OVP: Supporting Actor (1999)

OVP: Best Supporting Actor (1999)

The Nominees Were...

Michael Caine, The Cider House Rules

Tom Cruise, Magnolia

Michael Clarke Duncan, The Green Mile

Jude Law, The Talented Mr. Ripley

Haley Joel Osment, The Sixth Sense

My Thoughts: The Best Supporting Actor field of 1999 is one of my favorites.  With one exception, I genuinely admire all of these performances.  I think that different styles of acting are being represented here in a really cool way, and we get a lot of famous actors at different stages of their careers.  It's a tough field, quite honestly, to pick a winner (even Michael Caine seemed a bit flummoxed as to how he had been the one to come out on top in this collection).  So to try and end with some happy, we'll start with the one performance that I didn't care for of the bunch.

Michael Clarke Duncan seemed like a nice enough guy (and based on the ceremony, had a blast being an Oscar nominee), but wasn't a good enough actor to really compete with this field.  His work in The Green Mile is quite one-note, sympathetic and sweet but lacking in a lot of depth, and not adding to the film itself.  I get why this was nominated (it's the type of scene-stealing role that Oscar falls in love with), but that's no excuse given how many really strong achievements were waiting in the wings for this field.

Beyond that, get ready for the superlatives.  I mean, look at Jude Law.  No, seriously, look at him.  Has anyone ever been as beautiful as Jude Law is as Dickie Greenleaf.  He doesn't need to be good in this movie-he is such a golden god that you wouldn't care if he wasn't grand, but he is.  His breakthrough role gives us a depth-of-range.  He is always about protecting himself, Dickie, even when he's trying to help someone else it's always on his terms.  Law does a good job of making his carefree attitude nasty whenever that paradigm is shifted.  Spoiled, petulant, but violent and irresistible.  It's a tour-de-force, and proof that he was going to be a big star, as Caine said in his speech.

Caine's win is ill-regarded, but it's hard for me to really join in on the pile-on, as I love what he's doing here.  This isn't a stretch like some of the other men (or as complicated as some of the other figures), but does that matter?  Not all great acting needs to come with a thesaurus, and he is carefree and effortless in the way he brings this doctor to existence.  I love the little details he puts in, the stubbornness borne out of both always being in charge and also knowing he's about to die.  The interactions with the children, teaching but caring in one breath-this is good stuff from one of our finest actors.

Haley Joel Osment's work in The Sixth Sense became the sort of textbook definition of great child acting so quickly, you can honestly be forgiven for forgetting how good he is.  But the way that his Cole unfolds, giving us so much knowledge from the opening moments, and how his monologues land every single time (particularly the late-in-film one to his onscreen mother Toni Collette) is magical.  I will admit that I don't think he's supporting here.  I don't buy that "but it's X's story" nonsense-he's in more than twice the movie compared to all four of his other nominees: he's the lead.  So I take a point off for that, but that's it-this is one for the ages.

Tom Cruise has, to date, only gotten three Oscar nominations, and while he got a My Ballot nomination in 2002, I feel like we haven't really talked about him yet in the Oscar Viewing Project.  I genuinely think Cruise is a great actor (but an even better movie star), and it feels weird to start that conversation with Magnolia, which is not only spoofing Cruise, but honestly spoofing L. Ron Hubbard (still not sure if Cruise realized that at the time).  The performance here is sensational, his take on crumbling toxic masculinity fully-felt and realized.  This didn't win an Oscar because it's a very prickly performance, but man is it good.

Other Precursor Contenders: Get ready for some repetition (except BAFTA)!  The Globes picked the same lineup as Oscar, but instead went with Tom Cruise for their winner.  SAG skipped Jude Law and put in Chris Cooper (American Beauty), but otherwise copied Oscar, and also gave it to Michael Caine.  The BAFTA's totally threw their hands in the air, picking Law as the victor atop Caine, Rhys Ifans (Notting Hill), Timothy Spall (Topsy-Turvy), and Wes Bentley (American Beauty).  You could maybe make the case for one of the American Beauty actors, but honestly...I think sixth place was behind two men who got no precursors, but whose films were well-liked by Oscar: John Malkovich (Being John Malkovich) and Christopher Plummer (The Insider).  Both are well-respected thespians, and make sense given who else got in.  If I had to pick who was in sixth I think Plummer's was more conventional (and thus an easier sell), but they both make sense.

Performances I Would Have Nominated: Oscar spent decades ignoring Christopher Plummer, but I am not such a fool.  His vain, driven Mike Wallace is one of the best aspects of The Insider.

Oscar’s Choice: In something of an upset, Michael Caine beat both Osment & Cruise (his chief competition) to win his second Oscar (neither of the other two men have been nominated since).

My Choice: Despite losing a point for category fraud, that's not enough to derail Osment, who is giving the best of the 20 performances nominated for Oscar in 1999.  Behind him are (in order) Cruise, Law, Caine, and then Duncan.

Those are my thoughts-what are yours?  Do you want to hide under your bed with me, or would you rather extend a morphine drip with Oscar?  Is Tom Cruise ever going to be nominated for an Oscar again (or for that matter...is Jude Law)?  And was it Plummer or Malkovich in sixth place?  Share in the comments!

Also in 1999: Adapted Screenplay, Original Screenplay, Foreign Language Film, Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, Original Score, Original Song, Art Direction, Cinematography, Costume, Film Editing, Visual Effects, Makeup, Previously, in 1999

Past Best Supporting Actor Contests: 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022. 2023

Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore (2022)

Film: Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore

Stars: Eddie Redmayne, Jude Law, Ezra Miller, Dan Fogler, Alison Sudol, William Nadylam, Callum Turner, Jessica Williams, Mads Mikkelsen

Director: David Yates

Oscar History: Probably not?  The first film won a surprise citation for Best Costume Design, the first film in the Harry Potter universe to do so, but the second one totally missed, and given the baggage of this  movie, it's hard to imagine Oscar latching on even if notice for Visual Effects or Production Design might be worth considering.

