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.

Red light, (Project) Greenlight

Producer Effie Brown, writer-director Jason Mann, and actor Bruce Davison on the set of The Leisure Class.

We have seen it all now – or at least, everything they are going to show us. Season 4 of HBO’s Project Greenlight ended Sunday, and the film it produced, The Leisure Class, debuted last night. If you are unfamiliar with the Matt Damon- and Ben Affleck-produced documentary series, it follows the journey of an untested director as he, always a “he” so far, attempts to make a film. This year’s “lucky” winner was Jason Mann, and for eight episodes this season, we watch as he navigates the world of Hollywood moviemaking.

Both as a film fan and an aspiring filmmaker, I find this show fascinating. It is a treat to step behind the curtain and really see the process of creating a movie. I think most of us are long past the stage where we imagine films or any other creative endeavor springing forth fully formed from the minds of brilliant artists. Like all other things in life, it is hard work, and it is likely we would all benefit from learning the hard work behind most people’s jobs. Honestly, for the impact they have on my life, I know next to nothing about the day-to-day lives of my grocer or postman.

Mann directs The Leisure Class for Project Greenlight.

This is about movies, though, and this season of Project Greenlight was an illuminating look at the gritty details of what makes movie magic work – or not work. In addition to Mann, the series stars producers Effie Brown and Marc Joubert, as well as co-writer and season 1 winner Pete Jones. Affleck, Damon, Peter and Bobby Farrelly, and HBO President Len Amato show up from time to time, but it is really about those four people.

The show has been in the news a bit during its run, primarily early on for some comments Damon made to Brown about diversity. Now that the show has ended, Brown has been the participant whose profile has risen the most, as opposed to the ostensible star of the show and director of the movie Mann. That heightened profile is hard won as Brown tries like hell to keep the whole enterprise from flying off the rails. Hers is a valiant effort, thwarted at almost every turn by Mann.

There is much agreement that money has been damaging to the art world and the film business in particular. No one is here to argue that point. The last thing we need is another superhero movie or big-budget shoot-’em-up or lowest-common-denominator comedy. When a genuinely talented writer, director, or producer shepherds something truly visionary to the screen, it is to be applauded.

After watching him on eight episodes of television and a feature film, it is apparent Mann is not one of those people. Throughout the series, Mann steadfastly refuses to put himself in a position to make a good film, and The Leisure Class turns out to be a bad, bad movie. He and Brown butt heads constantly over budget, shooting, and story issues, and the interesting thing is Mann almost always wins these battles.

He wants to shoot on film instead of digital. Brown tells him it will be too expensive, so he goes over her head and gets his way. He refuses to choose a location that does not match what he has in his head. He finally settles for a house he was shown early on but chooses so close to shooting it creates further problems. He claims he cannot shoot the script he is given, so he convinces HBO to let him make his own script. Time after time after time, he gets his way, and ultimately, this is the best thing that could have happened.

If he had relented in any of his battles or agreed to compromise his vision in some way, he could have claimed the end result was not his fault. As it is, he got everything he wanted and made a terrible movie. There is no one to blame but Mann. Though some viewers will disagree with this assessment, Brown did all she could to help Mann and prevent him from hurting himself, but at the end of the day, he could not collaborate. He was determined to live or die on his own. Creatively and artistically, he dies.

Ed Weeks and Tom Bell star in The Leisure Class.

At 86 minutes, The Leisure Class is either way too long or way too short. Perhaps its distressing lack of character development could have been addressed by giving the scenes room to breathe or providing some semblance of backstory. However, since the plot is utter nonsense to begin with, this film, adapted from a short Mann worked on, probably should have stayed a short. A group of talented, game actors, including Tom Bell, Ed Weeks, Bruce Davison, and Bridget Regan, is stranded by an underdeveloped script and amateur direction.

Cinema fans like you and I, we want to root for art and artists. It is our natural inclination to cheer on Mann as he fights the good fight against corporate giants (HBO) and their moneymen (Brown and Joubert). It can be painful, then, to realize: Sometimes the giants and their moneymen are right. No one gets into the film business because they want to make bad movies, though Mann seems suspect of any non-artist. These are people with experience, talent, and knowledge, particularly Brown and Joubert, and Mann willfully ignores them to put out the worst possible product. It would be wrong to cheer on such hubris.

The final episode contains two quotes that sum up what went wrong with The Leisure Class. As Mann is being given final edit notes by Amato, he says in a talking-head interview: “I would love it if I could make movies in the future where I don’t have to debate the logic of my opinion on how something should be. Ultimately, it should be kind of a personal art form.” This is perfectly in keeping with the Mann we have seen through Project Greenlight.

Amato, without meaning to, provides the rejoinder to Mann’s sentiment, saying in his own interview: “Jason’s not as open as he should be to different input from different people. If you try to do everything yourself and you’re not getting the input of all the other artists and craftspeople around you, you’re not really making as good of a film as you can make. That’s the lesson he hasn’t been able to learn yet.”

