Here’s what I think happens. A film is seen. It’s genuinely loved. Like minds attract and in the intimate atmosphere of a film festival, the love grows. But with the love comes a desire for others to love, too. So the selling starts. The passion takes hold. And soon, even defenders of the film are damaging it, taking defensive positions, not allowing it to breathe freely and make its way unsuspectingly to fresh eyes like it did theirs.

This, I think, happens every year. And I’m not above it. A number of films are getting the advocacy treatment early on, siphoning precious gas needed to run the course. And favorites are being chosen, aggressively, by those fortunate enough to get the early, taste-making look. But fans of “Argo” won’t concede the film’s thinner-than-most thematic structure while knocking “Life of Pi” or “Silver Linings Playbook.” Fans of “Silver Linings Playbook” won’t concede its formulaic rom-com tendencies while knocking “Argo” or “Life of Pi.” And fans of “Life of Pi” won’t concede its clunky framing and extraneous elements while knocking “Argo” or “Silver Linings Playbook.”

The result is an identity for a film established before it has really developed one. It’s a small world with a tight radius, so the entertainment industry feeds on these morsels and voters in all sorts of bodies have something presented to them with certain notes and proclamations when it finally crosses their bow. And it just drowns the spirit of the thing.

If you’re waiting to unveil later in the season, you’re all too happy to see this. You want to know what the campaigns for “Lincoln,” “Les Misérables,” “Flight,” “Hitchcock,” “Zero Dark Thirty,” etc. are thinking? They’re thinking they’ll gladly concede this turf for now, because it’s a load blown early. You hold onto whatever mystery you have until it’s your turn to go. Meanwhile, if you’re one of the films with all the current buzz, your fingers are crossed that the other guys don’t have the goods, because you know — particularly with this crop — that you don’t have the sort of home run that will blow through a season unscathed.

Harvey Weinstein did it two years in a row, but he had undeniables. “The King’s Speech” faced what looked on the surface to be stiff competition from “The Social Network,” but it was all a mirage. “The Artist,” meanwhile, held up to “Hugo” because it was a discovery throughout the fall. Both films were crowd-pleasers, and so is “Silver Linings,” but the latter won’t have much support from the crafts branches and it may be outed soon enough as an oversold commercial film.

Warner Bros. has done well when playing the non-campaign campaign, and “Argo” is the perfect kind of film for that strategy. But a Telluride bow and the applause that met it makes it hard to creep through the season, while the early buzz (which carried into Toronto) allows for harsher scrutiny of what some see as merely a tight thriller from a movie star.

Fox has bobbled campaigns in the past but has rarely sported a major player in the early months. Now they have Ang Lee’s first contender since he was, many would say, screwed out of a Best Picture Oscar in 2005. But a film like “Life of Pi” is the toughest sort to keep afloat for so long, as it provides such an opportunity for cynicism and small-picture-obsession to fester and sink the ship (no pun intended).

Somewhere in all of this is “The Master,” the highbrow entry, praised to the heavens, which paved the way for a “what’s the big whoop?” response from many. Luckily its spotlight was stolen by the other three, which could keep it in the background long enough for the passionate base to form around it (particularly as other films open and, inevitably, disappoint). But it’s the critics’ favorite, and as the old maxim goes: critics don’t vote for Oscars.

What I’m saying is I don’t think we’ve seen a Best Picture winner yet. And I could absolutely be wrong about that. A lot of these campaigns haven’t really shown their hand yet. But my instinct, for whatever it’s worth, is that this year’s engravee has yet to take a bow.

After all it is — as of today — just October. So let’s all just slow down a bit.

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

As if you ever thought otherwise, film critics are not an easily satisfied people, but we seem particularly agitated lately. In the past two weeks, we’ve had David Denby decrying the state of American filmmaking, Stephanie Zacharek questioning her colleagues’ notions of importance, and now Andrew O’Hehir has jumped in to declare film culture dead. While conceding that plenty of good films are being made today, he wonders whether anyone outside of specialised cinephile circles really notices or cares anymore, as TV grows in water-cooler status: “I”m looking in the mirror and thinking about the purpose of what I do, which is supposed to be communicating with people, sharing ideas and generating discussion.” Are film critics still doing that? And does it matter if that’s becoming a more intimate, but equally impassioned conversation? I say yes and no. [Salon]  

Some changes in the Oscar-blogger universe: Sasha Stone has split from Jeff Wells and started a new podcast with Tom O’Neil. We wish them well. Check out the new duo’s first effort. [Gold Derby] 

Francois Ozon’s “In the House” won top honors at the San Sebastian Film Festival, while Spain’s Oscar submission, “Blancanieves,” was a multiple prizewinner. [Screen Daily]

Kicking off his annual Fifties feature, Nick Davis rounds up the best leading male performances of 2012 so far. My own such list would include four of the five names he nominates. [Nick’s Flick Picks]

The brilliant Ezra Miller talks to Kate Carraway about playing a gay teen “The Perks of Being a Wallflower” and coming out in real life. [The Guardian]

David O. Russell, Amy Adams and “Anna Karenina” production designer Sarah Greenwood will all receive prizes at the Hollywood Film Awards, for whatever that’s worth. [THR] 

Remember the Reel Geezers? Well, they’re still with us, and they have thoughts on “The Master.” [Thompson on Hollywood]

Oscar-nominated costume designer Sharen Davis talks to Chris Laverty about her retro inspirations for the otherwise forward-looking “Looper.” [Clothes on Film]

Speaking of which, Katey Rich and Kristy Puchko debate the best forms of cinematic time-travel. [Cinema Blend]

Charlie Lyne lays out a manifesto for the modern-day teen movie, adhered to this year by only a few titles, including “21 Jump Street” and “Pitch Perfect.” [Ultraculture]

Arguably no film has suffered a steeper fall on the autumn festival circuit than Terrence Malick’s “To the Wonder.” The usually slow-working director’s unexpectedly prompt follow-up to last year’s Palme d’Or winner “The Tree of Life” entered the Venice Film Festival, together with Paul Thomas Anderson’s “The Master,” as its prime attraction. By the time it moved on to Toronto, however, many critics seemed to be wishing he’d taken a little more time. 

