It's late, I'm tired...I'm going to try and make this brief.
- Best award of the night was Ang Lee for Best Director (Spielberg really did a shoddy job on Lincoln, it was structurally and tonally all over the place, just glad to see him beat out here).
- SO ANGRY about Chastain losing Best Actress....what a cheap blow Academy. I understand that it's "not cool" to give any big award to ZDT because of brain-dead retards that claim it was pro-torture....but I really hoped you guys would try to set an example, you know, be the better men here. Guess not. Anyways, Lawrence was great in SLP but it was still an undeserved and unfair win for her....very sad.
- You can probably guess my thoughts on Best Picture. I feel that ZDT losing Best Picture does not change the fact that it was still best film of 2012. Argo was a great film, and I feel that Ben Affleck deserved Best Director (since Bigelow never would have been nominated anyways even though she was best. Can't imagine how hard The Academy must be kicking themselves for snubbing him). 2nd year in a row that The Academy pulled down their pants, bent over, and sucked their own dick in the Best Picture category. Don't get me wrong, loved ya Argo.....but that's was a HUGE influencing factor. Argo was a film that celebrated Hollywood, and I'm sure that had a huge influence on its Best Picture won. The Academy loves to give awards to themselves , after all.
- Never would have expected Christoph Waltz to win Best Supporting Actor this year, making for 2 consecutive wins for this for the talented actor. It was well deserved.
- Glad that Quentin Tarantino won Best Original Screenplay....still wish he would have toned down the usage of the N word in the film. Pretty surprised The Academy would honor a script like that. Still Tarantino's a bad-ass so I guess it's all good.
- Best Original Score went to Life of Pi.....really??? Made for a nice surprise, and it's good to see The Academy not go with the obvious choice (coughcough John Williams coughcough) this time around.
- A tie for Best Sound Editing??? WOW, completely unexpected....seriously thought Mark Whalberg was joking when he announced it was tie. Well, at least Zero Dark Thirty won one award although it has to share it with Skyfall... just one more way the Academy gave the middle finger to ZDT.
- SO, SO HAPPY that Paperman won best animated short......an extremely well-deserved win.
- How shocking was Brave's win for Best ANimated film? It was like the Academy didn't know who to give it to, so they just fell back on the default. Another film that didn't deserve the win AT ALL. Kind of sad.
- Seth Macfarlene was definitely the best Oscar host in years (loved his Sound of Music reference/joke), and this was the best Oscar show in quite a while as well just due to the fact that it held more surprises than previous years had.
-Did they really have to drag Kristen Chenowith onto the stage at the end? She looks just plain awful, like someone exhumed her corpse and decided to make it dance and sing.
So there you have it....my condensed thoughts on the 2013 Oscars. Hope you enjoyed reading this reaction blog and watching the show yourself. Till next time guys.....STAY CLASSY!!
Sunday, February 24, 2013
Saturday, February 23, 2013
OSCAR BLOG: SO, ARGO IS THE FRONTRUNNER NOW?
Oh my, how times have....actually, stayed the same.
I remember going to see Argo in theaters, I had made a bold prediction: I actually had told my brother that The Academy would pick Argo for the best picture win because The Academy can never pass up an opportunity to, if you would excuse my crude language, suck its own dick. Every member of my family (myself included) absolutely loved the film and looking back I still think it's pretty great.
As the weeks and months went by, Affleck found himself snubbed for Best Director, just about guaranteeing in my mind a no-win situation for the film in the Best Picture race. I guess I got schooled though, you just can't keep a good film down I suppose, and both Argo and Affleck went on to win several Best director/best movie awards from several different awards show putting the cool little flick right back at the top of the Best Picture Oscar list.
Ask any internet blogger/writer/reviewer who they think is going to win Best Picture and about 9 out of 10 will say Argo without so much as a second thought.
I already stated in my Best Of 2012 list that I thought Affleck did a better job behind the camera than he did in front of it so you can imagine my thoughts on his snub (yeah, I feel he should have been nominated). I can only imagine how hard the Academy must be kicking themselves for leaving him out of the list. It would appear even the Academy can be taken to school every now and then.
What are my thoughts on Argo's Best Picture chances though? I still feel that best film was Zero Dark Thirty....but as for which film will actually walk away with that award? I really don't know anymore, I'd say it's still a neck and neck race between Lincoln, Argo, and Life of Pi....I still say it's just about anybody's game now but I wouldn't be surprised at all to see Argo walk away with the award this year. It's funny how things come full circle, I start out with a bold prediction, then go to just about discarding that film altogether, to back to thinking "hey, this film actually has a really good chance". I guess that's life though...or at least life at The Oscars.....the world's most predictable and unpredictable awards show.
