VMA Video of the Year Rundown: 1984

My new series in which I go through the nominees for the MTV Video Music Award for Video of the Year in each and every year. Enjoy and let me know what you think in the comments!

Overall: Generally, with the first year of any awards show, the nominators try to pick nominees that will make a statement and pave the way for future ceremonies. From the five nominees here, you can see the VMA going for the types it will love the most in future years: the innovator ("Rockit"), the epic ("Thriller"), the comic relief ("You Might Think"), the deadly serious ("Every Breath You Take") and the bouncy breakthrough ("Girls Just Want to Have Fun"). My only source of puzzlement is the choice of winner; "You Might Think" is decent enough and would be an acceptable winner in most other years, but not in a year with both "Rockit" and "Thriller." If you need an Oscar equivalent, the win for The Cars would be the same as if the slightly above-average Dark Victory had beaten both Gone With the Wind and Stagecoach in 1939.

The Best of the Nominees:
Herbie Hancock "Rockit" # # # # #
Directed by Godley & Creme
One of the many great things about the early days of MTV is that, through interesting and innovative music videos that they chose to show, they brought attention to songs that their teenage audience never would have sought on their own and actually made them cool. Herbie Hancock's "Rockit" is one of those videos and, somewhat surprisingly, its still an exciting and visionary video that shames many modern videos' lack of originality. "Rockit" is disturbing and scary in the same way that Metropolis' way too ahead of its time vision of a futuristic utopia gone wrong creeps me out but it also manages to effectively combine the surrealism and commercialis of the early scenes of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. The success of this video and its nomination here was visual proof that in such a short time, the music video was starting to bloom into something more mature than ever thought possible.
(Watch here)

The Rest (in order):
Michael Jackson "Thriller" # # # # #
Directed by John Landis
Is "Thriller" the greatest music video ever made? Three years ago, I probably would have enthusiastically said yes; now, I'm not so sure. I will give it that, along with "Rockit," "Thriller" pushed the music video forward ten years and made it acceptable as an artform (much like The Birth of a Nation proved that movies could be more than Keystone Cops shorts). But what do you say about the music video in which the music comes in second to the story? There has to be some kind of balance, otherwise we're just watching an above average short film with a couple of musical breaks. I would argue that "Billie Jean," although smaller in scale, is the better video since it is both iconic (the dancing, the light up squares) and music-focused. Still, these are minor squibbles for such an innovative and technically superior video as "Thriller" was compared to most of its competition of the time- and that dance sequence looks just as fresh 24 years later as it did back then (even after the countless imitations we've been subjected to over the years).
(Watch here)

Cyndi Lauper "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" # # # # #
Directed by Edd Griles
I've gone back and forth on this video so many times that I'm not even sure what I think anymore. Technically, the video is nothing special and I suspect that even by 1984 standards people had seen this type of video more than once. What "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" has on its side is the one-woman show that is Cyndi Lauper and an infinite amount of personality. The early shot of Cyndi she-bopping along the street with her crazy red hair and bouncy dress is almost like a battle cry for Girl Power. Combined with Madonna's own emergence in the very same year, Lauper's achievement with both this video and the eventual nomination proved that the women of the MTV generation were ready to be heard. Interestingly enough, this was the only female Video of the Year nominee until Madonna's "Like a Prayer" in 1989 (and there wouldn't be a winner until a year after that with Sinead O'Connor's "Nothing Compares 2 U").
(Watch here)

The Police "Every Breath You Take" # # # # #
Directed by Godley & Creme
I love the choice to shoot this music video in black and white and parts of the video-- most notably, the shot where Sting looks directly into the camera-- play really well into the creepy stalker aspects of the song (which most people probably didn't realize until they saw this video). Looking at it now, however, I just wish there was more to excited about. The clip is deceptively simple; the directors, Godley & Creme, are magicians at using the black and white cinematography to cover up the fact that absolutely nothing happens in this video. The most movement we get is the aforementioned turn towards the camera by Sting, which is actually kind of annoying since the switch between lights is a touch too obvious. "Every Breath You Take" is on its way to becoming a great video; it just needed a tad bit more thought about its intentions.
(Watch here)

