After the widely criticized “de-gaying” of “A Single Man,” The Weinstein Company’s next marketing project appears to be the “de-gritting” of “The Road.”
How else to explain the choice of a tidily mustachioed Viggo Mortensen and a radiantly smiling Charlize Theron as the largest images in this FYC ad? Never mind that they appear in this attractive, well-groomed state for only the briefest of interludes in the film. Nobody votes for a guy with a beard, right?
I have mixed feelings about this finalized one-sheet for James Cameron’s “Avatar.” My immediate reaction was that it was, well, a bit cheesy. But then again, it recalls the somewhat majestic poster art of the “Star Wars” films. If the film works and makes good on the hype and promise, I could see this becoming an iconic piece.
Or it could just be cheesy. Today, I like it.
• Just in time for BFCA and SAG balloting, Dennis Lim takes a second look at “Public Enemies.” [Los Angeles Times]
• Steven Zeitchik reports casting news before it’s official: Josh Brolin is being considered for “Men in Black 3.” I’m down. [Hero Complex]
• David Poland talks “The Lovely Bones” with Peter Jackson. [The Hot Blog]
LA Times music critic Todd Martens has posted a useful series of short interviews with the men behind some of the year’s most distinctive film scores. Indeed, it’s group of five names that isn’t too hard to imagine mirroring the year’s eventual Oscar slate: Alexandre Desplat for “Fantastic Mr. Fox,” Michael Giacchino for “Up,” Randy Newman for “The Princess and the Frog,” Marvin Hamlisch for “The Informant!” and Elliot Goldenthal for “Public Enemies.”
There are nice quotes and musical snippets peppered throughout all the profiles, but I was particularly drawn to read Desplat’s take on his “Fox” score, given how curiously — yet happily — the jangly Americana and English folk notes in the work sit with his more Euro-flavored oeuvre:
“I just felt that if we found a sound that would belong to these little puppets, it would make them come alive,” Desplat said. “I suggested to Wes that we do a sort of puppet orchestra. I wanted to make everything sound like they were play- ing. I wanted little things — the mandolin, the banjo, the whistle, the recorder and all these little families of instruments. They weren’t toys but kind of toy-ish instruments.”
From Nick Davis’s appreciation of Terrence Malick’s “The New World,” tucked within his marvelous larger appreciation of 2006:
Emmanuel Lubezki, a craftsman who needs no assistance from anybody, conducts his own jaw-dropping symphony of 100% natural-source lighting. I’d rank it up there with the three or four most impressive technical accomplishments I witnessed over the course of the decade. I’m just sad that Lubezki has personally assassinated the entire families of so many Oscar voters. Or, I’m sorry, do you have another theory as to why he still hasn’t won?
(Sidebar: Remember that brief window of hope when it looked like “The Tree of Life” might come out in 2009? What a happy time that was.)
I took Richard Corliss to task yesterday for his uninspired list of the year’s Top 10 performances. Fortunately, there’s a little more individual thinking (and international flavor) to be found in his TIME list of the year’s ten best films — say what you like, but “The Princess and the Frog” is an original pick for the year’s best.
Corliss makes an emphatic point by filling his top three with animated titles, while I must commend him for shining a light on “Of Time and the City,” Terence Davies’ exquisite personal valentine to Liverpool that was my own favorite documentary of 2008.
(On an unrelated note, Miranda Lambert crops up in the magazine’s lists for both album and single of the year. So I guess we’re cool, TIME.) Corliss’s Top 10 below the cut.
Any regular Oscar-watcher is familiar with the finicky rules and regulations that, year in and year out, keep some of the year’s most talked-about foreign-language titles from contending for the Oscar.
Happily, the Golden Globes have fewer restrictions — unlike AMPAS, they permit more than one film per country in the competition, and don’t rely on the official submissions of the countries themselves. The result is a larger, more inclusive field of contenders for the Best Foreign Language Film award, as demonstrated by this longlist of Globe contenders (courtesy of Screen International).
At 69 titles, it’s only 4 titles longer than the Academy’s list, but the real difference lies in the number of high-profile films in contention. For example, while France’s profilic industry is only represented by “A Prophet” for the Oscars, the Globes allow such titles as “Coco Before Chanel,” “The Girl on the Train” and Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s “Micmacs” to join it in the race.
We’re currently in that month where precursors do their utmost to reduce a year’s worth of cinematic achievement to a small handful of oft-repeated names and titles. It’s understandable (if disappointing) when groups or committees compile these identikit lists — but when individuals (and serious critics at that) stick rigidly to the formula, it becomes a little depressing.
This is my way of saying I read Richard Corliss’s Time list of the year’s Top 10 movie performances and could only say, “Really?” He watched an entire year’s worth of films and could only come up with nine heavily-publicized Oscar contenders and one token wacky/stupid/throwaway pick? (That’d be Michael Jackson, if you’re interested.)
Make no mistake, there are a number of fine performances here. Colin Firth, Mo’Nique, Jeremy Renner, Christoph Waltz, Carey Mulligan … noteworthy work, make no mistake. I just find it hard to believe that a critic has no personal favorites that deviate slightly from the buzz-determined consensus. I’m not saying he has to pick Tilda Swinton or Tom Hardy or John Malkovich — but he must have noticed some performers that weren’t already clocked by everyone else. Why not highlight one of them?
One of the numerous problems I always had with the late critic Pauline Kael was the pride she took in seeing a film only once before reviewing it, and in maintaining that she would never go back and revise an opinion later. While I could understand this stance from a professional point of view — Kael was nothing if not opinionated, and it was no doubt necessary that her opinions be seen as absolute, unwavering and not subject to change — from a human standpoint it always seemed silly. While the great majority of movies don’t need or deserve repeat viewings, why deny yourself the pleasure of seeing films you love a second or third time, or of watching a film more closely to understand how the filmmakers made it work?
