In Contention

Category: Featured

  • The Top 10 Shots of 2018

    (This article originally appeared at Variety.com.)

    The best cinematography of 2018 has come in black and white. It’s come in vibrant color. It’s come as photochemical reaction and as streams of ones and zeroes. It’s crossed genres and approaches, from horror and satire to costume porn and blockbuster action. It’s taken us from the hearth to the moon and into the souls of artists and lovers.

    This annual column, a 12th edition, is a personal reflection on the year in single cinematic images. Thematic import, technical prowess and of course good old fashioned subjective affinity figure into determining the list, which would probably change if you asked me tomorrow. But if you’re asking me today, these are the 10 best shots of the year.

    SPOILER WARNING: It goes without saying that a granular assessment of filmmaking such as this will deal quite liberally in information that might be deemed a spoiler. Some of these films have not yet been released, so proceed as you will.

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  • The Top 10 Shots of 2017

    (This article originally appeared at Variety.com.)

    “It’s a weird year.” That’s been a common refrain in virtually all circles over the last several months, mostly because this Oscar season has refused to conform to any typical paradigm. There is no best picture frontrunner. There isn’t even a consensus on the year’s best movie. One glance at the regional critics circuit makes that clear enough; so far 11 different films have claimed top honors, already up by five from last year’s final spread. (More on that when we have an even fuller picture in a few weeks.)

    Another reason it’s a “weird year,” no doubt, is because of the dark cloud that has settled over this and other industries as fresh allegations of sexual misconduct have become a part of the daily news cycle. It’s difficult to engage with the awards season status quo in the face of that. It renders all of this so…small.

    Here at In Contention, we’re 11 years in on putting 12 months of movie-going to bed with a look at the individual images that made an impact throughout. That kind of reflection also takes on a different sheen in a “weird year.” A cinematic frame that might have been rather standard in another context suddenly means so much more.

    That’s why this column has become such a mainstay. Every year is different. Every context is its own. The top 10 shots of the year becomes a sort of time capsule in some way, with the only real connective tissue from year-to-year being the analysis of cinema’s most basic component: a picture, telling a story.

    Whittling the list down for 2017 wasn’t as taxing as it has been in other years. That’s purely subjective, of course. These are my choices. Your process would differ. For me, many of the year’s most striking frames announced themselves immediately. That doesn’t necessarily mean it amounted to the most potent assortment we’ve collected, just that many of 2017’s movies seemed to quickly boil down to one image that said it all. That kind of precision has always been hard to ignore for this piece.

    A note on specs: Half of the films on this year’s list were full-on digital productions (each of them shot on the Arri Alexa camera). Three were strictly film: two in 35mm, one in IMAX. Two others employed a mix of digital and photochemical formats. That ongoing evolution, as ever, is interesting to track.

    So with that bit of preamble out of the way, let’s just dive right in. Here are the top 10 shots of 2017.

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  • The Top 10 Shots of 2016

    (This article originally appeared at Variety.com.)

    For a decade now I’ve written about the year in single images. It’s an annual tradition that started on a whim — certain shots from “No Country for Old Men” and “The Bourne Ultimatum” spurred a desire to seek out other potent imagery and chew on it — and it has developed into my own little way of adding to the usual year-in-review cavalcade.

    The rise of press screeners has certainly helped me to be thorough. Re-watching the year’s movies and scrubbing them for stand-out shots I might have missed has become its own unique form of absorbing movies. Other outlets have come along and taken similar approaches, which is great, because this is as subjective as anything else. But many have bailed after giving it a go, too, which I understand: this can be sort of taxing.

    But I’ve cherished it. I’ve delighted, and continue to delight, in the conversations I have with cinematographers, examining the nuts and bolts of visual storytelling. Whether it’s the most weathered of veterans or the freshest talent on the scene, these are the people who speak the language of cinema most fluently, and they’re eager to talk about it and share the details of their decision making. I’ve even observed some of them climb to the industry’s top shelf. That’s been a gift, and I thank each and every lenser who has hopped on the phone with me to discuss along the way.

    So let’s dive in. For the 10th year running, the top 10 shots of the year…

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  • The Top 10 Shots of 2015

    (This article originally appeared at Variety.com.)

