A Spirited Chat: Casting Our 2011 Independent Spirit Award Votes (Part 2)

We continue with our chat where we reveal our ballot for this year’s Independent Spirit Awards (occurring right as this is posting!). Part 1 is here.

BEST MALE LEAD

The nominees:

• Demian Bichir, A Better Life
• Jean Dujardin, The Artist
• Ryan Gosling, Drive
• Woddy Harrelson, Rampart
• Micahel Shannon, Take Shelter

WINNER: Michael Shannon (19 points – 12 from Brian, 7 from John)
Other votes: Jean Dujardin (1 point – Jared)

Jared: So you guys want to talk about your love for Michael Shannon?

John: He’s so intense!

Jared: He really is fantastic

Brian: I can’t imagine anyone else doing that role

John: He’s got the face, the voice, the demeanor for that role

Brian: There were only two categories I really truly cared about — and it was this and Supp. Female — but I didn’t realize you all agreed with me!

Jared: I thought this category was really, really strong, I wavered back and forth on voting for every single nominee.

John: This is all around a good crop of nominees though

Brian: I never considered voting for Gosling but other than that, the strongest batch of the nominees for sure

John: I agree that there wasn’t quite enough for Gosling to work with

Jared: I think Gosling managed to turn a little into a whole heck of a lot. Bichir has a kind of similar argument. Harrelson always seems to create these indelible characters.

John: I wish I liked Rampart more, but Harrelson is good. Dujardin is good. Bichir is good in a more subdued role. Good good good. I was a tad worried about Dujardin winning. Not because he’s not great but because I feel like someone else needs to win the Spirit. That’s why I fought the urge to take points from Shannon when I needed more elsewhere

Jared: I guess I want the best to win, but I see what you are saying.

BEST FIRST FEATURE

The nominees:

• Another Earth
• In the Family
• Margin Call
• Martha Marcy May Marlene
• Natural Selection

WINNER: Martha Marcy May Marlene

Jared: I actually kinda liked all of the Best First Feature nominees, not sure I loved any of them, but all are worthwhile films. Our nominee, though, will be Martha Marcy May Marlene.

Brian: Wooooo, that’s who I would have voted for

John: Good movie

John: I can’t believe Margin Call and MMMM are first features. Those are some real up and coming talents

Adam: It was fine. Not great, but had interesting elements

Brian: I fear that Margin Call will be a little bit of a one-trick pony

John: It depends on what Chandor does next. He’s gotta do something different. imdb says his next project is called All Is Lost. “A journey of one man’s fight to survive.” Starring Robert Redford

Jared: I thought MMMM did a good job of maintain tension throughout.

Brian: yes, it was incredibly tense

Jared: So In the Family is a 170 minute film about an gay, ethnically Asian man from Tennessee (completely with drawl) and his battle to cope after his partner dies leaving behind a biological son the two had been raising, and his battle to win custody of said kid. It also is surprisingly watchable.

Brian: I can see the ads now: “Surprisingly Watchable’

Jared: I mean, there’s no way to describe it so it sounds interesting. And the guy is desperate need of an editor or something. But writer/director/star Patrick Wang managed to put together a pretty compelling film.

John: I can see how that would make a compelling movie

Jared: I wouldn’t say to go out of your way to see it, but you probably won’t be disappointed.

BEST INTERNATIONAL FILM

The nominees:

• A Separation
• Melancholia
• Shame
• The Kid with a Bike
• Tyrannosaur

WINNER: Shame

John: OUR vote for international film is Shame

Jared: Good thing Adam zoned out an hour ago, otherwise he’d be yelling at you a lot.

Adam: I would, but I am completely unsurprised that John chose the inferior film.

John: I know you all didn’t care for it, but it mesmerized me and it really affected me. I just wanted to curl up in my seat and then go take a shower

Brian: oh god

John: The last 30 minutes or so is so intense

Brian: or pointless

John: It reminds me of the finale to Requiem for a Dream. Just increasingly bleak and awful. I’m talking of the scenes in the lead up to his return home, which I cared for less

Brian: I’d love to hear about Melancholia instead of ragging on John about why Shame is terrible

John: You guys won’t like Melancholia

Brian: so… you loved it?

John: No I did not. I can see how people liked it though. It saves the best for last. The last 20-30 minutes is the impending doom of the apocalypse and it gets increasingly uneasy. So it ends with a tense bang

Adam: It looked absolutely awful

John: But holy hell the first hour is rough. The Kirsten Dunst character is at her wedding and has a serious case of cuntitis. She’s mentally ill, but still

Adam: YES!!!!

