The truth is something on the fringe is likely to win the Best Animated Short Oscar this year. “The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore” over “La Luna,” “The Lost Thing” over “Day & Night,” “Logorama” over “A Matter of Loaf and Death,” “The Danish Poet” over “The Little Matchgirl” — it happens. A lot.

That having been said, Disney’s “Paperman,” a delicate little love story that’s greeting viewers of “Wreck-It Ralph” this weekend, is generating plenty of love and goodwill. It’s a blend of hand-drawn 2D animation and 3D CG artwork. “The characters are modeled in CG and rendered in high contrast to create the modeling and shading, then merged with hand-drawn linework using a proprietary software program called Meander to create the final result,” Jim MacQuarrie explains in a Wired piece, which also features an interview with the film’s producer, Kristina Reed. “It looks like traditional ‘classic’ animation but with a sense of solidity and volume that”s more common to CG films.” So maybe there’s enough technical meat on its bones to grab the branch’s collective brain in addition to its heart.

Over at Cartoon Brew, the film’s director, John Kahrs, explains, “After ‘Tangled’ ended, they had a gap between the ending of that film and the beginning of production on ‘Wreck-It Ralph.’ Management was wondering: ‘Is there anything around to push the technology? Anything that we have that”s going to fill the space between films, to utilize as much of the crew as possible?’ I had ideas about maybe doing a bit of animation that involved 2D and 3D together. So I just pitched it and they were like: ‘Ok, let”s try this.’ But they didn”t really know how far we were going to take it technologically.”

So obviously they’re banging that drum pretty hard.

It’s entirely possible Disney manages three Best Animated Feature Film nominations this year (for “Brave,” “Frankenweenie” and “Wreck-It Ralph”), and to that point, two of them are in-house productions that could win the big prize. All three could, in fact. So there could be a whiff of appreciation in the air. At least there should be. Believe it or not, no in-house Disney animated effort has won the feature prize yet. And only “Lilo & Stitch,” “Treasure Planet,” “Brother Bear,” “Bolt” and “The Princess and the Frog” have received nominations.

I thought “Paperman” was an absolute delight and I kind of wish I had seen it in 3D (my screening of “Wreck-It Ralph” was 2D, and the feature doesn’t really need the added effect). Whether it does well with the Oscars, we’ll have to wait and see, but for now, it’s a lovely Fall pleasure.

“Wreck-It Ralph” is now playing everywhere.

Following the International Documentary Association’s breaking of the champagne on the hull of this year’s documentary race, the Cinema Eye Honors have announced their list of nominees. “The Imposter” and “Searching for Sugar Man” led the way with five nominations each. Both are considered formidable competitors in this year’s Oscar race for Best Documentary Feature. Check out the full list below.

Outstanding Achievement in Nonfiction Feature Filmmaking
“5 Broken Cameras”
“Detropia”
“The Imposter”
“Marina Abramovic The Artist is Present”
“Only the Young”
“Searching for Sugar Man”

Outstanding Achievement in Direction
Heidi Ewing, Rachel Grady, “Detropia”
Ra’anan Alexandrowicz, “The Law in These Parts”
Jason Tippet, Elizabeth Mims, “Only the Young”
Seungjun Yi, “Planet of Snail”
Bill Ross, Turner Ross, “Tchoupitoulas”
Victor Kossakovsky, “¡Vivan las Antipodas!”

Outstanding Achievement in Production
“Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry”
“Big Boys Gone Bananas!*”
“The Imposter”
“Searching for Sugar Man”
“¡Vivan las Antipodas!”

Outsdanding Achievement in Cinematography
“Chasing Ice”
“The Imposter”
“Only the Young”
“Samsara”
“¡Vivan las Antipodas!”

Outstanding Achievement in Editing
“5 Broken Cameras”
“Detropia”
“How to Survive a Plague”
“Room 237”
“Tchoupitoulas”

Audience Choice Prize
“5 Broken Cameras”
“Beauty is Embarrassing”
“Bully”
“How to Survive a Plague”
“The Imposter”
“Jiro Dreams of Sushi”
“Kumaré”
“Marina Abramovic The Artist is Present”
“Searching for Sugar Man”
“Trash Dance”

Outstanding Achievement in Debut Feature Film
Alison Klayman, “Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry”
David France, “How to Survive a Plague”
Matthew Akers, “Marina Abramovic The Artist is Present”
Jason Tippet, Elizabeth Mims, “Only the Young”
Rodney Ascher, “Room 237”
Malik Bendjelloul, “Searching for Sugar Man”
Peter Nicks, “The Waiting Room”

Outstanding Achievement in Original Music Score
“Detropia”
“The Imposter”
“Into the Abyss”
“Room 237”
“¡Vivan las Antipodas!”

Outstanding Achievement in Graphic Design or Animation
“Beauty is Embarrassing”
“Herman’s House”
“Indie Game: The Movie”
“Room 237”
“Searching for Sugar Man”
“Urbanized”

Spotlight Award
“Argentinian Lesson”
“Bestiaire”
“Downeast”
“Meanwhile in Mamelodi”
“Vol Special (Special Fight)”

Outstanding Achievement in Nonfiction Short Filmmaking
“Cutting Loose”
“Family Nightmare”
“Good Bye Mandima (Kwa Heri Mandima)”
“Into the Middle of Nowhere”
“Paradise (Paraíso)”

I’ve been so tied up in my own little world this week, toiling away, working on this and that, closed up in the apartment for the most part (typical when you’re at your busiest in this line of work — and this has probably been the busiest week of the season for me), mainly aware of the horrors of Sandy via the news like most of you. Which is a trip. Out here, uptown, we’re fine. We’re lucky. Just a number of blocks this way or that, many people aren’t.

So I feel like I really need to take stock of that. Lots of friends, whether they be in New Jersey, upstate, Long Island, wherever, are still stuck in a bad spot. I haven’t had a chance to go downtown and take in the full effect of what’s gone on down there, and I should. I will. My heart sank a little when I saw the cover of this week’s New York Magazine. Then it was lifted again when I read the mag’s editors’ letter and all the resilience it reflected. And as resilient as New York is, it’s a city in need of a laugh right now, to say the least.

It was with great pleasure, then, that I read comedian Louis C.K.’s recent letter, which he says he tapped out on his phone in his dressing room at Studio 8H at 30 Rock where he’s gearing up to host “Saturday Night Live” tonight. A New York guy on a New York show at a time when New York could use a breather. It’s a great opportunity for an artist at the height of his game. Truly, I think there are fewer filmmakers performing, consistently, at Louis C.K.’s level these days, and this could be a highlight of his career.

