Author Archives: Matt

A comment on the Best Documentary Oscar race

I have only been able to find two of the Best Documentary nominees. I regret that I couldn’t see more but I’m not sure I’d be in a much better position to predict a winner if I had. After last year, where the undisputedly entertaining and interesting 20 Feet from Stardom won over the thought-provoking, troubling, and almost universally acclaimed The Act of Killing, I wondered what criteria voters were using to decide what the Best Documentary was.

The best thing about awards season is it gives us the chance to look back on our favourites of the year and talk about them, argue about them, and think about what makes a movie better than another. In this case, what makes a good documentary?

All four of us here at Assholes Watching Movies have predicted a win this year for Citizenfour, one of the only two nominated docs that I’ve been able to see. My thinking was that, not only is it the subject matter important- which is a tough thing to measure against the other nominees- but one that the Acadamey is sure to endorse. We’re all feeling a little sensitive about our cyber security right now. Even Hollywood, with a major studio being hacked just a few months ago. Just as director Laura Poitras was lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time, this might be the right movie at the right time.

A great documentary, like any great movie, is about more than the topic. A great documentary has to be great, not just important. Poitras was fortunate enough to get footage of history as it happens, instead of just interviewing people about it later. Unfortunately, as I said when I reviewed Citizenfour last month, she didn’t get enough of this footage to fill a whole movie and seems to spend the rest of the movie struggling to fill it, without asking some of the tough questions that I would have liked to have seen asked.

Virunga, the other nominated doc that I watched, also got great footage and important subject matter; civil war in the Congo. Like in Citizenfour, the subjects and filmmakers take serious risks and in some cases make great personal sacrifices in their quest for justice. The difference is that director Orlando von Einsiedel knows how to use his great footage to tell a great story and edits it together to form a finished film with a genuine emotional impact. “I cried,” wrote fellow Asshole Jay. This is why am hoping that Virunga wins the Oscar, even if I predict that Citizenfour will.

Note: This started out as a review of a fantastic 2013 documentary called Gideon’s Army but I seemed to have gotten sidetracked. I’ll have to write that tomorrow.

What was your favourite documentary of 2014? Have you seen any of the other three nominees? What do you think makes a great documentary? We’d love to hear from you.

Oscars 2015: Best Actor and Actress

Oscars 2015: Sound Mixing and Editing, Film Editing, and Original Score

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Best Sound Editing

What is sound editing and how is it different from sound mixing? I myself didn’t know until today and understanding the difference is sure to give us some advantage in our Oscar pools. Sound Editing, which used to be called sound effects editing, is basically just the recording or creation of a sound. For example, in American Sniper, the sound editor would either have to find or make a recording of a gunshot or something that sounds like it. Speaking of sound effects, if you haven’t seen Berberian Sound Studio, you definitely should.

The nominees are…

American Sniper

Birdman

The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies

Interstellar

Unbroken

Ihaven’t seen Unbroken or The Hobbit so I can’t comment on thosee. Luc, Jay, and I have all predicted a win for American Sniper while Sean went his own way by putting his money on Interstellar. Now that I know what sound editing is, I think he may have made the right choice. When I first reviewed Interstellar last year, I complained that I could barely hear the dialogue over the score and sound effects. Now that I’ve done my research and know that I should be taking this up with the sound mixer, I’m thinking about what it was like to see Interstellar in IMAX. The sound was as impressive as the picture. I was as blown away as I was when I first saw The Dark Knight or Inception on the big screen, both of which won the Oscar.

Sound Mixing

Sound mixing is exactly what it sounds like. All the sounds that have been collected by the sound editor must now come together in a way that makes sense. The gunshot in American Sniper has to ring out over the sounds of the city and, I’m talking to you now Interstellar sound mixer, never drown out the dialogue.

The nominees are…

American Sniper

Birdman

Interstellar (seriously?)

Unbroken

Whiplash

Sean, always marching to the beat of his own drum, has strayed again and predicted a win for Whiplash. The rest of us are sticking with American Sniper. Sean has a point. There’s a lot going on around the sounds of live music in the movie but war movies have a lot of sounds and must be complicated to mix so I’m sticking with my guns.

Film Editing

This is always an exciting category, Even if we don’t comment on it, we aall appreciate good editing and know it when we see it. The hnominees are…

American Sniper

Boyhood

Thel Grand Budapest Hotel

The Imitation Game

Whiplash

These five film’s are so well made that I’m amazed that three of us were able to agree. Luc, Jay, and I all picked Boyhood and Sean is going with Whiplash. Boyhood edited together 12 years of footage so that’s tough to beat. I’m hoping for a tie between Boyhood and Grand Budapest though.

