Movie Matters: 2011 Oscars: And the Nominees Are Alright

First thoughts, Helena Bonham Carter and Geoffrey Rush are geniuses but they got in on the coat tails of Colin Firth's tour de force performance in the "King's Speech."

"The Kids Are All Right" is the perfect portrait of the Whole Foods American family and every Obama voter should go see it right now.

"Inception" was the second most fun I had at the theater last year.

"The Social Network," yawn.

Other thoughts, this is the first time in a long time that a number of the films nominated were released all throughout the year.

Snubs include "Scott Pilgrim vs. The World" (Best Adapted Screenplay) and "Scott Pilgrim vs. The World" (Best Picture Ever and the most fun I had at the theater this year).

For complete coverage go to the source.

Soundtracks Matter: Time to Settle the Score

By John Mallory

As it gets closer to Oscar night, movie fans and film critics will continue to discuss who will be rewarded or disappointed by this year's Academy Awards. People naturally focus on what they consider to be the "major" awards. (Best Director, Best Picture, Best Leading Actress, etc) But I want to focus on the real magic of the movies... the music. It's true that directors went to film school and actors occasionally have some type of "craft" that is usually wasted on cell phone commercials, but the beautiful, uplifting, sad, frightening, and euphoric musical themes not only compliment what we're watching, but also shape and control our entire theatrical experience. A poorly scored movie is a waste of time. A film who's music encapsulates the raw and sometimes inexpressible emotions of both the characters and audience is nothing short of magic.

This year's Oscar nominations for Best Original Score provide an interesting sample of some of the best movie music of 2009. First let's look at James Horner's nomination for "Avatar". Horner is a powerful composer who is increasing his stronghold on Hollywood's music having already composed for such films as "Legends of the Fall", "Braveheart", "Apollo 13", "Titanic", and "A Beautiful Mind". His approach to "Avatar" was slightly different from the style we've come to expect, but still keeping to his orchestral basics and adding a little more of everything. This is an epic movie for which he provided a score of epic proportions and epic orchestration. Given the films focus on fictional indigenous tribes, he employed a large array of global vocals which blend almost perfectly with culture of the Navi. Looking at his entire body of work, the music to Avatar sounds most similar to Titanic which won his only two Oscars in 1998. (Best Original Score and Best Original Song) It'll be interesting to see if returning to that style earns him the award again.

Looking next at Alexandre Desplat's music for "Fantastic Mr. Fox" we encounter a lesser known composer. Although he's composed for a few well known films and even 2 previous Oscar nominations ("Curious Case of Benjamin Button" and "The Queen"), most of his film music career has focused on French films. In this puppet and claymation movie, Desplat takes a more whimsical focus that matches the film's personality and approach. Although he does an impressive job of providing the type of musical that almost perfectly compliments the film, it's difficult to walk away with an Oscar when your orchestration focuses on Banjos and whistling.

The music for "The Hurt Locker" was a surprising nomination for best Original Score. The soundtrack has allot of originality, but very little score. This was a joint composition by Marco Beltrami and Buck Sanders who have collaborated on other films such as "I Robot", "Blade", and "Scream". Beltrami received the nomination once before for his work on "3:10 to Yuma", but I think he'll once again go home empty handed. This is an extremely complex psychological film and the music intended to match it's dark internal exploration. What sounds like an attempt to juxtaposition the frustrating anger of war surrounded by Arabic culture ends up sounding like nothing more than a Mosque competing with a Matallica concert. The nomination could've been for Sound Effects.

Hans Zimmer's music for "Sherlock Holmes" also took a very original approach, but presented a fascinating work that was surprisingly fun. Zimmer is a tremendously talented composer ("Crimson Tide", "The Lion King", "Gladiator") who has been nominated 7 previous times and never won the Oscar. The music for "Sherlock Holmes" is disjunct and abrasive yet somehow coherent and organized much like the lead character. His focus on harpsichord gives the entire soundtrack a Victorian feel, but with modern flavor. Also, his frenetic orchestration compliments the entire films urgency as Holmes and Watson frantically search for answers. Zimmer brilliantly combines his musical talent with films personality to create a score that just might win his first Oscar.

