Into the Vast Unknown: 10 Most Anticipated Movies of the Fall

It feels almost silly to state the obvious, but let’s state it anyway: There has never been a year like this. This, of course, does not refer only to the cinema, but for our purposes here, we shall confine our conversation to matters of the cinema.

In past years, Last Cinema Standing’s Most Anticipated Movies of the Fall has referred exclusively to the films we are excited to see on the big screen in the final four months of the year. That will not be possible this year. Though theaters are open in much of the country, they are not open in Los Angeles, and even if they were, I would not feel comfortable sitting with strangers in a room right now. I do not foresee that being the case any time in the near future.

Given these unprecedented circumstances, the process of putting together this list of 10 movies was more melancholy than any that came before. It hurts to know I will not be seeing any of these films in a dark theater, on a giant screen, with a crowd of fellow movie fans, united in our love of the cinema.

These times force me to consider the very name of this site and its mission statement, which has always been to defend the sanctity of the moviegoing experience until the last theater shuts its doors. Last Cinema Standing. Never has that name felt more literal, nor has that possibility felt closer. The trend lines are pointing in the wrong direction for this industry I love, and if there is one thing that cannot be stopped, it is the march of time. 

I try hard not to be an antiquarian about these things. The world changes, technology advances, tastes change, etc., but anyone who has lived to watch a generation or two pass by understands what it is to feel the times are leaving you behind. Evolve or go extinct. Those pangs of sadness, however, are real when we consider that beyond which we have evolved. But it is still better than the alternative.

No one knows what the future holds, but the cinema will be changing. That much is certain. It is on those of us who love the movies to change with it, to hope that it continues to reflect our values and interests. We must trust that the cinema of the future will be a cinema we can love. I suppose as long as the lights still go down and the projector still comes on, throwing moving images at a blank wall, there will be something there to love.

Until we meet in that dark room again, Last Cinema Standing’s 10 Most Anticipated Movies of the Fall:

10. News of the World, directed by Paul Greengrass (Dec. 25)

The last collaboration between Paul Greengrass and Tom Hanks was the gripping, boots-on-the-ground thriller Captain Phillips, which is perhaps better remembered in popular culture for the thousands of “I am the captain now” jokes it spawned than its artistic merits. But make no mistake -- Greengrass’ film was full of the kind of artistry his “shaky-cam” detractors would have you believe he lacks. Few directors out there fill their films with as much tension and dread, and Hanks brings the gravitas to match.

9. Dick Johnson Is Dead, directed by Kirsten Johnson (Oct. 2)

A brief personal anecdote: In 2016, my wife and I attended a random weekday evening screening of Kirsten Johnson’s Camera Person at the IFC Center in the Village. I had heard good things and was excited to check it out for myself. The film was tremendous, and as the credits rolled, Johnson came walking down the aisle and took a spot in the crowd for an impromptu Q-and-A session. She was witty, engaging, and informative, and on the spot, I became a fan for life. I am excited for this and for anything else she plans to make.

8. Black Widow, directed by Cate Shortland (Nov. 6)

Black Widow should have had her own solo film a long time ago. It is hard to believe we have three Thor movies, three Iron Man movies, and two new Spider-man outings without a Black Widow-centric film. The absence is more than a little embarrassing when considering the first 10 years of the Marvel Cinematic Universe as a whole. Now, it arrives, and it brings along not only star Scarlett Johansson but Florence Pugh, the most exciting young performer in Hollywood. If we had to wait, Pugh’s industry ascent and appearance here mean the wait will have been worth it.

7. Mank, directed by David Fincher (TBA)

A biopic of Citizen Kane co-writer Herman J. Mankiewicz by one of the most revered directors working today, this has me of two minds. David Fincher is not always for me, and I blanch at any attempt to undermine Orson Welles’ role in making the greatest film of all time. That said, I devour Citizen Kane content, and while I do not think Fincher’s films all work, even those that do not work are interesting failures. So, count me in on this one.

6. Soul, directed by Pete Docter and Kemp Powers (Nov. 20)

Somehow, Pixar made it 25 years and 22 films without a black lead. For one of the most innovative and creative production companies in the business, that is a shameful record. For my money, Coco, the only Pixar film with a person of color in the lead, is the studio’s crowning achievement. Starring Jamie Foxx, Soul appears to follow in the footsteps of the more introspective, experimental Inside Out (also directed by Pete Docter), and with a supporting cast that includes, Quest Love, Daveed Diggs, Phylicia Rashad, Angela Bassett, and Richard Ayoade, I say bring it on.

5. Ammonite, directed by Francis Lee (Nov. 13)

Kate Winslet never really went away. She has worked steadily in both film and television after a brief post-Oscar hiatus from 2008-2011 to focus on her family. She earned her seventh Academy Award nomination in 2015 for Steve Jobs and has continued to deliver brilliant performances in middling to good movies such as Wonder Wheel and The Dressmaker. For whatever reason, though, Ammonite feels like a comeback, and I could not be more here for it. Put Winslet in everything, and I will have a ticket to everything.

4. Stillwater, directed by Tom McCarthy (Nov. 6)

Tom McCarthy was already one of my favorite filmmakers before Spotlight took the top prize at the Oscars. His first three films, The Station Agent, The Visitor, and Win Win, are masterworks of human emotion, exploring the deep need for connection that we all share. Then he went and made one of the best films of the 2010s (we’ll call The Cobbler an anomaly). He appears to be back in prestige waters here with this international mystery. 

3. Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, directed by George C. Wolfe (TBA)

This would have been high on the list anyway. We have words like anticipation for films like this: an adaptation of a play by August Wilson, that giant of the American stage, starring Viola Davis, whose only Oscar win came for Wilson’s Fences in 2016. Now, however, in the wake of the tragic death of Chadwick Boseman, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom affords us our last chance to see new work by the talented performer. It is our opportunity to mourn and to celebrate an actor who had so much more to give.

