An Education's Staccato Buzz

Oscar buzz is a funny customized thing. For some films it simmers continually, sauteeing the film until it's golden. Other films ride choppy waves feeling alternately like very big deals, empty threats or troubled half successes. More often than not, especially for the small film without marquee names, the buzz tends to be intermittent, giving off staccato sparks fueled only by those traditional pit stops on the road to Oscar: festival premiere, early reviews, trailer, actual release, precursor trophies. It's this track that An Education, the story of a teenage girl eager to begin her adult life in 60s London, will obviously be working since its star, Carey Mulligan, is currently "unknown" in the larger sense (but probably won't be by the end of the year).

One gets the sense that people will keep forgetting about this movie, or shoving it to the minor buzz side as each of the Baity behemoths arrive with massive P&A budgets and traditional Oscar names fueling their hype. After reading reviews and watching this comprehensive trailer (I'm guessing they're giving the film away but, given its genre, the experience will all be in the nuances of the telling which you can't get until you're in the theater anyway) I'd say it's best not to underestimate it.



Picture (yes) Director (maybe) Adapted Screenplay (of course) Actress (duh) Supporting Actor (Alfred Molina, yes), Supporting Actress (hmmm). Some people love Rosamund Pike in the movie but there's also the perennial joy that is Emma Thompson is what looks like an ace bit part (bit parts do the trick every so often). Mulligan's mom is played by the underappreciated Cara Seymour, whose face is exceedingly familiar to moviegoers who seek out interesting films, even if her name isn't. Her filmography is damn impressive: American Psycho, Dancer in the Dark, Adaptation, Gangs of New York, Birth, Hotel Rwanda, The Savages, etc...

About Peter Sarsgaard's Oscar chances as the charming rake who beds the high school girl? I REFUSE TO DISCUSS IT. I've become paranoia that my love for Sarsgaard has been a jinx upon his Oscarability. It's not OK to live in a world where his Shattered Glass performance didn't register with film industry professionals as one of the year's best. Six years on and that one still aggravates [note to self: blog fodder, 'ten worst snubs of the decade']. What on earth does Hollywood have against the Sarsgaards, anyway? His wife also can't get arrested by the Academy despite being one of the best and the most electric actresses in the world.
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The Battle For War Machine

JA from MNPP here, curious what my fellow TFE readers think about the recasting of Terrence Howard as Rhodes (who's probably set to become War Machine at some point in the sequel-ized future) in Iron Man by one Don Cheadle.

I come at this from a slightly different perspective than the general consensus I think, since I wasn't much of a fan of Iron Man at all. Which is weird because I'm always clamoring for less serious-mindedness when it comes to comic book adaptations, but then this one came along with boozer/user antihero Tony Stark and it didn't sit right with me. Chalk it up to an occasional distaste for RDJ - I liked him in Tropic Thunder, but found him to be, well, kind of boring here - as well as a really vivid, I-still-feel-it-in-my-gut hatred of the movie's lame-ass climax, which was... lame. Really really lame. Like, on a scale from Treat Williams in The Phantom to Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight, Jeff Bridges makes Nick Nolte looks like Alfred Molina! (A cookie to anyone that follows the gist of that sentiment.)

All that's besides the point here though, since we're talking Terrence Howard... whom I barely remember in the flick. Which I'm taking as a good thing, since I normally hate Howard in everything, and since I don't feel anything regarding his performance in the film it must mean he gave an alright, less mannered than usual performance. Right? Course then went on to express the insane notion that everyone was holding their breath for the favorite superhero ever War Machine to show up... humility, thy name is not Terrence Howard.

But I love me some Don Cheadle. Buck Swope, y'all! (Look at him porning it up in that picture over there! I never knew he had that in him.)

So the place I stand with regards to this news is an ambiguous one. It does sound like The Powers That Be treated Howard kinda unfairly if he's to be believed. But on the other hand, Don Cheadle! I just don't know. What about y'all?

And on a seperate but related note, doesn't it suck that we've got two black actors in one superhero-movie role while it's otherwise basically a total wash with respect to minorities in these movies?
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Monday Monologue: Doctor Octopus

I can't stop thinking about Iron Man today. It's but 25 days away. Why am I so susceptible to spandex movies (that don't star Nicolas Cage)? On that fanboy note, let's start summer early by jumping into the exposition filled panels of comic-to-film super-baddie origins, well one in particular --Doctor Octopus in Spider-Man 2

Doctor Octavius: Ladies and gentlemen, my wife Rosie and I would like to welcome you this afternoon. But first before we start, has anyone lost a large roll of 20 dollar bills in a rubber band? Because we found the rubber band.

[polite laughter]

It's a terrible joke but thank you for coming.

Today you will witness the birth of a new fusion-based energy source: safe, renewable energy and cheap electricity for everyone. And now let me introduce my assistants.

I love Sam Raimi's directorial sense of humor. This is a great sick joke. A grimace, to a flesh puncture (with gross sound effect) to a crowd grimace. And it's over in a second but Raimi always gets the details. None of the extras in bad superhero movies ever get this involved in a scene.

His "arms" are intimidating. A little HR Giger/Alien like, yes?


Unfortunately they never break out into song like the other movie beastie they remind me of, Audrey II from Little Shop of Horrors, or rather its backup singing buds.


Maybe the upcoming Spider-Man musical (god help us all) will rectify that.

Anywayyyyy, the good doctor continues enthusing about his project. Alfred Molina plays him all kind and accomplished/nerdy, winning you over before he gets villainous.

These four actuators were developed and programmed for the sole purpose of creating successful fusion. They are impervious to heat and magnetism.

These Smart Arms™ are controlled by my brain through a neural link. Nanowires feed directly into my cerebellum allowing me to use these arms to control fusion reaction in an environment no human hand could enter.

