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Transformers: Age of Extinction
1st Teaser Trailer
Watch It Here
Person of Interest: Optimus Prime, Grimlock, Mark Whalberg as a precocious farmer, Nicola Peltz as his daughter who can only say the word "Dad!", Jack Reynor as some guy no one will care about, Kelsey Grammer and Stanley Tucci as some evil U.S. officials, and a cameoing Li Bingbing.
Scene Pop: Optimus bitch-slapping Grimlock.
Briggs Breakdown: 2 transformations, 3 low-flying spaceships, Optimus suffering a deadly blown (again!), a blown up barn, a Autobot takedown at a pier, a bad landing on a Radio Flyer.
Effective?: Yes.
Check it Out?: It will ultimately depend on the viewer at this point. I enjoyed the the third film, despite having many major issues, and I was enraptured by Bay's Pain & Gain. Still, I'm probably going to wait for it to hit the drive-ins.
The show was frankly too predictable to really enjoy.
16-8. If I really went with my gut feelings and followed along with the rest of the sheep, I would have had a near perfect spread, the sole exception being Best Film Editing.
Except for maybe the group selfie that crashed Twitter, none of Ellen's segments or bits were funny. She was too focused on being an inoffensive host and a glad-hand to the nominees, except for that strange diss to Liza Minnelli. Spending practically all of her time walking the aisles with her lame improv skills killed her mojo and showed that her hosting duties didn't matter, so why bother having a host then? The Oscars' recurring female announcer Randy Thomas did a better job keeping the show moving forward. And what the hell was up with that cutaway to her with a guitar?
Amid the usual softball interviews during the pre-show, there was something that royally pissed me off: Jimmy Kimmel's horrendous skit about him confronting the people behind snarky Twitter remarks was completely uncalled for. What a total dick. Why the hell would I want to watch your after-party show after that? Many famous comedians, such as Albert Brooks, live-twitted during the Oscar affairs, so are they trailer-park trash too, huh Kimmel? No wonder why you're in third place.
The theme of the evening was "Heroes in Hollywood". This was somehow supposed to be displayed through three cookie-cutter montages, including great action classics such as Footloose and seriously using the cheesy quotes from Air Force One and Independence Day. This should have been cut entirely.
What a crazy set design: An army of plastic Oscars, awaiting to do battle with the Terracotta Army at the Vanity Fair after-party.
Nice shiny chest plate you got there, Anne Hathaway.
Jim Carrey, once again showing why age is a bitch. With the material he had here, I'm more fearful of what's to come with the Dumb and Dumber sequel.
Kim Novak and Goldie Hawn both broke my heart when they showed off their reconstructed faces.
I knew 20 Feet from Stardom would pull off the win; The Academy just doesn't like their docs to be depressing lately, which is pretty sad for The Act of Killing and Drafthouse Films. Darlene Love then capped it with her signature soaring vocals.
Then U2 tried to kill the power of music with their "unplugged" rendition of their terrible song. Those high notes and the smug expression on Bono's face.
Lupita Nyong'o had the night's most touching speech, right above Jared Leto's tribute to his mom. So glad her dream came true.
I knew that The Great Gatsby would be the obvious winners for the artistic awards. Catherine Martin was the big winner of the night with two statues. Now can we please stop celebrating period pieces in these categories?
All of the Oscar nominated songs being performed tonight had to be truncated just so P!nk can do a subpar rendition of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" and Bette Midler to show that she no longer has the energy to ring the emotion out of "Wind Beneath My Wings".
Bill Murray earned major brownie points for his personal little tribute to Harold Ramis during the Best Cinematography presentation.
I was going to complain about the lack of the recently departed Sarah Jones during the "in memoriam" segment but it was remedied by the small graphic at the very end. Glad that the grass-roots campaign worked itself out.
What the hell did John Travolta call Idina Menzel?
How about that amazing Stealth reunion of Jaime Foxx and Jessica Biel during Best Original Score?
Yes! Yes! Yes! "Let It Go" won! Forget Julia, Cate, #SuckIt Bono! And to cap it off, the Lopez couple had the most creative victory speech and entered in the entertainment distinction of having an EGOT.
Ooh, now Cate Blanchett will be on Mia Farrow's death list.
