As a writer and film reviewer, I've been watching the Annual Academy Awards Nominations special on cable TV with huge anticipation and disappointment. While looking at my list, I cannot help but wonder "what are this year's surprises" or "have I forgotten this or that" before the nominees are announced.
This morning (5:45 a.m., Pacific time), I got the same feeling. (I woke up at five in the morning just to go over my list and add a few more entries --- Kristen Wiig's Bridesmaids original screenplay included.) "Brace for some shockers and predictable ones" is my mantra. And by the time AMPAS President Tom Sherak and last year's Best Actress nominee Jennifer Lawrence (Winter's Bone; 2012's The Hunger Games) entered the stage and introduced the broadcast, programming officially begins.
THE GOOD:
1. The Artist earns 10 nods (including Best Actor and Best Sup. Actress for Berenice Bejo as George Valentin's/Jean Dujardin's partner Peppy Miller).
2. Asghar Farhadi's critically adored A Separation scored two nods: Best Foreign Film (only the second Iranian movie to be nominated after Majid Majidi's 1998 feature Children of Heaven) and for Farhadi's intense original screenplay (alongside The Artist's Michel Hazanavicius; Woody Allen for four-time nominated Midnight in Paris, Best Picture and Director among them; Kristen Wiig and Annie Mumolo for Bridesmaids; and first time scribe and helmer J. C. Chandor for last year's indie hit (and Wall Street 2008 financial crisis drama) Margin Call).
3. Martin Scorsese's homage to film preservation, his first 3D feature Hugo, lead this year's awards with 11 nominations. It's a bittersweet year for Scorsese since the movie was a huge financial disaster despite its immense critical approbation.
4. The elusive filmmaker Terrence Malick earned his second Best Picture and Director nod for last year's Cannes Palme d'Or winner The Tree of Life (ditto cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki in his sixth Oscar nom). The man deserves it.
5. Racial diversity wins this year (African-American contenders Viola Davis and Octavia Spencer for Best Picture nominee The Help; Demian Bechir for A Better Life; Dujardin and Bejo for The Artist, and Farhadi for A Separation. Ditto the Chinese director of Kung Fu Panda 2.)
THE BAD:
1. Tilda Swinton was snubbed for one of 2011's critically acclaimed films, Lynne Ramsay's We Need to Talk About Kevin in favor of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo's Rooney Mara as Best Actress. (Cannot fathom Tilda's snub despite being cited by the Globes, SAG, and BAFTA.)
2. No Michael Fassbender (for Steve McQueen's NC-17 rated feature Shame), Michael Shannon (in Jeff Nichols' apocalyptic thriller Take Shelter), and Leonardo diCaprio (as controversial FBI founder J. Edgar Hoover in Clint Eastwood's latest picture) for Best Actor. Instead, Gary Oldman was cited for Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (this is his first nomination, and I have to watch the movie ASAP!), ditto Mexican actor Bechir for A Better Life (I bought the DVD last week at Blockbuster as a three films for $14.99 promo, and I have to watch it soon.)
3. Most handsome actors and best buddies George Clooney and Brad Pitt were shortlisted for Alexander Payne's The Descendants (five nods inc. Best Picture) and Bennett Miller's Moneyball (which Pitt co-produced, making him a two-time nominee this year), respectively. Give me a Fassbinder and Shannon instead!
THE INTERESTING:
1. The divisive critical and box office reception for Daldry's Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close was this year's most shocking inclusion at the Oscars. With the 2011 line-up of nine Best Film nominees (and ELAIC as the last to be announced), it overshadowed five-time nominated The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo as a potential Best Film frontrunner. I have to watch it before going back to the Philippines.
2. 1988 nominees Glenn Close (Albert Nobbs) and Max von Sydow (ELAIC) were shortlisted this year. (For the record, they were cited as Best Actress and Best Actor nominees for Dangerous Liaisons and Best Foreign Film honoree Pelle the Conqueror, respectively.)
3. There are only two Original Song nominees this year (for The Muppets and Rio, respectively). I cannot believe this.
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
A vacation with cinema
One thing that made my Los Angeles vacation unforgettable this year is spending some time watching movies (art films, surely) in comfortable and "audience-friendly" theaters. I got to see Meryl Streep as the forgotten British prime minister Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady (she won her seventh Golden Globe award for the role) and French actor Jean Dujardin as silent movie star George Valentin in last year's Cannes favorite (and Oscar-friendly film) The Artist under favorable conditions at AMC Independent Theaters (there were only 10 of us inside, frankly speaking).
Meanwhile, my Sunday date with Marilyn Monroe, uhmm, Michelle Williams in another Weinstein Company release (Harvey has an Oscar friendly crop in 2011 which includes The Iron Lady, The Artist, Ralph Fiennes' directorial debut Coriolanus) My Week with Marilyn was delightful. She was mesmerizing (a word which I very rarely use when reviewing or critiquing a movie or a performance) in the role of a lifetime. The British cast (led by Kenneth Branagh as Sir Laurence Olivier and Eddie Redmayne as apprentice Colin Clark who falls in love with the blonde) was engaging. However, the film was basically good in paper (great idea) but trite in execution (best seen as a short film or a documentary and not a feature film). Anyway, the audience seemed to like the film. (And I had to buy two bags at Macy's just to break my $100.00 bill and buy a ticket; it's worth the wait, and the money.)
