Tag: movies

Oscar History: 2010

In my ongoing series of Oscar History posts, we arrive at what happened during the year 2010. This was quite a strong year for movies and, unlike other years, I can’t really quibble with the ten pictures that were nominated.

I can, however, differ with what won: Tom Hooper’s The King’s Speech. While this was a very solid and entertaining picture, I would have definitely put at least three of the other nominees above it: Black Swan, Inception, and my favorite of the year, The Social Network. Other nominees were 127 Hours, The Fighter, The Kids Are All Right, Toy Story 3, True Grit, and Winter’s Bone. 

Picture/Director matched up as Tom Hooper’s work in King’s Speech would win over Darren Aronofsky (Black Swan), Joel and Ethan Coen (True Grit), David Fincher (The Social Network), and David O. Russell (The Fighter). I may have found a spot for Christopher Nolan’s visually striking work in Inception. 

The love for The King’s Speech continued in Best Actor as Colin Firth was honored for his portrayal as King George VI. He triumphed over Javier Bardem (Biutiful), Jeff Bridges (True Grit), Jesse Eisenberg (The Social Network), and James Franco (127 Hours). It’s worth noting that Franco co-hosted the Oscars that year with Anne Hathaway. It wasn’t too memorable.

While his supporting players were showered with love, Mark Wahlberg was snubbed for his anchoring performance in The Fighter. Others worthy of mention: Leonardo DiCaprio in either Inception or Shutter Island and Robert Duvall for Get Low.

Natalie Portman was a bit of a no-brainer pick for her tour de force work in Black Swan in the Actress race, beating out Annette Bening (The Kids Are All Right), Nicole Kidman (Rabbit Hole), Jennifer Lawrence (Winter’s Bone), and Michelle Williams (Blue Valentine).

I was a little surprised to see Bening’s Kids lead costar Julianne Moore left out. Franco’s co-host Anne Hathaway would’ve been a solid choice for her fine work in Love and Other Drugs. The Oscar voters rarely honor comedy, but they could have here with Emma Stone in her hit Easy A, as well.

Supporting Actor honored Christian Bale as Mark Wahlberg’s drug addicted brother in The Fighter. The other nominees were John Hawkes (Winter’s Bone), Jeremy Renner (The Town), Mark Ruffalo (The Kids Are All Right), and Geoffrey Rush (The King’s Speech).

I might have found room for either Andrew Garfield or Justin Timberlake in The Social Network. And keeping the snubbed comedy theme going, here’s an outside the box mention: Rob Corddry for his hilarious work in Hot Tub Time Machine.

The Fighter also won in Supporting Actress with Melissa Leo, who edged out her co-star Amy Adams. The other nominees: Helena Bonham Carter in The King’s Speech, Hailee Steinfeld in True Grit, and Jacki Weaver in Animal Kingdom. The voters could have certainly nominated either Mila Kunis or Barbara Hershey for their roles in Black Swan.

And that’s your Oscar History of 2010, my friends. We’ll get to 2011 soon…

Top 25 Best Movies (1990-2015): Nos. 5-1

This is it, loyal blog readers! We’ve reached the best of the best of my personal favorite 25 motion pictures of the past 25 years. I hope you’ve enjoyed reading my picks and keep in mind that while I know your list likely differs from mine, I would encourage all of you to check out any titles on this here list you may have missed.

Our final installment brings us the top five and these are obviously pictures I hold among the greatest of all time. Let’s get to it:

5. The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

Has any actor done more with less screen time than Anthony Hopkins in his iconic role as Hannibal “The Cannibal” Lecter? I think not. This masterfully constructed suspense thriller deserved the across the board Oscar attention it received – Best Picture, Director (Jonathan Demme), Actor (Hopkins), and Actress (Jodie Foster).

4. The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

21 years later, it doesn’t matter how many times I see Andy Dufrane (Tim Robbins) make his escape past that poster on the wall… it still gives me goosebumps. Frank Darabont’s rendering of Stephen King’s short story is one of the ultimate feel good movies of any era about a man who had to experience years of hell to find redemption. And that moment seeing Andy walk the beach to meet Morgan Freeman’s Red gets me every time, too.

