Monthly Archive for January, 2011

There’s really no reason to pomp and circumstance this entry. They’ve announced the nominations for this year’s Oscars, and now I will tell you what I think of them. This is not an authoritative list, and I don’t even promise to list all the nominees in each category; just the ones I want to talk about.

LEADING ACTOR

Jeff Bridges (True Grit)–certainly worthy, but won’t get it. Remember “Crazy Heart,” people?

Jesse Eisenberg (The Social Network)–incredibly likely, although in my opinion not overwhelmingly deserving. Eisenberg was good, but he was out-classed by newcomer Andrew Garfield and Justin Timberlake.

Colin Firth (The King’s Speech)–the winner. Let’s just be honest, he’s going to win. A challenging performance without being “I Am Sam” cloying, and a well-respected actor who built up good will in the critical community last year.

James Franco (127 Hours)–in the old days, he’d be the shoe-in. But showy roles don’t win you the same prestige they used to. I’m not saying he won’t win for sure, and I’m definitely not saying he’s unworthy, but times have changed. As a side note, when I first heard Franco turned down a role in “Inception” to do “127 Hours,” I scoffed ginger ale all over my keyboard. “What a fool,” I blithely commented. Turns out it was a smart move…or as smart as not working with Chris Nolan can be.

SUPPORTING ACTOR

Christian Bale (The Fighter)–winner. For so many reasons. A potent trifecta of stored-up respect, dynamite acting, and a vanilla movie surrounding him which only highlights his excellence more.

Jeremy Renner (The Town)–first of all, “The Town” was not that great. It was a freshman’s attempt to make the Boston “Heat,” and it failed (never step to Michael Mann unless you know what in the hell you’re doing). Second of all, this was a sleepwalk performance from Renner, of a character he has done many times. He did fine, but I didn’t get the sense it was challenging for him, so I don’t think this is such a great choice.

Mark Ruffalo (The Kids Are All Right)–Not going to happen. Ruffalo’s acting is of a particular quality: he’s kind of mush-mouthed, his cadence and pronunciation is unusual, and he’s got a soft-eyed quality to him. Sometimes it gets played to perfection, sometimes it misses.

Geoffery Rush (The King’s Speech)–A strong, strong contender. I wouldn’t be shocked in the slightest if he won. Still, I count it less likely, because Firth feels so solid to me in Lead Actor, and the Academy is very stingy with acting nods in one film.

LEAD ACTRESS

Natalie Portman (Black Swan)–my personal favorite, although I think she might be a shade too popular to actually win, if that makes any sense. Sometimes the Academy likes to kid itself and pretend it’s not a trend-mongering whore. In this case, though, the trend is valid: Portman was incindiary, and should win.

SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Amy Adams (The Fighter)–beautiful, classy, and good in absolutely any role, Amy Adams should win everything. Ever. But she won’t, especially not for this. I applaud the Academy for noticing how deft her turn was, it could easily be missed because it’s so authentic, but with Bale taking the Supporting Actor without breaking a sweat, the old stinginess factors in again.

Helena Bonham Carter (The King’s Speech)–deserving as hell, and if she wins go with God. A subtle role, but executed masterfully. Carter plays every part like she’s spent a career getting typecast in it.

Hailee Steinfeld (True Grit)–the best performance here. And that’s ridiculous considering her age and experience, and the talent competing with her, but it’s true. If we’re running on a strict meritocracy, it’s all her.

ANIMATED FEATURE

How To Train Your Dragon–no.

The Illusionist–no.

Toy Story 3–the winner. Moving on.

CINEMATOGRAPHY

Matthew Libatique (Black Swan)–actually no. “Black Swan’s” weakest attribute was it’s mostly effective, but sometimes hazy and annoying camera style.

Wally Pfister (Inception)–could not possibly deserve it more, and has been snubbed twice now for his world-class work on “Begins” and “Dark Knight.” It’s time, damn it.

