Below are Syd Field’s Oscar Picks!
We love to hear your comments and thoughts on the best films of the year!
Do you agree? Disagree?
Predictions for the 82nd Academy Awards, Sunday March 7th, 8/5p on ABC:
| Best Picture Avatar “in terms of conception and execution this is, for me, the best picture achievement” The Blind Side District 9 An Education The Hurt Locker Inglourious Basterds Precious A Serious Man Up Up in the Air Best Director
Kathryn Bigelow James Cameron Lee Daniels Jason Reitman Quentin Tarantino Best Animated Feature Film Coraline Fantastic Mr. Fox The Princess and the Frog The Secret of Kells Up ” There’s so much humanity here —” Best Foreign Language Film
‘Ajami’ ‘El Secreto de Sus Ojos’ ‘The Milk of Sorrow’ ‘Un Prophète’ ‘The White Ribbon’ |
Best Actor Jeff Bridges George Clooney Colin Firth Morgan Freeman Jeremy Renner Best Actress Sandra Bullock Helen Mirren Carey Mulligan Gabourey Sidibe Meryl Streep Best Supporting Actor Matt Damon Woody Harrelson Christopher Plummer Stanley Tucci Christoph Waltz Best Supporting Actress
Penelope Cruz Vera Farmiga Maggie Gyllenhaal Anna Kendrick Mo’nique |
Best Original Screenplay Mark Boal ‘The Hurt Locker’ “Tough, original and powerful, though I like Up as well.” Quentin Tarantino Alessandro Camon and Oren Moverman Joel Coen and Ethan Coen Peter Docter, Bob Peterson, Tom McCarthy Best Adapted Screenplay Neill Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell Nick Hornby Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Armando Iannucci, Tony Roche Geoffrey Fletcher Jason Reitman, Sheldon Turner |
February 23rd, 2010 at 6:51 pm
I have not seen ‘The White Ribbon’, but I still agree with it deserving to win Best Foreign Language Film based purely on my love for Michael Hanake’s ‘Funny Games’.
March 3rd, 2010 at 9:01 pm
For best picture it should be Up not avatar which was a remake of a remake of an old short cartoon. Please don’t let it win people>>
April 10th, 2010 at 12:05 pm
I was soooooo disappointed when AVATAR didn’t win “Best Picture.” Of course the momentum was with THE HURT LOCKER by the time the awards rolled around. AVATAR still has a special place in my heart, though and always will.
Very sorry THE WHITE RIBBON didn’t win, too. I thought it was an extraordinary, and extraordinarily moving, film.
September 22nd, 2010 at 6:13 pm
George Clooney is sooooo gorgeous.If you ever read this. Marry Me.
January 9th, 2011 at 9:32 pm
It’s a big gamble for me when I go out to a movie. Paying $9.50 for one ticket is like playing the slots. My husband and I wonder if we will lose again. We were rewarded with our choice of The Blind Side. That movie was a delight because I got to see people act like human beings without all of the action sequences and violence. Of course the movie was a whole lot more than that. It had decent humor and a wonderful story. I have three males in my home so I’ve seen more than my share of testosterone fueled movies.
I like Sandra Bullock as an actress also. I think that she did a wonderful job portraying the real life person. I liked the frosted hair and costuming also. I wish that Hollywood was not so “first night” obsessed. I like the character driven movies. I like intelligent conversation. Sometimes I feel that I’m cheated when I don’t see a lot of that in some movies. I can like action too but not when the frames are moving so fast that I’m overwhelmed. I don’t get a sense of what is happening when that occurs.
The new technology is wonderful but Hollywood is forgetting about our humanity. That gets a high score from me. With high tech we will still need high touch. Studio executives should not forget that. A human being can convey a lot more real emotion than a computer graphic. As we get more technical and bureacratic in our world we will need to go to the movies to escape that.
I’m sorry to say it but some movies make me want to escape back to the world where watching my cat snooze would be more rewarding.
January 9th, 2011 at 9:55 pm
We get “On Demand”, at our home. The movie titles for a lot of the movies listed there are indicative of the shallow content. They seem to be B grade movies or less. I get turned off when I read these titles: Two million Stupid Women
300 Killers
7 Mummies
A Fistful of Brains
A Skeleton Crew
I will stop here. My husband and I have actually waisted an hour or longer per session scrolling through the titles and descriptions of the movies that seem interesting. More often than not we decide that there is nothing worth our time. The previews for a majority of the movies are horrible. Enticement doesn’t occur. There are some good movies but it is a pain to make a decision. Sheesh, I guess we should drop on demand. We’ve been had. I’m not an old fogey either.
February 12th, 2011 at 12:12 am
I watched THe Hurt Locker to learn about screenwriting and art. I don’t view war movies eagerly because the subject matter is too intense. I’m not intrigued by sand and weapons. The tense situations captured more of my attention than I planned to give.
Also, I was curious about how a female director would handle a war movie. I was in awe of that.
Concerning the screenwriting, I liked the small details like the cat with the broken leg and the forlorn cat. That illustrated the effects of war to me more that the huge explosions that are common in other movies. The character William being shown in the cereal aisle was a nice feature also. He was totally out of his element when united with his family.
The human emotions were skillfully shown in this movie. I wonder if a female director had an effect on this. The screenwriter definitely influenced it I’m sure. I’ve seen war movies that were cut short on emotion in favor of bravada and action. Not this one. Williams involvement with the child who played soccer and sold DVDs was effective. The young man being counseled by the psychiatrist/pyschologist was intriguing to me. I liked seeing his arch. Then the death of the psychiatrist was another obstacle that kept the audience on pin and needles as well as the young man…. good writing I guess. I don’t doubt for a minute that something like that happens in war.
The defusing of the bomb in the childs body was a distasteful subject that was handled very well I think. It wasn’t sensationalized. An average screenwriter and an average actor could have ruined the effect of that scene. It zoomed right in on the emotion that was important to the plot. I was thinking of the child, I was thinking of William’s relationship with him, I was thinking of his skill as he was more emotionally involved in his task than ever before. I also liked the dignity. He took the child’s body to those who cared rather than blowing it up. Then later he sat down in the shower with his clothes on which must have symbolized his desire to be cleansed from the evil that he had to endure. That was a low point for him. I can’t remember if it was the lowest point. I’ll have to watch the movie again.
I can’t relate to a man who would leave his child to re-enlist for the bomb squad. His words to his child before he did that were eerie. I don’t pretend to understand his mind set. He was a complex character but that’s okay. He was multi dimensional. His fellow bomb squad members lines and actions showing the conflict among them was well done. It seemed to be based on fact. This had a documentary feel. That’s not a negative thing. It as good thing because it was very close to real. Too real maybe. I guess the only line that I wonder about that might might not be real is the one that he spoke to his child before he left. I still havent decided. I’ll have to watch it again.
I’ll remember the poor man with a bomb attached to him who was referred to as a “good man” with a “family” That wasn’t overly done. I could feel it. I’ll have to rewatch that scene as painful as it was to see what made it so effective. The lack of sensationalism is high praise I think. Many things are overdone in today’s movies.
I have learned more about this by writing it down. Thank you for the space.
February 14th, 2011 at 9:29 pm
I was here last month so I’m cutting down the frequency of my posts. This site isn’t like other message boards that I visit like HGTV. Folks there post all the time. –Don’t want to monopolize the site here since once a month looks like excess. (insert icons for winking, confusion, and embarassment)
I’m driven to make one point about my recent post. I didn’t really like THe Hurt Locker. -Just didn’t. didn’t didn’t didn’t. So THere.
I asked my husband if he liked it. He said “No” –that he would not have wanted to pay full price for it. We got it through On Demand for under five dollars.
I can’t really compare the screenplay to others this year because I haven’t seen the ones that are in the category. Well I did see Up but I feel asleep during most of it. It seemed like a delight. I’m sure that movie would have been more to my liking than this one. I did see Avatar on my home screen. IT was nice too but my projection Tv didn’t do much for the graphics. Even it was more to my liking than The Hurt Locker.
I like to be uplifted when I watch a movie. The Hurt Locker did not do that for me.
I was being all text bookish by giving myself an assignment to watch a movie that I really didn’t want to digest. I guess that I did learn something. I’m still not sure that it deserved an Academy Award. I really don’t know. I watched it and tried to analyse it because everyone seemed to vote for it. Jeez, do Academy members have the time to watch all the movies that come out in one year. If they are as busy as me, they don’t. Hmmm –Not trying to be a smart aleck here.
I liked Seargent York better. –Tremendously better. It wasn’t concentrated as much in the war zone as Hurt Locker. I’ll have to see if it won awards for writing. Don’t have time to check that out.
Guess I’ll have to make one more point. The main character in Hurt Locker was barely within the boundaries of being a sympathetic likeable character. I would probably not like him in real life in the community life back at home. He’s not a hero in the totality of the situation. His fractured relationships at home were not optimum. He was not engaged with those at home when he was there. I know of and have read about heros who can do what is required in war and at home with more honor. He was a strange character. I didn’t like spending two hours with him. Wouldn’t want to spend any more time with him. Best Wishes to the people who put the movie together though. It is fiction based on real life and they have the right to creative license. They did a good job with it. I’m sure that there are plenty of people like the main character around. Just trying to say that i like more uplifting movies. Best Wishes!
February 14th, 2011 at 9:34 pm
Gee, I spelled Sergeant wrong. Too late to edit now. Good bye.
February 23rd, 2011 at 1:19 pm
Hi Diane:
I like your comments very much. Especially, about The Hurt Locker. You know, it’s one of the few films (that works!) that has no dramatic structure. The story just unfolds, from one event to another. Tense and suspenseful yes, but I found it to be a little boring even with the dynamic action sequences.
This is a case where structure would have really helped the film. But as it is, the film works, just not as effectively, in my opinion, as if it had an organic structure. Don’t want to harp on this too much because The Hurt Locker becomes the exception rather than the rule.
Even Inception had a strong structural foundation.
So, thanks for your posts. I’ve been traveling and it’s nice to read comments when I return.
Thanks,
Syd
February 25th, 2011 at 10:41 pm
Mr Field,
Thank you for your reply. I had been wondering which scene included the inciting incident. Now, I won’t feel so bad about the structure. Thank you again.
February 25th, 2011 at 10:46 pm
The best guess that I had was the scene where the man was blown up who had the defusing job that the main character inherited.