2012 Oscars: Costume Design

I know, I know, I said I was going to do the techs first, then the artistics. I'm sure you're very disappointed and confused that I'm going out of order. But there's a single costume in particular that kind of blew my mind and I want to talk about it.

So get over it.

Nominees
Anna Karenina, Jacqueline Durran
Les Miserables, Paco Delgado
Lincoln, Joanna Johnston
Mirror Mirror, Eiko Ishioka
Snow White and the Huntsman, Colleen Atwood

5. Mirror Mirror

Some of the dresses were pretty, I guess. The bright colors gave a nice fairy tale feel to the whole movie And Ishioka died a year ago, so yes, there's a bit of a sympathy vote here. But at the end of the day, these were cookie-cutter costumes that we've seen before, and they lacked a certain detail and texture to help them blend into their surroundings. Julia Roberts' giant yellow dresses were distracting. The costumes drew attention to themselves rather than aiding the story, and that's just not okay.

4. Les Miserables

These were fine, I guess. I wasn't a fan of the movie, and I don't want that to affect my position here, but given that most of the film was shot in closeups, most of the costumes we really got to see were of the collars and lapels, so it's rather difficult to tell if they were really all that good or not. They were appropriate enough, I guess. They seemed to fit the period and the characters, and there was a certain elaborateness that reflected the heightened musical atmosphere of the film, but really there wasn't a whole of really interesting work going on here.

For all I know, the entire cast never wore pants.

3. Snow White and the Huntsman

Colleen Atwood never fails to deliver, and where Mirror Mirror's costumes seemed distracting and inappropriate even for its bubblegum fairy tale vision, Atwood's work here adequately fits the darker medieval world of the film, without being too garish. Charlize Theron's costumes frequently had a sharp angular feel that matched her villainous character, and all the armor and chain mail seemed original and unique. That said, a few notable pieces aside, I feel like I've seen this all before.

2. Anna Karenina

Of the nominees thusfar, I think these costumes are the ones that best struck a balance between the authentic, period-based demands of the design with the colorful, exaggerated nature of the film itself. The film is intentionally theatrical, where films like Mirror Mirror and Les Miserables were accidentally theatrical. Therefore in my mind it gets a little leeway with its flamboyance. What's more, I never felt like I was focusing on the costumes, they seemed to simply exist in the world and became a part of the characters who wore them.

1. Lincoln

This will be the first of several awards I personally think Lincoln deserves, although it almost certainly won't win all of them. (And just to clarify now, in each of these categories I don't necessarily think Lincoln had the best such-and-such of the year so much as the best such-and-such of the nominees.) At face value, the design of Lincoln seems based in simply historical authenticity. Joanna Johnston has said as much, that "getting it right" was really the goal. So you see muted tones and rich textures to recreate the clothes and the mood of the times of the Civil War. Much of the outfit in Lincoln are indeed dutiful recreations, right down to the use of Lincoln's shawls, which he was apparently quite fond of. One of the few garish pieces was the bold yellow Asian-looking garment worn by Secretary of State Seward, and it does call attention to itself because it seems so out of place. Yet apparently, Seward had been a world traveller and was known to wear these sorts of things in private. So it is at least justified in it's out-of-placeness. Mary Todd Lincoln frequently wears finer fabrics and bolder colors in the film because, as she explains in one scene, she is intentionally living beyond her means so that the office of the Presidency maintains its dignity while she inhabits the White House. Her costumes are driving partially by history, but also by character.

My favorite example of character-driven costuming this entire year is the suit that Bob Lincoln wears on an outing with his father. It's a simple suit. The first time I saw the film, though, I frequently thought, "Joseph Gordon-Levitt looks odd in this film..." The second time I realized why: his clothes were almost always too big for him. In the film, his character is basically the son who wants to grow up and be a man in conflict with his parents who want to protect him and keep hold of their child. It's as though the entire film he's trying to wear his big boy pants, but something is stopping him from growing. It isn't until he does enlist in the military that he finally looks right in his own clothes.  It's honestly a brilliant piece of character-driven costume design, and just because the suit is an ugly brown instead of bright yellow, and just because the military uniforms are recreations instead of original armor and mail, and just because Charlize Theron looks hotter in her gowns than Sally Field does, that doesn't mean Lincoln is any less deserving of this award.


