The Kings Speech

I can't believe I made it. The final movie in my Best Picture quest. There were so many times I thought about just giving up on it but I made it through. My wife will be happy now since she thought this was a waste of my time.

For the second year in a row there were 10 nominees for Best Picture and 2010 was a good year. And for the first time (and probably the last time) I managed to see all the movies nominated for Best Picture before the nominations were announced. Coming into Oscar night there were two movies battling it out for the top spot. The Social Network and The King's Speech. The Social Network won almost every critic award but when the award season really kicked in The King's Speech started winning all the awards so it was anyone's guess who would win the top prize. But The King's Speech ended up winning.

The Kings Speech is about King George VI or Bertie (Colin Firth) as he was known to his friends before he became king. Bertie who always had a stutter is thrust in the spotlight as radio became more popular in the 30's and monarchs needed to make speeches that went out to a larger population. Being embarrassed by a speech he had given and numerous failures with speech therapist he wife Elizabeth (Helena Bonham Carter) seeks out the help of the unconventional doctor Lionel Logue (Geoffrey Rush). As Logue challenges everything Bertie has heard from previous doctors Bertie becomes disillusioned and things Logue is just a hack. At the same time Bertie's older brother who is next in line to become king is fooling around with a number of married women and is told he must stop before he becomes king. But after their father dies and he is crowned King he refuses to change and is forced to renounce the throne. This makes Bertie next in line to become King and he turns to Logue to help him. As he works with Logue he learns tricks to help him and when WWII starts and he needs to make a big radio address about the war Logue is by his side helping him.

The movie is funny, inspirational, and uplifting which is a change of pace from the dark gritty films that had won in the oughts. It had great performances especially Geoffrey Rush. He brought so much personality to his character and really gave the movie the comedy to balance the drama. Colin Firth and Helena Bonham Carter were both great in their roles also. While it was a good movie it was very formulaic and felt like a typical Oscar movie. I also felt one of the more interesting parts of the story was rushed and that was the story of Renouncement of the throne. It was the first time a King of England gave up his throne. And after when Bertie becomes King he even says that this is the first time a King has taken a throne while the previous King is alive and well.

I would have liked to see the more modern tale of The Social Network win or even better the twisted Inception win. The Social Network told the true story of Mark Zuckerberg and his rise to power after he started Facebook. The movie written by Aaron Sorkin with his typical rapid fire dialogue (he deservingly won Best Adapted Screenplay) and with a main character that was both sympathetic and ruthless. I felt the complicated characters that made this movie more interesting instead of the cookie cutter characters from The King's Speech . An even more bold choice for Best Picture would have been Inception which was written and directed by Christopher Nolan and told the story about a group of people who try to implant a thought into someone's head while they are asleep. The movie is also well acted and very original. But I think most Academy voters just didn't get it and only ended up winning 4 technical awards. And its loss to the King's Speech for Best Original Screenplay was a big snub in my opinion. I feel it should have went to the movie that really was original and creative.

The biggest snub in my opinion was the omission of Waiting for Super from the Best Documentary nominees. It was about the education system in America and how it needs to be improved. It was a great documentary and won a bunch of awards prior to the Academy Awards but was not even nominated. It has been speculated that its portrayal of Unions as bad made it hard for the members of the Academy (most who are members of one union or another) to vote for it. The other movie that I thought should have been nominated was Blue Valentine. Which featured great performances by Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams (she did get a Best Actress Nomination) as a married couple who are trying to save their marriage. The movie is sad and depressing but really has an emotional impact. Also Subbed was Mila Kunis as Best Supporting Actress for Black Swan. As rival to Best Actress Winner Natalie Portman she was a great villain and was one of the standout performances of the year.

Current Ranks on IMDB Top 250 for Best Picture nominated Films
Inception- #12
Toy Story 3- #29
The Black Swan-#123
The King's Speech-127
The Social Network-#236

MTV Movie Awards 2011

Well the MTV Movie Awards are tonight thought I would give my two cents on them.

The MTV Movie Awards usually nominate the highest grossing movies and movies that speak to the masses. I like to think of myself as a film goer that can appreciate both the indie art house movies and the mindless summer blockbuster, but nowadays I find myself tending to see more critically praised movies and not so much the big budget movies. There was a time when I would have seen all the movies nominated for Best Movie but those days have passed I guess I am just not the target demographic for MTV anymore. In fact there was a short time when I would have seen all the movies nominated for Best Movie at the MTV Awards and Best Picture at the Academy Awards. Oh well guess people change I just hope that I am not becoming one of those movie snobs I hated growing up. I did manage to see 3 of the movies nominated (Inception, The Social Network, and Black Swan) but those 3 were also nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards. MTV usually nominates a few movies that were also nominated for Best Picture at the Oscars but very rarely does a movie win both. Three movies have won both awards they are Titanic, Gladiator, and Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. Lately though it seems like voting has been taken over by Tween Girls. I don’t think movies like Terminator 2, A Few Good Men, Seven, or Pulp Fiction would win these days. The past two years the Twilight movies have won Best Movie beating movies like The Dark Knight and The Hangover.  It has the most nominations again this year so we will see if it can make it 3 years in a row.
Lets get to the predictions
Update in Red with Winners. All in all I did pretty well. I correctly predicted 10 our of the 12 winners. 

