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CINEMA SEEN - "Oscar Foolies!" By William Margold So it's like this...I'm the film reviewer/critic/cinematic thought provoker for THE LAXPRESS...and each year there comes a time when I have the chance to put my long history (careening toward 35 years with this publication and its predecessor) of commenting on motion pictures on the line by offering up my predictions in Oscar's six major categories. While I fully realize that I take the whole damn Academy Award thing WAY TOO SERIOUSLY, I can only defend my angst and my actions by comparing the Oscar event to The World Series and The Super Bowl, for it does indeed, if nothing else, solemnly signify that another competitive movie year has ended. In recent years, I have usually been more right than wrong, although there are moments when I simply predict something or someone just to be ornery (such as last year, when I tabbed "Good Night, and Good Luck" for Best film because I loathed "Brokeback Mountain"--- and I really didn't think all that much of the winner: "Crash"---you do remember that it won...don't you?). BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS---The most difficult category of them all this year, made even tougher by the fact that the best performance (Adriana Barraza's tragically overwhelmed housekeeper) was delivered in the year's most overrated motion picture ("Babel"). Plus, Ms. Barraza has been forced to compete against another "Babel-ette"---the unjustifiably nominated Rinko Kikuchi (who should have jumped off that balcony). The luminous Cate Blanchett was painfully excellent in the brittle "Notes on a Scandal"---but she won (surprisingly) in the same category a couple of years ago for her Kate Hepburn-ing in "The Aviator." Abigail Breslin was appropriately amusing in and as "Little Miss Sunshine"---but she didn't really standout from the rest of the cast. For most of her part, Jennifer Hudson stood out from the rest of her "Dreamgirls" cast members, but for the wrong reason: she was all singer and no actress. Therefore...I will tempt fate by going with the way ADRIANA BARRAZA was able to make me care for her character, even though I cared VERY little for the film that she (and I) were forced to suffer through. BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR---Mark Walberg's nomination for doing nothing except confusing matters by looking an awful like Mark Damon and Leonardo DiCaprio in "The Departed" makes me think that perhaps his name was there by mistake, replacing the admittedly overblown, but never the less scene stealing efforts by Jack Nicholson who owned the stolid show. I thought that Alan Arkin needed to stay around longer to make his impact felt in "Little Miss Sunshine." Jackie Earle Haley was appropriately creepy in the superb "Little Children, but I think that it's case of the way he looked more than the way he acted. Djimon Hounsou was powerful and moving in "Blood Diamond" and would win here. However...it's Djimon's misfortune to be up against the balls out, gloriously shameless, and I suspect incredibly introspective nuances of EDDIE MURPHY in "Dreamgirls." He brought lightening to his performance as James "Thunder" Early. BEST ACTRESS---Perhaps the easiest category for me to predict because as of my deadline, I haven't yet seen Penelope Cruz in "Volver"---so I'm only left with four ladies to deal with. Judi Dench was acutely hateful in "Notes on a Scandal" but I didn't feel that the role was a real test of her abilities. Kate Winslet was a perfect fit as the restlessly unfit housewife in "Little Children"---but didn't dominate the proceedings, perhaps by director Todd Field's design. Meryl Streep was a little too dominating in and as "The Devil Wears Prada"----perhaps by a lack of design by the film's director to design more for the other cast members to do. HELEN MIRREN ruled supremely throughout "The Queen" by allowing us to see the chinks in the armor of royalty. BEST ACTOR---Second easiest category for me, because I did see all five performances, and four of them don't even belong in the same breathe with the obvious winner. Will Smith was truly insufferable in "The Pursuit of Happyness." Ryan Gosling's efforts in the miserable little "Half Nelson" were little more than ordinary. Leonardo DiCaprio was amusingly heroic, but certainly not worthy of a nomination. Yes...I realize that the legendary Peter O'Toole (nominated seven times ranging from perfect turns in "The Lion in Winter" and "My Favorite Year") has never won a Best Actor Award, and that he is an international treasure. But his dreadful outing in "Venus" smacks more of indulgence than insight, and he shouldn't be honored here out of pity. Therefore, with pity toward no one, FOREST WHITAKER, for delivering the human grenade of Idi Amin (in "The Last King of Scotland") to the screen with unnerving and unwavering charm (and appropriate lack of same), should, will, and MUST win! BEST DIRECTOR---Perhaps the weakest category of all, although the Best Picture group isn't all that much to write home about either. Which, of course, is a perfect segue into Clint Eastwood's by-the numbing-numbers labor on the lamentable "Letters From Iwo Jima." His fiercely mounted "Flag of Our Fathers" was a far superior example of directorial style and sincerity, but apparently no one noticed...or gave a damn! Paul Greengrass delivered the emotionally hollow "United 93" like a fellow flipping portentous pancakes. Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu's pretentious look at the language barrier ("Babel") cried for the universal sentiment of "shouldn't have been made." Stephen Frears' helming of "The Queen" was perfectly respectable but not remarkable. Neither for that matter is what MARTIN SCORCESE exasperatingly presented in "The Departed"--- but Mr. "GoodFellas" is way the fuck overdue, so he wins...by default! Yeah..."de fault" of the idiots who didn't give him the dildo shaped statuette a long time ago. BEST PICTURE---I don't think that there has ever been a weaker selection of exceptionally ordinary Best Film nominees. And therefore, with the exception of "Letters From Iwo Jima"---which could have and should have been replaced with the likes of "Little Children" and/or "Children of Men"---the competition is as wide open as The Grand Canyon, into which fact "Babel" would be tossed into, if I could. "Little Miss Sunshine" is just a little too cute for its own good, but remember that "Crash" (although not cute) did win last year. (You do remember, don't you?). So it's down, way down, to "The Queen" and "The Departed." And figuring that it would truly be a bitch if the master was acknowledged, and his hound went wanting, I will be barking in minimal despair if Martin Scorcese's THE DEPARTED doesn't bring home the bacon, or more fittingly...the corned beef. end NOTE: Originally published in LA Xpress, February 22, 2007, issue. |