2025 OSCAR NOMINATIONS
When 55 percent of the acting
nominations come from three films—“Sinners,” “One Battle After Another” and
“Sentimental Value”—it signals to me that either the Academy members need to
see more movies or the voters have given up and just follow the critics Oscar predictions.
While
the Norwegian film is well written and acted (it would be in my Top 10 if I
included foreign-language films), anyone who thinks it’s the best acted foreign
film ever to reach our shores—no foreign film has ever had four (or even three)
acting nominations—needs to spend more time reading subtitles.
I’m not taking issue with any of those
selections, but please Oscar voters, broaden your picks: Among the most blatant
miscues this year are the omissions of Joel Edgerton’s sorrowful performance as
a turn-of-the-century logger in “Train Dreams,” William H. Macy as a wise old
man in the same film, Jennifer Lawrence having a nervous breakdown as a young
mother in “Die My Love,” Glenn Close’s hilarious take on the ultimate church
lady, Will Arnett as a budding standup comedian in “Is This Thing On?” and
Benicio Del Toro’s as a determined tycoon in the satirical “The Phoenician
Scheme.”
For another example of the myopic nature
of Academy voters, take a look at the nominees in adapted screenplay, casting
(a new category), score, cinematography, editing and production design. Every
contender represents one of the best picture nominees.
On the topic of best picture picks: Did
anyone other than racing enthusiasts imagine “F1: The Movie” as a best picture
nominee last summer? I liked the film but it tells you how weak 2025 was for
movies. If the voters wanted a popcorn movie in the competition they should
have voted for the concluding chapter of “Mission: Impossible.”
“Hamnet” and “Train Dreams” were the two
best films I saw in 2025 so I’ll be rooting for those films (and Jessie
Buckley’s heartbreaking performance) on March 15.
Here’s my Top 10 as of now, with the hope
that some hidden gem from 2025 will pop up at the last minute. My full “best
of” list will appear on the blog next month.
1
Hamnet (Chloe Zhao)
2 Train
Dreams (Clint Bentley)
3 The
Phoenician Scheme (Wes Anderson)
4 Is
This Thing On? (Bradley Cooper)
5
Bugonia (Yorgos Lanthimos)
6 A
House of Dynamite (Kathryn Bigelow)
7 Wake
Up Dead Man (Rian Johnson)
8
Warfare (Alex Garland and Ray Mendoza)
9
Sinners (Ryan Coogler)
10 Mission: Impossible—The Final Reckoning
(Christopher McQuarrie)
IS
THIS THING ON? (2025)
Bradley Cooper’s three outings as a
director seem, on the surface, quite different (“A Star Is Born” and “The
Maestro” before the new one) but they all deal, to different degrees, with how
to keep a marriage alive without each partner giving up their identity.
In “Is This Thing On?” he smartly passes
the lead role to someone else, the unpretentious, regular-guy TV and voice
actor Will Arnett, who expertly captures the easily distracted, cluelessness of
a middle-aged husband and father. Arnett’s Alex is married to Tess (Laura
Dern), a former Olympian volleyball player who clearly seeks something more in
her life than housemother.
Separated and living alone in an apartment
in Manhattan, he stumbles into a club having “open mike night,” signing up for
a spot on the bill to avoid paying the cover (of course, he could have walked
half-a-block and found another bar). In his few minutes on stage, he laments
his marital situation, almost turning it into a therapy session.
From that point on, he starts taking
stand-up serious, showing up nightly at the Comedy Cellar and becoming part of
the gang of regular comics. Meanwhile, his relationship with Tess seems to
change with every meeting.
As you can tell from this brief summary,
there isn’t much to the plot of the film, but every conversation between Alex
and Tess and every time we see Alex doing stand-up, offers real insight into
the realities of modern marriage, beyond the melodrama Hollywood films usually
dish out.
Under Cooper’s direction, with a script by
Cooper, Arnett and Mark Chappell, based on British comedian John Bishop’s life,
the actor makes the journey from accidental performer to featured comedian
completely believable, even as he struggles to figure out his life.
The supporting cast is just as good: Cooper
as his best friend, a grass-smoking bit actor who gives bad advice; Andra Day
as Cooper’s forgiving wife; the ultimate wise old man Ciaran Hinds as Arnett’s
father and Christine Ebersole, who I had no idea was old enough to play
grandmother roles, as his mother.
