My Favourite Films of 2017 [10 – 6]

Now that I’ve got the substantial snark out of the way, it’s time to honour the good stuff! Part 1 and part 2 of my favourite films of 2016, if you were wondering what my taste in films is like!

These following five movies constitute the bright sparks of 2017: the movies that bought a smile to my face, made me feel passionately, or triggered deep philosophical thoughts in my otherwise pretty one-track mind (nah, let’s be fair to myself, two-track. In that I think about Fionn Whitehead and Aneurin Barnard).

10. Wonder Woman

After the dross that was Batman vs Superman and Suicide Squad (which, despite me giving 7.5/10 initially after watching it, I’ve realised after reflection that the jukebox-style soundtrack and Viola Davis playing a red wine-drinking, steak-eating HBIC papered over a whole litany of flaws), the DCEU finally get it right.

U-rated films with the longest (or most eye-catching) BBFC short insights

Unlike the MPAA rating ‘G’ which is almost becoming obsolete these days (even My Little Pony: The Movie got a PG in America) the BBFC does not require a film to be squeaky clean in order to get a U-rating (ditto Ireland and their equivalent to the U, G).

The guidelines at U allow for more in the way of comic violence, threat, very elementary sexual innuendo (eg flirting) and mature themes than the Americans. (Case in point: Inside Out, Finding Dory and Love and Friendship were all U/G here and in Ireland, yet received a PG in America.)

When I was wondering around WHSmith and Tesco, I noticed a few DVDs which really testify to this fact, from the sheer length of their short insights (in case you hadn’t realised, turning over DVD cases and reading the back is one of my favourite pastimes *James Franco in The Disaster Artist-style awkward laugh*).

The Angry Birds Movie, which was cut to get a U-rating (read about why here), is the longest with four issues at U:

Thoughts on the 2018 Oscar Nominations

The Oscar nominations came out yesterday, and, in part because I post on an ‘Oscar Buzz’ Facebook group where the prize for correctly predicting as many categories as possible was a Dunkirk DVD, I actually put some welly into thinking through my predictions this year, rather than some really counter-logical guesses I made last year, purely because I hoped they’d happen (Taraji P. Henson for Best Actress, and Lucas Hedges’ scowling in Manchester by the Sea to not get nominated, etc).

There wasn’t a snub that riled me as much this year as last year when Amy Adams got overlooked for Arrival (yes, I'm still mad). What’s more, of the Best Picture nominees that I’ve seen, none irked me as much as Manchester by the Sea and Blah Blah Bland did, so, whilst there were films I disagreed to getting nominated on principle (like I, Tonya), overall, I really can’t complain! 🎬

Thoughts on the 2018 Golden Globes.

Here be the list of winners. My thoughts:

- Yay for Sersh! She is an amazing actress, who I’ve been following avidly ever since she amazed as Briony in 2007’s Atonement. It’s amazing to think that at just 23, she’s already being regarded as ‘overdue’, but that’s a testament to how good she is. I really thought Saoirse should have won the Oscar for 2015’s Brooklyn, and, although I’ve not yet seen Lady Bird, judging from the quality of everything else she’s done, I have no doubt she’s incredible in it. 

I’m also so relieved Margot Robbie’s shameless Oscar-begging didn’t prevail. Margot is more of a ‘celebrity’ than Saoirse, and the Golden Globes are renowned for favouring the more glamorous stars. But so, so happy that in this case, Saoirse Ronan’s inimitable talents transcended star-seeking!

- Related to this, well done to Greta Gerwig, who’s directorial debut, the female-ccentric Lady Bird, won Best Film – Musical or Comedy. I can’t wait to watch it!

Golden Globe predictions, 2018.

Last year saw an unprecedented sweep of seven wins for the insufferable Blah Blah Bland, really testifying people's perception of the Golden Globes as being 'starf_ckers'. This year, none of the films in contention are about how great Hollywood is (although The Disaster Artist does portray the film-making process with jovial teasing), so I foresee the wealth being spread out more evenly. 

Predictions:

Movies

Best Motion Picture - Drama: "The Shape of Water"

Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy: "Lady Bird"

Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Drama: Sally Hawkins, "The Shape of Water"

Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Drama: Gary Oldman, "Darkest Hour"

Best Actress in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy: Saoirse Ronan, "Lady Bird"

Best Director: Christopher Nolan, "Dunkirk"

Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy: James Franco, "The Disaster Artist"

Best Supporting Actress in a Motion Picture: Allison Janney, "I, Tonya"

Best Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture: Christopher Plummer, "All the Money in the World"

Best Original Score in a Motion Picture: "Dunkirk"

Best Screenplay in a Motion Picture: "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri"

Best Motion Picture - Foreign Language: "First They Killed My Father"

Best Animated Film: "Coco"
Best song: Mighty River, "Mudbound"

I don't usually predict the TV categories, but this year, me and my brother decided to do a competition to see who could get the most right out of the two combined sections!

