At last February’s Berlinale I caught Yann Demange‘s urgent, pulse-pounding ’71, and then promptly reviewed it. A bit later Roadside acquired ’71 but decided to hold it until early ’15, apparently hoping that star Jack O’Connell‘s drawing power would surge after the December ’14 release of Angelina Jolie‘s Unbroken, in which he played the late Louis Zamperini. Well, Unbroken was a domestic hit ($115 million) but ’71 isn’t driven by O’Connell’s charisma or star power — it’s really about Demange’s directing skills. You’d think that a violent chase thriller and a suspense film would play fine on its own terms, but the U.S. viewing public can be astonishingly thick and slow to respond to even the best-made films.

In any event ’71 is opening in New York and Los Angeles on Friday. It has a 98% Rotten Tomatoes rating and 79% on Metacritic.

For me Dick Cavett’s Watergate, which aired on PBS stations last August, was a delicious if too-short summary of all those great ABC Dick Cavett shows that focused on the Watergate scandal between mid ’72 and August ’74. Today director John Scheinfeld informed me that a similar compilation will air in April — Dick Cavett’s Vietnam. Cavett’s show was the only mainstream show that chewed the Vietnam War fat with politicians, journalists, newsmakers and celebrities — John Kerry, Henry Kissinger, Daniel Ellsberg, Muhammad Ali, Woody Allen, Warren Beatty, Jane Fonda, Barry Goldwater, Billy Graham, Alexander Haig, David Halberstam, Senator Wayne Morse, Paul Newman, I.F. Stone, etc.

I intended to post these last night, but whoopee and then fatigue interfered:

Best Picture: Birdman — Alejandro G. Inarritu, John Lesher and James W. Skotchdopole; Best Director: Alejandro González Iñárritu, Birdman; Best Actor: Eddie Redmayne, The Theory of Everything; Best Actress: Julianne Moore, Still Alice; Best Supporting Actor: J.K. Simmons, Whiplash; Best Supporting Actress: Patricia Arquette, Boyhood.

Best Original Screenplay: Birdman – Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Nicolás Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris, Jr. and Armando Bo; Best Adapted Screenplay: The Imitation Game, Graham Moore; Best Cinematography: Birdman, Emannuel Lubezki; Best Film Editing: Whiplash, Tom Cross; Best Documentary Feature: Citizenfour — Laura Poitras, Mathilde Bonnefoy, Dirk Wilutzky.

Thank God the season is over and now on to 2015. The 34 films opening between now and 12.31.15 that seem like the most formidable and aspirational are now posted inside the Oscar Balloon. But I have one last bark in the wake of last night’s four-pronged Birdman triumph — Best Picture, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay and Best Cinematography. I’m speaking, of course, about the appalling levels of sour grapes, elitism and snide derision from the charming Boyhood gang on Twitter. You guys were deluded predictors all along, and now you’re exuding nothing but class — what can I tell you? If it had gone the other way no fair-minded Birdman admirer would dream of calling Boyhood anything but a remarkable achievement and a profound family epic. But last night some were calling Birdman‘s win a tragedy, and Alejandro G. Inarritu‘s film one of the least deserving Oscar winners ever. How dare you?

Birdman is a film that screams audacity. It is pumped full of fear and anguished exposure and angst and brutal New York-itude, and is obviously one of the most daring, “divisive” and non-coddling Oscar winners ever (many of the old farts despised it) and one of the very few comedies to win. And then it blows through all the derision by winning the top four Oscars and you’re slagging it? You’re doubling down on a hand that’s already lost? Gotta know when to fold ’em, guys. Noblesse oblige and all that.

It needs to be said again that if nothing else the 2014/15 Oscar season has exposed the fraudulence of Oscar-predicting, and particularly the alleged impartiality of industry experts. Every year I’ve declared I’m not a predictor but an advocate, but except for Awards Daily‘s Sasha Stone and one or two others everyone else in the Oscar-blogging racket has claimed they were coming from a place of studied cultural impartiality. Well, maybe they were in previous years but not this time. Over the last six months most Best Picture predictors were encamped squarely inside their own rectums with Boyhood flags planted outside.

9:03 pm: Lean, gray and grizzled Sean Penn presenting the Best Picture Oscar. “And the Oscar goes to…who gave this sonuvabitch his green card?…Birdman.” Inarritu: “Two Mexicans in a row? That’s suspicious, I guess.” That’s diversity, I think. “Michael was the guy who really…Michael was the guy.” Keaton: “Look, it’s great to be here…who am I kidding?” Inarritu gives a shout-out to fellow Mexicans and offers a plea for a fairer, more decent government in Mexico, and praises “this wonderful immigrant nation.”

8:55 pm: Matthew McConaughey handing out Best Actress Oscar to locked-in-stone Julianne Moore.

