Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Days 372-374: Days of Future Past Part Four

We rewind once again and this time embark on a journey through three films that were nominated for Best Picture during the 1940s.

We kick off with an Oscar favourite; a biopic in the form of Yankee Doodle Dandy which focused on the life of composer and showman George M. Cohan. As somebody who wasn't particularly familiar with the name the only thing that drew my eye to the film was the title itself. Indeed, it was later revealed to me that Cohan wrote a number of patriotic songs including 'Over There' which was played to honour the men serving in the First World War. Yankee Doodle Dandy's patriotic nature meant that it had a lot in common with the last 1940s film I watched, Sergeant York. Both were flag-waving endeavours, both starred Joan Leslie as the female lead and both won the award for Best Actor. However I felt that James Cagney's portrayal of Cohan was miles better than Gary Cooper's turn in Sergeant York the previous year. Cagney captivated the screen throughout proving himself to be a fine theatrical presence but also was able to add more pathos to the role when the script required it. The musical numbers that were scattered throughout Yankee Doodle Dandy helped me to understand just why Cohan deserved to have a whole film devoted to him. If I have once criticism of Yankee Doodle Dandy, it's the linear approach that screenwriters Robert Buckner and Edmund Joseph employ. The film sees Cohan narrate his life story to President Roosevelt in a manner that I found quite dry although the musical aspect of the piece more than made up for it. Ultimately I found Yankee Doodle Dandy to be a rather easy watch which was bolstered by a blistering turn from James Cagney.

Nominated alongside Yankee Doodle Dandy in 1943 was Kings Row, a film based on the novel by Henry Bellamann about a number of youngsters growing up in a small town. The film begins with meeting the five characters we'll be spending time with as schoolchildren, which in a way helped to understand their motivations as we saw them grow up in prior years. Among the cast of twentysomethings were Ann Sheridan, Betty Field and a certain whipper-snapper by the name of Ronald Reagan. In fact Reagan's performance as the initially privileged Drake McHugh was possibly the best of the five turns given by the younger cast members. I believe that that has something to do with the fact that McHugh has the most to deal with from losing his inheritance to having his legs lopped off by a sadistic surgeon. As you can tell by that description alone there's a lot of bleak moments in Kings Row including suicide, murder and mental illness. I feel the melodramatic tone of Kings Row was what put me off it especially seeing as the three female members of the cast gave incredibly hammy turns. Erich Wolfgang Korngold's score was similarly overbearing and definitely left little to the imagination. At the same time I can't say that I wasn't moved by anything that happened in Kings Row and I discovered that I'd become invested in at least two of the characters. However, I ultimately believe that Kings Row will be one of the films I've watched throughout this challenge that will soon fade from my memory in the coming weeks.

Yankee Doodle Dandy and Kings Row ended up both losing the Best Picture prize to quaint English war yarn Mrs. Miniver which would also see Greer Garson pick up the Lead Actress award. One year later Garson would pair up with her Mrs Miniver co-star Walter Pidgeon for yet another biopic in which would see her portray the brilliant Marie Curie. However the lead characters of Marie and Pierre Curie are the only brilliant things in this really stale and dull biopic. If I didn't know any better I would've thought that Madame Curie had been made in the early 1930s rather than the mid-1940s. There are plenty of things wrong with Madame Curie not least its script which was ridiculously expositional. I wasn't surprised to learn that the script had gone through many rewrites after original scribe Aldous Huxley left the project in 1938. Rather than feeling like a cinematic release, Madame Curie looks like it's been cobbled together as an educational film to inform America's schoolchildren about the discovery of radium. After winning Best Actress the prior year, it appeared as if Greer Garson was exhausted from all the awards ceremonies as she appeared to be simply going through the motions throughout Madame Curie. Walter Pidgeon was slightly better in his role as Pierre; but the pair showed none of the excellent chemistry they shared in Mrs. Miniver and Blossoms in the Dust. One thing you could say in Madame Curie's favour is that it's a thorough retelling of Pierre and Marie's life and work together so if you wanted to know their story this is probably a good starting point. But, apart from being an educational tool, there's very little praise I can heap onto a film which I struggled to watch from beginning to end.