Snap Judgment Ranking: 4/5 stars

We have not reviewed a new movie on this blog for a number of months for a pair of reasons.  First, like many people I am feeling overwhelmed these days, the pressures of work, health, life, expectations, & the world at-large weighing down too much to be able to do any of those things at top speed.  And secondly (and less depressingly), I have a Letterboxd account where I have been doing mini-reviews of every film I see.  If you've been missing my thoughts on modern movies, please follow me there, as I review every film (first-time or repeat) that I see at this point.

But exceptions must be made (I am still deciding and will have a decision by early summer whether or not I will return to doing full reviews on the blog or if only certain new movies will get this treatment), , and few exceptions make more sense to expand upon than the newest (and potentially last) Harry Potter film, Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore.  For over twenty years, I have been obsessed with the world of Harry Potter.  I started reading the books as a teenager, and fell in love with the magical world they provided.  For a young closeted boy in a small midwestern town with few friends, the world of movies & books were my refuge, the place where I enjoyed spending so much of my time, and few places felt more far off & wondrous than Hogwarts.  Even as an adult, this world is a huge part of my personality (shut up-we all borrow from pop culture in 21st Century world to shape our personality...not everything can be Schopenhauer & Aristotle)...if you walk my home, you'll see little knicknacks & winks to the Harry Potter franchise everywhere.  When I went to Los Angeles last year and walked into the world of Hogwarts for the first time, I actually teared up behind my sunglasses, it was like walking into the world I'd spent my childhood imagining.

Being a fan of this franchise in 2022 requires nuance and a bit of self-reflection.  JK Rowling, who was once an icon to a generation of young writers & readers, has sullied herself in hatred & bigotry to the point where being a Harry Potter fan has become, at best, something you asterisk as being "not a fan of Rowling" and at worst, abandoning decades of fandom.  Stars of the franchise Johnny Depp & Ezra Miller have gone from being big enough deals for Warner Brothers to trust a billion-dollar franchise to them to basically unemployable in a matter of a few years (Depp isn't even in this movie, Miller's part greatly reduced from previous films).  But I'm still here-in a similar way that Star Wars became more than George Lucas and Marvel became more than Stan Lee, Harry Potter became far more than JK Rowling in the years since she first wrote it in a coffee shop.  And that teenager inside me who saw it as a refuge during a lonely period of finding myself still has his heart skip the second that he sees an aerial shot of Hogwarts or hears the strums of John Williams' iconic score.

(Spoilers Ahead) With that preamble over, let's dive into the movie at-hand.  Where last we left off (in full transparency, there were virtually no trailers for this movie, which I went with with six friends after a themed-dinner party, and so I missed the first maybe 90 seconds of the movie based on synopses I read about the movie afterward).  Grindelwald (then Depp, now Mikkelsen) had told Credence (Miller) that he was Albus Dumbledore's brother, Queenie (Sedol) had broken up with muggle Jacob (Fogler), joining Grindelwald, while Theseus (Turner) had lost his fiancee Leta (Zoe Kravitz) in the fight with Grindelwald.

Similar to The Crimes of Grindelwald, the film continues to shift focus away from the world of Newt Scamander, more safely into the realm of Albus Dumbledore & the tried-and-true Hogwarts universe.  This film takes place almost completely in Europe, frequently the UK & Germany, and with that shift it becomes at-best an ensemble, sidelining Eddie Redmayne's Newt Scamander and almost completely removing Katherine Waterston's Tina Goldstein from the movie (she shows up at the very end, but is otherwise removed from the franchise, fueling rumors that Rowling wrote Waterston's character out of the movie due to Waterston's public criticisms of Rowling's views on transgender rights).

This decision felt like fan service in the second film of the franchise, but with Secrets of Dumbledore I find it more forgivable.  This is partially because the movie puts Law's Dumbledore centerstage, but smartly doesn't give us that much back story as to ruin the mysterious nature of the character during the Harry Potter franchise (I loathe when movies take a character that works so well by being unknowable, and then feels they need to explain them).  Much has been made over the fact that Dumbledore is gay, but not particularly gay (i.e. there's no big kiss scene between he & Grindelwald like there is between Fogler & Sudol, and there's only two mentions of his homosexuality in the film, both of which have been excised from the picture in China), and it's hard not to be disappointed that they don't do more with his homosexuality to feed the character, other than, well, making him lonely because he lost his great love.  But, I'm willing to forgive for two reasons here-one, this is still bolder than I've ever seen from a movie with $200 million-the gay moments that Disney, Pixar, Star Wars, & Marvel have thrown at us in the past decade get less screen-time than Dumbledore's sexuality does...Dumbledore, a decade after Rowling was heavily criticized for making him gay only when the books were done, is canonically gay now.  And two, it works within the story.

Dumbledore as-written was always a bit of a tragic figure, someone whose life has lived on the edge, always sacrificing but never really living.  One of the things that made he & Snape both kindred spirits AND so selfless were that they gave much of their lives so that people like Harry, Ron, & Hermione could be free to live their own lives.  That works here-we see that Dumbledore was always going to sacrifice, that he might have been the most powerful wizard alive, but he also was incapable of finding a peace in himself...instead, he gives so that the people who can have that peace (in the original series the students, in this series people like Newt, Tina, Queenie, & Jacob) will achieve it.  It feels slightly problematic that it's a gay character who does this until you remember that Rowling's world is littered with such characters (Snape, Sirius, etc) & underlines the point that magic is no replacement for human connection & love.

This is the best part of the movie, which I think is the finest of the Fantastic Beasts series, even if it never quite becomes as enchanting as the original "boy who lived" pictures.  The lighting here is off (George Richmond's cinematography needed some lessons in lighting from Bruno Delbonnel), but the effects are fun.  I loved the scene where Jessica Williams' Lally Hicks jumps atop a sea of cascading pages so she & Jacob can escape, and the production design continues to show why Stuart Craig is the best in the business (love the street designs in the scenes in Bhutan). The acting is a mixed bag, with Sudol still the best of the group & Law bringing a weight to Dumbledore that isn't always on the page (that gives the film much more depth).  Recasting Mikkelsen in the Grindelwald role generally works for the plot, though I will say that Depp's seductive Grindelwald is a completely different approach, and honestly worked better with the idea of wise Dumbledore being seduced by an actor once called the "Sexiest Man Alive" (as Law also once held that title, this recasting means we didn't get to see two actors who shared that title play a love story with each other for the first time).  I also liked Williams...I know that people have taken a lot of issue with her accent (which seems to be akin to Katherine Hepburn attempting to be from Savannah), but I thought it was ridiculous enough to kind of work.  These people are riding dragons & casting spells...an unusual accent doesn't suspend belief.