Jared: That may be the best line of the year, by the way. [ed note: "cuntitis" is a joke from Cinematography nominee The Off Hours]

Adam: That’s staying in

John: Tyrannosaur is terrific also, by the way

Jared: Adam, I believe Tyrannosaur is done by the guy who played Jason Statham’s partnerish guy in Blitz.

John: I heard some complaints that it was just another British bleak picture, but it has plenty of story and packs a punch

Adam: Oh. Maybe I’ll see that then

John: I also was underwhelmed by A Separation. Two hours of people being stubborn

Jared: That’s disappointing to hear, looking forward to seeing it this weekend.

Adam: John doesn’t know what he is talking about

Brian: thats good to hear, but I’m going with John’s evaluation so my expectations are lowered

Jared: That’s generally my operating assumption.

John: Everyone else seems to love it though so your mileage may vary. I just really expected it to be up my alley

BEST FEMALE LEAD

The nominees:

• Lauren Ambrose, Think of Me
• Rachel Harris, Natural Selection
• Adepero Oduye, Pariah
• Elizabeth Olsen, Martha Marcy May Marlene
• Michelle Williams, My Week with Marilyn

WINNER: Rachel Harris (20 points – Adam)
Other votes: Elizabeth Olsen (9 points- 5 from John, 4 from Brian)
Michelle Williams (7 points – Jared)

Adam: YES!!

John: ha

Brian: Hahahaha

Adam: Clean sweep

Jared: Wanna tell us why you gave her so many points?

John: And here I was worried that someone would outvote Olsen with Williams

Brian: I can support this nomination, but I too want to hear why you loved it

Adam: Sure…I gave her so many points because fuck Michelle Williams

Jared: Hahaha.

Adam: And I like Game Theory

Jared: I was actually really surprised by Harris’s performance. I thought she did a fantastic job.

Adam: I actually agree. I was pleasantly surprised by the movie itself, but she made the movie

Brian: Me too — it could have turned into a Tracey Ullman like parody, but it didn’t. I found this category the hardest, actually

John: Until the last second I was throwing a point to Ambrose. Wish I had left it now!

Jared: John, I almost did the same! I really like Lauren Ambrose and thought she carried the film something fierce. She was playing a tough character and thought she did an admirable job.

John: The movie was meh but I can definitely see why she was nominated

Brian: Agreed

John: Yeah all were good but I never hesitated picking Olsen

Jared: She was a revelation, it is true.

John: Actually, I will say Oduye was a lesser nod to me.

Jared: Agreed. She was fine, but unremarkable.

John: Truth be told I found a few other performances outshone her. Specifically Aasha Davis as her friend and Sahra Mellesse as her sister in a small role

Brian: and Kim Wayans

John: See I wasn’t taken by Wayans

Jared: In Living Color 4 life!

John: Wayans is the mom, right?

Jared: Yup.

John: It’s an uneven movie for acting

Jared: I also have to defend Michelle Williams here. Thought she created a rather memorable Marilyn Monroe…fragile and strong, sexy and insecure and always larger than life.

John: I didn’t like the movie at all but she is indeed good. The big snub for Actress was Liana Liberato for Trust. I was really surpised that film didn’t show up anywhere. She’s so good for a child actress

Jared: I agree with John, people should watch Trust and praise her role

BEST SCREENPLAY

The nominees:

• Footnote
• The Artist
• Win Win
• Beginners
• The Descendants

WINNER: The Artist (6 points – 5 from Jared, 1 from Brian)

Brian: I guess I’m not in alone in feeling like the First Screenplay group were much stronger than the Screenplay group.

John: Definitely. And how does Take Shelter get love in so many categories but not screenplay?

Jared: It is a crime that 50/50 isn’t in here.

Adam: I am also surprised that 50/50 is not here

John: I believe that scripts can either be in screenplay or first screenplay, not both. I may not be right about that but I think that’s the case

Jared: Also, how did Midnight in Paris miss?

Adam: Also, while I didn’t always agree with the overall story, Midnight in Paris had some of the best dialogue of any movie this year

Jared: Instead we get Win Win and Beginners.

John: Obviously I would have voted for Midnight in Paris if it had been there, but I can understand spreading the love around, like the way Clooney wasn’t nominated

Brian: I liked Win Win much more than Jared

Adam: I am also fine with Win Win. Beginners should not be here

Brian: Beginners was so trite

John: Beginners is about 40% awesome and 60% navel gazing whiny crap

Brian: with an unoriginal take on the manic pixie dream girl

John: Yeah really. More gay dad please! We want gay dad! We want gay dad!