Next time we return to the 21st century and go on a marathon of Best Actor winning pictures.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Days 370-371: A Bit of Brad

It's fair to say that when he first appeared on the scene Brad Pitt was considered somewhat of a heartthrob. In an interview he once conducted, he claimed that it was hard for him to get serious roles due to the way he looked. But, as his career progressed, he appeared in a number of diverse films that demonstrated his considerable acting talent. By the end of the noughties; the Academy started to recognise Brad's efforts as two of the films he starred in were nominated for Best Picture. However, I would contend that neither film saw Brad at his best and in fact I found him rather unlikeable in the first part of this double bill. 

Brad and his on-screen wife Cate Blanchett were certainly the most recognisable faces in Babel, which consisted of a cast of largely unknown foreign actors. Pitt and Blanchett star as Richard and Susan Jones, an American couple trying to save their marriage by going on holiday in Morocco. I personally found both characters to be utterly unlikeable and, as their story was one of four interconnecting tales, they didn't really have long enough on screen to change my mind. Richard and Susan's lives are changed forever when the latter is shot by a stray bullet while the pair are travelling back to the hotel on their tour bus. This incident also changes the lives of Yusef and Ahmed; two young brothers whose jealousy of one another causes the former to shoot the bullet that injures Susan. Meanwhile, back in America, Richard and Susan's twin children Debbie and Mike are being cared for by their Mexican nanny Amelia who hopes for a day off to attend her son's wedding. When Richard is unable to arrange alternative childcare arrangements for his kids, Amelia decides to take the children across the border with the help of her reckless nephew Santiago. The film's bleak nature eventually engulfs this story as Amelia has trouble crossing back from Mexico to the US and puts Mike and Debbie in danger as a result. The fourth story was my personal favourite although its connection to the original shooting was definitely the most tenuous. It focused on deaf Japanese teenager Chieko; whose father originally owned the rifle used in the incident as she desperately sought acceptance from her peers. I found Chieko to be the most identifiable character amongst the global cast and the scenes in which she tried to come on to a young police officer were incredibly touching. 

Part of the reason for this is the tender performance given by Rinko Kikuchi, who was one of two of Babel's stars to be nominated for acting awards. Although sign language was used throughout the film, Kikuchi's strengths came in the form of her facial expressions which told the story of both her sexual frustration and her grief concerning her mother's suicide. I did feel that Kikuchi's turn was more deserving of the Best Supporting Actress prize than the eventual winner Jennifer Hudson; whose in-your-face performance in Dreamgirls was a million miles away from the Japanese actress' sensitive portrayal of a deaf character. Nominated alongside Kikuchi was Adrian Barraza who, as Amelia, gave a great portrayal of a woman who'd been a mother to plenty of American children even though she received very little praise from the families who employed her. Also worthy of praise are Boubker Ait El Caid and Said Tarchani who brilliantly portrayed the two Moroccan children whose actions became a catalyst for the rest of the film. Director Alejandro González Iñárritu's vision for the film is beautifully realised thanks to Rodrigo Prieto's excellent cinematography and Gustavo Santaolalla's Oscar-winning score. Visually I can't fault Babel with several scenes sticking in the mind long after the final credits rolled. One scene in particular, in which Chieko attends a disco, is especially memorable as the sound dips as we see things from both are point-of-view and hers. My major problem with Babel was its increasingly bleak story as Guillermo Arriaga's screenplay didn't give anybody a happy ending with the possible exception of Chieko. A lot of the characters are also poorly-drawn with Richard and Susan coming off as particularly miserable which is a shame as Pitt and Blanchett's talents are seemingly wasted as a result. However, I did enjoy Babel more than I thought I would and it's definitely deserving of its place among the five Best Picture contenders. 

Pitt and Blanchett would reunite two years later as they played the two leads in David Fincher's The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. Fincher's previous collaborations with Pitt; Seven and Fight Club, arguably contained two of the actor's best performances. Their successful partnership continued as Fincher led Pitt to his first Best Actor Award although I felt this was mainly to do with the character rather than the star's performance. Based on a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald; the film tells the life story of the titular protagonist who physically ages backwards as he grows up. After being abandoned by his father, Benjamin is cared for by kindly nursing home employee Queenie who he looks upon as a mother. Meanwhile, during his childhood, Benjamin first meets Daisy who is the granddaughter of one of the home's residents. The film first introduces us to Daisy in the present day as she's on her deathbed and her daughter is reading from a will written by Benjamin which luckily contains his entire life story. Although it contains tales of journeys on ferries and Benjamin's later connection with his birth father; the main concern of the film is his romance with Daisy. As he grows physically younger, the two finally begin a relationship which appears to be going swimmingly. However when she gets pregnant, with the daughter who is reading Benjamin's story, he realises that Daisy will have to find another man to act as a father. Despite feeling that Benjamin's story should have ended when, as a teenager, he discovers that Daisy has met another man and married it continues to see him finally die as a child. This final section of the film is just one of many parts that I feel could have been cut to slim down Benjamin Button's two and half hour running time. 

