The televised ceremony will be on March 7th. The story and headline nominees are here.  Why did they expand the best picture list to 10, I wonder?  And will box office success once again dominate the winners?  And do you think the Oscars should award quality of performance or box office appeal - as in, is it meant to honor the business or the art?

Labels: movies, tv

Just finished reading "Up in the Air" by Walter Kirn. It's a profoundly sad story with very little moments of charm or levity to break the unremittingness of the main character's ennui. The only good news is that he is making huge changes as the book ends but, on the other hand, disaster may be about to strike; I suppose it's a little like old-fashioned romantic comedies that leave it up to viewers/readers to decide if the ALmost reunited couple will get back together or be forever separated.

What puzzled me a great deal and sent me researching on the Internet was that one of my favorite reviewers, 5 Second Reviews, had indicated the movie had an interesting and absorbing storyline but one that didn't remotely sound like what took place in all the gazillion endless musings of the characters in the novel. (Did I mention that it's not only unremittingly miserable but also very very very very very very (sorry) long? or that it's all told as an inner monologue and that it's often nearly crushingly nasty and mean, and almost always tedious with only a few few exceptions?)

So I was relieved to read an interview with Walter Kirn himself (here) in which he says that the screenwriters and producers (and Clooney, one assumes) invented some new characters as well as quite substantively different story threads for the movie. Enough so that I kept wondering if there were two books because the one I was reading had only the airplanes and million-mile goal and his job and the tedium of his job in common. In the interview, Kirn says he liked it that Ryan was saved/revived by the moview and I guess I would feel the same about my gone but not forgotten fictional offspring, although why anyone saw chose to bring this miserable guy back to life is beyond me; I have to assume the movie Ryan Bingham is not anywhere near as miserable as his book counterpart. And maybe I'll even like the Reitman character a bit (it would be hard impossible to like him less).

But I'm hard pressed to figure out how it isn't copyright infringement, even with the author's agreement, to use a title and characters but utterly change activities and, in fact, the whole story line. I suppose one could argue that disenchantment and misery are the core point of both and, therefore, that nothing fundamental has really been altered; in that case, why not just recite Sartre's "Being and Nothingness" or any of Nietzsche's books over and over?

Labels: books, movies, puzzles, writing

What's your favorite Ang Lee movie? Pushing Hands The Wedding Banquet Eat Drink Man Woman Sense and Sensibility Ice Storm Ride with the Devil Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon Chosen Hulk Brokeback Mountain Lust, Caution Take Woodstock Life of Pi (in production)

What's your favorite Michael Crichton book? A Case of Need Andromeda Strain Five Patients Terminal Man Jurassic Park The Great Train Robbery Eaters of the Dead Congo Sphere Travels (one of my favorites) Jurassic Park Rising Sun Disclosure The Lost World Airframe Timeline Prey State of Fear Next

Today is the birthday of both Ang Lee and Michael Crichton today. Two people whose words and imaginations have brought so much enjoyment to so many people.

Labels: anniversaries, books, movies

Laura points out that Claude Rains is TCM's September "star of the month" (read her post here and see the Rains listings here - click "refresh" when you go to the TCM schedule - they have yet to do something to juice up their slow-loading pages but refreshing it quickly seems to help). Unfortunately they're not showing all that many so most of the films have been seen often on TCM, but he is wonderful.

Labels: actors, movies

It's Alfred Hitchock's one hundred and tenth birthday today. It figures he'd be born on a 13th so it would be on a Friday the 13th every so often.

Labels: anniversaries, movies, people of note

Someone recommended the British miniseries "Mistresses" to me and, dutiful listener that I am, I snagged the first disc from Netflix. I've now watched all of season 1 and two episodes of season 2 and am still not sure how to evaluate it. The actors are fantastic (Sharon Small, Sarah Parish, Orla Brady and Shelley Conn (a great niece of Merle Oberon's)) and the production values are high. It's glitzy at times, as the houses and restaurants everyone frequents are lush and lovely supposedly because the people have good jobs or lots of money from other sources. But the characters are amazingly adept at making really bad decisions and coming to ghastly conclusions about their families and lives. Their extraordinary ability to be idiotic and make bad judgments really strains my credulity. On the other hand, we vicariously experience bad choices being made and then played out which may have instructive usefulness or even merit similar to watching horror films. My real problem is that it's so much fun to watch these women go through their lives making appalling choices and drawing ridiculous conclusions and I can't wait for them to shoot the third season and release it on dvd!

