OT: Awards Season - Psycho (1960) Discussion

[–] movieghoul (213) 6 years ago

Swanstep, when you say that Roma and FR got little love elsewhere, I assume you're referring to the Globes only. These two films dominated the New York Film Critics awards.

And they wouldn't be the Globes without controversy over Drama/COmedy/Musical. First, I haven't seen Star is BOrn, but it's NOT a musical?? Some critics have noted that while Green Book has a fair amount of humor with the concept of a white guy chauffering a black in the pre-Civil Rights South, that doesn't make it a comedy. And a DIck Cheney biopic is a comedy? Sure, Dick is one of the funniest men alive, remember all those WHite House parties where he got wasted and danced around with a lamp shade over his head (NOT!).

And wouldn't you know that while 4 out of 10 BPs are black themed, there's still a lot of complaints abbout how Widows get shut out proving an anti-black bias by the nominating committee.

And I haven't heard much about the score of MPR, they're keeping under wraps how much of it is original, how much of the original film's score is reprised, or even whether they interpolated any songs that were written for the stage musical. It's possible that the best songs in the new film are from the original so no Best Song nominee.

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

Swanstep, when you say that Roma and FR got little love elsewhere, I assume you're referring to the Globes only. These two films dominated the New York Film Critics awards.

Indeed, I was just referring to the GGs. BTW, Roma did get a 'Best Foreign Film' from the GGs so it's FR's complete absence that's most surprising.

Yes, ASiB not being on the musical side is a little odd.

Re Widows not getting noms: I thought the big shock there was Viola Davis missing out for a Best Actress nom. (she was as much of a sure thing people thought as Ethan Hawke!). If people really are moaning about there not being a fourth black Best Picture nom then that's both greedy and funny - what a great problem for an ethnic group to have that it's got 4 or 5 top contenders in a year so that it's essentially a dead certainty someone good will miss out.

MPR had a few new songs released on youtube recently (just the audio) - they sounded pretty good to me. I was genuinely surprised to see them absent from the GGs list.

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[–] movieghoul (213) 6 years ago

And, by the way, ROma was not snubbed for BP, the Globe rules (for some strange reason) only allow English language films to be BP noms.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

I stayed away from this thread until I finished The Americans. I assume it got some TV category noms? Maybe Keri Russell can win here. Its her last chance.

And I didn't see the Best Picture -- Musical or Comedy -- listings. But I'm sure all I have to do is to go find them.

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3. Two movies got both directing and writing nods: Vice and Green Book (Driving Mr Daisy). And both got Best Comedy or Musical nods. Category fraud?

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Well, the GGs famously "double the nominations"(at least in the acting categories) of the Oscars by including those two categories -- and by "fudging" what should go where. But indeed -- A Star is Born is NOT a musical?(hey, maybe it isn't, but it has SONGS.)

Meanwhile, have you seen the trailer for "Vice" in which Christian Bale packs on the pounds and goes bald to give us a formidable Dick Cheney? The trailer "cuts" like a comedy(with Sam Rockwell the latest in a series of funny George W. Bush impressions...following Will Ferrell on SNL and Josh Brolin for Oliver Stone.) Great song at the end -- competes with "Mary Poppins Returns" for "creating a got to see vibe" via the music and the stars' names and faces zipping by.

The idea that W and Cheney can play as comedy figures while being up to very serious war-related hijincks, well -- Doctor Strangelove went there first.

Green Book looks great, with Viggo Mortensen (Sam Loomis in our world) also putting on some more subtle pounds to play the Brooklyn bruiser who bodyguards a rather elegant black pianist. Its the "prestige movie" version of what we've been seeing since In the Heat of the Night(heck, since The Defiant Ones) and on through 48 HRS and Lethal Weapon.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

. Mary Poppins Returns got acting noms for Blunt and Miranda and a score nom but no song nom. What?

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"No song" nom for Mary Poppins Returns cuts to the core of my concern about a movie which, otherwise, I am highly anticipating. One thing the original Mary Poppins was famous for was its SONGS --- I grew up on them as a kid, and came to love them as an adult: Chim Chim Cheree(which never really gets sung all the way through), Super Cali Whatever; Feed the Birds, I Love to Laugh, A Spoonful of Sugar(which helped me perform childhood chores) and my personal favorite...the exhilarating happy ending finale tune, "Let's Go Fly a Kite." Can Mary Poppins Returns come close to matching that output? I've only heard Emily Blunt sing a few lines of one sweet song ("Nothing's really gone forever...just out of ...place" or something like that -- about the dead young mother at the heart of the sequel?)

(Update: oops just saw this):

MPR had a few new songs released on youtube recently (just the audio) - they sounded pretty good to me. I was genuinely surprised to see them absent from the GGs list.

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I'll go take a listen. Hard to beat Chim Chim Cheree and Fly a Kite, though. (Though I notice in the trailer, they DO fly a kite.)

More on the "I love the Mary Poppins returns trailer" beat:

Something about how, in the final shot of the trailer, Blunt looks out, smiles at us with delight, says "Off we go!" and falls backwards into a bubble bath and disappears...just charming. Blunt doesn't even LOOK like Blunt, her line reading is infectious, the "magic trick" is funny...just charming.

True confession: I had a major crush on Mary "Tough Love" Poppins as played by Julie Andrews when I was a kid, and Emily Blunt is re-creating it in an older fellow. Something about how Mary Poppins is about as mysterious and cryptic as Clint's Man With No Name, and a bit of a light dominatrix, I guess -- may Uncle Walt's ghost strike me down!

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

4. Acting noms galore for Star is Born, The Favourite, Vice, Green Book, and a couple for Black KKKlansman.

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Well, those double categories at the GG's always double the acting nods. And USUALLY the winner in the dramatic acting categories wins the Oscar, leaving folks like John Travolta(Get Shorty) and Leo DiCaprio(The Wolf of Wall Streeet) with only the GG comedy or musical award to give a winner's speech about.

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Redford got a Best actor – musical or comedy nom for Old Man & A Gun. No Reynolds nom

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Well, the Redford film got heavy promotion as "his final film" with Redford alive to heavily promote it. Burt's movie barely got released and I don't think he was well enough to promote it even before his death.

That said, I am a huge , major, lifelong Robert Redford fan and its deeply satisfying to see him still getting noticed after all these years. THAT said...the Reynolds film is more meaningful.

I'm guessing 88-year old Clint Eastwood in The Mule didn't make the GG cut? Oh, well...just APPEARING in the movie is his reward, I suppose.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

And, by the way, ROma was not snubbed for BP, the Globe rules (for some strange reason) only allow English language films to be BP noms.

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As happens nowadays, the Oscar race seems to materialize out of nowhere, not so much "led" by something major(Ben-Hur, West Side Story, The Sound of Music) as much as a few lists appearing that give us the "lay of the land" for what was good this year. Movies like La La Land and Moonlight arrived this way two years ago; The Shape of Water and Three Billboards last year -- Spotlight a few years ago. Good movies, all -- but not necessarily great, or popular, or beloved for all time.

From what I've been reading, "Roma" is a frontrunner unless the "foreign film" thing gets in the way(it didn't for Slumdog Millionaire, did it?) I assume Black Panther will win its GG easily...and challenge the Academy for a Best Picture Oscar -- there is no "Popular Film" category and I hear that Black Panther really isn't great enough for a Best Picture.

Green Book was looking good for Mortensen until he said the wrong thing at a press conference for it(the N word in some context); "Vice" posits Christian Bale as the Best Actor frontrunner under the "Robert DeNiro Weight Gain Standard"(and somebody somewhere will say how it is an important film for our times), A Star is Born might help mint Lady Gaga as a star further born....there's enough going on here for a year with good, not great, films , getting their due. Or a great film -- Roma -- with Netflix issues and low box office -- overcoming those hurdles.

We shall see.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

And they wouldn't be the Globes without controversy over Drama/COmedy/Musical. First, I haven't seen Star is BOrn, but it's NOT a musical??

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Well, as I mention up thread, it seems that the GGs use these two categories to "shoehorn" almost all deserving movies or performances in somewhere (recall that Barbara Harris got a GG nomination in the Comedy/Musical category for Family Plot.)

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Some critics have noted that while Green Book has a fair amount of humor with the concept of a white guy chauffering a black in the pre-Civil Rights South, that doesn't make it a comedy.

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Probably not. Though I suppose even most dramas today have comedic elements.

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And a DIck Cheney biopic is a comedy? Sure, Dick is one of the funniest men alive, remember all those WHite House parties where he got wasted and danced around with a lamp shade over his head (NOT!).

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The trailer for the film shows Christian Bale with such girth and baldness that he seems funny just because he doesn't look like Christian Bale. And he has adapted Cheney's speech pattern so that it plays ...kinda funny.

Its a hard call on things like this. Very serious things happened under Bush/Cheney, but they were always treated as "funny" -- clips of them together on The Sopranos and in the movie Sideways were chosen for purpose of ridicule.

I'm reminded of Robert Redford's line to Streisand in The Way We Were:

Streisand: You think politicians are funny?
Redford. Of course I do. You make fun of politicians...what else can you do with them?

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

And wouldn't you know that while 4 out of 10 BPs are black themed, there's still a lot of complaints abbout how Widows get shut out proving an anti-black bias by the nominating committee.

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Er...yeah.

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And I haven't heard much about the score of MPR, they're keeping under wraps how much of it is original, how much of the original film's score is reprised, or even whether they interpolated any songs that were written for the stage musical. It's possible that the best songs in the new film are from the original so no Best Song nominee.

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This business about what the songs are in Mary Poppins Returns is getting interesting. The trailer only has Blunt sing a snatch of one song, but there is music throughout the trailer which sounds pretty good -- if it is in the movie, all the better.

But indeed...what if some of the songs from the original are used? Or at least instrumentally scored? (Its like making sure that a Psycho sequel sounds like Bernard Herrmann score it...which actually only happened with Psycho IV) Though "Chim Chim Cheree" was never sung all the way through in the original, it was reprised in bits and pieces all through the film, as I recall. Maybe they repeat that here?

I would assume if original songs were written for the stage musical....and they are good...they might get in the movie. Have not songs from Broadway musicals won the Best Song Oscar before?

And yet: swanstep has directed us to some audio songs from the new movie on YouTube. If they were written FOR the movie...a Best Song Oscar nom might well work out. (Recall that Chim Chim Cheree WON, even though it is not sung all the way through.)

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[–] ProductionNow (1072) 6 years ago

and an Oscar for Andrews? Hmm.
I noticed she only gets nominated when she SINGS in a film. No other film society awarded her, they were going with Kim Stanley.
I don't dislike Andrews, but nobody is owed an Oscar because they were not previously allowed to do the film version of their play; that has happened to many actors.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

and an Oscar for Andrews? Hmm.
I noticed she only gets nominated when she SINGS in a film. No other film society awarded her, they were going with Kim Stanley.

