Warner Bros. Pictures

Oscars 2025 Best Picture Reviews: Part Five

Jon The Blogcentric1 Comment

I didn’t think I could do it but I did it. And this soon! All ten Best Picture nominees reviewed. And these are the last two. One just set an Oscars record for the most nominations (16) and the other was the big winner at the Independent Spirit Awards:

Sinners

The most unique thing about this film is that it goes on a common theme of how past generations of peoples would see music as a way to heal but also some music that is evil and is able to unleash demons. This story helps imagine of such a type of music or such musicians that can unleash a type of evil spirits or in this case, create a set of vampires. The setting appears to be right. Two African American twins, the Smokestack Twins, rent out a sawmill for a night of entertainment for their people. They do the dealing and inviting and even bring their younger cousin Sammie to play, despite his minister father’s religious objections. Meanwhile an Irish vampire is sheltered by a couple who belong to the KKK. The vampire infects them and they come to the event just as everyone’s partying. Despite their initial rejection, they find a way to infect those from the party and turn them into vampires themselves.

It’s the story of mixing the theme of music as something wicked and playing on that theme as white musical vampires use it to lure people to their spell and become vampires themselves where they become enslaved by the leader. It’s also the theme of music as something good as it helps connect with both generations past that adds to the theme of the overall story. Outside of music, it’s also the theme of racism in the film. Whites who are part of the KKK own this Mississippi land. The twins learned a thing or two about money and they try to prove they’re not inferior by proving their purchasing power to the white men. A group of singing white vampires, including two KKK members, who find a way to infect some attendees and turn them under their spell. This can definitely stimulate a lot of talk about racism and Jim Crow laws. And all this in a story about a young musician who gets his first break in a gig that will haunt him for the rest of his life, and have him decide his future.

Now this film became the surprise hit film of the summer. Normally horror films and films of the supernatural are good at winning crowds and stimulating intrigue, but most film critics look down upon the genre. These past ten years has helped in giving this genre its long overdue respect. This film helps add to the respect of the genre of various music styles. Mind you this is not your typical horror film. The twins thought their only problems they had to deal with was Jim Crow racism, but a bigger more supernatural threat was coming their way. Being a story about music bringing demons out, both in the spirit world and down to Earth, this horror story goes above and beyond what one would expect for a horror story. With music being a central theme, the film delivers on a lot of excellent songs that can make you appreciate the genre it represents. Easy to see why this film that was quietly released in the summer became one of the biggest hits.

Biggest acclaim has to go to writer/director Ryan Coogler. His illustrious career took off with 2013’s Fruitvale Station, which was also the breakthrough film for Michael B. Jordan. Further success would come with 2015’s Creed, 2018’s Black Panther and its 2022 sequel Wakanda Forever. This film is his masterpiece. It’s a film no one expected to be a hit and comes across as a difficult story to write and a difficult film to direct, but Coogler masters it. In the end comes the film of 2025 I can most label a masterpiece! Definitely a classic for the future.

One of the biggest strengths of the film is its acting. Top accolades should go to Michael B. Jordan. He’s worked with Coogler before with Fruitvale Station, Creed and the two Black Panther films. Here, he does the remarkable job of two twin brothers. He’s able to know the characterizations well and portrays Smoke as the serious one and Stack as the more playful one very well. Then to have Stack become a vampire and Smoke to fight the vampire spirits. To do the two roles and know what to play when is a job and a half. Especially for a film like this.

The supporting acting of the film really stands out. The top standout has to be Miles Caton as Sammie Moore. For a debut role as a young musician looking for his big moment and being horrified with all that happened, that is no easy task. Miles masters it like nobody’s business. Miles is also great at singing the blues. In fact, some of the best acting of this film comes from the performances that include singing. Delroy Lindo is very believable as Delta Slim. His delivery of the performance gets you believing he really is a blues legend. Wunmi Musaku gave an excellent performance as Smoke’s estranged wife and she can sing very well too. Other standout performances in the film include Hailee Steinfeld as Stack’s former girlfriend, Jayme Lawson as a singer who seduces Sammie, Jack O’Connell as the leader of the vampires, Li Jun LI as the shopkeeper’s wife, and the legendary Buddy Guy portraying the older Sammie at the end! Kudos to casting director Francine Maisler for making the right choices!

