Best Picture Challenge: Anora

 So, I took me long enough!

The 2025 Best Picture Winner: Anora

This 2024 film is about a woman named Anora. She is a call girl/stripper that ends up meeting a man, Vanya, who comes from money and is about to go back to Russia to start working. In an attempt to have fun the last two weeks he is here, he hires her to be his fake girlfriend for that time. In the process thy goes to Vegas, get married, and they both think they are going to have it made in their new life together. However, when his parents find out, they come to the states to make them get an annulment. Vanya runs away from the three bodyguards that his parents sent to keeps him there, and this leads guards and Anora on an all night man hunt to find him. 

So, I didn't even hear of this movie last year before is was announced for Best Picture Nominee. Now that I have seen it.. I have no clue why it was nominated or how in the world that it won. 

It starts off like it's going to be some sort of "Cinderella" type deal. That she doesn't have to be a prostitute anymore, and can change her life. She gets like 25,000 total at the end of the film, ends up with and annulment, thinking that the man-child actually was in love with her. I'm watching this going that someone who is that line of work can not be that stupid to think that She was going to get a happy ever after that way. With a "man" like that. I mean he is spoiled boy whose parents all of a sudden expect him to grow up and start working, when he never had to before. He those money at everything, money that is not his and says so at the start of the film. 

So, this is a going into the category of never going to watch again, next to most of the Best Picture winners from the 70s.

Best Picture Challenge: Oppenheimer

 So, I finally got my act together and rewatched the Best Picture winner of 2023. 

Let's get into in. 

Oppenheimer is about a a scientist, named J Robert Oppenheimer, and the creation of the Atomic Bomb. 

Ok, look the movie is fine. I get the story and the life of J. Robert Oppenheimer is interesting. The conclusion of World War II and what happened to him after the bombs went off, all good. However, I have seen it twice and I had a hard time following it. I get the his ties to the communist party is what got him called back to court and had his security clearance revoked, but I'm not sure how RDJ's character was effect, and why his testimony was relevant. 

I love Cillian Murphy so much, and I think he did a great job in the role. I just think the movie was long and didn't have enough as rick to keep me hooked. That's probably because I don't get the feuding aspect with RDJ. 

I'm sure if I read up on the history it would make more sense but I don't think I should have to do homework to understand the basis of a movie. 

I wanted the movie to win Best Picture, because I understand the beauty, heart and passion that went into the film, but it's not my favorite Best Picture winner. 

Best Picture Challenge: Everything Everywhere All at Once

 You know there haven't been that many movies in recent memory that really got talked about quite like Everything Everywhere All at Once. There have been many a great movie to come out, lots that have been talked about, but those are mostly popular movies like the Marvel movies. If you know me you know that I do love me a good Marvel movie, however, nothing has garnered attention of the masses like this film. 

What happens when the multi-verse opens? What do you think that you will be doing during that time? Do you think you will even know? Do you think that your life matters enough for anything in the world to even matter? What if it was you who was called to save the world from a darkness unlike any other? That is the question that Evelyn is faced with. One moment she is working very hard to keep her family laundry mat afloat, and the next she gathering abilities from other forms of herself to fight of a darkness that wants to consume the whole of creation. She must confront her own fears, and her own circumstances, in order to face the terrifying darkness that seems to be following her across all universes. 

This movie is bonkers! 

It's one of those movies that you watch questioning if this movie is even real. You sometimes think that you are having a fever dream and trying to make sense of what you are watching. However, in the end it doesn't matter how wild the ride is. All that matters is if the journey is worth it. I will say that this movie is well worth in insanity that sometimes happens on the screen. 

You would think that I would have learned by now. How many times have I said that here? The moment that this movie came to the big screen, it was literally the only movie that anyone was talking about! Every influencer, every critic, and all the average movie goers instantly fell in love with this movie. The creative perspective, the immersive plot, and the sometimes insane places that we see in the movie really would have made the film going experience well worth the trip. I made the crucial mistake of not going to see this movie when it was in the theaters. 

This movie is also one of those movies that fell into the unfortunate fate of having a trailer that doesn't explain anything. Most movies I feel like today are like that. The trailer comes out and there is supposed to be enough explosions, color, crazy, and laughter to get people to come. I want trailers to do their job and tell me what the general plot of the movie is. I don't want just the wild stuff that I could see, I want to know what the movie is about so that I can go and check  it out. Why is this movie worth my time and money to go and see. Thankfully, the word of mouth was good enough for me to be excited to see the movie, even before it won Best Picture. That may also play into why didn't see it before if left the theater. 

