Our critics’ takes on the 9 Best Picture nominees

The writers here at Film Journal seem to agree with The Academy and its selection of the top films of 2013. Each of the nine Best Picture nominees found favor with our critics when it first premiered last year.  Spike Jonze’s dystopian love story, Her, came the closest to receiving what could be considered a negative review, with critic David Noh singling out “eternal sufferer” protagonist, Theodore Twombly, for being too passive a hero. Yet, even with Twombly’s persistent moroseness, the character's world was nonetheless full of “droll moments and real surprise,” Noh acknowledged. As is the case with several directors whose films received nominations, Spike Jonze turned in one of his finest works in years.

Here’s what the FJI critics had to say about the best films of 2013:

12 Years A Slave:
12 Years a Slave is a landmark film, complete with a terrific ensemble (Paul Dano, Sara Paulson and Brad Pitt need to be mentioned in certain key roles), and the vision and skill required to do justice to such historically complex material. It is one of those rare pieces of art that all its successors taking a shot at the same topic will be measured against.

Click here for the full review.

American Hustle:
With a crackling script and masterful direction, Russell has made a fiction that is stranger—and way more fun—than the truth. He has the help of a dream cast of actors, all at the top of their games.

Click here for the full review.

Dallas Buyers Club:
Screenwriters Craig Borten and Melisa Wallack don’t fall back on any heroic or clichéd turns but keep Woodroof on an outlaw course where no pro-gay marches or quilts sweeten the way or soften the character’s macho, prejudicial core. Yet it’s McConaughey’s savvy incarnation of this Lone Star brute that makes this gritty tale worth the ride.

Click here for the full review.

Captain Phillips:
But Captain Phillips functions most as a handsomely, elaborately produced “hardware” movie that satisfies in both its details and the sustained suspense of its action elements.  And by having Hanks in the starring role.

Click here for the full review.

The Wolf of Wall Street:
Unlike its mostly slimy characters, The Wolf of Wall Street favorably impresses on every level. Perversely enjoyable and entertaining, this wild ride of a film offers a motor-mouth chorus of really bad boys whose rousing cantata celebrates the recent era of easy money and financial funny business. Audiences—their values be damned—will sing along.

Click here for the full review.

Nebraska:
Like a Hitchcock MacGuffin, the non-existent prize is the peg on which screenwriter Bob Nelson hangs an alternately charming and caustic road movie about the often exasperating bonds between parents and children and how we could all benefit from taking the time to get to know those sometime-strangers we call Mom and Dad.

Click here for the full review.

Philomena:
Philomena is as much a sharp exploration of class, sexuality, faith and relationships as it is a wittily written, devastating account of the barbaric treatment of unwed mothers in Ireland as recently as the 1950s, with a plum role for the remarkable Judi Dench.

Click here for the full review.

Gravity:
Cuarón and his team have created screen spectacle with a searing human dimension, and bring a true sense of wonder to a groundbreaking movie experience.

Click here for the full review.

Her:
It's a fiendishly clever concept, his most satisfying outing since the brilliant Being John Malkovich, rife with droll moments and real surprise.

Click here for the full review.

The Internet is of course full of Oscar lists and countdowns today, posing much more of a distraction than usual for film-lovers. In-keeping with this spirit of enjoyable diversions, here’s another (brief!) list outlining What the Internet Has to Say About Oscar:

Film.com: The 12 Best Acceptance Speeches in Oscar History
Replete with video and fully subjective commentary.

Entertainment Weekly: The 10 Most High-Powered Oscar Races of the Past 25 Years
A fun trip down commemorative lane. Who knew Kate Winslet had already received three nominations by age 26? More importantly: Can Jennifer Lawrence best her record?

Vulture: Where to Stream This Year’s Oscar-Nominated Documentaries
A fantastic resource.

Indiewire: Interview: Lupita Nyong’o
Months before she received a Best Supporting Actress nomination for 12 Years a Slave.

Vanity Fair: Celebrating The Oldest-Ever Class of Best Actress Nominees
Take that, Sexist Agism.

‘Hercules’ to fall in step behind ‘Lone Survivor’

If early tracking reports bear out, the son of Zeus is no match for the U.S. Navy SEALs (now there’s an infomercial for you). Lone Survivor, the critically acclaimed war drama starring Mark Wahlberg and based on a real-life disastrous, albeit heroic, 2005 SEALs mission in Afghanistan, expands wide to 2,876 theatres today. Comparable combat films Zero Dark Thirty and Black Hawk Down managed to pull in figures in the low-to-mid $20-million range over their opening weekends (in 2012 and 2001, respectively), setting mid-January precedents many believe Lone Survivor could easily match. Universal, however, has released more conservative estimates, predicting their film will bow somewhere in the high teens.

The other high-profile release opening nationwide this weekend, The Legend of Hercules, isn’t expected to make its competitors work hard for their survival. Although promos have Kellan Lutz looking appropriately muscular, and the CGI visuals boasting the appropriate fanboy aesthetic, there’s been little advance hype, from either critics or fans, surrounding this latest variation on the 300 formula. Hercules will likely haul in around $10 million, and may not even crack the weekend’s Top 5. However, those still gunning for an epic take on the epic tale of a son-of-a-god can rest assured: Brett Ratner will release his version, starring The Rock, this July. If that doesn’t do it for you, there’s always the Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth adaptation.

Over in the specialty realm, Spike Jonze’s Her is poised to expand to 1,729 locations. The quirky tale of fraught love between man and machine has so far earned $3.2 million and received generally favorable reviews, though given its strange/original subject matter, pundits are unsure of its continued success. Similar oddball titles, such as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Lost in Translation, however, managed to play very well, so we’ll see if cerebral cinemagoers can help Her reach the $5 million mark.

Finally, August: Osage County and Inside Llewyn Davis will also continue their rollouts. August will screen in 905 theatres, while Llewyn will play in 729.

In sum, the weekend’s breakdown will likely go something like this:

1. Lone Survivor


2. Frozen (No, audiences can’t let it go)


3. The Wolf of Wall Street


4. The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug


5. American Hustle

 

Will 'Where the Wild Things Are' enchant or repel audiences?

By Sarah Sluis

Last night, in a theatre dotted with kids wearing cardboard crowns just like the boy lead, Max, I saw Where the Wild Things Are . Like many of my generation, the book by Maurice Sendak was one of my favorites, in part because it defied easy explanation. Max breaks rules and is mean to his Mom, then goes on this weird, parallel adventure that's never really explained. All in a few hundred words. Max's wolf suit, in particular, captured my imagination. In the movie it's just as compelling, and comes with the addition of Converse sneakers to place the movie in a modern, but still retro, context.

I loved the soundtrack by Karen O (a singer in the Yeah Yeah Yeahs). It would burst in with just the right note of ebullience during the rumpus or dirt clod fight. But it's also eclectic. Not everyone likes the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and those that aren't a big fan of children choruses (apparently one of the most hated things about music, according to an NPR "This American Life" I once listened to) will probably dislike the film's music even more. But director Spike Jonze's choice in the soundtrack reflects his sensibility for everything else about the movie. He's not trying to please everyone. Maybe he doesn't even care that the movie has some slow spots in the middle. He's certainly not trying to make a Disney movie.

In the press notes, Jonze explains that "kids are

given so much material that's not honest, so when they find a story

like this it really gets their attention." It's true that Americans in particular are known for sheltering their children, which leads me to wonder how this movie will play across the world. In an interview with Newsweek, Sendak rails against Disney for defanging the Mickey Mouse of his youth (he apparently used to have teeth) and spoke of how his immigrant parents believed in giving children the full, messy, evil truth. Will Max's disobedience of his mother read the same across cultures? Or the presence of monsters who want to eat you one minute and are your friends the next?

More immediately, how will the movie do this weekend? Thompson on Hollywood puts tracking at $25 million, a plausible figure. Toy Story / Toy Story 2 has been playing this week, and the studio announced that it extended its engagement through a link on Twitter to this video. Meanwhile, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs will be entering its fifth week, and will probably dip below $10 million. Among family and kid-oriented fare, the field is wide open. Let the wild rumpus start!

Trailer for 'Where the Wild Things Are' released

By Sarah Sluis

Warner Bros. just released its (extremely well-made) trailer for Where the Wild Things Are. Unlike most movie trailers, this one seems targeted not for children, but for twenty- and thirty-somethings that grew up

with Maurice Sendak's acclaimed book, published in 1988 and the winner of the Caldecott Medal.

First, it's set to the Arcade Fire song "Wake Up." Second, Dave Eggers penned the screenplay and Spike Jonze directed the work, two names that have cachet among the age group. Third, this movie has moved around its release dates, which occasionally indicates changes in strategy/trouble, and will now release on October 17. All of the moving around was accompanied by blogosphere rumors that the film was testing too edgy and subversive for children, which might explain why the trailer seems targeted towards adults. Last year, Beverly Hills Chihuahua opened in early October to great box office, so it's not a dump (in fact, one of the planned release dates was February, also similar to the October slot) but a less competitive time than a summer or December release. I'm certain that Where the Wild Things Are doesn't expect twenty and thirty-somethings to be the primary audience for the movie, but this is the kind of trailer that makes me wish I had a nephew or niece to take to the movies.

I had heard that Where the Wild Things Are would be a mix of live action/CGI, but I certainly didn't expect the kind of miniature/claymation work that also sneaks into the trailer. There are also many jump cuts on

running, itself a common occurrence in movie trailers, but this trailer closely aligns main protagonist Max's position in the shots so we see him continuously running while the background changes from the land of Where the Wild Things Are and his home, a rather thrilling use of editing.

Sendak's book is pretty short on plot, and long on mood, but based on one shot in the trailer, I have confidence that Jonze and Eggers will be able to embellish the plot while preserving the simple emotions that drive the story. Max sneaks a look of his parents sharing some wine and lovey-dovey looks with each other. It conveys so

much of that kid movie emotion, where you love and hate your parents at the same time, and explains some of the alienation Max feels from his parents, who don't understand him and are wrapped up in their own lives. If my memory serves me correctly, the scene must come after Max is sent to bed without dinner for misbehaving. While I'll have to wait until October 17th to find out, Where the Wild Things Are seems like a solid adaptation with a thoughtful marketing campaign.