1991 - The Prince of Tides

The dust has truly settled on another Oscar season, so let me wrap it up by noting the decidedly average result of my predictions. I correctly picked only 16 of the 23 winners this year. Mind you, I did exceedingly well with the major categories, nailing Picture, Director, both Screenplays and three out of the four acting awards. Emma Stone pipped Lily Gladstone at the post, it seems, and that was my lone error in the top eight categories.

As I write this, I'm again in Los Angeles. I'm about to finish off this current year of review, which ironically began in this very city two years ago when I saw Bugsy on the big screen. Indeed, no visit to LA is complete without at least one trip to one of the many revival cinemas here, so I have my sights set on a few potential Best Picture nominees that are screening.

For now, though, we come to the final movie in the 1991 Best Picture race...


The Prince of Tides
Director:
Barbra Streisand
Screenplay:
Pat Conroy & Becky Johnston
(based on the novel by Pat Conroy)
Starring:
Barbra Streisand, Nick Nolte, Blythe Danner, Kate Nelligan, Jeroen Krabbé, Melinda Dillon, George Carlin, Jason Gould, Brad Sullivan
Academy Awards:
7 nominations
0 wins

In a somewhat strange turn of events, I watched this movie with the genuine conviction that it was my first time seeing it. However, after checking my movie diary (yes, I maintain a spreadsheet, tracking every movie I've seen since 1994 - don't judge!), I noticed I had in fact watched The Prince of Tides over 20 years ago. Yet, I had absolutely no recollection of it. Usually, even for a film I haven't seen for many, many years, I would at least feel some slight pangs of familiarity with certain scenes, or even a line or an image, but nope, I got to the end of the movie and was still utterly convinced that was the first time I'd watched it. In a way, I suppose it means I got to enjoy all the twists and turns all over again. I wish I could watch The Sixth Sense or Fight Club or Psycho the same way.

Based on the novel of the same name, The Prince of Tides centres on high school football coach Tom Wingo (Nolte) and his South Carolinian family's struggles. His childhood was marred by an emotionally manipulative mother (Nelligan) and a physically abusive father (Sullivan), and he also seems to be in a rut with his current home life, barely caring that his wife, Sallie (Danner), is having an affair.

In New York City, Tom's sister, Savannah (Dillon), has attempted suicide, and her psychiatrist, Susan Lowenstein (Streisand), has requested some help from the family. Despite loathing New York, Tom goes to meet with Dr. Lowenstein, initially remaining tight-lipped about his family's past trauma. But as he eventually opens up, he and Lowenstein begin falling for each other, complicating things further.

It would be easy to be fooled into thinking this film was based on a play, instead of the novel from which it was actually sourced. The locations are mostly static and there's an abundance of dialogue, often melodramatic. Barbra Streisand's direction doesn't shy away from that melodrama, to the point that it seems to be the main driving force behind the production. In fact, if it weren't for the headlining movie stars, you'd be forgiven for confusing this for a TV movie. Along with cheesy lines from clichéd characters, the score cements the film's melodramatic vibe. Consider the stereotypical training montage sequence. Instead of a fast-paced rock song soundtrack, à la Rocky, this one has slow classical music.

But hey, I love movies, even melodramatic ones, so regardless of that previous paragraph, this film is still very entertaining. I found myself invested in all the characters, clichéd or not. The scene where Tom finally tells the story of the family's secret definitely packs a very large emotional punch. I can also forgive the fact that the film struggles to decide whether it's a family drama or a romance flick. For the majority of the story, I would have assumed it was the former if it weren't for the film's poster inexplicably giving away the two protagonists' eventual union. Mind you, there's more to the film after that point, so thankfully, it doesn't reveal everything.

The cast all do a superb job of elevating the material. For me, the gold star goes to Blythe Danner (pictured), who not only missed out on an Oscar nomination for this moving portrayal of a frustrated wife, but has sadly never received one for any of her brilliant work. Barbra Streisand also delivers an affable performance, sans Oscar nomination. Nick Nolte as the dissatisfied family man hiding his pain with humour, and Kate Nelligan as the bitter, controlling mother were the only two cast members to receive nominations, both well deserved. In total, the film received seven nods, but walked away empty-handed on Oscar night.