See you on Oscar Sunday!!!
I remember going to see Argo in theaters, I had made a bold prediction: I actually had told my brother that The Academy would pick Argo for the best picture win because The Academy can never pass up an opportunity to, if you would excuse my crude language, suck its own dick. Every member of my family (myself included) absolutely loved the film and looking back I still think it's pretty great.
As the weeks and months went by, Affleck found himself snubbed for Best Director, just about guaranteeing in my mind a no-win situation for the film in the Best Picture race. I guess I got schooled though, you just can't keep a good film down I suppose, and both Argo and Affleck went on to win several Best director/best movie awards from several different awards show putting the cool little flick right back at the top of the Best Picture Oscar list.
Ask any internet blogger/writer/reviewer who they think is going to win Best Picture and about 9 out of 10 will say Argo without so much as a second thought.
I already stated in my Best Of 2012 list that I thought Affleck did a better job behind the camera than he did in front of it so you can imagine my thoughts on his snub (yeah, I feel he should have been nominated). I can only imagine how hard the Academy must be kicking themselves for leaving him out of the list. It would appear even the Academy can be taken to school every now and then.
What are my thoughts on Argo's Best Picture chances though? I still feel that best film was Zero Dark Thirty....but as for which film will actually walk away with that award? I really don't know anymore, I'd say it's still a neck and neck race between Lincoln, Argo, and Life of Pi....I still say it's just about anybody's game now but I wouldn't be surprised at all to see Argo walk away with the award this year. It's funny how things come full circle, I start out with a bold prediction, then go to just about discarding that film altogether, to back to thinking "hey, this film actually has a really good chance". I guess that's life though...or at least life at The Oscars.....the world's most predictable and unpredictable awards show.
See you on Oscar Sunday!!!
Friday, February 22, 2013
SMALLS PONDERS IF IT IS EVER A GOOD DAY TO DIE HARD
Oh, so much to say....where to start, where to start?
Ok, first off: why would anyone make a film if they clearly don't give two shits about what they are making? I mean, I guess maybe if the money is good enough....but still??? Why do that with such a beloved franchise as Die Hard and why with such a respected American hero as John Mcclane? Come on guys, this guy deserves better than this and so does his franchise....why can't we just let the poor old bastard die in peace?
Well, in case it isn't already obvious....I didn't particularly care for A Good Day To Day Hard. Now, I didn't hate this film...it by no means made me angry......it made me more frustrated than anything else. It's a film that tries to make "I'm on vacation" a catch-phrase when it doesn't even make sense within the confines of the film....but fuck that noise, AGDTDH continually forces this line down our throats whether we like it or not. John McClane is not on vacation, he flew to Russia with a specific purpose: to rescue his son from a bad situation. But apparently Mcclane is beginning to show the first stages of Alzheimers as he says this line throughout the film with a good amount of glee, apparently forgetting that he chose to fly over here and that he had a damn good reason to.
There isn't much plot here, or character development (or script development come to think of it, many of the places the script chooses to go will have most slapping their faces repeatedly). In AGDTDH, John Mcclane flies to Russia when he catches wind that his son Jack may have gotten himself in a pretty bad situation. Little does John know, but Jack is there on a mission of his own. You see, he's working as a CIA operative, and he has been sent to Russia to protect a Russian ex-terrorist who has possession of a file that could help lock the REAL baddies up for good. Naturally, John only manages to fuck the whole situation up, and soon teams up with his son to save the day (and then some).
That's the plot....pretty flimsy dontcha think? This is a film that clearly only cares about showing us pretty explosions and high-octane action and to it's credit (which I give reluctantly) it does try to show us good scenes of these. Unfortunately, what the people working on this film forgot was that action, explosions, gunplay and perceived danger to our heroes only works if we are invested in the story, our characters, and if we believe them to be in real peril. That's part of the problem of this film, not once do we ever believe that John and Jack to be in any real danger. John's car flips over a good 6 times, he dangles from a helicopter which is spinning out of control only to be flung through a window and into a room, he survives many fiery explosions, falls through several wooden construction structures, falls several stories down a plastic chute, and falls through a glass roof and then continues to fall several stories before landing on the ground without his legs turning into jelly upon impact. BULLSHIT!!!! The most damage John and Jack ever receive is a few bloody bruises....you guys need a band-aid? Seriously though, John Mcclane has become a super-hero here...a man who literally can not die and who has lost all sense of fear as at one point he runs towards a helicopter that is shooting full blast straight at him....this guy KNOWS that he can not die.