2. I’m Thinking of Ending Things, directed by Charlie Kaufman (Sept. 4)

We do not have to wait long for this now, but it feels like forever since existentialist filmmaker par excellence Charlie Kaufman has gifted us a vision of the world as he sees it. We got the lovely Anomalisa in 2015, but this will be just Kaufman’s second live-action feature film, following up his masterpiece of a directorial debut from 2008, Synecdoche, N.Y. With rising star Jessie Buckley, of Wild Rose and Judy fame, on board, this is an instant must-see that is guaranteed to be more interesting than almost any other film that will be released this year.

1. Nomadland, directed by Chloé Zhao (Dec. 4)

It is easy to be excited about a new film from Chloé Zhao, whose The Rider is one of the great humanist dramas of the past decade and made my list of the top 10 films of 2018. She has a clear directorial voice that is apparent already at this early stage of her career, and like many immigrant filmmakers working in the US, she has a better instinct for the truth of the American experience than most native artists. Adding Frances McDormand to the top of the poster only increases that excitement.

Selfishly, this may also be the last time we get to see a work by Zhao before she is catapulted into the stratosphere by her next film, Marvel’s The Eternals. All the greats are going to franchises, and they are making the best films in those franchises (Ryan Coogler’s Black Panther, Rian Johnson’s The Last Jedi, etc.). I have all the faith in the world that Zhao will make The Eternals special. 

So, let’s enjoy what is likely to be the last purely independent work by a brilliant independent artist. If there is justice in the world, which there so rarely is, money will be flying at Zhao for anything she wants to do next. And I will be there on opening night for whatever that is -- whether in a theater or in my living room, in whatever form the cinema takes.

RIP Chadwick Boseman

What we know is Chadwick Boseman was a brilliant man, a tremendous actor, and a genuine human being. He played iconic figures of American history, and he created iconic figures that have defined world culture. He quietly battled cancer for four years while working harder than most of us will work in 40. He spent his nearly 43 years on earth not only playing heroes but embodying them. He is dead way too soon.

The news does not hit you right away because it does not make sense. We just saw him this year in Spike Lee’s Vietnam opus, Da 5 Bloods. We will see him again this year when the August Wilson adaptation Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom comes out. He will undoubtedly be wonderful in the film, and it will serve as his final big-screen gift to us. The gift all along, of course, was having him in our lives.

He rose to prominence as Jackie Robinson in 42. Much will be made of his death coming on the day Major League Baseball was celebrating Jackie Robinson Day, one of those cosmic coincidences that feels somehow scripted. It is not and feels to me more sad than poetic. He also took on Thurgood Marshall and James Brown. He brought grace, power, and sensitivity to all of these roles. 

And, there was Black Panther. It is on as I type this. It remains the defining masterpiece of the Marvel era. The cultural capital of the Marvel Cinematic Universe often feels purchased and purchasable. Black Panther feels earned, necessary. The world needed a movie like Black Panther, and it needed a hero like King T’Challa. For it all to work, though, the enterprise needed an actor who could engage, empower, and inspire. That actor was Chadwick Boseman, could only have been Chadwick Boseman.

There have been three or four good Superman performers. As many or more solid Batman actors. Three Spider-men just this century. Often, superheroes feel interchangeable -- that is the purchased cultural capital we were talking about -- but Black Panther is not interchangeable. Chadwick Boseman is not replaceable. Oh, he will be replaced because the gods of profit demand a Black Panther 2, and the millions across the globe who find hope and inspiration in the character to see the story continued.

But Black Panther without Chadwick Boseman will be inherently lesser. Hollywood without Chadwick Boseman is inherently lesser. The world is inherently lesser. Rest in power.

Out brief candle: Farewell to the Landmark 57 West

Every one of these hits harder and harder. I never like to read about a theater I frequented closing down. Hell, I never like to read about a theater closing at all, but it seems to happen more frequently as the months and years pass. Still, something about the Landmark 57 West, a beautiful independent multiplex on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, hurts more than the others.

The first time I visited with my wife, then girlfriend, we were in awe of the place. We had anxiously awaited its opening since the closure of the Landmark Sunshine, 57 odd blocks south and way over on the other side of town. The Sunshine was a wonderful little cinema, but New York rents and neighborhood politics being what they are, it could not last.

“It could not last” was an apt phrase for the 57 West from the beginning. That giant space, with its luxe interiors and copious amenities, that had us so in awe when we arrived was too giant, too luxurious to survive in the most expensive city in the nation. Add to that the fact most New Yorkers were loath to travel that far from the city center to see a movie, and it had disaster written on it from the start.

The first movie we saw there was the Bret Morgen documentary on Jane Goodall, Jane. We bought a giant popcorn, which was delicious, a small soda, and some candy, then settled into the massive leather recliners in the auditorium for an excellent film. After the credits rolled, we sauntered over to the bar at the front of the house for a cocktail and lively discussion about the film. In short, it was a perfect moviegoing experience. But it wasn’t cheap, and it wasn’t crowded. The writing was already on the wall.

Theater owners across the country - both independent and chain - have scrambled over the past decade to find some way to keep people coming to the movies. The reasons why people stay home (the pandemic notwithstanding) have long been clear: Theaters are run down, tickets and concessions are too expensive, fellow moviegoers are talking or on their phones, and for the average person, most movies just are not worth all of that hassle and cost. Most folks are not like my wife and me and presumably you, if you are reading this. For them, the theater experience is not the end all, be all of cinema.

