85th Academy Awards Nominees: Best Screenplays

Righting?  Well. who cant do taht.  I cant beleeve they give awards 4 this.  Maks absalootlyno scensce too me.

But yet, the Academy seems to think that they’re worth a mention.  And if the Academy thinks they’re worth a mention…

Best Adapted Screenplay

Lucy Alibar and Benh Zeitlin for Beasts of the Southern Wild

Tony Kushner for Lincoln

David Magee for Life of Pi

David O. Russell for Silver Linings Playbook

Chris Terrio for Argo

This is a very strong category and, other perhaps than Beasts of the Southern Wild whose success owes more to its distinct look and performances, it is easy to see all of the contenders walking away with it.  Indeed, all 5 are up for Best Picture.

In another year, I would be standing directly behind Silver Linings, as the screenplay categories tend to favour smart, offbeat comedies (much to the joy of Alexander Payne) and David O. Russell.  And David Magee’s valiant effort at writing a screenplay based on an “unfilmable” book is rightfully nominated.  It is faithful to the text (except for that odd bit where the eponymous protagonist has memorised the digits of pi to hundreds of decimal places) but still somehow makes it translatable to the screen.

That said, this should be a toss up between Lincoln and Argo.  For me, Tony Kushner takes it.  His script nails the ideal combination of drama, comedy, a commentary on the human psyche and, considering the plot mostly revolves around political procedure, it never once becomes a bore.

Chris Terrio (right, obvs) on the set of Argo (Credit unknown)

But, with the groundswell of goodwill, together with its win at the Writers Guild of America last weekend, Chris Terrio with his debut feature script will walk away with the Oscar at the first attempt.

What should win: Lincoln

What will win: Argo

Best Original Screenplay

Wes Anderson and Roman Coppola for Moonrise Kingdom

Mark Boal for Zero Dark Thirty

John Gatins for Flight

Michael Haneke for Amour

Quentin Tarantino for Django Unchained

I must disclose that I have a predilection to prefer this category over its sister.  There’s something that appeals to me a little more about somebody who has come up with a concept, developed it and scribbled it down.  After all, I doubt there’s many among us who haven’t thought to ourselves after reading the last few words of a novel who’ve thought: “They should make a film of this”.

Unfortunately, in my view this year’s crop are a rather weak bunch.

Although it will go in as favourite, particularly after its win at the WGA Awards, Mark Boal’s script is the worst thing about the torturously overrated Zero Dark Thirty.  The only thing that lifts the movie is its last hour, in which Kathryn Bigelow flexes her muscles and delivers a barnstorming siege.

Conversely, Tarantino’s script is probably the best thing about Django (well it certainly isn’t his painfully dreadful cameo).  The first hour in particular hosts some bloody good laughs together with some sharp set-pieces and it is only Q’s solipsistic propensity for self-indulgence that allows the film to run flabbily over the two-and-a-half hour mark.  He picked up the Golden Globe and Bafta and it would not be a surprise to many to see Tarantino delivering one of his coke-feulled acceptance speeches on Sunday night.

I’m sure it can’t only be a contrarian streak that puts me at odds with the masses who think The Darjeeling Limited and The Life Aquatic were missteps for Wes Anderson.  For me, his supposed “return to form” in Moonrise Kingdom is his weakest film to date.  He changes up the cute and curt quotidian, for an epic ending that doesn’t quite come off.

And it is no surprise to see a history of schmaltzy melodrama littering John Gatins’s back catalogue.  The only things that take Flight from 19 inch to silver screens are nudity, visible drug taking, Denzel Washington and a horrifying plane crash scene.

