Nightcap 1/17/16:On the Oscar nominations, See AFERIM! this week and avoid MOJAVE, things heat up, the Oxford FIlm Festival is impressing me, where Unseen is going and Randi's links

The Oscar nominations are out and well, they are bland.

Everyone is complaining about the lack of ethnic diversity but since the nominations are not decided by one person and are the top vote getters  it's kind of hard to know who lost out and by what margin. I don't know if adding anyone will change the predicted outcome other than to make some people feel that at least the choices weren't color blind before the winners were all white.

And I don't want to go off on how Alicia Vikander and Rooney Mara are on screen for pretty much the entire time in DANISH GIRL and CAROL and are up for Best Supporting Actress. Great performances but they are the leads, especially Mara since it's her story.

I'm unimpressed by most of of the noms, though I am impressed that they once more picked two choices for best animated films from GKids. To me its clear proof that sometimes Oscar really does care about the best films.
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I want to note two films that are coming out this week

AFERIM! was a great adventure from Turkey I saw at Tribebca. Its trip about two constables tracking down a run away gypsy. Its funny and touching and  one that will open your eyes to another sort of life. Its just great.

MOJAVE is shit. Yes it has Oscar Isaac and endlessly quotable dialog but it has some of the stupidest plot twists ever. Its the story of a serial killer tussling with an actor and none of it makes any sense. I know you'll want to go because of Isaac, who is great, but trust me it really sucks.
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And now things will be getting busier…

At this point we’re going to shift into busy time until next December, with festival "season" hitting over drive as Sundance and Slamdance start up this week.

Yes we are going to have some coverage of both festivals in the offing. I have a few reviews already scheduled and I’m waiting on access to a few more films as well. I also have someone on the ground who is looking to send some stuff your way. I won’t jinx it by saying more than that.

And if that isn’t enough I have another 8 days of reports from the New York Jewish Film Festival plus additional reviews of new releases dropping including the awesome IP MAN 3 (tomorrow).

Keep reading because we'll keep posting.
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I want to remind you that after the “dances” the Oxford film Festival is happening in Mississippi. The organizers are lovely, the filmmakers are accommodating and based upon what I’ve seen the films are incredible, espeically the shorts which I've been overdosing on. I still have a good number of films to go, but this very well maybe the best programmed festival I’ve run across.

For more information and tickets go here.
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As you no doubt know things are slowly  changing around here at Unseen Films. We've made a couple of small changes behind the scenes and we're working on more changes in front of the scenes, so things are happening.

One of the things I've wanted to do with Unseen is stop flailing about and trying to find out where we really belong. Over the last couple of years, and this last year in particular, I've tried to chart where Unseen was heading with the intention of having it make money and getting us more "respect". I wanted to find a way to make the site to be considered one of the big guys...

While I'm still working on getting the site to make some money, I'm giving up trying to have the site get some respect, largely because I've come to realize that for better or worse we already have it.

No we aren't a big deal. No matter what we're likely to do we are rather a small deal but we are a solid small deal. We have some faithful readers, we are on the radar of many people outside our regular readership to the point people know who we are and our reviews are being noted here and there (say movie trailers and DVD  cases).

No we aren't one of the big names, but when it comes to highlighting small films and festivals we are a site that is helping to get the word out. For better or worse there is is a reason that when we do festival coverage that our readership triples and why our coverage of small films end up coming back around when the films get larger releases- people do take what we do seriously.

To that end I'm going to do less chasing of the big stuff, it will show up here as it crosses our paths, but I think, for now we'll stay in the inde track and follow the festivals where they lead.
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And now Randi's links

10,000 sparklers
Stop Motion Animator
A David Bowie story
Stan Lee can't read comics any more
Pepsi Year of The Monkey Video
George Clinton remembers David Bowie
Oscar upsets
The most brilliant moments of Alan Rickman's career
Is ghetto now a racist word
Views from and of space
Best Picture nominees that time has forgetten
If you haven't see the WIZARD OF OZ in word order yet
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For those curious as to how many films I see a year- my count is 53 features and 30 shorts (which I'm reviewing hence mentioning) through the first 15 days of January. The question always is how many films do I see not how many new films.

I will be periodically up dating the totals through the year.