Awards Season / 14.01.2016

The craziest awards season we've seen in years is potentially about to get even crazier, with the Oscar nominations due to be announced just after midnight tonight (Australian time). With only a month to go, we still genuinely have no idea who will win most categories which is fun in a way. Usually at least we have a fair lock on what will be nominated, but not this year. As I always say, take these predictions with a grain of salt. I'm just going with my gut here, but this year,...

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Awards Season / 08.01.2016

A new tradition was born last year, and it's time to keep it going. You should know by now I love a good awards show. Last year I created my own awards show with my own categories, nominees and winners. It's my way of having a little control over an industry I have literally zero control over. Bazinga. All in all, it was a fabulous year in film, so choosing this year's lucky nominees and winners was another exhaustive process. But there were some stinkers, and they get their...

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Opinion / 12.08.2015

It's been a year since we lost one of the greatest talents the world has ever known. Even after twelve months, it still doesn't quite seem real. Just remembering learning the news and being forced to hold in the grief over a full day of work (it was announced at 9am Sydney time) still seems like some horrible dream we're all going to wake up from. We know he's gone, but it's not a notion one can easily accept. I started writing this piece a few days after he died,...

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Reviews / 06.08.2015

I was going to write a proper film review of the reboot/re-launch/re-imagining/re-whatever of Fantastic Four. Instead, I've decided to just rip this film apart. I'm not being a jerk. This film has it coming. A review can only be written on a film where at least something works. Nothing works in this film. Nothing. It is the most inexplicably terrible piece of cinema I have had the displeasure of watching this year. It's not often that I advise people not to see a film. Films are subjective, so...

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Awards Season / 23.02.2015

When I do my predictions next year, if I say anything along the lines of it being an "unpredictable year", you have my permission to promptly slap me in the face. Despite all the discussion about how the winner of each category was so wildly difficult to nail down, everything pretty much went to plan, besides perhaps one major shocker. I am being completely genuine when I say that I was totally surprised to keep placing a tick next to prediction after prediction on my list. In the end, I walked away with three...

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Awards Season / 23.02.2015

Well, the day has arrived. After what feels like a longer-than-usual awards season, and an enormous amount of back-and-forth on these predictions, the time has come to lock them in. I haven't been this doubtful about the majority of my predictions in many years. There's been a few tricky categories over the past couple of seasons, but nothing like this year. Even at this late hour, I have absolutely no idea what will win Best Picture. I think my 'for and against' series of posts made my mind...

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Awards Season / 22.02.2015

We've arrived at our final nominee under The Jam Report's spotlight, and it's potentially the real dark-horse of this year's race. Whiplash has received enormous critical acclaim since it debuted at Sundance last year. It has racked up five nominations, and could potentially win three or four of those awards on the night. With so much focus on films like Boyhood, Birdman and The Grand Budapest Hotel, could it be we're not paying attention to the little film that could cause a massive upset? Why it could win Best Picture: The nominations. Unlike Birdman and The Theory of Everything, Whiplash...

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Awards Season / 22.02.2015

Ah, Selma. Almost completely snubbing this brilliant piece of cinema is one of the most shameful moments in recent Oscar history. The Academy seemingly came so far last year, and this year, they've regressed right back to their tired old ways. It seems the film had too many strikes that it couldn't overcome. A female director? A black female director? A predominantly black cast? A movie that casts shade on white people? No, no, no, no. Pathetic, isn't it? I don't like to cry things like racism easily, but...

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Awards Season / 21.02.2015

Now before anyone starts calling me lazy for combining these two films into one post, let me explain. As I was writing the points for both The Imitation Game and The Theory of Everything, I realised that they had almost identical reasons for why they will and won't win Best Picture. It seemed redundant to repeat myself in a separate post for each, so here we are with a combined result. Two critically acclaimed British films starring four critically acclaimed British actors. Can the Academy Awards possibly resist? Why it could win...

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