Director Alan Parker, who our youngest readers will probably beunfamiliar with, used to be a prestige director. He's been retired for ten years but his taste in material was quite awards-baity. He's receiving the BAFTA Fellowhip (aka career tribute) in February at the BAFTA ceremony. Because the BAFTAs aren't aired live and weirdly only ever broadcast parts of that show who knows if we'll see it.
So I thought we should look back at his career through Posterized. (We haven't done one of those in a while!)
How many have you seen?
Bugsy Malone (76), Midnight Express (78), Fame (80)
Three arguable classics right off the bat? And 11 more movies after the jump
Shoot the Moon (82), Pink Floyd The Wall (82), Birdy (84)
Angel Heart (87), Mississippi Burning (88), Come See the Paradise (90)
The Commitments (91), The Road to Wellville (94), Evita (96)
Angela's Ashes (99), David Gale (03)
How many of those 14 films have you seen? Which are your favorites?
His filmography by the Oscar numbers: 2 Best Picture Nominees (Mississippi Burning & Midnight Express); 2 Best Director Nominations; 2 non Best Pictures with several nominations (Evita & Fame); 27 nominations for the filmography (in various categories); 6 Oscar wins for the filmography.
Angelas Ashes and The Life of David Gale were an unlucky #13 and #14 for Alan Parker, the former clearly intended for Oscar glory with a Christmas opening and based on a prestige book (it won only a best score nomination for perennial nominee John Williams) and the latter garnering possibly the worst reviews of his career and a quickly forgotten misfire for all three of its Oscar favored principles. But even so his filmography always felt unfinished to me. Why not one more picture? But perhaps that's because I had a soft spot for him given that nearly half of his filmography -- a pretty solid filmography overall, don'cha think? -- is musically inclined.