The Ten Best Picture Nominees criticized, summoned, dissected and rated




The Social Network (PG-13)

A kind of critics darling for the new decade, David Fincher's film has the best script of the ten nominees. A critical depiction of our generation and the lack of communication that has happened in the process. A story about friendship, betrayal and connection. Was it the best picture of the year? I wouldn't say that but it sure is one hell of a triumph for all the artists that were on board this incredible picture. Jesse Eisenberg with his face that represents a whole generation and Andrew Garfield as Eduardo Saverin, the true hero of the story. Aaron Sorkin's script is layered, so much so that with every viewing you find a new sentence or a new word that you didn't notice the first time around and that brings even more resonance to the story's structure and plotting. A-

Inception (PG-13)

You can certainly find flaws in the script or in the film's action but there's no denying that Christopher Nolan's hire wire act of a movie had guts and a vision that lacked in all other Hollywood pictures. All the better for us since the film represents something we haven't really seen before. A film that certainly demands attention and multiple viewings to fully grasp its puzzling intricacies. In going deep into the realm of dreams, Nolan single handedly invented a world from scratch and a flawed hero -Leonardo Dicaprio's Cobb- that remained haunted by the death of his wife. It all came down to that last frame, the spinning of a totem and the never ending conversations that followed afterwards. What more can you ask for in a movie? A-


Black Swan (R)

My favourite of the ten nominees. Darren Aronofsky's ballet nightmare is an intense film that had a hypnotic intensity which truly took my breath away. As Nina, Nathalie Portman gives the performance of the year in a role that demanded heart and soul. Paving the way is Matthew Libatique's breathtaking cinematography, the best of the year & a script that honors everything from Cronenberg to the classic Red Shoes. What Black Swan did for cinema in 2010 is revitalize our perceptions of it and make us believe again in the power of movies. Following his masterful The Wrestler, Aronofsky's film is yet another study of an artist pushing his or herself to their limits and potential. The final shots of both films are raw, haunting and similarly planned. So much so that they can easily be seen as companion pieces to one another. This is art. A-

The Fighter (PG-13)

Here is a film that is more about family than boxing. I could have done without the last 15 minutes or so but the first 2/3 of the film are dynamite and essential viewing for any movie fan. David O' Russell's film might look to be about Mark Whalberg's Mickey Ward but I saw it differently. It is Christian Bale's movie. It is Melissa Leo's movie. It is Amy Adams' movie. They all steal the show and give us good reason as to why they got nominated in the acting categories and Whalberg was left in the dust. Bale's Dickie is a rundown junkie that still thinks about that famous night where he knocked out Sugar Ray Leonard. He is a man that has run out his luck by hanging out in crack houses and bringing down his brother with him. It is Bale's movie and I'll be darned if he doesn't come out of it with an Oscar tonight. B+

Winter's Bone (R)

This is such a small movie with such a microscopically small budget that it was already surprising to see it get nominated in this category. All the better for it. We need more movies like this one. Director Debra Granik creates an atmosphere that is grim and darkly lit in nature. Her film is one in which its heroine -indelibly played by Jennifer Lawrence- goes through the wooden passages of the Ozarks to find her junkie father. Surprising consequences happen and the girl is transported into an underground world that left me both shaken and disturbed. Winter's Bone is all about the small moments the heroine endures. The biblical boat trip that climaxes the film, her capture to the hands of corrupt bloodless people and even the smallest of moments, such as the gutting of a squirrel and the way she handles herself so proudly and so courageously in spite of things. Great movie. B+

The Kids Are All Right (R)

I had problems with Lisa Cholodenko's film. Mostly in the way it climaxes itself. But through and through this is a solid effort from her and has some of the most spectacular performances of 2010. As a married couple, Annette Benning and Julianne Moore are incredible and show us the creation of a couple that experience the ups and downs of a marriage. Mark Ruffalo as their kids' sperm donor gives the performance of his life. With charisma to spare, he has become one of the great character actors of the last 10 years and for good reason, his natural way of acting is both a permanent fixture of his style and a freshly credible counter to Holywood. But for me the highlight of the film is Julianne Moore, who's smart and sexy performance is right up there with her very best. B+

