Link of Note: Logorama

Watch the clever animated short film, Logorama (click the link to watch), which has been nominated for an Oscar.

All The Lonely People

And the winner of 2009's "Eleanor Rigby" award goes to... A Single Man.

This has got to be one of the most simultaneously depressing and beautiful films i've seen in quite some time. It is a collective mix of several woes: Growing older, living a lie, being alone, contemplation of suicide, and even heath scares.

The performances are excellent. Ever since Bridget Jones's Diary Colin Firth has always had this amazing ability to perform with such a dry british manner, yet I tend to find him very sympathetic when wounded. Firth balances both of these qualities masterfully in the character of George. Julianne Moore and Matthew Goode are so fantastic as the former lovers in George's life that I wish the film had included more scenes devoted to them. All of Goode's scenes are flashbacks that serve as a painful reminder to George of how happy he once was. Moore's boozy dinner party highlights one of the film's few lighter moments as she and George dance to "Green Onions."

The style is also especially worth noting. Notice how vibrant colors constantly fade in and out of scenes. The color scheme brightens slightly as George's mood begins to lift. It almost feels like life or hope is returning briefly to his empty existence. The ending might be a bit of a cheat. It felt invented to make sure it ends on a hopeful yet still heartbreaking note.

A Single Man is such a downer it is actually kind of hard to recommend. Honestly, does anyone enjoy being depressed? Still the performances, the style, and the story are so impressive that it might be worth getting crushed over. A-

5 Things You Should Know About . . . Cop Out

1. Kevin Smith did not write this movie, so don't expect a Kevin Smith film.  Yes, it's dirty, but it doesn't have that "colorful" dialogue that we know and love.

2.  The funniest parts of this movie were represented in the red band trailer.  If you aren't amused by it, you won't be amused by the movie.

3.  This is not a buddy-cop movie parody (for that, see National Lampoon's Loaded Weapon) and it's not even a comedy with a little police action thrown in.  It's a standard action comedy, and unfortunately, it doesn't do either action or comedy all that well.  It's almost like a lesser version of Hollywood Homicide, if you can believe (or accept) that.


4. There are three plots, and all of them are very, very uninteresting: (1) Bruce Willis needs to sell a baseball card to finance his daughter's expensive wedding, but the card gets stolen and falls into the hands of (wait for it) the Mexican gangster that they were investigating earlier in the movie! (2) Tracy Morgan thinks his wife is cheating on him; and (3) some sort of weird Mexican druglord, gang-related, bank-account-stealing plot that I found incoherent.  Unfortunately, the last hour spends most of its time on (3) and is therefore snoresville.  [There actually was someone in the theater snoring loudly -- it was a midnight show, but still.]


5. Seann William Scott stands out (an underrated talent, in my estimation), though his role is small and his screen time is short.  Tracy Morgan's rambling garbage-talk saves the movie from being a total waste (when you can understand what he's saying), but you can just watch 30 Rock episodes instead and you'll be entertained much, much more.

5 Things You Should Know About . . . The Invention of Lying

1.  The premise of this movie is that human beings never "evolved" the ability to lie.  Simple enough. But you're not going to be able to immediately suspend your disbelief. Why?  It's not only that people can't lie, but they also don't know how to omit the truth by staying silent.  The result is that the people in this movie are talkative and really mean.  They tell you that they just masturbated, or that you're ugly, or that they think you're worthless.  Your reaction will be: "they don't have to say that stuff," and you're right.  To help you with this, I offer the following explanation:  If society developed amidst the inability to lie, people would be used to sharing everything and hearing the truth constantly.  If that's the way it always was, then the etiquette of not saying everything on your mind might not have developed.  Is this theory perfect? No, but it will help you deal with the premise.

2. Ricky Gervais (who starred in and co-wrote this film) assembled a surprisingly good group of actors to perform in relatively meaningless bit parts:  Philip Seymour Hoffman, Tina Fey, Jeffrey Tambor, Christopher Guest, Jason Bateman, and of course, his Office and Extras collaborator, Stephen Merchant (in an especially funny cameo).

3. Gervais' character spontaneously develops the ability to lie, but unfortunately, his manipulations are mostly limited to finding ways to make people feel better (sparing their feelings, giving them false hope) and stealing money.  Early on he attempts to use his ability to lie (and to be unquestioningly believed) to get laid, but quickly abandons it when it doesn't go exactly as planned.  I feel like the premise was fertile ground, but the lying techniques get pretty repetitive after awhile.

4. I dare you to not get choked up when Gervais' character invents religion at his mother's deathbed.  It's not first-ten-minutes-of-Up, but I admit, it got to me.

5. The last hour gets bogged down with the disillusionment of empty celebrity (on account of the character's invention of both fiction and religion) and a belabored and forced romance with a not particularly likable character played by Jennifer Garner.  Therefore I only recommend the first half, which contains some genuine laughs along with a serious exploration of this "thought experiment" of a premise.

Terribly Happy

Here's a weird one. Imagine if the Coen Brothers had directed Hot Fuzz, minus the action sequences. What you'd get is the Danish import Terribly Happy. This movie has so much atmosphere, I got a headache watching it. It stars Jakob Cedergren as Robert Hansen, a Copenhagen cop banished to a small town after an "incident." He arrives there and takes the position of Police Marshall, and quickly finds nothing much to do.

The small town is apparently bankrupt. Very few people are around, and those that are spend most of their time in the pub. A little girl occasionally walks by pushing a baby carriage very much in need of oiling. When Hansen gets a flat tire on his bike, he takes it to the bike shop only to find that the proprietor has gone missing. "That happens here a lot," a lady tells him.

The town is surrounded on all sides by endless prairies. There is a bog on the edge of town. The town's grievances are often carried out at the bog, hence the "missing people." It's that kind of movie.

I thought I was getting into David Lynch territory there for a second, but once Terribly Happy gets going, it becomes a richly atmosphere film noir about a cop cut off from the big city and his wife and daughter, and left to deal with some screws loose hicks. The town's doctor is a morphine addict. The town slut takes to Hansen almost immediately. And then there is the slut's abusive husband, a rather unwholesome character named Jorgen, played with all stops out by Kim Bodnia, who I haven't seen since the original Nightwatch (The morgue movie, not the vampire one.).

The main plot centers on Hansen trying to straighten out the situation between Jorgen and his wife, whose daughter is the girl with the squeaky baby carriage. A lot of the twists and turns are fairly predictable, if well executed, and the actors are completely engaging. It's later in the film that a twist occurs that I saw coming, but that should throw you for a loop anyway because of what happens afterwards. Hansen goes from a mysterious, not entirely innocent protagonist to a slippery, conniving anti-hero in a snap, and it only gets worse from there, as Hansen's background, and details of the "incident" come to light.

Not much more can be said without giving away the twists and turns, but what I can talk about a couple of the film's more humorous moments. There is a particularly hilarious scene that comes out of nowhere where Hansen and Jorgen have a drink-off in the bar, each consuming beer after beer and shot after shot in a matter of seconds until they are stumbling drunk, all the while staring each other down. It's the funniest display of machismo since the scene in Predator where all the guys line up and fire their guns at the jungle. There are a lot of scenes like this in Terribly Happy that play on the cliches of a small hick town, especially one with its own catch phrase, "mojn" (pronounced like "coin" with an "m"), which means both hello and goodbye. Since it's the only custom Hansen is aware of, he overuses it in order to fit in. This gets a big laugh later when a cat says hello back to him.