So I'm going with 4-stars here, as I had a wonderful time, even if I'm aware that I'm giving this review with rose-colored glasses (if you're not a Harry Potter fan, your mileage will vary as the film is probably too long & has at least one too many plots...cutting Credence entirely wouldn't have made narrative sense to the last two movies but would've been in total service to this film on its own, and probably would've saved the Warner marketing team a headache).  Given the film's tepid box office (it has just crossed the $200 million mark after two weeks out, and with China's theaters being partially closed still, it'll be the first installment in the series to not hit $500 million), and the ending feeling so finite (with every character either married, on their way to that, or in Dumbledore's case, about to reach their destiny), it's probable that the film's final two chapters, long-promised by Rowling, are a mirage at this point.  If that's the case, Fantastic Beasts will likely be remembered in the same way we recall the Hobbit.  An unnecessary film that fans of the series embraced (albeit not as much as the first series), but casual observers tapped out on before the ending.  Given Warner's theme park investments in the franchise, it's difficult to know what comes next-do they remake the originals, do they try giving blank checks to Radcliffe, Watson, & Grint in hopes of getting them back for a big-screen adaptation of Cursed Child (I feel confident that that would be a $1 billion movie even if this one suffered), or do they hope that love for the originals is great enough to feed their investment for a decade to come?  It's hard to say, but I can confirm that if you are a fan of Fantastic Beasts (and I think at this point I am, regardless of Potter), you don't have to worry about this leaving you behind...you get an ending that satisfies.

OVP: Actor (2003)

OVP: Best Actor (2003)

The Nominees Were...

Johnny Depp, Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Ben Kingsley, House of Sand and Fog

Jude Law, Cold Mountain

Bill Murray, Lost in Translation

Sean Penn, Mystic River

My Thoughts: All right now we're talking.  After two relatively lackluster acting nominations, we get into the 2003 Best Actor field, which might be pound-for-pound, one of the best lineups in the history of the Oscars for this field; there are some lineups in the 1970's that could likely take it, but in the 2000's you'd be hard-pressed to find a better Best Actor field.  With one exception, and we'll get him out of the way first, I adored all of these men's performances and all will be repeating on My Oscar Ballot next week.  It is honestly odd, because in order to get here Oscar had to go pretty atypical-there are two comedic performances here, as well as a romantic lead from a devastatingly sexy man (neither of these are great hooks for Best Actor where Oscar wants you grizzled and over 40).  But going outside of his comfort zone got AMPAS some rich rewards.

The one performance I wasn't feeling is from Ben Kingsley.  Kingsley is an interesting film performer for me in that he reads a bit like Laurence Olivier, someone who would be dynamite onstage (I'd assume), but who plays to the back of the room in most of his screen performances.  I have yet to see a couple of his more celebrated works, but I like him better when he's cold-and-calculating in a popcorn flick like Sneakers than most of his 21st Century work where he's given roles that demand scenery-chewing.  He's surprisingly subdued, and much better, in the first hour of this picture, but in the last 20  minutes (when the entire movie goes down the toilet), he can't handle it & becomes far too hammy.  I get why this was nominated (Kingsley is an Oscar favorite, and overacting is something AMPAS goes for), but it's still a blemish on an otherwise unimpeachable list.

After all, Sean Penn manages to keep it reeled in for most of his picture, always a risky game with one of the better actors of his generation.  Penn had been marching toward an Oscar for years when Mystic River came along, and this has every bait-y hook that you can imagine: a crime lord trying to avenge his daughter...how are they going to turn that down?  But Penn also keeps his character the right modulation, never too laid back but never too much.  It's a delicate balancing act, playing a live wire so well, but that's kind of how Penn became one of his generation's great actors-when he's playing it right, there's few that can strike that balance so perfectly.  This is one of his best performances (maybe my favorite of his ever?).

Bill Murray is also giving his career-best performance with Lost in Translation.  This is one of my favorite movies partially because Murray was born to play this part.  He totally brings a world-weariness to Bob Harris that feels so informed.  Think of the scene where he's singing karaoke, and you can tell (without him ever breaking focus on the song) that he's trying to tell Scarlett Johansson that there is so much truth in the song's lyrics...that life is made up of these beautiful little connections, and they're the best part of it.  Playing someone who is having a midlife crisis without it feeling self-indulgent or too expositional is a challenge, but Murray knows how to do that-how he knows the best parts of his life are likely behind him, but that he still wants to ensure he goes on having a life of value...it's a tough part, free of a lot of Murray's more sarcastic tricks, and I loved it.

Unlike Penn or Murray, I wouldn't say that this is Jude Law's best performance (that's probably either Ripley or AI), but we're not judging on a curve here, and Cold Mountain is a marvelous piece from the actor.  His Southern accent is strong (stronger than Zellweger's, and she's the only American in the main trio), and he plays his slowly broken-down deserter who is fleeing for the woman he abandoned for the war.  It's hard to play a man with a modern sensitivity without it feeling inauthentic, but Law captures that through his short, clipped reading of the dialogue & the way he uses his beauty to tell a story that the script occasionally wants to gloss past.  Perfect casting, a wonderful performance, and the heart-and-soul of Cold Mountain.

It's hard to remember right now his career has had so many chapters, but Johnny Depp was once not just not a proper blockbuster movie star, but also he wasn't an Academy favorite.  Both those things changed with Captain Jack Sparrow.  This film didn't need to be as good as it was, and Depp didn't need to give the performance that would define his career...but he did.  Jack Sparrow arrives fully-fleshed, and stays that way, with the confidence of creating an iconic character that would redefine much of how we think of the summer movie for the next twenty years.  I have no notes here, other than I am still shocked the Academy was willing to take a chance by giving a Best Actor citation to a man they'd ignored up until then for a summer pirate movie based on a ride at Disneyland.  Few Oscar nominations have been so weird (and few so richly deserved).

