OVP: The English Patient (1996)

Film: The English Patient (1996)
Stars: Ralph Fiennes, Juliette Binoche, Willem Dafoe, Kristin Scott Thomas, Naveen Andrews, Colin Firth
Director: Anthony Minghella
Oscar History: 12 nods/9 wins (Best Picture*, Director*, Actor-Ralph Fiennes, Actress-Kristin Scott Thomas, Supporting Actress-Juliette Binoche*, Art Direction*, Cinematography*, Adapted Screenplay, Costume*, Sound*, Film Editing*, Original Score*)
(Not So) Snap Judgment Ranking: 5/5 stars

Stating a favorite movie has gotten harder as I've gotten older.  For years, it was a de facto answer (Casablanca), as sure as I could tell you my name is John or that I would definitely have sex with Colin Farrell if given the option.  But recently I've started to poke holes in that facade, realizing that as I've seen more movies than the average person will see in their entire lifetime at this point that it's okay to bring up Chinatown or Call Me By Your Name or Once Upon a Time in the West as potentially my favorite film ever made.  One of the movies that most strongly comes up when I decide to stray away from Casablanca as the Grand Teton of movies is The English Patient, a movie I was blessed enough to see at a "secret movie night" recently.  The English Patient is so ingrained in me that not only did I know it from literally the opening chord of the score (I literally squealed to my mom, sitting next to me, "it's my favorite movie!"), but also I have seen this film so often that I could literally mouth along to the words, as if I was at a rock concert and suddenly a favorite anthem began to play.  Since the film is arguably the movie I have the most arched eyebrows for when I mention it as potentially my favorite movie ever (even my mom who has known of my obsession with the film since I used to watch it alone in my bedroom every two months or so in high school, didn't quite get it after watching it with me for the second time), I figured I should rescue it today from the annals of being a Seinfeld punchline and talk about my English Patient.

(Spoilers Ahead) Okay, so the plot of The English Patient is somewhat hard to summarize as it's essentially two stories told chronologically and concurrently, so you're getting back story to one tale (about our present-day "English Patient" who has suffered terrible burns in a plane crash, and what happened to him before he was burned), and our current-state tale of Hana the Nurse (Binoche) who keeps losing everyone that she loves in horrible accidents toward the end of World War II.  The first half follows Almasy (Fiennes), the "English Patient," as he has a torrid affair with Katherine Clifton (Scott Thomas) who is married to Geoffrey (Firth).  All of them are helping to create maps of Northern Africa, which initially just feels like a past-time for bored and wealthy Europeans, but becomes crucially important as World War II breaks out, and increasingly battles are being fought between the Allies and the Axis powers in Africa.  Meanwhile, we learn seemingly contradictory things about Almasy in present-day, with him claiming to have been married to Katherine, and having him be accused of betraying the Allies (and his team, including the Cliftons) to the Germans, and in the process causing a thief named Caravaggio (Dafoe) who has traced down Almasy to come seeking his revenge, as Caravaggio blames Almasy for him being maimed (he had his thumbs cut off during illegal torture) during the war.  The film even has time for a second romance in the modern-day, between Hana and a young Sikh named Kip (Andrews), who disarms bombs and mines for a living.

The movie functions at once as a melodrama, a pair of doomed romances, and a mystery.  The first time you see it, it's not entirely clear what to do with our misleading narrator, who lies frequently in the present, so you don't know until the end that he's been telling the truth in the past.  The film kind of has something for everyone in this regard-if you don't really love the romances, you can always latch onto the "war is hell" portion of the story, as well as the central mystery, and of course there's two romances to point you toward, both of which feel fully-fleshed out (that's not a nudity joke, though there is ample nudity in the picture).

What I love about The English Patient (and this could honestly be a book, so for your own eyes I'll try to keep this relatively brief) is the way that it feels like a complete, epic story.  Frequently when a director like Minghella were to shoot for a big-picture sweeping tale there would be sluggish, potentially even ancillary aspects to the movie that don't keep it going; look at Minghella's impressive but less successful Cold Mountain for an example of a movie that can occasionally be spellbinding but gets lost along the way, never quite justifying its run-time.  The English Patient doesn't do that-it leaves layers for future viewings (it's impossible to get the depth of Binoche's Hana, and her misery the first time you see it, realizing what she has to go through while still maintaining a relatively caring-and-cheerful demeanor), but it's also a complete story all on its own.  It's not an epic that is long for the sake of being grand-it's long because the story demands it, and there isn't a lot of "spare" in the picture.  Unless you truly hate, say, the romance between Hana/Kip (and how could you do such a thing?), The English Patient is that rare movie that justifies heading into 3-hour territory without ever being dull.