BEST COSTUME DESIGN
Will win: Anna Karenina (and that's not necessarily wrong or undeserving)
Should win: Lincoln
Should have been nominated: Argo and Django Unchained, instead of Mirror Mirror and Les Miserables.

(By the way, if anyone wants me to explain my "should have been nominated" choices any further, indicate it in the comments. I just dont' want to bore anyone too much.)

2012 Oscars: Visual Effects

Over the next several weeks, I'll be going through each Academy Award category giving my personal rankings of the nominees. I'll give my thoughts on which films/performances didn't deserve to be nominated, and which should have been in their place. I'll start with the techs, move to artistics, then the major categories. I'm holding off on shorts, foreign, and docs since they're harder for me to get a hold of, and as often as possible I only want to address categories when I've seen all the nominees.

(Heads up, the most vs. best comparison comes up frequently in end-of-year awards discussions. Most cuts doesn't mean best editing, fanciest shots doesn't mean best cinematography, most beads and boldest colors doesn't mean best costumes, etc., etc.)

Nominees
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
Life of Pi
Marvel's The Avengers
Prometheus
Snow White and the Hunstman

5. Snow White and the Hunstman

This movie really did look pretty great and the effects were effective enough, but something about shards of black glass and ravens flying around just seems kind of "been there, done that." Not to mention the celebrity actor faces on dwarf bodies was a bit peculiar-looking.

4. Marvel's The Avengers

I warned you: most effects doesn't mean best effects. There are great effects in all the Marvel films, but by the end of The Avengers I just lost any sense of reality when the flying slug things were floating up and down the streets. It was CGI overload. I know these films aren't trying to bring a gritty true life feel to comics the way Nolan tried with Batman, but there was something unintentionally cartoonish about The Avengers and I don't think it was intended the way I took it.

See what I mean?

3. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

Again, most doesn't equal best, but The Hobbit felt real the entire time. I believed I was looking at Middle Earth the whole time - even in 48 fps - and with the excellent 3D cinematography, at times I believed I was in Middle Earth. The fighting rock formations in the rainstorm was one of the most simultaneously terrifying and majestic scenes of the year. That alone deserves recognition, but the whole film was visually stunning. The main missteps would be the CGI goblins in the Misty Mountains. I thought the taller, more humanoid orcs of Moria had a stronger, realer presence. Peter Jackson wanted a lighter feel for these films, and that works, but for me the Misty Mountain goblins stepped a toe over the line from light to silly.

2. Prometheus

Lots of people hated this movie, and plenty of people loved it. It basically depends on how much you choose to focus on the plot holes. I would also argue that since it's a film about human origins and cosmogony and religion, how much one likes the film is dependent on one's interests in that subject matter. But no one complained about the way the movie looked. The production design and especially the realization of that design by the FX team is near flawless.  Again, at times I felt like I was looking at real, tangible sets and creatures and sand storms, etc.

1. Life of Pi

Life of Pi, though, managed to find a brilliant balance between that real, tangible sort of effect (those flying fish look like they're hitting you in the face) and the fun, more colorful sort of effects like in Avengers (the gorgeous "Tiger Vision" scene).  Then consider the backgrounds and seascapes, the shipwreck, the "God Storm," and it becomes clear this movie had the best visual effects of the year. And all of that goes without mentioning Richard Parker, who this year trumps even Gollum as the best animated creature on the screen. That tiger was a thing of terrifying beauty and subtle character which all by itself earns this award. Just watch the trailer below for proof. The most visually stunning film of the year.

BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
Will win: Life of Pi
Should win: Life of Pi
Should have been nominated: Cloud Atlas, instead of Snow White and the Huntsman

Process Stories

It's Oscar season again, which is about the only thing that can usually pull me out of the woodwork to start blogging regularly again, for at least a month or so.  I'll get into what I think about specific categories as the next several weeks go by, but today is something different.

Looking up and down the list of major awards contenders, I began to notice a trend this year in the types of stories that were being told.  With many of the acclaimed or otherwise successful films this year, we usually know the ending before we get into the theater, or at least by a few minutes into the movie.  