The Venice premiere was by no means disastrous. Inevitably, as with “The Tree of Life” at Cannes, some boos greeted the closing credits at its morning press screening, and were swiftly, even gleefully blown out of proportion by the media, but it had its fair share of admirers, too — of which I was one. (Indeed, I’m one of the very few who thinks the film a step up from “Tree.”) The Toronto reception, however, was rockier: with expectations already dampened by the mixed advance word from Europe, a lot of critics positively seemed to revel in sticking the boot in, while claims to the effect of “Malick’s worst film” rapidly became consensus.

Naturally, this not only put the kibosh on the film’s awards-season prospects — though even its fiercest detractors might concede that genius DP Emmanuel Lubezki deserves another Oscar nod — but even its US distribution potential.

“The Tree of Life” was a gutsy acquisition for Fox Searchlight Pictures, not a brand previously identified with such rigorous arthouse pictures, and proved a worthwhile purchase in terms of associative prestige if not revenue. (Even with Brad Pitt on the poster, they couldn’t dupe the multiplex crowd to the tune of more than $13 million.) Industry observers were interested to see if Searchlight would further foster this creative partnership by picking up the no-more-commercial “To the Wonder,” but once the film screened, that seemed highly unlikely. Searchlight’s riskier purchases of late have been backed by strong critical word; without that, “To the Wonder” simply represented too much of a liability.

It was clear that it would fall to a smaller indie outfit to pick up the film, though with festival buzz dwindling — one or two pundits even absurdly labelled the film “unreleasable” — even they weren’t rushing to it. Finally, however, it’s noble art-film stable Magnolia Pictures — whose most notable recent titles include “Melancholia” and “Take This Waltz” — that has come to the rescue. It was confirmed yesterday that they have purchased the film, and are eyeing a 2013 release.

Magnolia is the smallest outfit yet to take on a Malick film, which is a sign more than anything of how the notion of studio movies have shifted: Warner Bros. released “Badlands” in 1973, Paramount “Days of Heaven” in 1978, Fox “The Thin Red Line” in 1998, and New Line “The New World” in 2005. Marquee names notwithstanding, “The Tree of Life” lucked out by securing a home as plush of Searchlight; Magnolia is probably a closer fit for Malick’s sensibility these days. Good for them, and here’s hoping their sensible decision to push “To the Wonder” to next year allows enough time for memories of this month’s unwarranted battering to fade.

I’ve said plenty about “Looper” in the podcasts but haven’t really had a chance to sit down and write something up. I’ll get to it, maybe, but I’m content in loving this film whether I get around to writing about it or not. And I’d love to hear the readership’s thoughts, too, so if/when you make it out to see it this weekend, do come on back here and give us your take.

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.

This week the New York Film Festival is launching and October is right around the corner. We’re catching up with this and that along the way and have plenty to mull over as always, so with that, let’s see what’s on the docket today…

The 50th annuals New York Film Festival kicks off today with the world premiere of Ang Lee’s “Life of Pi.” We both discuss the film, adapted from the award-winning novel.

With the season barreling ahead, it’s time to start handicapping some categories. So we start in with Best Actor, from Daniel Day-Lewis to Jamie Foxx and all possibilities in between.

Since I’ve had a chance to catch up on some films like “Cloud Atlas,” “End of Watch” and “Silver Linings Playbook,” so we go back to the well briefly on those and have a particularly heated disagreement on the latter.

And finally, reader questions. We field queries regarding major players peaking too early, viewing the season with favorites while banking on the excitement of upsets and — OMG — “Django Unchained.”

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. And as always, remember to subscribe to Oscar Talk via iTunes here.

“Here I Come” courtesy of Stuart Park.

NEW YORK — Translating Yann Martel’s award-winning novel “Life of Pi” to film has proven to be a daunting task for filmmakers kicking the tires on it for the better part of a decade, but in the hands of someone like Ang Lee, it was already getting off on the right foot. While the film, which opens the New York Film Festival this evening, takes some time revving past a clunky first act, it eventually settles into a visionary sweet spot for well over an hour. Messy though it may be, it’s affecting on the whole for the truths with which it concerns itself and the journey it so passionately suggests.

The story of the film is the visual scope of the endeavor, and Lee’s work with visual effects artists and cinematographer Claudio Miranda (“The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” “TRON Legacy”) has produced some of the most awe-inspiring images likely to grace a screen this year. And indeed, Lee wanted that extra power, so much so that he was basically thinking of 3D before he was thinking of 3D, as he put it at a press conference this morning. “I didn’t think it was possible without 3D,” he said. “It needed another dimension.”

