Cinemascope

1. Anthony Minghella is Oscar’s lucky charm.
He executive-produced “Michael Clayton” (and reportedly helped Tony Gilroy polish the script), and had a tiny cameo at the end of “Atonement” (as Vanessa Redgrave’s TV interviewer). The “write without adjectives” line in “Atonement” is lifted from Minghella’s Oscar winner, “The English Patient”. Now both “Michael Clayton” and “Atonement” are Best Picture nominees.

2. Academy voters don’t like pregnancy themed movies.
Going into the Oscar season we had “Knocked Up”, “Waitress”, “4 Months, 3 Weeks & 2 Days”, “Lake of Fire” and “Juno” all dealing with unwanted pregnancies. Only “Juno” made it through.

3. Family values are not so valuable anymore.
“Juno” deals with the disintegration of a married couple, “Michael Clayton” is unhappily divorced, “There Will Be Blood”’s Daniel Plainview has no family, “Atonement” rips sisters and lovers apart, and “No Country For Old Men” presents one idyllic picture of married couple, while killing off another.

4. France is the new England
With titles in French such as La Vie en Rose, Le Scaphandre et le Papillon, Persepolis, Beaufort and Ratatouille, this edition may be the most Francophonic Oscars ever.

5. The frozen Northern Mid-West is smoking hot.
The Coen Brothers come from Minnesota but they made a movie about Texas. Juno lives in Minnesota, but her mother left and moved to Texas. Diablo Cody’s career began in a Minnesota strip joint. Bob Dylan, who’s portrayed in “I’m Not There”, was born in Minnesota. Daniel Plainview (hero of “There Will Be Blood”) hails from Wisconsin. Tom Wilkinson’s character in “Michael Clayton” goes into meltdown after visiting a Wisconsin farm. And “Lars and the Real Girl” is also located somewhere North - Minnesota or Dakota - in an unnamed city.

6. The Ben Affleck curse is starting to wear off.
Casey Affleck, Brother of Ben, is nominated. Amy Ryan is nominated for Ben’s movie, “Gone Baby Gone”. And Jennifer Garner, Ben’s wife, is in “Juno”, the movie that may steal the show.

7. It’s awful to have a brother or a sister.
Paul Sunday betrays Eli Sunday. And what’s up with Daniel Plainview’s brother? Michael Clayton is estranged from his brother. The Savages are not the friendliest of siblings. Lars and his brother don’t get along. Jesse and Frank James are hardly on speaking terms. Remy the rat is embarrassed by his obese brother. The hero of “The Kite Runner” learns the true identity of his brother. Denzel brings his brother into his drug business but then threatens to kill him for his show-offy behavior. And young Briony’s vivid imagination ruins her sister’s life. And “No Country for Old Men” is the Coen Brothers’ most successful film since “O Brother Where Art Thou”.

8. The Third Revelation is upon us.
Daniel Plainview says he’s the Third Revelation, but I think Anton Chigurh is the real Third Revelation.

Anton Ego, “Ratattouille”

Anton Corbijn, “Control”

Anton Chigurh, “No Country for Old Men”

Scott Feinberg names these five films as Best Picture Nominees:

(1) Juno (Fox Searchlight)
(2) No Country for Old Men (Miramax)
(3) Atonement (Focus Features)
(4) Into the Wild (Paramount Vantage)
(5) The Diving Bell and Butterfly (Miramax)

This sounds almost perfect. But still, something is off… Juno.

Sasha Stone is still mulling around with an incomplete list:

No Country for Old Men
Michael Clayton
Atonement
American Gangster
…
And then one of three: Into the Wild (most likely), There Will Be Blood or Sweeney Todd.

American Gangster!? Does this one still have a chance? How can anyone still like American Gangster after seeing There Will Be Blood? Michael Clayton!? I don’t know. I can’t see it.

David Poland has four films locked: No Country For Old Men, Michael Clayton, Sweeney Todd, Atonement. And then five others for the last slot.

Anne Thompson, an ace Oscar predictor in my eyes, is considering (on the Guru’s o’ Gold chart) these five: No Country for Old Men, Atonement, American Gangster, Sweeney Todd, Juno.

Jeffrey Wells, in his Oscar Balloon feature has listed: No Country for Old Men, Atonement, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, There Will Be Blood, Juno.

Most Oscar Prognosticators said this before: this is an exceptional year because there really are many great movie to confuse us. And these prophecies, I believe, will be similar to the actual ballots. But what will be the final tally?

The good thing that happened so far is that The Kite Runner and Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead have dropped up from consideration. I never did see them as true contenders.

Here is my problem: American Gangster? Michael Clayton? Juno? I just can’t imagine any of those as Best Picture nominees. Maybe it’s because I didn’t flip over any of these. And maybe it’s moronic to hope that ALL five nominees will all be my favorites (although I adore There Will Be Blood but I can’t imagine it nabbing a Best Picture nomination).