Lastly there's Michael Giacchino's second Oscar nomination. (The first was for his work on "Ratatouille") Very seldom have I been so strongly moved by a soundtrack and within the first few minutes of the film, I fell in love. This previously little known composer crafted beautiful sweeping themes that literally saturate the audience with a moving emotional experience. The quieter moments are appropriately intimate and personal, while the larger moments push everyone to the edge of their seats. During the entire film I was mesmerized by the music's beauty and seamless necessity. I'm of course talking about his work on "Star Trek". Why he was instead nominated for "Up", I'm not very sure. Yes, he does an impressive job of employing some beautiful themes with an older style that seems to fit the main character's reminiscence for days gone by. However, it does little else. Giacchino is a talented composer, and I'm glad he was recognized even for the wrong film.

That's my assessment of this year's nominations for Best Original Score. I think this might be the year that Zimmer finally receives what he deserves, but Oscar night is always full of surprises.

Oscar Matters: Sandra Bullock vs. Meryl Streep

I never thought I would say this, but Sandra Bullock (The Blind Side) is giving Meryl Streep (Julia & Julia and 15 other Oscar nominations) a run for her money in this year's best actress race. When I saw trailers for The Blind Side I rolled my eyes and yawned. I thought nothing could get me interested in seeing what was clearly going to be an overly sentimental sport-as-metaphor cliché ridden film. On the other hand, 10 seconds into the trailer for Julia & Julia I was psyched to see the movie. My dream girl, Amy Adams, and acting legend Meryl Streep team up in a movie about Julie Child? Sign me up. In hindsight I was duped by the conniving marketing teams of both films but ultimately saved by the Academy's expanded best picture category (which I thought I hated).

First, the ad team for Julia & Julia promised two great stories for the price of one, but they didn't mention the fact that one story was of unequal and lesser value than the other. While the story of Julia Child living with her husband in Paris and her decision to learn the art of French cooking is funny and touching, the story of Julia Powell writing a blog based on Julie Child's famous cookbook is a failed attempt to equate an insignificant woman with the great woman on whose coat tails she rode. It was also tough to watch my future lover Amy Adams struggle with trying to make this frustrating character likable.

Second, the ad team for The Blind Side refused to target this movie at me. They promised me Sandra Bullock, who has made a string of hit or miss movies over the last twenty years, in a wholesome family drama where some white family in the south adopts a black kid who plays football. Totally implausible. Well, it turns out, that the movie is really a character study of affluent southern white Christians confronted with an opportunity to save the life a young black man. The movie takes a balanced look at two communities that are prejudiced against each other and it goes on to show the human ties that bind those two communities together. Sandra Bullock is also a revelation. She plays Leigh Anne Touhy with bitting authenticity and heartfelt compassion which must mean her talent has been tragically wasted on the glib roles of all those low-stakes rom-coms she's been in.

At the end of the day, Sandra Bullock's performance had to be spot on perfect for The Blind Side to work and there is no doubt she nailed it. On the other hand Meryl Streep's outstanding performance could not salvage the mess that was Julia & Julia. Meryl was by far the best part of the movie, as she often is, but I'm of the school that says, the movie needs to be great to receive any Oscars. Sandra Bullock set The Blind Side up to be great and she deserves the Oscar. Oh gods of the Oscars, forgive me.

Oscar Matters: "The Hurt Locker" and "In the Loop"

The Academy has steadily honored Iraq war documentaries but this is the first year that it honors dramatized depictions of the eight year war. That's partly because the war is happening and documentaries are better at capturing real time events. But dramatized depictions of the war harness the power of fiction to make the audience a part of the story.

In 2004, an election year, the Academy awarded the best documentary feature to Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara a cautionary tale about the Vietnam War and the trap of American hubris. This was the first of a series of documentary features honored by the Academy that marked a not so subtle protest of the Iraq war. During subsequent election years they continued the trend, nominating two Iraq war documentary features in 2006, Iraq in Fragments and My Country, My Country (neither won) and three in 2008, Taxi to the Dark Side (winner), No End in Sight, and Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience. It's not shocking that the liberal peacenik hippies of lala land (i.e., the Academy) felt a moral obligation to shine a light on the blunders of the US invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq. But this spotlight was a bit dim.