Ours is a culture that lionizes lone wolves and mavericks. We abhor group think and committee decision-making. This is what makes someone like Steve Jobs so popular. In reality, the genius of individuals is at best a myth. In filmmaking, especially, collaboration is essential. Through the failure of The Leisure Class and the success of Project Greenlight, this lesson is spelled out, for Mann’s benefit, in both celluloid and digital.

New movie review: Gone Girl

Nick, played by Ben Affleck gives us a smile during a press conference on his missing wife in Gone Girl.

Welcome to America – 2014. Well, the worst parts of it anyway. The part that is corrupt and sensationalized. The part that promotes style over substance and flash over fulfillment. The part of us that loves ourselves just a little more than anyone else. It is nasty, brutish, obsessive, and ill informed. David Fincher’s Gone Girl reflects all of that, and as such, it is a hard movie to like.

Hell, it is a hard movie to watch. You may be familiar with the story, based on the worldwide bestseller of the same name by author Gillian Flynn and adapted here by the writer. If you have not read the book, as I have not, then know the less you know going in, the better off you will be. The movie is a series of twists and turns in the dark, interrupted occasionally by a bright and shining light that does more to disorient than illuminate. But when you reach the end, you realize you have been in the sewer the whole time.

Ben Affleck plays Nick, and Rosamund Pike plays Amy, who is married to Nick. We learn about their courtship and relationship mostly in flashbacks narrated by Amy’s diary entries. Five years into the marriage, things are not going well. Amy is dissatisfied, and Nick wants out. On the morning of their anniversary, she goes missing, and the circus begins.

Most of the rest you will recognize from real life – or the 24-hour news cycle version thereof. The husband is the prime suspect because the husband is always the prime suspect. He is scrutinized and demonized until the court of public opinion convicts him before he has been arrested. The news loves a villain, and the public loves a victim. How could he have done this to her? What monster could? And so on, and so on it goes. These points are both part of the film and part of a pattern of sensationalism you will have seen on CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC, all equally culpable in this farce.

Fincher’s film is at its best when it is deconstructing the role the media play in these cases. The classic “I go where the story is” defense is trotted out for maximum irony – because of course, there was no story until you got there. The benefit of Gone Girl is its privileged viewpoint on Nick’s side of the camera. Rightly or wrongly accused, the newly minted villain’s life will never be the same. Convicted or not, he will forever live under the cloud of suspicion fashioned out of whole cloth by the media’s intractable desire to quench the public’s insatiable thirst for justice – or vengeance, take your pick.

If I have so far avoided much discussing the movie at hand, you will forgive me, but the role of the news media in our culture and in our public consciousness is a near and dear subject to me (see this review). I have made my living as a journalist for four years now, and it is hard to like what I see: the pandering, the lowest-common-denominator thinking, the appeal to our basest desires. In Gone Girl, there is a mirror held up to us, and the reflection is ugly.

For his role, Affleck studied the real-life subjects of these feeding frenzies, in particular Scott Peterson, to whom Affleck bears a striking resemblance in this film. This is probably not an accident. Affleck hits every note on both sides of the persona – the public and the private. When he is in front of the cameras, he displays a smug charm that is a little too self-satisfied to be genuine. At home, however, he is unravelling, caught in a whirlwind that has no end. Guilt and innocence mean nothing when your life is a perpetual blur, and Affleck is remarkable in helping the audience understand what it is to live in such a haze.

Floating above it all is Pike, the victim. She is immediately lionized and canonized, as though death has washed away her sins. However, Amy’s diary reveals her to be more complex than all that – as I would hope we all are – and Pike digs into every facet of “Amazing Amy.” Rarely has an actress used her voice to such effect, modulating her pitch, tone, and cadence to match the mood of the character and the scene. It is a great physical performance as well, but Pike wields her voice alternately like a weapon and a shield.

A notoriously demanding director, Fincher gives his cast and crew a darkly funny and hypnotically histrionic canvas on which to paint, and everyone seems to have fun going outside the lines – from the actors’ deranged-in-the-best-way performances to the propulsive jangling of Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross’ score. Fincher and editor Kirk Baxter collaborate to create a pace all their own, using a disjointed fade-to-black style that would seem more at home on an episode of Law and Order but fits this material like a glove.

And therein lies the rub: the material. The filmmakers could use the boldest colors in the spectrum, but if the picture they are painting just is not that good, then what have they really created? Flynn’s story is a boardwalk caricature drawing placed on an art pedestal by Fincher and his crew. Character motivations are frequently murky, and events seem to happen often for the sole purpose of moving a frankly ludicrous plot forward.

The story wants to take the audience to some dark places, but to what end, it is unclear. The movie is an expert evocation of the darkest sides of ourselves and revels in laying bare the most awful aspects of our humanity. This would be wonderful subject matter to explore, but those involved in Gone Girl seem less interested in exploration of the soul than in titillation of the senses. In this way, perhaps, it is the perfect film for America now – a pulpy exercise in high style that lacks any real substance.

See it? Yes.