Irish Eyes Are Smiling (1944)

Academy Awards, USA 1945

Nominee Oscar

Best Music, Scoring of a Musical Picture Alfred Newman

Twentieth Century-Fox Films
Directed by Gregory Ratoff
My rating: 1.5 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(DVD, Fox Cinema Archives)

Dick Haymes composes sentimental ballads in turn-of-the-century Cleveland. He is promptly thrown out of a music conservatory and left broke. He meets chorus girl June Haver, mistaking her for someone else, and they fall in love at first sight. However, she decides to go to New York City to advance her career, leaving Haymes behind. He earns money in a boxing challenge and soon is in New York himself working for a music publisher. His songs become nationwide sensations and he becomes popular and wealthy. Searching for Haver the whoe time, he finally accidentally meets her working as a hat check girl, and after a few mistarts and misunderstandings resume their romance. Anthony Quinn and Monty Woolley are a couple of bored socialites trying to outdo each other in bets. Other than the songs, pretty forgettable.

The Princess and the Pirate (1944)

Academy Awards, USA 1945

Nominee Oscar	Best Art Direction-Interior Decoration, Color Ernst Fegté Howard Bristol
	Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture David Rose

RKO Radio Pictures
Directed by David Butler
My rating: 2 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(DVD, MGM)

Pirate spoof in which Bob Hope plays a vaudeville style actor caught up in the kidnapping of a princess played by Virginia Mayo. They both happen to be on the same boat that a bloodthirsty pirate known as The Hook captures. Hope escapes by dressing as a gypsy woman but Mayo is kidnapped and held for ransom. They develop a mutual friendship, and, Hope believes, a budding romance. Complications develop when tattoo artist Walter Brennan uses him in a scheme to steal The Hook's treasure. They end up on a crazy pirate island performing at the Bucket of Blood to earn their hotel rent. The Hook soon shows up to claim his ransom. Hope's jokes are insufferable as usual and even Brennan can't save it, with his maniacal laugh forced and just plain irritating. The final gag was pretty good, though. 

Sideways (2004)

Academy Awards, USA 2005

Winner Oscar	Best Writing, Adapted Screenplay Alexander Payne Jim Taylor
Nominee Oscar	Best Motion Picture of the Year Michael London
	Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role Thomas Haden Church
	Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role Virginia Madsen
	Best Achievement in Directing Alexander Payne

Fox Searchlight Pictures
Directed by Alexander Payne
My rating: 3 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(Blu-ray, Fox)

Paul Giamatti and Thomas Haden Church are old college buddies who take a road trip through California wine county to celebrate Church's upcoming wedding. Giamatti, recently divorced, just wants to relax and play golf, but Church is intent on having a final fling. He soon enough finds a willing bartender at a winery, and they go on a double date with a waitress Giamatti knows. All goes well for a couple of days until Giamatti lets it slip that his friend is getting married in a few days. They deal with the fallout with the two girls. Church wastes no time in finding another waitress getting them into even deeper trouble. It's sort of a mismatched buddy movie, and at times difficult to believe that these two very different people could actually be friends. Still, Giamatti is a revelation and his characterization is just wonderful to watch unfold. The sex can be jarring, and the wine talk boring, but it is also frequently laugh-out-loud funny. A mixed bag to be sure.

Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954)

Academy Awards, USA 1955

Winner Oscar	Best Music, Scoring of a Musical Picture Adolph Deutsch Saul Chaplin
Nominee Oscar	Best Picture Jack Cummings
	Best Writing, Screenplay Albert Hackett Frances Goodrich Dorothy Kingsley
	Best Cinematography, Color George J. Folsey
	Best Film Editing Ralph E. Winters

MGM
Directed by Stanley Donen
My rating: 1.5 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(Blu-ray, Warner Archive Collection)

Howard Keel, a mountain man in pioneer days Oregon, goes to town looking for supplies, and a wife. He finds Jane Powell slaving in a restaurant and she agrees to marry him within minutes of meeting. Up at his log cabin, she finds his six brothers waiting. They seem incapable of feeding themselves or even keeping the cabin or themselves clean. Realizing she has become a hired housekeeper, she kicks Keel outside their bedroom window into a tree on their wedding night. They eventually reconcile. Later that winter, Keel convinces his brothers to go to town and kidnap the six girls they danced with at an earlier barn raising. Their relatives don't take too kindly to that action, but are cut off by an avalanche and have to wait to spring to rescue them. That gives the boys plenty of time to convince the girls they aren't so bad after all. I know this is supposed to be a musical and not really reflective of real life, but this is perhaps the most mysoginistic mainstream Hollywood film ever made. Jawdroppingly so.

Inside Out (2015)

Academy Awards, USA 2016

Winner Oscar	Best Animated Feature Film of the Year Pete Docter Jonas Rivera
Nominee Oscar	Best Writing, Original Screenplay Pete Docter (screenplay/story) Meg LeFauve (screenplay) Josh Cooley (screenplay) Ronnie Del Carmen (story)

Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures
Directed by Pete Docter
My rating: 3 stars out of 4
IMDb Wikipedia
(Blu-ray, Disney)

When an 11-year-old girl's family moves from Minnesota to San Francisco, her life is turned upside down. Anthropomorphic emotions that live in her mind bicker with each other over how to deal with the situation. An embarrassing moment on the first day of school sets in  motion her idea to run away from home and back to Minnesota. In her mind, the emotions scramble to prevent it. Meticulously plotted and conceived wonder from Pixar knows how to pull all the right emotional levers, but in the end seems overly contrived and almost manipulative. However, I must admit I fell for the whole thing. I thought Bing Bong, the girl's imaginary friend from childhood, was the best character, who disappears forever in her mind's memory dump.