Oscar night

It was Slumdog Millionaire's night for sure. Best Picture, Best Director, even Best Original Song. But even more amazing is that it is actually wrapping up on time. I'm typing this from the West Coast, and having watched the show from the East Coast for the last 7 years, I'm still disorientated from leaving off before midnight.

I still think Wall-E was the best movie of last year, but am not surprised that Academy wasn't ready to give an animated film a Best Picture nomination. There have been solid animated films before, but Wall-E smashed through barriers in terms of complexity of the shots, use of focus and close-up, and a multilayered plot.

And yet, I do have to admit: Jai Ho is a catchy tune.

Wall-E

I saw Wall-E yesterday, and the first thing that I want to say is how blown away I was by it. There is of course a long standing tradition of just how the apocalypse will go down in science fiction, but Wall-E managed to create a vision that was simultaneously 1) not a simple retread of a Twilight Zone episode, 2) horrible, 3) funny, 4) suitable for children. Not an easy task!

Computer animation techniques are still improving. Especially noticeable in this movie was the use of focus to emulate a camera operator frantically trying to capture the action as it unfolded (example: the scene with the shopping carts.)

I can only imagine Pixar greenlit this film before they were sure they would remain part of Disney: The irony of a giant multinational corporation like Disney bankrolling and promoting such an aggressively anticorporate film added an extra layer of mirth to the film for me.