Awards Season: Week 5

[merridia]

It's 2020! Happy new year everyone! We made it! Mostly!

2019 was pretty much the longest, most stressful year of my life (and that's coming on the heels of years where I had close family die and my city burning down), but I'm in a MUCH better place now than I was a year ago, both figuratively and literally, so hopefully the '20s will turn out to be less of a total wash than MY 20s were! Onwards!

I have made one (1) resolution, and that's to seriously stop ordering food every goddamn night at work, it's SO expensive, oh my god you'll be home in a couple of hours anyway, just WAIT a bit, JESUS. Am currently chugging a whole lot of water and munching on some Crispers I brought to get me off on the right foot!

Missed the Golden Globes because I went to the movies, but they sounded fairly obnoxious to watch from what I gathered after the fact? Some REAL interesting wins, though, looking forward to finding out what some of them will end up meaning come Oscar time.

So I actually managed to keep up with my goal of updating this thing regularly for a whole year?? Wild! I didn't often have much to say, but damn it, it's something! Now I'm debating whether or not I should keep going with the mini movie reviews or do something else? God knows I need SOME sort of push, idk.

Hey, speaking of!



The Avengers (2012): Is it weird to be hyped to watch a movie I've seen tons of times since it came out almost eight years ago? DON'T CARE, my slow MCU rewatch reached the end of Phase 1 and I was super excited about it. It's so hard to express my love for this movie, what it is, what it did, what it meant, it's just SO MUCH. It feels like at least 80% of this movie was just instantly iconic in a way that few things can touch, from the one-liners to the character beats to the fight sequences to the locations. It's probably my favourite film of the decade, since that's a thing people were deciding last week??? It's just so well put together, in both the unprecedented THEY MADE THE MARVEL UNIVERSE INTO MOVIES ways, but also just... good filmmaking, attention to detail ways. They didn't have to go so hard establishing how Hawkeye's trick arrows work! And it literally only just registered for me on this viewing that while Tony has to play pop psych on Loki to figure out where the obligatory sky beam is gonna be, the reason Bruce knows to meet them there after unHulking is because he already knew, being the only one to see the location on the screen when it popped before everything went 'splodey. LITTLE THINGS! And I doubt they will ever again attain the perfection of that post-credits bit.

The Pirate (1948): WHAT'S THIS? A STRAY MGM MUSICAL I MISSED IN MY EARLIER FUROR? DON'T MIND IF I DO! If anyone is reading this, go do yourself a favour and experience the majesty of Gene Kelly's slutty pirate costume from this one dream sequence. It's genuinely life-changing.

Midnight Run (1988): Ending the year right! God, I love this stupid movie so much.

Black Jack (1979): This one had a bit of trouble holding my attention. Also, I found the accents REALLY tough to understand in parts, which probably didn't help the attention issue, but overall it was pretty endearingly wholesome.

Blancanieves (2012): I automatically love any movie where a matador gets fucked up, but I enjoyed this for other reasons, too! The modern silent film gimmick is fun (I still like The Artist, too, even it it's uncool), and the actors use it to take you on some real face journeys! I love that you could tell the evil stepmother was exactly that within like two seconds of her appearing as a nurse just with her ridiculous expressions. The ending was EXTREMELY uncomfortable and weird, but man, idk, I dug it. But why were there only six dwarves????

And then it was oldschool Hitchcock time!

Jamaica Inn (1939): Atmospheric and grimy and Maureen O'Hara's character is a total badass. Definitely gives the impression of being more of a Laughton movie than a Hitchcock one, but it's not bad.

Champagne (1928): Hitchcomedy! This is really frothy and inconsequential and not much of the humour really landed for me, but there are some REALLY arresting shots buried in amongst all the nonsense. That club set, with the two floors and the big open area in the middle, is AMAZING for following characters around and tracking eyelines through. Also every guy in this is absolutely horrible and Betty deserved so much better!!! Also also, it's really weird and unsettling watching silent movies with no musical accompaniment!

Blackmail (1929): Light on plot and a little slow in the back half because of it, but there's still some brilliant stuff here. That rape/murder scene legit gave me chills. I kinda want to find the silent edit of this and watch that, because it feels like it'd be a lot tighter? Most of the slow parts were to do with everyone standing around talking about the interesting parts.

Little Women (2019): LOOK, I'M JUST HERE FOR PREACHER DAD ODENKIRK, OKAY. This didn't do much to change my opinion of either Gerwig or the source material, but the performances were across-the-board SUPER likable, so I enjoyed it well enough. It's a very clever adaptation, it did a lot of things that I think were really smart (starting out with Jo/Bhaer and Amy/Laurie so they feel less like the consolation prize romances, pairing Beth's two illnesses so it's not just more of the same when she croaks, etc.), some things that I think were a little too clever (yes, yes, they all wind up married or dead, we get it), and some that I'm just not sure about (the whole meta 'this didn't actually happen' ending is certainly INTERESTING, but I'm still not sure if it's GOOD, I think I might have liked a commitment to actually diverging from the book as it was instead of breaking the fourth wall to make the statement while still getting to end it the same way). Oh, and I really liked Laura Dern getting to do the bit about Marmy being angry all the time, she's so good, and how often does THAT make it into adaptations?

