For Natalie & Benjamin: A Swan-Themed Wedding.

By now you've probably heard the exciting news that Natalie Portman and Benjamin Millipeid, the Black Swan pair who've been our "crush of the moment" for too many moments now (see sidebar), are pregnant and engaged.

a photoshopped imagining of their wedding cake
top from The Film Experience.

There's no exact word on when either of the blessed events (baby & wedding) are to occur though hundreds of thousands of years of human history tell us that the genetically lucky baby, certain to possess both dark haired beauty and physical grace, is coming in 2011.

We immediately tweeted advocating for a swan-themed wedding. Which is an obvious joke but come on. Swan has to be a common theme for weddings anyway and the possibilities are endless. Here are some other great suggestions from friends @jigsawlounge, @joereid and @moviedork18 on twitter.

I told Joe Reid that Timothy Hutton (Beautiful Girls) has to share that duty with Jean Reno (The Professional) if we're going there. But we shouldn't go there. That said, it does cause the mind to wander into Natalie's large filmography for wedding ideas. I still haven't figured out a way to work Clive Owen (Closer) in. Moviedork's comment made me giggle because it reminded me that Black Swan isn't the first time Natalie has had doubles. Remember those Queen Amidala decoys in the Star Wars prequels?!

He's sleeping with Natalie Portman and you're not.
The future Mr. Natalie Portman, choreographer/dancer/actor Benjamin Millipeid.

 But we digress...

Congratulations to the happy couple.

What would you suggest for Natalie's wedding? How would you work her filmography into the nuptials?
*

Links: True Grit, Spidey, Gay Rugby, and "Original" Films

Movie|Line celebrates a year of "The Verge," their great up-and-coming actor series.
Cinema Blend goosing the sales of True Grit (the novel)
Today One of the Fantastic Four will die in the comic's #587th issue. Does anyone still believe in these marketing ploys? I'm sure they'll come back to life within 3 years. That's how comics do.
MUBI The great Michel Piccoli is 85 today. Has anyone seen La Belle Noiseuse (1991)? That's such a good one.
CineEuropa international actor Armin Mueller-Stahl will receive a lifetime achievement award at Berlinale this year.
The Guardian talks to Andrew Garfield about Spider-Man (with audio)
Blog Stage an informative and weird animated bit describing what's going on with Spider Man's Broadway disaster.
Towleroad Mickey Rourke to pay gay rugby legend Gareth Thomas in a sports bio. We've had a lot of sports bios at the movies but you can't say we've had a lot of rugby films, gay or otherwise.
Scott Feinberg, fine Oscar pundit, delivers his top ten.

Finally, the New York Times has a totally bizarre article called "Hollywood Moves Away from Middlebrow Movies" which is about the new quality edict in Hollywood. I never understand these articles which seem to find all sorts of bizarre trends that the box office data doesn't actually support like "originality sells!" Er, no... I wish! I knew the article was in trouble when it says that Hollywood is going for quality and Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland is referred to as "arty" example of directorial artistry. Let me get this straight, in an article praising studio interest in Quality Original Films one of the prime examples is a messily 3D converted 2D film of a story that's been adapted literally dozens of times for the movies back to the days of silent film?

sigh

I swear to the cinematic gods that that one 2010 junkpile is going to be the death of me. It will not go away. I'll even have to be dealing with it in 2011 for the Oscars. Nooooooooooooooooo
*

The Ballots Are Coming. The Ballots Are Coming.

The day has arrived. Today, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences mails out those mythical Oscar nomination ballots to their members. Each member gets to nominate for their branch category(or categories) and for Best Picture. The ballots are due back on Friday January 14th at the latest but supposedly the majority of voters are quick about mailing them back. On the morning of Tuesday, January 25th we'll hear the results of the voting. Which actors did the other actors rally behind, which sound design thrilled the sound mixers, and which newbie will the exclusive music branch fraternity punch in Original Score category? And so on.

So freeze the Oscar buzz this week. It's decision time. If you believe that out of sight equals out of mind -- and you'd be wise to do so given the borg-mind of precursors -- you'll understand why so many of the Oscar hopefuls have just hit theaters. For example, how many earlier worthier nominees will True Grit muscle out? We shall see.

Here's the events that will occur during voting.

• Dec 27 Box Office media coverage (as far as Oscar goes, True Grit's strong opening and Black Swan and The King's Speech expansions will be the stories.)
• Dec 27 Online Film Critics Nominees (the usual suspects with key LAFCA's suggestions placing.)
• Dec 29 Blue Valentine finally opens in a handful of theaters. Jesus, they took long enough.
• Dec 31 New Year's Eve Shenanigans. Who fills out their ballots while plastered? Oh come on, you know someone does. (I mean, besides HFPA and NBR members.)
• Jan. 3 Online Film Critics Society winners announced
• Jan. 4 Producers Guild of America nominations
• Jan. 4 Writers Guild of America nominations
• Jan. 7 Blue Valentine expands
• Jan. 10 Directors Guild of America nominations announced

And finally, a Film Experience reminder to any Academy voters reading, particularly actors: Don't let precursor groups control you!

FACT: You are not a "Supporting" actor, when you're in every scene
and the entire story is about you.

Here's how it's supposed to work: You look at your lead ballots and you pick the five best in that category and rank them in order. If someone is not one of your five best, sorry no can do. It's totally sad for #6 & #7  *sniffle* but it's called a "shortlist" for a reason. It's supposed to be a major honor. If you're sad for your #6, don't demote them to another category. That's so unkind to the hard working character actors who deserve to be judged on a level playing field with other actors who have to sell entire characters in a limited number of scenes and gird up the starring player(s) when acting opposite them; different achievement, but you know it's equally worthy of honor. You've acted in films so you get the difficulties of either carrying a whole picture handily or adding a specific color or mood or a contrasting personality to the ensemble and thereby elevating the film. Vote accordingly.

A dramatization: Ewan McGregor contemplates his ballot.

Above all else, don't let anyone else tell you what to do. Including me (sigh) though if you'll allow me two suggestions, and I'll keep it simple, it's this:

1. Watch some acclaimed or popular films released before September before you vote. Films like The Ghost Writer, I Am Love, Mother, Animal Kingdom, The Kids Are All Right, Shutter Island, How to Train Your Dragon all had their ardent fans. Are you one of them? You don't want to keep perpetuating the myth that AMPAS voters can't remember what they had for breakfast, let alone what opened last month.
2. If you're not truly moved by some movie everyone is talking about... let's say you didn't like The Social Network or True Grit, ignore it in your best picture field. Just because everyone is talking about it right now, does not mean it's "best". What is "best" is totally up to you. If you wanna vote for Rabbit Hole or Another Year or whatever -- it's your ballot.

Happy voting!

Cinematic Shame: Worst of the Year

year in review part 5 of several
COME SEE THE NEW BLOG FOR THE FINAL CELEBRATION OF 2010


I thought it would be tasteless to drop this lump of coal on Christmas so I saved it one day. It's naughty, not nice. But before we get to the unsatisfying trends, performances, and movies of the year, some caveats. I didn't see everything and am not, generally speaking, paid to attend terrible movies. Even when I'm doing freelance gigs, nobody has ever said to me "Nathaniel, we'd love for you to write a 3,000 word essay about Yogi Bear." [Editors of the world take note: I would totally do this for money.]

Most Repetitive Actor or Actress Dear Leonardo DiCaprio, you have now done three movies in a row where you're a tortured soul with an emotionally unstable dead wife. This is an even more specific brick-wall niche then when Jodie Foster kept getting trapped in small places or when Julianne Moore kept losing her children (imaginary or otherwise).

DiCaprio's new franchise!

It's time to shake things up. Throw us anything at all that's different than this. Love, a former fan who is bored of your worryface.

