Tag Archives: Michael Fassbender

The Envelope Please: And the Oscar goes to . . .

January 29, 2016 | by Sammi Leigh Melville

It’s that time of year again!

The line of patrons at cinemas everywhere has grown exponentially as avid moviegoers cross films off their lists in preparation of Oscar’s big night. And though the lineup of nominees is whitewashed across the board—unfortunately repeating last year’s failure to recognize artists of color—there are definitely some competitive categories that will stir up excitement in this year’s standings.

There are many who will say that Leonardo DiCaprio may finally win his first Oscar for Best Actor—it’s been joked about for years, but it’s finally time. However, DiCaprio has some tough competition with Bryan Cranston as Trumbo and Michael Fassbender as Steve Jobs. The fact that all three compete with biographical roles makes it an even tougher call, but my vote goes to Fassbender. While DiCaprio won a Golden Globe and certainly had the widest emotional range of the contenders, the Academy tends to lean towards actors whose roles serve as a departure—and Fassbender definitely falls into that category with such a transformation.

The Best Actress category has a much clearer outcome. Though the other performances pack a punch, none quite sticks in your mind like Brie Larson’s heartbreaking role in “Room.” We’ve seen her rising in the indie world through the past few years, and she’s finally found the role that will get her some Oscar love. Though Cate Blanchett and Jennifer Lawrence certainly deserve nods for their performances in “Carol” and “Joy,” respectively, it’s an indisputable win for Larson.

This year’s supporting nominees are something of an oddity, as many of the films have a pretty evenly distributed ensemble cast, and, in several nominations, the role in mind is actually the protagonist (Rooney Mara in “Carol” and Alicia Vikander in “The Danish Girl”). Despite these quirks, the winners are still pretty clear.

Tom Hardy has the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor with his performance in “The Revenant.” In his usual transformative way, he is nearly unrecognizable as the ornery money-grubber and antagonist, John Fitzgerald. And it is a no brainer that Alicia Vikander will win Best Supporting Actress. While it is true that Kate Winslet’s persistent strength in “Steve Jobs” won her this year’s Golden Globe, this is another example of the difference in personality between the Hollywood Foreign Press Association and the Academy. Vikander’s immersion into her character will sway the decision in the end.

For this year’s Best Director, there is not a question in my mind that Alejandro González Iñárritu will win it for the second year in a row. Last year, he took the Oscar for “Birdman,” and, in my mind, it was always a given that his next film would either equal his prior effort or collapse to the status of a disappointment. The technical proficiency and artistic orchestration of “The Revenant” makes Iñárritu the obvious choice for this award.

The Best Picture category is always the hardest, but, this year, the two strongest contenders are “The Revenant” and “Spotlight.” It’s hard to even compare the two, as they are at opposite ends of the spectrum. While “The Revenant” deals out brute emotion and focuses centrally on the visual, “Spotlight” delves into more complex emotions and focuses on story. Despite the sheer number of nominations that “The Revenant” racked up, my gut instinct tells me that “Spotlight” will still win the prize. I believe 2016 will harken to 2014, when Best Picture and Best Director didn’t line up (“12 Years a Slave” and “Gravity”).

But only time will tell. And let’s be honest, what fun would the Oscars be if we weren’t kept on our toes? Anticipation is the Academy’s best friend, and you can count on them milking it all the way until Feb. 28.

Midtown Cinema
February Special Events

Midnight Matinee
“A Clockwork Orange”
Saturday, Feb. 6, 11:45 p.m.

Two Special Screenings of:
“The Notebook”
Hate it?
Friday, Feb. 12, 9:30 p.m.
with Down in Front! comedy riffing
Love it?
Saturday, Feb. 13, 8 p.m.

Classic Film Series
“Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner”
Sunday, Feb. 14, 6 p.m.

3^rd in the Burg $3 Movie
“When Harry Met Sally”
Friday, Feb. 19, 9:30 p.m.

Faulkner Honda Family Film Series
“Dennis the Menace”
Saturday, Feb. 20, 12 p.m.
Sunday, Feb. 21, 2 p.m.

15^th Anniversary Series
“Lost in Translation”
Saturday, Feb. 27, 8 p.m.

Oscar Party
Sunday, Feb. 28, 7 p.m.

Inglourious Actor: Spotlight on Fassbender at Midtown Cinema.

March 16, 2012 | by

Michael Fassbender.

Born in Germany, raised in Ireland, he is the “It” boy of present day cinema.

He was one of the oiled up muscled bodies in Zack Snyder’s battle royal 300. He made his big break as Bobby Sands in the harrowing 2008 film Hunger. Since then he has played a man who gets involved with his girlfriend’s teenage daughter (Fish Tank), the victim of torture porn terror (Eden Lake), a film critic turned tragic spy (Inglourious Basterds), the brooding Mr. Rochester (Jane Eyre), an assassin for hire (Haywire) and the master of magnetism himself (X-Men: First Class). Soon we will see the ubiquitous actor play an android in Ridley Scott’s highly anticipated Prometheus.

Today, we are here to talk about two of Herr Fassbender’s films, specifically, a pair of films, originally making their theatrical debut in 2011 that are finally making it to Harrisburg this very month.

The first of these is A Dangerous Method, the latest from Canadian auteur David Cronenberg. He plays Carl Jung opposite Viggo Mortensen as Freud and Kiera Knightley as the Russian woman who brought these two classic minds together and, in turn, who tore them apart. Cronenberg, more in his A History of Violence mode than his earlier Videodrome or Scanners mode, hands us a deep and haunting take on the delicate relationship between sex and sanity. Playing out as a ménage à trois of the mind (though mind you, there is much of the body as well) Cronenberg’s film is a sharply tuned near masterpiece of psychological derangement – and we get Fassbender at its juicy center.

The other film making its way to Harrisburg this month is Shame. The film is directed by Steve McQueen (no, not that Steve McQueen), the man who gave us Fassbender’s breakthrough Hunger, and has been saddled with an NC-17 rating for the full frontal nudity of Fassbender’s sex addict main character (a full frontal of epic proportions at that) and therefore may not be for everyone.

But even so, with a bravura performance by the seemingly omnipresent actor as a man dealing with the demons of addiction, and McQueen’s delicate yet audacious directorial style, it is a not-to-miss cinematic experience indeed – and not just for the endowments that made even George Clooney blush and gush at the Golden Globes.

Due to the NC-17 rating, the film will end up reaching less people than most movies, and that is a (pardon the pun) shame because it is a stellar and harrowing look at a man and his addiction. It is highlighted by a performance that many, including yours truly dear readers, believe to have been one of the biggest snubs at this year’s Academy Awards.

Both of these films will debut at Midtown Cinema in March and both are well worth the wait we had to endure from their respective late fall releases in New York and L.A. Other films coming our way include the equally long anticipated A Separation, The Skin I Live In, Albert Nobbs and We Need to Talk About Kevin – but none of these star Michael Fassbender, so we can talk about them another time.

Trivia Question: In Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds, Michael Fassbender plays Archie Hickox, a British film historian and critic whose knowledge of German cinema and culture makes him the perfect candidate to go undercover as a Nazi officer. What real life film critic and award-winning novelist, who also worked as a spy during WWII (though to less tragic circumstances), is this character based upon? Find out the answer in my next column.

Tag Archives: Michael Fassbender

The Envelope Please: And the Oscar goes to . . .

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