Category: Movies

Jill, official oldest daughter of NewMexiKen likes the Oscars:

I got up at 9:00 this morning on my only morning to sleep in and drove to Fairfax Corner to see the 10:15AM showing of Good Night and Good Luck. … Except that there was no 10:15am showing. It is a PM showing. And a 10:15PM showing only (no other options, not playing at any other remotely local theaters.) So I was screwed.

It was a mistake in their listing, so I threw a hissy fit with management and got a free pass for any time in the next month (so useful) [baby due March 23]. But, for only the second time in 14 years, I will not see all five nominees before the Oscars.

For the record, NewMexiKen has seen only three of the five best picture nominees (missing Munich and Brokeback). Also for the record, I seriously considered seeing both today.

And, for the record, my main picks: Crash, Ang Lee, Hoffman and Huffman, Dillon and Weisz. Not exactly going out on any limbs. (Posted at 2:30 PM MST)

Update: Just four for six for the main awards, but elsewhere I scored 17 of 24.

The Los Angeles Times has a very nice, one page printable list of Oscar nominees.

Joel Achenbach shows his kids a real western movie with The Duke and …

Naturally, I had to show the kids a John Wayne movie. We went to the video store and settled on “Red River.” Directed by Howard Hawks, co-starring Montgomery Clift. The teaser explained that John Wayne plays a cowboy who takes his massive herd on a long cattle drive. Perfect: A cowboy movie with lots of cows.

A little ways into the movie, the young Montgomery Clift makes his first appearance, playing “Matt,” the adopted son of the John Wayne character. He sort of . . . slinks around. Pantherish. Boy, he’s one pretty cowboy.

Another handsome young man, played by John Ireland, shows up and wants to join the cattle drive. Matt bristles at the newcomer, but it’s clear that the two lads are instantly fascinated with each other.

“That’s a good-lookin’ gun you were about to use back there. Can I see it?” the Ireland character says.

Matt hands him his gun.

“Maybe you’d like to see mine.”

Whoooaaaaaa, dogie!

There’s more like that — flirtatious comments about Matt’s gun. Mock hurt. Why did the new guy want to go on the cattle drive? “Just a notion I had, then Matt turned me down. Made me want to go. Besides, then I took a liking to that gun of his.”

I was practically shouting at the screen, “Get a room!”

Later I found out from the Internet what every film buff and “Brokeback” reviewer knows: “Red River” is famous for its suggestion of homoerotic behavior on the range. The “gay cowboy movie” has a long history. …

Which is exactly why Crash will get the Oscar.

NewMexiKen saw Good Night, And Good Luck this evening. One of the five films nominated for best picture, the story centers around newscaster Edward R. Murrow’s conflict with Senator Joe McCarthy in 1953-1954.

While a fine film with excellent acting — David Strathairn is just remarkable as Murrow — the film falls short. The characters are never really developed; the story is thin. Too much it seems is left to our knowledge of the actual events and historical context. For example, while we know from the beginning that Murrow and his crew dislike McCarthy — and well that they should — we never really see the conflict develop. In fact, the only real tension in the film is the conflict that develops between Murrow and CBS chairman William Paley (played admirably by Frank Langella). That’s not enough.

While genuine, and thankfully not an Oliver Stone historical travesty, Good Night, And Good Luck lacks the dramatic power to be best picture.

“Crash” features the most swear words — 182 compared to 92 for “Brokeback.” If it wins the top Oscar, “Crash” will be the third most profane best pic ever, behind “Platoon” (329 cuss words) and “The Deer Hunter” (208).

“Munich” is the most violent among this year’s best pic crop. “Good Night, and Good Luck” features the most cigarette smoking. “Brokeback” has the highest sexual content, but “Crash” comes close, although all five nominees contain 45% less sexual content than last year’s top contenders.

Gold Derby by Tom o’Neil using stats from FamilyMediaGuide.com

An excellent article on acting and the Oscars from Ann Hornaday in The Washington Post. It includes this:

Moss, who coached Helen Hunt for her role in “As Good as It Gets” and Hilary Swank for both “Boys Don’t Cry” and “Million Dollar Baby,” believes that the difference between impersonating and acting — and between good acting and great acting — lies in the psychological research and reflection an actor does before going on camera, accessing personal memories and emotions to bring oneself into a role rather than just playing it. Hoffman’s performance, Moss says, is “a very good example of a performance that has enormous technique, filled to the brim with what I call emotional justification, and that’s the private work the actor does to identify within himself the emotional cost of a character’s desires.”

Hornaday’s choices for the acting Oscars: Hoffman and Dillon, Huffman and Adams.

NewMexiKen enjoyed the film Nine Lives last evening. As the title suggests, the film touches on the relationships of nine characters, all women. It does so in nine separate, and essentially unrelated vignettes. Indeed, the movie is like watching nine short stories — and, as is often the case with short stories, the viewer feels as if they’ve entered each story in the middle. Moreso, one feels as if they’re leaving in the middle, too.

The nine lives include performances by such stars as Robin Wright Penn, Holly Hunter, Sissy Spacek and Glenn Close.

Good. Provocative. Recommended.

From columnist David Leonhardt in today’s Times:

Let’s say you decide to take a break tonight and go out to a movie. It’s Wednesday, of course, so when you walk up to the ticket counter, there is not another person in line. You settle on “Glory Road,” an inspirational basketball movie that has been out for a month. The theater is so empty that it almost feels as if you are watching it in your den. Your ticket costs $8.

Now it’s the weekend. You meet up with some friends to see “Date Movie,” a spoof that has just opened to good buzz. You have to stand in a long line to get a ticket, and the only seats you can find are in the third row. It is clearly a hot ticket. Yet it costs the same $8 as “Glory Road.”

This isn’t the way much of the American economy works. It’s not how airlines sell seats, the Gap sells shirts or eBay sells anything.

Soon, it won’t be the way the movies work either. You will pay more for a ticket on the weekends and less on weekdays. You’ll be able to buy a reserved seat in the center of the theater for a few extra dollars. One of these days, you may even have to pay more for a hit movie than for a bomb. The changes are under way, and they are long overdue.

In the meantime, NewMexiKen would like to know where these $8 movie tickets are.

Tonight NewMexiKen watched another outstanding foreign film that I had somehow added to my Netflix queue — Yesterday, a film I watched in Zulu with English subtitles.

As with many foreign films, the action here moves at an unhurried, less frentic pace than so much American film-making, where camera movement and split-second cut-aways resemble nothing more than 8mm home movies. In Yesterday, the camera stays on a subject long enough for the viewer to enter the character, to begin to understand (perhaps) and empathize (perhaps).*

Yesterday is the name of the lead character, a small-village Zulu woman of about 25, played by the beautiful actress Leleti Khumalo. Yesterday has a five-year-old daughter, Beauty, and a husband, John, working in the mines in Johannesburg. The movie opens with the mother and daughter walking (for more two hours we learn) so that Yesterday can visit the doctor. As the movie progresses, we learn that Yesterday is very sick — about half-way through the film we learn she is HIV positive.

What follows is an extraordinarily powerful story of sadness, friendship, fear, pain, courage and love — but never really anger. If there are saints on this planet (and I believe there are), then Yesterday is surely among them.

Not to be missed.

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* (It’s interesting to contrast Yesterday, an African-made movie, with the otherwise excellent The Constant Gardener, a European film about Africa, where the camera movement is so rapid, that NewMexiKen actually felt nauseated.)

There are few moving cars in this film, so no car chases, and few men, too, so no ‘splosions.

NewMexiKen wouldn’t have missed this film, but I must say I am in need of a comedy. Fortunately, Wedding Crashers is due to arrive from Netflix tomorrow.