127 Hours (R)

Featuring one of the most memorable scenes of any movie from last year -the amputation of an arm and the freedom of a life- Danny Boyle's visionary true life tale brims with energy and the twitching speed of 10 red bulls. Sometimes he goes way overboard and infuses an overtly glamorized amount of style to his context but his movie is too damn good to be faulted for that. James Franco as Aaron Ralston is smashingly good, especially considering he's practically alone on screen for close to 90% of the time. It's a bold, daring performance that has garnered him a well deserved acting nomination and pushes what could have been a one trick film into a triumphant journey of hell and back. Don't listen to the naysayers, Don't look away in 127 Hours cause you might just miss the beginning of a new life B+


Toy Story 3 (G)

We have come to expect nothing but greatness from the wizards over at Pixar. What with the great streak they got going the last 10 years (Up, WALL-E, Ratatouille, The Incredibles, Finding Nemo) This threequel to a popular film series is no exception. With its brightly popped out colors and resonant theme of growing up Lee Unkrich's film is designed to thrill you and that it does. I was on the edge of my seat as I saw a shade of darkness I never thought I'd see in the series, especially when the time comes for the toys to escape and for the brimmed out furnaces of fire to stop them. If that doesn't convince you that this isn't ordinary kiddie fare, I don't know exactly what will. B+

True Grit (PG-13)

I was underwhelmed by the Coen Brothers' remake of the John Wayne film. Nothing much was happening throughout and there was a certain deja vu feeling that kept popping out of my head. Not to say the performances weren't great, they most certainly were. What was lacking was a sense of boldness that appeared in the brothers' previous efforts, especially their Jewish nightmare 2009's A Serious Man. This film certainly has its fans but one can't help but think it might have more to do with the artists involved than by the actual movie itself. A true disappointment from major artists. C+

The King's Speech (PG-13)

Here's the film people say will win. A movie packaged and designed for the Oscars. Which doesn't mean it's a good thing. Listen, I know there have been many who believe this was in fact the best film of the year but -as The Social Network-ing people would write- IMHO there is no vision to Tom Hooper's The King's Speech, especially when comparing it to the incredible worlds the Nolans, Finchers and Aronofskys created this past year. If it in fact wins the big prize it will be the worse Best Picture winner since Crash's surprising victory in 2006. A huge backlash happened that year that caused Academy voters to rethink their priorities and start voting more smartly and artistically. The Kings Speech's win would bring it all back to square one. C+

Jordan's PRE-Oscar Rant & preview



Oh Oscar, where have you gone wrong this year? well let's see .. you forgot to nominate Christopher Nolan's Direction for Inception, which was a visionary balancing act from a man who still hasn't gotten the Academy's recognition. Inception was nominated for Best Picture yet omitting the man who created it all from scratch is completely silly and a big no no for an awards show that has in fact honored the right winners and films since 2005's embarrassing Best Picture win for Crash. In fact since that terrible night Best Picture has gone to masterworks such as No Country For Old Me, The Departed and The Hurt Locker. Nolan's lack of recognition will not got unnoticed as others have chimed in and complained about how ridiculous it is not to nominate THE director of the year. Love it or hate it, Inception is filled with ideas that dare and ambition that almost cannot contain itself (which is why it won't win anything come Sunday night).

Another note worthy absence is that of Lesley Manville, who's performance in Mike Leigh's Another Year was as good as any in 2010. Manville should feel robbed considering her award worthy work in the film is a career high for her as well as a memorable reminder of how important art can be if done right. The omissions in the acting category are glaring. I'm thinking of the incredible Julianne Moore not getting nominated for her sexually free work in The Kid Are All right, yet her co-star Annette Bening getting the nod. I'm not saying Bening doesn't deserve to get nominated, hell I even think she was spectacular but Moore was just as good if not edgier and riskier in Lisa Cholodenko's finely tuned film. Yet as time goes by and the days thin out before Sunday's ceremony you start to realize that there really are just 5 slots to get nominated by and that even a truly great performance can get left out of the mix.

