Oscar 2014 - Directing

I finally got to see the full list of movies nominated for directing. It's actually a relatively weak year on this side, at least compared to others, again with a nomination which leaves a bit behind the rest. But, let's cut the chit-chat and dig in ...

"American Hustle": Is by far the best directing by now from David O. Russell, at least between the three movies that earned some prizes (the other two being "Silver Linings Playbook" and "The Fighter" .. and I could add also "Three Kings" to the list from the extra I've seen). To be concise, style-wise, it's a movie that's more Scorsese-like than Scorsese's nomination below. And probably that's why is the first which makes me think that this guy may have something to show after all. Because until now I didn't see any reason for the recent years' wave of appreciation.

"Gravity": Is again the nomination that sort of detaches from the rest, as the most probable winner here. Although I did like more how "Children of Men" was driven by the same Alfonso Cuaron, I have to admit that here the directing is, besides the technical part, what manages to give an edge to this movie. It's why despite a short weak story, despite minimal character development, despite a script which doesn't do much else than to throw at you the same metaphor of "no matter what, there is hope" each ten minutes (until you're not able to call it a metaphor anymore), somehow you still don't reach for your watch to see how much is left until it ends ( otherwise said, the construction manages to keep up also the illusion that "there is hope" for something more in the movie too ;) ).

"Nebraska": As opposite compared to the first nominee, this is the weakest movie directed by Alexander Payne among the three I've seen by now (the other two being "Sideways" and "The Descendants"). Not necessarily weak as directing, or bad, the movie is ok overall. But it shows that compared to the rest, the script is written by somebody else. Payne still does what he knows to do best = the place, the context, the medium - Nebraska, has a "role" which is comparable in intensity with the rest of the characters. And still, without subjectivity since I didn't get there :), Hawaii ("Descendants") or California Wine Valley ("Sideways"), "acted" a bit better than the one here.

"12 Years a Slave": It's the first movie directed by Steve McQueen I've seen, not that are too many besides shorts by now. And that explains probably my feeling that it's good, but there's room for better (and I'm convinced we'll see better). It's probably the only film this year which might produce a surprise here, although objectively put the level is on par with "American Hustle". Subjectively though, it might leave a better impression - it looks like a movie that's hard to drive from beginning to the end: 12 years from a slave's life don't seem to have much variation. And, as I've said it before, that's probably the reason why we have some lengths, although in a decent amount to keep you still with the eyes on the screen, but also feel a bit .. the 12 years.

"The Wolf of Wall Street": The story of the out-of-common life of a former broker (Jordan Belfort) is brought to screen by Martin Scorsese in a long movie. Maybe a bit too long ( I can start some ironic comparison with the 12 years above, but I'll hold from it ;) ). The story itself clearly deserved a movie, and it got a movie. But more about this, next time. Anyway, the directing is not among Scorsese's best unfortunately. It's a bit too unpolished. The second half is good, but the first is way, way too extended, and I guess a director's cut, which should be a effectively a "cut" could make it much better by removing at least half an hour. That might explain somehow, that among 8 directing nominations by now, this is just the 2nd (since '88 - "Last Temptation of Christ") when Thelma Schoonmaker, the usual Scorsese's editor, doesn't get a parallel nod for editing ( checked fact ;) )

Oscar 2014 - Production Design & Set Decoration

It's hard to find conclusive clips for this area, so I've tried to go for B-Rolls. Which are not actually intended for showing what gets into production design/set decoration, but in any case they give a sufficiently varied perspective taken while shooting the movie. More important, they do it without the post-processing = VFX, editing, etc, so you can relatively clearly see what was "on the set". Unfortunately, B-Rolls are not available for every nomination, but let's see what we got ...

"American Hustle" takes us to a early '80s New Jersey. Stopping in restaurants, hotels, an airport landing track and others. Nice, and surprisingly varied for the movie topic, but still a bit average among the nominees.

"Gravity" might be good on the technical side, but the nomination for production design & set decoration is a bit for free. Ok, let's accept it for production design, but set decoration ... really ? At some point I remember I've seen a clip showing how Sandra Bullock's helmet floating inside the space pod, was added over a scene. I don't know how much is CGI, and how much is real stuff in the next clip, but I couldn't find another one to show more of an interior.

