Allied (2016)

We quite liked this glossy story of a couple of World War II spies who meet on a mission and stay together. Brad Pitt and Marion Cotillard make a handsome couple and the production values are high. They were last blogged in 12 Years a Slave and Two Days, One Night, respectively. There's a big cast but I'll just cite appearances by Jared Harris (after I mentioned him in Certain Women he had a major part in the first season of The Crown) and Lizzy Caplan (profiled in Now You See Me 2).

Robert Zemeckis (last directed The Walk) is very good at big Hollywood pictures and does not disappoint, working from a script by Steven Knight (most recently in these pages for writing Burnt).

We saw it 2½ weeks ago but my notes remind me that Jack said he could have done with fewer mirror shots, while the former film student in me rather liked them. Blame or credit go to Zemeckis and cinematographer Don Burgess (last shot 42). I'll be interested to see if the American Society of Cinematographers nominates Burgess when the announcement comes out Tuesday. Here's another plug for my running list of this year's nominees and winners.

Before we saw it I noted that it had been nominated for a Critics Choice Costume Design award (didn't win), so I watched for the wardrobe and Cotillard's outfits are, indeed, spectacular, thanks to Joanna Johnston (Oscar-nominated for Lincoln, also designed Forrest Gump (1994), About a Boy (2002), Valkyrie, Pirate Radio, The BFG, and many more).

Alan Silvestri, who scored The Walk for Zemeckis, composes good mood music which can be streamed in its entirety here (or at least until it's taken down for copyright infringement).

The movie has left all big screens in these parts, but the DVD release is estimated for next month. Rotten Tomatoes' averages of 61% from critics and 68% audiences are pretty tepid but we liked it.

Blog housekeeping notes: I found drafts of two old compilations of Oscar-nominated shorts that I didn't write about and have no notes. I'm adding them to the count of movies seen since I began the blog but can't tell you anything about them. I know, nobody else cares. But I strive for accuracy in numbers. That also means I've blown by my milestone of 900 movies seen (the count is now 904) and 923 summarized in these many, many pages since September 3, 2008. It certainly is late. You be the judge of whether it's better than never.