The universally agreed-upon solution seemed to be to make the theater experience a grand time out. No longer would the options at the concession stand be limited to buttery popcorn, a giant soda, and some Bunch-a-Cruch. Professional chefs prepared high-end menus. Theaters started serving beer and cocktails. You bought your ticket and walked into a bar instead of a lobby. Inside the auditorium, more and more, you find plush seats, many that recline, and more distance between you and your fellow patrons. Theater owners wanted to bring us back with the allure of creature comforts. 

It did not work. Why? I like a flatbread pizza and an IPA as much as the next person, but I can get those anywhere. I go to the movies for the buttery popcorn, giant soda, and Bunch-a-Crunch. The recliners are nice, but no one bothered to upgrade the screens, the projectors, or the soundsystem - you know, the things that might actually make the movies better. So we are left with cosmetic fixes to a structural problem.

As enchanting and appealing as a theater like the Landmark 57 West is, it is a luxury in a time when luxury is unaffordable for most. Really, going to the cinema has become a luxury, whether that is a giant AMC or the neighborhood single-screen movie house. The pandemic is only exacerbating a problem that has existed for years, hastening the demise of a cultural institution that was once central to American life. The fact that most Americans will not be terribly sad to see it go only makes the sting that much greater.

About a month before I left New York and moved back west, I attended my last screening at the 57 West: Nadine Labacki’s Cannes prize winner, Capernaum. It was a frigid January morning, and I was to have met a friend for the screening, but a bomb cyclone kept him from coming into the city. I entered the theater and the streets were clear. By the time I left, they were snow-covered in that beautiful way only New York City streets can be. Another perfect day at the movies.

The end of the Landmark 57 West era, brief as it was, is disheartening for the state of the moviegoing industry, certainly. But it feels as much like the end of a personal era for me. It is the end of something that meant a lot, not just a cinema but a state of mind. So, yeah, this one hurts a little more.

A Personal History of Oscar Watching: 2015

Michael Keaton and Co. accept the Oscar for Best Picture at the 2015 Academy Awards ceremony.

The 87th Academy Awards

Ceremony date: February 22, 2015

Best Picture: Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)

Best Director: Alejandro Gonzalez Iñárritu for Birdman

Best Actor: Eddie Redmayne for The Theory of Everything

Best Actress: Julianne Moore for Still Alice

It is fascinating to me how we use events to mark time in our lives. Intellectually, I know this ceremony was the #OscarsSoWhite ceremony. This was the year that particular criticism of the Academy really took off, and it has not let up since, nor should it. The criticism is fair and the discussion is vital to the long-term health of the Academy specifically and the industry in general. That can all be true, and yet that is not what I think of when I think of this ceremony.

By the time of the 2015 Oscars ceremony, we had been in New York a little more than a year. I had a steady job. We had a home. We had movie theaters and restaurants and parks and streets that we loved. New York had become more than a city. It was a way of living, and we did our best to soak up every second of life.

Part of that meant going to the movies, frequently and joyfully. I can tell you every theater I saw every Best Picture nominee in, and I can recount the experience in full. Eight movies in four different theaters, each one special. My wife and I were talking about it the other day, and she could not believe that we visited 34 different theaters in five years in New York. Every single one of them was unique, a reflection of its place in the city, an integral stitch in the cultural fabric.

We saw Richard Linklater’s Boyhood at the Lincoln Plaza (RIP) for my 26th birthday, apropos as there may not be a better birthday film than Linklater’s chronicle of lives lived. We saw Birdman in a packed house at the AMC Lincoln Square and knew instantly it was a special feat of filmmaking. The Imitation Game played a sold-out screening at The Paris, where the acoustics can be spotty in the cavernous hall, except when it is filled with people as it was that night. Damien Chazelle announced himself to us (and at least part of the world) in one of the small side theaters at the Regal Union Square.

These are all beautiful memories of a place and time, drifting further into the past but remaining clear as ever in my mind’s eye. This is how I mark time, and the Oscars are the great signposts of my life. I know where I was, whom I was with, and what I was doing for all of them.

The Daily Racing Form office. I used to work here.

On this particular occasion, Jen and I huddled together in the Daily Racing Form office on the 12th floor of the building at 44th and 3rd Avenue. I was working on the copy desk at the Form, and the TVs were usually on for racing during the day. On a Sunday night, though, we were all alone. We grabbed takeout from Davio’s just around the corner. As I said last time, Italian food in the city: almost always good. This was spectacular.

While the #OscarsSoWhite controversy and the ludicrous lack of recognition for Ava DuVernay’s masterful Selma dominated the conversation in the lead up to the show, the ceremony itself was about one thing: Boyhood vs. Birdman. It is remarkable how many years recently have come down to two films – usually one a more grounded human tale and the other a technical marvel. But perhaps that is just me, applying a loose narrative to events ruled more by the heart than the head.

I have always felt Boyhood, though good, is overpraised, while Birdman has been wrongly maligned. Unfortunately, the way this ceremony played out only reinforced those views. The Academy fell hard for Birdman, giving it four Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Director. Meanwhile, critical darling Boyhood came away with a single award for Supporting Actress for Patricia Arquette, an award I would have given to Birdman’s Emma Stone.

Though at the time I predicted Boyhood for the top awards, it seems now it was always likely to go this way. Birdman is a perfect Academy movie, a tribute to true artists, toiling away, struggling to make art that matters. It strikes out at focus-group-tested tentpole movies and attacks critics who may have their knives out in search of the blood of inauthenticity. There is pretension in Birman, but insomuch as there is, that pretension is earnest. Alejandro Gonzalez Iñárritu and Co. believe they are making great art and that that is a worthwhile endeavor. How could the Academy disagree?