Lending to the authenticity, the film
features a bunch of actual New York City comedians, including Sam Jay, Erin
Jackson, Greer Barnes and the legendary Dave Attell.
MARTY
SUPREME (2025)
There’s a good movie to be made about the
life of Marty Reisman, a world- famous ping pong champ of the 1950s, but “Marty
Supreme” isn’t it.
Josh Safdie’s film is a collection of
unpleasant adventures that illustrate a year or so in the life of a
self-centered, deceitful, unsympathetic young man.
Marty (a kinetic Timothée Chalamet) works
in his uncle’s shoe store but his laser focus is on getting the money to attend
a table tennis competition in London. When his uncle refuses him, Marty steals
from the business. Then, while supposedly concentrating on his sport at the
tournament, Marty takes a penthouse suite at the Ritz (billing it all to the
tennis table association) and seduces a retired silent film star (Gwyneth
Paltrow).
Yes, there are some specular ping pong
matches, but the film has little interest in how Marty earned his reputation in
the sport or how successful he’s been in the past. For much of the picture,
he’s shown doing terrible things to everyone he meets in hopes of cashing in.
In two episodes, neither having much to
do with anything, a mobster (Abel Ferrara) engages in a bloody shoot-out to
retrieve his dog and Marty sets fire to a bunch of local ping pong players he
just hustled. Every sequence in the film seems to be an outtake from another
movie. Not to pile on, but Safdie’s overuse of extreme closeups and a loud,
off-putting score by Daniel Lopatin told me that the director didn’t trust his
story or dialogue.
Chalamet does his best with this
unlikeable character but the story never allowed me to understand his lack of a
moral center. He’ll probably take home the best actor Oscar but I’m not sure
why. I have nothing against movie anti-heroes (see “The Godfather,” “A
Clockwork Orange,” “Pulp Fiction,” “Joker” and the entire filmography of Martin
Scorsese) but Marty comes off as charmless, irritating and never pays for his
bad behavior.
To me, the best performances in the film are
delivered by Ferrara, the veteran director of violent cult films including
“King of New York” (1990) and “Bad Lieutenant” (1992), as a bad guy Marty tries
to rip off, and Odessa A’zion as Marty’s cousin who, for no visible reason,
loves him.
Also in the cast is Fran Drescher, as
Marty’s mother, magician Penn Jillette, former NBA star George Gervin and Kevin
O’Leary from the TV show “Shark Tanks.” Unfortunately, O’ Leary plays a major
role as Paltrow’s husband who, for a time, takes a liking to Marty. His acting
is what you’d expect from a reality TV performer. (I guess Mark Cuban wasn’t
available.)
A lighter touch by director Safdie (who
made “Uncut Gems” with brother Benny) and co-writer Ronald Bronstein might have
made for a very entertaining film, in the vein of “Catch Me If You Can” or
“Paper Moon,” but this heavy-handed, frenetic tale of unbridled ambition left
me as cold as Marty’s heart.
DIE
MY LOVE (2025) and IF I HAD LEGS I’D KICK YOU (2025)
Two of the year’s best performances are in
films that test one’s tolerance for the depiction of extreme human emotions.
Yet considering that a majority of American movies involve worlds of sci-fi and
fantasy—at least it seems that way—I shouldn’t complain about even the most
unwatchable characters who are actual earthlings.
In “Die My Love,” Jennifer Lawrence,
among the most accomplished actresses of her generation, delivers a scorching
performance as Grace, a struggling writer who moves with boyfriend Jackson (a
properly confused Robert Pattinson) to his Montana hometown, near his parents,
while expecting their first child.
After the birth, Grace slips into the
worst case of postpartum depression you’ve ever seen, in part because Jackson
is away at work or, she suspects, having an affair. She continues to spiral,
growing more self-destructive and argumentative as the film, written and
directed by Lynne Ramsay (“Morvern Callar”), grows more disjointed, reflecting
her state of mind while taxing the audience’s. I was lost more than once during
the movie but Lawrence’s intense, painful acting carries one through.