    This is the ninth year I’ve sat down to digest and meditate on the year in single cinematic images, and every time I do it, it’s an absolute joy. Happy accidents, intriguing intentions, strong visual thematic ideas and unique directorial vision can be found under every stone. You just have to enjoy turning the stones over.

    This year things came together rather simply. I kept a mental tally throughout the year of the frames that spoke to me. In revisiting some films, however, I did find myself reacting unexpectedly to certain shots. That’s part of the fun, too, going back through and having the hindsight context to apply to this image or that.

    And it’s always interesting to see how things turn out in the micro. For instance, my picks for the two best examples of cinematography this year — “Carol” and “Son of Saul” — aren’t featured on the list at all, though they certainly could have been. I always try to make the point that collective work on a film doesn’t necessarily break down into single selections for this piece, and that’s perfectly fine. The moving image works in mysterious ways.

    As for the overall year in cinematography, it was again part and parcel of a golden age for the form. The field could even be represented at the Oscars this year by a mixture of 16mm, 35mm, 70mm and digital photography, indicative of how our brightest minds behind the camera aren’t driven in a single direction, but rather are inspired by all the tools at their disposal.

    These are the 10 single images that stood out to me this year. I’d be curious to hear yours. Let us know in the comments.

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  • The Top 10 Shots of 2014

    (This article originally appeared at HitFix.com.)

    As more try to co-opt our patented, eight-year-strong “shots of the year” feature, it seemed like maybe I should start trying to get the package ready sooner rather than later. So I tried to hit it as hard as I could to get 2014’s list out to you by the end of the year for the first time ever (it usually drops in late January or thereabouts). So…YOU’RE WELCOME. All kidding aside, though, it makes for a nice bow on the year, even if dropping it this early takes away some of the time I generally allot to thoroughly revisiting film imagery. This time around, the list is very much about the frames that stuck with me instantly, rather than decision-making slaved over toward the end of the year. And there’s something to be said for that, too.

    Of course, as always, I delight in jumping on the phone with the various cinematographers to get their takes (no pun intended) on the images chosen. It’s always enlightening and something I think we do a good job of exclusively offering our readers. Hopefully you continue to enjoy it as we inch closer to a decade of producing this feature (wow).

    So enough foreplay. You can dig into the first half of the list below. But before doing so, I did want to point you to this. There’s a bit of postured profundity in there to me, but it’s nevertheless interesting and thoughtful. And it’s just the kind of passion we’ve been trying to present with this piece over the last eight years. We’re happy the idea is catching on.

    Without further ado…

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  • The Top 10 Shots of 2013

    (This article originally appeared at HitFix.com.)

    If you look here and there on the web these days, you might notice that more than a few outlets are now cooking up their own “top 10 shots of the year” pieces. Here we are in our seventh year of producing such a collective, but imitation is flattery, and frankly, I’m glad others have caught on to the idea. Singular images and the thematic impact they make are as subjective as anything else we end up praising at the end of a given year, so having separate takes on the matter is only a good thing.

    But I’m also confident in the value of what we have to offer on the subject every year, which is a unique take on the specific images chosen from the horses’ mouths: the cinematographers themselves. An aside on that…

    Late last year, the International Cinematographers Guild saw fit to hand me a pretty trophy in recognition not just of the work I put into these kinds of pieces throughout the year, but our coverage of the craft of cinematography in general in this space. It was a huge honor, one that couldn’t have meant more coming from anyone else, honestly. The idea that there’s a level of appreciation for the spotlight we shine below the line is as gratifying as anything in my work over the years.

    In acceptance, I made it clear that they were basically handing me an award for having a blast. Because I truly relish the opportunity to get on the phone with people like Roger Deakins, Sean Bobbitt, Masanobu Takayanagi, the late Harris Savides, Wally Pfister, Bob Richardson and more this time of year, to pick their brains, to discuss their work and to boil down their thoughts on this and that film to that most singular, cellular of elements: the film frame.

    Sometimes, of course, it’s more than just one frame. Sometimes it’s a drawn-out composition that digs in and stays. Other times, it’s a clever move of the camera that dazzles or immerses. Whatever the case may be, the heart of this annual piece is an examination of how what we see on the screen informs the greater impact of a film, how what a DP captures through that aperture becomes the essence of our passion and how the resulting, indelible imagery stays with us as an everlasting footprint revealing the soul of a work of art.

