Hit Me With Your Best Shot: 'The Conversation'

by Nathaniel R

a wonderful 'establishing shot' not of a building but of a man (Gene Hackman), his targets (in photographs), and the tools of his trade.

Francis Ford Coppola's The Conversation (1974)  is nothing if not elusive. So many of the images in this paranoid mystery are obstructed. Coppola and the cinematographer Bill Butler are continually adjusting focus and searching for the subject and his targets. The protagonist, an 'unreliable narrator' type albeit without the narration, is Harry Caul (Gene Hackman, brilliant) and he's often hiding in the corner of frames, or with his back turned to us. The film begins with a full circle, as Harry is spying on a man and a woman as they walk around a city park. For what reason we do not yet know and might never know. Though we see his targets frequently, there are constant visual interruptions from trees and people and their own movements. We understand this to be Harry's view, figuratively if not literally, since people can't move like a crane shot or zoom in for a closeup...

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ASC and CAS nominations: 'Dune' & 'Power of the Dog' make both lists

by Nathaniel R

The American Society of Cinematographers and the Cinema Audio Society have released their nominations for outstanding work in film and television last year. As with the Art Directors yesterday, there are surprise omissions of notable contenders. West Side Story, for example, is not nominated for cinematography while another musical tick, tick...BOOM! misses with the sound guild. It's all leading up to an Oscar nomination morning that could be volatile.  The full list of nominations with notes after the jump...

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Oscar Finalist List Predictions!

by Nathaniel R

On Monday (December 21st) we'll be hearing the Oscar finalists list in the 10 categories that use that process to winnow down the vast array of possibilities before nomination balloting. There were 9 previously but Oscar has added Sound into the mix this year. That category has had quite a rollercoaster of late, given that it was two categories just two years ago, it was conjoined for 2020, and now it joins the "bakeoff" groups; in short it's getting smaller and smaller each year! After Monday's massive reveal we can really dig in to each Oscar race (and closely revamp each Oscar chart) individually. Isn't it strange that the finalist lists in these 10 categories are coming so much earlier than the actual nomination ballots (which don't go out for another 5 and a 1/2 weeks.

Anyway, let's quickly predict the finalist lists, shall we? You can use this cheat sheet to laugh at me or praise me later, depending on my success rate. If there's a link we've previously written about the picture...

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Streaming: "The Harder They Fall"

Please welcome guest contributor Jasmine Graham

Westerns are not a genre I’m a massive fan of so I had no idea what to expect from The Harder They Fall, a directorial debut from Jeymes Samuels, a singer-songwriter from England. The film, now streaming on Netflix, follows Nat Love (Jonathan Majors) spending the course of the film avenging his parents death as a child to Rufus Buck (Idris Elba) and his gang. Joining them in the ensemble cast are Edi Gathegi, Regina King, and Zazie Beetz to name a few. The cast is exceptional, with wonderful chemistry and such good performances that it’s hard to name one standout. The film is a western, through and through, with bloody and violent shootouts that do not disappoint...

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NYFF: The visual wonder of "The Tragedy of Macbeth"

By Nathaniel R

“When” is the first word of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, uttered by one of three witches. Though the word precedes a question it sounds more like a definitive statement in Joel Coen’s The Tragedy of Macbeth; the writer/director even grants the word its own solo title card. Later the word “Tomorrow” will also grace the screen alone. Time, we immediately understand, is at the heart of the latest big screen Shakespeare. And it’s running out. Coen’s adaptation casts two older-than-usual actors as the titular Lord (Denzel Washington) and Lady (Frances McDormand). As a result their infamous power grab plays like a violently desperate game of “last chance”…

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