New York Film Critics Circle Awards

After the Los Angeles Film Critics Association awarded David Fincher's "The Social Network" Best Picture yesterday, we now have the New York Film Critics Circle following suit by giving "The Social Network" the top prize.

Most notable behind this, though, was "The Kids Are All Right" which got three awards for Best Screenplay, Best Actress for Annette Bening and, the biggest shock of all, Mark Ruffalo for Best Supporting Actor. Nice to see considering the Critics' Choice Award nominations snubbed it earlier this afternoon.

Best Director went to David Fincher for "The Social Network."

Colin Firth in "The King's Speech" won for Best Actor while Melissa Leo in "The Fighter" won for Best Supporting Actress.

A huge surprise came in the category of Best Animated Film which went to "The Illusionist" over "Toy Story 3." Could this upset happen at the Oscars? Likely not, but it's good to see Sylvain Chomet's film getting recognition.

"Black Swan" won for Matthew Libatique's cinematography while "Carlos" won for Best Foreign Language Film.

Considering the New York Film Critics Circle awarded "The Hurt Locker" last year, I think for the Oscars everyone's eyes need to be set on "The Social Network" over the previously thought-to-be-frontrunner "The King's Speech."

16th Annual Critics' Choice Award Nominations

After yestserday's onslaught of picks for best of the year from critic circles and associations across the nation, all of which mostly praised David Fincher's "The Social Network" as the best of 2010, today we get a list of important nominations for the 16th Annual Critics' Choice Movie Awards which is organized by the Broadcast Film Critics Association. These awards have become a better predictor for what we're going to see for the Oscar nominations than even the Golden Globes.

And so, here's a run-down of the nominations for the 2011 Critics' Choice Movie Awards, which were led by Darren Aronofsky's "Black Swan" with a record-breaking total of 12 nominations. Close behind with 11 each were "True Grit" and "The King's Speech" followed by "Inception" with 10 and "The Social Network" with nine.

The nominees for Best Picture were "127 Hours," "Black Swan," "The Fighter," "Inception," "The King's Speech," "The Social Network," "The Town," "Toy Story 3," "True Grit" and "Winter's Bone." This list mirrors the 10 Best Picture nominees we'll see at this year's Oscars except for one glaring error: "The Kids Are All Right." How could a snub this large happen for such a deserving film? This is truly discomforting for the film's Best Picture chances at the Oscars.

This category got narrowed down by the Best Director nods which were Darren Aronofsky for "Black Swan," Danny Boyle for "127 Hours," Joel and Ethan Coen for "True Grit," David Fincher for "The Social Network" and Christopher Nolan for "Inception." Again, Lisa Cholodenko for "The Kids Are All Right" is absent.

"Blue Valentine," now happily R-rated, got some love with a Best Actor nomination for Ryan Gosling. Joining him were Jeff Bridges for "True Grit," Robert Duvall for "Get Low," Jesse Eisenberg for "The Social Network," Colin Firth for "The King's Speech" and James Franco for "127 Hours." The win could either go to Firth or Eisenberg as both have been getting considerable attention all season.

More love for "Blue Valentine" as Michelle Williams got nominated for Best Actress along with Annette Bening for "The Kids Are All Right," Nicole Kidman for "The Rabbit Hole," Jennifer Lawrence for "Winter's Bone," Natalie Portman for "Black Swan," and as an amazingly pleasant surprise, Noomi Rapace for "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo." Finally that astounding actress gets some recognition for her amazing work. Considering the exuding love for "Black Swan" with the nominations, I predict a rightful win for Portman here.

The category of Best Supporting Actor tossed in a few twists with the frontrunner Christian Bale for "The Fighter" predicted to win. With him were my personal favorite, Andrew Garfield for "The Social Network," Jeremy Renner for "The Town," Sam Rockwell for "Conviction," Mark Ruffalo for "The Kids Are All Right" and Geoffrey Rush for "The King's Speech." The fact that Rockwell, Garfield and Ruffalo all slipped in there gives them great hope for the Oscars, which will be an excellent addition to the proceedings.

