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Almost two months later than last year’s ceremony and encompassing two venues, 2021’s Academy Awards will cap the cinematic year that couldn’t get started and never seemed to end. On Sunday, April 25, it’ll be Oscar night on ABC with … Continue reading And the Nominees Are: 2021 Oscar Nominated Short Films
Every year, the Australian-based online quarterly, Senses of Cinema, invites writers from all over the globe to submit their selections for the best movies of the year. This year, over a hundred writers sent in their picks, giving a pretty comprehensive … Continue reading SENSES OF CINEMA: 2020 World Cinema Poll
2020 was the year I watched more but understood less. With a rotating series of crises to consider, rare were the instances where I found myself lost in someone else’s story for two hours. Empathy has its limits: When you’re … Continue reading 2020: A Year Like No Other
In addition to the praise and accolades each year’s Oscar nominations bring, there’s a fair amount of teeth-gnashing and viewers crying foul. A stupid movie got too much. Another didn’t get enough. My favorite didn’t get anything. On and on … Continue reading Cinema on the Shorter Side: 2020 Oscar Nominated Short Films
On Monday, Jan. 13, the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences announced their nominations for this year’s Oscars. Out of the 53 movies nominated, Joker leads the pack with 11 nominations. The Irishman and Once Upon a Time…In Hollywood … Continue reading Oscars 2020
No matter how corrupt, greedy, and heartless our government, our corporations, our media, and our religious and charitable institutions may become, the music will still be wonderful. Kurt Vonnegut, A Man Without a Country One of the best scenes in … Continue reading 2019: Something To Do With Death
All the best movies elicit our emotions—Roger Ebert famously called these movies “empathy machines”—but there is a fine line between an emotion earned and an emotion provoked. Movies that hopscotch across this line are what many dub “Oscar-bait” and the … Continue reading Big Emotions in Small Packages: 2019 Oscar Nominated Short Films
Every year is a great year for the movies, but when was the best? Was it 1939, the year Hollywood gave us The Wizard of Oz, Gone with the Wind, and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington? Or was it the great global year … Continue reading 2018: An Embarrassment of Riches
Instead of using that tired old cliché, “Big things come in small packages,” let’s rely on another one; one a little more apropos to this year’s Academy Awards: Little things often lead to bigger things. Case in point: Irish playwright-turned-filmmaker … Continue reading And the Award Goes To… 2018 Oscar Nominated Short Films
Michael J. Cinema 
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