Furthermore, many better films were overlooked by the Academy. Where is 50/50, an emotional, nuanced and finely acted film about dealing with cancer? Beginners told a unique story about the grief and freedom that can spring from the death of a loved one. And the Academy could have done worse than nominate Bridesmaids as best film; in fact, they did do worse by honoring several mawkish films rather than recognizing well-earned laughs. (At least Bridesmaids got a screenplay nomination, though this looks like a consolation prize when you consider the seeming inevitability of Woody Allen’s Midnight in Paris.)
Here is my take on the nine nominated films, ranking them in ascending order. While I loved my top two, I hope Oscar does a tad better next year. First, let’s look at the first three films that make up the bottom third of the list.
9. War Horse — Early in this tearjerker about a lovable horse sent into battle, there is a scene filmed with much drama, vivid camera angles and triumphant John Williams music. What has the protagonist done? Why, he plowed a field! Such is the overwrought emotion contained in this film by Steven Spielberg. (Really, would this film have been nominated if it were attached to a different director?) Yes, I got teary at the end, but I felt I had been emotionally bludgeoned in the process. Someone told me that she believed Spielberg didn’t trust his audience, so he had overplayed his hand. Point taken.
8. The Tree of Life — “You either love this film or hate it,” a respected friend and fellow cineaste told me. Well, count me among the haters. Yes, the elusive and reclusive Terrence Malick’s film has beautiful sweeping images set to music, but so does a screen saver. And both of these lack an element crucial to good filmmaking: a narrative. Why was Sean Penn, apparently a son of the abusive Brad Pitt character, moping around the film? Why did Jessica Chastain’s character of the mother appear not so much as a person but as some idealized vision of maternity? I give Malick some props for at least trying to tell his tale in a unique cinematic voice, but in the end neither I nor the audience with whom I saw it understood him.
7. Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close — This film completes our trifecta of works that seem to seem to shout, “This is an emotional film! Pay attention to the cues I’m giving you!” Lead character Oskar Schell has suffered an unimaginable tragedy, losing his father, played by Tom Hanks in flashback, in the 9/11 attack. But instead of heartbreak, we get little Oskar traveling at breakneck pace from one New York City locale to another, trying to decipher a posthumous message from his father. He encounters characters that are unlikely (read: unbelievable and illogical), such as the mute known only as The Renter, and an estranged couple, played with more conviction by Jeffrey Wright and Viola Davis than this film deserved. The fatal flaw here is the unrelenting quirkiness, which distracted me from the message. I found this movie extremely idiosyncratic & incredibly pretentious.
6. The Help —The Help centers on a group of African American women in the mid-20th century South who took one of the few jobs accessible to them — that of domestic help — and fulfilled it with conviction. One day, their lives, and those of their employers, are turned over and around by a book that uncovers their hidden feelings. Of all the vivid characters, perhaps the two who best anchor the film are the mischievous but strong Minny (Octavia Spencer) and Aibileen (Viola Davis), who is more reserved, but wears her pride, dignity and fatigue visibly on her passive face. Though The Help doesn’t break any cinematic ground, it is the most superbly acted film of the season.
5. The Descendants — As he did in 2004 with Sideways, Alexander Payne strikes gold once again with this offbeat movie that offers well-defined characters in an unusual setting (Hawaii? Really?). Two years ago, I called George Clooney “this generation’s answer to Cary Grant” after his performance in Up in the Air, and damn if the guy just doesn’t keep delivering. He is ably assisted by a wonderful supporting cast (Beau Bridges, Judy Greer, Matthew Lillard and Robert Forster), most notably Shailene Woodley, who plays Clooney’s deceptively wise young daughter who alerts her father to her mother’s betrayal of him, while she lies in a coma. While The Descendants doesn’t give us any cinematic fireworks, I expect its perceptive and witty script to pick up Best Adapted Screenplay.
4. Midnight in Paris —Woody Allen has his best box office in 45 years, and I suggest that he did so partly by borrowing from Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar. Midnight in Paris is about Gil, a struggling writer (played by Owen Wilson as an Allen stand-in), who discovers that when the clock strikes 12 on a Parisian side street, he is whisked back to the 1920s, the so-called “Jazz Age.” Not only does he escape his shrewish fiancé and her overbearing parents, he finds inspiration in the likes of Ernest Hemingway, Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, Gertrude Stein, Picasso and others. Like Almodóvar, Allen incorporates magic realism to achieve this bit of cinematic sleight-of-hand. Allen the director works thriftily, bringing the movie in at a tidy 90 minutes. Midnight in Paris shows that the Woodman still has a good film in him and he should receive a Best Original Screenplay Oscar for it.
3. Moneyball — Boy, did I not expect to like this movie. It seemed destined to be talky, describing the arcane mathematical principles that manager Billy Beane used to build a winning baseball team in Oakland, California. But Oscar winners Aaron Sorkin and Steve Zaillian whittled the source material (a book by Michael Lewis) down to its essential elements. Then director Bennett Miller added much needed of economy, moving the film along at an entertaining pace, which made even a mundane winning streak exciting to watch. In the end, Moneyball is anchored by an intelligent and deceptively easy-going performance by Brad Pitt as Beane. By giving us less, we got more, especially compared to the bloat that is evident in the films that rank at the bottom of this list of nominees.
It was tough to pick my favorite film from these last two. As it turned out, it came down to movies that appeal to my love for movies themselves. But here goes…
2. The Artist — This movie begins with us as part of a theater audience. The films in The Artist appeal to our wonder by stripping away basic technical developments—color, visual effects and sound. Director and writer Michel Hazanavicius helps us remember how, in a dark room and using persistence of vision, we get magic. Hazanavicius’s work, I truly believe that the film ultimately succeeds atop the broad, athletic shoulders of Jean Dujardin. He portrays the mature titular star, George Valentin, with a smile and a charm that belies his age. (Valentine resembles the crusty Warner Baxter of 42nd Street, but out of character, actor Dujardin is much younger.) It appears that the film and the director will walk away winners, but if there is any justice, Dujardin will also be crowned Best Actor.
1. Hugo — The Artist stripped movies down to their original silence, and that single conceit helped make it an excellent and memorable film. But in the end, Hugo works better for me because master Martin Scorsese used so many more elements into it. First, the director used 3-D for the first time, and it was a storytelling tool for him, not just a cheesy gimmick. He also incorporated superior production design and animatronics. Second, Hugo is Scorsese’s first film for children, and who would have guessed that after Taxi Driver, Raging Bull and other such violent works. Finally, look at the message of this film: Scorsese states forcefully that films are magical, very largely because of the work of pioneers like Georges Méliès, who saw the possibilities in this novelty item. He also makes his case for film preservation, warning us in an entertaining way that this vanishing legacy needs to be preserved. For this expression of a personal vision by a master craftsman who is still at the top of his game after many years, I found Hugo to be the best of this year’s Oscar nominees.
I welcome your comments. In the meantime, this is our annual reminder to enjoy the movies, which remains one of our most accessible art forms. Enjoy the ceremony on Sunday night.
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