Why was the word of mouth so good for this film? Not only was the script superb, but the heart of the film is something that just about everyone can relate to. We are told in movies all of the time that we need to be kind to each other, to look out for each other, and consider others when we are living life. However, in the chaos that is this film, that message vibrantly stands out. Kindness does not equal weakness. The fighting back darkness with light is admirable and often overlooked. Kindness is far to often seen as a means to walk all over a person. The someone being nice means that they are easily manipulated. In reality, someone who is always kind, always there, always stepping out of their way to help people are usually some of the most strong people on the face of the planet. They take all of the ridicule, stress, and harsh words and still show all people love. That they don't let other people attitudes effect theirs. They often don't tell people of the stress and worry that they go through in their lives. Just because someone doesn't fight the same way as you do doesn't mean that they aren't fighting. 

The cast in the film was also phenomenal! Michelle Yeoh, Ke Huy Quan, and Jamie Lee Curtis star in the film, and make the whole thing look effortless. That fighting in the air with hotdogs fingers and just a normal everyday thing for them. It's no wonder that all three of them won Oscars for the performances in these roles. Ms. Curtis was able to show all all of her acting skills in this film. She has been in comedies, horror, and dramatic roles in her time in front of the camera. This film was an incredible way of showing all all of her abilities at once. She got to play feral, heartbroken, happy, and hopelessly in love. Ms. Yeoh was inspiring as she explored hopelessness, loneliness, bravery, and peace in the same film. I was most impressed with Mr. Quan's performance. Which I didn't think that would be case going in. I have seen far more movies with Ms. Yeoh and Ms. Curtis than I have with Mr. Quan. Yet, it was his performance that gave me goosebumps and just stare in awe at the screen. His role was two fold. He was the loving, supporting, and heartbroken husband who had to switch to brave, confident, and stern in the same breathe! I am still trying to figure out how he went from the verge of tears and then jump to fearless in a blink of an eye! His performance is truly something to behold!

Everything Everywhere All at Once is a movie that makes you believe in the movie experience again. It's a movie that when you are watching you know that you are seeing something rare and spectacular. That there has never been anything like this movie and there will be nothing like it again. People may try to capture the same magic but will ultimately fail in doing so. It's a film that you can't afford to miss. I am giving it 9.5 out of 10 stars, and the note that it does live up to all of hype is was given. It has taken it's rightful place as of of the Best Pictures ever made and will continue to be something inspiring for the rest of time.  

Best Picture Challenge: Coda

 In the last few years you really can see a pattern of what movie the studios think are going to get them an Oscar. The last few years there have been a lot of civil rights movies. History, fictional, maybe a little bit of both? It was no a shock last year when the 2021 Best Picture was Green Book. I thought that we were going to get another movie winner that was about civil rights. I think lots of people were very shocked that Coda won this year. I can understand why when I watched it this past weekend.

Ruby is a unique individual with a unique family. Her family is deaf, and she is the only person in her family. She has grown up basically being the interpreter for family being the only one who can speak. She has done everything with her family but also doesn't fully feel like she belongs with her family because she is different from them. Her family being so different from the rest of the community she is in she doesn't really fit in with community either. There is one place where she feels like herself, that is when she is singing. She doesn't think much about what she is going to do with her life because she never things that she is going to leave. That is until her new Choir teacher see her potential and works with her to get into Berkley School of Music. At the same time her family fishing business is being threatened and Ruby is torn to what she needs to do.

Coda was nominated for lots of awards at the start of the year. The only other award that really stuck out to me was that fact that Troy Kotsur won Best Supporting Actor. I haven't heard of this movie until the nominations came out. It was until Mr. Kotsur won the award that is even knew that the movie was about a family that was deaf. Then I realized that Marlee Matlin was also in the film and I have seen her in other things, and I believe that she has won an Oscar in the past as well, and I really wanted to see this movie. Other than these things, I went into this movie blind. I had no clue what the plot was, I didn't know what was going to happen, but it was such a great movie! Growing up is hard, and you never feel like you fit in. I can't even imagine what it was like for Ruby. Then to have this incredible singing talent that your family just doesn't understand, and a family that the rest of the world doesn't understand, has got to be incredibly hard. 

