Well, tonight's the night. As I write this, I am enjoying a small pigeon for luncheon in my Mays Landing nest. We give the servants off on Oscar Day. It's the least we can do. I have servants because my nest is in the bourgeois part of Hamilton Township....which is right by...well....you know where....um....yea....right there.
Here's my final 2012 Academy Award observations.
There has never been a year in which the Falcon and the Academy seemingly agree so much. Maybe that means tonight will be filled with upsets. Oh, who are we kidding...the Oscars are as predictable as a Weisback midterm. These will be the winners with the Falcon's "talon of approval."
Best Supporting Actor: Christopher Plummer, BEGINNERS. Performance of the Year. Plummer's gay dad is an "everyman," struggling with identity and mortality. Despite the complexities of his actions, he is apologetic, but also unyielding in his embrace of one last chance to live the life he's dreamed of. Plummer peppers the doomed character with a lovable panache that makes the audience deeply mourn the character's passing.
BUT...flirting with nuns are still not cool.
Who Got Hosed: No one. I wasn't impressed with Ryan Gosling, Patton Oswald...Nick Nolte or Jonas Hill for that matter. It's Plummer, and then everyone else.
Best Actress: Viola Davis, THE HELP Best Supporting Actress: Octavia Spencer, THE HELP
From the moment these women hit the screen, there is an authenticity and genuineness that punctuates their performances. They demand attention. Their chutzpah makes the film enjoyable.
That said. THE HELP is not as good as the sum of its parts. The plot is somewhat cartoonish with its over-simplified view of Jim Crow Mississippi. nderstand, human teenagers, that these women would've been lynched for their crimes in the real Jackson. Don't kid yourself. The dangers were more real than THE HELP suggests. Poop pie would've resulted in certain death, or at least a heck of a lot more than being condescended by Ron Howard's hot daughter.
THE HELP was cute, but don't mistake this for any real representation of the horrors of Jim Crow.Here's an Oscar winning film that got it closer to right:
Hosed Actresses: Shailene Woodley. I didn't know she was in some lame ABC Family (or whatever) show when she stole some scenes from George Clooney in THE DESCENDENTS. All I knew was that she honestly evoked the instability and uncertainty of a teenager caught between a mother's memory and the reality of that mother's transgressions. It's hard to learn our parents are actual people...flawed and regretful. Woodley's maturation is the film is her acceptance of this truth for both parents. One is still alive, and her new-found respect for Clooney's Matt King is the source of the film's hope. Her performance deserved recognition.
Well that's it, human teenagers. Watch the Oscars...but only on your iPads or other approved Apple product. Until next year, be brave, drive slowly and watch overhead! For...
Falcon is whack???? What!? How dare you?! Whack? Seriously? 1987 called and wants its insult back.
And what's this business about the Falcon being Joe Costal? I gave that joker a "Falcon Punch" just for the comparison. If you have yet to receive a Falcon punch...it can be aranged...sike! But my talons are rather bodacious...darn you 80s slang...infectious like the spanish flu. And by that I mean it only infects characters who are inconvenient to plot progression (Little Downton Abbey humor for ya!).
In the New York Times, YA queen Judy Blume said the following about Tree of Life:
I can tell you the ones on the list, I did love “The Descendants,” and I liked “The Help.” I loved “Midnight in Paris,” I loved “Moneyball,” I enjoyed “War Horse.” The only one that truly made me furious was “Tree of Life.” I don’t like pretension, and I found it very pretentious. [But] you know what I liked about that movie? I loved the little family drama that was inside it, the scene of Jessica Chastain jumping on the bed with the little boys when the husband was out of town. I thought, this is the movie I wish I was here seeing.
Oh Judy...you've been looking into my soul since I was a Fourth Grade Nothing...
Now on to the picks...
BEST DIRECTOR: I think I made my case pretty clear in the last post.
