If I Were an Academy Member: Edwin Davies
By Edwin Davies
February 20, 2015
BoxOfficeProphets.com
If someone tried to invent a film that perfectly encapsulates the idea of “Oscar bait,” they’d be hard pressed to come up with something that fits the bill better than James Marsh’s The Theory of Everything. Though it features two undeniably great performances from Eddie Redmayne and Felicity Jones, the amount of time the film covers means that it quickly fizzles out after the first half an hour, which deals directly with Stephen Hawking’s initial work and his diagnosis with ALS and moves into the long slow process of depicting the Hawkings’ marriage. After that initial burst of energy, the film becomes little more than a series of scenes that happen to follow each other, with no cumulative effect worthy of the fine work being done by the people at its center.
7) The Imitation Game
There’s not much separating The Imitation Game from The Theory of Everything, either in terms of subject matter or quality. Both are pretty mediocre middlebrow fare, and neither are particularly challenging or all that dramatic. (If it wasn’t enough that both are biopics of influential British geniuses, Benedict Cumberbatch even played Hawking in a BBC TV movie in 2004, so he’s only an Isaac Newton cameo away from completing the set.) What gives The Imitation Game a slight edge is its clearer focus, in that it focuses on telling three stories from Alan Turing’s life instead of trying to encompass everything that happened to him. It also has a wry sense of humor, which at least makes it a more enjoyable watch than its fatally drab compatriot.
6) American Sniper
Part of the reason why American Sniper has been such a lightning rod for political discussions/hectoring, at least from my perspective, is that there is a conflict between the film’s themes and its style. Thematically, the film is the latest in a lineage of Clint Eastwood films about the impact of violence on the men who perpetrate it, and the parts with Chris Kyle at home dealing with PTSD hint at the idea that Eastwood is saying that the Iraq War had a lot of unintended consequences (something that you could extend to Kyle’s death, since it happened at the hands of another veteran). Under its surface, the film seems very uncertain about what the war means for Kyle personally or for America as a country. On its surface, though, the film is so slick and well-made that it can’t help but make the violence itself look cool, and in mimicking Kyle’s perspective as a sniper it dehumanizes the people in his sights to a degree which I found deeply unsettling. I enjoyed the film a fair bit, and I’m happy that Eastwood has turned around his recent run of critical and commercial duds, but the uneasiness I’ve felt about American Sniper since watching it prevents me from putting it up higher.
5) Birdman
In some ways, Birdman strikes me as this year’s Gravity. Not merely because they were both shot by Emmanuel Lubezki or that both utilize very long takes to force an intimacy with the actors, but because they’re both technically impressive films built around a compelling lead that are kind of let down by very obvious scripts. The characters in Birdman spend pretty much the entire film saying how they feel, yet none of them really feel like people that we could ever possible know, and the ambiguity about Keaton’s abilities/hallucinations kind of gets dull after a while. But everything apart from the script does make up for its deficits, as does the fact that Michael Keaton is surrounded by a great ensemble cast, many of whom play off their previous screen personas in much the same way that Keaton does. I’d even go so far as to say that Edward Norton does a better job than Keaton, especially since he’s so willing to make fun of his image as The Most Intense Actor Alive™. Of the eight nominees, I think that Birdman is the one that I had the most fun watching, but it’s also one that I’ve not really thought about much since, which is yet another way that it echoes Gravity.
4) Boyhood
Boyhood is the polar opposite to Birdman, in that I don’t remember enjoying it all that much but there are few films I’ve thought about more in the past year. Richard Linklater took a theoretically simple idea that presented a host of technical obstacles – not least of which being the question of whether or not the actors would want to be involved for such a long time, or whether all the various scenes would flow together as an actual movie – and managed to craft a film that feels consistent, and which manages to be both a very personal slice-of-life informed by Linklater’s childhood and those of his collaborators, as well as a kind of grand attempt to capture the little moments that make childhood and adolescence. I certainly couldn’t help comparing my own life to that of Mason, and I think that the film’s ability to forge such a personal connection in such an unassuming way is what makes it such a powerful film for the people who like it, as well as why people who don’t really care for it find it so alienating.
3) Whiplash
Whiplash is probably the film I’m most delighted and surprised to see get a nomination, and is probably the poster boy for keeping the expanded number of nominees. Under the old system of nominating just five films for Best Picture, the incredibly low-budget drama about jazz drumming would likely not have had a shot, and would have been shut out by the bigger hitters around it. It would probably still have landed a nomination of J.K. Simmons, but a great performance is not a guarantee of support in other areas (see also: Julianne Moore in Still Alice). Owing to its low budget and lack of momentum in other categories, Whiplash probably has no chance of winning, but just a nomination feels like a victory for such an intense and un-Oscar like film.
2) Selma
The way that Selma’s awards chances diminished in the lead up to the nominations – the result of a botched campaign by the studio, who pretty much only sent screeners out to Academy members and ignored other voting bodies, hurting their chances to build up steam as awards season progressed, as well as a well-orchestrated effort to smear the film for fairly minor deviations from the historical record – is probably one of the more disheartening thing about this year’s race. Here you have a film that is not merely a great work of art, something that feels incredibly alive in a way that few historical stories manage, but one that taps directly into questions of race and racism in America that have been at the forefront so much in 2014. The ultimate victory for Ava DuVernay and her cast and crew is that they made a fantastic film, and no one can take that away from them. But that it has not been recognized except in the most perfunctory manner, and that recognition did not lead to greater awareness for the film in general, is still shameful.
1) The Grand Budapest Hotel
Even though I loved Wes Anderson’s latest – it was my favourite film of last year and I love it more every time I watch it – it’s still surprising to see The Grand Budapest Hotel receiving so much love from the Academy. Not only did it come out in March, far outside of the usual confines of awards season, but Wes Anderson’s work in general has tended to be ignored when it comes to the Oscars. Prior to this year he had been nominated for Original Screenplay twice (for The Royal Tenenbaums and Moonrise Kingdom) and Best Animated Feature once (for The Fantastic Mr. Fox) but it always seemed like his work was on a wavelength that the Academy didn’t care for. I’m not sure what changed between Moonrise Kingdom and The Grand Budapest Hotel, but they’ve gone all in for him this year and I’m delighted to see one of his richest, funniest and saddest films receive such recognition. The film almost certainly won’t win Best Picture (though I’d bet good money on Anderson taking home Best Original Screenplay since the Academy likes to use that category to recognize interesting work (see also: Spike Jonze winning for Her)) but, much like his fellow Texan and multiple nominee Richard Linklater, Anderson’s showing this year feels like a long overdue celebration of decades of great work. Sure, the Oscars might be late to the party, but at least they got there before everyone had gone home.