Bigelow Wins, the Red Carpet & the Dude Abides

I am immensely happy with last night’s Academy Awards. I think people like to pick everything about the actual ceremony apart and try to make it into something it’s not (The Grammy’s), but I for one thought Baldwin and Martin were great hosts, the changes were entertaining and while I didn’t agree with some of the presenters, I agree with the films and people that were honored.

Instead of giving you a recap of what I thought about the whole 3+ hour affair I thought I’d give you the highlights of the day for me, from red carpet to credits rolling. These are the things that caught my eye and made the night memorable for me.

• George Clooney got out of his limo early & proved that he is the man everyone says he is. Instead of running through security to get on the red carpet he ran up and down the street greeting the fans that couldn’t even get in the bleachers.
  
• I loved Zoe Saldana’s dress. I may be in the minority here, but it was fun, different and very youthful. I couldn’t wear it but I would want to.
  
• I’ve decided that I don’t just want to meet Robert Downey Jr, I want to meet Susan Downey too. They were adorable on the red carpet and played off each other so well while being interviewed. I would love to work with Susan!
  
• Jake Gyllenhaal talked to Ryan Seacrest on the red carpet and when asked about his sister’s nomination gushed so much that he admitted the pocket square would be used by him if his sister ended up on stage that night.
  
• Neil Patrick Harris proved that he can pull off anything and he stole the show with an amazing opening number. I loved it right down to his glittery tux jacket.
  
• John Hughes affected an entire generation, so much so the Oscars actually did a solo tribute to him and the most memorable stars from his most memorable films took part in it.
  
• Sam Worthington wasn’t just cool enough to sit in the audience with his glasses on, he whipped them out on stage to read the teleprompter. Tell me how many other actors would be that unself-conscious?
  
• Perhaps it was unrelated, unfortunate cutting but Monique won her Oscar then they cut to Samuel L. Jackson making a not complementary face. Hmmm…
  
• Kristen Stewart proved she is completely uncomfortable with her career. She can’t do a red carpet or present without seeming angry and uncomfortable. It’s the Oscar’s honey, act like you’re glad to be there.
  
• Sandy Powell won yet another Oscar for costume and gave a shout out to all the costume designers that the Academy doesn’t recognize because they don’t see their genres or time periods as challenging.
  
• The crazy lady that interrupted the documentary short director because it was the “classy thing” for him to let her talk. The only thing classy about that was that he handled it with poise and didn’t shove her away from the mic.
  
• Ben Stiller I love you. Dressing as a Nav’i was hysterical and I loved it. Especially when he admitted that Avatar couldn’t even have been nominated for best makeup.
  
• Roger Corman won a lifetime achievement award. I could name 5-10 giant people off the top of my head that he helped start and the fact that the Academy found a way to honor Corman is huge.
  
• Robert Downey Jr. & Tina Fey presented an award together and had some of the best banter of the night – especially if you’ve ever worked with actors or writers.
  
• Jeff Bridges accepted the Oscar and proved that the Coen brothers may have helped along what was already there, but Bridges is inherently “The Dude”.
  
• Kathryn Bigelow became the first woman to win the Oscar for directing. Not only could it not have gone to a better female director, but her reaction was priceless. I missed most of what she was saying and what happened because I was in as much shock as she was. I will be writing about this in depth once I pull my thoughts together and re-watch the moment online.
  
• The Hurt Locker won best picture and Jeremy Renner and actors ran on stage and stole the moment in a great way. The three linked arms, shouted and basically grinned and laughed with joy the entire time the acceptance speech went on. Priceless.
  
• After almost looking like she was going to pass out from both her acceptance speeches Kathryn Bigelow tried to exit the stage and Steve Martin & Alec Baldwin grabbed her and kept her on stage with them to extend her moment while closing the show.
  

You thought Superbowl Sunday was in February? Really?

I'm BACK. After sleeping through the Oscars last year in a hotel bed in London, I am so glad to be back on American soil gearing up for the big night.

