Best Pictures #86: 2022 (95th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee TÁR

 by A.J.

Best Pictures #86: 2022 (95th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee

TÁR

“It is always the question that involves the listener, never the answer.”

Tár is a peculiar and very interesting film until it becomes a strange film for no real reason at all. If it fully committed to becoming a psychological thriller or cerebral drama or even a full blown surreal art film instead of only toying with these elements, then maybe it would be an overall more satisfying experience. As it is, Tár is two-thirds interesting and captivating character study and one third pseudo-cerebral art film that rests entirely on the shoulders of a great performance.

Cate Blanchett stars as Lydia Tár, a most distinguished and accomplished classical music conductor. In addition to being the current conductor of the Berlin Symphony Orchestra, she is also an “EGOT”, winner of an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony award. She enjoys the power and authority her accomplishments and notoriety provide and is in the middle of preparing for an ambitious performance of Mahler’s 5th symphony when her world comes undone. The suicide of a former student and protégé brings accusations that Tár engaged in inappropriate relations with her protégés, and inflicted severe repercussions on those who did not accept her advances. We never see any explicit scenes of Tár sexually exploiting a female musician but we get glimpses at her lascivious side when she finds a way around the blind audition process to hire Olga, a young female cellist she finds attractive, played by real life cellist Sophie Kauer. Soon after, Tár holds a second sham audition to give Olga a solo, meaning they will have to spend more time alone together.

That Lydia Tár's authority and power come from success in the arts opens the film up to being part of the greater conversation and reckoning society is currently having about artists and abusive behavior. Yet writer-director Todd Field withholds any chastising or pontificating. By keeping the focus on Lydia Tár his film is not just about “cancel culture” or the Me Too movement but has sparked many different conversations on its larger themes as well as its cinematic aspects. 

Blanchett’s performance holds the film together even in its odd third act. Lydia Tár is not a pleasant or sympathetic character but she is an interesting character and that is what keeps us engaged. Supposedly Field wrote the part for Blanchett and that is just as well because I doubt it would work with anyone else. No matter the tone of the scene, Blanchett brings the material to its full potential. Her monologues and lectures about composers and music are wonderfully delivered and belie an insecurity just below the surface. Field earned an Oscar nomination for his original screenplay and this in no small part thanks to Blanchett, also Oscar nominated for her performance. 

Perhaps the most skillful thing about Blanchett’s performance, the sign that she truly is a great actress, is that as strong as her performance is, and as overwhelming as her character is, she does not overwhelm the other other performers. Nina Hoss, as Sharon, Tár’s long suffering but loyal partner is great as a counterbalance; her character feels like an average person putting up with things she shouldn’t have to. Noémie Merlant, as Francesca, Tár's long suffering and long taken for granted assistant gives a subtle performance that portrays someone reaching the end of what she can endure. 

Like any number of classical compositions, Tár begins slowly and calmly, then builds gradually, hinting at what is to come, until it finally reaches a pitched climax. The final act of the film certainly packs in more than the first two thirds, but this is also where it falls apart. Throughout the film there are strange occurrences: a metronome in a closed cabinet running on its own in the middle of the night, a book of notes disappearing, Tár hearing the unplaceable screams of a woman in a park. These seem to hint at the potential for the supernatural or, at least, the unreliability of Tár’s perception of reality. The most surreal and uncanny scene of all, even more surreal than the actual dream sequence, happens when Tár follows Olga into an out of place abandoned building. If it were to be revealed that everything after this point is a hallucination or dream, I’d believe it—though I don’t mean to say that this is my theory of the film. After this scene it felt less like I was watching a character study and more like I was watching a soft imitation of David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive or Bergman’s Hour of the Wolf. The movie's most memorable moment is so over the top I wonder if it really happened. Despite its moments of strangeness and mysterious touches, Tár does not present itself as a film set in a questionable reality, yet that is where the movie goes and these elements, instead of creating intrigue, feel like nagging loose strings that draw attention away from Blanchett’s performance.