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For Séance on a Wet Afternoon?(a film I've read a lot about, but never seen.) And fun fact: Kim Stanley turned down the role of Lila in Psycho, imdb trivia says...because she didnt' want to work with Anthony Perkins(odd..Lila barely interacts with Norman in the film.)

The film societies going one way and the Academy another seems to be over nowadays. The professional critics have won. For better or worse, movies like Airport, Love Story, and The Towering Inferno used to get Best Picture nominations in a nod to box office popularity, but now it seems that such films will NEVER get nominated -- only critics' lists' favorites need apply.

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I don't dislike Andrews, but nobody is owed an Oscar because they were not previously allowed to do the film version of their play; that has happened to many actors. Too bad

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Well, perhaps this too has abated given the "performance heavy" Oscars given to near unknowns nowadays.

One of the reasons Andrews won the '64 Oscar was a rule that Jack Palance offered: "The performance doesn't win the Oscar, the character does." So many actors and actresses have won that statue because they got the role of a lifetime(or one of them) Atticus Finch, Mary Poppins, Rooster Cogburn, Patton, Don Vito Corleone, Nurse Ratched, Hannibal Lecter, Forrest Gump, Erin Brockovich....its one of the reasons it seems unfair that Norman Bates didn't even get a nomination for Perkins.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

But yes, Julie's snub over My Fair Lady seemed to help put her over the top. Oscar voters sometimes vote to punish someone(Jack Warner) by lifting someone else up (Andrews.)

And then Andrews took the clout and power from Mary Poppins and The Sound of Music and did Torn Curtain for Hitchcock...and the momentum slowed. Two OTHER musicals(bad) -- Star and Darling Lili -- killed her movie career pretty much until husband Blake Edwards rescued her with 10, SOB and Victor/Victoria.

I liked Andrews' quote on Torn Curtain. "I wanted to work with Alfred Hitchcock. That's why I took the picture, and that's what I took away from it."

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[–] ProductionNow (1072) 6 years ago

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[–] ProductionNow (1072) 6 years ago

One of the reasons Andrews won the '64 Oscar was a rule that Jack Palance offered: "The performance doesn't win the Oscar, the character does." So many actors and actresses have won that statue because they got the role of a lifetime(or one of them)
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1964 didn't seem that strong a year for lead female. The other heavy=hitter that year was Anne Bancroft's supposedly intense portrayal in The Pumpkin Eater. Julie over Anne, really? I have heard people agree that singing and dancing is part of the "performance", but that's unfair in my opinion. For example, Judy Garland in A Star is Born.

With Palance's theory, I don't know, since one is exclusive from the other; the character-role may have been the best-acted also..Depends on how often it works out the way he describes

Trivia: Kim Stanley in 1958 The Goddess (seems kind of miscast) The first 5 mins begins with a younger version of Stanley's character of a lonely sad girl. Not only did the girl (unknown actress) grow up to look similar to Stanley, but the casting dept must had seen it then when she was 10 yrs old when any resemblance was not that obvious. Know who she was?

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

The LA Film Critics Awards are as follows (they list runner-ups in each category):
Best Picture
ROMA
Runner up: Burning

Best Director
Debra Granik, Leave No Trace
Runner up: Alfonso Cuaron, ROMA

Best Actress
Olivia Colman, The Favourite
Runner up: Toni Collette, Hereditary

Best Actor
Ethan Hawke, First Reformed
Runner up: Ben Foster, Leave No Trace

Best Supporting Actress
Regina King, If Beale Street Could Talk
Runner up: Elizabeth Debicki, Widows

Best Supporting Actor
Steven Yeun, Burning
Runner up: Hugh Grant, Paddington 2

Best Foreign Language Film
Burning and Shoplifters (Tie)

Best Animation
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse
Runner up: Incredibles 2

Best Screenplay
Nicole Holofcener and Jeff Whitty, Can You Ever Forgive Me?
Runner up: Deborah Davis and Tony McNamara, The Favourite

Best Documentary/Non-Fiction Film
Shirkers
Runner up: Minding the Gap

Best Editing
Joshua Altman and Bing Liu, Minding the Gap
Runner up: Alfonso Cuarón and Adam Gough, Roma

Best Production Design
Hannah Beachler, Black Panther
Runner up: Fiona Crombie, The Favourite

Best Music/Score
Nicholas Britell, If Beale Street Could Talk
Runner up: Justin Hurwitz, First Man

Best Cinematography
Alfonso Cuarón, Roma
Runner up: James Laxton, If Beale Street Could Talk

Lifetime Achievement Award
Hayao Miyazaki

The Douglas Edwards Experimental Film Award
Evan Johnson, Galen Johnson, and Guy Maddin, The Green Fog

So, real sharing of the spoils: Roma gets Picture, Leave No Trace gets Director, and Can You Ever Forgive Me? gets script. Other awards also shared around.
Dogs that didn't bark: no love at *all* for Vice or Green Book or Star is Born or Mary Poppins here! Wow.

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[–] movieghoul (213) 6 years ago

Always happy to see Hugh Grant come up a winner, but for Paddington 2? Is it possible some of the voters got confused with Richard E who won the NYFCC award for Can You Ever Forgive Me?

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

SAG Awards Nominees are here:
https://variety.com/2018/film/news/2019-sag-award-nominations-list-nominees-1203087472/
Star is Born, Vice, The Favourite, Green Book all heavily nom'd - these now are the official Oscar front-runners.
Mary Poppins, Black KKKlansman, Can You Ever Forgive Me? get the main scraps.

Dogs that didn't bark: Roma, First Reform, Hereditary, Leave No Trace, Beale St get *no* love from actors. Wow (Philistines!).

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

Looking around for reviews of Mary Poppins Returns, I came across The Hollywood Reporter's original review of Mary Poppins (1964):
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/mary-poppins-review-1964-movie-1168686
Recommended.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Looking around for reviews of Mary Poppins Returns,

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Of which I've seen both good ...and not so good...

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I came across The Hollywood Reporter's original review of Mary Poppins (1964):
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/mary-poppins-review-1964-movie-1168686
Recommended.

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6That was a great read. Lemme tell ya: On my "personal list" of favorites of the year 1964, Dr. Strangelove is my choice -- based mainly on multiple viewings in high school and college when I felt "cool to be watching it." But -- in my heart of hearts -- I really do think Mary Poppins is my true favorite of that year. It was HUGE in my life when it came out, and I'll stick it in the ol' DVD player at least once a year, usually not only trying to recapture my childhood, but to raise my spirits when they need lifting(which is interesting, given that the end is a real tearjerker right on the heels of exhilarating happiness.)

I know that there is much to dislike about even the IDEA of "Mary Poppins Returns." Disney -- now a super-duper billion dollar conglomerate -- is methodically going through its library and remaking everything(Dumbo soon, Aladdin after that), and shouldn't we be MAD about that?

Well, its gonna happen. And Mary Poppins Returns posits itself as a sequel, not a remake (which is usually a bad thing, but in this case, a remake would be like...remaking Psycho.) And those other remakes are of animated films(there is SOME animation in the original Mary Poppins, but not the whole thing.)

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

The good reviews of Mary Poppins Returns suggest that it recaptures much of the spirit of the original while making its own name for itself. (The bad reviews say its heartless corporate plunder -- with unmemorable songs.) I'm hoping to see the movie that the good reviews are talking about -- and I think that's what will happen. Look, I picked "The Magnificent Seven" as my fave of 2016 -- and it mainly got "two star" reviews. I'm easy, and I'm nostalgic.

I'm interested that Lin-Manuel Miranda has gotten the male lead --- he's very much a "new star of the moment"(on Broadway) and here's his chance to be a movie star(his very sweet and friendly face is an asset.) He's doing a Cockney accent, too -- and has already been as panned for his as Dick Van Dyke was panned for his -- which strikes me as fitting. I'm always interested by "who is a star around the time a movie is made." Van Dyke was a TV star briefly elevated to movie stardom via Poppins(a Time magazine profile said, "Van Dyke now gets the scripts that Jack Lemmon isn't available for .) Now -- Miranda's turn?

I'm intrigued that the new Mary Poppins film has a "flat classic animation" sequence to bring 1964 back.

I"ve already noted that the "Mary Poppins Returns" TRAILER is one of my favorites. Interestingly, the long-form "Dumbo" trailer(very dependent on the sad "Baby Mine" as its theme) is not nearly as exhilarating and moving. Trailers can be hits, just like movies. And if I give "Mary Poppins Returns" my "favorite of 2018" slot, it will get a boost because of that trailer. I ALREADY like THAT movie.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

But back to 1964:

I lived in LA as a kid, and they used to broadcast premieres on Hollywood Boulevard as local TV -- though I think the Mary Poppins premiere got a nationwide broadcast. I remember watching that premiere with real "gotta see that movie" interest. It took a few months, but I did get to see it, and it was just great.

I do like how it ends in a mix of joy and tears -- Mary Poppins has completed her mission(Saving MR Banks, as we know from that fun movie of a few years back) and must leave. And it is always sad to watch someone you love have to leave.

I probably shouldn't have sleazed up the place by suggesting in an earlier post that there was something a bit "dominatrix" about Mary Poppins, but I DO remember finding Julie Andrews to be sweet, beautiful -- and just a bit sexy in the toughness of her demeanor. I'll drop the "d" word, but I will suggest that Andrews won her Oscar not just as revenge for losing "My Fair Lady"("I want to thank Jack Warner for getting me this award," she sniped from the podium), but for creating in Mary Poppins a sweet character with a LOT of "edge."

That's an irony about the name "Mary Poppins." Its now used to suggest a totally saccharine sweetness -- but the character is far more inscrutable and tough than that saccharine reputation might suggest.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

And I loved the songs. ALL of them. And I loved the patented Disney "look" and effects (matte paintings, animation) of the time. And Glynnis Johns was sexy, too (she had had a short-lived TV series at the time, called...wait for it, "Glynnis.") . And David Tomlinson -- perfect casting in every way(a few years later, he'd be the bad guy in the first Love Bug.) And the cannon fired from the rooftop . And the fireworks flashing by the dancing chimneysweeps at night on the rooftops and...

....well. Practically perfect in every way. Dr. Strangelove might be in a little trouble holding its 1964 spot on my favorites list , if I'm really honest with myself.

Its probably just as well that Hitchcock's release of 1964 was Marnie. Not competitive -- at all -- with Mary Poppins. Or Dr. Strangelove. Or Goldfinger(despite sharing a star.) Or A Hard Day's Night....

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Side-bar: having reviewed the lists of 2018 movies winning all the awards for the year, I'll stipulate that most of them are probably better on paper than a big old studio monstrosity like Mary Poppins Returns. But my "personal best" lists invariably have to move me in some way -- they are for the heart, not the mind.

