Movie Review: Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012)

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"For the animals that didn't have a dad to put them in a boat, the end of the world already happened."

Beasts of the Southern Wild is Behn Zeitlin's directing debut which earned Best Director Oscar nomination for him. Deserved!

I enjoyed the movie very much and there are couple of reasons for it. To begin with, Quvenzhane Wallis, whose performance I consider to be the best this year. This 6 years old (she was six during filming) girl's acting is so confident, emotional, beautiful and natural that it made me love the whole film.

Hushpuppy (Wallis) is a little girl under guardianship of her father - Wink (Dwight Henry). She has never seen mom, who abandoned family the moment child was born. Wink tends to drink pretty much and makes daughter live separately. However dad tries to teach Hushpuppy how to do things herself - father would not always be able to take care.

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the Oscars

Exactly an hour ago Academy of Motion Picture, Arts and Science declared bests of 2012. Because of time zone differences, I had to be awaken whole yearly morning. Here are some highlights of the show.

Red Carpet

Generally, red carpet is my least favorite part of the show. I always skip the arrivals.So did this year. However, I'll still post here some of my favorite parts and celebrities here:

I think that Charlize Theron was the Queen of the Oscars.  I totally loved her dancing with Channing Tatum. 

Ginger and Beautiful
Jessica Chastain

Aww, she's cute and winner -
Jennifer Lawrence

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Oscars 2013 - Predictions

All comes down to this - the Oscar night, which is gonna happen in exactly 24 hours. We had a long Road to Oscars, with a lot predictable and unpredictable wins and snubs. 

Anyway here are my predicted winners: (the post will be edited live tomorrow. Yellow shades indicate actual winners)

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Film Actually's Bonus Contest: Pick 6!

I give a try to another Oscar contest suggested by Film Actually called Pick 6!. There are six major and most debatable nominations (yeah, he did it on purpose) to be predicted with 100% accuracy.

Fingers crossed and here are they:

Best Director

Predicted Winner: Steven Spielberg for Lincoln

Possible Spoiler: Ang Lee for Life of Pi

Other Nominees: David O Russel for Silver Linings Playbook, Behn Zeitlin for Beasts of the Southern Wild, Michael Haneke for Amour

Best Adapted Screenplay

Predicted Winner: Chris Terrio for Argo

Possible Spoiler: David O. Russel for Silver Linings Playbook

Other Nominees: Tony Kushner for Lincoln, David Magee for Life of Pi, Lucy Alibar & Behn Zeitlin for Beasts of the Southern Wild

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Rise of the Guardians, Zero Dark Thirty, The Impossible and Why I Disappeared

I've not written a single word for ages (already two weeks). I have not even seen a single movie during this period. I had my reasons, which is quite exciting and very important to me.

The truth is that I've been preparing for the national rounds of Georgia of Jessup International Moot Court Competition for Lawyers (If you don't understand it, just consider that it is very cool thing). We won nationals and I'm heading to Washington D.C. for international rounds by the end of March - my long time dream of visiting United States has become true.

I think I'll be less active for the next one month and a half and I hope for huge comeback, whenever it is.

Now, few of films I saw but could not fully review. There is a short outline of each:

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House of Cards (Spoiler Free)

House of Cards is Netflix's new TV series, aired on February 1, 2013. The first amazing thing about this show - all thirteen episodes have been distributed the same time, so if you decide to give this a try, you won't have to wait until season finale for months. 

Francis Underwood (Spacey) is Democrat congressman - a House Majority Whip who helped Garret Walker to be elected as a president of United States. In return for it, president promised him to nominate as a candidate of Secretary of a State. However, Senator Michael Kern (Kilner) gets the place and Francis, with great support of his wife Claire (Robin Wright), decides to destroy him.

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Top 10 Films of 2012 (And Other of LIONs for the Lamb)

I planned to list my top 10 favorites of 2012 by the end of this month. However, The Large Association of Movie Blogs hosts annual Lions for Lamb award, where all members of the LAMB vote for the bests and worst of past year. 

Here are my votes:

1. Les Miserables
2. Argo
3. Moonrise Kingdom
4. Cloud Atlas
5. Silver Linings Playbook
6. Life of Pi
7. The Perks of Being a Wallflower
8. Beasts of Southern Wild
9. The Cabin in the Woods
10. Zero Dark Thirty

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Movie Review: Wreck-It Ralph (2012)

Wreck-It Ralph is Disney's computer Animated Feature Film. It tells a story of Ralph, an evil character of  the video game Fix-it. At nights when the Litwak's Arcade is closed, all the characters of video games star living their lives and travelling though other games. No one loves Ralph, he wreck the buildings in game and always loses. Once he decides to get a golden medal (award granted to heroes, however evil personages never become heroes) to make friends and make other love him. Ralph leaves his own game and moves to another to prove that he deserves the award. 

Something goes wrong and Wreck-It Ralph has to save his new friend Vanellope and the whole Sugar Rush. (for more spoilers WATCH IT)

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Movie Review: Silver Linings Playbook (2012)

David O. Russel's new family drama/comedy Silver Linings Playbook is this years one of the most loved films. Despite the very positive reviews, I had feeling like would not love it that much and I expected more negative feedback from myself.

However,

In terms of family movies, Silver Linings is great one. This has not happened since Little Miss Sunshine of the same genre. The story is charming, simple and fun and evolves pretty dynamically. I have never felt that good watching those love dramas and probably SLP is not that kind of film.

The cast is brilliant. Most outstanding work was done by Jennifer Lawrence by portraying extraordinary, weird, dramatic, funny and simple character. Probably not the most complicated role to play for an actress, however she easily makes you love Tiffany, a girl who fucked with every single man at work. She is an almost shoo-in for best actress and I shall admit I can not remember any lead actress giving such an "easy" performance in such a charming way.

Bradley Cooper's (Pat) nominations was surprising but deserving. It is definitely his best ever. He is worthy of nomination even for "the Hemingway Guy" episode. The same time, Robert De Niro and Jackie Weaver have some brilliant chemistry. Honestly, I believe Jackie's dramatic mom is far more better than Robert's funny dad. And if there was no Anne Hathaway's sure win in supporting actress category, Weaver could be best bid.

I had no idea of the novel Silver Linings Playbook before the film. However I do think that adaptation is well done. It was funny, purely written, the dialogues are simple and very smart - especially those between Pat and Tiffany.

All in all, the movie worked well for me. I don't know whether I want it to win Best Picture (or can it?), however if it happens in the less possible case, I would not mind much. At least Silver Linings is the first film with nods in each acting category since 1981.

8/10