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Dec. 30th, 2006 @ 07:02 pm
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So I've seen Babel, The Departed, The Pursuit of Happyness, and The Queen. Now it looks like the most important ones for me to see of the films that could potentially be nominated are:
United 93
Letters from Iwo Jima
The Last King of Scotland
Dreamgirls
Pan's Labyrinth
Notes on a Scandal
The Good Shepard
The Good German
Bobby |
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Dec. 24th, 2006 @ 02:11 am
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Well I just saw The Pursuit of Happyness tonight and I'd say that that is probably my favorite film this year |
So they announced the Golden Globe nominations the other day and I feel disappointed because I haven't seen like barely any of the films nominated for awards. Of course this is just the Golden Globes and not the Oscars so the nominees could change and I have time to see more movies. So far it's been a pretty weak year for movies in my opinion. Perhaps my favorite of the year so far was The Science of Sleep but that didn't get any Golden Globe nominations and probably won't get any Academy Award nominations.
I put a * next to the films I have yet to see. There's alot.
Best Motion Picture - Drama
Babel
Bobby*
The Departed
Little Children*
The Queen*
Of the two I've seen I have a hard time choosing between. Babel was definetly one of the most depressing films I've ever seen and I truly liked it, just as I really liked The Departed which was taught and extremely entertaining. Both were so well done. They'll both probably be nominated for an Academy Award, as will The Queen.
Best Peformance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Drama
Penélope Cruz - Volver*
Judi Dench - Notes on a Scandal*
Maggie Gyllenhaal - Sherrybaby*
Helen Mirren - The Queen*
Kate Winslet - Little Children*
I've seen none of these. I really wanted to see Vovler because I love Pedro Almodovar. Helen Mirren will probably win and be the front runner for the Oscar.
Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Drama
Leonardo DiCaprio - Blood Diamond*
Leonardo DiCaprio - The Departed
Peter O'Toole - Venus*
Will Smith - The Pursuit of Happyness*
Forest Whitaker - The Last King of Scotland*
I thought DiCaprio was terrific in The Departed and I'm sure he'll get an Oscar nom for his performance. The favorite here is Forest Whitaker who is apparently phenomenal, so I'm dying to see The Last King of Scotland.
Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy
Borat: Cultural Learnings Of America For Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan
The Devil Wears Prada*
Dreamgirls*
Little Miss Sunshine
Thank You For Smoking
Ok Devil Wears Prada will most certainly not win and I don't see it being nominated for an Academy Award. In fact I can't see any of these being nominated for Best Picture come Oscar time. That's not to say I didn't like them. Little Miss Sunshine and Thank You For Smoking were two of my favorite films this year.
Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy
Annette Bening - Running With Scissors*
Toni Collette - Little Miss Sunshine
Beyoncé Knowles - Dreamgirls*
Meryl Streep - The Devil Wears Prada*
Renée Zellweger - Miss Potter*
I've only seen one of these actresses performances, but I see the award going to Meryl Streep. She is the second-most nominated performer with 21 nominations and has won like 4 times. She'll win, oh yes, she'll win.
Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy
Sacha Cohen - Borat: Cultural Learnings Of America For Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan
Johnny Depp - Pirates of the Carribean: Dead Man's Chest
Aaron Eckhart - Thank You For Smoking
Chiwetel Ejiofor - Kinky Boots*
Will Ferrell - Stranger Than Fiction*
Aaron Eckhart was tremendous in Thank You For Smoking, but love him or hate him, Sacha Cohen gave one of the most amazing acting performances I've ever seen.
Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture
Adriana Barraza - Babel
Cate Blanchett - Notes On A Scandal*
Emily Blunt - The Devil Wears Prada*
Jennifer Hudson - Dreamgirls*
Rinko Kikuchi - Babel
Both Adriana Barraza and Rinko Kikuchi were excellent in Babel, and so it's really hard to pick between the two but if I had to pick one it'd probably be Barraza. That's a really tough one though because Kikuchi was so good, her performance was extremely moving.
Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture
Ben Affleck - Hollywoodland*
Eddie Murphy - Dreamgirls*
Jack Nicholson - The Departed
Brad Pitt - Babel
Mark Wahlberg - The Departed
As amazing as this sounds, the front runner in this category is Affleck. He won Best Actor at the Venice Film Festival and Best Supporting Actor at the Hollywood Film Festival. Nicholson is always a favorite but I don't see him winning. I really liked Wahlberg in The Departed, his natural Dorchester accent was badass. Pitt gave a strong performance in Babel
Best Animated Feature Film
Cars*
Happy Feet*
Monster House*
Best Foreign Language Film
Apocalypto*
Letters From Iwo Jima*
The Lives Of Others*
Pan's Labyrinth*
Volver*
Letters From Iwo Jima is the favorite here. Many critics have picked it as the best film of the year. It will no doubtly be nominated for Best Picture.