It also needed an actor capable of holding the screen opposite some impressive razzle dazzle and not get lost in the mix. As the titular Pi, Suraj Sharma actually pulls that feat off impressively, finding the right emotional notes and never overplaying them, even when they demand a little extra emphasis. Irrfan Khan, meanwhile, when not losing ground to the at times slightly smothering early portions (which simply don’t have the visual impact, try as Lee might to make them visually interesting), is a calm and stoic presence throughout as the adult Pi, recalling his tale. In particular, a tear-drenched moment late in the film lands just perfectly. “Thank you, Richard Parker.”

What marks “Life of Pi” as relevant and important above all else is its somewhat universalist heart. At a time when religious strife is as troubling as ever, a story featuring a main character welcoming of multiple faiths and challenged by nature regardless of them can truly resonate. It never quite falls into any kind of New Age traps because it sticks, ultimately, to simple, unrefined truth. Chaos, nature, but beneath all, something more. That’s all we really know, anyway. “I studied philosophy,” Martel said at this morning’s press conference, “which is a very good way to turn yourself into an atheist or an agnostic.”

The film ought to play well for Academy types, particularly given the focus with which 20th Century Fox can campaign it to them. Best Picture and Best Director are certainly in play, though acting and writing nominations could be hard to come by. Nevertheless, recognition throughout the crafts, from cinematography to film editing, original score to sound fields and, of course, Best Visual Effects, ought to help it to a bountiful tally.

More on “Life of Pi” in this afternoon’s Oscar Talk podcast and, likely, more to come.

With that, the 50th annual New York Film Festival is off to the races. Other films premiering here include Alan Berlinger’s “First Cousin Once Removed,” Robert Zemeckis’s “Flight” and David Chase’s “Not Fade Away.” Additional highlights include Cannes Palme d’Or winner “Amour” from Michael Haneke and Berlinale Golden Bear winner “Caesar Must Die,” as well as Focus Features’ “Hyde Park on Hudson” and IFC Films’ “Frances Ha,” among others. Nicole Kidman and Richard Peña will receive tributes.

The New York Film Festival runs September 28 – October 14.

The New York Film Festival kicks off its golden-anniversary edition tonight with the world premiere of Ang Lee’s “Life of Pi” — Kris will be on hand to offer his thoughts. In the meantime, A.O. Scott shares his notes on the films he’s seen from the lineup, including “Pi,” which he describes as “a lavish reminder that film nowadays is sometimes not film at all, but rather a rapidly evolving digital art form.” He also notes that it’s an unusually large-scale choice of opener for an arthouse-dominated fest that kicked off with an Alain Resnais film three years ago. Have they sold out? Scott discusses. [New York Times]

Ted Johnson looks into the tricky Hollywood issue of “life rights,” after an army sergeant sued the makers of “The Hurt Locker” for “improperly” using his likeness for its protagonist. [Variety]

Tom O’Neil wonders whether “Silver Linings Playbook” can really win Best Picture. As usual, his straight-white-guy-voter theories come into play. [Gold Derby]

“Looper” director Rian Johnson talks to Kyle Buchanan about piling all the makeup work on Joseph Gordon-Levitt… and directing episodes of “Breaking Bad.” [Vulture]

David Poland does his video thing with Elizabeth Banks and Jason Moore, respectively the producer-star and director of “Pitch Perfect” — which you should totally see this weekend, by the way. [Hot Blog]

A real of surplus footage from “The Master” has been unveiled — the same one, more or less, that was screened to select journalists at Cannes in the spring. [The Playlist]

Peter Bradshaw talks to pop pixie Kylie Minogue about going deeper underground in Leos Carax’s “Holy Motors,” opening today in the UK. [The Guardian]

Oscar-winning screenwriter Julian Fellowes is planning a prequel to “Downton Abbey.” I’ll leave you to it. [Hollywood Reporter] 

Katie Kilkenny ponders traces of Hitchcock in the trailer for Park Chan-wook’s God-I-can’t-wait “Stoker.” [Slate]

More characters are smoking in the movies than before. My exclusive sources suggest Hollywood may have found more important things to care about. [LA Times]

Fixating as we do on the seasonal ins and outs of the Oscar process, it”s easy to forget that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has a purpose beyond handing out gold stars to the industry”s great and good. As an organization dedicated both to the development and preservation of the medium, they have fostered a wealth of films and archive materials that have scant relationship to the Academy Awards. Little wonder they warmed so to the film-preservation paean that was “Hugo” last year.

Still, when their archiving obligations overlap with celebration of the awards that made them famous, it”s an irresistible promotional opportunity for AMPAS. Hence the launch of their Oscar”s Most Wanted movement, which seeks to complete their library of every single film, short or feature-length, that was once graced with the golden man”s touch.

Inevitably, they”re mostly on the lookout for various once-nominated short subjects or documentaries that have since seemingly disappeared to the great projector room in the sky. With little demand or occasion for repertory screenings of such materials, they tend to gather dust – or simply turn to it – faster than narrative features. More surprising, however, is that a former Best Picture nominee is also on the Most Wanted list, and one from a major filmmaker at that.

In 84 years of the Academy Awards, just under 500 films have been nominated for the top prize – and of those, only one isn”t available to view completely in some shape or form. I”d like to tell you that I”m talking about “Doctor Dolittle,” but it”s actually Ernst Lubitsch”s 1928 film “The Patriot” – no relation to the turgid Mel Gibson epic that earned a smattering of technical nods in 2000 – that is confounding the most obsessive Oscar completists.

A loose Hollywood biopic of Czar Paul I of Russia – yes, royalty porn was a hit with voters from the get-go – the film can be glimpsed in a trailer on YouTube, but no complete cut has yet surfaced. It won a writing Oscar and was nominated for Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor – though back in those days, the second year of the awards, nominees weren”t formally revealed. (I believe it was the last silent film to feature in the lineup, depending on how willing you are to classify “The Artist” as such.)

Is it a great loss? Hardly anyone knows, though one would rather Lubitsch films didn”t casually go missing. As such, it”s the highest-profile title in the Most Wanted list on the Academy”s official website, where they invite any informed parties to step forward, and any interested ones to follow the search – which has so far turned up the aforementioned trailer and a single reel, housed at the Cinemateca library in Lisbon, Portugal. (Coincidentally, back in the spring, I visited the Cinemateca, a swirlingly decorated period townhouse once featured in a Manoel de Oliveira film; it”s as romantic a cinematic resting-place as any film could ask for.)

Other titles being hunted down by the Academy include Oscar-nominated shorts “Chase of Death” and “The Kiss”; once-AWOL titles successfully sourced by the Academy”s archive include another such short, “The Cliff Dwellers” and a restored doc short nominee, “Naked Yoga.” Here”s hoping they continue in this vein: a complete archive of Academy-honored shorts, perhaps stored in a manner similar to the British Film Institute”s digitized Mediatheque, would be a neat resource.

You can read more on the Oscar”s Most Wanted drive here.

You know the drill. Oscar Talk is back tomorrow with a new installment so if you have any burning questions, offer them here. We’ll be talking NYFF and “Life of Pi,” the weekend’s releases and this and that. Rifle off your need-to-knows and we’ll try to address a few in the podcast.

The move to HitFix has put us right at the center of some exciting developments on the film awards coverage side of things, and one of those elements was revealed yesterday. We’ve established a separate Awards Channel that will serve as your hub for all of HitFix’s awards coverage, whether it’s music, TV or film. We’ve got your Grammy, Emmy and Oscar fix.

In addition to circulating all of our content in this spectrum, the channel also offers the usual bells and whistles of HitFix: calendar reminders, links to our Contenders section, video interviews and more. There is also easy access to all of the site’s festival coverage. So add a new bookmark!

As with most works of high-reaching ambition that critics can’t quite agree on — even those that like it — “The Master” continues to inspire some of the knottiest film writing of the year. For her part, Stephanie Zacharek admires the film, but suggests a lot of her colleagues feel it’s entitled to more thought and attention than it really is. She spins that into an observation of lofty, anti-mainstream festival titles in general: “There”s a danger in erecting false walls around different corners of the culture, of claiming some movies deserve our respect by virtue of who made them and of how they”re made, regardless of whether they arouse any passion in us.” [The AV Club]

R. Kurt Osenland examines the Oscar prospects for the fast-cooling “The Dark Knight Rises,” a concludes that it’s only assured of two technical nods. [Slant]

Anne Thompson talks to “Looper” star Emily Blunt about her busy year. (I see Anne’s predicting a Supporting Actress nod for Blunt on Gold Derby. First time I’ve heard that mentioned. [Thompson on Hollywood]

Dave Itzkoff talks to Tim Burton about “Frankenweenie” — and, generally, what it’s like to live in that head. [New York Times]

Speaking of which, “Frankenweenie” writer John August highlights his brief but hilarious musical contribution to the film. [John August]

Quentin Tarantino has given himself a cameo role in “Django Unchained.” (Please let the record state that we just mentioned “Django Unchained.”) [The Guardian]

Costume designer Tess Schofield talks about getting the period detail just right in the Weinsteins’ Down Under Motown musical “The Sapphires.” [Sydney Morning Herald]

The would-be inspirational education drama “Won’t Back Down” has indeed inspired parents’ groups and the American Federation of Teachers… to protest. [THR]

“The Avengers” director Joss Whedon offers six nuggets of wisdom for aspiring filmmakers. [Film School Rejects]

Ahead of “The Sessions”‘s UK premiere at the London Film Festival, an in-depth look at the real-life work of sex surrogates. [The Telegraph]

On Monday, a colleague pointed out to me that the next Academy Awards were, to the day, five months away. Strangely, he said it in the panicked tone of someone on whom Christmas has too swiftly crept up, whereas all I could think of was how dauntingly far away it sounded. Five months is a long time to parse the possibility of a third consecutive Best Picture from the Weinstein stable, to debate Philip Seymour Hoffman”s category placement, and for Jeff Wells to denigrate Daniel Day-Lewis”s Abe Lincoln accent; this weekly column, meanwhile, will have mulled over more than enough unseen variables before the season is out. Welcome.

So with plenty of weeks remaining to direct our gaze forward, please indulge me as I inaugurate this year”s Long Shot series by rewinding the clock a bit – just six weeks or so, to a little late-summer release called “Hope Springs.”

A very credible, budget-dwarfing $65 million gross notwithstanding, “Hope Springs” is not most people”s idea of a big deal – as a digestible but dialogue-driven marital drama somewhat regrettably mismarketed as a silver-haired sex comedy, the chatter around the film is relaxed enough that I only got around to seeing it, as a ticket-buying customer, last weekend. And though reviews had been warmer than expected for what looked like a soft lob to the Nancy Meyers set, I was still taken aback by just how special the film is.

