Wastin' Time With Oscar: The Last Emperor (1987)

Movie Description: Recounting the last years of China’s Ching Dynasty, this Oscar-winning epic charts the life of Pu Yi, who ascended the throne when he was 3 years old.
Starring: John Lone, Joan Chen and Peter O’Toole
Directed By: Bernardo Bertolucci

My Thoughts: Alright, I’ll admit I chose to watch and review The Last Emperor first because it looked pretty boring and I wanted to get it out of the way. Well, it turns out I shouldn’t judge a movie by it’s Netflix description.

While the movie was a little long, and maybe one or two of the accents were a little thick, I found myself enjoying the movie the entire time. I am a firm believer that any movie that attempts to tell the life story of a real person who actually lived should never be under 2 hours, and in this case The Last Emperor did not disappoint. The version I watched had a run time of 2 hours and 42 minutes, and I hear legend there’s also a version that runs well over 3 hours (in my opinion the 2 hour 42 minute is sufficient).

Unsurprisingly, the mostly Asian lead actors in this film aren’t famous faces to the American general movie going public, but this isn’t a problem. Some of the acting was so good it really makes you wish you could saw more of these actors in today’s movies. One actor most will recognize though is Peter O’Toole. In the movie he plays the child emperor’s Western tutor and friend. Needless to say O’Toole is fantastic in the role as he is in most of his acting roles.

All in all, I have to say I liked The Last Emperor a lot.

Which leads to…

Should This Movie Have The Academy Award For Best Picture?: In 1987 The Last Emperor was up against Broadcast News, Hope and Glory, Moonstruck, and Fatal Attraction. At the risk of sounding uninformed I have never seen Hope and Glory. I wasn’t crazy about Broadcast News, I think James L. Brooks has done much better work. Fatal Attraction was good, but I’m not sure I feel it as an Oscar winner. The same things with Moonstruck, I like the movie (which is hard to type because usually I hate Cher), but when it comes right down to the gut truth it wasn’t as good as The Last Emperor.

So “yes”, The Last Emperor should have won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1987.

I Should Get An Award For Doing This

So folks, lately I’ve been giving a little thought to maybe adding some new “features” to the ol’ Soviet Science blog…some new regular updates and the like. After much brain racking and sleepless nights of soul searching I finally came up with a few good ideas.

This is one of them.

Over the course of the next 6 (six) months I will attempt to view and review every movie that has won the Academy Award for Best Picture dating back to the year of my birth (1981).
Mind you, this is no easy task…for every “The Departed” and “Braveheart” there is also an “The English Patient” and “The Last Emperor”. Also some Academy Award winning movies are rather hard to find on DVD (“Out Of Africa” I’m looking at you…).

With that in mind, I hereby solemnly swear to watch  and review every single one of these movies in under six months or face the grim penalty of never seeing another movie again. So say I.

A few quick notes: I won’t be watching these movies in any specific order, I’m just going to watch them in what ever order I can get my hands on them. I own a few of these movies, but there are others that I’ll going to have to track down in order to watch them. Also, why am I giving myself six months to watch 31 movies? Plain and simply I want to give myself a little breathing room when it comes to watching them (a.k.a. So I can watch other movies too and not just these only). Lastly, for those who are keeping track at home, I’ll cross out the moves on the list below once I’ve seen and reviewed them.

For your enjoyment here’s a complete list of movies I’ll be watching along with the year they won their Academy Award for Best Picture:

1. Chariots of Fire, 1981
2. Gandhi, 1982
3. Terms Of Endearment, 1983
4. Amadeus, 1984
5. Out Of Africa, 1985
6. Platoon, 1986
7. The Last Emperor, 1987
8. Rain Man, 1988
9. Driving Miss Daisy, 1989
10. Dances With Wolves, 1990
11. The Silence Of The Lambs, 1991
12. Unforgiven, 1992
13. Schindler’s List, 1993
14. Forrest Gump, 1994
15. Braveheart, 1995
16. The English Patient, 1996
17. Titanic, 1997
18. Shakespeare in Love, 1998
19. American Beauty, 1999
20. Gladiator, 2000
21. A Beautiful Mind, 2001
22. Chicago, 2002
23. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, 2003
24. Million Dollar Baby, 2004
25. Crash, 2005
26. The Departed, 2006
27. No Country for Old Men, 2007
28. Slumdog Millionaire, 2008
29. The Hurt Locker, 2009
30. The King’s Speech, 2010
31. The Artist, 2011

2012 Is A Good Year For Archery

Katniss Everdeen from The Hunger Games

 2012 Summer Olympics in London*

 Merida from Pixar’s Brave

 Hawkeye from The Avengers

Green Arrow gets a new TV show on The CW

*I pulled this photo from the inter-web. I don’t know who he is, if he made the cut for the US Olympic team, or if he was even trying out for the Olympics. I would venture to guess he is an American though based on patriotic sleeves.