Speaking of John, the John Mcclane we grew to love in the first film is nowhere to be found here. True there are moments where we get brief glimmers of the old John Mcclane via some cool one-liners....but these never last for long. In AGDTDH, Willis is clearly tired of playing this role, and while he does attempt to do some good here, the film gives him zip to work with. Mcclane is pretty much an asshole, here is a man who is surprised and angry when he jumps into the middle of the road in an attempt to steal a car and is almost immediately hit by an oncoming vehicle. MORON.
Jack is no better. Here he is a bitter, angry young man with daddy issues that spends a good portion of the run time yelling at his dad and whining. for God's sake man, you're CIA and not to mention you're in a pretty serious situation......bad guys are trying to kill you. Shelve the drama, grow a fucking pair, suck it up, and save it for another time when your distraction with your daddy issues won't get you killed.
The film does half-heartedly try to throw us some father/son bonding moments and the like....but don't let this fool you, AGDTDH is in reality a heartless, brutal film that enjoys showing us complete carnage, people getting squashed by cars, bad guys getting thrown into helicopter blades, vehicles exploding, and other such nonsense.
At least this will be the last Die Hard film. How do I know this? Well, the last 45 + minutes of the film take place in Chernobyl. John and Jack decide to travel there WITH NO RADIATION PROTECTION AT ALL. The film never brings up the danger of entering a heavily radiated area with no protection what-so-ever, and neither John nor Jack seems particularly concerned.....who knows, maybe they've come to peace with the fact that they are now on what is essentially a suicide mission. I mean, everyone else in that area is wearing radiation protection (at first), and neither John nor Jack stop to think: Hey, you know...maybe this isn't such a wise idea? Rest assured dear audience, while the film pretends to end on a happy note the way it REALLY ends (you know, the part we don't get to see after the film is over) is John and Jack slowly dying of radiation poisoning ...hey, at least they get the ultimate father-son bonding experience of all time: getting to share their slow, painful deaths together. Maybe that is a happy ending after all?
AGDTDH is a largely uninspired, weak attempt to cash in on the video-game movie fad. The people who were writing the script didn't give a fuck about what they were working on, the actors are clearly just in it for the paycheck, the only ones who seemed to care were the VFX guys who are clearly trying to give us some good quality action scenes even though these fall flat because we are not invested in the story or the characters. AGDTDH is a fundamentally flawed film, at least Live Free or Die Hard actually had a script, a plot, character development and some chemistry between its leads (never thought I would find myself saying anything good about that film, a sad day indeed). AGDTDH will only satisfy the most easily-pleased of audience members. Myself, I'll take any Call of Duty game over this crap any day. Try harder next time Fox, and if you just don't give a fuck any more then maybe you should just leave Die Hard alone from now on.
So, is it ever a good day to die hard? No.....it's not. If this is the future of the Die Hard franchise I want no part of it. Good day, sir.
1 OUT OF 5 STARS
Ok, first off: why would anyone make a film if they clearly don't give two shits about what they are making? I mean, I guess maybe if the money is good enough....but still??? Why do that with such a beloved franchise as Die Hard and why with such a respected American hero as John Mcclane? Come on guys, this guy deserves better than this and so does his franchise....why can't we just let the poor old bastard die in peace?
Well, in case it isn't already obvious....I didn't particularly care for A Good Day To Day Hard. Now, I didn't hate this film...it by no means made me angry......it made me more frustrated than anything else. It's a film that tries to make "I'm on vacation" a catch-phrase when it doesn't even make sense within the confines of the film....but fuck that noise, AGDTDH continually forces this line down our throats whether we like it or not. John McClane is not on vacation, he flew to Russia with a specific purpose: to rescue his son from a bad situation. But apparently Mcclane is beginning to show the first stages of Alzheimers as he says this line throughout the film with a good amount of glee, apparently forgetting that he chose to fly over here and that he had a damn good reason to.
There isn't much plot here, or character development (or script development come to think of it, many of the places the script chooses to go will have most slapping their faces repeatedly). In AGDTDH, John Mcclane flies to Russia when he catches wind that his son Jack may have gotten himself in a pretty bad situation. Little does John know, but Jack is there on a mission of his own. You see, he's working as a CIA operative, and he has been sent to Russia to protect a Russian ex-terrorist who has possession of a file that could help lock the REAL baddies up for good. Naturally, John only manages to fuck the whole situation up, and soon teams up with his son to save the day (and then some).
