The King's Speech and Oscar Best Pic Check

Despite being a bit slow in parts, I really liked The King’s Speech. I’ve been listening to some talk about how some critics don’t think it’s worthy of being nominated for best picture – some find it a bland biopic and not edgy enough to be cool. It is probably one of the safer choices for best picture, but I think it’s a worthy choice. The King’s Speech portrays King George VI (Colin Firth) whose brother abdicated to marry his love, the divorcee Wallis Simpson. The King, or Bertie, as he is called, suffers from a stuttering problem and his wife (known as the Queen Mum or Queen Elizabeth’s mother) searches for a new answer to his speech problems encountering Lionel Logue, an Australian speech therapist, who challenges the king by not only making him recite tongue twisters but by forcing him to face some of his past childhood indignities. I liked Geoffrey Rush’s Logue, but I though Colin Firth is so moving in this story. The scene where he breaks down in front of his wife is heartbreaking.

Oscar season is upon on us and while the Oscars is very imperfect awards show, I, dork that I am, assiduously follow all the buzz surrounding it. I think it’s dumb that there are now TEN nominated Oscar Best Pictures, but that doesn’t make me want to see ALL or most of them any less. The winner is usually a Best a serious film with big emotions and big stories. – we do big things – I must be channeling Obama. Anyway . . . Here’s my quick look at the other nominated pictures:

Black Swan – saw it, thought it was trying too hard
The Fighter – hope to see
Inception – action flick – so don’t want to see but maybe should get over it
The King’s Speech (see above)
The Kids Are All Right – saw it, loved it, don’t think it will win best picture, a little too snappy and cutsey (in parts)
127 Hours – want to see it, but yikes, do I really want to watch a guy getting his arm severed for two hours?
The Social Network – saw it, liked it a lot, best picture material? Not sure- I think it’s too snappy like Kids Are All Right but more serious
Toy Story 3 – won’t see it, heard it’s great, but animation is not my thing
True Grit – want to see it
Winter’s Bone – saw it, liked it for the great acting by the young new star Jennifer Lawrence and a spooky John Hawkes

Cairo Time and Howl

Cairo Time
A story about a woman (Patricia Clarkson) who travels to Cairo to visit her husband who works for the UN. When she gets there, he is in the Gaza Strip, so she tries to visit this ancient city on her own and then with the help of her husband's friend (Alexander Siddig) an Egyptian. I liked visiting the city by watching this movie, and I liked the portrayal of the woman alone in a foreign, challenging, city. But the movie moved so slowly that it took some effort to pay attention to.

Howl
James Franco is so interesting to watch that he makes this documentary-like film watchable. And this topic is interesting: the case against Lawrence Ferlinghetti's publishing of Allen Ginsberg's controversial poem "Howl". All of the dialogue, trial transcripts, letters, etc. from the film come from real life. In addition, the whole of "Howl" is read throughout the film. So if you want a literary dip into history, you might enjoy Howl.

Three movies: the good, the really bad, and the so-so

The Special Relationship

The Special Relationship is about the relationship between Tony Blair and Bill Clinton from when Blair started his campaign to when after Clinton left office. The two leaders interact through phone calls, dinners with the wives, and cabinet meetings. Dennis Quaid plays Clinton and not for the first time Michael Sheen plays Tony Blair. (He also played Blair in The Queen). These two 90s power brokers have a brotherly relationship where Clinton acts as big brother who feels free to hang on up on his little bro mid-sentence after offering some sage advice. When Blair rebels in the media and takes Clinton to task about the US’s involvement in Kosovo, the relationship becomes less trusting but does not seem to completely sever. The portrayal of the wives is also interesting --Hope Davis as Hilary gives a thoughtful performance. This political movie examines a key moment in history. It's interesting and well acted.

Robin Hood

Robin Hood has an original start with a realistic take on the Robin Hood myth. It even has a cute romantic relationship with Cate Blanchet as Maid Marian and Russell Crowe who have to marry for convenience—the two of them making a very smart and good looking couple. But somehow it went awry about half way through the movie. It seemed like the second half of the movie was one big extended vicious battle. Robin Hood should be more about clever comrades who are amazing marksmen having jovial fun in the woods, but this Robin Hood seemed like it was trying too hard to be different by showing the “real” Robin Hood. I think it just got too big for its britches.

Sex and the City II

As a fan of the TV show and since I kinda liked Sex and the City I, I wanted to see this movie but knew it was going to be dumb – but, believe me it was dumber than I could have imagined. Dumb dialogue with bad puns (esp. from Samantha – she actually said, “Laurence of my labia” ehhh. Ridiculous outfits. Cliched Arabs. Just dumb. It makes you wonder how some smart people ended up making a movie that dreadful.

Fair Game and Black Swan

Fair Game

Fair Game tells the story of Valarie Plame (Naomi Watts) and her husband Joseph Wilson (Sean Penn) – she, a CIA agent and he a former ambassador and expert about the country of Niger where the Bush administration is claiming Iraq is getting uranium from. After Wilson writes a letter to the New York Times’ claiming that the Bush administration is beefing up the facts surrounding the weapons of mass destruction claim in Iraq, his wife is then outed as a CIA agent – a fact that some of her family members had no idea about and, according to the movie, put some Iraqis working for her at risk of not being able to safely escape Iraq. Of course, one can question the veracity of the events in this movie which, of course, is always a problem when movies are based on real events. But judged solely as a movie, I found Fair Game to be very compelling. I came away from the movie feeling indignant about the way the presidency used its power to ruin reputations and distort reality – I guess, Duh, but it is a reminder of what can happen when one, “speaks truth to power.” If you like political movies, like I do, I think you would enjoy Fair Game.

