Beltmann

Now you know what my last 8 years have been like.

If I still lived in an apartment, I'd be tempted to play that, like, really loud. Maybe on a loop.

But those aren't on TV... who pays any attention to them, besides other critics and movie nerds (like me)? At any rate, I suppose it's nice that there's something for movies like that; music really doesn't have an equivalent.

After enduring Shoah, now everything seems short.

I hope you aren't talking about the Academy Awards.

Heartless Bastards - The Mountain. About halfway through... so far, it compares favorably to All This Time.

I watched that the same week, I think, as Tony Kaye's equally harrowing Lake of Fire.

After that Arizona TD, I leaped up and shouted, um, something. Almost immediately, I heard the pitter-patter of footsteps marching down the hallway. Then I saw my daughter standing there, glaring at me with her arms crossed. "Daddy, why did you say a naughty word? You said a naughty word and woke me up!" "You're right, Kael. I should have said Holy cow."

Rules and facts have nothing to do with the narratives that play in our heads, sucker.

Boy A What is life like for a man who, as a young boy, was a participant in a grisly, highly-publicized child murder? Now released from prison, he is given a new name and a new life, and he is a soft-spoken guy who seems incapable of aggression--he can barely muster the courage to ask out a co-worker--but flashbacks provide complex psychological explanations for how he found himself caught up in violence. Although the movie's style is naturalistic, it often feels like a suspense thriller about guilt and inner struggle. The real theme, though, is forgiveness: Who needs it, who deserves it,

"About Today" is easily one of their very best songs, in my view.

I don't know about 2008, but we already have a winner for best movie of 2009.

I remember Hanks appearing on Family Ties. (Somehow this thread about the Oscar noms is going to wind up at Bosom Buddies.)

I love The Furies (and just about anything by Anthony Mann). GtrPlyr, if you like those Sirk melodramas, then I must recommend Fassbinder's Ali: Fear Eats the Soul. The central May-December romance between an elderly German cleaning lady and an Arab foreign worker can be read, obviously, as allegory: I saw it first as a racial allegory, then a sexual one, then, finally, a historical one--especially since the dialogue alludes to Hitler several times. The movie becomes a complex document of uneasy times, of how society divides itself in order to define itself, and how lingering doubt--in thi

Have you seen Frozen River yet? I watched it tonight, and I think it's about as perfect as a movie can be.

I don't think I'd say '59 Sound is the "best" album of 2008, but it's probably my favorite in the sense that I listened to it more than any other, and still can't put it away. It's an album that means something to me. Also, I think the comparison to Marah makes a lot of sense.

Surely Saving Private Ryan is better than Shakespeare in Love, but that's one of my favorite Oscar moments ever. It's rare when the show actually has a moment that doesn't feel pre-ordained, and that one was a shocker. Great fun, that was. I suppose we could get worked up about who wuz robbed, but seriously: Does Saving Private Ryan, or any other good movie, really need the validation of Oscar to endure or be treasured? A win is merely a footnote, a nice bit of trivia attached to the history of the movie's journey.

Haven't seen it yet, but it's pretty high on my must-see list. If you like it, then I would strongly recommend Akin's earlier Head-On and even earlier In July.

Fixed it for ya. I just don't see it. Benjamin Button is a major wide release, popular with both audiences and critics, starring two major actors. Frost/Nixon is another high-profile Hollywood release, based on a well-known play, made by one of the most successful and popular directors in the industry. Milk is a conventional biopic starring one of Hollywood's top actors, and directed by a highly-regarded artist with a long career. The Reader is an adaptation of a bestseller--an Oprah selection!--starring a major actress and directed by a prior nominee. Slumdog Millionaire is a commercia

Or maybe the Academy adored both Gran Torino and Eastwood in it, but just liked five others a bit more. Yeah, they always give it to squares like Eminem and Bob Dylan.

I guess I just don't get the notion that awards ought to reflect popular taste. If you want a list that's in touch with American filmgoers, read the box-office report (and give the Oscar to Paul Blart: Mall Cop). In my view, the most worthwhile thing an awards show can do is introduce intriguing movies to people who otherwise wouldn't have thought twice about them, since they are too busy being bombarded with commercials for Marley & Me. Besides, this list seems like yet another year where Hollywood rewarded its own relatively mainstream product rather than the really adventurous and i

Roger Ebert loved it:

The Curious Case of Forrest Gump