Oscar 2009

It’s that time of year again: Oscar season. I was really hoping for The Dark Knight to be nominated, but my hopes were dashed. Sigh.. Here we go… The nominees are: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Frost/Nixon, Milk, The Reader, and Slumdog Millionaire. Now, what to see? First, I’ve been interested in seeing Frost/Nixon since I saw the previews in the fall, so that was a must. Next, the Reader, having something to do with Nazis, sounded like it could be interesting, but unfortunately it wasn’t showing at either theater in town. So of the remaining three, the Button movie was at Kerasotes as one of its $5 movies, so that was plus despite my not being keen on Brad Pitt. Slumdog Millionaire looked good because everybody seems really happy in the commercial I saw the other night while watching Days of Our Lives. And Milk, well, I’m just not that into politics. So I decided what to see from this year’s contenders and set out.
First, I really planned on going to the Button movie, but a family/pet crisis prevented me from doing so. And since I’ve never really been a big fan of Brad Pitt, It was easy to let myself off the hook for sitting thru three hours of him. Grace Toone assures me that it was good, but you’d want to take tissues.

So, I went to see Slumdog Millionaire with my friend, Amy, and, as it turns out, Jon Goldman and his wife. The general premise of this movie is a young man, Jamal, from the low, low class in India is a contestant on India’s version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire. As the movie begins, it is the beginning of the second show, the first show having stopped right as the game show host was going to ask THE final question that would win Jamal 10 million rupees. Then we move into a flash back of Jamal being interrogated by the police with the suspicion that he must be cheating, because how else could a “slumdog” know all these answers. During the interrogation, we see each question from the show and then, through another flash back, we see what experiences from his past allowed him to know the answer. Once you get the hang of all the flashing back, it wasn’t too difficult to follow. At its core, this movie is a love story: boy meets girl, falls for girl, loses girl, does what he must to get girl back. Interwoven with the love story, the movie detailed the difficult lives these people lived. I really liked this movie and, knowing that it’s already won other best picture awards, can easily see it winning the Oscar. Two thumbs up!

Well, so then I went to see Frost/Nixon. I was only 6 when Nixon resigned, so I don’t have first-hand memories of the whole Watergate scandal, but I enjoy history and have adored Frank Langella ever since he played Dracula in the 70’s. I was eager to see this movie. And it did not disappoint. First, the setting: it is 1976 and Nixon has resigned and retired to California in disgrace. The country never really got a chance for a trial because Ford pardoned Nixon shortly after taking office. David Frost, a British talk show host with the reputation of being a party-going playboy, has the idea of interviewing Nixon and getting him to confess/apologize to the country on his show. The first half of the movie details the machinations behind getting the interview set up and the second half is the battle of wits between Frost and Nixon during the interview as both parties felt the interviews were a means to redeeming their careers. I would be interested in seeing the actual interviews (available at Amazon.com) because from watching this movie it would appear that Nixon controlled the interview until the final segment on the Watergate scandal. History seems to have softened how we view the Nixon presidency, and this movie made him somewhat of a sympathetic character, but there is still no question of the damage done to the presidency and to the American peoples’ faith in government by Nixon’s actions. This movie was excellent, weaving humor into the seriousness of the topic. Frank Langella did an amazing job as Nixon. I heartily recommend this movie.

Well, wonder of wonders, I actually enjoyed not one but two of the five Best Picture nominees. Something must be amiss! Before the Oscars on Feb. 22nd, I may look into watching the other 3 movies. But barring that, I’ll be rooting for either Slumdog Millionaire or Frost/Nixon.