    So, as it pertains to this space, “The Top 10 Shots of the Year” is a reflection on the most significant, though perhaps not always the most obvious, visual elements of a film year. And 2013 had plenty of wonders to offer – so many, in fact, that the density of quality seen elsewhere in this competitive awards season played itself out on the ballots of the American Society of Cinematographers, as a tie led to seven feature film nominees rather than the usual five.

    How did all of that boil down in my own little image diary of the year that was? Have a look below.

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  • The Top 10 Shots of 2012

    (This article originally appeared at HitFix.com.)

    I decided to do something a little different with the shots column for this, its sixth year (and finally imitated — we’re flattered). I thought I’d go with a metric of instinct rather than analysis.

    First let me introduce the overall concept for those perhaps unfamiliar. Every year I recap the year in my own unique way. Film is, after all, about the image first, and so what better way to put 12 cinematic months in a time capsule than to feature the most striking single images of the year? But what is striking to one is always not so much to the next. Like all of this, it’s in the eye of the beholder.

    For my part I would always try to give my perspective on shots that might seem, well, unexpected to others. I would posit that an Eric Gautier shot of an eagle picking away at a carcass in “Into the Wild” says something about a country weighing on the soul; or that an unassuming Anthony Dod Mantle shot crammed into a frenetic “Slumdog Millionaire” montage better sums up character motivations than any other frame; or that the simplicity of Anna Kendrick riding slowly away on an airport people-mover as seen through Eric Steelberg’s lens in “Up in the Air” speaks elegant volumes.

    Of course, room for sheer aesthetic beauty has often been made. A devastatingly gorgeous Luc Montpellier capture of Patricia Clarkson in “Cairo Time,” for instance, or an iconic Wally Pfister distillation of The Dark Knight in, well, “The Dark Knight.” I’ve even argued for a Ben Seresin angle on Megan Fox against a glass bottle wall in “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.”

    Then there are the stunts that dazzle. Jason Bourne leaping from window to shattering window in “The Bourne Ultimatum” had a hand in inspiring this annual column, while complex takes from “Let the Right One In,” “The Secret in Their Eyes” and “The Adventures of Tintin” have stood out in respective years.

    And now, our sixth year. As I said, I decided to try something a little different this year. Typically I would set aside a frame of time to specifically look back at many films and note the imagery. A revisit purely for this column’s purposes. This year, both so I could get the piece out sooner than usual (oh how hungry you can be — though that didn’t end up happening, anyway) and so I could simply shake up the way I build it, I shot from the hip and went with the gut.

    I always keep a bit of an eye out on first viewings, almost subconsciously, for potential contenders for this piece. But this time I let those stick sooner than usual. I let whatever struck me first survive, and when I had 10, that was it. Along the way this included inevitable revisits, which mostly just strengthened the original take anyway, but the point was I wondered what a first blush would look like rather than a (perhaps over-)analyzed take.

    This is what I came up with…

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  • The Top 10 Shots of 2011

    (This article originally appeared at HitFix.com.)

    They’re heeeeeeerrrrreeeeee. That’s right, the images have been assembled, the conversations have been had and the top 10 shots of 2011 are ready for their close-up (or over the shoulder, or two-shot, or insert, etc.).

    It’s become a bit of a tradition to note in this space that the year in cinematography wasn’t particularly compelling on the whole. The 2007 season that first inspired the idea behind this piece (now entering its fifth year) really was an exceptional year for the individual film image.

    However, while a year abundant in obvious visual takeaways would make writing this up quite a bit easier, I’ve grown to appreciate the digging and re-considering a lack-luster year requires. It’s forced me to appreciate the images all the more.

    With that in mind, this year’s collective is very much a reflection of, as usual, the frames that really grabbed me thematically or spoke inner narratives to me in profound ways. So it’s almost become a sort of cathartic exercise to better understand a given film year and how it has impacted me, a nostalgic scrapbook saying as much about me and where I am in my appreciation of cinema as it does the work of the cinematographers involved.

    Speaking of which, I have to thank the various DPs who hopped on the phone or exchanged a few emails to better contextualize this piece. Year after year, their input and perspective on the various choices is invaluable, and I think you’ll again find that to be the case this time around.

    (And P.S.: It’s great to know this has become such a hotly anticipated item. I really do appreciate it.)

