I've seen Midnight in Paris (it was wonderful!) and The Help. Would like to see all of the rest at some point. Of the two I saw I wouldn't consider either Oscar-worthy, but they were entertaining.

I forgot to include War Horse.

I have seen War Horse and The Help. Loved both pictures, but of the two, I would consider War Horse worthy of best picture. I would like to see Hugo also.

So far I've only seen Midnight in Paris. What a delight! Had no advance idea what it was about. It was a thoughtful movie, and done with Woody Allen's usual great cinematography. Will wait for the others to come out on dvd.

I've seen The Help, Moneyball, Tree of Life and Midnight in Paris.
I don't think any of them are oscar worth and I may be the odd man out here, but I hated Midnight in Paris, with a passion.
And yes, I got most of the references.

While not an oscar movie either, my favorite 2011 movie was Warrior.

I saw Midnight in Paris and liked it when Owen Wilson playing Woody Allen wasn't on-screen. I thought it was a fun premise and since Paris is my favorite city, I enjoyed the exterior scenes, but wouldn't choose it as a Best Picture contender.

Won't be going to The Help because I didn't like the book. Haven't seen any of the others and probably won't. I bet War Horse is wonderful, but I know I would probably sob through the entire thing, so won't be going to that.

I've seen The Help, The Descendants, The Artist, and Tree of Life. Of those, I thought The Descendants was the best. George Clooney is superb in it, and the premise of the movie has stayed with me.

The Help and The Descendents, and I liked them both and worthy of a nomination. Of the two, though, I would chose The Descendents, and Clooney was great.

I am sorry his pix, The Ides of March, didn't also get nominated.

Bumblebeez -- not the only one. I thought Midnight in Paris was absolutely dreadful: premise, characters, acting, dialogue -- all of it.

I liked that movie a lot too, Les, we saw it last weekend.
Other movies I really liked although again, not oscar material, were The Debt and how could I have forgotten, X-Men First Class.

We watch a lot of movies as Dad wants to watch something EVERY single night and my dogs want to sit in my lap EVERY single night and I prefer movies to most tv. Going to start Downtown Abby from Netflix soon.

Thank you for articulating my thoughts exactly, mjlb! I'm not a good writer.

Have only seen The Help and Tree of Life from that list.

Loved The Help, a story well told of time and place, some solid performances but not Oscar worthy IMO. I was thoroughly entertained and that's my personal holy grail when it comes to movies.

Tree of Life was painful to the point that I couldn't sit through it and never finished. Didn't 'get it' and didn't want to - nothing about it made me care.

I saw The Help, Moneyball, and Midnight in Paris. Fell asleep through parts of Midnight in Paris, so boring, didn't get it. Of the three I saw, I think Moneyball was the best. I really liked The Help too. I can't watch movies about people dying with kids, so won't be watching Extremely Loud. Never even heard of The Artist. The others didn't seem to interest me at the time. Oh, except I do want to see The Descendant's.

olliesmom, The Artist is actually a silent movie! I don't know... I don't think I really want to see a silent movie. It might be too highbrow for me.

Has anyone seen it?

I've seen The Descendants and The Help. Thought Descendants was a wonderful movie but SO sad. I hope George Clooney gets the Oscar for that role, he was terrific.

The Help was more than a little sugarcoated. I am jaded about Hollywood's feel-good movies dealing with tough issues like segregation (ahem, Driving Miss Daisy anyone) that end up being lionized by the Academy.

As for Midnight in Paris, I refuse on principle to watch, much less give money to, anything created by Woody Allen. I believe he is a molesting, incestuous monster and an example of the utter amorality of our entertainment industry. That this individual is still being lionized is a mystery and a disgusting aberration to me.

Ann

Hmm, never thought about the Woody Allen as child molester point. I loved Midnight in Paris. I had just finished reading "The Greater Journey: Americans in Paris" and also spent a week in Paris last spring. I enjoyed all the literary characters (not so much the young wife and her family). The scenes of Paris were wonderful especially since they went beyond the Eiffel Tower and the boats on the Seine. Owen Wilson wasn't so great but all the characters in the "traveling back in time" scenes were terrific, as was Carla Bruni. Kathy Bates as Gertrude Stein was amazing.

I saw The Descendants and enjoyed it for the most part although it disturbed me that the father would team up with his daughter to confront his wife's lover. What parent would do that? (Not a spoiler as it's made a clear at the start).

I don't think either movie is really Oscar-worthy. Didn't The Black Swan win last year? Talk about disturbing movies! Wow was one dark film.

I really just can't stand how the entertainment industry treats the announcement of the Oscar nominees as if it were "breaking news." Interrupt the current broadcast to bring you this important news!! Ugh. Save that for truly earth-shattering news. I never watch the award shows because I just can't stand all the speeches. Doesn't mean a thing to me. I like the performances on the Grammy show and I do like the red-carpet fashions.

I agree, dedtired. They take it way too seriously. And some of the actors are insufferable, and act like they're receiving the nobel peace prize! The grammys are a lot more fun.

I saw The Help, Moneyball and Tree of Life. Out of the three, Tree of Life is the only contender. I adored that movie and loved it even more every time I thought about it.

We don't go to the theatre (people bug me too much) so I have to wait for them to come out On Demand.

Moneyball and Tree of Life are on On Demand now. I'll have to catch up. I always find it hard to "commit" to watching a movie at home. I'm better off in a theater.

I find it hard to plunk down $4 or more for an On Demand movie when I can rent so much cheaper through Red Box.

We've started renting some of these. The first two have been major disappointments ... Moneyball and The Descendants. Moneyball was slower than a real baseball game and I used to love baseball. The Descendants was ... I don't know the right word ... boring? We kept looking at each other saying it's going to get better, right? It never did.

Nice to know about The Descendants. It was a movie I was looking forward to seeing. I watched it on an airplane flight and thought that might have been the resown it was so zzzzzs. I'm a person who doesn't mind slow-paced and talky movies, either. Really didn't see what all the fuss was about. I liked Moneyball though.

I liked Moneyball, but I thought it was overly long and I agree it was slow. I didn't see the Descendants.

Are there any good movies out now? I thought The Raven might be good, but it didn't get good reviews. I'm looking forward to seeing Dark Shadows.

Natal, I couldn't agree with you more. I was really looking forward to when Descendants was released and it was a big disappointment. As usual, the trailers showed the best and only highlights of the movie. The words, slow, boring, depressing and unimaginative all come to mind. On the flip side I did love the scenic shots, those were quite beautiful. :c)

Lukk, same here. The trailers and some of the reviews, not to mention Oscar nominations. Almost felt like we were watching the wrong movie. I will say the ending was nice, but George Clooney was a big disappointment.

We didn't see many of the nominated movies this year. We saw Moneyball and Midnight in Paris before the nominations came out. I enjoyed both movies, but wouldn't classify them as Best Picture material. We did see The Artist after it won the Oscar, and I hate to say it, but I found it rather snoozeworthy. Could have been that I was tired when we saw it, but it didn't grab my attention. I didn't find the storyline particularly original, though I thought that the cinematography was great.

My son couldn't get into Descendants. He kept watching Clooney's eyebrows. Was sure he had botox because only one eyebrow would raise when he made an expression and he had to laugh each time it happened. I didn't get the nomination either. Okay movie, but not great.

The last few years have been bombs for movies. Wonder when they are going to get back to the good stuff. Or maybe I am just getting old and most are directed toward youth. I'd rather find out a movie was bad on a rental than pay the horrendous cost of going too. Perhaps I'm old and stuffy too.

I saw the Descendents and, like Dedtired, I liked it but had trouble with him confiding in the daughter about the other guy. I understand that he was a clueless parent, since the mother had always taken care of the girls, but what type of adult would involve a teenager in that?

I didn't notice the eyebrow thing but many people I know can raise one eyebrow. This will really sound crazy but I remember thinking geez, he even has nice feet for man! At the end of the movie when the 3 of them are cuddling on the sofa, his feet are up on the coffee table and right in the picture.

Amusing side note: My SIL commented she finds Clooney attractive. My brother said well if I didn't have this beard I'd look just like him. My SIL's reply: shave the beard.

I'm looking forward to the new Judi Dench movie next week. The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel or something along that line.

We probably see about 6 movies a year, always at the early-bird prices. We've never rented a movie. I really like seeing a movie on a big screen.

Horrified side note: speaking of big screens, did you see that there are 80" tvs! OMG, who needs that big of a picture in their home? How many people would even have a big enough wall?

80 inches?! Holy cow, that's 6 ft 8 inches! Plus your room would have to be really long so you could sit far back enough. And windexing it would be such a pain.

I've seen The Artist, The Descendants, and The Help. Really want to see War Horse, as I've heard the scenery is fabulous. Out of the three I saw, I probably enjoyed The Descendants most of all. I found The Artist to be a bit tiresome. And having read The Help and absolutely loving the book, I think I went into the theater expecting to be a bit disappointed, because movies never hold a candle to the book IMO.

Rented Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close last night. It wasn't much better than The Descendants. Hard to believe either movie was nominated for best picture. Add Moneyball to the list.

Still to view ... Tree of Life, The Artist, and Hugo. Renting Iron Lady tonight.

The only one I've seen is The Descendants and sadly that's two hours I'll never get back. I can completely understand why it wasn't nominated.

Lukk, it was nominated.

I saw Marigold, enjoyed it immensely !! I also enjoyed the Descendants,
I found Clooney intense and real, the kids also.

Oh crap...I miss read it! LOL

IMHO, those award shows are nothing more than an opportunity for the stars to once again pat themselves on the back and say aren't we wonderful. It's no longer about the quality of a movie or the artistic beauty of it, it's all about how well known and popular the actor in it is. Most movies these days are just awful with no depth or thought to them.

I got so tired of buying into the hype of the trailers and walking away disappointed, I stopped looking to the theaters for entertainment quite a while ago and watch whatever I can find in Hulu plus or Netflix. The only reason I saw the Descendents is because DH wanted to rent from Redbox and asked if I'd choose a movie too. Next time I'll just save the money.

Really enjoyed The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel! What a great cast!
I read The Descendents and decided not to bother going to see the movie as I did not particularly enjoy the book. Pity because I usually like Clooney's movies.

I get why Meryl Streep was nominated (again), but Iron Lady was strangely lacking in any real focus.

CBS Sunday Morning did a profile on Phillip Seymour Hoffman. I've missed a lot of his movies, so that's the new quest to see how many Redbox offers.

I like Phillip Seymour Hoffman, he's very versatile and even though I haven't enjoyed all the movies he's been in, he's always very good in them. He's just not tall, dark and handsome and has really had to work hard to get where he is. In my opinion he's one of the better actors of today.

Meryl is a darling and one of my favorites also. Again, I've not always enjoyed the movie as a whole, but she always does an outstanding job.

Lukk, I agree. They both have many layers to their acting personas.

Yeah, and from what I have read both are very genuine and down to earth in real life too. Especially Meryl. Just a nice lady all the way around.

Speaking of Meryl ... we saw a local production of Osage August County last year. A few months later I read that Meryl Streep and Julia Roberts are going to star in the film version coming out next year.

Here is a link that might be useful: Osage August County

Phillip Seymour Hoffman was great in The Ides of March.

Just read about a summer movie release that might be worth seeing.

Here is a link that might be useful: Hope Springs