Hot Fuzz had machine guns going off all over the place, and blood and guts coating the camera. Terribly Happy works on a more subtle level, as evidenced in the only scene where a gun is fired. The sound made me jump, that's how quiet the movie is. Once again proving that less is more, a single gunshot in Terribly Happy did the same thing most movies use an entire explosion to accomplish.

Crazy On You

"Wild man's world is crying in pain, what you gonna do when everybody's insane?"

The lyrics may have been sung by Heart, but that is the exact dilemma facing the residents of Ogden Marsh in The Crazies. It might be all of that fresh air, or small town isolation, but i've got a feeling it's got something to do with the plane carrying a biological weapon that crashed in the town's drinking water reserve. Just a theory.

The townsfolk begin to act a little differently by doing things normal people wouldn't consider. Things like bringing a shotgun to opening day of baseball season, or mowing the lawn in the middle of the night after you have locked your family in a closet and set the house on fire. These events are rightfully confusing to the local Sheriff David Dutton (Timothy Olyphant), but once the government clean-up crew rolls into town logic and explanation take a backseat to escape and survival.

The Crazies is like a decaffeinated 'Zombie' movie. The virus that effects these people doesn't quite turn them into undead cannibals. They may look diseased, and are unable to thwart their madness with reasoning, but the fact that they use weapons to kill as opposed to their teeth is the only real difference. Monsters with enough motor functions to still use guns are not that frightening, so it's a good thing edged weapons like knives and even pitchforks are thrown into the mix. I also like the fact that the infected are not the only dangers our group of escapees must face. There are also hillbillies who decide to go human hunting off-season, and the masked military group that attempts to quarantine the town, and then just decides its easier to shoot and torch all remaining survivors.

Most people probably do not realize that The Crazies is in fact a remake of the 1973 film of the same name. It was the forgotten bridge project that the godfather of zombie films George A. Romero made in the decade gap between Night of the Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead. It is dated and extremely low budget, but well worth seeking out. On the other hand if you are looking for something similar with a more modern feel then I would recommend revisiting the vastly underrated 28 Weeks Later. A film most dismissed as incomparable to it's predecessor, I felt it surpassed it. It is scary, loud, action-packed, unpredictable, violent, and full of up and coming stars like Idris Elba, Rose Byrne, and The Hurt Locker's Jeremy Renner. It is truly one of my personal favorite zombie films.

Is The Crazies worth your time and money? Sure, if you have never seen a horror film of this nature before. I've seen damn near every one. The film moves along well enough and contains enough pseudo-suspense scenes to keep it mildly edgy and entertaining, but it is really nothing special. Since it is distributed by Overture Pictures, which is a company owned by Starz, I would recommend waiting six months and watching it instantly on Netflix one night if you are crazy bored. C+

Note: I recently read in an interview with Timothy Olyphan-tastic (as Bree and Kevin Smith have dubbed him) that two of his all time favorite films are Blue Velvet and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Crazy indeed.

Takeaways from LOST: "The Lighthouse"

[SPOILERS AHEAD, assuming you people are not caught up yet]


ISLAND REALITY (2007)

• Jacob is now officially Harvey.  It even fits, since the show is gaga about white rabbits.  
• When Dogen the Temple Samurai caught Hurley diddling around the hieroglyphs, he said something in Japanese, which Ghost Jacob suggested was so mean that Hurley wouldn't "even even wanna know."  According to Doc Jensen's twitter friends, the translation is somewhere between "If you weren't a candidate, I'd...[PUNCH YOU IN THE FACE]" and "I don't know who's protecting you, but you're lucky, otherwise I'd cut your head off."  With such disparate rough translations, the only thing we know for sure is that Japanese must be a tricky language.  
• Some more number-name combinations were caught in the Lighthouse.  Aside from the Candidate Six (4 8 15 16 23 42), screencaps show Austen - 51 (Kate, finally! And she's NOT crossed out), Rousseau - 20 (Danielle or Alex), Mr. Friendly - 106,  Linus - 117, and Dawson - 124 (that's Michael or Walt).  Does the number 51 mean anything to anyone?  
• Does the existence of a magical lighthouse that reflects images of where certain people live off the island based on their names having been scrawled next to a corresponding degree number on a giant wheel definitively prove that Lost DOES NOT intend to deal with its mysteries using science fiction?  This episode seems firmly planted in Fantasyland.  
• Scary Claire is awesome.  We all knew she was going to axe that dude no matter what, right?  And you gotta love that "pelt baby" in the crib.  Danielle Rousseau 2.0.  

FLASH-SIDEWAYS LAND (2004?)

• Another mysterious mark on Jack's body.  Last time it was the strange bloody mark on his neck (in the first episode of season six), which he was surprised by on the plane.  This time it's his appendix scar, which he conveniently doesn't remember getting he was seven (of course in Island Reality 2007 it was taken out by Juliet on the island). 
• Speaking of Juliet, does anyone think she might be Jack's ex-wife and David's (that's Jack's son) mother?  Just a guess.  If Dogen and Ben and Ethan are all showing up, it's only a matter of time until we see everyone, whether or not they're on V or FlashForward or Vampire Diaries.    

OBSERVATIONS RELEVANT TO BOTH TIMELINES

• A few references to Season One's Jack-chasing-his-dad's-ghost episode, "White Rabbit" - the Alice in Wonderland reading, the bunny yard ornament hiding the key, and Jack and Hurley ending up at Christian's coffin (and the two skeletons, "Adam and Eve").  
• PREDICTION FOR NEXT WEEK:  Episode is called "Sundown" so we can assume that the flash-sideways will be Kwon-oriented.  On the Island, we'll see Alana & Co. (including Ben and Sun) try to make it to the Temple to escape the wrath of Smokey.  Meanwhile, Smokey, Jin and Scary Claire (where was Sawyer, btw?) will trek down to the Temple, meet up with Scary Sayid and there'll be a BATTLE ROYALE, including the inevitable face-off between Kate and Scary Claire and the reunion of Sun and Jin (however sad and temporary that might be).  

I 'Shutter' to Think

Like John, I too have a few opinions of Martin Scorsese's insane asylum thriller Shutter Island, and some of them contain SPOILERS big and small. If you wish to be surprised, then don't read ahead.

• This film has an impressive cast of notable names and faces that even manages to rival last week's Valentine's Day. The only difference is that the cast of SI actually has talent... a lot of it. It is not filled to the brim with former models and charmless gossip magazine fodder.

• The combination of dark, dank, stone prison corridors, and the presence of Ted "Buffalo Bill" Levine assured me that the lambs are still screaming.

• The whole movie has an effectively eerie mood and look to it. It is also one of the few shock suspense stories that managed to make me jump with an act as simple as the striking of a match, or as extreme as the firing of a gun.

