Mar 252018
  March 25, 2018

howardhawksHawks has the most masculine style of any of the great directors. His films were about men and for men. The relationships that matter were between men, and the only way a woman could have power in a Hawks film was by taking on masculine traits and becoming one of the boys. Thus was born the Hawksian Woman, best fulfilled by Katharine Hepburn, Rosalind Russell, Barbara Stanwyck and Lauren Bacall. In a sideways fashion, this made Hawks a (occasionally) feminist director. This testosterone-drenched style can become obnoxious in a very serious film, but worked great with humor.

Besides his manly-man style, and those aggressive Hawksian women, he was known for his quick dialog—with actors often speaking over each other—and his willingness to take on any genre. He made westerns, Film Noirs, comedies, musicals, war films, gangster films, action movies, dramas, and maybe a science fiction film (see the honorable mention).

Like Hitchcock, Hawks had a tendency of remaking his own films. A Song is Born (1948) is a remake of the far superior Ball of Fire. Rio Lobo (1970) is a rough remake of El Dorado (1967) which is a rough remake of Rio Bravo (1959).

Honorable mention for The Thing from Another World (1951), for which he is uncredited, and may or may not have directed.

#8 – El Dorado (1967) — Hawks worked best with humor. Rio Bravo took the plot seriously and it is hard to sit through. For El Dorado he shot the same plot, but with everything lighter and a good number of jokes.

#7 – Ball of Fire (1941) — A screwball comedy with Gary Cooper as a hopelessly naĂŻve professor researching slang and Barbara Stanwyck as a showgirl in need of a place to hide. The plot fizzles at the end and Cooper is miscast, but Stanwyck sells the show. [Also on The Great Actors List for Barbara Stanwyck]

#6 – I Was a Male War Bride (1949) — No one starred in more good films than Cary Grant. This one is fluff, but it is fun fluff, with Grant as a French soldier who marries an American and then tries to get to America on a law that assumes the spouse will be female.

#5 – Bringing Up Baby (1938) — THE iconic screwball comedy sees the nearly sociopathic Katharine Hepburn tricking the drab Cary Grant into helping her retrieve her leopard. [Also on The Great Actors List for Katharine Hepburn]

#4 – Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) — You can spend days analyzing the subtext of this Jane Russell/Marilyn Monroe musical, which ends with Monroe’s Lorelei Lee giving a defense of gold digging that is impossible to refute. The Diamonds Are A Girl’s Best Friend number has become iconic.

#3 – To Have and Have Not (1944) — “You just put your lips together and blow.” Humphrey Bogart fell in love with his young costar, Lauren Bacall, and so did I, and Hawks found his ideal Hawksian Woman. [Also on The Great Actors List for Humphrey Bogart]

#2 – His Girl Friday (1940) — Who’d have thought gender-swapping one of the leads in a dramady newspaper play would produce this brilliant work. It has all the meaning and fun of the original, and extra layers of romance and feminism. It is extremely fast paced and very funny. Cary Grant excels as a fast-talking (very fast-talking) cad and Rosalind Russell is his equal. [Also on The Great Actors List for Cary Grant]

#1 – The Big Sleep (1946) — Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall make film magic and Hawks sculpts it all perfectly. This is my go-to film. I may have seen it more than any other. It is a joy, yet it still qualifies as Film Noirs. It’s funny, violent, twisted, nasty, and a great time. (Full Critique) [Also on The Great Actors List for Humphrey Bogart]

 

Mar 222018
  March 22, 2018

GeorgeCukorCukor was known as “the woman’s director” as he had a reputation for getting good performances from actresses, but he could have earned the title because of his focus on films targeting women: romances and melodramas. His pictures heavily featured the social elite and often compared life with a performance. He’s a fine director, but I’ve never found anything outstanding about his skills. Rather it was in collaboration (with writers, cinematographers, and actors) where he excelled. His greatest artistic success came from his collaborations with Katharine Hepburn.

