Back-to-Back

I recently watched Robert Zemeckis' Back to the Future (1985) and Back to the Future: Part II (1989) for the first time this past week and I liked them. They're fun, energetic, easy-to-watch family sci-fi adventures - deservedly considered to be among the best of a genre so prominent during the 80's (Tron, The Last Starfighter, Labyrinth, etc.).

But first off, the thing that I immediately noticed about both films is that they're too long by about 15-20 minutes. Both, in their final acts, turn into an impossible series of events that could potentially threaten or disrupt the flow of time. We know the outcome, yet they just keep on going.

I don't know that the sequel is necessarily inferior to the original - maybe a bit too frenetic and convoluted - but I do know that I like both of them for what they are. They're time traveling movies that make sense - which is all too rare in the days of Kurtzman, Orci and J.J. Abrams.

Frank Capra #7: 'Forbidden' (1932)

An ongoing contract dispute between Columbia producer Harry Cohn and Barbara Stanwyck prior to the filming of Frank Capra's next film probably had more intrigue and drama than the end result.

Written by frequent collaborator Jo Swerling and based on a story by Capra himself, Forbidden (1932) is a fatally overwrought and creaky melodrama - soapy and borderline insufferable. It charts the decades long fling between a rich, but married lawyer (Adolphe Menjou) and a librarian (Barbara Stanwyck), and the subsequent disarray over their forbidden romance as the former runs for governor.

It's relentlessly grim and weepy, yet from the first scene, we're sure where this thing is going. Even Stanwyck, who shined brightly in Capra's earlier films Ladies of Leisure and The Miracle Woman, is reduced to a frustrating pushover of a woman, who allows Menjou's Bob Grover to dictate and prioritize her life in the name of love, even though we don't buy it for a second.

She lacks the toughness and vulnerability and playfulness that marks her best performances, and even her minor ones. Forbidden is a career low-point, both for Stanwyck and for Capra, who would later admit and accept its major shortcomings. Needless to say, the two would bounce back just fine.

Spending Day

I've been trying to find Roberto Rossellini's War Trilogy, the release from Criterion that came out last Tuesday consisting of the director's post-WWII works Rome, Open City, Paisan and Germany, Year Zero.

Unfortunately, I haven't been able to find it in any of my local movie retail warehouses and I refuse to spend $89.99 at Best Buy. The last resort was Amazon.com, which was selling it for $57 all week until today, when the price shot up to $79.

82nd Academy Awards Nominations

Well, I went 32-for-35 on my predictions posted last night, although I would imagine that a lot of people were in the same ballpark since there were few surprises in the acting categories and other majors (I didn't even bother attempting screenplay).


Overall, John Hillcoat's The Blind Side was the wildcard Best Picture nominee that everyone is talking about - pushing out Clint Easwood's Invictus. I haven't seen the Sandra Bullock weep-vehicle yet out of sheer disinterest. Netflix.

I'm happy for Neill Blomkamp's District 9 (which I've come to appreciate more on Blu-ray) and, of course, the Coen Brothers' A Single Man. Both films also received screenplay nods in their respective categories, as well.

The only category that threw a few curveballs was Best Supporting Actress, where Maggie Gyllenhaal squeaked in for Crazy Heart and Penelope Cruz got in for her hooker show in Nine over my beloved Marion Cotillard who was one of the few bright spots in an otherwise forgettable film.

So that's it. For a comprehensive list of the nominees, head over here. Oh, one more thing! I'm so pleased to see that Leona Lewis' "I See You" failed to get a nomination for James Cameron's Avatar in the Best Original Song category. Amen. Let's all bring home The Hurt Locker for Best Picture in a month and call it a year.

Oscar Predictions

Tomorrow morning at 5:30am PST, the 2009 Academy Awards Nominations will be announced, and I'm here to throw together my best guess and see what happens. The really interesting thing this year will be what films sneak into the Best Picture race with the expansion to ten nominees for the first time this side of 1950.

There are a lot of possibilities with the two biggest names of the moment the populist favorites The Hangover and The Blind Side. I don't see either of them getting in and I personally believe that box-office returns are a bit overrated in terms of what the Academy will pick.

There are also some sci-fi summer flicks that are vying to get in with District 9 and Star Trek. After much deliberation today, I'm firmly rooted in the belief that the former has political/social importance on its side. Anyway, enough of me, here we go with the predictions.