Nominees: Todd Field, Alexandra Milchan, Scott Lambert, producers

Director: Todd Field

Screenplay: Todd Field

Cast: Cate Blanchett, Noémie Merlant, Nina Hoss, Mark Strong

Production Companies: Standard Film Company, EMJAG Productions

Distributor: Focus Features

Release Date: October 7th, 2022

Total Nominations: 6, including Best Picture

Other Nominations: Actress-Cate Blanchett; Director-Todd Field; Original Screenplay-Todd Field; Cinematography-Florian Hoffmeister; Editing-Monika Willi

Best Pictures #85: 2022 (95th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee: Avatar: The Way of Water

 by A.J.

Best Pictures #85: 2022 (95th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee

Avatar: The Way of Water

“The way of water has no beginning and no end.”

Thirteen years after the release of the record-breaking mega-hit blockbuster Avatar, the long-delayed sequel, Avatar: The Way of Water, finally made its way to theaters, also becoming a mega-hit. I was no fan of the first Avatar—its admittedly dazzling and impressive visuals were not enough to overcome a mediocre, derivative script and stiff acting from its lead, Sam Worthington—so I was, at best, indifferent about a sequel. Upon this visit to the alien moon of Pandora, the visuals and special effects are still dazzling but somewhat less impressive because we’ve been here before and know that the visual effects goals of writer-director James Cameron are achievable. However, I was much more caught up in the story and events in the Way of Water. For most of, but certainly not all, of its 3-hour 12-minute runtime I was well entertained. 

Sam Worthington returns as the ex-marine Jake Sully, who left his human body permanently for his Na’vi avatar in the first movie. Years have passed and Jake Sully and Neytiri (Zoe Saldana) now have children of various ages and find their home and lives again threatened by invading militaristic humans. Jake and Neytiri have also adopted the young teen-ish daughter of Sigourney Weaver’s character from the first movie, who died. How she came to have a Na’vi daughter is glossed over and forgotten. However, Weaver brings a believable youthful energy to her performance of an adolescent character. Stephen Lang as Quaritch, the villain from the first movie, who died, also returns as a Na’vi clone/hybrid and the “how” and “why" of this are glossed over and forgotten as well. In the first movie the peaceful, nature bonded Na’vi were being driven from their homes so humans could mine a precious mineral. Here, Quaritch and his band of human-Na’vi hybrid soldiers are unleashed simply to seek and destroy Jake Sully in the hopes that this will put down a larger Na’vi insurgency (but this too is glossed over and forgotten). 

If Avatar was James Cameron’s allegory for the plight of Native Americans against Westward Expansion, then The Way of Water is Cameron’s allegory for Vietnam—scenes of the human-Na’vi soldiers harassing natives and burning villages could be taken from any number of Vietnam war movies. This connection is interesting but does not do much to enhance the story’s substance.  

It is not until Jake and Neytiri seek refuge with the seafaring Metkayina Na’vi of Pandora’s coastline and the focus moves decidedly to the kids and their attempts to learn, adapt, and fit in with the teenage/adolescent Metkayina Na’vi that the Way of Water really hits its stride. Indeed, for most of the movie the adult Na’vi are more supporting players. Perhaps the most memorable sights and scenes from this Avatar sequel are the intelligent whale-like Tulkun that the sea-Na’vi share a deep bond with. One of the teen Sully boys forms a bond with an outsider whale that ends up being pretty meaningful.

The action scenes are exciting and thrilling, especially the climax, that is until it drags on and on. At a certain point it felt like things were going wrong just for the sake of making the movie longer. Too many scenes take far too long to revel in the majesty of the natural beauty of Pandora, which is more time for me to think: of course this looks spectacular, it was painstakingly made over years in a computer. As good as this movie is and as much of an improvement over the first film in terms of story, it never really earns its over 3-hour runtime. 

Nominees: James Cameron, Jon Landau, producers

Director: James Cameron

Screenplay: James Cameron & Rick Jaffa & Amanda Silver; story by James Cameron, Rick Jaffa, Amanda Silver, Josh Friedman, Shane Salerno

Cast: Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Stephen Lang

Production Companies: Lightstorm Entertainment, TSG Entertainment

Distributor: 20th Century Studios

Release Date: December 16th, 2022

Total Nominations: 4, including Best Picture

Other Nominations: Production Design-Dylan Cole, Ben Procter, Vanessa Cole; Visual Effects-Joe Letteri, Richard Baneham, Eric Saindon, Daniel Barrett; Sound-Julian Howarth, Gwendolyn Yates Whittle, Dick Bernstein, Christopher Boyes, Gary Summers, Michael Hedges

Best Pictures #84: The 2021 (94th) Academy Awards: My Pick

 by A.J. 

