OT: Awards Season

And, by the way, ROma was not snubbed for BP, the Globe rules (for some strange reason) only allow English language films to be BP noms.

---

As happens nowadays, the Oscar race seems to materialize out of nowhere, not so much "led" by something major(Ben-Hur, West Side Story, The Sound of Music) as much as a few lists appearing that give us the "lay of the land" for what was good this year. Movies like La La Land and Moonlight arrived this way two years ago; The Shape of Water and Three Billboards last year -- Spotlight a few years ago. Good movies, all -- but not necessarily great, or popular, or beloved for all time.

From what I've been reading, "Roma" is a frontrunner unless the "foreign film" thing gets in the way(it didn't for Slumdog Millionaire, did it?) I assume Black Panther will win its GG easily...and challenge the Academy for a Best Picture Oscar -- there is no "Popular Film" category and I hear that Black Panther really isn't great enough for a Best Picture.

Green Book was looking good for Mortensen until he said the wrong thing at a press conference for it(the N word in some context); "Vice" posits Christian Bale as the Best Actor frontrunner under the "Robert DeNiro Weight Gain Standard"(and somebody somewhere will say how it is an important film for our times), A Star is Born might help mint Lady Gaga as a star further born....there's enough going on here for a year with good, not great, films , getting their due. Or a great film -- Roma -- with Netflix issues and low box office -- overcoming those hurdles.

We shall see.

The good reviews of Mary Poppins Returns suggest that it recaptures much of the spirit of the original while making its own name for itself. (The bad reviews say its heartless corporate plunder -- with unmemorable songs.) I'm hoping to see the movie that the good reviews are talking about -- and I think that's what will happen. Look, I picked "The Magnificent Seven" as my fave of 2016 -- and it mainly got "two star" reviews. I'm easy, and I'm nostalgic.

I'm interested that Lin-Manuel Miranda has gotten the male lead --- he's very much a "new star of the moment"(on Broadway) and here's his chance to be a movie star(his very sweet and friendly face is an asset.) He's doing a Cockney accent, too -- and has already been as panned for his as Dick Van Dyke was panned for his -- which strikes me as fitting. I'm always interested by "who is a star around the time a movie is made." Van Dyke was a TV star briefly elevated to movie stardom via Poppins(a Time magazine profile said, "Van Dyke now gets the scripts that Jack Lemmon isn't available for .) Now -- Miranda's turn?

I'm intrigued that the new Mary Poppins film has a "flat classic animation" sequence to bring 1964 back.

I"ve already noted that the "Mary Poppins Returns" TRAILER is one of my favorites. Interestingly, the long-form "Dumbo" trailer(very dependent on the sad "Baby Mine" as its theme) is not nearly as exhilarating and moving. Trailers can be hits, just like movies. And if I give "Mary Poppins Returns" my "favorite of 2018" slot, it will get a boost because of that trailer. I ALREADY like THAT movie.

Within bounds because however captivating I found the musical cues in the trailer that repeat in the movie --- its a different musical experience than what Mary Poppins gave us with that grand slam of singable tunes. Many of the numbers in "Mary Poppins Returns" are designed as showstoppers. You're supposed to applaud when each one ends. But all the numbers are pretty much lacking the melodies that made the songs in Mary Poppins so unforgettable. Its interesting how important melody is to "what's a classic, and what's not?" Frank Sinatra knew this -- his biggest hits had great melodies, Well, not really his BIGGEST hits -- Strangers in the Night and My Way are kinda schmaltzy. But Without A Song, Nice and Easy, High Hopes, The Lady is a Tramp -- melodies. Not to mention other people's hits like Moon River and Call Me Irresponsible. And even some of those 1969 musicals had tunes you could hum -- Paint Your Wagon had They Call the Wind Mariah; Finian's Rainbow had That Old Devil Moon; Hello, Dolly had....It Only Takes a Moment. (And Damn Yankees had "You Gotta Have Heart.")

Those kinds of melodies seemed absent from Mary Poppins Returns to me. Each massively choreographed, delightfully staged number seemed to be missing something. You can tell at the happy, spectacular end of the movie -- when the attempt to match "Let's Go Fly A Kite" with a new song ("Nowhere to Go But Up") matches it in exhilaration and happiness -- but not, alas, in tunefulness. (Though maybe with another listen, I'll learn it.)

Ha, the Acad. has reversed itself and now all Awards will be presented live again:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/15/business/oscars-academy-awards-categories.html
All these reversed decisions over the past year... if only they surprised us with an actual host or semi-host on the night too.

---

On the one hand, they've been looking like real bumblers.

On the other hand, they have certainly generated interest in the show....now will MORE people turn in just to see Best Cinematography given on the air? (Probably not, but articles were written, names like Scorsese and Lee and Pitt and Clooney stepped up in protest.)

An issue, if not THE issue, with the movement of these awards to commercial is that the Oscars have maintained SOME integrity as where "the awards are given to the technical people." An emphasis on stars and star directors(see: The Golden Globes, The SAG awards, Directors Guild) are really for celebrity gazing. The Oscars are supposed to go "above and below the title."

Which reminds me. Best Film Editing. There have been some controversies there. Bullitt won the award, which felt right (the car chase; the airport chase.) But Psycho wasn't even nominated!!(The freakin' shower scene is all ABOUT editing, as in different ways are the Arbogast murder and the fruit cellar with Mother's face herky-jerky spinnin' around.) And The Wild Bunch was nominated -- but didn't win. Say what?

I've been looking at The Favorite's script. It's a very impressive, incredibly detailed piece of work. The film *felt* so visual, so we assume it was director-driven, hence it's a little surprising to see almost *everything* mapped out with great precision well before a director was even chosen.

---

"Well before a director was even chosen." Sometimes screenwriters have real resentment for their directors....Ernest Lehman told someone watching NXNW being shot:

Onlooker: So they're shooting Hitchcock's new movie?
Lehman: They are shooting MY new movie.

But Lehman was a bit too impressed with himself, as the mediocre movie of his script for The Prize(1963), an NXNW knockoff proved.

---

(Indeed, reading around, Davis had a first draft 20 years ago!

----

Man, the patience required in getting certain movies made.

On a "lesser level of time," both David Chase with The Sopranos and Matt Weiner with Mad Men shopped their scripts around for years with no takers before hitting paydirt(and Weiner did it with the obscure AMC channel.) And it was over a year from filming the Mad Men pilot that it went to series and then months before it was broadcast and became a hit(with critics more than audiences in the beginning.)