Nobody Knows Hollywood

Broad strokes -- that's the way artists in silent films often portrayed emotion and story. Because of the lack of dialogue, they were forced to find another way to get their message across. They did so with bold facial expressions, demonstrative gestures and animated reactions to people and situations. In its time, (pre-1929), the audience accepted what they were given as there was nothing else to compare it to. Film, as an art form, was still extremely young and novel. Today, these techniques are all too often, via broad strokes of judgment, written off as bad acting. I disagree -- and clearly, so do those involved with the making of the beautiful Oscar-Nominated, "The Artist". The quest for "reality" in films is displayed in two Oscar-Nominated films this year, this one and "Hugo". In both films, historical uses of techniques and period-correct artistry is put on display and, at the same time called into question. Both films are worthy of their nom...

Do dreams matter? To Martin Scorsese via Hugo, the answer is yes. Dreams, as we see them in our mind's sleeping eye, are one of the great mysteries of humanity. Are dreams our reality and vice versa (e.g. The Matrix)? Are we being spoken to by someone or something from beyond? Can we affect our dreams with our waking lives? In indirect form, all of these questions are in play in Hugo.  The familiar storyline of a boy losing his father and being left a secret message is a gentle in to a deeper storyline. In order to access all of it, the viewer may have to understand what it is to have dreamed, risked and, likely, lost at some point. That is the discovery of film pioneer George Melies that occurs early in the film for Hugo. They are similar in their passions and talent, but at opposite ends of the spectrum: Hugo is young and just discovering, Melies is old and bitter about what he has lost. In the middle of the journey is the idea of magic. Like dreams, magic is addressed lite...

When I first saw the trailers for this film I was immediately repulsed. It looked simplistic, manipulative and, once again, like "white people saved the black people (you're welcome black people)" - link .  The last film to pull this trick in a similar manner (both irritating me as a film and receiving far too acclaim for my taste) was "The Blind Side". Occasionally, Hollywood and the "powers that be" seem hell-bent on making a point. With "The Blind Side", they seemed to be to saying "Sandra Bullock is not just America's Sweetheart, but also an Oscar Winner". Her performance was solid in a very average film. Not, in my opinion, Oscar-worthy. That's not to say she's not a fine actress who could, in a better role, deliver what I would consider an Oscar-worthy performance. It's just that in this case, there was a decision made that it was her time and that trumped the evaluation of the actual performance. With that...

The movie is slow -- sometimes delightfully, sometimes painfully. In that respect, it mirrors the game the film covers. But baseball is not the main theme of the film; redemption and the pain of chasing ones own ghosts serves that role. Billy Beane (played masterfully by Brad Pitt) is out to prove to the baseball establishment that they're not selling jeans. What he means by that is there is more to winning in the game than how things look. The Yankees are glamorous in every aspect. They look great, they pay the most and they play in the biggest media market in the world. The reality is, Oakland is not New York, ergo the Athletics are not the Yankees. But does that mean they can't compete? No. But it does require them to channel their inner Steve Jobs and "think differently". The backlash Beane (in the film) takes for this approach is enormous and omnipresent. The media (presented mostly through V.O. across radio and television airwaves) is a constant critic. When t...