In Contention

Tag: Goodbye Solo

  • Roger Ebert’s top 10 list(s)

    Crazy HeartRoger Ebert has been alive like never before in his work as of late.  So I’ve been greatly anticipating his views on the year’s best.

    Unfortunately, he’s divided his list into mainstream and independent films, so it’s a top 20, and neither in any order.

    Maybe keeping things simple like that and not so authoritative with painstaking rankings is the way to go.  I’ve been considering it for a long time.

    Anyway, the most interesting inclusions on his mainstream list are “The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans,” “Crazy Heart” and “Knowing.” On the indie side, “Departures,” “Goodbye Solo” and “Trucker.”

    Check out the rest at the Chicago Sun-Times.

  • If I had a ballot

    Sam Worthington in AvatarEvery year I like to keep track of personal favorites throughout the Academy’s designated categories (plus one of my own addition, Best Ensemble). At the end of the year, my “if I had a ballot” post is the result.

    Of course, for the most part, I follow Academy designations here. If something is ruled ineligible, I play along. It’s not that often that something like that is egregious anyway, though the music branch consistently tests my resolve on the matter.  In years past I’ve tried to make it an AMPAS/critics’ awards hybrid kind of thing, but this makes it easier.

    I know, I know.  “Why don’t you just list what you think should be nominated, the rules be damned?”  Because then I couldn’t call it “If I had a ballot?”  But I guess I’m contradicting myself by adding a category.  I don’t know.  I’m just trying not to be too lamely definitive or authoritative with something like this, I suppose.

    Anyway, I’m also abstaining from offering up a list of foreign language nods. Firstly, I feel it’s been a rather weak year in general there, but I also haven’t made my way fully through the list of submissions either. So I’ll address that another time.  The same goes with he doc features, as I’d rather push through more of the eligible titles first.

    This year the top 10 is the Best Picture field, obviously, and from there, I toss my two cents into a variety of discussions. Here’s what I came up with…

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  • Going out with a bang: the best films of 2009

    Sharlto Copley in District 9I’ve often been asked throughout the latter part of 2009 why I should have the gall to consider it the best year of film product in a decade. It’s such a subjective circumstance that, of course, the only answer is, “I liked a lot of movies.” That’s not enough for most. Hard and fast evidence is necessary. A carefully outlined, persuasive argument is expected.

    I just liked a lot of movies.

    The year began slowly, as they tend to do. The first film I saw that cried for end-of-the-year remembrance was a modest baseball drama I caught at the Santa Barbara Film Festival in February. Then it was all the way into the summer before a blockbuster banged the first four-star gong, followed shortly by a happenstance viewing of an unconventional British biopic at the Los Angeles Film Festival and a catch-up viewing of one of the year’s Sundance hits.

    Sprinkled throughout was top-tier animated product, a Comic-Con screening of one of the best sci-fi outings in years (and a homefront viewing of another first-time filmmaker’s fascinating foray into the genre), not to mention finally catching up with one of two exemplary war dramas that debuted in Toronto last fall.

    Before long, the summer, with all its surprise delights, both substantial and appropriately frothy, began to wind down. The fall awards season picked up steam as Telluride fired the starting gun and, after that, it seemed every trip to a darkened theater brought some form of satisfaction.  Even the entertainments seemed to satisfy completely.

    How can one defend the position any more succinctly? I liked. A lot. Of movies. And I relish the opportunity now to pay tribute to the year’s best, some 30 titles, each of which could have been a top 10 finalist in any other year.

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  • OFF THE CARPET: Original players

    (from left) Jeremy Renner and Evangeline Lilly in The Hurt LockerWhen I had the unmitigated gall last week to project a set of winners for this year’s Oscar race, I was a bit startled at how easy Mark Boal’s script for “The Hurt Locker” slid into the Best Original Screenplay slot.  Looking over the landscape of contenders in the category, it’s a little obvious why such a somewhat non-traditional entry would be pegged as a frontrunner: this is a pretty thin year for original screenplays.

    That should take nothing away from Boal’s work, which is certainly commendable.  But beyond Pixar’s “Up” (penned by Pete Docter and Bob Peterson) and the Coen brothers’ “A Serious Man” (my pick for best-in-show in the category), there isn’t much competition for Boal’s play at the statuette.  I even find myself struggling with two more solid bets for nods after that trio.

    Fox Searchlight, however, is making some pretty strong moves on behalf of “(500) Days of Summer,” written by Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber.  The pair has already been cited by the Hollywood Film Festival as well as the Hamilton Behind the Camera awards.  Given the studio’s campaign prowess (and the undying spirit of the film’s champions), it makes sense to expect a spot to be reserved for the film here.

