Oscar Predictions!

It is almost time for the Academy Awards (Oscars), my favorite night of the year! I have been watching the Oscars religiously since I was little and anyone who knows me knows I make a big production about getting ready for MY Super Bowl.  Although I am disappointed by how political the whole process has become, the Oscars give me the chance to rant and rave over who won or lost, or rage over those people and films that were snubbed by the Academy all together (cough THE IMPOSSIBLE cough). To prepare for the big night, I watch every movie that is nominated (even down to the shorts) so I will be able to be an Oscar judge myself. Thankfully, this was a great year for movies.

Starting in November, movie studios and publicists begin to campaign for their films to receive an Oscar nomination. They mail members of the Academy various “For Your Consideration” advertisements and screeners (DVDs) of their films, as well as host special free screenings in theaters around the United States. In late December, the nomination ballots are sent out to the Academy’s 6,000+ voting members who are split into categories based on their profession (e.g. actors, directors, makeup artists, etc.). During the nomination process, each Academy member may only vote to nominate people from the professional category with which they are associated (directors vote for Best Director, actors vote for the Best Actor categories, etc.).  The only exception is Best Picture; every member of the Academy votes to nominate the Best Picture category using a preferential voting system (which is a more complicated process to explain than there is room in this article!). The categories for Best Foreign Language Film and Best Animated Picture are nominated by a committee of people chosen from different professional categories.

The ballots are then sent to PricewaterhouseCoopers, an accounting firm used to certify Academy ballots for the past seventy-nine years, for official tallying. The nominations are announced at a ceremony in Hollywood in January. Once nominations are announced, final ballots are then redistributed to the Academy members for voting.  Unlike in the initial nomination process, every Academy member is allowed to vote on each category for the final selections. The final results are announced on the live award ceremony.

Best Picture

What Will Win: Argo. Argo has been racking up the awards this season; the most important being Affleck’s Best Director win at the Directors Guild Awards (DGAs). The winner of Best Director at the DGAs has correctly predicted the Best Picture winner at the Oscars 58/64 times, meaning they have only gotten it wrong six times in the past sixty-four years. Those seem like good odds to me.  

What Should Win: I would be happy to see Argo win. It was a fantastic film that will hopefully make up for the fact Affleck was not nominated for Best Director.  I do wish, however, that Zero Dark Thirty and The Impossible (it’s shocking to me that this film wasn’t even nominated) could all qualify for a triple tie.  

Best Director

Who Will Win: Steven Spielberg (Lincoln). In a year where many other directors should be nominated, Spielberg will win this one by default. Though I wouldn’t be shocked if the Academy surprised everyone with a win for David O. Russell (Silver Linings Playbook) or Ang Lee (Life of Pi)

Who Should Win: Kathryn Bigelow (Zero Dark Thirty). I loved Ben Affleck’s direction in Argo but it took a lot more skill and talent to bring all of the elements of Zero Dark Thirty together. Bigelow’s snub at the Oscars proves just how political the nomination process has gotten.  

Best Actor

Who Will Win: Daniel Day Lewis (Lincoln). Daniel Day Lewis’ portrayal of  Abraham Lincoln was top-notch. I don’t think anyone can disagree with that. Known for his intense method acting, Day Lewis proved he deserves to be on top.

Who Should Win: Daniel Day Lewis. Few, if any, actors in Hollywood could pull off such a great portrayal of Lincoln. Too bad Hugh Jackman (Les Miserables) and Bradley Cooper (Silver Linings Playbook) had to be up against him this year. 

Best Actress

Who Will Win: Jennifer Lawrence (Silver Linings Playbook). Jennifer Lawrence has recently become the front-runner for Best Actress. While I love Lawrence, she is one of my favorite actresses, I don’t think her performance was the best of the year. She was great, but Naomi Watts and/or Jessica Chastain deserve to win this one.

Who Should Win: Jessica Chastain (Zero Dark Thirty) or Naomi Watts (The Impossible). Due to the politics of Hollywood, I would be very surprised to see Chastain walk away with a win. Her incredibly restrained performance in Zero Dark Thirty would be hard for any other actress to pull off. She is the best actress to come to Hollywood since Kate Winslet. Unfortunately, she was unable to schmooze with the Academy elite at the traditional Oscar campaign luncheons and parties because she was starring in a play, The Heiress, on Broadway. Not to mention, due to Zero Dark Thirty’s perceived “political” nature, it hasn’t been receiving the accolades it deserves. Naomi Watts’ performance in The Impossible was also incredible; her gut-wrenching, emotional portrayal of a mother trying to bring her family back together in the midst of the 2004 Tsunami tragedy was amazing. In 1969, there was a tie for Best Actress between Katharine Hepburn (The Lion in the Winter) and Barbra Streisand (Funny Girl). Can this please be the year that happens again? 