Mila Kunis got nominated for Best Supporting Actress for her sultry work in "Black Swan." Interesting to note, however, that she got nominated over both Vincent Cassel and Barbara Hershey. Nonetheless, a worthy nomination. Joining her were Amy Adams for "The Fighter," Helena Bonham Carter for "The King's Speech," Melissa Leo for "The Fighter," the newcomer Hailee Steinfeld for "True Grit," which gives her some Oscar momentum, and the actress who has been getting the most attention in this category so far, Jacki Weaver for the Australian drama "Animal Kingdom."

These awards also have the odd categories of Best Comedy and Best Action Movie.

The Best Comedy nominees were "Cyrus," "Date Night," "Easy A," "Get Him to the Greek," "I Love You Phillip Morris" and "The Other Guys."

The Best Action Movie nominees were "Inception," "Kick-Ass," "Red," "The Town" and "Unstoppable."

My question: where is "The Kids Are All Right" at least for comedy? Another huge snub for the film.

Best Foreign Language Film nominees were "Biutiful," "I Am Love" and "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo." It's disappointing to note that all three of these will more than likely be absent from the Oscar's nominees for this category.

It's refreshing to see that something other than "The Social Network," although entirely worthy, got some recognition. These awards have also introduced new faces to the list of possible nominees for the Oscars including Andrew Garfield, Mila Kunis, Noomi Rapace, Mark Ruffalo and Hailee Steinfeld. But geez, let's get "The Kids Are All Right" back in the picture please.

Go here for the entire list of nominees for the 2011 Critics' Choice Movie Awards and find out the winners on Friday, January 14, 2011 at 9:00 p.m. on VH1.

And stay tuned tomorrow for the announcement of the 68th Annual Golden Globe Award nominations!

BLACK SWAN Review

"Black Swan" (2010)

Darren Aronofsky's "Black Swan" is reminiscent of the director's previous work, "The Wrestler." Both films show a struggling person trying to perfect their professional career in performance. There a wrestler and here a ballerina. Both films also boasted an unforgettably physical and demanding performance from an actor. There Mickey Rourke and here Natalie Portman. This, however, is also an even better film. It is an exquisite horror film through and through echoing the feel and paranoia of Dario Argento's "Suspiria" and the electric eroticism of David Lynch's "Mulholland Drive."

Let's first make this clear: Natalie Portman deserves an Oscar for portraying Nina Sayers, the dedicated young woman who loses her mind in the face of her own obsessive strive toward perfection. It is a sublime performance of good and evil, dark and light, the themes of Tchaikovsky's ballet "Swan Lake" that consume Nina, and it is fearless.

It is a new season with a ballet company in New York City where Nina performs under the scrutiny of director Thomas Leroy (Vincent Cassel). He is intelligent but arrogant, egotistic and frightening, a beast rumored to allure the principal ballerina of his choosing. Nina is selected to star in his reimagining of "Swan Lake," and though she is ecstatic, the pressure is on. She is replacing the former principal and Thomas' former lover, Beth MacIntyre, who is ferociously bitter and played by Winona Ryder in a role so brief yet enormously powerful and haunting.

New to the company is Lily (Mila Kunis), a free spirit from the west coast who flows with carefree expression and sexuality, the opposite of the frigid Nina. She enters as a professional rival but also a personal role model as Nina wishes to embody Lily's confidence. It is also what Thomas wants from Nina: more feeling, less technique.

It is clear Nina has been a dancer all her life. She lives in a cramped apartment with her mother, played pitch-perfect by Barbara Hershey, who loves her daughter dearly but is oppressive and overbearing calling Nina her "sweet girl." Nina's mother was once a ballerina herself, and one can't help but get the feeling she's now living vicariously through her. When Nina returns home, it's like returning to her jail cell.

Lily enters Nina's life and wants to free her from her own self-control. Mila Kunis is superb as the sultry temptress, especially during an intoxicating scene at a night club. Nina instead begins to lose herself as she blurs the line between performance and reality. The film opens inside Nina's dream and continues as a hallucinatory nightmare from there.

