Oscar nominations

[calimac]

are out. It is perhaps rare to have so many films with similar titles. There's A Single Man and there's A Serious Man. You can go Up or you can go Up in the Air. We're running out of titles. Someone tell the melancholy elephants.

As usual, this is my opportunity to see how out of touch I am. Of all the films nominated, I've seen only three - two, Avatar and Coraline, because they were genre films that caught my interest, and which I fairly well enjoyed, and one, Julie & Julia, a non-genre film I disliked. I had a similar score last year: saw two or three films, was bored by one of them.

Since then, I've seen a couple more of last year's nominees on DVD, of which the best was Frozen River, a film I hadn't even heard of until it got Oscar nominations. Dire dramas set in the snow: it worked for the Coen brothers too. I'm waiting for someone to tell me that Frozen River was actually a knee-slapper of hilarity.

I may well see the single and serious men, and take the two trips up, at some future point on DVD. But everything else on the major-awards list looks either like not my kind of thing, or else I can't remember from the title what it is.

The change from 5 to 10 nominees for Best Picture hasn't expanded the overall list of films nominated for major awards. All five Best Director nominees are also nominated for Best Picture, but that's not unusual: the overlap is either four or five almost every year, at least in recent times. And all of the Best Picture nominees have either an acting or screenplay nomination, or both, as well, except Avatar, no surprise, which is also one of the directing nominees, also no surprise.

Comments

[barondave.livejournal.com]

I've seen five of the ten Best Picture nominees, way higher than average: Avatar, District 9, A Serious Man, Up, Up In The Air. Of those, my favorite is Up, by a wide margin, followed by Up In The Air and A Serious Man. However, Avatar will win because the awards aren't actually about the Best of anything.

I will probably see others on DVD. Netflix has changed how I watch movies.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

I figure Netflix would change how I watch movies too, which is why I haven't subscribed. There's not enough movies I want to see to make it worthwhile for me. I'd probably just see more films I disliked, which would make me grumpy. Grumpier.

[barondave.livejournal.com]

Netflix is good for exploring a film. Many (but not all) have commentaries and featurettes and extras and Closed Captioning and such. I like that, but I tend not to watch movies like most do anyway.

But DVDs are wasted without a widescreen tv.

Knowing you (to the extent that I do), I suspect you'd enjoy one aspect of Neflix I do as well: Exploring a director. Not every film by, for example, Kurosawa has been transfered, but most have. I can luxuriate in my own film festival.

And the "Read the Book, See the Movie" binges can be fun.

Addendum: I happen to have seen, more-or-less by accident, the movie which won the second Best Picture award, Broadway Melody of 1929. I was actually looking for the middle two (out of four) Broadway Melody pictures, but they didn't have them on DVD so this one slipped into my queue. While not a great movie, I'm glad I saw it.

Finding semi-random unknowns are another reason to subscribe to Netflix.

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

May not the commentaries, featurettes, et al, be found on other copies of the same DVD and not just the ones offered by Netflix? (Recognizing that some movies do come in multiple DVD edition with more or fewer extras - I mean just that these features are not Netflix-exclusive, are they?) I watch non-new films on DVD mostly from the library, and I do appreciate the features, when I have time to watch them. You're right, though, that I'd have better luck scanning through back catalogs than watching new releases, and if the library ceases to satisfy, I should think about it.

[barondave.livejournal.com]

There are indeed different versions out, and the Member Review section is pretty good about pointing out good or bad qualities of the disc. I've stopped rating "movies" on Netflix, and rate the entire pressing, rounding up or down depending on extras and such.

To be sure, a little research and you can probably buy or borrow the same disks. But since I rarely rewatch movies (except at the time, to see commentaries), my personal library is tiny but I've flixed 720 discs since June 2002. (Yes, I keep track.) Plus, I can watch at leisure, don't have to worry about late fees, set up a queue so I know pretty much what I'm going to get next, read other reviews, have Netflix make suggestions (which are generally pretty good, though hardly perfect) and see what my friends are doing (a small thing, but sometimes nice).

This has been an unsolicited advertisement for Nexflix in the midst of a solicited disparaging of the Academy Awards.

[stevegreen.livejournal.com]

I've seen eight of the 10 nominated for best picture. Of the remaining two, Precious was only released in the UK on Friday (I'm seeing it this coming weekend) and The Blind Side hasn't made it across the Pond yet.

Best actor: Clooney and Renner, ticked. The other three haven't opened here yet.
Supporting: Waltz, I've seen. The other four are still in transit.

Best actress: Mulligan. Missed Streep. Will catch Sibide this week. Other two not out here yet.
Supporting: Kendrick and Farminga, plus Mo'Nique in a couple of days. I missed Cruz, and Gyllenhall hasn't opened yet.

Director: Four down, the fifth by the end of this week.

[anderyn.livejournal.com]

I, too, have only seen two of the nominated for best picture movies -- Up and Avatar . Alas, I tend not to go to the serious pictures that get nominated so I am really out of touch most years.

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

I've seen Avatar, District 9 (another SF film), The Hurt Locker, A Serious Man, and Up. I don't really care who wins, although I'd like to see Kathryn Bigelow win Best Director. The Hurt Locker was strong enough that I watched every feature of hers afterward, and she strikes me as one of the most talented directors currently working.

A Serious Man is definitely worth checking out, although it's pretty black -- if not bleak -- humor. I enjoyed Up too, but it didn't blow me away. (Saw it on DVD.) Of the Best Picture noms that I haven't seen, I'm mildly interested in An Education, but that's about it.

[surliminal.livejournal.com]

An Education is a little gem. But then I adored Up! too.
Still haven't seen Coraline - seems to have been around so long an amazed it's this year's oscars!

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

Pretty good year for animated movies between Coraline, Fantastic Mr. Fox, and Up. (And Avatar, from a certain angle.)

[surliminal.livejournal.com]

I've seen far more of this year's than last year's and that's even given the time lag of them coming out in UK. Last year seemed dominated by those 2 big films ofr old men neither of which attracted me at all. Much more intersted this year. Btw I thought the Julia film appalingly bad too.

[ken-3k.livejournal.com]

I must like everything. I loved "Julie & Julia," though I don't know that it merits any awards. I'm rooting for "The Hurt Locker" in most categories, though I am guessing that the voters will find a way to split Best Picture and Best Director between "Hurt Locker" and "Avatar." Or maybe they'll be content to give "Avatar" all of the technical & design & photography awards.

I thought "Up" was exceptional, one of Pixar's best (and I am a huge Pixar fan). "Up In The Air" and "A Serious Man" were both quite worthwhile.

Re: "Julie and Julia": I have a favorite subcategory of Movies About Food. "Mostly Martha," "Big Night," and best of all, "A Private Function."

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

I remember "A Private Function" primarily as a film about what happens when you keep a live pig in the kitchen.

[ken-3k.livejournal.com]

Well, that was the comic relief, but the background was food rationing in postwar Britain. How much people thought about food, and how far people would go to get more, and how the enforcers viewed the world. (And, of course, Maggie Smith wants to leverage her knowledge of the illicit pig into social climbing...) And, eventually, what is our relationship to the cute and cuddly animals we plan to eat.