Neil Patrick Harris hosted – Doogie Houser to me, the guy on How I Met Your Mother (a show I have never seen) to many – and failed to live up to the high bar set by his own Tony Awards gigs. That said, I found him energetic and entertaining. The Oscars ceremony is a different beast from the Tonys, and while Harris did the best he could, the musical theater schtick will only go so far in a roomful of cinema people.

After Birdman won the top prize, we headed home on the train. It was a long journey from my office in Midtown East up to our studio in West Harlem. At least, it felt long at the time. By the 90th Oscars ceremony, I would know better all the ways of getting around, the trains you could rely on and the ones best avoided. I would grow and learn and change, but every year, the Academy Awards would come back around to mark that growth and that change. To mark time.

Quick notes: Common and John Legend performing “Glory” from Selma remains one of the all-time great musical performances in Oscars history. … It was impossible to beat Foreign Language frontrunner Ida, by Pawel Pawlikowsi, but Andrey Zvyagintsev’s Leviathan is a masterpiece and one of the best films of the decade. Do seek it out. … I am also here to stump for Animated Feature nominee The Boxtrolls, which is a sneaky great animated film.

___

Next time: We go to New Jersey to see how far a dollar can stretch and Leonardo DiCaprio finally wins an Oscar.

A Personal History of Oscar Watching: 2014

Lupita Nyong'o accepts the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress at the 2014 Academy Awards ceremony.

The 86th Academy Awards

Ceremony date: March 2, 2014

Best Picture: 12 Years a Slave

Best Director: Alfonso Cuarón for Gravity

Best Actor: Matthew McConaughey for Dallas Buyer’s Club

Best Actress: Cate Blanchett for Blue Jasmine

We moved to New York City on January 28, 2014. By the time of the 86th Academy Awards, I was still without a job and we were without a permanent residence. We were staying in a sublet in Harlem around 135th Street. We watched the ceremony from a dingy hotel in Midtown Manhattan with one of those windows that looks out onto a brick wall. The wallpaper was ancient, the lightning was drab, and like much of the city, it was almost charming in its antiquity.

I have mentioned in this series how I tend to make major life changes just before the Oscars. Leaving my job, my friends, my family, my home, and everything else back in California to move clear across the country certainly qualifies. I have changed jobs, changed states, and added life partners, but the cardinal rule of my life never changes: I don’t miss the Oscars.

So, here we were, settled into our hotel. We ordered in Italian, which in New York City is basically always good. If you ever find yourself out east and need recommendations, I have many of them. Just ask. Tell ‘em Anthony sent you. They won’t know me, but the look of confusion should be worth the price of admission.

The last time I had watched the ceremony from a hotel room was 2007, when Ellen DeGeneres hosted. Now, seven years later, sitting in a hotel room on the other side of the country, there was Ellen hosting again. I always like her as a host. You know it will not be edgy, but it will be fun. I dislike when the host attacks the audience. It is a big night for everyone. Let’s just have some fun.

The talk-show world in the past decade has really handed itself over to wacky stunts and a desire to go viral. Ellen brought that energy to the ceremony this year when she ordered pizza for the audience and got out among the crowd to take the selfie shared ‘round the world. If you ever doubt the power or popularity of the Oscars or someone suggests the awards mean nothing to real people, remember that the selfie of Ellen, Lupita Nyong’o, Brad Pitt, Meryl Streep, et al, literally broke Twitter. It shut the website down briefly. The photo was shared by 3.4 million people. That’s power. That’s influence. That’s the Oscars.

As for the awards, it was Gravity vs. 12 Years a Slave. Alfonso Cuarón’s technically accomplished but, forgive the pun, airless space epic was probably the slight favorite heading into the night. That said, Steve McQueen’s Solomon Northup biopic had tied Gravity for the Producers Guild award and won the BAFTA for best film. So, it was neck and neck.

All night, Gravity just kept racking up awards, seven in all, including Best Director. Before the final envelope was opened, the tally was 7-2, with 12 Years a Slave having won Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Supporting Actress for Nyong’o (which we will talk about in a second). Then, Will Smith opened the envelope and announced 12 Years a Slave. I was ecstatic. I jumped out of my seat. McQueen was ecstatic, as well, and jumped for joy on the Oscars stage. His speech was beautiful, bold, and brilliant. It was as exultant as I have ever been watching the ceremony.

Back in January, I called 12 Years a Slave the best movie of the decade. Beyond that, I think it is one of the best films of all time, a modern masterpiece, and the greatest Best Picture winner ever. I am aware of the company that puts it ahead of: Casablanca, The Godfather and The Godfather Part II, Schindler’s List, Sunrise, Annie Hall, The Bridge on the River Kwai, Midnight Cowboy. All great. All pantheon films. So is 12 Years a Slave.

I initially conceived this series of Oscars-watching remembrances after the joy I felt seeing Parasite win Best Picture. That made me think about the other moments watching this ceremony over the years that gave me equal joy. The series has drifted from that original thesis, but the desire to reflect on those joyous moments remains, and when I think about Oscars-watching joy, this is the year that comes to mind.

The Best Picture win for 12 Years a Slave is probably my second-favorite Oscars moment ever. It was an instance of the Academy just getting it exactly right. My favorite all-time Academy Awards moment, however, came a little less than two hours earlier on the same night, when Christoph Waltz announced Lupita Nyong’o as the Best Supporting Actress.

Nyong’o was definitely the frontrunner, having won the Screen Actors Guild award, but she lost the BAFTA and the Golden Globe to reigning Best Actress Jennifer Lawrence. So, I had a terrible feeling in the pit of my stomach that the Academy might pass up one of the great screen performances of the decade for subpar work in a mediocre movie. Thankfully, that did not happen.