Best Director - Motion Picture
Clint Eastwood - Flags Of Our Fathers*
Clint Eastwood - Letters From Iwo Jima*
Stephen Frears - The Queen*
Alejandro Iñárritu - Babel
Martin Scorsese - The Departed
Grrrr...how I want Scorsese to win! And he's up against that damn Eastwood again. Eastwood I can see winning with Letters From Iwo Jima and then being nominated for the Academy Award for it.
Best Screenplay - Motion Picture
Babel
The Departed
Little Children*
Notes On A Scandal*
The Queen*
Best Original Score - Motion Picture
The Painted Veil*
The Fountain*
Babel
Nomad*
The Da Vinci Code
Best Original Song - Motion Picture
"A Father's Way" - The Pursuit of Happyness
"Listen" - Dreamgirls
"Never Gonna Break My Faith" - Bobby
"The Song of the Heart" - Happy Feet
"Try Not To Remember" - Home Of The Brave
Well come my birthday night, we'll see who the Hollywood Foreign Press picks.
Current Music: Zox - Canon |
I keep thinking that I need to write something but I never get around to doing it. And it's not that I don't have enough time or I don't know what to write about it's just laziness I guess.
Now to write about random things:
I've always been a fan of Van Morrison, Moondance is a great album but recently I've gotten into Astral Weeks. I'd always read all these great things about it and that it was his best but I'd never heard any of the tracks. Astral Weeks was not a commercially successful album, there were no singles from the album and I'm not sure any of the songs recieved airplay, Madame George is 9 minutes long, Astral Weeks, Ballerina, and Cyprus Avenue are all 7 minutes long. Anyways, I've been listening to it non-stop since I first heard it. It's such a good album, I cannot tell you how awesome it is. I would easily say that it's in my top 10 greatest albums of all time, maybe top 5. The whole thing is like this beautiful, sometimes dark, melody with every track flowing into one another. I love the way the album sounds so improvisational and the recording sessions were pretty much just that. There was a skeletal outline of the song but Morrison told the other session members to play whatever they felt like playing and what came out is a perfect collection of songs. One example of the brilliance I feel is how the final song on the album, "Slim Slow Slider", just trickles out. It ends almost abruptly, with the sound of the patting of guitar strings, an almost abrasive sound. That unexpected ending does wonders to the depressing mood of the song. I could ramble on and on about how much this album kicks ass. You must check it out.
Lester Bangs, the infamous rock critic who Philip Seymour Hoffman portrays in the movie Almost Famous said that Astral Weeks was one of his two favorite albums of the 60's, the other being White Light/White Heat by The Velvet Underground. I really need to get my hands on that album.
Now to totally change the subject.
I spent 6 hours at Harris Teeter today, my first day back to work for the holidays. It's a boring job but the money is good and I can always come back to work there from. Of course this being the Holidays, the store is mighty busy. Anyways, today we were running out of paper bags and nothing gives me more pleasure than to tell customers who ask for paper bags that we're out. I'm not sure why it gives me such pleasure. Maybe it's telling the customer "No" that feels statisfying, even if it's over bags. Paper bags cost more than plastic so they push us to ask "Plastic bags ok?" It's so much better when people come in with fabric bags they can reuse or bags they have saved to use again. But that rarely happens. I might as well ask "Do you want to kill some trees or use some petroleum?" Here's an interesting little unknown fact, you know the recycling bins where people bring their paper and plastic bags? Well I sometimes my job is to hall them to the back and they get placed in with the trash so I'm pretty sure they aren't being recycled like everyone would like to believe.
That whole boycotting of stores that use Happy Holidays in their advertisements instead of Merry Christmas is back this year. It was big last year but it hasn't generated as much news this year. The whole thing just pisses me off. I don't understand why these angry Christians just can't accept other people's beliefs. They Christmas as a celebration of the birth of Christ but they can't deal with the fact that some people don't celebrate Christmas. Some have their own holidays but I guess to some, they shouldn't even be recognized or respected. I remember when I worked during the holidays last year, a cashier I was bagging for told a customer Merry Christmas and they responded "Thank you, it is Merry Christmas not this Happy Holidays stuff." I thought we as society were past all that. I don't remember this ever being a big deal until recent years and now there is the Committee to Save Merry Christmas. I know that this whole campaign doesn't represent the majority of Christians, but it's people like this who are giving Christianity a bad name. I respect their beliefs but I don't feel as though they should hold any dominance over the beliefs of others.
