Oscarthon Year Three I: The Films

This had to be one of the better Oscars seasons in recent memory. Eight of the nine nominees actually deserved their spots in the Best Picture roster. (The subject of Les Miserables is hugely debatable.) Tomorrow, Cannes paves the way for another season, another 365 days in celluloid paradise.

We saw a record 85 films for our third Oscars marathon. That's far from complete (The Hunt, A Royal Affair, and Beyond the Hills, for example). Roger Ebert's gone, and no word, no phrase will ever be able to capture how sad that is. Who's to guide us now?

We had the visually vibrant (Prometheus) and the vapidly visual (Marvel's The Avengers); the eloquent (Lincoln) and the pretentiously eloquent (Cosmopolis). Compliance, which attracted walk-outs when it first screened at Sundance 2012, yielded from us a similar reaction. Holy Motors simply left us with stiff jaws.     

And then there were the ones that had us going, "What the flying eff is this?!" (For example, Berberian Sound Studio, or the sound department's successful coup d'etat against the rest of the crew.) 

Young talent was all over the place, but apparently, none of the American voters felt secure enough to nominate any of them for the major awards (Tom Holland in The Impossible, Logan Lerman in The Perks of Being a Wallflower). Could any of them, as February arrived, even remember what Perks was about, this movie that signaled hope for the increasingly hackneyed American coming-of-age genre? 

Speaking of February, that was a rather weak foreign language category. Sentimentality from War Witch over honest, manipulative fun from Headhunters? And Cloud Atlas - oh do we still weep at its fate, this biggest snub of the season. Did anyone even listen to its score? (That said, Life of Pi was undoubtedly the deserving winner.)

But our biggest, most skull-grinding issue concerned the Best Actress category - and why not? The fuss over Quvenzhane Wallis in Beasts of the Southern Wild as the girl of color when Rachel Mwanza in War Witch was just as ravishing, if not more. If Jennifer Lawrence could get recognized, why not the terribly understated Juno Temple, who turned in not one, but TWO brilliant performances (in Killer Joe and Little Birds)?

We fear Oscarthon Year 3 might be the last... for now, of course. Next year's priorities will presumably be quite different. But presumptions assumptions whatsumptions.

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GOODBYE FIRST LOVE ~YOUR SISTER'S SISTER ~ GINGER AND ROSA ~ HAYWIRE
THE GREY ~ FOR ELLEN ~ JEFF, WHO LIVES AT HOME ~ LIBERAL ARTS ~ LITTLE BIRDS
CLOUD ATLAS ~ SLEEPWALK WITH ME ~ THE SAPPHIRES ~ BURNING MAN ~ LORE
HELLO I MUST BE GOING ~ PIETA ~ FAREWELL, MY QUEEN ~ ANY DAY NOW ~ BROKEN
SOUND OF MY VOICE ~ OSLO, AUGUST 31ST ~ BARBARA ~ HEADHUNTERS

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