The day after the day after... The Oscars 2015

I feel partly victorious after this year's ceremony, given that Film Excess' prognosis was 62 % correct this year (13/21), which is a lot better than last year's, (33 % or 7/21). Only partly since it mostly wasn't my favorites that won.

Here's a recap:

J. K. Simmons won Best Supporting Actor for Whiplash; Patricia Arquette Best Supporting Actress for Boyhood, probably the night's most deserved win in my opinion.
The tiny jazz drama Whiplash impressed by also taking Best Editing and Sound Mixing Oscars. 
Film Excess favorite American Sniper underwhelmed by only getting the Sound Editing Oscar: The film was snubbed, regrettably, in what looks like an overly liberal Academy's trying to hit the politically correct marks instead of honoring a truly great American movie.
Another Film Excess favorite, The Grand Budapest Hotel, took 4 'technical' Oscars: Production Design, Make-up and Hair, Costumes and Score (2 time nominee Alexandre Desplat (also nominated this year for The Imitation Game.)
Julianne Moore won Best Actress, as expected, for her role as a woman struggling with Alzheimer's Disease in Still Alice. British Eddie Redmayne surprised by getting Best Actor for his turn as Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything.
Common and John Legend won Best Song for their Glory from Selma and delivered one of the evening's political acceptance speeches, basically stating that America is still a racist country against African-Americans ... Interstellar won Best Visual Effects; Disney's Big Hero 6 Best Animation; Citizenfour Best Documentary; British Graham Moore Best Adapted Screenplay for his conventional Imitation Game script, and Polish nun-drama Ida won for Best Foreign Film.
As the above indicates, the Oscars were scattered over a number of films this year, but the evening's biggest winner was without doubt the bemusing Birdman: Though it won 4 statuettes like Grand Budapest Hotel, Birdman's were by far the more prestigious: Best Film, Original Screenplay, Cinematography (Emmanuel Lubezki won for the second year in a row (after last year's Gravity, he was again honored for his acrobatically impressive 'show' photography in Birdman's one-shot illusion concept)) and Best Director: Mexican Alejandro González Iñárritu, who was snubbed for his masterpiece Babel (2006), which only won for Best Score.
The short winners were Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1 (Documentary Short), Feast (Animated Short) and Phone Call (Live Action Short).

Did the right movies win? - (Mostly) No.
The suspiciously hip, slick satire Birdman was the choice of cool admiration, while American Sniper and especially Boyhood was slighted; both should definitely have won more. The people behind 5-time nominee Foxcatcher, who all went home empty-handed, must also feel somewhat overlooked.

The host of the year, Neil Patrick Harris, was a definite flop. After an opening song that was forgotten before it was over, Harris wise-cracked his way through the ceremony with glib, forgettable jokes. He tried to stand out by poking fun at Birdman by doing Michael Keaton's 'underpants run', but succeeded only in getting some generous laughs and applause from the schmoozing audience. His 'big' joke was to get Octavia Spencer to watch over a box containing his Oscar predictions for the entire show ... They turned out to be very accurate, 'proving' either that the show is depressingly predictable, or that Harris is a host with extremely insufficient powers as an entertaining ditto. His scatter-shot, lackluster approach seemed lazy and uninspired. - He should not get a second chance.
But he wasn't the show's only problem: Most of the presenters were attractive but really dull stars, obviously primarily focused on blowing up their chests and looking pretty. - Where were the comedians? - The singing? (Besides Lady Gaga's Sound of Music tribute and the Best Song nominees.) - The surprises? - Memorable moments?
Unfortunately, the Oscars 2015 was a snoozer, if ever there was one.

The Imitation Game (2014) - Great Cumberbatch, good movie

♥♥♥♥

Benedict Cumberbatch stares you right in the face on the poster for Morten Tyldum's The Imitation Game

The Imitation Game is the much-hyped top-grossing independent movie of 2014, 8 times Oscar-nominated and starring one of the most happening actors alive right now, England's Benedict Cumberbatch (Hawking (2004), TVM).

