My nephew Steven is a film buff trying to carve out a career as a movie critic in New York. And, against all odds, he seems to be succeeding. So far he’s interviewed three of this year’s Oscar nominees for Film Comment and has written a number of other pieces for that organ. Steven’s latest interview latest is with Alejandro Iñárritu, director of the acclaimed film Birdman (I haven’t yet seen it). The piece is well worth a read, and my nephew has now made me wildly jealous by scoring an interview with Julianne Moore, a Best Actress nominee for her role in Still Alice, and someone whom I’d be delighted to name as Mrs. Professor Ceiling Cat. (You can see the rest of Steven’s pieces here.)
Steven has an almost perfect record of predicting the Oscar winners, so I asked him who he thought would nab the little golden man this year. Here are his choices, covering, I think, every category:
Picture: Boyhood
Director: Richard Linklater, Boyhood
Actor: Michael Keaton, Birdman
Actress: Julianne Moore, Still Alice
Supporting Actor: J.K. Simmons, Whiplash
Supporting Actress: Patricia Arquette, Boyhood
Original Screenplay: The Grand Budapest Hotel
Adapted Screenplay: The Imitation Game
Song: “Glory,” Selma
Foreign Language Film: Ida
Animated Feature: How to Train Your Dragon 2
Documentary Feature: CitizenFour
Score: The Theory of Everything
Production Design: The Grand Budapest Hotel
Cinematography: Birdman
Costume Design: The Grand Budapest Hotel
Film Editing: Boyhood
Makeup and Hairstyling: Guardians of the Galaxy
Sound Mixing: Interstellar
Sound Editing: Interstellar
Visual Effects: Interstellar
We’ll see how he did after the winners are announced on February 22. But on February 13 Steven will announce the nominees for his own award, the “Golden Steve”—a honor that he sees as far superior to an Oscar.
p.s. I was curious about how the golden statue got named the “Oscar.” It turns out that the origin of the name is shrouded in mystery. But it does appear that the statue is based on a nude sculpture of the Mexican film director Emilio “El Indio” Fernández. I can’t resist pointing out that the same Chicago company that makes the Oscars also manufactures a similar gold-plated statue that I have, the Freedom from Religion Foundation’s “Emperor has No Clothes” award.
I’d be surprised if Guardians of the Galaxy won- action science fiction films (especially ones based off comic books) don’t seem to be popular at the Oscars regardless of how good or popular with the general public they’re considered to be.
True, but they often get best makeup. Recent winners include Star Trek and The Wolfman.
I’ve seen most of the major films this year except for Selma and Theory of Everything. They’re all nice, but the only one I’ll return to is Whiplash. Great script, incredible tension, and a hell of a performance by the two leads, Miles Teller and J.K. Simmons.
Loved Grand Budapest Hotel,and Boyhood Patricia Arquette was exquisitely good) , and have heard great things about Whiplash and Birdman, but we watched Ida the other night and found it really quite dull.
Movies are to expensive i’ll wait for them to come to Redbox.
Spendthrift! I borrow library DVDs. 🙂
My library has a remarkably good collection of DVDs.
Guardians of the Galaxy – lots of fun.
How to Train your Dragon 2 – modest at best. (What about Frozen…or was that last year?…that was much better.)
I have seen no others as I only see what my children see. Ah the days of Kurosawa, Bergman, and Tarantino and Coen Bros will have to wait till kids are older.
Frozen was released in 2013.
The “Freedom from…” was recently awarded to cosmologist and WEIT go to physicist, Sean Carroll. He posted his talk on his blog. Well worth viewing. A great talk on the physics of death.
Let me second that. A very nice talk he gave.
The comments on that post, however, caused a severe case of SIWOTI syndrome in me that took a couple of days to overcome. I limited myself to one very short, very minor comment that was completely useless. But man, I could have wasted days on that thread.
SOIWOTI means:
http://xkcd.com/386/
Yes.
Thanks a bunch!
I haven’t yet seen any of the major nominees except the The Grand Budapest Hotel. That was indeed good, even though I had to overcome my general indifference to Ralph Fiennes acting. I actually liked him in this, which surprised me. But easily the best played character in the film, for me, was Willem Dafoe as Jopling. Next was Jeff Goldblum as Kovacs.
But, easily the movie I enjoyed the most, of the ones I saw, was Guardians Of The Galaxy. What fun. The whole family saw it together and we had a blast. It has long been my opinion that the Oscars, and the Golden Globes, are just too stodgy. It would be really refreshing to see a film like Guardians Of The Galaxy win some of the top categories, like best picture. Heck, Rotten Tomatoes rated it a 91%!