    To fill out the set, you’ve got a slot that is undeniably up for grabs.  So let’s dig into the field and see what we come up with.

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  • Not getting it

    Red West in Goodbye SoloA little over six months ago, I saw “Goodbye Solo,” Ramin Bahrani’s highly regarded fourth feature film, at the London Film Festival. As I said in my capsule review at the time, I found several elements to like in this genial, commendably sincere work — not least a greatly moving performance from 71 year-old former stuntman Red West — but found the whole overextended and dramatically underpowered. Narrative parallels to Kiarostami’s masterful “A Taste of Cherry” did Bahrani’s film no favours in my mind either.

    Anyway, after being mildly appreciative while watching it, I promptly forgot about “Goodbye Solo” altogether. That is, until last week, when its limited U.S. release was greeted with such breathless critical adulation — Roger Ebert and A.O. Scott are just two of the poetically enthusing critics contributing to the film’s lofty Metacritic score of 88 — that I began to wonder if I had lost the plot altogether.

    What resonance have I missed in Bahrani’s slight, bittersweet narrative? Why does the minimalism of “Goodbye Solo” strike me as self-conscious, where the similar approach of, say, “Wendy and Lucy” feels wholly organic? Is it a film that might repay the effort of multiple viewings? All are questions that have run through my head. I was interested, however, to read this Huffington Post piece by Marshall Fine that suggests I’m not the only one scratching my head over this. Calling the film the most overrated of 2009 so far, Fine continues:

    Turgid and uneventful, built around two characters of opposite demeanor whose paths temporarily reach a confluence, Goodbye Solo is another under-paced, under-dramatized film that falls into “neo-neo-realism” category that A.O. Scott went on about at such great lengths in a recent Sunday Times magazine piece.

    Say what you will about the so-called mumblecore school of filmmaking — with its slapdash aesthetic and endless self-regarding conversations — but at least those movies seem to have something on their minds, beyond creating a mood. Goodbye Solo, however, is a thin character study over which critics wank themselves into a state of ecstasy at all the meaning they can superimpose on the film — sort of the way people imagined that the emperor was wearing beautiful clothes.

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  • LONDON: ‘Dean Spanley,’ ‘1234,’ ‘Goodbye Solo’

    Long day today, with some complicated scheduling: after a press screening of Atom Egoyan’s “Adoration” turned out to be full, I was presented with the choice of catching up with either “Miracle at St. Anna” or Kazakhstani Oscar submission “Tulpan.” I opted for the latter — well, it’s got more of a chance of getting an Oscar nomination than Spike Lee’s film, right?

    Anyway, as I have six films to discuss from today, for the sake of economy (and my own sleep requirements) I’ll look at three of them now, and deal with the rest early tomorrow. We’ll start with the English-language contingent.

    I missed tonight’s main attraction, Richard Eyre’s tepidly received “The Other Man.” However, Eyre’s film was preceded by another UK-set Toronto title, “Dean Spanley” (**), a sophomore effort from Kiwi helmer Toa Fraser, whose debut “No. 2” was, oddly, rather more ambitious than this amiable but over-extended skit.

    The ornate animated credit sequence and jaunty score announce upfront that the film demands high whimsy-tolerance levels from the audience. In the interest of full disclosure, mine are pretty low. Still, that doesn’t distract from the fact that the narrative is barely feature-film material. Set in London at the turn of the 20th century, the film focuses on the brittle relationship between mild-mannered gentleman Fisk (Jeremy Northam) and his batty, emotionally distant father (Peter O’Toole). Idly attending a lecture on reincarnation one afternoon, they encounter the enigmatic Dean Spanley (Sam Neill), whose own account of his imagined past life as a dog strikes an unexpected emotional chord with both father and son.

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  • 9/16 Oscarweb Round-up

    Brad Pitt in Burn After Reading• Sasha Stone rounds up a few of the foreign language film submissions coming in. [Awards Daily]

    • Peter Bart seems to think the Coen brothers’ best opening weekend yet for “Burn After Reading” has more to do with turning “cold” into “hot” than with Brad Pitt extracting laugh after laugh in trailers for the past few months. [Peter Bart]

    • Sony Pictures Classics nabs the Toronto documentary hit “Every Little Step.” [The Hollywood Reporter]

    • Hirokazu Kore-Eda’s “Still Walking” edges out “Goodbye Solo” and “The Wrestler” for the best of Toronto as Eugene Hernandez polls critics and bloggers at the fest. [indieWIRE]

    • Keira Knightley keeps the “Duchess” publicity tour going with a stop under Donna Freydkin’s microscope. [USA Today]