Brian: Win Win wasn’t anything new either, but well done

John: The weird thing with Win Win is that there isn’t much drama. It’s quite pleasant but that’s about it. Even the sullen teen is a good kid.

Brian: since when do you care about drama?

Jared: Did any of you guys actually like The Descendants script?

Brian: MORE LAND DEALS!

John: I suppose I would have voted for Descendants by default if I had to vote but I clearly didn’t care enough to bother. It has some really great elements but it just doesn’t cohere in a way that I hoped

Jared: Agreed. Maybe Footnote will be really awesome.

John: So weird to me that Footnote is in here

Brian: I guess we should talk about the winner, Jared?

Jared: oh. Everyone already knows The Artist is awesome.

John: I liked the ratatat patter of our winner

Brian: making a screenplay work for a silent movie is no small feat

Jared: And I’m glad people realize that a script is so much more than dialogue. Everything that happens has to be in a script first.

Adam: Says the Aaron Sorkin fan

Jared: [walks down a hallway]

John: Yeah I’d say my problems with The Artist are probably more in execution than in writing. I hope you like stage directions because that script is full of them

Brian: [says self important things]

BEST DIRECTOR

The nominees:

• Michel Hazanavicius, The Artist
• Mike Mills, Beginners
• Jeff Nichols, Take Shelter
• Alexander Payne, The Descendants
• Nicolas Winding Refn, Drive

WINNER: Jeff Nichols (9 points – 6 from John, 3 from Brian)
Other votes: Nicolas Winding Refn (6 points – 3 from John, 3 from Jared)

John: Oh good. I was worried after that last category that The Artist was ready to sweep our votes. Both Drive and Take Shelter are real directors’ movies. All about execution. I liked Take Shelter better than Drive so I gave it more points, but kudos to both

Jared: I think Drive has the script of a direct to DVD movie, but Refn worked really hard to make every single shot memorable and elevate it to something arthouse.

Adam: Yeah..I agree with that I wasn’t blown away by any of these movies directing. If I had to pick though, it would have been for Drive

John: I agree fully, Jared. If we have issues with it it’s from the script. Refn gives it some real style: Camera work, scene staging, sound, music, editing. And the same could be said for Nichols. I’d say the only problem I have with Take Shelter is the pacing through some of the middle. It could have used some trimming, I think. Nichols is really good at ratcheting up the tension and doom

Brian: Drive was all flash, no substance. I put some of that on the director. Actually I thought he kept getting in the way of the small semblance of plot that was there. But Take Shelter — those visuals were so arresting and haunting

John: Getting in the way, by being too awesome?

Brian: by being distracting. The violence was the definition of gratuitous

Jared: Refn didn’t really seem to try to be invisible, he wanted you to know someone was Directing, dammit.

John: Yes, but that’s literally the point. This was an exercise in stylish violence

Brian: but it was pointless

John: Well, it was the point

Brian: the point was that it was pointless?

John: I don’t disagree for the most part. But the point seemed to be nothing but to do some stylish violence

Brian: how is that in the plus column?

Adam: Wasn’t that one of your complaints about Inglourious Basterds?

John: Yeah it was my complaint about Inglourious Basterds and I have the same complaint about Drive. I’m just saying the violence isn’t pointless, it is the point. As a directorial exercise it’s great. It just needs some more substance

Brian: see I think Basterds and Drive are totally different. the violence in Basterds had a point — it was war and there was vengeance. in Drive — we knew nothing about The Driver

John: Are we talking writing or directing then

Brian: both. the director chooses what to do with the script . he choices he made didnt make much sense to me

Jared: Anyone have anything to say about the other nominees?

John: The Artist is also all about directorial vision. And people seem to like it. I think Mills gets in based on his segues when McGregor is rambling about shit over montages and the talking dog. Otherwise, why the hell is he there. If you think it’s a good movie you probably like it for the writing and the performances. What is there that makes it particularly well directed?

Jared: Nothing, frankly.

John: And Payne… whatever. He picked some nice Hawaiian music I suppose

Jared: Or the music supervisor did.

BEST FEATURE

The nominees:

• 50/50
• Beginners
• Drive
• Take Shelter
• The Artist
• The Descendants

WINNER: The Artist (10 points – Jared)
Other votes: Take Shelter (8 points – John)
50/50 (3 points – Brian)

Jared: Victory is mine again!

John: Jesus if The Artist wins the Spirits too then what’s the point

Jared: The best movie should win best picture.

Brian: yeah John I dont really think your argument makes much sense

Jared: The Artist is a black and white silent film…that seems pretty independent to me.

