2018: Well, That's Over

2018 will go down as...another year. There were extreme highs and severe lows, much like any other
and time marches on like an endless parade with rapidly deflating balloons and floats that have seen better days than this one. But since we have to leave some kind of mark on the world, I'll give you a few of the better things that I experienced this year, pop culture-wise, my field of expertise that needs some serious weeding. You want the bad stuff? Look elsewhere. Try Facebook. You'll have a field day.

As always, keep in mind that these are my favorites things that I encountered in 2018, not necessarily that were released this year. 

FILM

SHAPE OF WATER 

Guillermo del Toro's Oscar winning film won my heart over as no other did, a perfect birthday present to myself.  See blog post

DUNKIRK

Christopher Nolan's masterful WW II epic confirmed him as one of the finest filmmakers of this generation.

ISLE OF DOGS

Do I have any "Best..." of lists that don't include Wes Anderson? Uh-uh.

THE BALLAD OF BUSTER SCRUGGS

The same can be said of the Coen Bros. And it is. 

THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WIND

Orson Welles' final film, finished by other hands, finally arrived after a 40 year wait, filled to the brim with brilliance and pretension, at times infuriatingly annoying, often jaw-droppingly fabulous. After another viewing, which some might consider an endurance test, I'll have more to say, but for now, I can only bow in respect. Catch the companion documentary THEY'LL LOVE ME WHEN I'M DEAD on Netflix as well.

TV

THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE, BABYLON BERLIN and TABULA RASA

Three on Netflix top my list of faves. HILL HOUSE is probably the best ghost story ever committed to the small screen (well done, Mike Flanagan). BERLIN is a brilliant German series set in the days between the World Wars while RASA is another one of them ferrin' shows, this time from Belgium that I fell head over heels in love with. See blog post 

. 

THE AMERICANS

Ending on such a terrific note, a case study on how to wrap up a series

TRUST

This Getty kidnapping saga on FX featured a career defining performance by Donald Sutherland

THE TERROR and LODGE 49

Two swell AMC shows, one a 19th century thriller set in search of the Northwest Passage and the other, almost a prequel to THE BIG LEBOWSKI

MUSIC 

Grant Lee Phillips's WIDDERSHINS has to be my favorite album of the year, particularly the song "The Wilderness" while the best tune of the year had to be Nathaniel Ratecliff's haunting melancholic

"You Worry Me" moved me like none other.

BOOKS

FICTION

THE BARTENDER'S TALE by Ivan Doig

An author I had been unaware of until recently won me over with this coming of age tale set in Montana

THE TWELVE LIVES OF SAMUEL HAWLEY By Hannah Tinti

Many books I read this year dealt with parental issues for some reason, this one standing out from all the rest

NON-FICTION

THE AVIATORS by Winston Groom

From the author of FORREST GUMP, of all books, comes this superb telling of Charles Lindbergh, Jimmy Doolittle and Eddie Rickenbacker

ROBIN by Dave Itzkoff

I finished this soon after the death of Anthony Bourdain, a suicide that hit me as close to home as Robin Williams' did as few years before. Maybe that has something to do with my admiration of this book, but mostly because Itzkoff found a way to tell Robin's tale with all the warts exposed and with the respect he deserved.

So that's the good stuff I exposed myself to (careful...) while there was many others moments to cherish in 2018. First and foremost, the birth of my little warrior granddaughter Athena came into the world to claim it as her own. While I only had two of my plays produced this year, they landed on the same weekend, something else I toasted in celebration. I began work in earnest on a long-gestating novel of which I'm still putting together.

I lost a good lifelong friend in Glen Chin, a man whose heart and spirit were as huge as his talent and damn near lost another, giving me that feeling of mortality that keeps rearing its head as the clock continues to tick, tick, tick. Has this given a new perspective on the world? No. But if stop being selfish enough to realize that there's more to life outside of my narrow vision, I might just get out of this, certainly not alive, but with enough hope left behind for those I truly care about. Their numbers rise and lower with the tides...and so do I.

Cryptic comments for the end of 2018. Bring on the last year of new century teens.

NEXT!

Oscar and the Hate-Watch

Why does anyone watch the Academy Awards ceremony anymore? I do. I always do, but I'm not like most of you. I'm an obsessive film geek. I'll watch that show, good, bad or really ugly until the day I bite the big one, though I'll probably not make the In Memoriam segment of the show (aka the Death Parade).

But what about the rest of you? You know damn well that the Oscarcast is an overlong slog, always going over its allotted three hour time slot. It's an awards show. Other than the major awards, do you really give two figs who gets what, unless you have some dough riding on your office pool? Then of course there is the politically charged nature from the community, a gate propped open by Michael Moore's fat ass over a decade ago that may never be closed. It always stirs the right wing into a frenzy, which is not a bad thing at all.

The Oscars are the ultimate hate-watch, an insipid cultural symptom of our gluttonous ways. It is imperative that, no matter that there are thousands of options available to view on every sort of platform, we have to torture ourselves watching something we are already pre-disposed to hate just so we can get online and share our outrage with the rest of the world. What a bunch of maroons we are.