Bitchy Cassandra [interrupting the good doctor]: Doctor, if the artificial intelligence in the arms is as advanced as you suggest, couldn't that make you vulnerable to them?

Doctor Octavius: [smugly] How right you are.

Which is why I developed this inhibitor chip to protect my higher brain function. It means I maintain control of these arms instead of them controlling me. And now on to the main event. Give me the blue light, Rosie. Precious tridium is the fuel that makes this project go. There's only 25 lbs of it on the whole planet.

Ooh, talk dirty to me Octavius. But don't call me Rosie.

I seriously love nonsensical origin stories and scientific sounding crap. It's really too bad that the Fantastic Four were not fantastic at all on the big screen because what's better than a straight-faced explanation of how cosmic rays can permeate the hull of a spaceship and cause rubbery, invisible, fiery, or stony mutations depending on the personality of the humans they collide with? That's absurd and, well, fantastic. The only thing that could make that story better is if the cosmic rays had some ultra specific name instead of just being generically "cosmic"

But back to this particular experiment. There's a containment breach (of course there is!) and the good doctor soon becomes a very bad doctor once his inhibitor chip is destroyed and his creation begins to control him. I hate it when that happens.

Spider-Man 2 is the greatest superhero movie yet made. So very rewatchable. Perhaps that's why they thought they could just keep making the same movie? However good Iron Man's trailer suggests it might be, Jon Favreau and team will have a tough job measuring up. Spidey set the bar so high. Thankfully for them, the disappointments of 3 and the later bow of The Dark Knight should make it smooth sailing for Tony Stark and his armored alter ego to be showered with money and probably even lauded by the critical establishment once they kick off the summer movie season on May 2nd.

Can't wait to see it, but I don't expect they'll be able to top Dr. Octopus even if Jeff Bridges is playing the baddie. He's one our very best actors and you can tell he's evil in Iron Man because he's bald.


All baldies are bad in the movies unless they're played by Patrick Stewart or Bruce Willis. It's Hollywood's shorthand for evil, their sick way of justifying Nicolas Cage's horrifying plugs whilst making 40% of the adult male population feel bad about themselves.

This post is brought to you by Nathaniel's thinning hair shaved head and lost comic book collection.

Now Playing: Vampires, Missing Children, Grief

L I M I T E D
Out of the Blue -Busy Eomer (aka "Karl Urban") stars in this film about a gun collector who killed thirteen people in New Zealand.
Reservation Road -Joaquin Phoenix & Jennifer Connelly lose their son in a hit and run. Mark Ruffalo is to blame. The trailer, one of those tells-you-too-much affairs, makes it look like a one note slog. But perhaps that has unintentionally done us all a favor. If they show everything in 2 minutes do you really need to spend another 100 with it when word is dismal?
Wristcutters: A Love Story -A comedy set in the after-life. Heathers successfully mined black comedy from teen suicide but degree of difficulty with that feat is a 9.9 so good luck Patrick Fugit (Almost Famous) and Shannyn Sossamon

W I D E
30 Days of Night -(based on the graphic novel) They only come out at night. But what if it's always night? Josh Hartnett's Alaskan town is overrun by vampires. Things will get very bloody. As someone who has actually spent time above the arctic circle in the winter, the concept alone terrifies me. It is already freaky enough when there's no daylight where there outta be ... even without a vampire invasion [shudder]
The Comebacks -sports movie spoof. I guess the timing is right
Gone Baby Gone -Ben Affleck's directorial debut stars his kid brother Casey Affleck (an excellent actor: see also Gerry and the current The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford for proof) in a crime drama about a missing girl in working class Boston. It doesn't remind you of Mystic River on accident. It's also adapted from a novel by Mystic author Dennis Lehane. Reviews are strong. Can this film emerge as an Oscar contender? Stay tuned

Rendition -Jake Gyllenhaal has a troubled conscience. Reese Witherspoon has a missing husband. Meryl Streep has a dark side. Throw them all together for a tortured political drama. Get mixed reviews
Sarah Landon and the Paranormal Hour -This is billing itself as the first movie in a series of mysteries. No one told them that episodic detective work is the bread and butter of the small screen?
The Ten Commandments -For people who hated The Prince of Egypt but still feel the need to see a cartoon version of the beloved Bible story? The animation looks as cheap as the CG type that you sometimes see in locally produced TV commercials and they've condensed the whole story into 88 minutes. Famous actors eager for a quick buck (Ben Kingsley, Christian Slater, Alfred Molina) provide the big voices. I don't want to see any Moses movie unless Anne Baxter is there to drool on him "Oh Moses, Moses, you stubborn, splendid, adorable fool!"
Things We Lost in the Fire Susanne Bier (Brothers) directs Halle Berry as a new widow and Benicio Del Toro as a recovering junkie in this drama. I thought the plot sounded similar to Brothers (top ten list 2005) --apparently it's not as much as I feared --but Brothers is being remade. I hope for this Danish director's next project, she steps out of her comfort zone and really surprises.

P L U S
Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas in 3-D returns after a successful mini holiday run last year and I guess so will I (had fun last year and I do love the stop motion).

Sean Penn's Into the Wild takes its magic bus to hundreds of new locations this weekend so you can see what the fuss is about. If the AMPAS voters enjoy it Hal Holbrook's late in film supporting role is a real tearjerking contender. There's also 100+ new screens for haunted western killers and troubled white rich kids in India. And speaking of troubled kids... The Seeker: The Dark is Rising has just set a dubious record: the largest theater drop in history. It's losing 2,338 theaters only three weeks into it's run (10 bucks says this becomes a stand alone --franchise begone)

What are you seeing this weekend?