Review - Gone Girl

“You don't know what you've got 'til it's...” the tagline for Gone Girl ominously forebodes. That common phrase takes on twisted new meaning in this hotly-awaited thriller from David Fincher, which opens with the voiceover of a man confessing how he wishes he could know what his wife's thinking; pick her brain; see what's on her mind – all worded with a queasy skull-cracking metaphor designed to unsettle us right off the bat. He truly won't know what he's got until she's gone, and when he finds out, he'll wish he never asked.

Like the vanished woman to whom the title refers, Gone Girl has quite a lot – too much, in fact – on its mind. Based on the best-selling pulp novel by Gillian Flynn (who also adapted it for the screen), it's a movie that aspires to be many movies at once, but does not fully succeed at being any of them.

Oscar Postmortem Pt. 1: Overview

Well, the 85th Annual Academy Awards came and went, putting a cap on what has been one of the most unusual awards seasons in recent memory. To no one's surprise, Ben Affleck's Argo was crowned the Best Picture of 2012, also taking expected prizes for Chris Terrio's screenplay and William Goldenberg's editing.

One Category at a Time: Director

For an Oscar year as weird as this one to ultimately yield another no-brainer Best Picture winner (from where we stand, at least) is a bit disappointing. Thankfully, all the uncertainty and unpredictability that was once thought to cloud the Best Picture race has instead been concentrated into the competition for Best Director, which is up for grabs in Ben Affleck's conspicuous absence.

In recent years with a Best Picture/Best Director split, Best Director has often gone to the presumed runner-up for Best Picture as a sort of consolation prize. To cite the examples, it certainly seems like Brokeback Mountain, The Pianist, and Traffic all came about as close to winning Best Picture as you can get without actually winning. But it begs the question: Which movie is in the runner-up position? Will that even matter?

Busy night for industry kudos with DGA, ADG, and Annie Awards

Oh what a night. Lots of precursor announcements to parse through, the biggest of which was the Director Guild of America, awarding their top prize to Ben Affleck for his Oscar hopeful Argo. At this point it can hardly be called a surprise to see Affleck picking up more hardware, especially after last weekend's PGA and SAG victories. Indeed, it could be that his Best Director "snub" by the Academy turns out to be one of the biggest deceptions in recent Oscar history, because it's looking like Argo may have been the unbeatable frontrunner all along. Time will tell.

In the documentary category, Malik Bendjelloul continued his awards season sweep for Searching for Sugar Man, likely on way to the Oscar. I liked the movie, but is it too much to ask the film industry to spread the wealth a little bit. There were other good documentaries this year, y'know.

My Award nominations: Picture/Director

Well, here they are. My five faves of the year (actually six including my lone director nominee). It's been a strong year, with lots of singular artistic achievements.

There are only 24 days left until the Oscars, which gives me just enough time to start running down predictions one category at a time. The first of those will land later today.

For now, check out my top films after the cut:

Why and Why Not Argo?

What a bizarre and fascinating awards season it's been so far. Even before the season truly began in December, it was apparent that this would be the most tightly contested Oscar race in recent memory. But the date change for nominations added another layer of nuance onto the proceedings.

Without the benefit of the DGA's nominees to guide them, the Academy's directors branch voted with their hearts, and yielded a pair of refreshingly unexpected Best Director nominees upon which future generations are destined to look back and smile with approval. But it yielded one unfortunate omission which has now thrown the season into flux. Funny how one little "snub" can so entirely muddy the waters of Oscar prognostication.

Funny also how it can so fervently stoke the fires of debate. Across the Internet we're seeing writers and pundits making heated arguments (some coloured by more than just a little personal bias) as to why Argo will, or why Argo won't, win Best Picture in just under a month's time.

So, why Argo?

Golden Globes recap

Ben Affleck's Argo triumphed in Best Director and Best Picture at the Golden Globes, making good on the buzz it had accummulated before it disipated upon last Thursday's Academy snub for Directing. I think we still need to consider it a legit contender for the big prize, even without that important Directing nod. It'll pull in lots of #2 and #3 votes, a huge plus with the preferential ballot.

Over in the Musical/Comedy category, I was thrilled to see Les Mis triumph when most had written the category off as an obligatory win for Silver Linings Playbook. The divisive musical also won for Anne Hathaway (expected) and Hugh Jackman (less expected, but very welcome).

The biggest moment of the night, however, came from Jodie Foster, who "officially" came out while accepting her Cecil B. DeMille Award. NBC seemed to prudishly mute that portion of her speech, but they couldn't silence the main message. She also waxed philosophic on lack of privacy in celebrity life and loneliness in her middle age. It was a rapidly fired off speech, but it felt vaguely significant. I'd love to listen to it again.