This movie is charming, funny, sad, heartfelt, and just overall wonderful. This movie is going to stay with me for a while. It's beautiful in so many ways and I think everyone not only should see it, but I think everyone who sees it will enjoy it for many different reasons. 

Best Picture Challenge: Nomadland 2020

It's funny to me that after I have watched so many movies, and have pushed myself to watch many that I never thought that I  would, that I still get worried about new ones. Last year was hard for a movie lover because there really weren't any new movie coming out. If they were they were coming out on all of these different platforms that made it hard to keep up with the latest thing. It's more expensive to keep up with movies if you have to have a subscription to every streaming platform in existence. A lot of movie went under the radar because of this. 

The other problem is that rules for the Academy Awards qualifications had to change in order to get a nomination for any award this year. I am sure that some it will be the same this year too since movie theaters opened so late. However, these qualifications made the picking slim for the 2020 awards season. I can tell you that I had not heard of a good majority of the movies that came out with a nomination. As well I didn't really care for any of the nominations to really want to go out of my way to search to watch any of them. However, I have worked this hard in recent years to watch every Best Picture Film ever made and I don't plan on stopping just because of a bad year. 

The 2020 Best Picture went to a movie called Nomadland.

This story takes us along on a journey with a woman named Fern. She was living a peaceful and happy life until a local factory shuts it door. That factory put not only everyone that worked there without work but it eventually killed the town. Not long after the zip code was discontinued because no one was living there. Fern goes off to live in her van and travel and get some work here and there. However, she meets others on the road who are in a similar situation as she is in. she lives her life as a Nomad and goes where she pleases and meets lots of people with lots of stories along the way.

Here's the deal. When this movie was announced the winner I was annoyed. There seemed to be a few other movies that seemed more interesting to watch than this one. That fact alone made me put off watching this movie for a very long time. I didn't want to watch it. It really didn't interest me. 

It had it's moments. It's a great story about a woman trying to figure out a life without her home, her husband, her job, and really just trying to carve our a new life for herself. However, it was slow. Not the slowest movie I have ever seen, there are many more who hold that title. However, it's slow. 

I can put it down to a few words. I probably won't watch it again. I really won't recommend you watch it. There are other movies I would have rather watched. If I didn't start this challenge a few years ago and made it my goal to keep up with it, I would have not watched it at all. 

Best Picture Challenge: Parasite

It's hard to think that the Academy Awards were only three months ago. There were lots of familiar names, faces, and titles that we have all been very excited about in 2019. Lots of opinions surrounding who should have and not have been nominated, anger about the popular films not making the cut that they thought they were, excitement as to who was going to win. Also... that ever wonderful sense of predictability. 

Over the last few years I have noticed the same thing when it comes to these awards. Nominees for Directors and Best Pictures always go hand in hand. More often then not if you win best Director that film wins best picture. Superhero, actions films, and war pictures get nominations for sound mixing and editing, and they get visual effects, and they also get Cinematography. Disney is always nominated (and 9 times out of 10 wins) Best Animation film. They are also nominated for best from that film that year. There is always a period piece that is nominated for Best Costume. And, as always, unless you are someone who lives at the movies you haven't heard of most of the Best Picture nominations because they are not the big draw ins as some other movies are. 

2020 was no difference. Every movie that had a Director nominated was also in the Best Picture category. The same movie won both of those awards. Superhero, Action, and War movies where all represented in The Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, Visual Effects, and Cinematography (with 1917 taking a nomination in all 4 categories). Disney won for Best Animation with Toy Story 4. Which is odd since Frozen II came out it was not even nominated. However, they did not take home Best Original Song which was interesting seeing that both Frozen II and Toy Story 4 were in the category and neither of them won. Little Woman won for Best Costume. Then 4 out of 9 Nominations for Best Picture were films that most casual viewers of movies have never heard of. 

What was no predictable about these Awards this year is the shock of the biggest award of the night. The movie that took the top prize of Best Picture was also nominated for 5 other categories. it won 3 of those other including being the first time winner of the new renamed International Film (formally known as Foreign Language Film): Parasite.

Not going to lie.... I was shocked! This is not this first time that an International film has been nominated for Best Picture. It's the first time in the History of the Academy Awards that it's won! I think that most of us were shocked at that. There were so many great films that came out in 2019 that Parasite was really under the radar of most the general movie going public. 