The performances are brilliant.  All three of the Oscar-nominated leads are giving their best work here, and considering we're talking about Ralph Fiennes, Juliette Binoche, & Kristin Scott Thomas, that's saying something.  I can never quite decide my favorite performance in the picture, though I'd probably lean toward Fiennes on most days; he finds a thoroughly caddish rogue, someone we shouldn't sympathize with, and makes him a Heathcliff of the 20th Century.  Almasy is a brute, and probably not worthy of Katherine (or Hana, for that matter), but you understand the attraction here, and why he'd be the great love of her life.  Binoche finds an openness in Hana that is her trademark, but I love the quieter moments in her performance, the way that she is genuinely curious about the man she's caring for (always falling in love again), upon reflection.  Scott Thomas is in full-on glamour mode, never looking lovelier, but also is a woman who understands how to toe the line between being in a man's world, where she's frequently dismissed because of her gender and beauty, and someone who still manages to get things she wants, the way she wants them.  Along with sensitive portrayals from Dafoe & Andrews, the film's acting is just as good as the costumes, cinematography, and scoring, something you can't claim for a lot of romantic epics.

All-in-all, this is a movie I will always love, and that pretty much every age (even as I am now the age of the characters onscreen falling madly in love, rather than just someone imagining being so) of my existence will latch onto.  I am self-aware enough to know this isn't a picture for everyone-the dialogue is highly-stylized ("the heart is an organ of fire," "find that plant-cut out its heart,") but watching it in a packed theater, where the sparing jokes still land and the tender walk up to the Cave of Swimmers still had a number of wet eyes, I am reminded of why I love the movies-the very best ones unite us and captivate us in their stories.  The English Patient is a melodrama, one brimming with romantic tragedy, but it's also the very best of what the cinema can encapsulate-it's an escapist but all-too-human look at the lives of ordinary people put into extraordinary circumstances.

OVP: Mary Poppins Returns (2018)

Film: Mary Poppins Returns (2018)
Stars: Emily Blunt, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Ben Whishaw, Emily Mortimer, Pixie Davies, Nathanael Saleh, Joel Dawson, Julie Walters, Dick van Dyke, Angela Lansbury, Colin Firth, Meryl Streep
Director: Rob Marshall
Oscar History: 4 nominations (Best Costume Design, Score, Production Design, Original Song-"The Place Where the Lost Things Go")
Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

We live in a world of sequels and remakes.  Hollywood is learning this the hard way this summer as we watch a perpetual list of movies like Men in Black International and Shaft fail to make an indent at the Box Office (pretty much anyone who isn't Marvel has been struggling with remakes/followups this year).  But I'm more curious, as we get to a culture where we're constantly remaking films, what the role of film criticism would be in this case, particularly when it comes to classic films being remade or reinvented, but largely having the same plot as before.  Remakes are not new (this was the fourth A Star is Born movie last year, after all), but they are nearly constant right now, and one has to wonder when it comes to truly landmark films like A Star is Born or Mary Poppins or (later this year) West Side Story, what sort of curve should you be judging on when you look at the film itself compared to its classic predecessor?  How do you judge a film that's essential a carbon copy of its original?

(Spoilers Ahead) This was a question that I wrestled with when looking at Mary Poppins Returns, a movie that is lovely and pleasant on the surface of it, but it also is basically the same exact movie from 1964.  The problem is, that while I've seen the original film, it was not a cornerstone of my childhood the way that it was for so many people perhaps a few years older than me.  Julie Andrews was Maria von Trapp in my world, not Mary Poppins, and so I can understand the vast appeal of this movie to an audience that isn't enamored with the original.  The film's premise is that of a sequel even if it's basically a copy of the first film, with Mary Poppins (Blunt) returning years after taking care of the Banks children Michael (Whishaw) and Jane (Mortimer), and now must look after them again as Michael is about to lose their house and Jane is, well, in need of a man (Jane seems fine, but it's Disney so we need to throw in some heteronormative stuff rather than risk Jane being a lesbian).  She joins them as the nanny to Michael's three children after his wife dies, and they set off on a series of adventures across town with Topsy (Mary Poppins's cousin, played by Meryl Streep) and Jack (Miranda, whose character is an apprentice of Dick van Dyke's Bert) occasionally getting in on the fun.

