Quick Takes from Summer 2015

Yeah, it hasn't been an especially compelling summer movie season from where I'm standing, so I can count on two hands the total number of 2015 releases I've seen as of this posting.

As usual, I'll inevitably catch up with various titles later on, and when I do I'll often add some brief thoughts in this space. For now I'll start with my impressions of Trainwreck and Ricki and the Flash (female-centred movies are not common enough and they need your admission dollars!) with more to come...

One Category at a Time: Best Original Screenplay

The field looks pretty adaptation-heavy this year, but I spy a few interesting original films with great promise.

The one which will garner many a cinephile's attention this spring is Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life, at long last seeing a theatrical release after years on the shelf. If it impresses enough people to earn a Best Picture berth, as I've predicted, a writing nomination for Malick will likely follow.

But beyond that, I'm not finding a whole lot of original stories this year that immediately scream "Oscar bait". Maybe if independent drama Like Crazy catches on in an appreciable way, it could lead writers Drake Doremus and Ben York Jones to a nomination, but its chances are really no less bankable than any other small-scale dramedies and romances.

An example of one such small-scale dramedy is Jodie Foster's The Beaver, written by Kyle Killen and starring the infamous Mel Gibson. The premise is an intriguing one about an unbalanced man who communicates with the world by way of a beaver-resembling hand puppet. Sounds like there's lots of potential for comedy and interesting character development.

A writer/director combo who managed to successfully woo Oscar before is Diablo Cody and Jason Reitman (Juno), who will try to do so again with Young Adult, starring Charlize Theron as a woman still smitten with a now-married man. Or perhaps another previous Oscar nominee, Sarah Polley (Away From Her), can return to the big dance for Take This Waltz, with Michelle Williams and Seth Rogen.

Predicted five:
The Tree of Life
Like Crazy
Young Adult
The Beaver
Take This Waltz

Also consider: Beginners, The Conspirator, Contagion, Martha Marcy May Marlene, Midnight in Paris, Super 8, The Whistleblower