I went to see Slumdog Millionaire today. It was very good, although it was a little bit hard to follow sometimes, probably because of a combination of accents and cultural references (coming into 5 minutes late probably didn't help either). But I pretty much knew how it was going to end what with the publicity and the Oscars and all, and yet I was still antsy with suspense towards then end. And once again, it was one of those movies in which the journey is more important than the destination, though, having taken the journey, the destination makes for a nice payoff.

I loved how the police inspector started to get caught up in the story, so that it was less an interrogation and more of a Scheherezade, Thousand and One Nights situation.

I've said before and I'll say again that Dev Patel is adorable, and he was soooo good in this movie, although I felt that his dialect work was a little splotchy, but he brings such tenderness and pathos to the role that it hardly matters. His few scenes with Freida Pinto were so beautiful and sweet. It kind of reminded me of Man of LaMancha, the idea that idealized love doesn't have to be disappointed, that love has the power to make the ideal real; as the song lyrics go: "to each his Dulcinea that he alone can name."

It's interesting that of all its many awards and nominations, very few are for acting: few acting nominations and fewer wins. It's also interesting that for the SAG Awards Dev Patel was nominated as an Outstanding Actor in a Supporting Role rather than a leading role; I don't know if that's because they considered it to be such an ensemble piece, or they had so many strong contenders in the Leading category, or what. It's unfortunate for Dev Patel that he had to go up against my boy Heath Ledger but, God willing, Dev Patel will have a long and fruitful career ahead of him and get plenty more chances to win. I truly hope so, because from what I saw in this film he truly is a prodigious talent (Slumdog did win the Outstanding Cast award from SAG, so at least he didn't go home completely empty-handed).

Well, I've now seen two Academy Award nominees for Best Picture, this and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (unfortunately I missed both Frost/Nixon and Milk in the discount theater, so will have to wait for the DVDs, and don't know if or when The Reader has played near me, or will). Between the two of them, I honestly couldn't say which is better; I can't think of any valid grounds for comparison. I guess if I absolutely had to pick one over the other, I'd pick Benjamin Button, for the sole reason that I could easily follow the story and (mostly) understand what the characters were saying. Also, it had less of the cringe-worthy violence, which I appreciate. That's not to say that the violence and disturbing imagery in Slumdog was gratuitous, because it wasn't; I'd just prefer not to see it, although ultimately it was worth it.

Oh, by the way, the soundtrack kicks ass!

...not having seen any of the films, this was it. Not having seen any (well, most) of the movies, I don't have a lot of comments, but I have a few thoughts:

( Read more... )

To sum up, I enjoyed the Oscars, as I usually do, and of course the old debate rages on about whether the Academy is out of touch or hypocritical, about whether movies that make a lot of money are good and vice versa. So I'll just reiterate that I think that the Academy can stand to be a little more populist, and the populace can stand to be a little less hedonic; maybe we could all meet in the middle and be epicurean.

You know, last year I didn't put the results behind a cut, and maybe I should have. But then, maybe anyone who actually cares was either also watching or looked up the results already.

I don't have a lot to say, not having seen many movies or watched much TV this past year. One thing that I learned from watching this particular broadcast is that a five-second delay is not enough time to blur out obscene gestures, which is interesting to know. I wonder how much time they would need for that; perhaps we'll find out. I kind of hope not.

But anyway, there are three results that I want to comment briefly about:

( I will cut it just in case anyone hasn't seen the results yet and wants to be surprised )

Okay, I don't wanna debate the merits of the Oscars anymore, okay? I know everything that can said against them, I agree with a lot of it, yet the idea that without them we might be subjected to an endless array of Norbits has really put things in perspective for me. I've made my peace with the Oscars, and now I just want to have fun with them. My teeth hurt and I need a distraction. Okay? Fair enough?

Okay. With that said, I found last night's ceremony to be entirely enjoyable. It was as long as they usually are, but it didn't feel long. Acceptance speeches were interesting, touching, and surprisingly brief. My man Jon Stewart did an excellent job of hosting; funny and gracious, as he always is. I did sense the impact of the writers' strike and the hurried preparation, but it was still good and funny. I love it when Jon cracks himself up, although he did seem to do it kind of a lot, but it's okay because it's adorable. I do kind of wish that he'd stood at the podium to give his opening monologue, because his walking around and repetitive hand gestures was kind of distracting. But still funny. Just the right amount of political joking, with Democrats and Republicans getting equal portions. Too many funny bits to mention, but possibly my favorite: "...and the baby goes to...Angelina Jolie!" Runner-up: "Even Norbit got a nomination...so often the Academy ignores bad movies." Naturally this drew a somewhat rueful laugh from me.

Anyway, here are the winners, for reference; as to the ceremony, impressions in no particular order:

( Welcome to the make-up sex )

Thus did Jon Stewart refer to the Oscars, which he is hosting tonight (again, yay!).

I found this very interesting article analyzing and ultimately defending the Academy Awards' cultural relevance, and I think the writer, David Carr, made some very good points.

