The Oscar Project
A film made by your favorite directorI had such a hard time picking a favorite director for this category, so I landed on Steven Spielberg. I already had two Christopher Nolan films on the list and had selections from some greats like Alfred Hitchcock, Stanley Kubrick, George Lucas, Ridley Scott, and Peter Jackson but I only had one Spielberg film (Jurassic Park) way back on day 2. And if you’ve been playing along all month, you’ll know that a few of those names I just mentioned are teasers for upcoming films in the last few days. Obviously, Spielberg has such a vast catalog of films he has directed over a nearly 50-year career, I had many options to choose from. Some other choices that were near the top of my list included Jaws, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Schindler’s List, and Minority Report. But if I had to pick one movie that only Spielberg could have made, it would be E.T. The Extraterrestrial. There is so much to love about this film. He clearly moved on from Close Encounters of the Third Kind and wanted to make a different kind of alien movie and succeeded in that. From the instant E.T. appears on screen, anyone watching the film loves him. Granted, the film was released three months after I was born, but I would guess that the love for E.T. hasn’t been matched in the nearly 40 years since then, with the exception of the recent addition to the Star Wars universe, Baby Yoda. I think it’s a credit to the enduring legacy of this film that it even inspired a short film/commercial last holiday season that featured Henry Thomas, the actor who portrayed Elliott in the original. You can watch that short film here. I dare you to watch even this short 4-minute clip without tearing up just a little. We all want a little part of E.T. in our life, something from completely outside our imagination that we can believe in and be connected to. And deep down, we probably all understand that we may not get to keep that strange thing for long, but that it will always be a part of our experience and remain in our heart forever. Day 18 – A film that stars your favorite actor/actress | Day 20 – A film that changed your life
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A film that stars your favorite actor/actressI’m a little disappointed in myself with this one. I had every intention of re-watching this film for the first time in probably 15 years or more before writing this post, but just ran out of time. It’s on my list to revisit this fall at some point, and who knows, maybe Santa will be generous and bring me a copy in my stocking. I promise I’ve been good! So, with today’s category, I suppose I have to explain which actor or actress I’m talking about. For those who don’t know the film, Léon: The Professional is a French action film from 1994 (don't worry, it's in English) featuring Jean Reno as Léon, a hitman in New York City. He reluctantly offers shelter to a young neighbor girl named Mathilda, played by Natalie Portman, when her family is murdered by a corrupt DEA agent named Norman Stansfield (Gary Oldman). While I would be happy calling any one of these actors my favorite, I picked this film because it was Miss Portman’s big screen debut and if I had to pick one favorite actor, she would be it. Now, I admit that I wasn’t aware of Portman until she was cast as Luke and Leia Skywalker’s mother in Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace. I had seen her in 1996’s Mars Attacks! (as the president’s daughter) but the few other films she’d been in up to that point were not really the kind of stuff I was into when they came out. Once I got to college and gained access to some questionable file sharing services, I was able to check out more of her early films while waiting for my next dose of Portman in the Star Wars prequels. Léon and Heat were the first two I landed on and they did not disappoint. Portman has certainly had an incredible career that has already lasted almost 30 years. Not only was she cast as Anakin’s love interest, but she also caught the eye of the Mighty Thor in the first two Thor films and is scheduled to reprise that role in the next Thor film, due out in a few years. She has also played Anne Frank on Broadway and been nominated for three Academy Awards, winning once for Best Actress in Black Swan. On top of that, she graduated from Harvard in 2003 with a degree in psychology and even returned to her native Israel to take additional studies. I haven’t seen every film on her resume, but I generally like the work she does, even when the film itself may not be the best. The fact that she has taken on a diverse set of roles both before and after her work in Star Wars and Thor, demonstrates her skills as an actor. If you haven’t seen some of Portman’s earlier films, I highly recommend checking them out, especially Léon and Heat. Those films and the roles she inhabited were good indications of the success to come for her throughout her career. Day 17 – Favorite film sequel | Day 19 – A film made by your favorite director Favorite film sequelI was trying VERY hard to stay away from Star Wars films on this