That's the plot....pretty flimsy dontcha think? This is a film that clearly only cares about showing us pretty explosions and high-octane action and to it's credit (which I give reluctantly) it does try to show us good scenes of these. Unfortunately, what the people working on this film forgot was that action, explosions, gunplay and perceived danger to our heroes only works if we are invested in the story, our characters, and if we believe them to be in real peril. That's part of the problem of this film, not once do we ever believe that John and Jack to be in any real danger. John's car flips over a good 6 times, he dangles from a helicopter which is spinning out of control only to be flung through a window and into a room, he survives many fiery explosions, falls through several wooden construction structures, falls several stories down a plastic chute, and falls through a glass roof and then continues to fall several stories before landing on the ground without his legs turning into jelly upon impact. BULLSHIT!!!! The most damage John and Jack ever receive is a few bloody bruises....you guys need a band-aid? Seriously though, John Mcclane has become a super-hero here...a man who literally can not die and who has lost all sense of fear as at one point he runs towards a helicopter that is shooting full blast straight at him....this guy KNOWS that he can not die.
Speaking of John, the John Mcclane we grew to love in the first film is nowhere to be found here. True there are moments where we get brief glimmers of the old John Mcclane via some cool one-liners....but these never last for long. In AGDTDH, Willis is clearly tired of playing this role, and while he does attempt to do some good here, the film gives him zip to work with. Mcclane is pretty much an asshole, here is a man who is surprised and angry when he jumps into the middle of the road in an attempt to steal a car and is almost immediately hit by an oncoming vehicle. MORON.
Jack is no better. Here he is a bitter, angry young man with daddy issues that spends a good portion of the run time yelling at his dad and whining. for God's sake man, you're CIA and not to mention you're in a pretty serious situation......bad guys are trying to kill you. Shelve the drama, grow a fucking pair, suck it up, and save it for another time when your distraction with your daddy issues won't get you killed.
The film does half-heartedly try to throw us some father/son bonding moments and the like....but don't let this fool you, AGDTDH is in reality a heartless, brutal film that enjoys showing us complete carnage, people getting squashed by cars, bad guys getting thrown into helicopter blades, vehicles exploding, and other such nonsense.
At least this will be the last Die Hard film. How do I know this? Well, the last 45 + minutes of the film take place in Chernobyl. John and Jack decide to travel there WITH NO RADIATION PROTECTION AT ALL. The film never brings up the danger of entering a heavily radiated area with no protection what-so-ever, and neither John nor Jack seems particularly concerned.....who knows, maybe they've come to peace with the fact that they are now on what is essentially a suicide mission. I mean, everyone else in that area is wearing radiation protection (at first), and neither John nor Jack stop to think: Hey, you know...maybe this isn't such a wise idea? Rest assured dear audience, while the film pretends to end on a happy note the way it REALLY ends (you know, the part we don't get to see after the film is over) is John and Jack slowly dying of radiation poisoning ...hey, at least they get the ultimate father-son bonding experience of all time: getting to share their slow, painful deaths together. Maybe that is a happy ending after all?
AGDTDH is a largely uninspired, weak attempt to cash in on the video-game movie fad. The people who were writing the script didn't give a fuck about what they were working on, the actors are clearly just in it for the paycheck, the only ones who seemed to care were the VFX guys who are clearly trying to give us some good quality action scenes even though these fall flat because we are not invested in the story or the characters. AGDTDH is a fundamentally flawed film, at least Live Free or Die Hard actually had a script, a plot, character development and some chemistry between its leads (never thought I would find myself saying anything good about that film, a sad day indeed). AGDTDH will only satisfy the most easily-pleased of audience members. Myself, I'll take any Call of Duty game over this crap any day. Try harder next time Fox, and if you just don't give a fuck any more then maybe you should just leave Die Hard alone from now on.
So, is it ever a good day to die hard? No.....it's not. If this is the future of the Die Hard franchise I want no part of it. Good day, sir.
1 OUT OF 5 STARS
Thursday, February 14, 2013
ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND
"How happy is the blameless vessels lot! The world forgetting, by the world forgot. Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind! Each prayer accepted, and each wish resigned."- Alexander Pope
Break-ups are painful, I should know, I've been through my fair share of them. Hasn't everybody wished they could go back and just erase all those painful memories of a past relationship? Well, maybe it's for the better that we can't....at least, that's the question that Eternal Sunshine poses oh so eloquently.
In Eternal Sunshine, Joel (Jim Carrey) comes to the harsh realization that his most recent girlfriend, the effervescent and somewhat bipolar Clementine (Kate Winslet), has had her memory of him erased by a controversial new procedure created by new company Lacuna, Inc. Angry and hurt, Joel attempts to lash back by undergoing the same procedure, only to realize half-way through the memory-erasing process that he has made a terrible mistake. The race is on as Joel desperately attempts to save some memory, any memory of Clementine.
