Hey, two Zach Galifianakis trailers in a row. This one is for “Due Date,” the new film from “The Hangover” director Todd Phillips. The southern boy in me LOVES the Waffle House shout-out, but anyway, the film looks like a great tandem comedy for Galifianakis and Robert Downey Jr. Check out the trailer from Yahoo! Movies by clicking the image below, or watch the embed after the jump.
Friday we spotlighted the film editing category in our daily Oscar Guide feature. Tonight at the Beverly Hilton, the editors themselves had their say at the 60th annual ACE Eddies ceremony.
Bob Murawski and Chris Innis were the big winners in the drama category for “The Hurt Locker” (my prediction for the Oscar win), while in something of a surprise, Debra Neil-Fisher won in the comedy category for “The Hangover,” toppling the Coen brothers’ “A Serious Man.” It makes you wonder just how close the Warner Bros. romp was to a Best Picture nomination with all of this industry love.
Pixar and Kevin Nolting predictably won in the animated category for “Up,” while Geoffrey Richardson won in the documentary field for “The Cove,” a film that frankly deserved Oscar recognition in the category.
As always, keep track of the season’s goings on at The Circuit.
So this Steve Pond piece, titled “How Oscar Could Surprise — and Scare — Us,” is what we like to call hedging our bets. It’s a chance to address some bubble matters so that we have something to point to and say, “Look, I toldja!”
(Is that officially trademarked by Nikki Finke yet?)
Anyway, I do like the guessing game fun, and Pond touches on a couple of things that I would likely mention if I were to do a similar piece. One we can all understand is his #10, the potential snub of “Invictus” in the Best Picture category. It has kind of been in the water for a few weeks now that the film just isn’t as strong as it could be, likely lacking passionate top tier votes. It is, frankly, in the #10 spot on my list of final predictions.
I do like Pond’s mention of Sharlto Copley as a potential Best Actor spoiler, but failing to even make the longlist with BAFTA (a group that wasn’t shy on the “District 9” love) makes the actor (who gave the year’s best lead actor performance in my book) the darkest of dark horses.
In so many words, this is it. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences unveils it’s slate of nominees bright and early tomorrow morning, and this being the first year with a 10-film Best Picture field, all eyes will be on the top category to gauge which way the wind blew on this AMPAS experiment.
Will populist entertainment reap the benefits of an extra five slots or will independent cinema finally get its foot in the door? That’s been the question all year long. The answers are around the corner, and less than 24 hours out, they still feel as elusive as ever.
I learned long ago that to forecast “surprises” is folly. They’re called surprises for a reason. All you can do is try to find the pulse on the season and make your judgment calls, and in most cases, that means understanding what the Academy is high on, and when.
For instance, is “The Messenger” poised to surprise in the supporting actress and original screenplay races, as well as Best Picture? Or did the discussion stir up a bit late (which it did), too late, perhaps, to register? The screener showed up earlier than most. Did members find time in that lull to pop it into the player?
Meanwhile, how will the BAFTA contingent affect the race? We see it every year. Contenders left dangling on the vine get their due from a membership that has considerable AMPAS cross-over. Just ask Alan Alda. With that in mind, could Alec Baldwin or Alfred Molina find themselves sliding into an incredibly fluid supporting actor category?
With less than 72 hours until Oscar nominations are announced, prediction lists are coming through thick and fast. Kris and I will have our final predictions up on Monday, while Gerard’s technical picks will be scattered throughout the weekend. (I’ll also enter dreamland for a while and offer up my fantasy ballot at some point.)
Roger Ebert, meanwhile, is the latest big name to join the pile. As we’ve come to expect from the critic, his predictions are a blend of the rationally reasoned and the borderline insane. (Werner Herzog’s “The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans” has an outside shot at a Best Picture nomination, apparently. Right.)
Most interesting to me, however, is his conviction in “The Blind Side,” which he labels a can’t-miss Best Picture nominee. (He also calls Sandra Bullock a “sure thing” to win Best Actress.)
This, ladies and gentlemen, will be the last Long Shot column I write before the 2009 Academy Award nominations are announced, and it’s not just because it’s the column’s 17th week that the well of subject matter is looking rather dry.
I have followed longer awards seasons than this one (the awards used to take place in late March, after all), but none have felt longer – thanks to this year’s eccentric, unprecedented scheduling that has most of the most significant precursor awards done and dusted before the Oscar nominations are even out.
The six weeks between nomination morning and awards night were once chockfull of awards ceremonies that could move the needle this way or that. We now have only the BAFTAs and some guild announcements to break up the more stealthy campaigning that could yet affect the race.
The result, then, is that Tuesday’s nominations seem like more of a formality than usual. By the end of the weekend, the Globes, the BFCA and the three most influential guilds will all have had their say, meaning almost every major race can be boiled down to a maximum of two contenders … before we even receive official confirmation that they’re in the race at all. If that’s the case, Lord only knows what we’ll find to talk about until March 7.
One of the best parts of the film awards season, for me, has always been the print advertising artwork of “For Your Consideration” ads in trade publications. They feature a studio advertising department’s best foot forward on creatively reaching the AMPAS audience and generally make for some striking imagery.
Though I have to say, I find myself consistently wondering how much longer they will be a mainstay. The transition to online focus is becoming more and more evident. After all, Paramount Pictures angled its awards budget mainly toward online outlets this year. There wasn’t a single trade ad for “Up in the Air” all year long and it has done just fine for itself this season. I think that’s a first (and an early promise I was surprised to see the studio make good on). It’ll be interesting to see if other studios follow suit.
Anyway, sorry for the tangent. With all this in mind, an annual delight has always been Sasha Stone’s round-up of FYC ads at Awards Daily. A few years ago the gallery duties were handed over to Dora Kappou of Film-Releases.com, who’s done a fine job of presenting the material in an attractive, easily navigable manner. So which films were the cream of the FYC crop this year?
• “Avatar” and “The Hangover” took top honors at a very populist Golden Globes ceremony — Off the Carpet reported from the party circuit.
• The Academy revealed the nine films shortlisted for Best Foreign Language Film; we sized up the race.
• BAFTA announced their nominations, with “An Education,” “The Hurt Locker” and “Avatar” topping the list.
• The Long Shot, meanwhile, pondered the identity crisis of this particular awards institution.
Last January, I wrote an especially effusive review of the previous night’s Golden Globe awards, commending the usually much-derided HFPA for looking beyond star power and box-office grosses. Instead, they assembled an international and rather indie-minded winners slate that included such titles as “Happy-Go-Lucky,” “The Wrestler,” “In Bruges,” “Vicky Cristina Barcelona” and eventual Oscar-sweeper “Slumdog Millionaire.”
What a difference a year makes.
Whether stung by matters of ratings and economics, or simply wowed by a very different school of cinema this year, the Foreign Press voters were back to the big-name pandering for which they are famous.
Everyone present, meanwhile, seemed quite aware of the fact, some — including host Ricky Gervais and, in the night’s best speech, Robert Downey, Jr. — openly teasing them for it. “One thing you can’t buy is a Golden Globe,” the reliably droll Gervais observed, beer in hand. “Officially.”
So, what did I learn from last night’s proceedings?
For me, “District 9” is the biggest and most pleasant surprise for me in this morning’s American Cinema Editors announcement. If ever the film looked like a lock for a Best Picture nomination, now is that time, I have to say. Getting in over presumed Oscar frontrunners “Precious” and, most especially, “Inglourious Basterds,” that’s a pretty big feather in its cap if you ask me.
“Star Trek” also makes another fairly strong case this morning for getting into the Academy’s 10 over something like “Invictus,” which keeps missing with guild after guild and should, perhaps, finally be called a spade. The drama field is then rounded out by what has become the rather definitive frontrunner trilogy of films.
In the comedy field, we get veterans in Joe Hutshing and Richard Marks perhaps predictably recognized for “Its Complicated” and “Julie & Julia” respectively, while the Coen brothers get their third nomination from the guild to date. The other two: Best Picture nominees “Fargo” and “No Country for Old Men.” Round it out with two comedies that are tricking people into thinking they’ll be Best Picture nominees (with no mention of the dead and dying “Nine”) and voila, the ACE Eddie nominees.
Check out the full list after the jump.
And, there we are. “Avatar” gets a nomination for best writing from a 10,000 member-strong guild and plenty will find reason to argue with it. But let’s look at the rest.
“The Hangover” managed to get a nomination in the original screenplay field in the wake of a number of eligibility rulings on some top contenders. I’m most excited for Scott Cooper and “Crazy Heart,” because I’m getting the feeling he might turn this and his USC Scripter bid into something tangible for Oscar consideration. “District 9,” of course, was not eligible here and is still a threat, ditto “An Education,” but the race is a little more interesting now. Especially when you consider Nora Ephron (also nominated today), who I’ve always felt was a threat with the Academy for navigating two sources and making some entertaining sense of it all.
Elsewhere it’s the usual suspects, except for the appearance of “Star Trek” in the adapted ranks. Yes, the writers of “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen” are WGA nominees. But in my view, they deserve the pat on the back for this film, a high octane entertainment that was smartly conceived and remains one of the true gems of 2009.
Check out the nominees after the jump.
I’ve had my eye on these because I’ve always felt that, if “Avatar” could slide in here, it might be able to get over any weird bias against the way it was designed (largely in computer, etc.). But after sitting down with Robert Stromberg yesterday, and with these nominations in mind, I feel better about its prospects for Oscar in the category now.
I’m happy to see “The Lovely Bones” recognized, though I’m consistently baffled as to where the distinction is between “contemporary” and “period” with this film. And can I also say, looking out over the slate of nominees, this is a damn fine year for art direction? The 10 in period and fantasy could easily find their way to nominations.
The obvious snub here is kind of a big one, I’d say: “Nine.” Despite the quality of the film, the below-the-line elements were exemplary. I guess it wasn’t enough to overcome the film’s overall critical reception. Oh, and big ups to Jess Gonchor, who I’ve said since day one was a threat for his and set decorator Nancy Haigh’s meticulous work on “A Serious Man.” Stay tuned next week for a Tech Support interview with the principals from that film
Nominees after the jump.