I get pissed and start rambling.
I have a lot on my mind that I want to write about. There's just so much and I don't fully know how best to convey exactly what I'm thinking through this journal yet. Hopefully soon I'll figure it out.Current Mood:  relaxed Current Music: Van Morrison - Madame George |
Well it's my last night of the summer so I thought what the hell, why not post on the old LJ which I have kept dormant for sometime? It has been an enjoyable summer I'd say. I didn't get to travel as much as I had hoped, in fact the only real traveling I did other than Montreat was to Asheville for The Strokes concert with Janie. A great trip I must say. Instead I guess I decided to spend this summer working at the wonderful world of Harris Teeter. Bagging groceries with the utmost pleasure. They gave me more hours this summer which was nice of them. But oy that summer heat! Man it really sucked (thank you global warming). I think that when I'm out of college I'll probably end up living somewhere north or at least somewhere away from the humidity (Pittsburgh or San Francisco (yea right)) hey I can dream dammit. I've watched plenty of films this summer. Been renting a lot of foreign movies. Indulging myself in Fellini and Kurosawa. Also while I'm always lambasting television, HBO did a number on me and I ended up watching every episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm (50 episodes,roughly 25 hours) and Six Feet Under (63 episodes, roughly 60 hours). (by the way those estimates are probably not right).
Anyways, like I've said, it's been a great summer: I got to spend time with a lot of my friends that I've missed since they've been in school and I found some great stuff to watch. I'm pretty much all packed up and ready for year two at Elon. I'll try and update more with more depth. |
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Aug. 5th, 2006 @ 06:26 pm
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May. 13th, 2006 @ 09:27 am
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Apr. 20th, 2006 @ 12:06 pm
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The Strokes
May 26th
Asheville - Thomas Wolfe Auditorium
$30
Tickets go on-sale this Saturday at 10 AM.
Anyone wanna go? |
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Apr. 19th, 2006 @ 11:38 am
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I'm not abandoning this journal. It's just been a while since I've had time to update. Since my last entry, I'm moving this summer. We're going to move into a condominium on Sharon View. It's located across the street from Mountainbrook.Current Music: new york dolls - personality crisis |
I'm not gonna moan and whine like everyone else seems to be doing about who should've won what last night, but lets face it, that was overall a shitty academy awards. there were some positives: the film montages, the best actress political campaign clips were pretty hilarious, and jon stewart recovered from a shakey start and ended up making fun of hollywood's politics (i think that was a smart move on his half, oh hollywood).
Something interesting, each of the top six awards was won by a different film:
Picture - Crash
Director - Brokeback Mountain
Actor - Capote
Actress - Walk the Line
Supporting Actor - Syriana
Supporting Actress - The Constant Gardener
That's a bit unusal.
It's only happened once before, and that was in 1952:
Picture - The Greatest Show On Earth
Director - The Quiet Man
Actor - High Noon
Actress - Come Back, Little Sheba
Supporting Actor - Viva Zapata!
Supporting Actress - The Bad and the Beautiful |
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Oscars
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Mar. 2nd, 2006 @ 07:41 pm
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I really have no time to spend doing this, there are papers desperately calling my name for me to finish, but it just wouldn't be right not to do it, because hey, it's just what I do. So here is my Oscar analysis, who will win and who I think should win, even though I wasn't able to see anywhere near as many of the nominees as last year when I only missed one Vera Drake. The important one's I didn't get to see this year are most notably Good Night, and Good Luck (6 nominations) and North Country (2 nominations).
Best Picture
Will win: Brokeback Mountain
Who I think should win: Brokeback Mountain
Best Director
Will win: Ang Lee - Brokeback Mountain
Who I think should win: Ang Lee - Brokeback Mountain
Best Actor
Will win: Philip Seymour Hoffman - Capote
Who I think should win: Philip Seymour Hoffman - Capote
Any other year and Heath Ledger would win for Brokeback Mountain but Hoffman is just terrific.
Best Actress
Will win: Reese Witherspoon - Walk the Line
Who I think should win: Reese Witherspoon - Walk the Line
As much as I'm not a Reese Witherspoon fan (minus Election) she should and probably will win. Although I haven't seen Felicity Huffman -Transamerica, who is her biggest competition.