While most people tend to associate Jim Carrey with over-the-top comedies, Eternal Sunshine is nothing of the sort. It does have comedic elements to it, but for the most part the film is a drama. Jim Carrey has shown that he is capable of actual acting in films like The Truman Show and The Majestic....but for my money this is his best role. He gets to mix his comedic stylings with some real emotion as the character of Joel, and it is easy to sympathize with the guy...hell, every time I watch the film I always get a tad bit choked up by his character and his futile quest.
Kate Winslet is also pretty great as Clementine, yet another in the long line of Manic Pixie Dream Girls. You do care about her, and she is super hot (Winslet is not above showing her crotch and ass in some nice, tight panties every now and then....yum). For most of the film, her character represents some part of Joel's subconscious while Joel is unconscious for the procedure. The "REAL" Clementine however, is stuck dealing with a complicated relationship with the creepy Patrick (Elijah Wood), an employee of Lacuna that is doing some pretty devious and unethical things. The always fantastic Mark Ruffalo also appears as another employee of Lacuna, Stan, who is put in charge of Joel's procedure. Also in the cast roster are Kirsten Dunst as Mary, the receptionist at Lacuna and Tom Wilkinson as Howard, the head of Lacuna.....both do fine jobs here as well.
Eternal Sunshine is a simply fantastic film that is bound to speak to anyone who has ever gone through a painful break-up (which, let's be honest here, is everyone). One of the reasons the film works as well as it does is because it was written by Charlie Kaufman and directed by Michael Gondry....both of which are masters of imagination and style. It also doesn't hurt that the film is built around the desire to erase painful memories, and how that ends up affecting the person and their personality in the long run (By erasing memories are you also erasing everything you learned from the relationship?).
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless mind is a deep, provocative, tragic and painful movie-going experience....but just like every relationship we experience....it's worth the ride.
5/5 STARS
Break-ups are painful, I should know, I've been through my fair share of them. Hasn't everybody wished they could go back and just erase all those painful memories of a past relationship? Well, maybe it's for the better that we can't....at least, that's the question that Eternal Sunshine poses oh so eloquently.
In Eternal Sunshine, Joel (Jim Carrey) comes to the harsh realization that his most recent girlfriend, the effervescent and somewhat bipolar Clementine (Kate Winslet), has had her memory of him erased by a controversial new procedure created by new company Lacuna, Inc. Angry and hurt, Joel attempts to lash back by undergoing the same procedure, only to realize half-way through the memory-erasing process that he has made a terrible mistake. The race is on as Joel desperately attempts to save some memory, any memory of Clementine.
While most people tend to associate Jim Carrey with over-the-top comedies, Eternal Sunshine is nothing of the sort. It does have comedic elements to it, but for the most part the film is a drama. Jim Carrey has shown that he is capable of actual acting in films like The Truman Show and The Majestic....but for my money this is his best role. He gets to mix his comedic stylings with some real emotion as the character of Joel, and it is easy to sympathize with the guy...hell, every time I watch the film I always get a tad bit choked up by his character and his futile quest.
Kate Winslet is also pretty great as Clementine, yet another in the long line of Manic Pixie Dream Girls. You do care about her, and she is super hot (Winslet is not above showing her crotch and ass in some nice, tight panties every now and then....yum). For most of the film, her character represents some part of Joel's subconscious while Joel is unconscious for the procedure. The "REAL" Clementine however, is stuck dealing with a complicated relationship with the creepy Patrick (Elijah Wood), an employee of Lacuna that is doing some pretty devious and unethical things. The always fantastic Mark Ruffalo also appears as another employee of Lacuna, Stan, who is put in charge of Joel's procedure. Also in the cast roster are Kirsten Dunst as Mary, the receptionist at Lacuna and Tom Wilkinson as Howard, the head of Lacuna.....both do fine jobs here as well.
Eternal Sunshine is a simply fantastic film that is bound to speak to anyone who has ever gone through a painful break-up (which, let's be honest here, is everyone). One of the reasons the film works as well as it does is because it was written by Charlie Kaufman and directed by Michael Gondry....both of which are masters of imagination and style. It also doesn't hurt that the film is built around the desire to erase painful memories, and how that ends up affecting the person and their personality in the long run (By erasing memories are you also erasing everything you learned from the relationship?).
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless mind is a deep, provocative, tragic and painful movie-going experience....but just like every relationship we experience....it's worth the ride.
5/5 STARS
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