A/A- /
B+ /
B /
B- /
C /
D /
F / No rating
So my new week of movie-watching proved quite the Oscarbait fest, especially given the predictable-in-all-regards nominations that were announced, but before I
slash err dive into them with my much-to-be-expected cynicism and niggling, let me quickly mention a carry over from the previous week, that I forgot to write anything about, a 2014 adaptation of
Madame Bovary (
link), done with precious, pedantic filmmaking, but coming off uninspiring and rather dull - plus settling for a disorienting mix of English accents, which to disconnect from any possible original book flavor. Now, I understand empathy (or lack of) towards the protagonist and her condition / tragic story is a debatable issue in the novel, nevertheless I still felt the movie achieved the wrong notes on that. There is some distancing effect in the scenic and social boredom that's portrayed, but it almost veers into navalgazing, followed in the last act by pretty run-of-the-mill overdramatic crescendos. Mia Wasikowska's performance is kinda frost and all the men around her are complete no faces, whether it was Lloyd-Hughes who might have worked too hard on getting the most-boring-man-on-the-planet act right, the hipster romantic Ezra Miller or the prince macho Logan Marshall-Green. Perhaps one exception was Rhys Ifans, as the web-spinning, cold conniving Monsieur Lheureux. Yeah, I'll put him down as the MVP in this case.
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Now, while I still have a few more movies to check, the internet has blessed with enough screeners this week to ascertain that Hollywood has outdone itself to be even more lackluster with its awards season crop than last year. Even the ones that I did like from this list feel a bit like getting a bye, due to how much there is to complain about the rest.
Hacksaw Ridge (
link), Mel Gibson's return to directing and (given the reputation slump he's been during the past years) big-budget, accolade-grabbing works, adapting the story of Desmond Doss, a conscientous objector who enlisted despite his beliefs during WWII and served and saved lives straight on the battlefield of Okinawa. This topic honestly makes perfect material for both inspirational biopic-making and, given that it's Gibson we're talking about, war movie gruesomeness - and this combination is fairly straight. All the dramatic tropes and cheese are inserted to quickly cover Doss' life, romantic interests and moral challenges in joining the military, after which it's queasy time, as the war act unfolds with graphic violence and hecticism, Doss even disappearing for a while from the center of attention, until returning for his main shot, Oscar please grand climax. There's talk about how, for a movie centered on moral objections towards war and violence, Gibson's delights for gritty, bloody imagery almost thwart that message - and it's hard to argue against that. Andrew Garfield comes off a bit hammy in the biographical stages, but once thrown in the battle zone, I found his energy and acting much better. The movie also periodically makes you suffer through Vince Vaughn with his serious-acting-face on. Aaarrrrrrrrrggggggghhh. All in all, given that his last film, 10 yeas ago, was the controversial, but substantial and unique
Apocalypto, this one feels quite lazy and drenched in cheap Gibsonian moves.
Hidden Figures (
link) Honest, simple movie on the story of several African-American women scientists who rose to significant contributions in NASA's Space Program during the early 60s Space Race and later on. In the Oscars' narrow spectrum of what constitutes an Oscar-worthy movie, I'd rank this as the "Hallmark Channel type" (think
Trumbo last year or
My Week With Marilyn a while ago), nonetheless there's some sense of balance in covering the lifestories, the racial frictions of the period, the sentimental tones of the protagonists' conflicts or the strong acting. Guaranteed crowd-pleaser, but will I remember it in a month's time, even? No I won't. Can't lie about that.
Jackie (
link), which started as a Venice Filmfest contender, but it was quite inevitable to end up in the Oscars' race as well (though it may have gotten less attention than expected - only Actress, Costume and Score nods). It covers with kaleidoscopic narrative jumps a fragment from Jackie Kennedy's life, between JFK's assassination, dealing with the aftermath of it, his funerals and opening up to the media (her
Life interview with Theodore H. White). Given that it's made by Chilean director Pablo Larrain, there are certain good things you could expect: some degree of visual stylistic prowess (stemming all the way back to his 2012 pretty great
No, which was intentionally shot to capture the 80s televisual period style; here, there is also a visual sheen that allows for smooth transitions between fictional movie scenery and original media footage) and some elements of a non-standard approach to creating a biopic. Then again, it was also bound to be more mainstream and have soft touches, compared to his arthouse, unflinchingly bitter
El Club (which I reviewed a while ago). If you're ready to say this has Oscarbait written all over it, I would say Natalie Portman does an honest hard work and approximation in her acting and the directorial approach is also indiscriminate between honoring the former First Lady's persona and challenging the concepts of her public image, grace, grief and pretension, at the same time. But since the whole movie centers around a
Life interview that even its writer later disavowed (Wiki: "White later described his comparison of JFK to Camelot as the result of kindness to a distraught widow of a just-assassinated leader, and wrote that his essay was a "misreading of history."), it's hard to not imagine that this movie also has a serious spoonful of fantasy.
La La Land (
link) is a fine musical. A great one even, if you happen to enjoy life, music, colors, romance, puppies, kittens,
Les parapluies de Cherbourg, ice cream, chocolate, rainbows.