• Shutter Island seems to be suffering from a case of the "Good, but not Great" syndrome, and I can concur that this is an accurate assessment. Director Martin Scorsese has got such a wide list of greats under his belt (Goodfellas, Raging Bull) that Shutter Island is simply good by comparison. The novel by Dennis Lehane is entertaining, but not nearly as powerful as Mystic River or Gone Baby Gone. The plot also seems to have a great deal in common with Hitchcock's Spellbound, another film considered to be quite good, but hardly among his best. It's plain to see this was not intended to be Oscar material.

• Speaking of Hitchcock, the following quote comes from Roger Ebert's review of the immortal classic Psycho. Using a little word replacement we can uncover what I feel is Shutter Island's biggest misstep:

"For thoughtful viewers however an equal surprise is still waiting. That is why Hitchcock marred the ending of a masterpiece with a sequence that is grotesquely out of place. After the murders have been solved, there is an inexplicable scene during which a long-winded psychiatrist (Simon Oakland) lectures the assembled survivors on the causes of Norman's psychopathic behavior. This is an anticlimax taken almost to the point of parody."

Now just replace these words:

• Hitchcock = Scorsese
• Masterpiece = very good film
• Simon Oakland = Ben Kingsley
• assembled survivors = audience
• Norman's = Teddy's (or Andrew's, take your pick)

Audiences in 1960 had never been manipulated quite like this before, and a full explanation for all of the insanity was not only required, but welcome. Fifty years later you would think that audiences wouldn't require a twenty minute explanation to the resolution. After riding this crazy train for two hours the film grinds to a screeching halt, and decides to throw the training wheels back on. Much like Cameron Crowe's Vanilla Sky, all this spoon feeding renders Shutter Island idiot-proof. I just found the ending excessively overlong and unnecessary. It is kind of like ending a review with a star, number, or letter grade. (Before I forget, B+ by the way.)

Link of Note: Top Ten Shots of 2009

More top tens still popping up around the interwebs!  Someone has compiled his top 10 favorite shots from the films of 2009 (Part 1 and Part 2).  Educational commentary, though not exactly mind-blowing picks. But then I'm not a cinematographer, so . . .

Five things you need to know about . . . Shutter Island [SPOILERISH]

1. Be forewarned: Don't believe your eyes.

2. No rats were harmed during the making of Shutter Island.  

3. Jackie Earl Haley has cornered the market in "little unstable dude".  

4. I think Scorsese won Leonardo DiCaprio in some sort of slave auction.  DiCaprio has starred in this one, The Departed, The Aviator, and Gangs of New York, and is rumored to star in Scorsese's next two projects -- as Frank Sinatra and Teddy Roosevelt.  Is there anyone DiCaprio can't play?

5. This movie is like 50% nightmare, 35% delusion, and 30% rainstorm.  Doesn't add up, you say?  Neither does this movie's plot.  

Takeaways from LOST Episode 4: "The Substitute"

SPOILERS AHEAD (assuming you haven't watched the last episode to air)

I've decided that since our time with Lost is limited, and it's basically all I talk about anyway, I might as well start writing up a little something after each episode to keep track of the solved/unsolved mysteries, allusions, and my insane theories.  What better place to start than "The Substitute," which is chocked full of meaty stuff, relatively speaking for Lost.  Since the show is basically split into two shows, I'll divide my observations along those lines.  

TIMELINE WHERE 815 CRASHES

• The show begins with an odd Smokey POV ("Smokey Cam") in which he (it?) flutters about the forest and up to "New Otherton" (AKA "Dharmaville") to find Sawyer.  Anyone else think it was strange how it flashed back and forth between points?  Either cuts for editing sake, or maybe some sort of teleportation -- or ubiquity?
• Richard seems clueless.  It's just him and Smokey, and Richard acts like he has no idea what Smokey's talking about when he says that Locke was a "candidate."  Could it be that the none of the others have any idea what's going on?  Richard tells Sawyer that Smokey wants everyone dead.  That seems to be all he knows, and it seems to be at least partially incorrect -- Smokey saves Sawyer's life at the end of the episode.  
• Do we all assume the little blond boy haunting Smokey is Jacob?  Isn't it fun to see Smokey freaked out?  Apparently it's not a hallucination, since Sawyer sees it too later on in the episode.  
• Ilana collects the ashes of Jacob in a bag.  Same kind of ashes that supposedly protect them from Smokey?  Perhaps Jacob, like a Phoenix, rejuvenates himself periodically, and his ashes repel Smokey somehow.  
• Ilana knows enough about Smokey to know "he's recruiting."  Richard takes a pass, and it looks like Sawyer's on board.  We know from last week that Sayid and Claire have been "infected" or "claimed."  Perhaps this is related to being "recruited"? 
• Smokey says he pre-dates Of Mice and Men (1937), and he claims to have been a regular dude once, with hopes and dreams, etc.  
• Ilana says Smokey's stuck looking like Locke.  But he obviously can still turn into black smoke.  The implication is that if he's going to look like anyone, it has to be Locke, and not Yemi or Tall Walt or Christian Shephard.  Ilana seems to know a lot.  
• According to Smokey, Jacob wrote those names all over the cave walls, and they all have numbers in front of them, and most of them are crossed out (including one Claire "Littleton"). But six aren't crossed out:  4-Locke, 8-Reyes, 15-Ford, 16-Jarrah, 23-Shephard, 42-Kwon  (Smokey says Jacob has "a thing for numbers"). I wonder if those numbers are significant?(!)  But where's Austen (Kate)?  I didn't see her name crossed out on the wall, and we know Jacob intervened in her childhood.  
• According to the wall, Sawyer's a candidate!  Smokey gives Sawyer three choices: (1) abstain and get your name crossed off the wall; (2) become the New Jacob and protect the island; or (3) just get the hell off the island.  He picked door number three.  

TIMELINE WHERE 815 DOESN'T CRASH

• Locke's living with and engaged to Helen, which means she never left him, which also means he probably did not become obsessed with his con-man daddy (that was the thing that ripped him and Helen apart, after all) -- Which maybe means his daddy didn't even steal his kidney and throw him out the window?  Which may mean that's not how he became paralyzed?    
• Speaking of Dear Old Dad (Anthony Cooper AKA Tom Sawyer), it seems he (or someone else who could be considered "dad") is an active member in Locke's life (Helen remarks that they should have a small ceremony with his Dad there).  
• Locke rips up Jack's business card, which prematurely puts an apparent end to the story arc that I thought was going to dominate the new timeline - Jack successfully un-paralyzing Locke.  It still could. 
• It looks like Locke and Ben are going to be teachers' lounge buddies.  Thank god we get Ben in both timelines.  I expect that since we've already seen Ethan and Ben, we'll also be seeing other others (and/or other Dharmafolk) floating around the new timeline.  

OBSERVATIONS RELEVANT TO BOTH TIMELINES

The Episode Title:  The writers always enjoy playing games with the titles.  "The Substitute" is no exception -- it 's meaningful on several levels: (1) Smoky has replaced Locke (in the sense that he walks around looking like Locke while real Locke is dead), and is therefore his substitute; (2) Smoky explains to Sawyer that Jacob's endgame is trying to find a "candidate," essentially a substitute for himself -- someone to guard the island; (3) and Locke ends up finding a job as a substitute teacher.  There are probably other connections here.  Perhaps Tom Berenger fits in somewhere.  