Even though I'm a bit bitter at Matthew winning over Leo, he did have a very nice speech about the three who's in life.
Despite the expected dominance of Gravity, I'm glad that 12 Years a Slave won in the end and director Steve McQueen got to be a big ball of excitement, jumping up and down and snatching the Oscar like a little kid.
In case you forgot, this has been two years in a row where a Hollywood actor won for producing the Best Picture. Get to it, the rest of you rascals!
Not only that, but it is also the second film in a row where the American protagonist is saved by a Canadian. Hooray for Canada, except for when it comes to women's hockey!
I told you American Hustle would be totally shut out. It's too bad that The Wolf of Wall Street had to be in the same boat as well.
So, please don't bring back Ellen unless she has her A-game, fire the lazy show producers, and try to be more lively next time, Oscar. You were so lucky that the song performances and some great speeches perked up the festivities at times.
Right before the Oscar telecast comes another major blow to the world of film. Alain Resnais has died. He was 91 years old.
The French auteur was widely known for his unconventional narrative structures that often surround the idea of memory, radical editing techniques, and his later deconstructive takes on modern theater. Film students and scholars of course will be well aware of his major contributions: Night and Fog, the 1955 groundbreaking short documentary about the Nazi concentration camps, which haunts the viewer with cold dolly sweeps of the camps in the present while making shockingly quick cuts to b&w archival photos; Hiroshima Mon Amour, the 1959 influential film that juxtaposes an internal doc about the dropping of the atomic bomb and the consequences of its survivors with the main story of a troubled relationship between a French woman and a Japanese man; and finally, Last Year at Marienbad, the 1961 surrealist love story between a man who remembers a fleeting affair and a woman who has no recollection, all the while a party for the rich is going on, where its patrons stubbornly dismiss to move beyond their statuses or stop their thirst of playing a matchstick game.
Resnais was one of the few remaining film artists who refused to let his advanced age prevent him from crafting his thoughts. He made big splashes in the past recently with Wild Grass and last year's You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet! His latest film Life of Riley literally just made its premiere at the Berlin International Film Festival, winning him the Alfred Bauer Prize.
He will sorely be missed.
Of course, these are my predictions to win, not who or what movie I wish would win.
Best Picture: 12 Years a Slave
Best Actor: Leonardo DiCaprio, The Wolf of Wall Street
Best Actress: Cate Blanchett, Blue Jasmine
Best Supporting Actor: Jared Leto, Dallas Buyers Club
Best Supporting Actress: Lupita Nyong'o, 12 Years a Slave
Best Director: Alfonso Cuarón, Gravity
Best Original Screenplay: Spike Jonze, Her
Best Adapted Screenplay: John Ridley, 12 Years a Slave
Best Animated Film: Frozen
Best Foreign Film: The Great Beauty
Best Documentary Film: 20 Feet from Stardom
Best Original Score: Steven Price, Gravity
Best Original Song: "Let It Go", Frozen
Best Cinematography: Emmanuel Lubezki, Gravity
Best Film Editing: Joe Walker, 12 Years a Slave
Best Production Design: The Great Gatsby
Best Costume Design: Michael Wilkinson, American Hustle
Best Makeup and Hairstyling: Adruitha Lee and Robin Mathews, Dallas Buyers Club
Best Sound Editing: Wylie Stateman, Lone Survivor
Best Sound Mixing: Gravity
Best Visual Effects: Gravity
Best Documentary (Short Subject): The Lady In Number 6: Music Saved My Life
Best Animated Short Film: Feral
Best Live Action Short Film: Just Before Losing Everything
Yeah, not much of a shocker when it comes to Best Picture or most of the top awards.
I really do think that the Academy will favor DiCaprio over McConaughey. He has picked up a lot of public and press fanfare during the Oscar campaign. It really seems to be the right time and role to award him with the gold that has alluded him for so long now. If he doesn't, I understand the reasoning but there surely will be a pity Oscar down the line. I have nothing against McConaughey, but giving him Best Actor just continues the stereotype of afflicted character roles being prime bait.
Gravity is absolutely expected to be second-named on news articles on Monday, unless it somehow wins Best Picture, thanks to the many expected wins in the technical categories.