3. Boogie Nights (1997)

Paul Thomas Anderson’s epic about people in the California porn industry came out of nowhere and instantly became one of my all time favorites. The lengthy flick with its incredible cast (Mark Wahlberg, Don Cheadle, Burt Reynolds in career best work, Philip Seymour Hoffman, William H. Macy, John C. Reilly, Julianne Moore, Heather Graham and so forth) moves us from the character’s glorious excesses of the 1970s to their dark spiral downward in the 1980s. The drug dealing scene involving Alfred Molina’s crazed character and Chinese firecrackers that serve as an amazing example of sound effects work is the crowning scene in a film filled with many of them.

2. GoodFellas (1990)

Coppola’s first two Godfather masterpieces stood as the highlight of the American Mafia film genre. In 1990, Martin Scorsese’s GoodFellas made that list a trilogy. Astonishing from beginning to end, this stands as Marty’s finest hour in a career filled with fabulous work.

  1. Pulp Fiction (1994)

Readers of my blog knew this was coming from a mile away and Quentin Tarantino’s time shifting crime drama/comedy served as a massive adrenaline shot to the movie industry. With an unrivaled cast that included a career resurgent role for John Travolta, Pulp merged the sensibilities of mainstream entertainment with the independent filmmaker spirit in a previously unforeseen way. In a career filled with one terrific picture after another, Pulp still stands as Quentin’s greatest. And that makes it the greatest movie of the last 25 years.

Thanks for reading, ladies and gentlemen! It was a pleasure.

Box Office Predictions: November 6-8

The box office doldrums over the past couple of weeks should thankfully come to an end with November’s arrival and the release of two very high profile releases: 24th James Bond pic Spectre and Charlie Brown and company returning in the 3D animated The Peanuts Movie. You can read my detailed individual prediction posts on each here:

https://toddmthatcher.com/2015/10/29/spectre-box-office-prediction/

https://toddmthatcher.com/2015/10/29/the-peanuts-movie-box-office-prediction/

As you’ll see, I have Spectre actually debuting slightly bigger than previous entry Skyfall, though it’s worth noting that some prognosticators have it earning a bit less. We shall see.

The Peanuts Movie should also get off to a sterling start and I expect it to play well into the Thanksgiving season.

The remainder of the top five should be filled with holdover table scraps as the two newbies should dominate the frame.

And with that, my top five predictions for the weekend:

  1. Spectre

Predicted Gross: $91.3 million

2. The Peanuts Movie

Predicted Gross: $43.4 million

3. The Martian

Predicted Gross: $7.7 million (representing a drop of 34%)

4. Goosebumps

Predicted Gross: $6 million (representing a drop of 39%)

5. Bridge of Spies

Predicted Gross: $5.8 million (representing a drop of 31%)

Box Office Results (October 30-November 1)

In a very quiet Halloween weekend at the multiplexes, The Martian retained its #1 spot for the fourth weekend in five frames with $11.7 million (in range with my $10.8M projection) for a total of $183M. The Ridley Scott/Matt Damon collaboration is just the third movie of 2015 to manage a first place showing for 4 weeks (joining American Sniper and Furious 7). Its impressive reign will certainly come to an end with 007 and Snoopy coming in.

Staying in second was Goosebumps with $9.8 million (a bit under my $11.2M estimate) for a solid three week tally of $56M.

Bridge of Spies continued to hold up well from week to week with $8.3 million, on target with my $8.9M projection and its total stands at $45M.

Spots four and five belonged to holdovers that I incorrectly had outside the top five. Hotel Transylvania 2 was fourth with $5.8 million ($156M total gross) and Vin Diesel’s The Last Witch Hunter was fifth with $5.1 million for a weak two weekend total of just $19M.

That’s because the three newcomers that opened all posted less than expected results. Bradley Cooper’s Burnt was sixth with just $5 million, below my $8.9M estimate and represents two flops in a row for the actor after this summer’s Aloha.

Sandra Bullock’s critically panned Our Brand Is Crisis gave the actress the worst wide opening of her career with $3.2 million for eighth place, well below my $7.8M prediction.

And, finally, Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse was dead on arrival for a 12th place showing of $1.8 million, under my $4.2M forecast.