Unbest Actress This one was hard to choose as no one pled for the title. I didn't quite understand what Diane Lane was doing in the gold-hued Secretariat. She alternated between stiff and overemphatic playing which conjured mental images of someone trying to both be an Oscar and mime the actress winning one. While it's true that Christina Aguilera is no natural in Burlesque, she acquits herself better than some pop divas have in the past and the bulk of her role is singing (which you may have heard she does well). So if she's nominated for Razzies soon, that'll be just mean spirited. Therefore the prize must go to Katie Holmes who played a beautiful intellectual who loved nothing but poetry, philosophy and Josh Duhamel in The Romantics. Only the "beautiful" part was played convincingly.

Duhamel & Holmes: just your average poetry-quoting
post-graduate intellectuals.

Unbest Actor Aaron Johnson was mildly charismatic in Kick-Ass but in Nowhere Boy, the performance just didn't work and not only because he didn't look right for the part. He kept delivering a decent rendition of an arrogant semi-talented teen ... but where was the future John Lennon in that generic teenager? It's not easy to play a legendary charismatic performer. You've got to bring your own blazing showman's charisma along to function as a makeshift doppelganger.

Unbest Supporting Actress Early in the year I thought this might go to Ellen Page who was too listless in Inception as if she hadn't found any notes to add to an underwritten part but watching the film again, she was better than I remembered. Perhaps I expected a Juno or a Whip It level performance every time out? Still, this character was too much like the one she plays in the Cisco commercials. In both "Ellen Page" enters a room, exhibits curious disbelief about some new technological marvel and says something like  "neato. explain that to me again."

But the choice is clear. Frankly I don't know how you do what Melissa Leo did in The Fighter (best!) and also do what Melissa Leo did in Conviction (worst!) in the same calendar year. In the sports drama she plays a real character, in both senses of the word, with dynamic energy and insight. In the legal drama she plays a real character but as a character-free cartoon.  In scene after scene she was practically twirling an invisible mustache as the reprehensible cop who hates on Sam Rockwell. A lack of recognizable human nuance isn't always a problem if you're willing to go big-bigger-biggest, but she didn't. That's a huge problem when you're in a film with  a showboater (Juliette Lewis), a hard worker (Hilary Swank), a warm presence (Minnie Driver) and a natural (Sam Rockwell).

Unbest Supporting Actor Geoffrey Rush was so far over the top in Bran Nue Dae he was practically acting via satellite from an orbiting space station. But then, that's Rush's M.O. and judging on the rest of the insane musical film, they didn't hire him for subtlety.

But in the end, this came down to a death match between two young men who one presumes weren't hired for their thespian skills. Runner up is Reeve Carney in The Tempest. A block of wood could've out-acted him provided someone carved windpipes for it to sing with. But we're willing to give Carney a pass because he was brave enough to follow up the Tempest gig with another scary Julie Taymor project: Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark. The winner is Cam Gigandet who has never, one presumes, been hired specifically for acting skill. It's not that he doesn't have any. It's just that his musculature has often been the chief requirement, whether that's role-mandated or expected window-dressing. Inexplicably he must have been hired for his acting in Easy A and we also presume there was no audition. Or the casting director was stoned. May he never ever do comedy again! This story has a happy ending, though. Cam redeemed himself in Burlesque later in the year giving his most charming performance to date.


The Mysterious Case of the Vanishing Charisma I've already asked "How do you solve a problem like Christina?" so I shan't go there again. But post After.Life, one hopes that Ms. Ricci resurrects herself with her old sparkle.

Pearls Before Swine (Great performance in a lesser movie): Kirsten Dunst is so aching and intuitive in All Good Things that you desperately hope the movie will jettison all its other myriad parts (way too many parts) and focus on what's working: her. She's even doing the heavy lifting opposite Ryan Gosling who is weirdly undynamic this time, even with a role that begs for scenery-chewing dynamism in a "whoa, this dude is fucked up" kind of way.

Pearls Before Swine (Great scene in lesser movie): Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Pt 1 is, as previously stated, less a movie than a bookmark. But the actual 'Deathly Hallows' scene is an inspired use of storytelling within storytelling and the gorgeously stylized animation haunts. Too bad that scene wasn't released as a stand alone short film to tide you over between Half Blood Prince and a compact two hour Deathly Hallows movie.

Are you Terrible or Great?
Edward Norton acts his ass off in Stone. But w-h-a-t is he doing or should he even be doing it at all?