Best Pictures #84: The 2021 (94th) Academy Awards: My Pick

The 94th Academy Awards for films released between March 1st and December 31st, 2021 was held on March 27th, 2022 and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic loomed over the ceremony. The effect of the theater closures in 2020 could still be felt due to that year’s extended eligibility calendar (January 1st 2020-February 28th, 2021), giving the 2021 Academy Awards the shortest eligibility period in its history. As with the 2020 Oscars, eligibility was granted to streaming releases and theatrical runs outside of Los Angeles. In an attempt to boost broadcast ratings, several changes were made to the ceremony that stirred controversy and backlash. To shorten the broadcast, several “technical” categories were handed out before the official ceremony then edited into the primetime broadcast with speeches intact (except for one winner who mentioned the importance of the technical workers). The "In Memoriam" tribute included dancers which some found inappropriate. The results of internet polls for Fan Favorite and Stand Up And Cheer Moment were announced to awkwardly silent reactions from the ceremony audience and confusion from people watching at home. All the efforts to shorten the ceremony were unsuccessful and though the ratings increased from the previous year they were still among the lowest the Oscars broadcast has received. Perhaps the only change that worked was the expansion of the Best Picture nominations to a full set of 10, instead of the between 5-10 sliding scale that always resulted in either 8 or 9 nominees.

Any highlights of the 94th Oscars, including Troy Kostur’s win for Best Supporting Actor, and even the lowlights, were overshadowed by Will Smith slapping Chris Rock on stage after a joke Rock made about Jada Pinkett, Smith’s wife. The speech Smith gave about 40 minutes later when he won the Best Actor Oscar for King Richard could best be described as painfully awkward. For weeks after, whenever anyone talked about the Academy Awards they only talked about “the slap.”

The Power of the Dog, the most nominated film of the night and early frontrunner to win Best Picture, ended up winning only one award: Best Director for Jane Campion. The most awarded film ended up being Dune with 6 awards, however, nearly all of these were for technical categories given out before the live broadcast. Ultimately the big award went to CODA, which won every category it was nominated for (Picture, Adapted Screenplay, and Best Supporting Actor). In a potentially historic achievement CODA also became the first film distributed by a streaming service, AppleTV+, to win Best Picture, a prize long sought by established rival Netflix. CODA is an entertaining and heartwarming film in spite of its familiar and formulaic structure. As the Oscars approached, CODA picked up more and more awards from other awards bodies so its Oscar win was not entirely a surprise, but it still caught me off guard. The objections that have arisen to CODA’s Best Picture win run along the lines of: it’s a good movie but hardly the most creative, affecting, or the best. Depending on the person, this is true of every Best Picture Oscar winner. I agree that CODA is a satisfying film, but I would cast my vote another way:

My Pick for Best Picture of 2021: Licorice Pizza

There were two films from 2021 that had a profound and lasting effect on me. I saw both in theaters but I doubt this had any extra bearing on feelings as I’ve seen one of them at home twice since then. They are In the Heights and Licorice Pizza, each tied for my choice as the best film of 2021 and since only Licorice Pizza was noticed by the Academy, it gets my vote for Best Picture of 2021. I find it's much more difficult to write about a film I love (not like but love) because they make a connection on an emotional, ineffable level and it is hard to write about pure emotions. I believe that after Martin Scorsese, Paul Thomas Anderson is the greatest living filmmaker. Like Scorsese, even when his films miss or don’t work, they do so in an interesting way. Licorice Pizza works in every way. It’s the kind of film that could only be made by a master filmmaker. From cinematography to costumes to even sound (the sound of heavy car doors slamming shut, a sound I remember from my childhood, is expertly captured) to the performances and writing and editing. It is the kind of movie that makes me forget I’m watching a movie and creates an all-encompassing experience. It transports me to a time and place that I have no experience or familiarity with but makes me feel that they are similar to my own experiences. Licorice Pizza makes me want to say that it “reminds me of what I love about movies” and all the other clichés people use when they can’t pin down the words to describe the profound, moving, and elevating experience they just had at the movies.    

