It’s Oscar week, people. Not the week of the Oscars, but the week the Oscar winners and nominees come home to us. All told, five Oscar nominees (including the best picture winner) are available for home entertainment. And, if you prefer bad movies, Justice League is also out. Choice!
You know what? This year’s batch of Oscar hopefuls have made some genuinely excellent horror movies. Richard Jenkins starred in not only the amazing Bone Tomahawk, but also the underseen Fright Club favorite Let Me In. Willem Dafoe took a beating in the amazing Antichrist and grabbed an Oscar nomination for his glorious turn in Shadow of the Vampire. Laurie Metcalf made us laugh and squirm in Scream 2 and Woody Harrelson led one of our all time favorite zombie shoot-em-ups, Zombieland.
But what’s the fun in talking about that when so many of the nominees have made so many bad movies? Here we focus on the worst of the worst, but if you check out the podcast we mention even more.
5. Halloween II (2009)
Octavia Spencer’s 20+ year career, struggling early with low-budget supporting work, guarantees her a place in this list. Indeed, she could have taken several slots (2006’s Pulse is especially rank), but we find ourselves drawn to Rob Zombie’s sequel to his 2007 revisionist history.
Zombie ups the violence, adds dream sequences and suggests that Laurie Strode (played here, poorly, by Scout Taylor-Compton) shares some hereditary psychosis with her brother Michael.
Spencer plays the Night Nurse, which naturally means that she dies. Pretty spectacularly, actually, but that hardly salvages the mirthless cameo-tastic retread.
4. Gary Oldman: Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992)
Francis Ford Coppola took his shot at Dracula in ’92. How’d he do?
Cons: Keanu Reeves cannot act. Winona Ryder can act—we’ve seen her act—but she shows no aptitude for it here, and lord she should not do accents. Anthony Hopkins has always enjoyed the taste of scenery, but his performance here is just ham-fisted camp.
Pros: Gary Oldman, who can chomp scenery with the best chewers in the biz, munches here with great panache. He delivers a perversely fascinating performance. His queer old man Dracula, in particular – asynchronous shadow and all – offers a lot of creepy fun. Plus, Tom Waits as Renfield – nice!
Still, there’s no looking past Ryder, whose performance is high school drama bad.
3. Clownhouse (1989)
There are several fascinating pieces of information concerning the derivative yet uniquely weird Clownhouse. These range from odd to awful.
1) The Sundance Film Festival somehow found this film—this one, Clownhouse, the movie about 3 escaped mental patients who dress as clowns, break into a house where three brothers are home alone on Halloween night, and commence to terrify and slaughter them— worthy of a nomination for Best Drama. If you haven’t seen this film, you might not quite recognize how profoundly insane that is.
2) The great and underappreciated Sam Rockwell made his feature debut as the dickhead oldest brother in this movie. The clowns themselves—Cheezo, Bippo, and Dippo—are genuinely scary and garishly fascinating, but outside of them, only Rockwell can act. At all.
3) Writer/director Victor Salva would go on to create the Jeepers Creepers franchise. But first he would serve 15 months of a 3-year state prison sentence for molesting the 12-year-old lead actor in this film, Nathan Forrest Winters.
So, basically, this film should never have been made. But at least Rockwell got his start here.
2. Margot Robbie: ICU (2009)
Margot Robbie is a confirmed talent. Underappreciated in her wickedly perfect turn in Wolf of Wall Street, she has gone on to prove that she is far more than a stunning beauty (though she certainly is that).
Not that you’d realize that by way of her early work in this low-budget Aussie dumpster fire.
The then-19-year-old leads a cast of unhappy teens vacationing for the weekend with their estranged dad, who’s called into work yet again. To entertain themselves, they peep on their neighbors through the facing skyscraper windows.
Robbie showers, swims and changes clothes at least 3 needless times within the film’s opening 10 minutes, which makes a film that wags a finger at modern voyeurism feel a little hypocritical. But to even make that statement is to take writer/director Aash Aaron’s film too seriously. Heinously acted, abysmally written and tediously directed, it amounts to 50 minutes of whining followed by utterly ludicrous plot twists, unless Australia boasts the largest per-capita number of serial killers on earth.
But the point is this: Robbie would go on to deliver stellar performances, so this is just something we all need to shake off.
1. Frances McDormand: Crimewave (1985)
Is a horror film really a horror film just because imdb.com says so?
Well, anything as bad as Crimewave is a horror, that’s for sure. The fact that it’s a slapstick crime comedy at its heart hardly matters.