An honorable mention for his week as director on The Wizard of Oz and for him getting fired from Gone With the Wind for telling David O. Selznick, accurately, that the script was garbage. And then there’s My Fair Lady. If I’m being fair, it should appear on the list below, and above the 8th slot. But no matter how good it might be, I’m always hit on how disappointing it is. It is good, but it should be much better. The ending is wrong, the sets are poorly designed, the “Get Me To the Church” number is far too long, and Audrey Hepburn isn’t Julie Andrews.

So, the top 8 Cukor films that aren’t disappointing are:

#8 – A Double Life (1947) — It won Ronald Colman a best acting Oscar. He plays an actor who is far too method, so playing Othello turns out to be a very bad idea.

#7 – Pat and Mike (1952) — The 1st of four Katharine Hepburn film on this list and the 1st of two Hepburn/Tracy films. It tries to wave a feminist flag, but in 2017, it feels like it does the opposite. Still, it has some funny moments. [Also on The Great Actors Lists for Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn]

#6 – Adam’s Rib (1949) — Another Hepburn/Tracy film, this one setting them as competing lawyers. The best bits come from a young Judy Holliday as the defendant who shoots her unfaithful husband. [Also on The Great Actors Lists for Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn]

#5 – Les Girls (1957) — Cukor’s first “normal” musical (as A Star is Born is a tragic drama first) isn’t all that normal as it’s primarily a comedy, one with an art film basis. It was Gene Kelly’s last MGM musical, and it’s smart and fun. (My review)

#4 – The Women (1939) — An all female cast made up of most of MGM’s big names deal with male infidelity, pettiness, and backstabbing. It sounds serious, but it’s mostly comic.

#3 – Dinner at Eight (1933) — MGM pulled out all the stops, combining all their biggest stars in one film: John and Lionel Barrymore, Jean Harlow, Marie Dressler, Billie Burke, Wallace Beery. It’s melodrama and comedy about the lives of sad people who mostly deserve their misery. As was usually the case, Cukor worried mainly about the acting, shooting it like a stage play. Luckily, he got some great performances.

#2 – Holiday (1938) — Often overlooked, this Grant & Katharine Hepburn romantic comedy has always been a favorite of mine. Grant plays a vunderkin whose set to marry the good sister of a high society family, but he wants more than money which doesn’t go over well with the family, except for black sheep Hepburn. This is where you go if you want depth and philosophy with your comedy. [Also on The Great Actors Lists for Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn]

#1 – The Philadelphia Story (1940) — This seems a case of Cukor getting out of the way of Katharine Hepburn’s vision. It is the essential romcom, and was the perfect vehicle for its three leads, Hepburn, Jimmy Stewart, and Cary Grant. None of them ever had a role that more completely played to their strengths. This is as witty as film gets. [Also on The Great Actors Lists for Cary Grant, James Stewart, and Katharine Hepburn]

Mar 182018
 

AlfredHitchcockNormally my lists of the Best Films of the Great Directors will be top 10 lists, but for Hitchcock, I decided something more comprehensive was in order. He has plenty of masterpieces on his resume, but that doesn’t mean he hasn’t a few misfires—quite a few actually. And a few real stinkers: Frenzy…Wow…Just…Wow. So in ranking Hitchcock’s films, I’ll stick with the good ones. The rest I’ll group either with the complete failures or with the also-rans. After all, it doesn’t matter that Secret Agent is worse than Topaz if you should skip both.

Another factor with Hitchcock is that he was not the most original of directors. When he found something he liked, he stuck with it. Many of his films are variations on a single story and single theme and employ the same plot devices. He would build tension in the same way from film to film, and use similar climactic scenes. These tendencies do effect my ranking. Young and Innocent would rank higher if The 39 Steps and North by Northwest didn’t exist (not to mention Saboteaur).

I’ve a few yet to see: The Pleasure Garden (1925), The Mountain Eagle (1926), Easy Virtue (1928), Mary! (1930).

That leaves 49.

