James' World 2

The following 9 movies are all Oscar nominated for best picture and more. Click any movie title below, to see the associated review.

CLICK HERE to see a complete list of 2018 Oscar winners

            DARKEST HOUR

Nominated for:

Best Picture, Best  Actor, Cinematography, Costume Design, Makeup and Hairstyling and Production Design

— Totaling 6 Nominations —

WON FOR:  BEST ACTOR AND MAKEUP AND HAIRSTYLING

                  GET OUT

Nominated for:
BEST: Picture, Actor, Director and Original Screenplay

–Totaling 4 Nominations —

WON FOR: ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

           LADY BIRD

Nominated for:

BEST: Picture, Director, Actress, Supporting Actress, and Original Sceenplay

— Totaling 5 Nominations —

                  THE POST

Nominated for:

Best Picture and Best Actress

— Totaling 2 Nominations —

      THE SHAPE OF WATER

Nominated for:

BEST: Picture, Director,  Actress, Supporting Actor, Supporting Actress, Cinematography, Costume Design, Film Editing, Original Score, Production Design, Sound Editing, Sound…

Dunkirk is a war film written, directed, and produced by Christopher Nolan.  The film portrays the miraculous evacuation during World War II from three perspectives: land, sea, and air. It has little dialogue, as Nolan sought to create suspense from cinematography and music. The film has extensive practical effects, employs thousands of extras, historic boats and period airplanes. Dunkirk is a true story about 3,000 plus soldiers hopelessly trapped on the beach at Dunkirk.

Because Dunkirk is a well known story in history, I’ve decided to post the entire story as it doesn’t take anything away from the movie.

WARNING, THE FOLLOWING CONTAINS SPOILERS AS IT TELLS THE entire STORY!

In 1940, during the Battle of France, when allied soldiers retreated to Dunkirk, Tommy (Fionn Whitehead), a young British private, became the sole survivor when he escaped a German ambush and ended up on the beach in Dunkirk.  …

Phantom Thread is a drama written and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson.  This unusual film is about a couturier who takes a young waitress as his muse.  I didn’t think this film was Oscar worthy nor did I think it made a whole lot of sense.  I did feel the acting was brilliant and the fashions were exquisite.

In 1954 London, renowned fashion designer Reynolds Woodcock (Danial Day-Lewis) creates dresses for members of high society. His charisma and genius is matched by his obsessive, controlling personality. Cyril (Lesley Manville) his sister, manages the day-to-day operations of his fashion house and has significant influence over his life. Reynolds is haunted by the death of their mother, and stitches hidden messages into the linings of the dresses he makes to show the artistry of his work.

While visiting a restaurant in the countryside, Reynolds is drawn to a waitress named Alma (Vicky…

Call Me by Your Name is a coming-of-age drama directed by Luca Guadagnino and written by James Ivory and based on the 2007 novel of the same name by André Aciman.  Call Me by Your Name chronicles the romantic relationship between a 17 year old Jewish-American Italian boy and a 24 year old  Jewish-American graduate student who meet and start a  romance in Italy.  At face value, I got very little from this movie but am certain many others found it very informative and touching.

Call Me By Your Name opens in Italy, 1983 at the family home of the Perlman’s.  17 year old Elio, (Timothée Chalamet) lives in the northern Italian countryside with his parents. His father (Michael Stuhlbarg), a professor of archaeology, invites a 24-year-old Oliver (Armie Hammer), to live with his family during the summer to help with his academic paperwork. Elio, an introspective…

Darkest Hour is a British war drama directed by Joe Wright and written by Anthony McCarten. It is an account of the early days of Winston Churchill as Prime Minister, when Nazi Germany swept across Western Europe, threatening to defeat the United Kingdom during World War II. This threat lead to friction at the highest levels of government between those who would make a peace treaty with Hitler and Churchill who refused.