    Now, on to the shots…

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  • ‘Doubt’ leads with five SAG noms

    Amy Adams in Doubt(Apologies for the delay getting these up this morning.  I had technical difficulties signing in and had to scoot shortly after the announcement.  Here are the belated nominees with commentary.)

    The Screen Actors Guild didn’t have much up its sleeve this morning for its heavily anticipated nominations announcement.  No left-field zingers, no “3:10 to Yuma” or “Station Agent” surprises, just a slick rundown of the season’s favorites so far.

    Looking deeper into the categories, we can point to a number of things.  The fact that “Doubt” leads the way is no surprise, since all four principles from the cast were nominated and, therefore, the film landed a nod for Best Ensemble.  But praise for the acting, even if that represents the biggest branch of the Academy, isn’t necessarily enough.  Will the other branches be on board for this as a “film,” or will they simply see it for what it is: a photographed play with no creative bridge to the screen?

    Dev Patel’s nomination for Best Supporting Actor is the boost he needed for Oscar, though it should be noted that the SAG likes to nominate younger actors.  Dakota Fanning, Jamie Bell, etc.  Also, it’s worth noting that Taraji P. Henson received three nominations this morning, two for her performance in “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” (supporting actress and ensemble) and one as part of the “Boston Legal” ensemble on the TV side of things.  Congratulations to one sweetheart of a girl.

    The absence of Sally Hawkins is a bit distressing, however.  Especially when you consider the fact that the actress categories tend to go five-for-five with the Academy.  That could of course change this year as both fields are more competitive than usual, but seemingly a sure-thing after her critics awards bonanza, it seems the lovely Hawkins is back on the bubble.

    “Revolutionary Road” is, sad to say, officially on life-support, if the night nurse hasn’t already tripped on the chord and yanked it from the wall entirely.  One nomination for Kate Winslet, nothing for Leonardo DiCaprio, nothing for the brilliant Michael Shannon.  The industry doesn’t seem to be responding to this film.  So I think the likely five have finally slid into place, and “Doubt” remains the spoiler.

    The nominees after the jump.

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  • INTERVIEW: Matteo Garrone

    Matteo GarroneIn a year that hasn’t exactly wanted for strong European cinema, Matteo Garrone’s “Gomorrah” ranks as one of its most staggering offerings — as reflected by its well-deserved placing on Kris’s top 10 list yesterday.

    A brutal, multi-stranded portrait of daily life within Naples’s notorious Camorra crime syndicate, it brings a keen sociologist’s eye to the terrain of mafia cinema — thanks largely to the minutely detailed research of Roberto Saviano (whom Kris interviewed here), upon whose bestselling exposé the film is based, but also to the humanism and objectivity of Garrone himself.

    The affable Italian, who recently turned 40, is still getting his head around his film’s success.  When we speak, he has just arrived in New York after collecting a bushel of prizes in Copenhagen at the European Film Awards. Although he made his feature debut a decade ago, until now he hasn’t been the best-known name on the Italian cinema scene, and he admits to feeling considerable pressure in taking on the project.

    “Domenico [Procacci, the film’s producer] got the rights to Roberto’s book before it was published and sent it to me,” he explains. “I was shocked, but found it very powerful, very unusual in the characterization. I saw an opportunity to make a very different kind of Mafia movie.”

    However, once the book was actually published, the game changed for Garrone. “I didn’t know it was going to be such a huge bestseller,” he laughs. “Suddenly this movie became a much bigger deal, and there was much more box office pressure. I had made a couple of other movies that had done well with critics, but were disasters at the box office. I was worried that I was now the wrong person to make ‘Gomorrah,’ but it was too late!”

    He needn’t have worried: in addition to the stream of awards talk the film has gathered since taking the Grand Prix at Cannes, “Gomorrah” has stormed the Italian box office and done healthy art house business elsewhere, while expectations are high for its limited U.S. release this Friday. Garrone describes the film’s commercial performance as “a miracle.  It’s such a rigorous film, I was worried audiences might find it too harsh. But I think some people have gone in to see a gangster movie and come out surprised by what an emotional experience it is.”