The Cars "You Might Think" # # # # #
Directed by Alex Weil
It would be easy to make fun of the special effects in this video since, by 2008's standard, they are pretty laughable and too cartoonish to be taken seriously. I wasn't so much negatively affected by that (it was 1984 for Christ's sake- the computer as we know it was just starting to take form) as I was by the fact that, overall, the video is just kinda lame. The same one joke keeps getting repeated over and over again (Oh, look, Ric Ocasek just popped up in her tube of lipstick! Now, he's in her prom photo! That's hilarious!) and each time we're supposed to pretend like it's a whole new gag. And tell me I wasn't the only one who wanted to slap the girl in this video. I realize that the video is hokey by nature, but her reactions (or, should I say, overreactions) were mindless and completely took me out of the song and video. With a chance to honor two of the most important videos of the early 80's, it's so MTV to go with the one that probably felt outdated just a couple of years later.
(Watch here)

A New Series!...The Question is, Will It Stick?

Hey everyone, sorry about my absence over the long weekend. On Saturday I moved into my dorm and I couldn't get my internet working until tonight, which was a fucking nightmare to get fixed. Ugh, sometimes I hate technology. But I'm back and ready to get back to blogging.

Which brings me to this post. I had so much fun skewering this year's nominees for Video of the Year at the MTV VMA's this Sunday that I thought it might be interesting to go back in time and discuss the nominees for every year. It's not exactly a novel concept, but I love music and the music video is just an extension of the movies so it should be tons of fun. I feel it's appropriate to start at the beginning- 1984, to be exact.

The Nominees:
The Cars "You Might Think"
Herbie Hancock "Rockit"
Michael Jackson "Thriller"
Cyndi Lauper "Girls Just Want to Have Fun"
The Police "Every Breath You Take"

The only thing I need is a name for the series. Anyone have any ideas (they have to be better than mine)?

Random Top 10: Films I'm So Excited for This Fall I'm Pissing My Pants in Anticipation

As I was reminded by my most recent copy of Entertainment Weekly, the fall season is quickly approaching so that means four blissful months of movies made for adults and not silly teenage fanboys. Looking through the magazine (which features Harry Potter on the cover- ugh, I'm so over it- just before their announcement of their release date change) I got really excited about all of the wonderful films coming out that I wanted to share with you the ten that I'm most excited about.

Runner-Ups: Oliver Stone is hit or miss, so lets hope W., his attack on Bush, is more Nixon and less Alexander...Mike Leigh is a fantastic director and I bet he'll do wonders with Sally Hawkins in Happy-Go-Lucky...The poster may be complete shit, but the trailer for Lakeview Terrace looks like it could be a return to form for Samuel L. Jackson (plus, Patrick spends a lot of time without a shirt on)

10.

Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist
Director: Peter Sollett Starring: Michael Cera, Kat Dennings
Release Date: 10/3
This won't win any Oscars or anything, but Cera and Dennings are two gifted young comedians and have the talent to make this somewhat overused premise work.

9.

Miracle at St. Anna
Director: Spike Lee Starring: Derek Luke, Laz Alonso, Benson Miller
Release Date: 9/26
Spike Lee is always fascinating, even when he goes off the rails, so Miracle at St. Anna should be a good show, if nothing else. The WWII storyline bores me slightly but the trailer gave me hope that this one could be amazing.

8.

The Brothers Bloom
Director: Rian Johnson Starring: Mark Ruffalo, Adrien Brody, Rachel Weisz, Rinko Kikuchi
Release Date: 10/3
I wasn't really that excited for The Brothers Bloom until I saw the trailer and now I can't wait. It looks like a lot of fun, plus, in what other movie can you see Rinko Kikuchi- as a character named Bang Bang no less- blow a bunch of shit up?

7.

Revolutionary Road
Director: Sam Mendes Starring: Kate Winslet, Leonardo DiCaprio, Kathy Bates
Release Date: 12/26
As if it hasn't been said enough, my main reason for wanting to see this is because KATE AND LEO ARE REUNITED!

6.

Burn After Reading
Director: Joel and Ethan Coen Starring: Frances McDormand, Tilda Swinton, George Clooney, Brad Pitt, John Malkovich
Release Date: 9/12
I love the Coen Brothers in full-on anarchy mode and the all-star chemistry only adds to my curiousity. Plus, I laugh all the way through that trailer everytime I see it.

