Matt vs. the Academy

I'm back in Sydney once again, though I'll have another brief getaway next week when I'll be shooting a commercial for a cruise line company. The ad is being shot on an actual cruise ship during a regular four-day sailing, so apart from the approximate half-day that I'll be required to work, I'll have the rest of the time free to enjoy the cruise. Nice work if you can get it ... and I got it. Back to the task at hand. Just before I left Los Angeles, I squeezed in a viewing of another of 1974's Best Picture nominees... The Conversation Director : Francis Ford Coppola Screenplay : Francis Ford Coppola Starring : Gene Hackman, John Cazale, Allen Garfield, Cindy Williams, Frederic Forrest, Harrison Ford, Michael Higgins, Elizabeth MacRae, Teri Garr  Academy Awards : 3 nominations 0 wins Surveillance expert Harry Caul (Hackman) leads a team in secretly recording an intimate outdoor conversation between a couple (Williams and Forrest) who appear to be concer...

As my current LA trip approaches its end, it seems appropriate that we begin our next year of review with a film that features Los Angeles almost as a character of its own. I even had the privilege of taking in this masterpiece on the big screen for the first time, which was definitely a treat. Later, I also watched its sequel, The Two Jakes, which I had never seen before, and was pleasantly surprised, despite years of assuming its mixed reviews meant it was awful. In any case, let's take a look at the first nominee of the 1974 Best Picture contest... Chinatown Director : Roman Polanski Screenplay : Robert Towne Starring : Jack Nicholson, Faye Dunaway, John Hillerman, Perry Lopez, Burt Young, John Huston, Diane Ladd Academy Awards : 11 nominations 1 win, for Best Original Screenplay Los Angeles private investigator J.J. Gittes (Nicholson) is hired by Evelyn Mulwray (Ladd) to confirm that her husband, Hollis, is having an affair. Hollis happens to be the chief engineer of th...

Another year of review comes to a close and this is the most recent year of movies I've tackled for this project thus far. As such, many of these movies were still relatively fresh in my memory, so unlike older films, of which my opinion can sometimes change significantly over the years, my assessments of these films mostly remained the same as they were on my first viewings. The nominees for Best Picture of 2010 are: 127 Hours Black Swan The Fighter Inception The Kids Are All Right The King's Speech The Social Network Toy Story 3 True Grit Winter's Bone As one might expect from a year with ten nominees, there's quite a wide range of scope in this group, yet if I were to try to find the common ground, I'd have to say that all of these stories have a gripping intensity (to varying degrees and styles). Those that perhaps gripped me less than the others - and will therefore be the first to be set aside in the race to be named my favourite of the year - ar...

I'm currently on my annual (sometimes semi-annual) trip to Los Angeles and, as has become habit when I visit the City of Angels, I've already spent a day at the Academy Museum where I thoroughly enjoyed their new Jaws exhibit. A treasure trove of memorabilia from the movie, alongside clips from the movie, as well as behind the scenes clips, including some home video (home 8mm film?) footage from Spielberg himself. Plus, the pièce de résistance: an opportunity to insert yourself into the famed dolly zoom shot. Our final nominee vying for Best Picture of 2010 is... The Kids Are All Right Director : Lisa Cholodenko Screenplay : Lisa Cholodenko and Stuart Blumberg Starring : Annette Bening, Julianne Moore, Mark Ruffalo, Mia Wasikowska, Josh Hutcherson Academy Awards : 4 nominations 0 wins When teenagers Joni (Wasikowska) and Laser (Hutcherson) decide they want to meet their biological father, Paul (Ruffalo), they initially keep it from their mothers, Nic (Bening) and Jul...