Coffee: Check.
Office Oscar pool: Completed.
Re-read all my old notes: Done.

After watching the 15 Movies (and writing reviews for 15 films) in 2 weeks, I needed a break. I watched 9 on 2/19; Within minutes of finishing my review, I needed to cleanse my pallet. I scrolled through the channels to find on showtime: Rambo IV starting in five minutes.

Yesss.

I grabbed a beer and watched the mind-numbing violence of a hollow film. No analyzing, just entertainment (all be it in the most gratuitous way possible) for the sake of entertainment. I sipped my beer and revelled in it, watching every epic moment of the most violent film (by body count) ever made. it was only after that (and another beer) that I slept the most soft and restful sleep that I had since this project began. It wasn’t until the following afternoon that I began to ponder – who do I honestly think will win what?

To that question I say: I do not know.

The Academy isn’t like Baseball playoffs, where the team that is playing the best at the end of september wins (Please referrence the 69 Mets, 03 Marlins, 04 Red Sox, the 07 Rockies, the 08 Rays, etc), but more like the NCAA tournement (Right around the corner folks! get your Brackets ready!) where if you win 8 or 9 awards leading in, you can get some momentum building for an Oscar push. The other side of this is the politicing. Politics Politics politics! The Weinstien’s are notorious for this – badgering as many (if not all!) voting academy members to support their film, which has become an anual every for them (see: Inglourious Basterds, A Single Man, Nine) usually with success.

Ok, Enough is enough. Time for me to be bold and decisive and tell you what I think of the films for the BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY!

Ok, your excitement is jumping off the screen to me as you sit in rapt anticipation. I am sure your eager as I was when this all started, so without furth adieu…

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
I always loved this category – after Best Picture, and Best Director, it is my favorite. Why? Because I can imagine it being me! All you need is imagination, organization, drive and a touch of skill, and your can create something from nothing. Based off your ideas, the motion picture world churns! It gives me hope, that there may be a guy sitting in an office, bored out of his skull day dreaming when it hits – just an idea, a premise, an wisp of thought – he dwells on it some more, and it grows, gains character, thoughts, then dialogue, setting, situations. Then the snowball is really rolling, and the what ifs come in…”What if this character did this? Would it make that happen?”

Sometimes thats all it takes – boredom combined with dwelling on the idea to create something mind shattering from nothing.

Thats where I think the idea for “Up” came from. What kid growing up didn’t dream on a summer day of using balloons to fly their entire house away? Staring at the sky, imagining looking down on the world as your slowly drift where ever you wanted? “Up” is a sweet tale full of shild like whimsy, and a dear premise that is as sweet as it is simple: when you are in love, true love, you will keep your promises, even to the ends of the earth, and nothing will stop you from making them come true.

“Up”, However, is where the lightness ends.

3 films emphasize war, or its after effects in one way or another. The most obvious of this is the post-Iraq invasion story in “The Hurt Locker”, Mark Boal’s tale of war as seen through the eyes of 3 Bomb disposal team mates of Bravo Company. The brutal nature of war is exposed as a result of his time reporting from the front lines in Iraq. Even the writer’s guild of America said this was the finest original Screenplay of 2009, giving it their highest prize. This is all hidden beneath the brutallity of war – the most brutal times being the down time between violent, never knowing when the next mission, firefight, or battle will crop up.

“The Messenger” takes “The Hurt Locker” to the next level – it answers the question “What happens to the ground soldiers when they return from war? And what if they don’t return?”. It is a dark tale interwoven with 2 former front-line soldiers delivering grim news to the Next of Kin, while trying to overcome their own issues, stemming from war and otherwise. A powerful story, punctuated with the gut-wrenching reality of the need to tell families that their Sons/Daughters/Fathers/Husbands will never be coming back alive. The power within this does not lie in the dialogue, but the grim emotion, and the reality that this is what happens when your country goes to war.