Best Movie-The nomination that most surprised me here was Black Swan thought it was a little too trippy for most people.
My prediction- The Twilight Saga: Eclipse. My personal Pick- Inception
Winner-The Twilight Saga: Eclipse

Best Female Performance- Jennifer Aniston seems out of place here with the much younger crop of nominees.

My Prediction: Kristen Stewart Personal Pick: Natalie Portman
Winner-Kristen Stewart

Best Male Performance-Battle of the two guys from Eclipse

Prediction; Robert Pattinson Personal Pick: Jesse Eisenberg (honestly it’s the only one I had seen in this category)
Winner-Robert Pattinson

Best Breakout Star-I hate it when they nominate people who have been on TV shows for Breakout Performances but I don’t think Olivia Wilde has a chance here. Also I have no idea who Xavier Samuel is from Eclipse so I am going with that he is not a breakout star. It’s a difficult choice between Hailee Steinfeld, Andrew Garfield, and Chloe Grace Moretz.

Prediction and Personal Pick: Chloe Grace Moretz
Winner-Chloe Grace Moretz

Best Comedic Performance-Just recently saw Easy A and glad I did because it is the funniest movie out of these choices.
Prediction and Personal Pick-Emma Stone
Winner-Emma Stone

Best Line from A Movie-Tough choices but I am going to go with the dialogue from the movie that won best Screenplay at the Oscars.
Prediction and Personal Pick: “If you guys were the inventors of Facebook, you’d have invented Facebook”-Social Network
Winner-"I want to get Chocolate wasted" Grown Ups

Best Villain-Hard one I only saw two of the movies nominated and neither one of those are great villains.
Prediction: Tom Felton from Harry Potter Personal Pick: Can I just pick the winner from 1996 and say Kevin Spacey from Seven still the best villain to win the award.

Winner-Tom Felton

Best Fight-This one is for me is between Kick-Ass and Inception two of my favorite fight scenes of the year.

Prediction: The Twilight Saga: Eclipse Personal Pick: Inception
Winner-The Twilight Saga: Eclipse

Best Kiss: Another category with two Eclipse nominations

Prediction: Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson Personal Pick-Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis
Winner-Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson

Best Jaw Dropping Moment-wow a category without an Eclipse Nomination but another Tween sensation will probably take this one.
Prediction: Justin Bieber Personal Pick: Inception
Winner-Justin Bieber
Best Scared-As-Sh_ _ Performance-Again no Eclipse nominations here but not sure who is going to win.

Prediction and Personal Pick: Ryan Reynolds
Winner-Ellen Page

Biggest Badass Star-Not sure what constitutes Biggest Badass star but the best badass in this group is the smallest

Prediction and Personal Pick: Chloe Grace Moretz
Winner-Chloe Grace Moretz

Academy Award Predictions

Almost forgot to post my predictions.
I realized that I am predicting a lot of upsets this year so I have included the favorite to win in each category.

Best Picture-The Social Network (Favorite to Win-The Kings Speech)

Best Director-David Fincher (also favorite to win)

Best Actor-Colin Firth (also favorite to win)

Best Actress- Natalie Portman (Also favorite to win)

Best Supporting Actor-Christian Bale(also favorite to win)

Best Supporting Actress-Helena Bonham Carter (favorite to win- Melissa Leo)

Best Screenplay Adapted-The Social Network (also favorite to win)

Best Screenplay Original-Inception (favorite to win The Kings Speech)

Best Animated Feature- Toy Story 3 (also favorite to win)

Art Direction- Inception (favorite to win The Kings Speech)

Costume Design- Alice in Wonderland (favorite to win The Kings Speech)

Documentary Feature-Restrepo (favorite to win Inside Job)

Best Editing-The Social Network (also favorite to win)

Foreign Language Film- In a Better World (favorite to win Biutiful)

Make-up- The Wolfman ( also favorite to win)

Original Score- Inception (favorite to win The King Speech)

Original Song- We Belong Together from Toy Story 3 ( also favorite to win)

Sound Editing/Sound Mixing/Visual Effects- Inception for all thee (also favorite to win)

UPDATE-Got 13 right. Not bad.
Also realized I forgot to post my prediction for Cinematography which I correctly predicted Inception
Missed
Best Picture-Kings Speech
Best Director-Tom Hooper
Best Supporting Actress-Melissa Leo
Art Direction-Alice in Wonderland
Documentary Feature-Inside Job
Original Score-The Social Network
Original Screenplay-The Kings Speech.