Skippable: Downhill (1927), The Ring (1927), Champagne (1928), The Manxman (1929), The Skin Game (1931), Rich and Strange (1931), Number Seventeen (1932), Secret Agent (1936), Waltzes from Vienna (1934), The Paradine Case (1947), I Confess (1953), The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956), Marnie (1964), Torn Curtain (1966), Topaz (1969), Frenzy (1972), Family Plot (1976).

The Also-rans: The Lodger (1927), Murder! (1930), Juno and the Paycock (1930), Sabotage (1936), Jamaica Inn (1939), Foreign Correspondent (1940), Rebecca (1940), Suspicion (1941), Saboteur (1942), Lifeboat (1944), Spellbound (1945), Rope (1948), Under Capricorn (1949), Stage Fright (1950), The Wrong Man (1956).

Which leaves:

#18 – Mr. & Mrs. Smith (1941) — Strictly work-for-hire, the plot—a stupid and rich couple find out they aren’t really married—is pure screwball comedy, but Hitchcock had little interest or skill with that subgenre so it comes off as an uneven amalgamation of styles. Robert Montgomery lacked the charisma to play such an idiot (Cary Grant could have done marvels with it, and did so in a similarly-themed film) and Hitchcock didn’t know how to work with Carole Lombard. It’s just amusing enough to separate itself from the also-rans.

#17 – Blackmail (1929) — I can’t call this a great film, but it is fascinating. Britain’s first “all-talking picture,” has silent segments, poorly matched dubbing, and generally bizarre sound. It also has all the suspense and voyeurism that marked Hitchcock’s career.

#16 – The Farmer’s Wife (1928) — My favorite of Hitchcock’s silent films, this one rises above the also-rans by being funny. Not a thriller at all, but a comedy about a widower looking looking for a new wife and making a mess of things. You’d never know this was a Hitchcock film, though it is very well shot.

#15 – Young and Innocent (1937) — Hitchcock made a lot of semi-remakes of The 39 Steps. This one is closest in tone. Espionage has been replaced by a normal murder, but otherwise it’s much the same and equally as enjoyable. By the way, were there a lot of Blackface bands at fancy hotels in 1937? It’s a pertinent question.

#14 – The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934) — Regular folks (well, regular rich folks) stumble into spies and an assassination plot. Their daughter is kidnapped and they set out to save her while staying very British. It’s a solid thriller, though only Peter Lorre and Cicely Oates, as the villains, are memorable. Points for lacking the song Que Sera, Sera.

#13 – The 39 Steps (1935) — The basis for the rest of his career, The 39 Steps is a spy thriller, as concerned with romance and marriage (and the trouble with that institution) as it is with suspense. Robert Donat is a bit dry for my liking, but is serviceable (and Hitchcock had plenty of chances to “re-cast”).

#12 – The Lady Vanishes (1938) — The Lady Vanishes is a fun spy romp, if uneven. As we know that the lady has indeed vanished, the thirty minutes of people saying she hasn’t get old, and the male lead is introduced as an ass, but eventually our couple get on the same page. While often pointed to as iconic Hitchcock, it is actually iconic Sidney Gilliat, a producer/writer/director—in this case writer. Two years later he would write the similarly-toned Night Train to Munich in the same shared universe, and include the comic characters Caldicott and Charters. He would later team with Frank Launder for a slate of comedies, including the St. Trinians films.

#11 – The Birds (1963) — As a whole I always find The Birds lacking. The characters are neither likable nor realistic, and incredibly stupid (maybe don’t ask “Why?” over and over of people who clearly don’t know). but it has moments that are some of the greatest ever filmed. The crows outside the school is enough to make this a must-see film.