John: Mostly I just wish it cost a few million more so it didn’t qualify and we could have our own little playground here without The Artist juggernaut to deal with

Brian: made by French people!

Adam: Ugh…notice how I didn’t vote for it at all. Stupid French

Brian: Next time Adam is in charge of the voting so he rigs it

Adam: You realize that’s EXACTLY what would happen

John: Next time Brian doesn’t waste all his points so we can put up a fight against Jared’s taste in Best Feature

Adam: That said, I am more than happy to be in charge of voting

Brian: I’m actually fine with the selection though I’d have preferred Take Shelter or 50/50

John: So did The Artist warm your cold heart, Jared?

Jared: Yes. The Artist was fun and funny and also surprisingly dark and bleak. Also, it has a great doggie.

Brian: UGGGIE!

John: To me it was just too thin. The style wasn’t enough to get me through. I was on board for about 20 minutes

Jared: The movie managed to placate my entire family, which has pretty much never happened. There’s a really interesting story in there, though

John: It needs another viewing I think.

Thanks for reading. We’ll find out tonight if any of our selections won!

A Spirited Chat: Casting Our 2011 Independent Spirit Award Votes (Part 1)

Once again this year we are a member of Film Independent, the group that runs the Independent Spirit Awards. That is, the four of us combine to form one voting member with one ballot. I guess we could probably each afford the fee to join, but we had such fun last year wrangling to figure out our one set of votes that we decided to do it again!

Each of us have a certain number of points to assign to the whichever nominees we want. The nominee with the most points for each category gets the Grouches’ collective vote! And in a few categories only one of us saw all the movies and therefore got the sole vote in that category.

Last week just before the deadline we gathered to reveal our votes and discuss the outcome.

BEST DOCUMENTARY

The nominees:

• We Were Here
• The Redemption of General Butt Naked
• The Interrupters
• Bill Cunningham New York
• An African Election

WINNER: We Were Here

John: My sole vote goes to We Were Here. It’s a documentary about the AIDS epidemic in San Francisco.

Adam: Booooo

Brian: Boooooo – Bill Cunningham all the way

Adam: I completely disagree with both of you

Jared: Well, it didn’t take very long to turn on John, huh?

Adam: How can you not pick….quick, Jared, what’s another documentary?

Brian: John where is it available? That actually does sound interesting

John: It’s well made and naturally has an emotional impact. But what I found especially interesting is its look at what life was like during that time. What is it like when a mysterious disease is wiping out gay men? When something like a third of the people you know are dying? I think its next stop is DVD. It’s also a Film Fest DC 2011 alum!

Adam: There is an AIDS epidemic in San Francisco? Is it similar in scope to Africa?

Brian: I think he means during the 80s

John: I also rather enjoyed the two films about Africa. One about a militant leader who killed thousands in Liberia but is now a pastor (The Redemption of General Butt Naked). He goes around asking for forgiveness, which sets up some really fascinating encounters. What I really want to see is a follow-up. What do these people think of this guy, General Butt-Naked, when the cameras aren’t following him around? The other African film, An African Election, embeds filmmakers during the 2008 Ghanaian Presidential election. They have an extraordinary amount of access and present a very interesting portrait of a young democracy.

I also have to make one note about The Interrupters. It’s the film everyone is yelling about not even making the Oscar short list, which is also what happened to Hoop Dreams

Brian: Right

John: But it draaaags. The subjects and their work – stepping into street conflicts before they escalate – are really impressive. But after the nth scene where the interrupters do their interrupting, I felt like I got the point

Brian: If John thinks it drags then it must reallllly drag

John: But at least it has a bigger impact than Bill Cunningham

Brian: wait wait who needs an impact in a documentary? Not every documentary has to be out to solve the world

Adam: “solving the world” and “impact” are two different things

John: No, of course not. But I would like to have had a reason to have watched it

Brian: Sorry, I keep forgetting that you are a robot

John: And as I don’t care about fashion and have no nostalgia for old-timey journalism, Bill Cunningham was a trifle

Adam: wait…what? You went from arguing something didn’t have to have an impact to accusing John of being a “robot”

Jared: Documentary catfight!

Brian: hahaha. I misinterpreted what John meant by impact

John: I think though that you’ll like We Were Here

Brian: I probably will

John: And I know that Brian hates when I talk about this, but it also has a terrific title.

JOHN CASSAVETES AWARD

(For features made for less than $500,000)
The nominees:

• Bellflower
• Hello Lonesome
• Circumstance
• Pariah
• The Dynamiter

WINNER: Bellflower

Jared: Our (or rather my) pick for the Cassavetes award is Bellflower.

John: Guh. Were the others really that bad?