But mainly, I was just touched by his perspective on the town that made him, that he loves. He writes:

“Last night we shot some pre-tape segments in Greenwich Village, which was pitch black dark for blocks and blocks, as it has been for a week now. It’s pretty impossible to describe walking through these city streets in total darkness. It can’t even be called a trip through time, because as long as new york has lived, its been lit. By electricity, gas lamps, candlelight, kerosene. But this was pitch black, street after street, corner round corner. And for me, the village being the very place that made me into a comedian and a man, to walk through the heart of it and feel like, in a way, it was dead. I can’t tell you how that felt. And you also had a palpable sense that inside each dark window was a family or a student or an artist or an old woman living alone, just being in the dark and waiting for the day to come back. Like we were all having one big sleep over, but not so much fun as that. This is how a lot of the city is still. I know people in Queens, Brooklyn, Staten Island, New Jersey, all over, are not normal yet. And not normal is hard.”

So be sure to watch tonight at 11:30pm ET. It’s sure to be a delight.

And here’s to New York.

Click through to read the full Louis C.K. letter.

Hello. Its louis here. I’m clacking this to you on my phone in my dressing room here at studio 8H, right in 30 rockefeller center, in Manhattan, new york city, new york, america, world, current snapshot of all existence everywhere.

Tonight I’m hosting Saturday Night Live, something I zero ever in my life saw happening to me. And yet here it is completely most probably happening (I mean, ANYTHING could NOT happen. So we’ll see).

I’ve been working here all week with the cast, crew, producers and writers of SNL, and with Lorne Michaels. Such a great and talented group of people.

And here we are in the middle of New York City, which was just slammed by a hurricane, leaving behind so much trouble, so much difficulty and trauma, which everyone here is still dealing with every day.

Last night we shot some pre-tape segments in greenwich Village, which was pitch black dark for blocks and blocks, as it has been for a week now.

Its pretty impossible to describe walking through these city streets in total darkness. It can’t even be called a trip through time, because as long as new york has lived, its been lit. By electricity, gas lamps, candlelight, kerosene. But this was pitch black, street after street, corner round corner. And for me, the village being the very place that made me into a comedian and a man, to walk through the heart of it and feel like, in a way, it was dead. I can’t tell you how that felt. And you also had a palpable sense that inside each dark window was a family or a student or an artist or an old woman living alone, just being int he dark and waiting for the day to come back. Like we were all having one big sleep over, but not so much fun as that.

This is how a lot of the city is still. I know people in queens, brooklyn, Staten Island, new jersey, all over, are not normal yet. And not normal is hard.

And here at 30 rock, these folks are working so hard this week. There are kids in the studio every day, because members of the crew and staff had to bring them to work. Many people are sharing lodging. Everyone is tired. But there’s this feeling here that we’ve got to put on a great show. I’m sure it feels like that here every week. But wow. I feel really lucky to be sharing this time with these particular good folks here at SNL.

In about 5 hours we’ll be going on the air. I’ll do a monologue. And we’ll show you some sketches that we wrote and try to make you laugh. I’m gonna look really dumb in some of this stuff. But I don’t care. Its awfully worth it. And I’m really excited.

Anyway. I just wanted to let you know. If you watch the show tonight, when Don Pardo says my name and you see me walking out, all the shit in this email is what ill be thinking. I’m a pretty lucky guy. I hope you enjoy the show.

Thanks.

Louis C.K.

Live. From new york. Its saturday night.

The nominations for the 25th annual European Film Awards have been announced, and Michael Haneke’s “Amour” led the way with six nominations.

This could be the start of an awards roll-out for “Amour” that few are expecting (many still refrain from seriously considering it in the Best Picture race at the Oscars). Well, I suppose that streak would more accurately have begun with the Palme d’Or win in Cannes, but nevertheless, with a December release still to come and critics groups sure to spring for it, it’s about to come on strong, I’m betting.

Thomas Vinterberg’s “The Hunt” and Steve McQueen’s “Shame” weren’t far behind with five nods and Tomas Alfredson’s “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy” also had a strong presence with four nods. The European Film category was filled out with foreign film hopefuls “Barbara” (two nods), “Caesar Must Die” (which won top honors in Berlin back in February) and “The Intouchables.”

Check out the full list of nominees below.

European Film
“Amour”
“Barbara”
“Caesar Must Die”
“The Intouchables”
“The Hunt”
“Shame”

European Director
Nuri Bilge Ceylan, “Once Upon a Time in Anatolia”
Michael Haneke, “Amour”
Steve McQueen, “Shame”
Paolo & Vittorio Taviani, “Caesar Must Die”
Thomas Vinterberg, “The Hunt”

European Actor
François Cluzet, Omar Sy, “The Intouchables”
Michael Fassbender, “Shame”
Mads Mikkelsen, “The Hunt”
Gary Oldman, “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy”
Jean-Louis Trintignant, “Amour”

European Actress
Emilie Dequenne, “Our Children”
Nina Hoss, “Barbara”
Emmanuelle Riva, “Amour”
Margarethe Tiesel, “Paradise: Love”
Kate Winslet, “Carnage”

European Screenwriter
Michael Haneke, “Amour”
Tobias Lindholm, Thomas Vinterberg, “The Hunt”
Cristian Mungiu, “Beyond the Hills”
Olivier Nakache, Eric Toledano, “The Intouchables”
Roman Polanski, Yasmina Reza, “Carnage”

European Cinematographer
Sean Bobbit, “Shame”
Bruno Delbonnel, “Faust”
Darius Khondji, “Amour”
Gökhan Tiryaki, “Once Upon a Time in Anatolia”
Hoyte van Hoytema, “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy”

European Editor
Janus Billeskov Jansen, Anne Østerud, “The Hunt”
Roberto Perpigani, “Caesar Must Die”
Joe Walker, “Shame”

European Production Designer
Maria Djurkovic, “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy”
Niels Sejer, “A Royal Affair”
Elena Zhukova, “Faust”

European Composer
Cyrill Aufort, Gabriel Yared, “A Royal Affair”
François Couturier, “Shun Li and the Poet”
George Fenton, “The Angels’ Share”
Alberto Iglesias, “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy”

The 25th annual European Film Awards will be held on December 1, 2012. You can watch them live at www.europeanfilmawards.eu.

