Question: What do you think are the most overrated Oscar nominees this year?
Answer: You know, almost any other year I could have come up with a list a foot long. But the 2005 Academy Award nominees are a really strong bunch — among the major categories I can honestly say that there isn't a single one I strongly feel doesn't belong in the running. That said, I don't think John Williams merits two nominations in the category for best original score — for Munich and Memoirs of a Geisha. But I'm consistently at odds with the prevailing opinion on him. I find the overwhelming majority of his compositions overblown and totally ordinary — just because he can orchestrate up the yin-yang doesn't mean he has to do it every single time. He has 36 prior music nominations (all but three for original score), many of which represent two films in a single year; he also has five wins t
read more
Enron spent 16 years building up $65 billion in assets. It took a mere 24 days to lose it all. However, American history's largest corporate bankruptcy is not simply an arcane tale of accounting practices and financial formulas gone horribly awry. In director Alex Gibney's Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room (now out on DVD), the scandal is illuminated as a tragedy of human frailties and hubris, the type of saga that would make Shakespeare or the Greek masters proud. Based on the best-selling book written by Fortune reporters Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind, Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room is not your normal investigative documentary. Rather, Gibney's film combines gripping visuals, an eclectic pop-music score and pithy voice-over to give viewers a real sense of t
read more
