Waste of talent. Waste of time. Terrible movie.

It might have been salvageable and decently fun, had the entire movie been about Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone’s characters. Maybe not. Maybe I could just watch Ryan Gosling do anything

The directing alternated between boring and weird. The writing was way too trite to take itself this seriously (or was it even more trite that it did take itself this seriously?)

Also, congrats on the barely having one likeable (Emma Stone) female character, who only has 3 scenes in the movie while the rest of them were portrayed as some combination of crazy, cheating, weak or stupid.

Oh hi, middle of January. It was time to do this 3 weeks ago. Alas, I had some priority issues over the past month – this blog being one of the things that had to go hang out on the back burner for a while.

So here’s my list of highlights from 2011:

Books

Music
Some of these are albums and tunes I revisited this year, some are ones I discovered this year.  Most were not new releases from 2011.  Click albums to launch on spotify, the individual songs I listened to are all playable in that handy widget guy.

Albums

Songs

(in totally random order)

Movies
I didn’t see as many movies as I would have liked to this year. And I didn’t keep track of the older ones I watched (there were a lot of dvds from the library, netflix and hulu streaming this year).  Here is a handful of movies from this year that I really enjoyed. I will do better keeping track in 2012.

I went into this movie expecting to have fun watching it, good or bad and I am pleased to say that I really did.

Self-aware and meta to the point of self-obsession, the writing as the plot winds-up was either intentionally campy and over-the-top OR a really half-assed hack job.  It turned out to not matter all that much, especially because it was genuinely quite funny. While there were several moments during the first 45 minutes when I wondered what it was intended to be, in the second act it tightened considerably and by the time I was watching the conclusion unravel, I no longer cared.

The ending delivered nearly as much as the original Scream, which I consider a classic (albeit a relic) of the 90′s.  This fourth installment may be a cliche sequel moneygrab, but unlike nearly other franchise piece for which this is true, Scream 4 might be completely aware of that.  Intentionally or not, it managed to remix itself into a punchy, fun and effective commentary on the entertainment industry and our times.

Here are my picks (if I ruled the world), my predictions (what I think will actually happen) and Ebert’s picks (just for fun comparison!)

best picture
what I would pick: The Social Network or Black Swan
what will probably win: The King’s Speech
what Ebert says: The King’s Speech

direction
who I would pick: David Fincher for The Social Network
who will probably win: I really don’t know on this one.  It’s a total grab bag, but it’s likely to go to whoever won best picture.
what Ebert says: Tom Hooper for The King’s Speech
*note: I’m really sad that Nolan did not get a director’s nod for Inception. I happened to love it, but I understand why people did not love the screenplay. Regardless, he directed the fuck outta that movie.

screenplay (original)
what I would pick: The King’s Speech
what will probably win: The King’s Speech
what Ebert says: The King’s Speech

screenplay (adapted)
what I would pick: The Social Network
what will probably win: The Social Network
what Ebert says: The Social Network
*note: Why the fucking fuck is Toy Story 3 in this category?  Great film, but an adapted screenplay? No. Just no.

best actress (lead role)
who I would pick: Nathalie Portman.
who will probably win: Annette Bening
what Ebert says: Nathalie Portman

best actor (lead role)
who I would pick: Colin Firth
who will probably win: Colin Firth, although, I wouldn’t be surprised to see a James Franco upset!
what Ebert says: Colin Firth

best actress (supporting role)
who I would pick: Hailee Steinfeld (who really should have been nominated but not won for leading role… how the fuck was her part in True Grit not a leading role? The star of that movie was not Jeff Bridges, even though he rocked it as usual!)
who will probably win: Melissa Leo
what Ebert says: Hailee Steinfeld

best actor (supporting role)
who I would pick: Jeremy Renner.  He brought it in The Town. He was exceptional.
who will probably win: Christian Bale (Which I’m fine with. I’d also be happy if Geoffrey Rush won.)
what Ebert says: Geoffrey Rush

cinematography
what I would pick: Black Swan, Inception or The Social Network (if for nothing else, that beautiful tilt-shift scene just killed me!)  If I had to pick only one, I’d go with Black Swan.
what will probably win: True Grit
what Ebert says:True Grit

So that’s the basic set of awards I care about.  The only other two I’m really, really pulling for:

best documentary: I haven’t seen any of the others. I don’t care, I want Exit Through the Gift Shop to win.  I have no idea if it will.

best music: The Social Network.  That soundtrack was epic, it added layers of brilliance to the experience of watching that film which was good to begin with.  I am terribly excited that Atticus Ross and Trent Reznor have signed on for the soundtrack to The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. You can sign me up for that right now.

will you be watching tomorrow?  what would your picks be if you were an Academy voter?

So far, I love:

- The casting of the guys in this. James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender are going to the knock this out of the park and we all know it. Even if the screenplay is weak and all else fails, I could watch those two as X and Magneto all day. Of course I do remember saying something similar about Hugh Jackman and we all know how Wolverine turned out.  So… I hope I’m not being too optimistic, but their scenes together do look rather awesome already, don’t they?

- The glimpses of Nicholas Hoult, who I’m just really excited to see getting some work.  (For those of you who didn’t obsess over the real UK Skins, he acted the fuck outta that show in the first two series.)

- The awesome horn-rimmed glasses on Nicholas Hoult.

- Matthew Vaughn. I’m a fan. I rather enjoyed Kick-Ass and felt he made a lot of good choices.  This bodes well for this movie. I’m pleased this is his follow-up.

Mixed Feelings On:

- A Bryan Singer and Josh Schwartz screenplay. I’m trying to remember that Singer did do the first two X-Men films which I really, really enjoyed.  I’m trying to forget that Superman disaster that earned him a trip to the corner (I send people to the corner… as in “BRYAN SINGER… you go sit in the corner and think about what you’ve done”.) For that matter, his abandoning of the third X-Men movie in order to make the Superman disaster… we can indirectly thank him for that too.  (In the corner!  Next to M. Night, who LIVES in the corner.)  And Josh Schwartz, I love for two reasons: 1. He’s from Rhode Island.  2. He gave the world Seth Cohen, one of the best soap opera teen drama characters in the history of the world.  Neither of these things necessarily qualify him to write an X-Men movie.  I am reserving judgment until I see the movie.

- The release date. Last year we had the “SUMMER MOVIE SEASON” that never came.  It was like a year without christmas.  It was so sad. Even though the Thor release is supposed to signal the beginning of the season (May 6th), I personally don’t count anything before Memorial Day.  So if this rocks, it kick it off right and restore my hope.  If it doesn’t, and the next “big summer movie” is the July release of another fucking Michael Bay francheese flick, I’m going to cry.

- The female casting + potential lack of characterization.. I know that this is really a movie about Professor X and Magneto and everyone else is really a secondary character.  However, I don’t really know how I feel about January Jones as Emma Frost.  On the surface this seems like a good idea, but I guess it depends how deep they go with the role and how she’s able to carry it.  I’ve been told that Jennifer Lawrence is outstanding in Winter’s Bone (I have yet to see it), so I have no problem with her being cast as Mystique.  We’ve already seen a lot of Mystique tricks in the other X-Men films though, so are they going to do anything new or interesting with her?  Again, not judging, just concerned.

That’s about all I got for this little trailer.  Leave your thoughts in the comments!