TV

Best TV series - Drama: "The Handmaid's Tale"

Best performance by Actress in a TV series - Drama : Elisabeth Moss, "The Handmaid's Tale"

Best performance by an Actor in a TV Series - Drama: Sterling K. Brown, "This is Us"

Best TV series - Musical or Comedy: "Will & Grace"

Best performance by an Actor in a TV series - Musical or Comedy : Aziz Ansari "Master of None"

Best performance by an Actress in a TV series - Musical or Comedy: Rachel Brosnahan, "The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel"

Limited Series or Motion Picture Made for Television: "Big Little Lies"

Best Performance by an Actor in a Limited Series or Motion Picture Made for Television: Geoffrey Rush, "Genius"

Best Performance by an Actress in a Limited Series or Motion Picture Made for Television: Jessica Lange, "Feud: Bette and Joan"

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Series, Limited Series or Motion Picture Made for Television : Alexander Skarsgard, "Big Little Lies"

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Series, Limited Series or Motion Picture Made for Television : Laura Dern, "Big Little Lies"

Bonus prediction: Emma Stone, Casey Affleck, Meryl Streep and the whole gaggle of intolerable Hollyweird hypocrites will find any opportunity to self-congrulate for choosing to wear black outfits, like that undoes all their complicity when the moguls who were at the peak of their harassing powers by working with them and singing their praises.  And of course, in a classic case of 'methinks the lady doth protest too much', the stars will drone on to anyone who listens about how they 'had no idea' about it when it was happening when really they did but turned a blind eye because they wanted roles and awards recognition.

Thoughts on the 2017 Screen Actor Guild Nominations.

The SAG nominations were announced yesterday and they concretised some actors’ positions in the Oscar race, whilst throwing doubt on others. Here be my thoughts on the film categories (I don’t watch enough TV to be able to comment on those).

Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading RoleJUDI DENCH / Queen Victoria – “VICTORIA & ABDUL” (Focus Features)
SALLY HAWKINS / Elisa Esposito – “THE SHAPE OF WATER” (Fox Searchlight)
FRANCES McDORMAND / Mildred – “THREE BILLBOARDS OUTSIDE EBBING, MISSOURI” (Fox Searchlight)
MARGOT ROBBIE / Tonya Harding – “I, TONYA” (Neon)
SAOIRSE RONAN / Lady Bird McPherson – “LADY BIRD” (A24)

Dame Judi Dench is the surprise nominee here, who takes what many had predicted would be Meryl Streep’s slot (although the complete omission of The Post altogether has led some to speculate that it probably screened too late for SAG voters, who post their ballots in early), means that there are more English actresses here (Dench and Hawkins) than American ones (McDormand). 

Margot Robbie’s shameless Oscar-begging appears to have paid off (whenever a beautiful woman de-glams, awards bodies shower them with awards) and she’s likely to be nominated for the Oscar in this category along with Hawkins, Ronan and McDormand, leaving fifth place up for grabs.

The 10 Worst Performances of 2016.

I thought I'd post this list now, as I generally don't watch a film unless I think it's going to be 7/10 or more in terms of my enjoyment of it, thus, can't foresee me watching any other bad films (which usually contain the stinker performances) from this year.

10. Jared Leto, Suicide Squad 

An annoying and laughable bastardisation of the Joker character (which in Heath Ledger's far more capable hands, was terrifying) where he plagiarised liberally from James Franco in Spring Breakers as well as the 'Mexican gangster' cliche. But the worst thing about Leto's interpretation of the Joker  were his obnoxious off-screen antics during filming, all in the name of being 'Method'. Viola Davis giving him the sideye at this press junket perfectly encapsulates my feelings towards his insufferable behaviour. The fact that Leto has an Oscar and Davis doesn't says a lot about how little that golden man is actually about meritocracy.

2011 Oscar Nomination Predictions.

I’m in the middle of exams, so I’m just predicting the main categories. And score, 'cos I love me my film music :-)

Best Film

127 Hours

Black Swan

The Fighter
Inception
The Kids Are All Right
The King's Speech
The Social Network
The Town
Toy Story 3
True Grit
Alt: Winter’s Bone

I'm still not used to this 10-instead-of-5 nominations malarky. It really, really devalues the Oscars, if you ask me. And Inception? PAH.

