The Most Wonderful-ish Time of the Year

I have been to three new movies in the last three weeks. It's a busy time in awards world, and the first two movies I saw are certainly award worthy. The third? Well, I'll get to that later. In lieu of a huge review of each one, which I don't want to write and you don't want to read, I'm going to write about my impressions from each.

#1 Milk

This was my favorite of the three. And the thing is, I didn't think it would be. I'm not a big fan of Sean Penn and honestly was expecting him to utterly ruin the whole thing for me. Luckily, he proved me 100% wrong, and I am extremely happy about it. This movie makes you go through a complete range of emotions more than any other movie I've seen in a very long time. Happy, awkward, frightening, rage-inducing, unbelievably sad, hopeful, indignant - I felt it all, and it was a direct reaction to the whole of the movie, not a reaction to terrible acting or lack of plot. Neither of these were problems for this movie.
All that said, I would not be at all surprised if Sean Penn wins an academy award. Completely and utterly deserving (as opposed to his character in Mystic River, which in my opinion sucked big time...but that's another story). Josh Brolin is nominated along with Penn for a SAG award, but quite frankly that doesn't make any sense to me. If anyone should be nominated for supporting actor it should be Emile Hirsch or maybe James Franco. Josh Brolin isn't bad, but doesn't deserve an award. Sorry dude.


#2 Rachel Getting Married

This was a much more predictable movie, plot wise, but still a very strong and overall very solid movie. One thing that's been complained about by reviewers a lot is the fact that it was filmed much like a documentary with footage by a camera man who can't seem to keep his hands still. It didn't bother me, but I can see why people find it annoying to have a bouncy Blair Witch-like view the whole time.
Anne Hathaway is phenomenal, and has come a long way from her Princess Diary days. But she's getting too much credit. She is phenomenal because the entire supporting cast is utterly amazing. Debra Winger, who has little screen time, is at her best and delivers the textbook definition of a quietly screen stealing performance. The father, played by Bill Irwin (remember him from The Grinch??), is such a layered character that it's hard to believe that he's an actor, not a an actual person inserted into the movie. Also, Anna Deavere Smith is in it and I pretty much am required to love anything she's involved in, so. Unfortunately, since none of the supporting players have been given any love, my guess is none of them will be nominated, but I will hold out a sliver of hope for Debra Winger. Cross your fingers!!


#3 The Boy in the Striped Pajamas

I had high hopes for this movie. Maybe too high, actually. It has a promising plot - an 8 year old son of a Nazi officer befriends a young Jewish boy in a concentration camp - but in the end falls short. Partly, I think it becomes a victim of what I think of as the Grey's Anatomy problem. Namely, that in trying to address something that in life is very messy and dirty, turns into something fake dirty where the dirt smeared on the faces almost looks realistic and the perfectly arranged set almost looks genuine and the characters almost do their job for the story. Does it surprise you to know that I don't watch Grey's anymore? No? Oh. Well, me either.
Honestly, the majority of the movie didn't bother me too much. The actors did a decent job, and the children's performances were certainly respectable. It wasn't great, but it wasn't a complete disaster.
That is until the end. I'm tempted to tell the whole ending....but I won't. To put it simply, it completely glosses over the complete and utter horrific tragedy that was the holocaust by focusing on something else entirely. I suppose you could say that it plays along the thread of sympathizing with one's captors, but it takes it in a terrible direction, and in a nutshell implies that the loss of one child's innocence is on par with, if not worse than, you know, 6 million innocent people being killed all in the name of prejudice. Needless to say, I felt a bit sick leaving the movie theater and the thought I kept coming back to while riding the bus home was something along the lines of "Seriously, WTF? That was NOT OK. WTF???" ad nausea.

One more thing about this, I saw a preview for Valkyrie before this movie and want to know one reason why this movie may be better than Tom Cruise's? Well, although neither movie is in German, nor do any of the actors seem to attempt German accents, in Striped Pajamas, everyone consistently talks in an English accent. In the trailer for Valkyrie, Tom Cruise talks in an American accent. Um, really? He couldn't even try to talk like the rest of the actors? I thought male actors usually stopped trying in their late 50's (Jack Nicholson, Harrison Ford) - TC's still in his forties, right? Wow. Way to reach for the stars little buddy.


So. You've been forewarned. I'm looking forward to Revolutionary Road, Doubt and the genius of one Phillip Seymour Hoffman in the next few weeks.

It's going to be a great time to go to the movies! Who's with me?!