Which leaves us with Amour.  Probably the most worthy winner from the group.  Despite his apparent difficulties to grasp the English language, Michael Haneke’s French screenplay requires patience, but its heartbreaking denouement has given some of the older members of the Academy something to take notice and should, by rights, carry it over the finishing line.  A win would be the first foreign language winner since Pedro Almodóvar’s Talk to Her 10 years ago.  Before that, the last time was in 1966 when Claude Lelouch’s A Man and a Woman won.  And who was its star?  A young Jean-Louis Trintignant…

Mark Boal (right, obvs) on the set of Zero Dark Thirty (Credit: Jonathan Olley/Columbia Pictures)

What should win: Amour

What will win: Zero Dark Thirty

85th Academy Awards Nominees: Best Actor

Bradley Cooper for Silver Linings Playbook

Daniel Day-Lewis for Lincoln

Hugh Jackman for Les Misérables

Joaquin Phoenix for The Master

Denzel Washington for Flight

John Hawkes.  Gael Garcia Bernal.  Jean-Louis Trintignant. Mads Mikkelsen.  Toby Jones.  Ben Affleck.  Jamie Foxx.

We can rely on, at very least, these 7 unfortunate exhibits to prove just how strong the Best Actor category is at this year’s Academy Awards.  And the great thing is that, despite the wonderful performances of these above gentlemen, the five who got the nod are no less deserving.

Plus, they’re all very different.  Denzel Washington’s drug-addled alcoholic pilot shares similar traits to his two other Oscar-winning characters from Glory and Training Day.  Behind a smart-talking super confident facade there lies a deep trouble and ultimately false pride, which will eventually result in his demise.  Bradley Cooper is also very believable in Silver Linings as a troubled soul overcoming inner-demons.  And, talking of troubled souls, Phoenix is the very epitome of a mentally and physically lost child.  Accused by some critics of chewing the scenery, I found his central role in Paul Thomas Anderson’s flawed treatise as utterly compelling and just a little disturbing.  While Hugh Jackman’s Jen Valjean is the role the Australian was born to play (yep, a Frenchman with an American accent), and he plays it devilishly well.  Why, he’s even better than Russell Crowe.

And yet, despite the immense caliber of performances on show, somehow honest Abe still stands head, shoulders and stovepipe hat above the others.  Once again, Daniel Day-Lewis has managed to metamorphosise himself from an ostensibly mild-mannered unassuming chap, to something completely unforgettable and iconic.  To say that the performance for his inevitable third Oscar is on a level with his Christy Brown (My Left Foot) and Daniel Plainview (There Will Be Blood) is the highest and most reverential praise that I can bestow.

The measured yet authoritative portrayal of an almost legendary figure, is so beguiling, that not even the Wilkes-Booth ancestry would begrudge him the Oscar.

Daniel Day-Lewis in/as Lincoln

Who should win: Daniel Day-Lewis

Who will win: Daniel Day-Lewis

Guest Picture: Silver Linings Playbook

When I asked Shoreditch-based designery type Simon Hill to produce some artwork for Silver Linings Playbook (reviewed here), I was really hoping for a Shepard Fairey style piece of guerrilla street art, or at least an illustration of Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence wearing tiny top hats and riding mini tricycles.

What he produced instead however, is arguably even better:

www.SiHill.co.uk

@Siiighhill

Courtesy of Si Hill – http://www.SiHill.co.uk – @Siiighhill

85th Academy Awards Best Picture Nominees: Silver Linings Playbook

Courtesy of Si Hill – http://www.SiHill.co.uk – @Siiighhill

It dawned on me, while watching ‘Take Me Out’ the other day (it’s when I do my best thinking), that I really really HATE it when somebody describes something by speaking about it as if it were a recipe.

By way of a masochistic example, take the following:

What do you get if you take a pinch of Bradley Cooper’s charm; an ounce of Robert De Niro’s idiosyncrasies; a spoonful of Jennifer Lawrence’s nubile, vital, fresh-faced, beautiful talent; a dash of Jacki Weaver’s whatever-noun-applies-to-Jacki-Weaver; and stir it all up in a bowl of David O. Russell’s wit and originality?  That’s right, it’s Silver Lin…oh dear, you’ve already chosen swift suicide.  Understandable.

