It was a violent weekend at the movies. The week's best film was certainly Gerardo Naranjo's crime thriller "Miss Bala," although I was not quite as enthusiastic as some of the film's supporters at last year's Cannes Film Festival. It is, however, a solid and intense picture.
I also enjoyed Steven Soderbergh's "Haywire," but the picture is definitely an example of a great filmmaker working in a minor key. I had mixed feelings about Anthony Hemingway's "Red Tails," which is full of beautiful aerial photography and some good performances, but is a missed opportunity. It's merely an action picture that happens to feature the Tuskegee Airmen as its heroes, rather than an in-depth study of the pilots.
Here are my Patch reviews.
And then, the Oscar nominees - what's to say. I believe the exclusions this year, which were many, are the most telling. While I didn't expect "Melancholia" or "A Dangerous Method" to be included in the picture or directing categories due to their darker content, I thought it was a great sin of omission to leave Keira Knightley and Kirsten Dunst off the Best Actress roster.
And where the hell were the Best Original Score and Supporting Actor nods (Albert Brooks) for "Drive"? And Leonard DiCaprio for "J. Edgar"? And Jessica Chastain for "The Tree of Life," not "The Help"? And "Le Havre" in the Best Foreign Film category. And Michael Shannon's Best Actor nomination for "Take Shelter"? And Michael Fassbender for anything? Etc., etc.
I was glad to see "The Tree of Life" pick up nods for Best Picture and Director as well as a slew of nominations for "Hugo," "The Artist" and "The Descendants." And that was cool that "A Separation" also snuck into the screenplay slot. But, overall, it was a disappointing group of nominees.
No comments:
Post a Comment