Amph 2023 Oscars (discussion of likely award-winning films)

"Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you gonna get." that's not true either, it says on the box what each one is.

 

Before they may not have said it. Now they say it, because people no longer appreciate good or bad surprises, or maybe because we live in an era where we feel too insecure.

Still a touching scene though:

 

Really the problem is that people are going to assume it's some sort of mock frog.

 

Riseborough nomination under review! Shady doings!

 

Except it sounds like she literally did what every studio does...?

 

Yeah, that is incredibly inaccurate; he didn't mention beagles at all.

 

the donkey in the Bansheerenis (how the **** do you spell bansheerisn?) how has he is he not got a best Oscar Nom ?

 

"Best Oscar?"

 

Definitely the Grouch.

 

well Best Donkey or whatever, he was brilliant. Have you seen the movie?

 

Producers get an Oscar when their movie wins Best Picture; they don't need their own category.



But, yeah, I've seen it. Predictably excellent. Farrell might just be career best; he's subsumed all of his natural charm and affability to play an utterly charmless, unlikable and pretty stupid character. And Kerry Condon was fantastic. Barry Keoghan . . . excellent. Yeah, really great movie.

 

All right, who's seen Women Talking? I just came from seeing it in the theater and I am kind of dumbfounded at how little I liked it. I tend to like Sarah Polley; it's got Rooney Mara, Jessie Buckley and Claire Foy. Why am I so chilly on this movie? Well, one thing I can say objectively: I hated the extreme desaturation. I get what they were going for with the whole thing about how the lives in this community are so bleak and it would have been jarring if a movie about the systematic, years-long program of rape and molestation of young girls and women was filled with vibrant colors. But there was probably a middle ground. I found it really off-putting and it just kinda pulled me out of the movie, I think.

 

I'm waiting for VOD for Women Talking which should be in about less than 2 weeks. I like all those actresses so probably find something in it.

 

Yeah I'm waiting on that one too..just saw TAR is now on... I think Peacock? One of the services I have. So that and Banshees are up next for me this week probably.

 

TAR is on Peacock, yes.

 

Of the best picture nominees, I've seen:

Avatar: The Way of Water
The Banshees of Inisherin
Everything Everywhere All at Once
Top Gun: Maverick
Triangle of Sadness

I've liked them all on some level but I didn't walk away from any of them thinking I'd just seen the best picture of the year.

 

Something I usually do at some point is just watch all the BP nominee trailers back to back in one sitting. It's just kind of a way to get a compressed overview of the films in a way that even just watching them all separately won't do. So I just did that.

This is a weird slate of movies. They are each radically different from all of the others.

 

Saw Banshees last night, and I really enjoyed it but good god is it dark. Not as dark as Three Billboards or In Bruges.

Okay, never mind.

 

Banshees is definitely dark but there are some great one-liners. "Why'd you start with fingers?" and there's a sight gag involving a dog that totally breaks the realism vibe the movie is going for but it's good enough to get a pass.

 

Barry Keoghan gets some amazingly funny bits. "What the hell was he hittin' you with?" "A kettle was the final thing. *pause* I wouldna minded but for the spout." I mean, that's just such a classically structured joke that you can't help but laugh, but it's so terrible. I genuinely think I laughed more at Banshees than I did at anything else I saw this year. It's hilarious. And, yeah, really dark. It's a great example of how you can be dark without being grim.

 

Ah ha, so the evil confectioners of Crunchy Frog have returned.

(Promptly leaves thread)

 

The best movie of any given year isn’t a very high bar. Also it’s hard to tell what movies are going to stand the test of time. Ideally they should hand out Oscars 10 years later. We should be nominating 2012 movies now. What movies do people still watch from 2012? Probably Ted, The Hunger Games and Pitch Perfect. So those get nominated for best picture in 2023. Ok this was a terrible idea.

 

For 1980, the nominees for Best Picture should have been The Shining, The Elephant Man, Caddyshack, and Airplane!

Oh, and a nice little picture called The Empire Strikes Back.

 

I'd be more upset about Andrea Riseborough's grass-roots campaign for an Oscar nomination this year if she shouldn't have won in 2020 for Possessor.