Inessentials

Small spoiler for Parks and Recreation (2.19) and big spoiler for last year’s The Office (5.23)

There was a really good episode of Parks and Recreation last night, which has been enjoying a really great second season after a mini-first season that saw it finding its feet. (I’ve written about the importance of second seasons previously.) Last night, we got an (unnecessary but still quite funny) insight into why Jerry is the most put-upon member of the Parks Department. As Ron Swanson (Nick Offerman) explains, Jerry is both schlemiel and schlimazel. In the following scene, in sympathy to Jerry who has recently dislocated his shoulder, Leslie Knope (Amy Poehler) declares that no one in the office is to make fun of Jerry. Which turns out to be very, very difficult.

One thing that makes this scene work so well is the conference table. Five people sitting in a room around a table; one standing. In a single shot, we can see four characters (Tom, April, Donna, and Leslie). A second shot gives us Ron and Jerry. A third shows Donna, Leslie, and Ron. And so on. What does this do? Watch April as Tom asks, “Muncie?” or Donna as Leslie declares, “Muncie is a lovely city.” We can see one character’s reaction while another is speaking without the need for a reaction shot. So rather than feel hyper-edited as we jump back and forth from Jerry’s presentation, we get a feel for each character’s attempt to hold back their laughter. It’s an extremely simple yet extremely clever way to set up the scene.

What I’ll call “tabling” is a great way to block an ensemble comedy. The characters are literally facing each other, turned only slightly toward the camera. It invites the viewer into the room, into the meeting, into the world of the Pawnee Parks Department. It creates a natural feel appropriate to a single-camera sit-com. It also provides an excellent opportunity to show off how well the cast plays off each other. Parks and Rec isn’t the only show to do this, or do it well. For instance, we see it at the writers’ table on 30 Rock. (Since both Tracy and Jenna tend to eat up the camera when they’re one screen, we rarely see them together in large groups. Instead, we get all the writers, producers, and staff together around the writers’ table, with Liz standing at the head of the table or walking into/out of her office.)

But we see it most clearly on Community. Many of Community‘s best scenes have been nothing more than the cast sitting around the table in their library study room, playing off one another. The direction on Community is so solid that you rarely feel that seven people sitting at a table in a library is dull. We get a combination of shots that show one, two, three, or more characters. We can get both simple reaction shots and also shots of Annie with Shirley or Troy with Abed or Pierce with Shirley. We can get pans around the table. The characters on the show are so precise and the acting so strong that you actually look forward to watching scenes of them sitting around a table together. That’s quite an achievement for a sit-com in its first year.

One weakness on The Office is that it too often turns into The Michael Scott Comedy Show. And we can see this every time the cast enters the conference room, which is almost always set up with the chairs facing the front of the room. Michael Scott (Steve Carell) is such an over-the-top figure that he tends to dominate the show (like Tracy on 30 Rock). Put him in front of the conference room, and suddenly everyone (the other characters and the viewer) must turn their attention toward Michael. Then Jim is left to shoot “did you see that?” looks at the camera. Stanley sits and does his crossword. And no one can interact with anyone but Michael without awkward craning of the head. We know Jim and Dwight are going to play a role in a conference room scene in The Office when they sit against the wall, which allows them to turn toward Michael, the camera, and the coworkers. It’s a very limited structure and one that The Office relies on too often. (Imagine if Community was always stuck in Senor Chang’s classroom, facing toward the scene-chewing Ken Jeong.) Compare that to the wonderful scene in season 5 of The Office when Michael, Ryan, and Pam negotiate with David Wallace and Charles Miner. Look at the opportunities presented by the format, particularly how we are shown Ryan and Pam’s reaction to Michael’s “No.”

The table not only signifies the combat between Michael-Pam-Ryan and David-Charles, it also signifies the unity of Michael-Pam-Ryan. At the same time, it gives a way to watch how Ryan and Pam respond while Michael seems to throw their opportunity away. It’s a completely different way of watching these characters squirm with Michael.

This season of The Office could take a page from Community and last night’s Parks and Rec and use a lot more tabling.

My wife and I snuck off to see the Oscar-nominated animated shorts at the local theater before they disappeared into the void on Friday. It was an immensely pleasant experience, in part because these short films are clearly labors of love, crafted by people who may be taking their first shot at a film with (modestly) wide distribution, so it is easy to feel sympathy for the creators. And, heck, even if you don’t like a film it’s only going to last about 8 minutes, right?

Catch a run-down of all the short films here: http://www.shortshd.com/theoscarshorts/ (They are also all available to purchase from iTunes.) Here are four highlights from the ten or so shorts that we watched.

Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty

Although this film had more apparent flaws than many others of the night, it easily packed the most laughs over its six minutes. Watch the whole film below.

Wallace and Gromit: A Matter of Loaf and Death

Wallace and Gromit are two of the most beloved characters in film history, and any new episode in their on-going adventures is to be treasured. Nick Park has refined the stop-motion animation style into its definitive form over the last two decades. This adventure is nearly identical in plot to the earlier ones (Wallace falls for a girl, hijinx ensue, Gromit saves the day), but that’s not why we watch. We watch because we are cinephiles or Anglophiles, punsters or funsters, have kids or feel like kids. These films are so sweet-natured, even in their frightening sequences, that they infect you with good cheer. (And a craving for stinky cheeses.) A Matter of Loaf and Death is more franticly pace than earlier installments, with faster cuts (which means more set-ups for Park and friends). I can’t wait for the next one.

Logorama

The winner for best animated short at the Academy Awards was Logorama, which was perhaps an even more pointed political statement than giving a documentary award to Michael Moore. This was easily the most daring and conceptually innovative film of the night. Constructed almost completely out of brand logos, the film reads like a big postmodern joke at the way in which American culture is saturated with corporate branding. When the film’s story get’s going, it reveals a similarly postmodern mash-up of Tarantino dialogue, Michael Bay action sequences, and CNN round-the-clock “news” coverage. However, like many such attempts to skewer advertising, it must do so by becoming an advertisement. When watching the film, you look for all the fleeting jokes (that’s a GOP elephant! that mountain says The North Face!), so you end up searching out the very corporate brands that the film presumably wants you to dismiss. As one-time viewing, perhaps we can see this as an important step: we raise our consciousness of how steeped in branding our culture is, so that we can defiantly reject it. But in doing so, we give an audience to the very images we are supposed to reject.

Watch the first 45 seconds below.

La Dama y la Muerte (The Lady and the Reaper)

My favorite film of the night was also took a strong ethical stand, but more effectively than Logorama, partly because it did so only casually. To avoid the spoilers that follow, watch all of La Dama y la Muerte before continuing. (Don’t skip the closing credits.)

The frantic chase sequences recalls Looney Tunes, but does so in an innovative, visually daring style unto itself. It begins in a realist mode (the bedroom), but quickly devolves into a hyper-real locale (the hospital room), and continues in an exaggeration of the classic Chuck Jones style (the morgue). So it’s fun to watch. But it’s also a surprisingly touching story of a woman who is prepared to die but is forced back to life by a doctor. (“Famous Doctor Saves Another Miserable Life” reads the magazine cover on the wall. “I feel like a god.”) More effectively than Million Dollar Baby, it presents a way of understanding how a person might choose to end their life with dignity rather than continue it. Perhaps because of its Spanish origins, the film presents a mythology that combines Catholicism (there is an afterlife where we can see our loved ones), Indo-European folklore (the Grim Reaper), and classical Greek mythology (River Styx, Cerberus) to pose a challenge to medical technology that can prolong life. Perhaps most remarkably (and in direct defiance to Catholicism) it gets a laugh out of suicide, and leaves the viewer accepting that this was perhaps the right choice for the woman.

This points to an overall theme for these assorted animated shorts (and, come to think of it, for this website), which is that pop culture can be revealing in the stories it tells us about who we are and the lives we live. Even eight-minute cartoons can be expressions of attitude or summaries of philosophical thought experiments about how we do think or how we should think about the world we encounter. Euthanasia, the afterlife, how advertising affects our perception of the world, how our experiences shape the stories we tell about the world. Heady stuff for simple cartoons.

Some not-too-specific spoilers for Chuck and Burn Notice‘s third seasons

There’s an old adage in music that sophomore albums are usually terrible. Many bands manage one great break-through album before their sophomore release reveals a band not worth the investment. If the sophomore album holds steady or improves on the debut, then you have a band that is really worth throwing yourself into for the long haul.

I think something important also happens on television shows in their second year, but it’s often the opposite from the music case. Many shows have trouble finding just that right balance of tone in their first year. Occasionally they recover, but too late to save the show, like Dollhouse. Sometimes they recover and they have the good fortune to be on NBC (!), where very modest ratings can bring back buzz-building shows like Parks and Recreation, which is having a wonderful second season. But a good show is one that can manage by its second season to strike consistently in its tonal sweet spot, and hit that groove through enough episodes to make for really enjoyable viewing.

A great example of this is Chuck, which somewhere around episode five or six of its second year turned from modest and enjoyable spy comedy to unbelievably hilarious spy show, workplace comedy, and heart-twisting drama. In that second season, it was about as perfect as a lightweight TV show can be.

