• Dumb Money ***
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• Jules ***1/2
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• Meg 2: The Trench **1/2
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• The Machine *1/2
• Maggie Moore(s) ***
• Nefarious *1/2
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• A Dandy in Aspic **
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• Savanah Leaf on Earth Mama
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• Book Review: Once Upon a Rind In Hollywood
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• The 2022 San Francisco Bay Area Film Critics Circle Awards
• 2022: The Year in Film
• Book Review: Escape Into Meaning: Essays on Superman, Public Benches, and Other Obsessions
• Book Review: It's Alive!
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• Domee Shi on Turning Red
• Book Reviews - Guillermo Del Toro: The Iconic Filmmaker and His Work & The Unofficial Hocus Pocus Cookbook
• Destin Daniel Cretton talks Shang-Chi
• Brenda Chapman on Come Away
• Book Review: Sam Wasson's The Big Goodbye: Chinatown and the Last Years of Hollywood
• Nisha Ganatra
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• The Decade in Review (2010-2019)
• Sam Mendes
• Book Review: Cult Filmmakers: 50 Movie Mavericks You Need to Know
• Gurinder Chadha
• Olivia Wilde
• Claire Denis
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• My Top 100 Films
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• Cult Movies

Oscars 2006

Gold Standard

By Jeffrey M. Anderson

JANUARY 23, 2007: This is the list of Oscar nominations, accompanied by my personal vote, were I given one as of this morning. I also listed a few "unfairly overlooked" items, off the top of my head. I will get to my predictions soonish, as well as filling in the blanks of a couple of leftover films I didn't see.

As for comments, I was pleasantly surprised to see both Pan's Labyrinth and Children of Men -- both of which I liked -- get more nominations that I expected, with six and three, respectively. I was also pleasantly surprised to see Dreamgirls -- which I didn't like -- get fewer nominations than I expected. (It leads the pack with eight nods, but three of those are in Best Song.) Four of the five Best Picture nominees are actually good films, which is an unusual development. And a couple of my dark horse favorites wound up with nominations, Marie Antoinette for Costume Design and The Black Dahlia for Cinematography. (Art School Confidential and Inland Empire came away with nothing.)

I was also very happy to see the animated short The Little Matchgirl, released on Disney's The Little Mermaid DVD, get a nomination. It's a heartbreakingly lovely little film, and I'm rooting for it very strongly.

The Oscars will be announced February 25th. More later...

FEBRUARY 25, 2007: Some happy wins and some disappointments, but more good choices than not. Two of the year's best films, The Departed and Pan's Labyrinth led the night, with 4 awards and 3 awards, respectively, though Pan's Labyrinth lost the Best Foreign Film award to the more award-friendly The Lives of Others (a film no one will ever remember or ever want to see again). The overrated Dreamgirls took two awards, and five years from now people will wonder why, just as they did with Roberto Benigni. As for silver linings, the wonderful Happy Feet beat out the more conventional Cars and Sofia Coppola's under-appreciated Marie Antoinette picked up a surprise award for Costume Design. Even Clint Eastwood's Letters from Iwo Jima picked up a single Oscar for Sound Editing. But the most important pair of awards went to An Inconvenient Truth. Let's hope they inspire even more people to see it and to take its warnings to heart. As for my predictions, I got a lousy ten right, which has to be my worst year ever. Just wait till next year...