Original Score

The Grand Budapest Hotel

The Imitation Game

Interstellar

Mr Turner

The Theory of Everything

I thought the music in Interstellar was too manipulative and- as I’ve said before- loud. The score for The Imitation Game was too conventional and the one in Mr Turner seemed to belong in another movie. That leaves Budapest and Theory of Everything, both of which are very nicely done. Sean, Luc, and I have picked Grand Budapest Hotel while Jay is banking on a win for Theory of Everything. TOE won the Golden Globe which is something. Not to mention that it’s beautiful music that fits the tone of the movie. I still like Budapest though which may make an even better marriage between images in music. I’ll be interested to see what happens on Sunday.

Oscars 2015: Best Costumes, Makeup, and Hairstyling

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Costume Design

The Grand Budapest Hotel

Inherent Vice

Into the Woods

Maleficent

Mr Turner

Most people would rather talk about what Angelina Jolie wears to the ceremony than what she wore in the almost irredeemable Maleficent and I can’t say I really blame them. This is one of the more popular leave the room to make more popcorn moments of the ceremony. We might be joining you in the kitchen too since the Oscar for Best Costume Design won’t even affect our pool. All lour of us have agrend on Grand Budapest.

The only real competition I can see is Mr Turner, a film that deserves as much honourable mention for its costumes as it does for Production Design. Its painstakingly researched attention to detail is one of the movie’s key strengths. Who knows? The Academy went through the trouble of nominating the movie four times so they obviously appreciated it. Maybe they’ll throw poor Mr Turner a bone.

But I wouldn’t bet on it. Having taken home the BAFTA in the Costume Design category last week, Grand Budapest is a safe bet. Besides, let’s face it- it’s much more fun to look at.

Makeup and Hairstyling

Foxcatcher

The Grand Budapest Hotel

Guardians of the Galaxy

This is never the easiest race to call. I never thought they would have given 2010’s The Wolfman an Oscar for anything but they did in 2011. All bets are off in this category.

I split from the other Asshoes on this one. Jay, Sean, and Luc have all predicted yet another win for Grand Budapest but my gut has me taking a chance on last summer’s crowdpleaser Guardians of the Galaxy. Why not? All four of us have predicted several wins for Budapest. The makeup artists and special effects teams had a hard job to do in making these characters believable.

So that’s my vote.

Oscars 2015: Cinematography, Visual Effects, and Production Design

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If you’re reading this, I assume that you’re either passionate about production design or trying to get whatever advantage you can find on your Oscar pool. Some describe these as the boring categories, mostly because whoever comes up to accept the award is likely to look like they have never spoken in front of a crowd in their life. But these are the people who have made some of our favourite movies this year so good. Besides, with the acting awards being mostly a done deal this year, the annual Assholes Oscar pool will be decided on categories like this.

Cinematography

Birdman

The Grand Budapest Hotel

Mr Turner

Unbroken

Ida

For the past five years, this award went to big movies (Avatar, Inception, Hugo, Life of Pi, Gravity), all of which you could see im IMAX 3D. This pattern doesn’t help us this year, unfortunately. I won’t comment on Unbroken because I have not yet seen it. I am assuming its between Birdman and Grand Budapest Hotel. Since I started watching, the Oscar has gone to a Best Picture nominee 16 out of 20 times. Either way, watching Mr. Turner felt a little like homework and the disorienting and unconventional framing in Ida is likely to alienate a lot of voters.

Of the four of us, Luc and Jay predicted a win for Birdman and Sean and I are voting Grand Budapest. I’m regretting my decision already. Wes Anderson films feel almost perfect shot for shot. You get the sense that nothing happens by accident, that shots are framed exactly how he wanted and capturing exactly what he wanted. But birdman is bananas. Giving the appearance of one long continuous take, the camera frantically follows characters backstage and even through Times square. I think the word I used was “exhilerating” to describe my experience when I reviewed Birdman in December. I don’t know which of the two will win. But Birdman really should.

Visual Effects

Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes

Guardians of the Galaxy

Interstellar

X-Men: Days of Future Past

This is the fun part. This is the category that honours the movies that we actually want to see. Since I started watching, past winners include Independence Day, The Matrix, and Spiderman 2. This year is rare in that out of the five nominees, there’s not a single one that I hate. My favourite X-Men, my favourite Planet of the Apes, and my favourite Captain America. All in one category.

There’s not much in X-Men or Captain America that I haven’t seen before and I think we can safely rule either of these two out. Other than that, it’s anybody’s game. Jay and Luc predicted a win for Interstellar and Sean and I are voting Guardians of the Galaxy.