That said, I am an somewhat unhappy Yank. After last year's totally predictable set of winners, I'm sad to say that this year isn't shaping up to be much better. No less than 3 out of the 4 Acting categories are sure things, and I wouldn't be surprised to find myself 6 for 6 in the major categories. I realize that, if a film/nominee deserves the award, then it doesn't matter if it makes the show predictable. That said, I like it a little better when there's more variety.


Best Picture

• Avatar
• The Blind Side
• District 9
• An Education
• The Hurt Locker
• Inglourious Basterds
• Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire
• A Serious Man
• Up
• Up in the Air

Predicted winner: The Hurt Locker
If I was voting: Avatar
Possible upsets: Avatar

Analysis: 10 nominees means that the field is spread for a greater chance of an upset, right? Not even close. This race is between 2 films, folks. From a personal standpoint, while I admired The Hurt Locker, in the end, it seemed to me to be a really well-made war film, but nothing that terribly revolutionary or groundbreaking. On the other hand, Avatar was an accomplishment the likes of which I've never seen before. After its victory at the Golden Globes, I think Avatar seemed like a much stronger contender than it does now. The Hurt Locker has picked up a lot of momentum with major victories at the Producer's Guild Awards and BAFTA's. All of the signs right now point to a victory for The Hurt Locker, but Avatar is definitely lurking on the horizon.


Best Director

• James Cameron - Avatar
• Kathryn Bigelow - The Hurt Locker
• Quentin Tarantino - Inglourious Basterds
• Lee Daniels - Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire
• Jason Reitman - Up in the Air

Predicted winner: Kathryn Bigelow
If I was voting: James Cameron
Possible upsets: James Cameron

Analysis: Imagine this. The only two nominees with a chance in this category used to be married. Who would have thought we'd see that? Kathryn Bigelow has all the momentum right now, and, most importantly, the Director's Guild Award. Sadly, gender is playing a big role in this race, when it shouldn't even be an issue. The Academy has only nominated 4 women for this award in its history, with none of them walking off with Oscar. The pressure is on the Academy right now to change that. That said, I still believe that James Cameron's achievement is much more significant than Bigelow's, despite the fact that she definitely deserves her nomination.

Best Actor

• Jeff Bridges - Crazy Heart
• George Clooney - Up in the Air
• Colin Firth - A Single Man
• Morgan Freeman - Invictus
• Jeremy Renner - The Hurt Locker

Predicted winner: Jeff Bridges
If I was voting: Jeff Bridges
Possible upsets: None.

Analysis: Jeff Bridges has won almost every major award leading up to Oscar night, and I think that tonight will be no different. There are some strong performances in this category, but I don't see anyone beating The Dude.

Best Actress

• Sandra Bullock - The Blind Side
• Helen Mirren - The Last Station
• Carey Mulligan - An Education
• Gabourey Sidibe - Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire
• Meryl Streep - Julie & Julia
  

Predicted winner: Sandra Bullock
If I was voting: Carey Mulligan
Possible upsets: Meryl Streep

Analyis: If you would have told me last year that Sandra Bullock would be the favorite to win any major Best Actress award, I would have thought you were nuts. I don't think she's really got a ton of range to work with. That said, I think she's clearly the front-runner here. Ordinarily, I'm a big Streep fan, but don't think her performance as Julia Child is nearly as good as it's getting credit for. There were a number of times that I felt that it drifted into caricature, which is certainly not what she was going for. One question: what happend to Abbie Cornish? How did her work in Bright Star manage to fall off the Oscar map?


Best Supporting Actor:

• Matt Damon - Invictus
• Woody Harrelson - The Messenger
• Christopher Plummer - The Last Station
• Stanley Tucci - The Lovely Bones
• Christoph Waltz - Inglourious Basterds

Predicted winner: Christoph Waltz
If I was voting: Christoph Waltz
Possible upsets: None.

Analysis: This category is closed. No one else stands a chance. In a year defined by sure things, this is the surest of them all.

