Best Picture of 1987

I believe I've yet again broken the record for the longest period between the first review and the verdict. At around nine months, reviewing 1987's Best Picture nominees has certainly taken a long time, all the more shameful considering it's not even a 10-nominee year. But let's wrap it up now with my thoughts on which film should have taken home the trophy.

The nominees for Best Picture of 1987 are:

• Broadcast News
• Fatal Attraction
• Hope and Glory
• The Last Emperor
• Moonstruck

Quite an eclectic bunch. Period war films and epic biopics are stalwart genres for the Academy, but this year also saw the poorly represented comedies and psychological thrillers have their shot at the limelight.

It will be no surprise to anyone who read my previous review that Hope and Glory is being eliminated from the running first. Contrived in script and performance, it did not appeal to me at all. Beyond that, it's a much tougher decision. Moonstruck is incredibly charming and funny with some beautifully touching moments, but the crazy performance by Nicolas Cage precludes me from naming it my favourite. In a similar fashion, The Last Emperor is sumptuous in design, easily the most visually stunning of the five, but a slightly aloof script means I'll set it aside as well.

That leaves two films that I enjoyed immensely. Broadcast News is captivating and moving with a cheeky sense of humour. However, for a completely different reason, Fatal Attraction affected me more. Its thrills may be old tricks, but they're still extremely effective and what more can we ask of cinema than to be affected emotionally, whether it be sadness, joy, or in this case, nervous apprehension bordering on terror. Simply entertainment. Thus, I now officially proclaim Fatal Attraction as my favourite Best Picture nominee from 1987.

Best Picture of 1987
Academy's choice: The Last Emperor	Matt's choice: Fatal Attraction

Your choice:

Let me know what you think of 1987's nominees in the comments and/or by voting in the poll above. Meanwhile, as I attempt to continue my viewing streak, I've decided on the next year of review based on the fact that Jerry Maguire is playing at the New Beverly Cinema tonight. So, we now move to 1996's Best Picture contenders, a nice bunch of mostly independent flicks.

And the nominees for Best Picture of 1996 are:

• The English Patient
• Fargo
• Jerry Maguire
• Secrets and Lies
• Shine

Stay tuned...

1987 - Hope and Glory

Well, this is a rarity. Two posts in two days! That hasn't happened since the first year of this blog. But rather than question it, let's just see how long this renewed enthusiasm lasts.

We now take a look at the final nominee in 1987's battle for Best Picture...

Hope and Glory
Director:
John Boorman
Screenplay:
John Boorman
Starring:
Sebastian Rice-Edwards, Sarah Miles, David Hayman, Geraldine Muir, Sammi Davis, Susan Wooldridge, Derrick O'Connor, Ian Bannen
Academy Awards:
5 nominations
0 wins

Hope and Glory is the story of family life during wartime, as seen through the eyes of a young boy, Billy Rohan (Rice-Edwards). When World War II reaches suburban London, Billy's father (Hayman) enlists to serve his country, leaving Billy and his mother (Miles) and two sisters (Muir & Davis) to survive the constant threat of air raids. Billy occupies himself with daily strolls through the rubble in his street, collecting shrapnel from the previous night's shelling, and soon he joins a gang of like-minded boys his age, although he never quite fits in.

It's not often that I really don't like a movie, but Hope and Glory didn't grab me at all. The subject matter seemed interesting enough, and indeed, I've enjoyed many coming-of-age war films, but the contrivances and cliches, particularly from the laboured performances, left me with little to which I could relate. Everything just felt so staged and fake, which is surprising since this is often cited as writer/director John Boorman's most personal film.

The picture received many favourable reviews and accolades, and it appears to be considered somewhat of a classic, so perhaps I'm missing something, but what confuses me the most are references to this film as a comedy. Granted, there are amusing moments - or at least, attempts at humour - but it honestly hadn't occurred to me while I was watching it that this could be categorised as comedy. Much of the style is simply overwrought for my taste, be it intended as comedy or otherwise. The only time it seemed vaguely appropriate was during the few short fantasy sequences when Billy imagines himself involved in the war. But the impact of these scenes is severely lessened due to the rest of the film being played in a similar exaggerated style. It's almost as if Boorman created a film in the style of 1940s cinema, with its melodramatic acting and overly sentimental dialogue, but sadly, I suspect that was unintentional. Which is a shame because if it had been made in the 1940s, I doubt I would have judged it as harshly. I'm not sure what that says about my cinematic expectations.

