The most important piece you’re going to read on the awards season right now is Sasha Stone’s “The Oscars in an Election Year” over at Awards Daily. Even if you chafe against her politics (with which I am personally aligned), you can’t argue against the fact that she nails a certain truth: socio-political environment will impact reaction to art.

That’s what’s so great about movies, books, paintings, songs, etc. They are as much a direct reflection of the times as they are a nebulous Rorschach for them. Involuntary extrapolation can be as significant as clear-eyed reaction to a straight-forward treatise. And in an environment as heated, tense and divided as this, the art that escapes the cauldron is bound to be, if not willfully profound, then a fascinating looking glass, at the very least.

I hopped on iChat with Stone last week to chew on this idea a bit and do something I’ve been meaning to do for a while: really dig through the history of election years and the Oscars. Much of what follows is owed to that conversation and the ideas that came out of it. It’s a fool’s errand to try and tie any given election year down to the Best Picture winner, of course, but it certainly makes for intriguing considerations.

The Oscars actually began on an election year, interestingly enough. In 1928, as Herbert Hoover continued a period of Republicanism by beating out Al Davis, the country was at the end of a booming economic period. The Academy Awards, meanwhile, were initially created as a financial boost to the film industry. It made sense, then, that something as extravagant as William A. Wellman’s “Wings,” the epitome of everything that was possible on the big screen at the time, would be duly rewarded.

After that it was headlong into one of the country’s darkest hours: The Great Depression, with a granite leader to see us through not only that, but eventually, war. Beginning in 1932, it was 16 years of Franklin Roosevelt (who took down the likes of Hoover, Alf Landon, Wendell Willkie and Thomas Dewey along the way). That year, Edmund Goulding’s “Grand Hotel” — a cross-section of characters and the human condition — took the prize.

Robert Z. Leonard’s “The Great Ziegfeld” in 1936 was a portrait of a successful show-businessman, winning amid times of hardship, when dreaming big was even more of a luxury than normal. In 1940, it was Alfred Hitchock’s “Rebecca,” as Roosevelt broke from tradition and ran for a third term; isolationism ran rampant in the shadow of World War II overseas, and the Academy championed a dark film about keeping up appearances, living up to perceived greatness and, of all things, the inescapable. And in 1944, with America embroiled in all-out war on multiple fronts, it was Leo McCarey’s “Going My Way,” a story of conflicting ideologies giving way to understanding and progress. But that was a head-in-the-sand vote in some ways, a pattern that would pop up again when the country faced hardship.

Stone thinks she can make an intriguing case for the lasting impact of World War II informing, in some way, the choice of Laurence Olivier’s “Hamlet” in 1948 (the year that saw Harry Truman surprise Dewey at the polls). “It’s a film about deep, dark betrayal,” she told me. “So was World War II. Hamlet had a difficult time making a decision, much like the US did in joining the war.” An interesting thought.

The 1950s were all about the Red Scare, conventional “values,” the wholesomeness of post-war America. Two elections — 1952 and 1956 — saw the same two contenders: Dwight Eisenhower and Adlai Stevenson. And nothing daring or provocative was tapped by the Academy. We got Cecil B. DeMille’s “The Greatest Show on Earth” and Michael Anderson’s “Around the World in 80 Days.” But the approaching decade, a time of experimentation and shocking change that would eventually fuel a silent majority, was a different story.

Billy Wilder’s “The Apartment” is a fascinating Best Picture winner for 1960 when you look at what won just before and just after. It’s a film about human complexity nominated alongside a John Wayne-directed historical epic, a depiction of religious hucksterism in small town America, a Freudian love story and an outback-set yarn of family discord. All of them could be drawn as thematically relevant to the times, but there was something very current about “The Apartment,” much like John Kennedy, who in November out-charmed Richard Nixon in the first televised debates and won the tightest election in history.

But times were going to get dark, and the country was going to develop a rift. The Best Picture winners of the 1960s, for the most part, reflect the aforementioned desire to look away and just be entertained. Musicals won the day, and for 1964, with Kennedy assassinated and Lyndon Johnson defeating the extreme right-winger Barry Goldwater at the polls, it was George Cukor’s “My Fair Lady.”

Times would get even darker. In 1968, we would see the assassinations of civil rights leaders (Martin Luther King), rays of political hope (Robert Kennedy) and US ambassadors (John Gordon Mein). Racial tension was still dominant (independent George Wallace even won a handful of states in the south) and a war was tearing the country apart. Nixon, finally taking the spot he coveted, would beat out Hubert Humphrey for the presidency. And the Academy would award… Carol Reed’s “Oliver!,” a frothy musical that even took some of the bite out of Dickens.

As for 1972, it would bring a landslide re-election for Nixon (which the country would eventually regret) as he ate George McGovern’s lunch. The 1970s was an exhilarating decade for the medium, producing some of the greatest Best Picture line-ups we’ll likely ever see. And a dark tale of the American dream, capitalism and family would take the honor this year: Francis Ford Coppola’s “The Godfather.” It’s almost as if the soon-to-be-revealed underbelly could be sensed.

Four years later, with the country embarrassed by its fallen leader, a tight race between Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford (sullied by his affiliation with and pardon of Nixon) would put a Democrat in office. Concurrently, a story of an underdog, about winning without winning (Ford carried more states than Carter), would take Best Picture: John G. Avildsen’s “Rocky.”