Penned by Todd McCarthy on October 11, 2001 in relation to David Lynch’s then on-coming “Mulholland Drive,” and in an age when the internet had not yet begun to make traditional media sweat.
While South Africa’s currently high Hollywood profile is putting smiles on the faces (and much-needed cash in the pockets) of many figures in the country’s film industry, it appears that not all local actors are as pleased.
The Guardian reports that a number of prominent local thesps have spoken out against the casting of bankable American stars in plum South African parts — most notably Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela in “Invictus,” and Jennifer Hudson as his ex-wife Winnie in a separate biopic:
Oupa Lebogo, general secretary of the CWU [Creative Workers’ Union], said of Hudson’s casting, announced last month: “This decision must be reversed, it must be stopped now. If the matter doesn’t come up for discussion, we will push for a moratorium to be placed on the film being cast in South Africa. We are being undermined, there is no respect at all … We can’t allow this to happen. We have people who can play the role far better than Jennifer.”
The award-winning actor John Kani said Freeman had asked him how he felt about an African-African playing the former president. He said he understood the economics but lamented the fact that “I wasn’t even asked”.
• Reed Johnson sits down with “Invictus” director Clint Eastwood and star Morgan Freeman. [Los Angeles Times]
• Eric D. Snider digs into the different perspectives on what makes a decade’s end. [Eric D. Snider]
• Noah Forrest stumps for some low-lying contenders that need the help. [Movie City News]
The progression of “The Blind Side” from sleeper success to bona fide box-office phenomenon has cemented Sandra Bullock’s place in the Best Actress discussion. I don’t know if she’ll actually get a nomination — at this early stage, I’m guessing not — but in a tight race for the fifth spot, she’s currently one of the feistiest outside contenders.
Having not seen “The Blind Side” yet, I can’t say whether I’m okay with this or not. (She’ll have to be very good to justifiably deprive Abbie Cornish of a nod, that much I know.) But as more pundits speculate that Bullock might be in line for one of those “paid her dues” nominations the Academy sometimes hands popular entertainers for attempting more gravitas than usual, I find myself wondering: why now?
Where was this groundswell of support for Bullock four years ago, when she gave a strong, against-type performance in a film the Academy plainly loved?
A few weeks ago we told you about U2’s “Winter,” an original track from Jim Sheridan’s “Brothers.” Today we’re happy to feature the tune as we have a number of other contenders in the race for Best Original Song.
“Winter” was conceived originally for the film. Confusion has popped up as to whether that was the case, what with the tune accompanying the Irish band’s album “No Line on the Horizon” in conjunction with an Anton Corbijn short film. But when Sheridan set about making “Brothers,” he in fact asked his old friends to cook something up for the film.
In my opinion, it’s bottom-tier U2, full of a number of ideas that form a menagerie more than a cohesive song. The lyrics are a bit too on the nose for my taste, too, but they’re clearly written for the narrative of the film. The song comes in at the end of the film, over the credits, so it could be a tough sell for those reasons.
Have a listen below and tell us what you think.
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• Dear cry-baby Hollywood conservatives: Al Gore doesn’t even have that Oscar you want back. Talk to Davis Guggenheim. [Top of the Ticket]
• Editor Sally Menke on how she and Quentin Tarantino “clicked.” [The Guardian]
• Anne Thompson has 20 questions for “District 9” star Sharlto Copley. [Thompson on Hollywood]
So writes Vulture’s Lane Brown on “I See You,” the godawful (or “hilarious,” take your pick) theme song from “Avatar.” No reason for sharing, aside from the fact that I’m still laughing.
We neglected to mention the International Documentary Association Awards happened on Friday night, but happen they did.
Often an independent-minded group of on the precursor circuit, the IDA underlined the point this year by crowning a prominently Oscar-snubbed title as the year’s best.
The many fans of rock doc “Anvil! The Story of Anvil” will have been pleased to see it take Best Documentary Feature, beating Oscar contenders “Food, Inc.” and “Mugabe and the White African” in the process. That should be some consolation to the film, after failing to make the Academy’s documentary shortlist last month.
“Anvil!” also nabbed an award for Best Music Documentary (trumping “Soundtrack for a Revolution,” another film that made the Academy’s cut).
Um, okay. So the list of nominations for the Washington D.C. Area Film Critics Association were announced this morning. The group’s official website notes that the winners will be announced tomorrow (so…why bother with day-before nominees?). And now The Wrap is reporting (sans attribution — so I guess via press release) that the winners are as follows:
Best Film
“Up in the Air”
Best Director
Kathryn Bigelow, “The Hurt Locker”
Best Actor
George Clooney, “Up in the Air”
Best Actress
Carey Mulligan, “An Education”
(more after the jump)
The British Independent Film Awards really spread the wealth this year, with only two films — “Moon” and “Fish Tank” — taking more than one award. In a slightly surprising result, Duncan Jones’s sci-fi debut claimed the night’s top prize, Best British Independent Film, as well as Best Debut Director honors.
Meanwhile, “Fish Tank,” which entered the ceremony with the most nominations, took a well-deserved pair of awards: Best Director for Andrea Arnold (the first woman ever to receive the honor) and Most Promising Newcomer for 18 year-old sensation Katie Jarvis.
Jarvis lost the Best Actress award, however, to Carey Mulligan for “An Education” — one of the night’s few winners likely to figure prominently in the awards race across the pond. (This in stark contrast to last year’s BIFA awards, which were all about “Slumdog Millionaire.”)