The Falcon picks: ALEXANDER PAYNE, for THE DESCENDENTS Who will win: MICHAEL HAZANAVICIUS. Who does deserve a ton of credit for getting a film like this off the ground in a Hollywood where teenage wizards, teenage vampires, teenage pirates, teenage werewolves and robots that eat teenagers round out the highest grossing films. That's why my new film about a teenage leprechaun who is married to a teenage mermaid, but then the mermaid gets amnesia and has to try and fall in love with the leprechaun all over again although she is being courted by a pack of teenage unicorn (starring Lucky from Lucky Charms, Katy Perry and Sir Ben Kingsley) will be a smash. Who got hosed: MIKE MILLS...BEGINNERS (see last post)
BEST ACTOR:
The Falcon picks: JEAN DUJARDIN Who will win: JEAN DUJARDIN
Ok, although I expounded the virtues of George Clooney in the previous post, but the year belongs to JEAN DUJARDIN. His face, yes, just his face...his smile, his eyes...carried THE ARTIST. His expressions infused it with more charm and grace than Weisback riding a lion.
His performance set a tone. It communicated an ease of manner. He was having fun, and his performance invited the audience to join. A great performance feels "live." Like the artist is there in the room with the audience.
Hollywood has been calling THE ARTIST "a love letter to its past." DUJARDIN was the love. The last time an actor so captivated me with a single performance was Val Kilmer as Doc Holiday in Tombstone.
The Falcon picks: JEAN DUJARDIN Who will win: JEAN DUJARDIN Who got hosed: Michael Fassbender...look into it.
Hello young humans! It is I! The Film Falcon...sorry I have not been around as much as I would like, there are lots of little Falcon chicks in the ol' nest this year. Plus, the recession has hit birds of prey especially hard. You see, we have been recruited by your human Apple Computer corporation, because of our strong, pigeon shredding talons (Talon Productions? Get it?), to serve as a fleet of product shippers. FedEx be warned! I spent the Fall in a Chinese labor camp, being trained to deliver iPads down the chimneys of all middle class American homes. It's ok. They pay later. They always do.
Apple is so pleased with my work that they have given me a special perk...A DAY OFF (on every 5th Sunday of the month) Yay!
Next year, I hope to become a watcher Falcon...specially trained to poop on the cars of all PC users. I look forward to checking in with you from one of four, beautiful Apple Falcon training "campuses" in Guadalajara, Port-Au-Prince, Mogadishu or...the third moon of Mars...martians are great workers because of all those hands.
I have no hands.
Anywho...not to worry...a terrible economy, crumbling infrastructure and imminent doom at the suffocating hands of global warming won't stop the cleavage-tastic, dress-up fun of....THE OSCARS! So fire up your slave-labor device of choice....it's time for my annual picks and predictions.
The Falcon's Best Picture Nom Order:
1. The Descendants
2. The Artist
3. Moneyball
4. The Tree of Life
5. Midnight in Paris
6. The Help
7. Hugo
DNS: Extremely Loud or Warhorse
Best Picture:
The Falcon picks: THE DESCENDANTS. This is the first time George Clooney has played a character NOT based on George Clooney. Well, at least since The Facts of Life. His other leading role this year, as a Democratic hopeful turned Clinton-esq moral screw-up in The Ides of March is being called George Clooney for President in non-English speaking countries.
Also...Alexander Payne, the film's director, has masterminded the art of coaxing understated performances from larger than life leading men. He notoriously casts them as pathetic, yet somehow lovable, losers. From Broderick's doomed innocence as Mr. McCallister (Election...a film that single-handedly made me walk away from teaching for a while) to Nicholson's cathartic break-down as Schmidt (About Schmidt), it just works!
Clooney is innerly-manic, yet outwardly stoic in that way that only middle-aged white men with lots of money can accomplish. Everyone points to his "Payne-moment" as when he awkwardly runs down the hill in flip-flops. I prefer the hospital bed catharsis scene.
Payne loves to make grown men break down. Big Hollywood stars, too! And I love it. The result is always a little bit corny....true. But it's also sad, and awkward, and funny--in the way that all facets of the human condition are. THE DESCENDENTS is complicated in the way life is complicated. And yet, joyful in the tiny ways life can be joyful, if you are aware enough to let it. That's what a Best Picture should make us feel.
Oh and Nick Krause as the punchable, inappropriate Hawaiian boyfriend is one of the year's biggest scene stealers.