Burn Notice was always designed to be more episodic, and there are plenty of great moments in the first season. But the immensely irritating brother was largely removed in the second season, and the mother was made less histrionic and more sympathetic in the second season, which eliminated the two most unwatchable elements of the first season. The story became more complex without being too dense, the actors revealed themselves to be very comfortable in their roles, and the writing for each character became more specific. It was a pretty great season.

Then in the third seasons of both Chuck and Burn Notice, the producers made a change, and that change was largely the same in both cases. To push the edges of what each show did well, they attempted to take the central character (Chuck Bartowski and Michael Weston) and isolate them from their closest allies (Sarah & Casey for Chuck, Sam & Fiona for Michael Weston). In doing so, they took each character to a slightly darker place that challenged the viewer’s understanding and relationship to each lead. (This is more true for Chuck than Michael Weston, but it applies to both.) Can Chuck became a “real spy” and still be the person that Sarah (and the viewer) loves? Can Michael work for Gilroy and still be the good guy that does bad things for helpless people, which keeps Sam and Fiona (and the viewer) as allies?

It makes for more challenging viewing to see the central character in the show you love become less sympathetic. But when it works, it works. Buffy the Vampire Slayer worked well through seven seasons by pushing its title character further and further away from her friends (and only occasionally closer again) and making her more and more irritating. But the writers (often, not always) did such a fine job of telling their story that the viewer was rewarded with seven good-to-great seasons, even when those seasons (starting with two) push the lead character to a dark place that distances her from her friends.

But it doesn’t always work, which is what is worrying a lot of fans of Chuck. Where is the normal guy we loved? Where is the relationship with Sarah going? Who are these new characters pushing our two lovers away? Why is Chuck acting like such an ass? Has the show, in the unfortunate parlance of our time, jumped the shark?

Although I have some small worries, I do not think Chuck has ruined itself. It’s going through a fairly typical attempt (especially typical for a third season) to create drama by isolating the main character. And – this is important – the worries that we have about Chuck are amplified by standard television scheduling. Waiting week to week for each episode allows one to dwell on those worries about where the story is going and reduces the trust we have in showrunners to tell a compelling story. I’m sure many of the complaints about this season of Chuck would be dissipated if it could be watched in one weekend mega-viewing, without the unfortunate weeklong wait or monthlong Olympics hiatus. Let’s trust Josh Schwartz & Chris Fedak. We’ve already seen in the last month that Matt Nix can push Michael Weston to a similar place as Chuck and bring him back. Similarly, the third season of Mad Men left many cold in its front half, until viewers had a chance to see where Matt Weiner was taking us. (Surprise! He further isolated Don Draper from his family.) I don’t doubt (too much) that Schwartz & Fedak can do the same.

And even if they don’t, so what? Let them tell the story they need to tell, even if that means it loses some of its audience. I’m waiting to watch this last season of Lost for a while still, but I really hope they leave a lot of loose ends, things that leave the audience wondering. Great stories can do that. They can leave us disappointed, and they should, because sometimes life leaves us disappointed. (Of course, a show can be disappointing because it gets less good, but I’m talking about a story taking a character or story to a place we don’t want them to go.)

So I haven’t given up on Chuck, and those who have seen the screeners are saying tonight’s episode is pretty dang awesome. Cheers to third season isolation, and the hug-it-out moment we invariably get at the end.

If you are on Twitter (like I am) and follow pop culture creators and critics (like I do), you may know about the rebirth of Roger Ebert. If not, then it is worth taking a moment to see why his is one of the more remarkable stories of the last six months.

Ebert is the long-time film critic for the Chicago Sun Times and was co-host and producer of At the Movies, which cemented the “Two Thumbs Up” lingo in our national slang lexicon.

A recent article by Chris Jones in Esquire discussed his battle with cancer, which led to his jaw being removed in 2006. (Ebert talks about why he agreed to give the interview and have his photo taken at his wonderful blog. Also, there is a wonderful piece there on his not being able to eat or drink.) He now has new technology that allows him to speak, as demonstrated on his recent appearance on Oprah. (Here is a clip with Ebert’s wife Chaz.)

Ebert has embraced other technologies, too, becoming one of the most prolific Twitterers around; he has a following of nearly 100,000 people.

And if there was ever a question about whether Ebert is a nice guy, this remarkable story about his mentorship and forgiveness should settle it.