Just as equally deserved as praise and the reason for this film’s record-setting sixteen Oscar nominations are the technical efforts. If you take away the three Oscar categories for small films as well as the categories for Animated, Documentary and International Film, you’d see Sinners has a nomination in all those categories! The sound technicalities and the visual effects stand out. Hannah Beachler and Monique Champagne did a great job in the set designs and succeeded in turning back time. Also turning back time is Ruth E. Carter in costuming. Autumn Durald Arkapaw did a great job in cinematography.

The standout technical effort in this film has to be the music. Swedish composer Ludwig Goransson did a great job in delivering a score that respects the African American music styles and succeeds in creating the right mood for the film. Of the songs in the film “I Lied To You” which was written by Goransson and Raphael Saadiq stood out as it succeeds in making us believe it’s an old-time blues song. The whole film plays a wide variety of songs whether it’s sung by the actors or played as background music. When you watch the film and listen to the songs, it’s almost like the film is saluting music itself. The film magnifies the charm of the music styles. Even styles of music we come to dismiss as hokey, the film highlights the charming part of the style we didn’t bother to see the whole time. Music is the central theme of the film so it makes sense to have top-notch music.

Sinners is a film that’s indescribable. You could describe it as a horror movie or a drama set in the past or a musical. You can be both wrong and right. The film defies convention and delivers a masterpiece that’s unforgettable!

Train Dreams

A lot has changed in the film world over the last 25 years. The types of films that would find its way in film festivals and would find itself getting a chance at the box office would now find themselves on Netflix if they’re lucky. That doesn’t mean such films won’t be seen by the public or are out of chances for the Oscars. That was the case of Train Dreams as it made its debut at Sundance 2025, was shown in select theatres for Oscar eligibility and would become a Netflix film. A film about an 80 year-old hermit living in the forests of the Rocky Mountains a century ago doesn’t make for an attention-grabber of a film. How it attracts intrigue is it’s a story about one simple man and how he encompasses our own human feelings. Robert Grainier goes through the happiest of moments when he falls in love, marries and has a daughter. He goes through the hardest of heartbreaks when he loses them seemingly forever in a fire. He has feelings of hope as he hopes they may have survived and just moved off. Even feelings of hope as he meets Claire and the chance to start a new life for himself. He has feelings of hopelessness as his ageing no longer makes him physically able to do forestry work. He has images that haunt him like the Chinese worker who was killed, those in the forestry work who were killed on the job, or his wife Gladys and daughter Kate who give him haunting messages. He connects with all sorts of people from co-workers to people in town to people doing other work close by, even if it only appears to be a temporary connection with them. That seems to be it about the story of Robert Grainier. He’s a man whom people come and go in his life — even those closest to him — but he seems to find a purpose to his life. Having lost so many people, some tragically, he could do himself in and end it all, but he continues to live. And it’s all the better for him.

The unique thing about the film is not just about Robert Grainier and how he seems to be an ‘everyman’ character, but also happening in a time in the United States in the past. It’s a rare time to be in the forests of the American Northwest in the 1920’s. The film shows of a United States that used to be. A United States that was on the growth and Grainier was a part of it. It shows a nature of the United States that would soon fall prey to urbanisation. Grainier is part of both what nature gives to him generously and what nature takes form him cruelly. Even with urbanisation, Grainier doesn’t take himself away from the nature until his visit to Spokane in the 1960’s. The nature of the forests and the mountains Grainier is a part of is just as fascinating as the simple life of Grainier himself.

This film is another achievement for director Clint Bentley. He has only had four years of film work but he has created achievements like 2021’s Jockey and co-writing the script with Greg Kwedar for 2024’s Sing Sing. For this he directs, he collaborates again with Kwedar to adapt the 2011 novella form the late Denis Johnson. The novella received praise for its work and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Here, Bentley brings it to life and creates a story about the man and the time he lives in. He makes it a story that’s also about the people that come and go in his life and make it a story in which we the audience can find enriching. It’s an excellent achievement.

The film single-handedly belongs to Joel Edgerton. The whole story revolves around the life of Robert Grainier: a fictional man living in the forests of the American Northwest. Joel not only acts the role of Grainier out well but he also tells his story well. He tells his story and helps connect the characters of the story. The film is also as much about the people in Robert’s life as it is about him. Being the centrepiece, Edgerton makes the story of Grainier come alive.