I was nervous to watch it. Manly because whoever spliced together the movie clips on TV did in a way that it made it look like it was a horror film. It was not at all that. It's was a surprisingly deep and well thought out movie. It dealt with class, wealth, entitlement, secrecy, lust, love, murder, mystery I mean the list could really go on and on. 

It's really had to tall that plot of the movie without giving the whole film away, but here is a VERY over simplified plot. A lower class family is trying to make ends meet when opportunity strikes. A chance to work for a well off upper class family becomes available by way of a tutoring position. However, the whole family is soon working in the same household through a lot of manipulation and trickery. However, they are soon to find that secrets can only be kept so long.

Like I said if you have seen the movie you will know that this doesn't help. Also, by reading that there is love, lust, and murder as well you think that you can tell what is going to happen without watching the film. That is not the truth at all. You don't not ever begin to guess what is going to happen by just reading this. 

It's been several days since I have watched it and I have told some people that I may never watch this movie again because it wasn't my cup of tea. However, the more time that has passed that more I want to watch it again. It's brilliantly written, and a marvel to watch. The plot sticks to you and comes to your mind when you least expect it. This will go down as one of the most memorable movies that I have ever seen. 

I am just as shocked that I am saying that as you might be reading that.       

Best Picture Challenge: Green Book

So, after many months I finally got my act together and watch the Best Picture winner of 2018 Green Book. 

Green Book is about the unlikely friendship between Tony Lip and Dr. Don Shirley in 1962 New York. Tony Lip works security in the Copacabana Night Club. During it's renovation he has to find some temporary work. He gets a call that Dr. Don Shirley is looking for a driver for two months. When he goes for the interview he find out that Dr. Shirley is a famous black musician that is going to be doing a tour in the south. The deep south. He needs someone to drive him to the shows, and also to protect him as well. 

Over the years I have watched many movies that are during this time period in America. Segregation is rampant in the south, laws continue to separate those who are white and those who are not. However, most of the movies during this time are about people who made the biggest strides to change the laws, like Dr. Martin Luther King, or schools that had to desegregate like in the movie Remember the Titans. Manly they are about people who worked they way up to be in the history books and be remembered forever. This really is not the typical story we get from this time period in American History.

Dr. Don Shirley is not the typical story of a black man trying to change the world in the 60s. He is a man who has already mad a name for himself, all across America, for the way he can play music. He is already established, has fame, money, and knows what he likes and what he doesn't. He is someone who is "elite" meaning that he is someone who already has more privileges than most of us, no matter what color you are. That is why I have enjoyed this movie so much. 

I think when we got back and look at our history we think of the people of the past like we are now. We but ourselves into their shoes as much as week can. In school when we learn about segregation it's taught about through the eyes of an everyday American. You don't think about the people who have money or fame. You don't think of the people who have names for themselves. We don't even talk about those much other than when the laws changed and who were the biggest players to get the laws to change. We think about being the the sit ins, the protests, the marches. We forget about the "elites" anyone and everyone who has some sort of privilege in means of money, or fame. We forget about the people like Dr. Don Shirley. 

Again, Dr. Shirley was a very well known man across America. He lived in an apartment above Carnegie Hall, he was famous and never wanted for nothing. We, in our modern heads, who didn't live through that kind of separation of people, don't really think about how he was treated when he went places. I think we just assume, well I did, that he would get a "pass" because he was famous. However, seeing this movie really opened my eyes to that not being the case at all. 

This is a man who volunteered to go to the most segregated parts of our country to perform to the people who did pay him to go. He was invited to some of the most beautifully built homes in the south and was still expected to us and outhouse instead of the indoor bathroom. He would be invited to stay in beautiful theaters to play but not allowed to eat in their restaurants. He was applauded for being on stage and performing music like no one else could but off the stage he was still seen as less than a human being. Dr. Shirley has a special gift that people of today would love to have, and would probably get paid great money to perform, but was not treated with the same dignity off the stage as he was on.

I am not going to forget about Mr. Tony Lip. If you just watch the preview of this film and not the whole film you miss a very important detail about Tony. He is Italian. Now, if you go back to your history books you will remember that, even though their cultures are predominately white, Italians and Irish peoples where persecuted in this country too. So, even though we see that he has people being prejudiced against him he is still prejudiced against Dr. Shirley. He originally declines to take the job because he doesn't like the idea of being a drive for a black man. He tells Dr. Shirley that he has to pay him more and then he will go. After thinking about it Dr. Shirley agrees to his demands and Tony becomes his driver. After spending weeks with him out on the road he starts to see what makes Dr. Shirley so special and get to learn about his life. He finds a friendship he didn't expect to get. Not only that but it changed his perspective about how equal people really are.