While I found it difficult to relate to much of the emotional content, at least I found one familiar topic to which I could wax nostalgic - backyard cricket. I may not have been able to bowl a googly at Billy's age but the reference to the six-and-out rule did make me smile. It also reminded me how much I miss watching cricket. I mean, the bloody World Cup is on right now and I have to be satisfied receiving score updates on my phone because I can't watch a single game in this country unless I want to pay $99 a month for the privilege. But I digress...

Hope and Glory didn't receive any acting nominations, so at least I agree with the Academy on that. I can forgive the child actors for being a little hammy, but the other members of the cast get no such mercy. Sarah Miles cries too quickly and laughs too loudly. Ian Bannen merely plays the idea of a crotchety old man, without any real truthfulness. Derrick O'Connor is probably the only actor who manages to avoid histrionics, but unfortunately it's not enough to make us forget the rest of the performances.

I think it's fair to say I did not care for this film.

1987 - Broadcast News

It may be a few weeks past already, but since this is my first post back after the Oscars ceremony, it would be remiss of me not to offer a small debrief. As I predicted, Birdman and Alejandro G. Inarritu took home the Best Picture and Best Director gongs respectively. The lesson there is: Never go against the guilds. All in all, I managed to pick 20 of the 24 categories, which sounds impressive, yet that's exactly the way it played out last year, as well. I'd love to credit my superior analysis, but I have to at least acknowledge that there were very few surprises. The favourite won in almost every category, so it turns out that playing it safe is a good strategy.

My darling wife and child are both in Australia at the moment, while I remain here in Los Angeles. This seems like the perfect opportunity to make some real progress on Matt vs. the Academy, but they've already been gone for almost two weeks and this is the first post I've managed to write. Still, I'm determined to pick up the pace while I can.

As such, here is the next contender in 1987's Best Picture race...

Broadcast News
Director:
James L. Brooks
Screenplay:
James L. Brooks
Starring:
William Hurt, Albert Brooks, Holly Hunter, Robert Prosky, Lois Chiles, Joan Cusack, Jack Nicholson
Academy Awards:
7 nominations
0 wins

Set in the exciting world of television journalism, Broadcast News centres around three colleagues of a local news station. Jane (Hunter) is the fiery producer with integrity and ambition. Her best friend Aaron (Albert Brooks) is the reliable reporter with dreams of being an anchor. And Tom (Hurt) is the new member of the team who relies all too much on his good looks and charm for career advancement. Soon, a subtle rivalry emerges between the two men, as Aaron gets passed over for a temporary anchor position in favour of Tom. Their careers are not the only place for competition, however, when it becomes clear they both harbour feelings for Jane.

There's something very neat about Broadcast News. Perhaps it's the cute dialogue that, on occasion, seems almost too perfect. Albert Brooks' character, in particular, is a constant stream of witty self-deprecating one-liners that it starts to feel slightly dated. Then again, maybe I'm just jaded. The script by James L. Brooks (no relation to Albert) is genuinely funny and moving, and I was always entertained, so now that I think about it, I guess cute and neat are part of what makes the film so enjoyable.

Another part is, without question, the performances. Holly Hunter and William Hurt (pictured together) create a plethora of very real moments. They are natural and nuanced, even when intensely staring at each other, displaying the sort of electric chemistry most romantic comedies can only dream about. And if that weren't enough, there is another sort of chemistry, equally engaging, albeit in a more platonic way, between Hunter and Brooks. As best friends, their characters are clearly comfortable around each other, and the two actors deliver some sparkling repartee. Brooks' performance is clearly the comic relief (if you can even classify it as that in a picture that is itself a comedy) and he is sublime in that role, even if his dramatic moments don't quite hit the mark. Fittingly, all three performers earned Oscar nominations.

Supporting them are a gaggle of comedic actors, including Joan Cusack with her trademark silliness. Her little brother John also appears in a bit part as an angry messenger. Strangely, they are both credited incorrectly as "Cusak". And then there's Jack Nicholson as the national news anchor. He only appears briefly a couple of times and, on the surface, it seems like he would be too cheeky and cool for that kind of austere occupation. But there's a rare subtlety to his performance and he pulls it off. I mean, really, what else did I expect? He's Jack Nicholson.

Broadcast News was nominated for seven Oscars, including Best Picture, but sadly, it didn't collect a single trophy. Probably because The Last Emperor won everything.

1987 - The Last Emperor

Yes, I'm still alive.

Obviously, I've had a lot going on these last few months. The play I mentioned in my last post (over four months ago - yikes!) has come and gone. The Club was our theatre company's final show in New York City (read about it here) before Kat, Charlie and I packed up and moved out west to Los Angeles. It's been a couple of months already so we're settled in now and are not even remotely missing the New York weather.

