Twelve Days of Oscars, Day 11: Documentary Feature and Documentary Shorts

Let's talk docs!

I love documentary film. Love, love, love. This is one of my favorite Academy Awards categories, and I love seeking out and watching the nominated films, though they can occasionally be a little harder to come by than the feature fiction film noms. It has definitely gotten easier over the years, what with Netflix and online streaming and more web site accessibility to the filmmakers and whatnot. It was fifteen years ago that I really started paying tons of attention to this category, specifically with my boy Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine, and that very memorable Oscar win which happened the same week we (Dubya/"we") went to war in Iraq and I quit smoking and... that's a story I tell elsewhere.

Here, let's look at this year's nominees:

Documentary Feature:
Abacus: Small Enough to Jail, Faces Places, Icarus, Last Men in Aleppo, Strong Island

Documentary Short:
Heroin(e), Edith + Eddie, Heaven Is a Traffic Jam on the 405, Knife Skills, Traffic Stop

Unfortunately, I have been busy and scattered and unable to complete my Oscars checklist before today's ceremony, and the Documentary Feature category, despite being one of my favorites, is my least complete. I've only seen Abacus: Small Enough to Jail, which I really liked. It's about a family-owned bank in New York City that serves the Chinese immigrant community and was prosecuted in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis for, well, nothing to be guilty of, really, while "too big to fail" banks kept on doing their greedy illegal things. The family in Abacus... is so awesome and it's a really good documentary. I'm so lame for not having seen the others; I've been hearing about Faces Places for months, and I have Last Men in Aleppo recorded off of PBS but haven't found time to watch... I don't know if Icarus or Strong Island will be able to beat the appeal of voting for Agnes Varda's Faces Places, because she is getting an honorary Oscar this year and she would be the first woman to get an honorary and competitive Oscar in the same year. That would be such a fun fact. (Some men have done that, including Walt Disney.)

Documentary shorts, though, I saw. I love Heroin(e) a lot. It follows people, including three main women, dealing with the heroin epidemic and overdose crises in Huntington, West Virginia. The three women are helping heroin addicts in very different ways, some through official work, some through less official outreach, all through compassion, problem-solving, and tackling the problem in ways our societal systems are clearly not. You'll find yourself smiling so big while watching drug court scenes. It's great. But it's also a sobering reminder of how desperately this good work is needed. I would love for this short to win the Oscar.

Knife Skills also documents outreach to people who've had trouble, in this case former convicts who go through a culinary training program and work at a fancy restaurant, and the troubles that ensue along the way. Traffic Stop, very timely, is about a black woman body slammed to the ground by a cop during her traffic stop, and I think it does a really good job of exploring how that was preventable while doing more than issuing general platitudes. It was a strength of that film that you watch what happens and then later hear the cop describe what happened. He never speaks a lie or distorts the facts, really, and when you hear them from him perspective you're like -- oh my god. Yes, that's what happened. And why couldn't you - or thousands of other cops - in that situation make it better instead of worse? It was very interesting. I think a lot of people like Heaven Is a Traffic Jam on the 405, which has very little to do with traffic and is instead a weird, trippy examination of a traumatized woman who grapples with her life and issues, among them childhood and mental health issues, with art and other tactics. Edith + Eddie is a sad story - an old newlywed couple (like 95, seriously) separated when the daughter and legal guardian of the woman take over because she is judged not competent to make her own legal decisions. It wasn't as well made of a film, but was kind of like watching a long, fairly interesting news story.

All right, who's going to win?

Documentary Feature: I can't pick mine, because I'm ignorant here. I think Faces Places might win.
Documentary Short: I want Heroin(e).  It could be that or either of the Traffic ones though.

This is Oscar weekend, people! My own personal "New Year's Eve"-level festivity!

