A quiet January?

The end of the year 2015 was very special for saga lovers. The last part of The Hunger Games – Mockinjay Part II – was released last December but perhaps the film release that caught most people´s attention was the last episode of the Star Wars saga: The Force Awakens. After so much excitement, the beginning of the new year was expected to be a quiet one but out of the blue, a controversy has sparked due to the lack of Oscar nominations for black actors. Some well-known actors such as Will Smith or Jada Pinkett Smith – his wife – have even said that they won´t be attending the Oscars ceremony in protest against the Academy´s decision to nominate only white actors for the second year in a row. Last year the film Selma was nominated for best picture and best song, nomination that the film won but even then there was some protest against the lack of nominees in the acting and directing categories which was reflected in the Twitter-sphere by the hashtag “OscarSoWhite”. This year, as there are more films starring black actors such as Beasts of No Nation (Idris Elba), Concussion (Will Smith), Creed (Michael B. Jordan) or Compton (with a cast of many young actors) the expectations must have been higher, however the list of nominees didn´t include any of those names. The idea that the Academy Awards ceremony should reflect the diversity which is characteristic of the United States lies at the heart of this heated debate. The whole controversy has been considered from many standpoints and one of the issues which has been called into question has been the type of membership of the Academy – whose votes are decisive – and the voting process itself. Anyway, this is a sensitive topic, as is often the case with minorities, because overcoming prejudice is a difficult matter but feeling free to give your opinion without risking being misinterpreted is equally difficult, which has contributed to stirring the controversy even more.

                      The Academy Awards nominations were announced on 14^th January.

What do you think about this controversy? What´s the point of boycotting the Academy Awards ceremony? Will the absence of a few actors make any difference or will the ceremony attract as much attention as usual?

Spielberg´s recommendation for Christmas

I came across a video interview with Steven Spielberg some weeks ago. As the interviewer made it clear, Spielberg´s filmography is part of our collective memory. He has directed lots of films which are completely different from one another and according to Spielberg, that´s what characterizes his way of making films: diversity, that is, the fact that his stories are very different. Nevertheless, there is a recurrent theme in those stories: human relationships, for example, the relationship between parents and children or the personal struggle of one man to defend his values. Of course, he spoke about his last film Bridge of Spies which is a story about one of those men who stands for what he believes to be right. However, what caught my attention the most was the part in which he explained that he loved watching films from the 1930s, 1940s or 1950s, in fact, he said that these days, comparatively, he watches more films made in those decades than films made over the last five years. He made reference to Billy Wilder, Fritz Lang or Ernest Lubitsch and he mentioned The Shop Around the Corner as a film that he had watched lately. Spielberg´s interview made me think of this film whose title is likely to ring a bell but at the same time, it may be unknown for some people. The German film-maker Ernest Lubitsch directed this film in 1940 after having had a big success thanks to Ninotchka. The Shop Around the Corner is usually described as one of the best comedies in the history of cinema: it is a Hollywood film whose story is set in Budapest and has Margaret Sullavan and James Stewart in the lead roles. (The plot of You´ve got Mail is said to be based on the story of The Shop Around the Corner). If you love comedies or especially romantic comedies or just old films, you´re bound to enjoy The Shop Around the Corner. This film is a classic and even if you aren´t fond of black and white films, why don´t you give it a chance on Steven Spielberg´s recommendation? The film is set at Christmastime and it deals with the story of the employees – and particularly a couple – in a shop where customers buy Christmas presents, apparently a simple story turned into one of the best romantic comedies but that´s the greatness of good film-makers: creating memorable stories out of the lives of ordinary people.

This Christmas, why don´t you go to “the shop around the corner” to discover the gifts that are on display? I´m sure you won´t regret it.

MERRY CHRISTMAS and VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR!!