Best Picture

The question of what is the best picture of the year is not
really that straightforward. For purposes of the Academy Awards,
it is : members of the Academy vote, and that's it. But on
what grounds to these people vote. Presumably they are all
professionals of the industry, so that their votes each carry
a veto on anything shoddy, particularly if there is expertise involved.
But they are not given a rating sheet which spews out a winner,
but a ballot. So ultimately, the choice is subjective. About the experience
of watching that movie.

Well, I'll tell you what the movie of the year was; it was Bridget Jones' Baby.
I laughed, I cried, I aaaawed. And I'm waiting for the sequel. Not even nominated
for anything. But then I too was pregnant in my 40s, and I guess we are a minority
demographic.

Srsly, lovely dialogue: what's her name, Candida? No, you know her name is Camila.
And René Z., powering through with a British accent was a go-all-out performance.
That female gynecologist was the bomb. The American seducer was right on. Heck, I
would have married Mark Darcy, who has been charming women since Jane Austen.
So, to say it, I enjoyed the theatrical aspects of the movie, the literary allusions,
the solid comedy of American romance. A wee bit of satire as well, that mud fest
Music Festival with our heroine in white jeans.

Did the movie embody production values: there was no one dancing on cars, or turning
blue during a late night swim. Ed Sheeran sang - and no one recognized him, but the
viewer did - allowing me to wallow in a moment of smugness that my age is perhaps not
that much of a cultural barrier. So it was a feel good movie, and I feel good about it.

All this to say that the best movie category is perhaps the least well defined.
Things could have gone in a number of ways last Sunday. Indeed they did.