Twelve Days of Oscars, Day 10: Animated Feature and Visual Effects

I was very nearly thwarted on my way to seeing the film that is my pick to win one of these categories! Specifically, I was trapped in an elevator for a few minutes. (Not knowing, of course, as one never does when the elevator fails to function correctly, whether it would be a mere few minutes.) I was in the parking garage at the cinema and the elevator went to the ground floor where I needed to get off but the doors opened just an inch or so and then stayed stuck, unmoving, unable to be moved. I couldn't push or pry the door open from inside. It opened that inch or so and then just sat, stuck. Definitely not enough room to get any leverage or squeeze through. It was trippy, and I didn't feel particularly scared, as first of all I had my phone in my hand, and secondly there was an emergency call button right there on the panel, which I used to speak to a man who promptly sent help. But. My initial thought was that, oh no, I was now going to be late to see Coco!

Animated Feature: The Breadwinner, The Boss Baby, Coco, Ferdinand, Loving Vincent

Visual Effects: Blade Runner 2049, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, Kong: Skull Island, Star Wars: The Last Jedi, War for the Planet of the Apes

And indeed, after my elevator misadventure I was just a hair late getting into the Coco showing, but I could tell it was still the very beginning, with the kid voiceover narration introducing his family and his background. Let me just say, Coco is fantastic and deserves all the accolades it has been getting. Until that fateful elevator day when I saw it, I wanted Loving Vincent to win an Oscar. I absolutely adored Loving Vincent. It's unique and brilliant, and it's about my boy Vincent! (Van Gogh) The film is, as I understand it, painted. The process of painting animation is explained here, and it ends up looking really, really cool - Vincent's paintings, alive and fluid, telling his story. It was magical and I enjoyed it thoroughly. I was sure it deserved the Oscar. 

Then I saw Coco and thought - uh-oh. 

I really, really, really wish they could tie. It's the most fervently I've ever wished for an Oscars tie, or a tie for anything, really. 

Coco  is Pixar magic, and this year the magic tells a vibrant story set in Mexico Día de Muertos land. It's a boy who just wants to play guitar and release the music inside him who is thwarted by his family. I don't even want to describe the plot, because it's so much more than that, and the story hums and zips along as he wanders to the land of the dead. It's thrilling, touching, and spectacular. If it was any other Pixar film beating Loving Vincent, I'd be angry. If it's Coco, I understand. I seriously think if I was an Academy voter this year I would try to find one person to vote for one and I'd vote for the other, and encourage everyone I knew to do the same thing. 

As for the other nominees?  I didn't see The Breadwinner (really want to), and I really don' know that I'll make it to The Boss Baby, which is by all accounts terrible, and which is my absolute last priority on the checklist of all the nominated flicks. After the ceremony, I probably will lose interest  in checking that one off. I did see Ferdinand, and found it weirdly traumatic. It's about bulls who want to excel at bullfighting so as to avoid going to the slaughterhouse, who don't yet know that murder awaits them either way, but it's all talking animals/crazy characters/jolly times, so it's this kind of disconnect between the brutal truths of the plot and the song and dance and games you're watching. It was hard for me to experience. 

But Coco and Loving Vincent  are better films, seriously. 

As for the visual effects in otherwise "real" live action movies, I've seen three and a half nominees there: Blade Runner 2049, Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Kong: Skull Island, and half of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. Haven't yet got around to War for the Planet of the Apes - which, by the way, I hear is fantastic. But how are the visual effects? I don't know. Guardians...2's plot was so not interesting to me that even as I was watching (half) of it I kept forgetting what was happening, but it all did look really cool. Star Wars is, well, Star Wars. I might root for Blade Runner 2049 here, because I think that movie pulled off every visual thing that it did wonderfully. Kong: Skull Island was ridiculous, but enjoyably ridiculous, and you kind of believed that these various creatures and island things were interacting with the characters, so it's definitely no slouch in this category. 

What to do, what to do. 

