Ok so call me crazy, but one the best times of the year is coming up for me! OSCAR Season. Before Claire was born, Donna would typically acquiesce to seeing movies most weekends. But after Claire was born (affectionately known as A.C.) we have seen few movies. More recently we’ve gotten out more, but we still haven’t seen too many movies in the last two years. Last Oscar season I fought myself to go and see most of the Oscar movies (before last year I’d have seen MOST of them), and now this year I find myself behind in the viewing again. So now I have a goal to see MOST of the Oscar movies, even with a daughter. Over the course of the next month I will review the ones I get to see (with or without Donna). I’ve seen three recently. One of them with Donna, and the other two without. Donna doesn’t like certain kinds (e.g. horror), so I sometimes get out myself. Sorry, but there will be SPOILERS. You’ve been warned.

Let’s begin with THE QUEEN. Donna chose to see this one for her birthday, and I didn’t really know what we were getting into. Turns out that a brief summary would be that this film is about QE2′s relationship with Tony Blair and her action (and inaction) the week after Diana’s death in ’97. My cousin Marcy is a huge Diana freak and won’t see it because of the views. I found the film adaptation of history interesting, and there really was a blurred line between what actually happened and what didn’t happen. It was meshed together from what happened publically, interviews with some people (publically and off the record), and fictional creative license.

This was one of the best movies of the year. I honestly don’t think it will win Best Picture (it is nominated) because the entire thing wasn’t great. For example, the cinematography bothered us from time to time. The guy who played Tony Blair was well done, and he, uncanningly, looked like him. I liked the juxtaposition between his family and the royal family. Now onto Helen Mirren. Anyone who votes against her for the Best Actress award is a fool. She’s a shoo-in. She will win. I said it here first. Helen Mirren BECAME QE2 in this film. Sometimes I watch actors or actresses and think "Damn, so and so is doing a job playing so and so" but it wasn’t like that for me here. When Mirren was out driving around and being herself as the vulnerable woman who never wanted to be Queen, this was when she was her best. (No spoiler here, Diana’s dead.)