The story of Roger Ebert is not just the story of a remarkable person with a remarkable story, it is also the story of film criticism in America. For decades, people have fretted over the state of film criticism, particularly in America. “It’s dying.” “It’s dead.” “It’s pointless.” “It’s all about celebrity.” Ebert is sometimes seen as the major culprit behind the last charge. Ebert, first with Siskel, then with Roeper, became the face of film criticism in a way that earlier critics were not. He was a minor television celebrity who reached a national audience and whose “thumbs up” could lead any advertisement for a motion picture. The worry is that film criticism, partly because of television avenues like At the Movies, has become more about celebrity and less about the art of criticism.

There is a kernel of truth to this charge, but it’s largely off point. Film criticism serves a number of functions, and Ebert excelled at a number of them. First, he is a film lover. Critics can inspire love for films in us by demonstrating their love for films. And Ebert has always been a champion of film. Second, he is a lover of storytelling. Ebert, more than many critics, is interested in the story of a film more than many of its other artistic aspects. This is partly why he gives such favorable reviews to mainstream Hollywood films. Hollywood films tend to employ certain storytelling techniques, and Ebert is quick to praise films that tell conventional stories in a competent way. Third, and relatedly, Ebert has very populist tastes. One thing we look for from critics is the standard, “should I see this movie that opens tomorrow?” And Ebert is a great barometer of mainstream tastes. For a long time, especially when I first started paying attention to film criticism, I realized that no film critic was as good as Ebert at predicting whether I would like a given Hollywood film. And that is still valuable. Finally, Ebert is a very fine writer, who has an above-average prose style and a good sense of when to connect film reviews to larger truths, which makes his writing even more compelling.

There are other important roles that a film critic performs that Ebert has been less successful at, and I think this is the source of many complaints about him. For instance, his populist taste and preference for classical Hollywood storytelling lead to somewhat bland and predictable grades. While he champions films in his Great Movies series, they are usually films already part of the canon. You’re not likely to find many surprises in there. Also, Ebert has never focused on the close analysis of film. Now, this is moving more toward the domain of academic film studies since it is often not possible to do this in a newspaper review with a set word limit, but film critics also should have an eye for various formal elements of film, and many reviewers find ways to incorporate this into their writing. There is one other complaint about Ebert’s mainstream sensibilities: many of the most interesting films are those that divide critics. Some films deserve both passionate defense and full-on ridicule. (The films of Lars von Trier come to mind here, as well as what appears in Scott Tobias’ New Cult Canon or Manohla Dargis’ defense of Southland Tales.) Which means that we don’t always want critics that we agree with. Sometimes a critic’s job is to defend something we hate or devastate something we love. That makes us better film viewers.

The various roles that critics perform also suggest why we should read many different critics. Sometimes we simply want to know whether it is a movie we are likely to like, articulated very clearly or cleverly. (Ebert and A.O. Scott are good at this.) Sometimes we want consistently sharp or provocative reactions, even when they disagree with our own. (Here I like Mike D’Angelo and Stephanie Zecharek.) Other times, we want more historical and scholarly discussions. (David Bordwell and Matt Zoller Seitz.) A good critic can teach you how to watch film; engaging multiple critics can teach you how to understand film.

Every year there are a few surprises at the Academy Awards that fly in the face of conventional wisdom. Here’s your chance to wow your party guests by yelling out a surprise correct pick just before the names are read. This is your guide to Oscar night upsets.

Best Picture: Avatar, The Blind Side, District 9, An Education, The Hurt Locker, Inglourious Basterds, Precious: Based on the Novel “Push” by Sapphire, A Serious Man, Up, Up in the Air

Conventional wisdom says this is Avatar‘s race to lose, but if it loses it will lose to The Hurt Locker. There’s also been a little speculation recently that Inglourious Basterds is making a late push and could pull a dark horse upset. While Avatar is still the best bet in this category, I think it is worth considering how the method of Oscar voting for Best Picture could lead to an upset here. Academy members rank the nominees from 1-10. In counting the ballots, all ballots are stacked by their first place vote. If one picture has 50%, the counting is over. If not (which is much more likely), the film with the lowest total is eliminated, and those ballots’ second place votes are counted. This process continues, eliminating one picture at a time, until there is a film with 50% of the ballots. What does this mean? It means that a film could have only a medium-range number of first place votes, but if it has a lot of second- and third-place votes, it could win Best Picture. And this seems pretty likely. The films most likely to be eliminated first (A Serious Man, An Education) seem more likely to have The Hurt Locker ranked higher than Avatar. So unless Avatar begins with a very sizeable lead (say 25% of first-place votes with nothing else over 10%), I think it is very likely that The Hurt Locker or Inglourious Basterds wins. Also, the Academy loves violent films (No Country for Old Men, The Departed, LOTR: Return of the King, Gladiator), which favors The Hurt Locker and Inglourious Basterds. Also, a science fiction film has never one; Avatar (or District 9) would be the first.