Then, to top it off, Nyong’o got on stage and gave one of the great speeches in Academy history. I know I am using a lot of superlatives to describe this night, but if any film and performance have earned them, this film and this performance have. I have watched Nyong’o’s gracious, heartfelt speech 20 times, and I will likely watch it 20 more and then some. It never fails to bring a tear to my eye. If you have not seen it recently, go back and watch it. The actress displays the kind of humility and awareness of the moment to which we should all aspire.

My life was in disarray. Savings were dwindling. Our sublet would be up in four weeks. Jen was working hard, but it could not continue like that forever. The future was as uncertain as it has ever been. I needed this night. I needed these winners. For whatever else Hollywood does, it provides us an escape – something we are all reflecting on amid the pandemic. At that moment in time and that place in my life, I needed Ellen DeGeneres taking a selfie, Lupita Nyong’o thanking the Academy, and Steve McQueen jumping for joy. And, there they were, right when I needed them.

Quick notes: The dual wins for Dallas Buyers Club in the Actor and Supporting Actor categories still bums me out. Matthew McConaughey and Jared Leto were good in an underwhelming film, but better work was passed over. … If you have never seen Best Live Action Short winner Helium, seek it out. It is truly lovely. … This ceremony also featured a random 75th anniversary tribute to The Wizard of Oz. Again, these are the things we need to cut if we want a shorter show. Someone, take notes.

___

Next time: I have a job in an office, and in that office, I will watch Birdman triumph.

A Personal History of Oscar Watching: 2013

George Clooney, Grant Heslov, and Ben Affleck celebrate their Best Picture win for Argo at the 2013 Academy Awards ceremony.

The 85th Academy Awards

Ceremony date: February 24, 2013

Best Picture: Argo

Best Director: Ang Lee for Life of Pi

Best Actor: Daniel Day-Lewis for Lincoln

Best Actress: Jennifer Lawrence for Silver Linings Playbook

Jen and I had been together less than a month when the 85th Academy Awards came around. In 2020, we celebrated our eighth Oscars ceremony together and second as a married couple. Understandably, less than a month into the relationship, she did not quite grasp the importance of the ceremony to me. What sane person could?

We met at the newspaper. She was an education and business reporter, and I was on the copy desk. Watching the ceremony at my dad’s house would be the first time she met my family, but of course, in my Oscars-addled mind, asking her to share the Oscars with me was the bigger deal. She agreed and we chose to make a weekend of it.

We drove down to San Francisco in the afternoon and met some people for a late lunch. That late lunch kept getting pushed back and back and back until it was certain we would not make to my dad’s in time for the show. She did not seem concerned. I wanted to seem cool, an act that did not include being overly concerned about the Academy Awards. Inside, I was counting the minutes.

I asked my dad’s wife to DVR the ceremony so we could watch it from the beginning. By the time we arrived at my dad’s house in Tracy, we were about 45 minutes late for the ceremony – the first and last time I would be late for my Oscars viewing appointment. The DVR had kicked in just late enough to miss the opening monologue. I would learn later that this was probably a lucky break.

Seth MacFarlane, of Family Guy fame, was the host that year. An odd choice by any measure, MacFarlane apparently opened the show with a song about how he had seen the boobs of many of the nominated actresses. The song was called, “We Saw Your Boobs.”

Years later, when the Harvey Weinstein scandal broke, people would point to a joke about Weinstein made by MacFarlane during this ceremony as proof that the industry knew. MacFarlane essentially confirmed this by saying the joke was inspired by an actress friend of his who had had a run-in with the disgraced producer. MacFarlane was celebrated in some corners for having the courage to call out Weinstein from Hollywood’s biggest stage. All I am saying is: Let’s not give the “We Saw Your Boobs” guy too much credit.

I have never bothered to go back and watch that opening monologue, which just does not seem like something I need in my life. The rest of MacFarlane’s hosting gig felt fairly paint-by-numbers as these things go. Perhaps a tad more off-color than usual, but nothing Chris Rock had not tried nearly a decade before.

My dad and his wife, not Oscars watchers, went upstairs and left Jen and I downstairs to enjoy the show on our own. They had kindly made us dinner, and we brought a bottle of wine. The dog hung out downstairs with us. I forget at what point I knocked over an entire glass of red wine on the beige couch. That was the day I learned the miracle of Scotchgard. No damage to the couch at all. This is not an ad, but seriously, that stuff works.

If it seems I am spending an unusual amount of time talking about everything but the awards, it is because this ceremony felt more rote than most. Ben Affleck’s Argo was the frontrunner, and his snub for Best Director made a Best Picture triumph all but inevitable. I felt good for the film’s producer Grant Heslov, who shared the top prize with best friend George Clooney, as well as Affleck. You might recognize him from supporting roles in True Lies and The Scorpion King. I know him from Dante’s Peak.

Apart from Argo, Life of Pi was the dominant force of the evening. Ang Lee won Best Director for the second time in his career – and for the second time watched another movie win Best Picture. You may recognize this bit of trivia from a Final Jeopardy question during Jeopardy’s “Greatest of All Time” tournament a couple months ago.

Daniel Day-Lewis won his third Best Actor Oscar for his Abraham Lincoln impression in Steven Spielberg’s historical drama. Jennifer Lawrence won Best Actress for Silver Linings Playbook. Christoph Waltz won his second Supporting Actor trophy for Django Unchained. And, Anne Hathaway joined Jennifer Hudson on the list of Supporting Actress winners who won for performing a single song quite well. All of these were foregone conclusions – there was some intrigue with Tommy Lee Jones in Supporting Actor, but that fizzled – and none was particularly inspired.