Black Swan

Another cringe worthy movie for 2010. Luckily I had a friend who could fill me in on what was happening when I blocked the screen with my hand. Black Swan tells about a mentally disturbed ballerina Nina played by Natalie Portman who prepares to dance the lead in Swan Lake. Her director Thomas (a dance dictator and the most “fun” of the movie) wants Nina to get in touch with her bad side, the black swan side. Nina needs no help with this since she’s nutty already, as is her mother, by the way. This movie had some interesting plot twists and some cool scenes (especially some of the ending’s dance sequences), but its downfall for me was the movie’s pure humorlessness. Portman’s character is mousy and dour in the beginning of the movie all the way through to the end. She’s just not a very complex or interesting character – other than being just plain balmy.

Love and Other Drugs, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo series

Anne Hathaway and Jake Gyllenhaal fall in love, get nude A LOT, try to cure one of them of Parkinson’s, break up, YOU CAN’T HANDLE MY ILLNESS, and then … well, you know what happens. The unexpected thing about this movie, and no it’s not the Parkinson’s, is the fact that this movie is getting pretty ok reviews and some critics are even touting it as a substantial movie rather than a mediocre romantic comedy, which it is – in my opinion.

I finally saw the last of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo movies. I only read the first book, so I think that made me enjoy no. 2 and 3 more. The first two I saw on Netflix instant play, ok, but the quality was only so-so. I saw the third one in the theater and, as with all movies, that made the experience so much better. The Lisbeth is great in these movies and the stories are intriguing. I’m not a Steig Larson nut, like a lot of people, I know. I’m not really a mystery nut either, so that may explain why I not crazy about these movies, but I believe these movies are worthy versions of the books which is no small feat.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
The Girl who Played with Fire
The Girl who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest

Morning Glory

You can’t help but compare Morning Glory to Broadcast News, the latest newsroom movie with Rachel MacAdams and Harrison Ford. Of course, this movie does quite live up to Broadcast News which was about serious news, but focused on Holly Hunter’s character, Jane. But the juxtaposition between serious news and fluff is still at work in Morning Glory, a movie about a slight morning show that rivals the Today show that is losing in the ratings. Rachel McAdams’ character Becky Fuller is given the task of raising the ratings of this silly show. Her co-anchors are played by Dianne Keaton (always funny!) and Harrison Ford, who she persuades to join morning TV even though he has only ever done serious news. The conflict between perky Becky and grave Ford’s character, Mike Pomeroy is one of the funniest things about the movie. Also, I loved the way McAdams bounced through movie with a cheerleader’s glee. I think she’s great in this movie and is what makes the movie worth watching. The downer of the movie is that fluff wins – the movie seems to celebrate the truly stupid of TV. Anyway, Morning Glory’s no Broadcast News, but pretty fun. Will it get added to some of my all time favorite newsroom movies (see sidebar?), probably not.
Favorite Newsroom Movies:
Broadcast News, Who's the devil?
His Girl Friday, Oldie but a goodie
Zodiac, spooky but good
Shattered Glass, answers the question What if I made it up?

Waiting for Superman

I had to mull over David Guggenhiem’s (the Inconvenient Truth guy) Waiting for Superman for a while. Waiting for Superman is about our nation’s failing public school system and while it asserts that charter schools are not THE answer, they may be an answer for some. And the other answer is better teachers -- it heavily puts the burden on teacher performance as a way to save our nation’s schools.

As a documentary intended to capture the audience’s attention and persuade them into a point of view, it definitely did that – it really makes you think, argue, wonder but also fear that you are being strongly manipulated. Guggenheim even uses cute, worthy, poor children to create the central dramatic tension of the movie. The resolution of the movie is when we find out if these kids get into some of the successful charter schools and are not forced to return to their squalid, worthless schools.

But is Waiting for Superman a credible source for information about the state of our educational system? I’m not so sure. Yes, there are some terrible schools in a lot of our major cities, and yes, a lot of teachers should be fired who aren’t because of the power of teacher’s unions, but is that alone going to fix the schools? And what percentage of schools need fixing?
Diane Ravitch in the New York Times wrote a scathing article slapping around Waiting for Superman and taking offence at the burden that teachers were given for fixing the problem of schools. Instead, she points out that poverty and other ills are more to blame:

“…research shows that nonschool factors matter even more than teachers. According to University of Washington economist Dan Goldhaber, about 60 percent of achievement is explained by nonschool factors, such as family income. So while teachers are the most important factor within schools, their effects pale in comparison with those of students’ backgrounds, families, and other factors beyond the control of schools and teachers. Teachers can have a profound effect on students, but it would be foolish to believe that teachers alone can undo the damage caused by poverty and its associated burdens.”

Hear, hear! Even as a teacher at a charter school, I feel the weight pressing upon me as if I alone am in charge of fixing all that ails schools. Believe me, we get this pressure enough of the time at school – now we are getting it in the media. And indeed the prevailing mantra about fixing schools is better teachers, better teachers! What’s wrong with those darn teachers? It’s enough to give one heart palpitations.