2021 Oscar Contender Profiles (Part 2)

Part Two of our list! Which of these films will find Oscars success this winter?

“Euphoria” Season 1 Review

Euphoria is a teen drama series created by Sam Levinson for HBO. It stars Zendaya as Rue Bennett, a high schooler and recovering drug addict who struggles to stay clean while dealing with various classmate drama. While I don’t typically watch shows in this genre, the first season of the show received rave reviews and piqued my interest. Is this the next big teen sensation, or just a flash in the pan?

“Yes, God, Yes” Film Review: Sex, Lies and Videotape

Yes, God, Yes (2020) is a comedy-drama film written and directed by Karen Maine, based on her 2017 short film of the same name. It stars Natalia Dyer as a Catholic high-schooler who is attends a religious retreat to try and suppress her sexual urges. Dyer had her breakthrough on the small screen with Netflix’s Stranger Things series, and here looks to make the leap to leading lady on the silver screen. Could this be the start of a successful career for a talented young actress?

Top 10 Films of 2020 (So Far)

As is tradition here at Scriptophile, I like to mark the occasion of July 1st by highlighting the best of what the first half of the year had to offer. 2020 is an especially odd year, however, with theaters shut down due to COVID-19 and the future of new releases in jeopardy. As such, I saw far fewer movies than I usually do by this point in the year and we may not even have an awards season to look forward to in the fall and winter months! That said, we could all use a little positivity right now and I still love talking about film, so let’s look back and see what the year has had to offer us so far!

“The Vast of Night” Film Review: Shooting for the Stars

The Vast of Night (2020) is an indie sci-fi from debut filmmaker Andrew Patterson and writers James Montague and Craig W. Sanger. It stars Sierra McCormick and Jake Horowitz as two small-town teens who investigate strange audio frequencies coming in over the radio airwaves. The film debuted at the 2019 Slamdance Film Festival, where it won the Audience Award for Best Narrative Feature, and was finally released on Amazon Prime this weekend. Is it worth the hype?

Top 10 Most Overlooked Films of the Last Decade

As a counterbalance to my previous post, I want to do the opposite and talk about some films that DIDN’T get much public recognition but really should have. These are the hidden gems that have slipped through the cracks, the forgotten flicks that should have been remembered alongside their Oscar-nominated kin. Here are the 10 most overlooked films of the 2010’s!

Top 10 Most Overrated Films of the Last Decade

The 2010’s were overall a strong decade for cinema, with a wide range of films for many different types of audiences to enjoy. But as we all know, there is an objective right and wrong answer to what constitutes a good movie, and if you like a movie that I don’t, it means you’re wrong and stupid. So what better way to celebrate a great decade than by making everyone angry and imposing my own film views on everyone else? Let’s look at the top ten films I believe are waaaay too praised in cinephile circles!

Foreign Film Fridays: “Les Misérables” (France, 2019)

Les Misérables (2019) is the debut feature of French filmmaker Ladj Ly and the official French entry for the Academy Award for Best International Film. It tells the story of a group of young Parisians who join the Anti-Crime Brigade and find themselves at the epicenter of tensions within the city between conflicting groups. The film infamously took the place of festival favorite Portrait of a Lady on Fire as France’s Oscar entry, causing some to immediately criticize the film for no reason. Was it worthy of its nomination, or should it have been Celine Sciamma’s romance in its place?

“Bad Education” Film Review: The Art of Keeping a Secret

Bad Education (2020) is the sophomore effort of young director Cory Finley, who impressed a couple years back with his debut Thoroughbreds. It stars Hugh Jackman as a school superintendent in the true story of how he masterminded the largest scholastic embezzlement scheme in history. It debuted to solid reviews at TIFF last year and was released this weekend on HBO. Could this be an Oscars player?

“Monos”: The Best Film You Didn’t See Last Year

Like many people, my favorite film of 2019 was Bong Joon-ho’s Oscar-winning Parasite, but it very nearly got bumped off the top spot by another foreign film. It wasn’t nominated for the International Feature Oscar (it wasn’t even shortlisted!), and it was pretty much passed over by the entire cinephile community during the end-of-year retrospective. Alejandro Landes’ Monos (2019) out of Colombia is a stunning piece of work: a feast for the eyes and ears unlike few films we’ve seen in the past decade. But more than just a sensory cinematic experience, it is a fascinating look at the detrimental effects of war on youth and how the culture of conformity impacts a generation that prefers not to define itself by rigid guidelines.