Although the film is mostly Edgerton playing Grainier, the actors playing the supporting roles also add to the film very well. Felicity Jones did a great job of playing his wife Gladys who is able to win his heart. William H. Macy is also great as the explosives worker Arn Peeples who considers trees to be spirits. For a short period of time, Macy is able to steal the attention away. Kerry Condon is also great as Claire who is able to connect with him and share her loss with his. The film also features a lot of great technical achievements like the cinematography of Adolpho Veloso. His images really captured the region and helped to make the story. Malgosia Turganska made excellent decisions in the choice of costumes for the film’s costuming, fitting the eras well. The score from Bryce Dessner does a great job in capturing the atmosphere and drama of the film.

Train Dreams may come across as a slow film of boring subject matter but if you give it a fair chance, you will come to like the story it tells. It’s a story where one man can reflect our own feelings in his lifetime. It also feels like a piece of Americana.

And that does it. I am now complete in my reviews of the Best Picture contenders of 2025. It’s up for the winners to all be decided on Sunday March 15th.

Oscars 2025 Best Picture Reviews: Part Three

Jon The Blogcentric1 Comment

My next pair of Best Picture reviews is for two films that have two nominations in common: Best Actor and Best Director. They’re also both comedies. Usually the Academy isn’t too fond of comedies but these two films are among the most heralded and have a lot of buzz for big Oscar wins. One film is directed by one of the business’ top directors and features one of the biggest leading men in the past two decades. The other is by an emerging director featuring a young actor whom many tout to be the next great one. One is set in the present and features a very political topic. The other is less about politics and more about a person seen as a joke trying to shed his skin. Here’s my look at them.

Marty Supreme

It’s interesting how this film doesn’t simply focus on a table tennis player but also the times he was in. We should keep in mind that table tennis didn’t become an Olympic sport until 1988. The International Table Tennis Foundation was founded in 1926 and in the time set in the film, the early 1950’s, it was fine for a player to be paid in their sport, unlike those in Olympic sports at the time. Despite that, we should also know that table tennis players were not paid very much for their wins back then. You could understand how the federations were hoping to use many methods to try to popularise the sport at that time. So it should not be a surprise to see Marty try to use the money from his shoe salesman job to pay for his entries, trips, and equipment, and it still wouldn’t be enough. A New York table tennis player like Marty, he would have to hustle or swindle or even use his playing skills to win gambling money to get the money he needs. That’s how it was for Marty Reisman: the table tennis player Marty Mauser is loosely based on. In his 1974 memoir The Money Player, Reisman said top table tennis players back in the day had to be ‘gamblers and smugglers.’

I’m sure at first, you’ll wonder who would watch a film about a table tennis player from the 50’s, even with Timothee Chalamet starring in it? This story is not just about a table tennis player, but a player who had a bizarre year between a key tournament and the World Championships. Basically, Marty would be regarded commonly as a loser. He lost the British Open to a Japanese player and wants to be the World Champion. His only options to help pay for his training, equipment and tournament trips is selling shoes, making a novelty act of himself touring with the Harlem Globetrotters, have his gambling matches at the bowling alley or a lot of illegal hustling. Other options come along the way with a businessman striking a deal with ping pong balls in his name and having an affair with his movie star wife to get help. Very risky indeed. Adding to the risky moves of he reunites with an already-married childhood friend, having an affair with her and making her pregnant. Then damaging a mobster’s suite and he gives him a dog to look after, which eventually becomes the property of a trigger-happy farmer. You can see how this would catch the attention of many people. All the messes Marty gets in and he has a World Championship to compete in. A loser of a person who wants to be a winner in what he lives for, a woman he loves and a baby to be. That can make for a thrill ride of a story.

The story is a unique timepiece that it takes Marty Mauser from one situation or another. It takes him into his sports world, it takes him into his world at home, it takes him into his world of opportunities made and opportunities lost, and it takes him into his world of constant troubles. The story is more about Marty trying to win for once instead of constantly being seen as a loser. It’s about a man trying to get his way out of troubles that he constantly gets himself into. It’s about the women in his life and how being the man they have an affair with will cause a lot of problems. Especially the businessman Rockwell who knows of the affair and loves seeing him humiliated publicly. The story also provides a unique filmmaking element where it’s set in a specific time period but often features music from another time period. I did not expect a film set in the 1950’s have songs from the 1980’s included in many of the scenes. That is something that is becoming more common in films. It works in this film as well.

