2012 in Film: My Uninformed Musings
This is a shocker. Awards season has come & gone, and a turn of irony, I’m in my first year in the film industry and not caught up on all the Oscar nominees. In my last four years of school, I was afforded the time to watch all the major awards before Oscar night, while the adult world has only afforded me 50-60 hour, 7 day work weeks, spread across jobs, job hunting, internships, and LA traffic.
Before you all read my following opinions and exclaim, “Where’s Lincoln!?” or “What, no Les Miserables???” allow me to stop you and say that I haven’t seen Lincoln nor Les Miserables. I haven’t seen any documentaries, or any of the shorts (yes, I made efforts in the past to see those.) I haven’t seen Amour (as much as I love Austrian nihilism…) or The Hobbit (but let’s be honest, Lord of the Rings fans didn’t even like it.) I didn’t get to see many of the Sundance indie hits like Arbitrage, Compliance, or Sound of My Voice, nor did I get to see some of my more anticipated movies like Cronenberg’s Cosmopolis. In fact, as you’ll see from my list, much of my viewing time was actually spent away from critical snobbery, and simply with movies I wanted to see.
So for this last minute list of Oscar predictions, Oscar rantings, and top films of the year, I’ll keep it as brief as I can (so not very.)
Check it.
The Neighbourhood - Sweater Weather (by TheNeighbourhoodTube)
Angels Flight. 1 cent ride on NYE
If only Gangster Squad looked like this
I’ll play it first and tell you what it is later.
Magnus Zeller’s The Orator.
History Repeats: The Next New Hollywood is Near
I was reading a Wikipedia entry about “New Hollywood,” AKA “The American New Wave;” the crop of filmmakers that sprouted in the late 60s with films like The Graduate and Bonnie & Clyde, taking off most famously with filmmakers like Martin Scorsese, Francis Ford Coppola, Brian DePalma, Woody Allen, etc. This was not an independent film movement; movies like Taxi Driver were funded by Hollywood studios.
It is particularly interesting to read the history preceeding this unique movement. See the opening paragraph to the entry (From Wikipedia:)
That’s an awesome poster.