The 1980s would be all about greed and not feeling bad about it. But Robert Redford’s “Ordinary People” at the start of the decade seemed to say more about the outgoing Carter (“touchy, feely, therapy-ee,” as Stone put it to me, “a man in touch with his feelings — then it was on to winners about ego”) than it did the movie star Ronald Reagan. And Reagan would go on to destroy Walter Mondale (who took only one state) for re-election in 1984. Milos Forman’s “Amadeus” would take the Best Picture prize that year, a film about ego, yes, but also about jealousy in the face of true genius and, in the end, delusion.

Barry Levinson’s “Rain Man” in 1988 is the perfect last-gasp movie for the decade, in some sense. George Bush (the father) would beat out Michael Dukakis handily on the promise of carrying on Reagan’s myth, but Levinson’s Best Picture winner is intriguing. It’s a perfect fit with its depiction of a yuppy bent out of shape by unforeseen complications, looking for a way to manipulate them to his benefit. And it was the highest-grossing film of the year, to boot. But there’s a growth there, an introspection. It’s a film about learning to take responsibility. That’s fascinating at the end of a decade of decadence.

Bill Clinton would come calling four years later, a fresh face, a “hip” candidate, blasting his sax on Arsenio Hall, appealing to the youth. It was a revisionism of the American presidential candidate, and if you’ll forgive the stretch, a revisionism of the American art form — the western — took the gold at the Oscars. Money still mattered in a Best Picture race then, and the $100 million “Unforgiven” brought home at the box office was nothing to sneeze at. But it was a fresh take on a national treasure, an apparent swan song in the genre for an actor/filmmaker defined by it, just as the election represented a realignment after 12 years of Republican presence in the White House.

I don’t really know how you square Anthony Minghella’s “The English Patient.” It’s the one that really stumps me. Stability was somewhat afoot, though the elections of 1994 brought a slew of Republicans into Congress who were out to get the liberal at the top. 1996 was the year of independent cinema at the Oscars, with only “Jerry Maguire” representing the major studios. I don’t know. Maybe there’s something to be said about the inevitability of it. After all, Minghella’s film was the clear winner from the outset, just as Clinton was sure to oust Bob Dole at the polls. (Though he had conceded a little bit of ground from his 1992 victory: he picked up Arizona but lost Montana and Colorado).

Stone dug in to 2000 quite a bit in her piece because it was the first year she covered the Oscars online. It was also the first year I followed them online. And it was a tight, divided race between “Gladiator” (the eventual winner), “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” (the DGA winner) and “Traffic” (which seemed to win everything BUT Best Picture that night). Meanwhile, there was a very close, extremely contentious election at the polls between George Bush (the son) and Al Gore.

“It wasn’t surprising, then, that ‘Gladiator’ would be the America fuck-yeah movie to win Best Picture that year,” Stone wrote. “Of course, 9/11 hadn’t happened yet. But it feels somehow fitting that ‘Gladiator’ would be the movie that ushered in the Bush era.” It was also, of course, very much about the money, but a division was nevertheless apparent, both at the Oscars and at the polls.

Another Clint Eastwood movie would win in an election year in 2004, as the conservative filmmaker offered up the not-so-conservative “Million Dollar Baby,” which coasted in and stole Martin Scorsese’s thunder. It was a smart decision to bring it into the season, as no one really wanted to vote for “The Aviator” and there were precious few alternatives. Eastwood’s film was very much about being down but not out, about a scrappy fighter. And America, three years removed from 9/11, was in a similar boat. It’s a film about death, about mourning, ultimately. And perhaps most crucially, it’s about the elusiveness of closure.

In 2008, hope, change, Barack Obama. Danny Boyle’s “Slumdog Millionaire” is in many ways the perfect film to reflect that election year, which of course saw Obama defeat John McCain. It’s about all of that optimism in the face of misery. It’s about dark times and struggle, but about being changed forever by that struggle. I think that’s a perfect summation of where we were as a nation at that time.

And now, 2012. We’re more divided probably than ever. The lunatics are overrunning the asylum. Things like Citizens United and drastic shifts in ideology are ripping at the political fabric of the nation. Social media has taken hold like never before, giving voice to many who never thought they had it, allowing a megaphone for their thoughts, be them profound and insightful or ignorant and dangerous.

So, then — what’s on the horizon for the season?

Kathryn Bigelow’s “Zero Dark Thirty” will be very much on the nose, clinical, perhaps. A procedural about the elimination of Osama Bin Laden couldn’t be more current. But that kind of intense realism in the moment rarely flies at the Oscars. Even “The Hurt Locker” was depicting events of a few years removed, but then, there was still a very current air around that movie. I’d nevertheless argue that its win had little to do with the zeitgeist and more to do with the narrative presented by inherent elements of the season.

Ben Affleck’s “Argo,” about which I’ve yet to hear a bad word, goes back to the Carter administration and the Iranian revolution to tell a story about courageously and creatively averting crisis. Benh Zeitlin’s “Beasts of the Southern Wild” is a modern fable about being forged from the flame of hardship, much like “Slumdog Millionaire” was. Paul Thomas Anderson’s “The Master” is a film about taking control and being the master of one’s domain, while Gus Van Sant’s “Promised Land,” freshly added to the season, will tell a story of shifting American values against a backdrop of economy, corporatism and the environment.

