The year 2000 was my first living full-time in Los Angeles, having arrived from Atlanta on December 30, 1999, Y2K hysteria be damned. I got a job working as a projectionist at a theatre while also working as a reader for a small production company, and I immediately noticed something about a large number of people in Hollywood: they hate movies.

I have varied tastes, having argued the merits of gross-out comedy vs. Oscar bait type of movies. Everyone I met in the movie business claimed “Election” was their favorite movie of 1999, and the only person I met who had actually seen “Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo” was Rob Schneider’s agent. And he was lukewarm about it.

Total worldwide box office take for “Election” = $16M ($14.8M Domestic).

Total worldwide box office take for “Deuce Bigalow” = $92M ($65M Domestic).

Not bashing either movie; I love them both. But you can see a discrepancy.

Anyway, the nominees for Best Picture:

“Gladiator” – Saw this at the pre-ArcLight Cinerama Dome and was blown away. Still have to watch it on TNT at least one of the thirty-eight times a month they play it.

“Erin Brockovich” – One of my favorite genres: Movies that suck on paper but are actually really good. I never expected the movie to be as funny as it is. Albert Finney wuz robbed. (more…)

It’s Oscar season, the time of year when oh, so serious films line up for our approval.

That means somber biographies – “J. Edgar,” “The Iron Lady,” and “My Week with Marilyn” – will compete with Steven Spielberg’s “War Horse” and a few other films that practically scream, “Vote for me!”

So where does that leave “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2?”

The eighth and final film in the ridiculously popular franchise hits Blu-ray and DVD shelves this week, a timely reminder that it deserves serious consideration in the biggest Academy Award category, Best Picture.

Normally, popcorn fare is excluded from most Oscar chatter. Even “The Dark Knight,” a film which delighted critics and audiences alike, couldn’t nab a Best Picture nod.

But this season is shaping up to be a particularly weak one for Best Picture contenders.

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A pretty good year with a few movies that I would classify as great. The most popular movies were “Home Alone” and “Ghost,” the first of which inspired three sequels and the latter of which inspired what I still contend is the funniest movie trailer of all time.  The Oscars were particularly competitive and geeks are still mad about the outcome.

The nominees:

Dances With Wolves: I love it, but then my Indian name is Struggles with White Guilt.

Ghost: I distinctly remember thinking, really? Ghost? Really?! I don’t dislike it, but it wasn’t exactly Oscar bait. Maybe that’s a good thing.

Awakenings: Mmmmmm, L Dopa. Yummy, delicious L Dopa.

Goodfellas: Scorsese’s career seemed to build to this and plateau with this. I love some early Scorsese, and I love some later Scorsese. But this is the centerpiece of his career, in my opinion.

The Godfather Part III: Okay. Really? Really?!!! There were about a hundred gangster movies released in 1990, so it was practically unavoidable that two of them would wind up Best Picture Nominees, but seriously?

WHAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN NOMINATED

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A second viewing of “Toy Story 3″ is just as wondrous and entertaining as the first. In my initial review, I declared the Pixar sequel a masterpiece and another look only reinforced that. Pixar might be the brightest the star in the darkening universe of Filmdom today, but what a star. And this is coming from someone who was cold towards animation until “Monsters, Inc.” made me completely forget it was a cartoon and “Ratatouille” blew my mind. Pixar brings joy into my life. Pure, unadulterated joy.

“Toy Story 3″ wasn’t just the best picture of the year, it was the best picture of the year by a long shot. To drop it in the ghetto of Best Animated Feature is not only a disservice to the film itself, but a disservice to Hollywood’s own history — a history it writes itself every year with every Best Picture winner. 

Earlier in the countdown I mentioned that in my opinion only my first choice in this countdown ranked as a picture truly worthy of all that the title Best Picture of the Year should mean, and I meant that. I’m certainly fond of “Winter’s Bone,” “Inception,” “The King’s Speech,” and “The Social Network, but Best Picture worthy? No. To me, a Best Picture winner must tower over more than just a single year’s worth of entries, it must qualify as something as timeless as a Beethoven symphony.