Top 10 of 2010 Part 1

Top 10 movies of 2010
It’s that time of year again when everyone is making their Top 10 lists and figured I would throw my 2 cents out there.

1. Inception- The most creative and inventive movies of the year. Entertaining and made you think. It is one of those movies that it takes several views to figure it out.

2. Social Network- I had high expectations for this movie. With Aaron Sorkin writing and David Fincher directing it had a lot of potential. Luckily it lived up to the potential. I love Aaron Sorkin’s writing. It is fast and snappy. And it takes some great actors to deliver the dialogue. Luckily the cast was great, and is there anything that Justin Timberlake can’t do.

3. Blue Valentine- When this movie was over I wasn’t sure how to feel about it. Ryan Gosling and Michelle Williams were amazing in it. The story is a very sad movie and that’s what I didn’t like about it at first. It is a raw emotional story. Then I realized that a movie that could make me feel that emotional about the characters and want them to stay together must have done its job.

4. 127 Hours- AKA the movie where the guy cuts his arm off. The part where he finally cuts his arm off has gotten alot of headlines with people passing out or getting sick but the movie leading up to that is very good. Here is a guy stuck litterly between a rock and a hard place and he contemplates his life and how he ended up there. Similar to Into the Wild from a few years ago where the life lesson learnedis you need friends and family around to be truely happy.  I heard and interview with Danny Boyle the director and he described the movie as “an action movie about a guy who can’t move”. And he managed to pull it off.

5. Black Swan-I was really looking forward to this movie. Darren Aronofsky directed Requiem for a Dream about drug users decent into madness. This one about a ballerina’s decent into madness and he is at his best. The visuals and the overall feel of the movie you never know what is real or imagined. It will keep you thinking about it for days.

6. Buried-Similar to 127 Hours this is a movie about a guy who cant move. But unlike 127 Hours we never leave him. It is 90 minutes of Ryan Reynolds in a coffin. The camera never leaves him and we never see what is going on outside. It is a very claustrophobic movie and could have just been a very boring movie, but it somehow works. One of the best psychological thrillers I have seen in a while.

7. Kick Ass- Had to throw this in my top 10. One of the most fun movies I have seen this year. The story actually is pretty cool but it is the action that takes it over the top. It has some of the coolest action and fight scenes of any movie this year. Chloe Grace-Moretz is just amazing as Hit Girl.

8. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo-Now Swedish movies usually put me to sleep. Must be something about the language that is very soothing. But this movie kept me awake the whole time. Which is impressive considering I watched it after work and I was kind of tired which is reason enough to make it on my top 10. But it is a dark movie and has some very shocking parts that caught me off guard.

9. Feed the Fish-Along with Blue Valentine and Buried this was one of the highlights of the Milwaukee Film Festival for me. Made in Wisconsin by Wisconsinites and starring Tony Shalhoub. It is a fun little movie and I wish it got a wider release. It was made even better by having the filmmaker and Tony Shalhoub there for a little Q and A.

10. The Human Centipede (First Sequence) - Probably the movie I talked about the most. While not a great movie the premise is bizarre and disturbing and made for some interesting conversations. If you don’t know what it is about I wont gross you out now, but needles to say it is one of those movies that just sticks with you. The first half hour plays out like any other silly horror movie but quickly turns into something else.

Honorable Mention: Tucker and Dale vs. Evil-Looking over my list there isn’t any real funny movies. And thinking over the year there hasn’t been any movie that made me laugh as much as The Hangover did last year. But Tucker and Dale vs. Evil comes closest. It is a parody of horror films where a bunch of kids get lost in the wood and cross paths with what they think are killer hillbillies. The movie is told mostly from the hillbillies’ perspective as they try to just fix up their cabin. It is very funny without spoofing specific film like the Scary Movie franchise. Just a lot of fun but there is also a lot of blood.

There were some movies that got a lot of good reviews that I did not see and maybe would have made the list if I did.
Highly praised movies I did not see: The Town, The Kings Speech, Toy Story 3 and The Fighter.

For me 2010 was the year of documentaries and shorts. I was on the Milwaukee Film Festival short committee and got to see a lot of shorts. Here are some of my favorites some from MKE Film Fest and some from Sundance. Next week I will post my favorite documentaries of the year.

Top 5 Short Movies

1. Drunk History-Tesla and Edison-While Drunk History is not really a documentary it was part of the docu shorts at Sundance. It is one of the funniest shorts I have ever seen. There were two of them at Sundance Tesla and Edison and Lincoln and Douglas. But Tesla and Edison in my opinion is far better. You should check them out online along with some of their others. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwI1Xpwhyi8


2. Little Children, Big Words-One of the standouts at the Milwaukee Film Fest it is a dramatic short which shows a lot of emotion. This also has the chance to be nominated for and Academy Award. The acting in this movie is amazing, and what makes it stand out for me is that fact that most shorts are either silly or funny and I find it is rare for there to be a great dramatic short.