Tom Hooper’s “Les Misérables,” taken from a novel full of ideas about religion, politics and society, will tell a tale about the ends justifying the means and, if well-wrought, could be quite formidable as a result. Ang Lee’s “Life of Pi” offers a journey of spirituality and a story of finding direction, while Juan Antonio Bayona’s “The Impossible” is very much about people from all walks of life coming together in a time of disaster and ruin. And the aforementioned Franklin Roosevelt will even get a depiction as the US considers aiding the British in war in Roger Michell’s “Hyde Park on Hudson.”

But the de facto, sight-unseen frontrunner for most is Steven Spielberg’s “Lincoln.” It’s a marriage of artist and material that couldn’t be packed with more potential, a portrait of another very divided time and the one man who could collect the strands and strengthen the ties that bind a nation. I’m not saying Obama is that man, that he or anyone ought to be seen as an Honest Abe surrogate, but at times like this, you long for the fantasy of that. And maybe Daniel Day-Lewis’s Abraham Lincoln will be the superhero we all wish we had.

It’s a tough spot for the film to be in, but that’s the nature of early Oscar speculation. What will be fascinating is watching how these and other films will be painted against the backdrop of a very contentious and unsettling election year. How will our art imitate our life? And, more to the point, how will our art be viewed in light of our life? We shall see.

The Contenders section has received its annual pre-Telluride tidying. This is the last update that only Guy and I will administrate. Greg Ellwood’s work at Awards Campaign will soon be folded into In Contention this season and, as a result, we’ve brought him into the predictions fold. So the sidebar will reflect all three of our contributions after the Toronto Film Festival as of the next update on September 17 and going forward.

Meanwhile, Anne and I will be launching the new season of Oscar Talk this Friday, August 31, from Telluride. Guy will be on the ground covering in Venice and Greg and Drew McWeeny will be filing from Toronto the following week.

So buckle up. It’s going to be an interesting season.

Sony Pictures Classics has quite a few irons in the fire this season, as usual. There is the Cannes trio of Michael Haneke’s “Amour,” Jacques Audiard’s “Rust and Bone” and Pablo Larraín’s “No.” There is the recently acquired “At Any Price” from Ramin Bahrani. There are Sundance hits “Smashed,” from James Ponsoldt, and “West of Memphis,” from Amy Berg. And now, there is Robert Redford.

The movie star/director’s latest, “The Company You Keep,” is part of the slate of films announced for Toronto and Venice. It features a spectacular cast, including Redford, Shia LeBeouf, Julie Christie, Brendon Gleeson, Terrence Howard, Richard Jenkins, Anna Kendrick, Stanley Tucci, Nick Nolte, Chris Cooper, Susan Sarandon and Brit Marling. With Sony Classics’ just-announced acquisition of the title, I wonder if we might see the film pop up at Telluride first? They always come to Colorado with plenty to show.

According to the press release, “The Company You Keep” is “a thriller centered on a former Weather Underground activist who goes on the run from a journalist who has discovered his identity.” The release calls it “classic storytelling at its best.”

That’s kind of the sweet spot I’ve been hoping to see Redford get back to lately. His last couple of films, “The Conspirator” and “Lions for Lambs,” though commendable in part, seemed to just miss the mark. But this is a stellar line-up of talent Redford has assembled here, so perhaps it will be something special.

“The Company You Keep” will play out of competition at the Venice and Toronto film festivals next month. No release date has been set.

Before I get to the second official entry in the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar race, a word about the film that many have been casually assuming is the film to beat in the race: “Amour.” Michael Haneke’s Palme d’Or basked in critical adoration at Cannes and looks sure to stand as one of the year’s most lavishly acclaimed films when 2012 wraps up. After the Academy broke with tradition last year by actually giving the prize to the critics’ favorite — Iran’s “A Separation” — you could be forgiven for liking Haneke’s chances this time round, particularly given that his film should resonate with the Academy’s older voters, who are legion.

First, however, it actually has to be entered into the race, and that’s less of a sure thing than you might think. Though it’s a wholly French-set, French-language production, three countries can lay claim to it: France, Germany and Haneke’s home state of Austria.

France is in no position to submit the film this year, given that its French release (October 24) falls after the Academy cut-off date. Germany, which submitted Haneke’s “The White Ribbon” in 2009, opens “Amour” in September, and therefore would be permitted to enter it, but they just announced a shortlist of eight potential submissions — and “Amour” isn’t on it.

That leaves Austria, which hasn’t submitted a Haneke film since “Cache,” another French-language effort, was disqualified by the Academy in 2005 for being insufficiently Austrian. That move aroused enough protests to prompt a rule revision on the Academy’s part, which would make “Amour” a pointed submission for Austria. It is being released just in time, but will Austrian selectors — who have plumped for Haneke four times before — still be smarting from 2009, when they tussled with Germany for the right to submit “The White Ribbon,” and lost? The selection process is all too often a political one.

If it is submitted, it remains to be seen whether Academy voters, in spite of the rule change, will be bothered by the film’s lack of obvious connection to the submitting country. Last year, Finland submitted Aki Kaurismaki’s French-language “Le Havre” — it was widely tipped for a nomination, but failed to crack even the nine-film shortlist. Was the cultural disconnect a problem for voters, or did they simply not dig it? We can only guess.