Check out last year’s list of European Film Award nominees here.

Welcome to Oscar Talk.

In case you’re new to the site and/or the podcast, Oscar Talk is a weekly kudocast, your one-stop awards chat shop between yours truly and Anne Thompson of Thompson on Hollywood. The podcast is weekly, every Friday throughout the season, charting the ups and downs of contenders along the way. Plenty of things change en route to Oscar’s stage and we’re here to address it all as it unfolds.

Disney’s big pockets purchase of Lucasfilm leads the discussion this week as it’s a move that will have plenty of impact on the film industry.

The 2012 AFI Fest kicked off last night in Los Angeles with the world premiere of Sacha Gervasi’s “Hitchcock.” We discuss the film and its potential this season.

Opening next week is Sam Mendes’ “Skyfall,” the latest in the James Bond franchise and certainly a favorite of the two of us. We discuss.

And finally, reader questions. We address queries regarding the box office success of “Argo” and how 2012 is shaping up as a year in cinema.

Have a listen to the new podcast below. If the file cuts off for you at any time, try the back-up download link at the bottom of this post. You to subscribe to Oscar Talk via iTunes here. And as always, if you have a question you’d like us to address on a future podcast, send it to OscarTalk@HitFix.com.

“Here I Come” courtesy of Stuart Park.

Okay, well, I missed a few unseen contenders. I had a feeling I might since suddenly messages were being left on my phone from publicists pitching fringe hopefuls.

In addition to 16 of the Best Animated Feature Film contenders we have already thoroughly charted (and minus “Dino Time,” which didn’t bother — who can blame them? — and “Arjun: The Warrior Prince,” which I had been led to believe by Disney would qualify), the Academy has announced five more qualifying titles for a big ole’ list of 21. So that means we will definitely have a full slate of five nominees in the category, though that was already expected.

The other five are “Adventures in Zambezia” (which we had our eye on but never noticed a distributor come on board), “Delhi Safari,” “Hey Krishna,” “The Mystical Laws” and “Walter & Tandoori’s Christmas.” Check out the full slate below, as well as the aforementioned gallery running through most of the contenders, and let the guessing begin!

“Adventures in Zambezia”
“Brave”
“Delhi Safari”
“Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax”
“Frankenweenie”
“From Up on Poppy Hill”
“Hey Krishna”
“Hotel Transylvania”
“Ice Age: Continental Drift”
“A Liar’s Autobiography: The Untrue Story of Monty Python’s Graham Chapman”
“Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted”
“The Mystical Laws”
“The Painting”
“ParaNorman”
“The Pirates! Band of Misfits”
“The Rabbi’s Cat”
“Rise of the Guardians”
“Secret of the Wings”
“Walter & Tandoori’s Christmas”
“Wreck-It Ralph”
“Zarafa”

Keep track of this year’s Best Animated Feature Film race all season long at the category’s Contenders page.

AFI Fest picked a fun and droll piece of work for its 2012 opener in Sacha Gervasi’s “Hitchcock” last night. (Greg Ellwood’s review here.) As you’ll hear me mention in this evening’s podcast (coming later due to technical difficulties), I found it to be strikingly emotional, though, for its depiction of an artist’s plight and the joy that comes with the release of bottled creativity. And I can’t help but wonder if Academy members may feel the same way.

Films about the process have a long history of awards recognition, whether satirical or sincere. Things like Robert Altman’s “The Player” and Spike Jonze’s “Adaptation” come to mind, or “The Bad and the Beautiful” and “A Star is Born.” And there is, of course, the highest echelon of the subgenre: “8 1/2.” Oscar nominees all. Though sometimes masterworks in this vein can slip through the cracks. Just ask “Sullivan’s Travels.” And though it landed a pair of nods, “Singin’ in the Rain” was mostly passed over.

“Hitchcock” is no masterwork by any means but it gets at that yearning that resides inside of every artist and it struck the right chord for me. Add a meaningful and deeply considered love story — and one about the artistic collaborative process, at that — Gervasi’s film could resonate with his peers in the industry and pick up a number of nominations.

At the top of the list of possibilities is Helen Mirren as Alma Reville, Alfred Hitchcock’s wife of many years and collaborative partner throughout. Mirren, as brilliant as ever, lends a softness to Reville’s steel will that lands perfectly. The film is notable for finally affording the woman her due in a major way. Behind every great man there’s a woman, and never more so than in the case of Alfred Hitchcock.

As the corpulent legend himself, Anthony Hopkins is sublime. He’s afforded a much better opportunity than Toby Jones was in HBO’s “The Girl” because here Hitchcock is depicted with the proper depth to explore his obsessions and urges. Their primal nature marries splendidly with notions of what drove the man to make “Psycho” in the first place, the desire to be creative again, to tap into that most simplistic but vital of needs: freedom.

The two of them are sure to be in the conversation for Best Actress and Best Actor and could certainly land the nominations. Beyond that it’s not as easy to handicap but, well, let’s see…

Best Picture? Maybe. As mentioned, the film could easily resonate with the sort of creative types that populate the Academy and will be a favorite for many, I’m betting — unless, of course, they prefer Hitchcock to stay on a pedestal and view the film as the dismantling of a cinema treasure.

The screenplay — adapted from the book “Alfred Hitchcock and the Making of ‘Psycho'” — could be fun enough to corral writerly sentiment, but I’m doubtful.

The makeup on Hopkins gets the job done but left me, at least, aware of the presence of it. Hopkins is a difficult persona to drown out in superficial enhancements, so maybe the work isn’t to blame. But the branch could be delighted by the transformation, nevertheless.

Scarlett Johansson will not be nominated for Best Supporting Actress as Hitch’s leading lady Janet Leigh, but I feel a need to mention her. I kept seeing Leigh in her face, something about the spark of the eyes, the arch of the eyebrows. I just watched “Psycho” again earlier in the week so it was fresh in my mind. But I liked the way the character was carved out here, the professional, able to take Hitchcock’s quirks and steadfast amid them. It’s a certain trick to pull of fragile-but-strong. That’s what Leigh was, and Johansson conveys it well.

And oh how I wish they had found more for James D’Arcy to do as Anthony Perkins because he was nailing it. Alas, he’s in and out.

So it’s left to be seen how the film lands overall. Will the critics savage it for failing to revere the man (the same critics who have done up “Vertigo” to be the GREATEST MOVIE OF ALL TIME just like Scottie Ferguson doing up Judy Barton to reflect what he wants her to be)? Will it find an audience and be a notable box office player? And will the industry take to its depiction of the process. We’ll see. But I dug it.

