Another Amazing Foreign Film!

Rating: 8/10 (19 February 2019)

Cold War Review:
Cold War is a Polish film that follows Wiktor, a music director, who falls in love with Zulu, a singer. He tried to persuade her to flee communist Poland and go to France with him during the 1950s Cold War. This film is nominated for three Oscars this year including Best Foreign Film, Best Cinematography, and a big surprise for Best Director. Naturally I wanted to see this based on all the buzz it's been getting. People have either said they love this film or don't like this film on first viewing. I loved it! It had an interesting story throughout. Pawel Pawlikowski co-wrote and directed. He did a phenomenal job. I can definitely see why he got the directing nomination, though if I had to swap out a director for someone who is nominated, I would choose him. It's a music based story so it caught my attention right away. I knew very little about it going in. I saw the trailer once and read about it a few times and knew that it was about the Cold War and a singer. With it being a foreign film I didn't think I'd have the opportunity to see it in theaters, but I'm glad to have had the chance. Joanna Kulig was amazing and the best part. She was very good at playing singer Zula and I don't understand why she wasn't talked about more in the Oscar race. Yalitza Aparicio was talked about way more for Roma, another big foreign film this year, since it was her first movie ever. Though I thought Yalitza was better Joanna was still very good but this film wasn't praised for its acting. I can compare this film to Roma since they're competing for Best Foreign Film (I'll explain more later). Tomasz Kot as Wiktor was also another great part of the film. I liked his character and thought he was a great casting choice. The two actors were great with acting but I didn't feel their love connection entirely at first. It was just kind of there. I did like the two together and it added to the film, but it was just kind of thrown there. The cinematography was beautiful and I can see why it's nominated. Just like Roma it's all in black and white. I love black and white movies and it added effect with the time period. My vote is for Roma to win Best Cinematography because that was a beautifully shot film. There was no score to this film, just like Roma, but I loved the singing and song choices. The song performances, whether it was solo or for a concert, were another one of my favorite parts. Overall this was a very good film. My only issues were the love story being thrown in right away at the beginning and there were a few slow scenes. It was what some may consider to be a "slow movie" which I like but there were a couple lengthy scenes. I don't know when anyone would really have the chance to see this film but I would highly recommend this beautiful foreign film.
My Grade: A
Now to explain the beta between Cold War and Roma. As I explained earlier, they're both foreign films nominated for three of the same awards (Foreign Film, Cinematography, and Directing). This has been the year for foreign films. Now Roma is also up for Best Picture which some people feel is wrong. I'm personally fine with a foreign film being nominated and potentially winning the award. What I don't feel is right is a foreign film winning Best Foreign Film (it's basically their Best Picture) and Best Picture. Right now for foreign Film it's between those two movies and it's hard to tell. Roma is currently predicated as number one to win both Foreign Film and Picture. My thought and many others think that if during the awards ceremony that night, if Roma wins Best Foreign Film, it won't win Best Picture rather, in my opinion, Green Book. If Cold War wins Foreign Film that means Roma will win Best Picture which would be amazing since that's never happened and it's also a Netflix film. It opens a door for both foreign films and streaming services. This will be a very interesting year for the Oscars. Hope you liked this review and comment your thoughts.