1991 - Beauty and the Beast

With the actors' and writers' strikes behind us, Oscar season is well and truly heating up. Always an exciting time of year, in large part due to the glut of Oscar-bait movies that are released. Other than the Barbenheimer duo, I've not seen many of the contenders so my watchlist is growing as rapidly as my anticipation for such titles as Killers of the Flower Moon, Maestro, May December, Napoleon, Past Lives, American Fiction, Poor Things, The Holdovers... So many movies, so little time.

Meanwhile, next up in 1991's shortlist is the first animated film to gain a Best Picture nomination...


Beauty and the Beast
Director:
Gary Trousdale, Kirk Wise
Screenplay:
Linda Woolverton
Starring:
Paige O'Hara, Robby Benson, Richard White, Jerry Orbach, David Ogden Stiers, Angela Lansbury, Bradley Pierce, Rex Everhart, Jesse Corti
Academy Awards:
6 nominations
2 wins, for Best Original Score and Best Original Song

In this classic fairy tale, a heartless prince (Benson) is transformed into a monstrous beast by an enchantress, who explains that the only way to reverse the curse is to fall in love and be loved in return. Ashamed, the Beast isolates himself for many years in his castle, accompanied only by his servants who have themselves been transformed into household objects.

When an old man, Maurice (Everhart), stumbles upon the castle after losing his way in the forest, the Beast imprisons him for trespassing. Maurice's daughter, bookworm Belle (O'Hara), tracks her father to the castle and makes a deal with the Beast: she'll stay with him in the castle if he lets Maurice go. As the two get to know each other, Belle slowly discovers that the Beast is not as gruff as his outwardly appearance would suggest.

It's not often the Academy nominates a family film for its big prize, and indeed, this was the first animated film to achieve the accolade, so that in itself gives Beauty and the Beast a permanent place in Oscars history. And while the traditional hand-drawn animation is certainly outdated compared to today's shiny 3D effects, the film's beauty (no pun intended) is genuinely charming. In fact, the truth is this picture does indeed employ some early computer animation techniques, culminating in the 3D background during the ballroom dance sequence, a groundbreaking feat for the time.

This picture also came at a time when Disney was at its height in terms of musical animation (though, I suppose some would argue they've always dominated that space). The Little Mermaid was a couple of years earlier, with Aladdin, The Lion King and Pocahontas to follow soon after. All five of those films accomplished the double feat of Oscar wins for Best Original Song and Best Original Score. Some have complained that, while the songs may have deserved their respective wins, the only reason Alan Menken won four Score awards (Hans Zimmer scored The Lion King) was because Academy members didn't truly comprehend the distinction between a film's score and its songs. Certainly, the songs in Beauty and the Beast are worthy of praise due to their classic toe-tapping Broadway style and witty lyrics (hence the three nominations for Best Song) but I'd also argue that Menken's incidental music which underscores the scenes between the musical numbers is just as wonderfully emotive, well worthy of its win.

Along with witty song lyrics, the film's dialogue is often witty as well. It's easy to dismiss all these old-fashioned Disney kids movies as just that, exclusively for kids, but there's plenty of laughs for the grown-ups too. In particular, I enjoyed the banter between Lumiere and Cogsworth (pictured), expertly voiced by Jerry Orbach and David Ogden Stiers who sound like they had a lot of fun in the booth.

Granted, it's often cheesy and over the top, both in the cheap laughs and the forced melodrama, so it doesn't hold a candle to the brilliance of a Pixar movie, but it's not quite as childish as I'd imagined. In the end, of course, this is a fairy tale, and the script plays to those strengths with its streamlined and efficient story, capped off by a satisfying, albeit cliched, ending.

1991 - JFK

Oof, I'm yet again introducing a blog post by noting how embarrassingly long it has been since my last one. This time, it's just over a year (not including Oscar predictions). Hopefully, this slow pace won't remain for too much longer.

Let's dive in to another of 1991's Best Picture nominees...

JFK
Director:
Oliver Stone
Screenplay:
Oliver Stone & Zachary Sklar

(based on the books "On the Trail of the Assassins" by Jim Garrison and "Crossfire: The Plot that Killed Kennedy" by Jim Marrs)
Starring:
Kevin Costner, Kevin Bacon, Tommy Lee Jones, Laurie Metcalf, Gary Oldman, Michael Rooker, Jay O. Sanders, Sissy Spacek, Joe Pesci
Academy Awards:
8 nominations
2 wins, for Best Cinematography and Best Film Editing

Shortly after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in November 1963, New Orleans District Attorney Jim Garrison (Costner) discovers that the alleged assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald (Oldman), had ties to his jurisdiction. Garrison and his team soon focus on anti-communist David Ferrie (Pesci) but when the FBI's own investigation clears Ferrie, Garrison drops the case.

