By John H. Foote One of the dumbest rules ever created for the Academy Awards is that an actor is eligible for nomination only once in the same category each year. So, if someone has three brilliant performances in three different films, they must decide which one they are going to campaign for the nomination.…
By Alan Hurst (***) Streaming on Prime I guess it is possible to know too much about someone. Particularly when that person and her husband are the subject of a film biography where dramatic license is liberally employed to tell their story. That’s what Aaron Sorkin has done here in telling the story of Lucille…
By Alan Hurst Peter Bogdanovich – one of the hottest and most successful directors of the early seventies – passed away yesterday at the age of 82. His career serves as a cautionary tale of the kinetic combination of talent, early success, unbridled ego, and bad decisions. A scholar of film, before directing he had…
By John H. Foote Every film critic has them, those beliefs that are just not popular within critics circles. The question is, do these critics have the courage to discuss what might be very unpopular opinions? I do. 1. THE MARX BROTHERS BORE ME — I have never understood the appeal of the Marx Brothers…
By John H. Foote So many fine performances this year, each category for acting at the Academy Awards is jammed packed with potential nominees, with five slots for each. Rather than listing them by category or even by preference, I just wrote them down, lead and supporting together, again in no particular order. These were…
By John H. Foote When composing a Top 10 List of movies, I always like to follow it up with the 10 worst. So, here it is, the worst of the worst I have seen this year. Not much else to say, except no one sets out to make a bad film. But sometimes they…
By Alan Hurst John’s recent look at the Oscar snubs of Nicole Kidman and Tom Hanks got me thinking. They’re both winners and multiple nominees, but they also have a resume of performances that somehow Oscar overlooked. Coming from another generation of stars, Shirley MacLaine is another one who can be listed with Kidman and…
By John H. Foote The first woman to be nominated for an Academy Award as Best Director has passed. Italian filmmaker Lina Wertmuller died yesterday at the age of 93, after living a full life and having an extraordinary career. Her most exceptional period was in the seventies, during which she made history becoming the…
By John H. Foote Tom Hanks is often hailed as America’s most beloved actor. Despite this, the ever-fickle Academy seems to take every opportunity it can to bring him down a notch. The Academy has a long history of ignoring talent once they have received a few nominations. Case in point, Mr. Hanks. Yes, he…
By John H. Foote Throughout my 40-plus years as a film student, actor, director and film critic, I have heard countless arguments about who is the greatest of all actors? Understand the word actor is gender neutral, making the decision all the more difficult. Watching acting in early cinema can be trying, as the actors…