Monday, January 23, 2012

Act Break - Alex's 2012 Oscar Nominations

With little time to dabble in the analytical, the abstract, and the labyrinthine workings of my 2012 Oscar Nominations, I shall simply list them.  A few categories have more nominations that may be nominated (it was stated last year that the number of nominations will officially fluctuate based on actual merit, not on a pre-determined number, so we’ll see…) The official nominations are announced tomorrow at 5:30 AM.

 

Best Motion Picture of the Year

“Midnight in Paris”
“Moneyball”
“The Descendants”
“The Artist”
“The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”
“The Help”
“War Horse”
“Hugo”
“The Ides of March”
“The Tree of Life”

(Should be there: Drive, Take Shelter, 50/50, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role

Brad Pitt - "Moneyball"
George Clooney – “The Descendants”
Jean Dujardin – “The Artist”
Gary Oldman – “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy”
Joseph Gorden Levitt – “50/50”
Michael Fassbender- “Shame”
Ryan Gosling – “Drive”
Leonardo DiCaprio – “J Edgar”
Michael Shannon – “Take Shelter”

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role

Michelle Williams – “My Week with Marilyn”
Meryl Streep – “The Iron Lady”
Charlize Theron – “Young Adult”
Rooney Mara – “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”
Viola Davis – “The Help”
Glenn Close – “Albert Nobbs”
Tilda Swinton – “We Need to Talk About Kevin”
Elizabeth Olsen – “Martha Marcy May Marlene”

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role

Albert Brooks - “Drive”
Christopher Plummer – “Beginners”
Jonah Hill – “Moneyball”
Corey Stoll – “Midnight in Paris”
Kenneth Branagh – “My Week With Marilyn”
Armie Hammer – “J Edgar”
Nick Nolte – “Warrior”
Phillip Seymour Hoffman – “Moneyball”
Niels Arestrup – “War Horse”
Andy Serkis – “Rise of the Planet of the Apes”
            ***NOTE: Andy Serkis acted as ‘Ceasar,’ the lead ape…he pantomimed every motion that the character had, including eye/face/full body movement – he was the film.  If he doesn’t get nominated for ‘best supporting’ than he should get a ‘Special Achievement’ or a ‘Special Mention’ of some sort’

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role

Jessica Chastain – “The Help”
Shailene Woodley – “The Descendants”
Bérénice Bejo – “The Artist”
Melissa McCarthy – “Bridesmaids”
Octavia Spencer – “The Help”
Vanessa Redgrave – “Coriolanus”
Janet Mcteer – “Albert Nobbs”

Best Achievement in Directing

Steven Spielberg – “War Horse”
Alexander Payne – “The Descendants”
David Fincher – “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011)”
Nicolas Winding Ref – “Drive”
Woody Allen – “Midnight in Paris”
Michel Hazanavicius – “The Artist”
Martin Scorcese – “Hugo”
George Clooney – “The Ides of March”
Bennett Miller – “Moneyball”

Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen

"Midnight in Paris" - Woody Allen
 “Bridesmaids” - Kristen Wiig, Annie Mumolo
“The Artist” - Michel Hazanavicius
“50/50” – Will Reiser
“Young Adult” – Diablo Cody
“Win Win” – Tom McCarthy

Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published

“Moneyball” – Steven Zaillian, Aaron Sorkin, Stan Chervin (Story)
“The Ides of March” – George Clooney, Grant Heslov, Beau Willimon
“The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” - Steven Zaillian
“The Help” – Tate Taylor
“Hugo” – John Logan
“The Descendants” – Alexander Payne, Nat Faxon, Jim Rash

Best Animated Feature Film of the Year

“Rango”
“Puss in Boots”
“Kung Fu Panda 2”
“The Adventures of Tintin”
“Arthur Christmas”

Best Foreign Language Film of the Year

“A Separation”
“The Skin I Live in”
“In the Land of Blood and Honey”
 “Le Havre”
“Where Do We Go Now?

