Thoughts I Had... While Staring at This Poster for "Nebraska"
Tuesday, September 17, 2013 at 8:00PM Behold the new poster for Alexander Payne's Oscar Bait, 2013 Edition. Thoughts I had... brought to you uncensored as they came to me while staring at it.
• This is why I shave my head.
• Gee, do you think this movie is in black and white? Black and White In Your Face
• Alexander Payne's ERASERHEAD
• DERNHEAD
• So proud of them for not caving to pressure to campaign Bruce Dern as supporting. Now let's hope they also admit that Will Forte is a lead as well (Fact: Road trip movies about two people travelling together have two leads. See also Thelma & Louise, Two for The Road, Planes Trains and Automobiles, Y Tu Mama Tambien, etcetera)
• Recently I forced The Boyfriend to watch Alfred Hitchcock's last film Family Plot (1976) and halfway through (he's clearly hating it) whilst Dern is making a confused face onscreen he says "why is everyone in this movie so ugly?"
• The Descendants was Alexander Payne's worst movie (still puzzled by the avalanche of praise if not the Oscar nominations). Can he redeem himself and make another Sideways?
• When the Best Actor Nominees are announced, if Dern is among them, I promise to mock up all their movie posters like this just for comparisons sake: PROFILE vs. PROFILE!!!
• How many people do you think type in urls when they see websites listed at the bottom of movie posters or at the end of trailers? NebraskaMovie.com
Your Thoughts?
P.S. Oh and the movie's new trailer
Reader Comments (23)
I like the design of the credits at the bottom of the poster. It's very '70s.
I'm not looking forward to this as much as I should be considering Sideways is one of my favorite movies. But honestly, that's the only Alexander Payne movie I've really loved so far. Election and About Schmidt are both good, but I'm with you on The Descendants: it's pretty mediocre, and I don't understand all the praise it got. A lot of people even called it Payne's best film, which just shocked me.
I always thought that you and me were the only people who disliked The Descendants. "Oh look! A movie where everyone is ACTING and doesn't feel like they're part of a family whatsoever! Give it every nomination!" Hoping for better fare this time around, though I've liked everything else he's done.
About Schmidt just might be my favorite. So deeply felt, and Nicholson's performance is his best post-Chinatown.
The Old Man With the Dragon Tattoo
Travis - lol. LOVE IT.
The first thing it came to my mind was this >http://bit.ly/18wIg5I ;)
Descendants was so same-old that I hope Payne realized he was coasting and decided to something really different. Giving him a screenplay Oscar won't help that though.
Whatever comes of it, I do like the idea of putting Will Forte, Bruce Dern, and Bob Odenkirk into one movie though.
"About Schmidt" is a terrific movie, but "The Descendants" is my favorite.
Is that Sandra Bullock at the end of gravity? PS, so sorry EKG that Meryl did not do your little play. Bitter, party of one? There's a small table in the corner if you want it.
I love everything Payne's done except for The Descendants which I hated and I'm so glad to be amongst friends on that score in here, and Election's pretty much perfect... but CITIZEN RUTH, man. Laura Dern in Citizen Ruth is EVERYTHING.
Jason,
Who is EKG and what is the Meryl reference????
I think they will campaign both as leads just like when they campaign both Streep & Hathaway in The Devil Wears Prada as Lead. Voters chose Streep over Hathaway when it came to choosing and the same will happen to Dern and Forte.
Citizen Ruth
-Comedic satire perfection. Laura Motherfuckin Dern serving amazing and trashy characterization for your nerves. "Don't you people get it?! I WANNA HAVE AN ABORTION."
Election
-A hilariously dark screenplay with two amazing lead performances, particularly by Reeses Pieces in a tough and rewarding showcase role that continues to be far and away her best performance.
"14e Arrondissement" - Paris Je T'Aime
-Brilliance. Starts off one way and completely ends in a different place than you'd expect. Sneaks up on you with its touching humanity too. I honestly would've nominated Margo for Best Supporting Actress that year for this thin slice of heaven.
*gaaaaaap*
About Schmidt
-The Jack Nicholson Show. If he wasn't giving that performances here, I dunno if this one would hold up. That last scene is the best thing tho - pouring some needed cold water on these silly characters.
*massive gap*
Sideways
-I was not drinking the kool-aid like everyone else seemingly was during that 2004 awards season because I don't really GET wine culture but I simply didn't find myself giving a shit about any of the characters in any way. And the film is sneaky and cynical too which leaves some bad taste.
The Descendants
-Such an interesting mess but I can't help but feel like it was hilariously miscast and therefore doomed from the start. The setting and soundtrack were inspired but felt awfully insensitive and some of the worst bits of the movie were completely offensive and insufferable. Insert massive eyeroll at that cathartic climax. I hope he never gets near here again and maybe works on those scrips harder if he's thinking one thing but showing another.
