Thoughts as the Oscars Approach.

Tomorrow is already the Oscars. The year really went by fast. Last year The Artist swept the awards, and the year before, Black Swan, The King's Speech, The Social Network, and others shared the prizes. This year, honestly, I can't really tell which film will win, since I don't recall properly watching any movies while I've been here, and out of the 9 Best Picture nominees I've seen only one. 'Amour,' just that one. This work 'Amour' by director Michael Haneke gave me a great many things to think about, and it stirred up my heart for a long time over the question of what death really means. Anyway, since I haven't properly seen Argo, Lincoln, or Zero Dark Thirty, I have nothing to say about them, but since 'Les Misérables' is up as a nominee for sound, I'd like to talk a bit about this 'Les Misérables.'

Lately I've been continuously reading the novel 'Les Misérables.' Part of why I'm reading it is the thought that it might help me talk better with my girlfriend, and part is because I wanted to familiarize myself with the original's content before watching the film and understand better what the film was trying to express. The film's director, 'Tom Hooper,' is a director who made his name at the Academy with 'The King's Speech' the year before last, and since it's that director's work, I thought he would at least handle the music well.

I have a feeling 'Lincoln' will probably win Best Picture, but my personal wish is for 'Amour' to win. Making a film from someone's biography and saying it was 'well made' is fine too, but I believe what matters most in film is how the director expresses his thoughts. And I believe those thoughts should be projected onto film not as a 'scenario' based on some historical fact, but as the aggregate of everything personally felt and experienced, and for that 'Amour' seems more fitting. Of course, the regrettable thing is that, as with the story of 'Amour,' films of that kind usually feature the 'act of killing' frequently.

The more I watch films, the more actors I come to recognize, and seeing what a work tries to express along with the director's thoughts and ideas is just fascinating, and lately I'm also feeling the power of music more. The music I've linked is the second movement of Beethoven's Symphony No. 7, which is also the music that played during the final speech in The King's Speech, and it's also the music that appears in the prologue of the film 'The Fall,' made by the Indian visualist Tarsem Singh. It circled in my head all day, so I finally untangled it a bit into thought, but it keeps circling and it's driving me crazy.

This video is the climax of the film 'The King's Speech,' in which the above symphony was used. It's a very important part where the 'wartime speech' first begins, and this scene is the most memorable among the films I've watched recently. It's moving, solemn, majestic, and even sorrowful. It's probably because of the various feelings in the second movement of Beethoven's Symphony No. 7. This music, suited to the king's calm and slightly halting speech, expresses the feeling of wartime as it is, but at the same time it seems to also contain the meaning 'we can do this well,' so the emotions are complex. Pieces like the 'Choral' or 'Fate' weren't like this, but Beethoven's Symphony No. 7 is different.

Let me keep learning and mastering more. If I do, maybe I'll come to see something more.