Despite your justifiable self-fatallisation, I’ll continue to do writing about yonder Silver Linings Playbook.  It’s a faintly dark comedy about about a bipartite couple brought together by bipolar (excuse the inevitable misdiagnosis; I sacrificed accreacy for phraseology). Pat (Cooper) has just been discharged from a psychiatric unit after his wife’s infidelity got him all hitty.  Tiffany (Lawrence) has been seeking to overcome the grief of her young widowhood by slagging around with her whole lucky office. And in each other they find reluctant kinship – and unlikley dance partners – which flourishes into something golden.

The success of the piece hinges on Cooper and Lawrence, and Russell’s faith is repaid with a touchdown. Cooper, in particular, impresses with his vulnerable naivety and his Best Actor nomination is well deserved; while Lawrence, as the erratic nympho, continues to establish herself as a genuine leading lady who can pull-off a spectrum of roles.

But Russell also pulls his weight with a script that is funny enough to work as a comedy, and smart and insightful enough to stand-alone as a drama.  It never slips into the smugness that his previous screenplays sometimes can, the prime example being the unbearable Flirting With Disaster.  The film’s critics seem to have a problem with the trivialisation of mental illness, but for me it was an honest depiction of depression and its manifestations and I did not feel that the resolution suggested that the suffering parties were, all of a sudden, utterly cured.  They are people with problems, but who want to overcome them and, frankly, that’s a very useful message.

That said, Russell’s inclusion among the Best Director nominees seems unwarranted.  At times the film is very clumsy and the editing scatter-gun (although Crispin Smuthers and Jay Cassidy are also nominated) – many scenes seem unfinished or jammed-in.  The domestic argument set-pieces for example, in which Pat’s dysfunctional parents played by De Niro and Weaver (who make up the quartet of acting nominations, the first film to do so since Reds in 1981) evidence the possible cause of their son’s problems, are disjointed and disorientating.

Of course, I’m sure that the canny filmmakers would say that this ad-hoc cutting signifies the altered states of mind that the protagonists share in common.  And on the strength of the good faith developed by the film’s other boons, it is easy to give them the benefit of the doubt.

Silver Linings Playbook; 2012; Dir: David O. Russell; Stars: Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence, Robert De Niro; 122 mins; 8/10; 5 nominations (Best Picture, Best Directing, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Editing)

Bloscars’ Best Picture chart

1. Beasts of the Southern Wild

2.  Argo

3.  Silver Linings Playbook

4.  Les Misérables

5.  Amour

6.  Zero Dark Thirty

7.

8.

9.

85th Academy Awards Nominees: Best Foreign Language Film

Amour (Austria)

Kon-Tiki (Norway)

No (Chile)

A Royal Affair (Denmark)

War Witch (Canada)

What do Norway, Denmark, Austria, Canada and Chile have in common?  No, they’re not the countries in which Julian Assange sought amnesty (semi-topical satire for the win); they are actually the list of countries from which this year’s Best Foreign Language Film nominees are.  From.  Of course, you probably could have guessed that from the fact that they’re listed at the top of this post, but, in fairness, I did cunningly swap the order, so don’t be too hard in yourselves.

Amour is clearly the odds on favourite here, being – as it indeed is – nominated elsewhere.  Every time that a film has been nominated for Best Picture and Best Foreign Language Film in the same year, it has won the latter category.  That said, Pan’s Labyrinth recently picked up six nominations including three wins, without winning Best Foreign Language and, in a funny old couple of years, Swedish The Emigrants, was a losing nominee in 1972 but was then up for Best Picture in 1973.  Thank heavens the Academy has now stamped out that kind of mind-bending shenanigans.

But Amour remains distant favourite and my thoughts on the film have been well documented.  Here.

A Royal Affair also has love at its heart.  But this is a much more passionate and – inevitably with Alicia Vikander and Mads Mikkelsen involved – sexy love.  It’s a fairly nuts and bolts period piece set during the European enlightenment years of the late 18th century, and jam-packed full of the quintessential remarkable dresses, resplendent palaces, men in wigs and pantyhose, general misogyny and required quota of peasant whores.  But excellent performances, a taste of erstwhile unfamiliar Danish history and well-handled commentary on the perils of successful revolution, set this above the average hoipolloi.

