Review - Fury

It is April, 1945. The second world war draws to an agonizingly bloody close on German soil. Materializing out of a haze of sunlight and gun smoke, a German officer atop a weathered white horse trudges through a scorched battlefield, floating in silence like a ghost amongst the dead bodies and burning debris. There's a sad beauty to this image that greets us at the onset of Fury, steeped in an eerie serenity that the film's title does not suggest.

Naturally, this moment ends in an abrupt and brutal fashion more typical to the rest of this rockem' sockem' war story. Written and directed by David Ayer, many of whose previous films and screenplays (End of Watch, Harsh Times, Training Day) have been gritty studies in rock-hard masculinity, Fury follows the perilous travails of a tank unit as it pushes the Allied advance deeper into enemy territory in the dying days of WWII.

Brad Pitt headlines as Sgt. Don 'Wardaddy' Collier, commander of a 30-ton M4 Sherman tank (the eponymous Fury, whose moniker is scrawled across the cannon barrel as if the bow of a ship) and its testosterone-oozing crew. This includes Shia LaBeouf as its devout trigger man, Michael Peña as its empathetic driver, and Jon Bernthal as its certifiable mechanic. No, not “certified”, “certifiable”.

One Category at a Time: Actor

There will be plenty of suspense leading up to the opening of this envelope on Oscar night. The writing seemed to be on the wall early in the season, but a turning point at the SAG Awards had signaled a tight two-horse race (one made a little less tight by the BAFTAs this past Sunday). The other three nominees will have to sit back and enjoy the show. At least a couple of them can can count themselves lucky that they managed to squeak into the slate when high profile hopefuls Leonardo DiCaprio and Michael Fassbender were somewhat surprisingly shut out along with the films they represented.

My Awards nominations: Actor

Some tough calls for me to make in this category. I wish I could include more that these five Leading Actor nominees:

MICHAEL FASSBENDER in Shame:

A perturbed, methodical portrait of addiction and sexual dependency that commands our attention even when we would rather not look. Fassbender's work keeps us gripped to a film that, frankly, isn't as interesting as his character is. Even during long, uneventful takes, we are fascinated.

JOSEPH GORDON-LEVITT in 50/50:

A superb, controlled performance that maintains the character's typically mellow demeanor but subtly infers the anxiety simmering within. He often has to play the comedic straight man to multiple characters, which he handles perfectly without ever losing sight of his character's emotional journey.

WOODY HARRELSON in Rampart:

A painfully real depiction of an angry, foolish, tormented man in denial about himself and the world he lives in. Harrelson's performance is immersive and lived-in, implying a masterful application of method and a reliance on character-specific instincts.

BRAD PITT in Moneyball:

Some people quibble that there's too much Brad Pitt in his portrayal of Billy Beane. I argue that there's just the right amount of Brad Pitt, whose movie star charisma does indeed gleam through, but never at the expense of his internalization of a man questioning his own worth.

ANDY SEKIS in Rise of the Planet of the Apes:

Serkis, naturally, brings is A-game. His Caesar is one worth hailing; a sensitive, confused, angry soul condemned to the body of a beast. It's his performance that moves and inspires the audience far more than his human costars. Once again, he is deserving of an Oscar nomination he won't receive.

Just missed:
George Clooney in The Descendants, Gary Oldman in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Jean Dujardin in The Artist, Ryan Gosling in Drive, Matthias Schoenaerts in Bullhead

My Awards nominations: Supporting Actor

Supporting Actor:

ALBERT BROOKS in Drive:

Brooks finds the seedy darkness inside an outwardly affable facade that makes his villainous mob boss all the more threatening.

ROBERT FORSTER in The Descendents:

Even though he only appears in a couple of scenes, the impact he leaves is palpable. The only way he knows how to cope with the grief of his daughter's inevitable death is bitterness and anger, but we can sense his love and his hurt.

EZRA MILLER in We Need to Talk About Kevin:

We don't get much exposure to Miller (as the older Kevin) until halfway through the movie, but once he's there he carries a ubiquitous presence that you can't shake. His depiction of a disturbed youth is as unsettling as they come.

BRAD PITT in The Tree of Life:

With a galvanic performance that bests any other of his career, Pitt becomes the personified embodiment of Mallick's idea of Nature; raw, unrelenting, pure, instinctive. It's hard to play an abstract theme instead of an arc, but Pitt nails it.

CHRISTOPHER PLUMMER in Beginners:

Plummer's warm portrayal of dying man finally finding his identity in his last year of life is as inspiring as it is sad; a masterful stroke that blends the joy of his character's sexual liberation with the sorrow of knowing his own mortality.

Just missed:
Hugo Weaving in Captain America, Ben Kinsgley in Hugo, Nick Nolte in Warrior,
Patton Oswalt in Young Adult

New York Film Critics crown 'The Artist'

In a rather attention-grabbing move, the New York Film Critics Circle had decided some time back to preempt the National Board of Review this year and be the first major critics group out of the gate with their year-end awards. Although you can hardly call them "year-end", seeings as they're coming to us a full month before the year ends, and well before most audiences have even had a chance to see their pick for Best Picture and Director; Michael Hazanavicius' silent film homage The Artist. I have no comment. How could I? I haven't even seen it yet!

I'll only briefly comment on how silly I think it is for them to do this so soon. What's the rush? Seriously.

I do dig the support for Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life, which won awards for Brad Pitt's & Jessica Chastain's performances (coupled with their performances in Moneyball & The Help/Take Shelter respectively) and for Emmanual Lubezki's cinematography.

All winners after the cut.

Review - Moneyball

Like the game of baseball itself, Bennett Miller's Moneyball is mostly a slow-moving affair that picks up here and there, but carries a payoff that's well worth it for those who stuck the whole thing out.

Brad Pitt stars as Billy Beane, player-turned-scout-turned-GM whose promising MLB career fell through and left him embittered towards the whole system. He despairs that the league is governed by a financial hierarchy that sees the rich teams get richer and the poor teams (specifically his own Oakland As) get poorer, and he's equally cynical about the archaic scouting philosophy faithfully practiced by his older staff. Naturally, he's intrigued by the number-crunching sabermetrics of recent Yale graduate Pete Brand (Jonah Hill), a system that emphasizes statistical player projections for runs and wins while minimizing cost. It flies in the face of conventional wisdom about drafting superstar players, but Beane, unsatisfied with what he considers an unaccomplished life, is willing and eager to rock the boat.

Review - The Tree of Life

Note: I found it unavoidable to properly compose my thoughts on the film without divulging mild SPOILERS. Not that a non-narrative-driven movie like this one lends itself so easily to spoiling, but I would still encourage you to see it and mold your own interpretation before indulging mine.

“Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth... when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy?” Such is the Old Testament query that prefaces Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life, arguably the elusive master's most thought-provoking – and certainly his most artistically ambitious – effort to date; a flawed, painterly masterpiece that explores in broad, bold strokes mankind's search for God and the fluid relation between Nature and Grace.

The aforementioned question, posed by God to the long-suffering Job, seems to make the point that one man's tribulations are trivial, petty even, in the grand scheme of things; a mere thread in the pattern of the grand design (to paraphrase Stephen Schwartz). Initially, this line of thought appears to be Malick's driving principle. He introduces us to his story's everyman incarnations of Job, the O'Brien family. The sweet mother (Jessica Chastain) and strict father (Brad Pitt) mourn the passing of their 19-year-old son. We also meet their eldest son Jack some decades later (played here by Sean Penn) reflecting on the anniversary of his brother's death. It is here that Malick proposes, perhaps facetiously, that one's life takes either the path of Grace – loving, gentle, and clearly represented in the form of the O'Brien matriarch – or Nature – raw, pure, and clearly represented in the form of the O'Brien patriarch. Where does Jack fit in? Grace? Nature? Oddly enough, the reactions of the O'Brien parents to the news of their son's death are contradictory to Malick's designations, whereby it's Mrs. O'Brien who collapses with natural, heart-wrenching agony, while Mr. O'Brien adopts a more silent, filtered sorrow. Are Grace and Nature so cut and dry?

One Category at a Time: Best Picture (part 2)

As attested by those who attended it this past February, the Sundance Film Festival apparently did not offer up much in the way of Oscar fodder this year. But one that did turn some heads, especially for its breakout star Felicity Jones, is Like Crazy, a romantic drama about a British woman separated from her American lover upon expiration of her student visa. You may as well consider this prediction a placeholder for whatever small independent film happens to win the Academy's favour this year. There's always at least one (probably two, with ten slots open).

This past year's Oscar winner for Best Adapted Screenplay, Aaron Sorkin, may be back in the race sooner than we'd expect for Moneyball. He and Steve Zaillian, another past winner of Adapted Screenplay, have fashioned a script from the non-fiction book by Michael Lewis about how Oakland Athletic's general manager Billy Beane assembled a competitive team on a shoestring budget by employing analytical statistic methods. I'll admit it doesn't exactly sound rivetting, but neither did the origin story of Facebook, and we all saw how well Sorkin's take on that turned out. The film will be directed by Bennett Miller (nominated five years ago for Capote) and star Brad Pitt.

Let's not forget the reason the Best Picture field was expanded to ten nominees in the first place; to make room for critically-respected blockbusters. That said, it's quite conceivable there might not be any films that fit the bill this year, given how many sequels and superhero movies there are, but one original premise that already has the Internet abuzz with a titillating trailer is Super 8, from J.J. Abrams, whose Star Trek only just missed out on a Best Picture nomination last year. I'm not at all confident in this prediction. It'll need positive reviews to even stand a chance.

I've been predicting Terrence Malick's The Tree of Life for three consecutive years now, only for it to continue to linger in distribution limbo. Finally, this Spring, at long last, it will see the light of day, and I must say I'm excited. But will expectations be too high? Cinephiles have been waiting a long time to see this film. Can it survive after literally years of extended hype? And even so, is it the Academy's type of movie? I'm hoping for the best.

Steven Spielberg hasn't been a Best Picture nominee since Letter from Iwo Jima, but he could be back next year with another Academy friendly movie called War Horse, which tells the story of a young man who follows his beloved horse into World War I after it is sold to the cavalry. Nearly all the same department heads from Saving Private Ryan have joined up with Spielberg on this one, giving it massive across-the-board potential, and that sentimental storyline can only help matters.

Take these ten predictions lightly. It's just a shot in the dark. If even four of these make it into the Big Ten, I'll consider myself successful.

Predicted ten:
A Dangerous Method
The Descendants
The Help
The Ides of March
The Iron Lady
Like Crazy
Moneyball
Super 8
The Tree of Life
War Horse

Also consider: Albert Nobbs, The Beaver, The Conspirator, Coriolanus, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Jane Eyre, One Day, Water for Elephants, We Bought a Zoo, We Need to Talk About Kevin, The Whistleblower, Winnie, Wuthering Heights, Young Adult.