“Hitchcock” opens in limited release on November 23.

I haven’t had a chance to really get out my thoughts on “Wreck-It Ralph” beyond those in the animated feature piece, but I’m kind of over the moon for it. It’s Pixar-level storytelling out of Disney with top-notch voice acting — moving, even — and a beautifully animated instant classic. If that’s drowning it in superlatives then I’m not worried because I know this one will have its fair share of fans and I’m curious how many are out there, so when/if you see the film this weekend, let us know what you thought. And, of course, feel free to rate it via the tool above.

Alright, enough out of us about “Flight.” You know I like it and you’ve heard what screenwriter John Gatins, co-star John Goodman and star Denzel Washington have to say. It’s time to get your thoughts on the film, which finally makes it to the arrival gate (ugh, I know) nationwide today. So when and if you get around to seeing the film, come on back here and tell us your thoughts. And feel free to rate the film via the tool above.

When I sat down with “Flight” screenwriter John Gatins a few weeks back, he spoke about the release date of the film and how Robert Zemeckis’s theory was that there are a lot of people out there who get to see maybe one film each year. And it’s usually at the end of the year around the holidays when there’s time, etc. Hence the desire to open it later in the year. With that in mind, maybe there are some out there trying to narrow the list down for themselves. If so, London’s Guardian newspaper has a matchmaker for you. Apparently I’d dig “The Hunt” (haven’t seen it) “Killing Them Softly” ditto) and “The Iceman” (liked it…though it won’t be released this year). And apparently I won’t do well with “Ted” (haven’t seen it), “This is 40” (ditto) and “Silver Linings Playbook” (nailed it). You give it a try. [The Guardian]

John Krasinski says “Promised Land” is less a political thing, and more a Capra ode. [LA Times]

Devin Faraci, fan of “Rise of the Guardians,” reports from the big DreamWorks Animation campus visit. [Badass Digest]

Amy Nicholson sits down with the makeup gurus behind the transformative effects of the Wachowskis’ and Tom Tykwer’s “Cloud Atlas.” [Thompson on Hollywood]

Like a number of folks, Daniel Montgomery wonders whether we’re underestimating Hugh Jackman’s Best Actor chances. Not really. We just kinda want to see the movie before fully going there. [Gold Derby]

Steve Pond takes note of AFI Fest’s wide variety of programming. [The Wrap]

Sasha Stone wonders what the lack of a DGA precursor during the Oscar voting cycle will mean for this year’s Best Director category. [Awards Daily]

John Hiscock sits down with “Rust and Bone” star Marion Corillard, who tells him the Oscar put her “in a different universe.” [The Independent]

Joel Schumacher will head up the Cameraimage jury. [Variety]

And because someone had to, Eric D. Snider looks back at Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever” 10 years on. You know, the film that has a perfect 0% at Rotten Tomatoes. [Film.com]

DreamWorks brought out their animated fall player “Rise of the Guardians” for Los Angeles press Tuesday at a tastemaker event with director Peter Ramsey and executive producer Guillermo del Toro (who had a big hand in character designs) in tow. Earlier in the day press were rounded up for a trip to the studio’s Glendale, California campus for a full day of presentations and buttering-up, the usual.

I wasn’t at those events (I saw the film a few weeks back in New York and made some cursory comments in our survey of the Best Animated Feature Film contenders). But even from way out here you can see the heat is on as the studio preps the film to open just a few weeks after Disney’s “Wreck-It Ralph” gobbles up a lot of the demographic pie.

Looking back on the film with some time in between, I still feel the same as I did then. It’s beautifully animated but feels somewhat empty. “Empty” isn’t the right word. It’s very clearly a movie about faith and how that translates to childhood, and kids will love it, so it’s nice that it’s playing off an interesting theme. But there’s a thinness to it. The film’s heart doesn’t feel like much more than artifice, and that’s particularly pronounced when you put it up against a film like “Wreck-It Ralph” that is swimming in heart and thematic virtue.

Anyway, Anne and I will probably talk a little more about “Rise of the Guardians” in tomorrow’s Oscar Talk podcast, but for now, it’s worth pointing out that the studio is gunning for some unique areas of the Oscar race by pitching it for SAG ensemble consideration. Writes Jenelle Riley at Backstage:

“DreamWorks certainly thinks it has a shot, submitting the voice cast for ‘Rise of the Guardians’ in [the] Best Performance by an Ensemble in a Motion Picture category at the 2013 SAG Awards. This marks the first time DreamWorks has submitted an animated film in the category…It’s certainly a reach, but considering the SAG Awards have no voice acting category, it’s worth a shot. Besides, people once laughed at the idea of animated films earning Best Picture Oscar nominations before ‘Beauty and the Beast’ and ‘Up.’ And now animated films have their own category at the Academy Awards.”

The only time I’ve ever really felt voice work deserved awards attention was when Ellen DeGeneres came along with a stellar performance in 2003’s “Finding Nemo.” Though a lot of people have had and will continue to have glowing things to say about John C. Reilly in “Wreck-It Ralph.” I mostly agree with them; it’s an endearing and lovable portrait.

Maybe it’s time to start considering a new category or some kind of peripheral recognition for voice work. Eddie Murphy managed a BAFTA nomination for his work in “Shrek” in 2001, but that was an anomaly. And it wouldn’t have to just be for animated films, necessarily. Just look at what Mercedes McCambridge did in “The Exorcist.” (Indeed, McCambridge’s plight was recounted in a great piece about the film’s many details by Entertainment Weekly’s Anthony Breznican yesterday.) After all, when it’s not just about a quick paycheck for an actor who gets in and out without caring much (you know who you are), a voice performance can actually mean something.

I doubt much will come of DreamWorks’ SAG push, but it’s nice to see them trying.

“Rise of the Guardians” opens nationwide on November 21.

It’s nice that the Hollywood Foreign Press Association opted, finally, for a woman to receive its Cecil B. DeMille Award, analogous to a lifetime achievement honor. Sure, Lucille Ball, Joan Crawford, Doris Day, Judy Garland, Audrey Hepburn, Sophia Loren, Shirley MacLaine and Elizabeth Taylor have received the distinction over the years, but the last time a woman received the special Golden Globe was 12 years ago when Barbra Streisand won it.

