My 2011 Award winners

You've seen the nominees. Time to see my winners:

Best Picture:
THE TREE OF LIFE (Dede Gardner, Sarah Green, Grant Hill, Brad Pitt, Bill Pohlad, Terrence Malick)

Best Director:
TERRENCE MALICK, THE TREE OF LIFE

Best Actor:
BRAD PITT, MONEYBALL

Best Actress:
TILDA SWINTON, WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN

Best Supporting Actor:
CHRISTOPHER PLUMMER, BEGINNERS

Best Supporting Actress:
JESSICA CHASTAIN, THE HELP

Best Acting Ensemble:
A SEPARATION

Best Original Screenplay:
MIDNIGHT IN PARIS (Woody Allen)

Best Adapted Screenplay:
THE IDES OF MARCH (George Clooney, Grant Heslov, Beau Willimon)

Best Cinematography:
THE TREE OF LIFE (Emmanuel Lubezki)

Best Film Editing:
DRIVE (Matthew Newman)

Best Original Score:
WAR HORSE (John Williams)

Best Original Song:
“HELL AND BACK” from Hell and Back Again (J. Ralph)

Best Production Design, Set Decoration, and Art Direction:
HUGO (Dante Feretti, Francesca Lo Shiavo)

Best Costume Design:
CAPTAIN AMERICA (Anna B. Sheppard)

Best Sound Mixing:
WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN (Ken Ishii, Paul Davies, Robert Farr)

Best Sound Editing:
THE ADVENTURES OF TINTIN (Brent Burge, Chris Ward, Dave Whitehead)

Best Visual Effects:
RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES (Richard Darwin, Joe Letteri, Dan Lemmon, Chris White)

Best Makeup and Hair:
THE IRON LADY (Mark Coulier, Marese Langan)

Best Animated Feature:
CHICO & RITA (Fernando Treuba et.al.)

Best Foreign Film:
A SEPARATION (Asghar Farhadi)

Best Documentary:
HELL AND BACK AGAIN (Danfung Dennis)

That makes four wins for The Tree of Life, and two wins apiece for Hell and Back Again, A Separation, We Need to Talk About Kevin, and Chico & Rita.

My Awards nominations for 2011

Here's a one-stop recap of my own annual awards. I'll post the winners tomorrow.

The nomination leaders are Drive & We Need to Talk About Kevin with 8 apiece, The Tree of Life with 6, and Hell and Back Again, The Help, & A Separation with 5 apiece.

Best Picture
Drive
Hell and Back Again
A Separation
The Tree of Life
We Need to Talk About Kevin

My Awards nominations: Actress

Not as packed as last year's stellar slate, but I still had some tough decisions to make Here are the five Leading Actresses who made the cut:

VIOLA DAVIS in The Help:

Davis' subdued expressiveness communicates a great deal of fear and sadness, but also a gradual self-realization and growing estem which gives the character her arc. Her exposition of backstory carefully seeps through even when it's not yet there on the page.

ROONEY MARA in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo:

Mara is gripping and magnetic as the misanthropic investigator who can dish it out as bad as she gets it, if not worse. The performance is mannered, distinctive, and ballsy. Mara embraces Salander's emotional maladjustment with alarming confidence, which is what makes her so fun to watch!

ELIZABETH OLSEN in Martha Marcy May Marlene:

Olsen is superbly ambiguous, every facial tick revealing unspoken anguish and uncertainty. Her internalization of an indoctrinated mind at war with itself informs her external struggle to reassimilate with her family and society, which feels painfully authentic as a result.

TILDA SWINTON in We Need to Talk About Kevin:

Swinton is becoming the anti-Meryl-Streep in that she's giving awards worthy performances every year that never seem to get awards attention. That'll hopefully change with this quietly controlled turn. She owns every moment with her subtle command of understated but deep-running emotion.

CHARLIZE THERON in Young Adult:

Theron's thorny, darkly comedic portrayal of an alcoholic, emotionally juvenille trash novelist teems with precise, bitchy mannerisms. She paints a caustic collage of depression, anxiety, and severe psychological immaturity; a woman (rather, girl?) drowning in her own bitterness.

Just missed: Glenn Close in Albert Nobbs, Stephanie Sigman in Miss Bala,
Meryl Streep in The Irion Lady, Michelle Williams in My Week with Marilyn

My Awards nominations: Sound Mixing

My nominations for the best Sound Mixing of 2011 go to:

Drive (Robert Eber, Robert Fernandez, Dave Paterson):

The squeeling rubber and breaking glass of the action scenes are well handled, but its the suspenseful moments of silence, with only Cliff Martinez's tonal score boring through, that really get me. Oh, and the opening scene = perfect.

Transformers: Dark of the Moon
(Peter J. Devlin, Jeffrey J. Haboush, Greg P. Russell, Gary Summers):

Employing a sophisticated 7.1 surround-sound canvas, they somehow manage to lend sonic cognizance to Bay's visual cacophony with astonishing clarity and formidable bombast, KA-BAYs and all.

The Tree of Life
(Craig Berkey, Kirk Francis, Jeremy Peirson, John Pritchett, Christopher Scarabosio):

The extended creation sequence is the most obvious showcase of the sound in this film, but I also like how the voice-over narrations were blended in to yield an ethereal sonic quality that felt both natural and graceful.

War Horse (Tom Johnson, Andy Nelson, Gary Rydstrom, Stuart Wilson):

They may have amplified the music a tad beyond what was needed, but their handling of the battle and action segments more than compensates, immersing us in a variety of distinct sounds all in their right place.

We Need to Talk About Kevin (Paul Davies, Robert Farr, Ken Ishii):

Surely the film's most under-appreciated aspect, this ingenious sound mix is as essential to creating Eva's messy memories as the photography or editing. Sound takes on narrative meaning, becoming a device of foreshadowing and flashback before we even know it.

Just missed: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Hanna, Harry Potter,
Hell and Back Again, MI4, Tintin

My Awards nominations: Cinematography

My nominees for Cinematography are:

Drive (Newton Thomas Sigel):

L.A. is sleekly conveyed through Sigel's luminous photography; a mesmerizing display of soft lighting and focus to offset the brutality of the content.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Jeff Cronenweth):

The film may be an empty exercise in style, but such style! The green-saturated coloration fits the murky story nicely. Some experimental shots work well.

Midnight in Paris (Darius Khondji, Johanne Debas):

The midnight sequences are beautifully shot with warm, textured lighting, before jolting us back into Gil's painful present with the hard, bright light of day.

The Tree of Life (Emmanuel Lubezki):

Be it the indelible vastness of an otherworldly shore, or the minute delicacy of a floating butterfly, Lubezki's compositions are lush and hypnotic.

We Need to Talk About Kevin (Seamus McGarvey):

McGarvey captures Eva's adhesive guilt through dozens of arresting (if not subtle) images symbolic of bloodstained hands with deep, cascading reds.

Just missed: The Artist, Bullhead, Hell and Back Again, Hugo, War Horse,
Miss Bala, Moneyball, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Martha Marcy May Marlene

My Awards nomination: Film Editing

I rather the liked the variety and quality of Film Editing I saw on screen this year, but if I had to settle on five (which I did) they would be:

Beginners (Olivier Bugge Coutte):

Perfect handling of minimalist comic beats and soft-spoken drama, seamless back-and-forth between past and present.

Drive (Matthew Newman):

More varied and interesting than you'd expect of a crime thriller, making excellent use of dissolves and cross-fading, plus slow motion for suspense.

Moneyball (Christopher Tellefesen):

Finds interesting rhythms in scenes that might otherwise come across as mundane.

Warrior
(Sean Albertson, Matt Chesse, John Gilroy, Aaron Marshall):

Evenhanded presentation of multiple story arcs in the first half. The fight sequences owe their stirring effect to the dizzying shot selections.

We Need to Talk About Kevin (Joe Bini):

The evocation of Eva's frazzled recollections is a stellar editing showcase, excellent transitions between her present and her memories.

Just missed:
The Artist, Moneyball, Senna, Super 8, Tintin, The Tree of Life

My Awards nominations: Adapted Screenplay

Strong crop this year. Here's what I deem the best Adapted Screenplays of the year:

Drive (Hossein Amini):
The irrepressibility of one's true nature is a theme that's startlingly made in Drive. Amini minimizes dialogue and focuses more on implied backstory to illustrate the driver's character.

The Ides of March (George Clooney, Grant Heslov, Beau Willimon):
Clooney et. al. realize that making the actual politics the meat of this story would either alienate or bore their audience, so they wisely keep it on the side, keeping the screenplay lean, polished, and efficient.

Moneyball (Steve Zaillian, Aaron Sorkin, Stan Chervin):
While not one that always pops, the script does brim with ideas. The dialogue willfully revels in awkward beats that force unspoken characterization. Anyone who can make baseball stats interesting has to be a good writer!

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (Bridget O'Connor, Peter Straughan):
This is a thoughtful and attentive screenplay that intentionally moves a bit slowly, but at least it allows its audience time to process all the little narrative cogs that compose the complex plot.

We Need to Talk About Kevin (Lynne Ramsay, Rory Kinnear):
The book's more objective narration is translated into a brilliant first-person character study that comes tinted with its character's guilt and confusion. Cleverly structured as a pseudo mystery.

Just missed: The Help, Project Nim, Tintin

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

Review - We Need to Talk About Kevin

They say there's no greater grief than that of a mother who loses her child, but what about that of a mother who is hated by her child? In We Need to Talk About Kevin, Lynne Ramsay uses bold cinematic strokes to immerse us in the guilt, anguish, and confusion of a woman whose son holds an inexplicable personal vendetta against her, leading up to an atrocity that shatters more than just her life.

Tilda Swinton plays Eva, a practically catatonic woman struggling to lead a normal life in the wake of a hinted-at tragedy that left her without her family and reviled by her community. Through her daily drudgery she comes across sights and sounds that trigger memories that inform us about how she came to her current pitiable station. At first, the recollections are a vague but vivid wash of colour and sound; deep reds cascade across the screen while sirens and lawn sprinklers bleed in and out of the soundtrack.