Oscars – Page 16 – This Had Oscar Buzz

175 – Hustlers

This is an episode about control. We’ve tallied up the votes for our Listeners’ Choice episode and in a landslide victory, 2019′s Hustlers emerged quite victorious. One of our favorite films of 2019, the film (based on Jessica Pressler’s expose in The Cut) stars Constance Wu and Jennifer Lopez as two exotic dancers who team up to drug and rob their wealthy Wall Street customers in the wake of the financial crisis. A highly fictionalized adaptation, the film is a nonstop ride of entertaining moments, all given an empathic treatment by writer/director Lorene Scafaria. Though we have much to say for the film’s many merits, its awards hopes hinged on a career-best Lopez in Supporting Actress, who ran the gauntlet of being nominated at every major precursor only to miss out on an Oscar nomination.

This episode, we discuss how the film’s subject matter was met with unfair indifference despite Scafaria’s thoughtful approach and the film’s surprise $100M box office success. We also dive into its stellar performances outside of Lopez, Scafaria’s directorial career, Lopez’s career from critical praise to romcom star, the film’s deftly handled morality, and “so wait a minute actresses.”

Topics also include Lopez’s notorious 1998 interview with Movieline, the film’s perfect use of pop music, and “we love you, Gary!”

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174 – All is True

In 2018, perhaps the only audience that noticed All Is True were our belove AARP Movies for Grownups awards. The film is directed by and stars Kenneth Branagh as William Shakespeare returning home to his underappreciated wife and daughters after his Globe Theatre burned to the ground mid-production, reopening wounds of unspoken family tragedy. The period drama was given an extremely quiet qualifying release that earned Judi Dench (playing Shakespeare’s wife Anne Hathaway) a Supporting Actress win from M4GS before a May release the following year received scarsely more attention than the previous season’s.

This episode, we discuss the surprisingly compelling film, and Branagh’s career as a director of spotty and often forgotten films and his chances this season with his autobiographical film Belfast. We also take a deep look at the history of the Movies for Grownups (including their wildest, but most correct call for Supporting Actress), Ian McKellen as a possible victim of a closed Oscar window, and the growing understanding of qualifying releases.

Topics also include frontrunners for this year’s M4Gs, abandoned M4Gs categories, and what if Dench played the other Anne Hathaway.

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173 – My Blueberry Nights

With the release of Criterion’s retrospective box set, film lovers have been revisiting the work of living master Wong Kar-wai. But this week, we’re going to be talking about his least celebrated (and one omitted from that treasured collection). His first film in the English language, My Blueberry Nights is an episodic movie about a woman who mends her broken heart by finding herself on the road, leaving behind a could-have-been romance with a pie shop man back in New York. For his lead star, Wong Kar-wai selected adult contemporary sensation Norah Jones, a few years after wracking up a bundle of Grammys and selling millions of albums for her debut Come Away With Me. But opening the 2007 Cannes Film Festival was high positioning for this slighter effort from the maestro, and largely unkind critical notices left them film as more of an afterthought once it finally saw a US release almost a year later.

More of a fascinating failure than the fiasco its reputation would lead you to believe, the film meanders through its chapters where Jones plays opposite three stars at transitional stages of their careers: Jude Law post-2004 laughing stock omnipresence, Rachel Weisz post-Oscar, and the beginning stages of Natalie Portman Doing A Voice. This episode, we get into the 2007 Cannes Film Festival (and its charming poster), the work of Wong Kar-wai, and Jones’ Grammy success.

Topics also include Starbucks CDs, the Roku City screensaver, and how this is one of the few movies where David Strathairn is NOT hot.

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172 – Money Monster (with Katey Rich)

Our Thanksgiving tradition continues this year, with Vanity Fair’s Katey Rich joining us as a guest, this time to talk about quickly forgotten prestige thriller Money Monster. Premiering out of competiton in 2016 at the Cannes Film Festival to middling reviews but embarrassing no one involved, the film stars George Clooney as a cable news financial guru, Julia Roberts as his beleagured producer, and Jack O’Connell as the man holding their studio hostage after the show’s financial advice ruins his life. Directed by Jodie Foster, the film is a strange artifact of the immediately-pre-Trump moment that misunderstands the Occupy Wall Street and fails to capitalize on its star power.

Despite the presence of the headliners reuniting post-Ocean’s, the film is perhaps most interesting as a footnote in the few years when Jack O’Connell was poised to be the next big thing. We look back at O’Connell’s roles while also discussing Catriona Balfe’s role here as Belfast primes an awards run this year, Clooney’s few acting roles in recent years, and Foster’s directorial career.

Topics also include Pat Kiernan NY1 movie cameos, Dominic West getting meme-ified, and the ghosts of Flora Plum.

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171 – The Mighty

This week, we are talking about Sharon Stone and The Mighty. Adpated from the young adult novel Freak the Mighty by Rodman Philbrick, the film follows a burgeoning friendship between a silent giant teenager Max (Elden Henson) and a King Arthur obsessed neighbor with a rare metabolic disorder Kevin (Kieran Culkin). But the film’s real awards play was a Globe-nominated Stone, inhabiting the role of Kevin’s mother Gwen shortly after her first nomination for Casino. However, a firmly locked Supporting Actress race left Stone fighting for fifth place, ultimately missing out to Rachel Griffiths in the equally forgotten Hilary and Jackie.

The film was one of Miramax’s many titles in 1998, and shifted to a awards lower priority once Shakespeare in Love and Life is Beautiful began to take off. This episode, we discuss the film’s very broad performance from Gillian Anderson, James Gandolfini joins our Six Timers Club, and we look at back at Oscar’s love for “suffering parent” roles and other adjacent tropes.