The DVR cut out in the middle of Day-Lewis’ acceptance speech. I did not get to see Best Picture announced live, which is a shame because I can only imagine what it felt like not to know Michelle Obama was going to show up. People criticized the moment as too political for the Oscars. I respectfully disagree. Unlike MacFarlane’s opening monologue, I did go back and watch Best Picture. I have seen it a number of times and was reminded of it recently while reading a biography of Jack Nicholson. A lovely moment when the highest office in the land celebrated the arts. Remember those days?

Quick notes: A lot of people think Roma’s Academy Awards run paved the way for Parasite to go all the way in 2020. I am of the opinion the Parasite road to victory begins here with Michael Haneke’s superlative Amour. The French-language, French-German-Austrian coproduction was nominated for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actress, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Foreign Language Film. It won only Foreign Language, but it proved that in the new, expanded Best Picture lineup, Academy members were ready and willing to look outside the U.S. for the best in cinema.

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Next time: We move to New York, and the Academy honors, for my money, the single greatest Best Picture winner of all time.

A Personal History of Oscar Watching: 2012

Jean Dujardin, accompanied by Uggie, picks up his Oscar for Best Actor at the 2012 Academy Awards ceremony.

The 84th Academy Awards

Ceremony date: February 26, 2012

Best Picture: The Artist

Best Director: Michel Hazanavicius for The Artist

Best Actor: Jean Dujardin for The Artist

Best Actress: Meryl Streep for The Iron Lady

Whose bright idea was it to make the menu themed? It was mine. It was all my idea, and I had no one to blame but myself when I was still making fried chicken as the lights went down inside the Dolby Theatre (née Kodak, and at the time the Hollywood and Highland Center). I was throwing my biggest and, to date, last Oscars party. Perhaps there will be another in the future, but I can promise you this: The menu will not be themed.

By late 2011, early 2012, I had made some good friends in the small newsroom at The Union. I was still only 23 and no one else on the editorial staff was really in my age bracket, but nobody made me feel too bad about it. I was another ink-stained wretch. I was in the club. That being the case, I thought I would invite them into my world for an evening.

Still without cable, I asked one of my co-workers and softball teammates if I could host the party at his house. He agreed. That set, I decided to attempt something I had seen mentioned online: a themed menu based around the nominees. Implicit in “seen mentioned online” is the absent phrase “by professional chefs and party planners.”

Based off the nine Best Picture nominees, here is the menu I, a single man in his early 20s, thought I could prepare for a group of a dozen or so people:

Moneyball – Ballpark peanuts, served as a preshow snack for the baseball movie

War Horse – Baked portobello mushrooms because a very quick Google search for “British appetizers” yielded this result to go with the World War I film

The Help – Fried chicken, a dish that is a major plot point in the film (yeah, remember that movie?)

The Descendants – Pineapple roasted pork loin (vaguely luau themed for the Hawaii-set film)

The Artist – Black-and-white cake (you see, because the movie is black and white)

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close – New York cheesecake for the 9/11 weepie

Hugo and Midnight in Paris – A selection of French wines for the two Paris-set films

The Tree of Life – This is where I gave up. Really, what would you have me do for Terrence Malick’s existentialist masterpiece?

The morning of the show, the softball team had practice, and my friend agreed to let me skip practice and do the setup and organization while he was out. My friend Sean, whom you may recall from previous installments of this series, joined me to help with the prep. Sean is not really an Oscars guy, but he is a good friend, which is why he found himself making 30 pieces of fried chicken over a hot stove as the show approached.

I remember Van Helsing was on the television. Not exactly an Oscars mood setter, but you worked with what you got in the last days of cable television. I had the pork loin in the slow cooker. The mushrooms were in the oven. The rice was ready to go. I set out the peanuts and announced the predictions contest. All my friends were sports fans, so the prize was a movie pack that included a microwave popcorn, a pair of movie-sized candies (purchased from one of the world’s last Blockbusters), and a copy of Moneyball on DVD.

By the time the show started, the appetizers were served, the pork loin was ready, everything but the damn fried chicken. I was doing my best, but finally, we had to pause so I could finish and watch the show. That was when Sean – again not an Oscars guy but one hell of a mensch – jumped in and finished the cooking.

Billy Crystal jumped on stage, gave a fine monologue that I remember mostly for his James Earl Jones impersonation (“Baseball.”). Then Martin Scorsese’s Hugo and Michel Hazanavicius’ The Artist traded off winning all the awards. Hugo was that year’s crafts juggernaut, and I still remember being annoyed when it won Best Visual Effects over Rise of the Planet of the Apes. Little did I know at the time I would get to be annoyed by the Apes franchise unjustly losing this award twice more in the years to come.

The Artist was a strange frontrunner. I distinctly remember the outside world declaring it artsy Oscar bait. Following the victory by The King’s Speech the year before, I understand the inclination, but that truly could not have been further from the truth. No black-and-white film had won the top award since 1960. No (nearly) silent film had won since the first ceremony. No French-produced film had ever won. So, this black-and-white, silent French production was not your typical Academy movie, no matter how much the organization’s detractors wanted it to be.

I like The Artist. Stacked against The Tree of Life or even Moneyball, though, Hazanavicius’ silent homage to old Hollywood is a slight winner. Jean Dujardin is good in the lead, and Bérénice Bejo is tremendous in her meaty supporting role. Obviously, the world remembers Uggie. I saw it the same afternoon I saw Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, a double feature that could give you whiplash. The comparison made The Artist a necessary salve. In a fairly heavy group of nominees – The Help and Midnight in Paris notwithstanding – maybe that is what the Academy was looking for, too.

