The faults in "The Fault in Our Stars" (yes, cheap joke)

I don't read many books. I did read TFiOS last weekend, before seeing the movie. If you see the movie without reading the books, there will be some semi-spoilers below... I guess they would be book spoilers, yet not movie spoilers. I personally feel like I got two very different versions of Augustus Waters's personality and story between the two mediums, which I found pretty frustrating.

I do believe the movie is very, very good. And a viewer who has not read the book could find it to be even better than someone who did because there were some decisions that made a lot of sense to do differently in the film than what the book depicted. However, and primarily because of my feelings about how Gus was shown and some secondhand feedback I've heard, I also believe that feelings of "meh" could be had because Gus was not made to be as emotionally significant in the movie. If only I could both watch it with and without having read the book. Alas...

Changes I did not like from page to screen:

1. The egg-throwing scene was good, but I do not understand leaving out Hazel taking a picture of Isaac and Gus - especially since she could then refer or look at it later when she misses the real Augustus. That was a moment in the book that helped define her character, which was left out for no reason.
2. No consistent transition from Hazel calling him Augustus to Gus.  I acknowledge that this would have been difficult on film, but it would have been worthwhile for readers. (probably due to the next point on this list)
3. The extreme lack of Gus’ progressive spiral to the end, post gas station incident.  This removes many potential moments between Hazel and Gus that could have helped show her love for him much more genuinely.  I feel the film mostly shows his head-over-heelsness for her, and shows her primarily smitten and reactive to his love.  She has her own love for Augustus, but a significant portion of that story would have been shown during that portion of the story.  We got robbed a little bit.
4. Similarly, the time(s) spent with Isaac were lessened.  No video game playing, significantly less focus on his depressed state when Monica breaks up with him (and I can’t decide if I think the actor undersold that scene or not…),
5. While Willem Dafoe played a fantastically antagonistic and easy to hate Van Houten, it was not true to the book in almost any way other than dialog.  He didn’t look (based on the book’s description, particularly the lack of a large belly) nor act like a longtime drunkard (slurring speech, staggering as he walked perhaps).  Other than a glass in his hand at all times, there are no signs of his alcoholism or depression.
6. We also did not get enough of Van Houten!  Merging two scenes at the end was a mistake: at the funeral when he asks for a ride and when he appears in the car without her knowing before eventually mentioning that he’d been in touch with Gus for a while, and when she discovers that Anna represented his daughter, and changes her feelings toward him ever so slightly as to encourage him to go on living and do something meaningful with the rest of his life - all gone.  What a waste.  I was looking forward to that final encounter the whole movie, and it simply did not happen.
7. I wish they would have shown the conversation about and writing of the swingset listing.  It was a charming conversation between Hazel and Augustus that felt important to their story in certain ways.
8. The conversation between Hazel and her mom when she’s leaving the house to go to the prefuneral - definitely different from the book, and I do not think in an improved way.  The book’s telling of how she lets slip that her mom will still be a mother and the reaction is WAY better than the clunky and too obvious detour in the movie.  I don’t understand why they chose to make that slight but still significant alteration.
9. This exchange being completely absent:
   

   Gus: “Sometimes I dream that I’m writing a memoir. A memoir would be just the thing to keep me in the hearts and memories of my adoring public.” Hazel: “Why do you need an adoring public when you’ve got me?” I asked. Gus: “Hazel Grace, when you’re as charming and physically attractive as myself, it’s easy enough to win over people you meet. But getting strangers to love you… now, that’s the trick.” I rolled my eyes.

10. And this one:
    

    Hazel (this line IS in the film): “I don’t think you’re dying,” I said. “I think you’ve just got a touch of cancer.” He smiled. Gallows humor. “I’m on a roller coaster that only goes up,” he said. “And it is my privilege and my responsibility to ride all the way up with you,” I said.“Would it be absolutely ludicrous to try to make out?” “There is no try,” I said. “There is only do.”

Changes that definitely worked:

1. Gus’ arrival in a limo to pick Hazel and her mom up for the airport, which was much more enjoyable and inline with the negligence of his parents.
2. While I still would have preferred the version of how Hazel receives Gus’ letter at the end that the book offered, I understand the necessity to do it the way they did in the movie for a couple of reasons.  In keeping with their “don’t show Gus at his worst or interact much with his parents or siblings” concept, they couldn’t use his journal, etc.

Miscellaneous observations:

1. The pace of the book felt slowish, while the movie almost felt rushed by trying to get everything in.  Not a complaint, because the movie flowed well and was enjoyable throughout.  By contrast, my reading of The Hunger Games was very fluid and fast, but the films have been very deliberate, methodical, and slowly paced.  Less enjoyable for me.
2. Monica was definitely not attractive enough to garner the attention Isaac draws to her.
3. The overall feel of the book felt much less optimistic or hopeful to me than the film.  I’d be curious to ask John Green his take on this.
4. I did not like the casting of Hazel’s dad.  He just did not seem to fit as husband to her mom, or the father I imagined.
5. In the movie, the book Gus hands Hazel is Counter Insurgence 2, then it shows her reading what appears to be simply Counter Insurgence.
6. Casting, overall, was pretty good.  Woodley nailed it (as she ALWAYS DOES), and Wolff was perfect as Isaac.  Laura Dern played a good mom for Hazel and even has some major similarities in vocal quality and facial expressions at times.  Mike Birbiglia was enjoyable as the not-seen-enough and one-testicled Patrick. I expected both Van Houten and Lidewij to be older, her more significantly so - it was weird that she was such an attractive woman.

