This review will announce news surrounding the Oscars so be warned, also the following is very much my opinion versus my normal reviews so be aware of that.
I have to say this year's awards season has been quite disappointing; with films like Fences, Lion, Nocturnal Animals, Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them and even Suicide Squad of all films courting nominations. The big coup of this year's Academy Awards was how many awards La La Land was up for and quite frankly it deserved practically every category it was in. Anyone who knows the controversy around this year's ceremony knows that it went home with far fewer awards than it deserved and was pretty much robbed of a deserved Best Picture award.
So before I go any further I will be providing a list of categories that I won't be discussing which are: Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Foreign Language Film, Best Documentary -Feature and Short Subject, Best Live Action Short Film. This is because I have not seen the films Moonlight, The Salesman, O.J.: Made In America, The White Helmets and Sing.
I will rank the Award's that have been given as:
- Agree
- Neutral
- Disagree
Best Visual Effects: The Jungle Book (Neutral)
This is a very hard call for me to make as there were a lot of good films within the visual effects category and the film industry has only been getting better and better throughout the years. The Jungle Book was a film built solely around visual effects and convincing CGI creatures and environments. I was blown away by how realistic everything looks and can't wait to see where Jon Favreau goes from here. However I also would argue that Rogue One: A Star Wars Story is just as deserving of an Academy Award; once again developing such an incredible sci-fi universe with beautifully unique and original designs and effects.
Best Film Editing: Hacksaw Ridge (Neutral)
Hacksaw Ridge was an immaculate war film that flowed beautifully, switching between slow pace and fast pace almost effortlessly. The final half of this film is what probably earned this film it's Academy Award win. However I also felt that La La Land deserved this category as it had a style that flowed beautifully; catapulting you through a visual musical the likes of which hasn't been achieved in cinema in a long time.
Best Costume Design: Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them (Disagree)
I was quite surprised to see fantastic Beasts nominated for anything, let alone win an Academy Award. While this is a great sign of potentially shifting away from treating blockbuster movies as being inferior to the art haus or biopic cinema that usually gathers awards I do have to wonder what this film really accomplished with it's costuming. The outfits were all very bland and styled quite similarly to one another, the only outfits that really stood out were Newt and Queenie's respective costume pieces. A contender that really deserved this win would have been La La Land as the costumes within that had such colour and range that they only served to heighten the energy and elegance within the film.
Best Makeup And Hairstyling: Suicide Squad (Disagree)
Probably the biggest joke within the whole ceremony was Suicide Squad getting an Academy Award. This was a film that had some cool prosthetic make-up with Croc's character but the rest was just intensive paints. When you compare this to fellow contender Star Trek Beyond and the sheer scale of prosthetic work that went into that you start to question what the Academy was thinking.
Best Cinematography: La La Land (Agree)
There was something truly graceful in how La La Land was presented and it was in large part down to the visual style of the film. I found that while I sat watching this film in the theatre that I saw the camera as another ensemble dancer, moving with the scene and making art come to life. I loved the homage shots scattered throughout that drew upon classic musical film. It took a talented eye to capture these shots and was the only real option in my eyes.
Best Production Design: La La Land (Agree)
A musical, be it theatre or film, lives and dies on the production design or the set pieces and to a lesser extent the props. What's done in La La Land is really powerful, seemingly simple sets have so much detail placed in them that you feel transported to a timeless pocket of Los Angeles. This film draws a lot upon other classic films and that can be seen a lot in the design. This is a love letter to Hollywood and it shows in the world that has been designed.
Best Sound Mixing: Hacksaw Ridge (Neutral)
This is a really tricky category because you have to judge the film upon how well it captures natural sound and there's three contenders that all equally deserved that award this year. One of these was the winner, Kacksaw Ridge, which managed to really craft a battlefield that you believed and fell into. The screams of agony, the weight of falling bodies and the sheer mania was a big aspect of what I loved about this film. However La La Land also deserves a mention, capturing a lot of great raw music and blending it in with the studio recorded pieces. I would also argue that Rogue One: A Star Wars Story succeeded in creating the magnitude of battle through sound mixing in the same manner that Hacksaw Ridge did.
Best Sound Editing: Arrival (Disagree)
Arrival was a film that had a really unique range of generated noises added to it, sound that actually served to enhance and drive the story so it's clear to see why it got the award. However I feel that this award really belonged to La La Land which composed the sounds within the film to a masterful level, working generated sounds in alongside the great score and original songs. This is a hard award to judge but in my view Arrival was the wrong pick.