Does Lincoln get the 13th Amendment passed?  

Do the hostages get out of Iran?

Do we find Bin Laden?

Does Hitchcock manage to make and release Psycho?

Does the family in The Impossible manage to survive the tsunami aftermath, reunite, and sell the movie rights to their story?

These are, of course, matters of history or common knowledge.  But then consider the fictional films.

Does Django get his revenge on the oppressive/racist White Man? It's hard to imagine a bleaker story than one in which the slaveowner wins the day.

Does Pi survive his adventure at sea? Considering the adult Pi is narrating the tale from the start, the question of life or death seems moot.

Does Snow White defeat the Evil Queen? Always and forever.

Does Denzel get away with the tragic consequences of his alcoholism, or does he ultimately face his demons? 

You get my point.

There really weren't many surprises this year.  Yet I'd argue 2012 gave us one of the best crops of films we've had in quite a while.  How is it that so many movies with predictable endings could be so fascinating and satisfying?  Because ultimately we don't go to the movies to see what happens - we go to see how they happen.  The big twist ending or the big reveal or whatever is maybe five minutes of what following two hours of how.  You can have a crappy ending and still have enjoyed the ride and be grateful for the experience.  Or you can have a crappy ride, but get blown away by the finale, and subsequently confuse that with high quality.  But the best cinematic experiences are the ones that strike a balance.  When you suspect the ending will be satisfying regardless, and the trip the filmmakers take you on to get there is the truly enthralling part.  

Which brings me to Argo. I saw it in theaters and I was underwhelmed. I thought it was a well-made film, and Ben Affleck's direction held everything together. But Best Picture? Meh. 

You see, the whole time I was stuck in my head. I kept thinking, "This thriller isn't very thrilling. We know they're going to get out of Iran, we know the plan worked, so why am I here?" So I enjoyed the film but I questioned its necessity. 

But I watched it a second time recently and it was a different experience.  Having gotten the negativity out of my system, I realized that even though we know the hostages escape, they don't. And suddenly a tautness entered the movie that wasn't there before. I was also able to step back and look at some of the production elements more objectively - the costumes and production design were superb.  Giving the "Film Director" character curly hair and an ascot was brilliant.  The story juggled two or three locations/subplots at a time, but the editor never loses track of them so neither do we.  There's really not a bad performance in the entire ensemble.  The screenplay shows a fascinating look at the Hollywood system and the US intelligence system but includes just enough family tension to give Affleck's character an emotional core.  

All that said, it's not a perfect film. Because there are so many characters, only a few of them are developed beyond their function or the lines they are obligated to say to move the story forward.  And I think Affleck made a mistake in casting himself in the lead role - it might have been the writing, but it simply wasn't a charismatic enough performance from the guy who's supposed to be leading us through the adventure.  Not a bad performance by any means, but not exactly a memorable one. 

I looked up the historical accuracy and noticed that the screenplay takes liberties to create a more heightened sense danger than may have actually existed, but that doesn't really undermine the preposterous nature of the extraction plan or the fact that they actually pulled it off.  The story of the process trumps the announcement of the outcome. 

Life of Pi is essentially a story making that very point. Pi narrates the tale of his sea voyage with a tiger named Richard Parker, and when its integrity is questioned he responds simply, "Which story do you prefer?" 

Filmmaking is storytelling, and stories are how you get there, not where you get.  

Election Day

It’s election day. And i’m not voting. 

I don’t have any problems with voting, and i would vote if i had thought it through. But i didn’t want to register in Massachusetts, and i waited too long to request my North Carolina absentee ballot. Perhaps if i cared more i would have been more proactive, but i don’t really care. I don’t believe that the winner of this election will decide or even affect my happiness over the next four years, and i don’t believe he will have the power to really change the things that trouble me. 

In a way, i am truly grateful that i cannot with good conscious place that much trust and faith in one man. I am left with only one place to put my trust and faith.

