I mentioned in Random Factoid #87 that for a while after turning 12, I was still able to get into movies at children’s price.
Over the Thanksgiving holidays, I went with my 9-year-old brother to see “A Christmas Carol” in IMAX. I asked the lady at the kiosk for one student and one child ticket. When I paid, I thought it sounded pretty cheap. I looked down at the tickets.
She charged us for two kids.
I am 17 years old and still look under 12, apparently. I can drive a car and see an R-rated movie, yet I can pass for a child.
I once kept Blockbuster’s copy of “Munich” for over a month, convinced that I would find some time to watch it.
I didn’t.
I took it back and only paid a small late fee. So much for “no more late fees,” Blockbuster. Although considering how long I kept it, I should be thankful for how little I paid.
(In case you were wondering, I watched “Munich” a few months later and loved it.)
Here’s a little Oscar story for you, told just like a fairy tale!
Once upon a time, there was a studio called Fox Searchlight. This was a specialty studio, so their job was to release movies that would be critically acclaimed and win lots of Oscars.
But in September, it was becoming inherently clear that things weren’t quite panning out for Fox Searchlight. “(500) Days of Summer” and “Adam” weren’t really Academy-type movies, and “Amelia” was a huge bomb with critics. With only Wes Anderson’s animated “Fantastic Mr. Fox” left to release, they didn’t seem to have any viable candidate for big categories at the Oscars (although some author’s commentary: Zooey Deschanel and Joseph Gordon-Levitt deserve to be nominated).
Fox Searchlight, who gave us last year’s Best Picture “Slumdog Millionaire,” had to do something to put themselves on the awards season map. So they used a trick play and moved “Crazy Heart,” originally scheduled for release in 2010, up to December 2009.
“Crazy Heart” is about an aged, washed-up country singer who falls in love with a younger female journalist and begins the trek back to the place he loves the most: the stage.
Does this sound familiar? Think back to just last year…
“The Wrestler” is about an aged, washed-up wrestler who falls in love with a younger female stripper and begins the trek back to the place he loves the most: the ring.
But the comparisons shouldn’t stop there. Both movies feature a sort of “rebirth” performance from their lead actors who have been ignored by the Oscars previously. Jeff Bridges, the main man of “Crazy Heart,” has not hit the depths quite like “The Wrestler”‘s Mickey Rourke, whose struggles with drug abuse were widely publicized. Bridges, on the other hand, has been doing rounds as a valuable character actor over the past few years and has deep respect in the industry. However, Fox Searchlight wants to make sure that we know that he has been an Oscar bridesmaid four times. They also make the somewhat hyperbolic claim that this is “the performance of a lifetime.” I think its pretty safe to say that all the hopes of this movie ride on Bridges’ shoulders.
And just look at the trailers. They are practically the same, even down to the guitar-strumming melodies behind them (the tune for “Crazy Heart” is Ryan Bingham’s “The Weary Kind”).
So, will this be a fairy-tale ending for Fox Searchlight? That’s largely up to you, the moviegoer, who makes the business, and the critics, who give the awards and write the reviews. At the moment, the latter have not shown much love. The Washington, D.C. Film Critics did not even nominate Bridges for Best Actor.
One interesting note: Mickey Rourke lost the Oscar to a gay man played by Sean Penn. Could Bridges lose to Colin Firth, who plays a darker homosexual in “A Single Man?”
We’ll find out the ending on a Sunday night in March…
BEST BETS FOR NOMINATIONS: Best Actor (Jeff Bridges), Best Song (“The Weary Kind”)
OTHER POTENTIAL NOMINATIONS: Best Picture, Best Actress (Maggie Gyllenhaal)
About yesterday’s factoid regarding Beth Rowley and “You’ve Got Me Wrapped Around Your Little Finger” from “An Education”: I listened to the song three times in a row so it would become the most played song on my iTunes and so I could get not just one, but two factoids out of it.
Congratulations to Beth Rowley and her song “You’ve Got Me Wrapped Around Your Little Finger” for taking over the long-held #1 most played song on my iTunes from Alexandre Desplat’s “Postcards.”