Even if “Amour” falls victim to the arcane restrictions of the foreign Oscar race, that could greatly boost its chances in the general categories. As we saw with “Talk to Her” in 2002, or “Three Colors: Red” in 1994, when voters are denied the chance to vote for foreign-language favorites in their designated ghetto category, handsome consolation nominations can follow.

Anyway, back to more certain business, as the second official submission for the foreign Oscar (after Morocco got the ball rolling last week) comes from another infrequent visitor to the race: Cambodia. Indeed, the Southeast Asian nation has only submitted (unsuccessfully) once before, way back in 1994. For their second time at bat, Cambodia has opted for Chhay Bora’s “Lost Loves,” which is reportedly the country’s first film about the genocidal Khmer Rouge regime in over two decades.

The backstory of “Lost Loves,” as detailed in this Guardian piece, is an interesting one. Screenwriter-star (and Khmer Rouge survivor) Khauv Sotheary is a 47 year-old university professor who was inspired to make a film about her own mother’s experience of the regime in the 1970s, during which she lost her husband, father and four children. Though a novice actress, Sotheary took the role of her mother, while fellow academic Chhay Bora, who also lost family members to the Khmer Rouge, directed. 

Reviews of the film from known sources are hard to come by — it hasn’t played any festivals outside Asia — and a clumsily-cut, heavily overscored trailer clearly doesn’t do it any favors. But it looks crisply shot and potentially rather moving — it’s certainly the kind of story voters could respond to if told with the requisite polish.

Meanwhile, as mentioned above, a few more countries have announced shortlists of films vying to be submitted — including three that, in recent years, have been regular nominees in the category. Two of Germany’s eight potential submissions are documentaries: after all, they submitted “Pina” last year and cracked the Academy’s nine-film shortlist. The most high-profile title on their list, however, is Christian Petzold’s excellent Stasi-era character drama “Barbara,” which greatly impressed me at the Berlinale, where it deservedly won the Best Director prize. It’d be a strong submission, though among the films it’s up against is “Hotel Lux,” a politically-tinged WWII comedy. So it’s anyone’s guess.

Israel, as usual, will submit the Best Picture winner at the Ophir Awards, their local Oscars: I’m unfamiliar with the five contenders, save for Rama Burshtein’s “Fill the Void,” which will premiere in Competition at the upcoming Venice Film Festival. Finally, Mexico’s shortlist of seven possibilities includes two Cannes prizewinners. They’d be out of their minds to submit Carlos Reygadas’s off-puttingly indulgent non-narrative scrapbook effort “Post Tenebras Lux,” with fleshy mass orgies and self-decapitation among its many treats; “After Lucia,” an acclaimed study of high-school bullying that was a surprise winner of the Un Certain Regard award, would be a wiser choice.  

Alright, make some room. Another potential Oscar play has joined the party.

We’ve been speculating for some time that either Sacha Gervasi’s “Hitchcock” (Fox Searchlight), Scott Cooper’s “Out of the Furnace” (Relativity) or Gus Van Sant’s “Promised Land” (Focus) could be last-minute additions to the season. Gervasi’s film, it appears, is sticking with a 2013 launch, while Cooper’s — which came *this* close to peeking out this year — will hold off as well.

But Focus has just announced that Van Sant’s film, from a screenplay by Matt Damon and John Krasinski (based on a story by author Dave Eggers), will indeed hit the ground running in 2012. The film, starring Damon and Krasinski, along with Frances McDormand, Rosemarie DeWitt and Hal Holbrook, will miss the festival circuit but it’s set for release New York and Los Angeles on December 28.

The film’s star writers play rivals in the film. According to a synopsis, Damon’s character is “Steve Butler, a corporate salesman who arrives in a rural town with his sales partner, (McDormand). With the town having been hit hard by the economic decline of recent years, the two outsiders see the local citizens as likely to accept their company”s offer, for drilling rights to their properties, as much-needed relief. What seems like an easy job for the duo becomes complicated by the objection of a respected schoolteacher (Holbrook) with support from a grassroots campaign led by another man (Krasinski) who counters Steve both personally and professionally.”

Though there is some debate over how “issue-driven” the film may be, some of this could be a bit of a personal thing for Damon, on some level. The actor co-founded water.org, a clean water initiative driving new solutions and financing models to create lasting change for the global water and sanitation problem. The BFCA awarded him the Joel Siegel Award in 2011 for his humanitarian work in that field.

While water.org’s efforts have mostly been focused on areas like Africa, South Asia and Central America, there is nevertheless concern over reported contamination in drinking water here in the United States as a result of “fracking,” the process illuminated by Josh Fox’s Oscar-nominated 2010 documentary “GasLand.” And it’s that very issue that looks to be front and center in “Promised Land.” (A sequel to “GasLand” is due out this fall.)

The entire fracking debate really took off two years ago, and Hollywood seemed to be ground zero for much of the rhetoric. Movie stars like Mark Ruffalo joined the cause, and if Van Sant’s film hits the right note, it could be the kind of thing that makes Academy members feel like they’re actually doing something with their vote.

Focus already has Wes Anderon’s “Moonrise Kingdom,” Joe Wright’s “Anna Karenina” and Roger Michell’s “Hyde Park on Hudson” to play with this year, but this move seems to indicate that they have something even stronger on their hands. We shall see.