Think about it: Every year literally hundreds of motion pictures are produced by thousands of talented artists putting  everything they have into the greatest art form ever devised. In some cases those individuals pour years of their lives and tens of millions of dollars into a project that will all come down to a single moment of judgment – that first screening when it’s determined whether or not every drop of sweat and blood was all worthwhile.  But above the money and sweat equity, there are hopes and dreams and aspirations poured into every frame and every edit. And out of this incredible symphony of activity and passion, one film will emerge above all the others and that film must be worthy — and not just in comparison to the others.

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My apologies for dropping the ball on this countdown. For a couple of weeks I’ve been just barely holding back the flu and early last week it finally hit, hit with a vengeance, and put me in bed all week — something that hasn’t happened since the early nineties. Thanks to our awesome contributors and their awesome contributions (and Assoc. Editor Alex Marlow), the Big Hollywood plates kept spinning, but the effort required to write anything but quickie posts, much less a proper review, just wasn’t there. My thanks to everyone who chipped in while I was away, and without further ado…

“The King’s Speech“

Of course we all know by now that this was the big winner Oscar night; Picture, Director, Actor, and Screenplay — and deservedly so. What we have here is the perfect “Academy movie,” a look at one man overcoming a handicap — in this case a merciless stutter — which is always prime Oscar bait, especially when it’s pulled off as well as “The King’s Speech.”

Based on real-life events, what really makes the story sing is the relationship between King George VI (a terrific Colin Firth) and commoner Lionel Logue (a splendid Geoffrey Rush), his unorthodox speech therapist. This is essentially a love story between two men who meet under extraordinary circumstances and through a number of ups and downs both in their own personal lives and between each other, grow a real and lasting friendship.

The stakes are high, as well. After his hard partying, Charlie Sheen-ish brother is forced to step down, Firth is unsure of himself when it comes to assuming the throne of England. With Hitler spreading his reign of terror across Europe, Britain needs a king who can help to  rally and inspire its people against seemingly impossible odds. But the stutter makes speaking nearly impossible and is only a symptom, not the real problem. And so if this oddball and somewhat eccentric speech therapist is going to cure his patient’s speech impediment, it will require, in part, turning the King into A King, building the confidence and self-esteem of an insecure man unaware of his own potential.

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The Academy Awards have been a big deal to me for years. I throw a party replete with tons of booze and food and those Oscar pools we hear so much about. This has little to do with the nominees, which I think rarely do a good job of reflecting what actually deserves to win. Instead, it’s that the Oscars are like the Super Bowl for cinephiles, a Sunday-set event that one can throw a party to and revel in love of the medium. 

These are my Oscar predictions for Sunday’s ceremony. I don’t cover all the categories, because it would be disingenuous of me to predict the winner of Best Animated Short Film. 

Best Picture:

The early thunder of “The Social Network,” which took most of the earlier award shows by storm, has given way to a resurgence by “The King’s Speech,” now considered the front-runner. Both excellent films, remarkably differing in style and tone: one a tried-and-true drama about British royalty, the other a slick exploration of the contemporary price of genius and success. Although “The Social Network” is easily the better film and certainly the one that will be re-watched endlessly over the years, “The King’s Speech” shows all the signs of claiming the prize. Still, an upset is possible, but not by any of the other eight nominees, none of which stand a snowball’s chance in hell. 

Prediction: “The King’s Speech” 

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I always try to boil a movie down to its essence once I’ve seen it.  If I can do it according to the principles in Aristotle’s Poetics, then chances are the movie had a theme and it was probably a pretty good movie, as well.  Generally, only crappy movies lack theme.

So I took a look at this year’s Oscar nominees for Best Pictures to determine the overarching theme, as well as guess at the subtext (intended or otherwise).  Sometimes the latter reveals some deeper revelation about society, the filmmaker, or the story that illuminates.

(Regrettably, I did not see The Fighter and The Kids Are All Right)

Black Swan

Moral: The quest for perfection kills.

Those that achieve perfection are sometimes regarded as superhuman, rather than just human.  Nobody’s perfect, as the saying goes.  In one reading of the film’s climax, Nina sacrifices her own life for perfection.

Subtext:  We find our true selves in artistic expression.

