This is the thread where we discuss matters pertaining to the detrius that accompanies the "End of the Year in Cinema" -- 2018

Cider House

https://media1.tenor.com/images/83e9f264560cb0f7347e86610d9fb318/tenor.gif?itemid=4268615

A thread like this the doesn't nod toward Oscars is like a thread about gin that doesn't mention martinis.

eff 'em and all AA scholarship

this is about the GOOD stuff

you and yer gotdamn nodz

eff 'em and all AA scholarship

this is about the GOOD stuff

As if on cue, here are this year's National Board of Review results ...

Best Film
GREEN BOOK

Best Director
Bradley Cooper, A STAR IS BORN

Best Actor
Viggo Mortensen, GREEN BOOK

Best Actress
Lady Gaga, A STAR IS BORN

Best Supporting Actor
Sam Elliott, A STAR IS BORN

Best Supporting Actress
Regina King, IF BEALE STREET COULD TALK

Best Original Screenplay
Paul Schrader, FIRST REFORMED

Best Adapted Screenplay
Barry Jenkins, IF BEALE STREET COULD TALK

Best Animated Feature
THE INCREDIBLES 2

Breakthrough Performance
Thomasin McKenzie, LEAVE NO TRACE

Best Directorial Debut
Bo Burnham, EIGHTH GRADE

Best Foreign Language Film
COLD WAR

Best Documentary
RBG

Best Ensemble
CRAZY RICH ASIANS

William K. Everson Film History Award
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WIND and THEY’LL LOVE ME WHEN I’M DEAD

NBR Freedom of Expression Award
22 JULY

NBR Freedom of Expression Award
ON HER SHOULDERS

Top Films (in alphabetical order)

The Ballad of Buster Scruggs
Black Panther
Can You Ever Forgive Me?
Eighth Grade
First Reformed
If Beale Street Could Talk
Mary Poppins Returns
A Quiet Place
Roma
A Star Is Born

Top 5 Foreign Language Films (in alphabetical order)

Burning
Custody
The Guilty
Happy as Lazzaro
Shoplifters

Top 5 Documentaries (in alphabetical order)

Crime + Punishment
Free Solo
Minding the Gap
Three Identical Strangers
Won’t You Be My Neighbor?

Top 10 Independent Films (in alphabetical order)

The Death of Stalin
Lean on Pete
Leave No Trace
Mid90s
The Old Man & the Gun
The Rider
Searching
Sorry to Bother You
We the Animals
You Were Never Really Here

Best Foreign Language Film
COLD WAR

Best Documentary
RBG

Best Ensemble
CRAZY RICH ASIANS

hell of a hat trick

Best Film
GREEN BOOK

hell of a shat brick

I didn't know there was a word for such happiness!

damn i meant to predict that

Jeffwey Wells will cream himself, if that's still possible

I daren't admit that I prefer Green Book to A Star is Born.

dasn't you?

i just feel like reminding Eric of a film that won 3 Golden Globes for acting:

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0073766/awards

I debated whether I should wait for a screener or pay to watch goddamn Green Book tomorrow night.

Best Supporting Actor - Motion Picture
Richard Benjamin

Legitimately more laughable than Pia Zadora.

do not pay to see green book xp

^^^^^^ this, let your most elderly relative buy your ticket this holiday season

i have no plans to see Green Book EVER

Benjamin's good, i just watched it again

(he's in it more than Burns tho)

Viggo basically plays @nycguidovoice personified in Green Book.

izzat some twitter celeb?

I had a visceral, must-flee, "John Simon every time he laid eyes on Liza Minnelli" reaction to every scene Benjamin appeared in.

howbout Goodbye Columbus?

re morbs:

I neva meant ta say anyting dat was racialist [burping up sauce] I respect all races and people [more pasta barf] POCs are *kissing fingers*

— nYC Guido Voice (@nycguidovoice) March 12, 2017

Can confirm, this is the Twitter account Viggo Mortensen plays in Green Book.

so what is the arthouse horse this year, say for the NYFCC (tomorrow?)

i guess NY will go either Roma, Beale St or First Reformed?

Nice to see The Guilty mentioned :)

I don’t trust the NYFCC anymore, in the wake of their La La Land best pic citation.

The Guilty is OK sub-Hitchcock suspense.

some crix group will pick Binoche as best actress I hope

Maybe something fringe and highly unofficial (in the best possible sense) like the Muriels, maybe.

every generation gets the Driving Miss Daisy it deserves, I guess

I don’t trust the NYFCC anymore, in the wake of their La La Land best pic citation.