The documentary is a journalistic form of filmmaking that uses stark facts to tell a story. There's no CGI or clever editing techniques getting in the way of facts. People are interviewed while charts and graphs complete the narrative. Clear, concise and boring. This is not the escape from real life that a night at the movies promises, instead the documentary is a glaring reflection of real life. And while that is an extremely important exercise, especially in the case of the Iraq war, it's not a fun way to spend a Friday night. So while the Academy has honored these Iraq war documentaries with a meteor shower of nominations and Oscars they have failed to light up the sky so the average movie goer can't look away.

With 9 nominations for The Hurt Locker and one for In the Loop the Academy finally turns up the wattage on its Iraq war spotlight. With its nine nominations, The Hurt Locker is tied for the most nominations in 2010 meaning that the Academy is cementing it as one of the films to remember 2009 by. This is a truly great movie that tells a simple, compelling story about soldiers who search for meaning in life when life is cheapened by the scourge of war. Unlike it's documentary brothers, this movie does not delve into the political nuances of why and how the Iraq conflict proves or disproves the efficacy of a policy stance. Instead it deals with how the subtleties of human nature are affected by the Iraq war. The characters in the movie are specific yet representative of the diversity of people touched by this war.

It seems counter-intuative but I think fiction is better suited to reveal truth about human nature than true stories. I think it has something to do with the mutability of fictional realities verses the concreteness of real life. While watching The Hurt Locker I imagined what I would do if put into the same situations as the characters and that gave me a better understanding of myself which added to the film going experience. But when I watched Taxi to the Dark Side, I merely observed the actions of real people. What they did had consequences. Imagining anything different while watching that film would have taken away from the experience. And because most of our exposure to the war is through news reporting (true stories) we compartmentalize the war into something that is outside of ourselves, but fictional depictions of the war give us the latitude to internalize the human impact of the conflict.

The nomination for best adapted screenplay for In the Loop, a brilliant satire of pre-Iraq war Britain and America, was, to me, the biggest shock of the 2010 nominations. First of all, the Academy hasn't consistently honored comedies since the 30s and 40s. And I get it. Comedies are usually poorly made and unsophisticated. In the Loop is neither. The pacing of the movie is lightning fast. Jumping from Downing Street to Pennsylvania Ave, from the Pentagon to the UN this movie's rushed sense of urgency mimics the frenetic pace with which both countries decided to invade Iraq. The concept of hero and villain is obscured by the rampant incompetence and self-promotion of the technocrats on both sides of the Atlantic and the aisle. And after you've laughed at these boobs for an hour and a half you realize that these are the people who convinced you and the rest of the world that Saddam had WMDs. Our collective lack of scrutiny was the farce of this war. And again, you can never get that sort of visibility into human nature by just watching a true story.

As time passes, the films about Iraq will get better and hopefully the Academy will continue to honor all the films that teach us about this conflict but especially the films that expose our individual connection to and responsibilities for the Iraq war.

Movie Matters: 2010 Oscars: And the Nominees are Leaving Something to be Desired

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As a loyal EM reader you know that this blog has a general respect for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science. Their annual awards, commonly known as the Oscars, give the movies the requisite heft to be considered high art. But the announcement of the 2010 nominees irritated me.

First problem, ten best picture nominees. Of course this is not a new phenomenon, but its desperate. Back in the 30's nominating this many films was standard, but back then the Oscars where a more blatant attempt to sell movie tickets. As the awards evolved over the decades it appeared that they were more concerned with honoring a worthy few and were content to let extremely talented artists languish Oscar-free for an entire career (See, Peter O'Toole). They didn't seem to care if they honored movies that no one saw or will ever see (The English Patient). Raising the number of best picture nominees is a shameless attempt to raise Oscar night ratings at the expense of diminishing the prestige of the award. Also, with such a large field the picture that wins theoretically only needs 11% of the vote. Should a picture with that little support be etched in the pages of history forever?

Second problem, Avatar. With nine nominations, including Best Picture and Best Director, the Academy is making a bold statement that 2009 was the year of Avatar. I concede that the film grossed over $2 billion, which is good for the industry, and the visual effects rose to level of OMG, but those facts don't make up for the stale plot and stilted dialog. The beauty of film is that it's a collaborative art form but the draw back of that is if there is one weak link the entire production suffers. A best picture nominee should shine from every aspect of the movie making process and Avatar falls short in too many places. Just because people went to see the movie, doesn't mean it's great (See, Spider-Man 3).