Although it was nominated for thirteen Oscars, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button won just three and two of them were certainly well deserved. The visual effects and make-up in the film really make Benjamin's ageing process appear realistic and without them I feel that it wouldn't have been as well regarded as it is. Although the film's Art Direction wasn't as prominent, it was still unique enough to earn an Academy Award. In fact, visually, Benjamin Button can't be faulted all that much as it mixes in sepia tones with a more modern flare to create an aesthetically pleasing piece. However, as I alluded to, Eric Roth's adaptation of Fitzgerald's story is long-winded and contains plenty of sections that I would've cut entirely. As the film's key focus is on the relationship between Benjamin and Daisy, I would've concentrated on these scenes and cut everything that happened on that bleeding tugboat. Maybe it's a controversial statement, but I don't believe that Pitt really deserved that Best Actor nod as I feel he's slightly overshadowed by the make-up he wears throughout the film. I believe that I've seen Pitt act a lot better than he did in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and certainly his performance wasn't one of the more remarkable elements of the film. In fact I believe that Cate Blanchett's turn as injured dancer Daisy had more depth to it and I found her performance to be more captivating on the whole. Whilst I admire Fincher as a director, I feel The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is one of his weaker films and seems to be his attempt to curry favour with the Academy. The film certainly has all the elements of an Oscar-film; from the early 20th century settings to the extended running time, however I felt that it came off as a poor man's Forrest Gump. Thankfully Pitt would go on to bigger and better things in the next decade, eventually earning an Oscar as a producer rather than as an actor. 

Next Time we return to the 1940s for three more Oscar nominated movies. 

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Days 367-369: Days of Future Past Part Three

Sorry for those who are feeling a bit disorientated by the jumps in time but I'm back in the earlier days of the Academy Awards for three more films that I couldn't locate back when I covered the 1930s and 1940s.

We kick off with Alexander's Ragtime Band; a sideways look at the world of jazz and swing music directed by Henry King and co-written by Irving Berlin. As one would expect, the titular song by Berlin features quite heavily throughout the film and in fact the movie begins with a performance of it. Our central character is conductor Roger Grant who, by a coincidence, leads a performance of the song after he finds the music for it dropped by singer Stella Kirby. Roger is soon given the name of Alexander and tours with Stella even though each find the other hard work. Rather predictably they begin to fall for each other but she eventually gets signed to a record contract whilst the rest of the lads are forced to enrol in the army due to the start of World War I. Initially I believed that this film would be nothing more than another light-hearted musical like The Broadway Melody of 1936. However, it morphed into something a little darker as both Stella and Alexander fall in and out of the spotlight until the final performance of the hit at Carnegie Hall. Some of Berlin's most famous songs; including Heat Wave and Easter Parade, are included in the soundtrack and make for an incredibly enjoyable musical. In their roles of Alexander and Stella; Tyrone Power and Alice Faye both shine although I did find the supporting players didn't get much time in the spotlight. The ending was also a little disjointed as it appeared as if Berlin and his co-writers couldn't really devise a good way for Alexander and Stella to reunite. But despite this I felt the film wasn't as flimsy as it could've been and had a great soundtrack that got you through the movie's duller moments.