Brian: Bellflower wasnt bad!

Jared: I really liked Bellflower, it was one of the real surprises of the year for me. It had flaws, no question, but I found it really engaging and found myself thinking about it for days after seeing it.

John: Did you find the first half at all engaging?

Jared: Yes.

Brian: the first half was fascinating

John: What was fascinating about it? It’s a group of shitstain hipsters being insufferable.

Brian: its the latter half that went off the rails

Jared: I didn’t say I wanted to hang out with the characters.

John: I at least appreciated that the last half went so insane. Best tattoo of the year?

Jared: Hahaha.

John: Better than the dragon tattoo.

Brian: Oh I found the latter half just too batshit crazy, but the first half felt very authentic and natural

Jared: And yes, the juxtaposition of the madness of the second half with the hipsterness of the first was really effective, I thought. I really liked how the film mixed things up, careening through genres.

John: So it’s a film about male aggression. But why does it have to be so uninteresting at the front end? And so obnoxiously artsy fartsy to end

Jared: It is more than just male aggression, though. Like any indie film it is about ennui and not having a direction. It is also a love story and apocalyptic.

Brian: and a bromance

Jared: Exactly. Not saying every beat hit or anything. But I admired the ambition and thought it mostly worked. Oh, also, I’m kind of in love with Rebekah Brandes.

John: Had you heard of her before the movie?

Jared: Nope.

Brian: She kept reminding me of Taylor Swift. Then I laughed at the idea of Taylor Swift being in that movie

John: She caught my eye too. For a while I thought she was the best actor in the film

Brian: yes, I’m sure that’s why Jared loves her. For her acting.

John: Haha

Adam: I guess I should put my comment on Bellflower in. I have to admit that this was probably the most powerful movie I saw this year. For whatever reason, I was also thinking about it for days afterwards. However, I just didn’t have the same positive reaction to it that Jared and Brian had. I will say that I still have not fully processed my feelings about the movie.

Brian: I also give Bellflower points for being the most original movie I’ve watched this year. Jared, tell us about the two films we missed

Jared: So Circumstance is eerily similar to Pariah, it is about two adolescent girls in Iran who become more than friends with each other and how they deal with their affection for each other in present day Iran. It was better than I was expecting, but I felt there was something more there to explore than the filmmakers shied away from, maybe because they thought the film was controversial enough.

Brian: was it made in Iran? or made by expats elsewhere

Jared: imdb says it is filmed in Lebanon, but it was in Persian.

Brian: Farsi

Adam: Farsi

Jared: Farsi. Sorry. Actually, no. I’m not sorry. Imdb says “Persian”

John: Since you say it’s similar to Pariah, can I ask if has a similar issue that I had with Pariah? That it feels like a film that tries too hard to be about the Lesbian Experience at the expense of story?

Jared: John, I hear what you are saying and I think that’s one difference between the two films. Probably because there doesn’t seem to be a lesbian culture in Iran to which the girls could escape. It was much more the two of them against the world.

John: I liked Pariah and it was an interesting look into a world I’m not familiar with. But it sort of seemed like they had a list of “bad things that happen to black lesbians” and checked the boxes

Jared: Hello Lonesome tells three stories: a May December relationship between a middle-aged guy who works from home and his elderly neighbor, a voiceover artist who works from home who has alienated his family and doesn’t have friends, and a budding relationship between two people who met online (one of whom is Sabrina Lloyd!) only for one of them to soon find out she has cancer. The stories never meet up at all, which is kind of strange.

John: Hmm, sounds like these people may be LONESOME or something

Adam: That sounds like one of the most boring movies ever

Brian: sounds like something John would love

Jared: It is a little better than boring, but not by a whole lot.

Adam: I was nodding off as I was reading your description

Jared: The filmmaker clearly had something to say about the need for relationships with other people, but couldn’t really figure out a story to tell it.

BEST SUPPORTING MALE

The nominees:

• Albert Brooks, Drive
• John Hawkes, Martha Marcy May Marlene
• Christopher Plummer, Beginners
• John C Reilly, Cedar Rapids
• Corey Stoll, Midnight in Paris

WINNER: Corey Stoll (12 points – 8 from Jared, 4 from Adam)
Other votes: John Hawkes (4 points – Brian)
Christopher Plummer (3 points – John)

Brian: Woooo. I’m pleased with that

Adam: Nice!

Brian: but I need a defense from John on Plummer

John: I think you guys are the largest concentration of Plummer haters out there.

Adam: Actually, I would go with Plummer over Hawkes

John: He’s just marvelous. So much so that the movie blows when he’s off screen.

