With just a day left to go until the big show, I’d like to bet you’ve had enough Oscar predictions – especially considering quite a handful of the biggest honors are considered locks. Well, I offer you something a little different; not who I think will win, but who I think should win.
Best Picture: The King’s Speech
Every Best Picture nominee achieves some degree of filmmaking prowess, otherwise, they wouldn’t be nominated in the first place. Rather than pick apart the elements and compare the contenders by the writing, directing acting, etc., this category comes down to something far simpler, yet something tougher to achieve – poignancy. Which of these films moved me most? Toy Story 3 left me in tears, 127 Hours with a knot in my stomach and Inception with my head spinning, but it was The King’s Speech that was overwhelmingly rousing. This is such a special film for so many reasons and those reasons will likely be rewarded in the other categories, but in terms of the Best Picture Oscar alone, my fingers are crossed for The King Speech based on its incredible ability to connect my heartstrings to those of the characters in the film and tug on them all the way through.
I’ll Be Pissed If This Wins: Inception
Inception may be endlessly interesting and responsible for countless summertime debates, but an Oscar for Best Picture? Come on. On top of that, even after all the discussions, who can say they really understand the movie through and through? It was fun while it lasted, but Inception’s infinite twists and turns aren’t enough for the film to stand the test of time as well as its contenders.
Click here to read more.
Have you ever laughed at a joke, thought about it again and get angry at yourself for laughing at something so cheap, demeaning or derogatory? If not, go check out Hall Pass. When you’re not cringing at the lack of originality and wasted talent, you’re giggling at cut-rate gags that have no chance of earning a laugh the second time around. The fact that you could only get a viewer to laugh by having a character sneeze and poop at the same time is nothing to brag about.
When you’re about to watch a sequel and you can barely remember what happened in the first film, you know you’re heading for trouble. Well, while there’s certainly trouble to be had in writer-director Sebastian Gutierrez’s Elektra Luxx, just like its predecessor, Women in Trouble, there’s something keeping you from completely dismissing this sloppy mess of a film – the characters.
In an industry obsessed with making movies about friends with benefits, alien invasions and haunted houses, who’s got the guts to make a movie about a 
What’s with Adam Sandler lately? We get the unfunny missed opportunity with‘Grown Ups’ last summer, and now ‘Just Go With It?’ What’s happening to the guy who used to deliver comedy after comedy that’d keep us either laughing or disgusted (in a good way) all the way through?
Let’s say aliens really do attack Earth one day; who do you think will defend us? Tom Cruise? Probably not. Jeff Goldblum and Will Smith? Not happening. It’s the army and not the army Mars Attacks!-style. We’re talking dead serious real soldiers with intense weaponry setting off some massive explosions and, based on my chat with Neil Brown Jr., that’s who the unearthly visitors go head-to-head with in Battle: Los Angeles.
When you think Battle: Los Angeles, odds are, you think of Aaron Eckhart. Well, Eckhart may play the leader of a platoon of soldiers going into battle against invading aliens, but it’s be worth your while to get to know some of the Staff Sergeant’s men.
Movies about characters with super powers are inherently alluring. There’s something extremely fun about watching someone walk around knocking villains off the face of the earth. Oddly enough, what can kill the enjoyment of films like this isn’t shoddy effects or lack of reason, rather simply not believing in itself. If the characters aren’t entirely into the story, how can an audience be? I Am Number Four has just about every problem in the book, but it’s the major disconnect between director D.J. Caruso, his cast and the material that makes the film a downright waste of time.
If you’re a fan of animated feature films, odds are, you’re familiar with the work of Kelly Asbury. Not only has he had a hand in a number of fantastic productions including The Nightmare Before Christmas and Kung Fu Panda, but both of the films he directed, Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron and Shrek 2, were nominated for Best Animated Feature at the Academy Awards. Now, Asbury is out and about promoting his third directorial effort, Gnomeo & Juliet.
Who better to star in a swords and sandals movie than Channing Tatum? He’s basically built for the role. However, just because he looks good in Roman soldier garb doesn’t mean he can act like one. In fact, after The Eagle, it’s impossible not to recognize the fact that Tatum might not be able to act at all. Then again, all the blame can’t fall on this film’s star. Not only is director Kevin Macdonald to blame for the incredible amount of missed opportunities, but so is writer Jeremy Brock for adapting Rosemary Sutcliff’s book into a screenplay that, to a point, permits the stars to have the emotional range of a block of wood.