NewMexiKen viewed the French film Kings and Queen (Rois et reine) last evening. I’m not even certain why I added it to my Netflix queue, but I’m glad I did. The film is in French with English subtitles; it runs about 150 minutes.

The movie is essentially about Nora (Emmanuelle Devos), a beautiful 35-year-old art gallery manager and single mother. It details her past and present relationships with her eleven-year-old son, her dying father, her first (and dead) husband, and her second husband, the erratic and unstable Ismaël (Mathieu Amalric).

This is a film about relationships — with lovers, children, siblings, co-workers — and that relationships often are not what they seem. The movie is long enough that the viewer begins to think they know Nora and Ismaël — and the father and others — but not so.

The contrasting personalities of Nora and Ismaël are study enough to make the fim interesting. Catherine Deneuve in a brief appearance as the psychiatrist, Mme. Vasset, is a bonus. “You’re very beautiful,”says Ismaël. “I’ve been told,” says Mme. Vasset.

Recommended for a contemplative evening, though the film is not without humor. (There are no ‘splosions or car chases.)

A terrific Oscar-focused Q&A with Times film critic Manohla Dargis. It includes this:

Q. My friends and I seem to be asking each other the following two questions:

1. How did Reese Witherspoon become such a shoo-in when, as a lead actress, she doesn’t have that much screen time, and worse, she seems to be playing Reese Witherspoon the whole time?

2. How did “Crash,” a somewhat obvious, over-the-top, contrived drama, score so many nominations and now come to be considered as a possible dark horse for best picture?
—Danny, Austin, TX

A. Reese Witherspoon was nominated for “Walk the Line” because she’s beautiful, talented, has paid her dues (and I don’t mean by marrying Ryan Phillippe) and did a credible job in a big studio movie that made money and won kudos, if not across the board. (My pal A. O. Scott wasn’t wild about the movie, but he called her performance “lively” and “smart.”) Her performance seems more supporting than not, true, but given the paucity of good female lead performances (see above) the Academy’s choice of Ms. Witherspoon this year was a no-brainer.

There are a few obvious reasons why “Crash” connected with the Academy. First, Los Angeles, where most of Academy members live, is a profoundly segregated city, so any movie that makes it seem like its white, black, Asian and Latino inhabitants are constantly tripping over one another has appeal. If nothing else it makes Los Angeles seem as cosmopolitan as, well, New York or at least the Upper West Side. Second, no matter how many times the camera picks out Oprah Winfrey on Oscar night, the Academy is super white. Third, the Academy is, at least in general terms, socially liberal. You see where I’m going, right? What could better soothe the troubled brow of the Academy’s collective white conscious than a movie that says sometimes black men really are muggers (so don’t worry if you engage in racial profiling); your Latina maid really, really loves you (so don’t worry about paying her less than minimum wage); even white racists (even white racist cops) can love their black brothers or at least their hot black sisters; and all answers are basically simple, so don’t even think about politics, policy, the lingering effects of Proposition 13 and Governor Arnold. This is a consummate Hollywood fantasy, no matter how nominally independent the financing and release. I also think it helped the film’s cause that its distributor sent out more than 130,000 DVD’s to the industry, ensuring easy viewing.

David Carr has a take on the competition for the top Oscars. It includes this line: “‘Crash’ will test the depth of the Academy’s passion for ‘Brokeback’…”

Meanwhile, Jim Hanas shows us why Philip Seymour Hoffman will win.

Carpetbagger is an Oscars blog by New York Times critic David Carr. It has included both informative and amusing writing in the lead-up to today’s nominations. You might want to bookmark it. In the meantime, I liked this little summary:

This is the year that serious films about real stuff captured a city built on selling fantasy. And while the pert little movie stars are in the race — let’s retool that speech Reese and Kiera; insouciance has its upside, no? — grown-ups who have been annealed by countless roles and time’s winged feet are in there too. Anything that gets Felicity Huffman near a microphone is a good vote, and Judi Dench’s elegant durability is something to behold. Schlubs are having a big year, which is heartening for the Bagger to see. Both Philip Seymour Hoffman and Paul Giamatti are guys who know their way around hitching up pants being forced toward earth by ample midsections. The Academy knows a good ambassador when they see one, which may be part of the reason that Terrence Howard made it into the Best Actor category. He may not be a big movie star yet, but his willingness to engage in the awards season absent archness and with a clear enthusiasm for the craft has made everyone’s job easier, including the Bagger’s. And he can rap, too, if “Hustle and Flow” is to be believed. Russell Crowe is nowhere to be seen, which is too bad for the business and not such a good thing for audiences. Tantrums aside, he combines real curb appeal and the kind of acting muscle that rarely comes along. But you can’t really doubt the process. This is the first time since 1981 that the best director and best picture categories contain the same five pictures. The Academy is of a single mind, including the fact that studios might want to try something new, like making better movies.

The major nominees:

BEST PICTURE
“Brokeback Mountain,” Diana Ossana and James Schamus, producers
“Capote,” Caroline Baron, William Vince and Michael Ohoven, producers
“Crash,” Paul Haggis and Cathy Schulman, producers
“Good Night, and Good Luck,” Grant Heslov, producer
“Munich,” Kathleen Kennedy, Steven Spielberg and Barry Mendel, producers

BEST DIRECTOR
Ang Lee, “Brokeback Mountain”
Bennett Miller, “Capote”
Paul Haggis, “Crash”
George Clooney, “Good Night, and Good Luck”
Steven Spielberg, “Munich”

BEST ACTRESS
Judi Dench, “Mrs. Henderson Presents”
Felicity Huffman, “Transamerica”
Keira Knightley, “Pride & Prejudice”
Charlize Theron, “North Country”
Reese Witherspoon, “Walk the Line”

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Amy Adams, “Junebug”
Catherine Keener, “Capote”
Frances McDormand, “North Country”
Rachel Weisz, “The Constant Gardener”
Michelle Williams, “Brokeback Mountain”

BEST ACTOR
Philip Seymour Hoffman, “Capote”
Terrence Howard, “Hustle & Flow”
Heath Ledger, “Brokeback Mountain”
Joaquin Phoenix, “Walk the Line”
David Strathairn, “Good Night, and Good Luck”

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
George Clooney, “Syriana”
Matt Dillon, “Crash”
Paul Giamatti, “Cinderella Man”
Jake Gyllenhaal, “Brokeback Mountain”
William Hurt, “A History of Violence”

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Paul Haggis and Bobby Moresco, “Crash”
George Clooney and Grant Heslov, “Good Night, and Good Luck”
Woody Allen, “Match Point”
Noah Baumbach, “The Squid and the Whale”
Steven Gaghan, “Syriana”

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana, “Brokeback Mountain”
Dan Futterman, “Capote”
Jeffrey Caine, “The Constant Gardener”
Josh Olson, “A History of Violence”
Tony Kushner and Eric Roth, “Munich”

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM
“Don’t Tell” (Italy)
“Joyeux Noël” (France)
“Paradise Now” (Palestine)
“Sophie Scholl – The Final Days” (Germany)
“Tsotsi” (South Africa)

The Oscar® Igloo updates its predictions.

Current top films:

Brokeback Mountain
Good Night, And Good Luck
Crash
Walk the Line
Capote

And don’t count out:

The Constant Gardener
Munich
A History of Violence

Oh, and Reese Witherspoon — “Simply unstoppable.”

Simply awesome film.

Matt Dillon is superb. But everyone else is, too. As Jill, official oldest daughter of NewMexiKen put it, “I thought the performances, right down the line, were as good as in any movie I’ve ever seen.”

More after I watch it again: Crash.