"The Great Gatsby" is a re-adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel. I ignored this movie for a while, since I remember that the older version starring Redford bored me a lot when I've seen it = long, long ago. What's ok in Baz Luhrmann's movie, is that it manages to keep your attention on a romance story which after all is quite simplistic. And much of "the catchy factor" is represented by the visuals, mostly the impact of the environment = a very colored and flamboyant New York of the 20's. I think this is quite predictable as Oscar winner, despite the fact that's the only of the nominees here that's not present in many other sections.

"Her" is a romance between a guy and ... his operating system. A movie that I wanted to skip. As somebody working in IT research for who the idea itself, objectively, is somewhere between "freaking weird" - "highly dangerous", I already can set a reason. Subjectively, I guess I would have some others too ... I did see the movie after all because it simply has too many nominations this year to totally ignore it. I'll keep my focus on the topic. For other stuff, there is time ... The movie is set somewhere in a near future when the technology will presumably permit stories like this one. The film is probably the nicest surprize I've ever had for production design/set decoration from a production that doesn't have many opportunities to offer you much = relatively contemporary as story time, and without exotic locations. The environment in the movie adds a lot to a feeling of .. I don't know how to name it .. existential claustrophobia in "open spaces". Because, if you take separately the space in which the action develops, it's apparently a very relaxing environment. Not for the main character though, but that's in the story = not now ...

"12 Years a Slave" ends the nominees list. If "Gravity" wouldn't have been here, I could put this one at the bottom. Even so it's not far from there. We have indeed a time piece, in which everything has to be in place (and it is) as it was in the XIXth century. However, nothing out of common or that wasn't seen before.

Oscar 2014 - Film Editing

I'm definitely not in my best shape for writing (I know, I'm saying this a lot, but now's really without the ""). So, I'll just do a lightning pass through the editing section, to get it checked on the list.

"American Hustle" is the first of the nominees. Alphabetically. A story about corruption (more or less) from the New Jersey's beginning of the '80s. I didn't know how did this movie get on this category up to watching half of it. After that, I started to get the reasons. Solid ones. Even so, it was still after one full half ...

"Captain Phillips" is probably the only movie that can snatch the editing Oscar from "Gravity". One reason is that this is the best aspect of the entire movie. And since the editing Oscar tends to get to either action films, or real life adapted stories .. with a lot of action ... To be fair, the movie is quite nicely cut, and the editing is after all the hidden reason why you're still caught by what's going on, knowing the ending from the beginning ...

"Dallas Buyers Club" is another movie that I don't know how it got here. There are some nice cuts, especially in the beginning, or towards the end, but not much in the rest. As a general summary, we have the real story of a HIV patient who managed somehow = mostly self-medicated, to survive for 7 years after an estimation of 30 days to live. Overall, I found slightly radical the movie position ( ironically that I'm writing this today :) ) despite the fact that generally speaking I'm quite on the same line of thought. But let's develop another time ;) ...

"Gravity" again ( I'm starting to lose count ... ) I have to say, and admit that it deserves it, has the best chances for an Oscar here. It's useless to get into the deep details. I prefer the clip below. Although not as long as the full 17 minutes opening scene, it should be enough to show how good are woven the individual takes in order to create the impression of a continuous flow ...

"12 Years a Slave", which ends the nominees list, is another real story, of a free guy who got enslaved for 12 years. Although it may sound ironic - and it's not, the main merit I see in the editing of this movie is that the 12 years seem to be 12 years. Meaning that we have a bit too many lengths .. but I guess the script is the main part "guilty" for this. I couldn't find something very relevant for this topic, so I'll just go for the clip below ...

Oscar 2014 - Cinematography

I'm writing ... in a pause on writing an article on IT security for a conference where I don't think I'll meet the deadline. To add some extra to the time crisis, I'm also struck by a horrible migraine since this morning. Ergo, don't expect much coherence in what follows. And consequence 2: I've decided, as never before, with apologies for my laziness, that instead of searching for clips from every movie, to choose a very well done mix on the topic, with some comments on which I agree 90% or more. Credits go to fandor.com :

Now .. if the clip was not enough, and you have patience to get extra bored by me, let me throw a couple lines on the subject ...

"The Grandmaster" is yet another movie about Ip Man (or Yip Man depending on the orthography). Yet another = there are no less than 5 (five) movies made in China in the last 6 years which have this main character. Sorry .. who's Ip Man ? Apparently somebody quite important in the world of kung-fu schools, who people say that had also Bruce Lee as student at some point. This movie is directed by Wong Kar Wai, one of the most appreciated Chinese filmmakers, nominated quite often at Cannes. For who knows what we're talking about, there's probably no surprise that "The Grandmaster" is not a "kung fu movie" by definition. Is a melancholic chaos typical for WKW, hard to follow, and even more hard to understand if you see it one small part at a time as I finally managed to do. Even so, it's hard for me to give any circumstance for how "dis-articulated" the production proved to be. It's quite far from better titles by WKW as "Ashes of Time" or "2046". About the cinematography, it's indeed the best part of the movie, but even here, despite the fact that pleases the eye, it's a bit too much excess of gros-plan and slow motion. Overall it looks good, but still Phillipe Le Sourd (the director of photography) is not Christopher Doyle (again, check out "2046" or "Chungking Express"). And that rain is a bit too artificial ...

"Gravity" gets again in the top Oscar contender position, especially given the fact that since "Avatar", this award was unfortunately given too the most visual spectacular movie, and not really for the best cinematography. The comment in the clip is very objective on the question of where does cinematography start and where does it end ? Well ... we still have something called VFX, and we still have something called film editing, and for me there are three different things. Anyway, unlike "Avatar" where the Oscar was given as well as you could give a cinematography Oscar to an animation (by the way, the winner - Mauro Fiore in his whole career by now had only one nomination except "the blue movie" and that on something called DVD Exclusive Awards), in "Gravity" at least we have cinematography. There are close-ups, the camera is playing with the shadows, you get to see super-angular framing, we have out of the ordinary tracking shots. I have to admit, that besides all the VFX it has, "Gravity" has also an excellent cinematography, although in my opinion not the best one this year. Still, Emmanuel Lubezki should've got the Oscar anyway for "Tree of Life", and lost against "Hugo", so ...

"Inside Llewyn Davis" is the main reason (besides the lack of time) for which I preferred the clip above. The second scene presented there perfectly completes what I was saying last time when I wrote about sound mixing. You can feel the winter ... If there is to be any surprise this year, it will come from here (and I'd really like to happen). Bruno Delbonnel has his own well defined style as director of photography, which you can also recognize in "Amelie", in "Un long dimanche de fiançailles" (probably the most close to what we have here), and even in "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince". Maybe I'm a bit subjective, because from all that gets into cinematography I'm most fond of chromatic filtering, but this movie has more than that. I'll repeat myself, but the second scene presented in the clip, especially in the context where is set in the movie is supported in a very powerful manner by the light & shadows work for obtaining a sensation of "getting lost in life" ...

"Nebraska" is a movie shot in black and white. The first using this technique directed by Alexander Payne. I'll talk more about the movie another time (there are plenty of occasions left) since I'm quite on the rush now. What can I say about the cinematography ... Phedon Papamichael is the usual director of photography working with Payne, and the cinematography wasn't exactly the best part of the movies, by now. In this case we have an exception, especially due to some wide shots. Unfortunately the clip above doesn't present a panorama with a moving car on a U.S. interstate highway, which is probably the most significant scene visually. In any case, since "Schindler's List" I don't think I've seen any black & white movie to emit serious claims for an Oscar. This year neither ...

"Prisoners" is a movie I've written already before, so I'll end quickly, especially since I completely agree with the clip's comment that is a bit on a different league than the others. It's quite far actually from the best of Roger Deakins = "Shawshank Redemption", "The Reader" or "True Grit". I start to believe that the Academy has a sadistic pleasure to just nominate this guy (also last year without much chance for "Skyfall") considering he is for the 11th time on the list, and again quite unlikely to win. There's still time though, maybe next year ;) ...

Oscar 2014 - Sound Editing & Mixing

Ok .. We're getting to more complicated stuff. As usual, I guess here's a bit confusing what gets into editing and what into mixing. And again, I guess I should re-re-rewrite the description of apples, pears and why both are fruits. But I'm awfully lazy at the moment, so I'll go for a link that explains quite nicely the background of the sound in a movie: Film editing stages - Sound . I guess that still doesn't clarify the Oscars separation though, but at least lets me skip some definitions :). So .. the work on ADR, dialogue, effects and the foley part as far as I know gets (mainly) into editing. The location mixing or live recordings & the re-recording mixing or the final track gets (mainly) into .. guess what, mixing. "Mainly" means that the line between one and the other is quite thin. In rough lines, everything starts with the recordings during filming (= mixing department), it goes to editing that sound and adding effects (= editing department) and ends with mixing & tuning the final track (= mixing department again). Obviously, in all this flow there's enough interaction between the various stages. Well, it seems I sort of re-explained it again after all ... Let's get to the nominations, where thanks again to the very comprehensive clips from Soundworks Collection I can write less, and leave more experienced people to talk more ;)

"All is Lost" is nominated only on sound editing. What we have here is a movie about a guy stranded in the middle of the Indian Ocean after his yacht hits a .. drifting container, probably lost by a cargo ship. It's a sort of "Life of Pi", but with a stronger sense of reality. The movie stars only one actor (Robert Redford). Consequence 1: the dialogue (or monologue) is minimal. Consequence 2: the sound (what's beside the dialogue) has a major impact in the movie. I can even say that it could be considered as the second actor. It's so nicely worked out, and it contributes a lot to the sensation of isolation and pressure that doesn't predict anything good, from the cracks in the damaged boat to the far thunders forecasting a storm, and many more. As personal choice I would pick this for sound editing, and if "Gravity" loses at any of the two categories I hope it's this one and "All is Lost" will be the reason.

"Captain Phillips" is another movie set in the Indian Ocean, but on a bigger boat. Which is attacked by Somali pirates. Which results in gunshots. Which results further in nominations on both of the sound categories. I wasn't very impressed, and on the mixing side I don't think the movie has much chance. On the editing I can notice a tendency of the Academy to get easily convinced by the bullets swish (e.g., "The Hurt Locker" or "Zero Dark Thirty"). But even for this "quality" we have another contender that might fit even better the profile ...

"Gravity" has the strongest chances to nail the Oscars on both sound categories. On editing we have plenty of effects and ADR to get the job done ( "there is no sound in space" :) remember ? and not a very decent one in the studio mics either when Sandra Bullock panics with an astronaut helmet on ;) ). And even if on editing maybe we can get a surprise, I find hard to believe that "Gravity" can lose the Oscar on mixing. The final track for me is the best part in this movie after VFX. I didn't watch it in a cinema with Dolby Atmos (one of the latest surround environments) for which was done as I got from the clip, but in a normal hall I can say that it already sounds far more than ok.

"The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug" is probably the "fill up" nomination for both sound sections. Obviously, it's not bad. However, on editing, besides Smaug's voice I didn't notice much, and for the final impression on mixing the credit goes more to Howard Shore's score than anything else, so ...

"Inside Llewyn Davis" is the latest movie by the Coen brothers, following a week in the life of a folk singer from the '60s. One without a home, dropping from a friend's house to another, and getting in conflict with most of them = the result is a sort of "surreal life" passage, but a bit lighter than other Coen films as "Barton Fink", "The Man Who Wasn't There" or even "A Serious Man". Folk music is quite far from what I listen, but I really liked the mixing, for which the movie got the nomination. If I would remove "Gravity" from the category, this one would clearly stand as the option of choice. In particular, we have a sequence at some point, somewhere on a highway, during night. You can feel the winter .. and 50% of that is caused by the sound mix. About the rest, we'll talk when we get to cinematography ;)

"Lone Survivor" closes the series of nominations both on editing and mixing. Neither one, nor the other impressed my ears, and I don't see much chance of winning any of them. But still, we have again lots of bullets swishing by the voters ears, in a movie which tells the real story of a war mission failed in Afghanistan, so who knows ... In any case, it's the only movie for which I couldn't find (or maybe I didn't have the patience to look enough) a decently conclusive clip. Even for the trailer, I had to get to the 2nd version to have something a bit more close to the current entry topic, given what you can hear from the movie track ...