Co-written by Joel and Ethan Coen, directed by Sam Raimi and co-starring Bruce Campbell, this film has a pedigree. And we love them all so much we can almost forgive them for this insufferable disaster. But we suffered through it for two scenes—one at the beginning, one at the end—involving a nun who’s taken a vow of silence.
Frances McDormand, what the hell are you doing in this movie?
No, no. We get it. If we were duped into optimism by Coen brother involvement, what hope did you have? You couldn’t have known that the result would be a tiresome, embarrassing, un-funny, painful waste of 83 minutes.
This year’s batch of Oscar nominated animated shorts are varied in both style and subject matter. They run the gauntlet of emotion from tortured to heartwarming to comedic, and the heart of each story is reflected in the animation. Each film succeeds in marrying the story to the art so that none of the films would feel right without their particular style of animation.
Borrowed Time Directors: Andrew Coates, Lou Hamou-Lhadj Run Time: 7 minutes
Borrowed Time follows a sheriff as he reflects on a dark and brutal moment from his childhood. The minimal dialogue and bleak animation highlight the character’s inner turmoil. It’s a poignant piece that effectively utilizes the medium to explore the sadder side of human emotion.
https://youtu.be/2iDCfsQfst4
Pearl Director: Patrick Osborne Run Time: 6 minutes
A sweet tale, but overall bland in style and substance, Pearl tells the story of a single father and his daughter as they navigate the ups and downs of life. A song about home connects the story, as the audience is shown vignettes from the small family’s life. The animation is simplistic in style, but it works for the narrative. Unfortunately, there isn’t much to set Pearl apart from other films.
Blind Vaysha Director: Theodore Ushev Run Time: 8 minutes
Blind Vaysha blends a unique story with gorgeous visuals. A faceless narrator tells the story of Vaysha, a girl born with one eye that can see the past and one that can see the future. Blinded to the present, Vaysha can see the beginning of creation and the destruction of the earth, or the beginning and end of the same day. The animation highlights the terror the future holds for Vaysha, as well as the staid limitations of the past. Blind Vaysha is a marvelous, even flawless film.
Piper Director: Alan Barillaro Run Time: 6 minutes
Piper is also superb. The animation is stylized, but it offers hints of realism in the movements of the sand pipers as they dart back and forth across the sand dunes. The story of a young sand piper that overcomes fear with the help of a friend is reminiscent of the most touching Pixar films. At times both comedic and heartwarming, Piper is a worthy addition to the Pixar line up.
Pear Cider and Cigarettes Director: Robert Valley Run Time: 35 minutes
Techno Styles is the character at the center of Pear Cider and Cigarettes. With gritty graphics, Rob narrates the story of his friend Techno, a man seemingly larger-than-life. The imagery matches the story, from dull yellows to highlight Techno’s failing liver, to golden silhouettes to illustrate Techno as a mythic person. For a short film, Pear Cider and Cigarettes feels long, with moments of redundancy that slow the pace of an otherwise solid film.
This year’s Oscar-nominated live-action shorts take on an international flavor. Entries from Hungary, Switzerland, Denmark, France and Spain talk culture, loneliness, oppression and racism in a spate of lovely dramas, comedies and romantic bits.
Enemies Within (Ennemis Interieurs) Director: Selim Aazzazi Running Time: 28 minutes
Enemies Within (Ennemis interieurs) from France’s Selim Aazzazi intimately examines a power struggle between two men – a French inspector interrogates an Algerian-born Frenchman looking to formalize his citizenship.
McCarthyism knows no geographic border, nor does terrorism, paranoia, or the fallout from all three. Two nuanced performances keep the work – also written by Aazzazi – riveting.
La Femme et la TGV Director: Timo von Gunten Running Time: 30 minutes
Switzerland’s La femme et le TGV, a slight but insightful pseudo-romance, follows an aging woman who clings to things as they are. “I’ve never sent an Internet and I never will,” she declares. A charming and sometimes poignant look at embracing change, the film also looks great.
Silent Nights Director: Aske Bang Running Time: 30 minutes
A holiday piece on loneliness, longing and belonging, Denmark’s Silent Nights is the most sentimental of the shorts. Written and directed by Aske Bang, the film follows an immigrant from Ghana (Prince Yaw Appiah) and the homeless shelter volunteer (Malene Beltoff Olsen) who loves him.
Strong performances, especially from Olsen, buoy a solid if too tidy film.