#10 – Vertigo (1958) — Jimmy Stewart overacts and is miscast (Hitchcock blamed Stewart for the box office failure, and rightly so) and the early exposition scene is clunky (explaining to us what acrophobia is, their relationship, and that he’s quit the force even though the characters clearly would not be having the conversation at this time), but Kim Novak is solid (even if the director thought she was wrong for the part) and the colors sell the story. It’s Hitchcock finest use of color. The actors—and characters—can’t express the obsession the film wants to wallow in, but the cinematography can. Vertigo was pulled out of circulation for thirty years, so critics tend to overrate it, but it is still very good.  [Also on the James Stewart Great Actors List]

#9 – Rear Window (1954) — Hitchcock takes his obsession with voyeurism and makes it literal. As always Jimmy Stewart dialed it one notch too high (Hitchcock did little to direct him, letting him do as he pleased). The plot doesn’t matter. This is a film about watching a film.  [Also on the James Stewart Great Actors List]

#8 – Shadow of a Doubt (1943) — No spies here. This is evil slipping into a small town filled with innocent and stupid people. I find it the darkest of Hitchcock’s films because of that childlike world. Joseph Cotton often faded as a hero, but he simmers as the villain. The story maps on to Dracula, which gives it an extra layer. Like Vertigo, there are no surprises.

#7 – The Trouble with Harry (1955) — A very British comedy set in the US. Unlike Mr. & Mrs. Smith, this script plays to Hitchcock’s humorous strengths. The characters are quirky and exceptionally calm as they bury and rebury and re-rebury a body.

#6 – Psycho (1960) — I wonder if anyone nowadays understands the brilliance of the stunt-casting of Janet Leigh? Or if anyone at the time knew that Anthony Perkins would make such an impression as the killer that his career would never be able to escape it? Like The Birds, the parts are better than the whole, but those parts are fantastic. [Full Review]

#5 – Strangers on a Train (1951) —Farley Granger is the somewhat bland and angry hero who wants to divorce his cheating wife. Robert Walker is the psychopath who suggests they “trade murders” when they meet on a train. Granger’s work is very serious, but Walker inhabits an off-kilter world of pitch-black comedy. Hitchcock has never been sicker and more joyful.

#4 – Dial M for Murder (1954) — The perfect cozy mystery, its strength is in keeping the story focused and claustrophobic. It has been criticized (mistakenly) for its two greatest assets: not opening up the play and being very British. Ray Milland makes a wonderful urbane villain and John Williams is superb as the inspector. Both he and Grace Kelly would return the following year for the next film on this list. [Also on the Ray Milland Great Actors List]

#3 – To Catch a Thief (1955) — Cary Grant was Hitchcock’s best leading man, and here he is at his most Cary Grantish. This is Hitchcock in fun, adventure mode. Grace Kelly is one of the best of his icy blondes, and is a good equal for Grant. [Also on the Cary Grant Great Actors List]

#2 – North by Northwest (1959) — The culmination of Hitchcock’s career, it was all leading to this. He remade his innocent-on-the-run film until he got it perfect. This is perfect. [Also on the Cary Grant Great Actors List]

#1 – Notorious (1946) — Hitchcock’s masterpiece. A darker Cary Grant then normal, still charming, but with an edge. It’s spies and cruelty and self-loathing and love and it is remarkably moving. Ingrid Bergman is captivating and Claude Rains puts in another of his perfect supporting roles. [Also on the Cary Grant Great Actors List]

Mar 172018
 
two reels

A meteor strike on a lighthouse creates The Shimmer, an area of strange plant and animal growth. No one who enters has ever returned and no communication from within has been received. Then Kane (Oscar Isaac), who’s been missing for a year after entering The Shimmer, appears in his house and begins spitting up blood. His soldier-scientist wife Lena (Natalie Portman) is brought to the secret Southern Reach base, where they keep Kane in seclusion. Lena joins the next team that will be entering The Shimmer, along with psychologist Dr. Ventress (Jennifer Jason Leigh), paramedic Anya (Gina Rodriguez), geomorphologist Cass (Tuva Novotny), and physicist Josie (Tessa Thompson). Once inside The Shimmer, they find mutated plants and animals everywhere, many dangerous, and little that makes sense.

I liked Jeff VanderMeer’s novel, but would never have chosen to make a movie from it. But then Alex Garland (late of Ex Machina) really didn’t. He made a movie of things he vaguely remembered from the book. The characters don’t feel the same, the plot is only loosely connected, and the theme is different. There’s really not much from the book except “weird area,” odd female team, and a lighthouse. Changing the story from that of the book was a good plan as I call it un-filmable as is, but Garland lacked a clear vision. He knew he wanted a cool looking Shimmer, but beyond that he never decided on a story.

