Monthly Archives: December 2024

HBO Max Movie Review: Juror #2

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The new HBO Max movie “Juror #2” is about all that is wrong with the legal system in this country. People are often convicted for all the wrong reasons – including expediency due to the fact that once police investigators think they have found the right person, there is only so much money and time to investigate any situation thoroughly enough. For this one reason alone, way too many people – especially poor people are sent to jail or put on death row, even though they did nothing wrong.

Juror #2 is directed by Clint Eastwood, who is still directing movies at age 94, which according to records makes him the second oldest person to direct a film.

The screenplay for Juror #2 is a very good one about a man having an argument in a bar with his girlfriend during a rainy night and the girlfriend refuses a drive home with her boyfriend and is later found dead after falling off of a cliff. Several incorrect assumptions are made by the police and several witnesses and the boyfriend is arrested for murder. Later when the jury is selected, one of the jurors has significant knowledge of what happened to the woman that night.

Juror #2 has an excellent cast, including Nicholas Hoult as Justin Kemp (juror #2), Toni Collette as Faith Killebrew, the prosecuting attorney, Chris Messina as Eric Resnick the defense attorney, and J.K. Simmons who is excellent as a member of the jury, and a former police officer, who through some simple phone calls and research easily demonstrates major flaws in the police investigations of this alleged crime.

There are excellent courtroom scenes in this story, and along the way the expected ongoing conflicts that all lawyers face over winning a case at all costs against doing the right thing – to save the life of an innocent person.

Juror #2 is receiving very high 93% ratings on Rotten Tomatoes and I agree with these ratings and recommend this movie.

Golden Globe Nominations: 2024

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FILM:

Motion picture (drama)

  • “The Brutalist”
  • “A Complete Unknown”
  • “Conclave”
  • “Dune: Part Two”
  • “Nickel Boys”
  • “September 5”

Motion picture (comedy or musical)

  • “Anora”
  • “Challengers”
  • “Emilia Perez”
  • “A Real Pain”
  • “The Substance”
  • “Wicked”

Actor (drama)

  • Adrien Brody, “The Brutalist”
  • Timothée Chalamet, “A Complete Unknown”
  • Daniel Craig, “Queer”
  • Colman Domingo, “Sing Sing”
  • Ralph Fiennes, “Conclave”
  • Sebastian Stan, “The Apprentice”

Actor (comedy or musical)

  • Jesse Eisenberg, “A Real Pain”
  • Hugh Grant, “Heretic”
  • Gabriel LaBelle, “Saturday Night”
  • Jesse Plemons, “Kinds of Kindness”
  • Glen Powell, “Hit Man”
  • Sebastian Stan, “A Different Man”

Actress (drama)

  • Pamela Anderson, “The Last Showgirl”
  • Angelina Jolie, “Maria”
  • Nicole Kidman, “Babygirl”
  • Tilda Swinton, “The Room Next Door”
  • Fernanda Torres, “I’m Still Here”
  • Kate Winslet, “Lee”

Actress (comedy or musical)

  • Amy Adams, “Nightbitch”
  • Cynthia Erivo, “Wicked”
  • Karla Sofía Gascón, “Emilia Perez”
  • Mikey Madison, “Anora”
  • Demi Moore, “The Substance”
  • Zendaya, “Challengers”

Supporting actor

  • Yura Borisov, “Anora”
  • Kieran Culkin, “A Real Pain”
  • Edward Norton “A Complete Unknown”
  • Guy Pearce, “The Brutalist”
  • Jeremy Strong, “The Apprentice”
  • Denzel Washington, “Gladiator II”

Supporting actress

  • Selena Gomez, “Emilia Perez”
  • Ariana Grande, “Wicked”
  • Felicity Jones, “The Brutalist”
  • Margaret Qualley, “The Substance”
  • Isabella Rossellini, “Conclave”
  • Zoe Saldana, “Emilia Perez”