I agree with you about Ralph Fiennes in general, but he was great in this. Loved the young Indian kid, too: played the Lobby Boy or something. I’m blanking on the director’s name but he has such imagination. Absolutely loved his Fantastic Mr. Fox!!
Ralph Fiennes was great in Sunshine.
Also The Constant Gardener and Spider. He must be an acquired taste. 🙂
Guardians of the Galaxy was indeed a lot of fun — for the two hours I was in the theater. Once I left, it was out of sight, out of mind.
For my money, a Best Picture nominee ought to be one that gives you something to think about for days afterward. If all it takes to win the Oscar is a bunch of special effects and forgettable wisecracks, then why bother? A trophy of that sort wouldn’t add anything to the jackpot the filmmakers have already won at the box office.
So put me in the “stodgy” camp.
Gregory K., you old stodgebucket, you. I was giggling for weeks on flashbacks of Guardians, not to mention humming the soundtrack Awesome Mix. I didn’t like Grand Hotel Budapest so much when I saw it, but continued to flashback on scenes for weeks afterward, so it stuck with me.
I agree – although being given something to think about for days afterwards can be a bad thing as well as a good one, depending on the thoughts.
I think Birdman is a good illustration. It worried away at my mind for some time. The seemingly incomprehensibe ending bothered me, until (mainly by consulting a friend) I sorted it out – and found that the solution simply makes the film seem worse. And I’m afraid CC’s Steve’s interview with the director serves a similar purpose: everything Iñárritu says about his own film that resonates with the film (i.e., setting aside those remarks that are just silly), makes me like it still less.
The mulling-over I’ve given Birdman has transformed a largely fun experience into a sour one.
Assuming Steve’s predictions pan out, this year will have overall the most sensible set of winners in decades.
Boyhood might really be the best picture I’ve seen of 2014 – and I’ve seen 128 with a 2014 release date. (And I’m delighted to see Whiplash and Grand Budapest in the list, too.)
For anyone who cares, my two pet peeve omissions are:
* Birdman from the visual effects category (essentially, the film is an elaborate stunt)
* Winter’s Sleep (Turkey) from the foreign language film category
Would love to see Boyhood and Still Alice.
I did like The Grand Budapest Hotel.
Eddie Redmayne has a very good chance at getting Best Actor..
The story I heard on the name is of an actress, who said after being awarded a statue, said “that looks just like my ex husband Oscar” Apocryphal, perhaps.
The story I heard was it was Betty Davis, picking one up or about to hand one out, who said “he looks a bit like my Uncle Oscar”.
The standard story (given in most histories) is that it was the Academy librarian who said the award looked like her uncle Oscar.
And one variant which I swear I’ve seen in print from some Hollywood source (I won’t say “reputable source” – if it was Frank Capra, for instance, it wasn’t reputable) – but I can’t find the reference, so you’re free to assume I’m making it up – was that it was specifically the statue’s arse that reminded her of her uncle, or whoever “Oscar” was.
We watched the Theory of Everything last night. A very good, emotional flick, IMO.
I’ve read around some in the pieces listed in the link provided, inasmuch as I have an (entirely amateur) interest in film criticism. Mr. Mears has a pleasing (and pleasingly jargon-free) prose style, offers keen insights, and demonstrates an impressive breadth of cinema knowledge. (I found particularly insightful his article on character acting.) Piece by piece, he seems to be gaining his critical footing and finding his voice. He’s on his way to becoming a first-rate film critic.
These predictions are spot-on!
(Which is to say, they’re the same predictions that I’d make, if I weren’t so damn lazy to look at the ballot.)
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2919635/I-m-Luigi-McPenis-Benedict-Cumberbatch-pokes-fun-charismatic-tries-alternatives-Jimmy-Kimmel.html
funny riff on Benedict Cumberbatch’s name;-)
My pal Sam Juliano of Wonders in the Dark picked 21 out of 24 of the Oscars, which I’m sure represents something of a record (and is certainly better than Steve!). Myself, I lost interest fast when I saw the nominations almost entirely ignored Mike Leigh’s Mr Turner and especially Timothy Spall’s bravura turn as Turner — for me it was a tossup between Spall and Redmayne as Best Actor. (I see your nephew gives Spall the nod; all credit to him.)
That Mr Turner‘s cinematography didn’t win is one of those stupidities the Academy will never live down — suddenly you see the world through Turner’s eyes, and the experience is magnificent.