Van Sant, meanwhile, has experienced a roller-coaster relationship with awards season. His last film, “Restless,” was largely dismissed, but just three years prior his Harvey Milk biopic “Milk” was lighting up the circuit. Of course, the first time he teamed with Damon was 1997’s “Good Will Hunting,” which scooped up nine Oscar nominations and two wins. But then there was 2000’s “Finding Forrester,” widely considered cloying and formulaic (yet, somehow, not an Oscar player), and 2002’s “Gerry,” which most would agree was too esoteric to have ever appealed to the Academy demographic.

Personally, I think he has one of the most interesting portfolios in the business. And he’s at the top of his game when he finds a sweet spot between accessibility and artful bravery. You can’t pigeonhole him, and he never fails to find a new direction.

What will that direction be for “Promised Land?” We’ll find out sooner than we originally expected.

The BFI London Film Festival has enjoyed mixed fortunes with its opening night slot in recent years. They lucked out in 2008 and 2009, securing highly anticipated world premieres in “Frost/Nixon” and “Fantastic Mr. Fox,” attracting unprecedented international media attention to a festival that had never been noted for such publicity coups: its chief purpose, after all, is to bring the highlights of Cannes, Venice, Toronto and the like to local film buffs who don’t have the luxury of festival-trotting for a living.

It was an exciting development, but it couldn’t last: for the last two years, former LFF director Sandra Hebron kicked off the festival with films that had already premiered in Toronto. And while “Never Let Me Go” was a respectable choice — if a bit on the glum side for curtain-raising duties — last year’s choice of Fernando Meirelles’s dismal, critically savaged “360” (which only recently slumped in and out of US and UK cinemas) was calamitous.  

In that respect, Hebron set her Australian successor, Clare Stewart, a pretty low bar to clear. Happily, one needn’t have seen “Frankenweenie” to know that she’s done so pretty comfortably.

It was announced this morning that the Tim Burton’s monochrome 3D stop-motion comedy will be doing the honors on October 10, and even if it isn’t a world premiere (Fantastic Fest gets that privilege in late September, at least setting a shorter window than if it were a Toronto title), it’s a suitably high-profile get that also complies with the unwritten rule that a festival opener should be at least a little bit fun. Meanwhile, in an unprecedented move, the Opening Night film will be screened at 30 cinemas across the city, allowing more ticket-buyers to share in the festivities. Says Stewart:

Funny, dark and whimsical, this gloriously crafted, stop-motion 3D animation from Tim Burton – the reigning prince of outsiders – playfully turns the Frankenstein story on its bolted-on head. Frankenweenie is a perfect choice of opener – it”s a film about the magic of movies from one of cinema”s great visionaries. Tim Burton has chosen London as his home city and hundreds of talented British craftspeople have contributed to this production. To host the European Premiere, to present The Art of Frankenweenie Exhibition and to take our Opening Night out to 30 screens means we are making the Festival even more accessible for film fans across the UK.

Stewart previously energized the Sydney Film Festival, significantly raising its public profile. Bubbly and no-bullshit, she’s a markedly different personality from the widely beloved Hebron, her programming reputedly characterized by a sense of humor and a popular touch. Both seem evident in the choice of “Frankenweenie,” which will be looking to kick off the London fest on the same cheerily skew-whiff note that fellow stop-motion feature “Fantastic Mr. Fox” did three years ago. (The film has already been screening for critics; I haven’t seen it myself yet, but I hear positive murmurings from colleagues.)

Prior to the news of the opening film, two significant announcements had already been made regarding changes to the festival under Stewart’s steerage. First, by running from 10 to 21 October, the LFF is going to be four days shorter than usual, with screenings spread around more venues in different corners of London — a simultaneous concentration and dispersion strategy designed to heighten public awareness. Second, the former, geographically-based strands of the programme (European Cinema, British Cinema, etc) are to be replaced by more abstract, emotionally-themed ones — Love, Dare, Debate and the like.

Both innovations have met with resistance in some quarters, though I sympathise with the newcomer’s position. Unlike, say, recently appointed Edinburgh Film Festival head Chris Fujiwara, who took on a festival that had effectively been run into the ground by misguided administrators and required rebuilding from scratch, Stewart has inherited a well-liked, well-oiled machine from Hebron. It would be easy to continue running it in the same fashion, but any new director should want to make the festival their own to some extent; even at this early stage, Stewart is making her presence felt. I’m looking forward to seeing what she has up her sleeve when the full London programme is announced on September 5.

As for “Frankenweenie,” getting to open both Fantastic Fest and the rather more august London Film Festival makes for a nice pair of feathers in its cap, lending it credibility both with the genre crowd and the cinephile contingent. After the dreary one-two of “Alice in Wonderland” and “Dark Shadows,” could this be the film that makes us like Tim Burton again? And in a Best Animated Feature Oscar race that still has no clear frontrunner, could this double shot of festival publicity — sandwiching its October 5 release date Stateside — give it the necessary edge? 

It may still be gloriously summery — where I am, at least — but I’m feeling an intangible autumnal chill this week, as the upcoming prestige-movie season, and all the awards talk that comes with it, looms ever larger. Venice kicks off the fall festival circuit in exactly one week’s time, I’m attending screenings with embargoes signed in blood, and every day seems to bring another new poster, trailer, clip or press release for a film with the O-word on its mind. (Yesterday’s announcement of the Golden Globes voting schedule just about had me burying my head under the couch cushions, begging for another few months of sun.)

