Category: Oscar Nominee

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Minari (2020)

I have little patience or sympathy for father characters who are willing to lead their families on a path of destruction all because of their own hubris, leaving the mothers to sacrifice all they can just to keep the family together. Steven Yeun and Han Ye-ri play this tropes to perfection. Thankfully that’s not the entire story here and we have the wonderful Youn Yuh-jung as grandma, coming in to provide support and humor while also helping her grandson to find his strength. Middle America has never looked so good visually. I viscerally felt like as I was in the setting, one that is similar to others I have known intimately. Alan Kim is adorable as young David and manages the rarity of a cute child character who feels real instead of stilted.   Best Picture Nomination

Oscar Win: Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role

Oscar Nominations: Best Motion Picture of the Year; Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role; Best Achievement in Directing; Best Original Screenplay; Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures (Original Score)

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Not as a Stranger (1955)

Following the medical career of a Dr. Robert Mitchum from medical school to early days as a member of another doctor’s practice, this two-plus hour movie is dull. Bob is too old and too reticent as a doctor. Olivia de Havilland as his nurse and wife is also too fake-Swedish and too blonde for her role. Frank Sinatra, Gloria Grahame, and the rest of the cast are under-utilized. There are a few moments that have heart, mostly dealing with Mitchum’s relationships with his father and father-figure mentors, but they’re easily drowned in everything else.

Oscar Nomination: Best Sound, Recording

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Long Night’s Journey Into Day (2000)

All of my South African apartheid viewing has been limited to the days of segregation. I’m poorly informed on how the post-Apartheid era. I appreciated this window into the Truth and Reconciliation Committee even if the production quality was not far from a Public Access television level. I especially laud the choice of the filmmakers do focus on the stories themselves, only telling the viewer of the conclusion in an epilogue.

Oscar Nomination: Best Documentary, Features

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The Bear (1988)

Every time I travel through California, I pay special attention when I see Bear Crossing signs in the hopes of seeing a bear. I have yet to see a single wild bear this way. While maybe not as narratively satisfying, I could have done with 100% less humans in this story. There was a lot more dialogue in the film than I was lead to believe because of all the people. I welcome a sweet found family story. I felt guilty having to root against the puppies in one scene, but bears are cute.

Oscar Nomination: Best Film Editing

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Cry Freedom (1987)

Having been born on the day of the Soweto student uprising (a fact I learned at an embarrassingly old age), I am attracted to anti-apartheid stories of the 1970s. For the runtime of the movie, I really had hoped they would spend at least as much time focused on Biko’s story as they do on Donald Woods and his family. It doesn’t even reach white savior levels as much as it seems a story of a white guy in South Africa who learns to hate apartheid. Kevin Kline and Denzel Washington do fine jobs though Denzel doesn’t really transcend much beyond being his charismatic self. I did get to go down a small internet rabbit hole in learning about Denzel’s front gap.

Oscar Nominations: Best Actor in a Supporting Role; Best Music, Original Song; Best Music, Original Score

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Equus (1977)

I admit that the lurid one line description of the story both made me not interested in watching this while also sincerely wondering what has made it successful. I don’t know about the play itself, but the film is also a bit slow in getting started. As the psychiatrist unravels the mystery of why this boy maimed six horses, it becomes quite compelling. I’ve spent a lot of time in recent years pondering how much we should push people to be more ‘normal’ and fit into the mainstream. Any adult who interacts regularly with children particularly should be asking that question and how much to push them into abiding by what you think they should believe and be. I have mixed feelings about the roles I’ve seen Richard Burton in, but this may be one of the best so far. I am now curious to see it on stage.

Oscar Nominations: Best Actor in a Leading Role; Best Actor in a Supporting Role; Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium

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Raya and the Last Dragon (2021)

Since Disney Animation Studios has given up on traditional animation, I’ve had a hard time really feeling the magic in their feature films. Maybe it’s just a matter of me being old and unreceptive to change, but visually many of these films don’t have much spark. Raya and the Last Dragon tries (there are some beautiful individual settings), but somehow it simultaneously doesn’t spend enough time world building and takes too much time getting to the actual adventure. There is little that makes Raya as a character unique or interesting and no real reason to care about her plight. Every character other than her is more interesting, including everyone stuck in stone through the entire film.

Oscar Nomination: Best Animated Feature Film

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Streetwise (1984)

I do enjoy watching films that show locations I’m familiar with, especially from times before they and I were acquainted. Particularly here, anyone who thinks the problems that Seattle currently is experiencing should watch this to see that while the problems may have gotten worse in recent years, none of them are new. Beyond locality, there are a lot of messages to take away here: how to deal with those who slip through the cracks (both voluntarily and involuntarily), the threads that continue to spin from generation to generation, the unequal treatment of girls and boys that leads to extreme differences in results for women and men. I still don’t know how to even process how young they all were.

Oscar Nomination: Best Documentary, Features

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Nomadland (2020)

I only have one Best Picture nominee left to watch from this year (Minari is sitting next to my TV, waiting to be watched) so I can’t give a definitive answer whether this deserves to be Best Picture. Thus far I’m not mad at the pick. It doesn’t scream that it is entirely a new story, but it does feel like a now story: people driven from their homes and finding an alternative way to being when capitalism fails them. It is also provides beautiful views of Middle America. I don’t know what kind of life Frances McDormand would have had if she weren’t an award winning actress, but she is truly believable as a rugged, hard-working woman able to do whatever she needs to to get by. On the other hand, as much as I love David Strathairn, in a ‘normal’ Hollywood movie he could pass off as a fade into the background everyman, but in this one, he looked too clean and pretty.   Best Picture Winner

Oscar Wins: Best Motion Picture of the Year; Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role; Best Achievement in Directing

Oscar Nominations: Best Adapted Screenplay; Best Achievement in Film Editing; Best Achievement in Cinematography

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Citizen Kane (1941) – Rewatch

After watching Mank, I decided I needed to revisit this. I honestly didn’t get a whole lot out of it the first time I had watched it many years ago. With more film knowledge under my belt, I sadly still don’t connect much with the story and really can’t find reason to care about a fictionalization of William Randolph Hearst and others like him. I appreciate that the story more or less circles back on itself in a creative, though not really surprising, way. Visually it is striking and this subsequent watch gave me an opportunity to appreciate the framing, which is innovative for its time even when it feels overused. I don’t know what the Best Movie Ever actually is, but this still wouldn’t get my vote.   Best Picture Nomination

Oscar Win: Best Writing, Original Screenplay

Oscar Nominations: Best Picture; Best Actor in a Leading Role; Best Cinematography, Black-and-White; Best Art Direction-Interior Decoration, Black-and-White; Best Sound, Recording; Best Film Editing; Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic Picture

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