Best Achievement in Cinematography

"Drive"
“War Horse”
“The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”
“The Tree of Life”
“The Artist”
“Hugo”

Best Achievement in Editing

“Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy”
“The Artist”
“War Horse”
“Drive”
“The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”
“The Tree of Life”
“Take Shelter”
“Hugo”
“Midnight in Paris”

Best Achievement in Art Direction

“Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy”
“The Help”
“The Iron Lady”
“Drive”
“J Edgar”
“The Artist”
“My Week with Marilyn”
“War Horse”
“Hugo”
“Jane Eyre”

Best Achievement in Costume Design

“Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy”
“The Help”
“The Iron Lady”
 “J Edgar”
“The Artist”
“My Week with Marilyn”
“War Horse”
“Albert Nobbs”
“Hugo”
“Jane Eyre”

Best Achievement in Makeup

 “Drive”
“Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy”
“The Iron Lady”
“The Artist”
“Albert Nobbs”
“My Week with Marilyn”
“J Edgar”

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Score

Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross – ‘Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’
Ludovic Bource - “The Artist”
John Williams – “War Horse”
Howard Shore – “Hugo”
Cliff Martinez – “Contagion”
The Chemical Brothers – “Hanna”
Alexandre Desplat – “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2”
Cliff Martinez or Ilan Eshkeri - "Coriolanus"
Clint Eastwood - "J Edgar"

(Alexandre Desplat’s score for “Tree of Life” was deemed ineligible, and wouldn’t win over Trent Reznor and Ludovic Bource, but would walk over most of the other scores...as well as the score for “Drive.”)

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Song

‘Life’s a Happy Song’ – The Muppets
‘The Keeper’ – “Machine Gun Preacher”
‘Masterpiece’ – “W.E.”
‘The Living Proof’ – “The Help”
‘Man or Muppet’ – “The Muppets”
‘Hello Hello’ – “Gnomeo and Juliet”
‘Lay Your Head Down’ – Albert Nobbs

Best Achievement in Sound Mixing

“Super 8”
“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2”
“Rise of the Planet of the Apes”
“War Horse”
“Hugo”
“Drive”
“The Tree of Life”

Best Achievement in Sound Editing

“Super 8”
“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2”
“Rise of the Planet of the Apes”
“The Tree of Life”
“War Horse”
“Hugo”
“Drive”
“Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides”
“Transformers: Dark of the Moon”

Best Achievement in Visual Effects

“Rise of the Planet of the Apes”
“Super 8”
“The Tree of Life”
“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2”
“The Tree of Life”
“War Horse”
 “Sherlock Holmes: Game of Shadows”

Best Documentary, Features

“Buck”
“Cave of Forgotten Dreams”
“Page One: Inside the New York Times”
“George Harrison: Living in the Material World”
“The Swell Season”
“Project Nim”
“Undefeated”



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Monday, January 2, 2012

Despair Refuses to ‘Take Shelter’


            ‘Take Shelter,’ a film palpably spiked with despair and fitted with an eerily appropriate title, paints an intoxicating portrait of a man attempting to cope with an anguish so intense that his psyche forces him to externalize this pain.  Combining a subtle grittiness with a darkly fantastical edge, the film allows a portrayal of anguish that amalgamates drastically different film genres without losing an ounce of pathos, profundity, or intensity.  The film follows the lead character, played frighteningly right-on by Michael Shannon, through his agonizing attempts to differentiate between reality and his own delusions, simultaneously grappling with the fact that the line between the two is fine, bizarrely thrilling, and inscrutably disturbing. Structured upon a beautiful, unrelenting barrage of mise-en-scene that gracefully oscillates between ‘reality,’ ‘dream state,’ and the amalgamation of the two, the film embraces the concept of blending reality and dream state/hallucination to the point where the two become a single, cohesive narrative that questions the entire concept of reality.  The filmmaker embraces this concept, however, with a grace that allows the viewer a more personal and versatile reading of the film, more so than a movie like ‘Black Swan’ allows, which focuses intently on delivering a fairly didactic, blunt, and brutal psychological ‘mindfuck,’ more so than a meaningful parabol for a character’s loose grasp on reality.  Rather, 'Take Shelter' allows the viewer to lose track of what is real and what is not in a more subtle, gritty and realistic way (For example; most of the lead character's panic-inducing episodes are quickly interspersed with shots of this character choking in his sleep). ‘Take Shelter’ is less of a mindfuck, and more of a diegetic playing field of sorts, in which many viewers are able to project their own existential questions and insecurities into the narrative.  Jarringly different from the average psychological thriller, ‘Take Shelter’ allows the viewer to (in a painful, intertextually ironic way) take shelter in the narrative of the film.
                The film is a distillation of anguish. It is a grim yet refreshing, purified bottle of chaos. It is pain injected into mis-en-scene, hopelessness injected into a man’s facial tics, flinches, stares, blinks, and looks of emptiness.  It is sorrow injected into every bone, ligament, and nerve of an unrelenting narrative.  Proceeding with a surprisingly grabbing tone and story, considering the slow pace, ‘Take Shelter’ provides the viewer with a raw, painful, and awe-inspiring look into the conquering of a distinct fear – the fear of the indefinite. 
                 The images of the film are fantastical enough to startle and horrify, but subtle enough to genuinely confuse the film's diegetic reality with hallucination.  This oscillation between real and fantastical, and the subsequent integration of the two, suits the narrative of the film perfectly, following the story of a man attempting to confront the startling truth that he may be schizophrenic.  However, the film presents his disturbing, apocalyptic visions with a robust understatement that allows for a spacious insecurity; a certain paranoia for both the lead character and the viewer that these visions may not be traced to a genetic Schizophrenia, but rather to something more fantastical and otherworldy (Yes, the apocalypse!).  However, one of the most sincere and disturbing aspects of this story are that both realities for the lead character are equally dark, disturbing, all encompassing, and destructive.  If diagnosed with schizophrenia (like the lead character's mother in the narrative), he will be taken away from his normal life, his job, his wife and his children to be institutionalized, and if it is the apocalypse, than the world is simply over.  Either option for the lead character is hellish, stealing away his entire life, livelihood, and happiness.  His family - his sole source of happiness - will be taken away from him. 
                Differing from most portraits of anguish, the title character's pain in 'Take Shelter' is not precisely pin-pointed to a certain trauma or agony from his past.  More simply, concisely, and (in my opinion), more existentially sincere, profound, and universal, his inescapable anguish stems simply from his inability to accept his waking life, the basic pain that accompanies it, and the sorrow that he witnesses around him.  This anguish forces him to visually externalize his need for escape with apocalyptic visions (and the viewers thank you!!!).  The visions all seem to have one thing in common; they force a distinct and impending necessity to escape.  In a sort of quest for escape or abdication from his life, Michael Shannon’s questionably disturbed character strives to elude the present moment by focusing his energy on saving his future. In this way, he neglects his life.  By consistently looking forward, and always focusing on destruction, he is unable to live in the present, and is unwilling to live in the future (a theoretic impossibility anyway).  With this equation of metaphysical escape fairly perfected, Shannon’s character is somehow able to neglect all of his duties by presenting himself with a story in which his duty is to save himself and his family. By focusing on these ‘delusions,’ however, his life and his mind become counterproductive, presenting a self-fulfilling prophecy of sorts.  This is where the true nature of the film sets in; is Shannon fulfilling his true ‘duty’ to live his life in fullness and to protect his family, or is he completely escaping any sort of duty by allowing a façade of the same scenario to monopolize his life?  In other words, do Shannon's 'delusions' present him with a noble mission, or an illusory ‘mission’ that might more appropriately be described as a surprisingly graceful descent into madness?  OR, option three is my favorite: Is there any fucking difference?  Touching upon the aforementioned dark reality of the story, there is no good end to any of this.  Viewing the story through a 'Law of Attraction' paradigm, does Shannon's focus on destruction lead him to destruction and/or personal apocalypse?  Can the lead character truly find sanctum outside of his own mind, if the illusion of sanctum is within his mind?
                The film, on one level, structures itself as a story of a man’s conquering of fear by externalizing it into a storm shelter, subsequently becoming engrossed and obsessed with it.  As we all know, however, our minds can make our fears real with the blink of an eye, the shock of a synapse, or the tap of a finger, and the title character’s anguish is the real devastation of the film.  Michael Shannon, the notorious scene stealer and modern-day face for on-screen insanity and anguish, allows room, graciously and gracefully, for the real leading character of the film: Anguish.  Though slow at points, the film’s despair is unrelenting, allowing the story to subtly affect, disturb, and move, even when one is not expecting it.   The film also allows for a coup de gras of anguish, as Jessica Chastain painfully shocks the mood of the film to the point of submission, delivering despair with a distinct swagger, a sharp sadness with an edgy optimism, and a confusingly stable outlook on an altered state of mind (anyone still with me?).
                The film's 'fantastical' imagery tap-dances on the serrated border between beautiful and horrific, allowing the cinematography, tone and mise-en-scene of the film to strike a sincere balance between otherworldy and tantalizing mundanity.  I have to elaborate on this 'mundanity,' because the film is anything but, however the film utilizes a sense of normalcy (that might otherwise border on 'mundane') to startle the viewer with its quick and pulse-racing segments of poetic instability.  And this is how the film works so perfectly; it integrates a certain horrific fantasy into a seemingly normal and slow narrative, creating a synergy of moods that creates an unrelentingly painful film.  It is graceful, slow, torturous, quick, beautiful, and moving.  It is abstract with a touch of realism, and vice versa as the narrative proceeds. 
While the true pathos in the film is found in the performances of Michael Shannon and Jessica Chastain, the cinematography and editing of the film both stand out quite a bit.  The shockingly quick, yet often very slow pace of the film's editing allows a jarring, startling effect that initially serves to differentiate between ‘delusion’ and ‘waking life,’ while Michael Shannon provides a smoothing yet painful and seemingly unceasing agony to the narrative that serves to startle, providing a consistency for the film at the same time.  In a strange way, the lead character’s psychological imbalance provides a jolting, agitating and shocking effect for the narrative and the viewer, simultaneously serving as a consistent factor, emotion, tone, and plot-point for the narrative, ironically allowing a smoother viewing of the film. In this way, the viewer (or at least me) is subtly affected by the film, slowly being pushed into a state of cinematic, blissful, and diegetic agony and paralysis more so than simply being shoved into a plate of ‘fucked up,’ like most psychological thrillers these days (Cue Winona Ryder stabbing herself in the face relentlessly with a nail file - and yes, I will be consistently using 'Black Swan' as an example of opposition, as is suitable for its title).  In other words, the film is perfectly consistent with its inconsistency. 
In contrast to the overt psychological, apocalyptic thriller that I expected, I found myself ‘taking shelter’ in a profoundly more paralyzing, affecting story of a man attempting to differentiate between reality and his own delusions, providing more of a personal apocalypse rather than the modern-day 'zombie-thriller' – Shannon's character amalgamates his despair, hopelessness, and angst into a more externalized version of his own apocalypse.  Now I hesitate to use the word ‘Externalize’ in relation to the lead characters’ apocalyptic visions, because it brings the entire concept of the film into question, a lot of which is based on the fundamental question of what is within the mind, IE ‘hallucinatory,’ ‘not real,’ etc., and what is 'reality.' 
                Frame by frame, second by second, 'Take Shelter' agitates and affects like a pulsing vein speeding into panic; a palpitation of sorrow, a bomb cloud in slow motion, and a bone crack in reverse.  The film affects with a tone similar to a peaceful drizzle bursting into a thunder cloud.  Although void of clichéd images that generally horrify, this film is not for the faint of heart.  It might bore some, thrill others, depress many, horrify a few, and yes - make a certain filmmaker extremely happy to see a beautiful film in a year lacking cinematic sincerity.  

Having said all this, Michael Shannon is a front-runner for BEST LEAD ACTOR (other nominations: Jessica Chastain for BEST LEAD ACTRESS, and the film for BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY, BEST PICTURE, BEST EDITING and BEST DIRECTOR.) 

I will be posting my final list of Oscar nominations in the very near future (IE before the official Oscar announcement on Jan 24th).
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