I'm Kinda Sad, Man

I GUESS I SHOULD SAY “SPOILER” HERE BEFORE YOU READ SOMETHING YOU DON’T WANT TO KNOW…

I’m really gonna miss Lane Pryce. Both the character and Jared Harris who played him (the dude can’t keep a job…first killed off on Fringe and now on Mad Men).
Anyway, like most of you I saw the possibility of suicide coming early on last night, but when it actually happened I was still a little shocked…I was hoping he wouldn’t go through with it.
But the moment that secretary mentioned Lane’s door was locked and he hadn’t shown up at the office yet I knew it was a done deal.
You know a show is good when it sticks with you awhile after watching it. All last night I was dreaming about Mad Men and Lane’s death…my first thought when I woke up this morning was about Lane…I still can’t help but to picture his body hanging there from the ceiling looking all sad and spooky (the make-up team who did his dead make up deserves an award, it was top notch). Once again, the true mark of great TV.
But still…it’s sad to see Lane go…

In Hell Everyone Has A Roommate

Let's face it devoted reader, in today's day and age times are tough and money is hard. Often times good hard working folks like you and me are forced to tighten our budgetary belts and make financial sacrifices in order to survive.
With that thought in mind many folks choose to share a living space with a roommate.
Being that I have at one time or another been a poor struggling 20-something myself, I've had my fair share of roommates. Allow me to highlight some of the pros and cons of sharing your home with a roommate:

CONS:

• One of the roommates will undoubtedly be horrible with money, lose their job, or have a gambling addiction. This will resulting in someone (aka you) having to pick up the slack in order to cover their basic bills so the power won't be shut off.
• One roommate will always be cleaner than the other. This mean that one person is always going to be doing the cleaning housework all the while resenting their roommate's slob-like ways.
• No matter what time of day it is you will never be able to get to the living room TV first. You will have to chose between watching whatever God awful show your roommate is watching in the living room or hiding out in your bedroom to watch what you want uncomfortably on your bed.
• You will never be able to walk out the front door without be grilled about where you're going, when you'll be back, or if you want some company.
• As soon as you walk into the kitchen and open the refrigerator your roommate will no doubt join you in the kitchen and get in your way as you're trying to prepare a meal or snack.
• When your roommate is trying to sleep you will always have the TV up too loud. This works the other way too, because when you're trying to sleep your roommate will also have the TV volume up too loud for you to find your peace.
• Your roommate will always leave his/her clothes in the dryer for days and days forcing you to remove them yourself so you can put your own wet laundry in to dry.
• Your food and drinks will mysteriously disappear from the fridge or cupboard.
• If you bring a guy or gal home you can always count on adding a third to your party once you arrive because your roommate will always be up, in the living room and ready to talk your date's ear off.
• No matter the time of day, if you want to take a shower, your roommate will make it to the bathroom before you. Then you have to wait...and get cold water.

PROS:

• If a killer sneaks into your house in the middle of the night you might get lucky and kill your roommate first.

I don't know why I find this so funny...

Four Things I Miss

1. James Bond Week On TBS - I remember a million years ago in December around my birthday TBS used to show a full week of back-to-back James Bond movies. I would always make a point of watching as many as I could and taping all the best ones. Sadly, TBS quit doing that at some point and now on rare occasions some other cable networks will halfheartedly put together a “James Bond Weekend”, but they never show all 22 films and it’s just not the same.
2. Using My Bike As My Mode Of Transportation Before I Could Drive - As a youth before I had my drivers license my friends and I roamed all over the local area only on our bikes. We would ride up to a nearby gas station and buy sodas and junk food snacks or ride up to the library along the narrow two lane road. Traveling was an adventure back then, something driving a car just doesn’t seem to match.
3. Wizard Magazine - Wizard was a magazine about comic books that isn’t published anymore. In the days before the internet was so common all the big news for geeks like me came from the pages of Wizard Magazine. They always had articles and lists that sparked hours of debate and conversation amongst my friends and I. Some of the happiest reading times of my life were when I had a brand new issue of Wizard and a study hall period in middle school.
4. Martin Scorsese Gangster Movies - Mean Streets, Goodfellas, Casino, The Departed*…Scorsese just doesn’t make movies like this anymore. I’m well aware that Scorsese has been pegged as a “gangster movie-maker” even though the majority of his 52 films don’t deal with gangsters…but you know what? If you do something better than everybody else you should embrace it. I would be perfectly happy if Scorsese made one gritty gangster movie every 5 years, that way he could make all these other movies he wants to make but he still is providing the world (a.k.a. me) some good old fashioned mob drama!

*I’m not counting Gangs Of New York. That was a period piece and not a true gangster epic.