Moving on a year we find Greta Garbo in only one of the two films she starred in to be nominated for an Oscar, that being Ninotchka. As the majority of my knowledge of classic film stars is via this journey I'm not really aware of Garbo's back catalogue although she did have an incredibly powerful aura in Grand Hotel. Ninotchka was Garbo's penultimate film and was the first broad comedy film in which she starred hence the tagline 'Garbo Laughs.' I was particularly surprised how much the film made me laugh as well as it mocked the Soviet Union's rigid society and the way in which four of its patrons are corrupted when they arrive in Paris. Ninotchka's plot is wafer-thin as it involves the sale of jewellery which had been confiscated during the Russian Revolution and whose owner now wanted it back. Representing the Grand Duchess Swana is Melvin Douglas' Count Leon; a dashing cad who is able to corrupt the three Soviets who arrive in Paris to complete the sale. Garbo's Ninotchka then arrives on the scene; a beret-clad Soviet agent whose job is to complete the sale. I found Garbo to be utterly hilarious in her role as the strait-laced Soviet who is gradually won over by the smooth-talking count. Ernst Lubitsch's direction perfectly anchors the humour whilst the script is packed full of laugh-out-loud one-liners. At just under two hours, Ninotchka is perfectly paced as our two characters come together before being torn apart due to blackmail. The final scene is beautifully played and one more gag is included in the closing shot which I for one appreciated. But ultimately the success of Ninotchka comes down to the brilliant chemistry between Garbo and Douglas both of whom contribute to making this a thoroughly enjoyable satirical screwball comedy.

Entering the 1940s we find Sergeant York which is most famous in Academy Awards history for Gary Cooper's Best Actor win in a field that also included Orson Welles' powerful turn in Citizen Kane. Before going into Sergeant York I believed it to be a war film which chronicled the wartime exploits of Alvin York who won the Medal of Honour. Whilst there are war scenes towards the end of the film the majority of the picture is concerned with York's journey from ne'er-do-well to God-loving pacifist. Indeed, American's participation in World War One isn't even touched upon until the second half of the film and by that point I'd got a little bit bored if truth be told. York's Tennessee townsfolk were all a little bit backward and used phrases such as 'cash money' to resemble how simple they were. Meanwhile, I found Cooper's performance to be a little underwhelming and nowhere near as good as his turn as the steadfast sheriff in High Noon. There were some highlights amongst the cast namely the pretty Joan Leslie as the girl who made York change his way and Margaret Wycherly as his long-suffering mother. I feel my main gripe with Sergeant York though is its sense of American patriotism and the idea that God wanted an American to fight in the trenches in order to win the war. I think if I were a God-loving American I may feel differently about Sergeant York but overall I was a little bit bored during a film that run just over two hours. As well as winning two Oscars; Sergeant York was the highest-grossing film of 1941 and I have to say I'm not surprised as the Americans would've lapped up this patriotic nonsense during World War II. But, over seventy years later, Sergeant York is one of those films that feels awfully outdated.

Next time we return to the 21st Century where we focus on two films starring a hearthrob turned serious actor.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Days 365-366: Crowe's Best Part Two (Contains Spoilers)

We continue on now with our conclusion of the quartet of Russell Crowe Oscar films starting with the second consecutive Best Picture Winner that he appeared in.

A year after Gladiator; Crowe played a completely different type of character to Maximus in the form of troubled mathematician John Nash. Even as a somewhat mild-mannered chemistry teacher in The Insider Crowe was an intimidating presence but in A Beautiful Mind he was quite the opposite. The film follows Nash from his time as a student at Princeton to receiving the Nobel Prize for his revolutionary work on game theory. The majority of the film though concentrates of Nash's schizophrenia and the hallucinations that are side effects of the mental illness. Perhaps A Beautiful Mind's most memorable moment is when it's revealed that Nash's Princeton roommate Charles Herman and shady secret agent William Parcher are both imaginary figures. Even though I'd never seen the film before I felt it was quite easy to guess that Charles was an imaginary figure, due to the fact that he always disappeared whenever any other characters came on screen. Meanwhile the revelation about Parcher was more revelatory although it did negate a lot of the more interesting thriller elements of the film that were cast aside in favour of a story about Nash's rehabilitation following a stint in a mental hospital. The final part of the film concentrates on Nash's relationship with his loving wife Alicia as well as his return to Princeton where he became one of the institution's most respected professors. However, I found that this journey through time was almost a little anticlimactic judging by what had gone before.

