Reviewing Each Best Picture Nomination (2024) (Part 1) | Zelcher Reviews

[@mandobrownie]

0:56 Oppenheimer 7:45 Poor Things 14:26 Killers of the Flower Moon 18:11 Barbie 24:08 Maestro 28:44 Anatomy of a Fall 31:47 The Holdovers 35:46 Zone of Interest 38:28 American Fiction 42:53 Past Lives

[@Arthur-rh3oo]

Oscars: *Sweatpants* Zelcher video premiere: *full suit*

[@joeytheslimeboi8900]

I remember seeing a tweet saying that Takia should’ve directed killers of the flower moon, not Scorsese which is one of the most terrifying ideas I’ve ever heard

[@chinese_bot]

Takia could’ve done Killers of the Flower Moon tbh, but it wouldn’t have been as enjoyable. Despite his films and shows being generally goofy, he does his best work when he’s serious. Either way, glad it was Scorsese.

[@zakuraiyadesu]

Love the videos, man. Keep it up!!!

[@yggdrasil2]

I'm not completely sure, but I think the criteria that they judge adapted screenplays by are the same as for original screenplays. Only reason that they're different is probably that an adapted screenplay doesn't take as much effort since the base is already there.

[@j1ggly-]

here before the video blows up 😞☝️

[@elizabethk007]

Lead Actor/Actress is definitely by importance to the story rather than screen time because I remember Anthony Hopkins getting Lead Actor despite only being in Silence of the Lambs for 16 minutes

[@Zombie_Trooper]

I actually think Nolan deserves the win for directing. Oppenheimer isn't my favorite film he has made, it's actually probably in my bottom 3 of his career, HOWEVER I have to give him credit because you can see how the experimentation and filmic techniques he has played with over his filmography have been fine tuned. The entire time i was watching the film I kept thinking about how much he has grown as an artist. I agree with your opinion on the film overall, but I think he proved he is one of the greats with Oppenheimer and no one else really did that for me, even if their films were better. Edit: Called it!

[@jeremyusreevu237]

American Fiction was a great movie, but yeah the ending dropped the ball.

[@ArcTrooper269]

@@jeremyusreevu237 & You know better than anyone how to drop the ball considering that humongous ball you have hanging from your torso, called Belly

[@tuckerplum8085]

I think you might have missed something about "American Fiction." The tropes and artificial dialogue is the entire point. It is NOT ONLY the satire novel written by "Stagg R. Leigh" and the artificial reaction from "woke" White elites which is a comment on tropes and badly contrived plots. We are led to believe that all White people react in a patronizing, trope-y way, while the Black characters get to lead complex, nuanced lives. (No.) The ENTIRE movie is tropes. Every single aspect of the narrative is being written by the two characters who get into a convertible car and drive off the studio lot in the final scene. (We don't even know their names.) They are the true authors of this entire narrative. And they are changing things on-the-fly, in order to sell a movie. Every aspect of the movie is a plot device which drives the narrative forward. Tracey Ellis Ross dies very early in the movie. (Intentional plot device.) Her character has written her own eulogy. (Self-aware, writerly exercise.) Black family lives in a huge vintage house with antique woodwork. They originally bought what they could afford in a poor neighborhood, but years later, the neighborhood has gentrified, and they own valuable real estate. (TROPE!) Intellectual black man who speaks entirely proper English with no slang, wears horned-rim glasses, and feels caught between his professional identity and his racial identity. (TROPE!) Tracey Ellis Ross is often underestimated because she is Black, and because she is a woman, while she is actually a successful doctor. (TROPE!) Sterling Brown plays a gay man who spends much of his time coming to terms with his difficult relationship with his father's rejection. (TROPE!) Jefferey Wright's mother needs expensive nursing care. (Total plot device to explain why Wright is willing to sell-out his values for the money he will receive from "Stagg R. Leigh" novel.) Wright's girlfriend is a highly educated lawyer, but it has taken her years to save-up to buy a beach house. She cares so much about racial justice, she has devoted her life to being a Public Defender. (TROPE!) These are ALL artificial plot contrivances. INTENTIONALLY artificial plot contrivances. Yes. The movie wants us to question what it feels-like to have your identity reduced to a trope. But the story becomes more nuanced when we see the ending play-out in multiple ways. The Black Lives Matter movement was founded because Black people were frequently getting killed at routine traffic stops. (The trope here is that the driver reaches for an innocent object, like a wallet or a cell phone, and is seen as being such a threat that they are shot and killed.) You have felt this movie was being artificial. (I would say it was completely intended that you feel that way.) How contrived is it that police officers would feel threatened by an object in a Black man's hand which was actually a trophy he had just received in front of a large audience? Why does this scene play-out in multiple ways? The point is that EVERY aspect of writing is a self-aware contrivance with an agenda. Nobody wants their identity reduced to a trope. But if you were feeling like the White people were cartoons, and the Black people got to lead more complex and nuanced lives, that was all part of a larger point. Every bit of writing is a plot device. Let's write complex people, not tropes. My fear is that many people see this film as ham-handed in its portrayal of patronizing White people, but that the Black people are well-rounded characters. ALL OF IT is tropes. ALL OF IT is fiction. It's right there in the title. "American Fiction" is ALL contrivance.

[@ZelcherProductions]

Alright, all of what you said is 100% true and I agree with what you say about the film. However, this does not change my feelings on the film whatsoever. I get it, the movie is intentionally using these plot contrivances and tropes and artificial dialogue all in service of the larger point that these types of stories are very reductive. Well, guess what, I still ended up watching a terrible, boring, mind-numbingly artificial film except this one had a point to make at the very end. I'm struggling to really articulate my grievance with this film because it seems rather obvious. The whole runtime I'm sitting there thinking, "wow, this story is really lame and stupid" and at the end the director pretty much tells me "wow, that type of story is really lame and stupid, amiright fellas?" Ok, but you still made the movie bad, it's still a BAD movie. You don't get brownie points just because it was intentional or you had a point to make. It's not like the concept can't be done effectively, the first film that comes to my mind is Adaptation. (2002). It has a similar metatextual story and it also uses tropes as a way to critique tropes. What makes that movie work better than American Fiction is because it, on its own, is still a good movie. It is a far more interesting story with way more engaging drama and it has so much more to say about writing, specifically screenwriting, than American Fiction does. Other things like the soundtrack and the cinematography also enhance the experience of the film. Even if I were to be somehow impressed with the fact that American Fiction is was an intentionally bad with a purpose, the film's style (or lack thereof) is still incredibly lame because there is no style. I'm not saying American Fiction should be more like Adaption. I'm just giving an example of the same type of story that I think is actually done well. As it is, I don't find American Fiction all that impressive of a film even if everything I don't like about it is being done "intentionally."

[@mandobrownie]

Some of my thoughts on each Oppenheimer: There's no arguing that it's a good movie, but I think Nolan isn't at his best here. The Oppenheimer and Strauss story lines, despite intersecting obviously, don't fit well together. The section of the movie about developing the bomb up to the test bomb is almost played like a heist prep sequence, which just doesn't capture the interesting aspects of large-scale highly funded scientific research. Oppenheimer the character is a specific kind of person who just doesn't want to have opinions but also doesn't want to confront the ethics of his own actions to himself, so we end with this sort of empty person. The best parts of the movie, I think, could have been realized in some other, non-biopic movie Poor Things: Haven't watched yet; didn't know it was a baby brain, I thought it was some sort of more directly Frankenstein situation Killers of the Flower Moon: Haven't watched yet; surprised about the Gladstone screen time; had the feeling that it wasn't more than very well made movie. Barbie: Because it was so much better than anyone expected, when I watched it I felt so positive about it. But the second watch was really revealing for me. The to be a woman speech really is very basic, in the same way that a 10th grader's conception of feminism is basic. How are we all ok with a giant company, Matel, portraying itself as goofy misogynists, and just eating it up as forward-thinking? What's up with the comparative goodness of the Barbies-led vs. Kens-led vs. slightly more co-led doll world governments? Can we really say that it's showing why, despite patriarchy, that it's important to see men as flawed and valuable individuals instead of cogs of patriarchy? It's very bad that Barbie is the movie that's structuring conversations about patriarchy. Anatomy of a Fall: Haven't watched yet, seems really great The Holdovers: Haven't watched yet, will likely watch in the distant future when it's convenient. Zone of Interest: I quite liked Under the Skin, and this looks goood. Definitely on my watch list. I'm also guessing that this movie shows why Paul Shrader's The Gardner is kind of mid. American Fiction: Haven't watched yet; I didn't know the plot, but upon hearing it from Zelcher I'm shocked because this exact movie has already been made. It's called Bamboozled (2000, dir. Spike Lee). It seems like Bamboozled is a much better movie, and if you read its plot description you'll see that it really is the exact same plot. Past Lives: Great movie. It's a story about real love and not movie love, and that's very refreshing. It's also one of the first times I've seen online messaging and videos calls as a legitimate way to develop a deep relationship with someone portrayed in a movie. The in-yun concept is a great centerpiece idea for the movie. And it's not a visual book like most romantic movies are. The team that made this movie knew that they were making a movie first and foremost, not a visually-instantiated written plot.