The 2nd Annual Anti-Oscars

Every year there are great performers and films that for whatever reason do not get the attention they deserve at the Oscars. Sometimes they’re underrated, sometimes they’re critical darlings and sometimes the field is just too vast.

I guess I should be proud that when I did this feature last year, none of the movies or performers I named got nominated. Is that a good thing? Anyway, here again I’ve picked some names that have nary a prayer when the Oscar nominations are announced next Thursday. If it feels like I’m missing a really good one, assume they actually have a shot.

Best Picture

  • Looper
  • The Kid With a Bike
  • The Turin Horse
  • Bernie
  • The Perks of Being a Wallflower
  • Rust and Bone
  • The Impossible

I’ll maybe wish I included my four of my Top 10 movies of the year on this list when they don’t get nominated. Those are “The Master,” “Skyfall,” “Moonrise Kingdom” and “Beasts of the Southern Wild.”

But the movies I have selected are all just as wonderful and not Oscar bait at all. “Looper” is exactly what clever studio filmmaking should be. “The Kid With a Bike” is such a heartbreaking and darling film about a kid who loves too strong the things that don’t love him back, and it’s only being forgotten because it premiered two Cannes film festivals ago. “The Turin Horse” is so gigantic, epic and hard to watch, it may just be considered one of the best movies ever made years from now. “Rust and Bone” is a daring romance that the Academy simply hasn’t seen. “Bernie” treads the line between comedy, drama and documentary a little too closely for the Academy to care. “Perks” is destined to be a teen classic alongside “The Breakfast Club.” And “The Impossible” should have Oscar bait written all over it, but Academy voters have already booted it out of contention in fields such as Visual Effects and Makeup.

There’s no questioning that the movies that are being nominated for Best Picture are quality films, but some of my picks might hold up in the culture’s eye just a little better over time.

Snubs: “Chronicle,” “The Comedy,” “Oslo, August 31stContinue reading “The 2nd Annual Anti-Oscars”

The Perks of Being a Wallflower

There’s something all those coming of age stories have forgotten over the years. For some, discovering what you love comes with a feeling of regret. How different would I be if I found all these great things sooner? Would I be smarter? Would I be more honest? Would I have put up with so much abuse? Where would my life be?

These are questions we should ask as teenagers, but for some it comes later than others, if at all. “The Perks of Being a Wallflower” shows just how difficult that can be for people so young. But because it celebrates youth, music, love, rebellion and discovery, it’s a film that allows us to see and understand the world a little better. It’s a rare film that can help us grow.

The movie is based off a cult teen novel of the same name, and although it only came out in 1999, the book has for some meant as much to contemporary youth as “The Catcher in the Rye” has for so long. With how defensive today’s kids are about adapting their favorite novels into movies, something with such a passionate following could not have been directed or written by anyone other than the book’s author, Stephen Chbosky.

Thankfully he has made his book into a film, and he’s made a lovely one. Rather than stage it as a collection of anonymous letters like his novel, the film follows many of the punches of a standard coming-of-age drama. It lacks the narrative simplicity of “The Breakfast Club,” the indie charm of “Juno” or the visual splendor of “Rushmore,” but it matches all of those in endearing characters, confident dialogue and timelessness. Continue reading “The Perks of Being a Wallflower”