What this movie was not quite what I was expecting it ended up being a great movie about friendship, self worth, love and sacrifice.  

Best Picture Challenge: Rope

Alfred Hitchcock's Rope is a fantastic movie that I fell in love with the first time I saw it. It was not a Best Picture Winner but it's because of this movie that I started this blog or any challenges at all.

See, back in 2014 I was watching Conan on TBS, my favorite Late Night TV show. Conan had Michael Keaton and Edward Norton on the show in the same week talking about a movie that was gaining in popularity called Birdman. Now, at this point I really didn't want to watch the movie because it didn't sound that interesting. It wasn't until both of the actors starting talking about how the movie was filmed in one continuous shot that I was interested.

Rope was filmed in the same way. Now, because of camera limitation in the 40s it could not be done in the way Birdman was. They do have some shots that do cut away, and how the editing was done mad it a bit odd at times. However, it's one of the only films that dares to even try.

While watching the 2015 Academy Awards I was getting more and more interested in the film. During the show I decided that I was going to watch all of the Best Pictures because I wanted see how we started until how we got here. It was all because of this charming film that stars Jimmy Stewart...

Just goes to show that inspiration can be found in the most odd places...

Best Picture Challenge Review

Dear lord that was a lot of movies in a short amount of time...

Well, when I went into this I thought I was going to be let in on some secret of what makes a Best Picture really a Best Picture. Was it a theme? Similar storyline? Was it something else entirely? What I did find is really shocking.

There's nothing in common....

Yes, there are some Best Pictures that felt similar to other movies, or were sequels, but there was no theme....

I was really shocked to find how much range in the Best Pictures there were! Most of them are drama but even all of the dramas were not the same type of drama. Some were comedy dramas, some were mysteries. Some were even lighthearted dramas that no one thought would do any good. You had several musicals, comedy, and you even had a scary film in there! You dealt with war, harassment, history, sexuality, race, and you even had some real shock thrown your way!

Before I did my Year of Review I would be on of the many people who said that Hollywood has no new ideas. They have no new stories to tell. In reality that is not true.. It's the same story that is being told over and over again that is what is selling tickets and that is what people are dishing out the big bucks to see every years. It's the movies that get overlooked that are the movies that people are begging to see. Original ideas, and amazingly true stories of people we did know they existed. In reality when you look at the nominations in the last five or six years or so you start to see that the ones winning Best Picture were not films that were wildly publicized across the U.S.. They were movies that were so under the radar sometimes you never even heard of them.

I am glad for that. I am glad for that because that means that there are still stories being told and people getting recognized for them. Movie studios know that superhero movies are making them money now but it's stories told with a purpose that will go down in history.

Friends, I don't think I have been more happy about being more wrong in my life.

Best Picture of 2016: Moonlight

Chiron is a kid that grows up in rough neighborhood. He is quiet, doesn't really stand up for himself. The movie shows how he grows up and how he finds out who he is.

A24's Moonlight had very crazy night at the 89th Academy Awards. Mahershala Ali took home the Best Actor award that night, and this made history because he is the first Muslim to win an acting award at the Oscars. History was also made when La La Land was mistakenly announced as the Best Picture. The announcers were given the envelope for Best Actress by mistake thinking it was the Best Picture award. The Director for La La Land handled it really well when he came up and said how happy he was the Moonlight Actually won. The other nominations that night were: Paramount's Arrival and Fences; Summit Entertainment's Hacksaw Ridge and La La Land; CBS's Hell or High Water; 20th Century Fox's Hidden Figures; The Weinstein Company's Lion; and Amazon's Manchester by the Sea. 

I have to say I did not want to watch this film and I kind of wish I didn't. I didn't like it plain and simple. I was kind of board of it and it moved on the slow side. 

Best Picture of 2015: Spotlight

In the early 2000's a story broke on Boston the would change everything. It was reported that 70 Priests in the Boston area were reported for having sexually abused children. It's a story that has uncovered thousands of other cases across the world. This is the story about the investigative group Spotlight found the story and discovered the hidden secrets of the Catholic Church.