Senior sexuality is already a pretty courageous topic for a mainstream studio entertainment, and Vanessa Taylor”s tartly candid original script pushes it into the most truthful, occasionally desolate directions it can go within the padded pastel confines of a multiplex relationship movie. The packaging is cozy, and characters emerge from it rose-scented, but there”s a bare vein of fear and loneliness running through “Hope Springs” that”s hard to shake. The whole may be tonally haphazard, and aesthetically rather worse than that, but key scenes where Meryl Streep and Tommy Lee Jones, as a 60-something Midwestern couple facing up to their sexless shell of a marriage, nervously exchange blame from opposite ends of a therapist”s couch are as brisk and invigorating as any indie confessional. I can”t remember the last Hollywood romance that wanted its characters to endure such emotional brutality, much less had any idea how to write it.

Thanks to its A-grade leads, “Hope Springs” would be credited with a built-in veneer of class even if it weren”t half as good as it actually is, but both Streep and Jones work unexpectedly hard for the material. It”s not without due consideration that I say Streep hasn”t been this terrific since “The Hours” 10 years ago, mining seams of passion and pettiness in a mousy housewife without stooping to condescension or affectation. It”s a performance I”d take in a heartbeat over a dozen fussy, trophy-bedecked Maggie Thatchers. (I”m tempted to knock David Frankel”s direction, not least for his ruinously cloth-eared musical cues, but given that Streep”s two sharpest and subtlest turns in a decade have come on his watch – he made “The Devil Wears Prada,” too – he”s clearly doing something right.)

Streep”s detractors have complained of awards bodies” tendency to pile laurels on the 17-time Oscar nominee merely for breathing; I”m the first to admit that I wasn”t keen on her ostentatiously mannered work in “Doubt,” “Julie & Julia” and “The Iron Lady,” a trio responsible for a hat-trick of Academy nods in the last four years. This year, however, I”m fully on board the train for Nomination #18. So why, when you look at the Best Actress charts being drawn up by the pundits that be, does Streep appear to be on the outside looking in, and in a purportedly “weak” category to boot?

You could make the case for possible push-back after her third Oscar win in February for “The Iron Lady,” an outcome that was neither entirely expected nor universally popular, and certainly eased the pressure on voters to recognize the actress with quite such regularity. (Perhaps she”d be regarded as a frontrunner right now if Viola Davis”s name had been in that envelope; we”ll never know.) But there”s a more interesting, and more deeply-rooted, awards season truth at play in the soft buzz for Streep”s work in “Hope Springs”: voters all too frequently resist the regular. I don”t think it”s a coincidence that a number of Streep”s strongest performances to somehow escape Academy recognition – “The Hours,” “Falling in Love,” even “The River Wild” – are ones in which she plays American everywomen, boasting neither the virtuosic accents and/or biographical consequence that color much of her nominated work. She may have won her first Oscar for playing a regular Jo, but she had to play British and iconic to earn her third.

Streep”s hardly the only example one could use to illustrate the Academy”s tendency to conflate notions of extraordinary artistry with an extraordinary subject. Consider the fact that 13 of the last 20 leading-role Oscar winners have won for biopics. Even when pitting fiction against fiction, they prefer more grandiose dramatic arcs, which is how Sean Penn”s vocal, vengeful grief in “Mystic River” beats out Bill Murray”s quiet ennui in “Lost in Translation,” or how Natalie Portman”s delusional, high-strung “Black Swan” ballerina defeated a quartet of more silently suffering family women.

The preference applies to films as much as performances. Not since “American Beauty” in 1999 has a fundamentally domestic drama won Best Picture, and even then, that victory was something of an anomaly after a long run of high-flown, far-flung period pieces taking the prize; voters” tastes have since run more frequently in the direction of “small” narratives that nonetheless span exceptional situations and heftier social constructs.

The film many think is in the drivers” seat for Best Picture, “Silver Linings Playbook,” could represent a compromise of sorts, reportedly elevating a common-or-garden relationship drama with distinguishing stripes of quirk, but it has a lot of attractively extraordinary stories in its way, from the epic ardors of “Les Misérables” to the sensational survival of “The Impossible” to the momentous history of “Lincoln” to the stranger-than-fiction adventure of “Argo.”

In this year”s Oscar race, as in most, ordinary people don”t have time to take it slow.

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.

Apologies for the very late roundup today: I’ve been having substantial technical problems. We kick off with a look at an Oscar category that few pundits claim to have a bead on: the Best Animated Feature category. In the second consecutive year that Pixar doesn’t have it all wrapped up, Glenn Whipp surveys a highly flexible field, and wonders if venerable parent company Disney couldn’t reclaim its dominance of the medium and score a trio of nods: with Tim Burton’s well-received “Frankenweenie” (the one to beat, from where I’m standing) and “Wreck-It Ralph” bracketing Pixar’s generally liked-but-not-loved “Brave.” Wouldn’t it be fun to have a race in this category for a change? [LA Times]

“Anna Karenina” costume designer Jacqueline Durran — a racing favorite for the Oscar, surely — talks about bringing contemporary couture influences to her Russian finery. [The Genteel]

Looking at the real Hollywood story behind Ben Affleck’s festival favorite “Argo” — how did some hack screenwriter not dream this up first? [The Hollywood Reporter] 

“Arbitrage” star Richard Gere talks to Wendy Mitchell about making films about that rarest of modern-day concepts — real people. [Screen Daily]

