Culture

It’s about that time. I’ll probably live-blog the Oscars tonight, just because I like doing it. My commentary on the nominees is here. My picks for winners (and preferred winners if I had to pick from the nominees): Best Actor: Jamie Foxx. Should be Clint Eastwood, but the Academy will steer clear of him this year. The political aspects to Million Dollar Baby didn’t help him. Best Actress: hard to call, but I think Hilary Swank. (My other guess would be Catalina Moreno.) Kate Winslet should win it, though. ...

FYI: Theodore Roszak’s Flicker is back in print. It’s a great book about movies, albeit one with a somewhat unsatisfying ending; this review hits the mark for me. Particularly in the snark about Aronofsky as a director. (Via Twitch.)

I’m living my life wrong. How do I know this? I never get to say things like “The optimal, best-case scenario is the ashes will be shot out of a cannon.” (original) Ever.

In her first scene in Constantine, Tilda Swinton wears a bespoke suit. A bespoke suit is the best possible suit: hand-sewn and carefully tailored to the individual. English Cut is a bespoke blog: a blog written by a Savile Row bespoke tailor, who has made suits for Bryan Ferry, Prince Charles, and Ralph Lauren. Not a shabby resume.

Speaking of Wong Kar Wai, turns out the Brattle is running a Wong Kar Wai retrospective in April (original). They’re showing everything but 2046. Note that Ashes of Time, the only Wong Kar Wai movie unavailable on DVD in the US (OK, yes, but Sony seems to have the rights to 2046 (original) and it’ll be out by the end of this year, I bet) is playing on Sunday, April 10th.

I’m currently in La Guardia Airport. In the ideal world, I’m in Boston, but that world was shattered sometime this afternoon. No biggie. Most of the annoyance I might otherwise feel is dispelled by the fact that the Fort Lauderdale airport has free wireless Internet. Cool beans for Fort Lauderdale, which has suddenly become my preferred transfer point for any air travel involving Florida but not involving Orlando. (Once in the past seventeen years, counting this trip, but still.) ...

After much internal debate, I’ve finished my top twenty movie list. In order of preference, even. The up-to-date list is here (cool site, by the by) but if you’re too lazy to click through: Magnolia Days of Being Wild Brazil Casablanca City of God Bullet in the Head Miller’s Crossing Crash Breakfast at Tiffany’s Ronin Blue Velvet Goodfellas The General Dead Man Full Metal Jacket The Incredibles Taxi Driver Peking Opera Blues Glengarry Glen Ross The Grifters Yeah, I like genre movies. Possibly I like guy movies too; be your own judge. Yes, Miller’s Crossing is the best Coen Brothers movie. I don’t know if Days of Being Wild is the best Wong Kar Wai movie, but it’s the best one I’ve seen — I understand that In the Mood for Love may supercede it when I finally see that, though. Crash is the best Cronenberg movie because it’s the best cast he’s ever had, although Videodrome is a very close #2. ...

Hey! If you’re in Boston, I’m providing you with plenty of warning and I will brook no objections that do not involve the need to babysit. The Saturday after next, February 26th, Days of Being Wild is playing at the MFA. It’s at 4 PM. I cannot even begin to explain how great this movie is, although I took a crack at it once. When I listed the top twenty movies of all time? Most of them were hard to choose and maybe Last Life in the Universe could creep on there and so on. But the top three, those were easy, and Days of Being Wild was among them. ...

I say “Well, I think I’m going to see Constantine after all.” And you say, “What? That’s stupid. Keanu, and Los Angeles instead of London, and dude.” And I say, “Well.” Then the New York Times says, “How difficult is it to play a mythic figure like Gabriel as opposed to, say, a soccer mom?” And Tilda Swinton says “They’re exactly the same, because no one you play is ‘real.’ Every character is a construct, even if you’re playing a suburban mother. You’re looking for a construct in the way you look and talk, and you have either the mythic information about Gabriel, or what we know about suburban mothers, and then you just try to make it real. It’s exactly the same. So, you start with what we know about Gabriel as God’s messenger.” ...

Hey, so it turns out they do this new DVD thing every week. Whatta bonanza. Before I get started on talking about this week’s harvest, I wanted to mention that I picked up Delicious Library (original) over the weekend. It is awesome, although I would recommend carefully backing up your database regularly, since I lost a couple of titles in some sort of hiccup at some point. But man, is it awesome. I cataloged 360 DVDs (yeah, yeah, I know) in about two hours of lazy work. Cool stuff. ...