Time Running Out?  Since half of each episode is devoted to one of the two timelines, and there are only twelve episodes left, can we assume that there are really only SIX episodes of Lost storyline left?  That doesn't seem like enough time to put everything together.    

Oscar Has Just One Request - Keep the Talking to a Minimum

In light of John's link to the elimination of the Best Songs performances, I thought it proper to include this link as well, in which the Oscars producers requested that the nominees zip their lips when it comes to thanking the hundreds of people that helped them get there.

Do they really think these streamlining attempts, as well as the expansion of the Best Picture category to include more mainstream fare, is going to garner higher ratings? We'll see, but my guess is the ratings will stay the same.

Oscars to Drop Best Song Performances

Full story here.

It's about time they did away with these time-wasters. With few exceptions ("Blame Canada" and "It's Hard Out There for a Pimp") they're unbelievably boring.

Boom Goes the 'Dynamite'

They say this cat Black Dynamite is a Bad Mutha- Shut yo mouth. I'm talkin' 'bout BD. Then we can dig it!

I don't claim to be an expert on blaxploitation cinema, but I have seen my fair share of the more popular ones. The most recognizable figure and film in this genre would have to be Shaft. Everyone knows about the cat who won't cop out when there's danger all about. One of the first films of this kind I was introduced to was Superfly. A somewhat forgettable pusher man parable with an unforgettable soundtrack by Curtis Mayfield. Quentin Tarantino's personal take on blaxploitation Jackie Brown introduced a new generation (myself included) to Pam Grier and the likes of her no nonsense characters Coffy and Foxy Brown.

Blaxploitation films were born and flourished throughout the seventies. They served as an example of change not only in cinema, but in culture as well. Black audiences had been given heroes they could look up to and root for. Black Dynamite is an excellent film that succeeds on various levels. It is a parody that honors it's subject with phenomenal detail, and slightly mocks it by over-amplifying everything these films are known for: kung-fu fights with nun-chucks, drugs, bare breasts, shootouts, bellbottoms, and a whole lotta attitude. It is so hilarious and fun you would have to be some kinda jive turkey to hate it.

After his brother is killed the one man army and ladies man Black Dynamite (Michael Jai White) goes on a personal vendetta to avenge his death and stumbles upon a white man's conspiracy to keep the brother man down involving a new malt liquor. The film's plot only exists as a way for Black Dynamite to get into shoot-outs, karate matches, and spout out terribly tacky yet awesome catchphrases.

As I watched this film I couldn't help but realize that this specific kind of parody had been done before. It was in a film called Undercover Brother with Eddie Griffin as the title character. That film worked for what it was. It actually contains many of the same style of jokes, yet it lacks nearly all of the edge that this film has rendering it good but forgettable. Black Dynamite takes it's subject and humor to a whole other level.

I recommend this film for anyone seeking a good time. Even without any prior knowledge or blaxploitation experience I can assure you that some big laughs are guaranteed, and even more smaller ones if you are able to catch a number of the clever references. With a running time of less than an hour and a half it is over before it has a chance to become boring. Can you dig it? A-

The Final Four: Hurt Locker, Mr. Fox, (500) Days, and A Serious Man

#1 Hurt Locker defeats #3 District 9, 18-6
#3 (500) Days of Summer defeats #9 I Love You, Man 22-0 (goodbye, Cinderella!)
#3 A Serious Man defeats #1 Up in the Air, 18-10 (hello, upset!)
#1 Fantastic Mr. Fox defeats #3 Drag Me to Hell, 18-6


Surprised?  I am.  But, aside from A Serious Man and I Love You Man, which none of us had pegged Final Four contenders when the tourney began, these films were all designated by at least one of us as a top-four film (according to the secret pre-tourney rankings).


The Final Four matchups are:

#1 HURT LOCKER vs. #3 (500) DAYS OF SUMMER  
Storylines:  Bombs versus bombshells.  The trenches of war versus the trenches of love.   The battle of up and coming stars Renner and Gordon-Levitt.  Days left in rotation versus days left in relations.  

and

#1 FANTASTIC MR. FOX vs. #3 A SERIOUS MAN 
Storylines: Upper versus downer.  Whimsy versus whimpering.  A mesmerized possum versus a neck-cyst drainer.  Clooney faces off with Stuhlbarg (again, this time in voice only)!

I expect these games to be shootouts.  Leave your decisions in the comments to this post.  Make 'em count.

Mona Lisa: A Heartbreaking Work of Art

Let's just admit it. As much as people admire romantic films about lovers overcoming all obstacles to find true love in the end, we all know that the best films about relationships are the ones that end tragically. I'm not just referring to the tragedy of a character meeting their demise (e.g. Titanic, Moulin Rouge). That can work too, but I believe the films where one person is still determined to make it work while the other is ready to just move on can be so much more painfully effective. Aside from being what most consider to be the greatest films ever made, what do Citizen Kane, Casablanca, The Godfather, and Gone With the Wind all have in common? They all end with one character getting exactly what they wanted only to realize that they lost everyone they ever cared about in the process. I think true film lovers admire tragedy a lot more than they realize.

This being Valentine's Day and all I would like to recommend one of my favorite love stories about a relationship that was doomed from the start. Neil Jordan's Mona Lisa is a masterpiece that almost everyone seems to have forgotten about. It tells the story of George (Bob Hoskins) who has just been released from prison after several years. George is looking to rekindle his relationship with his family. His wife wants nothing to do with him, and his daughter is forced to meet with him in secret. George also is looking for employment with his former criminal boss Mortwell (Michael Cane). The only job George manages to get is as a chauffeur to a high class call girl. This is how he meets Simone (Cathy Tyson).

Their relationship begins about as well as you would expect between two polar opposites. They hate one another. He thinks she is common street trash because of her profession. She thinks he is loud, crass, and unrefined. To a certain degree they are both correct. After a while they begin to open up, and learn to tolerate to one another. She takes him out and buys him a proper suit, and he begins to act like a gentleman and offers her protection. They get to be so close that George begins doing Simone favors by prowling the seedier parts of city for reasons I will leave you to discover, but I will tell you that it ultimately leads to emotional chaos.

The performances in this film are outstanding. Bob Hoskins might be one of the best underused or underappreicated actors ever. His role in this as well as The Long Good Friday, and Who Framed Roger Rabbit? are among the best that the entire decade of the eighties had to offer. You believe and are intimated his anger and yet sympathize with his hurt. Cathy Tyson does an amazing job of getting George to fall for her only to discover she might have alternative motives. Michael Cane is an evil villain who started small time, but has moved up in the world. Even Robbie Coltrane does what he does best as George's friend and provides some brief comic relief.

There are two scenes in this film that really stand out to me. One consists of George uncomfortably visiting numerous strip joints and brothels at Simone's request, and realizing how depressing and hopeless life is for the girls trapped in them. The scene is even more effective with the use of "In Too Deep" by Genesis playing in the background. The other involves George confronting Simone on a carnival boardwalk after he realizes what she was using him for. He angrily holds her while pleading that they could have a happy future together even though he knows it's all a lie. You can practically feel his heart being ripped in two as he confesses how lonely he is and how much he cares for her.

