When we were living in Orange county (mumble) decades ago a movie would often show up in a theater between Christmas and New Year – exactly a week – so it would qualify for Oscar nominations then be pulled back until a general release in February to catch the Oscar buzz.
Los Angeles County is the specific qualifier, but I imagine you were close. There was a small theater chain called Laemmle that was famous for hosting qualifying runs for a very long time, I always kind of wanted to visit it.
In case anyone was confused about what the six areas that the film has to be shown in to be eligible for an Oscar, it’s these:
- Los Angeles County
- The City of New York
- The Bay area
- Chicago, Illinois
- Dallas/Fort Worth, Texas
- Atlanta, Georgia
Los Angeles County has a precise location, since it’s a city. The City of New York has a precise location, since it’s a city. Chicago, Illinois has a precise location, since it’s a city. Atlanta, Georgia has a precise location, since it’s a city. I don’t know how they define the Bay area (of California). I don’t know how they define the Dallas/Fort Worth area.
Just noting that the county is larger than the city.
I should have said that it was already a county.
The usual definition is the counties of San Francisco, Marin, Sonoma, Napa, Solano, Contra Costa, Alameda, Santa Clara, and San Mateo. I don’t know whether that’s how AMPAS defines it, though.
Yeah, the northwest corner, a few miles from La Mirada. The films would be in Hollywood or downtown LA so unless we were really keen on seeing the early release wouldn’t bother, but we still got the listings in the Times.
Backrooms (2026) in theaters.
Surreal Horror. Don’t think too much about the implied metaphors or physics of it and just enjoy the creepiness.
I just finished watching the dumbest damn horror movie of all time, 1978’s “The Manitou”, with Tony Curtis and Susan Strasberg, and featuring Michael Ansara as John Singing Rock (an Indian Medicine man).
Flags of our Fathers 2006 Ryan Phillippe, Jesse Bradford, Adam Beach
Paramount+
Tells the life stories of the soldiers that raised the flag at the Battle of Iwo Jima.
I already knew about Ira Hayes tragic life of alcoholism.
It’s almost like this small group of vets were cursed. Four KIA on Iwo Jima shortly afterwards. The rest were tormented for the rest of their lives.
It’s a well crafted and acted movie. However, I found it extremely sad and depressing.
It makes me fear for what happened to the rest of the Iwo Jima vets.
What happened to Monday? Not my favorite movie, but I enjoyed it. Twisty dystopian action flick in a world where there is (somehow) a global one child policy. A family of septuplets live as one person, each taking the role of that person one day a week. One evening Monday doesn’t come home. If you can buy into a ridiculous concept whole heartedly, it’s pretty cool. If not, this probably isn’t for you. Noomi Rapace plays the septuplets, giving each their own personality. Glenn Close plays the villain and while she’s unquestionably evil, you gotta wonder if she doesn’t have a point. Lot’s of violence. It starts slow, but if you can stick with it the action doesn’t stop after kicking in.
Streaming on Netflix.
The punchline is that it’s based on a book co-authored by James Bradley, son of John Bradley. As you’ll know, a major plot point is that at least one of the “flag raisers” wasn’t really in the iconic photo of the iconic flag-raising.
Turns out, John Bradley wasn’t in the photo either. He was misidentified. Maybe that’s one reason he didn’t talk so much to his son about it. Which is a bummer, because the man was legitimately a hero and I think it would have really dded something to the narrative that a combat-wounded man who earned a Navy Cross might conceivably dread returning to or continuing combat so much that he’d allow himself to be made a propaganda tool to escape it, and then have to see himself literally cast in bronze and feel compelled to live the rest of his life in the lie’s shadow.
But what’s kind of messed up too is, the man Bradley displaced from the “photo” and thus the trip home was actually still alive and would gomon to outlive all the other flag-raisers.
ETA: Oh, and the guys in the movie were marines and a sailor, not soldiers (but all the flag-raisers in real life were actually marines, since Bradley wasn’t among them). Also, 3 KIA, not 4.
We watched Wake Up Dead Man (Knives Out) last night. We really enjoyed it. A while back, I tried to watch The Glass Onion, but just couldn’t get into it. Maybe I’ll give it another shot.
Based on the crazy premise in your post, I sought this out last night and really enjoyed it. The action is good, Noomi Rapace’s performances are…interesting, and I just like a good eye-roller.
I saw Help! in the late 60s on TV, I loved it. I was 8(?). Never seen it since. Always wondered how it held up.
I saw Yellow Submarine in the theater when it was new. I was 7. I loved it. I saw it as an adult, not that long ago. I thought it was the stupidest film I’d ever seen. I realized you had to be either 7, or stoned, to enjoy it.
I’d hate to spend $30 to buy the blu ray and find the same is true of Help!
Spectral. American soldiers mixed up in an eastern European civil war encounter strange deadly apparitions. A DARPA scientist is brought in to figure out what’s going on. A military versus monsters action movie, like a poor man’s Aliens. The explanation requires you not to suspend your disbelief, but to expel it. That said it was an original idea, at least. It’s well made and watchable if you like action movies. Streaming on Netflix.
Sounds like WAR MACHINE with Alan Ritchson. And equal summoning of disbelief.
Oh wow. Thanks!
We saw Old Henry last weekend. An independent Western, and it was very well done.