My mother used to ask me, when I would rant about this or that person I "hated" (like, an annoying celebrity, or George Dubya, or whoever) versus some other awful person, "Whose elevator would you rather be stuck in?" It really makes you think. Like, Dubya is terrible, but you'd rather be stuck in his elevator than Charles Manson's, right? Whose elevator would you rather be stuck in, Anne Hathaway or James Franco? O.J. Simpson or Caitlin Jenner? Trump or Putin? Like such. Well, I really did get stuck in an elevator this week trying to see my animated features, and maybe that's a helpful way to make Oscar picks: which elevator would I rather be stuck in, one playing Coco on an endless loop, or Loving Vincent? 

That's actually quite hard, but it would probably be the latter because it's kind of calmer. What about a Blade Runner 2049 elevator or a Kong: Skull Island? Definitely either of those over the Star Wars: The Last Jedi elevator. 

Picks!

Animated Feature: PLEASE can we have a tie? I'll vote for my pick, Loving Vincent, and you vote for what I think will win, Coco. 

Visual Effects: Blade Runner 2049, I think, is my pick. And I think that either it or maybe the ...Apes will win? 

Previous Day of Oscar:
Day 9, Animated Shorts and Live Action Shorts

Twelve Days of Oscars, Day 9: Animated Shorts and Live Action Shorts

You know what's fun to do every year during awards season? Go see the nominated short films! 

This fun activity is available in more and more cities in recent years, as opposed to twenty years ago, when it seemed to be a much more obscure pursuit. I first started going regularly when I lived in New York, and have been happy to continue hitting up a theater to see them in Chicago. Definitely took time off from this hobby when I lived abroad. 

Animated Short:
Dear Basketball, Garden Party, Lou, Negative Space, Revolting Rhymes

Live Action Short:
DeKalb Elementary, The Eleven O'Clock, My Nephew Emmett, The Silent Child, Watu Wote/All of Us

The whole shorts-watching thing varies from year to year. Sometimes I like the animated a ton better, and sometimes the live action are better overall. I often LOVE the Documentary Short category, but we'll get to that another day. For now, let's think about fiction. 

And the first thing I have to say is that the Live Action Shorts this year were weirdly not-that-fiction like. I mean, they were fictional films, with actors, portraying a story but they were so reality-based, so ripped-from-the-headlines, and even so based-on-a-true-story for a couple of them, that they almost feel similar to the doc shorts in my mind. It's weird. DeKalb Elementary involves a man walking into a school with a gun. My Nephew Emmett is about a specific Emmett, namely, one who traveled from Chicago to the Deep South decades ago, and whose legacy we all now know about.  The Silent Child is about a deaf child whose parents haven't taught her sign language and now she's about to start school, and at the end credits it provides stats about hearing-impaired children. Watu Wote deals with tension between Christians and Muslims in Kenya and depicts an inspired-by-true-events experience on and around a bus in a hot-spot border region. The only one that's really a flight of fancy is The Eleven O'Clock, about a psychiatrist and a patient and some zany confusion. 

And they're all really good! Another tough race to call. 

The animated shorts were good this year, too, although one of them was overlong and didn't do as much for me, and that was Revolting Rhymes, which brings to (animated) life Roald Dahl's poems that parody/reimagine a few classic fairy tales - The Three Little Pigs, Red Riding Hood, etc. It went on and on and on and I'm like, OK, I get it, Roald Dahl was clever, but can this wolf stop talking now? I thought Garden Party and Negative Space were OK. Simple, intriguing, well-rendered. (Don't forget, y'all: animation and animated film aren't my thing to begin with, but I do enjoy the five shorts each year more than the five animated features, generally. That is, if I even get around to watching the five animated features. This year I've seen three.)  The two I liked best were Dear Basketball, Kobe Bryant's letter to basketball that was fantastic and is about his feelings toward his sport, his gift, his passion, and our (all of our!) need to do what we do best before our time is up. Make use of your talents, everyone! The day I saw the shorts, I declared Lou to be my favorite. It's Pixar, and we know they are at the top of their game. This one's content, though, was right up my alley: redemption!

So, let's pick: 

Animated Short: I want Dear Basketball or Lou. I think those are the two that might win, too. 