War Witch also stands on well-trodden ground.  A familiar portrayal of how grim it is to live in war-torn Sub-Saharan Africa.  Notwithstanding my rather unfair dismissiveness, it is an effective piece of cinema about a girl’s premature journey into womanhood after being left the sole-survivor of the slaughter of her entire village.  It is lead by one of those seemingly-now-standard jaw-dropping amateur performances from debutant Rachel Mwanza.

Kon-Tiki would be a little more unusual, but for its striking similarity to this year’s Life of Pi.  Although the acting is a little on the melodramatic side and the script tires under the weight of its own clichés, the cinematography transports this portrayal of anthropological endeavour.  Depicting Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl and his crew’s epic journey on a balsa wood raft across the Pacific Ocean from Peru to Polynesia, it is a remarkably shot picture.  Filmed in a huge tank in Malta, one is convinced by the intrepid travellers’  being surrounded only by deep blue salty stuff and dozens of very convincing sharks.

Similarly, were it not nominated in 2013 and did not star a very de rigueur (and superb) Gael García Bernal, one would be forgiven for thinking Pablo Larraín’s No was filmed contemporaneously with Rain Man and Pelle the Conqueror back in 1988.  It follows an advertising exec’s television campaign against General Augusto Pinochet’s re-election as Chile’s el presidente.  No is an excellent film; a compelling drama laying bare genuine emotional – as well as political – conflict and intrigue.  It looks fantastic; shot on the same 3:4 ratio film as in the late 80s, it seamlessly melds new film with archive footage from the time.

No directed by Pablo Larraín

And, for me, it says more about the human condition than Amour, which is the reason why (together with, perhaps, my semi-regular penchant for contrariness) it is my pick of the category.

What should win: No

What will win: Amour

Guest Picture: Argo

Argood old Natasha Searston.  Talented artist.  Milky of skin; fantastic of fringe.  And, now she has a spot on a blog with in excess of 50 Twitter followers, one has to ask whether there’s anything she hasn’t got…?

No, seriously, please let me know.  There must be a metaphorical stick that I can literally beat her with.

If you’re stuck for idea, indulge yourself in looking at the below image for Ben Affleck’s opus Argo (the Bloscars review of which, is here).

www.natashasearston.com

@natashasearston

Courtesy of Natasha Searston – http://www.natashasearston.com – @natashasearston

85th Academy Awards Best Picture Nominees: Argo

Courtesy of Natasha Searston – http://www.natashasearston.com – @natashasearston

Ben Affleck, eh?  Who woulda thought?  From generally chided half of Hollywood coupledom, to one of the most well regarded directors around.  And all in the space of a high profile breakup and two excellent films.  It’s like the plot of a dreadfully dull biopic (and if anybody now makes a dreadfully dull Ben Affleck biopic I really think you should give me a split of the meagre box office takings).

Gone Baby Gone was an excellent and suspenseful thriller, while The Town was a surprisingly trite heist-and-honeyz action.  Argo – the gripping based-on-true-events drama – may well be Affleck’s opus.

CIA agent Tony Mendez (Affleck), is called upon to exfiltrate half a dozen Americans secretly stranded in Iran after the embassy is overrun by rebels in 1979.  A hopeless situation requires a harebrained scheme, and Affleck’s stroke of genius does indeed smell decidedly like one from the cranium of a rabbit-like creature; to fabricate a fake movie and pretend that the 6 patrons are part of the crew, only in the Middle East to recee for locations.  Mendez must overcome the cutthroat world of movie production, the scrutiny of the Iranian authorities and the scepticism of his subjects, before attempting an audacious exodus.