I figured I should try to squeeze one more review in before the end of the year, so yesterday I watched the film that would take the top prize in the 1987 Best Picture competition...

The Last Emperor
Director:
Bernardo Bertolucci
Screenplay:
Mark Peploe and Bernardo Bertolucci
(based on Henry Pu-yi's autobiography "From Emperor to Citizen")
Starring:
John Lone, Joan Chen, Peter O'Toole, Ying Ruocheng, Victor Wong, Dennis Dun, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Maggie Han, Ric Young, Vivien Wu
Academy Awards:
9 nominations
9 wins, including Best Picture and Best Director

The monarch of the film's title, Pu-yi (Lone) is a political prisoner in a China he no longer recognises. While his captors interrogate him about his perceived war crimes, Pu-yi remembers his life, from his coronation at the age of two and his confined upbringing inside the Forbidden City where he befriends his British tutor Reginald Johnston (O'Toole) to his association with the Japanese who allow him to return to power as the emperor of occupied Manchukuo.

Without a doubt, The Last Emperor's biggest draw card is its stunning visual style. With luscious production design, lavish costumes and evocative cinematography - including the now iconic shot of a young Pu-yi running towards a billowing yellow curtain (pictured below) - it's no wonder the film won Oscars in almost every design category. Of course, the spectacular locations didn't hurt its cause. Shooting inside the actual Forbidden City certainly lends an air of authenticity.

And while Bertolucci's direction is masterful, his script with co-writer Mark Peploe is perhaps the one element of the film that is lacking. The story itself is incredibly well-structured with its simultaneous past and present storylines but - and I know this is a recurring theme in my reviews - the dialogue is rather basic and straightforward. I'm a sucker for clever dialogue and, unfortunately, the words here are a little uninspired. Then again, the film also won the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay, so what do I know?

The performances seem somewhat stilted, but only because the actors are given such banal things to say, preventing them from really making the words crackle. The Academy perhaps agreed with me since the picture received no acting nominations, which as it turns out, indirectly helped it achieve the rare feat of winning every category in which it was nominated. Nine Oscars from nine nominations - equalling Gigi's identical take and topped only by the 11-from-11 haul by The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King. Interestingly, neither of those films claimed any acting nods either.

1987 - Fatal Attraction

Who'd have thought raising a baby would take up so much time? Between looking after Charlie and getting things together for our theatre company's next play (more on that soon), movie-watching opportunities have been negligible. On top of that, we're also organising our imminent move to Los Angeles, so things are busy, to say the least.

I finally found a spare couple of hours to look at another 1987 Best Picture contender...

Fatal Attraction
Director:
Adrian Lyne
Screenplay:
James Dearden
Starring:
Michael Douglas, Glenn Close, Anne Archer, Ellen Hamilton Latzen, Stuart Pankin, Ellen Foley, Fred Gwynne
Academy Awards:
6 nominations
0 wins

Dan (Douglas), Beth (Archer) and their six-year-old daughter Ellen (Latzen) are the picture of a perfect family. But when Beth and Ellen take a weekend trip to the country to scope out the new family house, Dan throws matrimonial bliss out the window and shamefully has a brief affair with a work acquaintance, Alex (Close). When he tries to end it, Alex won't take no for an answer and it soon becomes clear that she's far from the fun-loving gal Dan thought he was fooling around with. After trying to manipulate him to stay by slitting her wrists, she eventually takes to stalking Dan and his family, threatening to tell Beth everything.

With a solid place in pop culture, Fatal Attraction is most definitely a thriller, but director Adrian Lyne also imbues the film with many shades of film noir, particularly evident in the steamy lighting and cinematography. And to go one step further, I suspect he was also giving a subtle nod to Hitchcock and his most famous psychological thriller, Psycho, when in the concluding moments of the film, we see close ups of a shower drain, taps and water flowing, followed a few moments later by a knife cutting through the shower curtain.

Despite these homages to cinema classics, the film begins with a distinctly more modern aesthetic. There are several seemingly improvised scenes of casual conversations, creating a very naturalistic atmosphere. This eventually gives way to all the gratuitous thriller tropes, the most frequent of which is the sudden shock as the villain appears "unexpectedly." We even get treated to the old wipe-the-steam-off-the-mirror-to-reveal-a-knife-wielding-maniac-standing-behind-you trick. Although, I must say, even though many of these moments are tired clichés, they're still so effectively creepy ... which probably explains why they get used so often.

In fact, watching the film with the knowledge of what's going to happen (due to both the film's fame and the fact that I've seen it several times before) surprisingly does not diminish its powerful impact. There is a constant dreaded feeling that something bad is about to happen, and even if you know it's coming, the anticipation remains excruciating.

If I had to pick one element which doesn't quite gel, it would have to be Maurice Jarre's score. Perhaps it's simply a result of the uncool 1980s sound, but the legendary film composer seems to have opted for the melodramatic and the obvious, an orchestration that leaves no doubt that we're watching a thriller.

One never expects an intricate plot from a genre whose main goal is ostensibly to thrill, but nevertheless James Dearden's script is mostly engaging, buoyed by the aforementioned extemporisation from the cast. Still, there's a slightly empty feeling when the film abruptly ends after the main thriller plot is resolved. It's almost as if I wanted to see the resolution of the subplot, but then I realised there was no subplot. I'd even say it was a missed opportunity to actually explore the effect this whole debacle had on Dan's marriage. You know, a bit of substance to go with the thrills.

But what the script lacks in substance, the cast more than makes up for with emotional power. Both leads are utterly superb. Michael Douglas delivers an excellently natural turn as the initially charming, then gradually frustrated and finally fed up adulterer. And it's hard to imagine anyone else but Glenn Close (pictured) in this now iconic role. She is nuanced and intense, vulnerable yet psychotic, the portrait of a disturbed mind. I also enjoyed Stuart Pankin as the jolly best friend. Plus, look closely and you'll see Jane Krakowski as the babysitter in a very brief scene at the beginning of the film.

1987 - Moonstruck

This past Sunday was Father's Day here in the United States and, indeed, most other countries around the world. Obviously, it held particular significance for me since it was the first Father's Day in which I was actually a father. Interestingly, however, Father's Day is celebrated in September in Australia - another one of those odd differences between our nations. Even more interestingly, Mother's Day is celebrated on the same day in May in both countries, so since our now international family will do things both the American and the Australian way, Kat will only get one day of honour every year, while I will cheekily receive two.

Let's take a look now at one of the contenders in the Academy's race for Best Picture of 1987...

Moonstruck
Director:
Norman Jewison
Screenplay:
John Patrick Shanley
Starring:
Cher, Nicolas Cage, Vincent Gardenia, Olympia Dukakis, Danny Aiello, Julie Bovasso, John Mahoney, Louis Guss
Academy Awards:
6 nominations
3 wins, including Best Actress (Cher) and Best Supporting Actress (Dukakis)

Superstitious Loretta (Cher) just got engaged to her humdrum beau Johnny (Aiello). He has promised they'll get married when he gets back from visiting his dying mother in Italy. In the meantime, he asks her to get in touch with his estranged brother Ronny (Cage) to patch up their five-year feud and invite him to the wedding. Unfortunately for Johnny, Loretta finds Ronny far more appealing and, more importantly, exciting.

Moonstruck is a comedy, that's clear. But there's something incongruous in its execution of that comedy. Much of it is larger than life - Nicolas Cage's histrionics, for example - yet so many of the scenes are languid in pace, a trait more often associated with subtle independent comedies. An interesting combination that doesn't quite mesh, in my opinion.

Perhaps consequentially, it's also rather difficult to accept the sudden attraction between the two leads. Well, let me rephrase that. Loretta is perfectly attractive in many ways and it's easy to recognise why a man would fall in love with her. But Ronny is so wildly insane that it's hard to imagine any woman being interested in him so quickly, particularly considering the lunacy he displays when he first meets Loretta. Nonetheless, this is a movie, after all, and suspension of disbelief aids greatly in forgiving the initial conceit, making way for a relationship that is reasonably endearing. However, no amount of disbelief-suspending can alleviate the hastiness with which Loretta's mother forgives her husband's indiscretions. Without really confronting him about it, such abrupt forgiveness is hard to swallow.

Cher is disarming in her starring role, offering warmth and humanity, and very much deserving of her Best Actress Oscar win. The same can't be said of her leading man, Nicolas Cage, who is just plain strange and somewhat obnoxious, which doesn't help with the aforementioned believability issues. His is not the only exaggerated performance, however, with a large portion of the supporting cast depicting a host of Italian-American caricatures. Thankfully, Cher isn't the only one to keep things subdued. Olympia Dukakis and John Mahoney also deliver more subtle portrayals, establishing the most affecting rapport in the film. And in case this film didn't have enough Italian-American pedigree, keep a keen eye out for Martin Scorsese's mother in an incredibly brief cameo.