Labels: movies, tv

Laura reports that, a mere one year after they were hired as co-hosts for "At the Movies," E-Entertainment's Ben Lyons and TCM's Ben Mankiewicz will soon be leaving, to be replaced by the New York Times's A.O. Scott and the Chicago Tribune's Michael Phillips. Technically, this is more a re-replacement because Scott and Phillips were frequent guest hosts either separately or together during the iteration of the show after Siskel and Ebert and before Mank and Lyons. I've never really liked Scott and Phillips all that much, I'm afraid - they're both perceptive and verbally clever but I have found them a bit too old-school and stodgy. OTOH, I will continue to watch - partly just because I like to watch (heh, hat tip to Peter Sellers) and partly because it's interesting to see what's coming out. I just won't enjoy it quite as much.

Some, Laura among them, never liked Lyons on the show and thought he was light and uninteresting; I'm sure they aren't sad to see him go. I actually kind of liked him, though, because he brought a viewpoint to the critique-al table that is rarely heard from . . . intone this next word dramatically. . . Critics. Most critics are older, came up on traditional movie-making and the whole history of it all. They love to show (off) how much they know about directors and the industry and so on. But Lyons and Mankewicz (someone with as solid a movie pedigree as even the most traditional elitist could wish for) seemed to be two guys who like movies a lot, without pretention, and I thought they conveyed their enjoyment and awareness. That made it fun to watch their show and listen to their discussions. I look forward to following both of them elsewhere.

Labels: movies, tv

It's James Mason Day on TCM today for a whole 24 hours. They're showing many of the famous films like A Star Is Born and North By Northwest, of course, as well as Lord Jim and the wonderful, touching Heaven Can Wait. James Mason Day also includes many smaller, unexpected and surprising (to me, anyway) films.

It bears mentioning that Dorothy Parker was one of the writers on Star Is Born, along with Moss Hart and some others, which explains why it's not just drivel, I suppose. And Ernest Lehman, the writer of NxN, also wrote the screenplays for The King and I, Sweet Smell of Success, Westside Story, Hello Dolly, Family Plot, The Sound of Music and others. Whew.

Judy Garland is not one of my favorite performers, partly because I always hear that omnipresent echo of her sad life when I see her, but holy cow she sings magnificently in Star. And she looks fantastic in that huge-skirted, light-and-dark violet dress with its big-shouldered shrug as she sings Melancholy Baby in a nightclub during the visualization of her rise to fame.

I don't know why my first reaction to James Mason is always that he's a little creepy and doesn't interest me and then, after five minutes, I can't turn away.

Labels: actors, movies, writing

In case one's children and grandchildren don't believe one (me), The Seventh Veil shows girls romping around in their gym uniforms that are the same ridiculous pleated almost-dresses we wore in the late sixties at the Catholic academy I attended in New York City. I don't think anyone would believe it unless there were actual evidence. Thank goodness for movies.

The Seventh Veil is one of those noir-ish films that requires a total suspension of modern (dis)belief but is, after that, irresistible and engrossing . It has Ann Todd and James Mason with a lovely turn by the always wonderful (if occasionally absurd) Herbert Lom as a psychiatrist. She plays a world-class pianist who has attempted suicide when the film opens. Unfortunately the script's solution for her troubles is the love of a man - although it's not as if that wasn't and isn't the solution offered in many movies and novels. When the seventh veil covering her awareness is lifted - to employ the linguistic metaphor of the script - she is free to choose her partner - will it be her domineering guardian uncle (Mason) or her musician beau (Hugh McDermott) or the understanding doctor (Lom)?

