In Contention

Author: Kristopher Tapley

  • Gurus back on the attack

    Here’s the pre-Toronto guesses from the group, via Movie City News. Additionally, we were polled on picks for an actor and an actress that could pop up as a “surprise” nominee. People like Michelle Yeoh and Charlize Theron don’t really qualify for me (the former dripping with bait, the latter stretching herself again in a role many expect to find traction). Ditto Gary Oldman, certainly. So I went with Kristin Scott Thomas and Rhys Ifans, one of which potentially has a stealth studio push coming, the other getting talked up by everyone I know who has seen the film. In any case, we’re just getting our engines humming, I guess.

    (EDIT: Now that Poland has corrected his typo, the order is slightly different.)

  • OFF THE CARPET: Closing the book on summer 2011

    The summer movie season has come to an end, and what an interesting season it was.

    We saw three billion-dollar grossers for the first time ever in one year, let alone one three-month spread (thank you, 3D). We saw a bit of a glass ceiling for comic book movies, proving nothing is a sure thing in that game. We saw indie darlings with more stamina than the big dogs and we saw R-rated comedies find impressive footholds.

    But what does it mean in the spectrum of a film awards race, seeing as we have one knocking on our door in a bit more than a week’s time? Let’s consider.

    First and foremost, as reported here last year (and confirmed by Variety a few weeks ago), Warner Bros. Pictures is all set for a balls-to-the-wall Best Picture push for “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2.” With 10 digits in the bank and counting, and with a breathtaking critical pass, now is the time, and it’s a smart tactic. DVDs will be out right in the thick of the season, adding fuel to the fire. And it’ll be a nice counter to the other in-houses pushes, dramas like “Contagion,” “J. Edgar.,” and “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close.” (The studio could also go screenplay hunting for Dan Fogelman and “Crazy, Stupid, Love” if it wants.)

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  • Sean Penn bitch-slaps ‘Tree of Life’

    It seems actor Sean Penn is still upset about the fact that so much of his performance in “The Tree of Life” was left on the cutting room floor. I guess he and Adrian Brody can drown their woes in a few down at the pub. Said the actor to French magazine Le Figaro:

    I didn’t at all find on the screen the emotion of the script, which is the most magnificent one that I’ve ever read. A clearer and more conventional narrative would have helped the film without, in my opinion, lessening its beauty and its impact. Frankly, I’m still trying to figure out what I’m doing there and what I was supposed to add in that context! What’s more, Terry himself never managed to explain it to me clearly.

    The thing is, I don’t entirely disagree with him. The bookend nature of his role is the weaker element of the film, particularly the reprise at the end. But I do think the early stuff works because it’s a brilliant, human lead-in to the film’s central question: “Why hast thou forsaken me?” Penn asking the almighty “Where were you” when his character’s brother died leads to the film’s extended cosmos sequence, and that is key, something I dug into when I wrote about the film at length in May.

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  • BOX OFFICE: ‘Help,’ I need some money, ‘Help,’ not just any money

    So, “The Help” took the top spot at the box office in a rather thin weekend for new releases. But it’s the hold that matters, and this one clearly has staying power. Combined with the impact it’s having with Academy types, that makes a contender, folks, and you’ll see the film, Davis, Spencer and the costumes chalked up for nominations in tomorrow’s predictions update. We’ll just have to see how much staying power it has, because mid-August is an early release for an Oscar hopeful. There’s really not much else to say elsewhere.

    (Courtesy: Exhibitor Relations)

  • ‘Warrior’ pulls its punches

    I have to say, even though the pieces were there and I tend to respond overwhelmingly to father/son dramas, I was really surprised at how little I felt emotionally while watching Gavin O’Connor’s “Warrior.” And O’Connor really excels at this stuff, in general, for me. But it didn’t come together this time.

    I feel pretty much alone here because the film has been affecting a number of critics and press members for the past month or so now and the room I was in tonight was all energy and tears, right there with it. But I don’t know, there is something in the fabric of the writing that kept me at arm’s length.

    So Nick Nolte’s Paddy Conlon character was an asshole father to sons Tommy (Tom Hardy) and Brendan (Joel Edgerton). I know this because I’m being told over and over and over again. I know it, but I don’t feel it. Being presented with a thousand-day sober man looking to make amends really shoots that in the foot and you start wondering why his kids can’t just stop being pricks. Something, anything, that would have keyed us into their perspective would have gone a long way.

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  • Gordon-Levitt, Rogen and Reiser on tragicomedy and ‘50/50’

    Yesterday I sang the praises of Jonathan Levine’s “50/50,” particularly the writing from real-life cancer survivor Will Reiser and actors Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Seth Rogen. Today, Summit has pointed us to a sit-down chat between the three regarding the film as part of Gordon-Levitt’s hitRECord call for submissions of personal stories of tragedy blended with comedy. He writes:

    Contribute your tragic/comic story here.  Tell us about something terribly unfortunate in your life, but do it with a sense of humor.  You could write your story in text, you could RECord yourself telling the story into your camera or microphone, draw a picture, write a song, whatever’s comfortable.

    And can I say this? I really didn’t know Rogen was essentially playing himself in the film and that the story is both his and Reiser’s. Had no idea at all. The things that fly under one’s radar. Anyway, check out the chat after the jump. And feel free to offer up your tragicomedy selections at hitRECord.

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  • ‘Carnage’ trailer

    I’ve been somewhat reserved on Roman Polanski’s “Carnage” for a while now, mainly because the cast doesn’t really seem all that right to me. I caught the play on Broadway a few years back, and it’s an amazing piece of work. You might recall I was particularly impressed with (and totally crushing on) Hope Davis back in 2009, and I’d have loved to see at least someone from the original ensemble carried over. Alas. But Polanski is a great fit for the material in an odd way and judging by the trailer, which I believe hit via Twitch, it looks like Kate Winslet is the stand-out in Davis’s role. Check out the trailer by clicking the image below or watch an embed after the jump.

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  • Darkness falls

    Just a programming note: Next week we begin weekly coverage of the 2011-2012 Oscar season. The latest Off the Carpet column hits Monday with updated predictions and proceeds weekly. Ditto Oscar Talk, which Anne and I will launch on Friday. The following week, both features will be off to the races as we move into the festival spread. Guy will launch The Long Shot post-Toronto on September 21 and Gerard will be close behind with the launch of Tech Support on September 29. By then, we’ll be very much in the midst of Oscar madness, so strap in.

  • ‘Machine Gun Preacher’ trailer

    Marc Forster’s “Machine Gun Preacher” is all set for a Toronto bow next month. It could be an awards play for actor Gerard Butler, or for Chris Cornell’s original song “The Keeper,” or maybe it’ll just be some September fun. We’ll see. But it has the “inspiring true story” thing going for it out of the gate. The trailer just hit via Apple, so check it out by clicking the image below, or watch an embed after the jump.

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  • ‘50/50’ draws laughs and tears, but Gordon-Levitt owns it

    It’s probably a bit ridiculous that I haven’t seen Jonathan Levine’s “The Wackness” yet. I have the screener somewhere around here and it’s just one of those films I keep forgetting to watch, despite constant encouragement to do so. Therefore, “50/50,” a dramedy from writer Will Reiser based on his own experience being diagnosed with cancer, is the extent of my knowledge of the director’s work. And it’s fantastic.

    Coming off “The Help,” I’m getting a little tired of crying like a baby in movies, but “50/50” earns those tears in more complex and special ways. It also finds the right pulse of comedy to balance the experience out and boasts a tight little ensemble with a natural vibe.

    Joseph Gordon-Levitt is front and center as Adam, a 27-year-old Seattleite smacked in the face with a cancer diagnosis. He has a girlfriend, Rachael (Bryce Dallas Howard), who isn’t totally up to the task of dealing with all this. He has a life-long friend, Kyle (Seth Rogen), who keeps pushing the illness as a chick-magnet (and follows an arc that is ultimately touching and surprising, yet believable and organic). And he has a mother (Anjelica Huston) who worries herself sick, naturally, and longs for connection that she can’t get from her own Alzheimer’s-afflicted husband.

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  • First look at Tom Hanks, Thomas Horn in ‘Extremely Loud’

    I’ve heard young Thomas Horn is a little heart-breaker in Stephen Daldry’s “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close.” And Sandra Bullock seems to me someone to watch for in the supporting actress race, given the narrative of the book on which Eric Roth’s screenplay is based. But Tom Hanks is featured front and center in the first official image from the film (courtesy of Awards Campaign). Warner Bros. has set the film for a late December release. Scott Rudin is producing. Awards hunting is in the cards. Etc. Etc.

  • BOX OFFICE: ‘Apes’ rose

    I’m no box office expert, but while $54 million is obviously a great late-summer number for “Rise of the Planet of the Apes,” I can’t help but wonder if it would have had a shot at more bank if it had been let out of the bag earlier via advance press screenings. Regardless, word of mouth could keep its legs strong, and I’m sure Fox is more than happy with this. “Transformers: Dark of the Moon” hit a billion worldwide earlier in the week and will be lapped domestically by “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2” later this week. “Cowboys & Aliens,” meanwhile, is toast.

    (Courtesy: Exhibitor Relations)

  • Blank

    It’s probably largely to do with the inherent sense of understanding, but there’s also something universal about it, about the tragically imperfect’s search for perfection. In any case, I find this to be one of the best, if simplest, slices of genius on the page in our time. Anyway, as you were. I’m just bored here.

  • Hollywood’s new obsession: robots

    Trends are hardly new in Hollywood, but I can’t help but react to the escalation of robot-themed projects in the works as of late, all of them, no doubt, looking to cash in on the multi-billion-dollar “Transformers” franchise.

    First there is the Hugh Jackman-starrer “Real Steel” later this year. Then, whenever he decides to get around to it, Steven Spielberg will dive into the adaptation “Robopocalypse.” An adaptation Daniel Wilson’s book “How to Survive a Robot Uprising” is also in the cards (which would dovetail nicely with a take on the Max Brooks classic “The Zombie Survival Guide”).

    Yesterday a reboot of “Short Circuit” was announced, and today, /Film reports that “Monsters” director Gareth Edwards is working on an untitled project “about a young human child (probably around 5 years old) and a robot who travel across the galaxy in search of mankind’s origin in a world void of humanity and filled with robots.” The director is apparently pitching the project as “a robot Star Wars.” Well, that’ll certainly get the suits listening.

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  • Tell us what you thought of ‘Rise of the Planet of the Apes’

    I finally caught up to Rupert Wyatt’s “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” tonight and thoroughly enjoyed every frame. It’s easily the best blockbuster of the summer season and, I’d say, the best film of the franchise (including the classic first installment, which is far better as a concept than it is as a film). It’s also a real shame Fox couldn’t build some steam by showing it earlier and getting the word out, because I think a bigger box office might have been in the cards. We’ll see how it does Sunday, but for now, midnight screenings should be letting out shortly on the east coast. I’d love to hear your thoughts, so head on back here with them when you get around to the film this weekend.

  • Brett Ratner and Don Mischer announced as Oscarcast producers

    Is this the day the earth stood still? Eesh. Via AMPAS release:

    Brett Ratner and Don Mischer will produce the 84th Academy Awards telecast, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences President Tom Sherak announced today. This will be Ratner’s first involvement with the Oscar show; Mischer will for the second year in a row serve as a producer and as the telecast director.

    “I was so impressed with Brett when I met with him to discuss the Oscar show,” said Sherak. “He has an incredible love of film and its history and is a true student of the business of movies. He’s unbelievably creative and knows how to take risks that are both interesting and inspiring. Together with Don Mischer – who, by the way, just earned an Emmy nomination for his work on the 83rd Academy Awards – I think these two will give us a fantastic Oscar show that you won’t want to miss.”

  • Serkis addendum

    Thanks to reader Micah for pointing me to this NPR interview with Andy Serkis, which offers a nice nugget to dovetail with this morning’s post about Oscar-worthiness and the potential for a Special Achievement Award for the actor’s work in “Rise of the Planet of the Apes.” Here is his take on awards hub-bub around performance-capture (which starts at the 18:40 mark):

    My take on it is — and having worked on it for some years now — is that acting is acting. A performance is a performance. When we shoot these things, after they’ve been shot, the director, Rupert Wyatt, cuts the film, he edits the film. And the actor’s performance — my performance as Caesar, for instance, in this film — he can see my face on film going through all the emotions. He then cuts the entire story using my performance. And then eight or nine months down the line the visual effects shots, the overlaying of the performance with the skin and the texturing and coloring and painting over my eye movements and so on, that’s done later on. But the director’s already edited the movie and told the story and wants to uphold the performance of that actor.

    [Photo: NPR]

  • First look at Henry Cavill as Superman in ‘Man of Steel’

    Looks like the Singer costume. Something about the plastic-ness of that steel door bothers me. Lots of trepidation on my end. Fingers crossed.

    (click for larger version)