Best Supporting Actor
Will win: Jake Gyllenhaal - Brokeback Mountain
Who I think should win: Jake Gyllenhaal - Brokeback Mountain
Sure George Clooney won the Golden Globe and Jake wasn't even nominated, but Jake did win the BAFTA and his performance is far stronger than Clooney's.
Best Supporting Actress
Will win: Rachel Weisz - The Constant Gardener
Who I think should win: Maria Bello - A History of Violence (not nominated)
I think Maria Bello should have been nominated and should win Supporting Actress, however because she's not nominated, I think Rachel Weisz - The Constant Gardener should win.
Best Screenplay - Original
Will win: Good Night, and Good Luck - George Clooney and Grant Heslov
Who I think should win: The Squid and the Whale - Noah Baumbach
Crash may pullout the win on this one.
Best Screenplay - Adapted
Will win: Brokeback Mountain - Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana
Who I think should win: Brokeback Mountain - Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana
Capote will be the competition.
Documentary Feature
Will win: March of the Penguins
Who I think should win: March of the Penguins
I suppose March of the Penguins was the best documentary I've seen this past year although my favorite was Mad Hot Ballroom which is right up there and should have at least been nominated.
Documentary Short Subject
Will win: God Sleeps in Rwanda
Who I think should win: God Sleeps in Rwanda
Art Direction
Will win: Memoirs of a Geisha, John Myhre, art direction; Gretchen Rau, set decoration
Who I think should win: Memoirs of a Geisha, John Myhre, art direction; Gretchen Rau, set decoration
Live Action Short Film
Will win: The Last Farm
Who I think should win: Cashback
Perhaps I'm biased because I work at a grocery store.
Costume Design
Will win: Memoirs of a Geisha, Colleen Atwood
Who I think should win: Memoirs of a Geisha, Colleen Atwood
Animated Feature
Will win: Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit
Who I think should win: Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit
Wallace & Gromit are rather brilliant.
Sound Mixing
Will win: King Kong
Who I think should win: King Kong
Sound Editing
Will win: King Kong
Who I think should win: King Kong
I think Kong will win, but Walk the Line may take home this award.
Editing
Will win: Crash
Who I think should win: Crash
It's really a contest between The Constant Gardener and Crash although there has been some talk about Munich.
Makeup
Will win: The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
Who I think should win: The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
This is a tought choice because Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith is strong as well in this category.
Foreign Language Film
Will win: Paradise Now, Palestine
Who I think should win: Tsotsi, South Africa
Hell, Ann Coulter picked Paradise Now
Cinematography
Will win: Brokeback Mountain, Rodrigo Prieto
Who I think should win: Brokeback Mountain, Rodrigo Prieto
Original Score
Will win: Memoirs of a Geisha, John Williams
Who I think should win: Brokeback Mountain, Gustavo Santaolalla
No contest in my opinion Santaolalla's score for the movie is beautiful.
Original Song
Will win: "Travelin' Thru," music and lyric by Dolly Parton, Transamerica
Who I think should win: '"In the Deep," music by Kathleen "Bird" York and Michael Becker; lyric by Kathleen "Bird" York, Crash
Only three songs nominated. Weird.
Well that certainly took a long time, too long. |
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Mar. 1st, 2006 @ 02:54 am
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Simply Beautiful
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Feb. 20th, 2006 @ 01:33 am
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I just came across something I wrote in my Creative Writing notebook in 10th grade:
Daniel
draws
different
donkeys
dancing
delightfully.
Donkey's
don't
dance
Dan's
dastardly
doctor
Dave
denounced. |
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Feb. 19th, 2006 @ 05:03 pm
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Top 3 of the Year:
1)Brokeback Mountain
2)Squid and the Whale
3)Syriana
After that it gets a bit difficult to rank. Capote would probably be number 4 but I'm just not sure how I'd rank the rest. |
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Jan. 28th, 2006 @ 05:01 pm
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I drove to Ohio yesterday to visit Joe. Good fun at Kenyon, although the drive was extremely stressful, cuz the schools in the middle of nowhere and finding it at night was hell. Now I'm back in Pittsburgh, and tomorrow I'll be heading back to Elon. This trip has been so much fun. I've really missed those two. |
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Jan. 25th, 2006 @ 06:35 pm
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Im in Pittsburgh with J-Max. Helluva drive through the snow. |
In response to the Golden Globes.