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  • If I had a ballot

    Philip Seymour Hoffman in Synecdoche New York(Note: Because I’ve been getting some correspondence of confusion, let it be known that categories such as Best Foreign Language Film and Best Documentary contain films released in the U.S. in 2008 that I consider the best of those fields, regardless of Academy rules and regulations regarding country submissions and peripheral qualifications.  This is more of an AMPAS/critics ballot hybrid.  Hopefully that clears it up.)

    As the year continues to wind down, I’ve come to an annual post here at In Contention that proves to be a lot of fun, no matter the quality of the year’s product. If I were a member of the 6,000-strong, what would my Oscar ballot look like?

    Of course, I’m cheating a bit here.  The way AMPAS balloting works is each branch votes for nominees in their representative categories, while everyone gets a crack at nominating the Best Picture field.  I’m acting as lord of all, super-duper Academy member extraordinaire with nominations in each of the categories we’ll see contended on February 22.  I subtract the short film fields, because I just can’t comment with any expertise, and as always, I add the category I annually plead for acceptance in the Academy’s proceedings: Best Ensemble.

    So with that, I give you my list of the year’s best in an array of categories.   The first five you know.  More after the jump.  (Check back Friday for a year-end list of superlatives.  And in case you missed it, my top 10 and “best of the year” column here).

    Best Picture
    “Bolt” (Walt Disney Pictures)
    “The Dark Knight” (Warner Bros. Pictures)
    “Pineapple Express” (Columbia Pictures)
    “Slumdog Millionaire” (Fox Searchlight Pictures)
    “Synecdoche, New York” (Sony Pictures Classics)

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  • New to DVD, the real Frost/Nixon Watergate interviews

    Frost/Nixon: The Original Watergate InterviewsAs Ron Howard’s “Frost/Nixon” continues to step up during the film awards season this year, it might be worth noting that Liberation Entertainment has gone to the trouble of putting together a hell of a study guide: “Frost/Nixon: The Original Watergate Interviews,” currently available on DVD.

    Patching together the Watergate portion of Sir David Frost’s legendary four-part interview session with the former Commander-in-Chief, the DVD captures a moment in time that was of course expanded to an edge-of-your-seat drama by playwright Peter Morgan two years ago.

    One thing that I paid attention to, seeing as I’ve never taken the time to view these interviews in the past (and certainly wasn’t around for their original airing), was Nixon’s unmitigated manipulation, reminding me of Robert McNamara’s peculiar obssession with control in Errol Morris’ sublime “The Fog of War” from 2003.  It also adds a whole other perspective to Frank Langella’s performance on stage and screen, clearly an embodiment of Nixon the idea rather than Nixon the man (because a straight impersonation of the man’s disposition from the interviews would have been perhaps overly awkward and flat).

    The piece runs roughly an hour and a half, with introductory and intermission commentary from Frost himself.  There is also, of course, Frost’s book, “Frost/Nixon: Behind the Scenes of the Nixon Interviews,” if you really want to be completest.

    Here’s a trailer for the DVD:

  • Runnin’ on empty: the best films of 2008

    Javier Bardem and Rebecca Hall in Vicky Cristina BarcelonaJust to say it once more, because I’ve certainly brought it up enough, 2008 was not a good year for film-goers.

    That’s an incredibly subjective quip, of course, but I certainly found myself struggling with the level of quality on display with each and every screening, the oasis of the Oscar season ultimately proving to be a trickster mirage on the horizon as contenders ultimately fell flat or disappointed in various ways. And suddenly, we’re two weeks away from 2009.

    Who let the goods out?

    But a year lacking broad quality can be a fun “Where’s Waldo” for the impassioned film lover, and so it is that I found some truly wonderful, praise-worthy work from a number of driven and creative filmmakers this year. But a peculiarity began to arise as I sifted through the year’s offerings: What a load of downer cinema.

    I first noticed it in the documentary offerings, heavier on morose subject matter than any other year I can remember. Depictions of the horrors of Katrina, the passionate life and tragic death of a Neil Diamond impersonator, the work of a journalist obsessed with his own inevitable suicide, the nation’s stance on the death penalty, the life and times of a child molester, a heart-breaking family drama in St. John’s, Newfoundland, a national economy on life support, despicable soldier etiquette at our global detention facilities -– it is hardly surprising that the most well-received documentary of the year is a celebration of an “artistic crime” in James Marsh’s “Man on Wire.” But how odd that the genre’s resident cynic, Werner Herzog, was responsible for one of the few other positive doc titles that made the rounds this year?