I couldn’t always tell what was going on in Guardians but I could almost tell it was awesome. The action was spectacular but even better was the creation of two characters- Groot and Rocket- that moved seamlessly around the human actors. They were so believable that they were able to even have comic chemistry with the others.

Production Design

The Grand Budapest Hotel

The Imitation Game

Interstellar

Into the Woods

Mr. Turner

The assholes agree for once. All four of us predict a win for Grand Budapest Hotel. Nothing seems out of place in a Wes Anderson film and visually this seems to be one of his most meticulous. Of the other nominees, only Mr. Turner gives it a run for its money. Mike Leigh worked so hard to recreate Turner’s time and place that it got in the way of telling an interesting story. In fact, Mr. Turner probably deserves to win here. But the assholes are united. Grand Budapest will win.

Oscar 2015: Best Screenplays

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The original and adapted screenplay categories are two of my favourites every year. This is traditionally where the Academy attempts to correct its worst Best Picture snubs, with many of my favourite movies of the last 20 years being nominated- or even winning- a writing Oscar despite having been ignored for the main prize.

Best Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen

Boyhood

Birdman

Foxcatcher

The Grand Budapest Hotel

Nightcrawler

Whoever wins next Sunday will be in good company. Since I started watching 20 years ago, previous winners include screenplays for Pulp Fiction, Fargo, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Almost Famous, and American Beauty. These are some of my favourites of all time and I am happy to say that I think this yea’s nominees will make for another exciting race.

Luc was probably right to predict a win for Birdman with Grand Budapest being possibly its only real competition. With Boyhood and Birdman being the clear Best Picture frontrunners though, I’d be a little surprised if neither one wins. And the unquestionable emotional impact of Boyhood is much more a credit to Richard Linklater as a director than it is to him as a writer. Like Luc, I predict a win for Birdman.

And it really should win. The script is maddeningly layered as it often seems to be commenting on itself- poking fun at its cast and its critics. Besides, the dialogue has a rhythm to it that makes it a blast to listen to and would probably even make a really good read which to me is one of the best signs of a great script.

That being said, Wes Anderson movies are always well-written and The Grand Budapest Hotel is no exception. It has a great rhythm too with humour at the most unexpected times that caught me completely off guard. Nightcrawler deserves honourable mention too finding a fresh take on the news media satire. Both funny and distrubing, writer Dan Gilroy gave Jake Gyllenhaal his best part so far and, neglected in other categories, I’m glad to see Nightcrawler get nominated for something.

Best Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published

American Sniper

Inherent Vice

The Imitation Game

The Theory of Everything

Whiplash

How many times have you heard “The movie was okay but the book was better”? It’s not easy to adapt “material previously produced or published” as we saw in 2003 nominee Adaptation. More often than not, I find the pickings to be slimmer among the Adapted Screenplays than the Original ones. This year especially.

I finally watched American Sniper last night and found it seemed to lack focus. What it was “about” seemed to change several times as the movie went on and any scene taking place before Kyle’s first tour was completely unnecessary and disrupted the flow of the film.

I’m glad the two-hour-plus bad trip that was Inherent Vice was nominated for something and the great Paul Thomas Anderson did Thomas Pynchon’s hippie noir the justice it deserved. Anderson has made better movies than this though and, since Inherent Vice was marketed as a comedy, he would have been wise to let us in on the joke just a little bit more.

Director James Marsh gave us more poetry in the images in The Theory of Everything than writer Anthony McCarten did in the screenplay. The movie worked very well and everyone involved deserves some credit for that but the cinematography and acting by the two leads are probably the main reason we’re even discussing The Theory of Everything at all during awards season.

The Imitation Game, on the other hand, is extremely well-written. Mathematicians breaking codes can be a tough sell for a night at the movies but writer Graham Moore helped make this a crowd-pleaser, what Jay called “The Avengers for math nerds”. Still, Moore’s screenplay relies on a few cliches too many, particularly frustrating in a film that is for the most part so well-written.

That leaves Whiplash. Damien Chazelle’s script wouldn’t even be in the top 3 if it would have to compete with the nominees in the Original Screenplay category but it is a clear winner here. The psychology of both teachers and musicians is insightful and, better yet, Chazelle has written a part for the underrated J. K. Simmons that has virtually guaranteed him an Oscar. Whiplash is probably going to be remembered for Simmons’ performance but it’s an all-around good movie and, if justice is served, it should win the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay.

For a complete list of nominees, click here.