Despite the blogger backlash (“bloglash”?) that Affleck is now yawningly being flagellated with following his shelves of awards, it is difficult to pick fault with Argo.  The opening few minutes smartly give the right level of background to the Iranian crisis to allow the viewer in on the action (an asset that, for example, Les Mis lacks) without sounding like a history lesson.  The pacing is swift, but never feels rushed.  Affleck is a likeable, fallible lead ably supported by an experienced cast featuring Alan Arkin, John Goodman and Bryan Cranston, as well as Clea DuVall and Scoot McNairy.  And the Arabian baddies aren’t the usual caricatured, yelling Allah-worshipers.

But best of all, Argo is genuinely, nail-bitingly tense.  From the harrowing opening siege scene to the ultimate great escape, it is hard to remember too many times in recent Oscar history when one of the Academy’s chosen ones have caused pulses to race as fast as this (‘cept when Winselt gets her kit off in Titanic, obvs).  Of course, it benefits from a source that is little known on these shores, but Affleck’s skill in handling cerebral subject matter alongside grave peril puts him somewhere between the Scott brothers, Ridley and Tony respectively.

But, despite, all that, Argo still somehow doesn’t feel like a Best Picture winner. Perhaps its admirable lack of grandstanding is the ironic cause, but I suspect that the Academy will continue to tell Affleck to Argofuckhimself in favour of the more Oscar-primed Lincoln.

Argo; 2012; Dir: Ben Affleck; Stars: Ben Affleck, Alan Arkin, Scoot McNairy; 120 mins; 8/10; 5 nominations (Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Editing, Best Musical Score, Best Sound Editing, Best Sound Mixing)

Bloscars’ Best Picture chart

1. Beasts of the Southern Wild

2.  Argo

3.  Les Misérables

4.  Amour

5.  Zero Dark Thirty

6.

7.

8.

9.

Guest Picture: Amour

I singularly failed to mention, in my review of Amour, that the real star of the show was the trespassing pigeon.

Fortunately, the delightful Lydia Fee has saved my ornithological blushes by creating the below beauty.  As a general cat fan, Lydia has honoured feline’s natural enemy, bird – clearly displaying what a brave and fearless artist she is.  Check out the rest of her perpetually splendid work:

www.lydiafee.co.uk

@lydiafee

Courtesy of Lydia Fee – http://www.lydiafee.co.uk – @lydiafee

85th Academy Awards Best Picture Nominees: Amour

Courtesy of Lydia Fee – http://www.lydiafee.co.uk – @lydiafee

Despite the impression he casts when tweeting, Michael Haneke has made is name by creating cinema that excruciatingly challenges the viewer’s sensitivities and intelligence. Rather than sadistic teenagers, masochistic pianists or phantom stalkers, Amour’s antagonist is the inevitable approach of ageing and death.

Anne (Emmanuelle Riva) and Georges (Jean-Louis Trintignant) are merrily seeing out their twilight days on a satisfying diet of culture and each other’s company, until Anne suffers a stroke, leaving her unable to walk or look after herself. The episode is catalyst for her physical deterioration, despite the efforts of endlessly committed husband.

But one should not mistake Amour for a thesis on death. The film is actually an ode to love (the clue was in the title, dummy). Love of a spouse and family, yes. But, more vividly, love of life.

As an existentialist snapshot of a woman deprived of the things that make life worth living, it is a highly powerful piece. Formerly a piano teacher, Anne is reduced to listen to her protégée only on CD. An art lover, she is bed bound and perpetually surrounded by the same four walls. With a relentlessly compassionate husband, Anne feels nothing but a burden and a brewer of resentment. And it is Georges patient, unwavering adoration that is so grueling to watch and that ultimately makes the dénouement so shocking.

While Riva has hauled in the plaudits and is making a last-minute dash for the Oscar, it is Trintignant’s calm and dignity that hammers home the difficulties of the quotidian horror story, and it is a shame that this year’s Best Actor nominees are quite so strong as his performance deserved recognition.

Amour is unlikely to feature on too many DVD shelves; repeat watching would be an exercise in the kind of masochism that Haneke revels in. But it is a work that should be seen by everybody at least once and although the Academy is unlikely to reward it as highly as at Cannes (where it won the Palme d’Or), it is a statement on its quality that it is being recognised among the most revered movies.

Amour; 2012; Dir: Michael Haneke; Stars: Emmanuelle Riva, Jean-Louis Trintignant, Isabelle Huppert; 127 mins; 8/10; 5 nominations (Best Picture, Best Directing, Best Actress, Best Original Screenplay, Best Foreign Language Film)

Bloscars’ Best Picture chart

1. Beasts of the Southern Wild

2. Les Misérables

3. Amour

4. Zero Dark Thirty

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

85th Academy Awards Nominees: Best Actress

Jessica Chastain for Zero Dark Thirty

Jennifer Lawrence for Silver Linings Playbook

Emmanuelle Riva for Amour

Quvenzhané Wallis for Beasts of the Southern Wild

Naomi Watts for The Impossible

Have you ever heard the expression “Moveable Feast”?  I have, but only recently.  And it troubles me.  It seems like an extremely unnecessary analogy for “The nature of the thing that we’re talking about changes from time-to-time”.  Why feast?  Is there something about feasts that make them – over any other non-sentient entity – significantly less animate?  Is the idea of a large meal/ old-fashioned chocolate ice cream on a stick being anything but stationary such a mind-blowing concept that it requires its own adage?

Considering the above paragraph, it may surprise you to read that I neither know nor care.  But this year’s Best Actress Oscar race has, indeed, been a moveable feast/pebble/bollard.

Jessica Chastain (Zero Dark Thirty) lead the way early doors.  Her irritating portrayal of Maya, the tunnel-visioned, obstinate, Bin Laden hunter.  But since the Golden Globes, the plaudits have rather dried up as, presumably, voters finally saw the film and realised what a bland and uninvolving performance it is.

Then Jennifer Lawrence (Silver Linings Playbook) seemed to have it in the bag. The fusty old letches of the Academy love fresh-faced, nubile lead actresses and, so it emerged, do the Screen Actors Guild.  And it is a fine performance. Playing an emotionally and mentally unstable young widow, under director David O. Russell she could have cranked this right up to 11 (case in point: Christian Bale in The Fighter for which he won the Oscar). But she shows just the right amount of manic vulnerability, as well as, crucially, sufficient cleavage, which should allow her to take home the statue.

But there has been a groundswell of reverence for Emmanuelle Riva’s (Amour) technical but deeply affecting performance as a deteriorating stroke victim, which lead to last weekend’s rapturously celebrated victory at the Baftas. Despite Riva’s exceptional work, it could have proved for naught without an equally sensational leading man. Jean-Louis Trintignant’s heart-wrenching calm as the barely-coping husband makes Haneke’s work quite so affecting.  Furthermore, after Jean Dujardin’s win last year, I don’t imagine the Academy will rush back to honour another French performer this year.

Quvenzhané Wallis’s recognition as infant Hushpuppy in Beasts of the Southern Wild was perhaps the most surprising, and much has been made of the Hollywood-esque story of her being the youngest ever nominee alongside Riva’s oldest. But while her performance was an enchanting one, there are inherent ethical issues in nominating a 9-year old.

Naomi Watts (The Impossible) makes up the five, impressing her peers with the physical unpleasantness of her role.  Her wince inducing performance is grueling and sensitive, although, like the film itself, does have the propensity to spill over to melodrama.  Already looking forward to 2014’s race, Watts is likely to feature again as her lead in the Princess Di biopic hits screens.

If this year’s selection seems somewhat weak (which, by the way, it does) there was little else on offer to challenge, although there were a lot of raised eyebrows at Marion Cotillard’s omission for Rust and Bone; thought to be a dead cert as the amputee whale-trainer.  Helen Mirren (Hitchcock) is another former winner who looked likely to feature, but her’s was a bombastic show-stealing performance that deserved not to be recognised among the other Birds (splendid Hitchcock/sexist humour there).

Jennifer Lawrence in Silver Linings Playbook

I expect the Academy to make the right play and throw J-Law a (winter’s) bone at her second attempt.

What should win: Jennifer Lawrence

What will win: Jennifer Lawrence