Other Precursor Contenders: The Globes of course break out their nominees between Drama and Comedy/Musical, so we have ten names from their ceremony.  Drama went to Sean Penn against Law, Kingsley, Tom Cruise (The Last Samurai), & Russell Crowe (Master and Commander), while Comedy/Musical favored Murray against Depp, Jack Black (School of Rock), Jack Nicholson (Something's Gotta Give), & Billy Bob Thornton (Bad Santa).  The SAG Awards went with Depp, besting the Oscar lineup except that Law was replaced by Peter Dinklage (The Station Agent), while BAFTA went with Murray against Depp, Law, Penn (for both Mystic River and 21 Grams), & Benicio del Toro (21 Grams).  I think Law was probably the most vulnerable, and based on its award count I have to assume that Russell Crowe was probably in sixth place (which was also a good performance-well done Oscar).

Actors I Would Have Nominated: I don't entirely know how you judge the work of Elijah Wood & Viggo Mortensen, both of whom were only giving a third of a performance in The Return of the King rather than a completed body-of-work, but it seems a damned shame that neither of them ever got a nomination for Frodo & Aragorn, and given the opportunity I would've rectified that for at least one of them.

Oscar’s Choice: A true threeway race between Penn, Depp, & Murray ended with the more traditional of the three winning.  It's a pity that they didn't get more adventurous by giving it to one of the other two, considering that Penn would win five years later and both Depp & Murray will likely go Oscar-less.

My Choice: Depp.  I've thought about this a lot, and even rewatched Lost in Translation to confirm, but what Depp does in Pirates (and throughout the whole franchise) is honestly one of those things that define the movies for me, and I can't pick anyone else.  Murray, Penn, Law, & Kingsley follow.

Those are my thoughts-what are yours?  Do you want to stick with Oscar & Sean Penn (I won't blame you) or will you ride the Seven Seas alongside me & Captain Jack?  Do you think Law, Depp, or Murray will ever win an Oscar or was this their shot that got away?  And how would you have handled the Return of the King lead actor quandary?  Share your thoughts below in the comments!

Also in 2003: Supporting Actress, Supporting Actor, Adapted Screenplay, Original Screenplay, Foreign Language Film, Animated Feature Film, Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, Original Score, Original Song, Art Direction, Cinematography, Costume Design, Film Editing, Visual Effects, Makeup, Previously in 2003

Past Best Actor Contests: 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2018, 2019

A Rainy Day in New York (2020)

Film: A Rainy Day in New York (2020)

Stars: Timothee Chalamet, Elle Fanning, Selena Gomez, Jude Law, Diego Luna, Liev Schreiber

Director: Woody Allen

Oscar History: No nominations

Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

A Rainy Day in New York is one of those films that cannot possibly live up to the scuttlebutt around it.  For those who were living under a rock at the time (or just don't regularly read Variety), this was the film that Amazon refused to release after critics of Woody Allen started to publicly deride the company & the film's stars for working with the director due to the allegations levied at him by his adopted daughter Dylan Farrow.  Stars of the film like Timothee Chalamet & Selena Gomez publicly donated their salaries to the Time's Up movement, while the film's other stars Jude Law & Cherry Jones stated that they were not comfortable with the public criticisms of Allen & Amazon's willingness to pull the film due to public opinion surrounding the director.  At the time it wasn't clear if anyone would ever see the movie in America, even as it was released in Europe (Allen even sued Amazon for breach-of-contract, which was settled out-of-court).

Two years later, however, it seems that Amazon is willing to take some risks with the film, and thus a two-year-old movies becomes one of our last minute run of 2020 films as I catch up on movies heading into my Top 10 lists (which I'll release around the 23rd).  Allen has since made another movie (Rifkin's Festival), which has not received an American release date yet, and Amazon, despite basically giving up the film, now has the movie available for rental on its Prime platform.  I'm not going to get into the morality of watching a Woody Allen film; we've talked about that many times on this blog before, and so if you look back you can find my thoughts on it, but this stars a number of people I enjoy (and I do, despite having reservations about Allen as a moral figure, love his movies), so I decided to catch it last weekend & intentionally watched it on Prime for the sheer "eye roll" of it suddenly deciding it was okay to air the film.

(Spoilers Ahead) The movie focuses on a New York City weekend getaway to New York between Gatsby Welles (Chalamet), the son of Upper East side money, and his girlfriend Ashleigh (Fanning), who is the daughter of a wealthy banking family from Arizona.  Gatsby is young & pretentious, while Ashleigh is a bit air-headed but beautiful (and wants to be a journalist).  She is brought to NYC to interview a director Roland Pollard (Schreiber), who takes a fancy to her, and eventually she's being courted around by Pollard's screenwriter Ted (Law) and his leading man Francisco Vega (Luna), with the latter also pursuing her romantically; they nearly sleep together before they're interrupted by his girlfriend.  While this is all happening, Gatsby meets up with the younger sister of an old girlfriend named Chan (Gomez), with whom his anxious intellectual is better suited.  The film finishes with them together, the rare Woody Allen movie that has a full, pretty uncomplicated romantic ending.

Like I said, I generally love Woody Allen's movies-they're always so cinematic, and seem to weave together into a similar, consistent tapestry.  But I'm also not oblivious to him making bad movies (some of his later work has a stench about it even if I can appreciate elements), and initially I thought Chalamet was a terrible choice for the "Woody surrogate."  He is far too young, cool, and well, sexy, to ever draw an obvious comparison to Allen, but Chalamet eventually grows into the role.  He's made to spout dialogue that any normal 22-year-old would know, but Chalamet isn't a normal 22-year-old, and it works as the movie goes.  He has an oddly jarring chemistry with Gomez (again, another actor that feels a bit too hip to be in a Woody Allen movie but who yet finds her groove) which feels off-kilter but eventually comes together.  A Rainy Day in New York eventually becomes a good, if not great, entry in Woody's filmography.