Danny Cohen (The King’s Speech)–I absolutely loathed the camera work on this film, so it goes without saying I find this nomination distasteful. Every frame smacked of attention-drawing insecurity. Low-angle, fish-eyed wide lenses dominated the picture, to say nothing of bizarre eye lines and distractingly ugly lighting and framing. Whatever gritty realism they hoped for was not achieved; instead, I was distracted and annoyed.

Jeff Cronenweth (The Social Network)–made the RED camera sing, no question there. Gorgeous but not showy. I felt that the movie smacked of over-color-correcting in places, but it’s a minor quibble designed mostly to impress you.

Roger Deakins (True Grit)–gorgeous, damn it. As always.

DIRECTING

No Christopher Nolan. Fine. No wait, it’s not fine, it’s ridiculous. I’m sure David O. Russell is more deserving for manhandling a formulaic boxing picture, sitting behind the monitors letting Christian Bale do all the work. And Tom Hooper, the man who fails to grasp eye lines, certainly he bests a $200 million sci fi epic juggling multiple storylines and realities with cutting edge special and visual effects. I see we’re still not over the weepy drama thing in Hollywood.

Hitchcock and Kubrick never got one, either. Ever heard of them?

Darren Aronofsky (Black Swan)–deserves it.

David Fincher (The Social Network)–has deserved it for years.

Joel and Ethan Coen (True Grit)–has deserved it for years, won it, and deserved it again.

MUSIC (ORIGINAL SCORE)

Hans Zimmer (Inception)–his best work with Chris Nolan yet, I think. And still, Chris is not a guy who inspires great music. He demands written stuff ahead of shooting, he seems to push composers towards monosyllabic musical phrasings, and he shies away from music that might stand on its own. Have you ever listened to the “Batman Begins” score? It’s a snooze-fest of glacial strings and pulsing basses with no trajectory whatsoever. “The Dark Knight” is better, having more texture thanks to the Joker, but it’s still icy stuff. “Inception” managed to breed a few genuine classics: the pulsing action piece “Mombassa,” the tear-jerker “Time,” and the blaring brass tones that make up the film’s unofficial theme. Still, I think the winner must fairly be…

Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross (The Social Network)–has everything you want: stands on its own marvelously, yet works in the picture and is perhaps the most distinctly Fincher touch of the entire movie. This score is how the director made his mark on the genre; it’s how he told the world this would be a different film. A definitive musical statement.

BEST PICTURE

Black Swan–A great picture.

The Fighter–a piece of crap with great acting.

Inception–should win, but it won’t win. They consider it consolation enough for last year that it was nominated. And everyone knows those action movies are just…less than the “real” films.

The King’s Speech–probably the winner. They’ve been building steam EXACTLY when you want to. Still, I think it’s a very good but slightly flawed movie overall.

The Social Network–the “old” shoe-in, so to speak; the movie they said would win all last year. But those have a way of expiring before the actual voting.

Toy Story 3–as deserving as any live action picture. A tender and emotional journey.

True Grit–nah. I mean it’s a good movie, but “No Country” hit harder, and the Coens have had their day in the sun.

Every so often, when I discover some really exemplary music, I’ll make the effort to share it with you, Dear Reader. That’s just the kind of guy I am. Now, I know everyone is always telling you about their favorite band and whatever, and it gets annoying. But you should listen to me, and not those people. Are you persuaded yet? Good. Let’s move right along.

Robyn

One Line: high end pop music with a strong electronica influence, as welcome in your earphones as it is on the dance floor.

How did I miss this one? This is seriously one of most exciting musicians I’ve come across in some time. Robyn is a Swedish pop star who grew up in the music industry, then rebelled against it. The story goes that she was signed to Jive in the late 90s when she discovered a love for electronic music, especially the type made by her fellow Swedes The Knife. When she started incorporating it into her sound, her label balked, and she eventually bought herself out of her contract and started up “Konichiwa,” a label where she could make whatever she damn well pleased. The result was the eponymous “Robyn,” which, for all intents and purposes, is a debut album. Yes, she had put out many before, but this was a rebirth.

