I thought it would be a fun idea to centrally track which of this year’s Best Picture nominees Dopers have seen.
The list below is presented so that each contributor may cut and paste for each subsequent post in order to keep his or her own running, updated list.
Your review of each movie - I will use a 4-Star scale - is optional.
The nominees are:
The Big Short
Bridge of Spies
Brooklyn
Mad Max: Fury Road
The Martian
The Revenant
Room
Spotlight
Seen:
The Martian ***1/2
The Big Short ****
Not seen:
Bridge of Spies
Brooklyn
Mad Max: Fury Road
The Revenant
Room
Spotlight
mmm
Seen:
The Martian ****
Mad Max: Fury Road ****
Not seen:
*The Big Short
Bridge of Spies
Brooklyn
The Revenant
Room
Spotlight *
About the only “Not Seen” I’d like to see is Bridge of Spies; the others don’t particularly interest me, fine movies though they probably are.
Seen:
The Big Short ****
Bridge of Spies ***
Mad Max:Fury Road *
The Martian ***
Spotlight ****
Unseen, yet:
Brooklyn
Room
The Revenant doesn’t interest me at all.
Seen:
The Big Short: ***1/2
Mad Max: Fury Road: ****
The Martian: ***1/2
The Revenant: ***
Room: ****
Spotlight: ***
Not yet seen:
Bridge of Spies
Brooklyn
I’ve no interest in Brooklyn, but I’ll see Bridge of Spies before awards night. The Oscars are basically my Super Bowl and I usually see all (or almost all) the nominees. IMO the best films of the year were Room and Mad Max.
I’ve seen all of them except The Revenant and I’m seeing that tomorrow.
Seen:
The Big Short **** (Loved it, unexpected fun))
Bridge of Spies *** (Workmanlike, very good performances elevate it)
Brooklyn *** (Ronan is such a good actress, she has to carry the film, and manages splendidly)
Mad Max: Fury Road * (Honestly, just didn’t get it at all)
The Martian *** (The year’s finest comedy/musical ;))
Not Seen:
The Revenant
Room
Spotlight
I’ve seen them all…
The Big Short *** (fun movie, interesting charters. I preferred Margin Call, personally)
Bridge of Spies***1/2 (good movie, I am a sucker for this type of thing. Mark Rylance should win, but likely won’t.)
Brooklyn****(As far as Romance movies go, this one is top notch. Saoirse Ronan did a great job with her character. Everything seemed earned.)
Mad Max: Fury Road****(one of my top three. The production design has to be one of the greatest ever. The attention to detail is astonishing. Also, really fun and did a great job at world building.)
The Martian***1/2(immensely rewatchable, great cast)
The Revenant****(one of the better movies about survival, incredible cinematography, super tense movie. Tom Hardy and Leo were great. Not sure about rewatchability, however.)
Room****(I’ve been on the Brie Larson bandwagon for a while now. She and her son were great. It’s rare to get a good performance out of a kid, also. Tough to watch, but that’s a credit to all involved.)
Spotlight****(best of the year for me. I saw it more times in theatres than Star Wars and still enjoy it. Great newspaper procedurals are rare, and this may be the best. Ruffalo is great, but for me, the unsung hero is Liev Schriber. It’s not a showy performance but they don’t all need to be.)
I’ll rank them out of 10, with 10/10 being perfect.
Seen:
The Big Short - 3/10. Entertaining opening 20 minutes. Rest was dull and badly made.
Bridge of Spies - 6/10. Nice, but nothing super incredible. Good, but not great.
Mad Max: Fury Road - 9/10. Amazing. The best movie of the year.
The Martian - 8/10. Great movie. I’d be fine if this wins Best Picture.
Not seen:
The Revenant
Room
Spotlight
Brooklynn
I’ve seen all Best Picture nominations:
The Big Short - Excellent film. Well written, great cast. An entertaining way to explain one of the worst crimes perpetrated on the American people. And they all got away with it.
Bridge of Spies - Looks great, interesting story. Overall though was just a good film.
Brooklyn - Another great looking film with a superb lead performance by Ronan
Mad Max: Fury Road - Fine film, gets real repetitive very quickly though. Nothing really all that new here.
The Martian - The most fun film of all the nominations. Great adventure.
The Revenant - One hell of an epic looking film. Gripping story with some excellent scenes.
***Room ***- Of all seven nominations, this film was the best. A terrifying subject with some GREAT performances by Larson and young Tremblay.
Spotlight - Solid true story with an excellent ensemble. Made me realize how much I miss the days when we had real journalists tackling and telling stories that needs to be told.
I have seen all of them.
I LOVED:
[ul]
[li]The Martian[/li][li]Room[/li][li]The Big Short[/li][/ul]
The rest:
[ul]
[li]Bridge of Spies[/li][li]Brooklyn[/li][li]Mad Max: Fury Road[/li][li]The Revenant[/li][li]Spotlight[/li][/ul]
were all perfectly fine films that I enjoyed and appreciated, but have no particularly strong feelings about.
Just a note that I set up a poll to predict the Best Picture winner.
link
mmm
We saw “Bridge of Spies” a few nights ago and I’m already forgetting it.
It was a perfectly good movie but there wasn’t anything terribly original, amazing, or noteworthy about it. Tom Hanks was certainly very good but he always is.
There wasn’t anything WRONG with it, but I don’t get why it was nominated. “Inside Out” was a much more interesting movie.
I saw only The Martian. I thought it was good, not great, but it was the best movie I saw this year.
Seen them all. Won’t apply star ratings but in order of preference
Mad Max: Fury Road
The Big Short
Room
Brooklyn
Spotlight
Bridge of Spies
The Revenant
The Martian
And I would rank Foreign Language Film nominee Mustang above all of them.
Seen:
The Big Short
Bridge of Spies
The Martian
My wife has seen Spotlight, but I haven’t.
We intend to see them all ere the Oscars – it’s a little game we play this time each year. Mad Max is on HBO, so that won’t be any problem.
Loved all 3 of the ones we’ve seen so far. I have a feeling Room will be like eating my vegetables.
For those who want to catch up on all the nominees in two days (end of February), AMC Theatres is doing their Best Picture Showcase again. Link lists participating theaters and tickets go on sale tomorrow.
This year will be our sixth AMCBPS, and we look forward to it every year. The only one we’ve seen so far is “Bridge of Spies”, so almost all of these will be fresh takes.
I’ve seen them all. I liked them all to one degree or another, but my favorites in no particular order are:
The Martian
Brooklyn
Mad Max: Fury Road
Spotlight
The others I liked but not as much:
The Revenant
Room
Bridge of Spies
The Big Short
Bridge of Spies was the most forgettable. I think I downgraded Room because it was such a hard watch - the performances were fantastic. The Big Short was kind of amusing but inconsistent. Revenant was visually spectacular but the story didn’t pull me in.
I’ve seen Mad Max: Fury Road and I loved it. 10/10.
Before this movie I loved the idea of Mad Max, but I always felt let down by the endings. This one has something closer to a traditional Hollywood ending, and it’s better for it. On top of that it has Imperator Furiosa, a badass woman with a bionic arm, which is pretty much my favourite thing ever.