Director

  • Jacques Audiard, “Emilia Perez”
  • Sean Baker, “Anora”
  • Edward Berger, “Conclave”
  • Brady Corbet, “The Brutalist”
  • Coralie Fargeat, “The Substance”
  • Payal Kapadia, “All We Imagine as Light”

Screenplay

  • Jacques Audiard, “Emilia Pérez”
  • Sean Baker, “Anora”  
  • Brady Corbet and Mona Fastvold, “The Brutalist”
  • Jesse Eisenberg, “A Real Pain”
  • Coralie Fargeat, “The Substance”
  • Peter Straughan, “Conclave”

Score

  • Volker Bertelmann, “Conclave”
  • Daniel Blumberg, “The Brutalist”
  • Kris Bowers, “The Wild Robot””
  • Clément Ducol, Camille, “Emilia Pérez”
  • Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross, “Challengers”
  • Hans Zimmer, “Dune: Part Two”

Song

  • “Beautiful That Way” from “The Last Showgirl”
  • “Compress/Repress” from “Challengers”
  • “El Mal” from Emilia Perez”
  • “Forbidden Road” from “Better Man”
  • “Kiss the Sky” from “The Wild Robot”
  • “Mi Camino” from “Emilia Perez”

Animated feature

  • “Flow”
  • “Inside Out 2”
  • “Memoir of a Snail”
  • “Moana 2”
  • “Wallace and Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl”
  • “The Wild Robot”

Non-English language film

  • “All We Imagine as Light”
  • “Emilia Perez”
  • “The Girl with the Needle”
  • “I’m Still Here”
  • “The Seed of the Sacred Fig”
  • “Vermiglio”

Cinematic box office achievement

  • “Alien: Romulus”
  • “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice”
  • “Deadpool & Wolverine”
  • “Gladiator II”
  • “Inside Out 2”
  • “Twisters”
  • “Wicked”
  • “The Wild Robot”

TELEVISION:

TV series (drama)

  • “The Day of the Jackal”
  • “The Diplomat”
  • “Mr. and Mrs. Smith”
  • “Shogun”
  • “Slow Horses”
  • “Squid Game”

TV series (comedy or musical)

  • “Abbott Elementary”
  • “The Bear”
  • “The Gentlemen”
  • “Hacks”
  • “Nobody Wants This”
  • “Only Murders in the Building”

TV series (limited or TV movie)

  • “Baby Reindeer”
  • “Disclaimer”
  • “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story”
  • “The Penguin”
  • “Ripley”
  • “True Detective: Night Country”

TV actor (drama)

  • Donald Glover, “Mr. and Mrs. Smith”
  • Jake Gyllenhaal, “Presumed Innocent”
  • Gary Oldman, “Slow Horses”
  • Eddie Redmayne, “The Day of the Jackal”
  • Hiroyuki Sanada, “Shōgun”
  • Billy Bob Thornton, “Landman”

TV actor (comedy)

  • Adam Brody, “Nobody Wants This”
  • Ted Danson, “A Man on the Inside”
  • Steve Martin, “Only Murders in the Building”
  • Jason Segel, “Shrinking”
  • Martin Short, “Only Murders in the Building”
  • Jeremy Allen White, “The Bear”

TV actor (limited series or TV movie)

  • Colin Farrell, “The Penguin”
  • Richard Gadd, “Baby Reindeer”
  • Kevin Kline, “Disclaimer”
  • Cooper Koch, “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story”
  • Ewan McGregor, “A Gentleman in Moscow”
  • Andrew Scott, “Ripley”

TV actress (drama)

  • Kathy Bates, “Matlock”
  • Emma D’Arcy, “House of the Dragon”
  • Maya Erskine, “Mr. and Mrs. Smith”
  • Keira Knightley, “Black Doves”
  • Keri Russell, “The Diplomat”
  • Anna Sawai, “Shōgun”

TV actress (comedy)

  • Kristen Bell, “Nobody Wants This”
  • Quinta Brunson, “Abbott Elementary”
  • Ayo Edebiri, “The Bear”
  • Selena Gomez, “Only Murders in the Building”
  • Kathryn Hahn, ‘”Agatha All Along”
  • Jean Smart, “Hacks”

