The Big Awards show is Sunday....all the stars will come out to get hammered because their campaign of kissing pundit ass to receive a coveted award is over and they can get back to living their abnormal lives.
To me, these awards shows are as much about who you are and who you know as they are about the art you make. James Cameron dedicated many years of his life and millions of dollars to making a film that will change the action film genre....so if it wins best picture it will confirm that technological advances and innovative film scaping have taken the place of a good script and good acting. Avatar has 'captured the imagination' of the world through production and special effects. But the flying dragon fiasco failed to create a dreamscape anywhere near what Spike Jonze and Company conceptualized!
So, my vote for Best Picture was cast for Where the Wild Things Are. This film is nothing short of a Masterpiece. For the imagination put into it and the recreation of the boundless ideas behind my favorite book as a child. The critics were not kind to this movie, which shows how very little THEY know. Have we become so jaded as a society that 3D is what drives our entertainment perspective? That we are now so lazy even in the lazy practice of cinematic observation that we need the characters in the room with us....?
Last night, I sat with my son and daughter and watched Where the Wild Things Are. We laughed and cried; they asked me questions regarding Max's frustration (empathetic to his plight). It was not an easy watch for them at times and they ran upstairs to pretend they where monsters during a fair part of the films mid-section. But when Max boarded his boat and returned home to his Mom, we smiled universally.
Where the Wild Things Are is a conveyance of the difficulty of childhood and parenting alike. It is a tribute to our imagination and where it can take us when times are tough. This film makes kids want to be grown ups and grown ups want to be kids. There is an empowerment of imagination and warning in the danger of worshiping to false idols.
I love books because they allow us to create a world in our minds that is not convertible to any type of media....except in this case. Spike Jonze, David Eggers, Tom Hanks and crew may have actually found a way to take a child's mind and throw it into the universe of the silver screen. A tribute to the great minds of our time....worked for not bought!
As the Monsters howled in blissful unison sending Max back home, my thoughts were strong: That being a kid can suck and that parents are as scared shitless as a kid in the forest. But moreso, that I was happy to see my old friend Brett this week, that I love to get emails from my friend Bob, that I am so grateful to have had a mother to read Where the Wild Things are to me and that I am happy to pass along the story to my kids.
When Catherine Keener fell asleep, her son safe in the kitchen, so did Marley Bobbie Kovacovich in my arms. My son looked up at me and asked for a chocolate sandwich. All of us back in our kingdom together, safe from all the monsters out there, but sympathetic to their need to just be part of the world.
Avatar can SUCK IT! Where the Wild Things Are is the Best picture released in 2009!
Don't Forget to Remember!
Dave
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