Best Supporting Actress

• Penélope Cruz - Nine
• Vera Farmiga - Up in the Air
• Maggie Gyllenhaal - Crazy Heart
• Anna Kendrick - Up in the Air
• Mo’Nique - Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire

Predicted winner: Mo'Nique
If I was voting: Vera Farmiga
Possible upsets: None

Analysis: Mo'Nique is the heavy favorite here, and has won nearly every major award of the season. Personally, I absolutely loved Vera Farmiga in Up in the Air. Her presence in the film was effortlessly nuanced and confident in its maturity. That said, she has no chance here, as any opportunity that she might have had is undercut by the nomination of co-star Anna Kendrick, who is the winner of my own award for Least Deserving Nominee. I have no idea what people saw in her performance. Oh well. Congrats, Mo'Nique.

In closing, here are a few more picks for you. Quentin Tarantino/Inglourious Basterds for Best Original Screenplay. Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner/Up in the Air for Best Adapted Screenplay. The White Ribbon for Best Foreign Language Film, with a possible upset coming from A Prophet. Up for Best Animated Film. "The Weary Kind" for Best Original Song.

Here's hoping that Steve Martin (one of my favorite Oscar hosts) and Alec Baldwin ROCK the HOUSE.

Enjoy the show.

FotM: Adam's vote goes to . . .

Look, I still don’t like the idea of 10 nominees for best picture. I never have, and probably never will. That said, choosing who I would vote for if I were a member of the Academy was surprisingly simple.

Currently, I’ve seen 7 out of the 10 nominees. There are at least 4 or 5 pretty good films in the bunch, with 2 that I’d say come the closest to being “great.” I’ll come right back to that . . .

I guess that you could say I’m an intellectual sort when it comes to films. I like films that try to tackle big themes, cover new ground, and communicate that elusive something. While I love being entertained, I don’t consider the having of a good time to be the ultimate goal of a film, or the chief sign of its quality. There have been a number of films (Fight Club, anyone?) I’ve seen that I didn’t necessarily enjoy that I consider to be examples of true craftsmanship, and I’m glad I watched them. Now, I’m certainly not suggesting that my way of looking at films is the “right” way of doing it, and that other approaches are wrong.

That would be stupid.

My point is this. I don’t normally go for the popular choice. When people were proclaiming The Dark Knight the single greatest thing since the dot got put before the com, I was one of the few pointing out what I thought were flaws. When people went nuts over Star Trek, I . . . well, you remember.

So, having said all of that, making my choice for what I would vote for as the Best Picture of 2009 was surprisingly simple.

Avatar.

Nothing I saw in 2009 equals the experience I had with James Cameron’s juggernaut. The only other film that I considered for this slot was Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds, but, as great as IB is, (and it is one of the best films an already venerable filmmaker has ever made) I don’t think that anything released between 01/01/2009 and 12/31/2009 comes close to the monumental achievement that is Avatar.

I’m astounded at the fact that almost everything I saw at key points on the screen was created by a computer. Watching it for the first time, I was skeptical of the idea that the incredibly lush world of Pandora was digitally generated. I mean, come on, obviously those blue guys were fake, but what about that tree? The water in the lake? The wind from the helicopter blades moving through the grass? Surely that had to have been real. No computer can make something look that good, and that authentic. There’s no way it could have been left up to processors and microchips.

But it was, and, while it was beautiful, there was even so much more to it than that.
See, Avatar is the kind of thing that George Lucas wanted to make with his Star Wars prequel trilogy. What he didn’t seem to realize is that mere visual trickery isn’t enough to make an audience invest in something. Our brains may enjoy the sight of a superbly created digital world, but our hearts want something to hang their proverbial hats on. I was sold on this thing, man. I wanted to see the Na’Vi triumph over the invading human scum, and I wanted Jake and Neytiri to end up together so desperately.

What Cameron’s done here is truly remarkable. He didn’t just demonstrate a mastery of CGI that no one to date has equaled. He made a film in which, even as your mind is marveling at what it’s watching, you partially (even totally) forget that what you’re seeing is created by a computer. Your heart simply sees a man and a woman standing side by side in a gorgeous place that’s unlike anything you’ve ever seen before.

So, with respect to Quentin Tarantino & Kathryn Bigelow, on Sunday night, Best Picture (and for my money, Best Director) should go to James Cameron for Avatar.