Three years later, the government's official report on the assassination is released, but Garrison remains unconvinced that Oswald was the lone assassin. He speaks to several witnesses and gathers more evidence with an aim to bring businessman Clay Shaw (Jones) to trial for conspiring to kill Kennedy. However, Garrison's obsession with the case causes fractures in his marriage as his wife Liz (Spacek) confronts him about his priorities.

Speaking of obsessions, a school friend and I were absolutely captivated with this film as teenagers. (Not as obsessed as we were with the Back to the Future trilogy, but pretty close.) If memory serves, we saw JFK at least twice during its original theatrical run, and when it was released on home video, we pored over every detail. Watching it again for this blog - at least two decades since my last viewing - was an exercise in nostalgia. I was hooked right from the opening seconds of the film, as soon as I heard the hauntingly familiar sound of the snare drum.

Back in the 90s, I bought into all of it. All the inconsistencies and anomalies surrounding the official story of JFK's assassination were mind-blowing to me and a slam dunk in the case against the lone assassin hypothesis. Now, of course, the conspiracy theory seems like nonsense. It's simply a lot of conjecture and circumstantial evidence. But here's the thing ... it doesn't really matter. The film itself is just so well put together that even if you think the content is all fairy dust and unicorn farts, you'll still be engrossed in the mystery, astounded by each new cockamamie revelation.

It plays a bit like an episode of Law & Order, the investigative team moving from one witness to the next, interviewing each while a visual flashback complements their testimony. Occasionally, however, this leads into perhaps the film's only drawback - it's just a series of information dumps. Laurie Metcalf's deep dive into Oswald is a good example. It's a straight five minutes of pure exposition about Oswald's past. Likewise, Donald Sutherland's cameo, which is about three times longer. In some ways, the whole movie is simply a laundry list of all the supposed anomalies related to the case. It's a lot to absorb, at times.

Nonetheless, the film remains engrossing and entertaining every step of the way, which is no mean feat considering it's over three hours long. It achieves this due to some unique and stylised cinematography, along with the tense and unsettling editing, both of which earned well-deserved Oscars. John Williams' impressive score also contributes to the film's powerful atmosphere. Not only does the aforementioned snare drum riff deftly set the mood, but the main theme is memorably potent.

And what a cast! Led by Kevin Costner (pictured), who peaks with a gut-wrenching final speech, the entire cast, cameos and all, are superb. If I had to pick a few standouts, Jack Lemmon, Sissy Spacek and Joe Pesci each deliver compelling performances. For the trivia buffs, Oliver Stone cast his own young son, Sean, to play Garrison's eldest child. And that's an uncredited Martin Sheen voicing the narration at the beginning of the film.

1991 - The Silence of the Lambs

I seem to be on a roll with the big-screen viewings of the nominees in this current year of review. First, it was Bugsy at the Los Feliz 3 in Los Angeles, and now, I've just taken in the eventual victor at the Randwick Ritz here in Sydney. I won't hold my breath waiting for the other three nominees to pop up on any local cinema's schedule, so this streak will likely end at two, but it was fun while it lasted.

Continuing our look at the Best Picture nominees of 1991, here are my thoughts on...

The Silence of the Lambs
Director:
Jonathan Demme
Screenplay:
Ted Tally

(based on the novel by Thomas Harris)
Starring:
Jodie Foster, Anthony Hopkins, Scott Glenn, Ted Levine, Anthony Heald, Brooke Smith
Academy Awards:
7 nominations
5 wins, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (Hopkins) and Best Actress (Foster)

FBI agent in training Clarice Starling (Foster) is entrusted with an interview of notorious psychiatrist turned serial killer Hannibal Lecter (Hopkins) with the hopes that he can aid in the investigation of another fearsome murderer, known as Buffalo Bill (Levine). Lecter is reticent, placing conditions on his cooperation, but when Buffalo Bill kidnaps a senator's daughter next, the FBI ramps up its efforts to acquire Lecter's insight, raising the risk of his escape.

