12 Years A Slave: The Film of the Year

12 Years A Slave is the most acclaimed film of the year. It has scored 96% on Rotten Tomatoes, a 97 on Metacritic, and so far has the most precursor award nominations of any film released this year. In addition, it has grossed almost $30 million against a $20 million budget, having just expanded into wide release; to say it's the Oscar favorite is an understatement, and it will certainly be facing off against critic favorite/box office behemoth Gravity for much of the awards season.

I was blown away by Gravity, completely and utterly in awe of the technical achievement, and the beautiful performance that Sandra Bullock gave. Up until 12 Years, it was my pick for Best Picture.

A lot of people are turned off at the subject matter: "Another slavery movie?", "Another period film?", "Ugh, typical Oscar movie", "It looks boring" are among the comments I've heard from being asked about the film. Many movies about slavery have never really gotten into the cold hard facts: It was a horrible experience, that was completely life altering in every way imaginable. Never has a film so accurately displayed the horrors of slavery, never has a film grabbed me and forced me to examine what it was showing, and never has a film blown me away quite in the way 12 Years A Slave did. Make no mistake, just because the film is set in the mid 1800s, does not mean the film is any less important. In fact, I'd say that 12 Years A Slave is one of the most important films to ever be made, of any year.

Film Independent Spirit Award Nominations

The Independent Spirit Awards (nicknamed the Indie Spirits) have risen in prominence in the last few years since their inception back in 1984 (the first ceremony took place a year later). These awards often honor a lot of the smaller films that oftentimes don't find a place in the major awards race (Globes-SAG-BAFTA-Oscar), but have been known to honor those that are destined for Oscar glory. They're a nice award because sometimes, by honoring a lesser known nominee, they spark a flame in that particular nominee's campaign. Sometimes it begins and ends with the Spirits, but sometimes, they can find themselves seated at the Oscar ceremony, awaiting their name to be called.

Either way, the Spirits announced their nominations this morning, and Oscar frontrunner 12 Years A Slave led the pack with 7 nominations, with Alexander Payne's Nebraska trailing not too far behind with 6.

Take a look at the list of major nominees (and my thoughts) below (for the full list of nominations and breakdown by studio, you can go here, where Awards Daily's Sasha Stone has done a good job of compiling everything you need to know). The Independent Spirit Award winners will be announced sometime next year during the telecast; the date has yet to be announced)

Catching Fire: Midnight Premiere

My college sponsored a trip the other night to a midnight screening of Catching Fire (you can read my reaction/thoughts on the film here). Coincidently, it was my friend Andrea's birthday, and she had been looking forward to Catching Fire being released, so we all nabbed tickets before they sold out and went in celebration of her birthday. I documented the night (and Andrea's reaction) for a class assignment for my Online Journalism class.

You can watch the video (made, filmed, and edited by yours truly) here [Blogger is being difficult and not letting me post the video to my page, sorry for the inconvenience] set to The Way by Ariana Grande (feat. Mac Miller). Enjoy :)

First American Hustle Screenings: Jennifer Lawrence is on Track for Oscar nomination #3

That's right! The biggest question mark in this year's Oscar race has finally been unveiled. Kris Tapley of incontention.com reports that after many test screenings and editing sessions, Sony Pictures held a screening of the film for various press members, among them are SAG members who will be voting on this year's nominations in just a few weeks.

The Hunger Games: Catching Fire Review

The Hunger Games Trilogy is one in many popular young adult novel series (including Harry Potter and Twilight) to receive the book to film adaptation treatment. The first film became an instant box office success last year, riding on the impressive popularity of the novels. It also made a star out of Jennifer Lawrence, then an Academy Award nominee who would later win for her performance in David O’Russell’s Silver Lining’s Playbook. When it was announced that the sequel, Catching Fire, was on track to be released, expectations were raised instantly, but after watching the film, I can tell you all expectations were shattered; not only does Catching Fire raise the bar for the series as a whole, but it is one of the best films of the year. 

Jennifer Lawrence and Josh Hutcherson as Katniss and Peeta (courtesy of ryanseacrest.com)

Precursor Buzz: Could Scarlett Johansson get an Oscar Nomination for "Her"? & Other Recipients.

Scarlett Johansson has had an interesting career ever since her she burst onto the scene. She gained indie cred and acclaim with roles in "North" and "Ghost World", but her breakout role in Sofia Coppola's "Lost In Translation". She unexpectedly won the BAFTA award for Best Leading Actress (though she missed out on the Oscar), and turned in another acclaimed performance in the little seen "Girl With The Pearl Earring", and again in Woody Allen's "Match Point".

Sky Ferreira Live Blog

Hey everyone! As I mentioned a few days ago I'd be live blogging the Sky Ferreira concert tonight. This is Sky's first tour, in support of her long awaited album which is finally here. It peaked at #8 on iTunes, with little to no promotion from her label, which she has notoriously been struggling with to release an album for almost 5 years now. 

For those of you that don't know, Sky Ferreira is not just a musician, but also a model and an actress. She uses her modeling and acting career as a way of funding her music. She has stated that she does this to have as much creative control over her music as possible, which is another reason why she's clashed with her label in the past. 

Sky has modeled for Forever 21, Marc Jacobs, Vogue, Elle, and a number of other high profile magazines and retailers. In addition, she has acted in a number of independent films, most notably Putty Hill, which was screened at a number of film festivals, including the Berlin Film Festival. She and the film received good notices from critic Roger Ebert. Recently she appeared in a short film called IRL, directed by Grant Singer (who she has collaborated with on many of her music videos). She's set to star in Eli Roth's horror film, "The Green Inferno", which is about a group of students on a trip to protect a group of natives in the Amazon, however, they are taken hostage by those same natives. 

Anyway, enough background, I've babbled enough. I'm waiting right now for my friend to come pick me up so we can start driving into the city. The liveblog will begin below with various updates throughout the night. Enjoy! :)