STACK #124 Feb 2016

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Charlie’s Country

The Grand Budapest Hotel and Boyhood dominate the Oscar nominations

OSCAR FRONTRUNNERS LINE uP AT JB

W e know last year’s Oscars feel like an ice age ago, but remember the ballyhoo about the Australian nominations? Cate Blanchett for Best Actress in Blue Jasmine (which she won), Catherine Martin for Costume Design in The Great Gatsby (also won), Beverly Dunn and Catherine Martin again for Production Design on The Great Gatsby (won), Michael Wilkinson for Costume Design in American Hustle , and Dave Clayton for Visual Effects in The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug . There was even an Aussie co-presenter when the noms were announced: man with excellent hair, Chris Hemsworth. This year? Not so much. In fact, only two: David Lee, as a part of the Sound Mixing team behind Angelina Jolie’s Unbroken , and Tim Crosbie, who’s one quarter of the X-Men: Days of Future Past Visual Effects crew. While we beamingly applaud these two, there are some Aussie snubs that are getting our goat. Why not Nicole Kidman for Before I Go to Sleep , or the brilliant Essie Davis in indie horror The Babadook , or the visual effects and animation in The Lego Movie , which only appears in the Best Original Song category for Everything is Awesome ? Perhaps, as Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn suggested in a recent Facebook post, these aren’t the kind of movies the Academy takes seriously. But that still doesn’t explain why our marvellous submission for Best Foreign Film, Rolf de Heer’s Charlie’s Country , was good enough to win at CALLING ANY AUSSIES IN THE ACADEMY HOUSE?

How To Train Your Dragon 2 , is also available now at JB Hi-Fi. The hilarious The Lego Movie was shamefully snubbed at this year’s awards, so let’s just hope that its fab theme song Everything Is Awesome gets the award for Best Song. Meanwhile, a fair few of the other leading contenders are out now – or due shortly – on the big screen. The Imitation Game , with eight nominations, opened on New Year’s Day, while Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s backstage comedy Birdman – which picked up nine nominations – has just begun its cinema run. Clint Eastwood’s latest, American Sniper (in the running for six Oscars) and Wild , with star Reese Witherspoon one of the front- runners for the Best Actress Oscar, are also in cinemas now. The other main frontrunner in that category is Julianne Moore, for her performance in Still Alice , which is due to open in cinemas on January 29, along with The Theory of Everything (five nominations including Best Actor and Actress nods for Eddie Redmayne and Felicity Jones) and Foxcatcher , which is also up for five Oscars, including Best Actor (a creepy Steve Carell) and Best Director (Bennett Miller). Elsewhere, the Russian drama Leviathan , the favourite to pick up the Best Foreign Film award, can currently be seen at the Perth International Film Festival, but otherwise you will have to wait until the end of March to catch it at the cinemas. So what about Australia’s contenders? Well, it’s slim pickings indeed this year, with David Lee up for an Oscar for Best Sound Mixing for Angelina Jolie’s Australian-shot Unbroken , and Tim Crosbie, visual FX guy on X-Men: Days of Future Past . On the other side of the Tasman, Kiwi writer Anthony McCarten, who wrote and co-produced The Theory of Everything , is up for two Oscars; although Peter Jackson’s second film in his Hobbit trilogy, The Battle of the Five Armies , only received a nomination for Sound Editing, and is due in-store at JB on March 26.

So when will this year’s nominated films start arriving at JB Hi-Fi?

W ell, as usual, some of the leading nominees haven’t arrived at the cinemas yet, so they are unlikely to be in-store until the middle of the year at least. However, one of the leading nominees is already out on DVD and Blu-ray, while one of the year’s biggest favourites is due this month. Wes Anderson’s The Grand Budapest Hotel – which earned nine nominations, including Best Picture and Best Director – has been out for a while and was one of last year’s must-have films. Another Golden Globe winner, Boyhood , remains one of the favourites for the top prizes and it will be available on DVD and Blu-ray on February 26. Richard Linklater’s heartwarming coming-of-age tale is up for six Oscars, including Best Picture and Best Director, plus supporting acting nods for Ethan Hawke and Patricia Arquette, and is available for pre-order at JB Hi-Fi. ( STACK talks to Linklater about Boyhood on page 44) Out on the same day is another multiple nominee, Whiplash , whose five nominations include Best Picture and a deserved Supporting Actor nod for J.K. Simmons. The Judge , which is out on February 11, looked like prime Oscar material on paper, but has had to settle for a Best Supporting Actor nod for veteran Robert Duvall. And David Fincher’s masterful thriller Gone Girl (on shelves this month February 4) also picked up just a solitary nomination, with Rosamund Pike in the running for Best Actress. Meanwhile, you can get a headstart in the Best Foreign Film category by checking out Pawel Pawlikowski’s moving Polish drama Ida , which is in-store now. As far as the Best Animated Feature contenders go, the delightful stop-motion hit The Boxtrolls has just been released on DVD and Blu-ray, while another on the short-list,

Selma

Cannes but not good enough for an Oscar nom – nor did the Academy breathe in the direction of Russell Crowe for Noah . And dare we ask: When’s Baz Luhrmann going to get his achievement award? (Never? - Ed.) He’s a divisive director to be sure, but in terms of a singular auteur vision, there hasn’t been a man who has contributed more eccentric, flamboyant colour to the filmic canon in a long time. The authoritative honchos in the States love to wax lyrical about how much they love the Aussies, but when it comes down to the wire it seems they’re happy to rest on their American (white, male) laurels. Poor form, dudes. Let’s hope Selma gets Best Picture, and we’ll consider it a win for all.

FEBRUARY 2015 JB Hi-Fi www.jbhifi.com.au

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