This film is an achievement for director Josh Safdie. Almost ten years ago, the Safdie brothers, Josh and Benny, were seen as rising talents in film making with films like Good Time, Uncut Gems andFunny Pages. Back in 2024, the two brothers split to pursue their own film making directions. This film is Josh’s first film as a solo director. The story he directs and co-wrote with Ronald Bronstein takes the audience back to a time when things were both glamorous and shady and a man who can be both a hero and an anti-hero. He succeeds not only in presenting the story in a creative way, but also in an entertaining way. He succeeds in making a ping pong hustler fascinate the audience and his misdoings and potential troubles keep us intrigued. It’s an excellent accomplishment.

Making the film most come alive is actor Timothee Chalamet. Ten years ago, he was seen as yet another young rising face in the film world. The last few years, we’ve seen Chalamet become a top box office draw and deliver in challenging acting roles. This film is the latest film where he shows his acting maturity. He does a great job of making a troubled young man look comical and at the same time, get us to see him as a 3D person who just wants to be taken seriously and try to get his dignity back. Chalamet does a great job in making us root for Marty.

Of the supporting performances, Odessa A’Zion stands out as the girlfriend who is just as troubling as Marty. She will make you hate Rachel but also hope for the best for her. Also great is Kevin O’Leary as Rockwell. We may remember him from the television show Shark Tank. This is his first film role and he succeeds in making his character both likeable and hateable. You could easily see why Marty would want to get even with him. Gwyneth Paltrow is also great as the movie star Kay Stone. She succeeds in replicating the charm of a movie star of the time. Tyler Okonma, most commonly known as Tyler The Creator, does a great job in playing Wally the cab driver. With Marty having so many people he shouldn’t trust, Tyler succeeds in making Wally look like a person Marty can trust.

This film also has a lot of great technical achievements as well. Safdie and Bronstein also did the editing for the film and they deliver the right moves. Cinematographer Darius Khondji delivers a lot of great scene shots. The costuming from Miyako Bellizzi and the set designers succeed very well in physically setting the film back to the past. Composer Daniel Lopatin delivers a fitting score for the film that blends in with the songs used in the film.

Marty Supreme succeeds in being a film about a ping pong player that makes you want to see it. It also succeeds in making a hero out of a man whom you wouldn’t want to make a hero of any kind. It will make you like it.

One Battle After Another

Usually around Oscar time, one can expect to have a film that’s very political as one of the top contenders. This year, there aren’t as many political films among the Best Picture contenders and those that are aren’t that heavy into the politics. This film is not only very political but it seems to come out at the right time. We see all that’s going on right now in the United States. We have a right-wing government whom many fear will threaten people’s civil liberties and their democratic system. We have the anti-immigration force ICE brutally abducting people and treating both the people they arrest and bystanders like garbage. With all this, it’s easy to understand why a film like this would come out.

In this film, it starts out as a left-wing militia rivalling the powers that be at the time and a right-wing militia. In the middle of it is a player in the left-wing group who uses sex to entice and manipulate her enemies. She bares the daughter of the white supremacist and her husband agrees to take care of her as she flees for refuge. Sixteen years later, secrets unravel, the daughter is grown, the father needs to sober up and join his group again to protect his wife’s child and the white supremacist father is trying to hunt the daughter down. When you watch all that unfolds and you learn of the scenarios, you can sense that this film has a lot to tell. Some say one can see far-left militias like the French 75 happening. We know of far-right militias. It should come as no surprise if one on the far-left arises with what’s going on now. And to have a child who’s the daughter of the racist colonel and the black revolutionary getting exposed to what happened around the time of her birth and learning she’s a target, it’s possible something like that could happen in real life. It’s a possibility Americans can’t avoid.