It should come to no one’s surprise that this track came from a soundtrack. I first heard the song in the trailer for the movie “An Education,” and the soothing voice of Beth Rowley immediately struck me. I had to hear more, so I bought the whole song off iTunes. Then, as I started listening to it on repeat, I became curious to know more about Rowley. After hearing a few of her songs, I bought her whole debut album, “Little Dreamer,” which is truly amazing. She has a voice similar to Norah Jones but much more angelic.
So I decided to use this factoid to shamelessly advertise Beth Rowley. I implore you to listen to some of her songs that I have embedded here from YouTube – my two personal favorites from the album – and instantly fall in love with this up-and-coming artist.
“The Blind Side” might as well be a Lifetime or Hallmark movie. It trades the sports movie cliches (coach’s speech, dramatic championship game) for the inspirational movie cliches (the moment that changes a life, small choice that signifies acceptance). It is able to excel beyond a made-for-TV movie because it has its heart in the right place, yet it still feels like one because the focus doesn’t hit similarly. The story should be about Michael Oher (Quinton Aaron) and how he rose from poverty to play in the NFL. However, the filmmakers felt it necessary to shift the paramount concern of the movie to Leigh Anne Touhy (Sandra Bullock), the wealthy woman who made it all possible. It takes the achievement out of the inspiration, and a movie that aims to be heartwarming winds up radiating nothing but lukewarm feelings.
Call it post-“Precious” syndrome, but the scenes that attempted to show Michael’s roots in poverty had remarkably little effect. I think the failure comes from a fundamental misunderstanding about films about triumph: in order for us to truly feel something when the hero comes out on top, we have to comprehend how terrible his situation really was. The film puts itself at an immediate disadvantage by giving us only fleeting glimpses of the neighborhood where Michael grew up, and even in those few scenes, it glosses over how truly dreadful it is to live there. The poverty is almost candy-coated; no real grit is assigned to it. Worst of all was the handling of Michael’s mother, a freewheeling drug addict who is deprived of her children by the government. Her brief appearance is so dazed that it hits with no impact, especially for those who have seen Mo’Nique’s character dish out abuse her daughter Precious.
Sandra Bullock’s spirited and spunky performance (which was good enough to overcome her dreadful accent) atones for some of the errors the film makes with her story. The reason that Michael is able to succeed is because of a random act of kindness Leigh Anne makes after observing him walking the lonely streets with a plastic bag of laundry. But for some reason, the filmmakers don’t buy that as a viable reason for her to make all the sacrifices that she does, so they turn into an episode of white guilt. That emotion doesn’t really work well with inspiration, and the film nearly turns Michael’s biggest struggle that overcoming his race, not his past. The story should have been how one woman selflessly sacrificed her own resources to empower an underprivileged boy who then used that encouragement to succeed in ways he could not imagine. But by shining the spotlight on Leigh Anne, it is seemingly demeaning to the accomplishments of Michael. No doubt she was responsible for the opportunities, but it was him who seized them.
“The Blind Side” wants to hit on a gut level, but comes rushing at you like a middle school football player instead of an NFL linebacker. Aside from Bullock and her plucky younger son S.J. (Jae Head), the performances really aren’t there, especially not from Quinton Aaron, who makes Michael reticent to a point where it becomes frustratingly difficult to sympathize with him. The movie falls a rung below inspirational, but still manages to provide a nice boost of happiness and an overall pleasant, if not wholly satisfying, experience. B /
I don’t know how many of you use Facebook, but there is an app on Facebook called Social Interview that allows you to answer random questions about a person and then post it to their walls. Here are some of the most recent question/answer pairs I have received:
Today’s factoid deals heavily with Sporcle. If you don’t know what I am talking about, you should (and you can find out by clicking the link to the left). It is the perfect way to do “meaningful procrastination.” By that, I mean that this is somewhat beneficial to your brain. Facebook and YouTube, not so much.
A friend of mine was in random quiz mode on Sporcle, and the quiz that followed was “Can you name all of the categories at the Academy Awards?” She knows me well enough and instantly called me over to help. In less than 2 minutes, I had rattled off all 28 categories much to astonishment of my classmates.
In honor of Jason Reitman’s third feature, “Up in the Air,” opening today, I wanted to use the “F.I.L.M. of the Week” for the first time in correlation with the release of a movie in theaters. This week’s “F.I.L.M.” is Reitman’s first feature, “Thank You for Smoking.” A satire that bites with the sharpness of piranha’s teeth, this look at the lobbying industry is absolutely brilliant. I have come to expect nothing less from Reitman, but he exhibits the deftness of an old pro as a newcomer.
Nick Naylor (Aaron Eckhart) has the gift of oratory and the art of spin, making him the perfect person to argue on behalf of the tobacco industry. He never tries to justify himself or tobacco; he simply uses the rationale that by proving the other person wrong, you must be right. Affectionately titled a “Merchant of Death,” he often meets for lunch with his respective counterparts in the alcohol and firearms industry (Maria Bello, David Koechner). The film follows Nick after the announcement of a proposed Congressional measure to put a “POISON” label on all boxes of cigarettes by a peevish Vermont senator (William H. Macy). However, Nick’s main struggle is not the label that threatens to destroy the product he promotes, but rather the struggle to balance the job he does with his requirement to be a good father to Joey, his budding adolescent son. The film is at its best when the contrast between the two is evident: Joey has very black-and-white morals and can’t seem to understand why Nick has such grey ones in lobbying for an industry that kills millions of people each year.
Reitman also penned the screenplay, which is packed to the brim with piquant wit and exciting characters. He also gets the best out of his actors, and the performance on celluloid matches their panache on the page. Especially exciting to watch is Aaron Eckhart as he really gets to the core of Nick Naylor. We really see what makes him tick, and as the story progresses, Eckhart really wrestles with his demons. He gives us one of the most full and electrifying characters that comedy has ever seen, a true sensation. “Thank You for Smoking” would be a crown jewel for an accomplished director, but as a first feature, Jason Reitman has set the bar extremely high for his masterpiece. And if “Up in the Air” is as good as I hear, that bar is up in the atmosphere.
I was determined to get the early word out on the National Board of Review winners today (you know, for everyone that comes to my site for all the breaking Oscar news). In order to do this, I kept the group’s official site open in my Internet window along with several other awards blogs and I hit refresh on each of them about every other minute. Surprisingly, I got the news from Dave Karger’s OscarWatch blog before I got it from the official site.
There is more than one “Marshall and the Movies” on the web.
Don’t worry, I am the other “Marshall and the Movies.” When I had the idea to create a blog, I wanted to explore a great series of hosts. I had previously used Blogger, but I settled on WordPress because I felt that it provided much more tools for growth. The site still exists, and I stumbled upon it the other day. There’s nothing there but my first post, but I just thought you might find it interesting.
January is always an interesting month at the movies. It is usually filled with trash, so it is usually best spent making sure you see everything that came out in December. With this post, I hope to steer you away from what I perceive to be the month’s garbage and towards what could be a surprise hit.
January 8
Is it just me or does the trailer do all the explanation and then some for “Leap Year?” Amy Adams will be welcome face in barren January, and if there is a breakout hit in this month, my bet is on this.
Wait – Michael Cera and teen angst? Never seen this before! So excited for “Youth in Revolt” that I can barely see straight!
And just in case the latest vampire movie has left your local theater by January, Hollywood has “Daybreakers” for you. This seems to have a lot less shirtlessness and a lot more blood and gore, so that might limit its appeal a tad.
January 15
“The Book of Eli” will provide the answer to a question that has me curious: how much apocalypse can moviegoers take? 2009 saw “2012,” “Knowing,” and “Zombieland,” just to name a few. This looks like a more mainstream, BA-version of “The Road.” Denzel Washington is a star that all respect, but “The Taking of Pelham 123” in June 2009 showed that he can’t always draw in a large audience. Will this be the movie to get him back on track?
I’ve held off as long as I could on issuing my predictions, but now I simply cannot wait. It is December and Oscar season is about to kick into high gear.
Don’t fret if you haven’t heard of some of these movies. You will soon. The National Board of Review, the first precursor that deserves to be taken seriously, issues its list this week. Critics circles from all over the country will begin to put forth their lists, and then we get the Golden Globe nominations on December 17th.
So, without further ado, here’s my first stab at predictions.
Apparently I’m still not growing up.
I once kept Blockbuster’s copy of “Munich” for over a month, convinced that I would find some time to watch it.
There is more than one “Marshall and the Movies” on the web.
I’ve held off as long as I could on issuing my predictions, but now I simply cannot wait. It is December and Oscar season is about to kick into high gear.
Marshall and the Movies 
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