Royce's Oscar Picks

Another year of Oscars.  I'll say again I don't usually care for Awards shows in general.  I rarely agree with who the snobs pick as winners.  Although last year I did like many of the winners.  I don't usually watch the show either.  Do we really need to see every little award (best sound mixing?) and long songs?  Make it a two hour extravaganza that everyone would love?  I generally wait for my friend Ted Cashin to watch it then read his recap the next day.  There is my old man rant for the day.

This year I saw six of the nine films nominated for Best Picture.  Only a couple I feel are truly deserving of the honor.  Here is my run down of the major nominees along with who I would pick to win and who it think will win.

Best Picture

12 Years a Slave-  I did not see this movie.  Honestly I have seen enough of this genre.  I know that time in our countries history was a bad time. Slavery was horrible and there were many very bad white people.  For me I have seen enough movies telling me this.  Just as the Holocaust was horrible I have seen enough movies showing me this.  I'm sure this is a touching movie and have seen the lead actor that no one can pronounce his name (Chiwetel Ejofor) in other films and liked him alot.   It's just not for me.

American Hustle- I have several friends the LOVED this movie.  Again, this was just not for me.  Seemed more of a parody of the 70s than actual real times.  For me the acting was very over the top and I didn't care for the story or the flow.  I can see how some would like this movie.  It wasn't for me.

Captain Phillips-  I liked this movie alot.  Tom Hanks is a great actor and this may be his best part so far.  Well made movie.  This is definitely one of the top five movies of the year and deserves the nomination.

Dallas Buyers Club- I did not see this movie.  Looking at the $20 million box office not many other people saw it either.  I know it's a big deal for Matthew McConaughey to lose 187 pounds for a part.  Wish I could go on his diet.  This was not a movie I had any interest in seeing.

Gravity- Visually one of the best movies to come down the pike in a while.  Acting was very good.  I liked this movie.

Her-  A very strange and sometimes disgusting movie.  I guess one could appreciate them pushing the envelope, but this is too strange.

Nebraska- I have never cared for black and white movies.  I don't get why director Alexander Payne deeded to shoot this boring low budget movie in black and white.  I rented this movie and gave it a good try.  Made it forty five minutes before boredom insisted I turn it off.

Philomena-  I see many, many movies every year and this is one I had not even heard of until the nominations came out.

The Wolf on Wall Street-  A terrible movie that the only claim to fame is setting the movie record for most F-bombs in averaging nearly four per minute.  This bloated three hour bomb has no business getting any nominations.  Did I hide my feelings on this?

Who I think should win-  Gravity or Captain Phillips

Who I think will win- 12 Years a slave seems to be on a roll.

Best Actor-

Christian Bale- I think Bale is a very good actor.  I just don't think he was that great in this movie.  I thought he was better in the movie Out of the Furnace. Here I mostly felt I was watching Batman in a fat suit (although he did gain the weight) and a bad comb over.

Bruce Dern- I also think Dern is a very good actor and probably deserved an award or two along the way.  Not for Nebraska.  He plays a cranky old man that has a mean wife and a good son.

Chiwetel Ejofor-  No idea how to pronounce his name but he is a very good actor.  I have liked him in everything I have seen him in.  I'm sure he is great here.

Matthew McConaughey- A good actor.  I'm sure he does a fine job as a guy with AIDS that tries to help other victims get drugs to help them live longer.

Leonardo DiCaprio- While I hated this movie I will admit DiCaprio did a good job playing a despicable stock broker with no redeeming values that never really pays for his crimes.

Who I think should win- Chiwetel Ejofor movie unseen.

Who I think will win- Matthew McConaughey.  The voters seem to be impressed with his weight loss even though almost no one saw this movie.

Best Actress

Cate Blanchett-  I get it.  The academy loooooooooves Ms. Blanchett.   She is a decent actress that has made a career out of boring movies that no one sees.  I rented Blue Jasmine and was bored to tears.

