Ten Best Pictures

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (or, as it's called in Hollywood terms, simply "the Academy") recently voted to expand their best picture nomination to ten nominees.

Here's the problem: It's not that the Academy doesn't nominate ENOUGH movies, it's that they nominate the WRONG movies. This year, the only "best pictures" who actually deserved to be in that category were Slumdog Millionaire and maybe, maybe Milk. As for the other nominees? There was The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, a movie that, by all accounts, was tailor-made to be an Oscar nominee. It was understated, emotional, and, last but not least, really, really long. Was it good? Yes, I suppose; it fulfilled a movie's minimum obligation by being at least entertaining. Yet there are two things wrong with this nominee. The first is that they should recognize what is easily the weakest of David Fincher's works, but ignore his early, explosive masterpieces such as Se7en and Fight Club. Another is that, if they really wanted a movie that would fit their "epic" quota, then they should have nominated a little thing called The Dark Knight, which was a philosophical tour de force, a phenomenon in acting, and just a hell of a lot more fun than Benjamin Button.

Next there was Frost/Nixon, which I didn't see. I know that it was based off a Broadway play, and that its director, Ron Howard, is - well, he's actually best known in the film community for being extremely generic. Again, I did not see the movie, so it would be unfair for me to judge, especially since this one got very good reviews. Yet I can't imagine it doing anything as impressive as, say, telling a heartfelt and socially-relevant love story with almost no dialogue. Because there actually was a movie that did that - it was called WALL-E. They should have nominated that.

And last there was The Reader. I didn't see this one due to my own judgement; it received a barely-passing "fresh" grade on Rotten Tomatoes. This means pretty consistent "C+" and "B-" grades from critics. This is not bad, per say, just extremely mediocre. This movie was obviously thrown in there so that they could have a low-budget "indie" film among the mix. Hey, you know what? The Wrestler was low-budget, and it was a really good movie that was unanimously hailed as one of the best movies of the year! So, why not that and why THE FREAKING READER?!

I can't think of how to end this post right now. So did you know that The Wrestler was filmed here in Union County? That just makes it even more awesome.