First, invariably every year people criticize the hypocrisy of the Oscars because Hollywood, at its core, is an industry and industry, almost by definition, does not concern itself with artistry, but with making money. If they can make money by producing something artistic, great, but it will never be a primary consideration. This is a perfectly relevant point, but Mr. Carr brings up another point which no one seems ever to have thought of: if there were no Academy Awards to raise a bar by which film quality is measured, would any of these artistic, thoughtful films ever get made (or at least distributed) in the first place? Well, it depends on who has the money to spend, so possibly, but probably not.

Mr. Carr also makes the point that winning--or even just being nominated for--Academy Awards may not necessarily be the culmination of the films' careers but rather their entry into the broader mainstream culture, through DVDs, etc. I think this is a very valid point; movies, like water, will eventually find their own level, but first they have to find their audience. Take, for example, the Shawshank Redemption which is in my opinion the greatest movie ever made; a brilliant and beautifully made movie and just a hell of a good and entertaining story. But not a commercial success in the theaters; nominated for seven Oscars but didn't win a single one. However, I recently read another article which said that more people watch the Oscars not to see a close contest but to see their favorite movies validated (so in that respect it was decidedly unlike the Super Bowl) and that was the year that the widely popular Forrest Gump was nominated for 13 Oscars and ultimately won six, including Best Picture. Now...would the Shawshank Redemption have subsequently become the top-rented movie of 1994 had it not been nominated for those seven Oscars and gained that exposure? Possibly; probably not. (Incidentally, I think it's interesting to note that Shawshank Redemption has held steady at number two on IMDb's top 250 list, while Forrest Gump is currently at number 60).

( Read more... )

I have my issues with the Oscars; I've learned the hard way not to get emotionally invested in them, because--regardless of who's right or wrong--the Academy almost never picks the movies/actors that I think should win. I suspect, though I have no proof to back this up, that the winners chosen have as much (if not more) to do with intra-Hollywood politics as they do with actual quality. But when all is said and done, it's nothing more or less than a matter of opinion. And whatever the disappointment, it'll be worth it to see Jon Stewart host again. So I say, let the games begin!

(...and at this point I'm kind of wishing I had cable, cuz my TV reception sucks tonight! Dammit!)

So there's this weird, mad-libby thing that lets you generate your own Oscar acceptance speech.

Here is mine:

( Read more... )

Oh, and speaking of Oscars humor, I just thought of this Kids in the Hall sketch. "You thanked Hitler!"

The evidence seems to support the assertion that it goes on. Until such time that it doesn't.

Deep, or just pretentiously meaningless?

( Rather random and incoherent...I have tags now, though, so you can get an idea of what is included without having to slog through the whole thing )

In other news, I've begun to tag my LiveJournal entries. I didn't do so initially because I didn't know about tagging, but having since found it to be a useful feature in other people's journals, I've long considered adding them. It's difficult, though, because I sometimes have difficulty categorizing what I write. Like this entry, for example: does my brief commemoration of the death of Buddy Holly warrent an "in memoriam" tag? What about when I mentioned the death of Jerry Falwell? Because that phrase connotes and kind of honor, and I don't want to honor his memory. I have a tag for "films", but do certain genres or even certain titles merit their own tags? And then there's the fact that tags don't serve much purpose unless you go back and tag ALL your entries, but I don't like going back and reading my old entries; sometimes it's painful and/or embarrassing. And plus, that takes an awful lot of time, and I have a day job AND graduate studies, the latter of which I sense will become more intensive and time-consuming as the semester wears on, but I'm trying to stay on top of it and possibly get a little ahead of things.

...I'd like to talk about the best and/or my favorite movies that I saw in 2007, although some of them were technically released in 2006. I kind of wanted to hold off on this until I got a chance to see The Mist, because I intended to see it in 2007 but then it left the theaters, but then as I was talking about the Globen Globes I realized that there's a whole lotta movies from 2007 that I haven't gotten to see yet but want to, and it's going to be well into 2008 before I get the chance, so let's just make a clean break of it, especially since at least two of the movies I'm about to mention are technically 2006 releases anyway.

So here is a ranked list of the movies from 2006-2007 that I saw last year and found to be outstanding:

( The Top 7 Movies )

So that is the list, and indeed that is nearly all of the 2006-2007 movies I saw this year, because after all, I don't waste time and/or money seeing movies if I don't think I'm going to like them. As far as I can remember, the only other 2006-2007 movies I saw this year were Shrek the Third and Eragon which, while enjoyable in their own ways, I found largely forgettable.

I'd like to acknowledge some outstanding actors and performances as well, but I don't want to rank them or comment on them in depth because we'll be here all night. So here's a list in no particular order:

( The Top...Actors. The list has ten items but some items have more than one entry )

Here are the results.

