MovieManifesto

Sometimes I worry that the rationale behind awarding Oscars for screenplays is utterly fraudulent. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not denigrating the importance of writing in today’s cinematic climate, not least when high-brow critics constantly grumble about how “Scripts don’t matter anymore” and “Young people are too attention-addled to appreciate a proper art film” and “What the hell is Twitter, anyway?”. My real concern is that, of all of the prizes awarded at the Academy Awards, the screenplay is the one category that voters can’t actually see. For Best Costume Design, they can judge a film’s wardrobe; for Best Cinematography, they can follow the camera movements and lighting; for the acting fields, they can watch the performer. You get the idea.

But a screenplay? Hell, a screenplay is just a few hundred typewritten pages that might have been drafted years ago and were lying in a dusty desk drawer underneath some old Superman comics until a director miraculously came along and decided to turn them into a movie. Of course, it rarely works that way (though Clint Eastwood apparently sat on the Oscar-nominated script for Unforgiven for 15 years until he was old enough to play the lead), but I nevertheless wonder if we can accurately judge a screenplay on its own merits rather than as a mere stepping stone to a finished film.

But so it goes. Besides, these are two of the categories in which the Academy regularly exhibits a certain degree of bravery (“The Oscar-winning Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” always has a nice ring to it), so I suppose I shouldn’t be staring into the mouths of gift horses. Read More

Someday, an enterprising young man with a degree in applied mathematics and way too much time on his hands – not that I’m looking at anyone in particular – is going to compile a riveting sociological study on the Best Supporting Actor/Actress Oscars and the economic windfall that they yield for their winners. I mean, do these things really matter? I’ve always argued that the Academy Awards themselves are highly relevant, at least from a commercial standpoint if not an artistic one. Oscar winners immediately become more marketable as business properties, simply due to their increased visibility; once you win an Oscar, you’re somebody. Aren’t you?

Lately, I’m not so sure. True, following his ferocious Oscar-winning performance in Inglourious Basterds, Christoph Waltz is now every casting director’s first call for the part of “Megalomaniacal Villain” (the only reason he isn’t playing the baddie in the upcoming James Bond movie is that fellow Best Supporting Actor winner Javier Bardem beat him to it). But do you realize that the winners of Best Supporting Actress over the past decade include Jennifer Connelly (only two worthwhile credits in the 10 years following A Beautiful Mind), Catherine Zeta-Jones (last quasi-memorable role: Ocean’s Twelve in 2004), Renée Zelweger (only function these days seems to involve spreading rumors of another wretched Bridget Jones sequel), Jennifer Hudson (virtually invisible post-Dreamgirls), and Mo’Nique (lone credit since Precious? Steppin: The Movie)? And I haven’t even mentioned Cuba Gooding, Jr. yet. I thought winning an Oscar was supposed to energize your career, not torpedo it.

So it’s entirely possible that winning an Academy Award for a supporting performance has a 30% chance of derailing an actor’s career. Just remember this when you look back 10 years from now and think to yourself, “Who the hell was Octavia Spencer?”.

But I digress. On to the predictions. Read More

Given that I dubbed my last post the “Aural Edition”, this one should probably be called the “Horror Edition”. Why? Because predicting these four categories at this year’s Oscars absolutely terrifies me. I don’t mean an abstract, intellectual form of terror in the “I’m scared that Keira Knightley might never win an Oscar” or “I’m afraid that Jeremy Lin might pull a Hank Gathers and die on the basketball court if D’Antoni keeps playing him 45 minutes every night” vein. I mean that, if I go 0-for-4 in predicting these deeply important technical categories on Oscar night – a scenario that is alarmingly plausible – then there’s the distinct possibility that I’ll film myself with tears streaming down my face, babbling, “I am so, so sorry for underestimating the impact that Hugo held with mainstream Academy voters,” before wandering into the woods and never being heard from again. In the words of Terius Nash, this shit real.

(Just to confirm: It’s not normal to have nightmares about an unwatchable film winning Best Cinematography, right? I’m starting to wonder if I take this whole Oscar thing a bit too seriously. Oh well, too late now.)

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY

NOMINEES
The Artist – Guillame Schiffman
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo – Jeff Crenoweth
Hugo – Robert Richardson
The Tree of Life – Emmanuel Lubezki
War Horse – Janusz Kaminski Read More

Cinema may be a visual medium first and foremost, but its visuals would be pretty fucking useless without their auditory companions. And while my list of things to do before I die includes compiling the Manifesto’s Mute-Movie Hall of Fame – a list of films that are effective as works of art even with the sound turned off (current candidates include Avatar, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Hero, The Man Who Wasn’t There, and every Pixar movie ever made) – for the most part, a film’s aural component can be critical to its success. So recognition from the Academy for achievement in these categories (with one exception – more on that later) makes perfect sense.

(Also, if you’re wondering why no Terence Malick productions made my random shortlist of Mute Movies, that’s because they’re too busy fighting for a spot on the Anti-Sound All-Stars, a select group reserved for movies that actually become worse once you turn on your speakers. And if you don’t know what I’m talking about, you’ve clearly never seen The New World or The Tree of Life.)

With that said, I have to confess that only one of the following four categories really interests me (though it’s one of the most important fields of the entire Academy Awards). I acknowledge the importance of the next two without fully partaking in their spirit, primarily because, after writing the Manifesto for 11 years and spending thousands of hours reading film criticism exclusively devoted to the Oscars, I still don’t really know what they mean. Oh, and the last category is worthless.

Alright, on to the predictions.

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE

NOMINEES
The Adventures of Tintin – John Williams
The Artist – Ludovic Bource
Hugo – Howard Shore
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy – Alberto Iglesias
War Horse – John Williams Read More

It is the Manifesto’s solemn, sacred duty to provide, for every Oscar category (stupid shorts aside), analysis that is both cogent and exhilarating. Fortunately, my enthusiasm for the majority of the fields is such that I take great pleasure in trying really hard but ultimately failing triumphing at such a daunting task. Sadly, my typically limitless passion is somewhat, well, limited for the following categories. As I say every year, I don’t mean to impugn the importance of these crafts to their respective films. They just aren’t that interesting to me personally, and thus I am unceremoniously lumping them together in a single, miscellany-style post.

For a strained but strangely pertinent analogy: Netflix has a setting on its website where you can select the video quality of your streaming service. The three potential options are – and I swear I’m not making this up – “Good,” “Better,” and “Best”. (Aside: These happen to be the same choices I give a woman whenever I ask her to critique my sexual prowess.) Applying that rubric to the Oscars, these are the “Good” categories. So if the text on your screen suddenly turns into Wingdings, or if the quality of the embedded videos reminds you of that time in 1995 when you kept watching late-night Cinemax even though your Dad wouldn’t pay for the channel and all you could really see were jagged lines and occasional glimpses of a woman’s bare shoulder, don’t worry, it’ll get better for the “Better” and “Best” fields.

BEST COSTUME DESIGN

NOMINEES
Anonymous
The Artist
Hugo
Jane Eyre
W.E. Read More