    Moving into the realm of fiction, even the usually jubilant folks at Pixar couldn’t help but crank out their most sobering film to date, a cautionary tale wrapped in the guise of a love story that conveyed a creepy sense of inevitability despite a hopeful denouement.

    I bring these observations up for a reason, and that is to add some perspective to the list you’ll find below. 2008 was a bellwether for me personally as I began to let the idea of “best” as a definitive slip away and become something more akin to a solid if flexible representation of the times, and how those times affect the viewer.

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  • Could Woody Allen be a surprise Best Director nominee?

    Woody Allen at the 2002 Academy AwardsIn 1994, Woody Allen’s masterful “Bullets Over Broadway” was not really on anyone’s charts as a potential Oscar nominee. A very funny film about a playwright who enlists a gangster to help him bring life and reality to his play, it was one of Allen’s best works with hysterically funny performances from John Cusack, the great Dianne Wiest (who won an Oscar), Chazz Palminteri, Jennifer Tilly, Jack Warden, Mary Louise Parker, Rob Reiner, Jim Broadbent, and Tracey Ullman. The film premiered here at the Toronto International Film Festival with excellent reviews, but it seemed overshadowed that season by Quentin Tarantino’s “Pulp Fiction,” without question the movie of the year.

    The day the Academy Award nominations were announced, as expected, “Forrest Gump” and “Pulp Fiction” dominated, but in a huge surprise, Allen’s film was up in seven categories including Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor (Palminteri), Best Supporting Actress (Weist and Tilly) and a couple of technical awards.

    I have always believed the film to be one of Allen’s funniest and finest films, with beautifully created characters and knockout performances throughout. Wiest is miraculous as a manipulative diva seducing the director/writer portrayed by Cusack because she knows it to be the only way to create a better character for herself. Her “don’t speak” becomes more and more insane throughout the film.

    I have always felt the film was robbed of a Best Picture nomination, likely edged out by “Four Weddings and a Funeral,” but it really did not matter as “Forrest Gump would dominate the ceremony.

    This year, Allen has directed and written a critically acclaimed film in “Vicky Christina Barcelona,” with a powerhouse performance from Penélope Cruz (the Oscar frontrunner), and solid work from Javier Bardem, Rebecca Hall, and Scarlett Johansson (two of them Golden Globe nominees). The film is funny, sexy and dangerous, both vintage Allen, but also a newer, darker Allen, a director evolving.

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  • AFI list a blend of commercial and independent cinema

    Paramount Pictures' Iron ManThe American Film Institute has unveiled its schizophrenic list of the top 10 films of the year, and it’s a strangely delightful mixture of populist choices and more fringe contenders.

    The appearance of “Iron Man” is as interesting as “Wendy and Lucy” popping up, but I don’t think this collective will do much to help any of the films within.  Just another fun list of the year’s best.  (Speaking of which, be sure to tune in tomorrow for my own list of same.  Like how I turned that into a plug?)

    Not sure why “Slumdog Millionaire” was snubbed.  Is it considered an American production?  Anyway, here’s the list:

    “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”
    “The Dark Knight”
    “Frost/Nixon”
    “Frozen River”
    “Gran Torino”
    “Iron Man”
    “Milk”
    “WALL-E”
    “Wendy and Lucy”
    “The Wrestler”

  • TECH SUPPORT: Gleaning the guilds

    Tech Support at In ContentionIt’s been three weeks since the last “Tech Support” column. For that, my apologies. In the meantime, we’ve had Thanksgiving, the NBR, the LAFCA, the NYFCC, the BFCA and the Golden Globes to keep us entertained.

    The Screen Actors Guild is the first guild to announce its nominees and will do so next week. Between then and the date the Oscar nominations are announced, the various crafts guilds will also announce their nominees.

    The guilds have a knack of shaking up the race, even more so than the Globes. The guilds have crossover membership with the Academy, which is incredibly important in predicting AMPAS nominees. The American Cinematographers Society (ASC), the American Cinema Editors (ACE), the Art Directors Guild (ADG), the Costume Designers Guild (CDG) and the Cinema Audio Society (CAS) all have a tendency to accurately predict the eventual Oscar nominees –- and often, winners –- in their respective categories.

    So what to expect from these groups when they announce their nominees in January?

    The ASC has what is probably the best correlation of any guild-to-Oscar nominees. Every year, at least three, usually four, of its five nominees tend to be cited by AMPAS.  Last year, all five nominees were cited by both groups.  This year, I would expect Roger Deakins (a guild favorite) to be nominated for “Revolutionary Road.” The living legend of cinematographers lensed what seems to be a major player among this year’s contenders. Moreover, the work has his customized style and class.

    Claudio Miranda (“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”) and Anthony Dod Mantle (“Slumdog Millionaire”) also seem primed for citations from this guild and AMPAS. Though awards have not been common in their careers to date, both are working on films which are leading the Oscar race so far. Moreover, the cinematography on both films is incredibly showy and Mantle has already been awarded by the NYFCC for his efforts. Miranda may face difficulty come Oscar time due to the use of visual effects to brush up his work. But that tends to be less of a problem from the guilds.

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  • Sean Penn on course for Oscar #2, and he deserves it

    Sean Penn in MilkWith two of the major critics awards won, actor Sean Penn seems to be headed for his second Academy Award for Best Actor for his brilliant work in “Milk.”

    Penn’s work through the 1980s and 1990s defined him as one of the greatest actors of his generation (if not the best) and certainly on the level with Marlon Brando, Jack Nicholson and early Robert De Niro.  I find it incredible to see him today in “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” and try to connect that actor and character to anything he has done in his career. It gives a very clear example of his seemingly limitless range.

    His first Oscar nod came for “Dead Man Walking” in 1995, with only the Independent Spirit Awards giving him the grand prize.  All the others went with Nicolas Cage in “Leaving Las Vegas,” a great performance to be sure, but for my money Penn was stronger. Four years later he was something of a surprise nominee for “Sweet and Lowdown,” a fine piece of acting, but a kind of out-of-nowhere nomination, as was his third nod for “I Am Sam,” which I still struggle with watching; it represents the only time I can “see” Penn acting.

    “Mystic River” won him his first and only Oscar, and I stand by it as a stunning example of the craft.  I agree with The New York Times, which declared it one of the great acting performances of all time. Bill Murray was a popular choice that year for “Lost in Translation” and no argument, he would have been a most worthy winner.  But I am pleased Penn won. For me, he captured the anger and rage of the character, as well as the disappointment and hurt over something so precious as a daughter, now lost. There was shame in his eyes for not having protected her, and to make up for that in his mind, he avenges her.

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  • 15 films vie for visual effects recognition

    The Dark KnightA little late to the party on this.  Been out, so, apologies.  But it looks like AMPAS has narrowed the Best Visual Effects field to 15 contenders, as follows:

    “Australia”
    “The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian”
    “Cloverfield”
    “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”
    “The Dark Knight”
    “The Day the Earth Stood Still”
    “Hancock”
    “Hellboy II: The Golden Army”
    “The Incredible Hulk”
    “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull”
    “Iron Man”
    “Journey to the Center of the Earth”
    “The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor”
    “Quantum of Solace”
    “The Spiderwick Chronicles”

    I’ve always had the itching feeling that “The Spiderwick Chronicles” could surprise in this category, but that could be the same feeling that told me the same thing about “I Am Legend” and “The WaterHorse.”  Anyway, after seeing “The Day the Earth Stood Still” Thursday night, I’m inclined to take it off my predicted three (where it’s been for a few months now).  There wasn’t anything particularly popping about it, and really, all the effects are ultimately in the trailer.  I thought there’d be more.

    So with that, I still think “Iron Man” and “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” (your winner, ladies and gentlemen) are secure.  Then I’d say it’s a free-for-all.  Love for “The Dark Knight,” despite a reliance of practical effects, could spread to this field.  Though after checking out the DVD’s special features, I see there’s more CGI going on than I thought.  Interesting to see “Cloverfield” on here, and really, I wouldn’t be shocked.  “Hancock” is still a possibility, but come on.  Most of those effects were kind of cheesy.  Maybe.

    Any of the summer films — “Prince Caspian,” “The Incredible Hulk,” “Hellboy II” — could pop up here, but I might lean toward the Bat at the end of the day.  We need to here from the Visual Effects Society to get a better idea.