FOTM: Megan's Vote Is For...

Let me tell you I am a fan of having ten nominees for best picture. Instead of devaluing the award, I think it almost means more – your film had to fight it’s way past nine other great films to pull out the top honor. In fact, this blog has been really hard for me to write because I am so excited about the films that received nominations this year that as underwhelmed as I was by last year’s nominees, I seem to be making up for it this year by being beyond excited to see who will win and what surprises are in store.

When I sat down to finally write this post I actually surprised myself. Instead of going with my immediate gut instinct I decided to take the list of the ten nominees and come up with reasons why each one of them would deserve my vote (if I had one) for best picture; my factors were qualities like acting, technique, craftsmanship, enjoyment, aesthetics, and even my own drive to see the film in the theatre – basically I wanted the film that I thought had the greatest artistic merit and compelling draw to it. I thought for sure when I put it all on paper that my initial gut reaction would be correct and I would be writing about Up In The Air which is the film that probably moved me the most out of any film I saw this year. While Up In The Air did score higher on my criteria than The Hurt Locker & Inglorious Basterds there was one film that I scored high above all of them…one I didn’t think I’d vote for despite my love of the film.

So I sat. I thought about all of my qualities as a director, as a lover of films and as a critic and what I think the best picture Oscar is for. It’s then I realized if I truly wanted to award the film that I think will do the most for the craft of filmmaking, the art of storytelling and last with audiences for years to come I would have to cast my vote for Avatar.

Why Avatar? I’m going to start with the obvious – technology & innovation. I have a quote on my wall from James Cameron which he received from Stan Winston before his death: “…once you’ve shown something is possible everybody can do it.” James Cameron likes to try the impossible and for some reason he usually succeeds. For Avatar he ignored the naysayers and decided he wanted to create an entire alien planet and nine foot tall blue aliens that would actually be played by real actors and he did it – he even re-imagined how 3-D works for the film. Because Cameron was able to accomplish this we are now seeing an even larger influx of 3-D films and I guarantee you people will be using and pushing the technology Cameron used for Pandora & the Nav’ii for years to come. He made something new.

However, technology isn’t enough. They have the sci-tech awards for that. This leads me to another quote on my desk, this one from Spielberg that reads “We try to understand as filmmakers through empathy…because you can’t understand the human motivation without empathy.” Arguably the most powerful & well respected filmmaker of our time, the point Spielberg is making is that if you can’t feel your characters motivations & emotions and effectively put those on screen then the audience has no hope of connecting with your characters or your story. Think about it carefully – it’s hard enough for us to find some humans in films as empathetic, likable characters, but somehow in Avatar we are caught in the emotional journey of Jake Sully, Neytiri and an entire race of giant blue aliens. That is commendable and brilliant, a sign of true talent and a great story.

I’m also not one that tends to put a lot of stock in box office numbers, but with Avatar you can’t ignore the fact that the film smashed records worldwide and was in the top spot on the box office charts for almost two months. That tells me that Avatar is a film that managed to draw in an audience and do the most important thing – keep them. Unlike most of the best picture nominees almost everyone I’ve spoken to has seen Avatar and out of those the majority of them adored it. I have myself seen Avatar in the theatre three times – I haven’t seen any of the other films more than once. That tells me the film has a massive draw and appeal, and the sheer span of its reign in the box office tells me it’s not just because it had a budget behind it, an advantage the smaller films didn’t have to reach their audience. It is much more typical for a large budget film to have a huge opening week and then have a 40-70% drop for every week thereafter, but Avatar broke that model. In the U.S. alone box office actually went up after the first weekend.

There are even more things I could pull out about Avatar but I’ll wrap it up with something personal. Up In The Air may have been the film that connected with me on an emotional level I didn’t expect, but Avatar connected with me emotionally too. Avatar reminded me why making films is my passion. It reminded me about the powers of imagination, the exhilaration a great film can provide and what it looks like to produce something that no one has ever seen before. It reminded me that no matter what story you are telling there is always a unique and fresh way to tell it and if you have a passion for the story you are telling that passion will show up on screen. James Cameron is a master of his craft and with Avatar he managed to reinvigorate the cinema lover inside me again, which is quite the feat as I am already an enthusiastic lover of cinema. Cameron proved that he has a supreme talent to work with actors, artists and transfer a story to the screen.