What will win: THE ARTIST. Why? Because Oscar gets it wrong more often than people think. Yes, I'm talking to you The King's Speech.
Also, this movie is sheer joy. It's delightfully buoyant and light in each tapping step. The music. The shots. The facial expressions. Jean Dujardin's eyebrows could've been considered for the Best Supporting Actor category. Berenice Bejo sweats sweetness. The way the camera tricks the audience into suspense in that by-gone Hal Roach kind of way...ooh la la...the French are gonna leave Hollywood with some extra baggage weight fees.
THE ARTISTis a very strong movie, and maybe a deserving winner of another year, but....
It's a silent film! Did you hear that? No talking! Silent! AND black and white. Overkill. So what? Maybe it's my own fault that I was over the film's primary gimmick before the first turn of the reel. But I was, and the problem with THE ARTIST is that once you get over the nostalgia, what do you have?
It's like when the Jets wear their old New York Titans uniforms. It's cool for that one game because, it's, well, different...new...fresh. But if I had to judge it on the criteria of any other uniform. It's not nearly as nice as the Jets' regular uniforms.
This is how I felt about The Artist. It was fun, but the gimmick drags the way Monopoly drags when all the properties are bought. I found it high on schmaltz and low on substance.
Accuse me of being a sucker for characterization. You'd be right. I want a rich, nuanced story anchored by smart, engrossing dialogue. I like movies that sound like Aaron Sorkin and Quentin Tarantino have a maladjusted love child and send him to apprentice on The Howard Stern show. I have never understood why people want movies that sound like real life. Have you ever had a conversation with someone in real life? Seldom worth $10. Maybe I just hang with the wrong crowd.
THE ARTIST is ultimately a romantic comedy, but the romance seemed under-cooked and rushed. Like an after-thought to the kitschy silent gags and slick camera-work. The plot arch is redundant and oversimplified.
Michel Hazanavicius, the director, leans too much on Orson Welles for my liking. Shot after shot is lifted directly from the pioneering visual story-telling of Citizen Kane, which is not a silent movie. The connection between the two movies is well documented, and almost every interview with Hazanavicius alludes to Kane.
Mockery is flattery and all that, and I know every director steals. But, it's too noticeable here. Silent romance is not such a novelty, America. Why should I care that this big-time silent movie happens to be a great romance. The greatest romantic comedy ever to grace the big screen happens to be a silent movie. Rent Chaplin's City Lights to see true love without dialogue.
Hosed Non-Mention: BEGINNERS. A crossroad between the hope, salvation of love and the devastating emptiness of death. Director Mike Mills accomplishes a slow burn of a film. By the time the happy ending comes, it feels like a relief rather than a cliche. Thank god they found one another. These two don't deserve more grief. Mills is steady, disciplined with the quirky abstract interludes that dot and fragment the film's narrative. By juxtaposition, similar interludes run rampant through Terrence Mallik's TREE OF LIFE. In BEGINNERS they serve to accentuate the plot, tying real-life episodes and artistic brainstorms into the story. In TREE OF LIFE, similar interludes seem to distract and bewilder the audience away from the gorgeously shot story about Brad Pitt's family. Ewan McGregor plays the reticent, damaged son of a recently outted and more recently deceased Christopher Plummer. They run a clinic on acting. Shame on you, Academy!
Oh, and the dog is cooler than the dog from THE ARTIST...nuff said!
In the link above, you will find the movies up for awards. However, have we ever stopped to think about who wins? Or the more important question, why? A little over five thousand "Academy Members" vote via secret ballot on their OPINION of what makes one movie better than all the rest or what makes one actor better than all the rest. Isn't this subject to bias? Even if it were just the general public, bias would flood the awards regardless.
Above is an independant site run by fans, for fans. It is predictions of winners based on what solely movie lovers think. Those who criticize, review, and actively watch movies are within this site. To get a better grasp on what movies are considered by the cinematic public, view above.
One of the most interesting things said in the Orson Welles' documentary is that "the only winner in the fight between Welles and Hearst is the film." Considering the universal appeal of the film, if Orson Welles were to truly return from the grave, do you think he would do anything differently. Defend your answer using the documentary and your own opinion.
