Review: Ad Astra

by Murtada Elfadl

The thing about having daddy issues is that you can never escape them. No matter how far you travel, even into space. In Ad Astra these issues drive Roy McBride (Brad Pitt), an astronaut sent on a mission across the solar system to find out the reason behind recent catastrophes,  including fires and plane crashes, taking place on Earth. The kicker here is that his astronaut father (Tommy Lee Jones), who went missing in another space expedition 29 years ago, might be connected to what’s happening. Not only does Roy have to confront the dangers awaiting him on his mission, he also has to deal with his feelings about his father and being abandoned by him.

The space odyssey element is surprising twist for writer director James Gray (The Immigrant, Two Lovers) but the father son imbroglio isn’t at all...

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Was 1993 the Best "Best Supporting Actor" Lineup Ever?

To celebrate the 25th anniversary of a rather amazing Oscar lineup, here's Ben Miller...

There have been several iconic Oscar nominee lineups throughout the years.  Best Actor 1967, Best Actress 1939, Best Director 1975... a wholly fearsome lineup comes around but once every couple of decades or so.  One of them is celebrating its 25-year anniversary this season: the 1993 lineup for Best Supporting Actor.

Before we get to the nominees, look at who just missed the lineup...  

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Months of Meryl: The Homesman (2014)

John and Matthew are watching every single live-action film starring Meryl Streep. 

#46 —Altha Carter, a minister’s wife who gives comfort to three disturbed women. 

JOHN: The Homesman is one of the best films Meryl Streep has ever had the good fortune to be in, and yet, she’s on screen for no more than five minutes. Set circa 1850 in the Nebraska territory, Tommy Lee Jones’ adaptation of Glendon Swarthout’s novel is a gorgeous and unsettling theatrical follow-up to his 2005 stunner The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada.

Hilary Swank stars as Mary Bee Cuddy, a self-sufficient spinster who volunteers to transport three insane women from their town to a church in Hebron, Iowa that cares for mentally ill patients...

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Months of Meryl: Hope Springs (2012)

John and Matthew are watching every single live-action film starring Meryl Streep. 

#44 — Kay Soames, a lonesome woman trying to revitalize her stagnant marriage

JOHN: Tommy Lee Jones and Meryl Streep have screen personas as disparate as the parts of a taijitu. While Streep actively courts her audience with vital charisma or some captivating form of transformation, Jones seems just as satisfied to pretend that the audience isn’t there, rarely soliciting our sympathy or even our attention. What a surprise, then, to see each actor force the other to explore previously untapped potentials in this later stage of his/her career and deliver a performance as nuanced and exciting as the very best work in their respective filmographies.

In David Frankel’s Hope Springs, Streep and Jones are Kay and Arnold Soames, a couple married for 31 years who now regard each other like estranged roommates. They rarely speak to one another aside from the occasional “good morning” and “good night.” A hug a day is the extent of their intimacy; they haven’t had sex in almost four years...

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Tues Top 10: Oscar's All Time Favorite Supporting Actors

by Nathaniel R

Tommy Lee Jones in JFKLet's discuss Oscar hiearchies, again. This one is ultra specific but we're doing it for balance since we did the supporting actresses last week. Who are Oscar's 10 favorite supporting actors of all time? We'll work the ranking like so: Supporting nominations count most, with wins acting like half a nomination to help determine rank. The tiebreaker is the spread of time of nominations which can denote either long term fandom on the Academy's part or shortlived enthusiasms.

In contrast to supporting actress where the leaders were clear and the nomination counts higher but among fewer people, very narrow statistics separated all of the runners up from the top ten. Though if you must know, the unlucky #11 was Tommy Lee Jones, who would have ranked 5th on the top ten had he won the Oscar for Lincoln AS HE SHOULD HAVE. But we'll discuss Tommy and the 7 other working actors who almost made the list after the top ten under "who's next?". But for now a shout out to the departed. They left behind great performances and almost made this list: 

• Gig Young (1951, 1958, 1969*)
• Martin Landau (1988, 1989, 1994*)
• Charles Coburn (1941, 1943*, 1946)
• Melvyn Douglas (1963*, 1979*)
• Philip Seymour Hoffman (2007, 2008, 2012)
• Charles Bickford (1943, 1947, 1948)
• Anthony Quinn (1952*, 1956*)

okay on to the top ten list...

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