My Oscars Scorecard

The following were my predictions for the Oscars (as predicted verbally, to my wife, sometimes within seconds of the winner being announced):

Best Picture: Argo 1/1
Best Actor: Day-Lewis 2/2
Best Actress: Lawrence 3/3
Best Director: Lee (I said "Shoot, with the way Life of Pi is going, Ang Lee will probably win" - that counts as a prediction, right? :)) 3/4 (I officially predicted Spielberg)
Best Supporting Actor: Waltz 4/5
Best Supporting Actress: Hathaway 5/6
Adapted Screenplay: Kushner 5/7
Original SP: Moonrise 5/8 (similarly, I said Django should win)
Animated: Brave 6/9
Foreign: Amour 7/10
Short Animated: Paperman 8/11
Costume Design: Anna Karenina 9/12
Cinematography: Life of Pi 10/13
Documentary feature: I said "I know nothing, but I bet Sugan Man wins" 11/14
Editing: Argo (I said "I hope it wins since Ben wasn't nominated") 12/15
Makeup/Hair: Les Mis 13/16
Song: Skyfall 14/17
Music: Lincoln (at the last second, I said "Oh, it's John Williams? That'll probably win") so nope 14/18
Production Design: Lincoln 15/19
Short Film: n/a (wasn't in the room) 15/20
Sound Editing: Zero Dark Thirty (tied Skyfall) 16/21
Sound Mixing: Les Mis 17/22
Visual Effects: Life of Pi 18/23

Not too bad for my first attempt at predicting the entire night.

The Oscars... an almost-definitive guide to Best Picture, Actor, Actress and the supporting roles

In order, the best films of 2012 were:

1. Argo
2. Lincoln
3. Silver Linings Playbook
4. Zero Dark Thirty
5. Django Unchained
6. Life of Pi
7. Beasts of the Southern Wild
8. Just about any other movie made in 2012
9. Les Miserables

* Not mentioned, because I didn't see it: Amour

Best Director will go to Steven Spielberg (Lincoln), though Ben Affleck's work on Argo was at least as good and he got royally snubbed.

Best Actor will go to Daniel Day-Lewis for his remarkable portrayal of Abraham Lincoln, but if that movie wasn't in the running this year it would be hard to stop Bradley Cooper for his astounding "I'm a really freaking good actor" role in Silver Linings Playbook.

Best Actress seems like it's Jennifer Lawrence's to lose (also from Silver Linings Playbook), but her competition doesn't seem to be that fair.  It won't shock me if the Academy gives the award to the 85-year-old Emmanuel Riva (Amour), but J-Law deserves it.  Unfortunately she doesn't deserve it as much as Cooper, who's luck ran out the second Lincoln came out.

Best Supporting Actor should go to DeNiro (Cooper's father in Silver Linings Playbook), but it seems the Academy is likely to award it to Tommy Lee Jones for his rarely-important Thaddeous Stephens in Lincoln. My actual favorite portrayal was from Christoph Waltz in Django Unchained, and his role was even more significant than DeNiro's (marginally so, however). Waltz was really more like the lead actor in Django, but that doesn't matter.

Best Supporting Actress is going to go to Anne Hatheway for Les Miserables, though that one should have stayed off the silver screen and then we wouldn't have to be dealing with this debacle of a "film" at all.  But apparently the Academy loved the over-the-top dramatized work Hatheway and the rest of the cast shoved down our throats and she's going to win.  I'd rather see it go to Adams for The Master, but oh well.

The Dark Knight Rises to expectations... but does it exceed them?

Preamble:
I don't think anybody out there expected Christopher Nolan and Co. to deliver a movie that was better than 2008's The Dark Knight.  Well, I don't know if they did or not, because it was that close.  I will say that I thought TDK was more enjoyable, but as a co-worker of mine likes to point out, that's probably due in LARGE part to Heath Ledger's earth-shattering portrayal of The Joker.

Now, onto the critique...

The Avengers did some serious justice to comic book filmmaking

A) these WILL contain spoilers

B) these are NOT in any particular order (aside from "the order in which i remember and choose to write them")

0. the previews:

• The Dark Knight Rises - I'd already seen it, and it's cool... these trailers aren't enticing me any more to see the film than my love for all things Christopher Nolan and Batman... if anything, they're hurting my desire a little.
• The Amazing Spider-Man - FINALLY convinced me that I'll WANT tos see it.  It all hinged on a small number of things, but they showed that Garfield CAN play a wittier Spidey, and therefore he will almost certainly trump Maguire without even trying.
• ParaNormaN looks creepy and pretty awesome
• Brave also sold itself to me, though Pixar certainly doesn't need help, either

k, now onto the film at hand...

I loved Toy Story 3, but...

... here are the Top Ten things wrong with it (in no particular order):

1a. Lotso used a cane for the whole movie until Big Baby picked him up and threw him in the dumpster, but later he starts running and climbing a ladder? C'mon!

1b. Speaking of Lotso being in the dumpster, how on Earth does he get high enough to grab Woody's leg when Woody rescues one of the Pizza Planet aliens? Is he levitating!?!? There is no logical explanation...

X-Men Origins: Wolverine

1. This movie was entertaining. I enjoyed it. I'm glad Gambit finally make it into a movie, albeit with a tiny role that really served only one purpose - leading Logan to the island. Can't wait for a potential Gambit movie (there will be a Deadpool movie, and Gambit should be at least equally entertaining), though hopefully the holes present in this film will be absent in it.2. Wolverine was as should be expected as a character. Logan was similar to the previous X-Men films, considering that he was a different person before getting shot with the Adamantium bullets. I'm not sure if in the comics he was indeed shot or not. But it seems like his natural disposition and lack of trust of others are intact. They don't go over the reasons behind him changing his name from James to Logan, but it is understood that he was trying to create a new life.