This trio of newcomers represents more October flops in a month full of them, including Steve Jobs, The Last Witch Hunter, Pan, Jem and the Holograms, Rock the Kasbah, Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension, and Crimson Peak.

And that’ll do it for now, folks! Until next time…

Top 25 Best Movies (1990-2015): Nos. 10-6

This evening on the blog, we move to the top ten of my personal favorite 25 pictures of the past generation, from 1990 to now. Not an easy task for sure, but clearly all of these ten titles (top five coming tomorrow) are masterpieces in my book. Let’s get to it:

10. Seven (1995)

David Fincher’s run of terrific movies began with this gut wrenching serial killer tale with Brad Pitt, Morgan Freeman, Gwyneth Paltrow, and a deliciously sadistic Kevin Spacey. The final act of these proceedings represent some of the most intense moments on film I’ve ever witnessed.

9. Up (2009)

Over the last 20 years, the creme de la creme of family entertainment has come from Pixar with the Toy Story franchise, Finding Nemo, The Incredibles, Ratatouille, Wall-E, Inside Out, and so on. To me, their absolute high point is Up. I wrote a post on the blog before discussing the sequence which shows the main character’s romance with his wife throughout her life. It’s one of the most beautifully constructed and emotional montages I’ve ever seen, period.

8. The Social Network (2010)

Back to David Fincher again and here we have his brilliant tale of the founding of Facebook that I contend will stand as one of the most important pictures to explain the time we live in.

7. Almost Famous (2000)

Cameron Crowe’s autobiographical tale of his youth spent at Rolling Stone magazine is one of the ultimate feel good experiences filled with great music and performances. The bus scene set to Elton John’s “Tiny Dancer” is perfect and one of the best examples ever put to film about music advancing the story line.

6. Groundhog Day (1993)

In a career filled with amazing performances, Bill Murray is at his apex in this uproarious and also touching tale of one very long day. It is easily my favorite comedy of the last many years.

And that’ll do it for today and the top five will hit the blog tomorrow!

Knock Knock Movie Review

Eli Roth is certainly one of the modern day architects of the genre dubbed “torture porn” with his popular Hostel series and Knock Knock finds him parodying that kind of pic with decidedly mixed results. This is a campy exercise that is neither very funny with horror aspects that aren’t that frightening. We essentially end up with a cautionary tale about adultery that has been used far better in more serious material.

Speaking of architects, Keanu Reeves is architect Evan. He’s a happily married dude to a lovely Spanish wife and their two perfect kids. The family goes to the beach for the weekend and he stays behind to work (on Father’s Day no less). His dull night is interrupted by a knock at the door and it’s two very attractive young women (Lorenza Izzo and Ana de Armis) who claim they can’t find the party they’re supposed to attend. Naturally, the girls are drenched because it’s atmospherically pouring outside and Evan invites them in to dry off and find proper transportation. Of course, when he orders an Uber, the lag time is 45 minutes and that’s more than enough time for the lovely twosome to seduce Evan into a threesome. As an aside, there’s also enough time for Evan to show off his sweet DJ’ing skills from his former job many years ago.

There is no double walk of shame that follows. Instead Evan awakens to find the girl’s intentions with him are quite sadistic. The tone of Knock Knock becomes increasingly ridiculous as it lumbers along. All performances grow more hammy, including that of Reeves, whose dialogue eventually becomes more and more laughable. I’m fully aware that this is likely by Roth’s own design and there are some bizarre moments that do work. He’s a talented director who revels in B movie cliches, but the one joke premise here can only be stretched so far and the rubber band snaps rather quickly. There’s a lot of guilty behavior in Knock Knock but not much pleasure to be derived.

** (out of four)

In Defense of Timothy Dalton

When Spectre opens this weekend, it will mark the 24th official James Bond adventure and Daniel Craig’s fourth go round as the famed super agent. There is no doubt that Mr. Craig’s time as 007 has been a wildly successful venture and it’s brought the franchise to previously unseen billion dollar heights.

Regarding the general consensus of the six actors who’ve played Bond, the least regarded are typically George Lazenby and Timothy Dalton. Not so coincidentally, they’re the two thespians who played him the least. Lazenby played him just once in 1969’s On Her Majesty’s Secret Service and his mediocre work was crushed under the weight of Sean Connery comparisons, who was the only man at the time to have played him. The generally negative rap on Lazenby is one in which I agree.

With Dalton, it’s a different story in my view. When 1987 came around, it was clear that it was time for Roger Moore to call it a day. 1985’s A View to a Kill found Moore playing 007 at the advanced age of 57. It was a mostly rewarding 12 year run in the role, though the pics themselves varied considerably in quality. Enter Dalton, stepping into Bond’s designer shoes in his mid 40s. Ironically, it has since been revealed that Dalton was originally considered to replace Connery for Secret Service and that even the actor himself felt he was far too young at the time to do it.

The Living Daylights would be his first outing. Two years later, Licence to Kill would be his second and his final. Six years later, after MGM’s financial woes delayed production of new entries, Pierce Brosnan would take over with Goldeneye. And while Brosnan’s four picture time in the part is justifiably regarded as pretty strong, Dalton’s double effort is often not.

Yet when I made the daunting task of watching all 007 flicks in a row in late 2012 to early 2013, I ended that adventure by ranking my preferred Bonds from 1-23. And it turned out that both Daylights and Licence landed in the top ten. Not one Brosnan pic did. Daylights, which stands as a more traditional Bond experience, was 10th. Licence to Kill was 6th, just above the beloved Skyfall. That film  stands alone as less of a normal 007 movie and more of a hard edged late 80s action thriller popularized at the time by the likes of Lethal Weapon and Die Hard. So while 007 purists weren’t enthralled, I found Licence to work exceedingly well in the genre it was borrowing. I believe that it’s the most underrated motion picture of the entire franchise.

As for Dalton himself, he was perfectly serviceable as Bond and I would’ve been curious to see his evolution in a third or fourth entry. It was never to be, but if you re-watch his two performances, there are hints of the darker take on the character that audiences would celebrate with Daniel Craig.

So while many talk of the Timothy Dalton era as a forgettable one, my verdict is that it produced two of the top ten flicks among the 23. That’s not forgettable to me.

The Wolfman Movie Review

Joe Johnston’s The Wolfman is so gloriously rich in its late 19th century English atmosphere that you’ll wish a better film had been placed in it. This is a loose remake of the 1941 Lon Chaney monster affair and finds Universal back in the creature feature business. I simply love the idea of horror flicks set in this Bram Stoker’s Dracula/Sleepy Hollow/From Hell type world. Unfortunately they are all superior to this, but this iteration of The Wolfman is not without its occasional merits.

The pic casts Benicio del Toro as Lawrence Talbot, a famous Shakespearean actor who is summoned to return to his childhood English village after his brother is brutally murdered by some sort of creature that’s terrorizing the area. He gets reacquainted with his strange father (Anthony Hopkins) and meets his brother’s widow (a perpetually sullen looking Emily Blunt). The family dynamic is a focus here, especially with daddy and there’s as much father/son wolfery issues since maybe 1985’s Teen Wolf. Of course, it turns out that a werewolf is doing the damage around town and soon Lawrence finds himself the victim of a bite. Full moons become a problem for him and that means he’s the subject of attention from Hugo Weaving’s Inspector character. This sets up one of The Wolfman’s very well constructed sequences when Lawrence escapes an insane asylum in grand and bloody fashion. By the way, you know when the doctor at a loony bin speaks of the advancements of their medical treatments during a movie set in this era, you’re about to watch something old school and barbaric.

When the freaks come out at night as Whodini would say (the 1980s hip hop group, not the magician), The Wolfman follows the tenets of the genre closely and doesn’t offer up much new. There’s CG special effects that veer between acceptable and shoddy. Del Toro is surprisingly dull in his role, though props go to the filmmakers for keeping his hairy makeup design close to that of Chaney’s from the 40s. It’s really Hopkins who gets to have the fun part and there are glimpses of just how menacing he can be.

The Wolfman also takes awhile to get its motor running and I never shook the feeling that there’s a number of other examples in this genre that worked better. For a lazy night on the couch, this is fairly acceptable entertainment but not much more save for the lovely ambience.

**1/2 (out of four)

Top 25 Best Movies (1990-2015): Nos. 15-11

Onto part three of my personal top 25 motion pictures of the past 25 years and we’re at numbers 15-11. Here they are:

15. Fargo (1996)

The Coen Brothers have been responsible for so many fabulous movies over the last 30 plus years. This violent charcoal black comedy that earned highly deserved Oscars for Frances McDormand and its screenplay is the best one of the bunch.

14. The Fugitive (1993)

There’s been a whole lot of action thrillers based on old TV series, but nothing like this one. Andrew Davis’s thrilling adaptation of the 1960s show with Harrison Ford and Tommy Lee Jones is a perfect example of this genre at its absolute peak.

13. Silver Linings Playbook (2012)

David O. Russell has arguably been putting out the finest films of this ongoing decade and Playbook is the highlight with grade A performances from Jennifer Lawrence, Bradley Cooper, and Robert De Niro in a career resurgent part. The last scene of the movie is perfect.

12. Nixon (1995)

Whether or not it’s historically accurate is a legit argument. What’s not is that Oliver Stone’s take on the Nixon life and presidency is a brilliantly made story of the corruption of power. It tackles the subject on a level close to that of Citizen Kane and Anthony Hopkins is marvelous as the 37th POTUS.

11. Heat (1995)

Michael Mann teaming with Robert De Niro and Al Pacino for a sprawling L.A. based crime thriller. It’s even better than it sounds and the coffee shop scene that pits its generation’s two signature actors together for the first time is movie lover heaven.

And there you have it… we’ll enter the Top Ten tomorrow folks!

Steve Jobs and Its Oscar Problem

When Danny Boyle’s Steve Jobs premiered at the Telluride Film Festival in early September, it immediately vaulted itself into contention as a Best Picture front runner. Nearly two months later, the narrative has shifted and it’s mostly due to the picture’s very lackluster box office numbers. It opened nationwide last weekend to a tepid seventh place $7.1 million placing. This weekend, early numbers show it tumbling approximately 65% for a grand total of around $14 million.

If this trend continues (and it probably will), Jobs will be lucky to make $25 million. That would put it barely above the $16 million earned by Jobs in 2013, where Ashton Kutcher played the Apple founder. It’s worth noting that the Kutcher version had no Oscar buzz whatsoever. Therefore, it’s clear that while moviegoers may like Apple’s products, they don’t like watching films about the guy who started the company.

Let there be no confusion: the bad numbers will affect its chances at a gold statue. Most Best Picture winners make decent money and this one isn’t. In 2009, we did see an exception when The Hurt Locker won with just a $17 million domestic take.

I still believe Jobs will find itself in the mix for a nomination and Michael Fassbender and Kate Winslet should get nods in Actor and Supporting Actress. Yet my earlier inclination that it could win has dissipated. We are already seeing the spotlight turn to, well, Spotlight – the upcoming journalistic expose about the Catholic Church priest abuse scandal. And there’s still Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu’s The Revenant left to screen.

Bottom line: box office numbers do often matter when it comes to Oscar chances and Steve Jobs’s numbers have been going in the wrong dIrection.

Top 25 Best Movies (1990-2015): Nos. 20-16

Today we arrive at part two of my personal top 25 movies of the last generation – 1990 to now and that covers numbers 20-16. Let’s get right to it, shall we?

20. There Will Be Blood (2007)

From master director Paul Thomas Anderson comes this riveting tale of oil and greed at the turn of the 20th century. It features a towering and Oscar winning performance from Daniel Day-Lewis.

19. The Player (1992)

Robert Altman made some incredible pictures in the 1970s and had a career resurgence in the 90s and his pitch black comedy about Hollywood and its superficiality is the best example of it.

18. Kill Bill – Vol I and II (2003/2004)

OK, maybe I cheated a bit here with this actually being two movies, but Quentin Tarantino’s genre hopping master work stands (almost) at the top of his filmography.

17. Being John Malkovich (1999)

Spike Jonze has been making singularly unique films for nearly two decades now and Malkovich is his most rewarding. There’s simply nothing like it and I mean that in a very great way.

16. The Departed (2006)

Martin Scorsese finally earned his Oscar (though he’d been snubbed plenty of times before) for this twisty and deliciously fun and violent crime thriller with a killer cast that included DiCaprio, Damon, Wahlberg, and Nicholson.

And we’ll get to numbers 15-11 tomorrow, readers!