5.

Rachel Getting Married
Director: Jonathan Demme Starring: Anne Hathaway, Debra Winger
Release Date: 10/3
Like The Brothers Bloom, I wasn't that excited until I saw the trailer and saw that this film is right up my alley. Anne Hathaway, steadily working her way up the Hollywood foodchain, looks like she has a legitimate chance at an Oscar nomination for her dark, deadpan work.

4.

Milk
Director: Gus Van Sant Starring: Sean Penn, James Franco, Josh Brolin, Emile Hirsch, Diego Luna
Release Date: 11/26
What kind of gay man would I be if I didn't place this one on my list? I'm not a huge Van Sant fan (too avant garde for my taste usually) but he has his moments and the material here is can't miss.

3.

High School Musical 3: Senior Year
Director: Kenny Ortega Starring: La Tisdale, Zac Efron, Vanessa Anne Hudgens
Release Date: 10/24
The serious film lover in me doesn't want to be so excited for this damn film that I already know is going to suck, but the teenage girl in me is screaming, "OMG, only two months left until I can swoon over Zac Efron on the big screen again!" Add to that the fact that we'll see this year's Best Supporting Actress Oscar winner here from Miss Ashley Tisdale and HSM3 earns its place this high on my list.

2.

Blindness
Director: Fernando Meirelles Starring: Julianne Moore, Mark Ruffalo, Danny Glover, Gael Garcia Bernal, Sandra Oh
Release Date: 9/26
A dark, fantastic novel. The most brilliant, underrated director of the past ten years. One of our premier actresses with a juicy character that, if done right, should redeem the past few years of complete shit she's done. An eclectic and exciting supporting cast. Everything's lining up for Blindness to be one of the best films of the year-- let's just hope it fulfills that promise.

1.

Australia
Director: Baz Luhrmann Starring: Nicole Kidman, Hugh Jackman
Release Date: 11/14 11/26
With every publicity still that's released containing Nicole Kidman looking fabulous and Hugh Jackman looking dashing and romantic, I get even giddier about this film. Add to that the sublimely talented director Baz Luhrmann, who makes every film of his an event, and you've got a potent combination in my eyes. I'm a little pissed I now I have to wait an additional 12 days to see Australia, but if that means the film will get the special attention it deserves than I will patiently wait.

Jean-Pierre Léaud Has a Lesson to Teach

I'm on my way out to see Pineapple Express with my brother in a few minutes, so I thought I would share with you this video I found late last night on Youtube. It's a clip from Jean-Luc Godard's 1967 film La Chinoise and it features Jean-Pierre Léaud and his crazy-ass take on the Vietnam War with different pairs of sunglasses and a woman being attacked by toy airplanes. I've never seen the film (I really want to now) but this scene was so bête et très amusante that I just had to share it with you (and it doesn't hurt that Léaud is there either).

Come On, Just Do It Already!

In my never ending quest to see true love rule the day, let me just say that La Tisdale and Zac Efron both need to dump their boring significant others and start dating each other. Ignore the fact that Zac's hair is a bit too long and he looks like a fucking lumberjack in the shirt, these two are always so adorable together and would make one hell of a power couple.

In other news, La Tisdale-- with her fab hair (doesn't she look good as a brunette?), sexy outfit and runway-ready pose-- looks especially fierce in this photo. Do you know what would look even better in this photo, though?

Mmmhmm, much better.

(Pictures via Just Jared)

A Somewhat Gratuitous Thought on Samuel Fuller's Masterpiece Pickup on South Street

Richard Widmark, you can pick my pockets and unknowingly steal my communist microfilm anytime.

Ignoring my huge infatuation with the tough, take no prisoners Richard Widmark after this and Kiss of Death (in which he pushes a cripple down a flight of stairs!), Pickup on South Street is a fantastic film. It's one of those films that you don't quite expect to be so amazing, but at the end all your left thinking is "Damn, this film is a masterpiece!" Widmark was excellent as the sneering anti-hero who plays both the police and the communists against each other for more money. Jean Peters, as the female lead, was unexpectedly good since the females in these types of movies tend to be one dimensional, we-need-a-good-looker-here roles. Then, of course, there's Thelma Ritter as the world-wise purveyor of information about the two-bit thieves who operate in her neighborhood. Not only is Moe the greatest, most in-depth character Ritter was every given to work with but she also does some of the best acting of her career (especially in her final scene, a real tearjerker it is). A

I Was Never Very Good at Mosaics

I found this interesting little meme floating around at Shiny Happy Blog and Valley Dreamin' and I thought it would be fun to do it myself. Here are the instructions

1. Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr Search.
2. Using only the first page, pick an image.
3. Copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into fd’s mosaic maker.