First of all, YAY Sweeney Todd! It won for best musical or comedy, and Johnny Depp won for best actor therein. I'm excited and happy about this, although I wouldn't have been too disappointed if Hairspray had won, but I do sincerely believe that Sweeney Todd is a better movie. Nor would I have been too disappointed to see Tom Hanks win; I've not seen Charlie Wilson's War and so do not have an opinion, although I am very intrigued by it, and especially intigued as to how it gets to be a comedy, so I may go see it when it comes to the discount theater. If you forced me to make a list of the greatest contemporary male American actors, Tom Hanks and Johnny Depp would probably be my top two choices, in that order, but if you asked me to pick my favorite male contemporary American actor, it would probably be Johnny Depp. I don't know what my point is here, I'm just happy to see people recognized for good work. I still think it kind of sucks for the comedic films and actors that they're lumped in the same category with musicals, so that any musical with any subject matter can swoop in and steal their thunder, but oh well.

I am disappointed about the actress in a musical or comedy award. I really wanted it to go to Nikki Blonsky for Hairspray, because even though it was a lesser movie than Sweeney Todd, she was radiant in it, and she will always be Tracy Turnblad to me. Helena Bonham Carter would have been my second choice, which isn't really saying that much as those were the only two of the nominated performances I had seen (although I do want to see Enchanted and Juno), but I do think she was really, really, really good in Sweeney Todd. I don't know anything about the woman who won or the movie in which she appeared.

Since I don't particularly care for dramas I haven't seen any of the nominees in the drama categories, although I do really want to see Atonement, so I'm happy for it that it won.

As far as the supporting-actor categories, I find it interesting that they both featured a gender-bending actor (Cate Blanchett for I'm Not There. and John Travolta for Hairspray). I find it so interesting that in American cinema and theater we're so squeamish about men playing women and vice-versa; you almost never see it, and when you do see it, it's usually as a joke. I think it's a reflection on our obsession with rigid gender roles in the wider culture, which I would like to see go away, and I think that seeing more gender-bending (especially in serious roles) in the movies would help us to get used to the idea that gender roles in the wider culture could be more fluid. That being the case, I'm happy to see Cate Blanchett win, and somewhat disappointed to see John Travolta lose. On the one hand, I hope that his losing was based more on the fact that he was up against four arguably dramatic players (even though Charlie Wilson's War is apparently a comedy in the eyes of the Foreign Press Association), and less due to the ew-a-man-in-a-dress-icky! factor. On the other hand, while I laud John Travolta for doing the role, and for bringing his macho-hetero street cred to it, and for recognizing that the humor does not (or should not) come merely from the tee-hee-a-man-in-a-dress! factor, the fact remains that he is not, and never will be, Edna Turnblad to me. As Nikki Blonsky will always be Tracy Turnblad to me, Harvey Fierstein will always be Edna.

I haven't seen any of the animated movies. Has anybody seen Ratatouille? If so, was it any good? I wasn't very excited by the previews for it, particularly since I'm not a particular fan of rats to begin with, so rats helping in a kitchen--however adorably animated or charmingly excuted--is not a very appealing movie premise to me. Also, I wonder why Beowulf wasn't nominated in this category. Do they not consider motion-capture to count as animation?

Yesterday (August 8)'s IMDb Daily Poll question (What is the worst Best Picture Oscar winner of the last ten years?) suggests that people still care about the quality (or lack thereof) of Academy Award winning/nominated films. Therefore I feel it is not entirely tardy of me to go back and give an informed opinion on this year's Best Picture race, having finally had a chance to see all five nominated movies. What follows is what I would have said in March had I had the opportunity to see all five Best Picture nominees, but I was very busy at that time (and since then, what with school and moving and work and all), so it has had to wait until now.

Here are the five nominees as I would have ranked them:

1. Brokeback Mountain
2. Good Night and Good Luck
3. Munich
4. Capote
5. Crash

( Brokeback Mountain, Good Night and Good Luck, Munich )

( Capote and Crash )

( Conclusions )

I had good intentions, in the sense that I had intentions that I honestly intended to carry out.

Events in my life over the past year have prevented me from maintaining this journal as I originally intended it, as an outlet for social commentary with a political purpose. Writing a good essay, particularly a good persuasive essay, takes time to write and to revise. And time has become such a precious commodity that I've had to spend it elsewhere.

Since the Oscar ceremony, I've felt the need to comment publicly on the Academy Awards, specifically Brokeback Mountain's loss. I did so in a friends-locked entry in order to articulate my feelings so as to revise them later. I was unsuccessful in getting my true feelings across, and instead of revising I had to write an entirely other essay, this time one more of apology/explanation.

I had more thoughts to share, but I don't have the time to do them justice, and three weeks after the fact I can hardly justify their relevance anymore.

So I'll just present my thesis, which is this: in spite of the Award ceremony's self-congratulatory theme of celebrating their willingness to stand in defiance of the status quo and challenge the prevailing attitudes, many of the choices for Award winners--particularly Best Picture--seemed to reveal a desire to not appear TOO controversial.

Though I originally did a lousy job of defending my thesis, I was later gratified to learn that others--people with at least a reputation for being knowledgable about the film medium--shared my viewpoint. I read many good and thought-provoking essays, but one stood out as the best, as somehow taking the ideas from my head and writing the words I wanted to write but couldn't, for whatever reason. At this point I would like to relinquish the floor to Mr. Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times, who accomplished what I could not: articulated and defended a thesis very similar to mine with eloquence and with objectivity.

Mr. Turan, if you please.