Sight unseen, MPR is my frontrunner. (With Burt Reynolds' Last Movie Star on deck if it fails.)

Not much of a cineaste, am I?

However: as I now have Netflix, I now have immediate access to Roma, and I will try to watch it soon -- weird as it is to consider the possible Best Picture winner is on TV right now.

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

However: as I now have Netflix, I now have immediate access to Roma, and I will try to watch it soon -- weird as it is to consider the possible Best Picture winner is on TV right now.

The NY Times has a new article about Netflix's big Oscar play:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/16/business/media/netflix-movies-hollywood.html
Amazingly the guy behind it at Netflix, one Scott Stuber, got his first Hollywood job (back in 1982) from Lew Wasserman, which brings us back to Hitchcock.

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

Cuaro talks about his self-shot Roma with is former, multi-Oscar winning DP, Lubezki ('Chivo'):
https://www.indiewire.com/2018/12/roma-emmanuel-lubezki-alfonso-cuaron-cinematography-1202028167/
I've only glanced at it; will come back to it after I've watched Roma.

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

OK... my brief spoiler-free Roma review. Hawks famously said that a good movie has at least three good scenes and no bad scenes. Roma tests that proposition since by my reckoning it only has 3 really good, memorable scenes (maybe only 2 if I wanted to be a hardass) and you have to wait 90 long minutes for the first one to come along.

In my view that 90 minute wait needs to be and could be chopped in half. That is, I think the ideal form of Roma would be about 90 minutes total, and I think I know were the fat needs to be trimmed from.

Cuaron makes a number of key decisions that make the first 90 minutes drag: (i) he shoots almost entirely in very deep focus master shots, no closeups period and only the lead, Cleo, gets any medium shots; (ii) Cleo is verbally very limited and as a household maid she's not otherwise expressive, and remains a cipher; (iii) there's no score; (iv) there's no real plot. In sum, Roma distances us from everyone except our taciturn, unlively lead, and we're denied simple film pleasures such as colorful, informative story, good dialogue, emotional music. In other words, we're deep in the slice of life weeds for a solid 90 minutes, and get to know *nobody* or come to understand any politics. While things pick up from there, for me it was 'too little, too late'.

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

I'll have to think a bit about the appropriate comparisons for Roma. My sense is, however, that Cuaron has shot himself in the foot by distancing us from all the kids in the film. Many an auto-biographical slice-of-life has been bolstered or even saved over the years by an incredible child-performance or three. I'm a little staggered that Cuaron clearly deliberately decided to nip such possibilities of connection in the bud. Amarcord and Fanny and Alexander and Los Olvidados and Mama Rosa maybe looked too easy?

But maybe I'm just not getting something. What did everyone else think?

p.s. You can fit the whole of Gravity into the part of Roma that occurs before the first good scene. Since that opening slice-o'-life ramble includes a scene where Cuaron winks at us about his childhood inspiration for Gravity, he may be punking us.
p.p.s. One of Roma's good scenes is a how-did-they-do-that? one-shot wonder if you're the sort of person who cares about technicalia. (How did water not get on the lens? I have no idea.) Most people however, just assume that cameras can go anywhere and do anything so won't be inclined to give Cuaron much credit for doing the impossible. It feels like this is a microcosm of Roma's problems finding an audience. I'm not sure that *anyone* is going to *really* like it.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

In my view that 90 minute wait needs to be and could be chopped in half. That is, I think the ideal form of Roma would be about 90 minutes total, and I think I know were the fat needs to be trimmed from.

---- (iii) there's no score; (iv) there's no real plot. In sum, Roma distances us from everyone except our taciturn, unlively lead, and we're denied simple film pleasures such as colorful, informative story, good dialogue, emotional music. In other words, we're deep in the slice of life weeds for a solid 90 minutes, and get to know *nobody* or come to understand any politics. While things pick up from there, for me it was 'too little, too late'.

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Swanstep, it must be tough to take a look at something that seems to be an unassailable Oscar frontrunner...and it comes up short. I'll still be looking at Roma on Netflix(how odd) but....my view is somewhat tempered.

And yet, SOMETHING has to win Best Picture. If not Roma...what, I wonder?

Its like my rather failing "personal favorite" list. If "Once Upon a Time In Hollywood' is my presumptive winner for 2019(sight unseen), that's really a mark of the fact that the movies "in general" don't much move me anymore, and QT is one of the few left who get the job done of exciting me. (Screenweriter Aaron Sorkin is in roughly the same boat, which is why I picked Mollys' Game for my 2017 favorite.)

Pit that against 1960. My favorite -- Psycho -- was a blockbuster and is historic, monumental. But I wouldn't have felt bad picking The Apartment, Spartacus, or The Magnificent Seven -- not for "Oscar value" but for being films that moves and excited me.

Same goes with 1959. My favorite -- North by Northwest -- was a hit , and is historic at a level below Psycho. But I wouldn't have felt bad picking Rio Bravo, Anatomy of a Murder, or Some Like It Hot.

Nowadays, I'm lucky if one movie a year catches my fancy.

Something tells me...it ain't gonna be Roma.

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

And yet, SOMETHING has to win Best Picture. If not Roma...what, I wonder?

I suspect that I'm going to like The Favourite - it combines a fave director (Lanthimos) and a fave genre (I love revisionist period films like Love and Friendship, Angels and Insects, Marie Antoinette, Ridicule), and Can You Ever Forgive Me? (I loved Heller's first film, Diary of a Teenage Girl) quite a lot but neither seems likely to get up and win many Oscars. Ditto my main keepers from this year: Hereditary, Leave No Trace, First Reformed, Death of Stalin.

I guess I'm resigned this year to being at odds this year *both* with what's popular (Star is Born, Black Panther) *and* with a lot of what's critically most acclaimed (Roma, Cold War - another strangely empty, show-off, hi-def, b&w photog showcase).

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

I suspect that I'm going to like The Favourite - it combines a fave director (Lanthimos) and a fave genre (I love revisionist period films)

I just saw The Favorite... I liked it a lot. It's definitely one of the films of the year for me. But it's quite a tough watch - extreme visually (bizarre lenses and purely natural lighting leading to impossible darkness in some scenes) sonically (harsh musical score + mumbly crucial dialogue at times) and editing-wise. And the ending is possibly the most brilliant thing ever but is genuinely mysterious too, probably requiring multiple viewings (preferably with subtitles!) for interpretation.

There's no way in hell that The Favourite is winning any major Oscars (except perhaps for acting); it's far too PTA-Kubrick-Greenaway-ish for that. Put another way, for The Favorite to win much I believe it would have to appeal to people like my Mom, who like Downton Abbey & Pride and Prejudice, but who aren't up for major experimentation with look or sound or pace or content... The Favorite experiments with *all* those things and it would be a waste of time to recommend it to my Mom. Super-polarizing, experimental films don't win popular vote contests!

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

In case you missed it, Emily Blunt on Colbert this week:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhN0ctVKQnM
She really has become a huge, beloved star, in part it seems by apparently never caring that much about stardom. Blunt is a reminder that stardom is often based on not just beauty and talent but also extreme agreeability.

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[–] jay440 (107) 6 years ago

If you haven't watched this already, it's a must-see:

22 Musicals In 12 Minutes w/ Lin-Manuel Miranda & Emily Blunt
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_TvKH-qEJk

From the YouTube description:
The Late Late Show with James Corden
Published on Dec 18, 2018
James Corden welcomes the stars of "Mary Poppins Returns" to perform a musical-inspired Role Call, featuring Lin-Manuel Miranda and Emily Blunt singing classics from 22 musicals covering Evita to The Wizard Of Oz. And Kermit the Frog stops by to help James with ''The Rainbow Connection.''

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

22 Musicals In 12 Minutes w/ Lin-Manuel Miranda & Emily Blunt
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_TvKH-qEJk

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Wow...I've seen Cordon run Samuel L. Jackson through his classic scenes(I expect its on YouTube, too)...but this one required singing and a little dancing and a certain ability to switch up -- Jackson was just doing his own scenes. Blunt and Miranda were up to the task.

I'm seeing them on magazine covers now -- the Mary Poppins Return media blitz is overkill, but its my kind of overkill.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

She really has become a huge, beloved star, in part it seems by apparently never caring that much about stardom. Blunt is a reminder that stardom is often based on not just beauty and talent but also extreme agreeability.

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Yes, she's "America's sweetheart but British"(which was Julie Andrews for a time) but she's international , too.

And for the moment, she's in what looks like a perfect Hollywood marriage to that guy from The Office(The AMERICAN office; Emily had only seen the British version) who is now equal parts nice guy and macho man(the beard; his size). Together, they look like the nicest couple in Hollywood and they had that hit "A Quiet Place" together before this Mary Poppins megahit(I'm guessing) to cement the wife's stardom.

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[–] movieghoul (213) 6 years ago

Well I've seen it and I think both the good and the bad reviews had valid points. On the good side, it's a great nostalgia trip, for one thing, just seeing those expansive opening credits (remember when movies used to have them?) with the orchestral sweep and if you listen closely, you can pick out bars from the earlier songs. And the comfort of knowing that you're going to get a new version of every scene you remember from the original, and if you're patient, two beloved nonagenarians will turn up as deus ex machinas.

But on the bad side, the songs just don't compete with the original, and eventually there's a "paint by numbers" feel to the whole thing, plus a need to overdo some of the production numbers. For example, the number that stands in for "super....docious" plays well enough and gives Miranda the chance to do a tongue twisting rap, but no one's going to be able to leave the theater humming or singing it, it's just too complex. And while no one would claim that Ed Wynn was abetter actor than Meryl Streep, I much preferred his version of the dotty ceiling dwelling relative.

SO a pleasant enough couple of hours, but the original's reputation is safe.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Well I've seen it

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First! (You are.) A special screening?

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and I think both the good and the bad reviews had valid points.

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I would guess so.

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On the good side, it's a great nostalgia trip, for one thing, just seeing those expansive opening credits (remember when movies used to have them?) with the orchestral sweep

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Yes! Rather like that trailer I love so much, this is how you create something "bigger than life" and memorable.

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and if you listen closely, you can pick out bars from the earlier songs.

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Nifty. I will listen closely.

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And the comfort of knowing that you're going to get a new version of every scene you remember from the original,

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Aha...a "quasi remake"(Streep in for Ed Wynn seems particularly "on the nose".)

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and if you're patient, two beloved nonagenarians will turn up as deus ex machinas.

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I think I know exactly who they are -- and we've got nonagenarian stars now -- Clint Eastwood should make another movie in two years after he crosses 90.