Even with all the support and adoration I’ve laid out for Avatar (and I could keep going) I still think that awarding one film over another is as futile as choosing your favorite shade of blue, but what I do believe in is supporting good work. All of the nominated films this year were great works and each deserved the best picture award for very different reasons – I will enjoy it no matter who wins and have reasons to think each deserved it. However, I think if I ever do get a vote in the Academy I might just have to pull out this technique again and cast my vote that way.

Crosses fingers, hopes for the best

It's almost 1 AM and the Academy Award nominations are about 6 1/2 hours away. For some reason, I felt like an 11th hour post to make some predictions. Here's what I think you can expect in the Best Picture and Best Director categories.

Best Picture: Avatar, District 9, An Education, The Hangover, The Hurt Locker, Inglourious Basterds, Precious, Star Trek, Up, & Up in the Air. Possible dark horse(s): Invictus and maybe even The Blind Side.

Best Director: James Cameron, Kathryn Bigelow, Quentin Tarantino, Lee Daniels, & Jason Reitman. You can bet money on those picks.

I think there's a definite possibility Zoe Saldana (Avatar) might get the very first acting nomination for a character created entirely using VFX. Here's hoping that Vera Farmiga (Up in the Air) gets a nod too.

Now, let's see what happens . . .

2009 in Review

It's that time, folks. I figured that, instead of writing something up, I'd rather tell you directly, face-to-screen style. I've got 3 categories: 2009's best films, 2009's films on the backburner, and the worst film of 2009.

Best of 2009

Films on the Backburner

The Worst Film of 2009

Leave a comment. You're bound to have some thoughts on my list, one way or another. (wink)

Happy New Year and all that jazz . . .

Well, it's 2010, and we're all still here. Here at the blog, we'd like to wish all of you a happy, prosperous, and healthy new year. 2009 was a record year for us, seeing a growth from 29 posts in 2008 to 150 posts. That's a growth rate of 417%. Eat your heart out, James Cameron!

We did some extensive blogging regarding our picks for the best films of the decade, so just in case you missed it, you can find Chris' here, here, and here, Adam's here, and Megan's here.

Additionally, Manohla Dargis' Floating In the Digital Experience is a must-read.

So, all the best to you in 2010, and don't forget to let us know if there's anything that you would like to see on the blog in the future. Happy New Year!

A Cinematic Public Service Announcement

In the 17 months that we’ve written about the movies for this blog, the four of us have seen countless films, arguing over many, partly seeing eye-to-eye over some, and agreeing unequivocally on a few.

This is one of those few.

The hype over James Cameron’s Avatar has been building up steadily over the past several years, reaching fever pitch over the past few months. Avatar has been touted as an event movie of epic proportions, and the “one” that will change the way that films are made in the future. Now that we’ve all had a chance to see it, we wanted to share our excitement with you as a group, because the four of us feel so strongly about Avatar that we feel that it’s one of THOSE movies that anyone who considers himself/herself a fan of the movies really ought to go see.

Below, you’ll find our individual comments on the film.

“Twelve years is a long time to wait for anything, but James Cameron has made it more than worth the wait. AVATAR is unlike anything you have ever seen before. It’ll dazzle your senses, melt your eyeballs and pin you to your seat. It immerses you in a world up until now you only thought you could see in your dreams. In short, AVATAR is the reason they make movie theatres. If you want to see the future of film making converge with the best that modern story telling has to offer, get your butt to a theatre NOW!”
--Chris W.

“My girlfriend didn't want to see it. This isn't anything new when it comes to her feelings on movies involving fantasy. But she was adamant that it looked stupid. Fortunately, I had a coupon that was a gift from her, stating she'd go to a movie she didn't want to see. I knew we were in for a treat, and wanted her to experience it too. By the end of the movie, she was on the edge of her seat, gripping my arm with suspense and enjoyment all in one. I simply ate my popcorn, grinned with satisfaction, and enjoyed the rest of my Christmas present.

James Cameron consistently delivers fascinating stories, classic characters, amazing worlds, and he does it while raising the standard for not only the technology that he's using, but also how those effects should be used. You are emotionally involved with the world and characters you are introduced to, as if you are in an Avatar yourself. It's Dances with Wolves with a little bit of The Matrix, and the hottest and most badass version of Pocahontas you will ever see. This movie has heart, and I love it. If you haven't seen it, you are crazy. If you haven't seen it twice, sell something so you can see it again. And if you haven't seen it in IMAX 3D, then you don't know Pandora. For those of you that have done all of the above, ‘I see you.’"
--FilmNinja

“Avatar is something not seen very often – a film that delivers on concept, story and craftsmanship. James Cameron promised that with Avatar we’d be visiting another planet and, while watching the film, we are. The astounding thing is that, in 2D, you are invested in the story of Jake Sully & the Na’vi people, but, in 3D, you are walking on Pandora with them. Avatar is a film that cannot be missed on the big screen, and, no matter what exhibition format you see it in, Cameron will take you into a story that you will cheer for.”
--Megan
“It’s no surprise that I’ve been somewhat skeptical about Avatar for the past several months. The first trailer was somewhat unimpressive, and while the second was better, my doubts still remained as I sat in the theater last weekend. Over the course of the next 2 hours and 40 minutes, my cinematic mind was blown. Sure, the script could have used another pass, but I found myself in a strange place. I just didn’t care. Cameron’s use of visual effects is second to none and Pandora is one of the most distinctive (and beautiful) environments I’ve ever seen in a movie. Look, I’ll just say it: if you miss seeing Avatar on the big screen, you might regret it for the rest of your life.”
--Adam

If you go to see only one movie the rest of the year, let that movie be Avatar.
-Chris W, FilmNinja, Megan, & Adam

2 trailers sometimes really are better than 1

Ah, brothers and sisters, the passing of time brings many changes. The second Avatar trailer has finally been released, and I'm happy to report that it looks infinitely more interesting than the teaser did. As you might remember, I took some flak for pointing out that the big blue guys just didn't look so realistic. Fortunately, while they still don't resemble the finest CGI these eyes have ever seen as Cameron may have hoped, they look pretty good.

The story seems to have legs too. Although seeming somewhat cliched (Star Trek: Insurrection, anyone?), Avatar seems to have a fairly compelling narrative conflict. This wasn't evident from the get go, and I know that Megan and I both expressed our concerns that the film would be all gimmick and no guts. However, that's kind of an inherent problem with teaser trailers in general. Unless the visuals are flat-out incredible/trippy/weirdly compelling, the teaser doesn't necessarily accomplish its main goal, which is namely to get your butt in a seat in the theater, preferably on opening weekend.

That said, I still have a few questions.

1. How does the blue girl know English? Pretty convenient, huh? Maybe they'll explain it with one of those "Oh, the avatar software comes with a universal translator so that you'll be able to talk to the natives."

2. Why don't the bad guys just unplug the machine Jake's hooked up to so that he can't control his avatar? That said, this'll probably be handled in one of two ways. Either he'll get the machine off the ship (Sigourney Weaver would probably help with this) or it'll turn into a subplot as the bad guys race to disconnect the machine. Or what about this: Sigourney Weaver might lock them out of the area of the ship where the machines are and it becomes a race-against-the-clock as they try to break through before he can lead the natives to victory on the planet surface.

All jokes aside, I just hope this movie is close to being as good as it wants to be. I'll be there opening weekend for sure. Cameron, if you're reading, please please PLEASE make it worth my while.

Oh, and keep your eye on a movie called An Education come Oscar time. Good stuff. The star, Carey Mulligan, is going to get a Best Actress nomination. Yep, that's my first Oscar prediction. We'll see how THAT goes.

Uh, ok . . .

I was starting to lose hope. After thinking that this summer might be end up being another big bust, I'm so glad to have finally seen a good film this summer. (although it was still kind of a bust anyway) Well, I should be honest. Make that THREE good films this summer. Oh, shoot. I just remembered Lorna's Silence too.