Best Pictures #83: 2021 (94th) Academy Award Best Picture Winner: CODA

 by A.J.

Best Pictures #83: 2021 (94th) Academy Award Best Picture Winner

CODA

It would be unfair, but accurate, to call CODA formulaic. Accurate because it indeed follows a very recognizable template, scene to scene, beat by beat. Unfair because “formulaic” strongly implies that it is unsatisfying and mediocre, which CODA certainly is not. This is an unabashedly feel-good, crowd-pleasing movie that works in spite of, and even because of, its familiarity. It is a coming-of-age story, a family drama, family comedy, and a relatable story, regardless of the specific circumstances of this family. 

Emilia Jones stars as Ruby, a high school senior and the only hearing member of a deaf family (a Child Of Deaf Adults, or CODA), which, as you might imagine, adds an extra layer of anxiety and stress to what would already be a stressful and anxious time for any teenager. At times she feels like an outsider in her own family. When her mother, Jackie (Marlee Matlin), learns that Ruby joined the school choir, her response is along the lines of: if I were blind you would want to be a painter. But Ruby really does love to sing and is good at it, once she gets over her initial shyness at choir rehearsal. Her father, Frank (Troy Kotsur), and brother, Leo (Daniel Durant), are fishermen who make the risky decision to start their own fishing co-op. Ruby works with them on the boat, acts as their translator, and makes sure they don’t get cheated by the vendors. 

The performances are what makes CODA so effective. Ruby is a kind of teenager we’ve seen before: bullied but not without friends, has a crush on the boy she’s assigned a duet with, wants to strike out on her own but feels responsible for her family. However, Emilia Jones really brings Ruby to life, turning her from a character into someone you recognize or find relatable. The Oscar winning screenplay by Sian Heder, who also directs, based on the French film La Famille Belier, gives each character a moment to shine. Leo wants his chance to prove that he can be the responsible one that looks out for the family. Jackie’s at times rocky relationship with her daughter feels like a genuine mother-daughter dynamic. The scene towards the end where she and Ruby finally connect is heartfelt thanks to Matlin and Jones. By a wide margin, the standout of the cast is Troy Kotsur. He plays Frank as a sometimes embarrassing parent, but always well meaning, loving, and optimistic. He even supports Ruby’s decision to join choir and apply to the prestigious Berklee College of Music in far away Boston. The most moving scene in the movie is a moment between him and Ruby after her college audition. Kotsur received much praise and acclaim and his win for Best Supporting Actor is very well deserved. Maybe the movie would work without him, but it is undeniably better with him.

The songs Ruby sings to express herself are a bit on the nose. There’s the obligatory scene where her responsibility for her family interferes with her choir commitments and the scene where choosing for herself leads to repercussions for her family. There’s the scene where she gets to know the boy she has a crush on and they jump into a lake together. There is not one but two big climaxes of Ruby performing on stage. Nevertheless, the groundwork is so expertly laid that when these scenes do come, they are dramatically satisfying.  

That the deaf characters do not feel like a gimmick or novelty is a credit to the approach taken by writer-director Sian Heder. This feels like so many other family stories because it is a movie about a family, not deafness. CODA tells a unique story in a familiar way, stirring emotions with great performances that make plot contrivances easy to overlook. 