Best Supporting Actor

Who Will Win: Christoph Waltz (Django Unchained). This choice is partly that I think he will win and partly that I refuse to write Tommy Lee Jones ‘(Lincoln) name as a potential winner. Jones plays the same role in every film he is in… which is himself. Waltz was fantastic in Django Unchained and out of everyone nominated for Best Supporting Actor, he deserves it.

Who Should Win: Tom Holland. Holland was absolutely fantastic in The Impossible and it blows my mind that he wasn’t nominated for an Oscar. It is incredible that he was only thirteen years old when he filmed the movie. Thankfully, with his talent, I expect to see him at many awards in the upcoming years.

Best Supporting Actress

Who Will Win: Anne Hathaway (Les Miserables). Hathaway did a great job in Les Miserables as Fantine. When thinking about the film, her emotional rendition of “I Dreamed A Dream” is what sticks with you.

Who Should Win: Anne Hathaway or Amy Adams (The Master). Hathaway brought a lot of emotion to Fantine and I wouldn’t be terribly upset to see her win. However, I would like to see Amy Adams take this one home too. Adams is great in everything she’s in and I appreciated her incredibly reserved performance in The Master. With her fourth nomination, it’s finally time for Adams to take the prize.

**Don’t forget to watch the Oscars on February 24, 2013 at 8 pm on ABC. I’ll be live tweeting the event and would love to hear what you think (@flickchickdc)! Who do you want to win the top categories? Discuss below.

Snitch: Duller Than Expected

Snitch, directed by former stuntman Ric Roman Waugh, is the latest example of Hollywood’s movie trailer trickery. While the film’s trailers make it look action-packed, in reality the action scenes only account for small parts of the movie (most occurring in the third act). With a former stuntman as the director and Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson (Fast Five) as the lead, it was surprising that the film lagged. Admittedly, the duller, dialogue-driven aspects of the plot made the tagline “inspired by true events” more plausible, as opposed to the continuous off-the-wall action scenes that I had expected. As an audience member, however, the 112 minute runtime seemed more like 180. Snitch is one of the better films in Johnson’s repertoire, but it is a movie you will forget pretty soon after you watch it.

The premise of Snitch is interesting. A teenage boy, Jason (Rafi Gavron), makes the mistake of accepting a package of Ecstasy sent by his best friend Craig for safekeeping. It turns out the package was tracked by DEA agents in a setup plot, whereby Craig would get a reduced sentence in exchange for snitching on Jason. Because the quantity of pills was so large, Jason was charged with drug distribution, which carries a minimum of ten years in jail. The only way he can reduce this sentence is by ratting on someone else. Unfortunately, Jason has no other drug contacts to snitch on and refuses to setup any of his friends so he is out of options. That is, until his dad John (Dwayne Johnson) takes matters into his own hands. John persuades the U.S. attorney (Susan Sarandon) to dismiss his son’s case in exchange for his help in capturing a drug kingpin. When the situation starts to escalate, John must decide whether his son’s freedom is worth risking his life.

While the premise of the film is intriguing, especially since it is based on a true story, the screenwriter seemed to be more interested in projecting a political message, strict drug laws in the United States need to be changed, than developing characters and an interesting storyline (I won’t even get into the scene where John searches for “drug cartels” on Wikipedia). The audience is constantly asked to feel sorry for Jason’s situation because he is a “good kid”, however, the only example we are given of him being “good” is the fact he is going to college; you’re not given enough time to meet Jason and feel bad for him before all of the action starts. It also seemed strange that high-target drug dealers would be so quick to trust a man like John without asking more questions, or at least following him! John made so many trips to the U.S. attorney’s office and prison, I was convinced he was being followed. Disappointingly, the situations I created in my head were much more suspenseful than any scenes in the actual script.