OK. Let me start over. I am glad to have seen a few good films this summer, even though some of them don't fall into the traditional "summer movie" category. I happily skipped a lot of those, .

I have a question for you. Am I the only one who is underwhelmed by the Avatar trailer? After hearing about the response from Con, I waited for the first real trailer eagerly. I watched it as soon as I could the first day it was up. . . and was pretty disappointed by the VFX. For all their supposed realism, the big blue people looked pretty fake, particularly in the footage when they're on board the ship or whatever it is. Maybe it'll be different in 3D, I don't know. It did look better when I saw it before Inglourious Basterds through a projector as opposed to seeing it in HD on my computer screen. Apparently, based on what I've heard from people that I know, the free footage played in IMAX a week and a half ago was pretty impressive. I'm not completely sure if I'll go see it in 2D or 3D. I do know that I'll be there opening weekend, because anything that purports to change the way movies are made should be taken seriously, particularly when it's being attempted by someone of Cameron's considerable talent.

The big blue guys still seemed fake. Who's with me?

---Also, I'm going to consider my review of Inglourious Basterds my contribution to this month's feature: Thoughts on Tarantino. I've tried to think of something new to contribute on the subject, but I put a lot of my thoughts on QT in that article and couldn't really think of something new that would be worth your time.

Feature of the Month: Favorite Halloween Movies

Written By: Christopher Welch

I didn’t want my mother to kill my father. That’s the thought that kept running through my head, the thought that caused me to lose countless nights worth of sleep and condemn me to months of sleeping in a fetal position. Very early in my life my father performed two very cool to me, but very taboo to my mother movie watching acts. Both involved James Cameron films, one was Terminator the other was Aliens.

The point of this endeavor is to write about a Halloween movie, a movie that encapsulates what this spooky, creepy day means to me as a movie goer. For me this presented a monumental task, pick a scary movie, a movie that flat out freaked the crap out of me. The problem is that, at least for me, no such film really exists.

I love horror movies, but I don’t really find any of them at all scary. I’m not the kind of person that jumps and shrieks at shocking cinematic moments. I don’t get the heeby jeebies, the hair doesn’t stand up on the back of my neck and nothing really makes me look twice over my shoulder. I love watching horror movies in the theatre because they are a great communal experience and I thrill to watch the audience squirm and squeal as I sit there and mock them. I mean I’ve never, ever been one of those cowering, whimpering masses. Or so I thought.

It took a bit of humbling myself and a nice long trip down memory lane but afterwards I realized that there was one movie, and honestly ONLY one movie that flat out scared the living crap out of me. That movie was James Cameron’s Aliens.

To this day I remember the conversation amongst the elder people in my life. My father and his brother were at the rental store coaxing my mother into letting them rent Cameron’s follow up to Ridley Scott’s brilliant, genre busting Alien. My mother was arguing that this was a film that they should not screen in front of my young, 6 year old eyes for fear that the images would haunt my dreams and plague my mind. Wanting to show my father and uncle that I was extra grown-up I convinced her along with her husband and brother-in-law that I would be fine. Eventually she relinquished and my young mind would never be the same again.

We returned home and what I saw didn’t just scare me, it terrified me beyond the capacity for rational thought. To this day I remember very little about my first viewing of the film other than the fact that when the alien threatens to pop out of Ripley’s stomach in her dream sequence, I quite nearly lost my mind. It was at that time that I feigned falling asleep so that I could still be “cool” without losing face. Like a terrible car accident though, I couldn’t help but sneak peeks every so often and the images of the face huggers and the slime covered insect like baddies did nothing to calm my fears.

After that fateful night I don’t think I slept right for a month, if not longer. Every night I would get into bed and curl into the tightest ball humanely possible for fear that Ripley’s enemies were lingering at the foot of my bed, under my covers, just waiting to feast on my succulent, young (thus all the more tasty) flesh. Sure I wanted to go running into my mother and have her hold me and assure me it was all a silly fantasy but I knew that by doing so I would prove her doubts about my viewing habits thus not only get my father in trouble but also ensure that I would no longer be able to watch the cool “big boy” movies. Of course finally my young fears got the best of me, I confessed and after a nice coddling and chastising of my father my sleep returned to its normal, peaceful nature. Now of course as any self respecting movie fan should expect, the story doesn’t end there.