The first-rate supporting cast aids
greatly in holding the plot together. Sissy Spacek and Nick Nolte play Grace’s
in-laws and LaKeith Stanfield has a small role as a mysterious neighbor.
In contrast, Rose Byrne’s Oscar-nominated
performance as a distressed mother cannot save “If I Had Legs I’d Kick You.” I
never was quite sure if I should pity Byrne’s Linda, an irritating, foolish
woman who makes one bad decision after another or sympathize with her burden of
dealing with a young child with a serious illness. No matter how you react, the
movie is nearly unwatchable.
It’s almost a shock when you first realize
that Linda is a therapist—the idea of her guiding others through troubles is
incomprehensible. Just as bad is her fellow therapist (who also treats her)
played stiffly by Conan O’Brien. Not sure why O’Brien was cast, but he is
clearly no actor.
One of the oddest choices director Mary
Bronstein makes is not showing the child. You hear her and watch as Linda
interacts with her, but the camera never reveals the girl’s face. If there was
a point, I missed it.
The plot drifts along after a pipe break
in Linda’s house creates a huge hole in the ceiling, forcing her and the child
to live in a hotel (the father is away on a work trip). At the hotel she meets
a young man (rapper A$AP Rocky) who she smokes pot with, developing an odd
love/hate relationship.
Byne creates a chaotic personality who
has no clue as to how to calmly deal with her life. I never doubted the truth
of the situation, but that didn’t make it a tale worth watching.
FATHER
MOTHER SISTER BROTHER (2025)
Writer-director Jim Jarmusch is an
acquired taste. His quirky characters, slow pacing and often absurd dialogue
lives in its own world, far from mainstream or even most independent movies. I
can’t say I’ve liked even the majority of his films, but since his breakthrough
1984 feature “Stranger Than Paradise,” he’s brought a distinctive, brutally
honest point of view rarely investigated by American films.
His latest plays out like a carefully
constructed short story collection: three stories of families linked only by
the idea of how children and parents can grow distant, strangers to one
another.
In the first episode, Adam Driver and Mayim Bialik play brother and sister enroute to visit their hermit-like father (longtime Jarmusch compadre Tom Waits, reason enough to see the film). During the visit, all three struggle to maintain a conversation and it becomes clear to the viewer than the father is lying to his children about his life.
The second section moves us to London,
where a haughty novelist (the always regal Charlotte Rampling) hosts an annual
tea for her very different daughters: the rebellious younger one Lilith (Vicky
Krieps) and the stiff, uncomfortable Timothea (Cate Blanchett). The gathering
isn’t much more joyous than the previous story; seemingly everyone is hiding
their lives from one another.
The last part offers the most upbeat look
at family relations, but sadly the twin sister and brother (Indya Moore and
Luka Sabbat) are brough together by the recent death of their parents. They
seem too normal, too adjusted to be in a Jarmusch film, but I guess he wanted
to end on a positive note.
While this doesn’t rank with the
director’s best works---“Stranger Than Paradise,” “Down by Law,” “Ghost Dog:
The Way of the Samurai,” and “Paterson”—it’s an insightful, if offhanded, tale
of how many find the simple act of communicating so difficult.
SORRY,
BABY (2025)
I recognize that I am out of step with the
critical consensus that “independent” movies—even if no one can properly define
indie films—represent the best in cinema as we enter the second quarter of the
century. Most of them bore the hell out of me, including last year’s best
picture winner, “Anora.”
But “Sorry, Baby,” primarily due to
impressive talent of writer-director-star Eva Victor, is the exception to the
rule.
The film has all the hallmarks of a
typical indie: an unhappy, traumatized 20something seeking the meaning in life;
shifting timeframe; long self-indulgent conversations; characters and actors
representing all strata of society; and the lack of typical movie dramatics.
But Victor, making her feature directing debut, manages to deal with issues while
giving her characters something interesting to say.
She plays Agnes, a literature teacher at a
small New England college, who continues to struggle with a sexual assault that
took place at the school while she was a student there. Much of the first act
focuses on a visit by her friend Lydie (Naomi Ackie), who is having a baby with
her partner, and her efforts to cheer-up Agnes. The film then goes back in time
to vaguely explain what happen between her and her former doctorate adviser.