Best Director

Darren Aronofsky, Black Swan
David Fincher, The Social Network
Tom Hooper, The King's Speech
Chris Nolan, Inception
David O. Russell, The Fighter
Alt: Danny Boyle, 127 Hours

Pretty standard, I’d say. I’ve seen all but The King’s Speech, and of them, Fincher is my favourite and the likely eventual winner. I’ll keep my (less than impressed) opinions about Inception to myself, no?

Best Actor
Jeff Bridges, True Grit

Robert DuVall, Get Low

Jesse Eisenberg, The Social Network

Colin Firth, The King's Speech

James Franco, 127 Hours

Alt: Ryan Gosling, Blue Valentine

I’ve only seen Bridges’ and Eisenberg’s performances, both of which are solid turns. I really enjoyed Marky Mark in The Fighter, but he doesn’t seem to have gathered as much pre-cursor buzz, so I’m not predicting him, despite him being one of my favourites.

Best Actress

Annette Bening, The Kids Are All Right
Nicole Kidman, Rabbit Hole
Jennifer Lawrence, Winter's Bone
Natalie Portman, Black Swan
Michelle Williams, Blue Valentine
Alt: Julianne Moore, The Kids are All Right

I don’t know what’s going with Hailee Steinfeld in terms of category placement; she’s quite clearly lead, but I think the FYCs have pushed her as supporting. Now sometimes, the Academy make up their own minds (like Keisha Castle-Hughes in Whale Rider), but if they accept her as lead, I don’t think she’ll get nominated, which is a shame so I’ll take her getting nominated in supporting because even though it’s category fraud, a nomination’s better than none at all, non? And I love Julie Moore, so despite the fact that I haven't seen The Kids are All Right yet, I want her to get another nomination <3

Best Supporting Actor

Christian Bale, The Fighter
Andrew Garfield , The Social Network
Jeremy Renner, The Town
Mark Ruffalo, The Kids Are All Right
Geoffrey Rush, The King's Speech
Alt: John Hawkes, Winter’s Bone

I’m not gonna lie, I really don’t see the big deal with Jeremy Renner’s performance; he was just all psycho-y. Rebecca Hall was the best performance in that film. I don’t see the Oscars “doing a BAFTA” and nominating Pete Postlewaite for the same film, so this is the safe five. I will CUT A BITCH if Andrew Garfield doesn’t get nominated, he was wonderful. Oh, Andy.

Best Supporting Actress
Amy Adams, The Fighter

Helena Bonham Carter, The King's Speech
Melissa Leo, The Fighter
Hailee Steinfeld, True Grit
Jacki Weaver, Animal Kingdom
Alt: Mila Kunis, Black Swan

Awww, I really, really, really wish Mila Kunis were getting nominated, but the pre-cursors just don’t seem enough for her, plus I don’t know if her free-spirited ballerina is “baity” enough for the Oscars. Anyway, I’d love for her to get nominated. However, were Kunis to get nominated, it seems that Hailee Steinfeld would be the opportunity cost, and I loved Steinfeidl in True Grit, her getting nominated would be a score one for the young action heroines that Ivana Baquero in Pan's Labyrinth missed out on. Plus Steinfeld was so natural and wonderful. So I'm so conflicted! Having seen The Fighter last night, I am fully in support of Adams’ and Leo’s nominations; I can’t decide whom I like more, but if Melissa Leo does win the Oscar, good for her!

Original Screenplay
Blue Valentine

The Fighter

Inception

The Kids are All Right
The King’s Speech
Alt: Black Swan

Right, so, why am I going for a Black Swan snub in favour of Blue Valentine? I dunno, I just think they might do it to “compensate” for Ryan Gosling not getting nominated. Plus I’ve heard reviews about how ~~true to life~~ the script is, so perhaps it will resonate with the Academy voters who are stuck in loveless marriages. Again, I’m shaking my head at Inception’s joke of a script getting nominated, but whatever.

Adapted Screenplay

127 Hours
The Social Network
Toy Story III
True Grit
Winter’s Bone

Oh dear god, I sincerely hope 127 Hours’ script doesn’t get nominated (hai. I’m on a rock. Hai, I’m chopping off my arm. Hai, film’s ended.), but I can see Danny Boyle & Simon Beaufoy (the twosome responsible for Slumdog Millionaire’s script – now that was a nice screenplay) getting nominated. The others, I’m cool with. I’d love if Toy Story III (my favourite film of 2010 at this moment in time) won over The Social Network, but that ain’t happening, and The Social Network is my second fave film of 2010 and I loved the banter, so I can deal. The lines coming out of this guy's mouth were hilar:

Score
Alexandre Desplat, The King’s Speech
Randy Newman, Toy Story III
John Powell, How to Train Your Dragon
Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, The Social Network
Hans Zimmer, Inception

Whilst I deeply enjoyed The Social Network, one thing I cannot for the life of me fathom is all the hoo-ha over its score. That’s the only Oscar that I have a problem with it getting. I really liked Desplat’s score to the seventh Harry Potter film, but obviously The King’s Speech is the score he’ll be getting nominated for. And despite holding Inception in the absolute lowest regard, the music in it was pretty decent.

