Review: “The Odyssey” is Signature Christopher Nolan (Both Good and Bad)

By Ben Miller

13 feature films into his career, director Christopher Nolan has developed a string of touchstones for his films. You can expect an all-star cast, massive practical set pieces, underdeveloped women, stunning visuals, and clunky dialogue. With his new film The Odyssey, Nolan again delivers on everything you come to expect from a Nolan movie.

This time, Nolan (a well-documented child of cinema history), decides to take his chances with a sword and sandals epic in the vein of Ben-Hur or Quo Vadis. While the filmmaker might not have the reverence for the genre, he dives headfirst into the craft and scope necessary to make a film of this magnitude. When this film is big, bold, and a little silly, that’s where everything excels. It’s when things get more intimate that the film loses its way...

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The Academy loves power couples

by Cláudio Alves

Though Margot Robbie isn't up for Best Actress, she's nominated in Best Picture with her husband, Tom Ackerley.

It's Valentine's Day, and love is in the air. To commemorate the occasion, let's consider this year's Academy Award nominations through the prism of romance, searching for couples among the contenders. Recognizing lovers together has been an Oscar tradition since the very start, from Lunt and Fontaine's matching Best Actor and Actress nomination in 1931 to last year's Baz Luhrmann and Catherine Martin. Even so, this season feels especially prone to honoring couples. I could find six of them while perusing the list, including in the Best Picture race. Though they're not represented in the star-studded acting categories, they still deserve acclaim and attention…

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Better Luck Next Time, Nathan Crowley

by Cláudio Alves

If Sarah Greenwood wins the Oscar for Barbie, Nathan Crowley will officially become the most nominated production designer without a single win. You may be familiar with his name from many Christopher Nolan pictures since he's worked on most of them. But most is not all, and this past year, the British production designer was absent from the Oppenheimer credits. Ruth De Jong did that job and is now up for an Oscar thanks to it. Crowley, however, was less fortunate. Instead of the blockbuster biopic, he was busy re-imagining the wondrous world of Roald Dahl for Wonka – new on PVOD if you want a taste of Chalamet…

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Oscar Volley: Best Director could be 2012 all over again

Team Experience is discussing each Oscar category before the nominations come out. Here's Eric Blume and Glenn Dunks to talk Best Director...

ERIC:  Hi Glenn, excited to dive into this year's crop of Best Directors with you.  To me, the big question is whether all three of the "big gun pictures" will carry their directors to nominations.  That's Martin Scorsese for Killers of the Flower Moon; Christopher Nolan for Oppenheimer; and Greta Gerwig for Barbie.  I personally can't get too excited about Nolan or Scorsese, even though they both do expert work but nothing that rattled my cage.  I think one of Gerwig's biggest achievements directing that film...and this is no easy feat...was dealing with what must have been BINDERS of notes from Mattell and Warner Bros and still delivering the film she set out to make...

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NYFCC Winners: "Killers," Nolan, Rogowski, and more!

by Cláudio Alves

The first major critics award of the season is upon us in the form of the New York Film Critics Circle. Killers of the Flower Moon was the big favorite, scoring two wins in Best Film and Actress, while a couple of other productions also won themselves a pair of prizes. Oppenheimer and May December were warmly embraced by the New York set, as was Franz Rogowski, whose Best Actor victory is this year's biggest surprise. The multiple winners and lack of disclosed runners-up means many of the season's hottest titles were left empty-handed. They include Maestro, Poor Things, Barbie, and The Zone of Interest, which many pegged as likely darlings among critics. Time will tell if other groups take the NYFCC's lead.

Though these things aim to celebrate cinema, one must recognize their fame as Oscar predictors. With that in mind, let's delve into numbers and trivia, history and percentages galore, as one explores this year's complete list of winners…

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