The alternative to all of this is the World War II flight of fancy set in 1943 Paris. It is the thought that if one COULD re-write history, how would he do it? The answer, of course, is “Inglourious Basterds”, based on the perfect circumstances of a group of Jewish Nazi Hunter’s stumbling onto a revenge plot to kill Hitler. This fantasy is in the same vein of childhood day dreaming as up… if you are Ted Bundy as a child. Tarantino’s decade long work on the script, billed as his “masterpeice” draws parallels to the great WWII war movies of the past (Particularly the Basterds, who parallel “the Dirty Dozen”. Just watch the first scene with the Basterds, and the first scene of “The Dirty Dozen” – you will see what I mean). Plus, you cannot forget he has won a Best Screenplay oscar before (1994, Pulp Fiction)

Last, but not least, is another Best Screenplay winner (Fargo – 1996; No Country for Old Men – 2007) with a dark comedy about a 1960′s South Dakota Jewish family (Centered around the patriarch, Larry Gopnik) as they are pushed and pulled from all sides, with each situation more outrageous then the last. Though it is a comedy, there is a dark haze hanging over Larry (Played by Michael Stuhlbarg) throughout the film, something he cannot escape. For him, even a win ends up being a loss, and his downward spiral only aids him to reaching new heights.

Thanks for reading all that. And now – who wins?

I think “A Serious Man” is the most complete script here; it has twists, turns, creativity, vision, while walking the fine line of a dark comedy. I love dark comedies; they are so hard to perfect and do correctly – like a good souffle, it is so easy to make a mistake and have your food end up less then tasty. “A Serious Man” deserves the win – but “The Hurt Locker”, with the power of the WGA award, gets the statue.

MY PICK: A Serious Man
ACADEMY AWARD GOES TO: The Hurt Locker

Writing can move you – can draw up pure emotions, paint a portrait within your own mind, reflect the deepest emotions within oneself, can create anything – it is only limited to the words on the page, and the imagination of the author who chains the words together. Writing for film, however – it can be a challenge, as it might be brilliant, but it is also subject to the directors interpretation of the words, and how they are played out. In fact, when you look back at some past winners, in the adaptive Screenplay winners of the past, some are VASTLY different then the original product (MASH, For example: Ring Lardner, Jr. was so pissed by the final product of the film he has defamed the final edit since his first viewing of it).

At any rate: after seeing In the Loop, I really must read “The Thick of It” by Armando Iannucci.

Based off the book, “In the Loop” is a seriously farce-ical dark comedy. Serious, Dark, comedy. Not a combo you hear very often. It is like the Office (the Ricky Gervais UK version, not our bastardized US version) had hot sweaty messy sex with “Primary Colors” and this was the fetus that popped out nine months later. But what a brainchild it is! Sharp and quick, the humor can escape you if your not paying close enough attention at times, as the dialogue holds as much humor as the absurdness of all the situations the characters find themselves in. And who would have known James Gandolfini was funny? Not I. But he is. Trust me.

The basis is America is pursuing a war with an unnamed nation, and is trying to get the UK and UN to go along with the plan. Taken from the point of view of an obscure, unknown ministry member, both sides put him in the middle as their poster boy, who unwittingly tries to be as non-committal as possible.

The writing – absolute gold. The lines are classic, yet smooth. My favorite – the one I cannot get out of my head was state by James Gandolfini: “War. It is something that no one wants to go to, and once you have been there, you never really want to go back to again ever. Its a lot like France.”

Brilliant.

Life can be inexplicably dark at times. All of us hit that time where we are at a low point; sometimes it is set into action by an event or chain of events, other times it is just for no other reason then simply “just because”. With the light times comes the dark. And by no means was this film light.

Set in an unspecified area of the US, Staff Sergeant Will Montgomery (Ben Foster) has been rotated out of active duty due to his injuries sustained in the course of battle. Reassigned to pair with Capt. Tony Stone (Woody Harrelson) his new assignment is to read the script, and deliver the news to NOK’s (next of kin) that their soldier husbands/sons/daughters will not be coming home. Within this announcement, there is no offers of comfort allowed – simply an announcement and then they are on their way.

Dark and heavy, the writing task with this is no easy feat. The script in itself does some heavy lifting – even approaching such a terribly strong topic is heartbreakingly difficult. I simply feel emotionally drained just watching it – writing it, living every word in your mind before it makes it onto paper would be such and exhausting task that I cannot even comprehend it. 2 Main characters (Montgomery and Stone) gradually peel back layers hidden under combative soldiers, and expose the true men underneath; the vulnerable and compassionate, the lonely and the begrudging. You get the sense that as different as they might be, the more similar they actually are.