But for a different view on it, read it below in spoilers at your own discretion
[/Mongoose]
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this is its color btw
So here's the thing, every two or three years a musical is destined to get Oscarbuzz and I normally flat out refuse to care about and watch it. I just know they're almost surely handmade industry tokens. They're almost surely never meant to win big, but them being nominated is just there to force me(/you/us) to take them into consideration. Nah. It was probably
Hairspray or
Mamma Mia! that broke the camel's back for me. And since: have not seen
Burlesque. Have not seen
Les miserables. Have not seen
Into the Woods. I recall a wonderful diatribe written by ProgArchives member Dean on why musicals suck by default and, while I haven't really reached that same level of dislike for the genre,
La La Land incidentally made me chuckle at the thought that it would fail the test, according to Dean's standards, from the very first minutes, in which a traffic jam is transformed into a common man spectacle of merrymaking and street dancing.
But anyway, on to why I did watch
La La Land after all -- now that it equaled the record for most Oscar nominations (alongside
Titanic and
All About Eve... some cinematic Everest level this is, geeeeeez), has the most serious shots at Best Picture since 2002's
Chicago and, apart from the acting roles and some other categories that might slip out of contention, by God if it's not aiming for at least 7-9 statues -- it mostly has to do with Damien Chazelle and the interest he held up since
Whiplash, a fervent piece of moviemaking, if arguable in its big message and delivery.
How was it then? Well, with all this Oscarbuzz around it, making it "the movie most likely to win given the Academy's self-infatuation", is sure to damage a bit of expectations and affection, but, for what it's worth, I can believe that Chazelle genuinely wanted to pull an epic, brash musical movie, with the elements he's most comfortable with: music, tributary forms to old art (and bloody hell are they plenty,
from musicals alone!!), self-realization narratives, pizzazz filmmaking. Problem is, it ends so jacked and jazzed up [pun intended] that it seems a braggadocio effort.
Here's what worked: I didn't feel the usual strain, towards the action and the actors' abilities, to push everything into musical territory. It was still a competent, normal flowing drama, without trying to transpose every significant fragment into an aria. Indeed, except the heavy first 15 minutes or so, I felt it's quite musical
light - or at least it often fused its musical numbers with other genres, like jazz, orchestral, dance etc. I kinda appreciated this. I kinda appreciated that the leads' voices were not overworked to pitch perfection.
-- In between this and the following category I'd place Emma Stone. I think she pulled the better effort here: quirky, sarcastic, bitter, emotional at various times, but vibrant through and through. --
Here's what made me feel nothing: a) it wasn't entrancing; it was a spectacle alright, but it wasn't entrancing; there were truly some moments, some seconds in which the mix of music, acting, coreography and scenery clicked and felt wonderful, but that was it; b) the American Dream fantasy storyline was quite thin and as much as the genre required; c) equally so, its technical and stylistic merits are all in there, bursting with both finesse and grandeur, but also being as artificial as the genre/industry normally demands it
Here's what's debatable from it: a) the romance chemistry - I would neither say it exists, nor that it doesn't. The Stone - Gosling coupling did not surprise me, since it is so overplayed by now (
Stupid Crazy Love,
Gangster something) and I think it's more an issue with Gosling playing the smug type so much that creates dissonance from a typical lovey-dovey mindframe; so if you'll expect the soulmatey type of romance connection, you'll likely be disappointed; if you like a more realistic romance, generated by shared dreams and goals, but also challenged by life and emotional hardships, this could make more sense to you; b) the amount of originality vs tributing; the movie can hardly breathe under its own glossy, tattooed with decades of musical history skin; c) the amount of elements that could be described as "subverting the tropes", like the mundane storytelling, the down-to-earth setting and ambitions of the characters, some of the deadpan twists in the romance's interactions and dialogue; they're present, but it just didn't click to me to the extent I feel Chazelle might have wanted to wow us with
Here's what fails: the preachiness (carried over from
Whiplash, tbh) about true art forms (Jazz in
Whiplash, for instance, meant only "muh Buddy Rich", here, jazz is reduced to namecalling Thelonious Monk and a few others; pretty disappointing elitism, if such); the feeling that this is a truly above average or even masterful product of its genre.
Manchester by the Sea (
link) In light of having just cut deep into most of the movies above, you'll probably hate me for colouring this one a bit better, given that it's close to Infinite Sadness - The Movie, about a reclusive, divorced man with a troubled past who must deal with becoming the guardian of his nephew, once his brother passes away. One thing I was surprised is that I didn't recognize its director, Kenneth Lonergan, from his previous effort,
Margaret, which I couldn't stand. This one fares slightly better, although the dramatic overtones feel just as implacable. Casey Affleck does a noteworthy performance on a multitude of shades of grey, so to speak: cloistered, bitter, mopey, grieving, profoundly depressed; quite small oscillations there. This is a slow burn of a story and while it could be labeled as "redemptory drama", it might still leave you wondering towards its end. You'd probably understand better if you saw it or will see it. Which you should. At least once.
And finally for this week,
Moonlight (
B- or maybe
B color, idk yet) (
link), the critically beloved three-part chronicle (literal transitions between child, adolescent and adult phases) of a black young man and his struggles with social inclusion and with his own sensitivities and sexual identity (hint: it's homosexuality). If there are movies I'd rewatch, it'd be probably be Jackie and this one. For one, it went by so fast, bewildering me with its soft, straight, but at the same time sparse, elliptical narrative. Sometimes it has more minutes of silence and visual-sensorial or gestical flickers than substantial dialogue. If that's meant to be the concentrated essence of this highly poetic and feeble movie, pretty sweet, but I still have to decide whether its themes are broad or archetypal.