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Complete 2012 Golden Globes nominations

“The Artist,” Weinstein Co.’s silent, black-and-white film about an actor who deals with the transition to talkies, was nominated for six Golden Globe awards, but in the Comedy or Musical category.

This selection seems erroneous since every other organization including the BFCA included it under it’s Best Picture categories. Did we miss something? Are you really telling us that ‘The Artist’ is competing with Bridesmaids?? Something seems terribly out of whack here.

Nevertheless, go ahead and immerse yourself in what will be a very interesting night hosted by noneother than Ricky Gervais.

BEST MOTION PICTURE – DRAMA
The Descendants, Fox Searchlight
The Help, Walt Disney Co./DreamWorks Pictures
Hugo, Paramount Pictures
The Ides of March, Sony Pictures
Moneyball, Sony Pictures
War Horse, Walt Disney Co./DreamWorks Pictures

BEST MOTION PICTURE – COMEDY OR MUSICAL
50/50, Summit Entertainment
The Artist, Weinstein Co.
Bridesmaids, Universal Pictures
Midnight in Paris, Sony Pictures Classics
My Week With Marilyn, Weinstein Co.

BEST ANIMATED FEATURE FILM
The Adventures of Tintin, Paramount Pictures
Arthur Christmas, Sony Pictures
Puss in Boots, DreamWorks Animation/Paramount
Cars 2, Walt Disney Co.
Rango, Paramount Pictures

BEST ACTOR – DRAMA
George Clooney, The Descendants
Leonardo DiCaprio, J. Edgar
Michael Fassbender, Shame
Ryan Gosling, The Ides of March
Brad Pitt, Moneyball

BEST ACTOR – COMEDY OR MUSICAL
Jean Dujardin, The Artist
Brendan Gleeson, The Guard
Joseph Gordon-Levitt, 50/50
Ryan Gosling, Crazy, Stupid, Love.
Owen Wilson, Midnight in Paris

BEST ACTRESS – DRAMA
Glenn Close, Albert Nobbs
Viola Davis, The Help
Rooney Mara, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
Meryl Streep, The Iron Lady
Tilda Swinton, We Need to Talk About Kevin

BEST ACTRESS – COMEDY OR MUSICAL
Jodie Foster, Carnage
Charlize Theron, Young Adult
Kristen Wiig, Bridesmaids
Michelle Williams, My Week With Marilyn
Kate Winslet, Carnage

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Kenneth Branagh, My Week With Marilyn
Albert Brooks, Drive
Jonah Hill, Moneyball
Viggo Mortensen, A Dangerous Method
Christopher Plummer, Beginners

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Berenice Bejo, The Artist
Jessica Chastain, The Help
Janet McTeer, Albert Nobbs
Octavia Spencer, The Help
Shailene Woodley, The Descendants

BEST DIRECTOR
Woody Allen, Midnight in Paris
George Clooney, The Ides of March
Michel Hazanavicius, The Artist
Alexander Payne, The Descendants
Martin Scorsese, Hugo

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows

Guy Ritchie’s sequel, ‘Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows’, is a highbrow action film that is exciting, thrilling, and very fun. This second effort, to an original that possessed an incohesive script and an inability to hold my attention throughout its duration, provides a fantastic adversary, stylish action sequences, a creative plot and a seamless flow that all fall perfectly into place. I must confess, this was a delightful surprise worth a second watch.

Sherlock Holmes has always been the smartest man in the room…until now. There is a new criminal mastermind at large—Professor James Moriarty (Jared Harris)—and not only is he Holmes’ intellectual equal, but his capacity for evil, coupled with a complete lack of conscience, may give him an advantage over the renowned detective. Around the globe, headlines break the news: a scandal takes down an Indian cotton tycoon; a Chinese opium trader dies of an apparent overdose; bombings in Strasbourg and Vienna; the death of an American steel magnate… No one sees the connective thread between these seemingly random events—no one, that is, except the great Sherlock Holmes, who has discerned a deliberate web of death and destruction. At its center sits a singularly sinister spider: Moriarty. Holmes’ investigation into Moriarty’s plot becomes more dangerous as it leads him and Watson out of London to France, Germany and finally Switzerland. But the cunning Moriarty is always one step ahead, and moving perilously close to completing his ominous plan. If he succeeds, it will not only bring him immense wealth and power but alter the course of history.

