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| Get Your Punch Cards Ready |
The Academy Awards are just around the corner, and it’s time
to look at the nine films vying for the Best Picture Oscar. Surprisingly, we've
only reviewed one of the nine films gunning for the top spot, so we thought it
would be a good idea to review all of 'em as fast as possible. Last year we reviewed ten films in one post in an attempt to see which films were Oscar contenders, and this year we're bringing you the reviews in three, easy-to-digest segments. So, we're going to be brief, but not 'last year' brief.
Silver Linings Playbook
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| Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper just want to dance. |
Story: There is no film on this list more lovable than Silver Linings Playbook, the mental
health, dance competition rom-dram-com from David O. Russell. It tells the story of Pat (Bradley Cooper), a
bipolar former teacher recovering from an episode and working on himself in order to win back the love of his wife. Complicating matters are his well-meaning parents (Robert De Niro and
Jackie Weaver) and a new maelstrom of quirks embodied in Tiffany (Jennifer
Lawrence), a recently widowed woman who just wants to dance and who sees
something in Pat. What that something is, God and Tiffany only know, but it sets
the stage for a film filled with both real drama and real laughs.
Pros: The film is very well-acted. Jennifer Lawrence is
magnetic, and her eventual Oscar win is well-deserved. She infuses energy into every scene she's in, demanding to be seen, yet remaining remarkably subtle in her approach to love and facing her own demons. Robert De Niro is actually acting, which he
hasn't done in quite a while, and Chris Tucker's return is a surprise. What is really
great, though, is the fact that Bradley Cooper has finally crawled out from
under Douche Rock, which he has been under ever since he left Alias. Here, he gives his most human
film performance to date, and he’s even likable, which is surprising given his
character's penchant for yelling and neck beards.
Cons: The script, adapted from a novel by Matthew Quick, has
a few problems that adapted screenplays tend to have. It is beautifully
written, and it flows well, but it sometimes feels like the film is working too
hard to fit in the plot beats that the book has already laid out. There are quite a few scenes that feel overly
expository, with many lines of dialogue that exist solely to keep re-explaining the plot. It's a
complicated film, to be sure, but it's not that complicated. Genre-wise, the film also seems to want to have its cake, eat it, and then make another
cake. What starts out as a film
about one man dealing with mental illness and recuperating (with the help of his family, friends, and professionals) suddenly turns into a
fairly rote romantic comedy. It's an
enjoyable turn, full of dancing and revelations, and the romantic bits work (in part because of
the great chemistry between Cooper and Lawrence), but the two movies never seem
to gel together.
Best Picture?: It’s not a Best Picture winner, but it is an
enjoyable and sweet film that's well acted, simply directed, and incredibly
engaging. It deserves the nomination, but not the win.
Film Grade: A-
Amour
Story: Did you love the first minutes of Up, when that adorable couple got
together and then the wife dies?Well, just wait until you watch Amour, the film that takes those few
minutes of old-person death and stretches it into a two-hour film! After his wife, Anne, has a stroke, Georges (Jean-Louis
Trintignant) is tasked with taking care of her as she quickly debilitates
in front of him, losing the shine in her eyes and the control of her
body. Their daughter (the wonderful Isabelle Huppert) has a hard time
understanding what is happening, and Georges is left to care for his wife in a
way that he never foresaw.
Pros: You won't find a more French film than this one, so of
course it's directed by an Austrian. Michael
Haneke makes the ennui of the film palpable, infusing every scene with longing, regret, and
love unspoken. Anne is played by actress Emmanuelle Riva, who is unknown to us
but has obviously been working for a very long time. She gives a raw
performance as a woman falling apart, and she's captivating. One element that we loved is the film's desire to let many moments, even mundane scenes of vacuuming and cooking, play out in real time, with long scenes filled with
long takes. It lets viewers really soak in the sadness... for a looong time.
Cons: The only downside to that is that the film is also
incredibly slow-paced and depressing. "Great," you'll think to yourself, "I love to spend hours thinking about how I have a finite time on this earth, and instead of going out
with dignity, I will probably be crapping my pants and getting bathed by
nurses until long-after I want to live." Delightful.
Best Picture: Amour is
a wonderful film and an incredibly touching look at unconditional love. While it's
basically a lock for Best Foreign Language Film, and Emmanuelle Riva just won a
Best Actress nod at the BAFTAs, the film hasn't exactly been killing it
during awards season. So, it's a no for Best Picture. Quelle Surprise!
Film Grade: A
Django Unchained
Story: Let's just get into it. Django (Jamie Foxx) is a free slave who wants two things: to
get his wife (Kerry Washington) back and hurt the men responsible for tearing
them apart. The man who frees him (Christoph Waltz) is willing to give him
those things, granted Django helps him in his bounty hunting business for a while. After some great fun killing slave owners and the like, it's clear that all roads leads to Candy Land. That being the plantation
owned by Calvin Candide (Leonardo DiCaprio), where Django's wife Broomhilda is being held, not the board game. From there, shoot-outs, stick-ups,
make-outs, and blow-ups abound in a film that, what it lacks in subtlety, more
than makes up for in length and full Jamie Foxx nudity.
Pros: Of the nine nominated for Best Picture, no film is as
much fun to watch as Django. It's a
revenge movie, full of blood and guts and even more blood, but even more it's a fine ode to love at the same time. Director Quentin
Tarantino barrels through plot at a mile-a-minute, pulling in fun cameos (hey,
Amber Tamblyn; hey, Jonah Hill) and creating a pitch-perfect homage to Spaghetti
Westerns without ever feeling like he's stealing too much from the
classics (the addition of Jay-Z music is a nice touch). Samuel Jackson, as house-slave
Stephen, is great, and Waltz and DiCaprio are great fun. Dicaprio is dangerous,
evil, and alluring, like a sexy vampire, and Waltz brings his dependable
gravitas to a role that could read lackluster on paper. The film is also not
afraid to be frightening and violent and vulgar, and it's all the
better for it. There has been some criticism for the film's use of the n-word, but it's
used to highlight the atrocities. It's not used flippantly.
Cons: The film is over-long, and the last hour is
particularly drawn out. It's an epic akin to The Odyssey, and, just
like The Odyssey, it tends to meander
in tiny stories and forgets about its ultimate quest of love. Also, Jamie Foxx,
while a dependable actor in movies where he doesn't really have to act, is
called on to do a lot more here, and turns in a pretty lackluster
performance. Alternately, Kerry
Washington, who is a terrific actress, isn't given that much to do, and is
wasted in a film filled with larger-than life personalities. One last acting note: Tarantino's late-in-film cameo is atrocious and unfunny and pretentious
to boot.
Best Picture: It's not a Best Picture winner. Despite
defending it earlier, it is difficult to win a Best Picture Oscar when you use
the n-word so many times (Gone with the
Wind used the not-at-all-offensive term ‘darky’ instead). Plus, it's not
Tarantino’s best film, and the Academy might want to wait to see what he does
next.
Film Grade: B+/A-
Well, that's the first in our three segments that will quickly review the 9 movies up for Best Picture. We'll be posting the second installment on Presidents Day, looking at the three nominated films that explore American History and that have the greatest chance at taking home gold come February 24th.
See you then.