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But on the bad side, the songs just don't compete with the original,

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I always felt this would be the "can't win against the original" aspect of the film. Several generations KNOW those original songs.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

and eventually there's a "paint by numbers" feel to the whole thing, plus a need to overdo some of the production numbers. For example, the number that stands in for "super....docious" plays well enough and gives Miranda the chance to do a tongue twisting rap, but no one's going to be able to leave the theater humming or singing it, it's just too complex.

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A tongue twisting rap in Mary Poppins. And "You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch" was rapped in the new Grinch picture(to where you could barely make out the melody anymore.) Oh well...this is the Age of Rap. It lasted longer than disco...or The Beatles. Its here to stay. But not much for me.

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And while no one would claim that Ed Wynn was abetter actor than Meryl Streep, I much preferred his version of the dotty ceiling dwelling relative.

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Eh, no Ed Wynn was not a better actor than Meryl Streep, but she's kind of reaching the point where she is "novelty casting."

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SO a pleasant enough couple of hours, but the original's reputation is safe.

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This I"ve always assumed. It may still bag my personal favorite of the year slot. I'd say that True Grit and The Magnificent Seven (the new ones) felt the same way to me -- even if the original True Grit was less well done as "craft," the new one can't beat John Wayne and other elements. And yet, the original True Grit was NOT my favorite of 1969(The Wild Bunch was), and the remake WAS my favorite of 2010. And yet the original The Magnificent Seven was NOT my favorite of 1960(Psycho was!), and the remake WAS my favorite of 2016. I expect perhaps Mary Poppins Returns can stand in as my favorite in honor of the original(which hasn't been my favorite of '64 in past self-reviews, but might rise over Strangelove any year now.)

Well...the parlor game works for ME. I end up with a lot of favorite movies that are a pleasure to watch over and over again.

I expect that I will have to take on the flood of Disney remakes and sequels one by one. This one looks great enough, Aladdin and The Lion King(neither or which are childhood memories for me, like Poppins) , less so. Dumbo -- the trailer is lacking, but to have Burton, Keaton and DeVito together again is a lure.

By the way, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, by default, is already my favorite of 2019...I've reached the point where my favorites are the works of the people I love. Hitchcock was the maker of half of my favorite 50's movies. MAYBE something will overcome my QT jones in '19, but it will be tough to beat.

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[–] movieghoul (213) 6 years ago

Saw MPR Wednesday night at a reglular theater, which was about 75% empty. Also a shame to see how it got trouced by Aquaman in the weekend BO, but I guess that's to be expected when a film aimed at young children opens the weekend before Xmas, when parents are too busy to drop everything and go. WIll be interesting to see how it does the week following.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

SAG Awards Nominees are here:
https://variety.com/2018/film/news/2019-sag-award-nominations-list-nominees-1203087472/
Star is Born, Vice, The Favourite, Green Book all heavily nom'd - these now are the official Oscar front-runners.
Mary Poppins, Black KKKlansman, Can You Ever Forgive Me? get the main scraps.

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I went to that link in search of...The Americans. Turns out that neither Keri Russell nor Matthew Rhys could score individual acting nominations, but the whole cast is up for "ensemble" -- which is rather the Best Dramatic TV Show award. Might win...but with the leads not nominated, can it? (I no longer think it should; the finale really enraged me the more I thought about it. Now, it probably WILL win, just to spite me. Hah.) Ozark did a bit better in nominations...it has some seasons to go yet.

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Dogs that didn't bark: Roma, First Reform, Hereditary, Leave No Trace, Beale St get *no* love from actors. Wow (Philistines!).

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Actors can be quirky. Recall that one reason Hitchcock never won a competitive Oscar, and was rarely nominated, is that actors are the main voting block and he kept making fun of them ("Actors are cattle" "Actors are children.")

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

OK, I saw Mary Poppins Returns. MINOR SPOILERS

Where to begin?

Stray thoughts:

In 2010, Jeff Bridges in True Grit played the role that won John Wayne the Best Actor Oscar in 1969. Bridges was nominated for Best Actor too(the year after he had finally won Best Actor for...that country singer movie.) But Bridges did not win. Now in 2018, Emily Blunt is playing the role that won Julie Andrews the Best Actress Oscar in 1964. I expect that Blunt will be nominated for the Oscar, too, but will she win? I dunno -- what's the competish? (Note in passing: Tony Perkins was famously not nominated for an Oscar for Psycho, but then neither was Vince Vaughn. Why does this not "track" with my other two examples?

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That trailer for Mary Poppins Returns that so captivated me turns out to be a pretty good "musical map" to the movie itself. The instrumental musical cues throughout the trailer recur all through the movie -- to the very end. Either in the same instrumental form, or with singers singing lyrics to them. And since I loved the trailer...I ended up loving the movie for the same reasons.

Within bounds.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Within bounds because however captivating I found the musical cues in the trailer that repeat in the movie --- its a different musical experience than what Mary Poppins gave us with that grand slam of singable tunes. Many of the numbers in "Mary Poppins Returns" are designed as showstoppers. You're supposed to applaud when each one ends. But all the numbers are pretty much lacking the melodies that made the songs in Mary Poppins so unforgettable. Its interesting how important melody is to "what's a classic, and what's not?" Frank Sinatra knew this -- his biggest hits had great melodies, Well, not really his BIGGEST hits -- Strangers in the Night and My Way are kinda schmaltzy. But Without A Song, Nice and Easy, High Hopes, The Lady is a Tramp -- melodies. Not to mention other people's hits like Moon River and Call Me Irresponsible. And even some of those 1969 musicals had tunes you could hum -- Paint Your Wagon had They Call the Wind Mariah; Finian's Rainbow had That Old Devil Moon; Hello, Dolly had....It Only Takes a Moment. (And Damn Yankees had "You Gotta Have Heart.")

Those kinds of melodies seemed absent from Mary Poppins Returns to me. Each massively choreographed, delightfully staged number seemed to be missing something. You can tell at the happy, spectacular end of the movie -- when the attempt to match "Let's Go Fly A Kite" with a new song ("Nowhere to Go But Up") matches it in exhilaration and happiness -- but not, alas, in tunefulness. (Though maybe with another listen, I'll learn it.)

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

That's how it is with "Mary Poppins Returns" -- the beats feel right, the story is very emotional (more powerful stuff than the original, with the mother of the young childfen dead and the father facing foreclosure and re-possession of his house), the actors are all very appealing --- but something's missing. The something that made the original a classic.

But I'm still giving it my favorite of the year. I'm applying the William Friedkin rule -- "You go to the movies for one of three reasons: to laugh, to feel excitement, or to cry" (Friedkin recently replaced "to scream" with "to feel excitement")...and MPR delivered on the last one. Kleenex, please. Its as if the musical numbers were good ENOUGH(in a new different way) to allow the overall production value and nostalgic pleasure of the original to shine through in a new , 2018 way.

Its funny. I gave True Grit my favorite of 2010, and The Magnificent Seven my favorite of 2016, and now Mary Poppins Returns my favorite of 2018 -- but I think the originals are better in all three cases and I DIDN'T give the originals my "best ofs" in their years of release. Thus, I feel like I am at least "a little bit" honoring the originals by honoring these two remakes and a sequel.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

About THAT. I've come to the conclusion that remakes(if done well) are OK -- a re-mounting of the classic story taken from the original material-- but that sequels are not OK (the story is being stretched beyond its conclusion, milked for a blessed buck, what the recently-late William Goldman called "wh--re movies." Well, as is known now, Mary Poppins Returns elects to re-stage a whole bunch of scenes from the original in slightly different form with new songs, so it very often FEELS like a remake, even as the story advances 30 years or so to take in the kids of the original as older now (btw, since she appears for just one line and a heartbeat, I will say that the actress who played the daughter in the original returns here -- she's got exactly the same FACE as a grown-up that she had as a child.)

I dunno...maybe if they'd leased all the old songs and given them this new CGI-heavy treatment, it would have been fine. Better, even.

But we got what we got,and its good enough.

Another stray thought: This new Mary Poppins has a strong dose of Hitchcock in it. No homages to his scenes, but there are thriller elements not in the original film. And an action chase sequence, good guys versus bad guys. And a cliffhanging finale in the NXNW/Vertigo tradition -- at a noted London monument. I can see the modern Disney moguls at it: "Kids won't sit still for a story with no villains, no jeopardy. We need bad guys in this one, we need conflict...we need ACTION."

I probably would have preferred that in 1964, myself. Thriller fan and all.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

(Note in passing: Ian Fleming's children's book Chitty Chitty Bang Bang had gangster villains and a Hitchocck vibe; the movie went all fairy tale and sugary -- somebody make the Fleming version.)

There's even a great explication of Hitchcock's simplest rule of suspense: "Give the audience information that the characters on screen don't have." WE learn of a key character's villainy...but the heroes don't know of it. Suspense!

The CGI musical numbers are pretty amazing, and when things go into "flat animation," one almost tears up seeing that form of "cartoon" again. There's a Music Hall number where Blunt(and Poppins) get to sex it up a bit in a way that I think us boys of the 60's have been waiting for(Blunt wears a Louise Brooks/Lulu black wig for the sequence). In the same sequence, Lin-Manuel Miranda does somewhat of a rap...but it sounds like a syncopated "Trouble in River City" type Music Man number to me(uh oh.) Also, Miranda is used to turn Cockney rhyming slang into hip-hop like tunefulness. It works.

I do wish that I had seen Mary Poppins Returns in Los Angeles(Hollywood), where studio shills and "appreciative pros in the business" applaud every number. Because every number in Mary Poppins Returns ends on a big finish that positively DEMANDS the applause. My near full-house theater didn't deliver it, alas. Though they did applaud at the end.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

I'll probably need another view or two to really get my mind around Mary Poppins Returns. On first viewing, it delivered on that trailer(literally, with the same musical beats and effects) and it did move me.

Also -- Ms. Blunt. She gives us her version of Mary Poppins while sometimes channeling Andrews' line readings(the kind of irritated "arrgh" Julie could do ); she sings quite well(and her lullaby-ish song about how the dead mother of the children isn't really gone, she's just "out of place"--- is moving), and she dances up a storm in a few sequences -- more than I recall Andrews doing, but I'll have to check.

In short, Emily Blunt just MIGHT have a shot at doing what Jeff Bridges couldn't: duplicate the Oscar win of the original player.

My favorites of the 2010s:

2010: True Grit
2011: Moneyball
2012: Django Unchained
2013: The Wolf of Wall Street
2014: John Wick
2015: The Hateful Eight
2016: The Magnificent Seven
2017: Molly's Game
2018: Mary Poppins Returns
2019: Once Upon a Time in Hollywood

Yep...I've gone and done "pre-selected" QT's next one as my 2019 favorite. Either it will be, or something I like better will de-throne it. Not ALL of QT's films have been my favorites of the year. "Nos" include Reservoir Dogs, Jackie Brown(reluctantly, LA Confidential beat it), both parts of Kill Bill(which left the field open for Love Actually in 2003 and Sideways in 2004), and Death Proof. But its been all Number Ones since then. I just couldn't bring myself to like something better than what QT gave us from 2009 on. I love his dialogue. I love his actors. I love the fact that he has stuck rigorously to action or the Western.

We will see if: Once Upon a Time survives as my 2019 favorite(Scorsese's The Irishman might beat it, if Netflix gets it into theaters first) and if it beats The Wolf of Wall Street as my likely favorite of the decade. Mary Poppins Returns did not. (My biggest worry about Once Upon a Time in Hollywood is how graphic the Tate/LaBianca murders will be. Its a big test of QT's penchant for violence and sensationalism. I hope he dials it down.)

My favorite movies list is a parlor game based on what I like. Using the William Friedkin rule, I guess. (Though the great dialogue in the QTs and Moneyball and Molly's Game is the "to get excited" clause of the rule.) Its too bad that there are more classics on my lists from 1950 through about 1999...but that's where the movies are for me, now. Lesser.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

And, oh: the director of Mary Poppins Returns is Rob Marshall, who directed my favorite of 2002, Chicago, which is a lot less nice than Mary Poppins Returns, but which gives him Two.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Those kinds of melodies seemed absent from Mary Poppins Returns to me. Each massively choreographed, delightfully staged number seemed to be missing something. You can tell at the happy, spectacular end of the movie -- when the attempt to match "Let's Go Fly A Kite" with a new song ("Nowhere to Go But Up") matches it in exhilaration and happiness -- but not, alas, in tunefulness. (Though maybe with another listen, I'll learn it.)

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I was actually able to conduct somewhat of an experiment with these two songs.

They are both on YouTube. I already know Let's God Fly a Kite by heart -- I think it locked into my brain the moment I heard it when I saw the original in '64(well, early '65 to be honest.) I played "Nowhere to Go But Up"(audio only) three times and I still can't quite find the melodic hook in it.

Try it yourself. If you find "Nowhere to Go But Up" to be a fine tune, it would prove...music is in the ear of the beholder.

"Nowhere to Go But Up" does benefit from the effervescent CGI visuals that go with it I guess that's why Disney is only allowing audio clips right now.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Well, the Oscar noms are in and...well...maybe a possible different outcome from recent years.

I mean, Black Panther COULD win Best Picture. Are its grosses not "Titanic"-like? (And if it loses to something little, we have the ol' "Annie Hall beats Star Wars?" outrage of 1977 -- but then, Star Wars the First was a really good, really ground breaking movie.)

A Star is Born has some noms. Best....SAM ELLIOTT. The man is loved. He narrates The Big Lebowski. I love him at middle-aged midpoint as an aging bouncer in "Road House"(1989), long gray-ish hair, great stache, father figure(or older brother figure) to the much less charismatic Patrick Swayze(RIP.) I've always figured that in another era Sam Elliott woulda/coulda been another John Wayne or Gary Cooper. We de-value that now but he's got the right stuff. And the right voice. I don't CARE who else is nominated in his category.

No nom for Emily Blunt as Mary Poppins. Looks like Jeff Bridges was luckier than we think getting a nom for True Grit. I"ve listed Mary Poppins Returns as my favorite of 2018, but it could wobble. Something I rent later could beat it. (This happened in 2011...I named The Descendants until I rented Moneyball and switched.)

Could Green Book get the "In the Heat of the Night 2018" Oscar love? Possibly. Nice to see Viggo Mortensen(Sam Loomis in that OTHER Psycho) get a Best Actor nod. He rather shockingly beefed up for his role, I think, he's always been so thin and reedy.

On make-up, weight gain, and voice, it looks like Christian Bale is kinda/sorta a lock as Dick Cheney. Except the real one is so disliked in Hollywood.

As for the rest of the bunch, your Roma your Favourite your Black KKKsman...I've read about them but I haven't seen them and I'm not terribly excited about them.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

I trust the right film and actors will win. I must say that I skimmed the Best Screenplay categories -- where winners like Pulp Fiction, Fargo, and LA Confidential staked their claims for greatness -- the titles that ARE there don't strike me as classics.

And they still don't have a host.

That's not a biggie...I recall in the 70's when Walter Matthau would hand off to Jane Fonda would hand off to Warren Beatty.....oh, wait, we don't have stars like that anymore(even rumpled Matthau seemed UNIQUE.)

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

In the spirit of something-for-everyone, the noms seemed simultaneously quite artsy and quite populist: Roma and The Favorite are the big winners and each is among the art-house-iest ever major nominees. At the other extreme, you can't get more by the numbers than Bohemian Rhap (not even close to Best Picture quality in my view) and it together with A Star is Born and Black Panther are over the $2 Billion gross mark!

That said, none of my fave films for the year (so far - I've got 4-5 biggies at least yet to see) got *any* noms: Leave No Trace, First Reformed, Hereditary, Death of Stalin. There were a whole bunch of performances in these films that were nom-worthy ahead of chosen ones: e.g., I like Sam Elliot too but his part is pretty nothing compared to Beria and others in Death of Stalin.

Anyhow, should be a fun show and campaign - a lot of categories including Best Picture seem wide open on their face.

Update: Whoops, Schrader got a screenplay nod for First Reformed.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

In the spirit of something-for-everyone, the noms seemed simultaneously quite artsy and quite populist: Roma and The Favorite are the big winners and each is among the art-house-iest ever major nominees.

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I expect the Best Picture winner is one of those two. And my sharp comment about not particularly WANTING to see them doesn't mean I won't see them. I just take some persuading for art films these days.

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At the other extreme, you can't get more by the numbers than Bohemian Rhap (not even close to Best Picture quality in my view)

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I haven't seen it, but its huge success seems in support of the songs of Queen, and I see where we've got an Elton John biopic coming for summer. Given how big Bohemian was...I'm guessing an Elton movie(with Elton songs) will be that much bigger.

70's/80's nostalgia. Best Picture be damned...quality wise. (And I don't see this Star is Born in THAT ballpark; I saw THAT. Except for Sam Elliott -- more below.)

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and it together with A Star is Born and Black Panther are over the $2 Billion gross mark!

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I'd guess Black Panther has most of that, but I guess the other two were pretty big to get grouped with its grosses. (The Academy may be sneaking its idea of a "Best Popular Motion Picture" in here, yes?

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That said, none of my fave films for the year (so far - I've got 4-5 biggies at least yet to see) got *any* noms: Leave No Trace, First Reformed, Hereditary, Death of Stalin.

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Of them, I saw -- and loved -- Death of Stalin. Which is a pretty good text against which to judge "The Americans" TV series, and certain American politicians.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

There were a whole bunch of performances in these films that were nom-worthy ahead of chosen ones: e.g., I like Sam Elliot too but his part is pretty nothing compared to Beria and others in Death of Stalin.

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Well, if Sam has a chance -- and I think he does -- its because he's put in some long dues, never got the stardom he should have had, and is by all reports a nice guy. A Star is Born made him emote and get angry and all that actorly stuff --- in that film, he's not really the relaxed Sam Elliott I usually like. But it got him the Oscar nomination. So maybe he gets one of those "let's just salute the old guy" Oscars, regardless of performance quality. That said -- this didn't happen for Bruce Dern a few years back. THAT said -- Dern was up for Best Actor, its harder to be charitable there. Elliott's up for Supporting.

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Anyhow, should be a fun show and campaign - a lot of categories including Best Picture seem wide open on their face.

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Yes. Wide open. And with a few popular films(Black Panther) and stars(Elliott, Bradley Cooper...Lady Gaga) to root for.

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Update: Whoops, Schrader got a screenplay nod for First Reformer

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Schrader brought Taxi Driver to my college in 1976 before release. So I got to talk to him. I'll always remember that guy. Strange guy.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

I've seen a couple of Oscar-nommed movies in the past coupla weeks:

Green Book. Reviewers have nailed this one as "predictable." And it is. A black man. A white man. Thrown together on a road trip from the Midwest down into the Deep South. It is a classic case of "the character wins the Oscar,not the actor," though so far, we are only talking nominations.

Viggo Mortensen gets the Bronx accent(circa 1962) and swagger that we've seen from GoodFellas to My Cousin Vinny to The Sopranos(though not The Godfather except for Sonny, a little.) You know, "fuhgeddaboudit...don' be bustin my balls" sorta talk. He's put a gut on his trim muscular body to give us a guy who can still beat everybody up but let himself go.

Mahershala Ali is the cultured, elegant, arrogant African-American piano prodigy who takes Viggo on as his driver/bodyguard for the adventure. Its roughly the same elegant black guy/uncultured white guy buddy team that we got way back in 1967 with Poitier and Steiger in In the Heat of the Night, except that movie was far more rough and dangerous and real than this one. This feels like the Disney version. I liked it, and I suppose either lead could justifably win the Oscar on the basis of what he does here. Since the story is familiar(see: Driving Miss Daisy), the "difference" I think, is...the comparison of Viggo's dese dem and dose New York tough guy to Ali's over-articulate (and deeply troubled) New York artist.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

The movie makes a nice point along the way: Ali's pianist has chosen a route through the Deep South specifically to confront bigotry down there. He could have stayed pampered and beloved in the Northeastern big cities, but he WANTS to bring his culture to redneck territory. And he is willing to suffer consequences if only to make his case for equality. Having a brawny Bronx bruiser as his bodyguard makes it all a bit easier, though. (A bit irritating: the Deep South cops roust our heroes, but as soon as they cross back into the North, the cops are nothing but understanding and helpful. Were things THAT black and white in 1962?)

The other one I saw was Vice. Uh oh...politics trigger alert. I'm reminded that director Adam McKay cut his teeth on Will Farrell comedies and that there is a "dumb" level to those that always feels ready to bust out and overcome this more highbrow project. Indeed, given the grim subject matter, Vice is always looking to bust out as a comedy rather than a drama...a black comedy, I suppose, in the Strangelove tradition.

So this: Yep, Christian Bale is amazing in girth and make-up as Dick Chaney. Its an Oscar-level impersonation; and those win. (See Streep as the Iron Lady; Foxx as Ray; Oldman as Churchill.) Amy Adams gives us a "power wife and power behind the throne" type who seems more interested in power than her husband is. Steve Carrell gives us a comic Donald Rumsfeld who doesn't seem to fit the real guy at all. And Sam Rockwell's W is, well, the same W we've seen about ten other guys do.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

One tidbit that I wonder whether its true: the movie gives us Cheney as a very young Congressional intern deciding, on a whim that feels like the flip of a coin, to join a Republican staff(Rumsfeld's) rather than a Democrat staff. Idea being: Cheney had no real principles, could have picked either party, didn't care. I'm willing to bet that happens more often than you would think with "power people": they pick the party that they figure will serve their interests at the time. (California, now a very Democratic state, has all sorts of Republicans switching parties right now.)

