Links of the week, 2/24/2012

I never did make it to The Artist, mainly because I decided I don’t actually care much about seeing it. Frankly, I’ve never been less interested in the Oscar Best Picture nominations than I am this year, though Sean and I did catch Moneyball this week—review to come. In the meantime, links of the week!

• Tasha Robinson of The AV Club posted an interesting essay describing what she sees as a common theme of the Academy’s Best Picture nominations—namely, a blithe “everything will work out in the end, no matter how stupidly or passively you behave” philosophy. I suspect she had to work to squeeze a few of the films under that umbrella, but she definitely lands a few strong hits.
• At Slate, Daniel Engber argues that Drive should win the Oscar for Best Sound Editing and supports his point with videos and background information about foley artists. So cool!
• The MoMA’s Cindy Sherman retrospective opens this Sunday, and I’m looking forward to it tremendously. I saw her Untitled Film Stills series there when I was a teenager and have been fascinated with her work ever since.
• The Metropolitan Opera announced its 2012–13 season this week and unfortunately, as Alex Ross pointedly notes, only two relatively recent works are included. (Every year I cross my fingers for Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress, and every year I am disappointed.) One of the two, however, is Thomas Adès’s The Tempest, which premiered in 2004. It will make its Met debut in October, and now that I’ve read Ross’s old 2004 review, I can’t wait to buy my ticket!
• This short little story—about a guy who managed to get an advance copy of a much-anticipated book for his dying friend—is such a beautiful testament to the power of friendship and the joy of reading that I get sniffly just thinking about it.