My thoughts of the Golden Globe winners
The Golden Globe winners were announced last night and once again I experience the frustration of living in a small country where the movies generally arrive months after their international launches.
There was a lot of love for The Descendants and The Artist, Hugo got a nod as well and what can I say? I haven’t watched them and won’t watch them for a long time. I saw about 50 or so new movies in a cinema last year, but quite a few of them are considered “2010 movies”. I’m like Owen Wilson in Midnight in Paris: I live in the past.
But for whatever it’s worth I’ll throw down a few comments on those I’ve seen on the list.
Best Foreign language film: A Separation. I liked it well enough, but there were several other foreign language films I liked better and I’m frankly a little bit baffled at how much love this movie has gotten. For me it was an easy choice: The Skin I Live In, which not only was my favourite foreign language movie, but my favourite movie overall, if you rule out films that were released in 2011 in Sweden but are considered 2010 movies internationally.
Sadly enough it isn’t likely that The Skin I Live in will get any Academy Award, since Spain chose to send a different movie as their contender. (Can a movie that hasn’t been nominated by their country even be awarded?)
Best animated movie: The Adventures of Tintin. No surprise there. I guess it was a weak year for animated movies, but would rather have seen Rango as the winner.
Best screenplay: Midnight in Paris. As a dedicated Woody Allen fan I’m always delighted to see him getting a nod, even though I honestly don’t consider it one of his best movies.
Best supporting actor: Christoffer Plummer/Beginners. This choice gets a big “yay!” from me. It’s one of my favourite movies from last year and Plummer’s performance contributed a great deal to this.
The Velvet Café 
Wow, I didn’t realize The Skin I Live In wasn’t the choice from Spain for the Oscars. I was counting on that to be one of the Oscar nominated films I actually loved. Technically it could get nominated in any (feature narrative) category but foreign language, but that isn’t likely.
Bondo
January 16, 2012 at 3:29 pm
Sad news. I can think of several categories that would apply – best picture, best screenplay, best actress (Elena Anaya) but I’m afraid it isn’t likely to happen.
Jessica
January 16, 2012 at 3:53 pm
Only the foreign language category is decided by Spain. The film can still canpaign and be nominated for other Oscars.
Joel Burman
January 16, 2012 at 4:25 pm
I’ll remain hopeful then until we see the nominations.
Jessica
January 16, 2012 at 5:04 pm
I agree it was a terrible mistake that Spain chose Black Bread over The Skin I Live In.
Bonjour Tristesse
January 16, 2012 at 7:35 pm
To be fair I haven’t seen Black Bread so it’s hard for me to tell. Perhaps it’s awesome. Kudos to Spain then having two such great movies in one year. But it’s really a shame that The Skin I Live In won’t get the chance in the Best foreign language category.
Jessica
January 16, 2012 at 7:39 pm
Belgium was nominated for a globe too with Le Gamin au vélo. And it’s not our send-in for the oscars either. Hopefully Bullhead will do better than the Dardenne brothers movie at the oscars.
Carra
January 16, 2012 at 8:05 pm
It isn’t? Well I’m going to try to watch it this week. It got some very good reviews when it opened last Friday.
Jessica
January 16, 2012 at 11:09 pm
I too am behind on lots of these but The Artist definitely deserves a lot of love and I’m with you, Rango should have won for anaimtion!
Pete
January 16, 2012 at 8:30 pm
I’ll definitely check out The Artist as it comes up here. I’ve heard some mixed views on it but if nothing else I’ve become a bit enchanted by silent movies after watching one with live music a month ago.
Jessica
January 16, 2012 at 11:13 pm
I didn’t thinki t was a weak year for animation. A real breakthough in both motion-capture and, surprisingly, even emotion-capture (I really liked that method from Gore Verbinski for ‘Rango’). A good animated sequel since ‘Shrek 2’ and ‘Toy Story 2’ (and I’m NOT talking about ‘Cars 2’…why that was nominated over ‘Kung Fu Panda 2’ I guess I’ll never know). A surprisingly good Christmas movie that I didn’t expect ANYTHING from, and, to top it off…well, okay, ‘Puss in Boots’ was just fine.
I think people get that impression that it’s a so-called “weak” year because there’s no “good” contribution from Pixar. Which I guess just disappoints them or something, I don’t know. But I really liked this year. If anything, I didn’t think LAST year was nearly as strong. Besides the first absolutely PERFECT use of 3-D in an animated picture (seriously, I really ‘How to Train Your Dragon’ should’ve gotten more acknowledgement for that, even if not an award, at least more word of mouth), there was nothing new. Not like this year.
‘Tintin’ was a really good decision because it’s the first good use of the technology in an animated movie (you know, besides the use of it in live-action films like ‘Lord of the Rings’ and ‘Rise of the Planet of the Apes’). I think a lot of that has to do with the involvement of WETA and, of course, the king himself, Andy Serkis. That said, I would have been just as happy – but less pleasantly surprised considering how Americans would obviously gobble it up – if ‘Rango’ had taken the award home because of its unique method of using the actors not only for their voices.
So am I pleased? Absolutely. I really liked ‘Tintin’, and not just because I grew up with the comics. It had some worthy competitors, but I’m very glad it managed to stand out. I expected it to take home a lot of awards from outside of America, so to see it get one from arguably one of the most famous awards shows in the country is very, for lack of better words, rewarding. 🙂 I’m sure Herge would be very proud.
Marissa
January 16, 2012 at 10:34 pm
OK, I must admit that I haven’t seen several of the nominated movies, so perhaps I shouldn’t be so quick to judge. However sadly enough I didn’t like Tintin at all, and mind you, like you I’m an old Tintin fan, grown up with the comics. I think that’s my problem. I found the movie soulless and too far away from the style of the books. It was messy and even boring at times and even Serkis couldn’t save it. This said I’m fascinated by motion capture like you and I think Serkis was fantastic in The Rise of the Planet of the Apes. It was just Tintin that didn’t work for me. I’m probably hopelessly conservative when it comes to Tintin.
It’s just that… that particular movie was the disappointment of the year to me since I’m a Tintin fan as well as a fan of Spielberg and Jackson. I was prepared to love it and I didn’t, which was sad.
But I’m glad there are others who like it. If nothing else it might bring a new generation to love Tintin and spread the awesomeness of the franchise to US as well. As far as I understand it they’ve never been much of Tintin readers there.
Jessica
January 16, 2012 at 11:19 pm