed with 10 movies again, as in days of old.  And I'm not going to any of them alone, as in days of old.  Sort of an entertainment industry stimulus program funded by The Thompsons.  You're welcome, greedy bastards.

Black Swan -- Liked it better than I expected to (not a huge Natalie Portman fan -- more criticism of her in the People post).  But it had to be about ballet.  My mother was a ballerina when she was young and then taught at Carnegie Hall.

G: Mom, how to you get to Carnegie Hall?
M: I took the train, but you could drive depending on the time of day you go.  There's probably a bus, too, but I don't know too much about that.  Train I used to take out of Trenton.  Cost fifty cents.  It's more now.  I don't know how much.  Take the train.  If you want to.
[Dorothy Thompson will be appearing a Caroline's Comedy Club every Tuesday during Lent.  There's an eight drink minimum, but you may opt to have more.]

But my mother ruined this movie for me.  She and one of her lady friends were planning on going to see it.  It was about ballet, after all.  She even heard they do Swan Lake.  Mom did Swan Lake.  But I knew there was drug abuse and madness at the center of the story.  So we went to see it first.  Every cringe-inducing moment made me wonder how mom would react.  Then that cute kid from That 70s Show has a lesbian romp wit Natalie Portman.  I might as well have been watching that scene in a theater full of nuns with the lights up.  Moving right along...

The Fighter -- This was a very enjoyable film.  Passed Donna's "true stories are the best movies" test.  Heard some public criticism that there were a bunch of people specifically performing with winning an Oscar in mind.  So what does that mean?  They wanted to give the best performance they could in the hope that a bunch of their peers think it was the best performance of the year?  I'm picturing myself at work giving an employee their year-end review:

"Listen, you worked really hard, but maybe too hard.  You were actually trying to get the firm's attention and expecting to be recognized as the best because you far exceeded our expectations and helped us make a lot of money.  Sorry."

How stupid are film critics?  Do you really have to be completely unqualified in everything else in life to be a film critic?  Seems so.  (Reminder: I am not a film critic.  This is a hobby intended to make my wife think I'm clever so she forgets how ugly a man she married).

Inception -- I enjoyed it.  I enjoyed The Matrix.  I enjoyed seeing The Matrix again...in 2011.....with a different title.

The Kids Are Alright -- This is an expansion nom.  Really wonderful, nuanced performances by Annette Bening and Julianne Moore, but this is not a Best Picture delivery.  In fact, it doesn't even get the nomination if it wasn't about a modern, two-mommy family.  We can be ok w/two-mommy families without falling over ourselves to prove how ok we are with it.  Good film, not a great film.

The Kings Speech -- A very entertaining movie which has a great chance of winning (because people keep telling us over and over that it has a great chance of winning).  Rush and Firth were amazing and I will certainly watch this again, but I don't picture it being viewed as a classic 20 years on.  A very good film, but in much the same way lesbianism-is-just-alright-with-me buoyed BSwan and Kids, the Nazi spectre and British accents are making this film seem smarter than it is (in much the same way I hope people think I'm smarter than I am because I spell colour with a 'u').

127 Hours -- This far exceeded my expectations.  We put it off to last because of the amputation scene.  Yup, no surgeon-wannabes in this family.  But very pleasantly surprised.  The only one of the ten that moved me to real tears.  Yet, my "it's ok to cry at TV commercials" wife did not cry.  In fact, she summed up why this film won't win with her first question when it ended:  "Was that guy right handed?"  You have to love her.

The Social Network -- This is my pick for Best Picture of 2011.  You know the plot.  You know the characters are going to be detestable rich kids that all turned out to be multi-millionaires (and one a billionaire).  You know the writers took liberties with the real story.  But it is still gripping.  You are still invested in the characters, still in pain when they ruthlessly screw one another.  You are laughing out loud.  You are on FB and know that most everyone else (under the age of 50) is, too, but you are still amazed at how it evolved.  That's the sign of a great piece of entertainment.  Stammering British royalty defeating Nazism will take the gold, but this picture should've won.

Toy Story 3 -- It's a shame the Oscars are so formulaic, because this should have gotten a nomination in a five-picture field (and we know it wouldn't) and should be a legitimate contender for Best Picture, but we know it's not.  Animated or not, this is a wonderful work of art right up there with The Lion King in all-time animated greatness.  In a generally soft year for all-time epic pictures, this really could've taken home the trophy and I would've been ok with it -- but like a musician who resents drum machines, DJs and sequencers for putting so many of us out of work, The Academy is idiotically frightened that James Cameron and the Apple Corporation will make them obsolete.  Message to the Hollywood Hopeless:  Just because we were momentarily turned on by Jessica Rabbit and the Na'vi version of Zoe Saldana, we  are not ready to dispense with flesh and blood.  Not yet, anyway.

 

True Grit -- Is Jeff Bridges going to play a drunken, has-been cowboy every year?  He does it well, so who cares.  I was genuinely concerned about this, only because I loved the original and associated it with John Wayne so much.  But the Coen Brothers wisely stayed truer to the novel than the Henry Hathaway version fro 1969.  It is told from the point of view of the young girl.  And the switch from Glen Campbell to Matt Damon as LaBoeuf is a huge upgrade (cue music: "I am a lineman for The Mounties...")  Dragged Donna to this kicking like a bull with hemorrhoids  (today's cowboy wisdom:  If you get thrown from a horse, you have to get up and get back on, unless you landed on a cactus; then you have to roll around and scream in pain.)


Winter's Bone -- Another expanded category entry.  Good movie, though.  It was dark and haunting, even though the mystery of the drug-dealing father was guessable for most of the movie.  You know it's going to be a tough one, though, for people like Donna when she asks me 20 minutes into it "What's this about, again?"  No action thriller or tense courtroom drama, this.  Beautifully filmed and acted.