But what I really meant to say was, looking forward to Nebraska and Payne working with interesting actors in great tricky parts in the future in general.
Mark the First: Absolutely agree on The Descendants. The lead role of Matt King? Should have been Steve Buscemi. Someone who would see just how slimy the guy's supposed to be and own up to it.
The Descandants was such a disappointment. Never read the book but, why is Hawaii that white in the movie! Didn't Payne insist he was making a movie in the "real" Hawaii? I say this because my whie aunt and uncle who moved to Hawaii years before actually complained about that representation. Shailene Woodley at least got to show her acting chops for the first time.
I like his other movies but I am a little concerned that Nebraska is a comedy about a man with Alzheimer's, considering I saw my grandfather with the disease. I love Bruce Dern too but this might hit a little too close to home.
Pleased I wasn't the only one bored with The Descandants. Nebraska looks more promising, not sure about Bruce Dern's chances, but would be really happy if June Squibb was nominated.
As for that trailer: YIKES. For a full thirty second span, the trailer hammers pretty much the same joke on you over and over. If the plot is actually as monotonous as all that, I don't buy it getting critical hosannas or having strong Oscar chances. (You might not have liked The World's End, but at least that one tried throwing out new jokes every chance it got.)
Laura Dern may be one of the few actresses who's completely fearless, and "Citizen Ruth" is an acid-drenched showcase for her brilliance. Some might argue that Payne has gotten "softer" as he's aged (the protagonists of "Sideways" "About Schmidt" and "The Descendants" all reach a point of grace/redemption/peace, compared to what happens to poor Matthew Broderick's character in "Election"). Personally, though "The Descendants" was a little squishier, I really liked the warmth and humanity of it, and thought Clooney was sensational (though he should've gotten his second Oscar for "Up In The Air"). Payne is probably due for something else really biting, but these days, what's left to satirize? Maybe the "foodie" movement...
Im actually seeing this at NYFF this year. Pretty excited. I'm looking forward to this because of the inspired casting in Dern whom i love in Coming Home. I agree with you on the descendants, but i have found it increasingly enjoyable on repeated viewings.
My Best Picture Guesses:
1. American Hustle
2. The Wolf of Wall Street
3. The Counselor (With that cast, that director and that screenwriter, I'd say 19th place is VERY LOW, especially when stacked up against Saving Mr. Banks or All is Lost.)
4. Rush
5. 12 Years a Slave
6. Spike Lee's Oldboy (Just the fact that they can use it to say, "Yes, we've finally nominated a Spike Lee movie for Best Picture. Ya happy now!?" is enough for me. From a younger, less discussed director, it would have no shot, no matter how good it was. I still think this could really surprise.)
7. Inside Llewyn Davis (They nominated True Grit for TEN AWARDS for crying out loud. We can't count out Oscar and the Coens, strange bedfellows though they may be.)
Films that will wind up bubbling under:
8. Gravity (not an unarguable or near unarguable triumph and one guaranteed to alienate nearly a quarter (actors and writers) of the Academy.)
9. Foxcatcher (Bennett Miller can't officially get in every time, and it was only two years since Moneyball.)
10. Lee Daniels' The Butler (If Rush is a hit, most of the #1 votes this uneven movie WOULD have gotten will go to that. Maybe if enough of the black members of the Academy feel racial pride it COULD get in, but the months of thought the August release gives them will cause the rest of the Academy to ruminate on the bad scenes and not give this thing #1 votes.)
The Descendants was doomed at the script stage. Absolutely no surmounting that ridiculous, lazy voice-over device. The cast did what they could (although I don't think it's Clooney's best performance).
Payne still hasn't topped Election for me. There are parts of Sideways that I like, but moments that others found transcendent I found uninspired. I remember liking About Schmidt on first viewing, but apart from THAT Kathy Bates scene I don't remember any of it. Nebraska looks... I don't even know. That poster looks like it's for a 70's horror film about a mad scientist, and the trailer really piles on the modest quirk.
Looking at this poster I'm thinking of Barbra Streisand's Greatest Hits II.
"The Descendants" was excellent. If Clooney had to win a lead actor Oscar, I would have been fine with him winning it for this role.
Nice trailer, but I have a feeling that certain aspects of this one will annoy me, like the way that the "locals" are depicted, and not in an especially flattering way. And in all of this lead/supporting talk for Dern, I'd suspect that Forte's going to get the supporting placement regardless of screentime. And where does that leave Stacy Keech? He looks like he could be nod worthy, and they'll be no place for him in supporting with Forte around. June Squibb looks like a possible scene-stealer.
I think I don't like Alexander Payne all that much. I really disliked The Descendants, I thought Election was good, I hated Sideways, I loved About Schmidt. I am not, apparently, marching to the same Alexander Payne drum as anyone else.
"This is why I shave my head" almost made all the coffee come out of my nose.