The biggest flaw in the film is Fanning.  To be fair, this part is impossible to play well.  The filmmakers never let on just how smart (or dumb, if you're a pessimist) Ashleigh is intended to be-you get the sense at moments that she understands that she can make grown men lose their cool on-purpose just because she's so pretty...but she doesn't land a critical role & if you didn't like the movie, I'm guessing it's because of this part.  I remember reading at the time that Allen was intentionally angering his critics by having a young woman (Fanning would've been twenty or so when this was initially supposed to come out), flirting with a much older director, but Schreiber's role is pretty small, and he's nothing like Allen so I think this was more a coincidence (or something you'd see a lot of in Allen's filmography-beautiful women frequently fall in love with older, insecure guys).

I'd be remiss if I didn't quickly mention the movie's best element-Vittorio Storaro's cinematography.  In a year gasping for first-rate camerawork, this movie has it.  He washes the stars & sets in a golden light, playing with shadows & candles in a way that almost feels like certain scenes are painted.  In a different era, Storaro would've been nominated for an Oscar for both this and his even better work in Wonder Wheel, but there's no way the Academy is touching a Woody Allen movie with a ten-foot pole in the modern era.  But it had to be said-this is one of the most luminous films you'll see in terms of sheer cinematography prowess this year.

The Nest (2020)

Film: The Nest (2020)

Stars: Jude Law, Carrie Coon, Charlie Shotwell, Oona Roche, Anne Reid, Michael Culkin

Director: Sean Durkin

Oscar History: No nominations

Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

One of the weirder aspects of 2020 in terms of my film-watching is the lack of trailers.  While I have watched trailers for films, they haven't been an omnipresent part of my life, not in the way they usually are.  This time of year, I'd have been seeing, say, the trailers for Soul and Wonder Woman virtually every three days as I plopped into another screening leading up to Christmas.  In 2020, though, I don't have that experience.  There isn't a ubiquity with movies.  This means that I'm less likely to take chances on random films that I might otherwise not (movie trailers, like most advertisements, work to some degree, and seen enough times will make me want to check out a picture), but it also means I don't know what I'm getting into for a film unless it's a sequel or remake.  I realized that about twenty minutes into The Nest, a drama from earlier this year with two leads so good I didn't feel I needed to test drive it with critical consensus (Coon & Law are enough to "buy the ticket"), but I also had no clue what direction we were heading.  This was one of several thrilling aspects about The Nest, a complicated look at marriage & money that doesn't exactly pay off, but is intriguing enough to be worth your time.

(Spoilers Ahead) The movie focuses on Rory O'Hara (Law), an English businessman, and his horse trainer wife Allison (Coon), who are living in 1980's New York City when Rory decides that a job opportunity in the UK affords him a new lease on life.  Allison is reluctant (they and their two children have moved a lot for Rory's jobs, and she doesn't want to uproot them yet again), but she acquiesces when Rory insists it's a good financial opportunity for the family.  As they move, Rory seems successful, but this turns out to be smoke-and-mirrors.  He is running the family into-the-ground with debt, and despite their opulent surroundings, they are behind on their bills & risking their financial security to appear wealthy.  This causes trouble in their marriage & parenting, as Allison becomes an absent mother and Rory's need to sink risky deals causes strife at work, with him living a false life.  The film ends with their lives found out, with Allison uncovering that her husband is not, in fact, a wealthy success but barely making ends meet (she does this at a business dinner), and the family is forced to confront, honestly but now together, their collective lies about their situation (so that they can actually be happy).

The Nest has a few moments of sheer brilliance.  The best part is coming from Law's & Coon's performances, because they play Rory & Allison as if we're in the middle of a movie from the start.  Allison has growth, but she starts out already knowing her husband is probably going to fail-you see that in the way she hoards her own money.  We initially assume this is because he doesn't share it with her, or because she's hiding a secret...but the movie's script (and the enigmatic musical score keying this up as more of a thriller or horror film than marital drama) turns our assumptions about this woman on their heads as we learn she's protecting the money from her husband, not hoarding it, because she knows he'll spend this money.

This confidence about the characters really works from the start nearly to the finish, as we spend much of the movie rethinking past actions.  Rory goes to meet his long-ignored mother (Anne Reid in a great cameo), and we again assume that she's not part of his life because of some problem of his childhood, but as the movie goes, we understand that Rory is a constant liar, needing to better himself (even without hard work), and it's possible his mother couldn't handle that anymore in her life.  

These sharp observations from the lead actors are so terrific, that it almost makes up for the movie not really going anywhere.  The ending is a cheat-I don't honestly know how the movie should've ended, but them just pretending that everything is suddenly going to be okay runs counter to a lot of the rest of the film.  It also doesn't help that there was such ominous attitude toward the house, and the dead horse (it's a red herring, but occasionally the hints that we're about to enter a horror movie feel like a distraction more than a twist on our expectations), that you leave wanting more mystery, more climax, to the film's ending.  But it's a really great piece-of-work from lead actors Law & Coon, both providing mountains of backstory to their portrayals.

Captain Marvel (2019)

Film: Captain Marvel (2019)
Stars: Brie Larson, Samuel L. Jackson, Ben Mendelsohn, Djimon Hounsou, Lee Pace, Gemma Chan, Annette Bening, Clark Gregg, Jude Law
Director: Anna Boden, Ryan K. Fleck
Oscar History: No nominations
Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

I'm having mixed feelings about the upcoming Avengers: Endgame cinematic event, and they could not be better encapsulated than in watching Captain Marvel this past weekend with my Marvel-going movie buddy.  The 21st film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the movie itself works as a weird diversion before we go into the literal end game of a saga that has been on our big-screens for over ten years.  Watching the film, I was struck by how much of my opinion of this film, which should theoretically work as a standalone product, felt like an episode of a television series toward the end of its run rather than a single movie.  Perhaps more damning and interesting for the movies post-Avengers, I feel like the movie doesn't necessarily work as a stand-alone film anymore, which is going to be bad if (as expected) most of the original Avengers are about to be replaced by a new class of superheroes in a non-ending tale.