Though underused, the saving grace of Snitch is its fantastic supporting cast. Susan Sarandon (Thelma and Louise) once again proves she will shine in any role, however minimal, and Barry Pepper (Saving Private Ryan) plays one of the most interesting characters in the film, an undercover DEA agent who serves as a mentor to John. It was also nice to see Jay Bernthal (Shane from The Walking Dead) onscreen again. His character, an ex-con who uses his past connections to introduce John to the drug world, was poorly written, but he did the best he could with the material.

 

If you are looking for an action-packed thrill ride, Snitch is definitely not the movie for you. In fact, it should be classified as a drama more than an action movie (I was going to say thriller, but few parts of the film were actually thrilling). Though I appreciate Johnson’s attempt to break away from his action-hero persona, this was not the movie to do it.  This is definitely the type of film you should wait to come to TV, and even then, you will probably forget you’re watching it when you flip the channel during commercials.

My Score: C-

A Good Day To Die Hard Skip A Movie

 
In the latest installment of the Die Hard franchise, A Good Day to Die Hard, audience members are once again asked to suspend all notions of reality to jump into the world of John McClane (Bruce Willis). With a survivability rate akin to the Road Runner, John and his son Jack (Jai Courtney) brave extreme car crashes, heavy enemy fire, oh, and radiation exposure at Chernobyl (maybe we will see the effects of that in future movies). Unfortunately, this good luck does not extend to the content of the film; the script is full of cornier than usual one-liners and a typical, yet also convoluted, action plot: Russian bad guys want nuclear material, American good guys try to stop them. I’m ready for something new from the franchise. I can excuse corny jokes, though the “I’m on vacation” shtick got really old after the third time it was used, but a boring, scattered plot is killer.

As opposed to the other Die Hard films, where it is up to John McClane to save the day, in this film, he is partly responsible for the conflict. Upon hearing that his estranged son Jack is imprisoned in Moscow, John sets off to free him. On the surface, it looks as if Jack has gotten involved with the wrong crowd. However, in reality, he is an undercover CIA officer who is assigned to protect Yuri Komarov (Sebastian Koch), an imprisoned Russian billionaire, from his former partner Viktor, a prominent Russian official. Komarov has a key to a locker, which is allegedly full of incriminating information against Viktor; he was going to use this information as leverage in exchange for freedom. As it turns out the CIA is also interested in the information, so on the day of Komarov’s trial, Jack busts him out of jail. Unfortunately, John interferes and the extraction plan is ruined. It is now up to John and Jack to protect the asset and retrieve the information. Got all of that? When the action then shifts to Chernobyl, and a “surprise” twist emerges, the film is unsalvageable. 

 
The best parts of the previous Die Hard movies are the villains. Alan Rickman (Die Hard) and Jeremy Irons (Die Hard With A Vengeance) were especially fantastic as McClane’s nemeses. In A Good Day to Die Hard, however, the main villain, Alik, is lacking. His signature characteristics are tap dancing and eating carrots… scary stuff. There were no mind games or witty dialogue; in fact, the “most chilling” thing he said to the McClanes was “I hate cowboys”.  The radiation at Chernobyl was the scariest aspect of the movie for me. 

Besides immortality, the running theme throughout the film was characters’ “daddy issues”. Jack resents John, and Komarov’s daughter seemingly resents her father. I will admit that the relationship between father and son was an enjoyable addition to the franchise. It was nice to finally see John interact with a member of his family throughout the whole film, as opposed to a brief hug before the closing credits or a two second phone call in the third act. However, the relationship storyline needed to be more fleshed out. The audience understands that Jack has issues with his father, but never find out exactly why. Is it because his dad worked a lot and didn’t have time for his family? Why is there so much resentment? 

 
A Good Day to Die Hard is not the type of film you want to see only months after seeing a great action film like Skyfall, nor is it the way Hollywood should want to start 2013. If you’re a hardcore Die Hard fan, you may be disappointed by how far the franchise has plummeted. Speaking of plummeting, one particular scene at the end of the film, reminiscent of Die Hard, made me wonder if the studio has plans to hand the reigns of the franchise to Jai Courtney whenever Bruce Willis decides it’s time to retire. Was this his coronation into the world of Die Hard? Perhaps the studio is leaving it up to the box office to decide.