The stated criteria for the Cecil B. DeMille Award is for individuals who have made an impact on entertainment. And Foster certainly qualifies. Ever since she leaped onto the scene in 1976’s “Taxi Driver” (from fellow DeMille-recipient Martin Scorsese), Foster has been a leading force in the industry.  She’s won two Best Actress Oscars (for “The Accussed” and “The Silence of the Lambs”) and been nominated for one more (“Nell”). She was also nominated for Best Supporting Actress for the aforementioned “Taxi Driver.”

The Globes failed to cite her for her Scorsese’s film but certainly made up for it that year by handing her a nomination for Best Actress in a Comedy or Musical for “Freaky Friday.” In addition to the three leading roles for which she was recognized by the Academy, the HFPA has also nominated her for “Contact,” “The Brave One” and “Carnage.”

And if she got started at a young age then she’s in keeping with that now, as at 49 years old, Foster is the youngest recipient of the award since Charlton Heston in 1967.

“Jodie is a multifaceted woman that has achieved immeasurable amounts of success and will continue to do so in her career,” HFPA president Adia Takla-O”Reilly said. “Her ambition, exuberance and grace have helped pave the way for budding artists in this business. She”s truly one of a kind.”

The 70th annual Golden Globes go down on Sunday, January 13 and they’ll be hosted by ladies as well: Tina Fey and Amy Poehler. Nominations will be announced on Thursday, December 13.

Ah, Best Production Design. It was about time the name was changed.

Previously known as “Best Art Direction,” the award doesn”t cite a movie”s art director. Rather, it recognizes both the production designer, who is in charge of the set designs and the overall art department, and the set decorator, whose responsibility it is to fill up those environments with accouterment that truly brings them alive.

The Designers Branch, as it is now known, votes for the nominees in Best Production Design. It also contains the costume designers, making the branch responsible for two of the Oscar categories, like the sound branch. And while the category”s name has changed, the rules have not, so branch’s past behavior provides helpful guidance in handicapping this race.

The designers strongly prefer period pieces, which consistently make up two-to-four of the nominees, usually closer to four. That said, fantasy endeavors consistently score a nomination each year, sometimes up to three. Contemporary films are very rarely nominated.

As always, Best Picture contenders are worth paying attention to, but the branch is more inclined to independent thinking than many other crafts branches. Prior to the last few years (in which there were more than five Best Picture nominees), there hadn”t been more than one Best Picture nominee cited in this category since 2004. (2006 was a Best Picture-less year.)

Joe Wright”s “Anna Karenina” has proven to be divisive. I seriously doubt it”s heading towards a nomination in the top category. But there is no dispute whatsoever about the quality of its design elements. Sarah Greenwood has been nominated for two previous Wright efforts, “Pride & Prejudice” and “Atonement,” as well as Guy Ritchie”s “Sherlock Holmes.”  Even up until the morning of nominations, none of those nods seemed assured, as deserved as they all were. This nomination does seem assured from this vantage point, and I”d call Greenwood the favorite to win alongside her longtime set decorator Katie Spencer, with whom she has shared all her nominations.

“Les Misérables” also takes a classic novel to the screen, via the stage, where it was turned into a musical. Musicals tend to do well in this category, scoring nominations even when the films are overall disappointments (see “Nine,” “Sweeney Todd” and “Dreamgirls,” for instance). This will also be set in early 19th Century France, providing inherent opportunity to draw attention to itself. Eve Stewart probably came close to winning for “The King”s Speech” (she was also nominated for “Topsy-Turvy”), and I suspect she”ll be back in the thick of it for this Hooper collaboration.

Changing the setting to America, “Lincoln” is also set in the 19th Century, and ought to provide a range of venues for Rick Carter to showcase his talents, from the surface of the Civil War to Washington”s corridors of power. Carter, who won this award for “Avatar,” was nominated last year for collaborating with Spielberg on “War Horse.”

Speaking of Best Picture contenders, Paul Thomas Anderson”s “The Master” paid exquisite attention to detail as it made us truly feel we were in a post-World War II world-of-opportunity that nonetheless confined people. Jack Fisk (Mr. Sissy Spacek) should have won this award for “There Will Be Blood” and he is working with co-production designer David Crank and set decorator Amy Wells this time around. I truly hope they are nominated. But given other work that is more likely to be showy, I have my doubts.

If there are close to 10 Best Picture nominees this year, something like Wes Anderson”s “Moonrise Kingdom” could sneak in. While I am hardly Anderson”s biggest fan in the world, the sweet and sentimental tale is probably his most Oscar-friendly film to date. While the sets were not extraordinarily showy, they were, like Fisk”s take on “The Master,” intricate and detailed. They appropriately created the period while also fitting into (this) Anderson”s semi-fantastical world. Adam Stockhausen has not been an awards magnet to date but that may not matter – it didn”t for Anne Siebel, who scored a somewhat surprising citation last year for “Midnight in Paris.”

Sharon Seymour created the late-70s/early-80s in painstaking detail for “Argo.” Hollywood itself was among her creations. I particularly loved some of the details added by set decorator Jan Pascale (Oscar-nominee for “Good Night, and Good Luck.”), such as massive period computers. Like most, I consider the film the Best Picture frontrunner, and while that is not an enormous bonus, it is still a sizable one. Admittedly, the work is not as showy as some other contenders. But I”d still give it strong consideration.

I”ll finish my discussion of the period contenders by looking to J. Michael Riva. Oscar-nominated for “The Color Purple,” Riva passed away this summer at the too-young age of 63. Prior to his death, he served as production designer on Quentin Tarantino”s “Django Unchained” (as well as the summer’s “The Amazing Spider-Man”).  While no Tarantino film has been nominated in this category (even, surprisingly, “Inglourious Basterds”), his films always give crafts artists an opportunity to shine. A 19th Century western also seems to be the sort of title that allows a production designer to show his or her craft. So depending on the film”s reception, Riva could well earn a posthumous nomination.

As I stated at the outset, this category makes room for at least one, often two or three fantasy titles each year. I”m not sure what will fill that space this year, but I see no reason to think that it will not be filled.

Ridley Scott”s “Prometheus” was a visual treat. In both its space ship and its take on outer space, Arthur Max showed vision that was appropriately imaginative and futuristic. Max also earned nominations for Scott”s “Gladiator” and “American Gangster.” If the branch can remember this title in December, he may well find himself in contention.