As for the show itself, hosts Tina Fey and Amy Poehler killed it. Their opening dialogue landed big laughs, and despite being sadly underused throughout the rest of the evening, they clearly set a high bar for Seth MacFarlane to try and top in six weeks' time.

Full list of movie winners after the cut.

Golden Globes live blog

So yeah, like everyone else on the net, I'll be live-blogging the Golden Globes when they begin in about three and a half hours time. Check back for updates throughout the evening.

7:33 - Usual banter on the red carpet. The women look cold. Apparently it's chilly out on the West coast tonight.

7:53 - Got my laptop. Got my port. Let's get this party started.

7:55 - Shameless Quartet plug by Dustin Hoffman. Supose I shouldn't prejudge (but I heard it's awful).

8:04 - "When it comes to torture, I trust the women who spent three years married to James Cameron" ZING! Fey and Poeller were great. Laughed at almost every joke.

8:09 - Supporting Actor: Goes to... Christoph Waltz in  Django Unchained. Weinstein at work, as always.

Critics Choice Awards

It never rains. It pours. The very day that Oscar nominations drop, the BFCA decide to hold their own shindig. The winner was Ben Affleck's Argo, taking Best Picture and Director, but nothing else. A fine choice, but clearly the BFCA did not see coming this morning's surprise Oscar snub for Affleck in Best Director, otherwise they would totally have jumped ship and gone for Lincoln. This is a group that seems intent on anticipating the Academy Awards year in and year out, and had their voting taken place later after the Oscar nods, I think it would have spelled a different story.

So Affleck and company can take this as a bittersweet consolation prize, I guess. The four acting triumvirates were the same that critics have been lining up behind all season: Day-Lewis, Chastain, Hoffman, and Hathaway. But I don't know if all of these will match up with Oscar.

Winners after the cut:

Directors Guild nominees

The DGA has confirmed what most prognosticators have been assuming are the top five films in the hunt for Best Picture; the directors of Argo, Les Miserables, Life of Pi, Lincoln, and Zero Dark Thirty were all nominated by the huge guild who often serve as a Best Picture bellwether. Mind you, that may not be the case this year since this precursor comes after the Academy's voting deadline, but it still serves as a good indication of what the industry at-large thinks.

Ben Affleck, Kathryn Bigelow, and Steven Speilberg were all presumed safe bets for DGA nods. The only suspense (minor, at that) came in anticipating whom of Ang Lee, Tom Hooper, Quentin Tarantino, or David O. Russell would take the other two. So Les Mis fans can breathe a sigh of relief [phew!!!], as Hooper's nomination shores up the musical's hopes of actually winning Best Picture, but this doesn't necessarily mean he'll be nominated by AMPAS' directors branch, which is much smaller than the DGA. I may as well predict a five-for-five match up, but to see either Lee or Hooper replaced by any of Russell, Tarantino, the Andersons (Wes and P.T.), or even Michael Haneke would not surprise me.

DGA nominees
Ben Affleck for Argo
Kathryn Bigelow for Zero Dark Thirty
Tom Hooper for Les Miserables
Ang Lee for Life of Pi
Steven Spielberg for Lincoln

Review - Argo

As though his first two features Gone, Baby, Gone and The Town weren't proof enough, Argo provides further evidence of Ben Affleck's continued maturation as a skillful, no-nonsense director. Falling into the unimpeachable category of “a good story, well told”, Argo is a near perfect Hollywood dramatization of a true story, deftly balancing tight thrills, human drama, and comic relief within a hugely entertaining and satisfying picture.

Starting off with a very brief history of Iran's political turmoil in the mid-to-late 70s, Affleck proceeds to drop us into a riveting opening sequence of a civilian mob storming the American embassy, brilliantly splicing together archived news footage with meticulously recreated shots (this scene alone is enough to justify William Goldenberg walking away with next year's Oscar for Best Film Editing). Intent on taking hostages so that the U.S. will relinquish the detested Shah who is being harboured stateside, the revolutionaries capture all but six embassy employees, who slip out the back and seek shelter at the house of the Canadian ambassador (Victor Garber). To prevent the unaccounted-for six from being hunted down and executed as spies, the CIA rushes to enact and escape plan. Dissatisfied with his colleagues' suggestions, special agent Tony Mendez (Affleck) comes up with an unlikely strategy to smuggle out the fugitives; as a Canadian film crew on a location scout for a sci-fi movie.