I love going to the movies. I mean I love movies in general, but my joy is in the movie theater experience. Last year that was taken away and it was hard (please don't judge, everybody's hard is relative). I go to a movie for many reasons, including to feel better whenever I'm sad or anxious or feeling lonely or stressed. It is a refuge, and when I was feeling ALL those things last year during lockdown and quarantine I couldn't do the one thing that makes me feel better. One Saturday night in March last year, I waited for the sun to go down, closed all my blinds, turned off the lights, put my phone on silent and in my bedroom, and made some popcorn to recreate the theater experience in my apartment to watch The Rise of Skywalker (y'all, I was obsessed with that movie last year and I can't even tell you how many times I saw it in a theater). While it sufficed for the world we were all living in, and it did help me in the moment, it was never going to be a permanent solution.
All that to say my relationship with movies has been very different this past year. Movie theaters reopened in Austin in August, but most studios were choosing to not release their films since the big markets of NY and LA were closed. New movies to see were not in the same amount as normal years, and while I was thankful for the new films that were released (yay Tenet and Wonder Woman 1984), it's just been a year where I've felt very disconnected from film and the film award world.
And here we are at Oscar Sunday. Back when the nominations were announced I wasn't very excited about anything. I didn't really even follow or keep track of the other awards during the season. But then Cinemark announced their annual Oscar Week and I could catch up and see all the films and be ready for Oscar Sunday. So here's my take on the noms, most notably the eight Best Pic nominees (which I've seen all), and some (likely) annoying commentary.
The Father
Wow, what a film to come out of left field for me. I saw this on Wednesday last week knowing nothing about it except the title and the stars. I had seen the ads for it online and immediately assumed it was some sad, treacly, sappy story of a dad and daughter in his final days; something akin to On Golden Pond. It definitely starts out that way, and then there is a huge change that made me wonder if I was watching a psychological thriller (helped along by the score and directing during the change). And I guess it kind of is a psycholgogica thriller, as Anthony (Anthony Hopkins) is living with dementia and he can't actually remember who is who and what is happening. The film always kept me on my toes and made me even wonder what was going on. Living with dementia must be terrifying, and those experiencing it through family members are also going through a lot. Both Anthony Hopkins and Olivia Colman are great and I recommend this film.
Judas and the Black Messiah
I saw this on a February afternoon at the beginning of some plumbing issues at my house. I really just wanted to escape and let go for a couple hours, and was so glad the theater in Denton was open and there was a new movie on the docket. Daniel Kaluuya gives a phenomenal performance as Chairman Fred Hampton, leader of the Black Panther in Illinois. Lakeith Stanfield gives an equally phenomenal performance as FBI informant Bill O'Neal, looking to get his conviction for stealing a car softened. The Black Panthers are incredibly misunderstood by (white) society and this film was a great intro into what they were really trying to do and the way the FBI (illegally) treated them. I intend to do more personal study of the Black Panthers. The ending had me crying at the brutality and illegality of the FBI murdering Fred Hampton.
Mank
When this film was announced I was pretty sure I was the target audience - directed by David Fincher (he directed one of my top-five favorite films, The Social Network) about the classic of classic-est movies, Citizen Kane (which I love). I even got to see it in a real movie theater (the S. Lamar Alamo in Austin). However, I found the movie to be incredibly boring even though I think billing for movies is incredibly fascinating. I didn't like Gary Oldman as Herman J. Mankiewicz (Mank, the guy who wrote Citizen Kane). I didn't really like anybody or anything, except for one very crackling scene at a crowded and somewhat fraught dinner party at the estate of Randolph Hearst.
Minari
I was excited to watch this film because it is directed by Lee Isaac Chung, a guy who also graduated from the University of Utah Film Studies program (he was a grad student that finished in 2004, I was an undergrad that started in 2005). When I moved to NYC in September 2007, I reached out to the alumni network and was given the email for a fellow graduate that was also living in NYC - Isaac Chung. I contacted him and I actually helped on a film that his friend was directing and he was shooting in early 2008. I don't even remember what I did to what the short/film was about, and we never connected again (although we did friend each other on FB). All of that to say, I was excited that this film had Oscar buzz because of my very small connection to the director. When A24 sent me an email about virtual screenings, I immediately bought a ticket because I wasn't sure I'd be able to see it in theaters. However, the application used wouldn't let me cast from my phone, laptop, or chromebook to my tv, and the ticket was only good for a five hour window, so I ended up watching it on my phone. NOT ideal, especially when reading the subtitles. Anyway, I still found the story to be incredibly affecting and the performances all very moving.
Nomadland
This was the first film I saw during Oscar Week, and I had no idea what it was about except that it had some scenes involving workers at an Amazon warehouse facility. It's a quietly affecting story of one woman's live after the death of her husband and the closing of the US Gypsum plant that employed her husband in Nevada. She lost her husband and her community, and she spends the movie as a nomad finding new community through work and solitude. It was melancholic and lovely.
Promising Young Woman
I can imagine many a conservative white dude who believes women "call rape" frequently, watched the trailer (not even the film) and immediately dismissed it as 1) the Me Too movement run amok; 2) angry women revenge film; 3) just a feminist movie (these are all basically versions of the same thing). And maybe it IS those things....but it's also more nuanced than that. Anyone who thinks Cassie the heroine of this movie isn't paying enough attention. She is damaged and hurt and angry (all understandable and justifiable), but her outlet isn't healthy. Numerous people tell her that she needs to move on, and it's clear she's stopped progressing by choice - and that's not a good thing for her or her friend Nina. When she does move on, she's timid and careful, only for it to be taken from her. She reacts in the extreme. And maybe that's all she felt she could do. I'm not really here to judge her....but I am judging the men and other accomplices in the film for their own actions and choices. It is a dark, funny, irreverent, stylistic film with really wonderful music choices. I hope Carey Mulligan wins Best Actress.
Sound of Metal
I don't have a ton to say about this film. I watched it a couple weeks ago in my home on Amazon Prime. I really like Riz Ahmed, but this film didn't totally connect with me. It's not as if it's bad in anyway, I just didn't feel it. But I don't have any negative feelings toward it.
The Trial of the Chicago 7
I watched this today instead of spending four hours at the theater watching the nominated Shorts. I like Sorkin as a writer (for the most part...I mean he wrote The Social Network which I love but he can definitely be overly speechy in his screenwriting), but don't particularly enjoy him as a director. He has a really all-star, stellar cast, that, in my opinion, helps him overcome some of his weaknesses as a director. But his dialogue oftentimes was annoying and to on-the-nose and it annoyed me. I don't know nearly enough about the actual events, but I feel like he dramatized a lot of the proceedings. The content of the film is extremely applicable to our current time, and it made me feel frustrated that we haven't really come all that far in equity and social justice. After living through this past summer and seeing so much police brutality and violence on Americans, I had anxiety watching the riot footage and had to turn away. The film definitely made me angry, frustrated with the ongoing white supremacy institutions that continue to perpetrate inequity, but that doesn't make it an overwhelming great film; telling a relevant, important story doesn't automatically bestow accolade. Additionally, I was troubled that Gary Seale, the Black Panther roped into the trial simply because he was black, was "saved" by the conscience of a respectable white man. That being said though, Joseph Gordon-Levitt gave a restrained performance that I really liked.