This film is based on a book from 1990 called Vineland where radicals from the 1960’s deal with the complexities in Ronald Reagan’s 1980’s. This film modernises the story and makes it more reflective of what is happening in our contemporary political landscape. The film will remind us of how many feared of what would happen during the Reagan Era was nothing compared to what is happening during the Trump Era. The film is also a mirror to our current society as we have all learned about extremist militias and about governments stimulating hate and racism. We’ve all seen in the recent ten years how racist groups have become more emboldened. The film creates the scenario of what would happen if a militant racist had a mixed-race child with ‘the enemy?’ How will it end up? The film makes for a drama that will have you at the edge of your seat as one hopes for the safety of Willa. The film also delivers comedy as we see Ghetto Pat become a fail of a person and try to get his life together and the racist Lockjaw face the music of what he did in surprising ways. To make such a film that’s both a drama and a comedy, that is no easy task, but it succeeds in doing it.

This film is another achievement for director/writer Paul Thomas Anderson. Hard to believe it was almost thirty years ago when he first made a name for himself with 1997’s Boogie Nights. He’s had many an acclaimed film since and this film gives him his fourth Best Director nomination. Anderson succeeds in modernising the story and making it reflective of what could happen in present-day United States. He also succeeds in making what should be an intense drama a comedy with shocker after shocker happening. It would be very difficult to make an intense story like this to be a comedy, but Anderson succeeds in achieving it.

Leading the film is Leonardo di Caprio. Delivering a character like Ghetto Pat who’s become an irresponsible father but the best father for Willa was no easy achievement. He succeeds in delivering the dramatic parts and the comedic parts in a good balance. Creating good chemistry with di Caprio is Chase Infiniti as Willa. This being her film debut performance, she shines greatly and makes the film as much a story about Willa, if not more, as it is about Ghetto Pat. Of the supporting performances, Teyana Taylor shines most as Perfidia Beverly Hills. Her performance as a modern-day Mata Hari-like soldier who knows how to take command of men steals the show and makes her character still felt long after she’s gone. Benicio del Toro is also great as Sergio in his duty to protect both Pat and Willa. Sean Penn is also great as a corrupt racist who faces a shocking truth and feels his only solution is killing Willa.

The film also features a lot of great technical achievements. Michael Bauman pulls the right moves in cinematography to deliver the best shots for telling the story. The film editing of Andy Jurgensen and the sound editing from the sound team give the right mix and the right placings to make it all work for the story for it to deliver well. The production design team does a great job in creating places like the militia hideouts and plotting scenes such as the convents. Composer Jonny Greenwood meets again for another Anderson film and delivers a score that’s fitting mixed in with popular songs from decades back.

One Battle After Another is a film that’s both a mirror to our society and an ironic comedy. It’s a story we can see happening, now but also be shocked with all that happens in the story. Not everyone will like it but it will please its crowd.

And that completes my third pair of reviews of the Best Picture nominees. Glad to see many of them are still in theatres and many of them are doing quite well this year.

Oscars 2025 Best Picture Reviews: Part One

Jon The Blogcentric1 Comment

The 2025 Academy Awards have announced the ten films worthy of being nominees for the Best Picture award. All ten are different in their own ways and their own styles. All of them are good at showing why they are being considered for the Best Picture award. Even in the first of my five reviews of the Best Picture nominees, we have two films that are polar opposites. One of the nominees in my review is an arthouse film by a Greek director who has become a big name in the arthouse film scene. The other film is one of the biggest summer blockbusters of the year done by a rising name in Hollywood. Both films are great in their own ways.

Bugonia

This film has two themes that are common in our modern world. The first theme that stands out is the power balance of those in control and those below that they command. That’s something of common discussion in our modern world that really gets a lot of conversation and a lot of angry responses. Especially as we see the wealth gap consistently widen in our society. I’m sure there is frequent talk on social media of revenge plots and revenge wishes that somewhat resemble Teddy’s and Don’s on Michelle. The second theme reflecting what stands out in our modern world is that of conspiracy theories. Thanks to social media, they’re all over the place. They range from government conspiracies to aliens living among us and there’s no limit to what they can be. The film is also very reflective of the type of person who believes their conspiracy theory to be true. Sammy completely believes his belief in aliens from the planet Andromeda to be the truth. Everything he read from the book fits the narrative of Michelle. The only person he will befriend is his autistic cousin Don. When he hears opposition from anyone, he becomes hostile or even violent.