And now for the question and answer session.

1. What is your first name? James
2. What is your favourite food? Almond Boneless Chicken
3. What high school did you go to? Yale High School
4. What is your favorite color? Pink
5. Who is your celebrity crush? Jake Gyllenhaal
6. Favorite drink? Cherry Coke
7. Dream vacation? Paris
8. Favorite dessert? Chocolate Cheesecake
9. What do you want to be when you grow up? An accountant
10. What do you love most in life? Movies
11. One word to describe you. Diva
12. Your Flickr name. Don't have one so Dame James will have to do

I love how most of these pictures are the most random things ever. What does that picture from WWII have to do with Cherry Coke? And what about that crazy homeless woman for accountant? There's no way in hell she needs someone to take care of her finances. Anyway, that was quite fun and the picture sure is pretty.

2008 MTV VMA Nominees for Video of the Year: I Feel Sorry for Today's Teens

After an online voting session lasting a couple of weeks, the nominees for this year's Video of the Year award at the 2008 MTV Video Music Awards were announced recently. In response to this paltry shortlist, I mourned the state of the music video. These were seriously the five best videos of the year? I realize that by opening up the voting to the general public is the cause of this travesty, but they can't be blamed entirely. Where are the Missy Elliott or Outkast videos which are always innovative? Where's Pink and the videos from M!ssundaztood or another White Stripes' "Fell in Love With a Girl"? Hell, where are the Eminem videos that, repetitive as they are, were always funny and relentless in their skewering of the pop culture of the time? Let's go through these nominees and then I'll let you know who I think should have been nominated.

Chris Brown "Forever"
I've never understood the appeal of Chris Brown and this video does nothing for me. The dancing is nice, but the CGI effects are as corny and ugly looking as that black shit in Madonna's "4 Minutes" video. I've certainly seen worse videos than "Forever"; I just wish there was something more here to get excited about.


Jonas Brothers "Burnin' Up"
The concept behind the Jonas Brothers' "Burnin' Up" is so corny and so overdone (it was done much better in the Beastie Boys' "Sabatage") that I can hardly sit through it. Add to that the saccharine lyrics and whiny lead vocals and I'm ready to throw my computer through the window. I guess this nomination is the obligatory teen girl Backstreet Boys/*NSYNC nomination that we saw between 1999 and 2002 (Can anyone truly say that "I Want It That Way" was one of the best videos of 1999 except for the thousands of girls who loved it?).


Pussycat Dolls "When I Grow Up"
I have mixed feelings about this song: the opening is truly epic, but that chorus is complete and utter garbage ("When I grow up, I wanna have boobies." Are you fucking kidding me?). The video is a vast improvement over the song, I'll give it that, and the dancing is technically amazing. In comparison with "Buttons" however, their other video in which they stood around strutting and dancing, it's minor PCD.

Britney Spears "Piece of Me" (watch here)
I couldn't embed the video here, so head on over to Youtube to check it out. I love the song and am glad people are all for her comeback as much as I am. It's just that after "...Baby One More Time," "Oops! I Did It Again," "I'm a Slave 4 U," and "Toxic," all iconic music videos in their own ways, it would be a shame if she won for this personality-free clip. Britney was still in the midst of her breakdown when she shot this, so there's very little dancing to speak of and she spends most of the time just standing around, pushing her hair behind her ear. With such an angry and indicting song against the paparazzi, the video is surprisingly timid.


The Ting Tings "Shut Up and Let Me Go"
Technically, it's the most creative of the five and the one I would want to watch more than a couple of times. But it's no "Fell in Love With a Girl" and the song gets kinda annoying after awhile.