Sandra Bullock- She does a fantastic job in Gravity.  I think she is head and shoulders above the class here.

Amy Adams-  I thought the best thing Amy did here is show cleavage.  She has been far better in other movies.

Judi Dench-  Another big Academy favorite.  Usually when I see one of her movies I know it's not one I'd be interested in.  She may be great here.  I'll never know.

Meryl Streep- She is a great actress.  Of that there is no doubt.  I heard August : Osage County was the downer movie of the year.  No one saw it.

Who I think should win-  Sandra Bullock in a walk

Who I think will win- Cate Blanchett.  She seems to be one they love.

Best Supporting Actor

Barkhad Abdi-  He was very good as the terrorist trying to hijack a big ship.  Not sure how big a stretch it is for him.

Bradley Cooper- His perm was impressive I'll give you that.  Nothing else was award winning to me.

Michael Fassbender-  He is a good actor.  I like him.  I'm sure he was good in 12 Years a Slave.

Jonah Hill- The biggest farce in the awards.  He and his big fake teeth were like scratching on a chalkboard for me.

Jared Leto- I guess he dresses like a woman for the movie and the Academy was impressed.

Who I think should win- I would guess Michael Fassbender.

Who I think will win- As I said the Academy was impressed with the dress.  Leto

Best Supporting Actress

Sally Hawkins- I watched most of Blue Jasmine and I don't remember her at all.

Jennifer Lawrence-  The Academy seems to like Ms. Lawrence in a crazy way.  I don't.

Lupita Nyong'o- She is the talk of the town right now.

Julia Roberts- Julia is always good.  I'm sure she was here.

June Squbb- She plays the nagging wife on Nebraska.  I stand a better chance of winning this than she does.

Who I think should win- I would probably go with Julia Roberts

Who will probably win- Lupita Nyong'o seems to be on a roll.

Pompeii

Pompeii

Rating 7 out of 10

Before this movie I had heard of Pompeii and knew they had a bad day with a volcano.  That was about it.  I knew nothing else about it.  When it happened or even where it was.  Turns out Pompeii was a small town in South Italy built just outside Mount Vesuvius.  It was destroyed in 79 AD

The movie Pompeii is part Gladiator, part Romeo and Juliet and part 80s disaster movie.  Milo (Game of Thrones Kit Harington) as a child watches the evil Roman soldiers led by Corvus (Keifer Sutherland playing a bad guy) slaughter his whole village to set and example to other villages what happens if you defy Rome.  He becomes a slave and eventually becomes a gladiator killing others for the enjoyment of Romans.  He catches the eye of the local princess (Emily Browning) when he helps with her favorite horse.  Here we get the forbidden love.  We know there is little time before the volcano blows.

This movie is no Gladiator or even close.  I was entertained.  The acting is pretty good.  The scenes where the volcano does blow and destroys everything is quite impressive.  The action and fight scenes are pretty good.

You won't stand in line to buy the dvd but if you like these type movies I think you'll be mildly entertained.  I was.

About Last Night

About Last Night

Rating 5 out of 10

This February seems to be the month of remaking classic movies of the 80s.  First was RoboCop and now About Last Night along with Endless Love which I will probably skip.  I am a big fan of the 1986 version of About Last Night with Rob Lowe and Demi Moore.  It is one of my favorite films of that era.  It was a sweet and comical movie that had nice back up's with Jim Belushi and Elizabeth Perkins. It was a movie about relationships.   If you haven't seen this version I highly recommend it.  You can borrow my dvd if you promise to bring it back.

This new version is clearly very different.  Kevin Hart is hot right now and seems to be in every movie released.  He is very funny and when he finally gets that one great movie like Eddie Murphy did in 48 Hrs and Beverly Hills Cop he will zoom to that next level.  I don't believe this is the movie to do that.

