MOST
IMPORTANT UNREMARKABLE MOVIE OF THE YEAR: Beasts of No Nation
You may have heard of Netflix’s mediocre child soldier movie
because it was Hollywood’s great black hope for an African American award
nomination – Idris Elba finally finds the right role. There are two things
standing in the way: 1) he’s black and 2) Netflix.
Elba’s problem isn’t so much that he’s black as that he’s
black and British. The British vote exercises enormous influence over the
Oscars – so on first thought, it should work to his benefit. But the Brit vote
also clings to traditionally trained British actors who do period dramas
whereas Elba muscled his way to celebrity through DJing and American
TV. Still, he wouldn’t be the first British actor to force his way into
stuffier halls…it’s just that there’s a problem: he can’t do British period
drama. Because he’s black. They’ll probably let him do Othello…but Fitzwilliam
Darcy? Apparently not yet. With Daniel Craig bowing out of Bond soon, here's my vote for Black Stringer Bond.
The other problem is that this movie was Netflix’s first,
and it’s the most important thing that happened in movies this year. Beasts of
No Nation was banned from every theater in America, despite Netflix giving
huge incentives to run it. Because Netflix’s entry into making second rate
movies spells the end of the theater business. Oh, there will still be theaters…probably.
But HD, streaming, and Wyoming-class TVs mean we don’t need them for much. Netflix
doesn’t even have to produce these B+ features – it just needs everyone to realize they don’t
need to spend tens of millions on distribution so AMC and Regal can take huge percentages.
Movies like Beasts of No Nation, and anything Adam Sandler does, don’t need a
big screen any more.
The theaters won
on this battlefield; Beasts of No Nation disappeared and Mr. Elba’s worthy
performance is a conflict diamond that the Academy can’t trade in. But the war is
already lost, and the theater monopoly knows it.
So those things, or maybe he just wasn’t that great.
WHY
EVERYONE’S FAVORITE MOVIE SUCKED: Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens
You may have
already heard from the ragtag band of haters and their plucky attempt to take
down the Sci-Fi Empire's Darth Disney entry: the plot’s a retread of the first movie, Han Solo is
still the only interesting character, the dialogue’s just as bad, the main characters have a
backstory but no personality, the things that made Episode IV a good movie (the
villain and the music) are replaced by an emo kid and a forgettable score. In summary, this
was straight fan service – most of those complaints are arguments made in favor
of the film by it’s 92% Rotten Tomatoes Rating.
So, in the
interest of originality, and in the spirit of an award designed to challenge, I
will go one further: the prequels are BETTER and TRUER to what made Star Wars
great.
In the end,
what made Star Wars change film wasn’t Darth Vader or John Williams; it was a
giant space ship enveloping the screen at the start. It was the sense of scale,
the imagination, the art direction. It was a new place, one no one had seen
before. It was exotic in a world that’s seen it all. It was beautiful.
For the
prequels, George Lucas pulled the same stunt. He redesigned the universe from
scratch. He showed us something new so that he could take it away from us. He gave us incredibly imaginative
lightsaber battles and galloping action pod races that make Episodes 4-7 dull
in comparison. And he did it by casting it directly at the same audience he
went after the first time: children, with the same weak dialogue and universal
themes to make it easily accessible. The people who complained weren’t the
kids, they were the kids he lured in the last time who had since grown old and
lost the capacity for wonder…or for putting up with bad dialogue and broad
brush strokes.
So they’ve
gotten what they wanted in this movie and they’ve fawned over it. But I assure
you, in retrospect, this will sit in the bottom third of the triple trilogy.
Just to
really upset everyone, here’s how I rank the Star Wars movies:
1. Episode
5: The Empire Strikes Back
2. Episode
2: Attack of the Clones
3. Episode
4: A New Hope
4. Episode
3: Revenge of the Sith
5. Episode 6:
Return of the Jedi
6. Episode
7: The Force Awakens
7. Episode
1: The Phantom Menace
I mean…Jar
Jar and the Republic of Adam Sandler Stereotypes are still too much to be
born.
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