Third problem, Star Trek. Science fiction is usually woefully snubbed at the Oscars, but this year the Academy had two science fiction blockbusters that it could honor, and as the knight in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade said they, "choose poorly." Save for visual affects (and that's debatable) Star Trek outshines Avatar in every metric. The story is more compelling, the characters are more fully developed, the stakes of the story are much higher and the movie is just plain fun. If the Academy insists on nominating ten pictures they can't miss the one movie that brought nerds and jocks together in 2009.


Final problem, repeat nominees. I get it. Meryl Streep is the greatest ever and the Coen Brothers are clever. But do we need to be reminded of these facts every year? I look to the Oscar nominations as a chance to see what great performances I might have missed over the last year because there were too many ads for Night at the Museum 2. Of course I'm going to go see Helen Mirren, Morgan Freeman, and George Clooney. Academy, please, tell me something I don't know.


This is the first of many posts about the 2010 Oscars. Stay tuned. And don't forget to follow @EnterMatter on Twitter for the latest updates.

Movie Matters: Tell No One

Tell No One is a movie that's so great that no one will see it until after it wins an Oscar. A taut murder mystery, Tell No One asks, "What happens when you bury the truth to protect the ones you love?" In this film, the answers are unsettling but always authentic.

I'm going to avoid going into the particulars of the film, the mystery is part of the fun, but I will say that the performance of the lead actor, François Cluzetis, is utterly breathtaking. Tell No One will be released on DVD on October 15, 2008. You can still catch it at the E Street Cinema or Bethesda Row.

Oscar Matters - Marion Cotillard's 9/11 Thoughts

An Open Letter to Marion Cotillard

Dear Marion -

Now that you have an Oscar, your in-depth analysis of the geo-political and economic reasons why the 9/11 attacks were faked are now going to make news. As someone who wants to see your slender body of work fattened up over time I have one request; stick to what you know. You are an actress, heck the best actress of 2008, so when you give interviews talk about your expertise. Your advice on craft could help untold numbers of aspiring actresses achieve their dreams. Your insight into on set politics could save productions time and money. You have real life experience in acting that others could benefit from, so I'm begging you, talk about that in your next encounter with the press.

You are not Rosie O’Donnell. Rosie can say and do whatever she wants because she made us fall in love with her before she told us she was a crazy person. She's like our crazy Aunt who we will always invite over for Thanksgiving and always send home early in a taxi because we are stuck with her. But we barely know you. Your first impression was good and we invited you to the ball. But now you've insulted us and maybe it's because you're French and think you don't need us, but honey, the real truth is we don't need you. I'm all for free speech and holding the government to account, but Hollywood isn't afraid to blackball people to protect its financial interests. For your own good, make us fall in love with you through your work before you poke us in the eye.

At the Oscars your dress was gorgeous and your French accent was super sexy and I want to see you around for years to come. Don't pull a Tom Cruise and torpedo your career.

Your acquaintance,

Aaron

Oscar Matters: Joining the Conversation

Movies influence our national conversation and the Academy offers Oscar nominated films to frame a specific discussion. This year I find myself less concerned about the winners and more interested in finding out what the Academy has on its mind. So, I decide to see as many Oscar nominated films as I can.

On Saturday, February 23 I spend nearly six hours at the National Archives to watch three hours and forty-two minutes of Oscar nominated short films. The two hours and change not spent watching film is spent standing in line outside. The temperature on the National Mall peaks at 36 degrees while a wintry mix drizzles non-stop. I don't mind the weather conditions because I'm in a robust conversation with several people about the film scene in DC, this year's Oscar nominees, and the movies in general. No doubt some of the people out here want to ensure they win their office Oscar pool. I point those competitors to David Carr's comment about the Oscar nominated Live Action, Animated, and Documentary shorts in The New York Times, "If you really are forced to choose these obscurities in your office pool, you should probably switch jobs." Picking Oscar winners is not hard. At my own Oscar shindig, having seen more nominated pictures than anyone in the room, I should be the expert, but I fail to pick more winners than anyone else. There are reasons, other than the hollow glory obtained by guessing more Oscar winners than your cubicle mate, why I or anyone else spends an entire Saturday watching these particular Oscar nominees.