Live Action Short: Ugh...hmmm... I'd be happy with ANY of them winning, seriously. But I think I'm pulling for DeKalb Elementary. I think it will be that or The Silent Child, although My Nephew Emmett  could sneak in there. It's equally as topical as DeKalb Elementary. 

Yay, shorts! 

Twelve Days of Oscars, Day 8: Original Song and Makeup/Hairstyling

What do *these* two categories have to do with each other? you might be asking yourself. I think a better question would be, how intertwined is success in these categories with the greatness of the film? And my answer to that question is.... not at all.

Both Original Song and Makeup/Hairstyling (which was pretty much just "Makeup" until, like, five minutes ago, in the scheme of things) are these weird categories that can totally 100% merit an Oscar nomination while just being part of abjectly ridiculous, terrible films. And even if you're not hating on the films, subjectively, you can acknowledge, objectively, that they are not relevant to any part of the Oscar discussion other than these two categories. Seriously. This is a thing that happens. That is totally a thing that can, and does, happen. Let's check out the nominees:

Makeup/Hairstyling: Victoria and Abdul, Darkest Hour, Wonder
(and by the way, see, only three nominees? it's totes one of those weird categories that just does whatever the eff it wants)

Original Song:
"Mighty River" - Mudbound
"Mystery of Love" - Call Me By Your Name
"Remember Me" - Coco
"Stand Up For Something" - Marshall
"This Is Me" - The Greatest Showman

Seriously - these movies. The songs can exist separately from them, or they can be an important part of the movie, but they're never really, truly related to the greatness of the flicks like other categories are. OK, for a second I forgot that I even saw The Greatest Showman, by the way, which I absolutely did. It was weirdly entertaining and fun to watch, despite being objectively kind of not great, the exact opposite of The Florida Project, which was MISERABLE to watch but acknowledged by me to be "good" - or, well done, anyway. So, that song from The Greatest Showman was all right, I guess, but I didn't love it. Confession time: I haven't seen Marshall yet, so I'm not 100% equipped to judge. But. Is this category Coco's to lose? Or does "Mighty River" have a chance? I loved Mudbound. I'm cool with it winning here.What about the song from Call Me By Your Name, though? I don't know that that film, which I like lots, is going to win anything...

Clearly, another hard-to-pick category. Seriously, this is a category, though, in which I legit don't care if I don't check off seeing all the films; for example, when some Fifty Shades of  nonsense was nominated for Original Song a couple of years ago I was like, "NO thanks! Goodbye! Not completing the checklist this year!" Yeah. Don't care.

As for Makeup, do we all remember that Suicide Squad  won this category last year?

I haven't seen Wonder yet, but it could be triumphant here. So could Darkest Hour, I suppose, more so than Victoria and Abdul.. Since I haven't seen what they did in Wonder, I'm not really equipped to judge this small category.

So we'll leave Day 8 at that: two categories that include one-off nominees pretty much every single year and linger at the bottom of my priority checklist.

Will we get good performances of the nominated songs this year? What do you think?

Twelve Days of Oscars, Day 7: Lead Actor and Supporting Actress

The Academy Awards are nigh, my Twelve Days of Oscars are passing quickly, and it's time to face facts: I might not get to every single flick before Sunday. I'm still trying my best, as any true awards-season-obsessive-with-a-checklist would do, but in one of the categories we'll examine today, I have not seen all five of the nominees. Shocking, I know! 

Supporting Actress: 

Mary J. Blige, Mudbound
Allison Janney, I, Tonya
Lesley Manville, Phantom Thread
Laurie Metcalf, Lady Bird
Octavia Spencer, The Shape of Water

Lead Actor: 

Timothee Chalamet, Call Me By Your Name

Daniel Day-Lewis, Phantom ThreadDaniel Kaluuya, Get Out
Gary Oldman, Darkest Hour
Denzel Washington, Roman J. Israel, Esq.

