A Dozen Takeaways from Oscar Night

by Nathaniel R

John Cena presenting Best Costume Design. Screenshot from ABC

There are 23 categories at the Oscars but always about 2,038 things to discuss. What to focus on? Here's an attempt to focus with a baker's dozen of things that stood out for yours truly. Overall it was a fun and well paced night. But your mileage may vary. Would you add any particular moment to this list?

In no particular order...

Click to read more ...

"Anatomy of a Fall" wins big at the Césars

by Nathaniel R

the great Juliette Binoche announcing Best Actress at the César Awards on Feb 23, 2024 in Paris

This has not been an awards season full of surprises. The expected winners just keep on winning whether we're talking awards bodies in the US, UK, or France. The 49th annual César Awards took place Friday in Paris with the expected winner, Justine Triet's Anatomy of a Fall, taking home six prizes. The nomination leader, Thomas Cailley's mutant adventure The Animal Kingdom also won multiple prizes with five statues in total... all for craft awards.  As expected the stupidly maligned but brilliant Oscar submission The Taste of Things was shut out from any wins after a paltry nomination showing.

The winners of each category and a few comments after the jump... 

Click to read more ...

Memorable Moments and Oscar Takeways from this year's Golden Globes

by Nathaniel R

Oppenheimer emerges as the big winner at the Globes (Photo by Rich Polk via Getty Images)

If you’re looking for a complete list of winners, that’s at the end of this post! 

Hello readers. Though I have been largely absent from writing, I am still me, therefore love movies and watch awards shows. The hilarious thing about my “notes” from awards shows (and also movies come to think of it) is that I always get so caught up in them that the notes ultimately end long before they should. The better the thing… the sooner the notes trail off! So herewith 8 expanded notes from the Globes, inspired by mostly indecipherable scribbles, and probably weighted towards earlier moments in the show...

Click to read more ...

First Round Oscar Predix - Picture / Director

by Nathaniel R

Bradley Cooper as Leonard Bernstein in "Maestro" (Netflix)

As noted in Best Actor & Best Supporting Actor, we're pretending as if the strike will be resolved and movies will actually arrive later this year (because if we don't predictions will be nightmarishly impossible). So let's look at Best Picture and Best Director. What might the future hold for us in these two categories? 

EARLY BIRD DIRECTORS 
It's possible that we've already seen 60% of the Best Director list (Greta Gerwig, Chris Nolan, Celine Song) but that would be highly unusual. This isn't 1972 where the two biggest contenders (Cabaret & The Godfather) had already been popular for literally over a year when they dominated Oscar night. The Oscar formulas and awards season release patterns have calcified in the half century since then. The earth still orbits the sun at the same speed as it did decades earlier, but time (at least in pop culture) has sped up considerably; you're an "old" movie much quicker now... 

Click to read more ...

Familiar Faces: The Chris Nolan Players

by Nathaniel R

Christopher Nolan's "Tenet" cast has a lot of first timers, including all of its leads. So will John David Washington, Robert Pattinson, or Elizabeth Debicki come back for more?

Normally we wouldn't do one of these "familiar faces" for a director known for sequels since they automatically give you repeated thespians. Repeat appearances in the work of a franchise director don't necessarily indicate affection or a favorite performative color on their palette. They're only a sure sign of  contractual / narrative obligation. Elsewhere in Christopher Nolan's filmography, though, we see that he is a true creature of habit when it comes to actors so chances are he would have worked with some of the franchise players again even if it weren't mandatory. 

With Tenet now reasonably priced for rental more people will be seeing it. Let's look at the faces that have most frequently populated Nolan's ambitious and often very financially successful endeavors...

Click to read more ...