Open Road's Spotlight took home the top prize that night at the 88th Annual Academy Awards. The other movies nominated that night were: Paramount's The Big Short; DreamWorks Bridge of Spies; Fox Searchlight's Brooklyn; Warner Brothers' Mad Max: Fury Road; 20th Century Fox's The Martian and The Revenant; and A24's Room.

I have to say that when this film came out I was a little worried about it. Knowing how media can sometime depict religion I was a little nervous. I was nervous because New Media can take any religion and make it look like something very negative and ugly no matte what is happening. IN this situation where something ugly was happening in a religious system I was afraid they were going to try and destroy all religion in that of itself. I was very wrong. I am so glad that I was very wrong. The writers, actors, and directors did an excellent job of shining the light of the horrid truth that was happening in the system, without saying that "everyone who is religious is a horrible person". I don't even recall them opening a Bible, or any form of religious text, to help make support claims to either side of the story. The only time a book was opened was for a directory of where are the priests were living in that year. They did an excellent job of showing that certain people needed to be held responsible for their actions and the system needed to be changed. Not that everything in the system was wrong and ignorant and the people who followed that faith were stupid as well. They stuck to the facts and left an individual person's faith in God out of it. I can respect, and was true impressed, that they did that.  

Best Picture of 2014: Birdman or (The Unexpected Virture of Ignorance)

Riggen Thomson is an actor best known for he superhero role in Birdman. After some time of playing the character he decides he wants to known for more. He goes out and tried to make it in other movie, but never really have been as popular. He now has decided to make a Broadway Show of a story by Raymond Carver. This is where we meet him. Becoming obsessed with making the show perfect, and the stress of his daughter getting out of rehab, and this new actor he hired last minute that is diving him up with wall we watch as he is working to make the play a success while being haunted by his old friend Birdman.

Nominated for nine Academy Awards Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) took home the Best Picture. When it came up to the idea of shooting the whole movie in one continuous shot many people thought Director Alejandro G. Iñárritu was crazy! If the film was done in a single shot then you could not go back and rearrange the scene, you could not cut pieces from the same reshot scenes to make it the best. It was all or nothing at all for every single take. It surely did pay off because on of the four Award it won that night was for Best Cinematography. Fox Searchlight claimed the Best Picture Award over: Their own movie The Grand Budapest Hotel; Warner Brothers' American Sniper; IFC's Boyhood; The Weinstein Company's The Imitation Game; Paramount's Selma; Focus Features The Theory of Everything; Sony Pictures' Whiplash. 

Ok, I have been looking forward to watching this film since I started this list two years ago! This is the movie that made me start watching all of the Best Pictures in the first place. I wasn't really that interested in seeing this film until I saw Michael Keaton and Edwards Norton on my favorite late night show Conan. During both of the interview they talked about how the movie was filmed in one shot. I thought that was fascinating because the only other movie that I have known to attempt such a feat was Alfred Hitchcock's Rope. Since I just saw Rope for the first time a month of so before the interviews I needed to make the comparison. Then because of the time difference between the film I got to wondering how movies have changed over the years of Best Picture films. I have to say this movie was crazy, a little strange, dramatic, funny, and overall a fun story to watch! I would had this movie to a must see list any day!

Best Picture of 2013: 12 Years a Slave

Solomon Northup was a free African American living in the north in 1841. A talented violinist, Northup was out looking for his next gig to play at when he is introduced to two men. They are looking for a great talent and start talking to him about him joining their circus. They take him out to dinner and show him a great time. He starts to feel really sick and then is taken back to his hotel room to rest up. The next morning he wakes up in a brick room chained to the wall. He finds out the he has been kidnapped and sold as a slave. We follow Northup for the next 12 years of his life to see the story of the people he met and what his life was like 12 Years A Slave. 

Stories like Northup's do not come around every day. It is also stories like Northup's that are rarely talked about in school. These are the types of stories that get people interest in history. The personal stories of people who have actually live through these time that we hardly hear about. Steve McQueen bringing Northup's story to life proved not only a great story about human spirit to tell, but a story that help people of today really relate and think about what situations like this really were in the past. With the assistance of Fox Searchlight, McQueen was able to being in a few Oscars that night. Other's nominated for Best Picture that night were: Columbia's American Hustle and Captain Phillips; Focus Features' Dallas Buyers Club; Warner Brothers' Gravity and Her; Paramount's Nebraska and The Wolf of Wall Street; and The Weinstein Company's Philomena.

