Oscar Nominations are out: Vice and Christopher Robin

Oscar nomination were just released yesterday and that might be the kick in the pants I need. There are a lot of nominations that made my eyes roll and breathe sighs of disbelief about some of the movies I would "have to watch", but also a little relief that I was in better shape that I originally thought. So, with one month to go, let's get moving.

12/28/2018 Vice, Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress, Best Original Screenplay, Best Film Editing, Best Makeup and Hairstyling, 2018

Every time someone asks my opinion of Vice starring Christian Bale as former Vice-President Dick Cheney, I hem and haw, I pause, and then I say, I liked it, it was good, Bale was great, but I couldn't wait until it was over. I tried explaining this to my brother, who saw it with me, and I think it was because I lived through most of what the movie portrayed, and I didn't like it when it was happening, and I liked it less watching it. Adam McKay wrote and directed, and he was behind The Big Short, another movie snatched my life experience (I had mixed feelings about that film as well). The film follows history, to a degree, with commentary from an unknown narrator, showing Cheney going from a drunk to a White House intern and then moving up in the Republican machinery. Cheney's wife Lynne (Amy Adams) is portrayed to be as ruthless as Cheney himself. Sam Rockwell is George W. Bush and Steve Carell is Donald Rumsfeld. This isn't a documentary, so there is obviously some artistic license taken, but if the scenes depicting what followed after 9/11 are even close to true, it seems that Vice-President Cheney was flying pretty close to the sun, claiming privileges and powers to which he had no right. I'm pretty much on the left of the political spectrum, but even I felt like I was being hit over the head with McKay's agenda. As for all of the nominations, Christian Bale disappeared in his portrayal of Cheney, and he captured so many of Cheney's mannerisms and speech patterns, he deserved his nomination. The makeup, which really transformed Bale, is nomination worthy, for sure. The other nominations? Well, I'm not so sure.

12/31/2018 Christopher Robin, nominated Best Visual Effects, 2018

Ewan McGregor plays a grown up and uptight Christopher Robin, who has long forgotten his playmates from the Thousand Acre Wood. Of course, grown up Christopher Robin has lived through combat in World War II, getting married, having a child, and a very adult job, with stress and budgets and managers. No wonder he's miserable. Lucky for him he has friends like Winnie the Pooh, Tigger and the rest of the gang, to remind him what it's like to be whimsical and driven by your imagination instead of deadlines. Pooh and Company are animated, and Jim Cummings, who has been the voice of Pooh and Tigger for many years, makes it all so wonderfully familiar. The animation isn't the cartoon animation that we've seen in Winnie the Pooh movies, but it's like the stuffed animals have come to life. A friend mentioned to me that's why she didn't want to watch it, but I didn't mind it, I actually enjoyed it. The movie has some of the familiar songs, including "The Wonderful Thing About Tiggers", plus a few new ones. I watched the movie because clearly I had nothing going on New Year's Eve, but also, someone told me they really liked it. Who knew it would be nominated? I would be surprised if it won considering some of the other nominees, including Avengers: Infinity War. 

A collection of hits and misses, but don't miss Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

12/7/18 BlacKKKlansman,  not yet nominated, 2018

When I first saw the trailers for Spike Lee's BlacKKKlansman, I shook my head. It just made no sense. I mean, how would a black man be in the KKK? It was genius. It made me want to see it so I could learn what was going on. It turns out that it's based on a true story; events that happened to the real Detective Ron Stallworth in 1970s Colorado Springs. After an assignment in the records room, Stallworth is moved to an undercover assignment where he poses, verbally, as a white supremacist who wants to join the Ku Klux Klan (the stereotype "you don't sound Black" is turned on its head). Obviously, Stallworth (John David Washington) can't attend any in person meetings, so, he fellow detective, Flip Zimmerman (Adam Driver), is the physical embodiment of Stallworth. In a bold move, Stallworth phones David Duke (Topher Grace), then the Grand Wizard of the KKK, and builds this bizarre relationship (given that Duke was unaware he was exchanging ideas with a black man) with Duke, to the point Duke expedites Stallworth's acceptance into the organization. Stallworth does a balancing act, between serving in a police department that had several racists and trying to be a good police officer, while he is dating Patrice Dumas (Laura Harrier), who is the head of the black student union, and trying to steer clear of the more radical facets of that movement. I don't know how accurate the movie is (it seems there is always some dramatic and creative license taken with anything based in reality, look at the outrage about Bohemian Rhapsody), and I haven't read Stallworth's memoir, but as far as the movie goes, I enjoyed it. I thought the story was interesting, certainly a different perspective, the cast was good, some better than others; Washington did a great job in what I think was his first starring role; I like that Driver shows diversity in his choice of roles and can carry it off; the various actors who were Klan members were good, but I don't know if I could pick them out of a crowd or would remember them if I saw them in another film. 

12/8/18 The Incredibles 2, not yet nominated, 2018

I feel like I should disqualify myself from any future reviews of kid-friendly films, because I think that piece of me that used to enjoy them, or appreciate them, died. Most reviews for The Incredibles 2 were fabulous, and I was so bored. Who cares? I should have been excited because in this sequel, Mrs. Incredible (Holly Hunter) takes the lead from her husband, Mr. Incredible (Craig T. Nelson), and hits the streets as the superhero of the moment. Yay equality! The movie picks up soon after the original ends, so Jack-Jack, everyone's favorite super baby is discovering more of his powers, and, well, I'm not even going to pretend. I'm done.

