Woohoo! Oscar season comes to a head with the nominees announced earlier this morning by Anne Hathaway and Tom Sherak, the prez of the Academy. This year’s a bit different, with 10 movies nominated for best picture, essentially so some piece of trash like The Blind Side can bring in more viewers (Kill. Me. Now.).

Not many suprises on this front (expect for maybe District 9 in the Best Picture category … nice!), although I’m glad to see the Coen Bros.’ A Serious Man as one of the 10 Best Pics (I was worried it was too esoteric), and of course, Philly’s own Lee Daniels comes away with a Best Director nod for Precious (which also picked up acting notices for Mo’Nique and Gabourey Sidibe).

There’s some stuff I’m excited about, not so excited about and downright pissed about (The Motherfucking Blind Side?!). I’m sure you are too. Let me know what you think in the comments and we can discuss.

…And the nominees are… Click For More »

Admit it, you want more from this week’s Movies section.

The Twilight Saga: New Moon — C

New Moon didn’t screen in time for publication but Drew Lazor went anyway:

Let’s start out by saying there’s no real point in criticizing Twilight. Complaining about the pointlessness of Stephanie Meyer’s bizarro Mormon fantasy world, populated by pouty, eyelash-fluttering studmuffin vampires, steroid-abusing American Indian werewolf boys and the screamingly self-absorbed teenage girls they lust after is akin to punching a tidal wave — it may make you feel like you’re fighting the good fight, but your ass is still going to drown. This series, for myriad reasons, has an unrelenting stranglehold on American pop culture and is not going to let go until the last drop of blood (money) has been drained from the veins of America’s shrieking tweens. So what exactly does Chris Weitz’s New Moon, which picks up right where Catherine Hardwicke’s 2008 smash left off, accomplish in terms of advancing our understanding of this arcane mess? Nothing in particular. Bella (Kristen Stewart, the No. 1-ranked lip biter/melodramatic sigher in Hollywood) still treats her friends and father like garbage because she’s so fixated on thousand-yard-stare-factory douchevamp Edward (Robert Pattinson), who abandons her early on after an ugly incident at his family’s house. Jacob (Taylor Lautner), tormented by Bella’s incessant mixed messages (“You’re beautiful! I love you! But I still like vampire guy better, he’s mad sparkly!�), lifts a shitload of weights, discovers he’s a werewolf and starts wearing nothing but jean shorts and running shoes. (We also learn that werewolves, while in human form, enjoy muffins for breakfast.) We eventually meet the Voltari vampire council, all of whom dress like they’re in a porn version of Immortal Beloved. The acting is crappy, the plot is stupid and Meyer seems to want every young girl in America to believe it’s OK to screw over everyone who cares about you in the name of restraining-order-worthy love. But this is the movie that made $26.3 million in a single night, so I’m going to go ahead and holster my haymakers and let that saltwater rush into my lungs real slow like.

The Messenger — A-

Just in case you missed it, Gary M. Kramer talked to The Messenger director Own Moverman and its star Ben Foster:

CP: So, Ben, how did you immerse yourself in the role?
BF: Oren set up a field trip for Woody and myself to go to Walter Reade Hospital before we started shooting, to spend time in the amputee ward. That was a life-changing experience. You can read things in the paper, and see things in the news, but to be in the amputee ward and touching a 19 year-old boy’s stump, it roots you. It becomes, in itself, its own kind of humble service trying to get out of the way of yourself and serve these men and women and represent them warts and all, scars and all.

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