Although I did go into A Beautiful Mind fresh there were a couple of things that I knew about it ahead of time, such as the fact that Russell Crowe was supposedly robbed of a second Best Actor Oscar for his role here. The rumour goes that, after winning a BAFTA for the role, Crowe's argument with an editor over a poem cost him points with the Academy. However, I would assert that Crowe's performance in A Beautiful Mind simply wasn't strong enough and I felt that his turn wasn't particularly memorable. The film itself had its moments most notably when Akiva Goldsman's adapted screenplay added a little bit of humour to otherwise stifled character of Nash. But Goldsman's weakness was his pacing and there were times were the narrative ground to a halt most notably just after Nash is released from the mental facility. Of the other performers, only Oscar winner Jennifer Connelly truly shone as Alicia Nash giving a well-rounded turn as a woman who discovered she'd taken on a lot more than she'd originally thought. I personally felt that Connelly provided the emotional core of the film and she provided the majority of A Beautiful Mind's most compelling moments. The film occasionally presented some interesting visual sequences in which Nash's theories would be constructed via light and fill the screen. Unfortunately these moments were few and far between and the only other highlight that I noted was James Horner's haunting score. Ultimately there's nothing particularly wrong with A Beautiful Mind; it's a solid biopic with solid direction by Ron Howard, but there's nothing particularly groundbreaking about it either and I feel that it won the Best Picture prize simply because it's one of those 'issue movies' that the Academy loves so dearly.

Another love of the Academy's older members is an epic swashbuckling adventure that harkens back to the films of the 1930s. They were give this two years later in Peter Weir's Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World; an adaptation of three books by Patrick O'Brian chronicling the Napoleonic War ventures of Captain 'Lucky' Jack Aubrey. In the lead role of Aubrey, Crowe wasn't the recipient of a Best Actor nod but the film did receive ten Oscar nominations, a tally only bettered by that year's Best Picture winner. Set in 1805, the film focuses on Aubrey's ship the HMS Surprise and its pursuit of the French privateer Acheron. The film's main themes are about the notions of hierarchy and tradition on the ship and how sometimes these can cause problems for the crew. The main relationship the film explores is that between Aubrey and the ship's doctor Stephen Maturin who are presented as old friends. The pair argue about Jack's occasional pig-headedness and Stephen's love of nature as opposed to his friend's preoccupation with warfare. In fact, there isn't a lot of action in Master and Commander, which I feel is rather a good thing as it allows the audience to get a feel for what it's really like being on the ship. Peter Weir explores every aspect of the Surprise from the crew's quarters to the Captain's table and punctuates the action-packed scenes with some quieter moments. Obviously, the final twenty minutes or so is devoted to the Surprise's final attack on the Acheron in which they disguise themselves as a whaler to avoid detection. Weir and co-screenwriter John Collee build up the tension in this final scene perfectly and so the pay-off is even more satisfactory. However, I'm still not quite sure what the film's final scene achieved and it made me believe that some people were clamouring for a Master and Commander sequel.

Of the ten nominations Master and Commander was awarded by the Academy it only won two; for Cinematography and Sound Editing. I'd certainly say that these were the two elements of Master and Commander that were the best especially Russell Boyd's cinematography which I believe was integral to the narrative of the film. Boyd takes the audience into every part of the ship and captures every skirmish perfectly and as a result gets us involved in the action. Meanwhile sound designer Richard King went out of his way to record realistic sounds particularly for the storm and battle scene. In fact I found all of Master and Commander's period detail to be spot on from the costumes worn by each crew member to the construction of the HMS Surprise itself. I suppose one could say that at times Master and Commander is a film that favours style over substance as the plot was quite easy to follow. But that's not to say that Master and Commander was poorly written as I felt that I knew all of the major characters and their key motivations. Furthermore I found that Russell Crowe was the ideal choice to play Aubrey due to his commanding presence. Whilst I didn't think the role required a much range from him as something like The Insider I found him to be utterly believable a the conflicted captain. Oddly Paul Bettany, who played Charles in A Beautiful Mind, played opposite Crowe once again here as Stephen. Due to this I spent a good twenty minutes trying to decide whether or not the doctor was in fact a real character or just a confidant that the Captain had imagined. It was only when Stephen started to interact with other crew members that I believed he was real and by the end Bettany had turned him into a compelling member of the crew. Although old-fashioned in its storytelling; Master and Commander's visual prowess made it stand out from the crowd and overall I felt it was deserving of its place among the pantheon of Oscar-nominated movies.