This is a movie that is was very interested in seeing since it came out. However, when it comes to movies about slavery they tend to be very gruesome and overly shocking. I am not saying that slavery was not gruesome or overly shocking. I am saying that how Hollywood plays up those part it tends to overshadow the writing, acting, and other aspects that made that time period as bad as it was. The violence tends to be the focus point of the story rather the story itself. This film did not do any of that. It was violent and it was shocking... but it was appropriate and not excessive. It aided the film to give it meaning and suspense. It was the "money shot" that some of these movie give them just to sell the ticket. This movie had a story that wanted to be told and it was told in a beautiful, powerful, and meaningful way.

Best Picture of 2012: Argo

Argo is the story about how six Americans were saved during the Iran Hostage Crisis in 1979 through 1980.


Argo was one of only nine Best Picture Nominations at the 85th Academy Awards. Warner Brothers' took home the prize over: Sony Pictures' Amour; Fox Searchlight's Beasts of the Southern Wild; The Weinstein Company's Django Unchained and Silver Linings Playbook; Universal's Les Misérables; 20th Century Fox's Life of Pi; DreamWorks' Lincoln; and Columbia's Zero Dark Thirty.


I have to say that this was another film that I could not get into. I have a hard time relating to Ben Affleck as an actor. While I like him more and more as Batman I still have a hard time with his other stuff. The concept and the story of how they got them out is great but I feel is was better suited to be told in a documentary rather than a feature film.

Best Picture of 2011: The Artist

The roaring 20's is an idealistic time to be alive. The economy is thriving and the movies are busting out to great stuff. People love going to see their favorite stars on the big screen. However, everything starts to change when they start adding "talking" to pictures. It's an idea that many in Hollywood was going to fail. After the public falls in love with idea many movies quickly change their style of movie to include talking pictures. However, not a lot a actor have the chops in order to make in talking films. This film follows the story of silent movie actor trying create films in a time when actors realty start to find their voice, and the love story of a young up and come actress who learns that sometimes silence is golden.




The first 100% black and white movie since 1960 to win Best Picture is one of the best to ever come out. The Artist was nominated for 10 Academy Awards and won five of them, included Best Actor. It's a picture that is so unique the it hard to compare it to any other movie in this day and age. The Weinstein Company apparently knows how to make hit movie this day in age because this is second year in a row that they took home the Best Picture Award. They beat out: Fox Searchlight's The Decedents and The Tree of Life; Warner Brothers' Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close; DreamWorks' The Help and War Horse; Paramount's Hugo; Sony Pictures' Midnight in Paris; and Columbia's Moneyball.


I have loved this film since the first time I saw it on DVD. My only regret about the film is that I did not go and watch it while it was out on the big screen. I always find something new about the film every time I watch it. It's a new experience every time. I know that a lot of people were mad when Jean Dujardin won for Best Actor because he was not an America. I am sorry but that is stupid. If you did an amazing enough job to be nominated for the award, of a movie was the shown in America and was allowed to be apart of the Academy Awards, than if you win you deserved to win the award because of the job you did not because of the nationality. If they didn't want to run the risk of him winning than they shouldn't have allowed it be in the running. However, I digress. This film is one of my all time favorite movies and I am actually going to make my Best Friend Alaina watch this film so I can nerd out.

Best Picture of 2010: The King's Speech

Elegant, proper, well spoken, and confident are some of the way you would describe a royal. That you how they are portrayed in every movie, every book and basically every way you see them. However, when you meet Prince Albert, the Duke of York, you quickly learn that well spoken and confident do not seem to be his strong suites. Prince Albert has spoken with a stutter since he was a child. He has gotten a lot of help from several speech therapists but none to any avail. That is until he meets that man by the name of Lionel Logue. The non-medically trained therapist learns a little bit about Prince Albert and starts working with him that day. The Prince is very much over being humiliated and believes he will never be cured. After a surprising result Prince Albert decides to start working with him. He soon learns that it's a good thing because shortly after Prince Albert, King George V, dies and his older brother takes the throne. However, through a crazy scandal of the time, Albert's older brother is forced off the throne and the crown will now goes to Prince Albert.




Filmed in a total of 39 days, The King's Speech is one of the most beautiful pieces of works to ever come on the big screen. The Weinstein Company did a phenomenal job and took home a total of four Academy Awards. This film had a stiff competition of the Best Picture Award that year. They other films nominated were: Fox Searchlight's 127 Hours and Black Swan; Paramount's The Fighter and True Grit; Warner Brother's Inception; Focus Features' The Kids Are All Right; Columbia's The Social Network; Disney's Toy Story 3; and Roadside Attractions' Winter's Bone.