The film appears to play around with a far-fetched conspiracy theory and tries to create a scenario of what if such a certain conspiracy theory turns out to be true? Sammy’s plot of revenge appears ridiculous but it’s also personal. Michelle is CEO of a pharmaceutical company that used his mother to test out a medicine that left her comatose. Teddy is convinced she is an alien and not only does he and Don commit their revenge on her, they plan it days before a lunar eclipse so they can get what they want before the mothership they anticipate will take her away. At first, this appears ridiculous as Michelle is still rational in thought while Teddy is belligerent. She knows how to use the power of the word to expose Teddy’s weakness and is very good at resisting whatever torture methods Teddy and Don inflict on her. As the eclipse looms, Michelle appears to play around with Teddy’s alleged charade but after she finds a dirty secret behind Teddy, she confronts him to give him an alternative theory to his conspiracy. A theory he can’t handle. The ending will not only leave you thinking the conspiracy is true but give you a shock ending. One that’s semi-apocalyptic!

Once again, Yorgos Lanthomos delivers a great film. This film is actually based on a 2003 film from South Korea called Save The Green Planet. Here, he teams up with Will Tracy, a former writer for The Onion, to adapt the story into an American scenario and relating to the present. Now a film set in the present is not something I would expect from Lanthimos. All the films I’ve seen from him are either set in the past or exist in another universe altogether. Those who’ve seen Poor Things know that Lanthonos can do science fiction, but a film about aliens living in human form is something many of us would not expect. Once again, he takes on a story that one would expect to make for a dreadful film and makes it work. It could be Tracy’s writing, could be Lanthimos’ directing, or it could be the acting from the actors, but they make it work. Lanthomos again does the impossible by making something that has a big risk of failing succeed with flying colors!

Excellent acting again from Emma Stone. She’s been seen in big-name films for almost 20 years and she still knows how to work the role well. She is acted in the last four Lanthimos films. Again she works the role well and takes command of the picture. She makes what could be a ridiculous character work like magic! Also worthy of praise is Jesse Plemons. He does an excellent job of playing a conspiracy-obsessed man. He does a great job of capturing the common mind of such a person on how they live a world of their own and are hostile to opposition. He really convinced me. Aidan Delbis is great in his film debut. He’s autistic in real life and he captures the chemistry between him and Sammy very well.

The film also has a lot of standout technical work such as the set design from James Peice, the makeup and hair by Torsten Witte and the original score from Jerskin Fendrix.

Bugonia is a shocker of a film. It’s a shocker in the style of film and as a film with a twist of an ending. This is one film to expect the unexpected!

F1: The Movie

A movie about fast facing cars makes for an attention-grabber for the hypercompetitive summer movie season. A pure sports film about auto racing isn’t as much of an attention-grabber like the mix of fast auto driving and action as in the Fast And The Furious films. Having Brad Pitt in the film does help but there has to be more to it. Scenes of fast racing always make for a thrill ride but there will still have to be a good story to go with it. The film does provide it with the story of a racing team that struggles to survive, an older racer who wants to prove he’s not washed up and a younger racer who has in a lot of potential and is hungry to win. There’s the clash of racer’s egos and a technical director who’s trying moves and methods that are unorthodox and even risky. Add in the fierce rivalry between the two, illegal moves and a romance in the way, and you have a good story. With many actual Formula One racers added into the film, you can tell this is a film that means serious business. It even goes into family relations of how Joshua and his mother have conflicting opinions of Joshua pursuing a Formula One race career and even the mother’s reactions after her son’s near-fatal crash. It’s not the Oscar fare type of story but it does make for a film that’s more than just the effects.

As for the effects, the film delivers on this. When you have a film about Formula One auto racing, the crowds are naturally going to expect a film that delivers the experience of race car driving. Most of us will never live that thrill and a movie is the closest we’ll ever get outside of a video game. The film does capture the high-speed moments a racer commonly experiences as well as the crashes and the intensity of the races. Outside of the effects, it also captures a lot of top training moments and the tension of the Formula One season and the difficulties of being a racer on the circuit as well as the challenges in making it for both the racer and the team. The film goes all over the spectrum in delivering a story about Formula One racing that captures the overall essence and challenges of being part of the Formula One circuit.