That's your lot for now, next time we will be going back in time again as I look at three more films from the 1930s and 1940s.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Days 363-364: Crowe's Best Part One

So we've made it through the 20th century and as we celebrate the new millennium; I continue my look back of Oscar-nominated films this time of the noughties. We start with a celebration of the films of one actor who received three acting nods during the decade as well as starring in four Oscar nominated movies.

The actor in question is Russell Crowe who we first met in L.A. Confidential in which he played the rough and ready Bud White. Although Crowe's physical presence was well-utilised during Curtis Hanson's film he also shone during the quieter scenes. Crowe's role in Michael Mann's The Insider couldn't be more different as he donned glasses and had his hair greyed in order to play the perfectly ordinary scientist Jeffrey Wigand. What made Wigand different was the fact he decided to blow the whistle on his former employees; tobacco company Brown and Williamson and reveal that they perjured themselves when they denied that nicotine was addictive. The Insider follows Lowell Bergman, a producer for '60 Minutes', who tried to convince Wigand to appear on the show before turning his attention to his bosses at CBS who refused to air his interview in full. Although it scrutinises the media somewhat, Eric Roth's screenplay almost turns The Insider into a thriller as Wigand's life is threatened in attempt to get him not to talk. Despite their obvious flaws, I was rooting for the film's two major characters throughout as Wigand wrestled with his personal life and struggled to continue after his wife left him. Meanwhile, Bergman's fight for media integrity was an honourable one and it was clear that he was incredibly protective of his source.

Crowe's performance is incredible throughout the film and he makes the rather meek Wigand into a likeable lead character. Crowe brings out the character's small intricacies as he balances Wigand's rather nervous energy with his occasional angry outbursts. After having watched several of his films from the past decades, I felt that Al Pacino gives one of his best turns as the passionate Bergman. The character was different from the gangsters and robbers that Pacino played in the past and I found him captivating throughout. In the supporting role of '60 Minutes' host Mike Wallace, Christopher Plummer shone and I think he deserved a Supporting Actor nod. Away from the acting, I felt that The Insider was a perfect example of how films can use the visual image to tell a story. From Dante Spinotti's grainy cinematography to its tense score everything about The Insider is superb. Although I'd watched the film before, not much of it had stayed in the memory but upon this second viewing I found it to be an extraordinary piece of work. This time The Insider will definitely stay in my memory and I feel that it would've made a great Best Picture winner at the 2000 ceremony. That being said The Insider failed to win any of the seven Oscars it was nominated for and I think this is a great shame. I believe that Crowe was particularly overlooked as his performance was maybe too subtle for the academy to honour him at the time.

Thankfully, one year later, Crowe would win the Best Actor award for playing a character who was anything other than subtle. That film was Gladiator and would see Crowe hacking off the heads of men, women and tigers alike in order to avenge his murdered wife and child. I have several vivid memories of watching, or not watching Gladiator, as I was originally intending to see it on release only for my bus to the cinema to be held up and the usher not let me into watch the movie. I then initially saw it on a school coach trip back from Belgium, before finally buying it on DVD and viewing it in the comfort of my own living room. I'm honestly not surprised that Gladiator won the Best Picture Oscar as Ridley Scott's film harks back to an old-fashioned sort of film-making albeit one made with a 21st century budget. Scott's relaunch of the sword and sandals epic would mean that we would have Gladiator wannabes for years to come but this was certainly a visual treat. The film's final third, depicting the Roman Coliseum was a particularly stunning piece of cinema with the Maltese locations acting as an authentic backdrop. Meanwhile the period costumes were incredibly designed and the score, although a little embellished at times, helped create a certain atmosphere. John Mathieson's cinematography helped capture every facial expression, every battle and every movement with pinpoint precision. For the majority of the film I couldn't take my eye off the screen and that's a testament to Mathieson's work as well as Scott's overall vision.