Oscars 2015: Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress

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In recent years, you can burn out on online Oscar debates before the nominees have even started writing their speeches yet but in 1995 all I had was Siskel and Ebert and Entertainment Tongith. I was 13 years old and hadn’t seen most of the movies but the way they talked about Oscar night, I wouldn’t have missed it for anything. I laughed through Letterman’s monolgue (probably pretending to get some of the jokes), had strong opinions on Pulp Fiction and Shawkshank Redemption without having seen either one, and celebrated when my two favourites (The Lion King and Speed) each took home two statues. Awards season has been like Christmas for me ever since.

Now, I watch all the movies or at least as many as I can. No category is too minor for me and have sat through more shiity movies than I can count just because they were nominated for best Costume Design or Makeup. I don’t always agree with the winners and have found myself yelling at the tv more than once but I’m back every year with a renewed- and delusional- hope that this time justice will be done.

Best Supporting Actor
Robert Duvall- The Judge

Ethan Hawke- Boyhood

Edward Norton- Birdman

Mark Ruffalo- Foxcatcher

J. K. Simmons- Whiplash

This category has been one of the surest bets of the night for years now. Recent winners include Javier Bardem for No Country for Old Men, Heath Ledger for The Dark Knight, Christoph Waltz for Inglourious Basterds, and Jared Leto for last year’s Dallas Buyers Club. Even before the nominations were announced, no one had a chance against any of these guys and with J. K. Simmons as an undisputed frontrunner, this year is no exception.

He deserves it too. I finally got around to seeing Whiplash a couple of days ago and was on edge almost every time Simmons was on screen. He’s intimidating even when he’s not being overtly mean and scary even when he’s making you laugh. Best of all, he’s unpredictable, which is more than I can say for the Best Supporting Actor race this year.

It’s not that his competition is completely unworthy. I’m not sure anyone in the world is more irritating to me than Ethan Hawke is but even I had to admit that he was likeable and believable as the still maturing father in Boyhood. He’s in most of my favourite scenes in the movie- my personal favourite being his awkward safe sex talk. And of course there’s Edward Norton, one of the better performances in one of the best acted films of the year.

How Mark Ruffalo was even considered for a nomination is a complete mystery to me and I’m still not sure I understand how it happened. Channing Tatum would have made more sense.

Finally, I have nothing bad to say about Robert Duvall. All other things being equal, he’s by far the best actor in this category but there’s only so much that even he could do to elevate the hokey writing and uninspired directing in The Judge.

J. K. Simmons wins. Anyone else would be a huge upset.

Best Supporting Actress

Lately this has been the Academy’s chance to show us how much it celebrates diversity, doing its best to make up for an obvious caucasian bias in the other acting categories. Recent winners include Penelope Cruz for Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Monique for Precious, Octavia Spencer for The Help, and Lupita Nyong’o for 12 Years a Slave. The list of nominees this year are not nearly as diverse- or as interesting- as it had been in recent years.

Patricia Arquette- Boyhood

Laura Dern- Wild

Keira Knightley- The Imitation Game

Emma Stone- Birdman

Meryl Streep- Into the Woods

I think we could have done better.

Dern, for Wild, seemed to come out of nowhere. I’m not sure I heard even a hint of speculation that she’d be nominated. I don’t get it.

Neither Knightley or Stone are able to stand out in their own movies, let alone among the other nominees. Knightley plays an important part in The Imitation Game and we learn a lot about Alan Turing from his relationship with her character but the movie belongs to Benedict Cumberbatch and to give anyone else in it an acting award would be bizarre. As for Stone, I thought she seemed to struggle with the demands of all the dialogue that she had to memorize in Birdman. She mostly rises to the occasion and has some fantastic moments but she’s really not in the same league as Michael Keaton or Edward Norton.

Meryl Streep’s nomination makes sense. She can’t help being amazing in almost everything and has some of the best scenes in Into the Woods. But do we really want to see her up there again acting like she had no idea she was going to win? She’s already been honoured three times for better performances.

This leaves, by process of elimination, Patricia Arquette. I’d have no problem with a win for her and Boyhood was possibly my favourite movie of the year. I still struggle with the idea of calling this the best supporting performance of the year since Richard Linklater went to great lengths to try and make us forget that we were watching a performance. Her work in the film is still impressive and she’s likely to take home the Oscar.

For an asshole’s discussion on the parts available to women in Hollywood, click here.

Brick

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Back in December, I reviewed Mysterious Skin, Looper, and Sin City: A Dame to Kill For and made no secret of my Joseph Gordon-Levitt bias. It all started with Brick. I exited the theater when I first saw it back in 2006 certain that this was an actor to watch out for and refusing to listen to my friend’s allegations that this was in fact the same kid from 3rd Rock from the Sun.