I like a lot of the music in this movie - although I agree with the uncle that sometimes she plays slightly overblown and romantic pieces that are too pop and unctious for my taste. I especially like the first piano scene between Mason and Todd when he's playing the Mozart 3rd piano sonata - the one all students, me included, play until the cows come home - and she cannot stop herself from joining the fun. It's a nice scene and a nice rendition of the piece.

Labels: movies, music, today's movie

Little girls are innocent, open, interested, eager. They are often adorable and gorgeous. They are tons of fun to be with and play with. They're even fun to play with as if they're real live dolls that you can dress up and do their hair. Unfortunately there is a flip and ghastly side to all that in that they are also sometimes the targets of very sick, cruel, evil people.

While rearranging some furniture and doing some cleaning, I put the tv on for background noise and got lured into watching a movie on Jon Benet Ramsey. The actors are an impressive line-up and quite good (Kris Kristoffersen, Marg Helgenberger (far more appealing onscreen than Patsy herself was), Ronny Cox, Ken Howard, John Heard, Dennis Boutsikaris, Jane Powell (yes, that Jane Powell - she plays JB's dance instructor), Ann-Margaret (she plays Mrs Ramsey's mother), among others). And although the movie is uneven from a critical point of view, it effectively depicts the all-too-human errors of the investigation, some unavoidable and some due to odd quirks of the people involved. It has been bizarrely impossible to solve the case partly because many of the police and detectives were so convinced that the Ramsey's had murdered their daughter, despite how unlikely it was from all kinds of points of view, so that they refused to pursue any alternative evidentiary leads. Even after nearly thirteen years, the story remains both oddly fascinating and very disturbing.

I found the story even creepier than I remembered, perhaps because t2cgitw arrived during the intervening years. Probably because of them, what struck me now is how much Jon Benet and her mother were/are like other little girls and their mothers. All the dressing up and make-up and playing at being ten or more years older than they are and caring so much about being fairy tale/cliché cutesy/pretty/sexy is so familiar and so ordinary.

On the one hand, one has to wonder if there is something at all damaging or wrong with so much emphasis and focus on external and superficial frill. On the other hand, maybe not because maybe fantasy play of all kinds is good for the imagination - and goodness knows that a healthy imagination is vital for self-aware and contented growth and development. It's hard - perhaps impossible - to know where the line between healthy and sick is - or even if there is such a line. There are so many ways to get from birth to death and who are any of us to be sure we know which are valid and which are not?

But whatever else is not entirely evident (pun intended), it is certain that this is a sad and awful story. I only wish there were clear lessons to take to heart, learn and pass on.

Labels: children, modern times, movies, today's movie

Cool new Facebook page (are they're called pages?): 5-Second Movie Reviews. Fun to read and quick opinions / reviews of movies and tv shows by someone who sees lots of both. The latest review is another rave for Up which may have received the most wildly enthusiastic reviews of any movie I've known about.

Labels: facebook, movies

One of my all-time favorite movies is on TCM tonight: The Winslow Boy. Written by Terrence Rattigan, it stars Robert Donat as the defense attorney, at his articulate handsome bemused and intense best. The always wonderful Cedric Hardwicke (after whom I named a small stuffed whale when I was a girl, for a reason I no longer recall) and the huskiest-voiced-wide-eyed-woman-in-movies Margaret Leighton are the boy's parents. It's thoroughly engrossing, attractive and engaging to watch, and it poses compelling questions which are interesting to ponder and fun to discuss.

Labels: movies, questions, today's movie, tv

Watched "The Jane Austen Book Club" since I was in an Austen frame of mind. It's an odd little story and I'm not sure it doesn't strain one's credibility a bit too much but it's kind of charming. It brings an Austen-esque touch to the lives of six people who decide to discuss and (re)read one Austen book each month for six months. It's interesting to see and hear their interpretations of the various characters. Furthermore, it's an astonishing 198 years since the first book was printed and it's almost impossible to believe that the books are so much a part of our social fabric. the plot twists and tie-ups are a bit too tidy but they are faithful to Austen and they're done without too much melodrama.

