the curious case of benjamin button Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Some critics' groups rush to hand out awards weeks before the year of eligility is over. Other groups, like the Academy of Science Fiction Fantasy & Horror Films, prefer to take their time. The 35th annual Saturn Awards were presented last night in beautiful downtown Burbank, California, honoring the best in genre films for the 2008 calendar year. The top awards, as listed by FearNet, went to Iron Man (Science Fiction), The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (Fantasy), Hellboy II: The Golden Army (Horror), and The Dark Knight (Action / Adventure / Thriller).

The Academy also found room to honor Angelina Jolie as Best Actress for Changeling, which makes me wonder how that film could possibly qualify as a genre flick. Horror, perhaps? More major awards went to Robert Downey, Jr. as Best Actor and Jon Favreau as Best Director for Iron Man, Heath Ledger as Best Supporting Actor, and Tilda Swinton as Best Supporting Actress. Wall-E took home Best Animated Film and Let the Right One In was presented with the Best International Film award. And here are the awards that make the Saturns stand out for genre fans: Lance Henriksen received the Life Career Award, and Leonard Nimoy nabbed the Lifetime Achievement Award.

I was following the awards show via Twitter, and the most entertaining account was the one by loquaciousmuse; she made it sound like a blast. If you're out of state, $40 buys an Academy membership with award voting privileges. The least expensive in-state membership is $150, which also grants access to more than 100 special screenings.

Tattoos in the movies have a storied history, from the simple, classic LOVE/HATE knuckle tattoos in The Night of the Hunter to the slick and sexy additions to Angelina Jolie's existing body art in last summer's Wanted. Recent movies like The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and Eastern Promises have used tattoos to great effect; in Button, Captain Mike's homemade tattoos both referred to his life on the sea as a sailor, which in that era was the most visible tattoo population, and his own father's discouragement of his hopes of becoming an artist. Instead, he brings his art with him everywhere he goes. And Eastern Promises based its tattoos (hello, Viggo in his undies sipping a shot of vodka getting tattooed) on the heavily researched Russian tattoos and their different signifiers in the gangster underworld.

Unfortunately, most recent movies have the tendency to slap some crappy tribal on a character to make him or her seem more bad-ass, which, given the context of tattoos in the movies, is kind of understandable. But what's not is just how freaking terrible they are! Here are my personal picks of the worst ink spilled onscreen, plus a bonus mention for the most gorgeous tattoos in a movie, both in design and story use.

No skipping this week! Bump a couple of these up to "buy" if your budget allows.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
F. Scott Fitzgerald's short story of a man who ages backwards becomes a staggering, three-hour demonstration of superb make-up and seamless computer effects under the direction of David Fincher. Despite the length, only one note is played -- everyone else's pity for "poor Benjamin" -- while the man himself (Brad Pitt) remains a frustrating cipher. With Cate Blanchett and Taraji P. Henson. Also on Blu-ray. Rent it.

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Last Chance Harvey
While in London for his daughter's wedding, New York jingle-writer Dustin Hoffman romances Emma Thompson. "A movie for grown-ups, but not in that clammy, Oscar-craving way that would make it untenable; it's a movie about people that takes place in the real world," said James Rocchi in his review for Cinematical. Directed by Joel Hopkins. Also on Blu-ray. Rent it.

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Wendy and Lucy
Michelle Williams stars as "a down-on-her-luck girl who's hoping to turn things around for herself with a summer job at a fishing cannery in Alaska," wrote Kim Voynar in her Cinematical review. When her car breaks down and her beloved dog goes missing in a small town in Oregon, she is "forced to make a series of increasingly difficult choices, and to rely upon the kindness (or not) of strangers to resolve her plight." Directed by Kelly Reichardt (the superb Old Joy), who "excels at capturing these small, very human moments in the overall stories of her characters' lives." Rent it.

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After the jump: Indies on DVD, Blu-ray, and Collector's Corner!

I didn't do too badly in my Oscar predictions. At the last minute, I went sentimental and predicted Mickey Rourke over Sean Penn, which was a bad idea, given that the Oscars were all business and duty this week, with no room for anything sentimental or personal. The other big mistake I made was to predict The Dark Knight (55 screens) as a winner in most of its eight categories. Everyone in the free world saw the film and no one can deny that its achievements in these categories were ground-breaking in some cases, and superb in all cases. But the Academy dutifully chose The Curious Case of Benjamin Button for these awards.

I have yet to meet very many people who actually like Benjamin Button, so I think there are two factors at stake. One is the concept in which the movie that employed the most people subsequently gets the most Oscar votes. The other factor states that only a certain type of movie actually gets to win. Benjamin Button is an Oscar movie through-and-through. It's long, first of all, and has a high-class literary pedigree (F. Scott Fitzgerald). It has obvious award bait in all the categories, not only in acting, cinematography, editing and music, but also the lower categories like makeup, visual effects and sound that usually go to summer blockbusters.

We've all been there before: You're invited to some cool kids Oscar party, but you're afraid to go because you didn't even see half the nominated films. And you just know everyone will be chatting up this year's nominees as if they directed the films themselves, leaving you tired, scared and alone off shivering in the corner near those tasty mini franks. But what if you had some sort of cheat sheet -- like a guide that shows you how to fake your way through any Oscars party? Would that help?