As the year (and decade) slowly winds down, I thought it would be a pretty good time to revive our long-slumbering Lists feature here at In Contention. And what better way to do so and salute the year at hand than to lay out the most significant movie-related moments of 2009?
The American Film Institute kind of tried its hand at this yesterday. I was already considering a list along these lines, but the AFI thing definitely got my the ole’ gears turning once again. Suffice it to say, I think they missed a few spots.
It was an intriguing year. For me, as mentioned many times, it was the best year of filmmaking the decade has seen. But it was also a pivotal year for the film industry, as everything from standardized digital projection to 3D technology, experimental distribution schemes to economic effects on the business seemed to be on the table as points of consideration along the way.
It was the first year of the Obama administration, something that found its way into the arts discussion as well. Whether it was the consideration of “Slumdog Millionaire” (which ultimately won the Best Picture Oscar this year) as the “first film of the Obama era” or the desire to include films like “Precious” (a stretch) and “Invictus” (not such a stretch) in that conversation, the political environment, as ever, was in the cinema air.
It was a year of many things, so obviously, a list like this could be filled with any number of instances. But these 10 stuck out to me as the most significant ticks on the clock of 2009. Agree, disagree, whatever the case, don’t look too hard for a “Twilight” mention (though I suppose one may have been warranted).
My picks…
• Anne Thompson reports that there is no “official” costume designer on “Fantastic Mr. Fox,” so anyone holding out longshot hope for its Oscar chances in that field can go ahead and focus elsewhere. [Thompson on Hollywood]
• Melena Ryzik gets Ivan Reitman to admit “The Hangover” would be on his top 10 list. [The Carpetbagger]
• Dave Karger chats with “Nine” star Penelope Cruz, who could be on her way to back-to-back supporting actress nominations. [Oscar Watch]
Jeez, give us some breathing room. Anyway, the American Film Institute has revealed their annual selection of the year’s best U.S. titles, and as usual, it’s a pleasingly diverse, idiosyncratic list.
My heart sings to see Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck’s marvelous “Sugar” make the cut, at the expense of heavily-hyped titles like “Invictus” and even “Avatar” — Anne Thompson reports the latter got a special citation for technical achievement, though it’s not in the press release.
From an awards-watcher’s perspective, however, the most interesting inclusion here might be “The Messenger,” whose higher-than-expected precursor profile suggests some may be underestimating its Oscar potential.
Those looking for correlation with the Academy’s eventual Top 10 should bear in mind that a foreign title like “An Education” isn’t eligible for inclusion here. Even so, I’d say there are plenty of American titles not included here that are more likely to land Best Picture nods than, say, “The Hangover.”
But that’s the beauty of the list — it’s always a joy to see a set of year-end honors with more on its mind than mere Oscar prognostication. Check out the full Top 10 after the cut.
• Dave Karger, in a slow news week, digs up the old “‘Hangover’ for Best Pic” notion. No. [Oscar Watch]
• Jeff Wells face-to-face with “Fantastic Mr. Fox” director Wes Anderson. [Hollywood Elsewhere]
• Susan King talks to editing legend Anne V. Coates, whose career was showcased at the Academy last night. [Los Angeles Times]
Behold! I give to you the very first edition of The Lists to be based on fact and not opinion — unless you count box office data as the ultimate opinion of the masses.
The decade is drawing to a close and unless something miraculous happens, the top 10 highest grossing films of the aughts is probably set in stone. At first I thought that would be a fun list to compile, but it turns out to be extremely boring and exactly what you’d expect it to be. If ever there was a doubt that this decade would be defined by anything but franchises, then let me put it to rest here. Number of sequels in the top 10 highest grossing movies of the 1990s: 1. Number of sequels in the top 10 highest grossing movies of the 2000s: 7.
Audiences have overwhelmingly turned against original product in favor of something, anything with some sort of pre-existing source material, and it has happened over the last 10 years. Of course, I think audiences have always depended on something familiar to get them into the multiplex. It used to be the reputation of an actor or director that provided that comfort. Now, star power is a thing of the past and brand recognition is the wave of the future. Of course, there are always a few exceptions to the rules, and so I’ve compiled this list to celebrate some of the films that were able to permeate the public consciousness and earn the right to be called a blockbuster the hard way: by being original (relatively speaking).
First, some caveats. A film like “The Passion of the Christ” is technically an original screenplay but obviously is based on stories from the Bible and carries an enormous built-in “fanbase,” so it was not considered for this list. I also decided to exclude animated films because if I didn’t, 50% of the list would be dominated by Pixar titles and that’s no fun either. In the interest of fairness, though, I will post the top 10 including animated films in the comments section.
One final note. If I did a similar chart for the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s, the number one film would also actually be the highest grossing film of the decade. For the 2000s, the number one film on this chart is the 32nd highest grossing overall film.
Oh, and all the numbers are adjusted to today’s figures, as always.