The movie I have not yet seen is Roman J. Israel, Esq. I'm going to, seriously. Netflix is going to help me out here. This week, I hope, before the ceremony. But I haven't yet. And with sincere apologies to Denzel, who gave an absolute master class in acting with his nominated performance in Flight a few years ago, when he lost to Daniel Day-Lewis in Lincoln, really the only contenders this year are Day-Lewis and Gary Oldman. Everyone wants Gary Oldman to win his Oscar and he totally Churchill jowl and bark and sputter and leadershipped it up to do so. But Daniel Day-Lewis is "quitting acting" and people might want to give him one last Oscar. SO. 

Who deserves it? Hmmm. I mean, the performance by Gary Oldman is a tour-de-force. You are drawn into Darkest Hour and along you go, totally buying in to the drama, even though you know what's going to happen. On the other hand, Phantom Thread and specifically Daniel Day-Lewis' character in it are all kinds of weird. I don't know that it's his best work nor the best of the nominees this year. Timothee Chalamet and Daniel Kaluuya both did great, but I think their movies and roles were so well written and made that they didn't have as hard of a job, not that that strictly makes sense, but just as a tiny factor. Without having seen Denzel, I hate to pick in this category -- I like to know all the competition even when one is widely agreed to just have been honored to be nominated. 

I've seen all the Supporting Actress performances, though. Loved everything about Mudbound, including Mary J. Blige's performance. Enjoyed Allison Janney and Laurie Metcalf, who are the two that everyone has agreed are the actual competitors here. I love Allison Janney - love her - if I could see into my future to make the movie of my entire life right now I'd want her to play the future older version of me. And I thought Laurie Metcalf was great, but, once again, I don't understand Lady Bird to be revelatory in the way that everyone else understands it to be. Does that mean I'm pulling for Janney here? Maybe... I'm not pulling for Octavia Spencer in the weird weird weird The Shape of Water although I will say I liked her better in this than in many other roles I've seen her in (don't even get me started on how god awful The Help was). You know who was totally awesome? Who did what everyone says Laurie Metcalf did, subtly and powerfully pulling off her role? Lesley Manville, that's who. I really didn't care for Phantom Thread - like, at all - but if I'm rooting for one aspect of it, and that's Lesley Manville. Most of her role was performed sitting at dinner/breakfast tables, and yet she delivered this incredible and absolutely fully realized character. It was phenomenal. 

Supporting Actress: My pick is Lesley Manville, but I think it will be Allison Janney. 

Lead Actor: My pick is -- don't know -- maybe Oldman -- and I think it will be Oldman. 

**when I see Roman J. Israel, Esq. I will come update this blog entry as necessary **

Twelve Days of Oscar, Day 6: Cinematography and Directing

For a lot of people, such as, you know, the people who maybe AREN'T obsessed with making a checklist of Academy Award nominees each year and being sure to watch them all (except when the song from Fifty Shades of What-the-hell-ever gets nominated because just no), there are categories that are variously called technical, minor, obscure, other... and then are the "big" ones. Setting aside the obsessive ones among us (ahem) for a moment, it does sadden me to divide things up that way, number one, because the creative, proficient, talented human being who did the work in a "lesser" category is just as valuable as the one who did the work in a "major" category, and number two because sometimes the winner in a "lesser" category delivers the coolest or most heartfelt speech of the night while the actors just rattle off a list of names which is SO ANNOYING but not quite as annoying as playing people off in the first place and have I mentioned that shut the fuck up please about how "long" and "boring" the annual ceremony is because no one is forcing you to watch please thanks?

My point (and yes, I do!) is that today we are looking at what is routinely considered a "major" category, Directing, along with Cinematography, which would never be considered lesser by anyone who likes film but is maybe a bit less paid attention to among the plebes.