Brian: I think thats more because he was adequate

John: That said, I almost tossed Hawkes and/or Stoll points too. And I figured you guys would outvote me

Brian: Stoll was easily the best “character” of the bunch of the fantasy land folks in Parisian Narnia

Adam: True, and he had better dialogue than the others as well…BUT, he pulled it off fantastically

Jared: I don’t think anyone else dominated the screen the way Stoll did.

John: Yep, true

Adam: Agreed. I can’t believe he got passed over for the Oscars

John: Hawkes is still the master creep. That guy is going to get typecast but he’s so good at it!

Jared: Yeah, if he had more screen time, I’d have considered him, maybe.

Brian: Yes that was my only hesitation in giving him points — was he just being his usually creepy self

Jared: I don’t think he’s like that normally.

John: And don’t say too many mean things about him or he’ll show up at your house, sing you a creepy song, and stab your throat. So there was no temptation to give John C Reilly 35 points, Adam?

Adam: Yes. There was. You have no idea how strong it was. I just couldn’t do that because I felt so strongly about Stoll

Jared: I also want to say I’m glad none of us gave points to Brooks…I have no idea where his Oscar campaign came from.

John: I get it. He’s playing against type and he’s very memorably creepy. But, hell, you’ve got Hawkes doing it better here

Jared: Yeah, absolutely.

Brian: and Ron Pearlman was better in the same role

John: Surprisingly, Brooks has a great voice for being cruel

CINEMATOGRAPHY

The nominees:

• John Hodge, Bellflower
• Benjamin Kasulke, The Off Hours
• Darius Khondji, Midnight in Paris
• Guillaume Schiffman, The Artist
• Jeffrey Waldron, The Dynamiter

WINNER: Midnight in Paris (15 points – Adam)
Other votes: Bellflower (4 points – 3 from Brian, 1 from John)
The Artist (1 point – Jared)

Adam: Yes!!! I win

Brian: Wow

John: Haha

Adam: I should have known none of you care about Cinematography. Barbarians

Jared: So maybe you can expound here, Adam?

Adam: Why?

John: I hope you enjoyed watching all these movies just to blow all your points on Cinematography

Adam: I didn’t really like most of the movies

Jared: What did you like about Midnight in Paris‘s cinematography?

John: I loved Midnight in Paris but I don’t recall much about the cinematography. Not that I cared much about this category this year.

Adam: I actually thought Midnight in Paris was well done. Especially the camera work and the dialogue. Just watch the opening scenes again to see what I mean. For me, Cinematography has a lot to do with the composition of the shots. It is hard to explain why one person or movie is able to compose and convey more through their shots than others. Midnight in Paris did it more for me than the others…which were, by and large, nothing special in this category.

Jared: That’s fair, the whole point of this category is visuals.

John: Did you know they built their own camera for Bellflower? That sort of industriousness will earn a point from me. So this category had two really small movies nominated in The Off Hours and The Dynamiter. And none of us can figure out why. I googled some reviews of The Off Hours and several mentioned the cinematography. So it’s not just the nominating committee smoking something

Adam: They ran out of eligible movies.

John: Drive has all sorts of iconic shots. Why not go for that over a where bored people populate a diner?

Jared: Drive was nothing but iconic shots, it seems silly for it not to be in here.

Brian: At least last year, with a movie like Tiny Furniture which I didnt enjoy, I found the cinematography noteworthy. But The Dynamiter – I didn’t get it at all.

John: Exactly. Jared, did you hate The Off Hours as much as us?

Jared: I wouldn’t say I hated it, but I didn’t enjoy it.

John: Jared, why The Artist?

Brian: Emulating an old movie style while also being modern

Jared: I’m not a visual person, so this category doesn’t mean that much to me, but I wanted to vote for something, and I had several vivid memories of shots from the film.

Adam: well that’s stupid

John: I appreciate that filming a black and white film requires different camera and lighting decisions. I think it would have been cooler if they actually used an older style camera instead of just changing it to black and white later

Brian: to quote Adam — well that’s stupid

John: But oh well. It definitely has some interesting visual elements, though I wonder if that’s more directorial

Adam: I would argue more directorial

BEST SUPPORTING FEMALE

The nominees:

• Jessica Chastain, Take Shelter
• Anjelica Huston, 50/50
• Janet McTeer, Albert Nobbs
• Harmony Santana, Gun Hill Road
• Shailene Woodley, The Descendants

WINNER: Jessica Chastain (16 points – 12 from Brian, 3 from John, 1 from Jared)
Other votes: Shailene Woodley (2 points – John)