Sing Director: Kristof Deak Running Time: 25 minutes
Kristof Deak’s entry from Hungary is equal parts sinister and triumphant as the new kid in school gets to join the country’s most successful children’s choir. Sing (Mindenki) follows Zsofi (Dorka Gasparfalvi). Befriended by popular Liza (Dorka Hais) and invited – as are all students – to join the world famous choir, Zsofi couldn’t be happier. Until she – and, by extension, Liza – learn something not quite right.
Deak articulates the logic of a child in a drama that offers as much tension and as welcome a resolution as most full-length films.
Spain’s Timecode is the most charming of the lot. Two parking garage security guards see each other in person only at the beginning and end of each shift. Regardless, they develop a very particular friendship – one that is fun, funny, endearing and full of welcome surprises.
When Son of Saul, Laszlo Nemes’s blistering Holocaust drama, opens, you will think the film is out of focus. Hold tight, because Nemes has made a conscious decision here and this is just the first of many moments that will alter the way you look at a film.
The director’s breathlessly confident feature debut, which the Academy has nominated for best foreign language film, closely follows one Auschwitz inmate over a particularly tumultuous 36 hour period of his confinement. If you think you’ve seen everything there is to see about the Holocaust, well, the director will surprise you there as well.
Saul (a phenomenal Geza Rohrig) is a sonderkommando, or “bearer of secrets.” He is among the prisoners used by the Nazis to grease the machinery of extermination: rifling through clothing for valuables, removing victims from gas chambers, burning bodies, scrubbing floors in preparation for the next batch being hustled to the “showers.”
Nemes and cinematographer Matyas Erdely keep Saul in shallow focus so that the horror around him is all only glimpsed peripherally. We are focused, as Saul is focused, on just one thing – and yet we are, as he is, saturated in the hell of this existence.
When Saul spies the body of a young boy he deems his son, an idea seizes him. He becomes possessed to save the corpse from the knife, find a rabbi to perform a Kaddish (prayer for the dead), and give the child a proper burial.
The counterproductive, myopic insanity of this act and the controlled lunacy of Saul’s determination become almost reasonable in the context of the mechanized dehumanization around him – a horror that is immersive thanks to Nemes singular vision and Tamas Zanyi’s suffocating sound design.
Much remains ambiguous as the relatively simple story unfolds, but that simplicity allows for the director’s unrelenting focus. It mirrors Saul’s necessary focus, and the moans, screams, beatings, death, and misery that surround him and us – because it is not neatly packaged or clearly articulated – may offer the most realistic picture of the incomprehensible events that any filmmaker could hope to achieve.
Son of Saul is a deeply human film about man’s inhumanity to man and Laszlo Nemes is an artistic phenomenon.
Yes, Mad Max: Fury Road came up big in this year’s Oscar nominations. In fact, it’s a big Tom Hardy year, as the actor’s two films – Mad Max and The Revenant – cleaned up.
The year’s two most crowded fields are not necessarily the most glamorous, but determining the top picks from the possible contenders in best supporting actor and best cinematographer had to be tough. So we’ll will try not to complain too terribly loudly.
For cinematography, spot on! Carol, Mad Max: Fury Road, Sicario, The Revenant, The Hateful Eight. There are no bones to pick here.
For best supporting actor, though, let’s run through a handful of the blistering and brilliant performances that did not make this cut: Benicio Del Toro (Sicario), Josh Brolin (Sicario), Paul Dano (Love & Mercy), and most grievously, Oscar Isaac (Ex Machina). In their stead are four worthy adversaries and one unfortunate “good job, old man” nod.
Yes, Stallone (Creed)– in what is rightly considered his best performance in eons – takes the place of far stronger performances based on public good will. And while everyone high fives over the good fortune of the 69-year-old, we mourn for the far, far, far superior performances that will go unacknowledged.
He’s joined by Mark Ruffalo (Spotlight), Mark Rylance (Bridge of Spies), Tom Hardy (The Revenant), and Christian Bale (The Big Short).
Otherwise, though, not a lot to bitch about.
Best actor looked about as we thought: DiCaprio (The Revenant), Redmayne (The Danish Girl), Fassbender (Steve Jobs), Cranston (Trumbo), Damon (The Martian). Best actress was almost as clear with Brie Larson (Room), Jennifer Lawrence (Joy), Cate Blanchett (Carol), Saoirse Ronan (Brooklyn), and the surprise but utterly deserved nomination for Charlotte Rampling (45 Years).