Other?
My main Oscar wish is that “Never Say Never” from The Karate Kid gets nominated for Best Song. It’s actually written by Justin Bieber, and I don’t know if I can be dealing with him as an Oscar nominee, but the song sums up the film so well, plus there’s a swaggerous breakdown rap in the middle. I rate it.


Oh, and should Andrew Garfield not get nominated? This is gonna be my reaction:

Three film reviews: 127 HOURS (Danny Boyle, 2010), THE SOCIAL NETWORK (David Fincher, 2010) and THE TOWN (Ben Affleck, 2010)

Screening log 10/01/11-16/10/11

I watched three films this week, all 2010 releases, two set in Boston, one set in between a rock.

127 Hours (Danny Boyle, 2010)

You’ve seen the trailer, you’ve heard the hype, you know what it’s about. While I don't treat IMDb scores as gospel, the film received a notably high rating on the site, so truth be told, I expected more. Instead, I found 127 Hours to be fairly boring at points. What we have here is about 60 minutes of material dragged out into a cinema release with the help of some fancy digital effects. 

Language. Sex. Violence. Other?

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Two Terrible Movies.

Now that I'm a University student, I don’t get as much time for watching movies as I used to. So when I do watch a movie, I expect it to be good. Sadly, the last two that I wasted my time with were anything but good.



The Quatermass Experiment
I went along to the Sci-fi’s society screening of The Quatermass Experiment with three of my friends yesterday, in complete blindness about the film and its plot. Which just goes to show that I should consult IMDb more frequently, because if I had, I would have had two hours of my life back, to have done some of the thick stack of Maths homework I have, to read a novel, or even, say, watching paint dry. Because any of those things would have been exponentially more exciting than The Quatermass Experiment.

The plot revolves around a failed space experiment (or something or other), resulting with, out of the three astronauts that had gone into space, two are missingng and the remaining one in a stage of crazed coma.

This was a remake of the 1953 film, and director Sam Miller must have felt a burning desire to the maintain the campness of 50s B-movies, because everything about it - from the stodgy script, to the actors who performances make Keira Knightley look expressive – was below par. The finale brought the lulz in the biggest way; my friends and I were just sat there blankly, and overall, nothing made sense, except that the BBC were really bored one day and couldn’t be arsed to make a proper movie. TQC has done little to sweeten my already tempestuous relationship with fantasy movies. As one of my friends said, “the only good thing about it was that it had David Tennant”, but for all his endeavours, no amount of Doctor Who impressions could redeem this “film”, a load of absolute bollocks. E.

Good Time Max
I downloaded this in time for the “Franco Revolution” (the non-Spanish civil war type) what with his performance in Pineapple Express being touted as one of the finest comedic turns of the year (I’m still yet to see it, but I will – any film that plays M.I.A.’s Paper Planes in the trailer has my interest as I bunging love that song). Anyway, this film was incredibly. Directed, co-written and starring James Franco, it’s about two brothers, Adam and Max, both born geniuses, but, whilst Adam purses a career as a surgeon, Max falls down on the slippery slope of drug addiction. After a drug deal gone wrong, Max convinces his brother to go far away and start a new life with him, but it’s not long before his rehabilitation process falls flat on his face and life gets worse than ever.



The only thing of interest in this entire film was probably the sight of James Franco in glasses, for everything else was just an indulgent, sprawling mess. Some of the acting was so poor that it wouldn’t have been out of place in my Sixth Form’s High School Musical-style-play, with Franco himself failing to shine, drooping back into his annoying Spiderman days; he came across as just a whiny, lazy little bastard who invoked no sympathy from me whatsoever despite being so aesthetically pleasing. I usually like to wax lyrical about independent films and their inner beauty, but this has to site alongside Lost in Translation and 40 Shades of Blue as one of the dullest indies I’ve ever seen. Bung, and not in a good way. E.

On the bright side, however, I’m going to the adorable Little Theatre Cinema with my friend Luke today to see the Coen brothers’ Burn After Reading. Am excited!