Bernie (Hart) is a one night stand playboy in Los Angeles that is proud of his status.  He cruises the bars looking for his next sexual conquest.  His best friend and work partner is Danny (Michael Ealy) is the nice guy who is still nursing a broken heart from a breakup a year earlier.   Bernies latest conquest is Joan (Regina Hall) a foul mouthed wild child that matches Bernie for raunch.  With Bernie and Joan dating they set up Danny with Joan's roommate and best friend Debbie (the lovely Joy Bryant) and they really hit it off.  They become the loving couple moving in together while Bernie and Joy are on again/off again.

When the first version was sweet and comical with this version they went with raunch, foul language and near port standard sex.  Hint:  Don't go see this movie with your teenage child.  After 15 minutes my wife couldn't handle being in the theater with my teenage son and left.  This movie could go for soft porn and they leave little for the imagination .  Both male and females discuss oral sex in very descriptive terms.  Clearly they were going for the younger audience and not the fans of the original.

Some of it works.  When Hart is funny he is very funny.  Hall has her moments too.  For me the movie goes too much to raunch for their comedy instead of good writing.  A little raunch can be funny and good.  But when you base your whole movie on it you lose the edge and it just becomes irritating.

I would wait to rent this one.

RoboCop

RoboCop

Rating 5 out of 10

I was a fan of the original RoboCop.  Hard to believe it was 25 years ago.  Was looking forward to seeing this movie even though I set the bar low in expectations.  Turns out it was needed.  This movie is mildly entertaining and on a cold icy/snowy day that was about all that was needed.

My first question with this version is the choice of lead actor.  Joel Kinnaman is mostly known as the skinny chain smoking cop on the tv show The Killing.  He is a good character actor but not nearly the chops needed for this action movie.

The movie begins in the year 2028.  We now have the ability to have robot cops and soldiers all over the world.  Everywhere but the US where they have been banned.  Politicians are worried that a robot has no morals or humanity.  For the huge corporation OmniCorp getting the robots into the States would mean Billion$.  To skirt around the law they come up with the idea of a robot with a human inside.  In comes Alex Murphy (Kinnaman).  One of the few honest cops in Detroit that is this close to taking down a bug crime lord.  When he gets too close and a car bomb nearly kills him he becomes the new RoboCop.

The movie didn't have as much action as I expected/wanted.  Sadly the special effects were not much if any better than the original so long ago.  Much of the movie is the talking of the politics of what all is going on.  There are some good actors involved.  Samuel L. Jackson, Michael Keaton, Gary Oldman and the lovely Abbie Cornish.  I just wish they had put a little more effort into the story.

This will make a decent rental but would probably grab the old version first.

Her

Her

Rating 4 out of 10

There are several movies released every year that push the envelope.  They are way different than other movies released.  Usually small budget films with a very different outlook on life. I generally don't care for these strange movies and I'm usually pretty good at avoiding them.  As I have said in the past if a movie rates above 90% on rottentomatoes.com it's a sign I want to avoid it.  Movie reviewers as a whole are strange birds and when that many agree on a movie you probably want to avoid it.   Normally I would not have bothered with this movie.  I had a couple free passes to a nearby Regal theater and Rocky wanted to see it.

The movie starts off kinda interesting.  Theodore Twombly (Joaquin Phoenix) several years in the future is trying to get over a divorce a year before.  He gets a new operating system for his computer that is said to have artificial intelligence.  Kind of like Suri on steroids.  The new operating system, Samatha, voiced by Scarlett Johansson becomes his best friend.  He talks to her night and day via a strange little earpiece.  It's kinda cute how the computer learns and how they get along.  There is a bit of witty dialog.

Then it turns reaaaallly strange.  Theodore and Samantha turns into a couple.  They do some really nasty phone sex that creeped me out.  Theodore begins to tell everyone his new girlfriend is his OS and no one bats an eye.  It is really creepy when Samantha complains to Theodore that they never have sex anymore.

The movie is just over two hours in length and seemed much longer.  Can't blame the cast.  Besides Joaquin and Scarlett there is Amy Adams, Rooney Mara and Olivia Wilde.  It's just way to strange for me.