Granted, there are practical considerations. These short films live obscure lives on film festival screens mostly in Europe. Of the 14 nominated shorts, 11 of them are made outside of the United States. Americans love the movies and will pay $10 or $12 to see Spider-Man 3, but we are not going bundle up the kids , drive to the movie theater, buy $40 worth of refreshments and watch a 20 minute movie about a child who recently contracted AIDS in Iraq. Even if avid film enthusiasts want to see short film, their local art house might show the Oscar nominated shorts for few days a year, but that will be the extent of their yearly short film schedule. (The same sort or analysis applies to many of the films nominated this year. Juno is the only nominated film that grosses over $100 million at the US box office. It doesn't win.) Living in DC, I can go to the E Street Theater and pay $30 to see these films or I can go to the National Archives and see the films for free. As one of my fellow film goers says, "I don't know what these films are about, but the price is right."

But besides practical considerations I brave the elements to learn the vocabulary for this year's Academy discussion. Innovation in film making is always on the Academy's mind. The reason the Academy honors Live Action, Animated and Documentary shorts is because, and I'm stealing this from Margaret Parson, Curator, Department of Film Programs, National Gallery of Art, these films, unencumbered by commercial constraints, are the laboratories for film experiments. Hollywood serves a fickle public so it must present new and different techniques to keep the public interested. Sort of. Only three of the short "laboratories of film" were made in America. Hollywood leaves the lab work to someone else and capitalizes on their innovations when the market is ready. In the mean time the Academy rewards many of these innovators by giving them Oscars and enough time at the podium to stammer in broken English until they give up and thank their friends and families in their native language. To me this suggests that, as far as craft, that is the mechanics of telling stories using film, Hollywood is looking abroad for ideas. But this discussion, while interesting to film nuts, is really for the industry professional. I care more about what the stories are telling us.

Atonement defends fiction's place in telling us stories which is interesting and innovative but the Academy seems more interested in films that ask Americans, "Who are we?" Four of the Best Picture nominees are American films that deal with U.S. specific issues. No Country For Old Men, a western, the most American of genres, wins best picture. But it isn't a western that we've seen before. There is no show down at high noon at or near the OK Corral. The West in this picture seems to have the same rules, but not all the players know the rules and if they do they break them intentionally. This is very unsettling to see as an American. Our entire national myth is tied up in our expansion West and if the rules that govern that place are falling apart, how are we falling apart? This idea is further explored in Michael Clayton and There Will Be Blood, where the American Dream belongs to corporations who rent it to individuals as long as they protect corporate interests. And finally Juno unmercifully strips away the glossy veneer of the American family. These films show that America is not the woman she used to be. She's maturing, and we can not keep treating her like a child. She's an adult and needs to start acting like one.

I encourage you to see as many nominees as you can so the next time I run into you we can talk about what Hollywood thinks is important and try to come to a consensus on whether or not it matters.

Oscar Matters - Taxi to the Darkside @ National Archives

Taxi to the Dark Side

On February 21st at 5:51 PM I arrive at the Special Events entrance to get my ticket for "Taxi to the Dark Side." Free tickets are going to be handed out at 6:00 PM and there is already a line out to the sidewalk on Constitution Ave. My fellow movie goers are all bundled up passing the time by doing "The Onion" crossword or reading a tattered copy of "Atonement" or talking about today's New York Times article about Senator McCain's "concubine." I'm standing next to a young woman who is holding a spot in line for family member who shows up in a well worn HRC hat. An employee of the National Archives walks out and tells us the rules: 1) Tickets will be handed out at 6 o'clock; 2) Doors will open at 6:30; 3) Visit the Starbucks or the Potbelly's across Pennsylvania but be back no later than a quarter of seven. The man in the HRC hat tells his young female relation, "Honey, my philosophy is if you think young, act young, and look young, it will help you stay young." Then he points to his face and says, "That why I got work done." This is a liberal crowd ecstatic to see a film that brings into sharp relief the failings of the Bush Presidency.

The wind is cutting through the pockets of my jacket as I wait for the doors to open. I'm doing everything to keep my hands warm but I know they won't be warm until I get inside. I'm envious of the woman who is being escorted into the building before doors officially open. A National Archives employee shouts ahead, "This is the speaker." The speaker reminds me of my Victorian Lit professor. She's carrying at least three bags and has a vague, confused expression on her face. I can't remember reading anything thing about speakers on the Web site, so I assume she is some sort of academic.