TV actress (limited series or TV movie)

  • Cate Blanchett, “Disclaimer”
  • Jodie Foster, “True Detective: Night Country”
  • Cristin Milioti, “The Penguin”
  • Sofía Vergara, “Griselda”
  • Naomi Watts, “Feud: Capote vs. The Swans”
  • Kate Winslet, “The Regime”

Supporting actor

  • Tadanobu Asano, “Shōgun”
  • Javier Bardem, “Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story”
  • Harrison Ford, “Shrinking”
  • Jack Lowden, “Slow Horses,”
  • Diego Luna, “La Máquina”
  • Ebon Moss-Bachrach, “The Bear”

Supporting actress

  • Liza Colón-Zayas, “The Bear”
  • Hannah Einbinder, “Hacks”
  • Dakota Fanning, “Ripley”
  • Jessica Gunning, “Baby Reindeer”
  • Allison Janney, “The Diplomat”
  • Kali Reis, “True Detective: Night Country”

Stand-up comedy performance

  • Jamie Foxx, “What Had Happened Was”
  • Nikki Glaser, “Someday You’ll Die”
  • Seth Meyers, “Dad Man Walking”
  • Adam Sandler, “Love You”
  • Ali Wong, “Single Lady”
  • Ramy Youssef, “More Feelings”

Movie Review: A Complete Unknown

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The new movie “A Complete Unknown” is one of those high-quality end-of-year film releases where we know immediately that the main star, Timothée Chalamet, who plays Bob Dylan, is a 100% shoo-in for an Academy Award nomination for best actor and most likely the movie will be nominated for best picture.

Anyone seeing this movie will appreciate the work and practice it must have taken for Chalamet to master Dylan’s voice, which arguably has an unusual, but not high-quality sound. The reason why Dylan was so significant is that he became relevant at the exact perfect time in the 1960s and is more well known for the lyrics of the songs he wrote rather than the quality sound of the music. In the 1960s Bob Dylan was known as the “The Voice of a Generation“.

The movie A Complete Unknown is a story told by showing different musical performances by Dylan, as he starts as a completely unknown singer, wandering the streets of New York City to a few years later one of the most famous people in the world. During his early years, Dylan cheated on two of his girlfriends at the same time, Joan Baez, played by Monica Barbaro, and Sylvie Russo, played by Elle Fanning. The back and forth breakups and reconnecting with these two women is a big part of this story.

Chalamet also did a great job mastering Dylan’s tired, drunk-like way of talking, sometimes seeming like he is about to fall asleep or fall over while walking around or even standing up. There was no obvious showing of drug use or heavy drinking to explain Dylan’s tired-like and word-slurring demeanor, but the chain-smoking by Dylan and too many other performers was annoyingly too much.

This story demonstrates, like some recent Whitney Houston movies and documentaries, how difficult it is to gain the heights of worldwide fame and then have to deal with the many downsides that come with a huge spotlight that never ends. One of the better scenes was when an audience booed Dylan for singing songs that were different than what they expected, angering Dylan who never wanted anyone but himself dictating the direction of his singing career.

One of the subplots in this movie, I thought was completely unnecessary was the frequent visits that Dylan and Pete Seeger made to a mute and dying Woody Guthrie in a hospital. This part of the story should not have been such a large part of this film, especially since Woody Guthrie, played by Scoot McNairy never says a word during all of the hospital scenes.

Actor Edward Norton plays singer/manager Pete Seeger and friend of Bob Dylan in a part that was relatively small, considering the importance of Seeger discovering Dylan in the early 1960s. There is a great deal of singing in this film, as the story is connected by several different Dylan and Dylan/Baez singing performances, with many of their most famous hits.

Overall the acting in his film is very good by all of the actors, with a strong possibility that Chalamet will win his first ever Academy Award for best actor.

Overall, I agree with the middle-of-the-road Rotten Tomatoes ratings of 79% for this movie and give it a solid recommendation.