It's a nice touch to have the characters develop as the characters in the books. To some extent this works because the film is fairly well written. To another it works because the actors are all terrific. The coup de grace is that each actor had to read entirely whichever book his/her character was leading in each month's meeting of the club. Given the literary plot this definittely gave substance to the layers.

The Northanger Abbey play scene is priceless, I have to say, and the subtle references are nice. As in "Clueless," there are verbal and physical references that will become apparent upon subsequent viewings, I feel sure. If I have a discernible quibble, it's mostly that it didn't seem substantial enough. I don't know if the fault likes it too many television actors whose gravitas is thin or if the writing simply lacked depth. It's pleasant and has some pleasant turns but it never quite picks up enough steam for my taste.

Among the main actors, Emily Blunt the most interesting to watch. At the beginning, she is so uptight your eyes hurt. I'm not entirely sure how she shows the transition so effectively. She reminds me of Amanda Root's transformation in my favorite film version of "Persuasion" when she morphs from plain to lovely without a film cut and without any change other than the light in her eyes. Some actresses have remarkable abilities.

Madeleine Peyroux sings "Getting some fun out of life" over the credits at the end of the movie and is a dead ringer for Billie Holliday though a lot less loopy. I can't wait to hear more.

Labels: actors, movies, singing, today's movie, writing

In the last week I've seen two movies whose message about equality between men and women is astonishing the same even though their stories are nearly seventy years apart. It's pretty depressing, actually.

The earlier, released in 1931 and starring Norma Shearer and Robert Montgomery is "Strangers May Kiss" (the title meaning something to the effect that it's all right for men to behave badly - kiss, drink, carouse, keep wives in the dark - but that women may not). Shearer plays Lisbeth, as snappy and independently modern as any women in current films. She believes marriage is outmoded, something women strive for only to be disappointed as their husbands wander or leave and she vows she will not get caught up in such dishonest nonsense. She has two men in her life: Steve (Montgomery), a charming, frivolous, rich playboy who is mad about her and continually asks her to marry him; and Alan (Neil Hamilton), a handsome world-traveling reporter who thrills and woos her while sharing her disdain for marriage and passion for freedom. Smitten with Alan, Lisbeth spends several weeks in Mexico with Alan (and we all know what that means) but when he's called to an assignment, although he declares his undying love for her, he reveals that he is married, albeit unhappily (surprise). She banishes him because of her principles and her unwillingness to throw herself at a married man, then spends three years cavorting around Europe and living wildly (and we are meant to know what that means, too). Eventually, of course, both men re-appear, both wanting to marry her (Alan has divorced his wife) but when Alan learns of her wild behavior he drops her faster than a hot potato, as if a red "A" were emblazoned on her head, his own adultery evidently being beside the point. Steve, ever noble and good (a/k/a not the one any self-respecting heroine could choose) wants to marry her simply because he loves her. In fact, when she explains that Alan has refused to marry her because of her dissolute behavior, Steve even says something to the effect of "why is it all right for us to behave like that if it's not all right for you?" Indeed.

The other film is "Lost in Austen" which stars Jemima Rooper and Eliot Cowan, two comely Brits, and a bevy of familiar faces. It's the story of a 21st century Londoner who enjoys reading "Pride and Prejudice" more than living her own life, partly informed by the luscious Colin Firth (Darcy) and Jennifer Ehle (Elizabeth) version. Elizabeth Bennett slips through a bathroom wall into a modern apartment (okay, there's an element of science fiction but it's just a tiny one, more a suspension of disbelief) and convinces Amanda Price (Jemima Rooper) to switch with her. Amanda goes back through the wall and joins the Bennett household at the beginning of the familiar story. (As an aside, Hugh Bonneville is terrific as Mr. Bennett, perhaps the best characterization in the film, close to Lindsay Duncan's Lady Catherine and in great contrast to Alex Kingston' excessively shrill Mrs. Bennett. The most amusing change/twist is handsome Mr. Wickham turning out to have been completely misrepresented by Jane Austen.) Anyway, this 2008 film has it that Elizabeth becomes captivated by the modern world and Amanda by the 19th century or, more accurately, by Darcy, who in turn falls head over heels for Amanda . . . until he learns that she has had an active social life (we know what that means) at which point he abandons her for Bingley's twirpy sister.