list and this is already my second one (after The Last Jedi last week) so I’ve already broken that goal. But there really is no other answer for this category. Not only is it my favorite film sequel, I think many people would argue that it is the best sequel ever made. I know my post last week about The Last Jedi identified some problems with The Empire Strikes Back, but while they derail the recent film, Empire is still a near perfect film. For fans of the franchise, this outing accomplishes what many other films in the series tried (and failed) to do. It goes in a very dark direction, while expanding the story and the universe of the original. We have the same familiar cast of characters, but also get a new crop of fan favorites from the Jedi Master Yoda to his evil counterpart Emperor Palpatine. The story also takes us to new locales, completely different from what we had in the first film. But all this pales in comparison with one of the greatest plot twists in cinematic history. I don’t need to flag this as a spoiler, but Darth Vader is Luke Skywalker’s father. So much has been made about this moment in film that took place now 40 years ago. The Simpson’s have referenced it when Homer and Marge’s went to see the film on a date and Homer ruined the surprise for fans waiting in line for the next showing. Many films have parodied the line including Tommy Boy, Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me, Toy Story 2, and Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure. The reveal is so pervasive in popular culture that even people who have never seen a second of a Star Wars film know the line and the situation. The film was nominated for several Oscars and won for Best Sound Mixing, the only other film in the series to win a competitive Oscar after the original 1977 release. The film has been heralded as the best Star Wars film ever made, many referring to the darker themes explored and the fact that unlike the first film, it ends with the bad guys on top, something you usually don’t see in popular cinema. Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back is available on Disney+. Day 16 – A film that is personal to you | Day 18 – A film that stars your favorite actor/actress A film that is personal to youToday’s film gets a little more personal, much like my first film in this list (the first film I remember watching – Dumbo) but for a very different reason. There are some films that cement themselves in your brain in relation to a specific event or episode in your life and Dodgeball is one of those for me. Besides being a hilarious film, it is one of the movies that I watched on the evening that I proposed to my wife nearly 15 years ago. The story goes like this. My girlfriend at the time (now my wife) and I had been invited over to a friend’s house to celebrate the New Year. It was a small gathering of a few friends and we spent the evening just relaxing, enjoying a few drinks, and watching some movies. My wife will tell the story and stress the fact that I was being a complete jerk the entire evening. Of course, she didn’t know that I had a ring burning a hole in my pocket and was planning on popping the question at midnight when the ball dropped in Times Square. (I know it’s cliché, but it was the best I could do). I had asked her father’s permission a week prior at a Christmas gathering and had only told him, my own parents, and a few select co-workers about my plans. Obviously, she said “yes” and we were married a year and a half later, spending the last 14+ years together. Not only did watching this movie the first time coincide with our engagement, but it’s one we have returned to over an over throughout our relationship. We often quote lines from the film to each other. (“If you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball” anyone?) We love the oversized personalities in the film, especially Ben Stiller’s White Goodman and Rip Torn’s Patches O’Houlihan. The main cast is hysterical and there are some great cameos from Gary Cole and Jason Bateman playing the dodgeball tournament announcers to Hank Azaria as a younger Patches and of course Lance Armstrong, Chuck Norris, and David Hasselhoff, all playing various versions of themselves. I’m not sure if it’s because of the association I have with that happy day of my life, or just because it’s such a fun movie, but I come back to this one often. Just like yesterday’s pick, I find myself watching this through to the end if I come across it on TV. If you haven’t seen it before, or it’s been a while, go check it out and have a few laughs at the expense of being getting smacked in the face with big rubber balls! Day 15 – A film that makes you feel happy | Day 17 – Favorite film sequel A film that makes you feel happyOK, it’s Sunday and we’re heading into the third week of this project this November. After a few days of downer categories, it’s time to lift things up a little with today’s selection, a film that makes me happy! If you’re too young to remember when Cool Runnings first hit theaters, go check it out immediately. It is based on the true story of the first Jamaican bobsled team that competed in the fifteenth Winter Olympics held in Calgary, Albert, Canada in 1988. Now, I remember this Olympics probably as the first one I remember seeing live. Being born in 1982, I was only two years old in 1984 when the previous Olympics were held, so this was my first exposure to athletics on a world stage. I’m not sure if I watched any of the bobsled at the time, though I’m sure I saw some in highlights since having the Jamaicans there was something of an oddity. This film makes me happy because it is a true underdog story. Forget that many of the elements of the story have been tweaked or embellished for the sake of the film narrative. It’s just a fun film and it has a little bit of everything. You have Derice Bannock who is a champion sprinter trying to live up to the name of his father, also an Olympic sprinter. Derice’s friend Sanka Coffie is the loveable jokester, always ready with a smart comment, but a genuine and true friend so stands by Derice’s side, even if it means freezing his “royal Rastafarian nenes off.” Rounding out their team is Junior Bevil, eternally bowing to his father’s will in hopes of currying his approval and acceptance, and Yul Brenner, the tough guy who comes to show his own heart of gold by taking former rival Junior under his wing. Top off this cast with the late John Candy playing Irv Blitzer, their troubled coach who only takes up their cause after much nagging. There are so many great scenes in this movie, and it’s one of those that’s hard to not watch to the end when you see it on TV. In true sports movie fashion, I always find myself watching the movie, hoping that the outcome might be just a little different. <SPOILERS AHEAD> For those who don’t know, the Jamaicans are in position to move into medal contention in the final day of competition, before an accident derails their chances. I always cross my fingers for these four unlikely heroes that they will make it through those final few turns and claim a spot on the medals stand. Unfortunately, they did not medal, and while the Jamaicans sent bobsled teams to the Olympics throughout the 1990s and even sent a women’s team to the 2018 Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea, those teams have never medaled. Regarding the film, it is a tight 98-minute runtime and feels like even less once you get into it. It is available on Disney+ and perfectly suitable for kids. Day 14 – A film that gave you depression | Day 16 – A film that is personal to you A film that gave you depressionThis was another category that I struggled with a bit. It’s hard for me to say that a film actually gave me depression or really depressed me. I can usually separate myself from the action in the films I watch and even when it is a truly depressing film, I don’t really feel depressed by it. I will often sit and think about the action, and consider the film a bit more deeply, but depressed? Not really. That said, I picked a film that I loved watching when it first came out, but the more and more I watched it, the more I started to appreciate the deeper messages contained within. It’s now a film I have a little bit of a hard time watching as an older adult. There are certain scenes that really hit home, added to the fact that Michael Clarke Duncan has since passed away, making his performance that much more impactful. I didn’t realize until several years after first seeing the film that it was an adaptation of Stephen King’s novella of the same name. On top of that, the film was directed by Frank Darabont who has previously directed The Shawshank Redemption, another adaptation of a King novella and often nominated among the best films in the history of cinema, at least according to the public voting on the movie site IMDb. It’s no accident that Duncan’s character in the film, John Coffey, shares his initials with another famous miracle worker. His words can be used for many situations, and none more so than “I’m tired, boss. Mostly I’m tired of people being ugly to each other.” We can all learn a lot from the hulking brute that is John Coffey, executed in prison for a crime he didn’t commit, by a group of guards that understood and believed in his innocence based on his actions. They judged him for what they saw him do firsthand, not based on the color of his skin or what others claimed of him. Day 13 – A film that put you in deep thought | Day 15 – A film that makes you feel happy A film that put you in deep thoughtThis is the second newest film I have on my list and one of the most recently critically acclaimed. As such, there may be a bit of recency bias in this pick, but that’s OK. I wanted this list to have a broad spectrum of films from different eras, genres, directors, and styles, and that means including recent films as well as those from 50 or 80 years ago. For anyone who has seen this film, I challenge you to admit that it didn’t move you in some way. As I wrote in my recent review of the film, it is a personal story, yet one that is told on a grand scale. There are moments of intense emotion between individuals, followed by sweeping views of the devastation of war that is evident all around them. I’m not joking when I tell you that I sat in silence in my living room, all by myself, after this film finished playing. In today’s world of streaming video and DVDs, it’s easy to just click off the credits and move on to the next piece of media. But as the category for today suggests, I sat in thought after this film finished. I let the credits play and imagined how I would have reacted in the shoes of the characters on screen. Would I have had the courage to lay my life on the line the way they did to save my fellow countrymen? Would I have been able to crawl through trenches full of decaying carcasses, avoid sniper fire, and swim over a waterfall, just to deliver a message that could potentially save the lives of hundreds of men? I’m not sure. This is a hallmark of some of the best films throughout history. They tell a striking story in an incredibly visual way that makes you sit back and think. Films like this stay with you and give your brain plenty to chew on, not just in the moment, but for days after viewing. That is what 1917 did for me. Day 12 – A film that you hate from your favorite genre | Day 14 – A film that gave you depression A film that you hate from your favorite genreThis is such a hard category for me, and probably the one I struggled with the most when coming up with this list. The whole idea of picking something from my favorite genre is that I love pretty much anything from that genre. Picking my least favorite science fiction film is like picking my least favorite child. I love them all, even though they are all different. OK, maybe not quite like picking between my kids, but you get the idea. That said, I had to land on something for this category and it came down to two films from this franchise. I had been trying to steer away from Star Wars on this list as much as possible because I could easily fill just about every category with one of those films and be happy. But that would get boring and I wanted to have some variety. That said, I think this is probably my least favorite of the entire series, and that’s saying something with films like The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones to pick from. My main problem with The Last Jedi is that is suffers from the same ailment as The Empire Strikes Back, but in a way that detracts so much from the story that I can’t ignore it. Don’t get me wrong, I love The Empire Strikes Back, but if you stop and think about it, there is a bit of a continuity issue with Luke spending a bunch of time training with Yoda (is it weeks? months? Who knows?) and the rest of the crew (Han, Leia, Chewbacca, and C-3PO) are simultaneously on the run from the Empire. Granted they have to travel slowly due to a malfunctioning hyperdrive, but does that mean it will take them weeks/months to get to Cloud City? Perhaps, but it doesn’t feel like that in film time. Jump forward to The Last Jedi and we have similar storylines where Rey is training with Luke on a remote planet no one can find, Finn and Rose are off to find a random gambler (this is starting to sound REALLY familiar) and the core group is being chased by the bad guys in big ships. While Empire deftly sidesteps the concept of time and the different durations that might take place in that film, The Last Jedi almost explicitly tells you how long it will be before the Resistance fleet has before it is overtaken and how long Rey spends with Luke. It isn’t necessary and hugely detracts from the story. Aside from the time aspects, I also abhor the waste of characters in this film in particular (but also the sequel trilogy as a whole). Captain Phasma should have been cool and a better replacement for Vader than Kylo Ren, but she’s relegated to a fringe role in this film and given a very unceremonious death. Supreme Leader Snoke is a poor fill-in for the Emperor, especially since we find out one film later that the Emperor isn’t completely gone. On the side of the good guys, Admiral Holdo feels like the light side version of Phasma, filling a plot point in this film and that’s about it. She doesn’t even get a cool tag-line like Admiral Ackbar (think traps…). From top to bottom, this film undermined The Force Awakens in many ways and diluted the product that could have been in The Rise of Skywalker. I have long been a proponent of giving J.J. Abrams the reigns for all three sequel films, just as George Lucas directed all three prequel films. Those three might not be perfect, but at least they tie together and tell a somewhat cohesive story without diverting too much attention to side quests and rabbit holes. I still love Star Wars, but The Last Jedi could have been so much more and for that it gets selected as a film I hate from my favorite genre. Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi is currently available on Disney+. Day 11 – A film you like from your least favorite genre | Day 13 – A film that put you in deep thought A film you like from your least favorite genreAnyone who has followed this blog for any length of time probably already knows that I am not a huge fan of horror films. I should probably amend that to not being a fan of slasher horror, the blood and guts kind that is out there just to spray the camera with as much fake blood as possible. Psychological horror films are some that I have grown to enjoy over the past several years, and my absolute favorite in this arena is Get Out. I watched this as part of my journey to watch all the Oscar nominated films a few years back. I was initially apprehensive about it but was willing to give it the benefit of the doubt after all the positive buzz I heard from pundits and reviewers at the time. As is normally the case with anything above a PG rating in my house, I waited until after everyone was sounds asleep in bed and it was plenty dark to put on Get Out and remember sitting on the edge of my seat through most of the film. I don’t want to spoil anything for those who haven’t seen the film, but just as Daniel Kaluuya’s character Chris can’t take his eyes off things later in the film, I couldn’t pull myself away from his predicament as the film progressed. Once I figured out what was going on, I felt paralyzed to do anything to stop the action, flailing along as an innocent bystander but just as invested in “getting out” as the characters in the film. One of my favorite parts of this film was the casting and how many of the roles are populated by people I associated with comedies. When I think of Catherine Keener, my mind immediately goes to The 40-Year-Old Virgin and while Bradley Whitford is probably best known for his role on The West Wing, I first knew him as the weasily Eric Gordon in Billy Madison. Another small role goes to Stephen Root, who I first think of as the bumbling Gordon Pibb in DodgeBall. All these actors are playing against type in this film and it is awesome to see. If you haven’t seen Get Out, you need to “get out” there and see it right now. Don’t worry if you’re not a big horror fan, this one is not your typical slasher and I don’t think there’s really any blood to speak of. There is plenty to terrify you though which is the whole point. Day 10 – Your favorite superhero film | Day 12 – A film that you hate from your favorite genre Your favorite superhero filmThere are so many films to choose from in this category, and thankfully the superhero genre has gone through a bit of a renaissance in the last decade or so. Many people credit Iron Man with updating the superhero films and bringing them a bit more into the mainstream, but I honestly think 2005’s Batman Begins set the stage even more. When Christopher Nolan took over the Batman franchise, he placed it in a world that felt more real than anything else in superhero films of the past. There were some elements of fantasy at work, and Batman Begins is probably the most “comicbooky” of his three Dark Knight films, but it was a different way of looking at the character that many people enjoyed. Fast forward to 2008 and the release of The Dark Knight. If you thought the story in Batman Begins was dark and gritty, Nolan took things to an entirely different level with his second installment. This film has it all. While the first film featured Bruce Wayne’s ascension into the role of Batman, while this featured him wrestling with the need to retain the Batman persona, while also running his millionaire empire. There is the love triangle of Bruce, Rachel and Harvey, whom we all know becomes Two Face. And there are the dual father figures of Michael Caine’s Alfred and Morgan Freeman’s Lucius Fox. There are so many strings to pull on with this film, and I haven’t even mentioned Heath Ledger yet. One of the few actors to receive an acting Oscar posthumously, his work on this film was rightly praised. While Cesar Romero portrayed the Joker as a prankster in the 1960s Batman television show and Jack Nicholson turned Batman’s nemesis a bit darker in Tim Burton’s 1989 Batman, it was Ledger who truly transformed the character into a sinister psychopath. It is a shame that he didn’t live to receive the acclaim for the role, but his Oscar is well deserved. Ultimately, the story unfolds, and we discover, along with Bruce, that he and The Joker are two sides of the same coin. As throughout the comics, they almost can’t live without each other. While in prison, Ledger’s Joker even throws out a Jerry Maguire reference when he tells Batman, “You complete me.” I had several films in my final grouping before selecting The Dark Knight as my favorite superhero film. Spider-man: Into the Spider-Verse was an option, as was Logan, for very different reasons. Avengers: Endgame also landed near the top for the way it was able to pull together storylines from dozens of different characters and almost as many writers and directors into one grand finale. Even the first Iron Man and Thor: Ragnarok came to mind, but in the end, my choice was clear. The Dark Knight is currently available on HBOMax. Day 9 – A film you hate that everyone liked | Day 11 – A film you like from your least favorite genre |
AuthorI'm just a film buff who wants to watch great movies. Where else to find the best, than the list of those nominated by the Academy each year? Archives
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