3. Banana Bread-This is a fun little movie that combines action and humor. About a hit man who has a nagging mother who feels the need to call him when he is on the job. Just a lot of fun. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFO0_x99gMw

4. The New Tenants –This movie won best short last year at the Academy Awards and has some of the oddest dialogue. About two gay guys who end up moving in to an apartment where there previous tenant was killed and a bunch of odd people start showing up to their door. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITE7Nshd3SM

5. The Surprise Demise of Francis Coopers Mother-One of the only animated shorts I like at the MKE Film Festival. About a guy whos mother dies unexeptedly and he tries to figure out statistically when he will die.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWphsMc8MGs

Week in Review 7/19-7/25/10

Had a lot going on this week but managed to get a couple of good movies and some not so good movie in.

Watched Soylent Green the 1973 Sci-fi movie with Charlton Heston early in the week. What a cheesefest that was. It's one of those movies that's so bad you have to laugh. It has one great line at the very end which ended up on the AFI list of best quotes but the whole movie leading up to the end is just ridiculous. The movie is supposed to take place in 2022 where overpopulation and global warming has made food scarce. Charlton Heston plays a detective trying to solve a murder of some rich guy who works for the Solyent company. While investigating the guys murder he comes across a giant conspiracy. The investigation makes no sense. One of the funniest parts is when he is interrogating a women who was this guys "furniture", as he asks her questions he is getting undressed and gets into bed with her. Not sure what kind of interrogation technique that is but worked for him. Also apparently the future(if we make it past 2012) will look a lot like the 70's. I know that past trends do come back but lets hope not like that. This is one movie that could use a major update. While the plot and story could be interesting and still relevant with the fears of overpopulation and global warming it just needs to be told better.





Heres another not so good one. I finally saw 2012. Now I guess I kind of had unrealistic high hopes for this movie. 2012 and the Mayan calender is a subject that I find fascinating and have listened to many conspiracy theories on Coast to Coast AM about the subject. And if anyone can pull off an end of the world disaster movie I thought it could be Roland Emmerich the guy that ended the world in Independence Day. But I was very disappointed. At 2 and 1/2 hours the movie is way too long. You should be able to destroy the world alot quicker then that. The movie deals with too many characters that are not necessary to the story. Would have been much shorter and better if we didn't even meet some of these people. Oddly John Cusack is actually good. He is funny and you kind of root for him even in the most bizarre circumstances he is in. Woody Harrelson plays a crazy radio host in a short but hilarious role. What really makes me mad about this movie is that I had an idea similar to this movie years ago when I first started listening to Coast to Coast AM. 2012, solar flares, end of the world, Mayan prophesies, crazy talk show hosts all going to be in my movie. Not like I would ever make a movie anyway. But still. I had the idea first.



After getting postponed a day due to some tornado's in the area I finally go to watch the movie on Friday. So, glad I finally saw the movie before people started telling me things about it and spoiled it. I don't want to give anything away here but lets just say it was mind blowing. The concept, the effects, the acting, and the ending was just amazing. While I know some people would argue that the ending was awful (and I am glad I didn't see it with my wife because I know she would have hated it) but I thought that was exactly how it should have ended. It was a movie and an ending that makes you think and that's how I like it. And what else would you expect from the guy that made Memento another twisting mind blowing movie. And who thought that Joseph Gordon Levitt could be an action star. His fight scene in the hallway was my favorite part of the movie that's all I am saying. It was awesome.



A Small Act is a HBO Documentary that premiered at Sundance earlier this year. Its the story of how a women who made a small charitable contribution to an organization that helps African school kids changed the life of a boy. The boy grew up, went to college, went to Harvard and eventually started his own charitable donation for children in his own village. The movie follows Chris Mburo and his organization as he tries to help kids from his village in Kenya. His organization gives money to the brightest students in the village so they can go to secondary school. The organization is named the Hilde Back Foundation in honor of the Swedish teacher who donated money and sponsored him. After Chris graduates from Harvard, gets a job at the UN and starts this foundation that he named after her he sets out to find out who she is. Its amazing when she finds out after so many years that she truly changed this persons life. Its a great story of how one small act of kindness can change people lives and in turn lead to other's lives being changed. It's an uplifting story that actually shows the pay it forward philosophy is alive in the world. Another incredible documentary from Sundance and glad HBO is showing a bunch of them on Monday nights. So if you have HBO check out their Monday night Documentary Showcase.

To Sum up.
Soylent Green-Bad so bad its almost funny
2012-bad
Inception-awesome-must see
A Small Act-Inspiring-Must see