Enough of Trump! I'd Rather Talk Oscars

We're getting closer to the 2017 Academy Awards, where a non-Broadway musical could win the big prize for the first time in nearly 60 years and some fans fear the show won't be interrupted by another pointless fight between Matt Damon and Jimmy Kimmel.

I've seen all but one of the Best Picture nominees but I am hoping to see Hacksaw Ridge eventually when it's finally on Redbox along with Manchester By The Sea next week. It's pretty clear La La Land will take the big prize because of its direction and story, and Emma Stone. Her win at the BAFTAs pretty much gave her enough of an edge over Natalie Portman to win.
Viola Davis has Supporting Actress locked down thanks to Fences. I still say she should have won for The Help, but this is her year.
Mahershala Ali, who I first knew from Luke Cage, should get enough to win Supporting Actor, mainly due to his win at the Screen Actors Guild Awards. That category has been interesting because Aaron Taylor-Johnson got the Golden Globes but isn't in the Oscars, while Dev Patel won at the BAFTAs for Lion. Patel could upset, but Ali may win out.

Actually of all the films I've seen, Lion had the best story and acting that could give La La Land a run for its money. So could Hidden Figures, the story of some unknown space travel pioneers who finally got their due. Manchester By The Sea has great performances from Casey Affleck and Lucas Hedges in a story about a family trying to recover from several tragedies. Moonlight gives an interesting story about an African-American boy dealing with his own sexuality and drug abuse within his family.
Still, feel-good movies always get the edge from the voters. That's why La La Land will take Best Picture, Actress, Director and maybe Original Screenplay along with a few tech awards. Manchester could upset in Original Screenplay.
Adapted Screenplay is a very tricky race, but my guess is Hidden Figures will win as a reward for the story and the cast. I still wish Deadpool was in there, even if it would have lost. Finally giving any comic book movie at the Oscar table is important, especially if it's some of the major awards. The ghost of The Dark Knight is still there.

As I said, Emma Stone will get Best Actress for La La Land over Natalie Portman, mainly due to her win at the BAFTAs. Casey Affleck has been unstoppable, despite Ryan Gosling's charm and ability to learn the piano. He'll at least sing the Best Song winner, "City of Stars."
I also saw Elle with Isabelle Huppert as a rape victim who is determined to find who did it...and even when she does, the story takes a lot of different turns. To be fair, the movie has a different outlook because it was made in France. Also, Huppert's character has a very interesting past, and makes some unusual decisions. It's enough to get a Golden Globe, but that's it.

Best Animation did look like a lock for Zootopia, aka How We Wound Up Electing Trump. With Kubo and the Two Strings winning at the BAFTAs, that movie's story may give it some momentum, but not enough to win.

Let's hope for an entertaining Academy Awards, even if the guys from The Man Show are involved. If there's ever a time for Kimmel to prove he's in the league of Johnny Carson in more ways than one, it's Oscar night.

Checking Out Hidden Figures and a Mourning First Lady

As movie award season kicked off early, I decided to check out three movies over the past two days. One was a second watch of Rogue One, which became the #2 movie of 2016. To be honest, I wanted to see it just for the final scene where the plans for the Death Star were given to someone who could wind up providing hope. If you've seen the movie, you know who it was.



I also just had to take a look at Natalie Portman's portrayal of Jackie Kennedy in Jackie. However, it wasn't in midtown or downtown Reno. It was at a shopping center eight miles away that was just as luxurious as the Galaxy Theater in Sparks, but the cost was cheaper thanks to Cinemark's Tuesday discount.

It was worth the extra drive because the movie takes a different look at Jackie that surprisingly no one thought of before....how she dealt with the assassination of her husband including her grief and the planning of his funeral. In between the days after his death, the movie shows her classic tour of the White House that was televised in 1962, and an interview she has with an unnamed reporter played by Billy Crudup. Through this, we see the many faces of Jackie Kennedy:  First Lady, grieving widow, and a woman facing an uncertain future.

Portman has Jackie's breathy voice and mannerisms down pat it's really spooky, but two scenes that were done very well shows how deep Portman got in this role. The first is seeing Jackie changing her clothes several times, as if things hadn't changed, while "Camelot" was heard on the record player. The other was her extensive discussions with a priest played beautifully by John Hurt.

Peter Skarsgard was also very good as Bobby Kennedy, who tries to keep the government and her sister-in-law together. This is especially true when he suggests she march at the procession by the side of her husband's coffin. There's also a great scene where she's angry at Bobby because she wasn't told Lee Harvey Oswald was killed.

It looks like the Best Actress races, which will really get underway when the SAG Awards happen late this month, will be a showdown between Portman and Emma Stone in La La Land. What the Oscars need is a really competitive race, and this could be it.



Meanwhile, there was a movie that certain people couldn't remember at the Golden Globes. It's about the secret behind NASA's success in getting man into space:  three African-American women whose stories weren't even known until recently.

Just after I saw Hidden Figures, I overheard two men who thought it took more than 50 years to reveal the story because the women were sworn to secrecy, almost like the Bletchly code-breakers in World War II. Actually, it's just that, according to Margot Lee Shetterly (who wrote the book that became the movie), the women just did their job and didn't seek fame.

Still, the sagas of Katherine Gobel Johnson (Taraji P. Henson), Dorothy Vaughn (Octavia Spencer) and Mary Jackson (Janelle Monae) should be told because it showed that women did have a role in the space race. Johnson's skill as a mathematician got her a building named after her, Vaughn helped NASA transition to computers, and Jackson became one of the first female and African-American engineers.

The movie is smart to divide the girls' stories into three pieces. They're all working moms, but Katherine tries to impress the others with her calculating skills, Vaughn goes to great lengths to figure out the new IBM system and make sure she and her fellow calculators aren't out of a job, and Jackson is determined to break the color line to have the right to take college courses in an all-white school to advance. It's great to see Mary tell a skeptical judge it's in his best interests to let her in those classes.

Some people may dismiss the movie as a cross between The Help and The Right Stuff, but co-writer and director Ted Melfi makes sure to get the story right, even talking to Johnson, and producing an inspiring movie. Henson is really good as Johnson, who is shy at first but lets her numbers do the talking. However, she does get some resentment from the guys, including Head Engineer Paul Stafford (Jim Parsons). Thanks to support from the head of the Space Task Group (Kevin Costner) and even John Glenn, she proves her worth.

There's some talk Spencer may get in the Supporting Actress race, but her role as Vaughn is too similar to her award-winning role in The Help. Henson is actually a little better, especially when she tells her boss she can't be at her desk because the building has no "colored only" restrooms. It's no wonder why it just edged Rogue One for first place last weekend.