Bria Lou Reviews

  In 1977, technology expert Armando (Wagner Moura) flees a troubled past and returns to his hometown of Recife, where he is forced to fight against corruption and political turmoil. And the last Best Picture nominee I needed to see! This was the film I knew the least about, and one of the only ones I could go into completely blind. The premise didn't give me as much as I wanted so I went in a bit apprehensive. I ended up really liking this movie, which I didn't expect! One of the first notes I wrote was that both the scenes and characters are given space to breathe. At 2hrs 40, this is one of the longer Best Picture nominees, but that time is used really well because the audience gets the chance to sit, breathe and live with these characters. And with that, the pacing it great, it doesn't feel nearly as long as it is. That being said, at the beginning it feels like characters are thrown at you every two minutes with no introductions, despite the clear importance they'r...

  Table Tennis player Marty Mauser ( Timothée Chalamet) is determined to be great - by any means necessary. This is the 9th of 10 Best Picture nominees I need to watch, and as much as the premise of this one didn't grab me, I'd heard great things about it, so I was looking forward to seeing it. For me, this film was average. There were things I liked about it, but overall it wasn't one of my favourite nominees. I found the story hard to get into. I was watching it with other people and they only made it maybe 10 minutes before checking out, and while I was interested enough to keep going, I can see why others would be put off. My initial impression of the premise was that table tennis is one of the most boring sports to make a movie about, but my mind was completely changed by seeing the way the games were shot. These scenes were so captivating and fun to watch. I found Marty to be a really frustrating character. As the viewer we want to root for him, but his arrogance make...

  After turning down a part in her estranged father's ( Stellan Skarsgård)  new movie, Nora (Renate Reinsve) and her sister Agnes ( Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas) have to deal with their changing relationship with their father, and the famous American actress (Elle Fanning) he's hired for the role. I had heard great things about this movie before it was in the Oscar conversation, and those things were only exacerbated after it was nominated, so I was really looking forward to seeing it. I really liked this movie, but I didn't find it as profound as a lot of other people seemed to. Because I already knew the main plot, I was eager to get there, and so the beginning of the film felt like it was moving slowly. And while it didn't lose my interest, I did want it to get there a bit quicker. But in saying that, I was also happy to get the chance to really know these characters. Particularly for Nora as the main character, it was great to really sink deeply into her world. Though sp...

  When William Shakespeare (Paul Mescal) and his wife Agnes (Jessie Buckley) lose their son Hamnet, Shakespeare is inspired to write his classic tragedy 'Hamlet'. This is one of the Best Picture nominees that I heard the most people talking about. Grief is always an interesting topic to explore, so I was looking forward to seeing this. I found the film quite average, which was so disappointing because I thought I'd love it. The actors are the best thing about the film. Mescal and Buckley work really well together, and all of the child actors were so great. All of the performances feel really authentic. That being said, most of the supporting cast were underutilised. As much as this is a story about one family, it would have been interesting to see more from the people around them. I found the pacing odd. Every scene, and by extension the entire movie, felt almost double the time it actually was, and some scenes felt particularly slow. And when it did decide to speed up, it ...

  When Vahid ( Vahid Mobasseri) runs into the man who he believes to be his former torturer, he decides to get revenge. But when the man ( Ebrahim Azizi) vehemently denies involvement in the torture, Vahid's confidence begins to falter. This was one of the Oscar-nominated movies that I was most intrigued about, and I ended up watching it before a lot of the Best Picture nominees because I thought that I'd probably like it more. And I was right, I liked this film more than a good few of the Best Picture nominees, and I would have loved to see it nominated in that category. It starts from a really great place. We're following a family, we don't know their place in the story, we don't know who they are, but we're put into their point of view. So when the story takes a turn, the viewer is left in an odd position where we don't really know where to place ourselves. And for me, this just made me feel a connection to the story that I probably wouldn't have othe...

  Two men (Jesse Plemons and Aidan Delbis) kidnap a CEO (Emma Stone) when they become convinced that she is an alien trying to destroy Earth. This one was on my radar before I knew the premise, purely based on it's Oscar potential. So I was really surprised to see what it was about. But because the premise is really interesting, and I liked 'Poor Things' by the same director (and starring Emma Stone) I was looking forward to seeing it. I had to let this film sit with me for a bit because I wasn't sure how I felt about it, it's a really odd mix. I've come to the conclusion that I did like it, but it wasn't on the top end of the Best Picture nominees for me. It had a slow start. Given we know the basic premise, we're looking forward to getting into it, but it takes way too long to actually start. And an argument could be made that it's good to get to know the characters first, but I don't think we get to know them that well. There were scenes that ...