His plot isn’t much: The team traipses through the mysterious land on their way to the lighthouse, and strange stuff happens. That’s OK. He didn’t need a lot of plot if he had something else to offer. Theme is the obvious place to go, and Annihilation has a theme: self-destruction. That’s rammed down our throats pretty hard. Great. But he has nothing to say about it. What about self-destruction? What insight does he have to offer other than the word “self-destruction”? Fine, films aren’t good with thought anyway; they are about emotion. But Annihilation doesn’t make us feel anything about self-destruction either. It is tense, and no doubt it will make many viewers tense, but “tense” is not the same as self-destructive.

To make us feel what it needed to, to feel something about self-destruction, Garland would have had to focus it through the characters, and that’s where things go really wrong. The characters don’t work. Lena is the major problem as she’s our portal, but we learn nothing about her. We spend a lot of time with her in an excessive number of flashbacks—I’m pretty sure there are flashbacks in flashbacks—but we get nothing from her in those. Portman plays it with maximum steeliness. We are not brought into her life, to feel what she feels and to empathize. We are kept on the outside, looking in, ticking off boxes. She’s a biologist; check. She’s had an affair; check. None of it means anything. We aren’t shown, but told (just as in an incredibly awkward conversation Cass rattles off each one of the women’s psychological problems—just telling us, not making us feel them). That doesn’t mean we aren’t shown that these women are a mess, but not in any way that relates to who they are and what they’ve gone through. They’re just all unstable. And as this is cinema, where realism rules unless shown otherwise, there really needs to be a reason why any of these five would be allowed to go on any mission. The actual reason for the character’s strange behavior—and I suspect many of the somnambulist acting choices—is that they acted odd in the book. They act hypnotized here because they were hypnotized in the book. But they aren’t in the film. That plot thread is missing. Likewise Ventress was creepy because she was using post-hypnotic suggestions to get the others to do problematic things—but that’s not in the movie. So they should have been behaving like humans, and having reasonable conversations. But oh well, that doesn’t happen.

Lena "doing" science

Lena “doing” science

The critics who like this movie keep saying this is “smart science fiction.” No. No it is not. There is close to zero science fiction in this film. It is fantasy. These scientists do not do science. Cass and Anya do nothing at all that could be considered competent. The only psychology Dr. Ventress manages is to blurt out that everyone is self-destructive. Lena just picks up samples, says the word “mutation” a lot, and looks at cells under a microscope that always are dividing when she glances. As for the physicist, her only contribution in the entire film is to say that The Shimmer is refracting everything, including genes. That’s not physics. That’s not a scientific statement. It barely has meaning at all, and the little it does have is poetic. That’s all fine, but these are supposed to be scientists doing…science, instead of whatever the hell it is they are doing. But then they have no plan of any kind. Really, they have no idea what they are doing, where they are going, what to do if something goes wrong, etc. (Maybe a planning meeting might have been a good idea.) This is not smart science fiction. It’s pulp adventure, more or less.

Garland had to come up with an ending as the book wasn’t going to help him there, so he did. He answered all the questions and ties things up. His answers don’t mean anything and his way of tying things up comes out of nowhere, is not earned, and screams of having no idea what to do with the material (which I’m sure is the case since Garland proudly said that he didn’t reread the book nor ever pick up the other two volumes). But I suppose having an ending is better than the alternative.

OK, it isn’t all a train wreck. There’s some fine art design involved with The Shimmer and the outdoor cinematography is generally very good. And as mentioned, it is tense. So if you want a dumb little dark adventure flick about dim unrealistic characters traveling through cool sets and fighting nasty mutants, then this will do. Looking for smart science fiction, or depth, or emotion, then you best look elsewhere.