Will Win: I'm going to go with "Piece of Me" simply because Britney's never won a VMA in her long career and MTV will want to make amends for last year's performance.
Should Win: If it was by song, "Piece of Me" by a long mile. However, since it's for the complete video, I guess I'll go with "Shut Up and Let Me Go" for its interesting visual choices.

My Picks for Video of the Year:


Danity Kane "Damaged"


Duffy "Warwick Avenue"


Girls Aloud "Sexy! No No No..."


Janet Jackson "Feedback"


Rihanna "Disturbia"


Sneaky Sound System "Kansas City"

To me, these five nominees have both interesting videos and hot songs. It may seem like the Girls Aloud and Danity Kane videos are nothing more than PCD's "When I Grow Up" video, but I think the songs are a lot better and the dancing/posing is 100 times more original. Plus, the Danity Kane video has cheesy CGI effects yet doesn't treat them as anything more than eye candy (rather than force us to take them seriously). "Disturbia" is seriously one of the most fucked up videos I've ever seen and I love it. Janet's "Feedback" gets its spot solely for it being the strangest video I've seen all year. Nothing about it makes sense individually (what the hell is with that ball of light?) but all together, it reaches visual harmony. Originally, I had forgotten about Sneaky Sound System's Team America-inspired "Kansas City" clip but when I finally remembered what a fantastic video it is I knew I just had to add it in. And, finally, Duffy's "Warwick Avenue" video does nothing but focus on her face, but what a lovely and expressive face it is.

My favorite: Strangely enough, I'm going to go with "Feedback" for being the craziest non-Missy Elliott video ever.

Movies About Movies Blog-a-thon: The Opening Scene of Day for Night

Movies about the filmmaking process is one of my favorite subgenres of film. Even when they are bad, I'm always fascinated by the process of getting a story filmed and all the things that can get fucked up between the sheet and the celluloid. I love the bitterness of Sunset Boulevard and its portrayal of the Hollywood Dream gone terribly wrong; Singin' in the Rain showed just how awkward the conversion to talkies were and poked fun at the stiffness of the early ones; Sullivan's Travels set out to prove that comedies are just as important to audiences as serious, high-minded drama; Sherlock, Jr. showed that, even by 1924, people were living vicariously through film. The film I chose to talk about, however, is basically a love letter to the filmmaking process and how even when it kicks you in the ass, you would do anything for it: François Truffaut's Day for Night.

There are so many layers and so many things that can be discussed from this film, that I decided to make it easy on myself and discuss one small section of Day for Night. A nearly impossible task, mind you, but I've narrowed it down to the brilliant opening sequence. It is very short, only about a minute or so, but it comments on so much about the nature of film and sets up the rest of Day for Night and the rest of its film-within-a-film Meet Pamela.

The film's opening credits. I love how the sound waves are shown in these frames as a way to prove that Truffaut is the ultimate film nerd (even more so than Tarantino and Kevin Smith) and will stop at nothing to immerse us into what's rattling around in his brilliant mind.

The first shot. Day for Night starts off with a long take of a bunch of random people doing ordinary, everyday things in some random town. It's quite a nice shot and everything, but what exactly is Truffaut doing? This is supposed to be a film about the movies, not about nameless people living a normal life. The first 45 seconds leave you confused until....

...you breathe a sigh of relief because you finally recognize someone: Jean-Pierre Léaud! Now that we've seen our star, Day for Night is finally going to get off the ground and go on with the story. Or so we think. The camera follows Léaud for a few seconds but then drops him to go back to capturing the crowd for awhile longer. Then we get our first cut...

Léaud is back, now standing head to head with some guy we don't know the identity of. No words are spoken between them. Then...

SLAP! And, in sync, with the sound cue from Léaud's slap, we cut to...

Truffaut himself yelling "Cut!" In case you're as confused as I was during the first time I saw Day for Night, the film immediately cuts to....

A zoom out from the previous scene showing us that everything shown to us previously was all only a movie. It's the perfect sort of reality-bending trick than can only work in the movies.

Truffaut's point in using this as his opening is to lull the audience into a false sense of reality. From the opening shot, we think we're going to be watching one type of movie and just as we're starting to put things together and try to understand what's being presented, it's all being pulled out from underneath us with a little "gotcha!" from Truffaut.