Luckily, our peeps over at Moviefone have flown in to rescue those last-minute Oscar bandwagon fans who desperately want to pretend they know all about Frozen River ("It's kind of like 'Maria Full of Grace' meets 'Fargo.'"), Milk ("It's got a positive, uplifting message that anyone -- gay or straight -- can connect with."), The Curious Case of Benjamin Button ("It's kind of like 'Forrest Gump' meets 'Cocoon.'"), Slumdog Millionaire ("The dance scene at the end made me want to run out and rent a week's worth of Bollywood movies.") and those other Oscar-nominated movies ... even if they didn't yet have a chance to actually watch them. So head on over to Moviefone to snag some of these fantastic one-liners, then thank us later ... after you impress your friends and woo everyone with your slick, snarky movie knowledge.

Also on Moviefone: Oscars Made Easy. Still trying to decide which films to see before the big event on Sunday? Check out this very cool break down on all the Oscar contenders, and use it to help steer you in the right direction.

I am anything but a rom-com fan (there's maybe one good one a year, by my reckoning), but even I was charmed by the lovely, funny trailer for He's Just Not That Into You. A bunch of genuinely funny people -- Ginnifer Goodwin, Jennifer Aniston, Justin Long, Drew Barrymore -- in what appeared to be a breezy, clever rumination on romance (that voicemail Goodwin leaves, starting out as a practiced, casual come-on and deteriorating into a panicked digression about how "more women are admitted to law school now than men," made me laugh every time): I wanted to see it. I haven't yet -- the unversally bad reviews dampened my enthusiasm -- but apparently the rest of the country wanted to see it too. The two-hour-plus film won a busy weekend with $27.5 million dollars, beating out a sci-fi thriller, a broad comedy with Steve Martin, and a 3-D animated wonder.

The latter, Henry Selick's Coraline, settled for third with $16.3 million. That may not seem like much, but consider that the film had no brand (with the possible exception of the "from the makers of A Nightmare Before Christmas label) and that the marketing did little to hide its deep-seated creepiness. On the other hand, Push, the gorgeous-but-incoherent sci-fi thriller only managed $10.2 million, a disappointing opening for what could have been at least a minor event film. Blame a crowded weekend and the fact that Summit Entertainment is still a relative newcomer to this whole wide distribution thing.

If I seemed distressed about Paul Blart: Mall Cop handily winning its debut weekend, imagine how I feel about it spending two weeks at #1. Its family film bona fides helped it edge out Underworld: Rise of the Lycans (at least in the estimates), despite the latter winning Friday. Underworld's $20.70 million opening is the weakest of the franchise, dipping just below the first film's $21 million and change; it's a good thing they saved money by ditching Kate Beckinsale in favor of Rhona Mitra, though I sense that the fourth film may go straight to DVD.

The other new wide release this weekend was Inkheart, and it's the year's first genuine flop. Kid-friendly, pervasively marketed fantasy based on a popular book seemed like a recipe for success, but it didn't take, with the film opening to $7.7 million in a not-terribly-crowded marketplace. Possibly not enough whole-family appeal.

Oscar nominations were announced on Thursday; that, combined with a screen count boost, combined with already steamrolling word-of-mouth rocketed Slumdog Millionare to its first double-digit weekend and an 80% gain over last week. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button -- the nomination leader -- managed to hold the line from last week without the benefit of a screen count increase, which is good news.

I haven't really done any comprehensive Oscar predicting this year. There's a glut of prognosticators, and I'm not any good at it anyway. But I figure I should go out on one limb the day before nominations are announced -- how else can I look foolish on the 22nd? -- and here it is: I predict that Wall-E slips into the Best Picture final five and leaves The Dark Knight in the cold.

Now, I'll admit that I'm doing this partially to annoy Josh "Snub It And There Will Be Consequences" Tyler (because seriously, that was insane). But here's the thing: if you accept the conventional wisdom that four of the five Best Picture slots will be occupied by Slumdog Millionaire, Frost/Nixon, Milk and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, that leaves Dark Knight and Wall-E (and possibly Doubt) fighting for #5. Since we're talking about Academy voters here, I think the smart money is on the beloved, endlessly charming Pixar flick over the pitch-black superhero epic. It's less divisive and more accessible. (I'll agree that it's not quite as awesome.) The Bat will content itself with tech noms and Heath Ledger.

So that's my last-minute sucker's bet. You got any? Aronofsky for Best Director? Dev Patel for Best Actor? Last chance, kids.

Gran Torino's expansion into wide release, plus strong openings for The Unborn and Bride Wars, combined for a surprisingly robust early January weekend at the box office.

With Gran Torino, Warner Bros. appears to have pulled off a genuinely successful platform release -- which isn't easy (though perhaps somewhat easier when your movie is a populist crowdpleaser). The film crept along in limited release for four weeks before expanding to 2800 screens this weekend for a cool $29 million. Next week, Defiance will attempt a similar coup, and we'll see what happens; my guess is that it won't play nearly as well.

Bride Wars and The Unborn essentially tied for second place with around $21 million each. Both did well, which is not a huge shock; the obligatory January horror film tends to be easy money, and Bride Wars pretty much matched the precedent set by 27 Dresses last January. And Screen Gems found an audience for its African-American-led drama Not Easily Broken, which did an okay $5.6 million on just over 700 screens.

The first real post-holiday weekend was rough on the holdovers, which, with the exception of Slumdog Millionare, pretty uniformly took hits of 50% or more. Unsurprisingly, Marley & Me remains the biggest winner of the holiday season; it should top out around $140 million. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, meanwhile, is hoping to hold on for long enough to get a boost when the Oscar nominations come out.

The full top 10 after the jump.