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

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

Rating System

Recently there has been a lot of controversy surrounding the rating of Blue Valentine which opens this week. The controversy is that it was originally rated NC-17 for one sex scene. On appeal it was re-rated R without having to make any changes. This is not the first time the rating of a movie has caused controversy; one of the most notorious is Midnight Cowboy which was rated X in 1969 and went on to win best picture. The questions raises are what is the point of the ratings and what does it mean to get one rating over the other?

First lets look at the history of the ratings. The ratings are issued by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA). The MPAA was started in 1922 by the major motion picture studios as a way of self regulation to avoid government censorship. The first head of the MPAA was former Postmaster General Will Hays. He developed what is called the Hay’s Code which had a list of things that could not be in a movie if it was going to be released in the United States. According to the Hays code there could be no immoral behavior in the movie or the movie would not get released. Then in the late 60’s filmmakers started pushing the envelope with what they were showing. This led new head of the MPAA Jack Valenti to try and come up with a different way of reviewing movies without making the filmmaker edit the movie to be released. So with the National Association of Theatre Owners (NATO) he developed the modern ratings system.

The new rating system was started on November 1, 1968. Originally the ratings for a movie were G, M, R, and X. M was changed to PG in 1972, and in the 1980’s they added PG-13 to kind of bridge the gap between PG and R. This was mostly due to parents uproar over the violence in the Indiana Jones movies and Gremlins. This led Steven Spielberg to suggest another rating would be useful. In 1990 the X rating was changed to NC-17 to get away from the notion that an X rating made it a pornographic film. Basically G is General Admittance, PG is Parental Guidance, PG-13 is Parental Guidance for those under 13. The difference between R and NC-17 is one that many people get confused. An R rating means that 17 and under need to be accompanied by and adult and a NC-17 rating means no one 17 and under can see the movie even if with a parent.

So why are filmmakers upset over the ratings? In theory it seems to make sense. Give parents a guide so they can make informed decisions about what their kids watch. I am all for that. There are certain movies should not be allowed to see and it is up to the parents to decide what is appropriate. But there are a number of problems with the system.

One of the biggest problems is the MPAA close association with NATO. National theatre chains are all members of NATO and there is an agreement between NATO and MPAA that any movie rated NC-17 will not be shown in their theatres. Therefore any movie that gets an NC-17 rating will not make any money even if it is good because no one will be able to see it. Also, it makes it harder to advertise since most TV and print media wont show advertisements for NC-17 movies. That is not as much a problem any more with the Internet and low profile movies can still generate a lot of buzz and you can see “red band” trailers online. “Red Band” trailers are trailers for rated R or NC-17 movies that were not approved by the MPAA as suitable for all ages. Also, movie retail stores like Blockbuster and Walmart will not sell or rent any movie with an NC-17 rating. Blockbuster will also not rent any movie that is not rated by the MPAA. So, while the stated purpose of the MPAA ratings is to avoid censorship and while it does not directly censor if a movies gets the dreaded NC-17 rating it sets it up to lose a lot of money. An example is what happened earlier this year with Hatchet 2. A horror movie that came out around Halloween got a NC-17 rating. Every theatre refused to release it unedited. There was one AMC theatre that said they would show it. After showing it on one screen for two days they pulled it off the screen. Their story was that it wasn’t doing well but it appeared to be due to pressure from other theatre chains for showing it.

The other problem with the system is that I feel the ratings are too vague and there is not clear distinction when a movie crosses the line from PG-13 to R to NC-17. Unlike the Hays Code there is no specific criterion for what each rating means. The biggest difference in NC-17 and R is usually sex. Very rarely does a movie get a NC-17 rating strictly for violence or language. Exceptions are as noted above Hatchet 2 for violence and Clerks originally had NC-17 for language. According to the movie This Film is Not Yet Rated the MPAA’s own website says that 4 times as many films receive NC-17 ratings for sex then for violence. So while a movie like Hostel can get an R rating even though it has graphic violence a movie like Blue Valentine gets an NC-17 for one scene of sex. And that sex scene is between a married couple in love. It is not gratuitous in anyway it is just a very raw and passionate scene. Also they do not have to tell the filmmakers why the movie is rated what it is. Sometimes they do and sometimes they don’t. The MPAA appears to favor studio movies over independent movies. A perfect example of that was in 1999 when American Pie and But I’m a Cheerleader came out. Both movies had a masturbation and a sex scene but American Pie got an R rating and But I’m a Cheerleader got an NC-17 rating.

There is an appeals process for movies. And it usually takes a famous star, director, or major studio to get a rating overturned. In the past you were not able to cite precedent. Therefore if you feel that you were not given an appropriate rating you could not reference any other movies to show how your film compares to a scene in that movie. They now allow you to mention other movies but the appeals board can ignore it.

This Film Not Yet Rated is a great movie that really shows a lot of the hypocrisy in the ratings system as it stands today. The movie is sort a tale about censorship and a spy drama. Because the identities of the people on the board are kept private no one knows anything about the members. So to try and find out who are these people giving the ratings Kirby Dick the director of  hires a private investigator to find out who they are and hold them accountable. The board is supposed to be made of parents of kids aged 5-17 but during his investigation he found out that is not true of all of them. Also he found out that during the appeals process there is always clergy present. It is not real clear why that is. The best quote form the movie is by Darren Aronofsky. “It seems backwards that to show human sexuality in pretty much any form is getting to R territory while you can shoot as many bodies as long as there is no blood and its PG-13…It should be flipped where if there is violence without blood its fantasy and should be for adults… but if you show violence with blood it should be PG-13 because you can see the consequences.”

Not a parent I am just curious how others choose what movies to let their kids see. I think that the current ratings system is helpful to a point. I think it helps parents to see which movies might be age appropriate but I don’t think it really helps parents see what kind of content is in a movie. R ratings can be for any number of things and for some reason things that can be R in one movie will be NC-17 in another or PG-13 in a different one. I am glad they don’t try to censor the movie’s but all the financial implications from a NC-17 rating is a form of censorship. The website I find very helpful and recommend to my friends that are parents is Kids in Mind . They rate movies based on 3 different categories violence, sexuality and language. So a movie that has 1-1-6 you know has very little violence, very little sex but some cursing. That website also goes into very detailed descriptions of why each movie is rated what it is (Almost too detailed for me as it can give away some spoilers). But if I had kids I think that is the kind of rating system I would like. I would love to hear any parent’s thoughts on this topic.