Oswald Chambers writes:

“...if we love a human being and do not love God, we demand of him every perfection and every rectitude, and when we do not get it we become cruel and vindictivel we are demanding of a human being that which he or she cannot give. There is only one Being Who can satisfy the last aching abyss of the human heart, and that is the Lord Jesus Christ. Why our Lord is apparently so severe regarding every human relationship is because He knows that every relationship not based on loyalty to Himself will end in disaster. Our Lord trusted no man, yet He was never suspicious, never bitter. Our Lord’s confidence in God and in what His grace could do for any man, was so perfect that He despaired of no one. If our trust is placed in human beings, we shall end in despairing of everyone.”

Four years ago, i believed many people placed President Obama on a pedestal on the same level as, if not above, God. And when he only delivered some of what he promised, their enthusiasm diminished. As a recent episode of 30 Rock pointed out, “We’re not doing that this year - no one’s that excited.”

What interests me about this phenomenon lately is how we can do the same thing in our personal lives. I have very recently had a friendship dissolve, a good friendship i thought. I put a lot of time and energy into my relationship with someone, trying to support him and be there for him when he had problems. Unfortunately, when i expected reciprocity, when i needed someone to return the support i had given him, he proved unable or unwilling to deliver - the burden of another’s problems proved too much to handle. I learned a valuable lesson in the risks of trusting people. 

I'm not saying you shouldn't vote this election, or that i never will, only that i don't feel compelled or convicted to do so right now. Oh, i still trust many politicians and i still have faith in our political system, just as i have trust and faith in many of my other good friends. I know there are people who will be there for me when i need it. But the only being that i know will always be there for me is God. 

This election and my recent falling out with a friend remind me of that, and comfort me. The people i see who place their trust in human beings have thusfar only ended in despairing of everyone, and i thank God i haven’t reached that point.

Hiatus

It’s been almost a year since i posted here.

I’ve spent a year in Boston, a year in film school. I’ve watched (or re-watched) some more Jesus movies, including Jesus Christ Superstar, Godspell, King of Kings, and The Last Temptation of Christ. I’ve had crises of faith, and experiences of overwhelming conviction in my faith. I’ve made friendships. i’ve nearly lost a few friendships. I’ve made a few short films. i’ve bartended weekends.

And throughout all of it, i have simply had no motivation to write on this blog. i haven’t been able to form thoughts - arguments, questions, anything - with a coherence that merited a post.  

Of course, i’ve been busy with school and all, which has it’s own writing demands. But this is different. I’ve tried to limit my facebook posting, to avoid those obnoxious debates, and i haven’t especially missed the opportunities to flesh out my own opinions in a public sphere. Maybe i haven’t blogged because i accept my limitations - i simply might not have the capacity to speak with any authority on certain issues of faith or politics or film, and would prefer this not become a space for half-baked whining or pontificating. 

Whatever the reasons or circumstances, it’s been nearly a year and i’m finally motivated to at least address or acknowledge my absence. 

i might need to take another hiatus soon. We’ll see. But for now, i’m still here, i’m still thinking, and i’ll try to start writing again very soon. Maybe tomorrow. Here’s a link to a music video in the meantime.

http://www.youtube.com/embed/2q9_ZEtuTR8

The Robe

The Robe (1953), like the last film Ben-Hur, is the story of a man who lived in the time of Jesus and was radically changed by his experience with Jesus.  But where Judah Ben-Hur witnessed both Jesus’ life and death, the Roman soldier Marcellus (Richard Burton) in The Robe begins his story with the death of Jesus, which he is assigned to oversee.  He is the soldier who won Jesus’ robe in a dice game after the crucifixion.  Afterwards, the robe appears to have some sort of spiritual power to cause Marcellus great pain or guilt, so he gets rid of it.  When, a year or so later, he sees the loving behavior of those who follower Jesus’ teachings, he is convinced he was wrong to allow the crucifixion and converts to Christianity.  The emperor Caligula fears this Christian sect, and is angered by their refusal to acknowledge the him (and Rome) as the highest authority - Caligula views Christians as traitors.  When Marcellus refuses to abandon Christianity, claiming that he can be loyal to both Rome and Jesus, Caligula apparently sentences Marcellus and his girlfriend Diana to death, which is portrayed as Marcellus and Diana walking out a door into a sea of white fluffy clouds.

There are so many problems with this movie.  Really, like, a lot.  