Brian: Thats hilarious. I thought John was going to Botz me and considering your inexcusable like of Albert Nobbs, I was worried

John: Well, it is the year of Chastain. I can’t pick which of her roles I like best. I generally think Take Shelter, but she’s also great in The Help. And of course I liked her in Tree of Life. But there’s no doubt she’s hottest in The Debt. A guy started talking to me in the bathroom about how much hotter she was in The Debt compared to the Israeli actress in the original

Brian: One of the things that has bothered me about a number of the movies this year is that the wives/girlfriends are harpy, selfish, whiny, or just awful people. But Chastain did a great job with the role of being the supportive mom and wife, while giving her moments to shine through her frustration. There’s no doubt that this was her best performance of the big 3 (Help, Tree of Life, Take Shelter) — and just thought I’d reward her for it.

John: It’s a noticeable, impressive dramatic performance. Does Huston seem like a nomination for being a name actress?

Jared: That is bizarre.

Brian: I thought she was great in 50/50 but…. not in it very much

John: It’s such a small role. But people were certainly talking about it

Jared: I’ll be honest, looking through our spreadsheet, where we just had the movie listed under this category, I assumed it was Anna Kendrick that had the nomination.

Brian: as did I

Adam: I would DEFINITELY have voted for her

John: But if you’re choosing a supporting role from 50/50 I think it has to be Bryce Dallas Howard

Brian: ew no

Adam: No. Once again, John is wrong

John: BDH is the anti-Chastain, racking up great, varied villain roles

Jared: And since John brought up hotness already…how about Shailene Woodley? Hubba hubba.

John: I gave Woodley two honorary points for contributing the two best parts of The Descendants: her gams. Yowza

Brian: Her gams?

Jared: Gams does not mean what you think it does.

Brian: that is not where I thought that was going

John: I don’t mind a movie where Woodley gets to wonder about in shorts or bikinis throughout

Adam: Agreed

Jared: She wore so much fewer clothing than anyone else in that movie. It was a solid choice by the costumer.

John: Haha. Yknow, Hawaii, or whatever

Adam: Do you think that is why they decided to do it in Hawaii?

John: She’s good too. I guess push come to shove I’d pick McTeer over her, but she’s still memorable. Love the swimming pool scene

Brian: you all are a bunch of cads

BEST FIRST SCREENPLAY

The nominees:

• Another Earth
• Margin Call
• Terri
• Cedar Rapids
• 50/50

WINNER: 50/50 (10 points – 8 from Jared, 2 from Brian)
Other votes: Margin Call (6 points – John)

Brian: wooo

John: Oh PHEW. I suddenly got petrified you voted for Another Earth. I have a lot of goodwill for 50/50. But it just didn’t hit with me as much as I had hoped

Jared: So 50/50 was, hands down, one of the best screenplays of the year, it is a travesty it didn’t get an Oscar nom.

Brian: I concur. It had a fatal weakness, but was still very strong

Jared: Fatal would mean it died.

John: The weakness being the plot line with Anna Kendrick?

Brian: no. Bryce Dallas Howard

Jared: I actually liked that part.

John: The character?

Brian: the girlfriend was written so unsympathetically and given no chance at all to be a real person

Jared: I strongly disagree.

Adam: I agree with Jared…about strongly disagreeing

John: I hate to say it but I think it probably played out pretty realistically

Adam: Absolutely

John: A lot of young people bail on relationships when one gets sick

Adam: Brian, you are an idiot

Jared: It was made very clear the relationship had severe problems before the cancer diagnosis, and then she’s forced to deal with handling a guy she doesn’t really love having cancer.

Brian: sure

John: I liked that she kept trying to justify it to herself

Adam: Yep and yep

Jared: So where’s the weakness?

Brian: but from her being a mooch, to being a bad artist, to making out with a gross hippie, just layer upon layer of her sucking as a person, they could have had her just being a shitty person by bailing on him

Adam: Which is COMPLETELY realistic. You are just biased because you hang out with awesome people like us. Those type of people exist in spades

John: Ha, forgot about the hippie

Jared: She was in a bad spot and felt a need to escape.

Brian: she didn’t need to be a bad person in every realm of her life and she was

John: I really didn’t care for the romantic plot. Dating your patient is icky.

Jared: I don’t think they made her a horrible person, just not a completely successful one. And I agree with John, romancing Anna Kendrick was kinda icky and forced.

Brian: also agreed

Adam: But it was Anna Kendrick

Jared: Oh yeah. Don’t get me wrong, if she were my doctor, I’d fall in love with her.