I have two more films in the bag before returning to my homeland: Stephen Daldry's interesting adaptation of Jonathan Safran-Toer's 9/11-themed novel Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close (starring Tom Hanks and Sandra Bullock), and Valerie Donzelli's official French entry to the Best Foreign Language Film Academy Awards La guerre est declaree (Declaration of War) (which I will all watch in New York during the weekend). For now, I should say that it was a wonderful (another rarely used adjective when writing about movies) vacation in the US. Here's to more trips to come!
Meanwhile, my Sunday date with Marilyn Monroe, uhmm, Michelle Williams in another Weinstein Company release (Harvey has an Oscar friendly crop in 2011 which includes The Iron Lady, The Artist, Ralph Fiennes' directorial debut Coriolanus) My Week with Marilyn was delightful. She was mesmerizing (a word which I very rarely use when reviewing or critiquing a movie or a performance) in the role of a lifetime. The British cast (led by Kenneth Branagh as Sir Laurence Olivier and Eddie Redmayne as apprentice Colin Clark who falls in love with the blonde) was engaging. However, the film was basically good in paper (great idea) but trite in execution (best seen as a short film or a documentary and not a feature film). Anyway, the audience seemed to like the film. (And I had to buy two bags at Macy's just to break my $100.00 bill and buy a ticket; it's worth the wait, and the money.)
I have two more films in the bag before returning to my homeland: Stephen Daldry's interesting adaptation of Jonathan Safran-Toer's 9/11-themed novel Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close (starring Tom Hanks and Sandra Bullock), and Valerie Donzelli's official French entry to the Best Foreign Language Film Academy Awards La guerre est declaree (Declaration of War) (which I will all watch in New York during the weekend). For now, I should say that it was a wonderful (another rarely used adjective when writing about movies) vacation in the US. Here's to more trips to come!
THE BEST OF 2011 (Senses of Cinema 2011 World Poll article)
What a great way to end the cinematic year and to optimistically start a new one!
Here is my top ten films of 2011 as published in Senses of Cinema World Poll. (I've contributed four times already; and being the other Filipino writer on the list --- aside from Noel Vera --- it's a BIG DEAL.)
DUSTIN DASIG
Assistant professor, film critic, writer and training director.
My 10 best films of 2011 are categorised by theme, as follows:
The family in crisis (and the society in general)
Jodaeiye Nader az Simin (A Separation, Asghar Farhadi, 2011)
Le gamin au vélo (The Kid with a Bike, Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, 2011)
Family secrets, secrets and lies
We Need To Talk About Kevin (Lynne Ramsay, 2011)
Marţi, după Crăciun (Tuesday, After Christmas, Radu Montean, 2010)
The family in crisis (and the world as a stage)
The Tree of Life (Terrence Malick, 2011)
Another Year (Mike Leigh, 2010)
Hævnen (In A Better World, Susanne Bier, 2010)
Avaze gonjeshk-ha (The Song of Sparrows, Majid Majidi, 2009)
Life as a drama (and the world as a stage)
El secreto de sus ojos (The Secret In Her Eyes, Juan Jose Campanella, 2009)
Des Hommes et des dieux (Of Gods and Men, Xavier Beauvois, 2010)
Outstanding performances
The cast of A Separation
Jessica Chastain in The Tree of Life and The Help (Tate Taylor, 2011)
Best directing
Terrence Malick, The Tree of Life
Best writing
Asghar Farhadi, A Separation
Best visual design
Emmanuel Lubezki, cinematographer, The Tree of Life
Hayedeh Safiyari, editor, A Separation
L’illusioniste (The Illusionist, Sylvain Chomet, 2010) for the narrative
Best aural design
The Tree of Life and Melancholia (Lars von Trier, 2011), for the use of classical music
The Illusionist, for its original score
Here is my top ten films of 2011 as published in Senses of Cinema World Poll. (I've contributed four times already; and being the other Filipino writer on the list --- aside from Noel Vera --- it's a BIG DEAL.)
DUSTIN DASIG
Assistant professor, film critic, writer and training director.
My 10 best films of 2011 are categorised by theme, as follows:
The family in crisis (and the society in general)
Jodaeiye Nader az Simin (A Separation, Asghar Farhadi, 2011)
Le gamin au vélo (The Kid with a Bike, Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne, 2011)
Family secrets, secrets and lies
We Need To Talk About Kevin (Lynne Ramsay, 2011)
Marţi, după Crăciun (Tuesday, After Christmas, Radu Montean, 2010)
The family in crisis (and the world as a stage)
The Tree of Life (Terrence Malick, 2011)
Another Year (Mike Leigh, 2010)
Hævnen (In A Better World, Susanne Bier, 2010)
Avaze gonjeshk-ha (The Song of Sparrows, Majid Majidi, 2009)
Life as a drama (and the world as a stage)
El secreto de sus ojos (The Secret In Her Eyes, Juan Jose Campanella, 2009)
Des Hommes et des dieux (Of Gods and Men, Xavier Beauvois, 2010)
Outstanding performances
The cast of A Separation
Jessica Chastain in The Tree of Life and The Help (Tate Taylor, 2011)
Best directing
Terrence Malick, The Tree of Life
Best writing
Asghar Farhadi, A Separation
Best visual design
Emmanuel Lubezki, cinematographer, The Tree of Life
Hayedeh Safiyari, editor, A Separation
L’illusioniste (The Illusionist, Sylvain Chomet, 2010) for the narrative
Best aural design
The Tree of Life and Melancholia (Lars von Trier, 2011), for the use of classical music
The Illusionist, for its original score
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