I’ll begin with the representation of Jesus, which is the purpose of this series.  Jesus is on screen for very little time - we basically only see him entering Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, then a scene later he is walking to his death and put up on the cross.  The crucifixion here is an important plot point on which Marcellus’ story hinges, but is not the focus of the movie.  As such, Jesus is shown dutifully, but not substantially.  The image of Jesus that is more important is image of him we see in his followers - a loving, peaceful people who are persecuted for apparently no reason.  

It is what this movie does in its portrayal of those influenced by Jesus that I do not like, and the historical details in particular are fairly horrendous.  One man is converted on the spot when looking at Jesus enter Jerusalem, claiming things like, “Only his eyes spoke...”  Something about these moments make me feel like Jesus is more like a magician than the Son of God.  

There was one almost laughable scene after Jesus’ death when Marcellus encounters a man on the street, obviously emotionally distressed, who says he should tell people to believe, before running off.  He says before he goes that his name is Judas (accompanied by loud music and thunderclaps), and exits up stairs leading to a gnarled dead tree.  While I did like the visual cue of the tree implying Judas’ imminent suicide, as soon as I realized that this was Judas, wracked with guilt and claiming people should believe in Jesus, I just thought, “You can’t do that.  You can’t just take a vital character to the Jesus narrative and invent feelings and words that you don’t know he had.”  This was slightly different in Ben-Hur when we see Pontius Pilate a few times because those encounters were not offering much insight into his character - they were more anecdotal coincidences.  This struck me more as a serious mistreatment of history and as just one of many attempts to manipulate the audiences emotions.

Meanwhile, even though the “Christians” in the movie are loving and understanding of the importance of their messiah’s sacrifice, Marcellus is driven for a bit almost entirely by guilt.  When he put on Christ’s robe for the first time, he convulsed in pain, and I could imagine the robe was essentially whispering in his’ ear, “Look what you did to me!  I’m Jesus!  And you killed me!  Don’t you just feel so terrible about yourself now?!”  Richard Burton’s over-the-top, exaggerated pain gestures do not help the case much.  I was able to excuse the style of acting of older films in Ben-Hur, but it is more difficult to hear.  People do not cry, they sob and heave and grit their teeth.  People do not get injured, they writhe in excruciating agony.  Even the more positive emotions struck me as a bit too much - the Christians were not just kind and generous, but grateful to be crippled, and almost simple-minded when trying to understand their persecution and low place in Roman society.  (Perhaps this is what Christians are supposed to act like, but it did not seem like a very organic result of their faith in Jesus, more like a wistful dreamy show of faith.)  

But let’s talk about that persecution of Christians for a minute.  Marcellus encountered these people just a year or so after the crucifixion.  At this time, there were no Christians.  It was not a thing that people could be.  There were some Jews and some Gentiles who knew who Jesus was, and followed his teachings.  But the Gospels had not been written yet.  Paul had not yet begun his ministry.  There was no such thing as a clearly identifiable religion called “Christianity.”  And what’s more, if there was a defined group of these Jesus-followers, Caligula was not the emperor who ordered their deaths.  One scene showed Roman soldiers shooting arrows without cause into a crowd.  This was not the work of Caligula.  That’s more like the behavior of Nero, and even then, the persecution and martyrdom of Christians was the exception, not the rule.  

But these details do not matter so much because in this movie the point is that Rome is bad.  Rome does not want you to be a Christian.  Even the opening shots of the film, showing the slave trade in the middle of Rome itself seem designed to make us think, “This is a bad place because they sell and own people, which we now know is morally wrong.  This is not the side I should be rooting for.”  

There are some nice moments, as when Marcellus gives a young boy a donkey as a gift, and discovers that boy had re-gifted it to his crippled friend for transportation.  But these moments are not plentiful enough to rise above some of the oddities - there is a sword-fight for two that seem too, I think the correct word would be swashbuckling to feel natural in Rome or Nazareth.  Maybe it’s right for Robin Hood or a pirate ship, but not here.  