Cinematography: Blade Runner 2049, Darkest Hour, Dunkirk, Mudbound, The Shape of Water

Directing:  Dunkirk, Christopher Nolan; Get Out - Jordan Peele; Lady Bird - Greta Gerwig; Phantom Thread - Paul Thomas Anderson; The Shape of Water - Guillermo del Toro

Well, we have two overlappers, Dunkirk and The Shape of Water. And as much as I have been reiterating everywhere and to anyone who will listen (and some who won't) that The Shape of Water is goddamn weird and so not my thing, I actually will have zero problem if Guillermo wins here for Directing, because I think he actually perfectly realized his (weird!) vision, with both finesse and technical competence and creativity. Even though it's just not necessarily for me.  That said, I would not award Cinematography to The Shape of Water. I think Directing is pretty much the only category I'd want it to win. As for Dunkirk, it could get Cinematography, which was definitely an achievement and a half, involving as it did big battle scenes, airplanes, cramped boat quarters, vast waterscapes, and just all kinds of skill.

But. There were other fantastic Cinematography nominees, specifically Blade Runner 2049 and Mudbound. I am pulling for Blade Runner 2049 in other technical categories but I think I'm totally behind Mudbound here. I thought that movie was just wonderful.Well done, and really visually engaging - there were some simply gorgeous shots of farm vistas and, well, mud... which looked a lot cooler than you might think!  The more I think about that film, the more I want it to win stuff.

Also, I would be letting you down as an Oscar trivia aficionado and feminist if I didn't mention here the fun fact that Mudbound cinematographer Rachel Morrison is the first woman ever nominated in this category and WHAT THE HECK TOOK SO LONG?!

Additionally, a new CNN story reports that she at first didn't even want to win because she wanted her competition, Roger Deakins, who is nominated for Blade Runner 2049, to win; this is his 14th nomination and he still has never won. Basically, I guess we can all be happy if either of those films wins for Cinematography, eh?

Darkest Hour is a weird nom here and I think it's a non-factor...I guess all the filming in underground spaces was skilled work and all, but...I don't think it will win.

Now, if Guillermo del Toro does not win for directing The Shape of Water, another distinct possibility is Get Out's Jordan Peele. There is a lot of love for this film and for the somewhat out-of-nowhere-ness of it, and for the fun-fact-ness of  Peele being the first African-American to be nominated at once for Best Picture (as a producer), Directing, and Screenplay. I don't personally think Get Out is the best film of the year, but I am not opposed to a Directing win here... I just think I'm a tiny bit more behind Guillermo's (weird!) visionary directing achievement. This category is very interesting because it also has Greta Gerwig, and we all know (don't we, though) how damn rare Directing nominations for women are, sheesh. I feel the same about her Lady Bird achievement as I do about Peele's, I think - it was great. I won't be mad and throw things if it wins, but I just don't think it was necessarily the best. While this category did have diversity this year, and thanks for that Hollywood amiright?!, there are still a couple of white guys - the aforementioned Nolan and Paul Thomas Anderson. Here's what I think about PTA winning for Phantom Thread: no. Just no, please. That movie is also weird, but more annoying weird than bizarre-o visionary fable weird. I am well aware that there are people, including a person I live with, who vehemently disagree with me on this point. Don't care. I'm 100% not about Phantom Thread.

And so....
Cinematography: My pick is Mudbound.  I think it might go to her or to Blade Runner 2049...but, hard to call. It's not out of the question that The Shape of Water sweeps a ton of categories, so...
Directing: I'm good with Guillermo for The Shape of Water. I think it will be him or possibly Nolan or Peele.

My Previous Days of Oscar:
Day 5: Adapted Screenplay and Original Screenplay
Day 4: Supporting Actor and Lead Actress
Day 3: Production Design and Costume Design
Day 2: Editing and Original Score
Day 1: Sound Mixing and Sound Editing

Twelve Days of Oscar, Day 5 Redux: Adapted Screenplay and Original Screenplay

Well, I failed at delivering a Day 5 post on Day 5, so here we go, a dollar short, with a couple of my absolute favorite categories, the screenplays.