For me, the appeal of Robyn is obvious: I love electronica (not techno, mind you, there’s a difference). I love distorted synths, 808s, computerized noises, and so forth. Robyn takes this sound and marries it to pop; a feat often tried, very rarely achieved without being annoying as hell. Many American artists have tried this—Justin Timberlake most famously—but none of them worked for me. In most cases, the musicians who try to go electronic don’t take the music seriously, and do so with a wink and a grain of salt. Robyn works because she’s passionate about the sound she’s crafting.

Very few people can sing on top of synthesizers and make it work. It’s not even about technical skill, it’s about the quality of your voice, and how you respond to what the computers are giving you. You can’t just belt like you’re singing to an electric guitar, you’ll sound disconnected from the clean mechanical feel of the music, but refusing to emote won’t work either. It’s a fine line, and if you don’t believe me, go try and sit through Chris Cornell’s “Scream.”

Robyn joins the ranks of the masters, like Reznor or Imogen Heap. The icy timbre of her voice melds with the clanking machines behind her perfectly, and yet she never goes mechanical (even on a song called “Fembot”). She seems to understand what the music needs from her implicitly, and she answers the call with great finesse. The emotional range she achieves is impressive: somber maturity on “Cry When You Get Older,” sexy rebelliousness on “Konichiwa B*****s,” and dangerous, maybe even psychotic edge in “Don’t F**king Tell Me What To Do.”

And, of course, “Dancing On My Own,” your standard club-ready track about jealousy on the dance floor (I’m so sick of songs about the dance floor). Except it’s not. For one thing, the melody is sharp as a tack, perfectly constructed. Secondly, the wall of synths behind her don’t sit quietly where they belong. They’re loud, aggressive, and they’re mixed way in the front, assaulting your ears and vying with Robyn for control of the song. When her voice peaks through them, it’s more like a sliver of light than a controlling force. She’s being drowned in the sound, struggling against the tide that is overwhelming her, much like her character in the song. If you’re going to approach this genre, this is how to do it.

Anyway, enjoy these tracks.

Four Tet

One Line: gorgeous instrumental music that blends real and synthetic instruments perfectly.

The next act I want to tell you about is a guy who records under the moniker “Four Tet.” His actual name Kieran Hebden, and he’s in some post-rock band I don’t care about. Apparently all that moaning about his feelings made him want to produce some real music, so he decided to start experimenting with electronic song structure and organic instrumentation. Four Tet produces gorgeous instrumental music with a heavy instrumental and post-classical influence.

It often gets billed as “folktronica,” a slyly derivative name that implies it’s techno made with acoustic guitars. Blegh. The very thought kept me away for a while. But rest assured, Dear Reader, that this is not the case. The only name for what Four Tet does is “instrumental.” It’s not electronica, because there’s too much actual instrumentation; and it’s certainly not folk or rock, because the song structures center around dynamics, movements, and builds instead of verse chorus verse. Oh, and it’s not prog or math rock, because it’s…you know…pleasant to listen to (I kid because I love, Battles).

No, what we have here is something quite other. Four Tet employs a wide range of real and synthetic instruments, to the point that your brain doesn’t bother telling them apart. I think Hebden’s goal here is to muddle the battle lines between guys with computers and guys with guitars. They’re all sounds, weapons in his arsenal, colors on his palette, and he blends them effortlessly. Nothing clangs, or stands out, or dominates the audio space; guitars and synths and drums all work happily together, none of them hogging the ball.

Hebden has a serious ear for melody, which brings us to Four Tet’s greatest strength: the sheer beauty of it. This is music that deliberately intends to be gorgeous. It’s emotional, even poetic, but somehow avoids being prissy or boring. It’s light but never thin. Transcendent but always grounded.

I hate most musicians who sit on one emotion all the time, and I especially can’t stand stuff that’s happy all the time. That was another reservation I had about Four Tet, it sounded like gag-inducing sunshine music. It’s not. There’s real joy in these notes, but it’s an honest joy, and the mood it sets is complex and elastic. I’ve found myself connecting to it in moments of deep sadness, as well as when I feel like I’m on top of the world. It seems to work for almost anything.

Anyway, enough babbling, try out these tracks: