Oscar Predictions 2017

Happy Oscar Day everyone! Before the best night if the year begins, here are my prediction’s for tonight’s winners

full list of nominees here

Best Picture: La La Land 

Director: Damien Chazelle for La La Land

Actor in  Leading Role: Casey Affleck for Manchester by the Sea. This one could definitely go to Denzel Washington for Fences as well and I would not be surprised. Though I’m rooting for Denzel, Casey had a lot of early awards season momentum that might land him on that stage.

Actress in a Leading Role: Emma Stone for La La Land. While I do not think Emma Stone should win as her performance was not exactly Oscar-worthy to me, she has come out as the front runner for this category so I’m going to put my money on her. Isabelle Hupert for the French film Elle is one to look out for though.

Actor in a Supporting Role: Mahershala Ali for Moonlight

Actress in a Supporting Role: Viola Davis for Fences

Original Screenplay: Manchester by the Sea

Adapted Screenplay: Moonlight

Animated Feature Film: Zootopia

Foreign Film: The Salesman

Best Music (original song): “City of Stars”, La La Land

Music (original score): La La Land

Cinematography: La La Land

Costume Design: Jackie, but the La La Land sweep could take this one as well even if it’s not as deserving

Documentary Feature:  OJ: Made in America

Film Editing: La La Land

Makeup and Hair styling:  Star Trek Beyond

Production Design: La La Land

Visual Effects: The Jungle Book

Sound Mixing: La La Land, watch out for Hacksaw Ridge though

Sound Editing:  Hacksaw Ridge, deserves it more than La La Land but again the sweep

Short Film, live action: Ennemis Interieurs

Short Film, animated:  Piper

Documentary Short: The White Helmets

Make sure to tune in to the Oscars tonight 8:30 pm EST on ABC! Jimmy Kimmel is hosting this year and it should be a good show with a lot of great winners. I will also be live tweeting so check out our Twitter page as well!

Catch-Up!!

Wow I am terrible, it has been almost three months since the last post! Wow, where did the time go? Well I actually was very busy for the past couple of months but my attention is now to you whatever few and faithful readers I may still have. One of the reasons I had a busy schedule was due to traveling as my family went to India for almost three weeks. Now anyone who has been on those cross the globe flights knows that the only real way to pass the insufferable hours is to watch movies and that is exactly what I did! So similar to last year’s catch up post after my trip to Barcelona, here are some short reviews of the movies I watched on the plane to and back.

Cinderella (2015: Lily James, Cate Blanchett, Richard Madden, Helena Bonham Carter)

I loved Cinderella! It is a great movie for anyone to watch, classic Disney. Sure there were times when Cinderella’s goodness was almost sickeningly sweet but it was all made up for by the glorious Richard Madden as Prince Charming. He was fantastic and charming, (haha funny joke). However, I thought the best performance was hands down Cate Blanchett, who played the evil stepmother perfectly. Helena Bonham Carter was also a nice little pop of fun as the fairy godmother. Cinderella was very enjoyable.

 

Into the Woods (2014: Meryl Streep, Anna Kendrick, Emily Blunt, Johnny Depp)

This was a very different turn after the traditional Cinderella as both films included the same character but in different lights. I thought the acting in Into the Woods was spot on, including of course Meryl Streep and also Chris Pine who was pretty hilarious at times. The movie itself was just eh to me. I realize the story is based upon the Broadway musical of the same name but the pacing felt off at times. This also is not exactly a movie for children which I think the marketing failed to highlight. Into the Woods was not really my favorite.

 

Kingsman: The Secret Service (2014: Colin Firth, Taron Egerton, Samuel L. Jackson, Michael Caine)

I have actually been meaning to watch Kingsman for a while so imagine my delight when seeing it among the plane films. It was a fun movie to watch and I loved the style and tone of it. I am a big James Bond fan so it had that kind of vibe going on at times. I was surprised by the actual reason behind Samuel L. Jackson’s master plan: the environment and population size (shout out to AP environmental students!). The film was definitely goofy at times and the violence/gore actually caught me off guard but only added to the fun in the end. Kingsman was chock full of spy action which I enjoyed!

 

 

American Sniper (2014: Bradley Cooper, Sienna Miller)

American Sniper is not really a film that one enjoys. It is more of a film that one just has to sit down and get through. I can say though that it was very well done though so props to Clint Eastwood for his direction and an impressive performance by Bradley Cooper.

 

 

Focus (2015: Will Smith, Margot Robbie)

Focus was more stylish than solid to me. It is a pretty movie on the surface but closer examination just leads to a very confusing and at times messy plot. The chemistry between Will Smith and Margot Robbie was very believable though. I think the movie just tried to be too smart and slick.

 

 

Cake (2014: Jennifer Aniston, Anna Kendrick, Sam Worthington, Adriana Barraza)

I was  deciding between Cake and Still Alice (which has Julianne Moore’s Oscar-winning performance) but I found myself to be more curious about Jennifer Aniston in Cake. I thought she did a fantastic job! The film definitely acted as a vehicle to show off her skills but for good reason since it seems she has not had this type of opportunity before. However the plot of Cake was very underdeveloped and was more about Jennifer Aniston overall.

The other two movies I watched on the plane were Mili (a Malayalam movie) and Happy New Year ( a Hindi movie), both of which were pretty good in my opinion, but this post is getting long and my fingers are tired of typing so we will save those for another time. Perhaps a foreign film post is needed to also cover the many movies I watched in India as well! Let’s get into the summer blockbusters now in the meantime!

 

 

Oscar Predictions 2015

People, it’s that time of year again….THE OSCARS! The show is set for tomorrow so here are Ticket Stub Love’s predictions for the big winners!

full list of nominees, click here

Best Picture: Boyhood. It’s not my favorite (check out our review), but it will most likely win

Director: Richard Linklater for Boyhood. Though, I would prefer Alejandro G. Iñárritu for Birdman 

Actor in  Leading Role: I am honestly split between Eddie Redmayne for The Theory of Everything or Michael Keaton for Birdman. I am going to guess Redmayne because he’s been sweeping a lot of major awards, but man I really want Keaton!

Actress in a Leading Role: Julianne Moore for Still Alice (Rosamund Pike was awesome though in Gone Girl, gotta give her props)

Actor in a Supporting Role: J.K. Simmons for Whiplash 

Actress in a Supporting Role: Patricia Arquette for Boyhood

Original Screenplay: Birdman: Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Nicolás Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris, Jr. & Armando Bo

Adapted Screenplay: The Imitation Game: Graham Moore

Animated Feature Film: How to Train Your Dragon 2

Foreign Film: Leviathan (Russia)

Best Music (original song): “Glory” from Selma

Music (original score): The Theory of Everything: Jóhann Jóhannsson

Cinematography: Birdman: Emmanuel Lubezki

Costume Design: The Grand Budapest Hotel: Milena Canonero

Documentary Feature:  CitizenFour

Film Editing: Boyhood: Sandra Adair

Makeup and Hair styling:  The Grand Budapest Hotel: Frances Hannon and Mark Coulier

Production Design: The Grand Budapest Hotel: Adam Stockhausen (Production Design); Anna Pinnock (Set Decoration)

Visual Effects: Interstellar: Paul Franklin, Andrew Lockley, Ian Hunter and Scott Fisher

Sound Mixing: Whiplash: Craig Mann, Ben Wilkins and Thomas Curley

Sound Editing:  American Sniper: Alan Robert Murray and Bub Asman

Short Film, live action: Parvaneh

Short Film, animated:  The Bigger Picture

Documentary Short: Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1

Yay! Make sure to tune in to see the 86th Academy Awards hosted By Neil Patrick Harris on Sunday, February 22 at 8:30pm ET on ABC. Red carpet coverage will probably start at 7. HERE WE GO!!!

 

RIP Robin Williams

 

“Genie, you’re free”

-Aladdin (1992)

 

RIP Robin Williams, thank you for making so many of us laugh

Catch-up!

Well where has the time gone? Ticket Stub Love has been extremely busy lately and we probably won’t be able to get back into full swing until summer but we’re doing our best to still bring you some reviews.

So I recently went on vacation to Barcelona and on my way there I watched some movies of course. Right when I turned on the little TV in front of me, I got really excited because it was full of pretty up to date ones too!

Now these aren’t full reviews but a few thoughts of some of the movies I watched:

American Hustle (Christian Bale, Amy Adams, Bradley Cooper, Jennifer Lawrence, Jeremy Renner)

I have wanted to watch this for a while so I immediately selected this as my first choice. Got to say though, kinda disappointed. Now don’t get me wrong, I loved the cast. Every single actor did a great job but the story was so bland. I enjoyed the beginning where you got introduced to everyone and it went through some of the past cons of Christian Bale’s and Amy Adam’s characters, but when they got into the full Abscam storyline, I quickly lost interest. It got good again near the end, but still a downer.

Gravity (Sandra Bullock, George Clooney)

Sooo remember my trailer review of Gravity back in August where I made fun of the movie (I later too back some of this in follow-up post). Yeah, I was wrong. Dead wrong. Gravity was AMAZING! No wonder it won 7 Oscars! Everything was great: cinematography, score, direction, performances. I mean Sandra Bullock’s character has pretty much everything go wrong on her in space, but the audience is still tethered to her because it’s just that thrilling. I loved this movie and thought it was fantastic!

The Book Thief (Sophie Nélisse, Emily Watson, Geoffrey Rush)

I am a huge fan of the book so I was naturally curious to see how the movie pulled off the movie. Overall I would say it was well done. Nothing compared to the book though because there are some aspects of the book that don’t have the same impact when transitioned to the big screen, such as the narrator being Death-you just can’t do that well on-screen.

 

1 Year Anniversary!

First of all, I want to apologize for not reviewing lately. I haven’t seen any movies lately that have inspired me to do a review. However, with the holiday season coming around, hopefully we can get back into the swing of things again.

Today  marks the one year anniversary of Ticket Stub Love! I really just want to thank everyone who has checked out this blog and especially those who have followed along from the very beginning. Your support has been amazing and doing this blog has been such a fun experience for me.

From all of us here at Ticket Stub Love: THANK YOU!

~Amy A, founder

Changed Opinion About Gravity???

Hmmm so I hope you all remember that trailer review I did of the upcoming Gravity film By Alfonso Cuar‪ón and starring Sandra Bullock and George Clooney. I think it is time for me to go back and watch that trailer again because the film is getting critical acclaim! It currently has a 98% on Rotten Tomatoes and many critics are praising the direction, screenplay, cinematography, effects, and score to be breathtaking and amazingly beautiful. Sandra Bullock is also getting rave reviews for her performance. So maybe I shouldn’t have underestimated the genius Cuar‪ón and been so quick to judge. I even considered taking down that last post since it contrasted so differently; however, I think it serves as a lesson. To not judge a movie by it’s trailer!  Hey, who knows, it might still not be too favorable for me if I ever do see it, but hopefully I can do a review soon on the actual movie. We’ll see!

Gravity comes out today. PG-13, 1 hr 31 min

ALL IN ALL: Don’t judge a movie by its trailer!

superhero movies overload: a rant

Okay so this week there has been a lot of superhero movie talk. Sony announced The Amazing Spiderman 2 and 3 release dates, in addition to Shailene Woodley being cut out of the 2nd movie as Mary Jane. I guess it makes sense to wait to introduce her until the 3rd movie, but come on, she already shot the scenes and everything! Plus I was really looking forward to seeing her. However, I’m not really looking forward to the sequels that much. First of all, I did not see the need for the 1st movie because the last Spiderman film (Spiderman 3)  was just out 5 years ago. Really? A reboot that soon? Sure the movie was good, but I’m not sure if a whole trilogy is actually wanted by a lot of people.

Now another Marvel mega hit was announced today for two more sequels. Yup The Avengers. Was I the only one who wasn’t obsessed with this movie? Probably with me being more of a DC Comics girl (still need to see Man of Steel), I was not really that impressed. Now there’s going to be 2 more? Oy vey. Not to mention the separate sequels for all the other members of The Avengers. Captain America: The Winter Soldier  (2014) and Thor: The Dark World (2013). Is there going to be an Iron Man 4and 5? I know there were rumors. Oh and there’s going to be a Fantastic Four reboot (2015), when again the last one came out 5 years ago, and the new X-Men: Days of the Future movie (2014)….. whoa. Marvel, slow down!!!!! Can we give DC some time to catch up here?

Also did anyone see Man of Steel? Critics were iffy on it, but I know a lot of people who absolutely loved it. comments please!

In Memoriam: Roger Ebert

1942 – 2013

Roger Ebert was a film critic. A film critic who redefined the art of film criticism. His reviews could sky-rocket a career and bring a nobody out of the shadows and into the spotlight. His iconic use of a “thumbs up” for grading a film is used frequently nowadays, sadly without much recognition to Ebert himself. Roger Ebert was not scared to give a movie a bad review. He told the truth, a bold truth that was always agreeable true! For me, Roger Ebert was the first film critic I ever knew by name. Whenever I came across a review, the first thing I would do was look for his name and see what he had to say because I knew that he would tell the raw truth. I agreed with his opinions 99% of the time, and I am terrified at the fact that I now can’t know what a great man thinks after he sees a movie. Roger Ebert was not just a critic. He was a man who loved the art of film and loved to talk about it.

We are put on this planet only once, and to limit ourselves to the familiar is a crime against our minds – Roger Ebert

 

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Merry Christmas! I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday!

 

~Amy A.