But ultimately I simply could not get over the fact that this whole story seems to depend on a really severe guilt trip.  The author of the novel says he wrote it to ask what happened to the soldier who won Christ’s robe.  Apparently the answer this film has is that he was wracked with guilt and converted to kindness to assuage that guilt.  I just don’t believe that is how Christianity works.  I don’t think that system of guilt-repentance-guilt-repentance on a seeming loop is the way a relationship with Christ should operate.  Sure we sin, we confess, we repent, we try not to do it again.  But there’s more too it than that, and while Marcellus does seem to reach a point of total change, the way he gets there seemed strange to me - and considering this is a movie to be watched by an audience, that guilt trip extends to them as well.  I don’t think a movie about the role that Jesus plays in our lives should serve to make an audience feel worse about themselves, but better.  And the assurance at the end that if we stick to our guns, we’ll be rewarded in heaven with awesome cloud shoes is ultimately unsatisfying, since we’ve still got to live our lives on earth for a while.  Unless we choose martyrdom like Marcellus and Diana did...but I suppose being executed isn’t all that bad since they skipped that part in the movie and went straight to the part about walking on clouds.

The Robe has flawed theology, seriously inaccurate history, and a disrespect for the secular cultures in which we live.  But hey, look on the bright side, at least we get to feel bad about ourselves for killing Jesus, right?  

Things We Learned on the Metro

I've been in Boston for a few days now, getting ready to start my graduate program in film production at Boston University.  Somehow, I hadn't expected everything to be different... somewhere in the back of my mind, I think I expected to find UNC's campus transplanted into the Boston infrastructure, and all I'd have to deal with was new people and their accents.  After the initial overwhelming feeling of being in a new place, knowing I'll be living here for at least two years, I've settled in pretty quickly so far.  This past summer I've been living just outside of DC, and I'd like to take a minute to discuss some of the differences between the cities based on observations I've made while riding the T. (Boston's subway system is called the T, instead of the Metro.)

Accents are almost directly correlated with class.  The more blue-collar, working class a person is (or seems), the thicker that Southie-sounding accent.  You know, the one from Good Will Hunting and The Town and The Departed.  It's honestly not different in that way than the South, where you tend to find the heavier twangs in more rural, less buit-up areas, or in people who have not (for whatever reason) risen to a position in the more affluent business world.

There are far fewer earbuds on the T than on the Metro.  People are more social.  In DC, you're not really supposed to look at anyone on the metro.  You keep your head down, read your newspaper, don't talk too loudly.  Here in Boston I've witnessed total strangers spark up a conversation - given, it's small talk usually - "Oh, is that so-and-so book?  I've heard it's good." "Yeah it is, you should check it out," and so on.  But still, they talk to each other.  They apologize when they're in your way - in DC, you are expected to apologize to someone who is in your way instead...especially if that person in your way is wearing a suit, meaning they are surely very important to national security.

A man reached over my dad's and my heads to grab a rail, and apologized for basically putting his armpit in our faces.  In DC, you would receive a glare for having dared to allow your face to be in the way of this stranger's musk.  (Fortunately, neither of these systems is like the Paris metro, where musk is commonplace and pungent, sometimes curry, sometimes with a smack of ham.)

But there are somethings which are annoying no matter what train system you are riding.  I am simply calling it how I see it.

- If you bring a stroller onto the subway, and you do not have a baby in that stroller, you make life harder for other people.  You are wasting space with your stupid contraption.

- If you bring a stroller onto the subway, and you keep your child in it, well, you're wasting less space, but you're still taking up a lot, so don't expect people to be very pleased about it.

- If you bring four giant stuffed Bed, Bath, and Beyond shopping bags onto the subway, you will be that person that everyone hates.  Just be aware - keep your head down, and have a look of contrition on your face, and perhaps we'll forgive you.

- If you are medically obese on the subway, whether or not you can help it, you will be in other people's way.  We'll forgive you out of sympathy, but you'll still be in our way.

- If you need to brace yourself, please, dear God, please do not do it by leaning back against a pole, allowing that pole to find its way between your buttocks, and then clenching.  It is as disturbing as it is, I suspect, unsanitary.  And rest assured, we will notice it and swap knowing glances with the other riders, asking with our eyes, "What is this guy doing?!"

So that sums up some of what I have witnessed in my first few days in Boston.  There's more, of course, and maybe I'll get to that later.  Maybe not.

Stay tuned, though, for my next piece on Jesus in film, where I'll be looking at a movie I did not like, 1953's The Robe.