And the Oscar went to…

As Oscar nominees start showing up from my library hold list, I am confirming again I have not been missing much. Two got a 3 and one a 2.9. The rest have been marginal or worse. A couple foreign films are still to come.

Call the Midwife(Season Six) – 2017 (3.1). The series resumes in 1962 with the birth control pill coming on and characters growing, struggling and adjusting and a new midwife entering. The same quality of writing and acting prevails.

Life, Animated – 2016 (3.0). A young man with autism is followed in this documentary as he begins life on his own, supported by his parents and brother. Home movies show his childhood and animation helps explain his feelings, which ties in neatly with the fact that memorizing Disnet animated movies was what opened the door for him to communicate with his family and the outside world.

A Man Called Ove – 2015 (3.0). Adapted from a popular Swedish novel, this drama with comic overtones centers on an aging curmudgeon who has always been a bit OCD and now seems to be angrily depressed. A young Swede and his Persian wife pregnant with their third child move in across the way and add new problems for the old man while we await his personal reconciliation. The back story of the man is told in flashbacks which are well blended into a good script which holds attention and is well paced. Fine direction and effective acting round out an enjoyable film.

Dark Angel – 2017 (2.9). A movie about the first British female serial killer sounds like a downer, but it is so well acted by Joanne Froggatt (appealing maid Anna of Downton Abbey) that it is compelling to watch this woman struggle with adversity by working her wicked schemes knowing all the while as we do that it is only a matter of time before she has to pay the price.

Hidden Figures – 2016 (2.9). Three African American women mathematicians who worked for NASA starting in the early days of the space race are celebrated in this biopic. The discrimination they faced based on race and gender is realistically shown and may seem overstated to those too young to have experienced those days. Because their story has not been as widely publicized as it deserves, it might seem their importance to the space mission is a bit overplayed in this movie. Apparently it is not, but even if it were, after what they put up with and what they accomplished, they deserve all the honors they can get. The fine performance of Taraji P. Henson seems to have been unreasonably overlooked.

The Son – 2017 (2.9). This original AMC series tells a fictional story of how a white Texan grew from a teenage captive of the Comanche to a ruthless land baron. Like the Godfather, the man has sons whom he brings into the family "business" applying a self-serving brand of frontier 'justice". Indians, Mexicans and any whites who get in their way are in peril. Ongoing flashbacks to the time of captivity are integrated at first in a mildly annoying way but soon their presence becomes more welcome in filling in the back story. Artistic license has the Comanche speaking English in a probably false vernacular but it is more useful to express nuance than the grunting trade jargon that would likely have really been employed. The season moved along with consistency and sufficient history and drama to justify giving a second season a look.

Dalya's Other Country – 2017 (2.8). Four years of following a Syrian girl who moves with her mother from Aleppo to Los Angeles to attend an all-girl Catholic high school affords lots of opportunity to get to know the girl as she adapts. In this documentary we also get to know some about the mother and a little about the brother who had come to LA for college and the father who separated from the mother and visits a few times from Turkey where he lives. We barely meet a second brother and some extended family and though we see people with whom the family interfaces in LA, such as classmates of the girl, we never actually hear from them during the interactions or by interview. This is a very intimate portrait which could have had broader effect if we could have heard froma few more people.

Elle – 2016 (2.8). Director Paul Verhoeven and star Isabelle Huppert agree this French movie adapted from a novel is not any specific genre and the primary female character is driven by a need not to see herself as a victim. The resulting film does defy easy classification and the woman does defy victimization even as she herself avoids feeling guilt for any people she may have hurt. The audience ends up not particularly liking or disliking her, but just coming to learn how she sees and accepts herself.

Fences – 2016 (2.8). Movies made from stage plays are often too static and wordy on the screen, especially when the screenplay is written by the playwright. This film is no exception. The story of a black garbage man in Pittsburgh portrays a bitter man with children by three different women, married to the long suffering mother of the middle child and especially hard on their son together. Denzel Washington stars and makes his directorial debut. Understanding how a man got to be who he is does not necessarily engender sympathy or respect for the result. Indeed, the more the man demands respect, the less likely he is to deserve it.

Lion – 2016 (2.8).  Tens of thousands of young children become homeless every year in India and this movie tells the true story of one of them, a five year old boy who wandered on his own for two months before being taken to an orphanage and adopted by an Australian couple. His life seems idyllic, especially in contrast with another boy adopted from India by the same couple. That child appears to be suffering from a type of PTSD as a result of abuse, perhaps in the orphanage. Two decades later the contented man starts having flashbacks and after a struggle decides to search for his birth mother and two siblings. The cinematography is evocative and several adult performances receive acting nominations, but the actor who plays the five year old delivers a wonderful performance that hooks the audience.

Hacksaw Ridge – 2015 (2.7). Desmond Doss was the first conscientious objector to win the Congressional Medal of Honor, for his heroic action as a medic in WWII rescuing numerous soldiers from behind enemy lines on Okinawa. Director Mel Gibson used his kind of clichéd script and lots of his trademark blood and gore to tell this version of the story. The script has lots of holes in it, such as new enlistees wearing their uniforms before going to boot camp and being able to keep their curly locks throughout training and their drill sergeant serving on the battlefield with them. Granted the carnage on Hacksaw Ridge was horrific, but way too much time was devoted to that in this movie, whereas the real heart of the story, what Desmond was like as a person and how he lived his values was relatively short changed.

Hell or High Water – 2016 (2.7). The direction, cinematography and acting are good in this movie about contemporary depressed small town Texas. The script moves us along toward the two bank robbing rancher brothers escalating their crimes and coming to the point of having to answer to the wise old Texas Ranger about to retire. But then the ending goes a little soft, prompting a view of the special feature interview with the screenwriter who reveals that the movie he wrote is not the one that was just viewed. Apparently we were supposed to feel some ambivalence or nuance or even sympathy for these desperados. Even if the script had gone more into the back story to generate some understanding, the violence these men perpetrated on innocent victims could not be justified.

La La Land – 2016 (2.7). Holding the Best Picture Oscar for a couple minutes before a mistake was discovered has analogies to this musical drama, which starts as a musical and then morphs into more of a drama. The story is nothing new, an aspiring actress and a male jazz pianist searching for more creative gigs hook up then take different turns in their careers and are separated. Will they reunite or does she choose someone else is the teaser of the ending.

Arrival – 2016 (2.4). The space aliens have landed and all humankind is understandably concerned. Enter an American woman who is an expert linguist and she will manage to figure out why they have come. In the process she learns a new way of seeing the time of our lives and the minds of the movie viewers are suddenly blown open. Well alright sir.

King Charles III – 2017 (2.4). Apparently impatient for Queen Elizabeth II to die, someone wrote a play about a plot to force son Charles to abdicate. Delivered with pseudo Shakespearean iambic pentameter, this tasteless drivel, filmed as a teleplay, is shamefully disrespectful to a most respectable woman.