I did like a "meta" moment about halfway through the film where a happy ending is declared in titles on the screen("Cheney chose his daughter over politics, and retired to a fulfilling life on a farm") and the end credits start rolling(Dick Cheney...Christian Bale). And then everything stops and the rest of the movie begins again. With the REAL last years....

The weird thing about Vice is that...it is entertaining. Funny, even. And thus it feels like it misses the point of its own subject.

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

Idea being: Cheney had no real principles, could have picked either party, didn't care. I'm willing to bet that happens more often than you would think with "power people": they pick the party that they figure will serve their interests at the time.

That part of the film's picture of Cheney has attracted a lot of criticism, e.g., at Slate reliable Fred Kaplan did the smackdown (google 'fred kaplan vice' - it's the first hit). In real life there are mysteries about both Cheney's and Rumsfeld's evolution but that they were (certain sorts of) conservative true-believers (and not complete cynics or pure opportunists) is not in doubt.

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

I've seen a couple of Oscar-nommed movies in the past coupla weeks

I've got one to report positively on: Can You Ever Forgive Me?

This has acting noms for Melissa McCarthy & Richard Grant and an adapted screenplay nom. I'm a little sad for director Marielle Heller (whose previous film, her directorial debut, Diary of a Teenage Girl, I loved). She does a great, albeit non-flashy job here (with especially nice integration of soundtrack of smokey jazz and '30s and '40s standards), and this is easily one of the most 'pulled together' films of the year. CYEFM? is the sort of sour comedy of middle-aged discomfort and dissoluteness that Alexander Payne made bank with in the early '00s. CYEFM? lacks the sort of big comic set-piece pay-off that sent the most successful films of this type from Sideways to Toni Erdmann over the top.... so I can see why it's not become a must-see popular hit. As with I Tonya last year, however, CYEFM? is so well made, written and acted that everyone's going to see it *eventually* at home.

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

Note that Richard Grant seems to be campaigning up a storm: I've read mutiple stories over the last week about, e.g., him being charming Barbra Streisand over twitter and instagram. The Acad. has soft-spots for Brits *and* for those who show they really love the industry and really really want the award. Grant's very good in a very watchable film *and* his role is virtually a lead - he'd have 3 or 4 times Sam Elliot's screentime I'd guess. Grant's got a real chance

That said, Mahershala Ali is in this category for Green Book and has won SAG and Golden Globes awards so is probably unassailable. Grant's the big dark horse tho'.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Grant's very good in a very watchable film *and* his role is virtually a lead - he'd have 3 or 4 times Sam Elliot's screentime I'd guess. Grant's got a real chance

That said, Mahershala Ali is in this category for Green Book and has won SAG and Golden Globes awards so is probably unassailable. Grant's the big dark horse tho'.

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I suppose I'll make Sam Elliott my dark horse "ya never know" candidate for a win, though I think this: some decades ago, he would have been a shoo-in like Ben Johnson for Last Picture Show, because lots of voters in town KNEW the guy. I think the Academy is quite diverse and art film savvy now and that kind of "voting for my pal" approach won't work. Grant is in a movie few have seen. Ali has an Oscar already, right? Didn't stop Chris Waltz(I loved how he got one for Django as well as Basterds, because his ROLE is so much better -- and nicer -- in Django.) Interestingly for me, I've seen both the Elliott perf and the Ali perf, and I must admit: Elliott wasn't given much of a role to play, too sullen and angry and jealous of his star brother. Ali's role is predictable(as is his movie) but he's very honorable and touching in the part. Fine by me, if he wins.

But Richard Grant has certainly paid his dues, has his British cred, etc. Best Supporting Actor is often a wide open race; let's see what happens this time.

PS. Melissa McCarthy could use this nom. I think she is very talented and funny(her SNL Sean Spicer was literally gut-busting), but she's been in too many formula comedies that waste her. She needed some "gravitas." She got it.

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

She needed some "gravitas." She got it.

In a way, CYEFM? is a reminder of just how good McCarthy is in almost everything: so often she brings a little more reality than you expect to a broad, comedic role and ends up making the thing twice as watchable as it would otherwise be (John Goodman was the same way for many years).

CYEFM? has a miraculous production history: it was written by Holofcener who was originally going to direct. Julianne Moore was cast in the lead. Grant was a last minute substitute for Chris O'Dowd. And yet, wow, when you see the final product it's almost inconceivable that the film could exist (or be nearly as good) without its key players: McCarthy & Grant *give* you so much and Heller's direction is so assured.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

In a way, CYEFM? is a reminder of just how good McCarthy is in almost everything: so often she brings a little more reality than you expect to a broad, comedic role and ends up making the thing twice as watchable as it would otherwise be (John Goodman was the same way for many years).

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Due to circumstances beyond my control in my current dating life, I have seen most of Melissa McCarthy's "formula" movies. She has struck me as one of those Hollywood stars who rather sell themselves out: if they will pay her big bucks to make these formula comedies, that's where she will go (and she often gets her husband acting and writing jobs on these films, which is nice.) Sandra Bullock did the same thing. But in both cases, Bullock and MM have demonstrated a desire to show that they have better chops than their formula comedies allow for, and both have done indie films and shown their stuff.

I have not seen CYEFM yet, but I did see MM in a movie a few years back with Bill Murray and Naomi Watts, and all three actors were clearly trying to be more "serious" than usual, in an indiefilm low budget way. MM impressed me there, and I expect she'll impress me in CYEFM. Note in passing: some movie she made where she wore a paper bag over her head and nicely robbed a place with apologetic sympathy for the workers was in a formula comedy, but in that SCENE(with a paper bag over her head!), her great comedy talent was purely expressed in voice, timing and gesture. I remember thinking "this is a lousy movie, but this is a funny scene....all because of this very funny woman."

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

CYEFM? has a miraculous production history: it was written by Holofcener who was originally going to direct. Julianne Moore was cast in the lead. Grant was a last minute substitute for Chris O'Dowd. And yet, wow, when you see the final product it's almost inconceivable that the film could exist (or be nearly as good) without its key players: McCarthy & Grant *give* you so much and Heller's direction is so assured.

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Often one reads of "casts that weren't used" and its pretty amazing given how "perfect' the cast that IS used turns out to be. I wish I could name another example, but I can't.

Well, a couple of casting "one offs" maybe:

The alcoholic, foul-mouthed and sexual male lead in "Bad Santa" is a part offered first to Jack Nicholson and then to Bill Murray before Billy Bob Thornton got it. The role changed his persona overnight and made him a true star(Sling Blade had made him a known great actor.) And one realizes that Nicholson and Murray would have been WRONG for the role. Nicholson was too old and overweight for the sexual prowess of the guy; Murray was never sexual, period. Billy Bob brought that extra carnal dimension, and some real meanness , to the part(though the character proves kindly to a kid, in the end.)

And this: I read that Sammy Davis Jr and Dan Ackroyd, both past their prime at the time(Davis was two years from death!), were considered to play Beetlejuice...the role that made Michael Keaton famous as a fast talking hipster.

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

Often one reads of "casts that weren't used" and its pretty amazing given how "perfect' the cast that IS used turns out to be. I wish I could name another example, but I can't.

Silence of the Lambs is a big one: Hackman was Hannibal for a long time and then Connery was offered it before settling on Hopkins. Clarice was Pfeiffer mainly with Meg Ryan as the fallback for ages before Foster's campaign for the role won Demme over after Pfeiffer finally passed.

Big single-role but literally movie/franchise-saving cases: does Back To The Future ever amount to anything if Eric Stoltz isn't replaced by Michael J. Fox? And Lord of The Rings is Mortal Engines or John Carter without soulful Viggo Mortensen last minute replacing one Stuart Townsend (who was Charlize Theron's boyfriend at the time) to anchor everything.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Silence of the Lambs is a big one: Hackman was Hannibal for a long time

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...and evidently intending to direct the film

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and then Connery was offered it before settling on Hopkins.

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Nicholson and Duvall were offered it, too. This whole group was rather "the usual suspects" at the time(Hackman, Connery, Nicholson, and Duvall) and Nicholson would have gone to town with it(he could have had ANOTHER Joker like icon on his resume.)

But the "names" said no...and struggling, almost-forgotten Anthony Hopkins got it and made himself history and a star career.

One can understand why the stars said "no" to Hannibal the Cannibal. Probably just too grotesque to imagine. But Hopkins had no such qualms.

And: I can't picture crisp all-American tough guys like Hackman and Duvall as Lecter(irony: the doc WAS American, not British, in the book.)

And this: a very good but non-marquee actor named Brian Cox first played Lecter in 1986 in Michael Mann's "Manhunter"(from the novel Red Dragon.) Cox was quite good -- creepy, blobby -- but nobody remembers him in the part.

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Clarice was Pfeiffer mainly with Meg Ryan as the fallback for ages before Foster's campaign for the role won Demme over after Pfeiffer finally passed.

Yes, and I think Pfeiffer always regretted turning down the film(over the sick elements and violence.) Pfeiffer had already worked (well) with Demme in Married to the Mob.

And Foster ended up with a second Oscar in 3 years. (Foster's plain-girl non-sexuality in the role was better than how I see Pfeiffer in it, but who knows.)

Among similar lines. Bette Midler turned down the psycho role that won Kathy Bates an Oscar for "Misery." Midler graciously remarked, "if I had played it, maybe I would not have won the Oscar."

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Big single-role but literally movie/franchise-saving cases: does Back To The Future ever amount to anything if Eric Stoltz isn't replaced by Michael J. Fox?

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That was a tough decision for director Zemeckis and producer Spielberg to make(Stolz had filmed a lot of scenes before being replaced) and the movie made Fox a movie star of unique, surprising type.

(In a less major way, Hitchcock did the same thing when he pulled Roy Thinnes as the villain of Family Plot after Thinnes had filmed some scenes, and replaced him with William Devane...but Devane was a very unique and fabulous non-star actor, and perfect casting.)

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And Lord of The Rings is Mortal Engines or John Carter without soulful Viggo Mortensen last minute replacing one Stuart Townsend (who was Charlize Theron's boyfriend at the time) to anchor everything.

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Never thought about that. Viggo is the macho star heart of the Rings series. And to think, he was Sam Loomis for Van Sant.

That Stuart Townsend -- went nowhere as a star, but a very lucky man with the Theron thing, for a long time.

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

And this: I read that Sammy Davis Jr and Dan Ackroyd, both past their prime at the time(Davis was two years from death!), were considered to play Beetlejuice...the role that made Michael Keaton famous as a fast talking hipster.

Oh my Lord!