What permits Nina to reach perfection is the assimilation of her dark side into her being.  Carl Jung spoke of the Shadow, the part of ourselves that we repress because it represents the baser, more unflattering parts of our personality.   However, it is also the seat for creativity, representing the “true spirit of life as against the arid scholar”.  A pretty perfect description for Nina, if you ask me.  The movie can be read in many different ways, which is why it’s a great choice for Best Picture.  One reading is that this is actually a story of a woman confronting her Shadow, which Jung indicates is the path to fully realizing the Self, the unified conscious and unconscious of a person.  Thus, Nina does not actually die in the end.  Her previous psyche has died — the one that was only half-alive, controlled by her mother, neurotic, and angst-ridden.

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1989 remains a notable year for movies, one in which we learned that you couldn’t cure Mel Gibson’s case of the crazies, and that Kim Basinger weighed a little more than 108 pounds. The world was introduced to at least two filmmakers who would become unlikely mainstream mainstays: a jolly fat man whose wildly imaginative comedic fantasies would redefine a genre, and a sensitive geek who went and made a damn movie about a guy who videotapes women talking about sex.  Finally, it was the year that our angriest black filmmaker achieved mainstream success with a slice of life drama whose climax would have everyone talking and Roger Ebert crying.

None of these movies sniffed the Oscar. The nominees for Best Picture, please…

“Driving Miss Daisy”: Morgan Freeman’s performance approaches greatness, and I’d love to go to bat for a movie filmed and set in Atlanta, but like “Batman,” the movie may have won the Oscar for Best Picture of 1989 but it feels like a relic.

“Dead Poets Society”: Some really great performances, but the ending seems more manipulative the older I get.

“Born on the Fourth of July”: Stunning, great film.  Nolte nails it here.

“My Left Foot”: I know that I really loved this movie when it came out, especially Daniel Day Lewis’ Oscar-winning performance, but I have never felt the desire or need to see it again since.

“Field of Dreams”: A tricky one. The premise is goofy, the movie is corny, but…(continued below)

What Should’ve Been Nominated

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The real fun of the Oscars isn’t the cut-throat competition for the little gold naked man but guessing who will make the biggest idiot of himself. 

The Academy Awards show has a fine tradition of pampered celebrities popping off with something stupid when they hit the stage.  It must be something about TV cameras and the opportunity to make damn fools of themselves before tens of millions of people around the world that the Hollywoodoids find irresistible.  Notice how you never hear any fallout from the “technical awards” ceremony?  You know, the non televised ceremony recognizing the boring technological stuff that actually makes movies possible that is usually held at the Beverly Hills Elks Lodge with hosts Steve Guttenberg, Charo and/or one of the lesser Sweathogs.

Some of the past magic moments are legendary.  Remember back in 1993, when Tim Robbins and his then-gal pal, tranny vomit insanity enthusiast Susan Sarandon, harangued the crowd about the detention of Haitian refugees?  Of course, right after that these stars led the way by opening up the grounds of their mansion to these huddled Haitian masses.

Roberto Benigni engaged in memorably tiresome antics after winning “Best Foreign Language Film of 1997” for the Worst Film of All Time, the insanely appalling Life Is Beautiful.  Life has certainly aged well, and Benigni’s shtick has only gotten fresher, contributing to the runaway freight train of success that his career has become since then. (more…)

It’s safe to say that the contest for the Academy Award’s best picture Oscar was never any deeper than a three horse race: The Hurt Locker, Avatar and Up in the Air were the frontrunners all along. As the weeks and months have progressed, it has become more and more apparent that Jason Reitman’s touching drama about a layoff artist looking for love has dropped off the radar. Two horses have pulled ahead as we head into the straightaway.

And it’s Avatar by a nose! If history is any indication, James Cameron’s eco-action flick will be the big winner at the industry’s annual self-love fest. Three main factors point to the bloated opus taking home the best picture statue.

First off, it’s a box office smash. Now, that doesn’t always translate into gold at the Oscars – see last year’s unconscionable failure to even nominate The Dark Knight, Christopher Nolan’s critically praised film that was, at the time, the second-highest grossing film of all time – but it’s a pretty solid indicator. (more…)

As we say goodbye to the first decade of the new century – and I don’t wanna hear any revisionist bellyaching about the decade not ending until December 2010 – we also say hello to the mainstream media movie critics’ lists of the best movies since 2000.  Like their “hard news” reporting brethren, the MSM’s critics’ consensus view of what’s good constitutes a conventional wisdom that emphasizes the “conventional” while going light on the “wisdom.”  And, like the rest of the MSM, they are almost always wrong.

This countdown of movies – all but one of which was nominated for at least a couple of Oscars – is not a list of the worst movies of the last decade.  Instead, it counts down ten notable cinematic critical darlings that simply do not hold up over time.  They are not necessarily awful films – though some are transcendentally terrible – and many have good performances, memorable scenes or even a classic character or two.  But overall, the effect of watching them again today is similar to what you might experience at your high school reunion when you see how that sexy cheerleader you once dated is now a bloated wildebeest with a tat on her meaty hock reading “Hope and Change.”  You just shake your head, asking yourself, “Man, what was I thinking?” (more…)

It was another good weekend for Summit Entertainment. The distributor behind last year’s meteoric hit Twilight has scored a solid hit with the Alex Proyas-directed Knowing, starring Nicolas Cage. Despite shaky word-of-mouth and negative reviews, the sci-fi thriller got a solid 9% bump on Saturday for a $9.7M second day, and it will likely finish its opening weekend with a possible $24.8M.

As a production company, Summit is responsible for some monster hits, including commercially and/or artistically successful films like Once (Oscar nominee for Best Picture), American Pie ($102..5M domestic), Memento (Oscar nominee for Best Original Screenplay: Chris Nolan), Mr. & Mrs. Smith ($186.3M domestic) and In the Valley of Ellah (Tommy Lee Jones nominated for Best Actor). But as a distributor, they got off to a slow start. (more…)

Early box office returns are pointing to a weekend win for Knowing from Summit, but I will put my money on I Love You, Man (Dreamworks/Paramount) to generate more in US ticket sales over the long haul. The Nicolas Cage sci-fi thriller has grabbed an estimated $8.95M to start the weekend, and it will likely finish at $24M or so. That is, unless word-of-mouth catches up to it first.

Will reviews and word-of-mouth catch up to KNOWING?

Reviews for Knowing, written and directed by Alex Proyas, the inventive filmmaker behind the visually striking 1998 film Dark City and the 2004 Will Smith mega-hit I, Robot, has received overwhelmingly negative reviews (25% Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes), but thanks to Twitter, real-time movie-goer reactions spread like wildfire. Here are some Tweets I just grabbed off the social networking platform.

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For the last few weeks, Summit’s Knowing, starring Nicolas Cage, has appeared to be the likely winner of the upcoming box office weekend. But, my sources tell me that I Love You, Man, the new comedy starring Paul Rudd (Role Models) and Jason Segal (Forgetting Sarah Marshall) has surged in the latest pre-release industry tracking.

In the spirit of March Madness, I’m calling for the upset. I Love You, Man may not actually be a Judd Apatow movie, but it sure does look like one in trailers and commercials. The movie reportedly “rocked the house” at the South By South West Festival last week, and the buzz is very positive. I am calling for $21.5M, which would be above industry expectations.

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As expected Disney’s Race To Witch Mountain enjoyed a huge Saturday surge for just over $11M in tickets sold, and the reboot of the 70’s franchise will finish with about $25M for the 3-day. Overall, Race posted the year’s seventh-best Saturday performance.

TOP 10 SATURDAY GROSSES IN 2009
1. March 7 – Watchmen – $18.3M
2. February 21 – Tyler Perry’s Madea Goes To Jail – $16.6M
3. February 14 – Friday the Thirteenth – $14.3M
4. January 17 – Paul Blart: Mall Cop – $13.2M
5. January 10 – Gran Torino – $12.1M
6. January 31 – Taken – $11.65M
7. March 14 - Race To Witch Mountain – $11M (estimated)
8. February 7 – He’s Just Not That Into You – $10.9M
9. January 17 – Paul Blart: Mall Cop – $10M
10. January 17 – Gran Torino – $10M
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If I was forced today to guess which 2009 release will win the Academy Award for Best Picture, I would first complain that it’s impossible to guess right. Then I would put my money on Clint Eastwood’s The Human Factor (Warner Bros). In mid-March, it’s silly to start discussing which upcoming movies will be Academy Award contenders, but there are some films, still in production, that seem to have the pedigree to “go all the way.” Eastwood’s next movie as a director, based on John Carlin’s Playing the Enemy: Nelson Mandela & the Game That Changed a Nation, seems like a decent bet.

Academy Award winner Morgan Freeman acquired the film rights to the book, and he will play a post-prison Nelson Mandela with friend Eastwood directing. The Human Factor will tell the story of how the 1995 World Cup Rugby Final between heavily-favored New Zealand and underdog South Africa helped to heal the post-Apartheid racial divide. Matt Damon, sporting blonde hair, has reportedly trained hard in order to credibly play South African captain Francois Pienaar. Some photos have begun to show up from the current production.

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As Watchmen (Warner Bros) falls, “The Rock” appears to be racing to a weekend win. Disney’s Race To Witch Mountain, starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, is off to a solid start with $6.8M or so on opening day, and, with its expected surge in family matinee audiences on Saturday and Sunday, it will likely triumph with a possible $24.25M.

Meanwhile last weekend’s winner Watchmen staggered to a second Friday of only $5.4M or so, and I am projecting only $15.75M for the 3-day. That marks a 71% drop. Anything over $20M would have been acceptable, but the bottom has fallen out of this movie, and it will now struggle to reach $100M domestic. When the foreign and DVD are added, it may make a small profit, but it will likely be negligible. The superstitious might suggest that Watchmen writer Alan Moore’s alleged curse may be to blame, but the reality is that word-of-mouth has been more negative than for any movie in recent memory.

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One of the coolest ways to use the social networking platform Twitter is to find out what people are thinking, saying and Twittering about in real time. Here’s a small sampling of Tweets from the opening weekend of Watchmen (Warner Bros).

The Watchmen = Epic fail!

If you haven’t seen The Watchmen yet, I’d urge you to read the graphic novel first. Well, actually, I’d urge you to JUST read the GN. lol.

Watchmen.undecided,confused as superhero film with

very little superhero action.Convoluted story,but overall watchable. My opinion only

I was bored while watching Watchmen

Just got out of Watchmen…. Ouch, would spend the 9 quid on – can’t even find the humour, brain switched off 1 hour into the 3- BIG YAWN (more…)

Tween girls will unite this weekend and transform Kevin, Joe and Nick into box office stars. Last year, Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert Tour ignited a box office wildfire with a $31.1M opening weekend despite only 683 3-D-equipped screens. Now Disney has the teen stars of the moment, Jonas Brothers, in the same sort of concert movie vehicle. The difference is that Jonas Brothers: The 3-D Concert Experience will open on about twice as many screens.

The precise number of 3-D screens is difficult to pinpoint. Last month, Lionsgate confirmed 1,033 Digital 3-D runs for the remake of My Bloody Valentine, and although I have not been able to confirm a hard number for Coraline (Focus), it was probably close to 1,100. Now, as the expensive $100K per screen digital conversion creeps along for exhibitors, Jonas Brothers could reach 1,200 3-D screens. Unlike Coraline, the new Disney concert movie will not be boosted by traditional 2-D 35MM playdates.

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I am forecasting a coronation for Slumdog Millionaire (Fox Searchlight) at Sunday’s Academy Awards. My final predictions call for Slumdog wins in 8 of the 9 categories it is competing in including Best Picture and Best Director: Danny Boyle. The only place I think it will fail is in the Sound Mixing category where The Dark Knight (Warner Bros) may trump it.

Slumdog Millionaire is about to win the Hollywood's Grand Prize

The “Battle Royale” of the night is Mickey Rouke from The Wrestler (Fox Searchlight) vs. Sean Penn in Milk (Focus) in the Best Actor category. There have been two ties in major categories in Academy Award history. The first was in 1932 when Frederic March in Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde shared Best Actor with Wallace Beery for The Champ. (March had one more vote, but in that era, any finish within 3 votes was rules a tie.) Then in 1968, Katherine Hepburn for The Lion In Winter and Barbara Streisand for Funny Girl tied for Best Actress. If there was any justice, Rourke and Penn would share the award. In any other year, either of them would be a lock. Forced to make a pick, I’m going with Rourke.

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