On the note of prequels, “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” marks the beginning of Peter Jackson”s three-part prelude to “The Lord of the Rings.”  Not unlike George Lucas”s “Star Wars” prequels, I fear this could be bloated and detract from the strength of the original series. Even so, there is no denying this has great source material. And Grant Major”s production design on the original trilogy should be considered justly legendary. Dan Hennah, previously set decorator under Major, has graduated to production designer this time around. He”ll be in the conversation, even if he ultimately is not a nominee. Of that I”m confident.

The last fantasy film I”ll cite is also, at least to some extent, a period film: the Wachowski/Twyker adaptation of “Cloud Atlas.” Hugh Bateup and Uli Hanisch have not received Oscar love to date but they managed to blend many fantastical visions of the future with many different cultures across many different time periods. That would seem to be the stuff this category is made of. If, that is, the Academy can tolerate the movie; neither audiences nor critics have eaten it up.

Finally, I”ll turn to a film that is somewhat period, somewhat contemporary and even somewhat fantastical – Ang Lee”s “Life of Pi.” The film may be most memorable for its exteriors but its design should be very memorable indeed. Plus, it could always benefit from a potential sweep. David Gropman is probably due for a return since his unexpected nomination 13 years ago for “The Cider House Rules,” while set decorator Anna Pinnock has two nominations to her name.

So there are the top 11 real contenders as I see them. I feel more confident in narrowing down this field than, say, Best Sound Editing. But it”s possible I”ve missed someone. Who do you see making the cut?

Tonight, Sacha Gervasi’s “Hitchcock” will kick off the AFI Fest in Los Angeles, giving Oscar-watchers more to murmur about while critics decide if it’s a tribute worthy of Hitch himself or a disposable dress-up piece in the “My Week With Marilyn” mold.

Either way, Fox Searchlight — who sprang a surprise on the season by moving the film up from its scheduled 2013 bow — will be aiming to get more awards traction for their starry prestige item than almost any film directed by Hitchcock himself managed.

That tidy irony, meanwhile, could emerge as the chief hook for “Hitchcock”‘s Oscar campaign: many voters will be aware of how the Academy neglected the master in the past, so might they choose to demonstrate their latter-day awareness of his greatness by voting for a film in which he’s the subject?

It is, of course, both crass and irrational to suggest that an Oscar for “Hitchcock” in any way amounts to an Oscar for Hitchcock — almost a year on, no one is laboring under the misconception that Marilyn Monroe was belatedly honored with a nomination for Michelle Williams, while throwing a pair of statuettes at “Ed Wood” didn’t amount to a pardon for the eponymous, legendarily awful director’s own work. But don’t be surprised if a line to that effect works its way into the film’s awards-season narrative (just as we had to endure all those cheesy “A Fifth Oscar for Kate Hepburn!” headlines around the time Cate Blanchett scooped an award for playing the Academy’s favorite actor).  

The Hollywood Reporter’s Gregg Kilday gets the guilt-trip ball rolling with a piece that summarizes the Oscars’ sidelining of Hitchcock over the years, though it should be noted that he fared better with the Academy than many all-time great filmmakers. With five Best Director nominations, an Irving G. Thalberg Award and the distinction of having directed a Best Picture winner, he was less ignored than, say, Powell & Pressburger, Howard Hawks or Nicholas Ray — to pick only from the English-language canon.

Still, when you boil the conversation down simply to the question of which directors have a competitive Oscar to their name and which don’t, Hitch stands as one of their most absurd omissions. Moreover, and perhaps rather surprisingly, the famously unflappable director was reportedly rather bothered by the Oscar situation; Kilday quotes Hitchcock biographer Stephen Rebello (who wrote the volume upon which Gervasi’s film is based) as saying, “The lack of respect from the Academy pained him…he felt they resented him for being an entertainer and working in genres that weren’t perceived as worthy.”

The issue of the Academy’s anti-genre bias is, of course, one that extends far beyond Hitchcock’s work, though Best Picture wins for such films as “The Silence of the Lambs” and “The Departed” suggest that voters can be persuaded in that direction when a film’s cultural or sentimental significance bolsters its onscreen pleasures. It’s worth noting, meanwhile, that on two of the five occasions Hitchcock lost Best Director — for “Lifeboat” in 1944 and “Psycho” in 1960, both ‘lone director’ bids — the winner was an outright comedy, another genre that doesn’t routinely get much Academy love. You can draw your own conclusions over whether Leo McCarey for “Going My Way” and, more respectably, Billy Wilder for “The Apartment” deserved to beat him, but in neither year was populist entertainment disrespected.

Hitchcock presumably came closest to winning his first time at bat in 1940, when his romantic thriller “Rebecca” snagged the top prize. (The fact that the film’s lone other win was for cinematography suggests it didn’t win by a great margin.) Presumably the presence of reigning super-producer David O. Selznick was a more compelling draw for voters than the recently migrated British director, which is why they were happy to stick with their own in the Best Director category, handing John Ford a second Oscar for his more conventionally weighty Best Picture hopeful “The Grapes of Wrath.”

This split of Best Picture and Best Director along lines of ‘entertainment’ and ‘importance’ is one we’ve seen in several Oscar races since, most recently between “Chicago” and “The Pianist.” Hitchcock is said to have felt particularly slighted over this first defeat, though there’s hardly any shame in losing to John Ford for one of his greatest films. (Ford could have aired his own genre-related grievances, had he chosen to; arguably most celebrated for his westerns, he won four Oscars — not one of them for a film within that genre.)

Meanwhile, Ford’s name reminds us that Hitch was at least spared the indignity of losing to minor filmmakers — his five defeats came at the hands of Ford, McCarey, Elia Kazan and, twice, Billy Wilder. Of all those, if I put my hypothetical (and historical) Academy member hat on and look back through the ballots, I believe I might have checked his name only in the year of “Psycho.”

Of course, that’s ignoring the fact that he wasn’t even nominated for the likes of “North by Northwest” and “Vertigo,” a slight that today seems more egregious even than his failure to win the prize at any point. Though while Kilday points out the seeming absurdity of “Vertigo” securing a scant pair of Oscar nods for Best Art Direction and Best Sound back in 1958 — nothing even for Bernard Herrmann’s score! — the blame shouldn’t be laid squarely at the Academy’s feet. The film may have recently been voted the greatest of all time in Sight & Sound’s much-ballyhooed critics’ poll, but it was neither a critical nor a commercial success upon its release; the voters were merely following everyone else’s lead. We like the Academy to respond to critical and/or public consensus much of the time, but bless ’em, we’ve never expected future-classic clairvoyance from them.