With “Skyfall” less than a month away in the UK, the Guardian kicks off the perennial discussion about the greatest ever Bond film. (The answer, in case you didn’t know, is “From Russia With Love.”) [The Guardian]

Brad Brevet examines the two female acting Oscar races, and admits that he can’t see anyone beating Jennifer Lawrence for Best Actress. [Rope of Silicon]

Speaking of which, Jeff Wells believes in “Silver Linings Playbook”‘s Oscar chances so much that he allegedly broke down in a parking lot when Tom O’Neil averred. At least it wasn’t over something unimportant. [Gold Derby]

Brian De Palma, whose “Passion” was just picked up by IFC, gets the video interview treatment from David Poland. [Hot Blog]

How much is an Academy Award worth these days? Well, if it’s the one Joan Crawford won 65 years ago, a little over $400,000. Yes, that’s less than what Bette Davis’s statuette fetched. Ouch. [Vanity Fair]

Tracking and rating the screen masturbation history of the three stars of “The Master.” Hey, why not? [Vulture]

The Oscar season is just warming up as the Venice, Telluride and Toronto film festivals have gotten us started. The New York and London film fests around the corner will keep things humming and in the meantime, a survey of the field is in order. This year’s crop of possibilities is as diverse as ever, genre and foreign film making their voices heard, while animation is curiously absent. Presidential biopics are represented, as are political thrillers. Comedy, as ever, barely shows up, while Hollywood gets a unique spotlight the year after industry nostalgia owned the season. There’s something for western fans, comic book fans and literary fans, so click through to check out our cross-section of the players, from “A(mour)” to “Z(ero” Dark Thirty). And of course, keep track of the ups and downs of the category all season at In Contention’s Best Picture Contenders page.

For films that don’t have deep pockets or any number of other elements stacked up against them in an awards season — genre bias, early-year release, etc. — muscling into the conversation at the end of the year can be tough. You use what’s at your disposal, of course, and you seize the moment when you can. And make no mistake, there’s always a moment to be seized. Because an Oscar season isn’t a preordained thing. It’s constantly shifting, giving slack, taking it in, ebbing, flowing.

This year, for instance, there is softness in the lead actress category to be capitalized upon. Of course, it seems like there is always a fair share of complaints to be lodged against a minimal amount of Best Actress contenders in a given season, but often enough (in my opinion), we have a strong field. And nevertheless, I think that blame lies first and foremost with a dearth of quality female roles than it does a dearth of quality female performances. So you get something like “Hitchcock” showing up with Helen Mirren in tow, or the possibility of multiple foreign nominees (which means, thankfully, they’re getting a look as a result of wanting elsewhere), or you see a campaign excited about the possibilities of a Sundancer like Mary Elizabeth Winstead in “Smashed.” The doors crack a bit and whoever wedges in a foot gets the shot.

This year, there are a number of films that are either coming back around or daring to dare when they might have otherwise played it conservatively. Richard Linklater’s “Bernie,” for instance, has stuck around long enough with enough of a critical stamp of approval that Millennium has stepped it up for the writer/director and particularly star Jack Black. I’d say it’s valid, as Black gives one of his best performances to date in the film. The two will be in New York next week to get the motor going on the east coast.

“Arbitrage” is another film that has kept interest up for quite a while — since Sundance — and finally started its theatrical roll-out this month. Richard Gere has and will continue to grace his share of tastemakers in the coming weeks on both coasts as Roadside Attractions gives it a go with the company’s most viable contender. Hey, sticking with it helped Javier Bardem get there for “Biutiful” (as it did for Demián Bichir in last year’s “A Better Life” from Summit Entertainment).

Speaking of Summit, that little pair is well-liked enough that breathing wind into the campaign sails makes some sense. Naomi Watts is already off to a good start (particularly given the competition) in “The Impossible,” while “The Perks of Being a Wallflower” is well-liked by even the biggest grouches and could be seen as something unexpectedly relatable (despite what my Oscar Talk colleague Anne Thompson might think, sight-unseen).

A film like “End of Watch” you wouldn’t expect to land in an awards hunt, but Jake Gyllenhaal and Michael Peña’s names are mentioned enough to make it real. Meanwhile, Open Road is making good on its promise to bring around a campaign for Joe Carnahan’s brilliant “The Grey.” No re-release seems to be in the cards, but it’s not really necessary. Bringing the film back to voters via screenings and Q&As is enough. But will it stick this time around?

Then there are the new additions, like the aforementioned “Hitchcock,” and Gus Van Sant’s “Promised Land.” You don’t make moves like that this late in the game if you don’t think you have something to work with. Some have argued the commercial implications more than the awards prospects, and indeed, that’s obviously part of the equation, too. It is, ultimately, a symbiotic relationship (among the two elements — awards and box office — that should matter least). I dare say if Relativity had found a way to release “Out of the Furnace” this year, they may have dropped a bomb on the acting races.

And that’s what’s so interesting, to me, about an awards season. Every year is different. I may have made this point before, but it’s all about the environment into which a film is released. If it was “Million Dollar Baby” that had waited for 2005 rather than “Cinderella Man” (pre-telephone), it might have been a different story than “Marty vs. Clint.”

So what else could use a little primping to get it out into the spotlight with the big guns, anyway? Well, I mentioned “Smashed,” which I just caught up with, and it’s a perfect place to start. Mary Elizabeth Winstead is amazing in the film and deserves the goodwill of a campaign. Judging from some of the internal rhetoric, it looks like she’ll get it.

Sticking with Sony Classics, how about “Damsels in Distress,” which our own Guy Lodge singled out for its writing in our list of the top Oscar contenders of the first half of the year? “The Intouchables” from The Weinstein Company? It made decent money and is a foreign film selection to boot. That can be an interesting combination. Rachel Weisz sure does have her “Deep Blue Sea” fans.

The point is, there’s always hope for films that can generate passion. I’m in love with “The Grey,” for instance, and I imagine others are, too. Tapping that base can be a powerful thing, and if you’ve got talent just as hungry for it, big things can happen. Just ask Terrence Howard, Sandra Bullock, Melissa Leo, Tommy Lee Jones and the aforementioned Bardem and Bichir.

A day later than normal on this but that gave Greg a chance to start catching up with his portion of the Contenders pages. So check out what we’re all thinking there.

Also, one more piece of business: the rest of our weekly package will start to roll out this week. Guy’s column, The Long Shot,” kicks off tomorrow, while Gerard will launch the seventh season (wow) of “Tech Support” next week. Meanwhile, Greg’s “Contender Countdown” pieces, when available, will drop on Tuesdays.

A flurry of new titles have been added to the pile of Best Foreign Language Film Oscars submissions — which currently numbers 53 — in the last day. Among them are films from such one-time nominees as Georgia and Vietnam, as well, hearteningly, the first ever entry from Kenya. I’m always pleased to see more African films in the mix.

Though I need to investigate the new additions further, only one of them immediately strikes me as newsworthy — and it’s a film I’ve been half-expecting and wholly hoping would show up here since its Cannes debut back in May. Given its combination of acclaim, awards and name appeal, you might have thought Pablo Larrain’s superb political satire “No” a shoo-in to be Chile’s submission, but there was always the realistic worry that the inscrutable politics of national selection would determine otherwise.

Three years ago, for example, everyone expected the Chileans to submit the Sundance-laurelled critical darling “The Maid,” which ultimately nabbed a Golden Globe nod. The selectors, however, ditched the accessible domestic drama (and with it, their best shot at a nomination) for the far less popular political prisoner biopic “Dawson, Island 10.”

Happily, more sensible heads prevailed, and “No” was picked — presumably assisted by the fact that, as a fact-rooted story of rival campaigns in the 1988 referendum that ended the Pinochet dictatorship, this otherwise broadly entertaining dramedy has the ring of “importance” that so often impresses selection committees. It’s Larrain’s second time representing his country in the race, though he’s a far stronger contender than he was four years ago for “Tony Manero,” a remarkable disco-era black comedy that sat far outside the Academy’s comfort zone. (In between, he made his best film, “Post Mortem,” an even more mordantly cold-blooded study of 1970s social meltdown in the country; the Chileans didn’t submit it, but the Academy would never have bitten anyway.)

“No,” however, is a different, and somewhat friendlier, animal. Completing the director’s Pinochet trilogy with his bone-dry wit and perspicacity intact, but a grander, more uplifting revolutionary sweep — plus an international star, Gael Garcia Bernal, on strong form in the lead — it’s much more of an audience-pleaser than either “Manero” or “Mortem.”

That much was clear from the film’s very first screening at Cannes, where hearty cheers filled the auditorium as the credits rolled. “No” was a slow-burning hit on the Croisette: though it was one of my most anticipated films of the festival (“Post Mortem” made my Top 10 in 2010), it wasn’t on most US critics’ radars to begin with, thanks to Cannes brass unaccountably relegating Larrain to the Directors’ Fortnight sidebar instead of the Competition, or even Un Certain Regard.

More mainstream tastemakers caught the film at repeat screenings, as word of mouth grew loud enough for Sony Pictures Classics to buy the US rights mid-festival, a few days before it won the Fortnight’s top award. That marked a sizable step up from the boutique distributors that handled Larrain’s last two films Stateside: in case you need reminding, Sony are the Weinsteins of the foreign Oscar race, their films having emerged triumphant in five of the last six years, with plenty of other nominees to pad them out. (This year, they also have a highly likely nominee in “Amour.”) 

I wrote then that “if Chile submit the film as their Academy Award entry this year — and they’d be foolish not to — it’s blend of the personal and political is something that could well appeal to more adventurous voters in the foreign-language branch, particularly with Sony’s promotional powers on its side.” I stand by that, particularly given how the buzz for “No” has only grown in volume through further festival exposure. Having never cracked even the shortlist in 16 previous attempts, Chile have a serious shot at securing their first ever nomination in the category. 

In my review at Cannes, I described “No” as follows: “Dropping the previous films’ conceit of filtering political unrest through the blankly blinking eyes of half-aware civilians, ‘No’ instead heads straight into the machine: set around Chile’s 1988 referendum that wound up overthrowing the longstanding Pinochet dictatorship, its core conflict involves not soldiers but two rival ad-agency colleagues charged with building the electoral advertising campaigns for the ‘Yes’ and ‘No’ factions. Part ‘Mad Men’ in stonewashed denim, part south-of-the-border Paddy Chayefsky, it’s an irresistible story hook that provides ample material for Larrain’s own deadpan satirical eye, not least in the often spectacularly banal advertising under scrutiny.”

That jaded emphasis on the nuts, bolts and frequent absurdities of political advertising strategy could resonate with voters weary of hearing about campaigns — whether in the context of the Oscar race itself or, less trivially, the American presidential election. If it somehow slips through the net in the branch vote (traditionalist voters might take issue with Larrain’s ingenious use of U-matic stock to give his own film the texture of archive material), it’s hard to imagine the executive committee won’t stand up for it. Every year, there’s a lot of talk about “zeitgeist” films in the race: if anyone’s looking for one in this category, “No” is the closest thing there is.

Check out the updated submissions list at the category’s Contenders page.

Well, it sure is nice to see Helen Mirren win an award for once. It was announced today that the Oscar-winning actress will receive this year’s European Achievement in World Cinema Award at December’s European Film Awards ceremony — “a very meaningful honor,” she said, while clearing some shelf space. Of course, there’s the possibility that this won’t be the high point of her awards season, with Fox Searchlight planning a Best Actress Oscar campaign for her turn as Alma Reville opposite Anthony Hopkins’s “Hitchcock.” In other Mirren news, she’s reprising her role as Queen Elizabeth II on the West End in a new Peter Morgan play, to be directed by Stephen Daldry. Seats will no doubt be in high demand, so I’ll graciously sit this one out. [European Film Academy]

Word is out that the venerable trade paper Variety may be bought by Penske Media Corporation, whose stable also houses showbiz news rival Deadline. [LA Times]

Still on the business side of things, Anne Thompson examines super-producer Joel Silver’s recent departure from Warner Bros., and concludes he had it coming. [Thompson on Hollywood]

Steven James Snyder analyzes the Academy’s recent schedule shift, and concludes that it was done expressly to tarnish the Golden Globes. [Time]

Sadly, the possibility we reported yesterday has become a certainty: Iran is boycotting this year’s Best Foreign Language Film Oscar race. [The Guardian]

Sally Potter’s Elle Fanning starrer “Ginger and Rosa,” which has had mixed reviews on the fall fast circuit, has been acquired by new distributor A24, who are planning an Oscar-qualifying release this year. [Variety] 

Meanwhile, IFC Films has taken on Brian De Palma’s festival flop “Passion” — it wouldn’t have been an indie item 20 years ago, but times have changed. [The Playlist] 

Katey Rich rewatches “Snow White and the Huntsman” and thinks we’re generally not giving enough credit to Chris Hemsworth. Hey, I loved him in “Thor.” [Cinema Blend]

From the New York Film Festival, one of Nathaniel Rogers’s correspondents grapples with Germany’s Oscar hopeful “Barbara.” [The Film Experience]

London Film Festival director Clare Stewart tells David Gritten how she’s made the greatest-hits fest shorter and sweeter. [The Telegraph]

The win for “A Separation” in the Best Foreign Language Film category at last February’s Academy Awards marked a major breakthrough — and not just because it marked the first time in donkey’s years that the critics’ favorite actually took home the prize. More significantly, Asghar Farhadi’s searing marital drama made Iran the first Middle Eastern country the win this mostly Eurocentric award. 

Not that all of Farhadi’s compatriots appreciated the gesture. The Iranian government has been famously suppressive of its more outspoken artists — notably in the case of filmmaker Jafar Panahi, placed under house arrest and banned from producing films for 20 years for “making propaganda against the system” — and “A Separation” had its own share own hurdles to overcome. Initially banned while still in production due to Farhadi’s past criticisms of the administration, the film was used by certain factions as a political pawn after its success: Javad Shamaghdari, head of the government’s cinema agency, labelled the film’s Oscar win an anti-Zionist victory, much to the dismay of its makers.

Now, Iran’s relationship to the Oscars has again been muddied by politics — this time before it’s even had a chance to submit a film. And again, Shamaghdari is involved: he’s urging the country not to participate in the Oscar race at all, in protest against the controversial “Innocence of Muslims” anti-Islam YouTube video, which has prompted multiple demonstrations and outbreaks of violence across the globe in the past month.

If Shamaghdari’s stance takes hold, that’s bad news for the film that has been earmarked as the country’s submission, pending the Iranian government’s endorsement. “A Cube of Sugar,” directed by Reza Mirkarimi (a winner in Critics’ Week at Cannes 11 years ago), is reportedly an airy family dramedy portraying a wedding that turns to a funeral when a senior member of the wedding party dies. All evidence suggests it’s no “A Separation,” but Variety’s Ronnie Scheib, reviewing it at its Montreal Film Festival premiere last year, described it as resembling “a kinder, gentler ‘Rachel Getting Married,'” with a “glowing pastel canvas, seemingly inspired by French impressionists.”

It sounds a rather innocuous film to be the victim of a political protest, while Shamaghdari’s proposal seems counter-productive: if a viral video is causing consternation by showing one’s culture in a negative light, denying Western exposure to more positive artistic expressions from Iran hardly benefits anyone. Sitting out this particular Oscar race, meanwhile, is a gesture so minor as to affect only the filmmaker who would otherwise compete. Either way, it’d be a shame if Iranian cinema didn’t at least get a chance to defend its title.

In other news in the category, the last couple of days have brought three new submissions into the fold: India’s “Barfi!,” a romantic comedy about a deaf-mute rogue that had critics referencing both “Amelie” and Charlie Chaplin upon its release in the US last week, Thailand’s cop thriller “Headshot” and Estonia’s “Mushrooming,” which I gather is a political black comedy of sorts. All have been added to the category’s updated Contenders page.