7 Days til Oscar...
Sunday, February 21, 2016 at 5:00AM We already celebrated the 7th nominations of both Cate Blanchett and Kate Winslet on the day of the nominations so what shall we celebrate today now that we're exactly one week from Hollywood's High Holy Night?
Hmmm. The Martian? It does have seven nominations but don't feel like it today. So let's just go with the year sevens. Oscar's choices, biggest box office, and our favorites here.
1937: Oscar: Life of Emile Zola; Public: Snow White; TFE: The Awful Truth
1947: Oscar: Gentleman's Agreement; Public: Road to Rio; TFE: Black Narcissus
1957: Oscar: Bridge on the River Kwai; Public: Bridge on...; TFE: A Face in the Crowd
1967: Oscar: In the Heat of the Night; Public: Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?; TFE: Bonnie & Clyde It's worth reminding you here that Mark Harris's book about this year in film "Pictures at a Revolution" is one of the best movie books ever. Get it!
1977: Oscar: Annie Hall; Public: Star Wars; TFE: Annie Hall
1987: Oscar: Last Emperor; Public: 3 Men and a Baby; TFE: Moonstruck
1997: Oscar: Titanic; Public: Titanic; TFE: Boogie Nights
2007: Oscar: No Country For Old Men; Public: Spider-Man 3; TFE: There Will Be Blood
2017: Oscar: TBA; Public: Star Wars Episode VIII; TFE: TBA
Your favorites in "7" years? And let us all have a moment of silence for the great Se7en (1995) which only received one Oscar nomination in its year for Best Film Editing. What a shame!
Oscar Trivia, books
Reader Comments (27)
Only just saw "Bonnie and Clyde" for the first time last year - still feels revelatory. Amazing stuff, of-its-time and timeless all at once.
Mark Harris's book is indeed a whopper. What a great read.
My favourites (probably) in the "7" years:
1927: Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans
1937: The Awful Truth
1947: Crossfire
1957: Il grido
1967: Bonnie and Clyde
1977: Annie Hall
1987: Moonstruck
1997: Jackie Brown
2007: The Diving-Bell and the Butterfly
2007: Ratatouille. Whenever I see I'm convinced its Pixar's masterpiece. Formally perfect, absolutely gorgeous, beautiful and inspiring scrip, wonderful performances.
1997: Boogie Nights. Back when I thought PTA was the new Scorsese before he convinced himself he was the new Kubrick.
1987: Broadcast News. Such a rarity. A smart, layered, romantic comedy that's actually romantic(while still being realistic) and a comedy(without falling too hard into repetitive schtick). Holly Hunter is P E R F E C T in this movie.
1977: Annie Hall. I was thinking of avoiding some conventional wisdom here and going with the underrated Sorcerer, maybe Eraserhead, Close Encounters, or STAR WARS, but why avoid the obvious masterpiece when it staring at you in the face?
1967: Cool Hand Luke. My dad's favorite movie, and its pretty high up my list, too. No movie has ever made an actor seem cooler than this one works around Paul Newman.
1957: The Sweet Smell of Success. P E R F E C T lead performances, James Hong wonderful noir photography, that jazzy score, the clockwork precision of its plot machinations, its many many wonderful lines of dialog edited and delivered to perfection. Top 10 favorite here.
1947: Out of the Past. Another one of those perfect noir, which IMO is the greatest of all film genres.
1937: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Still top 5 Disney film animated film of all-time. Its a bit of a miracle it ended up as good as it did.
Sweet Smell of Success is just to die for. What a great movie!
2007: Zodiac
1997: L.A. Confidential or Donnie Brasco
1987: Full Metal Jacket
1977: Opening Night
1967: Bpnnie and Clyde
1957: Donzoko
1947: Nagaya shinshiroku
1937: La Grande Illusion
1937: Snow White
1947: Black Narcissus
1957: Funny Face
1967: Le Samourai
1977: Annie Hall
1987: Evil Dead 2
1997: LA Confidential
2007: No Country for Old Men
It's too hard to choose a favorite each year, but I'd like to echo the love for a few films:
Black Narcissus -- Far and away Deborah Kerr's best work. And it does such a great job of communicating mood and atmosphere.
Broadcast News -- Such well-written, well-acted characters. I straight-up dislike Terms of Endearment, but I think Broadcast News is sensational. How's that for James Brooks whiplash?
In the Heat of the Night -- People deride this movie for beating The Graduate and Bonnie and Clyde, but it really does so many things well. The give-and-take of the acting between Steiger and Poitier was top-notch. The choice of shots and the light work is clever and effective, and I like the music, too.
Zodiac -- Flat-out the scariest movie I've ever seen, and it's not even a horror movie. That's some great acting and directing. How did Oscar ignore it?
Thank you for mentioning Se7en.
7 Things I love about Se7en:
1. Brad Pitt kicking the door to Spacey's apartment.
2. the diner scene between Freeman and Paltrow
3. Fincher's direction, especially the abundance of wide shots that show us a world outside the main storyline
4. the chemistry between Freeman and Pitt (boy, do they play off one another so remarkably!)
5. Spacey's eerie voice (he should have won an Oscar for THIS, and not "The Usual Suspects")
6. the rarity of the color red (outside of all the blood): it's like an omen for bad things to come
7. the ending.
I third the accolades for Mark Harris' Pictures At a Revolution. One of the best film books ever. I'm still reeling from the hair-raising intell about Rex Harrison and Rachel Roberts from it.
Also: Broadcast News. I wasn't that impressed with it back when it was released. After seeing it again a few years ago, I thoroughly admired it, and was aback at how prescient it was about the unholy mariage of journalism and entertainment it turned out to be. And Holly Hunter was so damned good in it!
2007: The holy quartet of The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, 4 months 3 weeks 2 days, I'm Not There and There Will Be Blood. Towering achievements
1997: The Sweet Hereafter
1987: The Dead
1977: Annie Hall
1967: Bonnie and Clyde
1957: Wild Strawberries
1947: Black Narcisuss
1937: Lost Horizon
1927: Sunrise
What about films with Seven in the title?
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
Seven Brides for Seven Brothers
Seven Samurai
The Seventh Seal
Seven Psychopaths
The Magnificent Seven
Se7en
I think this list implies that seven of anything is too hard to live with. Except for "Ball of Fire" - where it's seven professors along with Gary Cooper & Barbara Stanwyck.
1927 - Bed and Sofa - gentle, poetic, naturalistic, effortlessly intoxicating - kind of like a Soviet L'Atalante - which, yes, is saying "kind of like a Soviet version of The Greatest Film Ever Made".
(And if we're going by year of US release, my favourite for 1927 is probably Sunrise.)
1937 - Grand Illusion - the kind of literate, profoundly wise humanist masterpiece that used to be a staple of all-time lists but isn't punchy or kitschy enough for the undergrad taste that seems to increasingly rule film culture. I know tastes are always bound to shift over time, but I'm still struggling to cope with how changing tastes shift everything that's classical and subtle towards film-snob obscurity.
(By US release: Make Way for Tomorrow - which is even more wrenching than Tokyo Story)
1947 - Odd Man Out - a bit eclipsed by Carol Reed's follow up (which is The Other Greatest Film of All Time) but still gripping and beautiful
1957 - The Seventh Seal - my favourite Bergman - a singular evocation of the Middle Ages and moment-for-moment completely bewitching
1967 - In Cold Blood - one of the great movie years so it's hard to look past Bonnie and Clyde and Weekend and Belle de Jour and The Graduate. But In Cold Blood belongs right up there among the most jaw-dropping pieces of cinema, especially in terms of cinematography and characterisation.
Incidentally I love that Blockbuster used to stand for something as 'dry' and character-driven and dialogue-driven and just generally cape-less and talking-animal-less as Guess Who's Coming to Dinner. I don't mean I love the movie - it's terrible - but I love that something of its ilk could once be the highest grossing film of a given year.
1977 - Annie Hall - my favourite comedy *and* my favourite love story. Ever.
1987 - Wings of Desire - almost as elegant as City of Angels.
1997 - Fast, Cheap and Out of Control - Errol Morris's genius still strikes me as morbidly underappreciated and this one in particular is one of the more profound statements on the human condition I've seen at the movies.
2007 - 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days - One of the most perfect films ever constructed. Featuring possibly the most layered/transfixing performance of the decade.
goran, you have impeccable taste.
Seven is ridiculously underrated...Brad Pitt has been top-tier for a very long time and people act like he's just a pretty face.
I love Se7en so so much. My favorite thing about it to this day is how fucking bleak it is. There are some moments of levity, but overall it is the definition of dark humanity. Plus, Freeman and Pitt were great together.
My favorites from the "7" years...
1927 - Wings
1937 - Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
1947 - The Bishop's Wife
1957 - 12 Angry Men
1967 - In the Heat of the Night
1977 - Star Wars
1987 - The Untouchables
1997 - The Full Monty
2007 - Zodiac
2017: Dunkirk.
That list above had me wondering if there's ever been a year when Oscar, Box Office and TFE were all unanimous...
1937 - Stella Dallas
1947 - Miracle on 34th Street
1957 - An Affair to Remember
1967 - Either Bonnie and Clyde or The Graduate
1977 - Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind
1987 - Awesome Movie Year. (We really should do a poll on Best Actress.) Either Fatal Attraction or The Untouchables (where I first me my Celebrity Husband, Kevin Costner.)
1997 - Titanic
2007 - Zodiac
Patryk, you are trying to seduce me. (And it worked!)
I went back and forth on Se7en. At first I thought it was brilliant, when I younger. Five years later I thought it was just miserablism garbage and Brad Pitt was WAY overacting the entire time. Now, having seen it again, I realize its both excellent AND also crazy nihilistic, but it has these signs of life and vitality and humanism that keeps it from being a slot into Hell. Also, Brad Pitt's performance works in perfect unison with Morgan Freeman, who's at his most stoic and knowledgeable. Where Freeman sits still and doesn't overreact, Pitt's hot-headed idealist cop will kick down doors unprovoked and get frequently flustered. His ego, his sense of pride is out of control and he tries hard to see the best in people, while Morgan Freeman(this is probably my fave performance of his) seems to have accepted the way the world is a long time ago. I think that relationship between them and how it builds to its crazy ending is a large part of why it works like gangbusters. Morgan realizes the horror but begs for rationality in this extreme moment, which is something Pitt just cannot accept.
So all that stuff is dope, on top of the filmmaking being basically perfect top to bottom. If Alien3 was the waved-off studio fuck-up and The Game was the debut calling card, Se7en will be the arrival of David Fincher's brand of mainstream cinema, and all that entails. I think he's only made two greater films, The Social Network(best of 2010) and Zodiac(2nd best movie of 2007). Can't wait for his next project.
goran: That description of blockbuster. NO. I use that term, consistently, to refer to budget, not hit status. A blockbuster. A tentpole. A megabudget movie. With how I use it, blockbusters can fail. The Lone Ranger is a failed blockbuster, for example.
1937: Snow White
1947: Crossfire
1957: The Seventh Seal
1967: Bonnie and Clyde
1977: Annie Hall
1987: Wings of Desire
1997: Titanic
2007: No Country for Old Men
Fun! Off the top of my head:
1937: The Grand Illusion
1947: My Darling Clementine
1957: Paths of Glory
1967: Cool Hand Luke
1977: Annie Hall
1987: Matewan
1997: LA Confidential
2007: There Will Be Blood
Years w/too many choices for me: 2007, 1957. Year w/too few: 1947
1937: The Awful Truth
1947: The Farmer's Daughter
1957: Funny Face
1967: The Graduate
1977: Annie Hall
1987: Moonstruck
1997: Boogie Nights
2007: Michael Clayton
I haven't seen The Farmer's Daughter in about 25 years, but I remember liking it a lot. That and Black Narcissus are the only possibilities from 1947 for me. The rest of these are all classics I've seen repeatedly, though!
2007: Lust, Caution
Man, I really have to see "Broadcast News". I was watching "And the Oscar Goes To" on TCM, and one of the most fascinating interviews was Cher, who discussed being nominated previously (for "Silkwood") and she was convinced she wouldn't win for "Moonstruck" because she saw Holly Hunter in BN and thought it was one of the best performances she had ever seen.
Erik: My Darling Clementine is a 1946 film, not a 1947 film.