My Score: D

A Good Day To Die Hard Trailer

Are You A Good Witch Or A Bad Witch?: Beautiful Creatures Review

Just as Glinda asks Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, “Are you a good witch or a bad witch?”, the main conflict in Beautiful Creatures also questions good vs. evil. Based on the first book of the fairly popular Young Adult book series Caster Chronicles, Beautiful Creatures is the studios’ latest attempt to fill the Twilight-sized hole left in Hollywood. Unfortunately, the film’s all-star supporting cast could not save it from itself, a poorly written script that at times verges on boring and at other times on campy melodrama. Try as I may, not even my love for cheesy teen-romances could make me enjoy this film. 

Beautiful Creatures centers around the sleepy small town of Gatlin, South Carolina and its extremely religious inhabitants. Ethan Wate (Alden Ehrenreich) is a popular high-school junior who is eager to leave the conservative town he refers to as his prison. He applies to every college he can, hoping distance from Gatlin will bring him a more fulfilled life far, far away. Before Ethan can leave town, however, he is captivated by Lena Duchannes (Alice Englert), the new Goth-esque girl in school. Whereas Ethan is desperate to leave his stable, dull life, Lena is desperate for stability and peace; she has had to move constantly due to the magical secret she is hiding. Sparks fly between the two teenagers, and a new movie franchise is born. 

 
Everyone in Gatlin believes Lena and her family, especially her uncle Mason Ravenwood (Jeremy Irons), are Satanists. In reality, however, they are casters (a more politically correct term for witches). On Lena’s sixteenth birthday, she must participate in a ceremony called “The Claiming”, which will determine whether she will become a caster for the light (good) or dark (evil). With a history of dark casters in her immediate family, Lena is afraid of what she will become. In addition to The Claiming, Lena and Ethan must also discover how to break the curse on Lena’s family that prevents casters from being with mortals.

Warner Bros. February 14 release date is hoping to capture the Valentine’s Day crowds looking for a romantic movie date night. Regrettably, the romance in the film falls short due to the lack of chemistry between the two lead actors; Edward and Bella... or Ron and Hermione they are not. To be honest, I was more interested in the relationship between Lena’s dark caster cousin Ridley (played fantastically by Emmy Rossum) and Ethan’s best friend Link (Thomas Mann) than the two main characters. Rossum shines as a wicked siren, making men swoon with a single glance. Hopefully if there is a sequel, it will focus more on her. 

 
It was surprising that such an amazing supporting cast (Viola Davis, Emma Thompson, and Jeremy Irons) would choose a movie like this. Davis’ role was expendable; her character could have been played by anyone. I wonder why she chose this role after such success with The Help. Besides Rossum’s Ridley, the only other saving grace in the film was the fantastic Emma Thompson. Thompson’s role as a religious zealot with a dark secret was the most well-written, interesting character in the entire movie. 

Beautiful Creatures is definitely not the type of movie you should rush to the theaters, or even RedBox to see; its 124 minute runtime does not go by quickly. For a good witch....errr caster... film check out Practical Magic instead. (it's available for free if you're a member of Amazon Prime)

My review: C-/D+

Beautiful Creatures Trailer

Identity Thief: Thievery of a Movie Night

When it comes to comedies, I’m always scared that the studio put many of the funniest scenes in the trailer. Unfortunately, that is what happened with Identity Thief. Identity Thief is a slapstick comedy with disjointed jokes and outlandish plot points.  By the middle of the second act, I was already wondering how much time was left in the film. With such fantastic comedic leads as Jason Bateman (Arrested Development) and Melissa McCarthy (Bridesmaids), it’s unfortunate that screenwriter Craig Mazin’s (Hangover II) script couldn’t rise to their level of talent.

Sandy Bigelow Patterson (Bateman… and at some points McCarthy) is a caring family man stuck in a low-paying dead-end job with a horrible boss (Jon Favreau). He has just enough money to support his wife (Amanda Peet) and two kids, but they can’t afford any luxuries; that is, until he and his coworkers quit their jobs and go out on their own. At his new job, Sandy is a Vice President with a great salary. Cue Diana (McCarthy). After stealing Sandy’s identity through a phone scam, Diana takes it upon herself to run up his credit cards and drain his bank account. This poses a problem for Sandy when clients from his new firm run a background check and find he is in financial ruin. In order to save his job, Sandy promises to bring the identity thief to Colorado to confess her crimes and clear his name. 