Tasteless (Tone)
[tie] Red & Kick-Ass. Killing people is HI-LAR-IOUS. And it's especially funny & cool when little kids or old people do it.

Hit Girl and hitwoman. "I kill people, dear."

Tasteless (Look)
Practically everything in Alice in Wonderland. It's as if "more" always always always equalled "not enough."

Edited with a Chainsaw
(3-way tie!) The Tempest triumphs in the "we can't find a rhythm other than 'all' rhythms" division. Stone wins in the "confusingly-artful" category. Finally, Kites wins the "too-eager-to-please but wrongheaded" division. "We're going to cutaway from this dance sequence that just started because we think you might get bored. We've heard Americans don't like that. Here's 17 more dewy close-ups. Oh wait, no, that'll bore you too. How about some action and a few dissolves? Dewy close-ups intermingled? A shoot-out? Flashback? Flashforward? What else you want? You like this movie, right?"

Special Prize for Audacious Randomness in an Opening Scene Secretariat opens by quoting the Biblical story of Job, who famously had it real tough. My favorite film review of the year is probably Andrew O'Hehir's review of Secretariat in Salon which is itself audacious and random but also insightful, provocative and hilarious. This is one of my favorite bits casually referencing that opening monologue.

This long-suffering female Job overcomes such tremendous obstacles as having been born white and Southern and possessed of impressive wealth and property, and who then lucks into owning a genetic freak who turned out to be faster and stronger than any racehorse ever foaled. And guess what? She triumphs anyway!

Worst Opening Never Let Me Go and Shutter Island, both spring from twist novels and strangely both clue you in immediately as to the twists that aren't coming for some time. Never... does this with maudlin voiceover and adult closeups "This will be tragic and sad but very handsomely made starring Carey Mulligan and Andrew Garfield," it whispers and then starts again as extended prologue with unknown child actors. Shutter Island starts with Leonardo, our hero?, already at sea both literally and emotionally. "Look at him. He's a mess," it warns. "And this is going to be extreme," it adds with a close-up on Leo's extremely wet anguish-face with isolating shots of a tiny ship in the vast seas. In both cases, wouldn't it have been better to let the story and emotional content develop organically and allow us to be undone by the gradual reveals of purpose and identity?

Worst Ending
Two good movies that didn't stick their landings: Salt and The Town. The Angelina Jolie actioner was a fun cartoon but it just ran out of steam and closed awkwardly with the unstoppable diva running through a nondescript landscape. One half expected a "next time on..." preview to play alongside the credits. But this isn't a television series and unless you paid Angie a ton of money in a sequel clause, we're not seeing that one. The Town, an often tense drama ends with a weirdly soft/happy conclusion. What's with the borrowing from The Bourne Identity... or am I remembering that film wrong? Plus there's that magic fruit which doesn't rot and the idea that he's atoning for his crimes... by hanging out in luxury with ample money in a far off location? Tough life! It as if we ended an intense workout and the instructor, fearing those heart-rates he egged on, demands a lengthy cool down period.

Hell's Multiplex: The Worst Films of the Year
Or worst that I personally happened to see. It's very likely you saw different "worsts".

Josh, Woody & Naomi meet a long red carpet.

10. YOU WILL MEET A TALL DARK STRANGER
Woody warns you away from his movie straight away by quoting Shakespeare. It's the 'told by an idiot. full of sound and fury, signifying nothing' bit. These new characters do mostly behave like idiots but the sound and fury aren't particularly fulsome. Here is only the ambient noise of second rate Allen dialogue and unshaped less-than-cathartic misanthropy. This is not the first Woody Allen movie to feature an important subplot about an unpublished manuscript but this may be the first Woody Allen movie to feel like an unfinished manuscript come to life; it wobbles around on two paper legs, poorly bound, unedited, a thin approximation of the humanity it observes with its ink eyes.

09. AFTER.LIFE [previous post]

08. LOVE RANCH
You'd think a movie about Helen Mirren running a whorehouse while sexing up a virile younger boxer and bossing Gina Gershon and Bai Ling around while Joe Pesci swears at everyone would have to be entertaining and frisky and shocking and dangerous, exciting to look upon, superbly-acted and alive. You'd be wrong. You'd be so wrong.

07. THE ROMANTICS [review]

06. REPO MEN
Needlessly sadistic, grimy-looking and strangely insufficient if not entirely devoid in the chemistry department despite the good actors milling about. P.S. If you're going to plagiarize another movie, like say Oldboy (2003), try not to be so obvious about it or at least, only sample it. Don't lift an entire scene!

05. THE WOLF MAN [review]

04. PRINCE OF PERSIA: THE SANDS OF TIME
Feels constructed on an assembly line, with no one ever thinking (or daring?) too put a personal stamp on the material, or even a loving idiosyncratic flourish on any scene. Tell us humans had a hand in making this, please. Footsteps vanish in the sand, and this movie blows away, too. Can you recall any detail?

03. STONE
I'd be happy to read a defense of this because, I'll be totally honest, I have no idea what this movie was on about. (I loved John Curran's last picture The Painted Veil so would like to extend the benefit of the doubt.)

02. THE TEMPEST
Having twenty-four visual ideas is not the same thing as a possessing strong visual storytelling skill. Assembling a group of famous actors is not the same thing as directing them. Attention grabbing gender-blind casting is not the same thing as saying something about character or gender. And so on.

run away... run away...  from The Tempest

01. TIM BURTON'S ALICE IN WONDERLAND
I've literally seen all of Tim Burton's work (there's not a ton of prolific auteurs who I can say that about unfortunately). I've seen the shorts, the films, the gallery showings. I've taken to obnoxiously referring to this movie as Eyesore in Wonderland but I could safely call this Tim Burton's Nadir because I've seen it all. That isn't as catchy a title and it's also hella depressing. I'd rather watch Planet of the Apes on loop than ever go near this one again. [Long-winded hatred for this movie here.]

Which movies made you desperate for the closing credits this year? And which moments in good movies were surprisingly bad?

YEAR END "BESTS"

Seasons Greetings!

[Thx to Jeffery for this fun image]

Happy Holidays.
Be back tomorrow!

Movie Thingamajigs. Put That In Your Stocking

year in review - part 4 of several

Are you ever stumped as to what to put in your loved ones Christmas stockings? Here are some ideas culled from this year's movies. Gadgets, random junk or magical objects that lingered after the credits rolled. (If you don't have time to use these ideas for Christmas, there's always birthdays.)

Let them inspire gift giving!

• Tiny things are wonderful. How about some Tiny Furniture? You can easily slip a miniature chair, bed or bookshelf into a stocking and it's weird, funny, and could even be significant if it recalls some memory with that loved one.  

• Remember at the beginning of 127 Hours when he reaches for his fancy swiss army knife thingie in the cupboard and can't reach it? That's important later in the movie but it's not as important as they make it out to be; even with a good pocketknife, he'd still have to cut off his arm! But everyone needs a good pocket knife, don't they? Or so you hear when you're young. I haven't really needed one yet but maybe if I fell into a cave I would.

• If you need a practical cheap gift, everyone needs razors. But please leave them in their packaging and don't try to deliver by hand or mouth.

A Prophet

• Speaking of sharp unpleasantries... if one of your friends is obsessed with Black Swan (it happens) slip a file sharpener or a tube of lipstick into their stocking with a note. "Sorry I stole your things!". Better yet find a broken ballerina figurine.

• Alexa already beat me to those Inception totems but you know some movie geek is going to be thrilled to find that in the stocking.

• Remember that hilarious dinner sequence in Please Give when the teenage daughter Abby (Sarah Steele) refuses to show her face because of a pimple? Gift certificates for facials are a luxury that some people would never buy for themselves. A pre-paid spa treatment doesn't necessarily imply that your loved one has terrible skin. But don't go for the acid peel though because ouch that red blistery face did not look good on her.

• If all of these gifts sound too extreme, I'm sure there's a ton of "minion" merchandise from Despicable Me -- though they seem overpriced to me for something only 6" high-- or any of the new toys from Toy Story 3 that would be so cute in a stocking. My favorite new toy was Dolly. Despite Ken's protestations, there's no shame in girl toys.

• One gift I would advise against giving is an unpublished manuscript. If you've seen You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger or The Ghost Writer or even Rabbit Hole you'll understand; they cause so much trouble.

• But speaking of Rabbit Hole, how about a homemade comic book? That's where the movie Rabbit Hole gets its name and as Nicole Kidman turns its pages, you get the sense that she's never read one before and that it's opening up whole new world(s) to her. Homemade items are awesome to receive for Christmas, birthdays, or for no obvious reason at all...

True story: One Christmas I made my nephews and niece a comic book starring them as superheroes.  It was a crude quickly drawn thing (I made it in 2 days, racing against the clock) but it was personal, with lines of dialogue inspired by the way they talked and powers that reflected their own kid personalities and interests at the time. It was messily assembled and crazy but somehow to them it was pure magic. They read it incessantly for months.

• If you're handy on the sewing machine or with a needle and thread you could gift your sluttiest friend their very own Easy A patch to accessorize their school uniform looks. [Emma Stone's charisma not included. Sold separately by way of movie ticket or DVD purchase.]

• Or an eyepatch ala True Grit.

• I was about to make a joke about Never Let Me Go but decided it was in extremely poor taste. So, let's go serious instead: The best gift you can give a complete stranger is to register as an organ donor. Trust that you won't need those vital organs when you're dead. But plenty of living suffering people sure need them.

Hmmm.

Let's end with two less practical gifts that we gazed glassy-eyed at in the movie theaters. One of them is even small enough to be a stocking stuffer. Both are difficult to procure but their rewards are great.

• If you were to receive the "Sands of Time", encased in a lovely ornate dagger, what would you use it for? I would probably go far back enough in time to pick a different movie to see that day. And if you gave it to Jake Gyllenhaal, wouldn't he probably steal back some of those months of hard in the gym since they only gave him like 8-10 seconds of shirtlessness in the movie? What would you use it for? It seems like a handy priceless gift and more mobile than a Hot Tub Time Machine.

• Finally, there's the "Sword of Self Respect" from Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. But that one you have to earn; it's a gift you give yourself.

Which items from the movies did you dream of after the movies were gone?

HAPPY HOLIDAYS to all Film Experience readers
drive safe, be merry, enjoy your wee break from the daily grind.

Make Room For Pearce

Michael C. here from Serious Film to file a complaint.

If I were to name the biggest problem currently facing the nation today that problem would be category fraud. Okay, maybe not, but it still irks the hell out of me. Not because, like some political press release, this Oscar-grubbing is treated completely legit despite everyone knowing it's total bull. That's no biggie. No, what bugs me is the way this screws over the guys and girls this category is there to honor in the first place: the supporting players who show up for two or three scenes and absolutely kill it. Not only are the leads hogging the precious few slots, but they're overshadowing the real supporting players from their own films. Look no further than this year's The King's Speech to see this problem in action.

If it was called The King's Therapist would this even be an issue?

By pushing Rush as supporting they're sidelining the real standout supporting turn in the film, Guy Pearce as King Edward. With just a few well-chosen strokes Pearce deftly suggests his rebellious, feckless character. The audience's immediate reaction is, "Jesus, don't put that guy on the throne." The performance supports the movie perfectly, setting the stage for the main conflict. Yet Pearce can't get any oxygen because Rush is sucking it all up. What's the point of having a supporting category if major screen time is practically a requirement? The same thing happened when Jamie Foxx was laughably crammed into the supporting category for Collateral despite being in literally every scene in the movie. Barry Shabaka Henley's unforgettable seven minutes as the jazz club owner with regrets and secrets never had a chance.

Spot the supporting actor. Hint: It's not the guy in 99% of the film.

I don't see how anyone could classify Geoffrey Rush as supporting and keep a straight face since the whole movie is a two-hander between him and Firth. Listen closely, Academy: Just because one character is royalty and the other is a commoner doesn't mean the actor playing the king is somehow more important. I feel like this should be a simple concept to grasp.