I need to get some more fresh icons up in here.

Comments

[whatwedo]

I enjoy the mini reviews a lot, so my vote is to keep up with those! :D

I think I wanna try that big scavenger hunt list you have on letterboxd >_>

[merridia]

Letterboxd scavenger hunts are SO much fun, but I always make up my lists, start them and then immediately get distracted by other things, womp womp

IF SOMEONE'S READING THESE THINGS, I SUPPOSE I SHALL CONTINUE :D

[eternaldaisy]

wait, do you not like Greta Gerwig either, did I not know this somehow

[merridia]

It's not a DEEP ABIDING dislike or anything, I've only seen Frances Ha and Ladybird (and now Little Women) of hers, but my opinion of both was a hearty 'meeeeeehrhg'

[eternaldaisy]

I FEEL SO MUCH LESS ALONE, THANK YOU

I've only seen the latter two, but I disliked Ladybird intensely enough to reeeeeally put me off her. I tried to be optimistic with Little Women, and I didn't dislike it AS much, but I'm... still not sold, or sure what the big deal is? Florence Pugh was delightful, and I will watch Laura Dern do goddamn anything (wow, can we have another movie where she and Odenkirk are a cute married couple, but we get to see more of them?), but I agree that it was trying to be TOO clever, the meta stuff did not really work for me, and it also just seemed to miss the mark in a lot of ways.

Man. After hearing everyone rave about it, it's really nice not to be the only person who didn't love it, because I've felt like I was ALL NIGHT.

[merridia]

"Not sure what the big deal is" is EXACTLY where I'm at with it, I liked it fine! It's definitely my favourite Gerwig thus far! Just... entirely because of the performances, is all, the parts where the directorial hand/vision really showed through were where it kinda faltered for me. XD

wow, can we have another movie where she and Odenkirk are a cute married couple, but we get to see more of them?

I'M VIBRATING JUST THINKING ABOUT IT, I LOVED THEM SO MUCCCCCCHHHHHHH

[eternaldaisy]

Yeah, like... as a movie totally divorced from the source material, it was OKAY? Definitely better than her last movie with its weird abuse apologism? But it was way too into its own cleverness, and I don't think it succeeded in doing what it was trying to do. Plus, they did my boy Bhaer so dirty. The actors were really good, a lot of them were very well cast, a lot of them I wanted to see MORE of — there was a whole lotta telling rather than showing — but the direction and, really, the script, felt flat and stilted to me. Except with Amy! I really liked what they did with Amy. She had a personality as an adult! The way she started shrieking when she saw Laurie was so cute! FLORENCE PUGH!

SAAAAAME OMG. THEY WERE SO ADORABLE, that was SUCH a good pairing. And Meryl Streep as Aunt March was kind of inspired.

[merridia]

Yeah, I'm in the peculiar boat where I really have no affinity for the source material, so I'm cool with it doing its own thing, but in this case, that 'own thing' was just being really winkingly self-aware without actually being willing to commit to the antithesis it was putting forward? And while the timey-wimey cutting back and forth was a smart move for SOME things (Beth, the romances, etc.), I'm not sure if it was worth it for how difficult it made the whole thing to follow if you HAVEN'T read the book (there were definitely a few confused whispers going on around me at some of the cuts).

Meryl Streep is LOVING taking all these quirky old lady roles now that she's out of Marmy age and it's WONDERFUL

[eternaldaisy]

Yeah, I felt like there were a few places it was definitely a benefit, but in general mostly made it seem confusing, and even knowing the source material, I felt like it made it harder to get a grasp on the characters and their development? And idk, I think I would have been more fine with it doing its own thing — I really, really tried to be open-minded — if it hadn't been so overly clever about it and had been... better storytelling in general. idk, I mostly just don't get what all the hype is about, it's weird.

SHE IS, IT'S GREAT. Though I kept waiting for Marmy go off at Aunt March like Laura did to Meryl in Big Little Lies.

[merridia]

As a nice little movie with lots of pretty actors being delightful, I totally get why people would be into this, it's all the awards buzz it's still getting that has me all ?????? WHAT AM I MISSING

[eternaldaisy]

yeah, I get it as, like, this is a light, fun thing with lots of pretty, charming people being pretty and charming, but the reviews that are like THIS IS THE BEST MOVIE EVER and THIS IS THE DEFINITIVE LITTLE WOMEN and shit? the awards buzz? but... why? I know a lot of people want to see a woman nominated for best director, and yeah, I do, too, but I think there were plenty of stronger contenders? I feel like I watched an entirely different movie than most people are talking about.

[merridia]

yeah, I don't get the insane raves at all, and every time I see someone saying Gerwig was snubbed for a director nom, I'm just like... very thorface 'was she, though?'

I'd rather see her in there before Todd fucking Phillips, but... c'mon, people. Just give it a costume nod and find another hill to die on.

[eternaldaisy]

YEP. ALL OF THIS. I'd take anyone over Todd Phillips, fuck that, but... really, guys? It's not a snub if she doesn't deserve it. >_>

And there were other female directors! Lorene Scafaria! Lulu Wang! It doesn't have to be this one lady!