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

I read those choices and shook my head. Davis was in poor health and little active; Ackroyd was nearing the end of a weirdly lucrative decline in 1988. (He was one of the top earning stars in the 80's, but usually from co-starring in movies with the funnier Belushi, Murphy, Murray, and Chase.) And Ackroyd had the luck of the devil: he starred alone in a lousy movie called "Dr. Detroit," but landed his leading lady, the va-va-voom Donna Dixon as his Mrs.(still, today!), and he did "Driving Miss Daisy" for a percentage of what became a very big hit.

Still...I don't see Ackroyd as Beetlejuice...

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

While we are on "casting that didn't happen," a tour of Hitchcock movies is instructive.

Here's who did NOT play these leads:

Gary Cooper: Foreign Correspondent, Saboteur.

Claudette Colbert: Foreign Correspondent.

Barbara Stanwyk: Saboteur.

William Powell: Shadow of a Doubt(Uncle Charlie.)

Henry Fonda: Lifeboat.

William Holden: Strangers on a Train, The Trouble With Harry.

Audrey Hepburn: No Bail for the Judge(not even made.)

Grace Kelly: Marnie.

Rock Hudson: Marnie.

Anthony Perkins: Torn Curtain. (Universal nixed.)

Eva Marie Saint: Torn Curtain. (Universal nixed.)

Yves Montand: Topaz.

Michael Caine, Richard Burton, Richard Harris, Glenda Jackson: Frenzy.

Jack Nicholson, Robert Redford, Burt Reynolds, Roy Scheider, Faye Dunaway : Family Plot (a record number of turndowns.)

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

OK, I've finally seen Green Book... and found it undistinguished. Surely it doesn't have enough cinematic or thematic juice to win Best Picture? I don't even rate Ali or Mortensen especially highly. It's not their fault: the story's just dull, the dialogue unmemorable, no visual ideas to speak of, no *other* characters at all to really bounce off, what can they do? The whole thing felt inert and telegraphed to me . Even though they all have their problems, I'd take The Favorite, Roma, Blackk Klansman and even A Star is Born, Bo Rhap, and Black Panther over GB. Hell, I'd take The Last Movie Star over GB.

Realistically, I'd say The Favorite, Roma or Blackk Klansman should win and one is going to win. I guess the smart money has to be on Roma to get both Picture & Director...but maybe just maybe enough Acad members will *not* allow themselves to vote for a Netflix Best Picture. If that voting bloc activates & in turn wants to share around the awards, I'd say the most likely outcome is The Fav get Original Screenplay, Cuaron gets Director, and Black KKlansman in an upset gets Best Pic.. I should place a pair of bets on Roma at low odds to cover a side-bet on Black Klan at relatively high odds!

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

OK, I've finally seen Green Book... and found it undistinguished.

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Its in that Oscar division -- "movie that has to be nominated because of subject matter."

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Surely it doesn't have enough cinematic or thematic juice to win Best Picture? I don't even rate Ali or Mortensen especially highly.

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Well, Mortensen had a little fun with the dese-dem-dose accent and the excess poundage, I found him entertaining. Ali was given the more regal "un-fun" part, but the noble one.

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It's not their fault: the story's just dull, the dialogue unmemorable, no visual ideas to speak of, no *other* characters at all to really bounce off, what can they do? The whole thing felt inert and telegraphed to me .

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Very rote, particularly, I'm afraid with each scene about Ali being refused service in the South. Ostensibly America went through a lot of legal and "by force" trauma to end such policies, to see them demonstrated over and over felt rather like the continuing statement of a sad truth which has been eradicated (as a legal matter.)

I still think that In the Heat of the Night over 50 years ago tackled the same subject matter with a lot more power and discomfort.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Even though they all have their problems, I'd take The Favorite, Roma, Blackk Klansman and even A Star is Born, Bo Rhap, and Black Panther over GB. Hell, I'd take The Last Movie Star over GB.

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The Last Movie Star! Still probably my sentimental favorite of the year. (I went and gave my favorite slot to Mary Poppins Returns for the scale of the thing, and my love for the original, but who knows how the years will treat it, in my mind. Plus -- we're about to get all these other Disney remakes to dilute it. That said -- Dumbo has Tim Burton, Batman, and The Penguin and I'm intrigued.)

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Realistically, I'd say The Favorite, Roma or Blackk Klansman should win and one is going to win.

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Yep, that's the three. With the added game: will Director and Picture go together(they've split a few times in recent years.)

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

I guess the smart money has to be on Roma to get both Picture & Director...but maybe just maybe enough Acad members will *not* allow themselves to vote for a Netflix Best Picture.

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That's turning into the "big battle" of the show, now , I think. I don't know if Netflix is helping or hurting other studios, but it is here in a big way. If Roma is rejected, Netflix will be why. On the other hand, with US/Mexico relations a very big deal right now, the voters may want to award Roma accordingly.

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If that voting bloc activates & in turn wants to share around the awards, I'd say the most likely outcome is The Fav get Original Screenplay, Cuaron gets Director, and Black KKlansman in an upset gets Best Pic.. I should place a pair of bets on Roma at low odds to cover a side-bet on Black Klan at relatively high odds!

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Well, the Spike Lee Joint winning some things would give that fellow the award he's never gotten, right? Remember the backlash over Do the Right Thing not winning in 1989? (Why, Kim Basinger, the big Batman star of the year, called it the Best Picture from the Oscar stage -- in her opinion.)

The Favourite keeps hanging in there as the "period prestige movie" to beat, and has gay elements, never harmful with the Academy.

We shall see in a few days.

I've been chuckling reading over all the gaffes the Oscar board made this year. Added to all the others: for awhile, they were going to have big stars -- not last year's acting winners -- give the awards to this year's four acting winners. But now that is kaput and all four from last year(remember who they were?) will give out the awards.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Evidently, all of this attempted change was for a very simple business reason: the Academy loses money for its operating budget if the ratings go down. NOW I get it. But it didn't work. Perhaps all those stars and directors who protested these changes should just raise money directly for the Academy, and let the show run as a "prestige craft show" as it was meant to be .

As for me, I fear I've circled back round to my beginnings: I'm a thriller/mystery/action/Western/genre fan, not a well rounded movie fan. In the past few weeks, I've paid to see two thrillers -- one good (Cold Pursuit) one bad(Glass.) And neither great. (From my past, those would be Rear Window and NXNW and Psycho and Wait Until Dark and Charade...and, yes, Vertigo, which grew on me.)

But I still like READING about Oscars, and Oscar movies, and their weighted merits. Thank you for that, swanstep. I still think I'll be seeing The Favourite.

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[–] movieghoul (213) 6 years ago

swanstep and ecarle:

Please do not correspond further with movieghoul. These are his adult children. He is blogging during a busy worktime, and he will get himself fired.

Thank you.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

A NY Times story about (horrifying) changes for the Oscars ceremony this year:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/30/movies/oscars-controversy.html
In sum, only 2 of the best song nominees get performed, and craft awards like Cinematography get presented during commercial breaks then summarized in a short clips package later.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Oh my.

I sort of swore off making comments this year about how the Oscars tend to shirk relevance to society at large. Truthfully, its the luck of the draw. With Black Panther and A Star is Born prominently featured as nominees(and hey, only THEIR two songs will be sung), the Oscars are plenty relevant in terms of hits on parade. And yet, will they win?(Sam Elliott possibly gets to be a dark horse front runner not because of his performance, but because the movie should win SOMETHING.)

But the show keeps losing relevance.

The Golden Globes keeps it almost "all about the actors" -- in drama AND in comedy movies; in movies AND on TV. The Academy with its second tier of "below the line" craft awards seems to be feeling the need to reject them: but that's what makes it special. Actors get feted at the Globes, the SAGs, the People's Choice awards; supposedly the Academy is about craft AND art.

Also: I think the loss of connection on the Oscar show to movie history was a great loss. The lifetime achievement things like the Thalberg now off-show. And certain presenters. Back in 1979 for the 1978 Oscars, I recall Cary Grant introducing Laurence Olivier, who made a rather obtuse speech but hey, it was Grant and Olivier! And on the same show, a clearly dying John Wayne got out and gave Best Picture to The Deer Hunter; the whole thing was emotional and profound in all directions.

Our movie history is rather waning today, anyway. Dustin Hoffman -- one of the greats -- is now Persona Non Grata because of "Me too." Nicholson dutifully trotted himself out a LOT, but is withdrawing into old age, retirement, and weight gain. (Meryl Streep is his alternate, but she's overexposed.) Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway emerged only to stumble into one of the great Oscar gaffes of all time(a multi-million dollar show thwarted by a Lions Club MC mistake.) DeNiro is now a hackwork actor(Bad Grandpa) and an angry political presence (note how Pacino's all silent where DeNiro won't stop, ever.)

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Another loss in movie history circles is how the longevity of the stars of the Bogart, Grant, Stewart era couldn't transfer to the new generation. Mel Gibson was a huge star, now he's a semi-welcome ex-pariah. Kevin Costner was a huge star(and like Gibson,a Best Director winner), but now he does streaming TV series. As does Julia Roberts for that matter. Bruce Willis does too much straight-to-video. Etc. The marketplace devalues our superstars. I think only Hanks and Cruise are left. And Denzel. I'm still upset that Depp has been forcibly taken from us, I thought he was pretty good.

So with movie history tarnished for the past three decades -- and what kids today would know or care who Cary Grant was? -- the Oscars becomes a "creature of the present," a weird split between a nod to the popular(Black Panther) and a continued emphasis on movies that few people will ever see or even know existed in the first place.

Still...bring 'em on. The Oscars. The ratings are never so in the toilet that nobody's watching. Let it just drag on as a testament to an industry that has changed so radically that the Oscars don't make sense anymore.

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

OK, the final decision has been made: Editing, Cinematography, Makeup, and Live Action Short awards this year will be shunted to commercial breaks. Apparently this dishonorable shortcutting will be systematically spread around in subsequent years, so, e.g., Editing etc. are guaranteed to go uncut next year.
https://www.vulture.com/2019/02/oscars-2019-four-category-awards-commercials.html

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

Ha, the Acad. has reversed itself and now all Awards will be presented live again:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/15/business/oscars-academy-awards-categories.html
All these reversed decisions over the past year... if only they surprised us with an actual host or semi-host on the night too.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Ha, the Acad. has reversed itself and now all Awards will be presented live again:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/15/business/oscars-academy-awards-categories.html
All these reversed decisions over the past year... if only they surprised us with an actual host or semi-host on the night too.

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On the one hand, they've been looking like real bumblers.

On the other hand, they have certainly generated interest in the show....now will MORE people turn in just to see Best Cinematography given on the air? (Probably not, but articles were written, names like Scorsese and Lee and Pitt and Clooney stepped up in protest.)

An issue, if not THE issue, with the movement of these awards to commercial is that the Oscars have maintained SOME integrity as where "the awards are given to the technical people." An emphasis on stars and star directors(see: The Golden Globes, The SAG awards, Directors Guild) are really for celebrity gazing. The Oscars are supposed to go "above and below the title."

