The 2007 ACADEMY AWARDS

Best motion picture of the year
Babel
Letters from Iwo Jima
Little Miss Sunshine
The Queen
THE WINNER: The Departed

Performance by an actor in a leading role
Leonardo DiCaprio, Blood Diamond
Ryan Gosling, Half Nelson
Peter O’Toole, Venus
Will Smith, The Pursuit of Happyness
THE WINNER: Forest Whitaker, The Last King of Scotland

Performance by an actor in a supporting role
Jackie Earle Haley, Little Children
Djimon Hounsou, Blood Diamond
Eddie Murphy, Dreamgirls
Mark Wahlberg, The Departed
THE WINNER: Alan Arkin, Little Miss Sunshine

Original screenplay
Guillermo Arriaga, Babel
Iris Yamashita, Paul Haggis, Letters from Iwo Jima
Guillermo del Toro, Pan's Labyrinth
Peter Morgan, The Queen
THE WINNER: Michael Arndt, Little Miss Sunshine

Achievement in cinematography
The Black Dahlia
Children of Men
The Illusionist
The Prestige
THE WINNER: Pan’s Labyrinth

Visual Effects
Poseidon
Superman Returns
THE WINNER: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest

Achievement in costume design
Curse of the Golden Flower
The Devil Wears Prada
Dreamgirls
The Queen
THE WINNER: Marie Antoinette

Achievement in sound mixing
Apocalypto
Blood Diamond
Flags of our Fathers
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest
THE WINNER: Dreamgirls

Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original song)
"Listen," Dreamgirls
"Love You I Do," Dreamgirls
"Our Town," Cars
"Patience," Dreamgirls
THE WINNER: "I Need to Wake Up," An Inconvenient Truth

Best animated feature film of the year
Cars
Monster House
THE WINNER: Happy Feet

Best documentary feature
Deliver Us from Evil
Iraq in Fragments
Jesus Camp
My Country, My Country
THE WINNER: An Inconvenient Truth

Best animated short film
Lifted
The Little Matchgirl
Maestro
No Time for Nuts
THE WINNER: The Danish Poet

Achievement in directing
Babel, Alejandro González Iñárritu
Letters from Iwo Jima, Clint Eastwood
The Queen, Stephen Frears
United 93, Paul Greengrass
THE WINNER: The Departed, Martin Scorsese

Performance by an actress in a leading role
Penélope Cruz, Volver
Judi Dench, Notes on a Scandal
Meryl Streep, The Devil Wears Prada
Kate Winslet, Little Children
THE WINNER: Helen Mirren, The Queen

Performance by an actress in a supporting role
Adriana Barraza, Babel
Cate Blanchett, Notes on a Scandal
Abigail Breslin, Little Miss Sunshine
Rinko Kikuchi, Babel
THE WINNER: Jennifer Hudson, Dreamgirls

Adapted screenplay
Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan
Children of Men
Little Children
Notes on a Scandal
THE WINNER: The Departed

Achievement in film editing
Babel
Blood Diamond
Children of Men
United 93
THE WINNER: The Departed

Achievement in art direction
Dreamgirls
The Good Shepherd
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
The Prestige
THE WINNER: Pan's Labyrinth

Achievement in makeup
Apocalypto
Click
THE WINNER: Pan's Labyrinth

Achievement in sound editing
Apocalypto
Blood Diamond
Flags of Our Fathers
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest
THE WINNER: Letters from Iwo Jima

Achievement in music written for motion pictures (Original score)
The Good German
Notes on a Scandal
Pan's Labyrinth
The Queen
THE WINNER: Babel

Best foreign language film of the year
After the Wedding
Days of Glory (Indigènes)
Pan's Labyrinth
Water
THE WINNER: The Lives of Others

Best documentary short subject
Recycled Life
Rehearsing a Dream
Two Hands
THE WINNER: The Blood of Yingzhou District

Best live action short film
Binta and the Great Idea (Binta Y La Gran Idea)
Éramos Pocos (One Too Many)
Helmer & Son
The Saviour
THE WINNER: West Bank Story

The 27th Annual Golden Raspberry Awards (The Razzies)

Along with the Academy Awards that honor the BEST in film, the GOLDEN RASPBERRY Awards honors THE WORST in film.

Worst Picture:
Basic Instinct 2
a.k.a.
Basically, It Stinks, Too
Sony/Columbia

Worst Actress:
Sharon Stone
Basically, It Stinks, Too

Worst Actor:
Marlon Wayans & Shawn Wayans
Little Man

Worst Supporting Actress:
Carmen Electra
Date Movie and Scary Movie 4

Worst Supporting Actor:
M. Night Shyamalan
Lady in the Water

Worst Director:
M. Night Shyamalan
Lady in the Water

Worst Screen Couple:
Shawn Wayans
& either
Kerry Washington
or
Marlon Wayans
Little Man

Worst Remake Or Rip-off:
Little Man
(Rip-off of the 1954 Bugs Bunny cartoon "Baby Buggy Bunny")

Worst Prequel or Sequel:
Basically, It Stinks, Too

Worst Screenplay:
Basically, It Stinks, Too
Screenplay by Leora Barish & Henry Bean, Based on Characters Created by Joe Ezsterhas

Worst Excuse for Family Entertainment:
(New Category, Saluting the Celebs We're ALL Sick & Tired Of!)
RV
(Sony/Columbia)

Awards Per Picture:

Basically, It Stinks, Too — 4 "Wins":
Worst Picture, Worst Actress, Worst Sequel, Worst Screenplay