Oliver Stone once said of Woody Harrelson (Just before casting him in the role of Mickey Knox in “Natural Born Killers”) that Woody has an “inherent sickness to him”. There is a level, always brewing right under the surface that makes him seem like a slight sociopath – always knowing how to say the right thing at the right time. The was a decent role for him, giving him more depth as a person then I have seen from him in a long, long time. I fall back to comparing him to his character of Larry Flynt in “The People vs. Larry Flynt” where his character evolved, transformed, was deep, and he was wholeheartedly behind it. As Capt. Stone, he did a very solid job – but not spectacular to the point of and Oscar win.

When you sit back to watch this film, be ready. It might take you places your not ready to go. It might be heavier then you need to go, and it might leave you flat on your back afterwards. All that being said – sometimes you need to visit the dark places in life just so you can truly appreciate all the light around us.

Animated films don’t tend to fare well outside of the animation categories. In fact, rarely are they nominated for the top prizes by the Academy (the last Best Picture nomination for an animation was Beauty and the Beast in 1992), but with this years “Up”, Disney has once again breathed new life into this genre.

The simple story of an old man, his youthful (all be it accidental!) sidekick on an impromptu ride of adventure. It is a simple story, laced with sorrow, that leads us gently on the sweet, wonderfully grandiose adventure into fantasy – into every child’s “what if my house could fly!” daydream on a sunny summer day, flights of whimsy combined with the child-like idea of adventure and fun, with a larger then life background of the entire world – literally – right at your doorstep.

As we have come to expect in recent years, I was surprised to find that this was not your typical Disney script – I have always stated that Disney does best when they create their own stories, not taking pre-packaged fairy tales and remaking them for epic films. When they work from a new, original place, they can create virtual (literally!) wonders before our very eyes. The characters develop in a smooth, subtle way that you know why they react the way they do in each and every situation. There is no backstory, no mystery, no ill-will. It is a simple tale, but arranged in an eloquent way as to reward all levels of understanding with it.

I do not foresee this breaking in to become the first animation to win best picture – though it is a wonderful film, and will more then likely take the Best Feature Length Animation award, and the story is well written, and powerful, with a simple message behind it: For the ones we love deeply, we will go to the ends of the earth to keep our promises to them.

As I sit, watching this 1960′s character (judging by the music, cars and styles, I would guess late 60′s) for about 2 minutes, a recurring question keeps coming in: Have you ever wondered what happened to Michael Douglas in the lead up to his explosion in “Falling Down”? The secret is: “A Serious Man” – the gradual falling of a Jewish man in an unspecified South Dakota town is both humorous and appalling, a cringe and laugh fest from beginning to end.

The story is about a Middle age man who seems to be getting hit from all sides: a question about his job security, a wife who wants to leave him, a broth who lives on his couch, a daughter who seems to do nothing in life except wash her hair, and a soon to be Bah-Mitzvah’ed son who cares more about smoking pot and watching TV then anything else in life. Very little in life seems to go the protagonist’s way, even his dreams seem to want to kick him when he is down.

Some way wonder why the Coen’s are up for just the best picture and best original screenplay – maybe a token nod to them as artists who have been there before? Possibly. May also wonder why they are not up for best director as well – since the film is not as visually stunning as “No Country for Old Men”, but does have all the grace and aptitude of “Fargo”. But the true artistry for the Coen’s in this piece lies within the writing.

It can be argued that the Coen Brothers are the finest multi-genre screenwriters in this generation. Yes, I might be very generous with that previous statement, but dwell on it for a second, I think you will find it to be very much the truth. Few writers can write a dark comedy so well that you not only laugh out loud, but feel complete pity for the protagonist (Michael Stuhlbarg as Larry Gopnik, a down on his luck Physics Professor) and those around him. The absurdity of his dreams, the crushing realities that surround him, and even the little wins in his life come back to him as negative boomerangs, whipping his up moments until he is down.

With all that being said, I look at A Serious Man as a fine, Mighty fine movie, worthy of a Best Picture nod (But not a win, as this film has neither the lead in, or acclaim that either Fargo or No Country for Old Men had) and worthy of a Best Director nomination (though it did not receive once). However, it’s nomination for Best Original Screenplay is not only warranted, but expected. Necessary, in fact. As it is, I have a genuine belief that it could (and should) win.

With sadness comes hope.

Thats the overwhelming sentiment I have about the film “Precious”, the story of an unfortunate incest survivor whose own father is the father of her own 2 kids. Layered amidst flights of fancy to escape the harsh realities she is trying to face, the protagonists struggles to find not only self worth, but security and well being in a world she doesn’t trust.