8:49 pm: Big Moment for Best Actor Oscar. Maybe Redmayne? Yup…he takes it! He was favored/predicted by the Gold Derby-ites so not a total surprise. “This belongs to all those people battling ALS…my staggering partner-in-crime Felicity Jones…director James Marsh.” Classy guy, top-rank performance…congrats.

8:40 pm: Ben Affleck about to hand out the Best Director Oscar, and the Oscar goes to Alejandro G. Inarritu. Big hug from Richard Linklater. Tonight I am wearing the real Michael Keaton tighty whities….for someone to win, some one has to lose…but for the real filmmakers, there can’t be defeat. This is a slow-motion kidn of moment.

8:35 pm: The Imitation Game‘s Graham Moore has won the Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar. A very moving speech given by Moore on behalf of Alan Turing and to all the weird and different and alone-feeling kids out there. You’re good. Your time will come.

8:30 pm: Best Original Screenplay Oscar being announced by Eddie Murphy, and the Oscar goes to the four Birdman guys. That’s it, Boyhood gang. I love you but you’re done. The Grand Budapest Hotel was forecast by Gold Derby gang…thud.

8:22 pm: Best Original Score Oscar is being announced by Julie Andrews. The Theory of Everything is expected to win, of course, but it doesn’t! Alexandre Desplat‘s Grand Budapest Hotel score takes it! Four Budapest Oscars. For the fourth time this evening, Wes Anderson is thanked by a winner. Four wins for Budapest, three for Whiplash so far….right?

8:11 pm: This Oscar telecast has no bite, no snap, no real pizazz or feeling. Neal Patrick Harris has been agreeable but bland. The whole show has been kind of bland. Only the acceptance speeches — Common, John Legend, Patricia Arquette, J.K. Simmons — have delivered the deep-well memories. Lady Gaga is doing a fine job with her Sound of Music tribute and the great Julie Andrews coming on stage…but why do it in the first okace? I say give the hook to Craig Zadan and Neil Meron as Oscar-show producers. Time to move on, give someone else a chance.

8:06 pm: Did NPH just make a joke work? He’s been whiffing all night. The Best Song Oscar, I expect, will go to “Glory”….right? Yes. Well earned. “Right now, the struggle for freedom and justice is real. Selma is now…march on.” — Common and John Legend.

8:01 pm: The performance of “Glory,” the song from Selma, was easily the best of the evening. Emotional song, very emotional reaction.

7:49 pm: Here comes the Best Documentary Feature Oscar moment. The winner, as everyone knows, will be Citizenfour. And it is, of course. I’m a huge fan of Rory Kennedy‘s Last Days in Vietnam, but I worship Citizenfour. Well deserved.

7:47 pm: Too many emotional exhale blown-away pauses from Terrence Howard as he introduces The Imitation Game, Whiplash and Selma. Calm down.

7:43 pm: The Best Editing Oscar being presented by Benedict Cumberbatch and Naomi Watts, and the Oscar goes to Tom Cross for Whiplash. Boyhood was the predicted Gold Derby winner. This may be an indicator of something. Yo, Whiplash!

My initial Boyhood review, filed from the 2014 Sundance Film Festival, appeared on 1.20.14…almost exactly 13 months ago. My first-gush Birdman review went up on 8.31.14 after catching it at Telluride’s Werner Herzog Cinema. I was sincerely, profoundly affected by Boyhood but I wasn’t knocked out. I felt quietly satisfied in a nodding, measured sort of way. I went apeshit for Birdman, of course, calling it “Mozartian” and “levitational.” Here, for the last time, are re-samplings…actually a blending of those fresh-out-of-the-gate reactions:

“Alejandro G. Inarritu‘s Birdman (Fox Searchlight, 10.17), an audacious, darkly hilarious serving of snap-crackle brilliance and psychological excavation par excellence, blew the roof off the Werner Herzog theatre last night. I was giddy, ecstatic, swooning as I half-stumbled into the night air…so was almost everyone I spoke to about it over the next two or three hours. Okay, not everyone but those who were hungry and adventurous and receptive enough to revel in a work of reaching, swirling genius…pig heaven!

“I’ve long admired the great Richard Linklater and treasured most of his films (the one negative standout being 1998’s The Newton Boys) And like everyone else I felt instantly engaged and intrigued, sight unseen, by the Boyhood concept — i.e., filming the life of a young Texas kid (Ellar Coltrane) and his sister (Lorelei Linklater) growing up with divorced parents (Ethan Hawke, Patricia Arquette) over 11 or 12 years (i.e., ’02 to ’13). Is Boyhood as rich and fertile as it sounds? I saw it last night at the Eccles, all 160 minutes worth, and I have to say ‘yeah, pretty much’ — it’s a remarkably novel, human-scale, life-passage stunt film. I can’t honestly call it staggering or mind-blowing but that’s not a putdown, given what it is.”