The reason this movie worked so much better than the first one is due to the new villain in town that opposes our protagonist – Professor James Moriarty played wonderfully by Jared Harris, known from the Mad Men television series. Heroes like Holmes suffer from the ‘invincible syndrome’ that affects so many stories of the like. We all know that the hero will always win and it’s hard not to zone out when this happens. But not here; Moriarty supplies the film with a subtle sinisterness, menace and belief that he can defeat Holmes, mind to mind, wit to wit, and punchline to punchline. It’s this plausibility that makes the difference between an ordinary action film churned in a Los Angeles warehouse and a rousing and titillating experience this sequel brings forth.

I would be remiss in not mentioning Robert Downey Jr.’s performance, which is infused with some hilarious moments, but also with a sense of fear for his death and to the loved ones around him. Jude Law serves as a nice compliment to Holmes, but is unequivocally overshadowed by Downey’s performance. Noomi Rapace doesn’t replicate anything remotely to her character of Lisbeth Salander in ‘The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’ but perhaps proves that she can do a film in English. Finally, Stephen Fry, who somehow has to convince us he is Sherlock’s brother, is a graceful and charming man who manages to stand out from all the action sequences.

What the movie has going against it, at moments, is the English accents that get in the way of understanding the, at times, entertaining but complicated plot. Nevertheless, if that’s the worst I have to endure, then it becomes just a matter of taste because there are many who like those accents.

Guy Ritchie is in rare form here. Not since ‘Snatch’ has he been this good. His stylistic camera shots, his slow-mo trademark moments and his irreverent humor are all present here, but he’s added a maturity to the storytelling that has polished his filmmaking. The action sequences are phenomenal. Some that come to mind are the bullet-fest on a train, Jude Law’s cannon incident with a tower and a sharpshooter, plus the race for their lives through a forest while a deluge of bombs bullets and missiles almost claimed their lives.

‘Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows’ is being released concurrently with another unabashed action film in Tom Cruise’s ‘Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol’ in IMAX. Even though ‘MI:4’ might be better, your decision will ultimately boil down to your particular tastes in stars, a classic vs contemporary story, and whether one of them is sold out or not. You really can’t go wrong with these selections, making this week in movies, one of the most entertaining of 2011.

‘The Expendables 2’ has a new poster

We just received the new poster of ‘The Expendables 2’, the highly anticipated action movie that assembles the greatest 80’s action stars in one film: Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jean Claude Van Damme, Chuck Norris and Dolph Lundgren, amongst others.

The poster only has Stallone on it, but you can bet the others are going to want in. From our perspective, looks like a bomb went off outlining the number 2 on a concrete wall with Stallone looking on like a bad ass. This new poster looks much better than the original posters from last year.

Part 1 was #1 at the box office generating $266,159,621 worldwide. So why not come back and make some more cash! Stallone wrote this sequel, but he won’t be directing or producing. Sounds like he wants to take it easy on this one and concentrate on his “acting”.

If you have no clue of what’s going down in this second installment, The Expendables are back and this time it’s personal… Barney Ross (Sylvester Stallone), Lee Christmas (Jason Statham), Yin Yang (Jet Li), Gunnar Jensen (Dolph Lundgren),Toll Road (Randy Couture) and Hale Caesar (Terry Crews) — with newest members Billy the Kid (Liam Hemsworth) and Maggie (Yu Nan) aboard — are reunited when Mr. Church (Bruce Willis) enlists the Expendables to take on a seemingly simple job.  The task looks like an easy paycheck for Barney and his band of old-school mercenaries.   But when things go wrong and one of their own is viciously killed, the Expendables are compelled to seek revenge in hostile territory where the odds are stacked against them.  Hell-bent on payback, the crew cuts a swath of destruction through opposing forces, wreaking havoc and shutting down an unexpected threat in the nick of time – six pounds of weapons-grade plutonium; enough to change the balance of power in the world.  But that’s nothing compared to the justice they serve against the villainous adversary who savagely murdered their brother. That is done the Expendables way….