The Father - 6 nominations

 

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role - Anthony Hopkins

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role - Olivia Colman

Best Adapted Screenplay - Christopher Hampton (screenplay by), Florian Zeller (screenplay by)

Best Achievement in Film Editing - Yorgos Lamprinos

Best Achievement in Production Design - Peter Francis (production design), Cathy Featherstone (set decoration)

Best Motion Picture of the Year - David Parfitt (producer), Jean-Louis Livi (producer),  Philippe Carcassonne (producer)

As my husband always reminds me, the Oscars is not the playground of comedic films, and especially not the Best Picture category.  The Father is a brilliant film about a man experiencing middle to advanced dementia, and the burden that places on his daughter, trying (but not always knowing how) to do the right thing for his care.  Much of the film is one scene lived through the father's experience - with different actors playing different roles representing how a person with dementia might remember someone one day and not recognize that person the next day; with a timeline that seems to repeat itself and scenes that don't follow a linear path, with the same confusion that the father experiences day in and day out.  While there have been plenty of Oscar nominated films about the experience of Alzheimer's or dementia (Still Alice, Away From Her, The Savages, Glen Campbell: I'll Be Me) none gives the first-person experience of what it feels like until The Father.

The film is intended to be confusing, and truly the editing is the star of this movie - though Oscar winners Anthony Hopkins and Olivia Colman remind us with every word and every expression why these two actors are truly giants.  The only nomination I found truly confusing was the production design which worked, but was not truly special - no matter, this award mostly goes to period pieces and I can't really see this film nabbing the gold.

Unlike most of the Best Picture nominees,  I can't say that this film is for everyone.  Dementia touches people's lives differently and for some, this film will just be too hard to watch.  It is a highly original take and it feels true.  I don't know enough about the disease to know how accurately it is portrayed, but it is certainly the first time I can recall that a film tackles the subject from the inside - we aren't watching what happens to someone living with dementia, we are living it with him.  It's a powerful film.

Watch the trailer here.

The Two Popes - 3 nominations

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role - Jonathan Pryce

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role - Anthony Hopkins

Best Adapted Screenplay - Anthony McCarten

The Two Popes begins with the election of Cardinal Ratzinger to become Pope Benedict, and his church embroiled by child molestation scandals, slowly losing relevance to young Catholics everywhere.  (This, not uncommon to any religion, as younger people are more connected to spirituality and less connected to institutions.  My commentary, not the film's.) . He decides that he would like to resign, which is very rare indeed; most Popes don't live to see their successor.  He confides this desire in Cardinal Bergoglio, a priest who Benedict considers far too liberal but potentially the right man to lead Catholics through worldwide change, and who has come to see the Pope to resign his role and retire.  The film is a conversation and also, a look back to Bergoglio's life, how he decided to become a priest, and his rise during a tumultuous time in Argentina.  They share their demons with each other, and work to hear each others' confessions as they take ownership for their biggest transgressions.  

I've done a lot of reading about these two actual Popes since I saw the film, and this is one of those movies that seems to get a large majority of its facts wrong about each of these men, so a reminder that narrative movies are not documentaries.  (While I have not fact checked this article, I thought this the best of the pieces I read explaining the real history versus what is depicted in the film: https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2019/12/the-two-popes-real-story)

But we are not meant to watch fictional films and expect to learn history.  We watch them for entertainment, for character study, for overcoming obstacles with satisfying resolutions - and if those are the jobs of a film, The Two Popes scores on all counts.  Both actors are outstanding as they always are (this is Pryce's first Oscars nomination.... say what?) and Hopkins' 5th (he won for Silence of the Lambs).  Neither will win his category, but the acting in the film is the centerpiece of the experience, there isn't a lot of flash or folly, the film is primarily two aging men flawlessly holding the attention of the audience for a few hours.

The film is based on a play, and obviously I'm in no position to recommend seeing that.  So, for more information on the child molestation cases against the Catholic church, I'd like to recommend another Oscars nominated documentary called Deliver Us From Evil.

It was an excellent documentary, and relates tangentially to this film.  (and I'll bet you haven't seen it!)

Watch the trailer: