TEN movies in one post

2012 Oscar-nominated shorts; Amour; Barbara; From Nothing, Something; Identity Thief; Magic Mike; Movie 43; Price Check; Side Effects; Starlet.

Amour (2012). Well done and difficult to watch, this French language Best Picture nominee stars Emmanuelle Riva in an Oscar-nominated performance of an elderly woman before and after suffering a stroke. Her co-star, Jean-Louis Trintignant, is every bit as good and was, in my opinion, robbed when he didn't get nominated as well.

Side Effects (2013). Jack and I were captivated by this thriller about a woman on a roller coaster from her anxiety meds, said to be director Steven Soderbergh's final picture. Rooney Mara is outstanding as mood-swinging Emily; Jude Law terrific as her cutting-edge new psychiatrist Dr. Banks, Catherine Zeta-Jones scary as her tightly-wound old shrink Dr. Siebert, and Channing Tatum doesn't have many scenes as Emily's loving husband Martin.

Identity Thief (2013). Slapstick hilarity (CPA (Jason Bateman) goes after white trash woman (Melissa McCarthy) who stole his identity for serial shopping sprees) that would have benefited from removing all traces of sentiment. We went opening day and enjoyed it immensely nonetheless.

Movie 43 (2013). Tasteless, offensive, puerile, and occasionally funny, this collection of silly shorts, loaded with penis and poop jokes, will be better seen on DVD and/or when you can skip parts. That being said, I laughed like a loon at Kate Winslet's comic-horror at a single sight gag in The Catch. Try not to learn the gag before you see it. Chock-full of stars, behind and in front of cameras.

2012 Oscar-nominated live action and animated shorts. Our favorite live action one is Curfew, a very dark comedy about a man on the edge brought back by a child-care request from his sister. Here's the trailer. I hope it wins. The others are Death of a Shadow, Henry, Buzkashi Boys, and Asad. When the Disney logo began the fifth animated one, Paperman, I said to Jack, "I hope it loses." But it is my favorite--a love story with flying papers. Close second is Maggie Simpson in The Longest Daycare. The other nominees are Adam and Dog, Fresh Guacamole, and Head Over Heels. Added to the program are three honorable mentions: Abiogenesis, Dripped, and The Gruffalo's Child, a sequel to the 2010 nominee. Noteworthy that the only animated short with dialog is the last one.

From Nothing, Something (2012). Filmmaker Tim Cawley, in a pre-recorded introduction, cited It Might Get Loud as inspiration for this documentary about the creative process. Far reaching. But accurate. We loved it as well.

Magic Mike (2012). An older Soderbergh picture we watched on demand, this was nominated for (but lost) a People's Choice Award, and has earned Matthew McConaughey a bunch of awards and nominations as the owner/head stripper of a Florida night spot. Apparently based on star Channing Tatum's pre-Hollywood life as a male stripper. Alex Pettyfer stars as the novice Tatum trains.

Starlet (2012). The best of the three I saw at an independent film festival in January. Dree Hemingway (Mariel's daughter) stars as flakey 21-year-old Jane, who befriends an elderly lady after an encounter at a yard sale. Jane's chihuahua is named Starlet. Lest you think this is a sweet movie about a girl, a granny, and a puppy, be forewarned there is a graphic sex scene with full nudity about 2/3 of the way through. Won one Independent Spirit Award and nominated for another. Will induce MPMS.

Price Check (2012). Parker Posey is, in Jack's words, never afraid to commit, and here she is stark raving mad as a driven grocery executive. Unfortunately her co-star, Eric Mabius, is bland and ruins the movie.

Barbara (2012). Judy and I didn't love this 1980s period piece about the titular doctor who has been banished from the city to a rural hospital in East Germany. But the Eastern European acquaintances we talked to after the screening loved it and said it was spot on.

Sorry, readers. I promised myself I wouldn't complain anymore about how far behind I was in writing. But here I am with too many, it seems, to catch up. If and when I write more about each title, I'll link the postings to this page. Be sure to watch not only the Oscars on Sunday night February 24 (and/or go to your neighborhood Oscar party), but also the Independent Spirit Awards Saturday the 23rd on IFC at 10pm Pacific and rerun at 10pm Eastern.

Rust and Bone (De rouille et d'os - 2012)

We really liked this powerful story of a two people rebuilding their lives--a single father of a 5 year old and a woman who loses both legs in an accident at Marineland on the French Riviera where she trains killer whales. While understandably scary and sad, it's not depressing. The gory details of the accident are offscreen, but the man's boxing career ensures this isn't a blood-free movie. You can infer from my comments in the last post, Quartet, that I believe the man, Ali, is the protagonist, and Belgian actor Matthias Schoenaerts (new to me) is great as the guy trying to grow up. However he has only one of the 28 nominations and wins on the imdb list which is more extensive than mine. Marion Cotillard (she was working on The Dark Knight Rises concurrently with this one--think back to her character in that one, and know that she had given birth in May 2011, started Dark Knight in July, and added her starring role in Rust and Bone before the other was finished) has one win (Hollywood Film Fest) and six nominations, including Screen Actors Guild, Critics Choice, and Golden Globe, for her role as Stéphanie. Here's where I need to insert a shout out to the digital effects team, inexplicably nominated for nothing. We see her foreshortened legs a lot and they look totally real. No effects are needed for this talented actress to convince us of her emotions, though. Supporting strength comes from adorable little Armand Verdure as Ali's son Sam and Corinne Masiero as Ali's older sister who takes them in.

Director/co-writer Jacques Audiard and co-writer Thomas Bidegain (same jobs on A Prophet) have artfully merged two short stories by Craig Davidson: "Rust and Bone" about a boxer and "Rocket Ride" about a man losing his legs, but Audiard has said he had enough men in A Prophet so made Stéphanie female. Audiard also preferred a boxer to an actor for the part of Ali, but settled on Schoenaerts, who is both.

There really is a Marineland in Antibes, and the production was allowed to shoot there, both with full audiences and after hours, as well as in neighboring Cannes and the magnificent beaches in the area. For some snowy scenes at the end they went to Belgium.

Once again, composer Alexandre Desplat (most recently blogged in Zero Dark Thirty; in the last four years I've seen 18 of the 31 projects he has scored and there have been 143 since he started in 1985) provides the soundtrack. When does this guy sleep? There are also a number of songs, every one in English, on the soundtrack. You can listen to long clips on this site. The Katy Perry song Firework is featured as well but not listed anywhere. I guess they figured they didn't need to help her sell it.

As fast as everyone talks you'll be glad there are subtitles. Rated 81% by critics and audiences alike on rottentomatoes, this is well worth your time.

Quartet (2012)

Our quintet of "young" (post-1950) boomers loved this story of a home for retired musicians that gets disrupted by the arrival of a diva who sang opera with three of the others and was married to one. Dame Maggie Smith (profiled in The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel), Golden Globe-nominated for her role, is wonderful as the brooding, vain Jean, resplendent in her makeup, ash blonde coiffure, and pumps. Jack and I are big fans of Billy Connolly (covered in Brave), whom we loved watching crack jokes as the lecherous Wilf, which earned him a Best Supporting Actor nomination at the British Independent Film Awards. Pauline Collins (last in these pages in Albert Nobbs) is adorable as the ditzy Cissy and Sir Tom Courtenay (Oscar-nominated for Doctor Zhivago (1965) and The Dresser (1983), and won The British Academy's Most Promising Newcomer for The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner (1962), among his dozens of accomplishments) is arguably the star (my rule, not hard and fast, is that the first person you see on screen is usually the protagonist) as Reg, Jean's ex-husband, who loves teaching his opera class to teen-agers. Yo La Tengo named a song after him but didn't put his name in the lyrics, only Julie Christie's (his co-star in Zhivago) and Eleanor Bron's (as far as I can tell Bron never worked with him, but, like Christie, was a sexy English actress in the 1960s and beyond). The reason young Dr. Cogan looked so familiar to us is that the actress, Sheridan Smith, was notable as the saucy maid in Hysteria. Michael Gambon (last in Fantastic Mr. Fox) also shines as a male diva (divus?) who is directing the home's annual Verdi birthday gala.

The rest of the cast is filled out with actual retired professional musicians, many of whom are named and pictured in their youth during the credits, so don't leave early! The grand mansion is divine and I'm glad there are a few aerial shots of it. Not as big as Downton Abbey, but quite lovely.

Much of the delightful music comes from the players (many of the pieces are on this site, albeit performed by others), all rehearsing for the gala, although Alexandre Desplat (most recently in Zero Dark Thirty) is credited as the movie's composer for the tunes he contributed. This page will play short clips from the soundtrack album, including the Desplat tracks. Film student note: when you see the source of the music onscreen, e.g. the players, the radio, the turntable, it's called source music. Speaking of which, you may recall my post on Les Misérables in which I said I don't like opera. I loved the singing in this one, so I guess I do like opera (just not the sung dialogue). For those keeping track, there's a lot of the Gilbert and Sullivan operetta The Mikado, and the piece that the four are planning for the gala is Bella figlia dell'amore, from Act 3 of Rigoletto. You can listen on the continuation of the first link in this paragraph and watch for a potential Joan Sutherland wardrobe malfunction.

78 year old screenwriter Ronald Harwood (Oscar winner for The Pianist (2002), Oscar-nominated for The Dresser and the wonderful The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (2007); others I've enjoyed were the Julie Andrews vehicle A Fine Romance (1992), Annette Bening's triumph Being Julia (2004), Love in the Time of Cholera (2007), and Australia) (he also wrote Courtenay's screen debut Private Potter (1962), but I didn't see it) adapts his 1999 stage play. I don't think you'll mind this mild spoiler: after it was over Mike turned to me and said, "I'm so glad nobody died!"

At 75, Dustin Hoffman (in detail in Barney's Version) makes his directorial debut (he doesn't appear), and has won the Hollywood Film Festival Breakthrough and Chicago Film Fest Audience Choice Awards, as well as this movie having been chosen as one of last year's ten best from the National Board of Review. Rottentomatoes' critics average 80%. Which makes it all the more maddening that our local paper once again chose to print a negative review of this charming movie. Make a point of seeing it! Not to be confused with A Late Quartet, which is also outstanding. Catch this one on the big screen for the sets and locations and get a DVD of the other.