Mona Lisa is a dark, depressing, and unconventional love story. It is also logical and realistic. A happy ending would have been so inappropriate and unbelievable. It certainly isn't an ideal date movie for this Hallmark holiday, but for all of the phony overly romanticized tripe that exists out there, this is one film about a damaged relationship that never feels cheap. A

Note: Speaking of Genesis songs effectively used in tragic tales of love and loss I recently watched Against All Odds. Not bad, but I'm more looking forward to seeing the noir Out of the Past, the film that served as it's inspiration. And now that I'm on the topic of Jeff Bridges and tragic relationships, I also saw Crazy Heart this past weekend. The performances were great (He will and should win Best Actor). The music was also amazing. I was more impressed with it than I was expecting to be.

Valentine's Day Link of Note: Rom Com Cliches

Entertainment Weekly lists 24 Romantic Comedy Cliches they'd like to see retired, including "the last minute sprint," "the workaholic," "love at first fight," "the lonely montage," and the "top of the stairs moment."  

The funny thing is, in describing what they'd like to see missing from rom-coms, they inadvertently describe what makes rom-coms, well, rom-coms.  Even the best of the genre (e.g. (500) Days of Summer) have at least a few of these cliches built in.  The reason, in my opinion, is that the concept of "romance" is basically one big cliche, so without all of these heartstring-tugging tricks (which also apply in real life), the romantic comedy would just be . . . relationship comedy.

Happy Valentine's Day!  Make sure that it ends with a makeout session under a bridge in the rain.

Link of Note: The Best "Long Takes" of All Time

Blogger Mike Le posts the 20 greatest extended or long takes in movie history.  According to Wikipedia, the long take is "an uninterrupted shot in a film which lasts much longer than the conventional editing pace either of the film itself or of films in general, usually lasting several minutes."

Notable inclusions are: Hitchcock's Rope, which was shot in ten takes (through it attempts to appear as if it's a single take); Kill Bill's tour through the House of Blue Leaves; Several takes from P.T. Anderson's Boogie Nights and Magnolia; the hammer-fight scene from Oldboy;  several scenes from Cuaron's Children of Men; and of course, Scorsese's long steadicam shot through the nightclub in Goodfellas.

Were there any glaring omissions on his list?  Let the debate begin.

The Wolfman: Dull Moon Fever

There are so many things that Joe Johnston's remake of The Wolfman gets right, and yet it really is a shame that I cannot quite recommend it. The cast is made up of respectable names, the blood and guts factor is refreshingly high, and the mood is pitch perfect. Still, there is one word that comes to mind first and foremost when a film with a predecessor brings absolutely nothing new to the table: unnecessary.

Benicio Del Toro stars as Lawrence Talbot, an american actor who must return home upon learning of his brother's disappearance. He arrives only to discover that his brother has been found, but he was savagely mauled to death by a large ravenous animal. Lawrence vows to find who or what committed the crime. If the title of the film is any indication as to where all of this is leading, then you already know Lawrence survives an attack from the creature only to later become the creature during the next full moon.

There are a few other occupants of Lawrence's gothic estate. They include his loony and darkly mysterious father Sir John Talbot (Anthony Hopkins), and his brother's gorgeous but emotionally distant former fiancee Gwen Conliffe (Emily Blunt). There is also a special officer from Scotland Yard named Abberline (Hugo Weaving) who arrives in town to investigate the case. Once each of these characters learns about Lawrence's alter ego they try to help him in completely different ways by either curing him, killing him, and even joining him.

The entire cast of The Wolfman does a very good job transcending the material. I would say these actors are even impressive when they are slumming it. However, I never got the feeling that any of them were not taking this seriously. They are all good sports for giving it their best, but we all know that they are better than this.

I was really glad that the filmmakers decided not to skimp out on the gore. It does not make the film scary by any means, but had this film not had the carnage it would have been much less interesting. In a particularly memorable scene an entire camp is attacked one person at a time without ever seeing the hunter responsible. One man emerges with a bloody stump where his arm used to be. Another screams as his entrails lie on the ground. This causes all sorts of confusion and panic, and it makes the scene seem more dangerous and frantic. One thing I could have done less with were the jolt moments. This film has so many that there are even a few instances of a second jolt occurring right on the tail of the first. When films continuously keep throwing this trick at you it looses most of it's effect after a while. I lost count after the first dozen or so.

The way The Wolfman looks and feels might be it's strongest quality. This film is plagued with shadows, candles, moonlight, and fog. The settings and costumes look like a great representation of the time period. The music contains a wonderful sense of moody dread. Some of the special effects are a bit noticeable. The transformation scenes aren't that bad at all, and even the wolf sprinting effects look less fake by being covered in darkness.

My biggest problem with this film remains a lack originality. There is absolutely nothing in The Wolfman that hasn't been done before or better. I spent most of the time in a state of boredom. I have seen much better films that succeeded by simply putting a slant on the material. An American Werewolf in London was interesting because it managed to be both horrific and hilarious. And Le Pacte Des Loups (Brotherhood of the Wolf) was fascinating because it was virtually every frigging genre mashed together with a killer wolf smack dab in the middle. A sliver bullet of originality might have saved this beast from the hell of mediocrity. C

The Elite Eight: Home Stretch

After a contentious Sweet Sixteen round, eight teams films are left to duke it out for Best Picture.  Many fan favorites (Avatar, Up) have fallen by the wayside [perhaps an indictment of the scoring methodology?], but there are plenty of great ones left, including four out of the ten Oscar contenders, and three out of four of our top seeds.  Here they are:


Group A: #1 The Hurt Locker VS #3 District 9.  The first of our two Academy Award nominees get 97% and 90% approval from Rotten Tomatoes, respectively.   I'm sure Kathryn Bigelow would have liked to face off against her ex-hubby's fluorescent alien flick here, instead of Blomkamp's dirty, gritty one, but she'll have her chance at the Oscars.  For now, it's prawns versus bombs.


Group B: #3 (500) Days of Summer VS #9 I Love You, Man.  This is a tale of two very different romantic comedies.  (500) Days was a critical darling, appreciated widely enough to be considered officially snubbed by the Academy, whereas I Love You, Man was simply appreciated as bubble-gum entertainment (accept by EW's Owen Glieberman, who ranked it in his top ten).   This one is a battle of adorable leading men, both wookin pa nub in all da wong pwaces.  


Group C: #1 Up in the Air VS #3 A Serious Man. The other match-up of Oscar nominees includes two critically acclaimed indies by established directors (Jason Reitman and the Coens).  Neither of these generated Avatar-like returns, but Clooney's likable dramedy was a relatively big hit compared to the Coen Bros.' celeb-lacking meditation on suffering.  This one is the battle of The Faceless versus The Face.  


Group D: #1 Fantastic Mr. Fox VS #3 Drag Me To Hell.  Neither of these generated Oscar buzz (though Mr. Fox is getting 100% critical approval at RT), but both were fan favorites:  fanciful re-imaginings of old genre styles (stop-motion animation and comedy-horror) with their own built-in audiences as a result of their directors' prior work (Wes Anderson and Sam Raimi).


Since there are only four matches, there's no need to make four separate posts for comments. Just comment on this post with your calls on each of these match-ups.