So, these are my five Best Picture nominees:

- No Country For Old Men
- Atonement
- Into the Wild
- The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
- Sweeney Todd

This list sounds perfect to me. The only problem is that it’s probably too perfect. But I’m sticking with this one for now.

“I’m finished here”.

For several days I’ve been switching back and forth between There Will be Blood and Control in the number 1 spot on my Best-Of-2007 list. I can’t make up my mind which I love more. They were both astounding. I finally settled on Control for Best Movie of 2007, but I can’t help thinking how Ian Curtis’ life would look if directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. As far as I care, the two films are tied for Best of the Year.

1. Control (Anton Corbijn)

2. There Will Be Blood (Paul Thomas Anderson)
3. Zodiac (David Fincher)
4. Ratatouille (Brad Bird)
5. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (Julian Schnabel)
6. The Host (Bong Joon-ho)
7. The Bourne Ultimatum (Paul Greengrass)
8. Eastern Promises (David Cronnenberg)
9. Knocked Up (Judd Apatow)
10. Away From Her (Sarah Poley)

Note: No Country for Old Men, Juno, Into the Wild and Sweeney Todd have not yet been seen on my side of the world. I hear they are good.

Best of their kind genre-movie-runner-ups:
11. 300 & Beowulf
(two mythical CGI epics, both wonderfully over-the-top. The first is campy and ironic; the second took itself way too seriously but provided the best film-going experience of the year when viewed on Imax 3D)

12. Hot Fuzz
(Hilarious and superbly made, and made you want to see Point Break all over again. The final act is a riot).

13. Superbad
(If David Mamet or Tom Stoppard were to write a teen comedy this is what it would sound like. This film has the best dialog lines heard this year).

14. Hairspray & Across the Universe
(Two musicals set in the Sixties. both naive and old-fashioned but sneakily engaging and lovable).

15. 28 Weeks Later
(This year’s best horror movie. The scenes in an infested and deserted London make I am Legend look like a rip-off).

Almost there:
Wristcutters: A Love Story
(The second movie this year to feature music from Joy Division. An adorable film).

Honorable mentions for documentaries:
Sicko, Crazy Love, The War and In The Shadow of the Moon.

Most moving movies I didn’t think I’ll care for:
The Diving Bell & the Butterfly and Away From Her. I hate hospital movies. But these two movies moved me tremendously. I think of them often.

Best DVD:
Blade Runner: The Final Cut
(As always with this movie - a rare example of a film misunderstood by its own director - Ridley Scott’s additions to the 2007 cut are completely useless, but the image and sound quality are breathtaking and make you fall in love with this movie all over again. The bonus documentary, Dangerous Days, is the best summary of the Big Blade Runner Battle and a riveting story in itself. But mainly: having the much-superior 1982 theatrical cut, for the first time on DVD, is worth buying the entire case. This is the true masterpiece, even if the brains behind it is more Budd Yorkin than Ridley Scott).

Highly over-rated:

Michael Clayton
(Except for one scene, where one character gets whacked out in one continuous take, this film is not as good as many think it is).

American Gangster
(In many ways Denzel Washington’s character in American Gangster and Daniel Day Lewis’s character in There Will Be Blood are quite similar. But American Gangster is like a stone skipping on lukewarm water, a chronology of events with no real gravitas. TWBB, however, displays how grandiose and magnificent a story like this can be, a mythology in the making, a metaphor played out to the extreme, and a real wild ride).

Rescue Dawn
(I prefer the documentary Herzog).

4 months, 3 weeks and 2 Days
(That horrendous fetus on the floor shot aborted this movie mid-term).

La Vie En Rose
(An Oscar for Best Make-up for sure. Not much more than that).

The Namesake
(How do you say “Soap Opera” in Sanskrit?)

Best Screenplay:
(tie) Ratatouille and Zodiac. Two different disciplines of screenwriting, each one fashionable in different eras in Hollywood, get a superb make-over this year. Brad Bird’s script for Ratatouille is astonishing, well structured, perfectly balanced, this is mainstream Hollywood at its most excellent. This is a screenplay Billy Wilder and Izzy Diamond would have loved to have written.
James Vanderbilt’s screenplay for Zodiac is the complete opposite: episodic, open ended, it takes you on a roller coaster ride with your identification. Who’s the real wacko in this movie? This could have been the best movie of 1971.

Way-way-way underrated:

Steven Soderbegh’s The Good German had its’ international premiere at the Berlin Film Festival in February 2007 so I have it on my list this year. This film got overlooked, but it’s a brilliant piece of filmmaking with a very witty and acidic screenplay. Between The Good German and Ratatouille, this has been the year of the Billy Wilder wannabes.

Masterful art-house movies:
Tsai Ming Liang’s Wayward Cloud and I Don’t Want to Sleep Alone
Ploy (Pen-ek Ratanaruang)
Beaufort (Joseph Cedar)
Jellyfish (Etgar Keret and Shira Gefen)
Persepolis (Marjane Satrapi)