(Spoilers Ahead) But before we get into that discussion, let's talk about the movie at-hand.  The film centers around Vers (Larson), who is really Carol Danvers, being trained as a soldier in the Kree Empire, and has unusual powers that her trainer Yon-Rogg (Law) is trying to help her control and master.  Through a series of fights, she is brought to Earth in the 1990's (we know this because she crashes into a Blockbuster Video), and meets up with a pre-Avengers Initiative Nick Fury (Jackson), whom she convinces to help her in finding Wendy Lawson (Bening), who was once a mentor of Carol's when she was on Earth, and has discovered a way to travel at the speed of light.  Carol eventually realizes that the Kree are the bad guys, and she's been brainwashed, eventually joining sides with Earth & the Skrulls (their leader played by Mendelsohn), defeating Yon-Rogg.

This is all well-done, and a fine action film.  Larson has been one of the more promising actors of her generation so far, with brilliant work in Room and Short-Term 12, and fits into the mold of action-hero movie star like a glove.  She's charming, has great chemistry with Jackson, and underlines the feminist importance of her character without it every feeling like she's exploiting the historical nature of the film (both the first Marvel movie to feature a female lead, as well as the first Marvel movie directed by a woman).  The supporting cast is good-Law is great in villain mode, I love the instant gravitas that Bening's character demands (which is needed even if the character would've felt "too much" in the hands of a lesser actress), and Jackson hasn't been this good in a while, showing that underneath the "I'll take anyone that clears my asking price" nature of the past twenty years, he's still got the talent that launched him into this stratosphere twenty years ago.  It's a 3 star, maybe 3.5-star, movie if you take it on its merits.

The problem, though, is that this is being framed entirely against the Avengers movies.  Many of the jokes in the picture don't work without acknowledging it against other films (particularly those surrounding a young Nick Fury).  And let's be real here-the moment all of the fans were most excited about in this film is the end credits sequence, where an uncredited Don Cheadle, Scarlett Johansson, Chris Evans, & Mark Ruffalo appear as their Avengers counterparts in "modern day" post-Thanos world, summoning Captain Marvel through Nick Fury's pager.  This is a problem because Avengers: Endgame is not the end of the movie series-if it was, this would be a really cool episode, much like "Across the Sea" in Lost, showing us where our final savior came from.  Instead, it's hard not to wonder how a constantly stretched and molded story without proper stakes (if a story never ends, there's always the chance that characters will return) should be judged as a singular entity.  Marvel has, with its last couple of movies, so made this a "previously on..." type of story that you almost have to judge it as a whole, in which case Captain Marvel might not be particularly good if it doesn't work to the end of the larger story.  I've made no qualms about not liking the "TV-ization" of films, but as a critic I have to state that it's getting harder to judge any of these style of movies without knowing how they'll end.  And if they never end, at what point does this become a franchise like Modern Family or The Simpsons that would have been a lot better if they'd stopped while they were ahead?  Something to consider if, as I suspect, this story doesn't end with Avengers: Endgame but just tries to re-up the stakes over-and-over again to lessening effect.

Two thoughts before I go.  First, I loved the ode to Stan Lee's cameos over the opening credits, and Brie Larson's little wink at Lee felt so sweet considering his recent death.  This was a well-done moment, and while I haven't checked to see how many more movies Lee filmed his cameos for, if this is the last one, what a fitting tribute.  Secondly, I want to talk about the de-aging of Clark Gregg & Samuel L. Jackson.  I have not been a fan of this for a couple of reasons, namely that it feels like actors shortsightedly (and narcissistically) signing their own death warrants (in many ways it feels like a travel agent giving you a link to Travelocity), but mostly because it never looks realistic.  Previous instances of this in the Avengers series have looked washed out, as iconic stars like Michael Douglas, Kurt Russell, and Michelle Pfeiffer looked plastic and "off."  One could argue this is the best instance of de-aging we've seen so far, and the most aggressive (Jackson is de-aged the entire film), but let's be real here-this is good on a scale, not good.  You see scenes where Jackson stands next to Brie Larson, and you instantly can see the tells between the two characters.  This isn't a Gollum or Paddington situation where they're supposed to look different-they're supposed to look the same, but Larson's face has freckles and feeling that is simply lacking in Jackson's character.  You can tell the directors realized this considering the way the film is edited (frequently close-ups of Jackson are done with no other actors in the shot to avoid comparison), making the editing slightly choppy.  Jackson's really good work here makes you want to dismiss criticism (I think it's his best MCU performance to date), but it has to be said-if this is the future of film, I hope at least the technology gets better.

Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald (2018)

Film: Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald
Stars: Eddie Redmayne, Katherine Waterston, Dan Fogler, Alison Sudol, Ezra Miler, Zoe Kravitz, Callum Turner, Claudia Kim, Jude Law, Johnny Depp
Director: David Yates
Oscar History: No nominations
Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

I didn't grow up with Harry Potter in the sense that many of my younger Millennial friends did.  While Harry Potter was something I was obsessed with as a youth, it was as a late youth-I think I read the first Harry Potter book when I was fifteen or sixteen (I can't remember if Goblet of Fire was out yet).  But, and I cannot impress this enough-I loved it.  It's become a boring cliche for someone to claim their adoration for the works of JK Rowling, but those seven books were full of imagination, wonder, and genuine intrigue.  Though it's been over ten years since the final book and nearly as long since the final of the eight original movies, that love is still there, and I still feel my stomach drop out when I hear the opening music of Fantastic Beasts, with James Newton Howard riffing on John Williams classic score.  But a lot has changed since I first stood on the literary steps of 4 Privet Drive.  Rowling has expanded her empire, but in doing so has created a world that feels a tad bit more generic, less specific than the creation she crafted so exquisitely over seven books.  While her politics occasionally feel a bit problematic (you can take her on from either the right or the left), it's the way that she's in many ways emerged as the Millennial George Lucas that is most troubling.  This is on full-display in Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, which is brimming with enough Hogwarts wonder that it's hard for me to dislike it, but even the most ardent of fans would have to admit that Rowling has taken a detour into uncharted territory: a decidedly muggle affair.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film takes place relatively soon after the last movie left off, with Grindelwald (Depp) being transported to a different prison while Newt Scamander (Redmayne) faces a potential ban on travel after the events in New York City.  As you might expect, neither of these go as planned with Grindelwald escaping (with a good deal of ease), while Newt is banned but ends up ignoring the ban with little consequence.  He is joined by his brother Theseus (Turner, who is about as ruggedly handsome as you get in the Harry Potter universe), who is the by-the-books sibling to Newt's nerdy rebel.  Newt is quickly joined by his New York City friends Queenie (Sudol), Jacob (Folger), and love interest Tina (Waterston), who initially dislikes Newt when she thinks that he's engaged to Leta Lestrange (Kravitz), who clearly has a thing for Newt but is with Theseus (can't blame a girl).

The picture unfolds in a weird way after this.  Rowling's penchant for thick plot is evidenced here as we get a lot of characters and information, including a few winks to Harry Potter readers (Nicolas Flamel finally shows his face to the delight of readers, while Minerva McGonagall gets a cameo despite being decades to young for this movie), but nothing really happens.  This isn't always a bad thing if you're looking at this as a miniseries-there needs to be down time to lay some foundation-but it feels cheap when you're shelling out $15 to see the movie that you get so little actual progress (just set-up) & that the film cannot stand on its own.  I complained about this with the last Fantastic Beasts, but the cast being all over the place in levels of intrigue certainly hurts the film.  Forget for a second the problematic aspects of hiring Johnny Depp (or the foolishness of putting him in place of Colin Farrell)-the real problem here is that Redmayne & Waterston are so blah as leading characters.  Even Ezra Miller fails to properly intrigue (what a waste!) and Jude Law, while charming and aware of the importance of filling such an iconic character's shoes, doesn't give us much in terms of Dumbledore other than pensive stares and mischievous smiles.  For the second film in a row, it feels like Alison Sudol's Queenie is in a completely different movie, she's so much better than the rest of the cast.  Watching her become disillusioned with a prejudiced government (that won't let her marry a muggle) and thus join Grindelwald is the best part of the movie, and also makes her the only character that would feel at-home in Rowling's original world.

But while the film itself is hardly impressive, I can't say I didn't enjoy it.  Your worst day in Rowling's world is still more fun that pretty much any other franchise out there, and it felt like going home watching Hogwarts emerge on the big-screen.  I let out a squeal the first time Flamel showed up, and was grinning ear-to-ear when I heard McGonagall proclaim "10 points from Slytherin!"  In many ways I wonder if this is how people feel about the worst installments of the Star Wars or Lord of the Rings franchises; you simply don't care because you got another shot of the drug, even if it's not as potent as it once was.  As a result, I can't go below three stars because I genuinely liked it and will watch it again in the context of the series.  My patience with Rowling's storytelling may be waning, but it's not gone yet and I'll be around for another go...though she perhaps needs to hire an editor who is willing to tell her "no" at this point.

Spy (2015)

Film: Spy (2015)
Stars: Melissa McCarthy, Jason Statham, Rose Byrne, Miranda Hart, Bobby Cannavale, Allison Janney, Jude Law
Director: Paul Feig
Oscar History: No nominations
Snap Judgment Ranking: 5/5 stars

I have had a weirdly strong run of great movie luck lately.  For those that have followed this blog for only the past month, you might be thinking I'm just a generous reviewer, but the reality is that I'm pretty harsh as a rule.  And yet I've encountered a magnificent film chronicling the complicated relationships of women, a wonderful treatise on life in the "golden years," and a brilliantly acted look at Hollywood and its roller coaster nature.  Plus, I haven't even gotten to the recent Mad Max film, which I also thoroughly enjoyed.  So take this as a brief moment of giddiness as I have yet another truly brilliant piece of cinema to recommend, and in a truly bizarre moment for me, it's a comedy.  I almost never latch onto comedies in a big way, and if I do they're usually accompanied by a musical performance or I'm judging on a curve.  That being said, I cannot remember the last time I laughed so hard in a movie theater, and not just chuckles.  Boisterous, rousing, "I think I'm going to choke" sort of laughter.  Spy is a breath of fresh air for anyone who misses great physical comedies at the movies, and the funniest movie I have seen in years.

(Spoilers Ahead) The film follows Susan Cooper (McCarthy) a mild-mannered CIA analyst who spends most of her days helping her unrequited love interest Bradley Fine (Law) get out of James Bond-style jams.  When Fine is shot by a woman who is trying to sell a nuclear bomb named Rayna (Byrne), Susan volunteers to go undercover for a mission to stop the sale of the bomb, and eventually finds herself in a series of madcap encounters with Rayna, as well as a rogue and clumsy agent named Rick Ford (a wonderfully-cast Jason Statham), all the while encountering twists and turns along the way.

The film's plot, I will give you, seems pretty generic and may even sound like the sort of role that McCarthy has disappointed in in the past (McCarthy is always game, but I will admit that a movie like Tammy didn't inspire a lot of confidence).  Thankfully, not only is McCarthy truly superb in this movie, the movie that accompanies her is just aces.  The film's casting director deserves some sort of award for finding actors that both seem believable as spy characters (Jude Law, Rose Byrne, and Jason Statham all seem at-home in an action-adventure), but also have ridiculously perfect comic timing.  Part of the enjoyment of the film is that all of them get to play with their personas a bit onscreen, most notably the usually dour Statham (for the record, THIS is the sort of vehicle you skewer your persona in-you don't just do it for laughs, but in a way that may open up doors in your career), and have almost non-stop jokes.  The film almost made me physically uncomfortable I was laughing so frequently, particularly in scenes with Statham going through different far-fetched missions he has been on and watching McCarthy's increasingly skeptical reactions.  Really, though, there's not a bad scene in the movie-the way that Byrne and McCarthy play off of each other is bliss, with Byrne's insults increasingly cruel and unfortunate, or Allison Janney's ridiculously doughty costumes for Susan.  Honestly, every single actor in this cast is on-fire, and aided by a script that knows timing and doesn't just stunt-cast.  Smaller roles, for example, are filled by genuinely funny individuals like Miranda Hart, who is gut-bustingly lovely as Susan's best friend and fellow office analyst.  The movie also pokes fun at McCarthy's humiliation (it's frequently been commented on by onlookers to her career that the script occasionally laughs at her rather than with her) but in a way that feels very empowering.

