OSCARS 2021

As I mentioned before in a blog post, 2020 was the worst year for movies in my lifetime. First, there were fewer movies. Second, you could not see those movies in their ideal setting, a movie theater. Third, counterintuitively, since movies were not in theaters, they may have found themselves behind paywalls for a streaming site, which made them harder to see. In finally, the world of criticism continues to fracturing under the weight of ever increasing content making it harder for a cultural consensus to form as to what movies are worth watching. Still, I saw some very good movies this last year. Below are my picks. Bold denotes a winner

Like the Academy, I'm considering movies that did not come out in theaters for the first time. So the HBO movie "Bad Education" is nominated when otherwise it would not have been considered. I probably will keep with that trend moving forward. HBO movies are of significant quality.

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

Another Round

Judas and the Black Messiah

Minari

Palm Springs

Sound of Metal

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

The Father

First Cow

The Invisible Man

The Personal History of David Copperfield

Nomadland

BEST MAKEUP AND HAIRSTYLING

Emma

Ma Rainey's Black Bottom

Pinocchio

BEST COSTUME DESIGN

Emma

Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga

Mank

The Personal History of David Copperfield

Pinocchio

BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN

Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar

Emma

The Father

Mank

Tenet

BEST VISUAL EFFECTS

The Invisible Man

The Personal History of David Copperfield

Tenet

BEST SOUND EDITING

First Cow

Mank

Soul

Sound of Metal

BEST MUSIC SCORE

First Cow

Mank

Minari

Soul 

Wendy

BEST USE OF A SONG IN A MOVIE

Another Round: "What a Life"

Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga - "Song-Along"

Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga - "Husavik"

Ma Rainey's Black Bottom: "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom

Sound of Metal: "Cet Amour Me Tue"

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Allison Janney - Bad Education

Amanda Seyfried - Mank

Olivia Colman - The Father

Olivia Cooke - Sound of Metal

Yuh-Jung Youn - Minari

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Ben Whishaw - The Personal History of David Copperfield

Charles Dance - Mank

Dan Stevens - Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga

Mark Gatiss - The Father

Paul Raci - Sound of Metal

BEST ACTRESS

Viola Davis - Ma Rainey's Black Bottom

Frances McDormand - Nomadland

Elisabeth Moss - The Invisible Man

Anna Taylor Joy - Emma

Krisin Wiig - Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar

BEST ACTOR

Riz Ahmed - Sound of Metal

Anthony Hopkins - The Father

John Magaro - First Cow

Mads Mikkelsen - Another Round

Steven Yuen - Minari

BEST FILM EDITING

The Father

First Cow

Mank

Nomadland

Sound of Metal

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY

First Cow

Mank

Nomadland

The Personal History of David Copperfield

Pinocchio

BEST DIRECTOR

Lee Isaac Chung - Minari

Darius Marder - Sound of Metal

Kelly Reichardt - First Cow

Chloe Zhao - Nomadland

Thomas Vinterberg - Another Round

BEST DOCUMENTARY

Collective

BEST INTERNATIONAL FEATURE

Another Round

Collective

BEST PICTURE

Another Round

The Father

First Cow

Palm Springs

The Personal History of David Copperfield

Minari

Nomadland

Sound of Metal

Also here is a picture from Palm Springs, most 2020 movie?

Judas and the Black Messiah (3/5 Stars)

 

There is an inherent conflict in the mythology of the Black Panthers. Its supporters want it to be an important group and at the same time deems its enemies as overzealous. The title of this movie, directed by Shaka King, is illustrative. The Black Messiah is allegedly a descriptive title given by J. Edgar Hoover, then director of the FBI, to Fred Hampton, the leader of the Chicago chapter of the Black Panthers. Such a title imposes an importance on Fred Hampton akin to Jesus Christ. This movie wants you to think of Fred Hampton as an important, potentially dangerous, man. It also wants you to believe the FBI was wrong to treat him as such.

What I knew about the Black Panthers walking into this movie was scant. First, their name post-dates the Marvel comic Superhero by a few years. That is probably coincidental. Second, they were heavily armed and “patrolled” neighborhoods with the vague mission of defending the residents therein from the police. Third, they had some ancillary connection to the ideology of Malcolm X.