Topics also include the shared loving gaze of Redgrave/McKellen/Fraser, Lara Flynn Boyle in Wayne’s World, and Cincinnati cinema.

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170 – Holy Smoke (with Jourdain Searles)

We have two exciting returns this week! First, entertainment writer and Bad Romance co-host Jourdain Searles is joining us once again. Second, we return to the work of Jane Campion, this time for 1999′s divisive and sexually charged Holy Smoke. The film premiered in competition at the Venice Film Festival with a high pedigree: Campion reuniting with her The Piano castmember Harvey Keitel, with Kate Winslet center stage two years after Titanic. But the film was Campion’s most subversive yet, and its sometimes farcical approach to the subject of one woman’s forced deprogramming from getting involved in a cult made for a poor critical reception in the very crowded movie landscape of 1999.

This episode, we talk about our excitement for The Power of the Dog and look back at our favorites in Campion’s filmography. We also discuss Winslet’s post-Titanic career of daring, interesting character roles that led up to an underwhelming Oscar win with The Reader and Pam Grier’s brief performance in the film after her Oscar snub for Jackie Brown.

Topics also include the 1999 Best Actress race, Neil Diamond needle drops, and Harvey Keitel’s butt.

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169 – Suspiria

“Volk” intensifies this week, because we’re talking about Luca Guadgnino’s 2018 Suspiria remake! Diverging greatly in style and story from the Dario Argento original, Luca Guadagnino followed up his Oscar success with Call Me By Your Name with this riff on witches, post-WWII Germany, feminine power, and the art of dance. Guadagnino’s mounting pedigree stirred some to expect the film as a potential awards play, even after the first footage of the film had some losing their lunch at CinemaCon. Starring Dakota Johnson as a novice ballerina from a strict religious upbringing and Tilda Swinton in three wildly divergent roles, Suspiria ultimately proved to be too violent and esoteric for Oscar, even leaving critics divided over its very unique approach to genre.

This episode, we look back at a remake that was almost directed by David Gordon Green and starred Natalie Portman, and the rise of Dakota Johnson as a stealthily great actress. We also discuss Swinton’s Oscar win for Michael Clayton and the attempt to hide her prosthetic-aided performance as Lutz Ebersdorf as Dr. Josef Klemperer.

Topics also include “that’s not true, Ellen”, Thom Yorke’s original score, and Amazon’s patchy history as an Oscar player.

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168 – Never Let Me Go (with Tara Ariano)

This episode, Extra Hot Great co-host Tara Ariano returns to us to talk about another much-requested film, 2010′s Never Let Me Go. An adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro’s incredibly lauded science fiction novel, the film stars a post-nomination Carey Mulligan opposite Keira Knightley and breakthrough Andrew Garfield as clones raised for the sole purpose of harvesting their organs for the regular people of society. The film was the sophomore feature of Mark Romanek and adapted by Alex Garland, and met a cold to mixed reaction on the festival circuit before quickly exiting theatres and the awards race.

The film still has its ardent fans (including a few of us on mic), but also fell victim to Fox Searchlight’s shifting awards possibilities in its muscular slate of films that year. We look back at Romanek’s reception in comparison to another music video director’s sci-fi-adjacent Oscar film, certain fall festivals going in and out of favor as perceived Oscar launch pads, Rachel Portman’s original score, and Mulligan’s roles between nominations.

Topics also include Andrea Riseborough facial blindness, “Gay or Just Nice to Me”, and Bad Art Friend.

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167 – The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou

We’ll get you a red cap and a speedo for this week’s episode, becuase we’re talking about Wes Anderson for the first time with The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. The follow-up to Anderson’s first Oscar-nominated film The Royal Tenenbaums put Bill Murray front and center in the year after Murray almost won Best Actor for Lost in Translation. But critics were far less kind to this film than Anderson’s previous efforts (it remains his only rotten movie on RT), and voters looking to reward Murray for his previous loss were met with a more caustic and off-putting character than hid lauded “sad Murray” era.

This episode, we look back at how Murray was shockingly snubbed for Anderson’s Rushmore and the ebbs and flows of Anderson’s career in relation to audience/critic perceptions. And since no performance in a Wes Anderson film has ever landed an Oscar nomination, we pick our top 5 performances in his films we think are most deserving.

Topics also include Seu Jorge’s David Bowie covers in Portuguese, whether or not Ray is appropriately categorized as a musical, and which performance in The French Dispatch has the best chance at a nomination.

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166- To Die For

Nicole Kidman finally joins the THOB Six Timers Club this week with what many consider her first major critical success. In the same year that Kidman had a major blockbuster in Batman Forever, the actress joined forces with Gus Van Sant for satirical Joyce Maynard adaptation To Die For. The film starred Kidman as the fame obsessed (and possibly murderous) Suzanne Stone, earning the actress raves and a Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Comedy/Musical, but stiff competition among lead actresses left the film as a headscratcher of an Oscar snub in hindsight.

To Die For was also a rebound for Van Sant from the disastrous Even Cowgirls Get The Blues, and we look back at his career balanced between big successes and major misfires. We also talk about Illeana Douglas’ burst of great supporting roles in the 1990s, the emergence of tabloid and talkshow culture, and the 1995 Cannes Film Festival.

Topics also include the late work of screenwriter Buck Henry, Goldie Hawn in Protocol, and what the plot of Vanessa Redgrave-starrer A Month By The Lake might be.

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