This year's Academy Awards clocked in at about 3 hours and 40 minutes and frankly, was no better or worse than most of them. There was an over-abundance of speechifying, totally expected due to the nature of recent events, though some handled it better than others. Lupita Nyongo'o and Kumail Nanjiani's thoughts on Dreamers hit the mark beautifully and there was no better advocate for the Times Up movement than Frances McDormand. The show relied too heavily on montages (cutting a couple wouldn't have hurt) and the invasion of the cinema across the street took up too much time, though I rather enjoyed it, especially since they cut into A WRINKLE IN TIME during one of Oprah's big scenes. The musical numbers were quite good, but thanks to some uninspired staging, there sure seemed to be a lot of standing around. On the basis of their performances, I would have voted for THE GREATEST SHOWMAN's "This is Me" over the song from COCO. And is there something in the Academy by-laws that require Common's appearance every year? I also think that, despite what most of the critics have written, Tiffany Haddish is going to wear out her welcome quicker than Amy Schumer. I'd keep Jimmy Kimmel as host. He's been the best of the 21st century, with the exception of Hugh Jackman. (No, I'm not being ironic) It's also high time to pack the ceremony with more A list talent. Too many of this year's presenters were more like a Who's Who? At certain moments, I felt like I was watching the Kid's Choice Awards on Nickelodeon. I half-way expected the stars of BABY DRIVER to get slimed. Jane Fonda would have been a better choice. (On another note, she really is looking more and more like her dad Henry, isn't she?)

To cut down on time, it may be time to move some awards over to the presentation of the honorary ceremony such as the short subjects, sound, special effects, makeup and costumes. Bring the winners in and acknowledge them on the Big Night. (By the way, where were the Honorary Award winners this year?) Awarding others in less than major categories happens at the Grammys, why not here?

And maybe Kimmel accidentally hit onto an idea that might help boost the Oscar's rating, which have dipped lower than ever, with his jet ski gag. Tap into that Oscar pool concept and take it to the next level. Make it part of the show, boost the pot and award some movie swag. Couldn't hurt.

The Awards themselves offered no surprises, which is actually fine with me. I was overjoyed to see THE SHAPE OF WATER get the love it so deserved. Nothing has restored my faith in the magic of movies more in recent memory. Guillermo del Toro is a geek god and that community should bow to him in great respect. Everything else was down the line and as I said, that was fine.

From a show I was dreading after an award season that buffered my very soul,  I may have my problems with the 90th Academy Award presentation, but it won't keep me from watching it next year or any year after that until I bite the big one. I can't speak for the rest of you. I'll let you do that for each other as I know you will.

OSCAR BLOGS FROM DAYS GONE BY

Happy Birthday to Me

Every year when I hit this mile post known as my birthday (or rather it hits me), I treat myself to a special movie of choice, a present and tribute to me, for me and by me. I honestly don't recall when this tradition of mine began, but I do know that I started to keep track as far back as 1993 when I took in Joe Dante's sweet little piece of nostalgia MATINEE.

Over the last quarter century, I've made some damn good choices film-wise, many of which I regard of some of my favorites of all time, a list so long it would be impossible to chronicle due to its sheer heft.  Among those birthday movies have been the aforementioned MATINEE, David Lynch's THE STRAIGHT STORY, Danny Boyle's SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE, Darren Aronofsky's BLACK SWAN, The Coen Brothers' NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN, Sam Mendes' REVOLUTIONARY ROAD, Peter Jackson's LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy (one three years in a row), Alejandro Innaritu's BIRDMAN and oh so many more.

Birthday Movie 2007 was Guillermo del Toro's PAN'S LABYRINTH, a magical piece of work I admired so much that I have been anxiously awaiting a follow-up (or through) from this visionary director. Unfortunately, his subsequent efforts have underwhelmed and frankly, tried my patience.

Until now.

THE SHAPE OF WATER is flat out magnificent. This is why I go to the movies. Del Toro's innate and abundant sense of wonder shows in every single frame of this fantastic film. This is something recent cinema has lost, buried beneath overdone and used CGI with nothing else to back it up such as story, character and, most of all, heart. At its core, WATER is a love story. Del Toro's heart lies in the passion he coveys in his vision, execution and the art form itself.

His tall tale, set in Cold War-era Baltimore, concerns the non-traditional relationship between a mute cleaning woman and an aquatic man-like creature. Outwardly, it may not be the most original concept, especially if you reduce it down to a mash-up of CREATURE FROM THE BLACK LAGOON and SPLASH with a little BEAUTY AND THE BEAST thrown in for good measure. But del Toro's take on the proceedings, adding characters like Richard Jenkins' closeted artist (my choice for the Best Supporting Actor over Sam Rockwell) and Sally Hawkins' Elisa, the big fish's gf, as well as some wonderful homages to cinema itself, warmed my soul as no other film has in recent memory. There are nit-picky flaws here and there which kept from from being that absolutely perfect jewel, such as Michael Shannon cast once again as the heavy, though, thankfully not in a merely stereotypical sense.Maybe I appreciate these rough edges since they are honed down by some gasp inducing visuals and emotional points that embedded this film into my internal film vault forever. I floated out of the cinema in a state of bliss on yes, the shape of water..

Bravo, Guillermo. I'm sorry I doubted you. And thank you. I couldn't have picked a better birthday film for myself and THE SHAPE OF WATER was the perfect gift. I hope Oscar smiles upon you.