― I Never Promised You A Hose Harden (Eric H.), Tuesday, November 27, 2018 12:29 PM (two hours ago)

that one bothered me too, but their choices are often better than those of the other end-of-year film critics groups

saw The Rider last night, enjoyed it more than I thought I would

not sure why NBR is making a distinction between 'films' and 'independent films'

The Rider is fine, so is Lean on Pete, perfectly decent platonic equine movies.

xps I know; and virtually every critics' org has had their year of major embarrassment in the top award (e.g. Nat'l Society opting for Capote)

def preferred Lean On Pete, w/ surly Buscemi and resigned Sevigny plus the horror of LoP's exit

Mark Harris goes all in on Green Book: https://www.vulture.com/2018/11/green-book-flopped-but-who-was-it-supposed-to-be-for.html

Another movie might have explored Don’s costumed hauteur from within, understanding it as a defense, a calculation, even a performance. (The real Shirley was also a psychologist, a fact about which Green Book expresses virtually no interest.) But this film uses his remoteness geometrically; it’s one point on a triangle, exactly as far from the apex that represents a warm and human ideal as the other point — Tony’s unregenerate coarseness and frank racism — is. Green Book sometimes feels less imagined than measured with a protractor. Tony needs to stop referring to black people as “jungle bunnies,” but also Don needs to stop saying highfalutin things like, “It is my feeling that your diction, however charming it may be in the tristate area, could use some finessing.” Tony needs to broaden his horizons and learn how to write his wife a nice letter (he ends up taking dictation, Cyrano-style, from Don, who naturally has nobody to write nice letters to), but also Don needs to learn to enjoy fried chicken and Aretha Franklin and be more comfortable in his skin. Tony needs to grow up (because racism is, in movies like Green Book, primarily a sign of immaturity), but also Don needs to loosen up; he’s so constricted that he owns a chess set with only white pieces! Tony needs to get a little smarter, but also Don is too smart, like Obama was. “It don’t look fun to be that smart,” Tony — so unrefined yet so observant about deeper truths! — writes home. (Don didn’t need to help him with that sentence.)

Jeffrey Wells looks with alarm at the failure for Green Book (and Widows and The Front Runner and others) to make any kind of significant bank: http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2018/11/dropping-like-flies/

The concern of the moment is that recently opened critical and film-festival favorites (Widows, Green Book, Boy Erased, The Front Runner, Can You Ever Forgive Me?, Beautiful Boy) are underperforming or limping along while generic family-friendly sludge movies (Ralph Breaks the Internet, Creed II, Dr. Seuss’ The Grinch, Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, Bohemian Rhapsody, Instant Family, A Star Is Born) are making all the dough.

The general social-pledge attitude of the moviegoing audience used to be that (a) they would pay to see low-rent, mass-appeal popcorn fare (horror, CG-driven, superheroes, stupid comedies) all through the winter, spring, summer and early fall, but that (b) they’d willingly shift gears and pay to see prestigious, well-reviewed, award-contending movies in November and December.

The new general attitude seems to be “fuck the prestige human-drama movies…we’ll watch them on Netflix or Amazon when they come around in three or four months.” Even in the case of a feel-good flick like Green Book, which audiences are completely in love with (I heard yesterday that it got a standing ovation in Hartford from a regular paying audience)…even with Green Book they seem to be going “ehh, well, maybe not…I can wait.”

(I'd argue that Green Book and The Front Runner more than meet the standards for being tagged "sludge," as well.)

I'm sort of amazed Green Book is flopping. Things actually do change sometimes!

Boy Erased has made $1.5 million on 672 screens, hardly a flop.

and I'm not sure Green Book can be called a flop yet. It still has plenty of white Academy members and old people to charm.

Pls, let me hope that the days of feel-good racism movies are over.

Sadly, I'd sooner believe Wells' basic argument that basically any non-franchise, non-jukebox movie is doomed at the box office going forward than I'd accept Harris's argument that audiences are wising up to white savior movies.

Another non-fan of Green Book ... this time, a relative of Dr. Shirley.

https://shadowandact.com/green-book-is-full-of-lies-dr-don-shirleys-family-speaks-out

"I think to consistently see our stories and our Black icons filtered through the lens of a racist white person like Tony Lip does nothing to advance the understanding of Black history and only serves to perpetuate white supremacy.”

sorry i guess nyfcc aint til tomorrow

pic.twitter.com/I0fdsF3URw

— Peter Labuza (@labuzamovies) November 27, 2018

Turn on your notifications for @Sidney_Falco on Twitter!

I'd hate to take a bite outta him