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 ARTIST
is 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!
