Ask Mick LaSalle: Did Carey Mulligan deserve an Oscar nomination?
Did Carey Mulligan deserve an Oscar nomination?
Dear Mick LaSalle: I think Carey Mulligan was fabulous in “Suffragette” and deserved to be nominated for best actress in a leading role.
Dear Susan Schrader: I think if she’d been nominated in place of Brie Larson (“Room”) or Jennifer Lawrence (“Joy”), I wouldn’t have thrown up.
Was there a period between the end of World War II and the beginning of the House Un-American Activities Committee witch hunts where Hollywood took on subjects that were more daring than usual?
Movies were hemmed in by censorship during the immediate postwar period, and if anything, they loosened up (somewhat) as the ’50s went on.
About the only thing that emerged in the postwar era that could be perceived as daring was film noir, and that didn’t so much stretch the era’s censorship guidelines as fall weirdly within them.
Crying isn’t enough, but if you cry and have stuff come out of your nose, you’ll win, so long as you don’t blow your nose or wipe it.
The one exception is Adele Exarchopoulos (“Blue Is the Warmest Color”), who played half of an emotional scene with what looked like a snail sitting in the middle of her face.
How do you keep track of all the movies you have seen over the years?
Not long ago, I saw an insane French movie called “Secret Things.”
After watching it, I got online to see if any American critics reviewed it, and I came across this opening paragraph from The San Francisco Chronicle in 2004: Like most French films, ‘Secret Things’ begins with a scene of a beautiful woman masturbating.
[...] yet I watched it a second time without recognizing or remembering any of it, and I had absolutely no recollection of having written that review.
Several years back you criticized my contention that “The Sound of Silence” worked in “Bobby,” saying it belonged to “The Graduate.”
Yes, the music of Simon and Garfunkel dates “The Graduate,” and yes, it was a mistake in “Bobby” to lean so heavily on a song that was so thoroughly associated with an earlier film.