10:37 am: Hollywood Elsewhere 100% applauds the NYFCC giving their Best Picture award to Martin Scorsese‘s The Irishman, but giving their Best Director award to Benny and Josh Safdie for Uncut Gems is absolute contrarian poke-the-hornet’s nest insanity. The honorable Scorsese has taken the top prize and Quentin Tarantino has snagged a kind of second … Read more
In the wake of Saturday’s extremely robust Virtuosos show, last night’s Lupita Nyong’o interview with Dave Karger seemed a little bit flat. Okay, not flat but rote. Fine but ho-hummish. The Montecito Award recipient appeared last night, per SBIFF, in concert with the Martin Luther King holiday, and to re-hash her celebrated performance as “Red” … Read more
Reaction #1: The Outstanding Cast noms (SAG’s equivalent to Best Picture) went to Bombshell, The Irishman, Jojo Rabbit, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood and Parasite. Sincere HE question: What happened to Little Women? I’ll tell you what happened to Little Women. A percentage of SAG/AFTRA members found it a bit precious, studied, curious and … Read more
The Philadelphia Film Critics Circle today handed Rian Johnson‘s Knives Out their Best Film award. I’m presuming that when Johnson heard the news he called the PFCC president and demanded a recount. All I can figure is that the Philly crix couldn’t decide on a Best Pic winner and so somebody finally said “fuck it, … Read more
The foodiest critics group in the world is now voting. This is who they are, what they stand for, what they care about most….toasted bagels and fruit and potato salad. No, seriously — they mostly care about defying Joe Popcorn mindsets. Which is cool. HE acronyms (Yay), (Fine), (HRO) and (WTF) signify hearty approval, moderate … Read more
Jordan Peele‘s Get Out was about a covert and malignant plot on the part of wealthy, Obama-supporting Anglos to turn blackfolk into obedient zombies through hypnosis. The basic message was “whiteys might act friendly and profess to understand and applaud black culture, but they’re actually Satan’s spawn.” Us (Universal, 3.22), Peele’s soon-to-open followup, is about…well, … Read more
Yesterday seven Indiewire contributors riffed on twenty 2019 films that may, in some cases, excite woke-ish or avant-garde sensibilities…who knows? In alphabetical order: James Gray‘s Ad Astra, Harmony Korine‘s Beach Bum, Mia Hansen Love‘s Bergman Island, Martin Scorsese‘s The Irishman, Taika Waititi‘s Jojo Rabbit, Rian Johnson‘s Knives Out, Dee Rees‘ The Last Thing He Wanted, … Read more
Get Out suggested that Jordan Peele‘s schtick is social-metaphor horror with a racial stamp. The good guys (Daniel Kaluuya, Lil Rel Howery, Lakeith Stanfield) were near-victims of the white liberal hypnotist cultural predators (Allison Williams, Catherine Keener, Bradley Whitford, Caleb Landry Jones). I’m not presuming that Peele’s Us (3.15) will be cut from the same … Read more
In the view of BBC.com’s Owen Gleiberman, Nate Parker‘s The Birth of a Nation is “scrupulous and honorable, with moments of scalding power. But it’s also just good enough to make me wish it had been better. To present a drama of slavery not so long after 12 Years a Slave, the most searing and … Read more
I have a theory about why certain news anchors have prounounced Lupita Nyong’o‘s last name as Enn-yongo. I think it began 53 years ago when President Kennedy welcomed Ghana’s chief of state Kwame Nkrumah, whose last name Kennedy pronounced (apparently correctly) as “Enn-krumah.” I think that vocal impression (a clipped New England accent pronouncing an … Read more
So Matthew McConaughey has the Best Actor Oscar in the bag, and the Best Supporting Actor winner will be, of course, Jared Leto. Even people in rural China know that Cate Blanchett is a deadbolt lock for Best Actress. But at tonight’s SAG awards, a surprise. 12 Years A Slave‘s Lupita Nyong’o finally beat American … Read more
