A statue, a tower and... a romantic comedy?

Because I made such a big deal about the Oscars a few posts ago, and now they came and went, I suppose I ought to make a comment about them. Except what a snoozefest. There were a few pretty dresses but nothing really and truly spectacular. And there was a lot of blonde pin-straight hair. *sigh* This is always sad news for the redhead w/ the crazy Jew hair. But there was little excitement in the whole event. I felt like both supporting actor awards were given to the wrong people and who cares about The Queen and I'm just not interested enough in mobsters or hambones like Nicholson (man, I just know some friend or other is gonna take me to task on that one...) to be all that interested in The Departed. Yes, it was nice to see Forest Whitaker win and it was even nicer to see Ryan Gosling appear to be legitimately happy that Whitaker won and he didn't. But all in all, it was a lackluster crop of films this year and a lackluster show. Al Gore and all. Oh, it was pretty cool that Marie Antoinette won for costumes, though. I mean, I wasn't in love with this movie by any means, but it's a movie about clothes so its clothes SHOULD win. And really, they were meticulously beautiful taffeta confections, now, weren't they?

And I saw Babel. I thought it was gonna be a lot like Crash and it was and it wasn't. The movie format of seemingly unrelated, yet really quite interrelated story-threads is SO done! When people first started making movies in this format, they were about deep connections between disparate people-- like Grand Canyon, maybe, which is probably in my top 5 of all-time favorite movies, by the way. But somewhere along the way, filmmakers started tying to use this format to talk about other stuff: everyone's a rascist deep down, for instance (a la Crash). Or how all the world's problems exist because we can't talk to each other, or more accurately, because we can't listen to each other, as in Babel. And while the format sometimes works if the format is the subject of the film, the format doesn't really work if there's some other message with which the filmmaker would like to beat us over the head. And this is why Babel feels so damn contrived. I mean, I watched parts of it through my fingers because the pain on the faces of the actors was so real, but the overarching story was anything BUT realistic. However, either of the two women who were nominated for supporting actress would have been a far more accurate choice than poor Jennifer Hudson- once that poor girl's American Idol cast-off gimick-glow fades out-- well, I don't know that anyone will continue to recognize her for excellence in acting.

And I also saw a little romantic comedy. Yep, that's right. You'll very very seldom catch me in front of a screen full o' chick flick, but there you have it. My excuse? It has David Duchovny in it. It's called Trust the Man. It also has a couple more of my favorites--Maggie Gyllenhaal and Julianne Moore. And it's directing by Julianne Moore's husband, Bart Freundlich. And there's certainly nothing groundbreaking in it but it's a cute little peice about established couples falling back in love with each other. And that's kinda nice. And David Duchovny's character is a little obsessed with sex... in his typical deadpan sort of fashion. And good god.. the voiceovers he's been doing or the Pedigree dog food ads lately? The "I don't know how I got here but I know I'm a good dog" ones? The ones with the big sad puppy eyes peering out from behind chain link shelter/kennel doors? Sheesh! The man speaks to my soul. What can I say?

And I booked my plane tickets to come home for the Nashville Film Festival in April! I'm very excited. I'm hoping they'll have some stuff every bit as good as last year! Keep the light on for me, Nash Vegas!

Even Sophia can't save the vapid.

Huh... look at that... I haven't posted in some time! No excuses. Sometimes, that's just how it is.

So, anyway, Jon was in town last weekend! Yay! That was fun... We had a delightful, yet crude, hit-or-miss driving tour of important DC buildings (and the Ikea store)and he put up with me exploring the dark and mysterious Georgetown Mall... and we got to see some movies in an actual theatre!

And I'd been really excited about seeing Marie Antoinette... every other Sophia Coppola effort I've seen has been understated and sardonic without, necessarily, undercutting its own Romanticism. I've found this an appealing mix. And really, I feel like poor Sophia did all she could with this movie. She plugs stridently though, applying a lithely ironic hand, now and again, to a story that is about as rapturous as the Paris Hilton: E! True Hollywood Story. Truly, it's a gorgeously shot, very well-propped little piece of French pastry... but how interesting can two hours of eating eclairs, trying on pink shoes and wondering when the Dauphin (a chubby and un-sexy Jason Schwartzman (Louis XVI was Jewish?)) is gonna finally get down to business with a (not particularly virginal) Kirsten Dunst really get? I wanted to really love this movie-- I wanted to find in it some discussion of the culture that could create a person who was on the tip of every French tongue, and yet, knew so little about the very realm she ruled. But it wasn't there.

If I'm going to give this movie the benefit of the doubt, I'll have to consider that it might be a veiled indictment of this headcold of celebrity adulation that seems to be going around these days... but, really, that doesn't help the fact that our dear departed, beheaded queen of France led a deeply, deeply boring life-- up until the last 3 minutes of this movie, anyway. And a boring life doesn't necessarily lead to a boring movie-- but, alas, this one sure did. I'll equate it with, perhaps, Ellie Parker on my bore-ificense scale. Sorry, Ms. Coppola... try applying your zesty New Wave soundtrack to your more intriguing lower-budget fair, why dontcha?