Best supporting actress was likewise littered with excellence: Jennifer Jason Leigh (The Hateful Eight), Rooney Mara (Carol), Rachel McAdams (Spotlight), Alicia Vikander (The Danish Girl), and Kate Winslet (Steve Jobs).
Best director nominations were entirely welcome, with Adam McKay getting noticed for his unexpected and wonderful work on The Big Short, George Miller capping off an exceptional day for Mad Max: Fury Road, Alejandro G. Inarritu getting a chance at back-to-back wins for The Revenant, along with two highly worthy newcomers to the category, Tom McCarthy for Spotlight and Lenny Abrahamson for his marvel, Room.
Original screenplay nominees are strong: Bridge of Spies, Inside Out, Spotlight, Ex Machina, and as a nice surprise, Straight Outta Compton. We wouldn’t have minded a nod for The Hateful Eight, but those five are a fine group. Adapted screenplay hopefuls are The Big Short, Brooklyn, Carol, Room, and The Martian taking the final slot we’d have given to Steve Jobs.
Our biggest gripe comes at the top, with the exquisite Carol being denied a best picture nod while the obvious pandering of The Martian is rewarded. Criminal. Otherwise, Best Picture is a healthy group: The Big Short, Bridge of Spies, Brooklyn, Mad Max: Fury Road, The Revenant, Room, and Spotlight.
Chris Rock will host the awards show Sunday night, February 28th on ABC.
We want to recommend a couple of lovely Irish tales for this week’s queue, beginning with the Academy Award nominated Song of the Sea. This beautifully watercolored dream mixes modern day with Irish folklore to spin the yarn of a wee selkie and the brother who begrudgingly loves her. Magical, sweet, charming and funny, it’s a treat parents will enjoy at least as much as their kids. It should have won the Oscar.
Pair it with director Tomm Moore’s first Oscar nominee, the gorgeous Celtic poem The Secret of Kells. Moore’s talent for blending everyday challenges with ancient magic is again at work as we shadow young Brendan through the riotous color and animated details of the enchanted forest outside the medieval abby where he lives. It’s another visually stunning bit of animation that’s as compelling to adults as it is to children.
Russia’s contender for the Oscar last week is the devastating everyman struggle Leviathan.
The film is so intimate, so generously detailed yet provocatively ambiguous that you can almost overlook the larger metaphorical drama.
Hard drinking hothead Kolya (Aleksey Serebryakov) finds himself in a losing battle for his own property, a prime piece of beachfront real estate the town’s corrupt mayor wants for his own purposes. Still bullishly optimistic, Kolya calls in a favor from an old army buddy, now a high powered Moscow lawyer. The lawyer has dirt on the mayor, but justice is complicated in Russia.
Director Andrey Zvyaginstev draws wonderfully understated performances from his entire cast. Serebryakov is an aggravatingly empathetic center, profoundly flawed but deeply human. Equal to him is Elena Lyadova as Kolya’s world-wearied, enigmatic wife. And Roman Madyanov is sloppy perfection as the old school Russian thug/politician.
Zvyaginstev’s vision is one of Russia in transition. Old World practices mesh with a current sense of entitlement from the Orthodox Church, and the newly democratic Russia seems to find its footing in the same old place – the throat of the people.
The film is richly allegorical from start to finish. The visual metaphors, in particular, are sometimes heavy but never unintentionally so. Zvyagintsev means to slap the audience now and again with both the overwhelming plight of the Russian everyman, and with his fighting spirit – boozy and bruised, but hard to extinguish.
Cinematographer Mikhail Krishman’s astonishing photography connects the viewer to the rugged beauty of the Russian land, the very earthliness that holds Kolya so firmly. He can trace his attachment to this plot of oceanside property for generations and without it, he’s terrifyingly untethered – a lost soul.
Leviathan is not without humor, and though Kolya’s plight grows overwhelming in biblical proportions, Zvyaginstev refuses to lose sight of the intimate, personal battle that grounds his epic metaphor.
One of the best films of 2014 and the very best performance of Jake Gyllenhaal’s career becomes available for home entertainment today.
No telling why it took so long to combine Network and American Psycho, but Nightcrawler is here now, so buckle down for a helluva ride. Jake Gyllenhaal is at his absolute best in a film that is as scorchingly relevant an image of modern media as it is a brilliant character study in psychosis. You should see Nightcrawler.
There may be no better pairing for this acidic look at modern media than the only film that could do it one better, Sidney Lumet’s masterpiece Network. The film is as prescient as any movie could be, predicting with wicked humor and weird precision the catastrophic consequences of pairing network news and profit. It’s one of the best films ever made.