This is a lovely little film.  The songs are not as memorable as the original, but that's a hard bar to clear, and you have such game performers all-around that you don't really notice that they aren't that good until you've left the theater.  Miranda & Blunt are a perfect odd-pair, with her cool standoffishness (a nice mirror of the original with Julie Andrews) and his unceasing nice-guy charisma working well together.  The supporting cast is lovely (Whishaw & Mortimer aren't really capable of being "not lovely") and the cameos are springy (in addition to Streep, we have Dick van Dyke playing a different character but still a true joy to see on the screen, and we also get the Balloon Lady ala Angela Lansbury).  The film won four Oscar nominations, and it's easy to see why as Disney assembled a top-notch crew to recreate one of their most seminal classics.

But it's basically the same movie as the 1964 version, albeit with less surprise and an almost constant need to make you swim in nostalgia.  This is Disney's MO recently, and I'm not inhuman-I liked it, I cried when Dick van Dyke got on that desk and started to dance, but it's also kind of manipulative.  It's objectively a lesser film than its predecessor, and it's genuinely hard to tell if it's actually any good because it only works with the previous movie, which it's wholesale ripping off.  But I liked it, so I'm going with 3 stars, which feels about right for a movie that I enjoyed, but can't really confirm if it's good or just trying to take me back to my childhood, even though my childhood didn't really feature Mary Poppins.  A conundrum of a film, but a good one for a lazy afternoon.

Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again (2018)

Film: Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again (2018)
Stars: Amanda Seyfried, Lily James, Dominic Cooper, Christine Baranski, Julie Walters, Pierce Brosnan, Colin Firth, Stellan Skarsgard, Andy Garcia, Cher, Meryl Streep
Director: Ol Parker
Oscar History: No nominations
Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

I have seen the musical Mamma Mia! both onstage and in theaters, but for me the songs of ABBA will always be something from my childhood, not something I learned about as an adult.  While I was nowhere near old enough to have ABBA be something on the "new hits" radio when I was younger, I stole my mom's ABBA Gold CD (along with Carole King's Tapestry & The Bodyguard...coming out feels so unnecessary in hindsight) and played it over-and-over again, secretly wishing for "Man After Midnight" and strutting to the "Dancing Queen."  The appeal of ABBA is their inexplicably fresh, infectious pop melodies-it's impossible to hear one of their songs that you know and not sing along as a result.  This is also the appeal of the Mamma Mia! franchise, now expanding into a fun, though oddly melancholy sequel-it makes the audience's nostalgia and inability to not sing along a character onto itself.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film take places a couple of years after the previous film, with Sophie (Seyfried) trying to make her mother's hotel dream come to life a year after Donna (Streep) has passed away.  Her relationship with her boyfriend Sky (Cooper) is strained as he is consistently away on business (and the audience is upset that he isn't jet-skiing in red board shorts again), and that two of her three fathers, Harry (Firth) and Bill (Skarsgard) aren't going to be able to make it for the grand opening.  We also learn that Sophie is pregnant (though in this case she knows Sky is the father), and we see flashbacks to her mother's arrival on this Greek island, and her interactions with younger versions of the three fathers.  This back-and-forth actually works quite well, with Lily James stepping into the role of a younger Donna with a great fizz.  The film ends with Donna's grandmother (Cher) coming out of the woodwork in time to sing "Super Trouper" and "Fernando" to a very game Andy Garcia (between this and Book Club, this is the summer of Andy Garcia romancing older women, and I am here for it).