If Gladiator has one weakness then it's in its screenplay as I found a lot of the scenes were overly expositional. Indeed, there are scenes in which characters simply list their traits to one another which is witnessed just before Commodus murders his father. In fact I'm surprised the screenplay even received an Oscar nomination as the film really thrived in the moments where there was no dialogue at all. That's mainly due to the fact that Crowe has such an expressive face that can tell a lot more stories than what's written on the page. Plenty of the scenes in Gladiator see Maximus reacting to the situation he finds himself in with actions not words and this allows Crowe to play to his strengths. The scenes that focus on his expression as he meets with enemies both on the battlefield and the arena are some of Gladiator's strongest. Crowe's Maximus is every inch the hero and luckily Joaquin Phoenix portrays Commodus as the oily, cowardly villain that he's meant to be. Phoenix was Oscar-nominated for his turn in this film which would be his first massive role and I found him to play the role to perfection. Connie Nielsen also deserves some praise for her role as Commodus' sister/love interest Lucilla; a strong female who doesn't quite know where her heart lies. As a fan of classic British cinema; Scott has loaded the supporting cast with some famous faces including Derek Jacobi, Richard Harris and Oliver Reed. Gladiator would actually be Reed's last film role, he died during filming, and I felt it would be a wonderful tribute to the man if he were at least nominated for his role as gladiator trainer Proximo. On reflection Gladiator deserves the five Oscars it won however it missed out on both the art direction and cinematography awards which I felt was a mistake. Ultimately Ridley Scott has made an old-fashioned epic with a modern twist and has cast a wonderfully expressive actor in the lead role.

Next time we conclude our Russell Crowe quadruple-bill with two more Oscar-nominated offerings from the Kiwi powerhouse.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Days 361-362: Days of Future Past Part Two

After several months away; the Oscar Challenge returns with two more films from the 1930s that have become available since I embarked on this quest.

First up we have The Broadway Melody of 1936; not to be confused with previous winner The Broadway Melody although both have plots that are fairly flimsy. In fact I found that the film was more of a showcase for the talents of lead actress Eleanor Powell who was making her on-screen debut. Powell starred as Irene Foster; a wide-eyed starlet who travelled to Broadway in order to make her fortune. Despite her obvious talent, she is cast aside by her former childhood friend turned producer Robert Gordon. The film then becomes a screwball comedy of sorts as Irene becomes a faux French singer and impresses Gordon enough to be given a role in the show. However, her rouse isn't without complications thanks to the show's wealthy backer as well as a gossip columnist who is out to get a particularly juicy scoop. Based on the story alone, The Broadway Melody of 1936 isn't exactly the most original film around but thankfully it is boosted by a number of positive elements. The first of these is the cast all of whom give energetic performances with standout turns given by Jack Benny as the aforementioned columnist and Powell herself. In fact Powell was so impressive that MGM signed her up to appear in the next two films in the Broadway Melody franchise. The songs are also incredibly catchy and contribute to presenting Broadway as an exciting place to be. Although it's a film that hasn't really carved its own legacy, The Broadway Melody of 1936 is an enjoyable romp and doesn't outstay it's welcome. At the same time I feel it's quite forgettable and I feel that I'd struggle to remember it in a few months' time.

Moving on to quite a timely film in so much as its leading actress, Luise Rainer recently passed away at the grand old age of 106. We first met Rainer in one of this blog's opening posts as she won her first Best Actress Oscar for her minimal role in The Great Ziegfeld. At the time I felt that this honour was a little undeserving however I don't hold that opinion with her second Oscar win for the next film on my list; The Good Earth. Sidney Franklin's film, an adaptation of Pearl S Buck's book, is an odd one in which Western actors play Chinese characters. Rainer's role was in fact originally going to be played by a Chinese American actress but because of miscegenation rules she wasn't permitted to partake in love scenes with lead actor Paul Muni. This was maybe a blessing in disguise as Rainer's performance as servant turned wife O-Ran was quietly brilliant. In fact Rainer saves the first half of this heavy-handed epic which I found to be inconsistent. Whilst The Good Earth is epic in scope, the screenplay was incredibly weak in places although there were visual flairs throughout. I personally thought The Good Earth's final sequence which depicted a locus attack on the family's field was incredibly well shot. The close-up shots on the locusts themselves were extremely memorable and were one of the more positive aspects of the film. Whilst I did feel that The Good Earth was impressively shot for the time; going on to win the Oscar for Best Cinematography, I found it overlong with a narrative that was hard to follow at times. Thankfully, Luise Rainer's performance kept me going throughout and I'm hoping that her memory will live on through this well-judged and emotional performance which won her a much-deserved Best Actress Oscar.

The next post will see the Oscar Challenge journey into the 21st century, but fear not classic film fans as I will be sporadically be writing catch-up posts like the one above. See you in the noughties guys!