Watching it again nearly a decade later, Brick feels a bit like a feature length high school video project- complete with an extremely low budget and a high school serving as the unlikely setting for a Maltese Falcon-style detective story. JGL plays a loner named Brendan who must navigate the seedy underworld of his school to solve his ex-girlfriend’s murder. The dialogue, music, and twists seem to come from a bizarre 40s noir. Instead of a meddling cop, we get a nagging vice-principal.

Just like in the Leonardo DiCaprio version of Romeo and Juliet, first time writer-director Rian Johnson (who JGL later worked with again on Looper) relies on the anachronisms in the discourse to make an old story feel new. This gives him an excuse to tell a pretty straightforward detective story without it feeling like just another detective story. I’ll admit his style takes some getting used to and I was completely thrown off at first back in 2006. But once you get the hang of it, it’s easy to get caught up in Johnson’s surreal picture of a modern high school. Sure, they don’t talk like real teenagers but they never do in the movies anyway. At least Brick is fun to listen to.

Brick runs just a little bit longer than the novelty of Johnson’s gimmick and there are a couple of times too many where he uses self-parody as a bit of a crutch. The film really works best when it’s reminding us that the darkest of secrets can be hidden within the walls of our publc schools. You’ll either love the film’s style or you’ll hate it but JGL sold it for me. He always strikes just the right note and, like the movie itself, has one foot in the past and the other in the present. He has the look of a modern troubled teenager with the soul of Sam Spade. Nearly a decade later, I am still always looking forward to his next project.

Still Alice

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We wouldn’t even be talking about Still Alice, about a world renowned linguistics professor who is diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease, if it weren’t for Julianne Moore. Michelle Pfeiifer, Julia Roberts, and Nicole Kidman all apparently passed on the part before anyone got around to considering Moore, which is baffling to me. Who among Moore’s peers is more up for the challenge? Who can play confused just as well as they can play sharp or as vulnerable as well as strong. Or, as Jay was right to point out in her review of Maps to the Stars, who else is so unconcerned with how she looks while she’s doing it? Because there are so many sides to her persona, we believe her as a respected academic, as a mother, and as a wife which is just as important as believing her as an Alzheimer’s patient. Because of Julianne Moore, we’re talking about Still Alice as an Oscar nominated film (Best Actress in a Leading Role).

The movie, as written and directed by Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland, may not be as beautiful as Away from Her or L’Amour but it gets it right mostly by not doing anything wrong. It’s never corny and doesn’t search for easy answers. This may not seem like high praise but I can imagine so many ways this could have gone wrong by being too pandering or by focusing on the disease instead of the person. I give it credit for not falling into these traps.

Julianne Moore is still the best reason to see Still Alice though. She’s been great since short Cuts but hasn’t had such a great opportunity to show it for years. Smart money is on her winning the Oscar.

If one asshole’s opinion isn’t enough, check out Jay’s review.

The Judge

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When his mother dies, a successful big city lawyer returns his the small town to which he swore he’d never return. Despite vowing to leave first thing the next morning, his stay gets extended when his father (a respected judge in his community) is charged with murder. Father and son haven’t spoken in years and neither one likes the idea of working together very much but the judge is going to need the best lawyer her can find to keep from going to jail.

Both the prodigal son and the courtroom drama are pretty played out so I wasn’t expecting anything great but when the father and son are played by Robert Duvall and Robert Downey Jr, I didn’t see how it could be bad.

Unfortunately, not much in The Judge feels real. The town doesn’t feel like a real place. The family doesn’t feel like a real family. The court case doesn’t play out like a real trial, with the family drama even playing out on the witness stand in a scene that I couldn’t believe I was watching.

More importantly though, nothing really satisfies. We have to wait until the end of the movie to find out what really happened, both between father and son and the night of the murder. And we should have to wait. All the best payoffs come that way. Our patience doesn’t pay off here though, neither with the family drama or the trial. Even Downey, the king of outalking someone, cross examing witnesses isn’t as much of a treat as it really should be.

The good news is that it’s not all bad. Robert Duvall is a nominee for this year’s academy award for Best Supporting Actor partly because he’s gotten pretty old and it’s been awhile since his last nomination but also because he is just pretty awesome. The best scenes in the movie are all his. His shower scene with Downey manages to be heart-wrenching, tender, and funny and I nearly cried in another scene where he meets his granddaughter. And even if Downey’s return home isn’t as compelling as I would like it to be, his return to real movies is more than welcome. He’s pretty much played no one but Iron Man or Sherlock Holmes for the last five years so even a drama as trite as The Judge is a nice change.