After I find my seat in the lavish William G. McGowan Theater I take a look at the program and read that Ann Hornaday, Washington Post film critic, is the speaker. As she sits in the audience before she's called to the podium I look over her shoulder and see a half page of typed notes. She's been asked to set aside her proclivity to assess the merits of individual films and talk about the DC film scene. Her comments are limited to the half page she had with her. After thanking foundations and vocalizing her hope that Charles Guggenheim's daughter is in the audience, she says, this theater is the center of the film scene in Washington. She goes on to note that seeing these nominated documentaries and short films is a new phenomenon and a privilege. She concludes by saying the films in this series, and any film worth is salt, approach the question, "Who are we?" in interesting and engaging ways.

Taxi to the Dark Side illuminates a dark and complex subject matter; the use torture in the war on terror. Like many of the war policies that come out of the Bush White House, the original torture policy is created hastily and implemented without consideration of long term consequences. The movie, in stark contrast to this mode of reasoning, carefully dissects each aspect of the story to find the underlying truth and lessons to be learned. Taxi and No End In Sight are must see films for every citizen concerned about American's standing in the world. What they ultimately show is that the promise of America lives within the thousands of civil servants who wake up each day to protect our nation and her interest. They also expose the greatest weakness of our nation: a complacence and apathetic public. The packed theater, the funding of several major foundations and organizations, and the general atmosphere of the evening reassure me that we have the capacity to learn from our mistakes and heal our wounded nation.

Oscar Matters - Is this Johnny Depp's Year?

There is no question that Johnny Deep is one of our most talented actors and he deserves an Oscar. It's always been my belief that actors and actresses should win Oscars for their body of work. When hot Hollywood new comers burst on the scene and win an Oscar for their first major role their next major role is historically a high-budget low-substance picture. Who can forget Adrian Brody's turn in The Jacket? Wait, who can remember Adrian Brody?

I love Johnny Depp, but his choice in roles has not always highlighted his true talent. From the first time I saw him on screen in Edward Scissorhands to his haunting portrayal of Sweeny Todd (Tim Burton uses him a lot), he has been my most reliable source for what life's like on the fringes of society. But the fringe doesn't really pay the bills in Hollywood nor does it always give room for versatility.

It took a big budget mass appeal juggernaut like Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl to make him an Oscar nominee . Stand out performances in Blow and Chocolat showed that he was more that just the quirky Tim Burton lead and his legion of cult followers have been good for business. Johnny Depp, after putting in memorable performances for 20 years earned his first nod in 2004 for playing Jack Sarrow. The Academy rarely gives statues for comedic performances, this was no exception, but it did give him a second nod the following year for his portrayal of Sir James Matthew Barrie in Finding Neverland. He lost to Jamie Fox (the Academy owes black people some back pay) .

This year is his best shot at winning the golden statute thus far. In Sweeny Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Depp reunites with Tim Burton. Todd tells the dark story of a Benjamin Barker who’s exiled because a powerful judge wants to take Barker's wife for his own. When Barker returns from exile, he has nothing and has become Sweeney Todd, a mad man out for revenge. It is here, in the deep recesses of the macabre, where Depp honed his talent and is arguably his most effective. His intensity as an actor helps him humanize the most inhuman of characters. I think it would be no small vindication for him, and his most loyal fans, to win the award for playing a mad man in a Tim Burton picture.

But than again he could easily be in his seat when the Best Actor winner is announced on February 25 at the Kodak Theater. The Academy usually honors the proven best (talent wise and box office wise), but it tends to take them a while. Jack Nicholson is the Academy's most honored actor, with four wins and twelve nominations. He didn't win until his fourth nomination. Peter O'Toole has been nominated eight times and has only won an honorary award. Kate Winslet has been nominated five times and hasn't won yet.

You have to wait your turn, but the Academy likes to share the wealth and three of this year's nominees, George Clooney, Tommy Lee John, and Daniel Day-Lewis, have already won acting Oscars. Viggo Mortinson is up for his first Oscar, making Johnny Depp the most acclaimed actor on the ballot without a win. Johnny's been good, and I hope this is the year the Academy makes him great.

Oscar Matters - Best Pictures of 2007

My greatest goal in life is to win an Oscar for Best Picture. In the mean time, lets take a look at why this year's best picture nods matter.