Both films work things out in the end, of course, because happy endings trump social conventions in most romantic films. And it's almost the same message in both films - Shearer convinces Hamilton that she has never stopped loving him and that her "misbehavior" was only a way of surviving without him and that she will never stray again (no such promise from him, needless to say). Amanada convinces Darcy that she has thought and dreamed only of him and wanted only him even when she was with other men - and if he fails to realize that she read about him at 12 and therefore it was truly him she dreamt of, well, so be it.

But I find it astonishing that there is still such a powerful assumption that it's all right to disapprove when women are wild but perfectly reasonable for men. It's sad that dismay makes sense in a 2008 movie when a woman has led an active social life - that she is still seen as ruined and untouchable in some way although a man can have spent as much familiar time with many women. How can there have been so little change from 1811 to 1931 to 2008? Since movies vividly show the social mores of a time, I look forward to movies (soon, I hope) showing we have stopped labeling and judging men and women differently or even at all.

Labels: mores, movies, today's movie

I wonder how much it would cost to buy groceries this week for a family of two adults and eighteen children including teenagers and toddlers.

While hanging shelves today (which is, yes, an underhanded aside by way of noting my afternoon's accomplishment), I had movies on in the background to distract me in case I panicked or hit my thumb or anything. Over the course of the day, several movies passed through my semi-awareness (perhaps not a fair way to "watch" or assess them but that's just the way it was.
5 Children and It is a bit sticky sweet sometimes and a bit manipulative other times but overall delightful and Eddie Izzard as the sand fairy is wonderful as are the Henson characters.
The TV Set is ghastly - I didn't make it even halfway.
The Good Woman is a bit too "period" but Helen Hunt and Scarlett Johanssen are very good. The movie is a good reminder that despite the social problems we have these days, nevertheless we have succeeded in moving beyond the ridiculous moralizing of previous eras. The dresses are great, too!
Yours Mine and Ours, which stars Henry Fonda and Lucille Ball with an enormous blended family including Tim Matheson as a snide teenager, is fun to watch because both Fonda and Ball are so relaxed - they almost stroll through it - and because it's another chance to be glad we're now and not then (children weren't allowed in the hospital for their mother's birth, of course). The final kicker was when they went to the grocery store and supposedly bought out the place. Everyone went nuts as the tally kept growing. I was curious to see what huge number would appear. I kept reminding myself that it was taking place in 1968, a mere forty years ago. But imagine my astonishment when the bill came to . . . the whopping, amazing, huge amount of . . . are you ready? . . . $126.

Labels: movies, shopping, the times, today's movie

I watched only some of the 81st (yikes - 81st?!) Academy Awards last night. Partly because I'm still expecting them on a Monday night in March (childhood sets patterns and expectations in stone, apparently). Partly because I hadn't seen any of the films. And partly because celebrity madness increasingly makes me mad, in both senses of the word, and there is no more celebrity-mad show than the Oscars. From what I did see, however, this piece by Mary McNamara is a slightly snide yet fairly accurate and amusing take on the evening.

One of the things I liked best was Angeline Jolie's earrings. Those big green teardrops were gorgeous, especially with everything else black. The other thing I liked best was Queen Latifah's singing during the "in memoriam" photos. I also liked the hope and optimism speeches of the "Slumdogs" winners, as I mentioned last night.

By the way, everyone raves about how gorgeous Kate Winslet is but could the emperor be wearing new clothes again? Am I the only one who thinks she looks a lot older than thirty-four, not physically so much as the expression on her face and in her eyes, and that when she smiles broadly her mouth turns down so much that she looks as if she's sneering really really hard?