After Sandy finds Diana in Florida, a dull road trip comedy emerges, full of corny, obvious jokes and a pointless B story involving a bounty hunter, assassins and snakes (Oh my!). Eric Stonestreet’s (Modern Family) cameo doesn’t work well in the story and is a bit more disturbing than it is funny. Another disappointing aspect of the film was that a lot of its humor was at McCarthy’s expense. There were many unnecessary jokes about her size and appearance that ended up being more heartbreaking than funny. 

Although this is billed as a comedy, I left the theater feeling more depressed than happy. Not just because the movie was bad but because the dramatic elements of this comedy were what really resonated with me; perhaps this should have been a drama instead of a comedy. Diana’s motivation for stealing identities stems from the fact she is extremely lonely and has to constantly deal with people laughing at her appearance; she wants other people to feel the same hurt she feels (while admittedly also feeding her shopping addiction). McCarthy has proven herself to be one of the funniest comediennes in Hollywood. She is a fantastic, scene-stealing actress who completely throws herself into her roles, losing all semblances of herself amidst her character. It was refreshing to see she has dramatic acting chops as well.

The one thing Identity Thief does well is prove that Melissa McCarthy can carry her own movie; she no longer has to be the best friend, or in the case of Bridesmaids a sister-in-law. She and Bateman did the best they could with a bad plot. Hopefully McCarthy’s next comedy, The Heat, with Sandra Bullock, will match her talent instead of bringing it down.  

My Grade: C-/D+ 

                    

Beauty and the Zombie: My Review of Warm Bodies

Based on a novel of the same name, Hollywood’s newest zom-com, Warm Bodies, gives audiences a zombie story that breaks from type. In most Zombiepocalypse horror movies and T.V. shows, zombies are mindless killing machines, hell-bent on eating the main characters; usually, they don’t even have a name. However, writer/director Jonathan Levine (50/50) wasn’t afraid to turn the rules of the genre on its head by making a zombie the film’s protagonist instead of its villain. The audience sees the world through the zombie’s eyes and is privy to his thoughts thanks to a hilarious tongue-in-cheek inner-monologue that explains the difficulties of zombie life: constant slouching, grunts instead of words, brain eating… you know, normal problems.

Warm Bodies begins eight years after an unidentified plague turned most of mankind into zombies. The film centers around “R” (Nicholas Hoult), a lonely zombie who actually feels conflicted about killing humans for food. When he is not moping around in an abandoned airplane listening to old love songs like John Waite’s “Missing You”, R inhabits an airport full of other zombies and “bonies”, skeleton creatures that viciously attack anything with a heartbeat; all zombies eventually turn into bonies after losing their humanity. None of the zombies can really speak to each other, except for random words here and there. They instead stumble around, grunt, and look for humans to eat.

But hope seeps into this dreary world, and the zombies begin to change for the better when R meets and falls in love with Julie (Teresa Palmer), a human. Along with many other apocalypse survivors, Julie lives in a heavily fortified colony, led by her zombie-hating father (John Malkovich). When she and her group of friends leave the colony in search of medicine and other supplies, they are attacked by a horde of zombies. R saves Julie’s life and brings her back to his abandoned airplane for “safety”. With Julie’s help, R begins to turn his grunts into actual words and the two realize that humans may not be so different from zombies after all. It is up to them to bridge the gap between both of their worlds, all while avoiding the true bad guys, the bonies. While some may see this film as a nod to Romeo and Juliet, I think it is actually a modern-day re-telling of Beauty and the Beast; only in this version, the Beast is a zombie and instead of Belle being impressed with the Beast’s library of books, she instead enjoys his “library” of vinyl records.

The best part of this film is that it never takes itself too seriously; even the few cheesy scenes didn’t take away from the overall sentiment of the film. R’s hilarious inner-dialogue constantly picks on the traditional zombie archetype and the love story between R and Julie really gives the story depth and heart. Hoult is able to give R semblances of humanity, and as a result, his “zombie” isn’t too outlandish or scary. Hoult and Palmer also have great chemistry, thought at times it was hard for me to focus on anything other than the fact that Palmer looks exactly like Kristen Stewart. Rob Corddry, who plays R’s “best friend” M, shows that a talented actor-comedian doesn’t need a lot of dialogue to make a scene-stealing impression.

Warm Bodies proves that you don’t need horror and gore in order to create a great zombie film. Though I will admit, for all of the zombie traditionalists, you may want to wait for Brad Pitt’s World War Z coming out this summer.