Greyhound - 1 nomination

Best Sound
Warren Shaw 
Michael Minkler 
Beau Borders 
David Wyman 

Tom Hanks plays Captain Krause, a new US Navy commander in World War 2 attempting to cross an unprotected piece of the ocean, the "Black Pit," bringing much-needed supplies to allied troops in Europe. The ship is part of a caravan of allied ships and they are of course attacked by German submarines.  Captain Krause has incredible instincts for battle and is the perfect commander - tough, kind, appreciative, knows the names of his crew, and maybe a little too perfect for a character.  (When the crew successfully defends the ship and blows up a German submarine, Captain Krause refuses to celebrate because the Germans who died were also souls in the world... what a beautiful and probably unrealistic portrayal - a little too goody goody for my taste.). The film has the requisite super kind kitchen crewman with the super special relationship with the Captain killed in battle, and with some exceptions, is basically a series of naval battles with submarines.  I mean A. LOT. OF. BATTLES. which are no doubt based on the true story but making the film less than engaging.

On the other hand, the sound is noticeably magnificent, even for an amateur like me who probably normally couldn't tell the difference.  As I have noted in prior years, war films do very well in the sound category because of the many layers of sound required in every scene.  Now that Sound Mixing and Sound Editing have merged into one category, you can easily imagine the layers of dialogue, booming sound effects, music, and ambient sound all layered into the major moments of the film.  But, the movie isn't good enough to be labeled "Academy Award nominee," and I don't really recommend it.

Watch the trailer here.

We're just two days away from the Oscars, so you still have time to download and listed to our 2 Movie Jews bonus episode on the nominees!  Here's the link or you can subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and more. 

 

INTERSTELLAR - 5 nominations

Original Score - Hans Zimmer
Production Design - Nathan Crowley (Production Design), Gary Fettis (Set Decoration)
Sound Editing - Richard King
Sound Mixing - Gary A. Rizzo, Gregg Landaker, Mark Weingarten
Visual Effects - Paul Franklin, Andrew Lockley, Ian Hunter, Scott Fisher

Let me just begin by saying that I fully expect to be derided for my review of the just mediocre Interstellar.  I highly doubt they will be "retweeting" what I have to say.  The visual effects were terrific and of course, this film was just primed for all of the technical awards.  It's no surprise that it has garnered nominations for both Sound Editing and Sound Mixing.  Much like Gravity, it had a stunning musical score which Hans Zimmer created (his 9th nomination for Original Score!), and that was a nice companion piece to the visual gymnastics.  The design of the film required the ability to suppose what other planets might look like, what space travel would look like, and what redesigned future worlds would look like.  That was very well done.

Then we arrive at the narrative.  I really really liked the first hour and a half.  It was interesting story, I was riveted, I liked the characters and the complexities of their relationships and the challenge faced by Matthew McConaghey's character whether to save the world or be with his family.  The exploration of other planets was cool.  But after that first section of the film, that's where Interstellar starts to go off the rails. We learn that love is a physical property (as in, another property of physics, or maybe it was meant to be next element on the periodic table... the science was, it was, well, let's just say Neil Degrasse Tyson was not the scientific advisor on this movie), that time is fluid, and that we had the power to click our heels and go back home all along.  (Believe it or not, that was not even a spoiler.)

In my defense, I want to add that I love science fiction films.  I don't mind a crazy new wrinkle that has nothing to do with reality or anything that could ever be reality.  I'm sure Neil Degrasse Tyson does too (right, Neil? Call me!), and that he is also able to separate real scientific principles from fantastic ones.  But this one was just too cheesy, even for me.  The last hour made science too precious, too adorable, too much baby seal hugging a puppy (what's cuter than that?), to the point where they lost me.

The sad part of this film is that it should be seen in a theatre in order to fully appreciate the sound and the visuals, but the story is more of one that you could "catch it on cable."  So if you balance the excellence of the technical merits and the silliness of the story, you end up with Inter-mediocre rather than Interstellar.  

THE HOBBIT: THE BATTLE OF THE FIVE ARMIES - 1 nomination

Sound Editing - Brent Burge and Jason Canovas

So let's just begin with a quick reminder of what the art of sound editing or sound design is.  Sound editing takes previously recorded audio elements like dialogue and sound effects and uses sound to establish the ambience of the film.  Sometimes audio elements are deconstructed or reconstructed to give the exact sound that the designer is attempting.  Sound editing is a very technical skill and you can bet that manipulating sound in a film with dragons, warring  armies, and dialogue is no small challenge.  War movies and musicals do very well in this category.

This Hobbit film is the third in the trilogy where Peter Jackson took a short book and turned it into three movies.  At the end of the book, all of the factions in the land are warring over control of the Lonely Mountain and all of the gold therein.  The interesting thing about this film is that it examines very real, very human themes - does power corrupt, is there a difference between justice and fairness, what is important to defend to the death and what requires compromise, can the little guy make a difference, what is bravery? The problem with the film is that true to its name, the majority of it is fighting scenes which means not that much actual storytelling.  This, of course, is the difficulty of taking a short book and making it into three long films - by the end, you have to make a whole movie out of the climax, and that's not easy to do.  Because of that, this is the weakest of the trilogy.  But, if you are a Peter Jackson/Lord of the Rings groupie, this will be a very satisfying experience as it brings the Hobbit tale to its conclusion.