The Informers in One Sentence

The Informers: An eighties soft-core porn version of Traffic.

OK, perhaps this isn't fair, since I only watched the first hour before I was too bored to continue.


The Informers is an adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis' book of short stories by the same name.   I haven't read the book (though I am a fan of Ellis' and have read three of his other books), so I can't make any comparisons, but the plot is a loosely assembled collection of intertwining stories involving sex, nudity, drugs, pedophilia, sex, nudity, douchebaggery, drugs, and adultery.  If you know Ellis, you know this is his usual material.  Unfortunately, it didn't translate well to film (at least the first hour).  Not recommended, unless your subscription to Hustler has expired.

From Paris with Love: Gleeful, Mindless, and Bloody

From Paris with Love is the new action movie from Pierre Morel and Luc Besson, the team that brought us last year's Liam Neeson thriller, Taken.  It stars Jonathan Rhys-Meyers as James Reece, a straight-laced young CIA operative bored with working at the embassy in Paris and itching to get some field work.  Unfortunately, his first opportunity comes in the form of picking up loose-cannon super-agent, Charlie Wax (John Travolta), at the airport, where he's stirring up problems with customs.  After getting Wax out of trouble, Reece finds himself dragged from one location to another, being forced to take coke, hanging out with hookers, and getting caught up in various shoot'em ups.

In form, it's very similar to Taken, which was about a one-man wrecking crew making his way through Paris one dead guy at a time.  The only differences are that instead of a solemn Liam Neeson, it stars a gleeful and over-the-top John Travolta; and instead of going after human trafficking thugs, he's going after terrorists and drug dealers.

The Flaws:  It's a bit campy in places, especially where Travolta's clownishness, Jonathan Rhys-Meyers' awful American accent, and the director's penchant for flashy action sequences overlap (a room full of mannequins, really?).  It's short on meaningful plot -- you're guaranteed not to really understand anything that happens in the first half of the movie.

The Draws:  Though some find Travolta's balls-out, crazy-eyed performance to be a drawback, I find it to be a plus.  If you enjoyed Travolta's performances in Face Off or Broken Arrow, you'll be pleased.  Not only do you get to see him joke about a Royale with Cheese (oh sweet nostalgia) and making light of the movie's high body count ("How many did we kill today? About one an hour?"), but he also actually has a couple good fight scenes.  Jack Bauer-style ass kicking.

Fish Tank - An Education Without An Education

Here's one of those low budget gems that contains a performance so grounded and real, it's hard to believe the young actress at its center has never been in anything before. Fish Tank doesn't have a plot so much as it has a character. That character is Mia, played by Katie Jarvis. She's a 15 year old poverty row delinquent growing up in a housing project somewhere in Britain. Her mother is an unemployed party girl who could care less what Mia and her younger sister, Tyler, get into as long as it doesn't interrupt her fun.

Mia is at war with everything around her. She has a foul mouth and a fouler attitude. Five minutes into the film, she's already cursed out a bunch of sluts having a dance-off on the project's playground, head butted one of them, had the police called on her, and broken into a vacant apartment where she can have a drink and be by herself. She doesn't have a pleasant thing to say to anyone. Most of the time, she doesn't have anything to say at all. She is tall, awkward, and very pretty. She has an idea that she wants to be a dancer, and uses the vacant apartment as a dance studio to practice moves she sees in music videos. But with no one around to point her in the right direction, she is aimless and angry, and headed for trouble.

Then along comes Connor (played by Michael Fassbender), her mother's sexy new boyfriend, and there is instant chemistry between them, even though Connor is pushing 40. At first, Mia curses him out just like all the others. She believes that no one understands her, and her defense mechanism is to spew abusive language, then run. Connor breaks through her defenses by acting as a father figure, encouraging her rather than telling her to fuck off. He lends her a camera so that she can film her dance routine for an upcoming audition. He takes her and her sister and mother on a drive far out into the country, away from the prison-like confines of the projects, so they can see how beautiful it is if you just get away from the city.

They stop at a lake in the countryside, and a curious thing happens there. Mia and Connor wade into the river, and Connor catches a fish with his hands, and on the way back to shore, Mia cuts her ankle on a rock. Connor bandages it up for her, and gives her a piggy back ride back to the car, and it is while she is this close to him, right there at his neck, that she begins to be attracted to him.

What is great about the film is that you learn all this without being told. There is nothing forced about the progression of the characters. Nothing in the dialogue spells it out for you. We follow Mia through her ordeals, and we feel sympathy for her plight, and for a long time, the relationship between Mia and Connor is balanced on the razor's edge between appropriate and inappropriate, and could have gone either way. He could have been a father figure, or he could have slipped and taken advantage of this naive girl who is unaware of how inappropriate such a relationship is.

The power of the film, and the power of the performances by Jarvis and Fassbender, is in how this relationship is handled. You know it is going to go south, and when it does, you side with Jarvis, and you keep siding with Jarvis even after a third act of astounding sociopathic behavior, because Jarvis's performance is that good. It is as if we are watching a real girl in a real world, and we want her to get out even more than she does, and even after the horrible things that happen to her, and the horrible things that she does, we still empathize with her, because at that point in the movie, she's not a character anymore, she's someone that you know.

DiCaprio on Inception

"It didn’t make sense to many of us when we were doing it. We had to do a lot of detective work to figure out what the movie was about."

--Leonardo DiCaprio, on Inception, Christopher Nolan's upcoming film.

HT: Slashfilm

Frozen

Don't read this review if you want to be surprised by this movie, because I'm going to talk about all three things that happen in it.

Frozen, from writer/director Adam Green, is another in a line of minimalist horror films that have popped up since The Blair Witch Project. The film it will most be compared to is Open Water. The film it reminded me most of is Alive, the 1993 Frank Marshall film about the rugby team trapped on the Andes Mountains after a plane crash. I suggest you watch either of these films instead.

With the success of Paranormal Activity, we're going to get a crop of films like Frozen in the coming years. Films with simple, low budget set-ups and only a few actors. These films aren't bad, but they would often work better as short films, and that's the case with Frozen.

The set-up: Three friends, two boys and a girl, get trapped on a ski lift when the lodge shuts down for the night. They are suspended thirty feet in the air, and the lodge won't open again for five days. What do you do?

Perfect set-up for a 30 minute horror film. Perfectly boring set-up for a feature length film. What do you do with a set-up like this when you have to fill 90 minutes? First of all, you better make the characters interesting. No such luck here. They're just a couple of emo-dorks, and one of them is pissed off at the other because his girlfriend keeps getting in the way of their bromance. Oh, and she's not very good at skiing, so they have to ride the bunny slopes. Girlfriends are so stupid!

So once the shit has hit the fan, they have all sorts of conversations to fill the time and keep their minds off the fact that they're freezing and no one's coming to help, and they'll basically starve to death. What do they talk about? I think at one point, one of the characters lists what his favorite cereals are.

Okay, so you have to generate suspense, since you can't just have these three boring shells sitting up there talking to each other interminably. So one of the characters decides he's just going to jump. Logical. How else would you get down from there? (Actually, I thought of a much better solution about three minutes into their ordeal, and it only took the two remaining characters the rest of the day to think of it.)

All right, we have to break here to discuss a trend that has developed in horror films since Saw and Hostel, and K-horror and J-horror, and the whole torture porn thing, and that is unnecessarily graphic gore. Sure, horror movies have always been bloody, and Alfred Hitchcock splashed chocolate syrup all over the shower in Psycho, but did the guy in Frozen really have to get compound fractures on both legs when he landed, and did the bones have to come shooting through his pants like pistons? And did the director really have to keep cutting to close-ups of the bloody, nasty bones and ligaments? Would they even pop through his puffy, insulated ski pants? Wouldn't the blood soaking through have been enough?

Horror directors just don't know how to restrain themselves. I don't blame them. It's a load of fun to spray blood all over. Believe me, when you're a screenwriter, and you can convincingly get a chainsaw into a horror script you're working on, the adrenaline really starts to pump. You could type a 100 words per minute! So since Green has a pretty bloodless concept here, he had to go for the green (or red) when he could. Which would explain the wolves.

Yeah, once the poor guy is laying there with bones sticking out of his legs, the wolves run in and eat him. They're pretty hungry. They eat the other guy, too. And they almost eat the girl. But that's later. This friend of mine couldn't get over the fact that anyone would ski at a lodge where there are wolves all over the place. I kept telling him, if you were an investor, would you let the fact that there are wolves in them there hills stop you from building a high-priced ski resort? I don't think so. You could hire hunters to de-wolf the place. Besides, wolves wouldn't attack during the day, with dozens of people around making all that noise. They would only attack when there are one or two people. Like if you were laying in the snow bleeding all over. So that explains the wolves. But that doesn't mean the movie isn't bankrupt of ideas.

It would have been more terrifying if the guy, say, had ruptured his femoral artery when he landed, and bled to death, screaming for his life, as his two friends watched, helpless, from above. That would have been more frightening and depressing, and would have amounted to more dread. The wolves are just silly by comparison, especially since they keep coming back. They basically build a campfire below the ski lift, waiting for the other two to come down. Whenever the director needs suspense, cue the wolves.

So what else happens in the movie? Oh, the two characters forget to bundle up for the night - you know, zip your coats over your faces, and pull your hats down over your eyes so your face doesn't freeze. So they get frost bite. Oh, and the girl, who loses a glove at one point, falls asleep, somehow, with her bare hand gripping the safety bar in front of her, so when she wakes up in the morning, she has to pry her hand off the bar, ripping all the skin off her palm and fingers. (Another instance of unnecessary gore.) I guess, if they bundled up, we wouldn't recognize the actors underneath all that downy clothing. It can be so confusing telling two characters apart when one is sitting on the right and one is sitting on the left, and they never move.

All right, so the other two things that happen in the movie: The other guy finally gets the bright idea of climbing, hand over hand, down the cable to the next car, then on to the support tower, which has a ladder he can climb down. The cable, for some reason, cuts right through his gloves, so his hands bleeds all over. I don't know why a cable would do this, but whatever. He makes it to the ladder, and the wolves show up on cue, and he fights them off with a ski pole, and they run away. Then he hobbles off to go get some help. "I'm gonna go get some help! Stay here!" (Thankfully, this is not actual dialogue from the film.)

The girl is left up there all alone thinking help is on the way, only the guy never comes back, and a whole day goes by. Something must have happened to him. I wonder what. Oh yeah, and by this point, the lift has come loose from its support bracket, and is threatening to plummet to the ground. (Nice suspense maneuver there - gives us a ticking clock.)

So we're left with this girl with the skin taken off her palm, and frostbite eating holes in her face, and scraps of her boyfriend sticking out of the snow below her, and she better do something, or the whole thing will come tumbling down. What's a girl to do? I won't give away the ending. It's satisfactory. It's not the downbeat, bummer of an ending I was expecting, like the one Open Water has. It'll do. The whole movie will do, but it's just passable.

I can think of a number of better films that tell similar stories of survival, and do it with characters who are much more interesting in stories that have more things going on that just three people trapped in a chair in a static medium close-up for most of its duration. Frozen is boring. You could say I was bored stiff.

My Timeline Theory: LOST, Season Six, Episode One

What if the "LAX" timeline is the timeline that should have happened, absent the time traveling of the Losties to 1977, and the "2007" timeline is the one that flows naturally from their time time-traveling and detonation of the H-bomb? After all, we know that Widmore and Eloise knew about the Losties in the 50s and after, so the "815 crashes" scenario is probably dependent on the past in which the Losties go back to 1977. (Remember, Widmore probably sends Desmond to the island on purpose by setting up that race around the world).

Similarly, we're assuming that the hatch doesn't get built if the bomb goes off (and therefore doesn't leave that crater), but what if the detonation is indeed "the incident" that leads to the hatch's button-pushing necessity, like Miles suggests in the Season 5 finale? And we're assuming that the island is "sunk" because of the bomb going off, but what if the truth is that the island would have been sunk if Jack et al had NOT come to the island and time traveled back to 1977?

Is it possible that the effect of the detonation was simply to replicate Orchid-style flashing and that's why it transports them 30 years forward in their same timeline?

Food for thought.

The Oscars Pick Their Nose, Then Thumb Them At Me

Of course The Blind Side got nominated! Because now, with declining box office attendance and a slumping home video market, and with competition from phones and ipods, the Academy had to do something to capture viewers. So they turned the Oscars into the Golden Globes.

I'm willing to give a nomination to Sandra Bullock, even though it is a gimmicky, predictable sports vehicle she is in. What I think is rather shallow of the Academy is going for the thoughtless popular vote over stretching their imaginations even one brain cell to include, maybe, an unknown actor (aside from those in The Hurt Locker or Precious, whom they were forced to nominate).

We have nominations for Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon for a film that received little attention or acclaim, and was considered mostly middle of the road. But nominating them gets them to the show, and that gets people watching, and that appears to be how the Academy is thinking these days. Thankfully, they didn't throw a bone to New Moon to lasso in the teen girl demographic.

Penelope Cruz is the new Meryl Streep. She will, from now on, be nominated for everything she appears in. She couldn't make it into the Best Actress category for her turn in the well-received Almodovar film Broken Embraces, since the category was too full (what with that Meryl Streep nomination for Julie and Julia), so they had to subjugate her to the supporting category. Luckily, she appeared in the critically lambasted big budget box office failure, Nine. As long as she appears in a studio film once a year, she will in all likelihood be nominated.

It is an insult that 500 Days of Summer didn't get a single nomination. It should, at the very least, have received an Original Screenplay nomination. How about forgoing a nomination for Up, since it is included in both the Best Animated Feature and Best Picture category? They nominated The Messenger, which I haven't seen, so they can consider that reaching out to the little guy, but The Messenger was neither as widely received nor praised as 500 Days of Summer. How about dropping Morgan Freeman, a multiple Oscar Nominee and Winner, from the Best Actor race in favor of Joseph Gordon-Levitt, the hardest working independent actor in the business? But you can't do that. Not with Freeman playing Nelson Mandela, a role he's been attempting to bring to the screen for decades.

The acting categories are really thin. I thought Stanley Tucci was creepy and effective in The Lovely Bones, but the movie was so disjointed and puzzling, I didn't consider Tucci in the race, and I don't think anyone else did, either. But Tucci is more recognizable than, say, Fred Melamed for his turn as the infuriating Sy Abelman in A Serious Man (The guy you want poor Larry to punch.), or Anthony Mackie, as Renner's anchor to reality in The Hurt Locker. Unknown faces get shut out in favor of red carpet attention-getters. You don't want your Access Hollywood reporters asking, "Who's that? What movie were they in?" But, more surprisingly, they gave the nomination to Tucci rather than to Tobey Maguire for Brothers, another effective performance in an uneven film.

Helen Mirren will also get nominated for anything she appears in. Just like Judi Dench. Whereas they both deserve all the acclaim they can get, it just shows how thin the acting categories were this year, when a film like The Last Station, which very few people have heard of, gets two acting nominations, and one actor is in her 60s, and the other in his 80s! Who says there are no roles for actors over 40?

My predictions:

Best Picture: Avatar

Best Director: Kathryn Bigelow

Best Actor: Jeff Bridges

Best Actress: Gabourey Sidibe

Best Supporting Actor: Christopher Waltz

Best Supporting Actress: Mo'Nique

Best Original Screenplay: Inglorious Basterds

Best Adapted Screenplay: Up In the Air

Best Animated Feature: Up

Best Foreign Language Film: The White Ribbon

(I hope Avatar doesn't win, but suspect it will. I think Bigelow will win to become the first female Best Director, and likely for that purpose only, but the inertia is in favor of Avatar, so Cameron may upset. Basterds will probably win screenplay so Tarantino can run off at the mouth, and ratings will go up that way, but if Avatar wins both Picture and Director, they may throw The Hurt Locker a bone by giving it Best Screenplay.)

I reserve the right to change my picks. I probably will.

Blind Sided by a Few Nominations

I watched the announcement of nominations for this year's academy awards this morning, and I have a few thoughts and predictions. Every year in the major categories my heart tends to get in the way of my head, and the prediction of who I think should win versus who actually will win is hardly ever the same.

Best Supporting Actress: Mo'Nique will win for Precious, and she is very good in it. Personally I would rather see Anna Kendrick win for Up in the Air. Not only is her role excellent as well, but I feel it will actually do something to advance her career. I fear that if Mo'Nique gets it she will either be typecast forever as the monstrous mother, or she will be the only oscar winner to star in Soul Plane 2.

Best Supporting Actor: No contest. Waltz has this in the bag. I am however a bit upset that Peter Capaldi didn't get nominated for his performance as an acid and obscenity spewing publicist in In the Loop.

Best Actress: I hope the Academy members learn something by watching An Education, and that is Carey Mulligan doesn't need a steamroller of hype and audience approval to turn out a phenomenal performance. She has this thing called talent. PLEASE for the love of God do not give it to the Arizona Wildcat.

Best Actor: Renner got a nom? YES! There's my reaction and my pick. I have not yet seen Crazy Heart, and I love Jeff Bridges, yet I seem to remember last year Mickey Rourke being the front runner and still loosing in what looked like the exact same film and performance. Notice how Downey Jr. did not get a nomination. No mystery to me, it is a well known curse that if you win the comedy Golden Globe your ass is gonna get passed over. Just ask Richard Gere (Chicago) and Gene Hackman (The Royal Tenenbaums).

Best Adapted Screenplay: The sharpest, funniest, and saddest dialogue with the most bite came from the mouths of the cast of Up in the Air. Rietman's films sure have a way with words.

Best Director: Looks like we will get to see the battle of the exes here instead of in our tournament. I really hope that the apprentice surpasses the master here. Bigelow has made one of the most hard core action films ever. She deserves to make history here.

Best Picture:

• Avatar
• The Blind Side
• District 9
• An Education
• The Hurt Locker
• Inglourious Basterds
• Precious
• A Serious Man
• Up
• Up in the Air

Now, which one of these films sticks out like a fucking sore thumb? Perhaps it is the only film on this list that I refused to see. Are you kidding me? What were they thinking not giving (500) Days of Summer a nomination? I would have been much happier to see something even more ludicrous like The Hangover up there. I don't think I need to name this film, you know who you are. I find it funny that The Dark Knight didn't get nominated last year, but YOU did this year. Bullshit. Avatar will probably win, but I would be ecstatic to see the top prize go to either The Hurt Locker or Up in the Air. If they tied that might be one of the greatest academy moments ever.

A couple other minor notes:

• What the hell is The Secret of Kells? I'll tell you what it is. It's even further proof that 9 got no love this year.
• District 9 up for best picture? Awesome!

Rocket Science (DVD): De-De-Debatable Excellence

I will be up front with you, the only reason I put Rocket Science on my Netflix queue was due to Up in the Air co-star Anna Kendrick's involvement with it. I thought she was phenomenal in Jason Riteman's picture, and I was really interested to see if there were any other projects that benefited from her presence that didn't involve toothless vampires. Turns out this was just about the only other movie she has had a major role in. I read several reviews that either praised the harsh reality of high school life, or severely punished the film for being too smug with the use of quirkiness. Sounded interesting enough to me.

Rocket Science tells the story of Hal Hafner (Reece Thompson). He is a bit of a loner, and it is pretty obvious to see why. His father has recently walked out of the family, his brother is an obsessive compulsive kleptomaniac, and the fact that Hal has a painfully bad stuttering problem certainly isn't helping his station in life. One bus ride home Hal is a bit stunned to notice that Ginny Ryerson (Kendrick) has taken an interest in him, and offers him a proposition as her partner on the school's debate team. Hal has no desire to participate in public speaking, but he does develop a massive desire for Ginny. He agrees if only to use it as a way to be close to her.

I won't reveal much more of what happens from there except to say that this film does an excellent job of dividing my feelings for it. I was totally infatuated with the first half hour. It's very observant how discovering love for someone can give you such a natural high. Hal's attraction to Ginny lifts him out of the world of despair he seemed stuck in. Life had begun, and it was a feeling I was able to relate to. That also means that the movie becomes overbearingly depressing once the poor kid experiences heartbreak for the first time.

After viewing Rocket Science I wasn't really sure if I loved it or hated it, but I just couldn't get it out of my mind. I could feel the quality straining to work on the level of a Wes Anderson project by being humorously dry (I especially loved the couple that play The Violent Femmes "Blister in the Sun" on classical instruments, and the Alec Baldwin-esque narration). I could also sense some Alexander Payne in the form of Kendrick's performance in what is basically a Tracy Flick Jr. The film it mostly reminded me of was Pumpkin. The very similar tale of a mentally handicapped athlete, and the sorority sister he falls in love with. That film went unrealistically soft in it's conclusion, but Rocket Science does not make the same mistake.

Should a movie like this be criticized for being so damned depressing? Perhaps not. Is experiencing heartbreak for the first time, or having to attend the period of teenage hell that is high school any less depressing? It certainly doesn't take a rocket scientist to answer that. B

Note: Next up on my queue is George A Romero's "Knightriders" in which Ed Harris leads a renaissance jousting festival... on motorcycles. Sounds like just the thing I need to counterbalance this downer.