Doc Corner: 'LA 92' and 'Let It Fall: Los Angeles 1982-1992'

by Glenn Dunks

It’s not surprising that the spectre of the Los Angeles riots of 1992 has loomed large over documentary filmmaking this year. Emerging out from shadow of O.J. Simpson, whose story was everywhere in 2016, the 25th anniversary of this monumental moment in American history has been the focus of not just (by my count) five feature documentaries, but has also felt like an integral part of more contemporary films like Sabaah Folayan and Damon Davis’ Whose Streets, Yance Ford’s Strong Island, and Peter Nicks’ The Force.

It would make sense then that these films, which largely pull from many of the same archival footage sources, might be in danger of working against one another. Dampening their urgency and their power simply by being too numerous.

However, at least in the case of Dan Lindsay and TJ Miller’s LA 92 and John Ridley’s Let It Fall: Los Angeles 1982-1992, that is certainly not what has occurred...

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FYC: mother!

by Chris Feil

Has the world already forgotten about mother!? It may not have ever been a film built to be a formidable Oscar contender, but Darren Aronofsky’s film is one to hang the year on nonetheless. Now is time for a healthy reassessment, as it arrives on streaming today!

Or maybe it might be a first watch for some, after that all-too-brief run in theatres. The film was killed by a flurry of hot takes, sink bracing jokes (guilty), dissections of its marketing, and conversations on the value of Cinemascore. But now that the dust and clickbait have settled, the film still remains one of the most audacious and purely entertaining films of the year. And also one of the very best that we should keep talking about...

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Field Narrows for Visual Effects Oscar

Chris here. We should soon be getting word of what films have moved on in bake off rounds for Oscar categories like Foreign Film and Makeup and Hairstyling. But now we have a longlist for the Visual Effects category and many of the players are genre films and blockbusters as expected. There is still room for a surprise or two, the most heartwarming of which is certainly Netflix's Okja. There's even two unseen films among the lineup: The Last Jedi and the Jumanji sequel.

Here are the 20 eligible films:

• Alien: Covenant
• Beauty and the Beast
• Blade Runner 2049
• Dunkirk
• Ghost in the Shell
• Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2
• Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle
• Justice League
• Kong: Skull Island
• Life
• Logan
• Okja
• Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales
• The Shape of Water
  
• Spider-Man Homecoming
• Star Wars: The Last Jedi
• Thor: Ragnarok
• Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets
• War for the Planet of the Apes
• Wonder Woman

Isn't it surprising that the awe-inspiring motion capture work on the new Apes trilogy has gone un rewarded so far? Folks might need to be reminded about War, but it would make for a lovely series capper should it take the prize this year. The candidates will narrow further to end at the end of the month. Any thoughts on frontrunners? Oscar chart here.

Annie Nominations Embrace "Coco" and "The Breadwinner"

by Nathaniel R

Coco and The Breadwinner are the top competitors for the Annies (and maybe the Oscars)

The Annie Awards first began handing out prizes in 1992 but weren't quite on a calendar year yet with Beauty and The Beast, a 1991 film, honored in that inaugural year. They've since aligned themselves to the calendar and last year their top prize went to Zootopia, which also took the Oscar. Coco leads their nominations for 2017 and also presumably leads the Oscar race with The Breadwinner the widely admired darkhorse at both. Presumably again as we won't know what the Oscar nominations are until January 23rd. 

Both of the leaders are powerfully rooted in cultural specificity (Mexico and Afghanistan respectively) and are, in their own way, tearjerkers, rather than the more traditionally glib action comedies that tend to be the bread and butter of the animated film world... at least in America.

We'd love to raise a glass to the nominations for the streaming series Trollhunters which we're huge fans of but we'd rather throw the contents of that glass inb Annie's face for preferencing Cars 3 and Despicable Me 3 over the insanity of The Lego Batman Movie. If you wanted to honor a sequel, that's really the way you wanna go? The complete list of nominees and a few more comments, cheers, and jeers are after the jump...

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The (Truly) Marvelous Mrs. Maisel

By Spencer Coile 

The year is 1958, and Miriam "Midge" Maisel (Rachel Brosnahan) lives on the Upper West Side with her wealthy husband (Michael Zegen) and two children. Her parents (Tony Shaloub and Marin Hinkle) live in the same apartment complex to watch the kids for her. She is dressed to the nines for all occasions, supports her husband's (flailing) career in stand-up comedy, and still has time to whip up a mean brisket. Why would she ever want her life to change? 

Which is to say, of course, that it will and does.

When her husband leaves her for his secretary, Midge angrily (and drunkenly) takes to the stage of the Gaslight, a downtown bar her husband frequently played at, to rant to her audience about this sudden shift. Her improvised venting, though, has the crowd in stitches. And it soon becomes clear that not only is she performing a stand-up routine, she is also quite good at it... 

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