Tom Hooper's The King's Speech is the favourite to go home with both Best Picture and Best Actor (Colin Firth) yet the film doesn't ring true to me. It felt all too facile and predictable in its delivery of a monarch's rise out of Speech impediment hell. Let's put it this way. Ten years from now will we remember Hooper's film or the likely landmarks of Darren Aronofsky's Black Swan, David Fincher's The Social Network or even Nolan's Inception? Not hard to see why then people are fuming over The King's Speech impending win. In all its pre-packaged Oscar ready triteness, the film does contain great performances and an impeccable sense of a time period long gone yet when all is said and done this bon bon of a movie will likely evaporate faster than the very stammer that is at the center of the movie's dilemma.

If everything goes as planned Nathalie Portman and Annette Bening will be fighting it out till the last minute to get that Best Actress Oscar. Go with Portman, even though -shockingly enough- Bening has never won before and deserves it too. Colin Firth is fighting a one man battle as he will likely win Best Actor for The King's Speech, even though Mark Zuckerberg himself played by Jesse Eisenberg in The Social Network deserves it just as much. Melissa Leo's portrayal of a loyal and destructive mom in The Fighter will duke it out with both Helena Bonham Carter in The King's Speech and Hallee Steinfeld's breakthrough role in True Grit. Go with Leo. Supporting Actor will be between Christian Bale's role as a junkie in The Fighter and Geoffrey Rush's predictably lovable speech therapist in The King's Speech. Bale deserves it and will win it, it's about time that one of the best actors of our generation finally gets his due and if Rush wins I Will surely be pulling my hair out of agony.

The one category I will be looking out for the most come Oscar night is that of Best Foreign film, where hometown favourite Montreal/Canada's Incendies will be vying for the top prize. I have seen most of the nominated films safe one and conclude that if voters have in fact taken the time to see all the nominated films they will likely find out that Incendies stands out above all the rest. It is a testament to our globalized times that Denis Villeneuve's masterwork of middle eastern dramatics was in fact the best movie of 2010. It is awaiting release in the states this April and will surely make as big a splash as it did in Canada this past year (or at least one hopes). The one true, epic crime Oscar would commit on Sunday night would be of not giving the foreign prize to Incendies.

Grading the 10 nominated films

Black Swan A-
Inception A-
The Social Network A-
Winter's Bone B+
The Fighter B+Toy Story 3 B+
127 Hours B+
The Kids Are All Right B+True Grit CThe King's Speech C

Best Of 2010 ...

So I was waiting long enough to make a Best Of 2010 yet I just had a really hard time finding some worthy candidates. Last year I had more than 20 great films in my list but alas this year I wouldn't even call 10 of these great. This was probably the worst movie year I've experienced since I started doing these annual lists back in 1999. There are a few more movies to watch or re-watch but the list won't change drastically in the months to come. I have added small comments cause I guess I was too lazy to do more than that and the movies speak for themselves really, I will -at some point- post my review for each of these films. So without further ado here's the good stuff of 2010.


(1) Black Swan

Taking a cue from Kanye West's latest record, this is Director Darren Aronofksy's Beautiful, Dark, twisted fantasy. Natalie Portman gives the performance of the year in a film that's more than just about ballet but about the boundaries an artist has in order to push his or herself to the limit. A campy, visionary, extraordinary mess that turns into the movie experience of the year.


(2) Shutter Island

A detective investigates a missing patient at a mental asylum for the criminally insane but ends up getting lost in the darkness that looms between the cracked corners. Leonardo Dicaprio's performance in Martin Scorsese's Shutter Island is astounding, ditto the film. Scorsese with the help of cinematographer Robert Richardson, conjures up dream-like images that stayed with you for weeks.


(3) Enter The Void

Gaspar Noe's follow-up to the controversial Irreversible did not disappoint. Its trippiness far exceeded any other film in 2010 in terms of originality, guts and madness. Here Noe is concerned with the co-existence between body, life and the after-life by giving us the story of a dead man who's presence roams around the crowded, mob ruled streets of Tokyo. You have never seen the crowed Oriental city shot like this before.


