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26-2-2008 (archived)

You'd be forgiven for thinking I hadn't seen many of the films involved in the Oscars, but in fact there are only a couple I've missed out on (I just haven't reviewed them yet, due to my continuing bad attack of laziness). My opinions are, of course, without value, but it's my blog so I'm going to talk about them anyway.

Best picture: No Country For Old Men surprised nobody, and is probably the right choice, being almost without flaw. There Will Be Blood is a genuinely staggering film, but imperfect (in a way that frankly adds to the brilliance, I think, but hey ho). It's also a film that will divide people, whereas if you don't like No Country then you don't like cinema. The only surprise here for me was Michael Clayton being on the ballot: it was a good movie, but not on a par with these others. The suggestion that it may be down to Clooney being thought a thoroughly good egg over the writers' strikes seems reasonable.

Best director: Again no surprise in No Country for Old Men, which probably deserved to win.

Actor: Although I feel for Tommy Lee Jones, who turned in a superb performance in The Valley Of Elah, Day-Lewis was the only conceivable winner in one of the best performances I have ever seen.

Actress was the mystery category for me: I did not see La Vie en Rose or Away From Her, the two front-runners. I personally would have found it difficult to vote for a Cotillard, the winner, regardless of how good she may have been simply because, playing a singer, she mimed the songs. I don't understand what Blanchett's performance as Elizabeth is doing here, and the single biggest surprise of the whole process was that Angelina Jolie's Mighty Heart was not nominated. It was the best female performance I saw all year.

Again in supporting actress, I saw only three of the five, and of those three Swinton was the correct winner. I saw four of the supporting actor performances, and again I think the best one won; Bardem truly was extraordinary, though so were all the others.

Best foreign language film is difficult because of the absurd nomination process. I saw The Counterfeiters, which won, and it was fine, but nothing like as good as The Diving Bell and The Butterfly, which was not eligible despite being in French throughout. They need to fix this system.

Animation: Didn't see Persepolis, Ratatouille was far better than Surf's Up, but I still hold fast to my sacrilegious opinion that it wasn't all that great.

Adapted screenplay is perhaps the only category where No Country won and shouldn't have: the Coens made a masterpiece from a masterpiece novel, adapting it almost completely faithfully (which I commend); but There Will Be Blood adapted an, I gather, hugely over-long and badly flawed book into a masterpiece, and I would have gone for Diving Bell and Butterfly, which took an unfilmable novel and made an astonishing film.

Original Screenplay: with the caveat that I have never even heard of “Lars and the Real Girl”, this was the second safest bet after Day-Lewis, and if Juno had not won it would have been a travesty.

Score: Atonement's score was, indeed, brilliant, but I might have been tempted by the overwhelming, tremendous score of There Will Be Blood, which was not nominated.

Cinematography: There Will Be Blood is a worthy winner, but any of these could have won, and in my opinion The Assassination of Jesse James should have.

I have no opinion on the other categories, which is doubtless more fitting. As you were.

15-2-2008 (archived)

Oops. Three love stories seen in early January, then.

Lust, Caution is in many ways a typical Ang Lee film: deliberately paced, emotionally profound, visually rich, and with a rather detached affect. Many scenes were powerful, perhaps especially the messy, inept and horribly protacted killing scene, and the sex scenes were both compelling and brutal. Part of the reason it's taken me so long to post this time is that I was struggling to sum up what I felt about this: I found it rather unsatisfying, and I wanted to make sure I understood why. It is another remarkable film, but it falls short of greatness simply because, unlike Brokeback Mountain, it is just too easy to lose sympathy with the characters.

Dan in real life is a little late; this sort of richly touching family-centred movie should have been out in December for Christmas, really. Yes, it's sentimental, but it's not quite by the numbers and it's lifted well above the ordinary by Juliette Binoche and especially Steve Carell, whose advice columnist comes apart beautifully under truly horrible pressures as his kids, parents, career and love life all hit at once. He's a good and touching actor as well as a comedian with magnificent timing, and he makes this a warm and genuinely moving movie. Not special, but well worth spending a half-evening on.

And then there's P.S. I Love You. I don't think it's quite as bad as it's been painted by most critics, but it is not a film that stays with you for more than a few seconds after leaving (unless you have a serious need to see Hilary Swank or Gerard Butler in their underwear, in which former case leave after the first ten minutes and latter go and buy 300). Lisa Kudrow does a good job of playing a shallow and irritating character, but the other performances are not exactly inspirational and the whole thing is never more than adequate. It's not very romantic, or very funny, or very inspirational, or very moving, it's clumsily and ineffectively manipulative, and it's a waste of the considerable talent in it, and it's half an hour longer than it has material for. It's not horrible. It just isn't any good at all.

9-1-2008 (archived)

I Am Legend is yet another attempt on Richard Matheson's classic short novel, and like The Omega Man the characters are not, quite, vampires. It's not at all clear why they shouldn't be, since they show all the requisite characteristics. Also like the others, it removes the whole point of the movie (and the reason for the title). Of course we still have a disease rendering the population monstrous, a theme that Matheson pioneered but that's been more than thoroughly explored in the cinema, but what we don't have - at least not clearly - is some of the monsters being intelligent (although there is some inconsistency, or if you prefer a massive plot messup, here). Neither is this Robert Neville a determined vampire slayer.

The empty New York here is never as affecting as the empty London of 28 Days Later, but there is a lot to like. Shit Goes Boom very nicely, and Will Smith turns in a magnificent performance as the lone survivor falling apart under the emotional pressure of isolation (the dog also performs well). Until, that is, they start REALLY deviating from the novel and the last reel turns around, and wrong. It's an ok movie with some great acting and Smith's formidable charisma, and has plenty of very effective spring-loaded cats; but there is a truly great, bleak, meaning-laden movie to be made from this book, and this isn't it. It should have been, and the execution is strong enough that it could have been, and that's a crying shame.

4-1-2008 (archived)

The Kite Runner is a shocking and disturbing film with strong performances, and a great advertisement for the book (I have now bought it and shall eventually read it). It held me completely riveted while I was in the theatre, but it is not a film that I think will haunt me. Very good, then, but not quite great.

2-1-2008 (archived)

Onto films which are, in my book, of 2008, since I saw them on New Year's Day or later. Enchanted is an unusually witty Disney piece in which a cartoon prince and princess end up in flesh-and-blood New York. Amy Adams is perfectly cast as the gradually-less-vapid Giselle, and the whole thing is delightful for the kids while being thoroughly enjoyable for real people. I didn't guess the ending until almost an hour in, either. Really rather good, and certainly the pick of this year's Christmas kiddie-films.