Best Director: James Cameron, Kathryn Bigelow, Quentin Tarantino, Lee Daniels, Jason Reitman

Everyone has handed over this award to Kathryn Bigelow already. Since no woman has ever won Best Director, many assume now is the time. But of course, that’s as much a reason to say Bigelow won’t win as that she will. That logic could also work with Lee Daniels, since he is only the second African-American to be nominated. (The first, John Singleton, didn’t win for Boyz n the Hood.) Remarkably, QT has only been nominated once before; if IB picks up some technical awards early in the night, he could pull an upset here. But I think the real upset will be Cameron defeating his ex-wife Bigelow. The Academy loves traditionalist men who command large epics. For the last six years, Best Picture and Best Director have gone together, so it’s hard to believe that the Academy will go for Bigelow for directing and Avatar for film. If there is a split, expect it to be the reverse, due to the voting procedures.

Best Original Screenplay: Mark Boal (The Hurt Locker), Quentin Tarantino (Inglourious Basterds), Alessandro Camon & Oren Moverman (The Messenger), Joel Coen & Ethan Coen (A Serious Man), Bob Peterson & Pete Docter (Up)

This category usually goes to the most inventive or innovative script and rarely aligns with Best Picture. Going by innovation, QT is the winner here. But the Academy has recently been leaning toward first-time writers (Dustin Lance Black, Diablo Cody, Sofia Coppola), which could favor Mark Boal. Oddly, if Hurt Locker gets shut out of the other major awards, expect a win here; if it does well elsewhere, then this one is for Tarantino.

Best Supporting Actress: Penelope Cruz, Vera Farmiga, Maggie Gyllenhall, Anna Kendrick, Mo’Nique

There is nearly universal consensus that Mo’Nique will run away with this award. But that runs against a strong precedent. This is the award that Hollywood gives to some pretty young thing like a glistening tiara in a beauty pageant. Cruz, Weisz, Blanchett, Zellweger(!), Zeta-Jones, Connelly, Jolie, Sorvino, Tomei… the last 15 years have almost always gone to some under-35 up-and-comer. (Sorry, Carey Mulligan, but you need a fake accent or heavy make-up to win Best Actress like Witherspoon, Theron, or Kidman.) Reasoning that Anna Kendrick and Vera Farmiga will split the votes of Up in the Air fans, this award goes to Gyllenhall. But don’t be too surprised if Up in the Air snags one or two acting wins, and this is the place to do it.

Best Actor: Jeff Bridges, George Clooney, Colin Firth, Morgan Freeman, Jeremy Renner

Bridges has this one locked up, the experts say. But will enough people have seen Crazy Heart to give it to Bridges? He hasn’t been nominated in 25 years, but don’t give too much attention to an actor’s being “due.” Freeman could win simply because the Academy so loves bio pics (Sean Penn, Forest Whitaker, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Jamie Foxx). But everybody loves them some Clooney, and who wouldn’t like to see Firth win? Especially since, like Hoffman and Penn, he is playing a gay man. I have trouble seeing how Renner wins this, but since no one is talking about anyone but Bridges, let’s at least mention his name, too.

Best Actress: Sandra Bullock, Helen Mirren, Carey Mulligan, Gabourey Sibide, Meryl Streep

This is being pitched as a heavy-weight fight of Bullock vs. Streep. Recently, Streep has only been the bridesmaid and never the bride, while Bullock has (understandably) never been nominated before. I can see an Erin Brockovitch-type win here, but that film had Steven Soderbergh’s pedigree behind it. This award never goes to a performance in a Best Picture winner, but that doesn’t seem to be a concern here. (Mulligan’s and Sibide’s films are nominated, but are very longshots.) Let’s call this one for Bullock because she used an accent and because we know she’ll squander the Oscar love on terrible films, just like Halle Berry.

So those are the categories where there’s a stand-out favorite, but why there could be an upset.

Still not enough to impress your friends? Tell them Up in the Air has no shot because only one comedy in the last 30 years has won Best Picture (Shakespeare in Love, during Miramax’s heyday). The Hurt Locker would be the lowest grossing film to ever win Best Picture. (Obviously, Avatar would be the highest.) When Christoph Waltz wins best Supporting Actor, tell them that Tarantino had given up on making Basterds until he found Waltz to play the multi-lingual Col. Landa. Tell your friends that you think Michael Giacchino should win Best Original Score for Up, and that you love his work with J.J. Abrams on television (Lost, Fringe, Alias) as well has his film scores for Abrams and for Pixar (The Incredibles, Ratatouille, Star Trek).