The final episode of Cary Fukunaga and Nic Pizzolatto‘s True Detective (titled “Form and Void”) airs tonight. Yesterday’s plan to marathon through the six episodes I hadn’t seen (#2 to #7) didn’t pan out — I only watched #2 and #3. I could, of course, sit down and watch #4 through #7 today but…all right, I might do this. #4 and #5 anyway. I just bought another bike yesterday (my third — two previous bikes were stolen) and I feel like roaming around today. Eff it — I’m just going to read the synopses on the Wiki page. Update: Up on everything. Have now seen episode #6.

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I slightly know a woman who paints all day long and sometimes into the night. She doesn’t recognize weekends or weekdays. She just gets up and paints like a fool. Under the usual circumstances this in itself would make her, in my eyes, a fairly serious artist, regardless of her talent. Unfortunately she’s also a devout Christian who believes that God is guiding her every brushstroke. In a sense He/She/It is doing that, but by speaking literally of God as her co-pilot, this woman somehow makes Herman Melville‘s famous theological rumination, spoken by Captain Ahab in Moby Dick, seem banal: “Is Ahab Ahab? Is it I, God, or who that lifts this arm? But if the great sun move not of himself but is an errand boy in heaven, nor one single star can revolve, but by some invisible power…how then can this one small heart beat, this one small brain think thoughts, unless God does that beating, does that thinking, does that living, and not I?”

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The likeliest Best Picture contenders of 2014 will, as usual, be made by respected people with strong resumes and, as usual, contain strong, socially resonant material that will probably push mainstream buttons. Particularly among over-25 women. Two of the likeliest will be directed by women, and four will primarily be about women. Plus a couple of dramedies, a crime drama, an epic Biblical drama, two World War II dramas, a more-or-less modern war drama and so on. In a word, varied. Nobody knows anything and I’m obviously just guessing at this stage, but here are the films I’m presuming will be among the final picks:

1. Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu‘s comedic Birdman (seen in a rough version by a friend last July and described as AGI’s “best, most humanistic work!”); 2. J.C. Chandor‘s A Most Violent Year (’80s-set, Sidney Lumet-ish Manhattan crime drama); 3. Ridley Scott‘s Exodus (Ridley Scott/Kingdom of Heaven treatment given to Biblical tale of Moses, Egyptians and Hebrew slaves); 4. Angelina Jolie‘s Unbroken (World War II survival saga, All Is Lost/Life of Pi + Japanese prison camp); 5. Jean Marc Vallee‘s Wild (makeup-free Reese Witherspoon discovering herself and the American character on a long-distance hike); 6. Saul Dibbs‘ Suite Francaise (married rural-residing French woman has affair with German solder during World War II); 7. Michel Hazanavicius‘ The Search (remake of Fred Zinneman‘s same-titled 1948 film, relationship between a woman and a young boy in war-torn Chechnya, Berenice Bejo and Annette Bening costarring); 8. Jason Reitman‘s Men, Women & Chidren (ensemble social-sexual dramedy with Adam Sandler, Jennifer Garner, Judy Greer, et. al.) ; 9. Sarah Gavron‘s Suffragette (British-set, turn-of-the-century drama about female voting-rights struggle, script by The Queen‘s Abi Morgan, costarring Carey Mulligan, Helena Bonham Carter and Meryl Streep).

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I’ve read two South by Southwest reviews of Jon Favreau‘s Chef (one by Indiewire‘s Eric Kohn, another by Variety‘s Joe Leydon) and the general response is that Favreau has made a likable, agreeable, indie-styled dramedy. My problem is that I’m reluctant to settle into a film about an overweight chef. We all love to nibble down on tasty dishes but we don’t want to pay the price. Nobody does. Only teens and 20somethings can get away with eating like a pig, and sometimes not even them. I’m sorry but the metaphor of Favreau’s girth (he wasn’t in one of his slim-down modes when he shot the film and he still isn’t, to go by recent photos) speaks for itself. I don’t ever want to go there, and so I don’t feel that keen about seeing Chef. (Although I’ll see it for sure.) If Favreau was slim and trim I’d feel a whole different way. Sorry but that’s what it boils down to. Well, that and the reviews.

I seem to recall Glenn Kenny and Steven Gaydos taking issue with a statement in my initial Grand Budapest Hotel review that it feels “like Ernst Lubiitsch back from the dead.” In fact they sneered, pooh-poohed and put that comparison down but good. Now along comes Salon‘s Andrew O’Hehir describing Anderson’s latest as a “frothy Ernst Lubitsch-styled comedy.” This doesn’t mean that Kenny and Gaydos are dead wrong, but their harumphy dismissals of the Lubitsch connection have now been called into greater question. I’m not saying Kenny and Gaydos are running for tall grass, but they have to be thinking about that. Especially with Anderson having said the other night at the Aero was Lubitsch was an influence.

In a “Premature 2015 Best Picture Oscar Predictions” piece, Indiewire‘s Oliver Lyttleton has listed Carey Fukunaga‘s Beasts of No Nation as a highly likely Best Picture contender if it had any chance of being released this year. Except this seems unlikely as the film, an adaptation of Uzodinma Iweala‘s violent Africa-set novel, will only begin filming later this month. Lyttleton is all woo-woo because Fukunaga directed all eight episodes of HBO’s True Detective and he’s figuring the director of the masterful Sin Nombre is on a roll.

Lyttleton acknowledges that Beasts contains “material that threatens to be difficult to watch, but prognosticators worrying about that sort of thing have been proven wrong more than once of late (nominations for Amour and 12 Years A Slave winning), and a supporting role for Idris Elba should help bring in some eyes, plus this year’s race (so far) is rather lacking in ‘important fare.'”

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With all the sudden whackings and the rolling of heads over the past three or four years at the Film Society of Lincoln Center (Mara Manus hired and fired, Kent Jones departs and returns, Scott Foundas ascends and leaves, Rose Kuo takes over only to get whacked like Joe Pesci in Goodfellas), the 65th Street organization has resembled a cross between the House of Borgia and House of Cards. So reactions to Lesli Klainberg‘s appointment as Executive Director and Eugene Hernandez as Deputy Director have been something along the lines of “okay, let’s see how long they last before the next palace coup or mafia-styled garroting.” Seriously, best wishes to them both and particularly Eugene. (Note: Klainberg’s decision to re-create her first name, which was almost certainly “Leslie” when she was a kid, means…I don’t know what it means but “Lesli” feels a bit affected on some level.)

Everybody knows Wes Anderson‘s The Grand Budapest Hotel (opening today, Fox Searchlight) is presented in three aspect ratios — 1.37, 1.85 and 2.39. This 3.6 Slate piece by David Haglund and Aisha Harris explains the whys and the particulars. The question is whether or not commercial “projectionists” (I use that term loosely as most theatres have senior ushers working the booths) will project it correctly or not. When Budapest goes to 1.37, mind, the image goes higher and deeper — it doesn’t just become a narrow windowbox image. The high-end projectionist on the Fox lot screwed this transition up (albeit briefly) when I first saw it with the trade reviewers, so what are the odds that average projectionists might do the same? I’m planning to visit two or three of the best LA theatres playing The Grand Budapest Hotel and see if they’re managing it properly. If anyone notices any a.r. problems anywhere, please inform.

1.85:1

2.39:1

1.37:1

Stanley Kubrick used to check projection standards in the ’60s and ’70s, as I recall. Particularly with A Clockwork Orange (1.66, not 1.85) and Barry Lyndon (which he also wanted shown at 1.66 and not 1.85). I can hear the grinding of teeth from the 1.85 fascists, particularly those who reside in the New York area, but they’re just going to have to accept the way things are now.

“If the question is, am I actively right now organizing and raising money and so forth for a campaign for president, I am not doing that. On the other hand, am I talking to people around the country? Yes, I am. Will I be doing some traveling around the country? Yes, I will be. But I think it’s premature to be talking about (the specifics of) a campaign when we still have a 2014 congressional race in front of us.” — U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders (Vermont) speaking to Truthout’s John Nichols in an interview published today (3.7).

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Two weeks ago I mentioned the necessity of being able to see a high-def version of Ken Russell‘s Women in Love (’69), which is only viewable now as a 2003 MGM Home Video DVD. Ditto Russell’s The Music Lovers (’70), his tortured-Tchaikovsky biopic with Richard Chamberlain as the closeted Russain composer. Viewable only as a DVD — no Bluray and not even a Vudu high-def version. The Music Lovers was the third of Russell’s five biographical films about classical composers. Elgar (’62) and Delius: Song of Summer (’68) came before it, and then Mahler (’74) and Lisztomania (’75).

Chiemi Karasawa‘s Elaine Stritch: Shoot Me (Sundance Selects, 3.7) is one of the frankest and boldest docs I’ve ever seen (or would want to see) about what a bitch 87 years old can be. Karasawa’s film is admirably blunt and candid, but that Bette Davis line about aging being “not for sissies” has never seemed more dead-on. This is no glossy showbiz portrait. Well, it is but it has more on its mind than just praise, and some of what we’re shown is unpleasant. I’m just being as honest as Karasawa’s film, okay? It’s not a walk in the park, this thing. But it’s quite tough and ballsy. And hats off to the subject for allowing the raw truth to come through.

Elaine Stritch, God love and praise her, is a Broadway legend and survivor extraordinaire. Most of the under-45s know her as Alec Baldwin‘s mom on 30 Rock, but you have to watch this YouTube video of Stritch’s one-woman show, Elaine Stritch: At Liberty, which she did in her late 70s and which won her a Tony.

How much of that 77 or 78 year-old can be found in the 87 year-old version? Honestly? Somewhere between half and two-thirds. Stritch is still that great, snappy firecracker and pistolero with the brassy attitude and the world-class gams. But Elaine Stritch: Shoot Me is really about what being 87 (Stritch is now 89) was doing to her and how she was pushing back all the same, pushing and performing and rehearsing and travelling around and forgetting lyrics and walking the uptown Manhattan streets. But still losing the battle.

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