This was the first Academy Awards that I really was starting to pay attention to what was going one. I remember this being a really hard choice just from what I know of the movies. Now that it's been a few years I haven most of these films it's still a hard choice! I will say that this is one of the best films that I have ever seen. You can't ever go wrong with Colin Firth because he knows how to really understand and do justice to a character and he totally deserved the Academy Award for Best Actor that he won.

Best Picture of 2009: The Hurt Locker

The Hurt Locker is the story about three officers in Iraq who work in EOD.


The 2009 Academy Awards marked a very big change. The number of Best Pictures that were allowed to be nominated from five movies to Ten. The last time that many movies were allowed to be nominated was in 1943. Summit Entertainment took this movie ran with it! It won a total of six Academy Awards and making history for Kathryn Bigelow to be the only female director to win the Best Director Award. The Hurt Locker took home the biggest honor that night over: 20th Century Fox's Avatar; Warner Brother's The Blind Side; Tristar's District 9; Sony Pictures' An Education; The Weinstein Company's Inglorious Bastards; Lionsgate's Precious; Focus Features' A Serious Man; Disney's Up; and Paramount's Up in the Air.


I am sorry to say that I could not get into this movie. I understood why it was an important movie and why the story needed to be told but I could not for the life of me get myself interested. Honestly, I am made after making the list of movie that it beat out to win and wonder how in the world this movie was better than The Blind Side, Avatar, or Up. Chalk this one up to "I do not know why this movie won".

Best Picture of 2008: Slumdog Millionaire

An extraordinary tale about Jamal and how he got to be on Who Wants to Be a Millionaire. From the life in the slums with his older brother, and best friend, to becoming a contestant on the biggest game show in India.




Fox Searchlight and Warner Brother teamed up to take this sleeper hit and turned it into an Academy Award winner. Originally, the movie was only to be released in India, with no hope of making it to the US. When some of  the theaters needed more "independent" movie toward the end of the year they pick up this movie and it became an sensation from there. Slumdog Millionaire took home the Best Picture Award over: Paramount's The Curious Case of Benjamin Button; Universal's Frost/Nixon; Focus Features' Milk; and The Weinstein Company's The Reader.


The title of this film makes it sound like that is a thriller with a lot of shooting and turf wars. I don't know why I thought the title made it sound like that but it did. I could not have been more wrong in my life! This is one of those movies I dreaded watching and ended up loving. This has to be one of my favorite this year. Dev Patel is one of the actors who I very much enjoyed watching last year in my Year of Review challenge and finding out he was in the movie made it all the better. This would be a movie I would suggest anyone to watch.

Best Picture of 2007: No Country for Old Men

A hitman chasing after a man who stole money during a drug deal are being chased by the local sheriff in 1980's Texas.

Paramount took home four Academy Awards for No Country for Old Men. In order to do so they had to take down: Focus' Atonement; Fox Searchlight's Juno; Warner Brothers' Michael Clayton; and Paramount's There Will Be Blood.

I was so board watching this that I almost turned it off. I thought that I might be one of those movies that once you got to the end you would at least like it and it was not that way at all. I wish I could have gotten my two hours of my life back. 

Best Picture of 2006: The Departed

Boston. One of the most historic cities in the United Starts. It's beautiful and full of life. It's also filled with mystery and murder. Although Boston is a wonderful place it does have a secret underbelly that is controlled by the Irish Mob. Still a thriving part of the community the mob is still out to make a buck using whatever they can. Frank Costello, the head of the mob, is the man looking to make the money. He is looking to do it anyway he can. He gains the trust of a young boy, Conor Donovan, who grows up to be a detective. Donovan become Costello's mole in the BPD. Donovan soon learns that the BPD have a mole in the Costello's gang.

Wining four Oscars at the 79th Academy Awards The Departed is a thrilling tale that will keep ou on the edge of your seat. Warner Brothers took home the Best Picture Award over: Paramount's Babel; DreamWorks Letters from Iwo Jima; Fox Searchlight's Little Miss Sunshine; and Miramax's The Queen. 

I have heard very good things about this movie. Also, who doesn't love Leonardo DiCaprio? So I was very excited to get to this movie! It was a great film! I liked it much more than I thought that I would. It's a movie that I would recommend for anyone to watch.