Labels: movies, tv

My arms are metaphorically up over my head to shield myself from the pelting of phff-phff hailstones some readers may fling upon my head, but I must point out that the 2008 Oscar winners for best score, adapted screenplay, direction and film spoke explicitly and in careful detail about how hopefulness and optimism were their primary driving force when writing "Slumdog Millionaire" as well as the explanation for it getting made at all, not to mention finding a distributor who took it off the straight-to-dvd pile and got it so much audience exposure and enthusiasm that it earned 10 Oscar nominations and 8 wins.

Labels: movies, optimism

*From redoubtable blog friend Laura, I have learned that the title of a soon-to-be-published dvd collection uses the name of the production company publishing the collection, not an adjective-masquerading as a noun, as I thought. I feel I must apologize because the fact that it never would have occurred to me is no excuse for not doing a bit of research. To boot, Renown Pictures seems to have a mission I champion and is quite interesting.

Labels: blogs (mine), movies, writing

Fans of pre-code films should be saving their pennies for the next few weeks. Laura who muses writes that two collections of pre-code dvd's will be released shortly. At the end of March, Warners' Forbidden Hollywood, Vol. 3, will be available and then, on April 7th, Universal will release its own pre-code collection. And there's a British film goodie coming out soon, too.

Warner's set includes movies directed by the marvelous William Wellman. The films are Other Men’s Women (Mary Astor and Richard Toomey), The Purchase Price (Barbara Stanwyck, Lyle Talbot and George Brent), Frisco Jenny (the fabulous Ruth Chatterton), Midnight Mary (written by Anita Loos and starring Loretta Young), Heroes for Sale (Richard Bartlemass) and Wild Boys of the Road (Frankie Darro and Dorothy Coonon who later married William Wellman). Details galore at DVD Times. The films have been remastered of course and there are tons of bonuses included such as "two feature-length documentaries profiling the director, along with new commentaries, original theatrical trailers, vintage Warner Bros. shorts and cartoons of the era."

Universal's set includes the films Merrily We Go To Hell (Fredric March and Sylvia Sidney), Hot Saturday (Cary Grant, Randolph Scott and Nancy Carroll), Torch Singer (Claudette Colbert), Search for Beauty (Ida Lupino and Buster Crabbe), The Cheat (Tallulah Bankhead) and Murder At The Vanities (a young and awesome Kitty Carlisle and Victor McLaglen). Details at ClassicFlix. No extras except a short documentary.

British films fans also have cause to rejoice because a collection of three fantastic films made in the 50s is being released at the end of March entitled British Cinema - Renown Pictures Literary Classics Collection (The Pickwick Papers / Tom Brown's Schooldays / Svengali). One feels some alarm at the VCI Video folks' using "renown" in the title instead of "renowned" (nouns used as adjectives being as annoying as nouns used as verbs, cf. "to medal") so I hope the production values are not similarly problematic since aside from that * It looks wonderful.
* Update here.

Labels: movies, writing

Don't you wonder who the heck was the first person to get up one morning, look out his or her window and say, "hey, is a groundhog casting a shadow today?" And why did he or she think there was a connection between whether that groundhog did cast a shadow (or not) and whether there'd be more winter weather (or not)? And how did he or she have enough marketing savvy and know-how to get the whole thing publicized all over the place to such an extent that it became a quasi-holiday? And why did he or she pick today instead of yesterday or tomorrow or even next week, for goodness sake? And has there been a reliable analysis of the reliability of groundhog shadows and winter weather on into March and April?? And what's the difference between a groundhog and a hedgehog, just by the way? Well, whatever and however all of that, today is Groundhog Day - an annual moment that's always a good excuse to watch Bill Murray's often hilarious movie - directed by Harold Ramis and written by Danny Rubin. I suspect many of us can recite the whole script by now. Can you? and do you have a favorite scene?

Update. For another take twist on it, don't miss Venomous Kate's Groundhog Day post.

Labels: anniversaries, movies