I was wrong about the third one. Whereas Malcolm X was staunch in his belief that black people had the right to defend themselves, with violence if necessary, I don’t recall him preaching civil war in his book. He seemed to be more interested in black self-reliance, going so far as to advocate segregation. To put it another way, he seemed less interested in affecting the white man and more interested in the white man not affecting the black man.

The Black Panthers, at least the Fred Hampton led ones in Chicago, are Marxists. They are preaching a racialized Marxist ideology. The movie does not shy away from this. Fred Hampton preaches revolution from the stage, and because he uses the terminology of Marxism, it is no metaphor. One listening to it would be justified in believing that Fred Hampton means to bring about a violent revolution, starting with the overthrow of the Chicago Police Department. The movie believes that the FBI thought that.

The movie makes a big deal about Black Panthers’ charitable works in the community. Apparently they ran food services for hungry children. This is hardly relevant as to whether the FBI deems them dangerous and no excuse for them to be considered harmless. Many dictators, gangsters, and totalitarian governments give away bread and circuses to the poor. It is not something only good and peaceful people do. It can be noted however that when good and peaceful people do it (like say the church) they don’t also walk around heavily armed.

Still they probably were mostly harmless. They were not, as argued by an FBI agent using a false equivalency, like the Ku Klux Klan. The Black Panthers did not have the same amount of numbers, had little to no political support in any level of government, and although they had guns, had no knowledge of tactics. A commendable thing about Director Shaka King movie is that even though he is clearly sympathetic to the Black Panthers, his movie is still honest enough in its portrayal to allow them to perform acts of extraordinary stupidity. At one point, after a Black Panther has initiated a shoot out with the police, several police cars nonchalantly stake out the Black Panther headquarters. One particular cop taunts the Panthers with a megaphone. A member of the Black Panthers reacts to this by opening the window and brandishing a shotgun. What results is the world’s most predictable shootout with the world’s most predictable ending: the cops win. What was the plan? Did the Black Panthers really believe that a show of force would intimidate the cops? Did they think that once the shooting started, that the cops would give up and go away?

(For all the bad things said about the moral impact of the video game Grand Theft Auto, one particular mechanic of the game should be taken to heart by all would be revolutionaries: Once you shoot a cop, the only option is to run. Because the cops will keep coming and coming until you are dead, at least in America.)

Fred Hampton is played by Daniel Kaluuya. The title “Judas” is Bill O’Neal, played by Lakeith Stanfield, the Black Panther head of security and also an FBI informant. Interestingly, although Hampton and O’Neal are the characters with the most screentime in the movie respectively, both Kaluuya and Stanfield were nominated for Oscars in the Supporting Actor category, Kaluuya winning. Kaluuya is a fine actor and Stanfield is a favorite of mine. Having said that, both are miscast. Fred Hampton was 21 at the time of his assassination (Kaluuya is 32). Bill O’Neal was 20 at the time (Stanfield is 30). The actors bring a gravitas to their roles that is misleading and blinds the audience to reasons for their behavior that would be obvious if younger actors had played the roles.

For example, Bill O’Neal’s career as an FBI informant started when he was a teenager. He had been caught impersonating a federal officer while trying to steal cars when he was 17. If you wanted a good reason why he was so impressionable and would betray all the Panthers for steak dinners, money, a car, and a business, all you need to know is that he is just a stupid kid. As for Hampton, it is illustrative of the actual pedigree of the Black Panthers (as opposed to their mythologized status as a dangerous terrorist group) that the head of the chapter is barely old enough to drink alcohol. In his wisdom he appointed a paid informant as head of security. These were kids playing dress-up, wearing silly fatigues and berets, walking around with guns they hardly knew how to use.

Really, the main character of this story is Bill O’Neal’s FBI handler Roy Mitchell (played by Jesse Plemons). He, along with the rest of the FBI are the adults in the room. They are the ones with the moral dilemma on their hands, the ones that have agency. The Black Panthers are outmaneuvered and outgunned at every turn, their ranks rife with informants. The movie ends with what can be categorized as an act of war by the FBI against the Black Panthers. It was a surprise attack in the dead of night with overwhelming force, no due process, ending in the assassination of an unconscious Fred Hampton. When such tactics are used against citizens, that’s called fascism. Who is the real Judas here? It’s the FBI and they betrayed all of us.