A Star is Born

More peculiar in its execution than its already absurd premise, “Annette” immediately casts a uniquely alluring spell over audiences, but struggles to retain the magic throughout its 140-minute runtime.

The concert setlist was ultimately a play-by-play of the album’s tracklist, allowing ample space for Ramos to weave a story through and between each song.

“It’s one thing to listen to the record, but when you come to the show, I get to walk you through what was going through my mind when I wrote every song. I love to let you know what you’re about to hear,” Ramos explained.

It would be easy to go down the IMDb list of addiction films to examine the nuances of how these stories have been told. But we don’t have to look back so far, considering two films about addiction and rehabilitation are right in our rearview mirror.

Though the show featured some pleasantly surprising wins and an impressive number of awards given to artists of color, the moments we could champion were quickly snuffed out by those that disappointed.

With the Academy Awards just around the corner, the question that immediately comes to mind is: have you even watched any of the nominated films yet? We at the Clog have the perfect quiz to help you find out which best picture nominee is the ideal match for you.

This awards season has truly been a wild ride; fingers crossed that optimism will prevail and the Oscars will emerge from this critical inferno having made some good choices.

Here is a grab bag of craft superlatives that largely went unrecognized last year by voting bodies. Some of these films may have never stood a chance on the awards circuit, but that doesn’t mean they don’t represent some of the strongest work of last year.

If your film is a commercial film, it has to reinvent its genre of choice, be constantly talked about by the press and audiences and/or have a hefty studio campaign budget standing behind it to even stand a chance at getting nominated. And then you’ll still lose to stuff such as “The Shape of Water.”

On Sunday some of you might be shocked to find out the Super Bowl is happening again. Watching it will not be my Sunday recommendation but I felt it worth mentioning so you aren’t as blindsided as I was.