Quick notes: I did not stop throwing Oscars parties for any reason. Circumstances simply have not leant themselves to the occasion. If I do again someday, you, dear reader, will be the first to know. Let it be known, however, that everyone had a good time that night. … Woody Allen won his fourth Academy Award, taking Best Original Screenplay for Midnight in Paris. It was also the fourth award he chose not to show up to receive. It will likely be the last award he gets from the Academy, as well, given the current circumstances.

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Next time: I’m late, I’m late for a very important date, and I spill the wine on my dad’s couch.

A Personal History of Oscar Watching: 2011

Colin Firth celebrates after winning the Oscar for Best Actor at the 2011 Academy Awards ceremony.

The 83rd Academy Awards

Ceremony date: February 27, 2011

Best Picture: The King’s Speech

Best Director: Tom Hooper for The King’s Speech

Best Actor: Colin Firth for The King’s Speech

Best Actress: Natalie Portman for Black Swan

For whatever reason, it has worked out that I have made a number of major life changes immediately preceding the Oscars, meaning my memory of the ceremony in certain years is inextricably tied to the events going on in my life. I completed my college education in December 2010 and moved to Grass Valley, Calif., to begin my first post-college job on Feb. 14, 2011, 13 days before the 2011 Academy Awards ceremony.

It was just by chance that my first job out of school happened to be a half-hour from where my best friend had grown up and where he lived with his parents after we left school. So, for those first two weeks, before I secured my first apartment, I stayed in the Leydons’ den. At the time, I preferred to fall asleep with a movie playing – a habit that continued until I met my wife, who cannot sleep with noise – so I slept on a pullout sofa and watched an old VHS copy of Back to the Future most nights.

I commuted to my job at the neighboring town’s local newspaper, ate dinner with the Leydons, drank with my friend (Sean, whose writing you may have seen on this site), and generally adjusted to life without the structure of school. My dad lived two hours south of my new home, and the Leydons became like a family away from family. They still are. The last weekend before the quarantine went into full effect, I was in Grass Valley, visiting with Sean, and we had a lovely brunch with his parents. We ate coffee cake and watched Samsara. Remember social gatherings?

The Leydons graciously allowed me to throw a miniature Oscars party in their den. The four of us and a Leydon family friend crammed onto the couch, finding additional seating room on the ottoman, and ate my homemade vegetarian spinach lasagna, a step up from the Stouffer’s I had served the year before. I cannot recall what else I prepared, but I remember being shocked by how much spinach shrinks when you cook it. I remember communal laughs and fun and a lovely night. Social gathering.

That ceremony became infamous for co-hosts Anne Hathaway and James Franco, primarily for Franco being stoned out of his mind throughout the event. They were lambasted as sleepy, boring, and generally unwatchable. My secret: I loved it. I thought they were great, and I thought Franco was hilarious. Who didn’t want more Pineapple Express? I remain in the minority, but my small group had a good time.

This was the year The King’s Speech beat The Social Network. Time has been kind to David Fincher’s Facebook drama, with many recently hailing it as one of the best films, if not the best film, of the 2010s. That is going too far. It is quite good. So is The King’s Speech, a Best Picture winner that film snobs dismissed as stuffy Academy bait. I have rewatched both recently, and in my estimation, they are not as far apart as history would have you believe.

Unfortunately, director Tom Hooper’s subsequent work – the overpraised Les Misérables, the dour The Danish Girl, and the disastrous Cats – have only served further to take the shine off of his award winner. I do not have the time or patience to look into it right now, but it seems likely no other director’s post-Oscar resume is quite this dire. None of that takes away from the fine accomplishment of The King’s Speech, but it is worth remembering the next time you see Hooper’s name on a marquee.

I snuck in a screening of The King’s Speech while I was visiting my dad for Christmas. I was still living in Humboldt in the immediate aftermath of graduation. My little car was bedraggled and did not deserve the beating of a 600-mile roundtrip, so I took a bus down to Tracy. For the trip back, the route was Tracy to San Francisco to Arcata. There was, however, a four-hour layover in The City, and I figured I had enough time to get to the Embarcadero Center Cinema for a screening of the much-hyped Oscar contender. I was right and I was wrong about that timing.

I remain famous among my friends and acquaintances for my lack of navigation skill. In the days before you could download Google Maps to your smartphone, I was all but helpless if placed in even moderately unfamiliar surroundings. Given this, it was foolish of me to believe I could get to the theater from the bus station and get back without getting lost. After five years living in New York City, I feel fairly confident I could do it now, but at the time, there was no way.

The afternoon screening was packed – the limited release would grow into a massive sleeper hit – and the audience seemed genuinely moved and entertained by King George VI’s plight. I had about 45 minutes to make it back to the station to catch my bus. I spent 20 minutes good and lost, wandering around central San Francisco. I did not have a clue where I was or how to get where I was going. I flagged down a cab and did my best to explain what I needed.

San Francisco is, of course, a city of many bus stations, so it was not precisely helpful to say to the driver, “Take me to the bus station.” A familiar calm settled over me. I have been lost many times in much more dire circumstances, and I have learned to roll with the punches. The driver and I worked it out together, and I was at the station with minutes to spare. Another adventure to tell, and another Oscars year in the books.

Quick notes: This was the last year of 10 Best Picture nominees because Academy members complained they could not come up with 10 worthy nominees. That is obviously ludicrous, but the next year, the system we have now would be put into place. … The best of the 10 nominees in my estimation was Danny Boyle’s 127 Hours, and the lineup was not particularly strong in a somewhat down year for film. … That said, I find it delightfully subversive that Banksy’s Exit Through the Gift Shop and Yorgos Lanthimos’ Dogtooth found their way into the room. … This was the first year I was able to catch the short films in a theater. They were lovely, but since we are running long here, I will save that story for another time.

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Next time: The biggest Oscars party I have thrown and a rather mediocre year for nominees.

