The Oscars

First off is Chris Cooper winning Best Supporting Actor for Adaption. Adaptation was the most intelligent film this year. I'm not saying it was the best, since intelligence, despite what I might feel in my gut, doesn't really have that much to do with quality. His performance as a Orchid Thief was incredible. I could watch an entire movie of just that character. Performances like his are what make me love film like a Dosteyevski novel.

Secondly, I was really glad Adrien Brody won for Best Actor for his performance in The Pianist. Sure, he won because of the split between Jack Nicholson and Daniel Day-Lewis, but I felt his performance was far more subtle, more nuances, more controlled then either performance by Day-Lewis and Nicholson. Yes, Day-Lewis was mesmerizing in Gang's, but Brody was so convincing I forgot I was watching a movie and felt like I was reading the visual dairy of his character. Its rare I find myself unironically engaged in a film, and Brody's performance was crucial to such an engrossing film. And you gotta give the guy props for having the moxy to kiss Halle Berry when he got up on stage, and telling the stupid academy people to shutup and let him finish his speech.

Which brings me to Roman Polanski for Best Director. I know there was a real fight between whatever his lame name for Chicago and Martin Scorsesi for Gangs of New York. Without a doubt, Scorsesi is one of the greatest living film-makers who has been horribly overlooked in the past, but did he deserve it for Gangs? I definately feel like he was better that that guy from Chicago, but I don't think Gangs was his best work. So I was happy with Polanski winning for a movie I loved. The hard part is reconciling Polanski's past with his exceptional film-making talent. Honestly, I just try not to think about it. Does that make me weak, or a bad film critic? Thankfully I never professed to be one.

Final moment was Michael Moore's acceptance speech. It was interesting. I have a love-hate relationship with Michael Moore. Roger & Me was brilliant, and I really enjoyed Bowling for Columbine. But Moore is a nutjob, who shoots himself in the foot, and is consistently his own worst enemy. Seeing so many stars get red faced and embarassed for shameless politicking was great. Others though, didn't feel quite the same way.

Have you ever seen Memento? I ask because you seem to have a wide knowledge of film. I loved it despite the graphic violence and the vulgarities and I wondered what you thought of it.

Hey, I dug Memento, I have the DVD. He did a film before Memento, called Following, which was pretty good but in the same vein as Memento. He also directed the recent movie Insomnia, which had Al Pacino, Robin Williams, and Hillary Swank in it. It was an enjoyable film, though somewhat slow in parts (I think to mimic the whole feel of suffering from insomnia). Anyways, I think Chris Nolan is a promising film-maker, and it'll be interesting to see where he goes in the next few years.

I really enjoyed "Insomnia" as well. I really liked the play between Swank and Pacino, and the complexities of Pacino's character. I'd like to watch it again and do a little more character analysis.

Ya, I sorta felt like the movie was an well done made-for-tv movie movie. You see shows like Insomnia all the time on the sunday night network movies, but the usuall are done crappily. Insomnia was like a quality version of one of those. I mean, it was nothing spectacular, just quality, decent film-making.