Today, then, marks the first move in the marketing campaign for “Lincoln” — a sober monochrome one-sheet that quite clearly establishes, in case you thought otherwise, that Steven Spielberg’s presidential biopic (and sight-unseen Oscar threat) won’t be reframing Honest Abe’s life story as a romantic comedy. It’s not a terribly inspired poster, though I suppose it carries the requisite gravitas — between the shot of Daniel Day-Lewis’s artfully made-up profile and the grainily etched black and white of the imagery, it recalls nothing so much as a weathered penny coin in its iconography. That’s surely no accident.

What the poster really announces, however, is that a trailer can’t be far off. “Lincoln” will be, by my count, the last of the presumed year-end heavyweights to reveal so much as a shred of footage, even though it’ll beat many of them into theaters with its early November release date. Whether Spielberg has a “Schindler’s List” or an “Amistad” on his hands here is, at this stage, anyone’s guess, but in this age of chronic overmarketing, there’s a lot to be said for keeping things under your hat.

What do you make of the poster? Where does “Lincoln” rank on your most-anticipated list? Share your thoughts in the comments.

After a divided reception at May’s Cannes Film Festival (and a UK release earlier this summer), David Cronenberg’s “Cosmopolis” finally opened for New York and Los Angeles audiences on Friday. On Friday, meanwhile, it opens wide, exposing itself itself to hordes of Robert Pattinson fanatics who might well find themselves baffled by Cronenberg’s (or rather Don DeLillo’s) chilly, talky, unapologetically freeze-dried essay on the alienation of the One Per Cent. They’ll do anything for love, those Twi-hards, but I’m not sure they’ll do that. 

The Pattinson fans that decide to give it a skip, however, will ironically be missing their idol’s best screen work to date. Many sneered when it was announced that the veteran director would be working with the modern matinee idol, not an actor yet treasured for immense range — but his pinched, low-temperature charisma has found its perfect manipulator in Cronenberg, a director who has seemingly always been as interested in a star’s physique as their technique. In my review of “Cosmopolis,” I noted “the effectively slippery [energy] inherent in Pattinson”s compellingly blank screen presence,” which perhaps sounds more backhanded than I intended; it’s harder than it looks to play a cypher. 

Pattinson’s is the latest in a long line of impressive, slightly (well, sometimes very) off-kilter characterizations in Cronenberg films, so it seemed apt this week to make the director the focus of one of our performance-themed lists. That Cronenberg isn’t routinely spoken of as an “actor’s director” says a lot more about our sometimes narrowly literal definitions of performance-driven cinema than his own generosity to his actors. In my interview with him last year about his psychoanalysis-themed drama “A Dangerous Method,” he offered the following perspective: 

“As a director, I”m most interested in photographing the human face talking. So I don”t think of lots of words as being automatically theatrical at all. I think of it as being essentially cinematic. A car chase is a car chase, and it”s not that interesting after a while. But an incredible face saying incredible words is, to me, the essence of cinema.”

Even when the films aren’t as wordy and star-oriented as “A Dangerous Method” or “Cosmopolis,” however, Cronenberg’s oeuvre consists of one performance vehicle after another, many of them dependent on expert actors’ agile changeability to carry their concerns of physical and psychological mutation, and occasional doubling — whether between personalities, species or characters entire. (Jeremy Irons, Judy Davis and Miranda Richardson have all taken on multi-headed roles in his films.) The word “corporeal” doesn’t flavor most Academic discussions of Cronenberg’s work for nothing, after all. 

Below, then, I’ve listed the 10 performances from Cronenberg’s filmography — only one of them Oscar-nominated, which shows what some people know — that have most resonated with me over the years, and have also come to personalize that remote adjective, “Cronenbergian.” There were plenty to choose from, plenty of names I regretted leaving out. Did R.Pattz make the cut? Check out the gallery below to see, and have your own say in the comments.

This year’s New York Film Festival just keeps expanding. Yesterday it was revealed that anniversary screenings of “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs,” “Lawrence of Arabia” and “The Princess Bride” would be on the docket for the 50th annual, and today, it’s been revealed that, like Telluride and AFI Fest, NYFF has added a tribute element to its proceedings.

The first-ever honorees will be actress Nicole Kidman — whose film “The Paperboy,” from director Lee Daniels, was also added to the line-up today — and NYFF Selection Committee Chair & Program Director of the Film Society of Lincoln Center Richard Peña.

“Richard Peña has been the Program Director of the Film Society of Lincoln Center and the Director of the New York Film Festival since 1988,” the press release states. “At the Film Society, he has organized retrospectives of Michelangelo Antonioni, Sacha Guitry, Abbas Kiarostami, Robert Aldrich, Roberto Gavaldon, Ritwik Ghatak, Kira Muratova, Youssef Chahine, Yasujiro Ozu, Carlos Saura and Amitabh Bachchan, as well as major film series devoted to African, Israeli, Cuban, Polish, Hungarian, Arab, Korean, Swedish, Taiwanese and Argentine cinema.”