Adapted Screenplay:
Call Me By Your Name, James Ivory
The Disaster Artist, Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber
Logan, Scott Frank & James Mangold and Michael Green
Molly's Game, Aaron Sorkin
Mudbound, Virgil Williams and Dee Rees

Original Screenplay:
The Big Sick, Emily V. Gordon and Kumail Nanjiani
Get Out, Jordan Peele
Lady Bird, Greta Gerwig
The Shape of Water, Guillermo Del Toro, Vanessa Taylor
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, Martin McDonagh

Oh, I do love me some writers and writing. Let's think, shall we, about which of these writerly persons will take the stage on Oscars night for a moment of glory, and, it is hoped, a clever word or two in their brief allotted speech time (broadcast director: stop playing off the winners! folks at home: stop whining that the ceremony is too long! ain't no one forcing you to watch!)

Regrettably I have not read ANY of the source material for the adapted screenplay nominees, although I have touched the four real books and contemplated reading them (as opposed to the graphic novel, which, yes, I did just judge as "not a real book" in case you're wondering). It's fun to know the source material, but it's also kind of fun this way, being in the dark, and noting which movies make me want to go read the original book, which in this case is all of them (except Logan, because I don't ever want to read graphic novels, which is not I repeat NOT a content thing but just my inability to enjoy reading books of pictures. Give me prose or give me a drawing, but not both together. I physically cannot stand reading graphic novels and comic books. It makes me uncomfortable. Do not enjoy.)

People love to praise Aaron Sorkin and Diablo Cody and other screenwriters who fill actors' mouth with long, winding phrases of snappy discourse, which is fine with me because my own writing of dialogue is decidedly in that direction sometimes, so praise away, people! Although I personally think they go a little overboard about just how complex Sorkin's writing is at times, I thought the Molly's Game screenplay was quite good. There was quite a bit of back and forth between voiceover narration and on-screen action that was well handled. Mudbbound also had to decided when to weave in and out of voiceover, and I take it from how the film was done that the book, too, had multiple first person narrators? That story had a lot going on and everything was clear. (Clear as Mudbound! There's a fun new phrase for a screenwriting standard to aspire to. Don't say I never gave ya nothin'.) Having absolutely been down the path of The Room hate/lovewatching cult madness, I was eminently curious how The Disaster Artist would be, and I thought it was remarkable. Call Me By Your Name, as I've mentioned in previous posts, is one of my favorites of this year's nominees but so much of that is from the emotions of the book itself; in fact, in recent days I've read many articles about how faithful James Ivory was to the book, with, for example, Michael Stuhlbarg's stunning monologue being evidently lifted right from the novel. Which is great - I'm just not sure that means Ivory merits an Oscar, for leaving well enough alone? Always a tough call in this category. As for Logan, sorry y'all, and it's NOT because it was a comic book that I don't want it to win but for reasons of cliche and gee-didn't-see-that-coming-except-we-all-totally-did with which the screenplay was riddled.

I really think the two best efforts here were Mudbound and The Disaster Artist. And I think either one has a chance of winning, and, to complicate matters, they both have outside factors that might influence people to vote not just on the merits. James Franco was an early favorite as a sure-nomination-thing in the Lead Actor category for playing nutso Tommy Wiseau, the not-genius behind The Room, in The Disaster Artist, and there is much speculation that late revelations about his inappropriate sexist and awful behavior are what made the #TIMESUP Academy not nominate him. So, will people be more inclined to reward what they can from the film, the writing, here, since it's the only nomination it got? Or less inclined, because it's still associated with James Franco? As for Mudbound, Dee Rees' nomination is the first for a black woman for an adapted screenplay, and it's always fun to make history. So who knows where voters minds will go?