Adam: Exactly

Brian: and if Joseph Gordon-Levitt were your patient? you’d probably fall in love with him

John: I mean, you have a film about a young person with a serious illness combined with a mildly profane comedy. That’s enough. Why also shoehorn in a basic romantic plot?

The only twist to the basic movie romantic plot was that she is his therapist, which just makes it worse. Or just make her a random person or a fellow patient. There’s a lot of stuff to mine there. But, like I said, it still worked for me in the illness half of the film and it really packs a wallop with the occasional scene or line of dialogue

Jared: I hate to agree with John about romance, but I think you are spot on. Could you talk a little about the Oscar-nominated Margin Call?

John: Margin Call just enthralled me. It’s got a great structure of a workplace drama with big stakes taking place over a limited period of time. And it also fits into my political wheelhouse, which made me just love it even more. It could have easily been just about sleazy bankers, which is rote at this point. But instead its point, such as it is, is more subtle: that the whole system is kind of ridiculous. Like the way characters occasionally marvel at how much they make or how little they know.

Jared: I would have liked to have focus more on the number crunchers. Number crunchers seem like the true heroes in today’s society.

Brian: I really appreciated how the “villain” kept shifting further and further up the ladder

Jared: That was a neat conceit. Which ties into what John was saying, I think.

John: Yep. And the further up the chain you go the less in tune they are to the actual market. These guys make so much money and I just don’t really get why it isn’t competed away. They get paid like professional athletes for much more common skillsets. It could have been fine as an Occupy Wall Street screed, but it happened to present an outlook that I share so it really hit home for me.

Jared: I agree that Margin Call’s structure was unique, I just found the dialogue uninspired

Brian: and I found the character development was too sparse other than Spacey

John: That’s true re: character development. But I think it’s fine to let that slide as it’s meant to be about intense developments in a large organization over the course of about 24 hours.

I want to talk about Terri quickly because the movie it reminds me of the most is Please Give. The “ships passing in the night” thing that Brian talked about last year

Brian: I forgot about Please Give!

Jared: I don’t see that comparison at all.

John: You’ve got interesting characters. A few things happen over the course of a week or two. A few things are somewhat resolved, many are not. Movie over.

Jared: Isn’t that a lot of movies?

Brian: I thought Terri was fine and all, but I dont see the connection either

Jared: Like, you just described The Descendants.

Brian: And A Better Life

John: It’s that the plot revolves around these people crashing into each other and that’s about it. Descendants, Better Life, etc have more plot threads

Brian: I found Terri to be much more difficult to watch than Please Give and not nearly as well written

John: Please Give and Terri are really nothing more than creating some characters and letting them interact with a minimum of story points

Jared: Please Give also had lots of jokes. Terri…did not.

Brian: and Please Give has Catherine Keener!

John: It’s just interesting that all our opinions are flipped. I forgot about Please Give immediately and you guys loved it. The opposite for Terri

Brian: maybe because the movies aren’t similar

Jared: Terri just seemed so proud of itself for coming up with the idea of a hulking kid in high school having trouble fitting in, and then never went anywhere.

Brian: but Terri does have one thing in common with Cedar Rapids

Jared: Can we all agree Cedar Rapids was atrocious?

John: No

Brian: yes! Speaking of movies that don’t have jokes

John: All comedies seem to have to be hard R, romcoms, or kiddie movies these days. I liked that here was one that is just a basic comedy for adults. Amusing, entertaining, and isn’t going for anything more

Jared: It had exactly one funny joke.

John: Now, I’m not saying I need to see it again, but it hit a niche I feel like we don’t see any more. Don’t get me wrong, I like a lot of edgier movies. But now that they are the trend we’re getting a lot of bad ones and it’s nice to have something like Cedar Rapids which is content as it is

Jared: I wish it weren’t content not being funny.

John: It was humorous. Gives you some good chuckles but your spleen ain’t splitting. Oh and Another Earth: Awful or really awful?

Brian: neither

Jared: Another Earth was fine. I would have liked to explore the sci-fi aspects a little more.

Brian: I thought it was a fine premise with good characters but I concur with Jared about the sci-fi parts

John: Another Earth has a boring domestic drama and a barely used sci-fi element. The sci-fi seems like all a build up for the final shot, which does pack a punch. But woo boy did I not care by then

Brian: I thought it was just a backdrop

John: Yeah but why bother if you’re hardly going to use it?

Brian: That didn’t bother me as much as the fact that if the Another Earth was that close. How come the waves weren’t affected?

John: Haha yeah really. There have been a number of movies this year where I thought “Why aren’t the tides affected?” Another Earth, Melancholia, Transformers

Stay tuned for when we cast our votes for the other categories!