Said FSLC’s executive director Rose Kuo, “It is very fitting that we celebrate the 50th birthday of the New York Film Festival by honoring the man who has guided the festival’s artistic vision for the last 25 years. Richard Peña helped us discover directors like Pedro Almodovar, Abbas Kiarostami, Olivier Assayas, Lars Von Trier and Hou Hsiao-hsien, making an indelible contribution to film culture in New York City and around the world.”

Kidman, meanwhile, could maybe — MAYBE — be an awards season player for “The Paperboy.” The film premiered at Cannes in May to mixed — well, mostly negative — reactions. However, in noting that the film “straddles the line between trash and treat,” our own Guy Lodge said Kidman “is more sexually strident and earthily funny than she”s been since ‘To Die For,’ but in her subtly brokered exchanges with [co-star Zac] Efron smartly avoids patronizing [her character] as a gone-to-seed Lolita.” Millennium Entertainment picked the film up for US distribution.

Said Peña in today’s press release, “Nicole Kidman is one of film’s finest contemporary actresses. Since her breakthrough performance in ‘To Die For’ and her bold and provocative appearances in Lars Von Trier’s ‘Dogville,’ Stanley Kubrick’s ‘Eyes Wide Shut,’ as well as her awarding-winning portrayal of Virginia Woolf in Stephen Daldry’s ‘The Hours,’ Kidman has insisted on finding roles that are complex, bold and demanding.”

That seems to be a pattern continued with “The Paperboy,” which I’m happy was added to the slate. I’ve been intrigued ever since those boos emanated from The Croisette.

The 50th annual New York Film Festival runs September 28 – October 14.

Three years ago Summit Entertainment surmounted considerable odds — a 17-month viewing window, a Goliath “game changer,” low box office numbers that became the story — to claim the Best Picture prize for Kathryn Bigelow’s “The Hurt Locker.” It was a pretty significant moment. The house that “Twilight” built had secured the industry’s highest honor.

Things have changed a bit since then. Obviously, the biggest event has been Lionsgate’s acquisition of the company, which yielded plenty of personnel changes. But in the frame of awards season, Summit has been there when it had the goods. Last year brought “50/50,” a near-Oscar player that had a good time at the Independent Spirit Awards, and summer release “A Better Life,” which brought a surprising Best Actor nomination for star Demián Bichir. This year, they have another one-two punch, a pair of films that couldn’t be more different but that nevertheless showcase strong directorial voices.

Both Juan Antonio Bayona’s “The Impossible” and Stephen Chbosky’s “The Perks of Being a Wallflower” will be playing the Toronto Film Festival in a few weeks, and they could emerge as Oscar season stories when the dust settles. The former, from a Guillermo Del Toro-mentored horror maestro, tells the story of one family’s plight during the Boxing Day tsunami of 2004. The latter, from an author-turned-director, is a coming-of-age yarn full of damaged high-schoolers told against a brisk Pittsburgh backdrop.

Like I said — the two films couldn’t be more different. But that’s part of what makes their strong visions so exciting.

Bayona’s genre sensibilities make for such an intriguing filter for “The Impossible” that I was often exhilarated at some of the things he was trying. The emotion of the film is considerable, depicting a family of five being viciously separated during the tsunami and desperately trying to find their way back to one another under the most extreme of circumstances.

Naomi Watts shines as a woman under duress throughout, flashes of primal motherly instinct and tender vulnerability making for quite the opportunity. Ewan McGregor doesn’t get as many chances to strike such notes, but when he does, he makes them count. And a trio of child actors — Oaklee Pendergast, Samuel Joslin and particularly Tom Holland — are quite moving as well.

Beyond that, though, the craft on display is noteworthy. In particular, the sound design is just stunning. Every element of the tsunami sequence is more riveting and terrifying than the last, while makeup employed to depict its shattering effects is realistic and impressive. Bayona navigates all these different strands well and, crucially, brings his own voice to the proceedings in fresh ways.

Chbosky, meanwhile, takes the big plunge himself on the film version of his beloved novel “The Perks of Being a Wallflower.” It’s a risky move, both for the artist and the financiers (even with 1995’s “The Four Corners of Nowhere” under his belt), but it’s a bit surprising how confident and authoritative Chbosky is as a visual storyteller.

The real story of the film is Logan Lerman, who is an absolute revelation and deserves his own post (which he will get soon enough). But co-stars Ezra Miller (fantastic), Emma Watson and Mae Whitman, among others, help round out an impressive ensemble of youngsters in a unique if still somewhat familiar take on the genre.

But, again, it’s Chbosky’s deft handling of the narrative and how it unfolds that is truly surprising. Of course, he knows the material intimately. And he’s clearly had this movie in his head for some time. But having it in your head and executing it are two very different things.

Of course, neither film is perfect. “The Impossible” flirts with repetition, “Perks” with cliche. But it’s the directorial visions that stand out. I guess that’s what I keep coming back to.

So I’d say Summit has an exciting pair of hopefuls on its hands. Three years after winning the big one, maybe one or both of these strikingly different films can strike the right emotional chord and find some Academy love. “Perks” will hit theaters just a few short weeks after its Toronto bow (September 21), “The Impossible” three months later (December 21), right in the thick of the season — and just a few days before the eighth anniversary of the disaster.

This is just one guy’s opinion, though. It’ll take a chorus out of Toronto to help get the films there. Let’s see if it comes.

Check out the new trailer for “The Impossible” below, which debuted at Apple yesterday.

