RobertR

I'll agree that the film does need to be more than plot driven. I just wish they were better at it when they do it.

Watchmen is about as densely packed as any comic book and it's obvious that about 4 hours would have been enough to cover just about everything in those 12 issues. Certainly 5 hours would have been plenty. I can't imagine that Walking Dead is that dense. The first part of the season had enough different things going on that I thought the pace worked. Plus, Andrea seemed a lot less important to the plot. We pretty much know the Governor is a crazy, despot now just biding his time before he strikes and although I think "Clear" was one of the best episodes of the whole series, the overarching plotline isn't advancing for no good reason. Maybe in subsequent seasons they can break the storylines down further so that you get one arc done in the fall and one in the spring instead of stringing it out over the full season with a cliffhanger in the middle. They're better off being a plot based show than a slow boil character based show.

I could probably look it up myself, but how long did the Prison/Governor arc last in the comics? While I think that Season 3 is a big improvement in most regards, the overall arc seems to be mostly spinning its wheels the last few weeks setting up the big confrontation.

I think what you most want to look for is consistency and all parts working together when judging a director. The old chestnut is, when one performance is good, credit the actor, when all the performances are good, credit the director. The director is the boss and everything passes through him for approval and guidance. Some delegate more than others, but just like any manager their fingerprints are going to be on the final product. Robert

Yeah, the poor Ben Affleck meme could have stopped a month ago. I get the Hollywood likes him and he probably should have been nominated for Best Director, but it's not like he isn't already a highly respected and paid director. If anyone has a claim to complain, I'd agree that it was Bigelow. The film got smeared with the idea that it supports torture, and I think that was as much Oscar politics as real politics. It helps that she already has an Oscar, so it would have been incredibly difficult for her to complain, but it also does nothing to encourage tackling difficult material. The way the voting is set up now, you can be divisive and get a nomination if you're loved by 5% of the voters, but since they use a preferential ranking ballot, consensus is the order of the day for the big winner. Argo with its "Hollywood helps save the day" story probably was middle of the pack in rankings even with the naysayers. That's as much of a reason that it won as the quality of the film. Being non-divisive, or if you're being uncharitable "safe", is a plus in that kind of system when finishing 2nd or 3rd on a lot of ballots beats being divisive and getting a lot of 1st and 9th place votes. Robert

Just like a closer, only goes for a limited amount of categories instead of for a complete game. I don't know if there's much to say about the awards this year. Some surprises, but nothing totally out of left field. I think Argo is a little slight for a BP winner, but it's well crafted, smart, entertaining, and non-controversial and it's easy to see why a consensus emerged for it. It's doesn't stick out like a sore thumb when you put it in a list of films that were viewed as primarily entertainment/thrillers that won like Rebecca, The French Connection, The Sting, Rocky, The Silence of the Lambs, Gladiator, or The Departed. As for the ceremony itself, I thought it was hit and miss. Shirley Bassey was probably the highlight. Macfarlane was his usually scattershot, adolescent self, although apparently the ratings were way up for teens and young men, so I expect that he'll be back. After Tina Fey and Amy Poehler get a shot to host a more female friendly show.

Purely on what I think is likely to win. This is the horse race report. As far as what I would like to win, throw a dart at the board and I'll probably not complain this year. I haven't been able to see several of the major nominees, Lincoln, Life of Pi, Les Mis, and Zero Dark Thirty, for a variety of reasons including length of the films, so it's hard for me to get really worked up. Kind of odd since I've seen 40 some 2012 releases, from a variety of genres, but from what I gather I expect I'd like all of them, but not be blown away by any. From what I've seen, my BP vote would probably go to Beasts of the Southern Wild, but I recognize that's not likely to mean anything on Sunday, especially since I'm well aware of the box office. If we were taking the year as a whole, Holy Motors would probably get my vote, but no surprise that it's not nominated, it's much too weird and esoteric for the Oscars. Robert

Honestly, there are enough unknown quantities in the pitching staff that I'm willing to see just who's throwing the ball well in Spring Training and go from there. Odds are there's going to be some change in the staff anyways once the season starts. I fully expect to see 7 or 8 different pitchers start games and I don't think a midseason trade is beyond the realm of possibility. I agree that Narveson doesn't have the upside of some of the Brewers prospects, but I think his downside is fairly small as well. Really, the big questions I'd have would be for Roenicke. How prepared is he to change things up if guys in the starting rotation, other than Gallardo, are struggling? Sticking with Wolf as long as he did last year was arguably his biggest mistake of the season. Does he treat the pitching rotation decided in Spring Training, as written in stone or is he willing to make changes? I realize guys are going to go through bad stretches and you can't yank a guy from the rotation every time there's a bad outing, but figuring out when to make a change and being willing to make it, may be an important managerial decision this year that could make the difference between a successful or unsuccessful season.