I felt they went pretty well unfortunately I haven't seen a lot of the
films that were nominated. So for a couple my choice wasn't the
winner, however from the clips I've seen their wins are rightfully
justified. I haven't been able to see highly rated films like
Capote, Transamerica, Good Night, and Good Luck and Match Point,
because they don't reach Burlington and aren't playing when I'm
home. I asked Lawrence Toppman when Match Point was going to
reach Charlotte and he told me it would on the 20th, that's this
Friday, so I'll missed another one because I doubt it will come
here. Anyways. I did get to see Brokeback Mountain when I
was back this past weekend, and it really is the best movie of the
year, in fact probably the best movie of the past few years. I
hate falling in line with all the critics saying that its the best, but
there's no denying it, it really is that damn good. Go see
it. Anyways I compiled a list of what films won the Golden Globes
and what films I think should have won in each category, of those nominated. The
winners are in italics, while the ones I think should have one are in
bold.
( Here we go. )Current Music: daft punk - da funk |
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Jan. 12th, 2006 @ 03:16 am
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"...it's in despair that you find the sharpest pleasures, particularly when you are most acutely aware of the hopelessness of your position." - Notes from Underground |
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Jan. 2nd, 2006 @ 06:22 pm
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I was a pretty far behind on my movie watching before Christmas break,
so I tried to do as much catching up as possible. I saw 7 movies
(Squid and the Whale, Sarah Silverman: Jesus is Magic, King Kong,
Munich, Memoirs of a Geisha, Chronicles of Narnia, The Producers) over
the break and updated my progress. I've still got some more to
see, mainly Brokeback Mountain and Good Night, and Good Luck and I can
hopefully see those when I go back on the 13th for my b-day weekend.
2006 Golden Globe Nominees
Best Picture, Drama
- Brokeback Mountain
- The Constant Gardner
- Good Night, and Good Luck
- A History of Violence
- Match Point
Best Actress, Drama
- Maria Bello - A History of Violence
- Felicity Huffman - Transamerica
- Gywneth Paltrow - Proof
- Charlize Theron - North Country
- Ziyi Zhang - Memoirs of a Geisha
Best Actor, Drama
- Russell Crowe - Cinderella Man
- Philip Seymour Hoffman - Capote
- Terrence Howard - Hustle & Flow
- Heath Ledger - Brokeback Mountain
- David Straithairn - Good Night, and Good Luck
Best Picture, Musical or Comedy
- Mrs. Henderson Presents
- Pride & Prejudice
- The Producers
- The Squid and the Whale
- Walk the Line
Best Actress, Musical or Comedy
- Judi Dench - Mrs. Henderson Presents
- Kiera Knightley - Pride & Prejudice
- Laura Linney - The Squid and the Whale
- Sarah Jessica Parker - The Family Stone
- Reese Witherspoon - Walk the Line
Best Actor, Musical or Comedy
- Pierce Brosnan - The Matador
- Jeff Daniels - The Squid and the Whale
- Nathan Lane - The Producers
- Cillian Murphy - Breakfast on Pluto
- Joaquin Phoenix - Walk the Line
Best Supporting Actress
- Scarlett Johansson - Match Point
- Shirley Maclaine - In Her Shoes
- Frances McDormand - North Country
- Rachel Weisz - The Constant Gardener
- Michelle Williams - Brokeback Mountain
Best Supporting Actor
- George Clooney - Syriana
- Matt Dillon - Crash
- Will Ferrell - The Producers
- Paul Giamatti - Cinderella Man
- Bob Hoskins - Mrs. Henderson Presents
Best Director
- Woody Allen - Match Point
- George Clooney - Good Night, and Good Luck
- Peter Jackson - King Kong
- Ang Lee - Brokeback Mountain
- Fernando Meirelles - The Constant Gardener
- Steven Spielberg - Munich
Best Screenplay
- Match Point - written by Woody Allen
- Good Night, and Good Luck - written by George Clooney & Grant Heslov
- Crash - written by Paul Haggis & Bobby Moresco
- Munich - written by Tony Kushner & Eric Roth
- Brokeback Mountain - written by Larry McMurthy & Diana Ossana
Best Original Score
- Brokeback Mountain
- The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
- King Kong
- Memoirs of a Geisha
- Syriana
Best Original Song
- "A Love That Will Never Grow Old" - Brokeback Mountain
- "Christmas in Love" - Christmas in Love
- "There's Nothing Like a Show on Broadway" - The Producers
- "Travelin' Thru" - Transamerica
- "Wunderkind" - The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
There you have it.
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Jan. 2nd, 2006 @ 04:10 pm
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Just to copy Juliana's.
Perhaps the most striking figure is that as of the time I've posted
this 209 kids at Elon have poked one another on facebook. Crazy.
( My school's most popular listings on facebook ) |
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