On to Originals... well, we all know by now that Greta Gerwig wrote Lady Bird and people's minds are blown by this. I have found Lady Bird to be great and overrated. Sometimes people misunderstand me and say we shouldn't call things "overrated" because one person loves something and another person doesn't and that's just differing opinions. True that -- but that's also not what "overrated" means. I'm not saying it "wasn't that good" - then I'd say adequate or mediocre or whatever. I'm saying the frenzied reaction to it is weirdly outsized and kind of off-kilter. That can be true of reaction to something fabulous, something terrible, or something in between. In the case of Lady Bird, I've been mystified by all the people including critics who get paid to watch hundreds of movies a year saying that they've never seen anything like it because, um, what the heck have they all been watching, I wonder? But it was good. I don't think Gerwig is going to win in the Directing category, but she might win here for Writing. It was well written. Speaking of directors realizing their vision and writing it too, we've got Guillermo del Toro and the (SO WEIRD!) The Shape of Water. As I have been saying, this (weird!) movie doesn't do it for me the way it does for many, but I recognize that del Toro is creative and realizes his visions and renders them as art for many to enjoy... this doesn't necessarily make me advocate for him to win the screenplay Oscar, though. He was nominated for writing another weird fable, Pan's Labyrinth, a decade or so ago, losing then to Michael Arndt for Little Miss Sunshine. I don't think writing was The Shape of Water's main strength, and don't want it to win this. (Do I think it had strengths? Weeelll..even though it was damn weird, honestly, the directing was all right. We'll talk about that tomorrow, maybe.)

Yet ANOTHER nominee who both wrote and directed this year, Martin McDonagh, is the current recipient of backlash right now for his Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri white privilege racism. It's hard to discuss without spoilering the movie, so I won't, but I will say that he leaves some things very much up for debate and in my interpretation does not come down on the side of ever saying this or that majorly flawed character is redeemed, despite indications that maybe he's holding out hope everyone is redeemable. I think some people just generally also have an issue with Irish Guy writing about small-town, racially divided USA, which is fair on one hand, but on another hand, Irish people have in our very lifetimes lived in a place of extremely divided violence and ethno-religous strife so it's not like he's all smiles and flowers and bunnies and roses and then trying to make some commentary from a place of utter b.s.  Man, I was SUCH a huge fan of his previous movie, In Bruges, which may be affecting my understanding of what he was trying to do here ("Save the next little boy!" <--one of my all-time favorite movie moments. just go watch In Bruges, please, thanks)

And then there are the movies that are definitely written funny. Now, I know there was some consternation about Get Out  being in the Musical/Comedy category at the Golden Globes because it is addressing pretty much the most serious topic but first of all, that's just a big misunderstanding of the Globes, where part of the fun is mocking their weird Drama and Musical/Comedy categories and predicting what will inappropriately be relegated to the latter, and secondly, seriously, though, Get Out was funny. While also being serious. But it was written funny. Like VEEP. Ya know? OK, maybe not exactly like VEEP. But serious while being funny. And Jordan Peele is another person whose previous film I liked very much indeed (yay, Keanu!) I also think Kumail Nanjiani is hilarious, and while I love everything about watching Silicon Valley, he is definitely one huge part of the hilarity of that show, and I relished watching him in The Big Sick, which he co-wrote with his wife Emily V. Gordon, with whom I was unfamiliar before this. It was really good! I blew it off when it came out in theaters, despite all the good things I heard about it, and just got around to watching it recently, after the nominations came out. I really, really liked it and stayed up to watch the whole thing even though I started it at 11:30 p.m., which in itself is some kind of testament to the writing.

And so, my picks? This is hard. Way too hard. Help.

Adapted Screenplay: I want The Disaster Artist or Mudbound to win. I think Call Me By Your Name might, though.
Original Screenplay: I guess I want The Big Sick or Lady Bird, and I think it's going to be either Lady Bird or Get Out.

I really wouldn't have a problem with most of the possible outcomes here. But it's so hard to pick. I want to reward all the writers! Shower the writers with prizes and accolades!

Which screenplays are you rooting for?

My Previous Days of Oscar:
Day 4: Supporting Actor and Lead Actress
Day 3: Production Design and Costume Design
Day 2: Editing and Original Score
Day 1: Sound Mixing and Sound Editing

Twelve Days of Oscar, Day 5: Screenplays!

**I straight up fell asleep Sunday night instead of keeping up with my awards season tasks and Oscar bloggage, so this discussion will have to wait until Monday.**