Best Original Song: "City Of Stars" From La La Land (Agree)
I was supremely worried that "Audition" was going to win on behalf of La La Land instead of this and I'm glad it didn't. "Audition" is a beautiful song but comes at a weird moment in the film and feels very surrealist. What I envision when I think of La La Land is "City Of Stars" because it captures all the abundance of hope and ambition in LA that often goes unrewarded. It's my big take away from La La Land and probably my favourite song upon the soundtrack.
Best Original Score: La La Land (Agree)
The score category really didn't hold much competition this year so it's no great shock to me that La La Land won. It is truly a musical unlike any I have ever seen, balancing a wild enrapturous joy with a deep melancholy. It isn't often that a score takes you upon a journey but that's the only way for me to describe how I felt watching and listening to La La Land.
Best Animated Short Film: Piper (Agree)
I won't dwell on this category for long as Piper was the only film I had seen in it however it's worth commending. The animation within this short film is one of the best Disney shorts to come out of the studio in recent years. It paints a really visually stunning setting and the birds in the film have such detail added to them.
Best Animated Feature Film: Zootopia (Disagree)
Zootopia is a great film don't get me wrong but it's hardly worthy of the Academy Award; I feel that the current political climate is very relevant to Zootopia which makes it the clear choice even if it isn't the right choice. Quite frankly as much as I'm tired of seeing Disney hog the animated Oscar I felt that Moana just deserved the Award. The difference between Zootopia and Moana is that Moana transports you to an incredible setting, cast of characters and culture the like of which make for a classic Disney tale. This is the film you'll be showing your kids or your grandkids one day while Zootopia is only relevant right now.
Best Original Screenplay: Manchester By The Sea (Disagree)
While I loved Manchester By The Sea as an honest exploration around grief and the inner conflict of two very real characters I did not think it was the best script I had watched throughout the year. Yes just to sound like a broken wheel I have to say that La La Land was the clear deserving winner with such a powerful narrative about ambition, love and the nostalgia of LA. It's a movie with two of the most compelling protagonists of the year and the ending of the film alone is worth giving the film an Academy Award for the script.
Best Supporting Actress: Viola Davis in Fences (Disagree)
Viola Davis is a very powerful performer in what is an otherwise horrendous film, Davis' portrays a role that doesn't really go through a lot of development but who despite that is very well portrayed. I think that giving anyone from Fences an Academy Award was a huge mistake and a major let down. The actress who really deserved this award was Octavia Spencer for her part in Hidden Figures. Spencer is a powerful woman onscreen who can play up compassion and fierce determination in spades. What's more I felt that with Spencer's role you actually learnt something about race relations whereas Davis' role you learnt precious little.
Best Actress: Emma Stone in La La Land (Agree)
In all honesty the Best Actress category didn't have much in terms of fierce competition this year, it was only right that Emma Stone won when her performance was leagues ahead of any other actress in that category. Stone is a very fun performer who has been hailed as an up and comer for years now, this is an award that really showcases her progress as an artist. In La La Land Stone presents a role with such unbridled optimism and wonder, as her character becomes more tragic and distant from her dreams you see how damaged LA and Gosling's role have both left her. This was a character my heart went out to and a fine win for Emma Stone.
Best Actor: Casey Affleck in Manchester By The Sea (Disagree)
Affleck's soft temperament and deep inner conflict in Manchester By The Sea really sold me on the film. Yet despite Affleck really standing out as one of his film's best qualities I don't think that he was the obvious pick for Best Actor. In fact Andrew Garfield had much more range in Hacksaw Ridge, where he had to show such raw grief and determination to save lives. Hacksaw Ridge has probably completely changed Garfield's career and I expect we'll see him now more than ever. Yet the actor who really deserved this award was Ryan Gosling for La La Land. Gosling's role was cynical and cold towards others yet as you came to know him you saw a passionate soul connected to the history of jazz right down to his soul.
Best Director: Damien Chazelle for La La Land (Agree)
A production to the scale of La La Land is only as good as it's director and I'm glad that the Academy saw that too. La La Land is one of the few film musicals I've found really accessible and with a great story to tell. It's all beautifully captured and choreographed, I felt that every part of the film was important and had something to contribute. Chazelle crafts a Hollywood fable right before your eyes and I don't think I could have looked away for a second of it.
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