In our third pass of the Oscar nominees from 1997 through 2016, we take a look at the nominees for Best Actress. Each week, we’ll present a list of contenders from which you can select five to make up the Best Original Song slate. There will be an “Other” option, but you can only use this once and you’ll have to specify your other in the comments. Now on to the game: Best Original Song.
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(September 16, 2018) Original
September 21, 2018
From IMDb: “Music collector Ollie Sway recruits his only friend, a rowdy Russian drifter, to help him steal a 78 record from his own family’s estate.”
Review: There was no poster immediately available for my review. Should one become available in the future, this section will be updated.
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Review: The trailer tries very hard to feel like some indie vision, a dramatic exploration of a son’s lost parent and the impact that has on his behavior, which might not be terribly different than his normal attitude considering what we’re introduced in the trailer.
None.
Born February 9, 1892 in Brooklyn, New York, Mary Margaret (Peggy) Wood was the daughter of journalist Eugene Wood and telegraph operator Mary Gardner Wood. A lilting soprano, she began taking singing lessons at the age of 8 and made her stage debut at 18 in a production of Naughty Marietta. She made her Broadway debut the following year in The Three Romeos.
Alternating between musicals and classic dramas, Wood starred in 1917’s Maytime in which she introduced the song “Will You Remember (Sweetheart)”. She made her film debut in 1919’s Almost a Husband but it did not lead to a sustained film career. Married to poet and writer John Weaver in 1924, they had a son David, born in 1927. Both were both members of the famed Algonquin Round Table. One of her most memorable Broadway roles was as Portia in a 1928 Broadway production of The Merchant of Venice. In 1929 Noel Coward wrote Bitter Sweet for her, which she played both in London and New York. That same year she co-stared on screen with Lewis Stone and Leila Hyams in Wonder of Women which was nominated for an Academy Award for writing at the second awards ceremony.
Wood’s next film was 1934’s Handy Andy in which she played Will Rogers’ wife. She appeared in several other films in the 1930s including The Right to Live, A Star Is Born and The Housekeeper’s Daughter. Her husband died of tuberculosis in 1938 at the age of 44.
(September 16, 2018) Original
November 23, 2018
From IMDb: “A family of small-time crooks take in a child they find on the street.”
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Review: This is how you give a slice of life concept some actual life. Although it’s still a fairly plain design, it’s not less interesting because of it.
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Review: Great word has exited the festival circuit on this film, but the trailer doesn’t quite enliven those high expectations. It still feels like a gentle and modestly appealing drama, but it’s hard to see where the praise is coming from with this particular design.
It could be a major Oscar player for Best Foreign Language Film, but outside of that, i don’t think it has much chance.
Let’s take a look back at our prior preview and see where we were right, wrong, and everything in between.
Oscar Prospects: What I said: “None.”
Oscar Results: Still None.
Box Office Prospects: $65 M
Box Office Expectations: What I Said: “Uncertain. R-rated comedies have had a hit-or-miss relationship with the box office in recent years and while Game Night managed to perform well not long ago, this film will face a tougher box office with a bit more competition. It could still do quite well, but maybe not as well as it should.”
Box Office Results: $60.1 M
Thoughts: [Unexceptional] Failing to become a spring breakout hit, this parental comedy nevertheless did decently at the box office, but nothing to ensure a sequel.
With so few kid-targeted adventures this year, the presence of Jack Black and Cate Blanchett should elevate the film’s chances to a solid opening weekend and definitely a presence at the top of the box office. Life Itself won’t be much competition, but Fahrenheit 11/9 could be a surprisingly strong documentary performer. After all, Michael Moore’s similarly titled Fahrenheit 9/11 was one of the most popular documentaries in cinema history.
Our Highest Rated Films: Fahrenheit 11/9; Colette; The House with a Clock In Its Walls; The Sisters Brothers
Our Best Awards Ratings: Fahrenheit 11/9 (Oscars); Colette (Oscars)
Garry Winogrand: All Things Are Photographable
Love, Gilda
The Pagan King
Tea with the Dames
(September 16, 2018) Original
October 26, 2018
From IMDb: “A war correspondent gets taken hostage while on assignment, prompting his mother, impatient with the government’s lack of concern, to take matters into her own hands.”
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Review: Although it appears to be unintentional, the figure on the right could conceivably look like Susan Sarandon’s hidden mouth. Of course, the metaphorical decision to cover Sarandon’s mouth with a war-set image is obvious, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t work.
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Review: The trailer follows a formulaic path to explain why this mother wants to circumvent the law and the government to get her son back. The problem is that the formula is a partial result of the commonplace nature of the plot even if it features a few differing details.
None.
Minding the Gap started almost ten years ago, when a teenage Bing Liu would videotape his friends’ skateboarding exploits. As adults, he has revisited his hometown and those friends, and followed the beginnings of their adult lives. One friend is a young father, another is struggling to find a purpose and get out of his hometown, and Liu himself has moved on physically but can’t escape the emotional pains of childhood. Along the way, we meet parents, girlfriends, and adult figures who all played a part in getting these kids to where they are. The subjects balance from uplifting to devastating — one of Liu’s friends confesses that “some people do take their negative experiences and turn them into powerful, positive things. I just don’t think I’m that sort of person” — but at every turn they are brutally honest.
Dietrich and von Sternberg in Hollywood was easily the best classic Blu-ray release within the last twelve months, but what were the other “bests” of this period?
Looking back and slightly ahead, here are my top picks from October 2017 through September 2018:
October 2017
Best New Release – Baby Driver (2017)
Best Classic Release – The Old Dark House (1932)
Edgar Wright’s high adrenaline thriller Baby Driver was one of last year’s most exciting films while James Whale’s The Old Dark House is more a comic gem than a genuine horror classic given class A treatment by Cohen Media.
November 2017
Best New Release – Wind River (2017)
Best Classic Release – The Philadelphia Story (1940)
Taylor Sheridan’s Wind River was one of last year’s best films, one that was both a taut thriller and contemporary social drama. George Cukor’s The Philadelphia Story is an ageless comedy of manners given deluxe handling by Criterion.
(September 16, 2018) Original
September 14, 2018
From IMDb: “A rites of passage story of a bi-racial teen struggling for survival in Nazi Germany.”
Review: There was no poster immediately available for my review. Should one become available in the future, this section will be updated.
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Review: This Holocaust drama takes a different tack than many others of its kind by presenting a picture of a black teenager and the German officer she falls in love with. While a lot of the formula that has come to define Holocaust films in the last few decades is here, it still has its charms.
None.
A.M.P.A.S. (The Oscars Feed)
