Sean's Run at the Oscars V, 2-27-04
Feb. 27th, 2004 01:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kilroyI almost didn't make it-- but I finally buckled down and rented Seabiscuit. My victory over the Best Picture nominees is now complete.
I suppose it would be remiss to say nothing about the movie, but it was pretty much exactly as I expected it to be. The production values were through the ceiling and used with excellent good taste; the script was highly moral and incorporated a number of overcoming-adversity cliches while maintaining a sense of humor; the cast was elementally ensemble with no one person taking too much of the limelight. It even had the stock photos and the wise-old-man voiceover. In short, Seabiscuit was exactly, precisely, spot-on for its genre. It was not innovative in any way, but it was still an excellent movie.
I think the only thing I can say about it that's not obvious is that it strikes me as sort of the anti-Monster... but you'd have to have seen both films to really appreciate the comparison. Morally, stylistically, scriptwise, character-wise-- they're complete opposites, and yet both really good films. It's good that cinema can encompass such polar opposites effectively; the fact that the Academy nominated two such films for any awards at all gives me a warm feeling.
Addendum: Triplettes of Belleville. Great movie. No dialogue. Awesome.
I suppose it would be remiss to say nothing about the movie, but it was pretty much exactly as I expected it to be. The production values were through the ceiling and used with excellent good taste; the script was highly moral and incorporated a number of overcoming-adversity cliches while maintaining a sense of humor; the cast was elementally ensemble with no one person taking too much of the limelight. It even had the stock photos and the wise-old-man voiceover. In short, Seabiscuit was exactly, precisely, spot-on for its genre. It was not innovative in any way, but it was still an excellent movie.
I think the only thing I can say about it that's not obvious is that it strikes me as sort of the anti-Monster... but you'd have to have seen both films to really appreciate the comparison. Morally, stylistically, scriptwise, character-wise-- they're complete opposites, and yet both really good films. It's good that cinema can encompass such polar opposites effectively; the fact that the Academy nominated two such films for any awards at all gives me a warm feeling.
Addendum: Triplettes of Belleville. Great movie. No dialogue. Awesome.