TRAVIS BYRAM'S MOVIE REVIEWS

Since there are rather obscure categories (Gut-Wrenching Performance? Best Kiss? And now Best Villain is referred to as "Best On-Screen Dirt-bag?" Geez) in the MTV Movie Awards, I'll only cover a few major categories.  "Hunger Games" and "Deathly Hallows: Part 2" appears so often it's almost ridiculous, but here are the big categories ("*" indicates my prediction to win): BEST CAST: Bridesmaids Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 The Hunger Games* 21 Jump Street The Help It's good to see actual Oscar movies nominated for this awards show.  The only movie actually in theaters right now from this list is "Hunger Games" and "21 Jump Street" (barely).  You want to know what was nominated last time they had a Best Cast award? "Fantastic Four" and "The Dukes of Hazzard."  Yeah. That's real. BEST ACTOR: Joseph Gordon-Levitt- 50/50 Ryan Gosling- Drive Josh Hutcherson...

As a movie critic walks out of a theater, he has to think hard of how much he enjoyed the movie, but mostly, what the majority of people do reading reviews, think of the bad parts to warn patrons of the cinema.  As I walked out of Alexander Payne's "The Descendants," I realized I couldn't find anything wrong with it.  It really is one of the best films of the year. We begin by seeing Matt King's (excellently portrayed by a subtle, defeated George Clooney) wife water skiing happily on a motor boat.  The next scene we hear Matt's voice giving us the intro to his life, the work that consumes him, his profane little girl who wants to be anything but, and his other little girl, who really isn't little anymore, a rebellious, headstrong teen named Alex, played with devastating confidence by Shailene Woodley, who will hopefully no longer be solely associated with that stupid teen pregnancy soap opera.  Most importantly, we see King's wife in a coma.  We...

I'm very behind on this but I figured I'd cover it anyway!  There were some surprises after all, I was shocked to see Clooney not get his 2nd Oscar. I hate to say it but it is very unlikely Jean Dujardin, or should I say Oscar-winner Jean Dujardin will become a big Hollywood star, but whatever.  Meryl Streep won her 3rd Oscar, Christopher Plummer got his prize, but Octavia Spencer seemed the most overjoyed out of all of them. I think it a great thing favorite Viola Davis was the first to give Streep a standing ovation, I'm sure there'll be further nominations for her in the future.  I was glad to see Woody Allen and Alexander Payne to win for their great scripts!  I'd accepted "The Artist" was going to win Best Picture long ago, so I was...happy to see it win. Well, now that all the buzz has settled it's starting to look like another promising Oscar year with Pixar's "Brave,"  Nolan's final "The Dark Knight Rises" and Ri...

A wide variety of films are up for Best Picture this year, including one that got some pretty bad reviews, cough cough, "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close."  I take a look at what will win and (IMO) what should win: BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY: (The Ides of March, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Hugo, The Descendants, Moneyball) WILL WIN: While "TTSS" got this award at the BAFTAs, last year's winner Aaron Sorkin has got it again this year for "Moneyball." SHOULD WIN: Moneyball.  It deserves it because it made an odd topic like baseball statistics seem interesting, and the character development is top-notch. BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY: (The Artist, Midnight in Paris, Margin Call, A Separation, Bridesmaids) WILL WIN: Midnight in Paris. SHOULD WIN:  Midnight in Paris.  It really doesn't get any more original from the mind of Woody Allen, who most likely won't even be there to accept it. BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR: (Christopher Plummer, Nick Nolte, ...

It is the day before the Oscar nominations are being announced!  I'm excited for tomorrow, I'll post the nominees as tradition since 2010.  Another tradition I have to uphold is predicting the Oscar nominees for the best movie of 2011 right before they come out.  This year it's going to be a lot trickier, so I'll do it like this: THE SHOO-INS: The Descendants The Artist (and the winner) Hugo The Help (a BAFTA nomination for Best Picture helped its outlook) and Midnight in Paris Like I said, this is where it gets harder.  Though there won't be 10, many are saying 7 or 8, there is always that possibility the Oscars will throw us a curve-ball.  So, if there are: 6.  War Horse 7.  Moneyball 8.  The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo 9.  Bridesmaids/Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 (if they're going all out they'll want to include a blockbuster favorite) 10.  The Tree of Life  So, in hopes I don't lo...

It's that time of year again, when critics announce their ten favorite films of the year!  I'm unfortunately at a disadvantage, for the year of 2011 I only saw about 20 movies in the theaters, where pro-critics see about 80-90 movies.  2011 was a GREAT year for cinema, truly marking some of the best movies I've seen a while.  You got movies about Marilyn Monroe, a man trying to find his coma-stricken wife's lover and a whole lot of movies about Paris.  Go figure.  Here are my top five films of the year, some others that didn't quite make the cut, and some movies I wished I just hadn't seen.  I plan on seeing other 2011 films before Oscar season, like "The Artist," "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close" and "The Iron Lady," but since I'll be seeing them in 2012 they won't necessarily count for this list. 5.   MONEYBALL Just like with last year's "The Social Network" Aaron Sorkin writes another incredible scr...

This year's Golden Globe's were surprisingly straightforward, where really nothing was totally out of the park. There were  no head-scratchers like last year's "The Tourist" and "Burlesque" getting Best Comedy/Musical nods except for the lame "Cars 2" getting a Best Animated Feature nomination.  This year's selection of movies was so good they actually expanded the Best Drama category to 6!  Here are the major nominees: BEST DRAMA: The Help (an audience favorite with 2 supporting nods for Spencer and Chastain, who both deserve the award) The Descendants (an excellent little movie I've yet to review, that's been generating a lot of buzz) War Horse (the yet-to-be-released Spielberg epic that's gotten considerable lauding) Moneyball (one of my favorite films of the year got both Brad Pitt and Jonah Hill nominations) Hugo (Scorsese's breathtaking love letter to cinema of yesteryears) The Ides of March (Clooney got ...

I saw "Rise of the Planet of the Apes" last week and was pretty impressed by it.  I was going to write up a review talking about how much I liked it and how great Andy Serkis was as Caesar, the ape responsible for the whole "Planet of the Apes" thing and how the characters came in 2nd to the awesome visual effects, but then I saw "The Help" just yesterday.  And it blew my mind. The film, as one might already know, is the adaptation of the "wildly popular" bestselling novel about maids in the South and how one rambunctious woman tries to put their predicament into a book and reach the nation to tell how these maids are struggling.  The novel was probably popular with adults, no one my age that I know of has ever read or heard of the book "The Help."  Maybe due to its subject matter; the book is very racially charged and has several uses of racist terminology. The movie's mood reminds me of several other racially charged films, ...