After all, in one of the best twists of the film, McCarthy isn't just a fish-out-of-water like Channing Tatum or Jonah Hill in 21 Jump Street-she's genuinely excellent at her job.  She's great in hand-to-hand combat, she's smart, she sees things other spies don't.  It would have been so easy to watch her accidentally get through the movie, but her Susan has skills that keep her alive, and it's not just about McCarthy lobbing foul mouthed rants (though she does, particularly toward Byrne's Rayna), but also about how she is just kind of a badass that dresses like your Aunt Fern.  The film isn't afraid to occasionally sexualize her (you totally find it believable that either Statham or Law could fall for her), and I find refreshing the way that McCarthy continues to use standard movie star vehicles to elevate her fame.

But mostly, I'm going to be honest here, I'm just raving about the comic bits.  I think the last time I laughed this hard at a movie may have been Bridesmaids, which not coincidentally was a reunion of McCarthy and Feig.  At this point I'm volunteering for anything between them-bring on Ghostbusters!  But mostly, I already want to watch Spy again-a wonderful return-to-comedic-form for McCarthy, and an all-around splendid movie.

If you've seen it (and if you haven't, you're insane), what did you think?  Are you with me on the belly laughs?  What's your favorite McCarthy/Feig outing (I also liked The Heat, for the record)?  Share in the comments!

OVP: Anna Karenina (2012)

Film: Anna Karenina (2012)

Stars: Keira Knightley, Aaron Johnson, Jude Law, Kelly MacDonald, Matthew McFadyen, Domhnall Gleeson, Olivia Williams, Emily Watson

Director: Joe Wright

Oscar History: 4 nominations/1 win (Best Costume*, Art Direction, Score, Cinematography)
Snap Judgment Ranking: 4/5 stars

There are a few tales that the cinema insists on telling over and over and over again-Pride and Prejudice, Jane Eyre, Hamlet, and of course, the tale of the doomed Russian socialite, Anna Karenina. For those who have read the book (which I have, albeit a decade ago), you know the draw here-there are few more passionate love stories, more engrossing tales, than Leo Tolstoy's tale of betrayal, lust, societal ruin, and suicide.  And yet, since we've seen the story so often, it was a little difficult for me to get excited for the film, but leave it to Joe Wright, one of the most visually arresting directors to come to the forefront in the past few years, to keep me enchanted with a story I know so well.

The story, for those of you who have been living under an academic rock or did not take Russian Lit in college, is the tale of a Russian aristocrat (Knightley), who falls in love with a younger Count (Johnson), despite being married to an older man who is working his way up the occupational ranks and is a very proper, but devoted man (Law).  The film, which cannot possibly cover all of the characters and plots, focuses primarily on the novel's two major love stories-that of Knightley/Law/Johnson and the one between Levin and Kitty.

The film takes a sort of Baz Luhrmann-style approach to its subject.  We open with a curtain being raised, and throughout the film, the art direction and the set seems to be unfolding, and it's hard to tell how much of a fourth wall is being busted open.  Wright never addresses whether they are actors playing a parts in a production of Anna Karenina, or if they are characters in a world that is slowly unfolding.  That metaphor works quite a bit better, as the rapidly expanding set and world of Anna and her compatriots focuses less and less on the set as a stage as the film progresses.  Still, it's a rather daunting and beautiful way to further highlight the rich set and art direction on display from Katie Spencer and Sarah Greenwood (both gunning for their fourth Oscar nomination here, their third from a Joe Wright film, and I think they'll get it).  It also keeps you guessing, even if the set is never addressed, and you are left with an oddly open question of identity.

It seems silly to discuss the overall plot of such a famous book, so I'll just highlight a few bits that stand out to me.  Primarily, there is the performance from Knightley.  Knightley as an actress has come a long way from being simply the beautiful, feisty actress from the Pirates of the Caribbean movies.  Unlike a couple of her peers, she hasn't tarnished her actorly reputation with idiotic comedies or endless supporting roles in mediocre dramas just to earn a gargantuan pay day.  She, instead, has struck a very distinct path-working with directors like Joe Wright and David Cronenberg in provocative, occasionally under-seen period and sci-fi films.  It's paid off tenfold, in my opinion-there's no doubt these days that Knightley, ten years after her first big mark on the cinema, is an actor of considerable talent and will be working for years and years to come, and films like Never Let Me Go, A Dangerous Method, and Atonement are just going to improve with age.

Here, her Anna is a sporadic, almost bipolar creature that is constantly swinging in different directions.  You at first assume that she's just a rich woman, bored by her husband, and wanting a new thing to amuse her, but slowly you see the years of monotony and being neglected have left her with little self-esteem.  The magical thing about Knightley's performance is that she spells that out with her eyes, her voice, her constant swings of emotion and impetuousness.  It doesn't have to be said verbatim, it's just seen as we watch her unravel.  It's the sort of stirring performance that deserves critical love, but awards bodies are going to prefer something gentler, more straight-forward and less jutting.  A woman consumed by lust and rage is not a character the Academy will respond to very well, particularly with more traditional choices like Jennifer Lawrence or Jessica Chastain are there for the plucking.

The rest of the cast pales in comparison, and while I enjoyed the bit parts played by MacDonald and McFadyen, I wasn't drawn to either Law or Johnson, both characters so distinctly lacking in depth that their "big moments" come across as hollow, particularly compard to the lightning that Knightley is projecting on-screen.  The film suffers as a result, and Johnson, in particular, I am starting to question as an actor of serious means-his films seem to rely on his exotic beauty far too much, and on his actorly skills far too little.  Law, who hasn't been given much opportunity since his ridiculously wonderful run in the early Aughts, will have to go on searching for a role worth of his 1999-2004 self.

Overall, though, this was a welcome break from the "Academy-friendly" films that usually fill up December and January-it's not too heavy, but deep and rich, and is yet another vehicle for Knightley to continue her thespian ascent.