I think it's also interesting that this opening is a further example of Truffaut's thesis that the cinema is more important than life. In real life, this scene would be nothing special, something we see every day on the street. But, in the context of Day for Night, it's immensely more fascinating because we are trying to put all of these clues together to try to make some kind of story out of the visuals. And, admit it, who doesn't find the moments after Truffaut yells "Cut," when he shows what is going on behind the scenes and the extraordinary amount of work it takes to make such an innocuous scene an exhilarating rush of deeply involving?

I could go on and on for days intellectualizing Day for Night, but I think it's quite wise to stop right here. If you haven't seen this gem of a movie, what the hell are you waiting for? Go out and see it so we can discuss it.

For other entries into Goatdog's Movie about Movies Blog-a-thon, head over here to the headquarters and check them out. I haven't read them all yet, but the ones I have clicked on have all been fascinating and quite diverse. Enjoy!

More Zac Efron Pics from Me and Orson Welles

Just Jared has a couple of shots from Zac Efron's first attempt at serious filmmaking Me and Orson Welles, which is set to debut at the Toronto Film Festival in a couple of weeks. Who knows if Zac Efron will be any good in this film, but I must say that I love seeing him classy in his period clothes and hair.

Oscar Predictions: August 2008

I haven't updated my original predictions on here since March. Yikes! A lot has changed since then so let's get started.

Best Picture
Australia
Changeling
Frost/Nixon
Milk
Revolutionary Road

Changeling probably has the most buzz right now (probably because it's the only one people have had the chance to see, even if it was only at Cannes), but just wait until the release of Luhrmann's Australia and hopefully that will be the film everyone will be talking about. Frost/Nixon and Milk are the obligatory biopic nominees (although Milk actually looks to like a fascinating film) and Revolutionary Road will have the undeniable PR power from the reteaming of Titanic lovebirds DiCaprio and Winslet.

Best Actor
Benicio Del Toro, Che
Leonardo DiCaprio, Revolutionary Road (or Body of Lies)
Frank Langella, Frost/Nixon
Viggo Mortensen, The Road
Sean Penn, Milk

I'm already slightly bored with this category and am hoping for some new and unlikely contenders to emerge in the next couple of months. Del Toro has the Cannes win in his corner, but who knows if his film will even get released this year. Langella and Penn are the biopic subjects in two films I think will make the Top 5, so they're in as of right now. DiCaprio, just like in 2006, could go either way with his two films being released this year: will Oscar rather see him suffering in an unhappy marriage or looking for an Al Qadea leader in Jordan? Mortensen has a powerful Cormac McCarthy novel in his corner (I've only heard amazing things about the book...maybe I should pick it up soon) so that's enough for me at this early stage.

Best Actress
Anne Hathaway, Rachel Getting Married
Nicole Kidman, Australia
Julianne Moore, Blindness
Meryl Streep, Doubt
Kate Winslet, Revolutionary Road

I still haven't given up on Moore yet, no matter how unlikely her nomination is seeming at this point. Maybe she (and the film) gain some more buzz once it is released in September. Kidman, Streep and Winslet almost seem too perfect at this point, but until I find some other more likely contenders, they're staying in. Hathaway sneaks after the amazingness that was the first trailer for Rachel Getting Married. Will she get the attention she should have gotten three years ago for Brokeback Mountain?

Best Supporting Actor
Josh Brolin, Milk
Robert Downey, Jr., The Soloist
Heath Ledger, The Dark Knight
Michael Sheen, Frost/Nixon
Kodi Smit-McPhee, The Road

At this point, Ledger is crushing the competition, so I'm curious to see if his buzz will last all the way until January or if it was subside as we move farther and farther away from The Dark Knight's dominance over our lives. Downey has gotten great reviews for both Iron Man and Tropic Thunder so I suspect that Oscar will top-off his spectacular comeback year with a nomination for his baitiest project, The Soloist. The film sounds completely shitty and almost designed solely for awards consdieration, but I doubt at this point that Oscar will go with both a Ben Stiller comedy and a comic book movie in its lineup. Brolin and Sheen still seem like good choices at this point so I'll stick with them. Oscar isn't as fond of male child actors as they are of females (I can only think of Jackie Cooper, Justin Henry and Haley Joel Osment getting nominations at such a young age, correct me if I'm wrong) so I'm a bit nervous for Smit-McPhee, but getting a nomination seems feasible at this point.