Jump to some 11 or 12 years later. I am working at Suncoast Motion Picture Company and for reasons that I can’t quite explain (and it should be pointed out I’d like to think fear wasn’t one of them) my manager and good friend Matt finds out that I, a self proposed James Cameron junky have never seen Aliens… or at least haven’t seen it in a VERY long time. I realized that something that frightened me that much as a child could very well thrill me now and after Matt’s money back guarantee I bought the film, went home and that night devoured Cameron’s sci-fi opus.

It’s funny because a film that scared the snot out of me as a kid, heck the only movie that ever really scared me my entire life quickly became one of my all time favorite movies. As I sat down and thought about it I thought what better movie to sum up the Halloween experience. I went from abject fear to adrenaline pumping excitement and joy. If that isn’t what Halloween and horror movies are all about then I don’t know what is.

For my money Aliens is not only James Cameron’s best film, but it is also one of the single most overlooked movies of all time. Every few years AFI and or someone else and their mother will come out with a list of the greatest movies or the scariest movies, or the most influential movies of all time. Invariably Alien always shows up on that list but Aliens is never anywhere to be found. This always leads me to ask the question; are we watching the same movie or does the critical community just follow the standard party line like seemingly the rest of the world? Make no mistake, Alien is a brilliant film, but pound for pound it doesn’t hold a candle entertainment or influence wise to Cameron’s sequel.

At the end of the day, no matter how you slice it Alien is a VERY effective, horror film that substitutes the boogey man and a haunted house for a spaceship and an acid blooded E.T.. While Sigourney Weaver is certainly the standout of the film and a great female role model, at the end of the day she’s really only the “survivor” of the horror film. She does very little other than be smarter and luckier than everyone else and as such outlasts the rest of her crew mates. In fact any real hope of establishing her as a revolutionary, women’s lib era heroine goes right out the window during her very seductive and unnecessary striptease (Go back and watch the movie and you’ll see what I’m talking about) at the end of the film.

On the other hand we have Aliens. In one film Cameron not only ups the scare factor by the hundreds by introducing hundreds of the face hugging, acid bleeding, stomach bursting baddies and the Queen Freaking Mother, but he also takes Ripley from being a reactive defensive, force to an aggressive, proactive one. Yet through it all Cameron never once allows Ripley to lose a single ounce of her femininity and in many ways adds to it even more by introducing Newt thus creating a motherly connection and relationship for the ultimate, female, badass supreme.

Sure Aliens takes a few minutes to get going but the moment Ripley and The Colonial Marines (Perhaps the single coolest group ever created for the movies outside the Jedi) hit the planet you never know what’s going to happen. The tension and the fear in the air is palpable as your realize death and so much worse can be lurking around every corner. Add to the mix humanity’s own capacity for opportunistic evil in Paul Reiser’s brilliant Cater Burke and the dread and suspense of the past as epitomized by Lance Henriksen’s Bishop and you have a film that’s infinitely more layered than Ridley Scott’s creation. Heck, I haven’t even brought up the cowardice of Bill Paxton’s “Game over man” Hudson.

In 1986 James Cameron forged Ellen Ripley into the single greatest heroine cinema has ever seen. From that point forward every film maker worth his or her salt has tried to emulate it yet none, save for Cameron have come even close. The fact that he did all of this in the scariest, most pulse pounding, sci-fi/action adventure film ever made is just icing on the cake.

For every big breasted bimbo stupidly running towards danger as opposed to running away from it, there is Ripley, armed with a pulse rifle, a grenade launcher and a flame thrower, descending into the mouth of hell and turning gender roles on their ear. Aliens changed the world of cinema in ways no one ever really gives it credit for, changed my views on horror in cinema, women in the world and almost made my dad sleep on the couch. I don’t know if that’s everyone’s idea of a great scary movie, but it sure as heck is mine.