The movie lives or dies off of the two things: the songs and the hot guys.  Really, Mamma Mia knows that its audience is women and gay men, and it doesn't disappoint either group.  The songs are fluffy and fun, and while there aren't any standout numbers (other than the gaudy loveliness of "Fernando"...I was at a morning matinee and I still heard applause from my fellow moviegoers when Cher started singing), you'd have to be deaf with a heart-of-stone not to be humming one of the songs when you left the theater.  The latter aspect we get in the forms of the three young fathers: Hugh Skinner (young Harry), Jeremy Irvine (Young Sam), and Josh Dylan (Young Bill).  Dylan, in particular, with his mop of blond hair and Elvis-like swinging thin hips, literally made me blush when he started moonwalking on a boat it was so, umm, arousing.  They could have just used the tagline "Come for the Hot Guys...Stay for the Cher" and made just as much as money.

The film's decision to go in a darker direction than its predecessor, with Donna dead for most of the film, feels a bit off at first, but as the film progresses it kind of works.  It's a testament to the confidence of Lily James' work, the appeal of the younger "dads" and the tunes of ABBA that you don't really miss Meryl Streep until she shows up and reminds you that she's a true movie star for a reason, giving a wrenching performance of "My Love, My Life."  Streep, more prone to cameos in recent years than she used to be (The Horseman, Suffragette, Mamma Mia 2, and probably Mary Poppins Returns this winter), knows how to effectively land her character in a few short breaths, and rocks out over the credits with Cher.  If they make another movie (and honestly why not at this point?), they don't need to even have the callback to her when they inevitably push Shirley MacLaine as Sophie's great-grandmother, but Meryl makes the most of her big number (as expected).

Magic in the Moonlight (2014)

Film: Magic in the Moonlight (2014)

Stars: Emma Stone, Colin Firth, Hamish Linklater, Marcia Gay Harden, Jacki Weaver, Eileen Atkins, Simon McBurney

Director: Woody Allen

Oscar History: No Nominations

Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

Like taxes and Christmas, a new Woody Allen movie comes out once a year, and much like those two things, I indulge every year regardless of my level of excitement.  This year, I will admit, I wasn’t quite feeling it.  Quite frankly, the public would be forgiven for being a little Woody fatigued from the many (MANY) stories earlier this year between Allen and Mia Farrow.  That being said, I'm a devoted fan of his films at least through good times and bad, and even with a sense of malaise in the reviews to this film, I decided to head out to the movie.

(Spoilers Ahead) I will admit, though, that I was pleasantly surprised by the eventual outcome.  The film, while never as classically constructed as Annie Hall or as biting in its social and character commentary as Blue Jasmine, is certainly charming and occasionally quite funny.  Set in the late 1920's, the film is about an egotistical illusionist named Stanley (Firth) who is widely celebrated on the stage and an absolute boor in real life.  His skills at unmasking psychic frauds is put to the test when he stays at a country estate of a wealthy family, and is stumped as to how their mystic Sophie (Stone) is seemingly able to know everything about Stanley, somehow defying all logic or sense by perhaps being a true clairvoyant.

The film continues from there as Stanley falls in love with Sophie, though his close-mindedness doesn't really allow for such a revelation until late in the film, even if the audience and even Sophie are aware of what is happening.  Because this is an Allen picture, there isn't a particularly large amount of time spent on the actual "I love you's" (he knows you get the idea), but instead about the pitfalls that happen when you try to meld two opposites.  Stanley abandons his self-assuredness ever briefly but never his severe lack of hubris (he remains, rigidly and completely the same person he was at the beginning of the film, if perhaps a little more open to the ideas of love).  Sophie, on the other hand, changes completely throughout the film, opening up a new world and realizing what her completely arbitrary approach to life is bringing her.

This comes across as a bit sexist, and I wouldn't recommend the film in this regard, but the performances by the two leads, Stone in particular, are quite excellent.  You wouldn't think that the handsome and affable Firth would make a good proxy for the Woody protagonist, but Firth (who has been on such a role as of late) is a wonderful fill-in and while never quite the neurotic that Woody is, clearly is illustrating his substitute part with homage to the director.  Stone is excellent-it's as if she was plucked out of the Thirties and is playing the film like she's a young Irene Dunne.  I love the way she switches from the "performer" to the real character and back again-it's proof that she's being wasted wholly in those Spider-Man movies, and is genuinely an actor who could add something to classic screwball and "talking" comedies.  Sadly, Woody's the only director who makes these styles of pictures anymore, but he at least had the good sense to cast her in his next movie as well.