Prediction Time BEST PICTURE: Argo DIRECTOR: Steven Spielberg ("Lincoln") LEAD ACTOR: Daniel Day-Lewis ("Lincoln") LEAD ACTRESS: Jennifer Lawrence ("Silver Linings Playbook") SUPPORTING ACTOR: Tommy Lee Jones ("Lincoln") SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Anne Hathaway ("Les Miserables") ANIMATED FEATURE: Wreck-It Ralph DOCUMENTARY FEATURE: Searching for Sugar Man FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM: Amour ADAPTED SCREENPLAY: Lincoln ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY: Zero Dark Thirty PRODUCTION DESIGN: Anna Karenina CINEMATOGRAPHY: Life of Pi COSTUME DESIGN: Anna Karenina FILM EDITING: Argo MAKEUP: Les Miserables MUSIC (SCORE): Life of Pi MUSIC (SONG): "Skyfall" from "Skyfall" SOUND EDITING: Zero Dark Thirty SOUND MIXING: Les Miserables VISUAL EFFECTS: Life of Pi BEST DOCUMENTARY - SHORT SUBJECT Inocente BEST LIVE ACTION SHORT FILM Curfew BEST ANIMATED SHORT FILM Paperman

Frankly, playing football itself probably causes more long term health problems than PEDs. Which isn't an excuse for breaking the rules, but I think the PED debate lacks perspective a lot of the time. People are mad that baseball players use PEDs because there's a myth of purity that they don't want to see shattered. People also like to see home runs hit a long way and like to see players perform at a high level, and their team win, and will fill the stands and defend a player as long as those two goals are accomplished. Frankly, there's a fine and probably scientifically unsupportable line between legal supplements and illegal PEDs. I kind of think in 20 years with a lot more science that the line will move considerably in the direction of getting all the performance of the PEDs without the side effects. And, we'll have to make a choice between optimal performance with supplements or supposed purity. Robert

Nominations are out tomorrow, might as well make a couple of predictions. I'm expecting 8 to 10 Best Picture nominations, most likely 9. Here's my prediction in order of likelihood of nomination. 1. Lincoln 2. Zero Dark Thirty 3. Argo 4. Les Miserables 5. Silver Linings Playbook 6. Life of Pi 7. Moonrise Kingdom 8. Django Unchained 9. Beasts of the Southern Wild 10. Skyfall Others that I could see hanging around and perhaps pulling a surprise are The Master, Amour, The Sessions, The Dark Knight Rises, and The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (the Academy is old). So far, I haven't seen 5 of the films I expect to be nominated. That will change. And, in general, I don't have any major issue if the nominations pan out that way. A little bit of everything and some solidly ambitious films. Not the riskiest bunch, but then awards of these types run on concensus. Robert

I spent some time getting caught up with Walking Dead over the holidays. Overall, I think it's in a far better place than it was at this point last year, although I think it's character work is really lacking. At least among the main characters. Rick is a really underwhelming leader, partly because he can never really have a clean victory due to the nature of the show, and Michonne is being forced down our throat as cool, when really all she's done is scowl a lot. OTOH, the Governor and Merle have livened up the show a lot and stuff is happening at a good clip now. I don't particularly think there are many main characters that are intrinsically interesting, but they've gotten to the point where I don't find any characters actively annoying. That's progress. It's also verging on comedy on how they can only seem to have one black male character on the show at any one time. It's a good thing I like the premise as much as I do. Although, honestly, if American Horror Story did a zombie apocalypse storyline featuring Jessica Lange, I'd be all over it. At least I'd be confident in the acting and character work even if the plotting was insane. Robert

Ishikawa is settling into a career as a fungible bench guy. Nothing wrong with that (c'mon the alternative was Brooks Conrad), but also no reason to go to arbitration with them either. Still, he apparently has a good attitude and works hard and given an acceptable level of performance he should find himself a nice niche for the next 4 to 6 years. Robert

I'll give this to the showrunners, they're ruthless about cutting characters that don't work. Sometimes even redeeming said characters in the process, at least a little. They've got to do a better job of building the characters in the first place though or the trick is going to wear out its welcome in a hurry. At some point, it would be nice to invest in a couple of characters because you actually care what happens to them than out of some sense of obligation. Robert

Yeah, it was a good start. Albeit, they leaned on what they do well, conflict between people and zombies, with the character and dialogue work being on the light side. That's probably a smart move on their part, but obviously that can't be sustained every week on a budget. Still, giving them an objective (take the prison), obstacles to overcome (zombies), and complications (body armor wearing zombies) is good television. You could nitpick their tactics, but overall I think entertainment value trumps those nitpicks. Robert

The show returns, and probably my love/hate relationship with it. It has my attention for this season, but as far as I'm concerned the training wheels and excuses are gone. Robert

Both Marvel and DC offer a selection of their older comics digitally through Comixology.