Little Man — 3 "Wins":
Worst Actor, Worst Screen Couple and Worst Remake/Rip-Off


Lady in the Water — 2 "Wins":
Worst Supporting Actor and Worst Director

Screening Schedule this Week (02-21-07)

SM CITY CINEMA
Babel
11 AM, 1:30 PM, 4, 6:30, 9 PM
Arthur & the Invisibles
11:25 AM, 1:20 PM, 3:15, 5:10, 7:05, 9 PM
The Promise
10:35 AM, 12:40 PM, 2:45, 4:50, 6:55, 9 PM
GHOST RIDER
10:35 AM, 12:40 PM, 2:45, 4:50, 6:55, 9 PM
The Curse of the Golden Flower
10:35 AM, 12:40 PM, 2:45, 4:50, 6:55, 9 PM
The Messengers
11 AM, 12:40 PM, 2:20, 4, 5:40, 7:20, 9 PM

ROBINSONS MOVIEWORLD
GHOST RIDER
12:45 PM, 2:55, 5:05, 7:15 PM
The Promise
12:45 PM, 2:55, 5:05, 7:15 PM
Catch & Release
12:45 PM, 2:55, 5:05, 7:15 PM
Apocalypto
11:15 AM, 1:55 PM, 4:35, 7:15
The Messengers
1:15 PM, 3:15, 5:15, 7:15 PM
Arthur & the Invisibles
1:15 PM, 3:15, 5:15, 7:15 PM

Ghost Rider

GHOST RIDER: BETTER LOWER THOSE EXPECTATIONS, IT’S DISAPPOINTING
by Reymundo Salao

Johnny Blaze made a deal with a devil named Mephistopheles in order to cure his dying father. But that deal cost him his soul. And now, he has become the devil's bounty hunter. At night, in the presence of evil, Johnny Blaze transforms into the hellish being known as The Ghost Rider, and his first major bounty is to destroy the demon known as Blackheart and his minions.

GHOST RIDER is an adaptation of the Marvel comics series of the same title. Since I grew up with comic books, I am a big fan of comic book movies. And of course, I was excited to see the GHOST RIDER movie adaptation. Sure, I lowered down my expectations because the storyline of "Ghost Rider" has been used and overused in numerous films with vaguely similar storylines. I expected for it to be a movie loved with the highest tolerance to criticism. But a disappointing film is a disappointing film. And if it has too little redeeming factors, then there's no reason not to talk about it.


Don’t get me wrong, GHOST RIDER would not necessarily make you feel like you’re throwing away your money on crap. GHOST RIDER has its moments of utter coolness. The fiery transformations with gothic angelic chorals on the background, the bits of humor, that hellishly radical bike he rides. I would not have even cared if the storyline would be considered over-used & cliché, because I already did expect that. But just the overall delivery of the movie itself was purely bland. The movie was fun but disappointing.

It's no surprise, this film was directed by Mark Steven Johnson, the same guy who directed the Daredevil movie, which also could be considered a failure. well, I guess that's STRIKE TWO! & I don't want to see him directing a superhero/comicbook adaptation movie again. I can appreciate Daredevil with the highest tolerance, and would admit to liking it a little. But it still goes out the same that it was crap, & badly needed to fall on a new director.

There was no question of the choices for Nicholas Cage to be Johnny Blaze, Peter Fonda to be Mephistopheles, and Eva Mendes to be Roxanne Simpson. They are all superior performers, and very fitting for their roles at that. But the script never seemed to work well with the direction of the film. Many of the lines looked cheesy, mostly due to the editing which had bad timing and monotony of angles, so much so that Nicholas Cage's supposedly memorable lines end up looking like scenes from a bad B-movie. Same with Peter Fonda, who by the scarcity of film projects made him look like a struggling has-been in this movie. There were moments when Eva Mendes was comedically adorable. But her charm (that usually leaves me lovesick) could not save her from ending up looking like a cheap "face" in a sad project. At least Wes Bentley was spunky for the role. But his entire look for the film did not carry on a sense of overwhelmingly cool villain. His costume looked like he was spoofing each and every cliché from each and every badly-made superhero and vampire movie. His hair & make-up looked more metrosexual than demon, he could not intimidate me and I swear I could easily ward him off with smelly feet and a bad fashion sense.


The fight scenes were pathetic. Sure, the "minion" villains known as The Hidden were cool. But the fighting scenes with them did not excite me. In action movies, nothing's new these days when it comes to fight scenes. But one should at least make it either interesting or at least sensible for the audiences to get a sense of response. Many of the fight scenes in this movie makes you end up mumbling "Huh?", "What?!" or "Anu tu ya kuno?!" It's as if some characters were too dumb to stand and wait for a punch to hit them. Giving it credit, the film does make the effort to breakthrough with some kind of originality (with scenes like how he beat his enemy made out of the wind), the problem is, they don’t really convince me, as far as I’m concerned anyway.

CGI or Computer animation is this movie's main Ace card. The thing which it heavily relies to. But one should not really be strict in CGI judgment because in the long run, this technology will get old. It is actually how a film uses its technology to create a good movie. Ghost Rider may have fabulous CGI, but there isn’t too much innovative and impressive scenes for it to be a step ahead of the usual eye candy.

I cannot deny that there were moments when this movie made me laugh and cheer. But overall, it was a failure, that will stand aside other disappointing classics such as Blade Trinity, Daredevil, and a bit better than that awful Spawn movie adaptation. Oh well, I hope a sequel with a new director could redeem it.