The finale is a bit of a yawn, I must admit.  After an entire film where Stanley has stayed so rigid and Sophie has literally had to come to him, Woody gives us one of his rare happy endings, with Sophie choosing Stanley despite the handsome young Brice (Linklater) being the smarter on-paper choice (and possibly the smarter choice period).  I think this film would have benefited greatly from a little more discretion from Woody (having her sail off and Stanley left to wonder, much like Jasmine in his last picture, whether or not his decision to be right was worth the decision to be happy).  Either way, though, this is still a solid movie and worth your time, even if it might get a bit shuffled in Woody's overall filmography.

What were your thoughts on Magic in the Moonlight?  Where does it rank amongst Woody's films?  And what do you think of Emma Stone as his latest muse?  Share in the comments!

OVP: Actor (2009)

OVP: Best Actor (2009)

The Nominees Were...

Jeff Bridges, Crazy Heart

George Clooney, Up in the Air

Colin Firth, A Single Man

Morgan Freeman, Invictus

Jeremy Renner, The Hurt Locker

My Thoughts: We now move into the Big 4, and we’ll see if I continue my Academy-matching ways (we’ve yet to have all four of the acting winners match up with Oscar…and oddly enough I’ve yet to agree with the Academy in a lead race).  The men of 2009 are kind of titans of acting-all but one have picked up an Oscar, and he’s the youngest of the bunch so it could still happen.  In fact, since I’m always on the hunt for a segway and whom to start with, we’ll go with the guy still hunting for that first Oscar: Jeremy Renner.

Renner’s work as Sergeant First Class William James is the sort of acting that feels like an acquired taste.  There’s a dominant force in film criticism that seems to value this sort of he-man higher than most-the brooding tough guy, driven to the brink of madness (or perhaps over the edge into its abyss), operating within his own spiraling inferno.  To say this is Renner’s finest work is both obvious and insulting, since he’s never really done anything since that was remotely as important or as riveting.  I love the way that he interacts with himself in the film, the inner demons that he is constantly addressing.  Renner isn’t quite as good when he’s trying to find connections with his fellow actors-he falls far into clichéd machismo and male-bonding, but that’s not to say there isn’t something very worthwhile in what he’s doing.

Colin Firth also excels in his own personal demons in A Single Man.  A stylish gay period piece, the film is at first glance more about actors-as-props, but Firth finds something within his character that shows it’s more than the sum-of-its-parts, and brings that out in two of his key costars (a splashy and fabulous Julianne Moore and an unnervingly sexy Nic Hoult).  You don’t have to have him address his deeply inhibited sexuality to understand that he’s become a master of control, and this break in his life (the death of his partner) is a life-changing shot.  The vein of suicide runs through the film, but Firth’s performance is also informed with the sense of what-to-do-next.  That’s the real thing that frightens him, that his life could go on without his Jim.  I love the way that that’s the thing that starts to push Firth’s George toward the end of the film.  That combination of stuffy, period-informed repression and deeply conflicted emotion that he dare not speak of-that’s the stuff of great acting, and that’s what Firth is giving here (he, too, gives his best performance in this movie, and that’s a slightly more complimentary statement considering the breadth of his body of work).

I’m not quite sure if George Clooney is also doing career best (I really need to re-view Michael Clayton before we get into 2007), but his Ryan Bingham is definitely one of his ballsier creations.  I remember people talking about how Clooney plays himself in every movie, and in some ways that’s true (he’s frequently the dapper man-with-a-twinkle), but Ryan Bingham is an inverted, darker version of Clooney, and probably his ballsiest role choice to date.  In some ways he’s similar to George, in the way that he has to encounter a part of his life that he’s long since avoided, but here it’s his impending age.  Because that’s what rings through Up in the Air-the threat of missed opportunities.  Clooney makes his Ryan a man confident that he made the decisions he should have made, and yet smart enough to know when to drop his guard and self-assuredness.  There are no great epiphany moments like we’re used to in a movie with his mistress Alex, but Clooney knows to put them in the way he cuts words at her and restrains his face.  It’s a truly marvelous piece of work from an actor that, even in his over-celebrated current Academy state, doesn’t often get enough credit for his ability to escape into a role.

Jeff Bridges is an actor that is celebrated as a chameleon, however, and he gets to that point in Crazy Heart, where he plays yet another hang loose personality.  Bridges is one of those actors (in some similar ways to Brad Pitt) that makes relaxed look easy onscreen, and I think some people assume that’s the actor behind the performance.  However, there’s clearly an artistry in the way that he pushes Bad Blake through all of these scenes.  Most actors would have had his drinking seem over-the-top and exaggerated, but Bridges holds back in some scenes, only having his later moments, when he’s just slipping, be truly informed by the wild swings within his character.  Bridges understands that this is a man consumed by decades of alcohol, not just two hours worth, and doesn’t give us everything the character has been through.  He also finds a hope within the way that he sings, and pines for the dream career that has long since passed him by that is now given to the younger Tommy Sweet (Colin Farrell…another actor who makes it all look easy).  Bridges is hampered by something that Clooney and Firth don’t have to deal with (he’s not in a good movie), but that doesn’t keep his Bad Blake down-being the best in his film doesn’t stop him from being one of the best of the year.

Finally, there’s Morgan Freeman in Invictus.  I feel I do myself a disservice by discussing this too harshly.  I mean, it’s perfect casting.  Morgan Freeman was born to play Nelson Mandela, and this is a film that had to be made.  I just wish he’d been given a better movie to do it in, to be honest.  Freeman hits all of the right notes, and though he does some of the things that people accuse George Clooney of (relying on his persona, which he does to help sell some of the schmaltzier moments in the script), there’s still an informed light behind his eyes.  I think there’s something to be said for being the right person for the right role at the right time, even if I don’t think this is as great as either Freeman or Eastwood could have delivered (the film relies too heavily on pushing the point of harmony and less on selling the actual script).

Other Precursor Contenders: The Globes found room for all but Renner in their lineup, skipping him in the drama race in favor of Tobey Maguire in Brothers (the Globes didn’t really go for The Hurt Locker), a nomination I don’t think anyone assumed was possible (Bridges won).  The Comedy/Musical nominees included Robert Downey Jr. for Sherlock Holmes (the winner), Daniel Day-Lewis in Nine, Matt Damon in The Informant!, Michael Stuhlberg in A Serious Man, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt in (500) Days of Summer.  The SAG Awards found a carbon copy of the Oscar list, both in terms of nominees and the winners.  The BAFTA went to Colin Firth (country pride), and skipped Freeman (huh?) for Andy Serkis in Sex and Drugs and Rock and Roll (double huh).  As far as sixth place, I have no clue.  This was clearly the list that was getting nominated (I would assume sixth place was extremely distant).  Perhaps Viggo Mortenson in The Road or Daniel Day-Lewis in Nine?  That’s my best bet.

Actors I Would Have Nominated: This is, all things considered, a very strong list, particularly considering the field.  I would have probably included Gordon-Levitt and I admittedly have never seen The Road, but there’s not a lot to quibble with.

Oscar’s Choice: Feeling the insane pressure to finally honor a well-respected industry veteran, Jeff Bridges took out George Clooney and Colin Firth, in that order.

My Choice: I’m going to go with Firth, with Clooney a closer-than-expected second.  I will put Bridges in third, followed by Renner, and then Freeman, though I don’t want that to sound like Freeman is last as I still think that was a worthwhile performance to be had.

Those are my thoughts-how about yours?  Are you  with myself and Colin Firth, or the consensus around Bad Blake?  What are people’s thoughts on Invictus (since it missed the Best Picture race, this is our last shot with it)?  Who was 2009’s sixth place (I’m going with Day-Lewis, but would love to discuss others)?  And which man had the best lead actor performance of 2009?  Share in the comments below!

Also in 2009: Supporting Actress, Supporting Actor, Original Screenplay, Adapted Screenplay, Foreign Film, Animated Feature, Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, Original Score, Original Song, Art Direction, Cinematography, Costume, Editing, Visual Effects, Makeup, Previously in 2009

Past Best Actor Contests: 2010, 2011, 2012

OVP: Lead Actor (2010)

OVP: Best Lead Actor (2010)

The Nominees Were...

Javier Bardem, Biutiful

Jeff Bridges, True Grit

Jesse Eisenberg, The Social Network

Colin Firth, The King's Speech

James Franco, 127 Hours

My Thoughts: You sometimes have to wonder, in categories where the winner is completely, totally obvious, what the other actors are thinking on Oscar night.  I mean, there's always someone that would be considered the "frontrunner," but on rare occasions there are nominees that seem like there is no fathomable way that they will lose: Helen Mirren in The Queen, Meryl Streep in Sophie's Choice, Christopher Plummer in Beginners, and in 2010, Colin Firth in The King's Speech.

This isn't meant as a slight-the best part of The King's Speech, by a wide margin, is Firth.  An actor long on the sidelines of films, taking on small parts in Bridget Jones and being most well-known for a BBC miniseries that had monstrous legs both in Britain and abroad, Firth came out as an actor to be reckoned with in Tom Ford's A Single Man the year before, and suddenly with this year, it was time to honor and reward his career.  The movie is tailor-made to his sensibilities: a man of much self-doubt, but still stately and with a strong upper lip, he'd been practicing for this role for the past fifteen years.

The physical demands of the stutter had to be extraordinary, and while I'm not one typically to acknowledge weight gains and losses (anyone can do that...well anyone can gain weight), a stutter is something that you have to hone as an actor and that requires some measure of skill, and Firth made it seem as realistic as he could.  He also does a great job weighing the internal war inside of him-this is a man who was never meant to be king, was put in that place by one of the most extraordinary turn-of-events of the twentieth century, and had to balance that doubt that he shouldn't be there with the fact that the King rules, historically, by the grace of god.  He has a thousand years of relatives who have lived up to the task he is so reluctant and scared to take, and without Firth's sturdy, physical performance, we wouldn't have the payoff in the title sequence that we do.

Of the other four nominees, probably the only one who didn't start to become slightly annoyed with Firth's stampede was Javier Bardem.  This isn't just because Bardem had won three years earlier, but it's also because Bardem was a big surprise on Oscar nomination morning. Robert Duvall was a far more likely contender for his work in Get Low, but a strong campaign brought Bardem into the mix, getting his first lead actor nomination in ten years.

The film, as we documented in the Foreign Film race (see the link below) was not my favorite, and that extends to the performance.  Like The King's Speech, I get the physical demands that playing a dying man must entail, but I wasn't drawn into the world of Bardem's pain like I was Firth's.  Bardem doesn't expand his character-his performance, like the film, spends more time pointing out the sorrow and pain of dying of cancer and not enough time developing the man we see onscreen into someone that we could encounter in every day life.  Making someone sad doesn't make a great movie, it just proves that you can make them recall their own lives-Bardem may succeed on that front, but he doesn't make us feel for the man on the screen, and that is his issue in a nutshell.

Jesse Eisenberg is one of the youngest men to ever be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor, and to break that barrier, he had to do something extraordinary onscreen.  It's worth noting that, at 27, he was playing Mark Zuckerberg at the same age as Orson Welles when he made Citizen Kane.  I don't know if this is widely discussed on the internet, but I've always noticed a nagging similarity between the two films (one man's rise to power and ultimate downfall, in the end wishing for the life he had at the beginning of the movie), and that extends to these performances.  Eisenberg may be the most limited in the characters he's tackled of these five actors, but that doesn't mean that he can't easily handle a role tailor-made for him.  He has to walk the fine line of making us dislike Mark but still making us interested enough in his outcome to carry us through the movie.  I love some of his slighter character choices.  Most actors would have made some sort of sign when Eduardo accuses Mark of wanting to destroy him out of jealousy over being kicked out of the Porcelain.  Eisenberg knows that this is part of his character's motivation, and is aware that the simple act of saying nothing for a man like Mark is enough to implicate his guilt.  The way that Eisenberg makes him always awkward, yet always completely confident-it's a tightwire act, and he does it beautifully.

James Franco, the other youngster in this crowd, has perhaps the most difficult task of these five men.  On the Broadway stage, it's fairly common for actors to have to take on one-person shows and carry a play, but we're not used to it onscreen, and while he is joined by a couple of actors (including Kate Mara, sister of Rooney, who had a significant part in The Social Network), for most of the film he's on his own.  This works when Franco is playing to his strengths-the cocky, manic interviews with himself are so solid, and overall Franco succeeds in this role.  However, I will say that what Franco does best-insecure, lustful, pretentious-it's not what Aron is about, and so there are times when I feel that a different actor would have brought a stronger character arc to Aron's struggle to survive.  Again, a solid performance by Franco, but in hindsight, I think he may be better in Howl, which also came out that year, or especially Milk.

Jeff Bridges, like Javier Bardem, had recently picked up a trophy, and in Bridges case, it had been just the previous year.  Here he has the unenviable task of being compared to John Wayne (one of the most iconic movie stars of all time), as well as living up to a lifetime of solid character work.  As I mentioned before, there are times when I feel like he's playing Rooster Cogburn as the Dude in the Old West-this is fun for the novelty of it, but it doesn't get to Rooster's essence.  We don't see him hit the drunken, broken places he hit in Crazy Heart, and instead we get a performance that shifts too frequently from comedic to dramatic.  In the end, we know that he wants to protect Mattie Ross, but we don't know why it took him so long to break his exterior, and why this was the first time someone had done it.

Other Precursor Contenders: As you're likely aware, the Globes split their categories into comedic and dramatic for lead performances, which typically means most of the actors get their nominations.  In this year, however, both Bridges and Bardem were dumped in the drama category; instead the HFPA favored Ryan Gosling in Blue Valentine and Mark Wahlberg in The Fighter (Firth of course won).  For the comedic races, I should just leave the category unsaid, but in the completist in me wants to point out that the nominees were Johnny Depp in The Tourist, Johnny Depp in Alice in Wonderland, Kevin Spacey in Casino Jack, Jake Gyllenhaal in Love and Other Drugs, and Paul Giamatti in Barney's Version.  Seriously, that's the best the Globes could come up with?  Giamatti won, by the way, though you probably already figured that since it's the only nomination that doesn't completely shout "what the f#@^?"  The Globes also cut Bardem (as I said, it was a surprise), putting in Robert Duvall in Get Low (and honored Colin Firth with the win).  And finally the BAFTA Awards (probably unanimously giving the award to Firth) went with a carbon copy of the Oscar lineup.

Performances I Would Have Nominated: I want to point out my fifth place nominee before I get to my favorite performance of the year, because I'm still scratching my head over the Globe lineup and it's the only one that fits: Michael Cera is not a great actor, but he knew exactly what he was doing with Scott Pilgrim.  Just because a role is tailor-made for you doesn't mean that when you succeed (splendidly) that you shouldn't be celebrated for it.  Especially when you're miles ahead of the actual nominees.  For first place, though, it's an easy bone to throw to Ryan Gosling (aren't they all, though...sorry, it was just lying there)-his performance as a man trapped in a doomed relationship, showing both the romantic, heroic beginnings that he started with and then slowly turning into the man he dreaded he would become, it's a triumph.  Oscar likely didn't want to go with another youngster with Eisenberg and Franco already in the mix, but they should have found the room, as the lineup looks empty without him there.

Oscar's Choice: Well it obviously went to Firth, though for the fun of it, let's guess who was in second place-my bet would be that it was Bardem.  With 90% of the Academy probably voting for Firth, Bardem's support base was passionate enough to get him a nomination, and I suspect probably kept voting for him in the general.

My Choice: Part of me wants to go with Firth just for the symmetry of it, and indeed, he's in the running, but I cannot shake what Eisenberg does in The Social Network.  He's not the chameleon that Bridges is, nor the acting poet that Bardem is, nor is he has immersed in his character as Firth is.  He is, however, giving a performance that is at once current and timeless, and while he may never be that great again, he's still wonderful and the best of the lineup.  Firth follows, with Franco, Bridges, and Bardem behind.

Do you agree that Firth should be dethroned, or do you think he was appropriately crowned?  Are you like me in being aghast at the Globes lineup (who else should have made it)?  And should I see Get Low with Robert Duvall-it's one of the few major nominated films that I haven't seen (it missed out entirely at the Oscars, but scored that key SAG nomination), or is it fine taking a pass?

Also in 2010: Supporting Actress, Supporting Actor, Original Screenplay, Adapted Screenplay, Foreign Film, Animated Film, Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, Original Score, Original Song, Art Direction, Cinematography, Costume, Editing, Visual Effects, Makeup, Previously in 2010

Past Best Actor Contests: 2011