In the legendary Gunga Din, Eduardo Ciannelli‘s fanatical leader of the Thug rebellion is called a “tormenting fiend” by Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. and is made to seem demonic in that famously lighted shot by dp Joseph H. August. But he’s easily the most principled, eloquent and courageous man in the film. Not to mention the most highly educated. And yet there’s an unlikely scene inside the temple that hinges on Ciannelli’s guru being unable to read English, despite his Oxford don bearing and his vast knowledge of world history. Otis Ferguson‘s review of George Stevens‘ 1939 adventure flick ripped it for being a racist and arrogant celebration of British colonial rule. And yet I’ve been emotionally touched and roused by this film all my life. The last half-hour of Gunga Din is perfect, but it ends with Sam Jaffe‘s Indian “beastie” basking in post-mortem nirvana over having been accepted as a British soldier. Which raises a question: Which films have you admired or even loved despite knowing they stand for the wrong things and/or tell appalling lies about the way things are?

After noting that Boyhood and Birdman are “box office lightweights when measured against past Oscar winners,” Variety‘s Brent Lang calls this “a sign that Academy Awards voters are more moved by art than commerce when it comes to handing out the top prize.” Moved by Oscar blogoscenti picks and the well-orchestrated campaigns for the annointed few, he means. And then Rentrak’s Paul Dergarabedian, a veritable Rudyard Kipling when it comes to flat-footed observations about box-office currents, delivers the following: “Often times the most challenging movies aren’t the ones that generate the most popular attention from audiences.” These articles always seem to be hinting there should be a closer alignment between popularity and quality. That happens every so often (currently with American Sniper), but Lang seems to be suggesting that the Oscars should give a little more thought to the philosophy of the People’s Choice Awards. If you ask me one of the Academy’s proudest moments was when The Hurt Locker ($17 million and change) won the Best Picture Oscar — the loudest reminder heard in the 21st Century that the twains of popularity and quality rarely meet. The vast majority of popcorn-buying Joes lack perception and sensitivity. That’s not a good or bad thing — just fact. And that’s okay.

Indiewire‘s Eric Kohn has posted an amused and even semi-admiring response to Paul Thomas Anderson‘s diss of American Airlines at the Spirit Awards: “When Anderson accepted the Robert Altman Prize for Inherent Vice, his crack about sponsor American Airlines (‘Don’t fly American Airlines…they will fucking lose your luggage’) was the truest moment of the day. Thanks to PTA, the event offered a fleeting glimpse of the prankish, anti-authoritarian mentality that allows certain filmmakers to challenge the restrictions of the marketplace. In an ideal world, the Spirits would follow suit.”

During today’s Bart/Fleming discussion on Deadline, Mike Fleming offered the following: “I want to offer a special shout out to Paul Thomas Anderson for Biggest Dick Move. While accepting an award with the cast of Inherent Vice, he pointedly told people to boycott Spirit Awards-sponsor American Airlines [because] they lost his luggage. Here is a revered filmmaker who has clearly crossed from struggling artist to pampered self-absorbed auteur. I heard [that] the American Airlines people on the premises were appalled. Spirits organizers scrambled for a way to take the sting out of the insult, and finally Foxcatcher‘s Bennett Miller read a sheepish PTA apology where he said it was United that lost his luggage. A Narcissus moment for the great PTA!”

Two days ago National Review critic Armond White posted a roster of performances of gay characters that he admires but which the Academy overlooked. He calls them “the Brandos” in honor of Marlon Brando‘s brave but discomforting-to-watch performance as a closeted military officer in John Huston‘s Reflections in a Golden Eye (’67). “Through imagination, compassion and talent, [these performances] validate gay people’s humanity,” he writes. I respect the choices except for Toby Jones‘ performance as Truman Capote in Infamous (’06), And I especially admire Tony Perkins‘ B.Z., a gay Hollywood producer with a kind heart and a flip attitude, in Frank Perry‘s Plays It As It Lays. I’ve long felt it’s the finest performance of his life.

Here’s a longish piece I wrote about Play It As It Lays 12 years ago. Never on DVD or Bluray, and you still can’t stream it on Amazon, Vudu, Netflix or anywhere else. But last month a guy named “Zardon M” posted the entire 98-minute film on YouTube, recorded off the Sundance Channel which mysteriously aired the film a few years back. If you’ve never seen it, here’s your chance. It’s posted after the jump.

I’d like to know the name of the director of this Birdman spoof, which began yesterday’s Spirit Awards presentation. Fred Armisen, Adam Scott, Kristin Bell, Miles Teller…perfect. And then the whipped cream and cherry on top with Bill Hader doing an inspired comic riff on Alejandro G. Inarritu. Remember those spoof reels that ran when Billy Crystal hosted the Oscars in ’97? This is easily as good as any of those. Where and when was it shot, how many takes, etc.? More clips after the jump, including Foxcatcher‘s Bennett Miller offering a faux-apology on behalf of Paul Thomas Anderson‘s slam of American Airlines.