Nominees: Philippe Rousselet, Fabrice Gianfermi, Patrick Wachsberger, producers

Director: Sian Heder

Screenplay: Sian Heder; based on La Famille Belier by Victoria Bedos & Stanislas Carré de Malberg & Éric Lartigau & Thomas Bidegain 

Cast: Emilia Jones, Eugenio Derbez, Troy Kotsur, Daniel Durant, Marlee Matlin

Release Date: August 13, 2021 

Production Companies: Apple Original Films, Pathé Films, Vendôme Pictures

Distributor: Apple TV+

Total Nominations: 3, including Best Picture

Wins: Best Picture, Supporting Actor-Troy Kotsur; Adapted Screenplay-Sian Heder

Other Nominations: N/A

Best Pictures #82: 2021 (94th) Academy Award Best Picture Nominee: Licorice Pizza

by A.J 

Best Pictures #82: 2021 (94th) Academy Award Best Picture Nominee

Licorice Pizza

No matter the genre or subject matter, writer-director Paul Thomas Anderson, turns in films that are interesting, creative, challenging, and fascinating. They are the kind of movies that I hope to see every time I go to the theater or push play on a movie at home but are so rare that they feel like a treat. So much of Anderson’s Licorice Pizza feels like a living memory. Even as the sights and situations move from unlikely to bizarre, and back again, the story maintains believability because it stays grounded in its wonderfully charming main characters. Watching Licorice Pizza isn’t like watching someone else’s memory, it is being completely engrossed in the time and place and excitement the characters experience. 

Not unlike many films of the era in which Licorice Pizza is set, the early 1970’s, there is no discernible plot, but that is not to say it has no story or is aimless. What Licorice Pizza has instead of a traditional plot is great, charming leads with performances to match from Alana Haim and Cooper Hoffman. Hoffman, son of the late Phillip Seymour Hoffman, gives the most charismatic performance I’ve seen in years, matched only by co-star Alana Haim’s genuine movie star performance. Each does that rare and special movie magic trick of making their characters feel like real people. Their natural charisma, whether on screen together or separately, is the driving force and key to the whole movie. We follow these young people from experience to experience, scheme to scheme, as they navigate their way through 1973 Los Angeles. 

Hoffman plays Gary, a 15 year old actor who senses that his days as a child star are behind him and sets about on a series of business schemes (selling waterbeds, opening a pinball arcade). Haim plays Alana, a 25 year old working odd jobs who then gets caught up in Gary’s schemes. It is obvious that Gary has an unrequited crush on Alana, but his main appeal to her is as an unlikely mentor. It’s unlikely that Alana would’ve wanted to become an actress or become involved in a local L.A. political campaign if she had not met Gary first. After his first scene it is easy to see why other characters gravitate to him, go along with his plans and schemes, and why all the adults treat him like an old friend. Alana is more serious in her aspirations, though no less of a wanderer. She easily avoids the pitfalls of this kind of character: she’s never pretentious though she wants to do something important, never whiny though she doesn’t know what she wants. She is recognizable and relatable. We don’t know where she or Gary are going but we’re rooting for them and their futures. Neither Cooper Hoffman nor Alana Haim received Oscar nominations, yet they are entirely deserving of any and all praise and recognition for their performances.

Licorice Pizza is episodic but never feels disjointed or aimless. The episodes that stand out are the ones that involve Gary and Alana encountering the worst examples of adult males. From John Michael Higgins as the owner of Japanese restaurant who speaks English to his Japanese wife in a horribly racist accent (because he does not know Japanese) to Sean Penn as Jack Holden (a Williams Holden surrogate) who recreates a famous movie stunt and puts Alana in real danger to Bradley Cooper as real life hairdresser turned movie producer and husband of Barbara Streisand, Jon Peters. Cooper’s brief scenes are the most memorable and over the top sequence in the movie, simultaneously strange, hilarious, and frightening. Cooper is only so funny because he plays it so seriously; he wasn’t nominated by the Academy but Bradley Cooper deserves special recognition for his wild performance.

I suppose Licorice Pizza could be described as a “vibe” or “hangout” movie, meaning that if you like the vibe, if you want to just hangout with the characters no matter what happens, then you will enjoy the movie; if not, then you won’t. Recent examples of this kind of movie are the musical In the Heights and Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. Of course this is not a new genre or approach. Two films Licorice Pizza reminded me of right away were Richard Linklater’s Dazed and Confused and George Lucas’s American Graffiti. These films, also light on plot, heavy on atmosphere, characters, and a sense of time and place are more than just the events that happen between the opening and closing credits. Youthful energy is recreated and released out to the audience. You experience what it is like to be these people at this time in this place searching for the next step, running blissfully in the glowing sunlight. 