This film is another accomplishment for director Joseph Kosinski. It seems unnoticed, but Kosinski appears to be a rising name for blockbuster films. His success started with 2010’s Tron: Legacy and continued with Oblivion and Only The Brave, but he finally achieved Oscar acclaim with Top Gun: Maverick. Here, Kosinski works to make a fresh story about Formula One racing work with the story he co-wrote with Ehren Kruger. This story is not as deep as most of the films nominated for this year’s Oscars but the story delivers a lot more than the stories of common blockbuster fare. The story takes the audience beyond the Formula One racetrack and shows the common difficulties a Formula One racer has to face along with giving the racers Sonny and Joshua more personality and more depth than you’d see in roles of common summer blockbusters. It’s a story that goes beyond what one expects.

Brad Pitt is great as racer Sonny Hayes. A racer who never had his chance but sees a chance during a time he’s not fit to race again, that could be played off in simple manner. Brad gives the role of Sonny some depth and makes Sonny relatable as well as keeping the story from going cardboard. Damson Idris does a great job of playing rising racer Joshua Pearce. He does a very good job of playing a racer that is hungry but arrogant and has a lot to learn, His rivalry with Sonny while also being a student adds to the story. Javier Bardem is also great as the team owner Ruben Cervantes. He does a great job in showing Ruben anticipating good results but nervous because of what he fears could happen to his team. Kerry Condon does a great job in her role as a technical director who dares to pull risky moves and even challenge the rules. Sarah Niles is also very good in playing the mother who’s supportive of her son’s career but also fearful.

The technical aspects of the film area especially great. Claudio Miranda delivers winning cinematography for this story delivering the right shots to capture the excitement of racing. Stephen Mirrione delivers top editing in piecing together a story that works. Hans Zimmer adds in a score that fits the film excellently. The film’s visual effects team delivers excellent effects to give the audience the thrill ride of racing they expect to get out of a racing story.

F1: The Movie is a racing movie that goes beyond being a simple racing story. It delivers in a story with intensity and gives characters with a lot of dimension. It also doesn’t compromise in the action moments and the effects that the movie crowds expect it to deliver.

And there you go. This is my first pair of reviews of this year’s Best Picture nominees. I’m planning to have it two films per blog so you can expect to see four more blogs to come.

Oscars 2019 Best Picture Review: Joker

Jon The Blogcentric2 Comments

 

Phoenix
Joaquin Phoenix showcases a villain in the making in Joker.

“I thought my life was a tragedy. Turns out it’s a comedy.”

At first you’ll think a film like Joker is yet another popcorn movie. I mean the film about the eventual making of Batman’s most legendary villain. what more can you expect? Actually it goes beyond what you’d expect.

This film is interesting, and I don’t mean interesting in a negative way. We live in a time where superhero movies are the call of the day. We love heroes. We even consider anti-heroes like Deadpool a guilty pleasure. Very rarely do we get a movie of the origins of the villain. Before this film, I’m sure there were all sorts of ideas for a villain film, including a few ideas in the past for a Joker film, but it never came to full fruition. I always felt that if there was to be a first major ‘origin of a villain’ film for a superhero franchise, there would be a Lex Luthor movie before any Joker movie. I was wrong!

One thing about the Joker is that there have been several stories of the original of the Joker from DC Comics. Actually the original story of how the Joker came to be is in 1940 that the Joker fell into a vat of chemicals which left his skin and appearance the way it is., as well as the chemicals making him insane. Another 1951 story is that the Joker was a normal person until Batman interfered with him and he fell into a chemical vat. Interesting to know that Jerry Robinson who created the Joker never paid too much focus to his origin, just the villain he became.

This is one story of the evolution of the Joker that’s like no other. The film presents Gotham City as a big city full of crime and being run as a plutocracy in which mayoral candidate Thomas Wayne supports, but wants to take to higher levels. It seems like their one escape from the hell is through watching The Murray Franklin Show. Meanwhile Arthur Fleck is one of the marginalized people. He’s mentally ill, possibly from a head injury from his abusive childhood, but he just wants to make people smile and laugh. Whatever attempts to do so backfires and it seems like he’s dragged down by them. He tries to get a girlfriend with a mother in his own apartment but that falls apart. The mental illness consumes his mind and it interferes with his life. On top of it, his mental illness made him look like a fool with a clip run on a late night show. However it’s right after receiving an answer for what he dug for about his mother that he loses it. He threw in the towel for what he wanted to be and just explodes. He already got a good sense that he was good at revenge by that subway shooting. Following the revenge shooting he gave on a fellow clown of his, he got a sense that he was actually destined to be a person of revenge. However his biggest act was yet to come on the Murray Franklin show. He had an act that was an act of entertainment mixed with an act of revenge on Franklin. That started the wave of anarchy and mayhem in Gotham City  which would pave the way for the Joker to be king and would lead to the murders of Thomas and Mrs. Wayne in front of Bruce.

The thing about this story about the Joker is that it’s obvious the Joker story is meant to be dark just by the way it starts. It presents Gotham of a place of doom and gloom and Arthur as one of it’s many casualties. His mental illness is also portrayed in a dark manner with its symptoms and how he’s dealt with by the government. Actually mental illness has to be the biggest theme of the film. I don’t know if there’s a specific mental illness that is exactly like what Arthur has. I’m sure it’s possible because I remember the son in Parasite is left with a mental illness that has him laughing at the wrong times since his skull fracture. Whatever the situation, Fleck lives in what appears to be a prison of his mind that is common with a lot of people. Fleck’s mental illness has him write down statements of truth rather than statements of humor for his comedy routine. Those statements seem to echo that of many other people with mental illness. I think that’s the biggest thing that grabs people about the film, about how Fleck’s struggle is a common struggle with many.

The ending becomes an ending one should expect as Arthur Fleck is supposed to end as the Joker in the movie, right? However we get a lot more. The marginalization of the majority of Gotham City is reflected well inside Arthur Fleck. Recently he snapped. He’s already committed revenge against his mother and his coworker by shooting them. However it becomes obvious those two were all dress rehearsals and that he was planning for his biggest act on Murray Franklin. You could tell something was up by the way he walks to the Franklin studios in his Joker outfit and dances around. However even if you did anticipate Arthur would get his revenge on Franklin on live TV or not, I’m sure most did not expect the mayhem of a Gotham City riot to happen and this anarchy to happen either just after the Joker’s appearance on the show. Also some might not have expected the ending to be a case of both the Joker arriving and the legend of Batman just starting.

Now there was some talk when the movie first came out that there was fear there would be some copycat violent incidents. When you look at the film, it’s a film that features a lot of disturbing things like mental illness, marginalization, incels and vigilantism. There’s even that line just before Arthur shoots Murray: “What do you get when you cross a mentally ill loner with a society that abandons him and treats him like trash? You get what you fucking deserve!” No violent incidents have come of it. And even if one did, I believe it is not the responsibility of the filmmakers. I learned a long time ago in the 1990’s that you can say all you want how influential entertainment is on certain people or society, In the end, it;s not responsible. People are responsible for their own actions.

First off, the biggest accolades have to go to Joaquin Phoenix. This was a captivating character to play, but also a complex character to play as well. To portray this version of the Joker on the big screen was not an easy thing, especially since the character lives in both a fictional world of chaos and a mental world of chaos. Joaquin made it work, and in a way that keeps one in their seat. Also this may make history as the first-ever performance of a superhero character to win an Oscar. Additional accolades have to go to Todd Phillips. This movie he directed and co-wrote with Scott Silver worked beyond anyone’s expectations and even won moviegoers in the process.

For acting, it appeared Phoenix had the most developed role of the film while the other roles lacked dimension in comparison. However the performances did a lot to show their presence and add to the film rather than just be something for Phoenix to work off of. There was Frances Conroy who played Arthur’s mother and she did a good job of portraying her character’s own mental illness. There was Robert de Niro who did a good job as the host that’s friendly one minute, mean the next. There was Zazie Beetz who plays Arthur’s love interest. Technical efforts in the film were also excellent. There’s the cinematography by Lawrence Sher, the costuming by Mark Bridges, the makeup work, the production design, and of course the musical score by Hildur Guðnadóttir. I’m a fan of film scores and Hildur was excellent in delivering a score to fit a dark and disturbing world as well as the chaos in Arthur’s mind.

Joker does present a unique story of how one of DC Comics’ most legendary villains came to be. However it’s a lot more as it takes us into the character’s mind and into the world of mayhem he lives in. And it connects with you in a surprising way.