Mar 062018
  March 6, 2018

maureen-oharaO’Hara was a young stage beauty when Charles Laughton became captivated by her eyes, put her under contract, and changed her name to O’Hara. While starting off her film career as a maiden in distress and a gypsy girl, she is best known for a stream of Swashbucklers. In each she played a “fiery” red head—a welcome change from the more timid female characters that filled the genre, but not entirely a successful one as these ended up more often annoying than strong. As such, only two of my top eight O’Hara films are Swashbucklers.

#8 – Jamaica Inn (1939) — An early Hitchcock thriller that has as much of Charles Laughton’s fingerprints on it as the director’s. It was O’Hara’s first big role and her first time using her screen name of “O’Hara” instead of “FitzSimons.”

#7 – The Spanish Main (1945) — A standard but enjoyable Swashbuckler with Paul Henreid as the noble pirate and O’Hara as her normal moody maiden. Call it a solid second tier adventure film. (Full Review)

#6 – The Quiet Man (1952) — An over-rated but still good dramady romance with John Wayne trying for a human role for a change and not quite making it. Romance, not to mention dramatic acting, was not in his range. Parts of the film are silly—the never ending fight and the cross-country dragging of O’Hara are the most obvious—but enough works, including O’Hara, to make it a fun film.

#5 – At Sword’s Point (1952) — A surprisingly good Swashbuckler considering the silly premise. The sons and daughter (O’Hara) of the original Musketeers must save France once again.

#4 – The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939) — Charles Laughton again dominates a picture on this list, at least behind the scenes. He brought O’Hara into the production, and she outshines him. This is the best adaptation of the novel, and the one that influenced all those that followed.

#3 – The Parent Trap (1961) — A joyful family film that’s funny and romantic while escaping the saccharine tones that infected so many Disney films of the time. Hayley Mills plays identical twins attempting to reunite their divorced parents, Brian Keith and O’Hara.

#2 – Our Man in Havana (1959) — A darkly comedic satire on spies and politics, shot in Cuba just after the revolution. Alec Guinness stars as a vacuum cleaner salesmen who fakes being a spy. O’Hara is his assistant, sent from London to help him in his “fine” work. (Full Review)

#1 – Miracle on 34th Street (1947) — A Christmas classic. O’Hara is one of the romantic leads as a mother who doesn’t want her child to be raised with fantasy, but is overshadowed by Edmund Gwenn’s Kris Kringle. (Quick Review)

Mar 042018
  March 4, 2018

Oh, what the hell. The Oscars have always been a mess and this year it is already junk at the nomination level. But it is tradition, so I’ll give it a shot. I’ll kinda sorta say who I think should win and what I think will win. And just like the Academy voters, I haven’t seen every nominee. Note: I’m skipping the doc, shorts, and Foreign Language categories. So here goes, following the order of presentation:

Supporting Actor:

NOMINEES: Willem Dafoe (The Florida Project), Woody Harrelson (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri). Richard Jenkins (The Shape of Water), Christopher Plummer (All the Money in the World), Sam Rockwell (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri)

WHO SHOULD WIN: Jason Sudeikis (Colossal) Really. Watch it. Forget the nominees—unless he’d count as lead actor.
WHO WILL WIN: Sam Rockwell


Costume Design:

NOMINEES: Beauty and the Beast, Darkest Hour, Phantom Thread, The Shape of Water, Victoria and Abdul

WHO SHOULD WIN: Really? Just ignore the MCU, sure…
WHO WILL WIN: Phantom Thread


Makeup and Hair:

NOMINEES: Darkest Hour, Victoria and Abdul, Wonder

WHO SHOULD WIN: Again, really? So, no genre films? Idiots
WHO WILL WIN: Darkest Hour


Sound Editing/Mixing (Two categories, same nominees):

NOMINEES: Baby Driver, Blade Runner 2049, Dunkirk, The Shape of Water, Star Wars: The Last Jedi

WHO SHOULD WIN: Only professional sound people should have an opinion
WHO WILL WIN: Dunkirk (at least once)


Supporting Actress:

NOMINEES: Mary J. Blige, (Mudbound), Allison Janney, (I, Tonya), Lesley Manville, (Phantom Thread), Laurie Metcalf, (Lady Bird), Octavia Spencer, (The Shape of Water)

WHO SHOULD WIN: flip a coin
WHO WILL WIN: Allison Janney


Animated Feature:

NOMINEES: The Boss Baby, The Breadwinner, Coco, Ferdinand, Loving Vincent

WHO SHOULD WIN: None!!!
WHO WILL WIN: Coco


Production Design:

NOMINEES: Beauty and the Beast, Blade Runner 2049, Darkest Hour, Dunkirk, The Shape of Water

WHO SHOULD WIN: No Thor? No Guardians of the Galaxy? Screw it!
WHO WILL WIN: The Shape of Water


Visual Effects:

NOMINEES:: Blade Runner 2049, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, Kong: Skull Island, Star Wars: The Last Jedi, War for the Planet of the Apes

WHO SHOULD WIN: War for the Planet of the Apes
WHO WILL WIN: War for the Planet of the Apes


Film Editing:

NOMINEES: Baby Driver, Dunkirk, I, Tonya, The Shape of Water, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

WHO SHOULD WIN: I’ll leave this to professional editors
WHO WILL WIN: Dunkirk


Cinematography:

NOMINEES: Blade Runner 2049, Darkest Hour, Dunkirk, Mudbound, The Shape of Water

WHO SHOULD WIN: The Shape of Water
WHO WILL WIN: Blade Runner 2049


Original Score:

NOMINEES: Dunkirk {Hans Zimmer}, Phantom Thread {Jonny Greenwood}, The Shape of Water {Alexandre Desplat}, Star Wars: The Last Jedi {John Williams}, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri {Carter Burwell}

WHO SHOULD WIN: Star Wars: The Last Jedi {John Williams}
WHO WILL WIN: The Shape of Water {Alexandre Desplat}


Original Song:

NOMINEES: “Mighty River” from Mudbound, “Mystery of Love” from Call Me by Your Name, “Remember Me” from Coco, “Stand Up for Something” from “Marshall, “This Is Me” from The Greatest Showman

WHO SHOULD WIN: none
WHO WILL WIN: “Remember Me” from Coco


Adapted Screenplay:

NOMINEES: Call Me by Your Name, The Disaster Artist, Logan, Molly’s Game, Mudbound

WHO SHOULD WIN: The Girl With All the Gifts (screw the nominations)
WHO WILL WIN: Call Me by Your Name


Original Screenplay:

NOMINEES: The Big Sick, Get Out, Lady Bird, The Shape of Water, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

WHO SHOULD WIN: Thor: Ragnarok (if that counts as “original”)
WHO WILL WIN: Get Out


Director:

NOMINEES: Christopher Nolan, Jordan Peele, Greta Gerwig, Paul Thomas Anderson, Guillermo del Toro

WHO SHOULD WIN: Guillermo del Toro
WHO WILL WIN: Guillermo del Toro


Actor:

NOMINEES: Timothée Chalamet (Call Me by Your Name), Daniel Day-Lewis (Phantom Thread), Daniel Kaluuya (Get Out), Gary Oldman (Darkest Hour), Denzel Washington (Roman J. Israel, Esq.)

WHO SHOULD WIN: Chris Hemsworth (comedy is hard)
WHO WILL WIN: Gary Oldman


Actress:

NOMINEES: Sally Hawkins (The Shape of Water), Frances McDormand (Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri), Margot Robbie (I, Tonya), Saoirse Ronan (Lady Bird), Meryl Steep (The Post)

WHO SHOULD WIN: Sennia Nanua (The Girl With All the Gifts). Either she wins in a write-in or the Academy Awards needs to be dumped now. She is clearly the best.
WHO WILL WIN: Frances McDormand


Best Picture:

NOMINEES: Call Me by Your Name, Darkest Hour, Dunkirk, Get Out, Lady Bird, Phantom Thread, The Post, The Shape of Water, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

WHO SHOULD WIN: The Shape of Water, of the nominees
WHO WILL WIN: Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri