Oscar Night! (Obligatory Oscar Post)

The Oscars begin in about two hours, so I'm gonna quickly talk about some of the nominated films I've seen. And yes, the Academy Awards are ridiculous and overblown, and are chosen by a group of out-of-touch elderly white men. But it's also 'Hollywood's Biggest Night!', so let's do this fuckin' shit and let God sort 'em out!

Milk - Really solid film, I'm glad to see Gus Van Sant return to mainstream film making. He really hit this one out of the park, and Sean Penn turns in a great performance as Harvey Milk, the slain gay politician who helped lead a movement. James Franco continues his hot streak and proves he's got range to spare, even amidst a great ensemble such as this one. I'd almost say Penn's a lock for the Best Actor trophy if not for...

The Wrestler - The return of this generation's Brando. Mickey Rourke comes roaring back into the limelight with the role of a lifetime in Aronofsky's visceral masterpiece. 'Gritty, real, affecting,' - these adjectives all apply, and are also cliches, but I'm two drinks in so whatever. Forget the hype and just see this movie. Aronofsky probably should've gotten a Best Director nod, as he rebounds from the critical and commercial failure that was The Fountain (I liked it by the way, and respected its ambition).

Slumdog Millionaire - I love Danny Boyle, and love the fact that this movie's doing so well. I'm not sure it deserves all the accolades it's been receiving throughout the award season, but it is pretty great in its own right. The run-and-gun style of shooting lends the film an immediacy that draws you right in, and allows you to almost smell the streets of Mumbai. The heartwarming story is just the type of film the Academy likes to reward, and it's nice to see a subtitled, India-set film with no real stars become such an Oscar front runner. I'm rooting for Boyle and his film tonight; it'll be nice to see one of the most diverse directors working today get his due.

Wall*E - Fuck the 'Best Animated Feature' category. This should've been a Best Picture nominee. Another masterpiece from the unstoppable Pixar. The best love story of the year. And it stars robots. Weird, huh?

The Dark Knight - Heath will win, and kudos to him. The Joker was an inspired, lunatic fever dream of a creation that will live on for years to come. It would've been nice to see the film itself get more recognition; Oscar's reticence to reward it is a testament to their insular choices and lack of vision. Or maybe I'm just a fanboy who wants to see Batman get his due. I heard Christian Bale will personally berate any Academy member that doesn't vote for Heath for four straight minutes.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button - I love David Fincher, and Brad Pitt can (and will) make any straight man go gay through sheer dreaminess, but I fell asleep halfway through this. By fell asleep, I mean passed out drunk. Look for an incoherent, rambling, overtly homoerotic review of this film in the near future.

Frost/Nixon - A solid film from the perennially Oscar-grabbing director Ron Howard. The two lead performances were great, and in a different year Frank Langella would probably have won Best Actor for his chillingly accurate Richard Nixon. A little too pedestrian to take away Best Director or Best Picture, although the Academy loves to award mediocrity, and have in the past for other Ron Howard efforts (*cough* A Beautiful Mind *cough*).

The Rest - See my earlier post for my thoughts on Rachel Getting Married and Anne Hathaway's Oscar chances (she's a lock, unless they give it to Kate Winslet for snubbing her for so many years). Man on Wire looks like the best documentary of the year that I haven't seen. Waltz With Bashir also looks amazing; I'll definitely have to catch up with that on DVD as well.

Anyway, hopefully some stars get drunk and make asses of themselves (Jack Nicholson, I'm looking at you), and hopefully there's a least a few unexpected winners. The pomp and circumstance is about to get underway, and I'm gonna need a lot more vodka to make it through four hours of insanely rich Hollywood insiders jerking off each other's penises. Happy Oscar night! And remember, you can be anything you set your mind to - except successful. You definitely won't ever be successful. At least not like the motherfuckers you're about to see walk the red carpet in Gucci and Dolce and Gabbana. Now, I need to go work on my screenplay. I'm looking at Eric Roberts for the lead.

Cheers,
Filmspurt.

Rachel Getting Married (Anne Hathaway is not Rachel)

Welcome to my first review for Filmspurt! My motto: "Just like Bloodsport, only not at all." Feel free to lambast my grade five-level prose in the comments below. Your hatred keeps me alive.

I watched Rachel Getting Married last night at the local AMC 24 (at baby Times Square Toronto - Yonge & Dundas! Toronto is cold as fuck!). There I was, bulk barn snacks squirrelled away in my lady friend's purse and feeling extremely George Costanza-ish about the smuggling. As I waited for the lights to dim, I was looking forward to watching Anne Hathaway get married while trying to sabotage her best friend Kate Hudson's wedding. I guess I was mistaken.

The movie makes its intentions clear during the lo-fi opening credits played over the sounds of instruments being tuned and strummed while off-centre text announces the principals: "Hi. This is not Bride Wars and I hope no teenagers are watching because they will not like me." I felt like I was back at the Toronto International Film Festival watching a movie that would never get North American distribution. What I got was a gut-punch of a film packed with nuanced performances from a uniformly great cast.

Hathaway plays Kym, a woman leaving rehab for a few days to attend her titular sister's (Rosemarie Dewitt) wedding. Hathaway disappears into the role, making you forget her former Disney teen/early twenties-queen status. In the immortal words of Ol' Bill Shakespeare, "Holy shit this bitch can act!"

The script and close-up, swirling verite shooting style of the film leave no room for vanity or artifice on Hathaway's part, and she responds in turn with raw emotion and creates a character that you feel lives and breathes outside of the 114 minutes of the film itself. Plus, she shows her tits in one scene (kind of), and she got nominated for an Oscar! The Academy loves tits. Look at Kate Winslet and how many times she's been nominated for getting all nekkid! (That's a whole other post though. One that will require extensive.... research [smacks lips and chuckles ominously].)

The film follows the lead-up to the wedding and the occasion itself, mostly sticking around Kym and Rachel's father's house. Bill Irwin plays Paul, the women's doting father, with an energy and peculiar brand of expressiveness that leads to him scoring some of the best scenes and eliciting lots of empathy from the viewer. This guy is real good. Hey www.imdb.com, what's he done previously that I might recognize him from? Oh, Sesame Street you say? Holy fuck, get this bro some good character actor roles please!

Rosemarie DeWitt scores big as the sister that gets less attention than the fucked-up Kym, even on the day she's getting married. Debra Winger shows up as the semi-estranged mom that has disconnected long ago. She nails the coldness and pent-up feelings of her character remarkably well the few scenes she appears in. Her character's journey is really internal until a shocking third-act scene that leaps from the screen to slap you awake and make your stomach drop. The final scenes with her really speak to not only the film's subtle, layered style, but to the film maker's respect for the audience's intelligence.

Thankfully, the rest of the movie works similarly well. The music is organic in that it's played by onscreen musicians who are in the scene, instead of the score being piped out to only the viewing audience as a tool to evoke an emotional response. Tunde Adebimpe is understated and warm as Rachel's fiance Sydney, and he's in the band TV On The Radio (!). Mather Zickel shows real charisma as Sydney's best man, and injects some much-needed humour into the proceedings. Blah, blah, blah, subplots play out in unexpected fashion, the movie's real humanity is uplifting, blah, blah, just go see it.

Basically, I give it four out of five beaten-and-bruised, chain-smoking Anne Hathaways. I hoped you liked my review and, if not... well... it'll get better. I promise baby. I treat you this way because I love you. If you try to leave me I'll kill you.

Much Love,
Filmspurt