All of which is to say that Hitchcock may never have won an Oscar, but looking at the fascination that surrounds him and his work today, you’d be hard pressed to say he needed to. Hollywood’s a risky place to state certainties, but I’m not counting on a Tom Hooper biopic generating Oscar buzz in 2062.

I have to say, Joaquin Phoenix deserves the Oscar for his interviews alone this season — whether he likes it or not, he’s swiftly shaping up as the most compelling human figure in this year’s awards race, and I’m increasingly thinking his sheer unfiltered bolshiness could be more of a help than a hindrance to his reluctant Best Actor campaign. His latest refreshing dose of candor comes in a UK broadsheet interview, and is perhaps more endearing than his headline-making anti-awards rant. The choice quote: “I think the trouble is I’m not very good and I need a lot of help; I need the entire set to be working to help me.” Keep going, sir. [The Independent] 

Anne Thompson previews the AFI Fest, which kicks off tonight with the world premiere of “Hitchcock.” [Thompson on Hollywood]

After the film’s commercial bellyflop in the States, “Cloud Atlas” producers are counting on the international market to help them save face. [Variety]

In spite of the box office grosses, meanwhile, R. Kurt Osenlund believes the film should still be taken seriously as a Best Picture contender. [The House Next Door]

Michael Cieply looks at “Quartet” and “A Late Quartet,” two films linked by concerns of aging and classical music. (The same goes for “Amour,” but that annoyingly doesn’t have “Quartet” in the title.) [New York Times]

Oli Lyttelton looks at the screenplay races, and thinks Paul Thomas Anderson is well-positioned to become an Oscar winner even if “The Master” doesn’t take off in a big way with the Academy. [The Playlist] 

Executive producer Guillermo Del Toro talks about fighting fear and cynicism in animated Oscar hopeful “Rise of the Guardians.” [LA Times]

Jon Weisman condenses all the key awards dates over the next four months into one pretty cut-out-and-keep calendar. [The Vote]

With Halloween over, Nathaniel Rogers rounds up a month of his highly enjoyable Oscar Horrors series. [The Film Experience]

Finally, I saw a whole lot of Twitter folk going on about how William Friedkin’s Criterion Top 10 was pretty great. I checked. It’s pretty great. [Criterion]

Moving right along through the season’s major Oscar categories, we come today to the Best Director field. A wide and varied field of contenders is represented, from intimate dramas to CGI blockbusters and everything in between.

As of late, there has been little mystery around this category in the season’s final hours. Wins for Peter Jackson, Clint Eastwood, Ang Lee, Martin Scorsese, the Coen brothers, Danny Boyle, Kathryn Bigelow, Tom Hooper and Michel Haznavicius were all widely expected. You have to go all the way back 10 years, to Roman Polanski’s shocking win for “The Pianist” in 2002, to find a race that was the least bit surprising.

The Best Director category tends to mirror the Best Picture field, and this has particularly been the case in the last three years, which have seen an expanded Best Picture category. No nominated director has seen his film miss in Best Pic in that time, leaving one to wonder if the “lone director” nomination is really a thing of the past.

For an in-depth overview of the entire field, click on the gallery story below composed and constructed by myself and Guy Lodge.

Agree or disagree on our thoughts? Share your own below.

Spot question: What do the last seven winners of the Best Picture Oscar all have in common? Chances are you won’t find many narrative, practical or technical common points between the lot of them, but there is this: none of them were first released Stateside in December. Yes, “The Artist” and “The King’s Speech” only narrowly count by virtue of their limited Thanksgiving releases, but the point is that they, too, got in just ahead of the traditional Christmastime glut of prestige fare that has become inseparable from Oscar season.

In every year since the last-minute sneak attack by “Million Dollar Baby” in the 2004 season, the overstuffed Christmas stocking that is the December release calendar has produced contenders and nominees aplenty – as well as the high-profile misfires that are an equally inevitable part of the season. But when it comes to actually choosing their favorite of favorites, the Academy has recently proved that its collective memory can extend at least a little beyond the eggnog fog.

It’s a marked turnaround from four straight years of tightly-wrapped mid-to-late December releases, from “A Beautiful Mind” to the aforementioned “Baby,” dominating proceedings – and an indication, as much as anything, of the increased role that film festivals play in launching and nurturing contenders in an Oscar landscape no longer ruled by the studios. Of those last seven pre-December winners, only 2006’s “The Departed” skipped the festival route, building its Best Picture case simply from reviews and box office receipts – a patient strategy a Christmas release mightn’t have afforded.

Yet clearly the studios have as much conviction in the December release strategy as ever, if not more so – this season’s slate is veritably stuffed with major titles that have dodged the festivals and are gearing up for a late unveiling, before descending upon spoilt-for-choice ticket buyers in the last month of the year. “Les Miserables,” “Zero Dark Thirty,” “Django Unchained,” “Promised Land” and “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” are among the unseen heavyweights taking that tack, while already-debuted titles that are nonetheless taking their chances in the December whirlwind include “Amour,” “The Impossible,” “Quartet” and “Not Fade Away.”

Most of those films are angling for Best Picture consideration. At least a few of them will be disappointed, though it’s impossible to say as yet if their chances would improve in a less pressured month. The raised profile and amplified expectations of a December release may not have done any favors for botched Oscar hopefuls like “The Lovely Bones” or “Nine,” but they would have been branded disappointments, and limped out of the race, earlier in the year too.

Meanwhile, last year proved that the December hype machine could just as easily benefit dubious contenders, as late releases “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close” and “War Horse” slid into the Best Picture race despite critical skepticism and a weak precursor showing. One can only speculate, but either film been released to such a moderate reception in, say, October, it seems unlikely they’d have stayed the course.

One can hardly blame studios, then, for capitalizing on the short-term heat of December, given the returns that even a token nomination brings an expensive prestige item. It’ll be interesting to see this year if the Academy’s decisions continue to convince them it’s right approach, given that the earlier-than-ever deadline for nomination ballots gives the December releases a shorter-than-ever period in which to make an impact on voters. One wonders if Universal, which pushed “Les Mis” back to Christmas Day just one day before the Academy announced the January 10 nomination date, would have done so after the fact; they’re presumably confident enough in the film not to fear the spread of a tepid response, but the fact remains that many voters will be struggling to see it in time.