Atonement - This picture asks, can fiction save one's soul? This is an important question as mass market fiction becomes the elegiac touchstone of our collective lives. Stories have always helped to guide people through the collective fog of human experience, but usually religion has had a monopoly on the truth that lie in telling tells. As Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and philosophers of their ilk gain traction in the public conscience, we risk loosing the power of fiction to explain the human condition. But is fiction really that powerful/necessary or is it a poor substitute for careful scientific observation?

Weighty stuff, but Atonement, based of the Ian McEwen book of the same name, uses a simple story to test fiction's mettle. A young girl, Briony Tallis (Saoirse Ronan in an Oscar Nominated performance), deliberately gives a fictitious account of the assault of another young girl. In so doing she sends an innocent young man, Robbie Turner (James McAvoy), to jail and deprives her older sister, Cecilia (Kira Knightly) of his love. In the ensuing years, these three characters are thrown into the harsh realities of WWII. In the climax of the plot, the little girl has grown up and is confronted by her sister and the man she sent to jail.

Several critics have criticizes the movie for losing focus in the second half. I would suggest that the film makers are merely building their case for the clarity of fiction over the jumble of raw fact. The first half of the movie hums with an electric pace that is propelled forward by crisp dialogue and constant expositional character development. The second half lurches forward at an uneven pace, bogged down by static dialogue, and wild leaps in characterizations. The first half represents the kind of order fiction provides in helping us assign meaning to human actions, while the second half examines how the haphazardness of real life makes meaning difficult to pin down.


Now before you balk at the obtuse metaness of that argument consider the film's closing sequence. The little girl from the being of the story is now an old woman being interviewed about the story we just saw. This kind of narrative stunt suggests that the film makers expect us to take a step back and examine the picture on a higher level. That's why this film matters, and that's why it's best picture nod is well deserved.

Juno - The film explores the ebb and flow of gender roles in today's society. Juno (brilliantly portrayed by Oscar nominee Ellen Page), is an eccentric 16 year-old from Minnesota who unexpectedly gets pregnant and then decides to keep the baby and put it up for adoption. On the surface this seems like a pro-life polemic that says, "See, there's no need to have a choice." Not so fast pro-lifers. She ends up giving the baby to a recently divorced single mother. How's that for woman power? Juno is all set to have an abortion, but when she gets to the clinic she's realize that choice slices both ways. She knows that she doesn't want this baby, but she's empowered enough to take it to term and put it up for adoption where she sees fit. This film is really a celebration of the choice movement.

You can't talk about the choice movement without conjuring up ideas of gender equality. Juno is an autonomous woman who is in charge of her own destiny. Unlike most teen sex comedies, the woman initiates sex and the movie explores how pregnancy affects men. The movie asks a question that pro-choicers need to think about. What role do men in a pregnancy? If woman are self-sufficient automatons, do they need men?

The film makes a strong case for keeping us Y's around for a little while longer. Juno's father raises her when her mom leaves the family. Bleaker (played by Michael Cera) , her baby's bio dad, loves her more than anything in the world. These relationships point to the partnership qualities of male/female relationships that can enrich human experience. And that's why this movie matters.

Michael Clayton - This film examines what happens when people are reduced to a corporate function. In the opening sense, Michael Clayton (Played by George Clooney who gets an Oscar nod for it) explains to a hysterical client that he is not miracle worker, but a janitor. Wow. After $150,000 of law school training, a growling career in public law and several years as an attorney at a major law firm, he feels like an unskilled worker who does his jobs in the shadows, after hours, because the work he does is dirty and shouldn't see the light of day.

Everyone in this picture is doing someone else's dirty work. The plot centers around a class action lawsuit against an Agro-giant who has poisoned an entire community by letting a carcinogenic pesticide sep into the water supply. Tilda Swinton puts in an Oscar nominated performance as Karen Crowder a recently minted General Counsel whose current responsibilities include doing whatever it takes to save the agriculture company she works for from paying out in the suit. The ever brilliant Tom Wilkinson gains a nod for playing Arthur Edens, a corporate attorney who has an apparent breakdown because he realizes that he has logged 30,000 hours defending the corporate greed and corruption that lead to the sickness and death of innocents. But as the movie takes a look at Michael Clayton's life, a recovering gamblholic, in debt to a loan shark (who likes Michael but who has to collect on behalf of his employers) for a botched restaurant deal, prevented from doing the court room work that he loves, and charged with betraying his only friend for the good of his company, you get the sense that Arthur has finally gained his sanity.

The movie's characters are constantly asked to set aside their morality to advance corporate interests. And while to money's nice, the movie suggests that a life exchanged for money and power is not worth living. And that's why this movie matters.

No Country for Old Men - In this film, the classic mano y mano western trope is stretched to its limits as the old west gives way to the new west. The Coen Brothers (Nominated for Director, Adaptation, and Best Picture) present Cormac McCarthey's bleak story about the march of progress. The pivotal character is Anton Chigurh, (played by Javier Bardem in an Oscar nominated performance) a psychopathic hit man sent to retrieve the money from a botched drug deal. Llewelyn Moss (played by Josh Brolin) is out shooting at some food in rural Texas when he comes across the grizzly scene of the botched drug deal. He finds the money and the chase begins.

The simple chase plot is secondary to the greater issue of seismic societal shifts. The story is anchored by the elderly Sheriff Ed Tom Bell (played be Tommy Lee Jones) whose father and father's father served as Sheriff in this rural Texas county. There are a number of scenes in which he is overwhelmed by the pointless violence and mayhem caused by Chigurh. At the end of the ordeal he retires because he feels that he's no longer fit to work in a world that no longer funtions by any rule he can recognize. But the movie makes the point that just because the out comes are unfamiliar, it doesn't mean that the underlying structure of society has changed.

Stephen Hunter of the Washington Post wrote one of the few unfavorable reviews of the movie, pointing out that the ironic ending to the chase plot robbed the viewer of the text book western movie ending that people pay for. He has a point. There isn't the classic high noon show down between good and evil where two men square off and the good guy wins thanks to grit and determination. Instead, as is the case in our day, corporate interest, and a guy behind a desk hundreds of miles away, steps in and exacts a cheaper more effective, yet un-poetic ending. The viewer is rewarded because the corporate tool is dealt with by Chigurh in a twisted "good" vs. "evil" showdown that does remotely align with viewer expectations. This movie shows that although the west has been civilized there is still a barbaric code that thrives out there and in men's hearts. This movie shows that the more things change the easier it is to find the unchangeable building blocks of human nature. And that's why this movie matters.

There Will Be Blood - This movie explores the nightmareish qualities of the American Dream. Daniel Day-Lewis earns another Oscar nod for his portrayal of turn-of-the-20th-century oil man Daniel Plainview. Plainview is an oil prospector who has survived a number of mining accidents, adopted an orphan and who is looking for his big break. That break walks into the door one night in the form of a cleaver young man named Paul who sells him the story of his home town, a place where the ground is actually soaked with oil.

This sets up an interesting look at the power struggle that still has the Republican party at odds with itself till this very day. On the one hand you have Plainview (the great American company) offering widespread prosperity through economic stability and basic infrastructure. Both the stability and the infrastructure come from Plainview’s exclusive right to drill the town's land for oil. This seems like a good deal, except that the enrichment of the community is a secondary goal to the personal wealth and power Plainview seeks.

Luckily, or so it would seem, the soul of the town is being cared for by Eli Sunday (Paul's twin brother, both played exquisitely by an actor to watch Paul Dano) a zealous preacher on a mission to build his church. Like many Christian Evangelical denominations, The Church of the Third Revelation offers eternal salvation in exchange for allegiance to it's doctrine and a weekly tithe. Again we have a mismatch; the enrichment of the soul seems secondary to the personal wealth and power that Eli seeks.

What the film suggests is that the power and wealth grabbing nature of business and religion both rely on people willingly giving themselves up. In this world, and in ours, business and religion team up to make the selling of ones soul and goods seem like a necessity for a successful life. But even as they work together, their greed propels them towards facing off against each other and this showdown is for the possession of everything.

In the heart-stopping last scene of the film Plainview, as the personification of unbridled capitalism, has spiraled into madness brought on by the utter meaninglessness of his life's endeavors, faces Eli, the personification of unbridled religious power, and the film is unambiguous as to which side of this argument will ultimately "win." The movie declares no winners at the end of this film because it believes that the entanglement of business and religion is a poisons relationship that destroys human decency, and bares a poisonous fruit that kills faith. And that's why this movie matters.