Best Picture

"An Education"
"Avatar"
"District 9"
"The Hurt Locker"
"Inglourious Basterds"
"Invictus"
"Precious"
"A Serious Man"
"Up"
"Up in the Air"

Best Actor

George Clooney, "Up in the Air"
Jeff Bridges, "Crazy Heart"
Jeremy Renner, "The Hurt Locker"
Morgan Freeman, "Invictus"
Colin Firth, "A Single Man"

Best Actress

Meryl Streep, "Julie & Julia"
Sandra Bullock, "The Blind Side"
Carey Mulligan, "An Education"
Helen Mirren, "The Last Station"
Gabourey Sidibe, "Precious"
(spoiler) Emily Blunt, "The Last Victoria"

Best Supporting Actor

Christoph Waltz, "Inglourious Basterds"
Woody Harrelson, "The Messenger"
Stanley Tucci, "The Lovely Bones"
Christopher Plummer, "The Last Station"
Matt Damon, "Invictus"

Best Supporting Actress

Mo'Nique, "Precious"
Anna Kendrick, "Up in the Air"
Vera Farmiga, "Up in the Air"
Marion Cotillard, "Nine"
Julianne Moore, "A Single Man"

Best Director

Quentin Tarantino, "Inglourious Basterds"
Jason Reitman, "Up in the Air"
Kathryn Bigelow, "The Hurt Locker"
James Cameron, "Avatar"
Lee Daniels, "Precious"

Reitman Talks "Locker," "District 9"

This clip (shot by Roger Ebert) of Up in the Air director Jason Reitman talking about The Hurt Locker and District 9 is interesting if only because we so rarely get to hear other filmmakers and actors talking openly about their fellow competitors.

I'm still very much a fan of Reitman's Up in the Air, despite its current status as a backtalkers' bulls-eye. It's limping into tomorrow morning's Oscar nominations and doesn't stand a chance to win. Reitman has hurt his reputation amongst some with his seemingly cocky bravura in interviews and appearances, but I'm not so quick to judge.



You can view some more videos of the chat with Jason Reitman here, courtesy of Ebert's blog.

The Sound of The Birds

I caught the last few minutes of Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds (1963) last night on BBC America and was reminded how striking and downright amazing that film is...at times. On the whole, I think it's a tad too bloated and infuriatingly spiked with poor supporting performances, but I wanted to talk a little about what it does so damn well.

First off, it's a technical masterclass, particularly in its inventive and brilliantly orchestrated sound design. Through a simple combination of natural bird sounds and electronic effects (using an instrument called an electroacoustic Trautonium) and arranged by Bernard Herrman, this soundtrack of abstract noises becomes a strange necessity to the success of the film.

The way that the sounds and shrills of the birds are being used instead of a more traditional orchestral score, and the way that these sounds work in relation to the material (building suspense, sustaining quiet, etc.) make this the most inventive use of sound in a film that I've ever heard. It wouldn't be the same without it.

Additionally, all of the "attack scenes" were shot using a careful and seamless blend of live and animated birds with special effects overseen by Ub Iwerks. The suspense created by Hitchcock in The Birds (which runs 120 minutes and doesn't really start going until a third of the way in) is paramount to the film's effectiveness and thus the believability of the effects becomes just as crucial.

Based on a 1952 short-story by Daphne Du Maurier (and originally intended as a likely metaphor for an aerial invasion by way of Communism or Nazism), The Birds remains so effective in its terror because the threat here comes from such a seemingly docile and innocuous creature. In "Hitchcock/Truffaut," the acclaimed one-on-one interview composed and published in the 70's, Hitch spoke on this idea: "I think if the story had involved vultures, or birds of prey, I might not have wanted it. The basic appeal to me is that it had to do with ordinary, everyday birds."

I like to think of the second half of The Birds in three major stages or scenes: the schoolhouse attack, the gasoline station attack and the final scene/escape at the Brenner home.

This first scene, the attack on the schoolhouse in which Melaine (Tippi Hedren) sits on the schoolyard bench as the crows slowly gather behind her, is one of the greatest examples of suspense you're likely to see. First, the juxtaposition of the children singing "Wee Cooper O'Fife" in the schoolhouse and the slow gathering of the birds on the playground is irony at its best.

Secondly, the way that we hear the sound of the children's feet stomping on the pavement and the subsequent reaction and fluttering of the birds in response is just another example of how the sound in The Birds is used to narrate the film and just how startlingly effective it is.

Next is the gas station scene, which contains my second favorite shot in the whole film, the literal birds-eye view of Bodega Bay and their slow descent towards the town. There's also a silly series of shots as Melanie reacts to the gas catching fire and her change in reactions as it moves across the street, one of several such scenes in The Birds. Yet once again, the entire attack is set solely to the sounds of the pesky, winged-creatures - chilling and effective.

The film ends with a violent attack on Melanie (Tippi Hedren) as she wanders upstairs and then as the Brenner family takes her out to the car and drives from the house through an imposing and eerily still crowd of birds. (I've always loved how Rod Taylor turns on the radio to hear a report on multiple attacks in other small California towns. The scope widening and the threat peaking.)

The implication in this final shot is that the birds are becoming stronger and more numerous, with no motivation (scientific or otherwise) implied. It's probably one of the greatest single takes in the history of film in terms of its meaning and its technical difficulty (Hitchcock said it was the hardest shot of his career) and it's just one of the few moments that makes The Birds such an extraordinary achievement.