Which reminds me. Best Film Editing. There have been some controversies there. Bullitt won the award, which felt right (the car chase; the airport chase.) But Psycho wasn't even nominated!!(The freakin' shower scene is all ABOUT editing, as in different ways are the Arbogast murder and the fruit cellar with Mother's face herky-jerky spinnin' around.) And The Wild Bunch was nominated -- but didn't win. Say what?

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

And Best Cinematography. A little controversy there. Psycho went up against The Apartment for Best Cinematography , black and white. Two of Psycho's nominations were in "black and white" categories, which is why the little-nominated film at least made it THERE. The other was b/w art direction.

Now, The Apartment won both. And the art direction in The Apartment is notable(Lemmon's office building rooms; the apartment itself.) But...c'mon. Psycho. THE HOUSE. Outside mainly but also inside. Classic. On the other hand, Psycho has a lot of boring rooms. Like California Charlie's bathroom. A couple of blank walls and a mirror.

Meanwhile, The Apartment has some nice images(best: the gleam over a scene of Ray Walston in a bar with a Marilyn Monroe lookalike/soundalike) but....Psycho...c'mon. The shots of the house(especially as Arbo climbs the hill to it.) The overhead shot on Arbogast. The twisting camera up and over Perkins on the stairs.

I think Psycho should have won in all of its meager four nominated categories: Cinematography(b/w); Art Direction (b/w). And Leigh. And especially Hitchcock.

Oh, well.

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

Scripts for almost all Oscar-contenders are available here:
https://www.simplyscripts.com/oscar-screenplays-91.html
I've been looking at The Favorite's script. It's a very impressive, incredibly detailed piece of work. The film *felt* so visual, so we assume it was director-driven, hence it's a little surprising to see almost *everything* mapped out with great precision well before a director was even chosen. (Indeed, reading around, Davis had a first draft 20 years ago! and by the time white-hot director Lanthimos came aboard the script was a retooled and refined diamond.) The Favorite's *definitely* winning a writing Oscar. Deborah Davis is a first-time screenwriter and Tony McNamara had done only UK TV before this. I hope they've got some scripts in a drawer so they can take immediate advantage of getting so hot. On the other hand, The Favourite sounds like it was Davis's ultra-long gestating baby, and those are often unrepeatable one-offs.

Note that the case of The Favorite illustrates how tricky the auteur concept is to apply outside of the case of a star-director who (essentially or with chosen yes-people) self-produces, writes or develops own scripts, makes all key casting decisions, and so on. When a director does only *some* of those things then the writers and producers and actors get more of the credit.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Scripts for almost all Oscar-contenders are available here:
https://www.simplyscripts.com/oscar-screenplays-91.html

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That's interesting. I always find scripts to be the "hidden gold" of movie-making. When you read one, you can see exactly just how much (or how little) of the movie was driven BY the script. Good ones are also written in a novelistic way.

Like in LA Confidential's script after the hero shoots a key villain in the back, the script puts in this sentence(not said by a character, simply as a line of description by the writer):

"The answer is yes."

And you have to think back to the beginning of the script(and movie) where one character asked another character if he would be willing to shoot a bad guy in the back to achieve justice. Funny: the character asking is the one who GETS shot in the back.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

I've been looking at The Favorite's script. It's a very impressive, incredibly detailed piece of work. The film *felt* so visual, so we assume it was director-driven, hence it's a little surprising to see almost *everything* mapped out with great precision well before a director was even chosen.

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"Well before a director was even chosen." Sometimes screenwriters have real resentment for their directors....Ernest Lehman told someone watching NXNW being shot:

Onlooker: So they're shooting Hitchcock's new movie?
Lehman: They are shooting MY new movie.

But Lehman was a bit too impressed with himself, as the mediocre movie of his script for The Prize(1963), an NXNW knockoff proved.

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(Indeed, reading around, Davis had a first draft 20 years ago!

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Man, the patience required in getting certain movies made.

On a "lesser level of time," both David Chase with The Sopranos and Matt Weiner with Mad Men shopped their scripts around for years with no takers before hitting paydirt(and Weiner did it with the obscure AMC channel.) And it was over a year from filming the Mad Men pilot that it went to series and then months before it was broadcast and became a hit(with critics more than audiences in the beginning.)

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

The Favorite's *definitely* winning a writing Oscar.

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I'll take your confidence. I have no interest in betting against it.

Moreover, since I think the movies that win Best Screenplay (Pulp Fiction, Fargo, LA Confidential) are often the REAL Best Pictures....I'm further intrigued.

Alas, this "Mainstream Man" just doesn't get to the Oscar movies as much as he should. I think A Star is Born, Green Book, and Vice are all I've seen in the major categories. And I must get around to Black Panther(though I saw its cast in parts of Avengers: Infinity War, about which -- is that ending some sort of big joke on emotion, or what? We're supposed to mourn exactly half of the Avengers "dying" -- when it is clear that they will all come back. But I digress.)

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Deborah Davis is a first-time screenwriter and Tony McNamara had done only UK TV before this. I hope they've got some scripts in a drawer so they can take immediate advantage of getting so hot.

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When you're hot, you're hot, though it is tricky for screenwriters. Someone like Ted Tally wins for Silence of the Lambs...and is never really heard from again. (Same goes for whoever wrote The Candidate in 1972. I remember liking that guy's work. Gone.) Meanwhile, the director-screenwriters(QT, Aaron Sorkin a little bit, the Coens)....win big.

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On the other hand, The Favourite sounds like it was Davis's ultra-long gestating baby, and those are often unrepeatable one-offs.

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An interesting thing about the film business. Folks like Hitchcock, Spielberg and Scorsese can churn out great ones for decades. Other folks seem to get that one and only film made that matters. And maybe that's all they wanted in the first place.

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Note that the case of The Favorite illustrates how tricky the auteur concept is to apply outside of the case of a star-director who (essentially or with chosen yes-people) self-produces, writes or develops own scripts, makes all key casting decisions, and so on. When a director does only *some* of those things then the writers and producers and actors get more of the credit.

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Yep. Though I've read a lot of books on filmmaking, and it seems like, other than landing a big star(if necessary) to get the movie financed, getting a good director to commit is its own dance with power. And directors make producers beg for them.

I'll be seeing The Favourite....

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

Yep. Though I've read a lot of books on filmmaking, and it seems like, other than landing a big star(if necessary) to get the movie financed, getting a good director to commit is its own dance with power. And directors make producers beg for them.

And, look, sometimes being more of a 'hired hand' allows directors to get-over-themselves a bit and relax and do some of their best work. Belle de Jour wasn't Bunuel's project: the producers, the Hakim Bros found the novel, hired Deneuve to be their Severine, and hired Bunuel to write the screenplay & direct. Big hit and a critical smash - Bunuel got to more or less self-produce for the next 5-6 years on the strength of it. And De Palma's career has several stories of this sort.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

And, look, sometimes being more of a 'hired hand' allows directors to get-over-themselves a bit and relax and do some of their best work.

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Agreed. Your example of DePalma is key. Left to his own devices, he rather overdid the Hitchcock homaging, to diminishing returns(Body Double, Raising Cain.) But for hire -- and using very good screenplays by very good writers -- he did Scarface, The Untouchables, and Carlito's Way.

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Belle de Jour wasn't Bunuel's project: the producers, the Hakim Bros found the novel, hired Deneuve to be their Severine, and hired Bunuel to write the screenplay & direct.

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I did not know that. I thought Bunuel was his own auteur. (Hitchcock in his later years often claimed to be a fan of Bunuel, but it rang a bit false. They were the same age, maybe that was it.)

Certainly, the subject matter of Belle De Jour was gonna be (adult) box office and "accessible."

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Big hit and a critical smash - Bunuel got to more or less self-produce for the next 5-6 years on the strength of it.

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For some reason I'm reminded of Clint Eastwood and Unforgiven. His career was otherwise tanking and he was finally "hiring out" as an actor on movies he didn't direct("In the Line of Fire" was great and more polished than Clint's usual cheapjack work.) But then Clint scores big with Unforgiven and gets to go back to being an auteur -- a dubious auteur, in my book.

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A matter of some amusement to me is how Hitchcock was approached for "hired hand" work in his later years, and simply said no. Wait Until Dark for Jack Warner. Cleopatra(!) for Fox. Though he'd have made the stabbing of Caesar into something!

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[–] swanstep (2715) 6 years ago

Someone like Ted Tally wins for Silence of the Lambs...and is never really heard from again. (Same goes for whoever wrote The Candidate in 1972. I remember liking that guy's work. Gone.)

Yes, it's weird when someone does something incredible but doesn't really follow up. Paul Brickman wrote (his own spec. script) and directed Risky Business (1983). It's kinda brilliant and a big, star-making hit, yet Brickman never has another significant credit - wtf? And Heathers (1989) appeared to announce the arrival of a major new writing talent, Daniel Waters, and an interesting new director, Michael Lehmann. Neither has done anything at all essential since. Weird.

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[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Yes, it's weird when someone does something incredible but doesn't really follow up. Paul Brickman wrote (his own spec. script) and directed Risky Business (1983). It's kinda brilliant and a big, star-making hit, yet Brickman never has another significant credit - wtf? And Heathers (1989) appeared to announce the arrival of a major new writing talent, Daniel Waters, and an interesting new director, Michael Lehmann. Neither has done anything at all essential since. Weird.

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Though there have been some exceptions, it seems that screenwriters often have trouble making lightning strike more than once or twice in their careers. Evidently a lot of them make tons of money writing movies that won't get made, or doctoring up other writers' credited scripts. But otherwise -- one or two and they are out.

Stretch this back in time: Joseph Stefano wrote that great script for Psycho(not Oscar nommed!) and got Gary Cooper's last movie(The Naked Edge) out of it, and then got The Outer Limits(but for only two seasons, alas) and then -- years of struggle, really. Eye of the Cat and a bunch of TV movies and the Swamp Thing TV series, I think. A terrible career given his early skill shown on Psycho; and yet he lived in Hollywood all his life, survived.

On the other hand: Ernest Lehman parlayed his NXNW success into some very big credits: West Side Story, The Sound of Music, and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf. Adapting the plays and (sometimes) producing the movies. It all crashed on the shoals of Hello Dolly and Portnoy's Complaint(Lehman's sole directing job) and Hitchcock ended up able to hire Lehman as a scripter again on the minor Family Plot. Still...a better career than Stefano's.

I'm also intrigued that John Michael Hayes followed up his record-four-in-a-row witty scripts for Hitchcock(Rear Window, To Catch a Thief, The Trouble With Harry, Man 2) into ...Peyton Place? The Carpetbaggers? Harlow? Highbrow to lowbrow.

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