Precious (Played by Gabourey Sidibe) was not a deep character to play, suffering with her secrets and pain in silence. The only joy you ever see from the character comes from her daydreams, fantasies, and flights of fancy, her escape for reality. Otherwise, the character did not call for much from her, not enough to warrant a best actress nomination, let alone a win. Mo’Nique (As Precious’ mother) has the range necessary for an Oscar: prone to fits of sudden rage and anger, a character you can both pity and despise at the same time. For the first time in any role I have ever seen her in, she actually come across as vulnerable, moving, strong yet out of control.

Only one other time in the Academy’s history has an Afri can-American film maker been up for Best Director (John Singleton, Boyz n The Hood), so Lee Daniels is in rarefied air at this point. The film is solid from a film makers standpoint, and he draws a good performance from Gabourney Sidibe, and a very good performance from Mo’Nique, otherwise, the film isn’t spectacular – the story itself, powerful, dramatic, dark and cruel – give the film the backbone it needs to stand. Otherwise, the would just be another offering.

The feeling I have, after watching the film, is that Mo’nique will probably be the only one walking away with hardware Oscar night – though, it is possible that writer Geoffry Fletcher might get a statue of his own.

As I sat down to Re-watch Inglourious Bastereds (I saw it about 4 weeks ago) I got a text. This was the conversation that ensued:
Me: And now (I’m watching)… Inglourious Basterds
LOS: I thought it was good but didn’t live up to expectations
Me: 10 yrs of work and his “Masterpeice”? Woefully short. Good none the less.
LOS: I actually don’t like Tarantino much lately. IB redeemed him slightly in my opinion.
Me: He peaked at Pulp Fiction – hard to go back to that.
LOS: True. Maybe you’ll disagree, but IB had more of a Coen Bros. vibe then Tarantino
Me: Scriptwise: Yes. Dramatically: Yes – But Quentin can’t build the drama the way they do. If they had this script, it would still be 2 hrs 33 min, but better. Much, much better.
LOS: Can’t argue with that logic.
Me: He throws in the dialogue between action, prefers jump cuts and no sense of true drama.
LOS: I think his use of violence is starting to work against him.
Me: Yes, but he has no other place to go. He isn’t skilled enough.

That synopsizes the film pretty well.

I am not going to lie, I like Tarantino. He writes natural dialogue well. He shoots films well. He works well with the talent. All around, he does everything well. Just not superb, like a man who has spent the last solid 25 years of his life to absorbing, watching, writing and creating films.

I love a good wwII film; I have a soft spot in my heart for The Great Escape and The Dirty Dozen (Both of with influenced Tarantino in this) but I only liked this film. It was epic, grandiose, larger then life – fiction from the get go, yes, but still well written. And it is known that Tarantino already won an oscar for best Original screenplay, so he is very capable of writing another. The thing that bothers me, however – is the predictability of Tarantino now. A movie of one person hunting down a group? Uma Thurmon in Kill Bill/Col Landa. A group letting an individual to “tell the Story” after everyone else is killed? Natural Born Killers (Though he had his credit removed) and The Basterds. His strange foot fetish? Every single movie (The Foot Massage Discussion, Big Toe in Kill Bill, the shoe in Inglourious Basterds, From Dusk ‘Til Dawn… I am sure you have some of your own too)

The Point is: the habitual elements, including violence – they are detracting away from the film for me.

The best part I remember from me first viewing is Col Hans Landa (Played by Christoph Waltz) and how he seamlessly and comfortably transitioned from English to German to French to Italian. Along with the rest of his character, he was the brightest spot in the entire film, overshadowing the other characters with a brilliance you see from the very beginning.

Quentin has been calling this film his “Masterpiece”. 10 years, multiple re-writes in the making. When I think of Masterpiece, my mind goes to some of the greats: John Ford directing “Grapes of Wrath”. Hitchcock’s “Vertigo”. The yardstick for any true masterpiece, in my mind, is Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Godfather”. Where does this measure up to “The Godfather”? Woefully short. Though this might be the very masterpiece of Tarantino’s career, I would say it hardly is a masterpiece overall. My basic feeling is that this film is worth a look, and is highly entertaining, but by far not the best film from the best director with the best script.