A Personal History of Oscar Watching: 2010

Kathryn Bigelow accepts the Oscar for Best Director at the 2010 Academy Awards ceremony.

The 82nd Academy Awards

Ceremony date: March 7, 2010

Best Picture: The Hurt Locker

Best Director: Kathryn Bigelow for The Hurt Locker

Best Actor: Jeff Bridges for Crazy Heart

Best Actress: Sandra Bullock for The Blind Side

There are two things that must be talked about when we talk about this year’s ceremony: Kathryn Bigelow becomes the first (and to date, only) woman to win Best Director, and The Hurt Locker triumphs in the 10-film Best Picture lineup.

Bigelow’s place in history is well deserved, and her film remains as pulse-pounding and psychologically complex as it felt a decade ago. The story of an elite bomb squad unit fighting in the Iraq War remains the best film made about that conflict, and that is due to Bigelow’s gripping storytelling and powerful direction. Having Barbara Streisand present the award to Bigelow was a touch similar to having Coppola, Lucas, and Spielberg give the same award to Scorsese in 2007. The Academy knew it had a special moment on its hands and played it for all it was worth.

I still recall Streisand’s earnest: “It’s about time.” There were definitely folks pulling for James Cameron to win for Avatar. I would not have minded Quentin Tarantino for Inglourious Basterds. But Bigelow was the right person at the right time with the right film to make history. It is shameful she remains the only woman to win the award. Among those overlooked in the ensuing years: Ava DuVernay for Selma, Greta Gerwig for Little Women, Chloé Zhao for The Rider, Deniz Gamze Ergüven for Mustang, and Dee Rees for Mudbound. None of them nominated. Any would have made a fine winner. For now, Bigelow stands alone.

I remember I was home from school for the summer when I saw The Hurt Locker in theaters. I drove down to San Jose to the CinéArts at Santana Row, which had become my go-to indie theater for summer and winter breaks. I loved the Embarcadero in San Francisco (a theater we will talk about in the next installment of this series), but San Jose was an easier drive. I caught the late-night showing in a mostly empty theater, and it was apparent right away The Hurt Locker was top-notch filmmaking.

That mostly empty theater turned out to be sadly prophetic as the film became the lowest-grossing Best Picture winner of the past 40 years. This brings us to the Academy’s expanded Best Picture lineup. I have talked before about the misguided belief that popular, box-office successes in contention translate to increased viewership. The numbers simply do not bear this out. That has not stopped the Academy and the ceremony’s producers from trying anything and everything to keep viewers tuned in to the show.

Despite eight nominations and two wins the year before, blockbuster superhero film The Dark Knight failed to score either a Best Picture nod or a Best Director nomination for Christopher Nolan. By the same token, Pixar smash Wall-E garnered six nominations, tying Beauty and the Beast for most ever for an animated film, but it could not break into the top categories. The loudest voices decried this as a stain on the Academy, particularly in light of a rather milquetoast group of Best Picture nominees that included Milk, Frost/Nixon, and The Reader.

The solution: 10 nominees. The hope was for more populist, crowdpleasing films to get in the mix. The Academy wanted voters to think big. Did it work? Yes and no. Avatar, still the second-biggest movie of all time, got in, but it is likely it would have been among the five anyway. Pixar adventure tale Up did manage to break in, becoming just the second animated Best Picture nominee after Beauty and the Beast, as did feel-good football drama and surprise box-office hit The Blind Side.

Avatar is an inarguable artistic achievement, and Up remains, for me, Pixar’s high-water mark, but I think it would be difficult to find anyone who thinks a Best Picture nomination for The Blind Side has been good for the long-term health of the Academy. The complaints about a watered-down Best Picture lineup will only grow louder next year, and the Academy will be forced once again to change.

The expanded lineup also had the unintended effect of making voters more adventurous and ushering in several of the kind of little-seen independent films from which the Academy was trying to distance itself. Among them this year were the Coen Brothers’ A Serious Man – the best film of the year in my estimation – and Lone Scherfig’s An Education. In the years since, the Academy has moved even more in this direction, choosing interesting, difficult indies over middle-of-the-road blockbusters (the odd Bohemian Rhapsody, which I actually think is fine, notwithstanding).

With all of this going on, this year happened to be my last year watching the Oscars at school, as I was set to graduate in fall 2010. The pandemic has ensured that I will not be forced to make the difficult decision not to attend my 10-year reunion. Pity. Once again, I relied on the cable connection of another to watch the show, but this time, I supplied the food and drinks.

I cobbled together the money to buy some alcohol, some frozen appetizers, and a Stouffer’s lasagna – not yet ready to try my cooking skills – and held my first informal Oscars party at my friend Ryan’s house. There were maybe eight or nine of us there for the show, many of them the same people who attended my wedding eight years later, which if nothing else, suggests a certain loyalty among my friends.

We ate, drank, laughed, and rather enjoyed ourselves. I remember being pleased I got to enjoy the show with good friends. The lasagna came out of the oven right about the time Michael Giacchino won Best Original Score for his work on Up. He paid tribute to artists and those who dare to dream big, and sitting there among my friends, those I played music with and made art with, it could not help but feel like he was talking to us.

Quick notes: This was the dreaded Adam Shankman-as-producer year, when the So You Think You Can Dance judge thought it would be a good idea to replace the Best Original Song performances with a series of interpretive dances set to the Best Original Score nominees. It was embarrassing for everyone. … I have always thought it a shame that Tarantino’s best film – give or take a Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood – came away with just one win from eight nominations. Still, that one win gave us Christoph Waltz, the gift who keeps on giving.

Next time: I move to the mountains and get lost in San Francisco. Find out what any of that has to do with the Oscars.