Hey there! It’s been another long minute since I’ve sent one of these. Since the fall, I’ve had the notion that maybe each month I’d sum up my new-release movie coverage in one of these email blasts, for my own edification and organization as much as anything, but it just hasn’t been high on the priority list. Yes, yes, if you do what you love, you’ll never work a day in your life, and at the same time, you will also work all the time and never stop even when you should. Anyway, the Oscars are going to air in about four hours, and if by some chance you’re puttering around looking for some last-minute reading to do on the major nominees — maybe you just finished your catch up and now you want to read about some of the stuff you saw — rather than, say, finishing up a long piece about Milla Jovovich that you mistakenly wrote down in your calendar as due several days later than it actually was, I thought I’d blast out my quick back-of-the-envelope ranking of the Best Picture nominees and link to my writing, where applicable. Some of it was really only just published in the last few days, so I think it works out. Or, if you want this in audio form, you can listen to the podcast I recorded with some friends where we smash through our predictions and preferences in a bunch of Oscar categories. Gotta get that plug in before it expires harder than any other of our annual episodes.
Anyway, here are my Best Picture thoughts:
Anora: Sean Baker’s latest is my favorite of the Best Picture bunch; it wasn’t my absolute favorite movie of the year (that was Challengers), or even my favorite of Baker’s movies (I love Florida Project and Red Rocket even more), but it’s really damn good and I reviewed it out of NYFF last fall.
The Brutalist: I saw this movie back in September when they started screening it for all the critics, before they even set a solid release date in December, and as privileged an experience as that can be, it also can really screw up your chances of placing a piece as a freelancer, because all the film-fest firsties are set and it’s way too early to pitch something for a movie that’s not out yet, and then by the time it is out, everyone pitching anything has also seen it. I’m not complaining; I love my job; just explaining why I didn’t actually write anything more substantial than a damn tweet about The Brutalist until like, last week, when I had the chance to make it a streaming rec, attempting to both explain why I liked it so much and also translate it a bit for the normies who might recoil at the 215-minute runtime. (Probably not a great case I’m making when one of my points is “well, it’s actually more like 200 minutes,” but honestly, I saw this movie twice in theaters and it just flew by.)
Nickel Boys: About as “overlooked” as a movie can feel whilst still nominated for Best Picture, this is another one I caught at NYFF and did my best to quick-turnaround my feelings of awe and immersion in a review. Like The Brutalist, I’m sure it’s helped immeasurably by seeing it on a big screen, but it should be seen regardless and I hope more people catch up with it throughout the year.
The Substance: This movie unexpectedly turning out to be an Oscar contender, which is just wild, also became a real thinkpiece generator, from my initial sorta-review about how it fits into movies about Demi Moore’s body to an A.V. Club check-in about the state of horror at the Oscars, to a review of other Demi Moore performances that might have been considered award-worthy. We love a good content machine, don’t we folks?!
A Complete Unknown: I’m a little surprised to see this as a top-half movie here, because I wasn’t crazy about the Dylan biopic but I also saw it twice and enjoyed it both times, and there’s something to be said for that. I actually reviewed this movie when it came out for GQ and that just… never made it online? I think it got lost in the holiday rush over there, which is too bad because I think I did it justice! But I did circle back and write a bit about the two nominated supporting performances and how crucial they are to the movie’s success (and how maybe they should win Oscars to assert what the supporting category actually means!).
Dune Part II: Marisa and I saw this movie in IMAX just for fun, not to save life, so I didn’t have an assignment going in but then I wound up writing about the movie’s general sexlessness, which is probably why I’d honestly just watch Rebel Moon. I also took a crack at doing an Ending Explainer when it came to HBO.
Wicked: I reviewed this for the A.V. Club back in November and fixated, as is my wont, on why it looks like that.
Conclave: I never wrote about this one, actually, in any capacity. There’s not really much to write about! There’s very little going on here! When my beloved Film-Related Social Media Feeds go on about how much fun this was, it makes me feel like I’m going crazy! This is an HBO Original Movie from 1996!!!!
Emilia Pérez: I gave this movie an appreciative mixed review out of NYFF, perhaps overcautiously for something that really bored the shit out of me in the final 45 minutes. But I did find the first chunk of it pretty grabby, if not necessarily insightful. I also wrote about how derisively sharing out-of-context clips online is very dumb, even if the movie kinda sucks.
I’m Still Here: I know this is a “better” movie than Emilia Pérez but I truly cannot picture ever watching this one again. I’m sorry, people of Brazil! Not a lot of dramatic tension here!
Other multiple nominees that aren’t in Best Picture (but certainly clear the Conclave line for being worth a nomination over like a third of these) that I wrote about include Nosferatu, Flow, and The Wild Robot.
OK, that’s all! Maybe I’ll do more of these round-ups in the future! Back to Milla!