The Ticket

Oscar movie time is here!

Christmas day may end the holiday season, but it starts a whole new one for me. It's See-As-Many-Movies-That-I-Think-Will-Be-Nominated-For-An-Oscar season. I'm behind the 8 ball for sure, hopefully the long New Years Day weekend will help me with that. Here's a review of what I've seen so far.

Milk.
Great story, Sean Penn did some great acting as did Emile Hirsch. In fact, this was a really well acted ensemble. Josh Brolin had a smaller supporting part, but he just nailed it. The last three things I've seen him in he's really carried it. I thought he was the most under-rated part of No Country for Old Men last year, he was perfect as W, which was not Oliver Stones best work, but more of a nanny nanny boo boo to the president, but Brolin made it worth while, and he had some real complexities in Milk that were brilliant. Milk is based on the true story of the first openly gay politician elected and it was a great story. It was open minded and passionate and persistent. If nothing else, you'll learn where the term "Twinkie defense" came from. Which I didn't know, but maybe you do.

Frost/Nixon.
Another based on a true story movie this Oscar season. I had no idea what this movie was ultimately about going in - except it was about Nixon and some guy named Frost. I loved the way this movie was edited, with some of the characters flashing back while the story was being told. I thought that made it more interesting to get their perspective on what they had been doing then and what the impact of it would be. Great supporting cast in this one, but the acting that stood out was Frank Langella as Nixon. I thought he was great and can support his nomination in acting if that happens. I have many more movies to see before I think he could win it, but he deserves the nod. Good story, told well, was engaging and went quickly.

With both of these being based on true stories, I'm reminded of a quote that Harry Truman said, "There is nothing new in the world except the history you do not know." Why do we bother to write fiction until we've told all the stories from the past. In a way, this is why I got out of the film program, I was worried that everything had already been done, there was nothing original left. I'm sad I didn't pay better attention in history classes I've had. It's all really quite interesting.