With pulsating tension and some of the greatest misdirects ever committed to celluloid, it's easy to understand how The Silence of the Lambs became a paragon of the thriller genre ... or horror genre, for those of you who prefer to categorise it that way, which is admittedly understandable, considering the gruesome and frightening elements. However you classify it, though, it has rightfully earned its place in film lore. That elevated status is at least in part thanks to Howard Shore's sublime score, which perfectly complements the foreboding action. The main theme, for example, is pure tension.

Jodie Foster delivers a powerhouse portrayal as a woman proving herself in a man's world - aided by the script's cleverly subtle feminist overtones - displaying both Clarice's ambition and her inexperience with equal parts strength and vulnerability. In arguably his most well-known role, Anthony Hopkins offers the ultimate masterclass in how to portray that steely-eyed unsettling evil that has become so cliched nowadays. But his performance contains oodles of nuance, eschewing the monotone vocal delivery of so many other actors' villainous performances that followed. Ted Levine also impresses with a creepy-as-hell turn as the deranged and demented Buffalo Bill. Anthony Heald (pictured) also stands out, nailing the slimy, in-it-for-himself asshole. Both Foster and Hopkins won Oscars, contributing to the film's Big Five haul. For the uninitiated, that means it won Best Picture, Director, Actor, Actress and the Screenplay category it was eligible for, in this case Adapted Screenplay. All in all, a rather impressive feat, especially considering it was only the third (and, to date, the last) film to do so.

1991 - Bugsy

For the first time in over two years, I'm back in Los Angeles. In fact, only a few more days and I'll be heading home again to Sydney. But I haven't wasted the opportunity to catch a classic on the big screen. I ventured out to the historic Los Feliz 3 Theatre to see another Best Picture nominee, presented in 35mm. While it was nice to experience the nostalgic graininess of a real film projector (as opposed to the flawless digital projectors currently in use almost everywhere), this particular print had clearly collected 30 years of dust, grit and hair, which was surely not what movie-goers in 1991 experienced. Nonetheless, watching old movies (it feels strange to me to call 1991 old, but I think that's undeniable now) on a big screen is still one of my favourite pastimes so I'm not complaining.

So, let's begin our review of 1991's race for Best Picture by taking a look at...


Bugsy
Director:
Barry Levinson
Screenplay:
James Toback
Starring:
Warren Beatty, Annette Bening, Harvey Keitel, Ben Kingsley, Elliott Gould, Joe Mantegna, Bebe Neuwirth
Academy Awards:
10 nominations
2 wins, for Art Direction & Costume Design

It seems odd, if not a little cruel, that the title of this film is a nickname that the main character detests with a passion. Benjamin Siegel (Beatty) positively despises being referred to as Bugsy and he's not shy to let people know that. In 1941, Siegel moves to Los Angeles to take over a rival crime family's gambling business. Despite being married with two kids, he meets and falls in love with actress Virginia Hill (Bening), while visiting his friend George Raft (Mantegna) on set. While navigating his rocky romance with Virginia, he attempts to realise an extravagant dream of opening a casino in Las Vegas, securing million-dollar investments from long-time crime pal Meyer Lansky (Kingsley) and others. But soon, the casino's budget balloons out of control and Siegel has to scramble to keep things on track.

Clearly an homage to classic film noir, from the script to the direction to the brilliant cinematography, Bugsy feels like it's from a different era. Everything except for the colour photography and the frequent profanities, I guess. The lighting, in particular, uses precisely the same techniques as those classic gangster flicks, creating a near perfect replica of 1940s cinema. Add to all that a captivating story that keeps you hooked and some divine and Oscar-winning sets and costumes, and you have yourself quite an exceptional motion picture.

As Meyer Lansky, Ben Kingsley's accent is pretty atrocious but if you can get past that, it's a powerful performance. The Academy obviously agreed because he nabbed a Supporting Actor nod along with his co-star Harvey Keitel, also brilliant as Mickey Cohen. Headlining the film, Warren Beatty possesses the requisite charm, for sure, however there are moments when he plays Bugsy Siegel as surprisingly naïve. Still, he also received an Oscar nomination for Best Actor. For me, though, despite being absent from the Best Actress shortlist, it's Annette Bening who steals the show. She absolutely nails the 1940s femme fatale in every way - a truly breathtaking performance.