My top ten 1. Seven Samurai - I watch it every year. I never get tired of it and I find something new every time I watch it. It's just a complete movie in all respects. 2. The Godfather - Do I really have to explain? 3. Casablanca - Because I'm a softie at heart. 4. Citizen Kane - Again a movie I can watch again and again and find something new. 5. M - A great thriller with Peter Lorre giving one of the greatest performances of the 20th century. Timeless. 6. The Third Man - Love everything about it. It's a toss up about what I love more, Welles' cuckoo clock speech or the ending shot. 7. Blue Velvet - The most polarizing film I've ever seen. It's beautiful, scary, disturbing, and mesmerizing. 8. Lawrence of Arabia - The ultimate epic. 9. Ran - Kurosawa's take on King Lear. Probably something that could only be made by an old man who had suffered failure and despair at some point. 10. The Grand Illusion - A film of great humanity. It really puts the lie to the notion of nationalism being a justification for war. The individual ballots for directors should be available soon at BFIs website. I think that's often more interesting than the poll itself which is a pretty conservative thing. Robert

As an fyi, A Face in the Crowd, one of the films that made Andy Griffith a star, is on TCM tomorrow. He takes a real dark turn in that one while not being far from his persona. It's an astoundingly good performance. Can we all agree that the best episode of The Andy Griffith Show is "Aunt Bea's Pickles"? Robert

You might want to check the refresh rate on your tv as well. Some tvs are set to artificially refresh at a higher rate than the 24 fps of film and I've heard that it can do more harm than good. Seeing if you can set the refresh rate to match the movie fps, is an experiment worth trying. Robert

Frank Drebin was a better ump than some of what I've seen this year.

Yeah, this reminds me of the complaints of Roenicke picking Ishikawa over Brooks Conrad. At the end of the day, the roster problems won't be solved by picking one marginal or worse ballplayer over another, but by bringing in someone who has some legitimate talent. Robert

Is the blu ray player outputting at 1080P? If it looks similar to broadcast HD, the player or the tv is probably set to 720.

I've got a long list, so some bullet points. Drive More about mood, style, and Ryan Gosling doing a slow burn than action, and all the better for it, IMO. The Idiot Kurosawa takes on Dostoevsky with mixed results. There's some very good stuff in here and some stuff that just plods along. It doesn't help that an hour of material was chopped out by the studio. The Muppets There are some clever songs and its a fun time, but it never really sells me that the Muppets getting back together is important other than nostalgia. Maybe next time The Muppets will be front and center of their own movie. The Adventures of Tintin Spielberg brings out some of his old Raiders of the Lost Ark action chops. Too bad the title character is such a non-entity. The dog is always entertaining though. Clue Pretty solid Agatha Christie style sendup, which is why it mostly works while I can't see other game based properties working as movies. The cast makes the movie work. Razorback Australian Jaws rip-off, that looks way more stylish than it has any right to be. Ikiru Certified classic from Kurosawa. Everything clicked for me on this watch. Due Date Recycled Planes, Trains, and Automobiles with less likable/funny characters. You're better off with Martin and Candy. The Gorgon The Hound of the Baskervilles The Man Who Could Cheat Death I'm on a Terence Fisher kick. The Gorgon is really stylish, Barbara Shelley is very appealing, and Christopher Lee gets to play a good guy, but some questionable makeup holds it back. Peter Cushing makes a very fine Sherlock Holmes which gets almost everything right in a horror laced adaptation although the hound itself is underwhelming. The Man Who Could Cheat Death is a solid Hammer entry which has much the same premise as The Night Strangler. Jane Eyre The two leads do well with an adaptation that captures a surprising amount of the plot of the novel, but doesn't quite capture Jane's fire and anger. Mission Impossible - Ghost Protocol Dubai might be the most fun an Act II of an action film can be. Brad Bird gives the material a light touch so that it feels a bit like a 60s throwback. A fun piece of popcorn entertainment. Fiend Without a Face 50s sci-fi film which is most notable for the gore effects and the stop motion animation of the brain creatures which are the threat. Good for what it is. Back to Bataan John Wayne WWII film which is a fairly episodic take on the Filipino resistance to the Japanese. An interesting premise, but a fairly standard movie overall which never develops much momentum. Alien This is just a well oiled machine of a movie. It looks great and the cast is excellent. It's a Blu Ray you should own. Aliens Aliens is showing its age in many ways and the characters are becoming more caricatures as it ages, but there's no denying that the last 20 to 30 minutes is a pure roller coaster and Cameron at the top of his game. It's a Blu Ray you should own. Planet of the Vampires A pair of spaceships land on a distant, fog shrouded world and deal with an ancient evil. Pretty clearly an influence on Alien and Prometheus. It's sci-fi hokum, but directed with great style by Mario Bava. Seven Samurai My favorite film. It's a masterpiece of editing as it just moves incredibly well making the 3+ hours feel more like 2. Superman vs. the Elite Not up to the usual standards of the DC animated movies as far as the quality of animation goes, but a really solid story. It gets that if Superman wasn't noble, he'd be a terrifying concept and uses that to show why the square thing he's become is a good thing. Robert

I can't vouch for your reaction to the movie, but Speed Racer looks AMAZING on Blu Ray. The Alien and Aliens Blu Rays are must buys as well. And on sale currently. Robert