Best Supporting Actress
Penelope Cruz, Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Viola Davis, Doubt
Taraji P. Henson, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Samantha Morton, Synecdoche, New York
Ashley Tisdale, High School Musical 3: Senior Year

My craziest category as of right now. Cruz's film has just opened and she's been getting tons of press for her performance. Oscar has shown that they already love her so that's one less hurdle to overcome. Davis apparently has the "big" supporting role in Doubt; if the film is any good and she gets good press, add her name to the shortlist. I figure one of the multitude of supporting women in Synecdoche, New York has to get a nom and I'm just guessing Samantha Morton at this point. She can be fun when she wants to be, right? I don't know anything about Henson's role in Benjamin Button, but I think she's fabulous and if the film's big she could go all the way. I know it may seem like wishful thinking but wouldn't it be a wonderful world to live in if La Tisdale got an Oscar nomination for HSM3? Stupider (and sillier) films have been nominated and in the second one La Tisdale was so in tune with her character that she became the sole focal point of the movie.

Best Director
Clint Eastwood, Changeling
David Fincher, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Spike Lee, Miracle at St. Anna
Baz Luhrmann, Australia
Gus Van Sant, Milk

Eastwood, Luhrmann and Van Sant are carry overs from the Best Picture race and I'm guessing there will be two "lone director" spots this year. Fincher hasn't been embraced by Oscar yet, but I think this year will be his year. Speaking of never being embraced by Oscar, Lee, 20+ years into his career, hasn't received a single Best Director nomination. Hopefully Oscar will right this wrong and give him a nom for his WWII drama (a favorite subgenre of Oscar) Miracle at St. Anna.

Best Original Screenplay
Woody Allen, Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Charlie Kaufman, Synecdoche, New York
Baz Luhrmann, Stuart Beattie, Australia
J. Michael Straczytnski, Changeling
Stanley Weiser, W.

Best Adapted Screenplay
William Monahan, Steve Zaillian, Body of Lies
Peter Morgan, Frost/Nixon
Joe Penhall, The Road
Eric Roth, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
John Patrick Shanley, Doubt

The Greatest Loudest Love Story Ever Told

Um...well, that sure was different.

After revealing my Shakespeare prejudice and proclaiming my love for Zeffirelli's 1968 version of Romeo and Juliet a couple of weeks ago, I was instructed in the comments to check out Luhrmann's 1996 version before making a definitive decision. I just watched it tonight and I must say that I'm still backing the Zeffirelli version whole-heartedly. Don't get me wrong, Luhrmann's vision and execution is impeccable and that opening scene-- a nearly post-apocalyptic version of a violence-torn city due to a grand feud between two wealthy families-- sucks you in so fast you almost have no idea what hits you.

My biggest problem was that everything in William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet was so fucking loud. I could kinda deal with the loud sound effects because, in context, they made sense with Luhrmann's vision. But when all of the actors are just shouting their lines so much that you can hardly make sense of what they are saying, it begins to become sort of a problem. And let me just add something about the acting: I never thought I'd say this but sometimes Shakespeare should be left to the theatre experts. John Leguizamo had the potential to be great, but he spoke every damn line through a clenched jaw that I suppose was trying to show how badass he was but instead made it impossible to understand the words coming out of his mouth. Of the star crossed lovers, DiCaprio was better, but not by a wide margin. He was at least trying to get into the character and make the material seem fresh. Danes, on the other hand, played Juliet like just another random lovestruck teenager in some 90's teen romance instead of a first-class auteur's modern vision of one of the most recognizable love stories of all time.

This brings me to another point. Watching this in 2008, as a child of the late 90's/early 2000's, the film already feels slightly dated. From the cheesy clothes and haircuts (which are very much of their time), to the romance (it didn't feel tragic enough to the point where they'd do anything for each other and I didn't feel any connection between DiCaprio and Dances and sort of wished they had cast someone like Kate Winslet to completely ignite the screen with chemistry) and the general debauchery and antics of all of the supporting cast which felt like it should belong in some fucked up hybrid of She's All That and Boyz 'N the Hood, everything felt completely 90's and almost kitschy. It will be interesting to see how this film fairs in 20 years: will people still love it or will it be a relic?

I know this may sound like I hated this film, but, truly, I thought it was a very jarring and provoking experience (in a good way). It was exactly what I needed to see that not all Shakespeare adaptations need to be excessively theatrical and can be used to express an unique point of view. I sincerely think that this film needs to be shown as part of Shakespeare units in high schools to prove that his works are still relevant 400 years later. Well, look at that...maybe Luhrmann's converted me after all. B

Smart People?

They should have called this movie Horribly Awful People Whom I Never Want to Get Within a 10 Mile Radius Of, Let Alone Have a Short, Pretentious Conversation With. I must say that I did enjoy Ellen Page, in a major reversal from her Juno character, and the script had the potential to be great. Ugh. C-

Everything's Coming Up Links

Both The Cellar Door and Valley Dreamin' announce their Top 10 films from 2007. Their varied and carefully chosen lists are well worth a look so who cares if they are a few months behind?

Stale Popcorn debuts the new Sugababes single "Girls." I'm in love already. Seriously, if you live in America and haven't heard of Sugababes, check them out right now.

PUXZKKX also thinks Katy Perry should suck it and offers a dozen reasons why. I agree with every single one.

Shiny Happy Blog offers her picks as the sexiest moments on film. It's hard to argue with Y Tu Mama Tambien or Brokeback Mountain. She even has a part two right here that's just as steamy.

Much Ado About Nothing has another entry in his weekly countdown of his favorite films. At #48, he has Martin Scorsese's The Age of Innocence. I've somehow never seen this film despite my admiration for all involved so maybe I should get on that soon.

Sexual Harassment 101

I've somehow managed to go nearly three years without watching North Country (Niki Caro, 2005), the iron miner sexual harassment drama that somehow netted both Charlize Theron and Frances McDormand Oscar nods that year. I must say that I wish I never had to see this film, not just because it's fucking awful (more on that later), but it's seriously one of the most fucked up movies I've ever seen. I'm not denying that what happened to these women was horrific, because it was, but the way it was represented by Caro and screenwriter Michael Seitzman was alternatively hilarious and ridiculously over the top. Some of the scenarios they presented were straight out of an 8th grade health class "sexual harassment is bad, mmkay?" video (Bobby's dialogue when he traps Theron at the top of that iron chute, Theron's first day of work in the women's locker room) while others just left me disgusted at the stupidity. What kind of morons would possibly think it's okay to tip a portapotty while someone's in it so that all that shit and piss gets all over them? I don't care if the film presents these men as the most vile people since Hitler, that scene just doesn't make sense. And don't even get me started about the stupid scene where Pearson tells his lawyer that she was only hired because she was the smartest woman lawyer he knows and then proceeds to berate her for, just like the women in the mines, not having a sense of humor. Are you fucking kidding me? I highly doubt that a CEO executive would ever talk to rudely and disgustingly towards someone who's supposed to help save him from this class action lawsuit. North Country is so fucked up that it doesn't even present one decent man who stands up for these women. There's no way that there wouldn't be one guy who's like, "Wait a minute. This ain't right." Instead, in this fucked up alternate universe, every single man around is just waiting to write "cunt" in shit on the wall or molest every single woman who walks by and then tell her to take it like a man.

The rest of the movie doesn't fair much better. Charlize Theron is given absolutely nothing interesting or original to do with her character and is only given importance by the subject matter. Everything she is given to do has been done before and better in and Norma Rae, Silkwood and Erin Brockovich. Her praise for this film is only proving to Theron that deglamming is the only way people will respect her as an actress. She needs to find a film where she gets to play a sexy, confident woman with all the talent she showed in Monster and then I will be ready to love her. Frances McDormand had the best role in the film-- and also the baitiest-- but it's her other Minnesotian that we will all remember in 15 years (although I did love her line reading of "fuck you" through that voice box). The screenplay is one of the most atrocious pieces of crap I've ever heard (for all of the above reasons and more). I also hated Theron's son and the way he talks about his mother. I couldn't believe that he would call his mother a whore and say that she's only claiming that she was raped to win the lawsuit. I don't care how pissy you are as a teenager and how much you claim to hate the mother who's never done anything justifiably bad to him, you just don't say that to your mother. Just another stupid situation in a completely stupid film. D+