(4) The Ghost Writer

 Roman Polanski's best thriller in years had the taut, tense, irresistibly grim mood we have come to expect from the director of Chinatown and Rosemary's Baby. The atmosphere is that of dread and the dark, unknown mysteries that lie around every corner. Nothing that happens is expected, which makes this one hell of a political thriller (loosely based on Tony Blair's stay as British prime minister).


(5) Un Prophete

This French import is the best gangster movie since Scorsese's The Departed. An angry, muscled look at the French prison system and the imprisoned Mobster that controls every move and word uttered in the cells, up until an Arabic inmate shows up and changes things around. An overlong but madly fascinating movie.


(6) Inception

A madly ambitious story, director Christopher Nolan's follow-up to The Dark Knight was concerned with the metaphysics of dreams. For close to two and a half hours, we got ideas spun at us faster than a spinning totem and were forced to re-watch it to better understand Nolan's creative world. the final image will surely become one of the great ones in movie history.

 
(7) Toy Story 3 (Lee Unkrich) 

 Toy Story 3's brilliance lies in its dreamy images of a darkened toy world and our main protagonist having the choice of growing up or staying young. Its themes are adult and its images match those very themes. A special gift wrapped on the outside with vibrant colors that pop out and stun your eyes but layered in the deep inside with a darkness that cannot be shaken.



(8) Dogtooth (Giorgos Lanthimos) 

 Director Lanthimos is an absurdist and he has made an absurdly brilliant film. You have to see it to believe it here. This is way too hard to explain but suffice to say that this is as truthful a depiction of dictatorship as we'll ever get in modern cinema. Except the dictatorship here is happening at a family home. Lots of divisive, opinionated debate surrounding this one but as you can see I dug it quite a bit.


(9) Fish Tank (Andrea Arnold)

Arnold spotted Katie Jarvis at a train station after drawing a blank with casting agencies. "She was on one platform arguing with her boyfriend on another platform, giving him grief." However the performance is achieved, Jarvis is electrifying. If Arnold wanted a 'real' person for the role, this seventeen-year-old takes over the screen with raw adolescent power. Fish Tank will lift you out of your seat and on an unstoppable flight, ricocheting against confines of circumstance and imploding a dysfunctional family with its head of hormonal steam.


(10) Winter's Bone (Debra Granik) 

Debra Granik's second feature film Winter's Bone is the kind of movie that gets progressively better & better as you delve deeper and deeper on it. It is filled with humane, real characterizations of a society that is rooted in evil and people that have lost all hope in life and succumbed to shadiness & drug dealing. There are memorable scenes that linger.


11. You Don't Know Jack, Barry Levinson

12. 127 Hours, Danny Boyle

13. I'm Still Here, Casey Affleck

14. Le Illusioniste, Sylvain Chomet

15.  The Kids Are All Right, Lisa Cholodenko

16. Cyrus, Jay Duplass and Mark Duplass

17. How To Train Your Dragon, Dean Deblois, Chris Sanders

18. Kick-Ass, Matthew Vaughn

19. The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, Niels Arden Oplev
19. The Girl Who Played With Fire, Daniel Alfredson

20. Salt, Phillip Noyce

TEN BEST MOVIES of 2010 (so far)



Flawed or not, these are the ones that left the best impression on me so far in this lackluster year. The academy started nominating 10 last year and these would be my ten if the year was already over. There will likey be some changes in the next few months but I just thought I'd throw these out- since some of these are already out on DVD. There's still 4 months left to the year, so this isn't even close to final. In alphabetical order & not from first to last.

Cyrus
Fish Tank
The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
The Ghost Writer
The Kids Are Alright
Inception
Un Prophete
Shutter Island
Toy Story 3
Winter's Bone

Runners Up;
Salt/Restrepo/Girl Who Played With Fire/MacGruber/Farewell/Piranha 3d/How To Train Your Dragon/Kick-Ass