Darkest Hour starts in May of 1940 with the opposition Labour Party in Parliament demanding the resignation of British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain (Ronald Pickup) for being too weak in the face of the Nazi onslaught. Chamberlain tells Conservative Party advisers that he wants Lord Halifax (Stephen Dillane) as his successor, but Halifax does not want to become Prime Minister yet. Chamberlain must choose the only other man whom other parties will support: Winston Churchill (Gary Oldman)…

Lady Bird is a comedy drama written and directed by Greta Gerwig.   Just by the title alone, I thought this was a movie about the wife of LBJ, whose name was Claudia Alta Johnson but was affectionately nicknamed Lady Bird by her nursemaid because she thought Claudia was as “purty as a ladybird”.  To my surprise, Lady Bird is as far from a story about a president or his wife as a story can get.  Instead it is a story about a typical high-school senior and her turbulent relationship with her mother.

Lady Bird is set in Sacramento, California in 2002-03 and tells the story of Christine “Lady Bird” McPherson (Saoirse Ronan) who is a senior student at a Catholic high school and is looking to some day attend an ivy league college in a city with lots of culture.  The problem is, her family is financially strapped…

I, Tonya, is a biographical film directed by Craig Gillespie and written by Steven Rogers.  There has been so much publicity and research into the Tonya Harding Saga, I wanted no parts of any future stories depicting the ups and downs or the rights and wrongs of the haves vs. the have none.  Because of the Oscar nominations, I was destine to see I, Tonya.  I’m glad I did.

I, Tonya, opens in 1970 when Tonya (Maizie Smith [age 4] / Margot Robbie [older adult]  / Mckenna Grace [young adult]) was 4 years old.  Taken to an ice skating rink by her abusive mother Lavona Fay Golden (Allison Janny) who  also took Tonya out of school to persue ice skating full time and employed a full time coach for Tonya, Diane Rowlinson (Julianne Nicholson).  Before long, Tonya becomes one of the best ice skaters in the US.  By…

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri is a crime film written, produced, and directed by Martin McDonagh. Simply put, “3 Billboards” is about a mother who rents three billboards to call attention to her daughter’s unsolved murder.  It sort of reminds me of the TV hit, “Wisdom of the Crowd”.  Instead of using computer technology it’s local, instead of involving the world, it only involves those who see the billboards and instead of having information at your fingertips, you have to make phone calls or rely on logic and whatever detective skills you may have achieved over time.

Mildred Hayes (Frances McDormand) is grieving the rape and murder of her teenage daughter, Angela seven months earlier. Angry over the lack of progress in the investigation, she rents three abandoned billboards near her home, which in sequence reads “RAPED WHILE DYING“, “AND STILL NO ARRESTS?“,  “HOW COME…

The Post is a political thriller directed and produced by Steven Spielberg and written by Liz Hannah and Josh Singer. Set in the early 1970s, The Post depicts the true story of the journalists from The Washington Post and their attempts to publish and expose the Pentagon Papers, classified documents regarding undisclosed information about the involvement of the United States government in the Vietnam War. It was a very long war with no real theme which cost us a great many men. We the people have always wanted to know why. Still unsure of the logic behind this senseless war, only one thing is certain…

In 1965 , State Dept. military analyst Daniel Ellsberg (Matthew Rhys) accompanies U.S. troops in combat to document progress of U.S. military activities in the Vietnam region for Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara (Bruce Greenwood). On the return flight, McNamara expresses to Ellsberg…

Molly’s Game is a crime drama written and directed by Aaron Sorkin (in his directorial debut), based on the memoir, Molly’s Game: From Hollywood’s Elite to Wall Street’s Billionaire Boys Club, My High-Stakes Adventure in the World of Underground Poker by Molly Bloom.  This film is based on a true story and is truly captivating.

Her first accident didn’t stop her but after her Olympic dreams are shattered by a second accident during a qualifying run, world-class skier Molly Bloom (Jessica Chastain) has to rethink her future and skiing isn’t in it. Not feeling like she wants to go straight into law school as originally planned, she instead heads to Las Vegas and finds herself assisting in the production of a high-end underground poker game. Discovering she’s got a knack for this sort of operation, she moves the action to New York and goes into business for herself.  Eventually, a young…