Part of me, I admit, hopes the December deluge isn’t rewarded too comfortably – if only because it’d be heartening to see equally lavish recognition for the few top-drawer prestige items that dare to venture out of hiding earlier in the year. There’s a hypocritical tendency among awards pundits to complain about the dearth of quality fare in the first three-quarters of the release calendar, only to regard the early birds with dismissive suspicion.

We’re repeatedly told that “Beasts of the Southern Wild”’s buzz is waning due to its summer bow, while Harvey Weinstein has been taken to task for releasing “The Master” wide in September to middling box office – you can debate the business acumen of these strategies, as well as the question of whether they’d actually perform any better in later months, but there’s something to be said for giving audiences the option of substantial awards-caliber options throughout the year, whether the audience takes up the offer or not.

I was recently talking to a colleague about Warner’s bumping of “The Great Gatsby” to next summer, and while I thought the move seemed reasonable enough – particularly to accommodate a potential Cannes premiere – he insisted that “films like that belong in December.” Whether Baz Luhrmann’s wild vision delivers or not, such an attitude serves only those in and around the awards racket, not adult audiences who’d rather not concentrate their cinemagoing at the holidays.

There are more than enough recent examples of cannily campaigned Oscar success stories from the earlier months of the year – from “Crash” to “Winter’s Bone” to “The Hurt Locker” to “Gladiator” – to suggest that voters’ memories, when appropriately prodded, can be longer than we give them credit for being. Here’s hoping a “Beasts of the Southern Wild” – or, to fantasize for a moment, a “Take This Waltz” or a Rachel Weisz in “The Deep Blue Sea” – survives the winter onslaught when the nominations are read. Movies are for life, not just for Christmas.

Check out my updated predictions HERE and, as always, see how Kris Tapley, Greg Ellwood and I collectively think the season will turn out at THE CONTENDERS.

After serving as production designer Mark Friedberg's art director on 2007's “The Darjeeling Limited,” Adam Stockhausen went on to design a number of commercials for director Wes Anderson over the last five years. In that time, the relationship strengthened and Anderson eventually tapped him to design his latest feature, “Moonrise Kingdom,” and all the New England quirks and Boy Scout flourishes that would come with it.

Stockhausen found early inspiration for the look of the film in the paintings of Norman Rockwell. They had a spirt and a sense of color that brought the world of scouting to life in a vivid way beyond a sort of dry, 1964 “Boy's Life” magazine advertisement. And that's really where the journey of visually conveying the world of the “Khaki Scouts” of “Moonrise Kingdom” began.

“Wes really wanted the Khaki Scouts to have a unique visual style of its own,” Stockhausen says. “So we looked at the Norman Rockwell paintings, and those are definitely BSA [Boy Scouts of America], but we also looked at French scouts and army patches and different countries, all kinds of stuff. So the idea was to create something of its own.”

The film was shot in Rhode Island, headquartered around Newport/Middletown in the southeastern, bay-infested area of the state. One of the big considerations, from a design standpoint, was the Bishops' house — the home of Walt (Bill Murray), Laura (Frances McDormand) and Suzy (Kara Hayward) Bishop in the film. There was a strip mall shopping center down the road from the production office that sported the usual: pet supply store, Barnes & Noble, Michael's, etc. But there was also a Linens n' Things that had gone out of business, so Stockhausen's art department took it over as a construction shop and stage.

“We basically built and shot all in one place,” Stockhausen says. “Wes wanted to show the house in the beginning of the film, not just from the outside but the inside as well. It works with the music where the orchestra”s broken apart into different sections. He kind of broke the house apart to show it in all of its different parts, and thereby seeing the family and their relationships, and how the characters interact in these different and very specific ways, sort of diagram-style. That”s pretty hard to do in a location house.”

The sets were constructed, therefore, with three sides, allowing the ability to track along them and pan from left to right, move up and down and reveal the various areas. Indeed, Robert Yeoman's camera really shows off Stockhausen's work in that sequence in particular and throughout the film in general. The house was “put back together again” on the stage after that opening bit, Stockhausen says.

Speaking of Yeoman, the film has a visual signature, like all of Anderson's films do. But the color palette, as always, was key to the design and how it would be conveyed thematically on camera.

“It started with basic kind of building blocks, like Suzy”s world definitely had a pink quality to it,” Stockhausen says. “If you look at the sequence where Sam gets up from the pew and goes down into the basement of the church and meets Suzy, that”s kind of her world and everything is very, very pink. The clothes on the rack that he pushes through are all pink, and kind of everything about her is color-coded that way. And then Sam had his own thing, which wasn”t really a color as much as it was a pattern or a style. It was these Native American ink drawings of these animals that we kind of interpreted, and they became present on his canoe and his getaway tent with Suzy.”

For the scout elements, there was baseline khaki but then plaid worked its way in. Stockhausen and Anderson settled on a plaid/yellow/khaki combo for that palette. Every character had its own inherent direction, too. Bruce Willis's Captain Sharp, for instance, reflected a black and white palette emblematic of his cut and dry, law and order disposition (ironic considering the depth and flaws his character ultimately presents).

The terrain of lower Rhode Island presented its hurdles. There was, for instance, the task of getting Captain Sharp's abode — a big Spartanette trailer — down to a beach area next to the pier where they built his office. “We sort of got all the pieces of that in the right geography to work,” Stockhausen says. “It was certainly a challenge, especially after we chopped that trailer up pretty well and it didn”t have a lot of structural integrity left to it. And so keeping it in one piece as we got it down onto the beach was definitely an unusual sort of a challenge.

Then there was the fun of scouting all over to find the elements of Sam and Suzy's journey as they make their getaway from the confines of their lives. “That was a long process,” Stockhausen says. “Everywhere we went we kind of would go off the trails and look for the most interesting little bits and pieces that we could find. And then Wes kind of assembled them into this journey.”

Then the production would take actors Jared Gilman and Kara Hayward with a small crew before main unit shooting commenced to get certain shots. It would be long drives to inhospitable little bits of territory to get a scene of the two children crossing the rocks by the stream or crossing a little bridge or hauling luggage up the face of a cliff, which Stockhausen says was particularly magical and indicative of the rewarding design journey the film yielded.

“That”s stuff that you don”t get to do on every movie when you have to fit it into sort of the normal, 'what can we grab that”s around the corner from the restaurant location where we”re shooting today' way of going about things,” he says. “That was really fun from a design and locations point of view.”

“Moonrise Kingdom” is now available on DVD and Blu-ray.