12/14/18 Eighth Grade, not yet nominated 2018

I have said to many of my contemporaries that I would not want to go through adolescence again for all the money in the world; it was hard enough without social media and the peer pressure exerted using it, but add those elements, and forget about it. Elsie Fisher plays Kayla Day, an eighth grader struggling with the aforementioned challenges. Kayla has her own YouTube channel where she posts confident, self-assured tips on navigating the whitewater rapids known as being a teenager. In real life, Kayla is the target audience for her channel, not the role model. She tries to fit in with the 'cool' kids, but it really never works the way she hopes. And, like most teenagers, Kayla butts heads with her single dad (Josh Hamilton) about curfews, privacy, and teenage angst. When Kayla starts to hang out with older kids at the high school, it seems pretty cool and more grown up, but it doesn't stay that way. You want to tell Kayla it's going to be okay, keep your head on your shoulders, talk to your dad, etc., because you really want your 15 year old self to know that, too. This movie does what some movies in a similar vein (I'm thinking of Richard Linklater movies that make me want to impale myself) don't do. I did care about Kayla and her dorky, but true friend, Gabe, and about the other eighth graders out there. The movie didn't drag on too long. It's heavy in parts, and funny and awkward in others. Kind of like life. It came out in the summer, and even though Fisher was nominated for a Golden Globe, it may get overlooked for the Oscars. See it anyway.

12/22/2018 Tully, not yet nominated, 2018

I like Charlize Theron, so I might have watched this movie at some point, but I pushed it to the top of my holiday Redbox list because it was nominated for a couple of Golden Globes. Usually, I'm pretty late to the party when it comes to picking up on plot twists, but I got this one early on. I don't know if that impacted the fact that I didn't really care for the movie, or if had to do with the actress playing the titular Tully (Mackenzie Davis) or just the character of Tully. Marlo Moreau is pregnant with her third child, and copes with her young son who has a developmental disorder that hasn't been properly diagnosed or treated; a husband who works a lot; and she has this strained relationship with her brother who is disgustingly successful. After the baby is born, Marlo is sleepless, overworked with caring for her children, and her husband, Drew (Ron Livingston), appears clueless to the stress she is under. Magically, Tully, a night nanny, comes into Marlo's life, and seems to help Marlo. Post-partum depression is a real thing, and can have a devastating impact on mothers and their relationships, and maybe there are moms who enjoyed this, but I'm not a mom, and I didn't enjoy it; I guess I would have liked it if there was a different presentation of the issue.

If a movie is classified as a drama-comedy, I'd like the comedy to be funny. Overall, this is more of a drama, with a few funny/humorous moments, but nowhere near enough to be considered a comedy. Theron is good, but honestly, she's good in most of her films, even really great, but it's not enough for me to recommend the movie.

12/25/2018 Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, not yet nominated, 2018

You may have sensed some hesitance, or malaise for some of my more recent films. There is no such feeling here. I loved this animated take on Spider-Man, almost more than any of the recent live action versions (much to the consternation of my Spidey-loving little brother). It did what I have wanted those other iterations to do, bring the comic books to life. The twist on this is the addition of Miles Morales (Shameik Moore) as the newest Spider-Man; Miles is of African-American and Hispanic parentage, whose parents have high expectations of him, especially his dad, who is a police officer (one of the funniest scenes was Miles' dad taking him to school, dropping him off, calling after him 'I love you', and Miles trying to walk away, and his dad saying 'Say I love You' over the patrol car's PA', and keeping it up until he said it. Such a real moment in the life of a teenager). The origin story is new, but similar, especially as we meet others from the Spider-Verse: SP//dr, Spider-Ham, Spider-Man Noir (Nicholas Cage), Spider-Woman (Hailee Steinfeld), and Aunt May (Lily Tomlin) and learn more about them. There is a roster of villains, including: King Pin/Wilson Fisk (Liev Schreiber), Doc Ock (Kathryn Hahn, yes, a female Dr. Octopus), Prowler (Mahershala Ali), who also happens to be Miles' uncle. If you're getting the feeling that there is a lot going on, go to the head of the class. I tried not to think too hard about the time-travel concept, because that always hurts my head; I just went with it. The writing was clever, quick-witted, irreverent, but yet it respected the legacy of Spider-Man movies that preceded it, as well as Spider-Man's creators, Stan Lee and Steve Ditko. Normally, I don't like modifications to who a character is, but things are different in the comic world, change is almost required to keep storylines relevant to new readers, but also keeping old readers, and I totally surrendered to it. I did have a little trouble with the drawings being blurry occasionally, but after checking with my brother, he explained that was the intention, to mimic the occasional blurriness that you see in comic books that happens during the printing process. That's pretty clever. My only regret is that I didn't see it in 3-D, I hurt the effects I enjoyed so much were even better in 3-D. I enjoyed it so much I almost saw it again in the theatre. I hope this is the beginning of a new series. I'd love to see how Miles negotiates his new powers, his relationship with his parents, and being a young man of color with super hero powers in 21st century New York. So many levels to this film. It won the Golden Globe for Best Animated Feature, and I think it definitely deserves to be nominated for the Oscar.