The Master

With the Oscars less than a month away, I'm in the midst of doing what I do every year at about this time; seeing every Best Picture nominee before the night of the Oscars. I've seen all but Amour so far, and I'm hoping to see it over the weekend.

The current Best Picture format is to have five to 10 films nominated. I like this. When it was five films (from 1944 to 2009), I felt that there was at least one major snub every year. When it was 10 films (from 2009-2011), I felt that there were films among the 10 that didn't really deserve to be there. In 2011, the decision was made to have 5 to 10 films, picking them by a format I won't get into here. I like this. In theory, good films shouldn't get snubbed, but films that are not so great wouldn't get a nomination.

That said, I was surprised when the nominations were announced earlier this year. Two movies that got nominated for Best Picture surprised me, for two very different reasons.

I hadn't seen Les Misérables when the nominees were announced, but I had heard and seen some reviews. It was not getting the best reviews, and has, by far, the lowest score from critics on Rotten Tomatoes (as of this posting, it has a 70%; the second lowest of the nominees has a score of 86%). The average person seems to like Les Misérables more than the average critic, but Oscars tend to side more with critics than people - look at the nominees for favorite movie from the most recent People's Choice Awards; none of them are up for the Best Picture Oscar. After seeing Les Misérables, I sided with the critics, which added to my surprise of the nomination.

Beasts of the Southern Wild is a low-budget movie. According to IMDB, it was made for $1.8 million. To put this into context, Silver Linings Playbook, which doesn't seem to have much in terms of special effects, had a budget of $21 million. Even Amour had a budget of just under $10 million. I was shocked to see such a small movie get a Best Picture nomination. Yes, critics liked it, but I was still surprised, pleasantly, mind you, to see it get a Best Picture nomination. This was a movie with a cast of amateurs, a first-time director, and it gets a Best Picture nomination. 

I was so sure that The Master would get a Best Picture nomination that I saw it in October, thinking it was the second Best Picture nomination I was going to see (I had seen Argo, assuming it would get nominated and Beasts of the Southern Wild, thinking it would not). The Master is directed by a guy critics love, the two lead actors in the film have had acting nominations in the past (and were both nominated this year), and it was a weird movie. That usually adds up to a Best Picture nomination - not this year, apparently.

As I walked out of The Master, I heard two older guys talking. I don't know if they had seen the film I had just seen, but the sentence I heard one of them say perfectly described how I felt about the movie, immediately after seeing it: "It was good, but I wouldn't want to see it again". I thought it was a well-acted film, a well-directed film, and I liked the cinematography. But it was weird, and I didn't really get it. It was a good film, technically, but I didn't think I'd want to see it again. 

Things have changed; I want to see it again.

Of all the films I've seen in the past year, this is the film that I can't seem to get out of my mind. I didn't really get it but as time has gone on, I want to see it again, thinking I may see things I didn't see before. I've heard critics say it was better with the second, or third, viewing. I can't get out of my mind Joaquin Phoenix's performance, the way he held his body in contorted ways, playing a really messed up guy, a guy who you wished you had a better idea what was going on in his head. A guy who I never really understood. 

It was not in the same class as other films I have loved, that didn't get a Best Picture nomination in the past (Blue Valentine is the first one that comes to mind). It was not the best film of the year, probably not even in my top five. But it was the film that stuck with me the most, and for that, I kind of wish it got a Best Picture nomination.