Late in the film, the always welcomed John
Carroll Lynch shows up as a restaurant owner who helps Agnes calm down after a
confusing confrontation with a colleague.
A struggling actor since 2014, Victor scored a Golden Globe nomination for her performance in “Sorry, Baby” and has received numerous “best first feature” from a number of critic groups.
THE
RING (1952)
Most of the B-movies I watch offer little
more than minor variations on the murder-mystery formula as performed by a cast
of no-name actors. But every so often, in my nightly searches on YouTube, I
discover a long-forgotten gem that has something more substantial to offer.
Set in a mid-century Mexican neighborhood
of Los Angeles, “The Ring” tells the story of a 20something son who attempts to
help his family out of their financial struggles by becoming a prize fighter.
But more than that, the picture exposes the bigotry, both subtle and blatant,
that Latinos faced daily in L.A.
I don’t believe I’ve ever seen a film,
certainly not one from the 1950s, that so directly highlights the racism toward
Spanish speakers. There’s a scene later in the film where Tommy and his friends
go to a diner in Beverly Hills, spurring the manager to immediate call the
police.
But when the cop recognizes Tommy from one
of his bouts, he demands the waitress serve the boys and stays around to make
sure they are properly treated. Even a bit of fame changes everything; without
the boxer’s presence it would have been a different story.
The boxing scenes are well done and
brutal, especially when Tommy defies his manager, letting his early success go
to his head. His bout with Art Aragon (the one-time popular L.A. fighter plays
himself) gives him a taste of the sport’s reality.
Rios later had small roles in “Touch of
Evil” (1958) and “The Magnificent Seven” (1960), but spent most of his career
in episodical television.
Director Kurt Neumann, a genre filmmaker
whose most successful picture was “The Fly” (1958) with Vincent Price, and
novelist and screenwriter Irving Shulman (“Rebel Without a Cause”), working for
the King Brothers, famous B-movie producers of the era, all deserve acclaim for
making a movie about an issue few in the 1950s wanted to hear about.
Sadly, the racist attitudes didn’t change
much over the next 25 years and few Latinos were the focus of Hollywood movies,
adding to the importance of “The Ring.”
THE
ALTO KNIGHTS (2025)
For no good reason, pure ego maybe,
Robert De Niro plays both Frank Costello and Vito Genovese, two aging mob
bosses making a play for power in the 1950s. Why anyone though this was a good
idea—no makeup can turn De Niro into two different men, is beyond me.
Plodding direction by long-time De Niro
collaborator Barry Levinson (“Wag the Dog,” “Wizard of Lies”) and an
under-developed script by Nicholas Pileggi (“Goodfellas,” “Casino”) doesn’t
help matters, especially when you are presenting a story well known to anyone
familiar with mid-century Mafia power struggles.
The two criminals, who both started as bootleggers under legendary mobster Lucky Luciano, went on to become powerful figures in the crime families in the 1930s through the ‘50s.
Genovese, who fled to Fascist Italy to
avoid murder charges during the war years, returned to New York expecting to
hold power over his family. But Costello, who had grown more dominate in the
Cosa Nostra since Genovese’s exile, is determined to keep his old friend at
bay. The complicated struggle for control is never made clear in the film, but
it was short-lived as Vito was sent to prison in 1959 on drug charges and died
there.
Not only is De Niro too old for these
roles—both men where in their 50s during the film’s main timeframe, but he
wears so much plastic prosthetics that it’s distracting. Why try to make this
world-famous actor look like two guys that 99 percent of the audience has never
seen? I guess De Niro put his trust in Levinson, but this is the kind of
picture I’d expect to see Eric Roberts or Steven Seagal star in.
The supporting cast doesn’t leave much of
an impression other than Debra Messing as Costello’s long-suffering wife.
Oddly, Carlo Gambino (James Ciccone), who, at the time, was the most powerful
figure in organized crime, crowned by Genovese, is reduced to a minor character
in “Alto Knights.”
A more interesting mob story is the
refusal of J. Edgar Hoover, the all-powerful FBI director, to acknowledge even
the existence of the Mafia for decades, giving them free range to run unions,
take a cut from most of American commerce, organize the illegal drug trade and
murder at will.
PHOTOS:
Rita Moreno and Lalo Rios in "The Ring." (United Artists)