Nominees: Sara Murphy, Adam Somner, Paul Thomas Anderson, producers

Director: Paul Thomas Anderson

Screenplay: Paul Thomas Anderson

Cast: Alana Haim, Cooper Hoffman, Sean Penn

Release Date: November 26th, 2021

Production Companies: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Focus Features, Bron Creative, Ghoulardi Film Company

Distributor: United Artists Releasing/Universal Pictures

Total Nominations: 3, including Best Picture

Win(s): N/A

Other Nominations: Director-Paul Thomas Anderson; Original Screenplay-Paul Thomas Anderson

Best Pictures #81: 2021 (94th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee: The Power of the Dog

by A.J.

Best Pictures #81: 2021 (94th) Academy Awards Best Picture Nominee

The Power of the Dog

"Deliver my soul from the sword. My darling from the power of the dog."

I suppose the easiest way to describe The Power of the Dog is as a western. It takes place in the American West, at a cattle ranch in Montana, there are cowboys and picturesque landscapes, but there are no gunfights or intense cattle drives. The year is 1925 and the inexorable modernity of the 20th century is creeping in and the hidden emotions of the taciturn western men are creeping out. There is a showdown of sorts, but it is so understated that even the climax of the film sneaks up on you. 

Phil (Benedict Cumberbatch) and George (Jesse Plemons) are brothers who own a cattle rancher and live a quiet life. Though being quiet and shy, George proposes marriage to Rose (Kirsten Dunst) just after he meets her. She accepts and moves to the ranch along with her teenage son Peter (Kodi Smit-McPhee). Phil does not approve of Rose or her son or their being at the ranch. In the second act, while Peter is away at college and George is away on business, Rose is left alone at the ranch with Phil’s unrelenting bullying and psychological abuse. In the third and final part of the film, Peter returns from college to be confronted with his now alcoholic mother and Phil’s domineering personality. Phil seems ready to bully Peter as well but then takes him under his wing and teaches him about being a rancher. Their uneasy dynamic is the source of the film's beguiling tension. 

All four of the principal cast members received Oscar nominations but the two real standout performances are from Kodi Smit-Mcphee, for what his character hides, and Benedict Cumberbatch, for what his character fails to hide. Phil becomes an unlikely mentor to Peter but there is also an underlying hostility even as the two grow closer. I don’t feel that it is giving away too much to reveal that Phil is a closeted and repressed homosexual, something he would not admit to anyone, especially himself. His treatment of the other characters is rooted in his repression. Peter’s presence has the potential to be a positive in Phil’s life, but Peter may have his own hidden intentions. 

The Power of the Dog has an almost experimental structure. Its first two acts are exposition and setup and it is not until the reappearance of Peter in the final third when a plot is set in motion. Until Peter’s reappearance the story feels like it is treading water and the pacing throughout is slow but deliberate. Director Jane Campion, who also adapted the screenplay from the novel by Thomas Savage, does not telegraph the thoughts of the characters and neither do the performances. They take a low key approach of revealing the characters through their actions (a reflection of themselves). This makes for an interesting but unconventional western.

Nominees: Jane Campion, Tanya Seghatchian, Emile Sherman, Iain Canning, Roger Frappier, producers

Director: Jane Campion

Screenplay: Jane Campion; based on the novel by Thomas Savage

Cast: Benedict Cumberbatch, Kirsten Dunst, Jesse Plemons, Kodi Smit-McPhee

Release Date: November 17, 2021

Production Companies: New Zealand Film Commission, BBC Film, Max Films, See-Saw Films, Bad Girl Creek, Cross City Films

Distributor: Netflix

Total Nominations: 12, including Best Picture

Win: 1) Director-Jane Campion

Other Nominations: Actor-Benedict Cumberbatch; Supporting Actor-Jesse Plemons, Kodi Smit-McPhee; Supporting Actress-Kirsten Dunst; Adapted Screenplay-Jane Campion; Cinematography-Ari Wegner; Editing-Peter Sciberras; Original Score-Jonny Greenwood; Production Design-Grant Major (production design), Amber Richards (set decoration); Sound-Richard Flynn, Robert Mackenzie, Tara Webb