Except for a possible upset over Catherine Martin's costume work in The Great Gatsby, which I do see happening, American Hustle might possibly walk away empty-handed. Jennifer Lawrence is still a possibility but the latest entertainment buzz has mostly surrounded the great breakthrough performance of Nyong'o. Having a killer dress at the Golden Globes also helped her cause.
Remember When Actual Pop Songs Were Nominated & Would Win Best Original Song? Part 4: It's a two-man race between "Happy" and "Let It Go", unless that stupid, stupid U2 song steals the glory. As of this writing, "Happy" is the highest charting of the two songs, currently resting comfortably at #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 while "Go" is stubbornly unable to move past #18. It will truly boggle me if "Let It Go" doesn't win, especially since its the only nominated song that has impacted the American zeitgeist for the past four months. And if the award is claimed by the Lopez duo, maybe it will finally reach the top of the pops.
I hope that my picks for the shorts categories end up as the winners: Feral is a foreseeable upset over the Mickey Mouse 3D-infused toon Get a Horse!, the only one of those nominated to be seen widely by the public; Just Before Losing Everything has been raved to be a chilling thriller but it still could lose to Helium, a saccharine-soaked film about a dying kid and dreams; And The Lady In Number 6: Music Saved My Life is kind of an easy choice, given that it taps into the Oscar-friendly material that was the Holocaust, but it genuinely looks moving and the recent news of the death of its central figure is sure to win the sympathy vote.
Again, not much to digest since it seems too cut and dry this year.
See you on Monday with my reactions to the awards.
THE LEGO MOVIE was, quite frankly, AWESOME!
ROBOCOP was a bit better than feared but was still an unnecessary 80's reboot and often too boring to endure.
Yeah, only watching two new movies of the year in its first two months isn't exactly a great feat but at least I started 2014 off with a 5/5 film.
Best Films of 2014
1. The Lego Movie
Godzilla
1st Official Trailer
Watch It Here
Person of Interest: Everybody, save for David Strathairn, return from the teaser trailer. Bryan Cranston and Ken Watanabe are given the heavy duty of narrating the plot and its conflict. Poor Elizabeth Olsen, she still doesn't have any importance yet. I was most certainly right about Juliette Binoche being a dead meat scientist, as evident by Cranston's shattered demeanor.
Scene Pop: Hooray, we finally get to see Godzilla's face! And, it's fine!
Briggs Breakdown: 6 BRAM music stings, 4 fired-off flares, raining jets, mass hysteria, colossal road of destruction in Las Vegas (and its ugly Statue of Liberty), some weird glowing thingy, and a callback to the first American Godzilla remake.
Effective?: Still yes. I wish the BRAMs weren't it in, though. Stupid action trailer cliche.
Check it Out?: This film is can now be safely labeled as a hot ticket. I'm still a bit concerned that Godzilla may not appear at all, given his still lack of full presence and might, but I do hope that this is corrected once it hits theaters.
Harold Ramis has died. He was 69 years old.
Ramis had a long, fruitful career in Hollywood but most will remember him as the straight man scientist in the pop culture phenomenon of 1984, Ghostbusters. With his prominent pompadour and signature circular glasses, he showed that he could steal laughs away from Dan Akroyd and Bill Murray as Dr. Egon Spengler.
But Ramis shouldn't just be known for one character. He first broke into show business as a series writer and later performer on SCTV. His expert craftsmanship with writing comedy lead to a fantastic streak of comedic classics in the 70's and 80's: Animal House, Meatballs, Caddyshack, Stripes, Ghostbusters, and Back to School.
With Caddyshack, he went beyond the page and started to rest nicely behind the camera. His noteworthy directorial efforts include Vacation, the SNL spawned underrated gem Stuart Saves His Family, Analyze This, and the underground cult favorite The Ice Harvest. Though he was one of the greats in modern comedy, he also had a series of severe missteps, including Multiplicity, the unnecessary sequel Analyze That, a begrudging remake of Bedazzled, and the major flop Year One.
Despite these major setbacks, they can not erase how Ramis will forever remain a major contributor to the film arts, particularly for directing and co-writing Groundhog Day, the 1993 masterpiece that has become a perennial favorite every February.
He will sorely be missed.
