I think this movie has received an
extra dose of undue applause for a multitude of reasons. Maybe it was the fact
that there weren’t a whole lot of movies out there that combined serious-drama
with a smidge of comedy, maybe there weren’t a lot of movies for the Academy
(and all other review committees) to review this year that allowed for a more
fair assessment. But I personally see nothing in Jennifer Lawrence’s acting
that would put her in a “Best Actress in a Lead Role” category—but then I look
who she was up against. All Naomi Watts did for 114 minutes is cry, wear
bandages, and breathe heavy. The Impossible
was what I call a jerk movie—and I don’t like being jerked. I don’t like a
movie editor placing sad music and some sort of touching moment of life and
death and basically telling me how to feel. I don’t like being jerked. It was a
B- movie at best, and had absolutely no business being recognized in any
way—and if anyone was going to be recognized for their jerky “achievement” in
the film, Tom Holland, aka Lucas, should have been nominated.
Then
there’s Emmanuelle Riva in another crappy film (I didn’t see Amour, but the reviews, plus personal accounts of
moviegoers was enough for me). I have an issue with a film that has nothing
noteworthy except for the fact that it’s foreign and therefore adds an air of
diversity or variation to the mix being nominated. And of course
Quvenzhané Wallis was nominated. A film about Hurricane Katrina…those films
about real catastrophic events (see also: The Impossible) always get some attention. But let’s be honest
here, she’s a cute and spunky little girl with a big personality. And
she did do a slightly impressive job portraying a little kid—it just is
unfortunate that the movie she happened to be a part of was honestly a terrible
film. A film like that gets recognized not for it’s talents or accomplishments
in acting, but for the fact that they got people to pay money to see their film
with absolutely no marketing and no familiar actors. Not for talent. Not for
“achievement” in the cinema. For simple, “wow factor” behind-the-scenes
bullshit. It doesn’t make it a good film just because it’s a low budget film
that made it to the theatre. No.
Jessica
Chastain did her job. She was hired to play the bad ass, sexy red head that was
smart and lead to the execution of our nation’s biggest (only?) accomplishment
in recent times. Argue with me on this, disagree with me all you want. But you
know what made Jennifer Lawrence beat Jessica Chastain? It wasn’t acting. It
was popularity, it was The Hunger Games,
it was the fact that J. Law goes on the Red Carpet and talks about how hungry
she is.
J.
Law (and the fact that we have a nickname for her is going to drive the next statement
home even more) is the most overrated celebrity at the moment. I don’t hate
her—don’t get me wrong. But I am bothered by the attention surrounding her. As
previously mentioned, she goes on the Red Carpet and says she likes pizza and
the .gif community explodes with a million .gifs of it, and another million
internet community members (myself included, at one point in the not-so-distant
past) explode with excitement—Oh my GOD, I like pizza too, she’s just like
me! She’s one of us!
So
David O. Russell hit the jackpot casting a cultural icon in his film, giving
her a sassy role that people would respond well to. And of course, you fill in
the rest of the cast with other A-listers like De Niro (to appeal to the older
generation) and Bradley Cooper and Jacki Weaver (another actress nominated for
crying the entire duration of her film) and you’ve got a gold mine already.
Those actors, coupled with…wait for it…a current national hot topic (mental
illness!), and that is how this movie received the undue, unjust, but
definitely not unwarranted popularity.

And
then there’s the title: Silver Linings Playbook. But Cooper continuously says excelsior throughout the entire movie like mantra. Why not
name it excelsior, cut out the extremely misleading scene that they couldn’t
stop showing in previews where Cooper is all, “This is what I believe to be true: You have to do everything
you can and if you stay positive you have a shot at a silver lining."
Okay, that’s fine and dandy. That’s stupendous. Don’t pull us in two different
verbal thematic ways—don’t say “there’s the silver lining” and “EXCELSIOR” over
and over. Choose one, and keep it consistent, people! I realize that this is in
large part because of Matthew Quick’s novel this movie was based on. There are
always the major issues that come with adapting a book for film, but really, you couldn’t choose just one mantra for
Pat? Excelsior is the theme of the movie, the theme of Pat’s life, and I wish
that had been purely driven home—it’s a good message (it means “ever up” in
Latin, and it’s an exceptionally optimistic image and idea for us moviegoers to
leave the theatre with). But then we get home and we think about the whole
silver-lining idea (because it’s, um, the title of the movie), and excelsior
gets put on the backburner.

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