For Your Consideration: Interstellar

It may seem like a bit of stretch that, even before Interstellar, Christopher Nolan has six directing credits in IMDB’s top 110 (The Prestige, you’ll be amused to discover, is apparently the 51st best film ever made). Even though half of those were chalked up by a single bat, a new Nolan simply can’t be ignored – neither by IMDB fanboys or the Academy.

Interstellar (2014)

To hear that Interstellar is an epic-lengthed philosophical, inter-deminesional science-fiction flick set, for the most part, in space, is to know that it is an obvious fit into the genre that Nolan seems to have single-handedly invented – the arthouse blockbuster.

In this one – surprisingly only his ninth film – he imagines a not-too-distant-future earth on its last legs. Wheat and other crops are a thing of the past, having been smote by the same dustbowls that also ravage young lungs. A concern on two fronts for Coop (Hollywood’s man of the moment, Matty Mac), a farmer and single father to two teenagers.

He also used to be a hotshot military pilot and so the obvious choice to man a spaceship (I said obvious, alright) as part of a NASA expedition to find a new habitat for mankind. If GCSE astronomy taught us anything, it’s that there are no such planets anywhere near our patch of the galaxy. But luckily, as you’ll recall from GCSE quantum physics, we can always find the nearest wormhole and dive through that to hopefully find a conveniently located human-friendly planet in the neighbouring dimension.

BAFTArgo

…and then Argo won another major pre-Oscars award.  Yea…I know.  Plus, Ben Affleck won Best Director.  Yes, I know he’s not nominated in that category at the Academy Awards.  I know, nuts isn’t it.  Actually no, you’re wrong…just because Argo won at the PGA Awards, Golden Globes and Baftas, that doesn’t make it a dead cert for the Oscar.  Aha, wrong again…both The Aviator and Brokeback Mountain did the same clean sweep before getting bettered by Million Dollar Baby and Crash respectively.   Yes, I know Crash is one of the most undeserving films ever to win Best Picture, but the fact remains… But yea, I basically agree that Argo will take some stopping now.  Erm…Lincoln maybe?  Or Life of Pi at a real stretch.  Yea, I reckon Argo will take it too.  Indeed.  Anyway, as I was saying, I’d like one pepperoni deep-pan, a small Hawaiian thin and crispy and two portions of garlic bread.  Oh, and coleslaw.  See you in 30 minutes.  Great.

The gentlemen were duly rewarded for winning the ‘Three identical looking men’ contest (Credit: Stuart Wilson/Getty)

As well as Argo, Daniel Day-Lewis and Anne Hathaway last night continued their relentless stomp towards inevitable Oscar glory.  But Emmanuelle Riva threw a French shaped spanner in the Best Actress works (that isn’t a euphemism, walking off with the shiny-metal-face-mask-thing.  I say walking off, she couldn’t actually be arsed to turn up to a free jolly to London town on Haneke.  But her win left Jessica Chastain and Jennifer Lawrence looking as forlorn as Jean-Louis Trintignant in Armour.

The Best Actress award will go down to the wire, with all three now having scooped big prizes.  While Christoph Waltz took another sinister step towards his second Best Supporting Actor statue.  In the category exclusively populated by former winners, Waltz now has all the momentum and will no doubt be penning another (Tarantino gush-fest) acceptance speech ready for the 24th.

Good old Baftas…

All SAG Jazz (and some stuff about the PGA Awards an’ all)

Phew.  The Oscar race didn’t half just het up.

In fact, it’s now even hotter than Jennifer Lawrence at the 2011 Oscars ceremony.  Yes indeed sir…that hot.

It was respectively the Producers Guild of America (PGA) and Screen Actors Guild (SAG) Awards, you see; a couple more cracks on the winding, uneven red path to the front door of the Dolby Theatre.

And talking of Miss Lawrence, as I was so pruriently above, she done a big win.  With the oldie, the youngie and the othie oney seemingly making up the numbers for the Academy’s Best Actress nominations, it seems as though its a one-on-one scrap between Lawrence and Chastain (who picked up the the Best Actress in a Drama Golden Globe) for the title.  And, if you’ll allow just a tad more prurience, I would suggest that the only fair way to decide is by making them have a “kiss-off”.  Basically it’s where they have to kiss either (a) eachother; or (b) me, until one or both of them is naked.  True, it’s a complex and cerebral contest, but it’s truly the only just way of deciding who should win the Oscar that my dreams have so far come up with.

Insert joke about Jennifer Lawrence ‘sagging’ here:    [                                                            ] (Credit: PA Images / Chris Pizzello / AP)

Daniel Day-Lewis continued his domination of the Best Actor category, for his portrayal of Honest Abe.  As if this wasn’t already sewn up enough, the SAGs have nailed the  category precisely for the last 9 years.   And even then they rewarded the more deserving candidate, Johnny Depp in Pirates of the Carribean over Sean Penn in Mystic River.

If there’s a dead cert to match D.D-L, it’s young A.H.  Hathaway came away with the Best Supporting Actress honour for her universally accepted breathtaking gadabout in Les Mis.  If she’s been dreaming a dream about winning an Oscar, it’s bound to come true in just under a month.

The most open acting category is the set of five past winners that adorn the Best Supporting Actor cabinet.  Christoph Waltz, who unexpectedly picked up the Golden Globe, was not even nominated at the SAGs.  Leaving the four Oscar nominees (plus Javier Bardem) to indulge in some shiny stuff.  Tommy Lee Jones, for his role in Lincoln, past the finishing line first.  But I’d venture that on the night, Bobby De Niro, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Alan Arkin will all have jacket pockets bulging with pre-prepared acceptance speeches.

The category puts me in mind of the battle for the Best Supporting Actress Oscar in 2008 when Ruby Dee (American Gangster), Cate Blanchett (I’m Not There) and Amy Ryan (Gone Baby Gone) each picked up awards before Tilda Swinton beat them all for her role in Michael Clayton.  This will be the one category that will retain some tension as we approach 24th February.

But this year’s Best Picture race is equally unpredictable.  With Tom Hooper and Kathryn Bigelow missing out for Best Director nods for Les Mis and Zero Dark Thirty respectively, the previously touted favourites seemed to be out of the running for the big prize.

Ben Affleck’s Argo also appeared to be on the casualty list.  Only for it to hit back with a trio of big wins at the Golden Globes, SAGs and PGA Awards.  Although it would be highly unusual for a film to win Best Picture without having also earned the Best Director nomination (only Driving Miss Daisy has achieved it in the last 30 years), one can’t ignore the momentum that it has built over the last few weeks.

Insert joke about Ben Affleck ‘PGAing’ here: [                                 ]. Actually, do you know what, forget that…

I still think that it will take some to beat Spielberg’s latest opus Lincoln, but the voters appear to now be telling Affleck’s flick to Argo-forget-about-the-Best-Director-snub-we’re-all-friends-here-Ben.