Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Image = Best of 2015

Spotlight
Me Earl & the Dying Girl
The Big Short
Room
Grandma

Star Wars
Bridge of Spies
Learning to Drive
Truth
Love & Mercy

Honorable Mention: 
The End of the Tour
Ricki & the Flash
Inside Out
Concussion
The Intern

2015 was not the behemoth for the annals of cinema history that 2014 was – not by a long shot.  But there was still a lot to enjoy this year.  From groundbreaking films like Room to guilty pleasures like Entourage and WAY underrated movies like Ricki and the Flash, there was enough to appease even this film maven.

Strangely, we are at the end of the year and there is still not a clear Best Picture.  I am choosing Spotlight as my best of the year for many reasons: the subject, the exceptional ensemble cast, the writing AND the fact that it is great in an understated way.  

While 2014 was 'The Year of the Actor', this year WOMEN ruled!  Lily Tomlin triumphed in both film and TV (Grandma and Grace & Frankie), Blythe Danner had her first starring role in her 5 decade career (I’ll See You in My Dreams), Charlotte Rampling was masterfully devastating in 45 Years, Brie Larson was heartbreaking in Room, Patricia Clarkson was self-effacingly wonderful in Learning to Drive, Saoirse Ronan came of age (both in the business and onscreen) in Brooklyn, Taraji P. Henson continued to wow us in Empire and on the red carpet, Viola Davis made history with her Emmy win for How to Get Away with Murder, no one on earth had a bigger year than Amy Schumer (Trainwreck, Inside Amy Schumer, hosting SNL, opening for Madonna, etc.) and Jennifer Lawrence continues her reign as the biggest thing in Hollywood (The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2 and Joy) which completely baffles me, but that’s another story.

{NOTE: I realize that a few of the projects mentioned above are on TV but I feel they are worth including since we are in the second golden age of television when A LOT of high quality stuff is being produced in TV and the streaming space and the line between television and film is becoming more and more blurry}.

On the subject of women and 'women’s movies', I just have to say this.  I don’t understand all the fuss about Carol.  Cate Blanchett is always amazing, but the movie is incredibly slow and borderline melodramatic.  I am a bleeding heart liberal and I felt very little for these women struggling with their taboo lesbian romance because I was so BORED.  And Rooney Mara is incredibly blah to me as an actress.  She doesn’t hold a candle to or the space onscreen with Blanchett the Great.  I enjoyed the movie Truth and Cate’s affecting performance much more in that.

In my next blogpost, I will discuss the upcoming awards season. The nominations so far are all over the place, with very few through lines among the Indie Spirits, SAGs and Golden Globes.  This is both exciting and disconcerting, but may make for a very exciting Oscar race…

Happy New Year everyone!



   

Friday, May 29, 2015

Image = Summer 2015 Indie Film Rundown

Now that Memorial Day has come and gone, we can officially talk about the summer.  In the past, summer has been strictly about Hollywood blockbusters.  For this reason there have been entire summers in recent years when I didn’t go to the movies at all.  But the tide has turned and I am very excited for this summer of film which includes A LOT of great indies starring A LOT of great women.

I have already seen the very poignant 5 Flights Up starring Diane Keaton and Morgan Freeman.  It is far from the greatest movie ever made, but for me it’s all about the love of Keaton.  I am the type of devoted cinephile who will watch anything that an icon like Diane Keaton does, especially at this point in her career.  Seeing her on film in anything is a treat because she is one of the most unique talents we have ever had.  Even in an inferior movie (like last summer’s And So It Goes) Keaton is captivating. And did I mention Morgan Freeman’s in it too?

Winner of the Grand Jury Prize and the Audience Award at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival Me & Earl and the Dying Girl is one of the most funny, sincere and inventive films I’ve seen in years.  All 3 young leads give breakout performances, enhanced by brilliantly quirky turns by stalwart veterans like Nick Offerman, Jon Bernthal and Molly Shannon.  
 
And here is the LONG list of what I will be seeing this summer, with release dates in NY & LA:
  
The D Train (May 8) This movie came and went in theaters(!) but I intend to track it down because 1 - Jack Black is back! and 2 - I do not understand why James Marsden is not an ginormous movie star already.

I’ll See You in My Dreams (May 15) It is about time to see the glorious Blythe Danner in a starring role!  I hope she continues to get showered with acclaim and win a bunch of awards.

Aloha (TODAY!) Cameron Crowe has made his first movie in years and I cannot wait because I think there is much more to it than the trailers suggest... 

Love & Mercy (June 5) Two incredibly talented and underrated actors John Cusack & Paul Dano both play the legendary Brian Wilson.

Manglehorn (June 19) Al Pacino is making indies these days and I am in! I loved the affecting Danny Collins and admire him for doing interesting smaller projects when he could be sitting on a beach somewhere. This film also brings the phenomenal Holly Hunter back to the big screen, for which I am incredibly grateful. 

Irrational Man (July 17) A new Woody Allen film is the highlight of every summer for me and I am intrigued to see what two idiosyncratic talents like Woody & Joaquin Phoenix have done together.  I have never been a big fan of Joaquin's but this film may change my tune about him. 

Learning to Drive (August 24) This is the film that inspired this entire blogpost.  Patricia Clarkson is one of the greatest character & supporting actors ever and she is actually starring in a movie this time, opposite the always astonishing Sir Ben Kingsley. 

Paper Towns (July 24) After last summer's wonderful The Fault in Our Stars (and my favorite film of 2014!) I am eager to see the lighter side of writer (and now executive producer) John Green with his new muse, the irrepressible Nat Wolff.   

Ricki & the Flash (August 7) Penned by Diablo Cody, with Meryl Streep as a rock star (yes please!) and co-starring Rick Springfield.  That's my idea of summer fun!

And yes - I have to admit that there are a few non-indies (which interestingly star mostly men) that I am looking forward to as well: 

Entourage (June 3) I am not expecting greatness, but I am from Queens and I love the boys!  This movie is probably the equivalent of a guilty pleasure beach read.

Spy (June 5) So far, Melissa McCarthy & writer/director Paul Feig are 2 for 2 (Bridesmaids & The Heat) and 3's a charm.
 
Ted 2 (June 26) I laughed my face off watching Ted so if this sequel is even half as funny, I will be satisfied.
  
Magic Mike XXL (July 1) I am a red-blooded heterosexual woman. Enough said.
 
And last but definitely not least...  

Trainwreck (July 17) Amy Schumer is one of the most distinctive & groundbreaking talents around right now and the combination of her & Judd Apatow is a match made in film comedy heaven. I predict that Schumer will be a household name by the end of the summer...





 

 

Friday, February 20, 2015

Image = And the Nominees Are... But Why?



As we approach the final weekend of Awards Season, I want to say a few things about the nominees.  It was an exceptional year for film and many nominees deserve all the praise that has been showered upon them.  Michael Keaton, Eddie Redmayne, JK Simmons and Julianne Moore, to name a few...  However - I feel that many nominations this year are more about hype than substance – and it begins with Boyhood. 

I admire Richard Linklater as a filmmaker and am in awe of the process and ground breaking nature of Boyhood, but I do not like the finished product.  To me, the movie Boyhood is not engaging in any way.  That is really the point of a great film, isn’t it? Boyhood is long & tedious, nothing much actually happens and the acting (especially by Ellar Coltrane & Patricia Arquette) is quite lackluster.  So, why all the acclaim?  And - is Patricia Arquette winning every award as part of the groundswell for Boyhood or because she has been around for close to 30 years and it is a nice acknowledgment of her tenure?  

In this current climate, awards are too much about campaigning.  Some actors go to everything because they are truly proud of the work they have done and truly honored to be acknowledged.  A good example this year is Benedict Cumberbatch.  He must know that his chances to win anything are slim, but he has said over & over how proud he is of The Imitation Game and how important the story of Alan Turing is to history.  Conversely, some actors (who shall remain nameless) go because they are required to by their contracts.     

Nominations and awards really should be about the work and not about politics or campaigning.  Katharine Hepburn won 4 Best Actress Oscars and did not attend one ceremony!  A story broke yesterday about Mo’Nique winning the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for Precious without campaigning and then not landing future roles because she didn’t campaign.  This is ludicrous!  Often an actor’s performance is so head and shoulders above everyone else, there is no real competition.  When I saw Mo’Nique’s performance I said, “There will be riots in the streets if she doesn’t win.”  It is the kind of visceral, raw, daring performance that you never forget.  And that’s what awards should reward.      
 
In my not so humble opinion - these are some great performances that were entirely overlooked this year...

Best Actress 
Shailene Woodley - The Fault in Our Stars
Jenny Slate - Obvious Child
Best Actor
Ansel Elgort - The Fault in Our Stars
Colin Firth - Magic in the Moonlight
Ralph Fiennes - The Grand Budapest Hotel
Best Supporting Actor
Miles Teller - Whiplash
Mark Strong - The Imitation Game
Ben Schnetzer - Pride
Bill Hader - The Skeleton Twins
Best Supporting Actress
Imelda Staunton - Pride
Naomi Watts - St. Vincent
Best Original Screenplay
Woody Allen - Magic in the Moonlight
Zach Braff - Wish I Was Here
Best Adapted Screenplay
Scott Neustadter & Michael H. Weber -  
The Fault in Our Stars





And - why is Steve Carell in the Best Actor category? Foxcatcher had an ensemble cast shared among 3 actors.  BAFTA nominated Carell as Best Supporting Actor and that is where his performance belongs.

One final thing.  Very occasionally in Academy Awards history there have been ties.  In 1968, Katharine Hepburn (The Lion in Winter) & Barbra Streisand (Funny Girl) shared the award for Best Actress.  The last time I prayed for a tie was in 1999 between Kevin Spacey (who won for American Beauty) and Denzel Washington (The Hurricane).  They were both so great, I couldn't choose but somehow The Academy did.  All season I have said that Eddie Redmayne is THE Best Actor, but on the eve of the Oscars, I am secretly hoping for another tie.  I want them to give awards to both Redmayne and Michael Keaton for his extraordinary job in Birdman - which I am also praying wins Best Picture, as it deserves. 



Friday, January 16, 2015

Image = Academy Award Winner Julianne Moore



For months I have been saying that Julianne Moore will win the Oscar for Best Actress for the movie Still Alice, opening today.  I finally saw the film this week at an advanced screening and I am indeed correct.  I have never been so certain of a win by an actor for a relatively unknown film.

Still Alice is a beautiful, heartbreaking and incredibly compassionate portrait of a 50 year old woman who gets a diagnosis of early onset Alzheimer’s.  It’s not just a film about Alzheimer’s – it’s a very well made film about Alzheimer’s. 

It is a tiny little indie made in a month and it is amazing that it got made at all.  The universe aligned for it to happen in a short time.  It was financed by a small group of mostly women investors, including Maria Shriver & Trudie Styler; and the studio gave Julianne a month off from Mockingjay, which is usually unheard of in big budget land.  The other remarkable fact is that one of the directors has ALS and now has very limited mobility from the waist up and no access to speech.  So, the director couple (Richard Glatzer & Wash Westmoreland) were experiencing a similar degeneration while making a film about a woman losing her memory.  It is no wonder that the film feels so empathetic.

In addition to Still Alice being a wonderful film – here are all the other reasons why Julianne Moore is going to win the Academy Award this year:

 

1 – She is due.  She has done consistently great work for 20 years and has been nominated four times already for both Best Actress & Best Supporting Actress.

2 – There is not a lot of female competition this year.  As I said previously, it’s all about the boys.  Moore's closest contender is Felicity Jones in The Theory of Everything but I don’t think Jones is popular enough yet to be a real threat.

3 – The film is about early onset Alzheimer’s, a devastating subject and as usual, Moore does a great job in the title role.

4 – She’s an actor’s actor. Everyone in the business loves her and that’s who votes for Oscars.


For many years, I took Julianne Moore for granted.  I loved everything about Boogie Nights and then simply assumed she’d be excellent whenever I saw her show up in a movie.  She was so dependable that I didn’t really take notice of her.  But in the last few years she has grown on me and absolutely knocked me out in A Single Man.  I finally woke up to her talent and the world will next month as well when they say, “And the Oscar goes to… Julianne Moore.”   



Sunday, January 11, 2015

Image = Best of 2014


The Fault in Our Stars
Birdman 
Obvious Child
Whiplash
The Theory of Everything
The Imitation Game
Pride
Magic in the Moonlight
The Skeleton Twins
Wish I Was Here

and this is why...


The Fault in Our Stars is my favorite movie of the year because it was the most satisfying film going experience I had all year.  Fault is wonderful all around - one of the best written films EVER and the performances are simply stunning.  Shailene Woodley is rapidly becoming a seriously great actress and Ansel Elgort seemed to come out of nowhere this year to be both radiantly charismatic & heartbreakingly vulnerable in this film.  It is a beautiful story of first love which was made for 12 million dollars and has already grossed ten times that.  It is proof that real stories about real people, when done well, can perform at the box office.

Birdman is definitely the best picture of the year because there is nothing else like it.  It is a technical marvel.  It deserves Best Picture and Best Director and every technical award it can get.  All the performances are great as well – especially Michael Keaton and Edward Norton.  I love Michael Keaton and would love to see him win an Oscar, but this year Redmayne edges Keaton out.

I wrote a whole blogpost about how remarkable Eddie Redmayne is in The Theory of Everything and how he SHOULD win Best Actor. He simply is THE best actor this year.

Whiplash is the most aptly named film of the year.  It is one of the most distinctive, exciting and unpredictable films I have ever seen.  Everything about it is electrifying, including JK Simmons, who deserves every award for Best Supporting Actor.

Obvious Child is bold, honest & hilarious and I want Jenny Slate to win Best Actress at the Independent Spirit Awards because she is wonderfully dimensional and this is the epitome of a great, low budget, female helmed indie.

The Imitation Game is a gorgeous, very British, tragic period piece and Benedict Cumberbatch does an impressive job in the lead.  Keira Knightley also matured as an actress in her role.  Amazing to me is the fact that Mark Strong is not getting any acknowledgment for his supporting performance.

Pride is the little indie that could.  It’s great.  A true story of the unlikely alliance of an LGBT club and a group of miners.  Wonderful ensemble led by breakout Ben Schnetzer and including Paddy Considine, Bill Nighy, Dominic West and the always superb and underrated Imelda Staunton.  Just see it.

I wrote a blogpost about how special Magic in the Moonlight is.  The best part is the extraordinary script and how Colin Firth commands attention every moment he is on screen.

The Skeleton Twins is another great indie – a dramedy about survival and the resilient connection between siblings.  It was great to see Bill Hader take on more serious material and the whole film, whether it makes you laugh or cry, is emotionally impactful.   

And – after all the hoopla about Zach Braff raising money on Kickstarter, Wish I Was Here is an exceptionally funny and sweet movie about the definition of family and finally growing up in your 30s.

2014 was another great year for films big and small – but mostly small.