Alan Turing is the arrogant, quaint mathematician, who claims that he will build a machine that can crack the Germans' enigma code during the distressful time of WWII. As Turing fights for his project, there is another code to be broken as well: the code of Turing himself.

I'll let it be said right off that the film is another Oscar favorite this year (like Birdman (2014)), which doesn't live up to its hype, and if it isn't clear to most people now, perhaps, then I think it will be clear in a few years, once the awards season dust has settled, so to speak.
The Imitation Game is a good period war movie that lives on mainly two qualities: Firstly, the great story at its core: Turing. Secondly, Cumberbatch's serious, transmorphing performance as him. While lots in the man's life has been polished and made easier to understand for a mass audience in 114 minutes' time, Cumberbatch has on the other hand been allowed to run wild with a deep-felt and unabashed characterization, which is the film's main selling point, and will quite likely earn him his first Oscar statuette in a couple of weeks' time. [Post-note: It didn't: Eddie Redmayne instead won for portraying Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything (2014).]
Other distinguished performers here include secondaries Rory Kinnear (Cuban Fury (2014)) as the detective that gets a whiff of Turing's secrets, Mark Strong (Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011)) as his superior Menzies and young Alex Lawther (X+Y (2014)) as young Turing, who is stunningly close to Cumberbatch's portrait.
In the up-played part as Turing's friend Joan Clarke, Keira Knightley (Pride & Prejudice (2005)) does well but is basically second banana. - Her Oscar-nomination for this supporting performance (her second after Pride & Prejudice) is a bit hard to understand, and definitely shouldn't wind up giving her her first statuette.

Benedict Cumberbatch by the cinematically enlarged, redesigned 'Bombe' decode machine for Morten Tyldum's The Imitation Game

The details:

The film is based on the first sold feature script of young screenwriter Graham Moore (Pirates vs. Ninjas (2005), short), who also, amazingly, has been Oscar-nominated for this job. (The script was a Blacklist favorite in 2011.) The complexity of Turing and his math gets washed over here and cooked down to a kind of motto which is repeated by different characters at different times in the film. But the story of the film and its success is so good that scores of audiences and critics won't recognize its dubious reconstruction of Turing, which you can read about towards the bottom of this page.
Together with a visual and score side (by Alexander Desplat, also Oscar-nominated) that both are neat but nothing particularly outstanding, Imitation Game comes off somewhat dusty and old-fashioned, perhaps also because it follows the towering Oscar-winner of last year, the sensuous, emotionally overpowering masterpiece 12 Years a Slave (2013).
But even comparing it to more related fare like Ron Howard's great mathematician biopic A Beautiful Mind (2001) or the recent British home run period biopic The King's Speech (2010), The Imitation Game simply falls short.
It is the English-language debut of Norwegian director Morten Tyldum (Headhunters/Hodejegerne (2011)), who should have given more of a damn of all the well-meaning forces undoubtedly securing that he "got it right" here with this heavy, important material, and instead have given us a bit wilder version of Turing's life. Incredibly, though, even Tyldum is Oscar-nominated for his direction.
At its core, the film presents a startling and incredible story; at its best, it is about how much of the 'great war' and the fate of much of Europe was controlled by mathematicians and statistics in a room in England. - That is new to the screen and mind-bending 'news' to boot. Turing's sad end, condemned for his homosexuality, ending his own life, becomes a a tragic end-note instead of a serious aftermath, the natural 3rd act for the film about his life, which might have made it excell. This doesn't happen.

Oscar-nominated, beautiful Keira Knightley, second banana in Morten Tyldum's The Imitation Game

Watch the trailer here

Cost: 14 mil. $
Box office: 134.6 mil. $ (and counting)
= Huge hit
[The Weinstein Company struck gold once again by purchasing the movie for 7 mil. $ for US distribution (the reportedly biggest sum paid for a foreign film ever), where it has made 69.8 mil. $ so far (52 % of the total gross). It premiered at Telluride, played at Toronto, and premiered in Europe at the BFI London Film Festival. It still has just over a dozen countries yet to premiere in, including, most prominently, Japan.]

What do you think of The Imitation Game?