Thomas wants to see both sides of Nina, the white swan which she excels at but also the ferocity of the black swan, the one with which she struggles to convey. This use of black and white in the film is to be expected, but Aronofsky puts it to work in playful and tantalizing ways with visual effects that are subtle but chilling.

"Black Swan" is about an inner battle with Natalie Portman at its center, a woman tragically consumed by the demands of her profession while losing sight of all else. Her own life becomes "Swan Lake," and in effect the film garners an operatic and melodramatic style with Clint Mansell's take on the orchestrations of "Swan Lake" swelling through every scene which grow into an exhilaratingly manic, gorgeous and demented tour de force of passion. This is one of the year's very best films.

Ranking the Past Decade's Best Pic Winners

In honor of Oscar season, I figured it would only be appropriate to rank some of the Best Pictures in the past years. Now, I'm not ambitious enough to go back and watch all of the ones I haven't seen, so we're keeping it current. Below is a ranked list of the Oscar Best Picture winners from 2000 to 2009.

10. Gladiator (2000)


Ridley Scott's Hollywood blockbuster lands itself at the bottom of the list simply because that's all it is: a Hollywood blockbuster. And while it's fantastic and rousing entertainment with Russell Crowe playing a convincing gladiator hero, there's not much more to it than that. Certainly not Best Picture worthy considering it was up against more worthy films.

9. A Beautiful Mind (2001)


It's funny to note that Russell Crowe has starred in a Best Picture winning film two years in a row. In any case, it's another one at the bottom of the list. Although this biopic is well-crafted and respectable with superb performances, it remains still rather forgettable in the larger scheme of things.

8. Slumdog Millionaire (2008)


Danny Boyle's immensely stylish and triumphant crowd pleaser is the Academy's way of saying they know what's popular. And while Boyle's film was great and popular and a bit of a success story, it is not by any means one of his best films. Just take a look at "127 Hours" which came out this year. It was also nominated against more deserving films such as "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" and "Milk."

7. Crash (2005)


The uproar surrounding this film winning Best Picture over "Brokeback Mountain" is enough to get this one higher up on the list because, in my opinion, this was a better film than the other. Although overwrought and scattered, this observation of racial tensions post-9/11 was the first film in a while to address such issues and in such a timely manner. It achieved such with great power and resonance, as well.

6. Million Dollar Baby (2004)


A great honor to veteran Clint Eastwood in one of his later, and arguably one of his best, directing efforts, this dark but ultimately life-affirming film showcased a strong performance from Hilary Swank and told a story about faith and redemption with a simple grace and elegant, heartbreaking beauty.

5. Chicago (2002)


One of the best musicals ever made, hands down. From director Rob Marshall, this film really deserved its Best Picture win for taking a Broadway hit and making an equally successful movie hit. Taking unexpected actors/actresses and turning them into dancing and singing stars worked perfectly in one of the most purely electric and entertaining films to come along.

4. The Departed (2006)


Legendary director Martin Scorsese finally got the praise he deserved with the Best Picture win for this one. A superbly structured and twisty game of cat and mouse with excellent performances all around from Mark Wahlberg, Leonardo DiCaprio and Jack Nicholson who all give perhaps some of their best work. A completely worthy win considering its competition that year ("Babel," "The Queen," "Little Miss Sunshine," "Letters from Iwo Jima").

3. No Country for Old Men (2007)


Arguably the Coen brothers best film since "Fargo," this dark and brooding meditation on violence and the immorality of unjustified coincidence and fate is a haunting masterpiece. It also boasts an absolutely dynamite performance from Javier Bardem embodying the horror of impending death.

2. The Hurt Locker (2009)


Director Kathryn Bigelow's "The Hurt Locker" is perhaps the best film about the Iraq war ever made. Simply enough, it's an astonishing achievement and a story of David vs. Goliath for beating out "Avatar."

1. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (2003)


Peter Jackson's glorious epic adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien's trilogy gets the worthy finish it so highly deserves with this final installment. Though "Fellowship of the Ring" and "Two Towers" were also superb, "Return of the King" truly is the top and encompasses the series in a fittingly lengthy and powerful grand finale. This winning Best Picture only makes sense, and it was one of the grandest wins of recent memory.