Whenever the conversation about potential new categories at the Academy Awards rolls around among award geeks, a Best Casting prize (generally in tandem with one for Best Ensemble) will usually be one of the first suggestions. It’s a worthy idea, but one that — like the oft-suggested category for stunt work — I fear would prove useless in practice. Casting may be one of the most vital contributions to the filmmaking process, but I doubt most laymen would be able to discern what it actually entails. They struggle enough with sound editing without having to judge off-screen disciplines too.

I strongly suspect an Oscar category for Best Casting would just wind up dully adding to the laurels of sundry Best Picture winners, brilliantly cast or otherwise. You might expect the Casting Society of America’s awards to take a different tack, but no: despite landing far outside awards season, the nominations for their Artios Awards check off most of the same 2011 contenders all the other guilds did seven months ago, with a few 2012 early birds thrown in for good measure.

So, just when you thought they couldn’t be rewarded any further, Oscar winners/nominees “The Artist,” “The Descendants,” “The Help,” “Moneyball,” “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo,” “My Week With Marilyn” and “The Ides of March” are all back for more. The most notable 2012 film to crack the list is “The Hunger Games,” which slots into the Big Budget Feature: Drama category in place of, say, “Hugo” or “War Horse.” It’s a small victory, but seeing it alongside four 2011 Oscar players does forge a certain mental connection: with nothing else on its slate, could Lionsgate run a serious awards campaign for its springtime blockbuster? (Also, I don’t know when the eligibility cut-off date was, but “The Avengers” surely missed out in the Comedy category.)

Still, I can’t help but wonder if these are really the most ingeniously cast films of the last 12 months or so. Is there no professional admiration for the eerily remarkable child casting in “We Need to Talk About Kevin,” or the meticulous perfectionism applied to both star roles and background faces in “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy?” What do I know? Anyway, the awards take place on October 29: bet you didn’t think “The Artist” would still be winning stuff then.

Full list of film nominees:

Big Budget Feature: ­Drama
“The Descendants,” John Jackson, John McAlary (Associate), Andy Henry (Associate), Yesi Ramirez (Associate)
“The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo,” Laray Mayfield
“The Help,” Kerry Barden, Paul Schnee 
“The Hunger Games,” Debra Zane, Jackie Burch (Location Casting)
“Moneyball,” Francine Maisler, Lauren Grey (Associate)

Big Budget Feature:­ Comedy
“21 Jump Street,” Jeanne McCarthy, Nicole Abellera, Elizabeth Coulon, (Location Casting), Yesi Ramirez (Associate)
“Crazy, Stupid, Love,” Mindy Marin, Kara Lipson (Associate)
“Horrible Bosses,” Lisa Beach, Sarah Katzman
“The Muppets,” Marcia Ross, Gail Goldberg, Brittainy Roberts (Associate)
“The Rum Diary,” Denise Chamian, Angela Demo (Associate)

­ Studio or Independent Feature: Drama
“Drive,” Mindy Marin, Kara Lipson (Associate)
“The Ides of March,” Ellen Chenoweth, Amelia McCarthy (Associate),
“Margin Call,” Bernard Telsey, Tiffany Little Canfield
“My Week With Marilyn,” Deborah Aquila, Tricia Wood, Nina Gold (Location Casting)
“Shame,” Avy Kaufman

­ Studio or Independent Feature: Comedy
“50/50,” Francine Maisler,
“The Artist,” Heidi Levitt, Michael Sanford (Associate)
“Friends With Kids,” Bernard Telsey, Tiffany Little Canfield, David Vaccari
“The Guard,” Jina Jay
“Hysteria,” Gaby Kester

Low Budget Feature:­ Comedy or Drama
“A Bag of Hammers,” Brad Gilmore
“Higher Ground,” Kerry Barden, Paul Schnee
“Like Crazy,” Eyde Belasco
“Martha Marcy May Marlene,” Susan Shopmaker
“Pariah,” Eyde Belasco

Animated Feature
“The Adventures of Tintin,” Jina Jay
“Cars 2,” Kevin Reher, Natalie Lyon
“Happy Feet Two,” Kristy Carlson

I don’t know what to write about Tony Scott. I saw the news late last night and the Twitter frenzy around it. Everyone, it seems, is so quick to have something to say in these instances. Armchair psychology, knee-jerk career analysis, etc. It’s to be expected but I usually just go a bit numb with something like this. Scott is one of the biggest names in this industry to take his leave and, well, it’s just awful. And not for Tony, really. For the wife and two kids he left behind.

I was going to offer up the usual “we don’t know why these things happen” line, but it’s now being reported that Scott recently learned he had inoperable brain cancer. “If true and Tony was terminal, then he died as he lived: Full blown, full speed and down to the very last second,” director Joe Carnahan, who has been on a tear about what Scott has meant to him, Tweeted recently.

It would certainly help make some sense of this. Scott had a flourishing career, and not just as a director. (UPDATE: The report of inoperable brain cancer has been debunked by autopsy.) Scott Free Productions (which he headed up with brother Ridley) is a major force in the industry, both on the big and small screen. But, obviously, career is not everything. Maybe we’ll know what’s in those notes one day, maybe we won’t. But a distinctive voice is gone, as is a husband, a father, a friend and a colleague.

The custom is to immediately shine a light on the work. Around here, we use the awards season as a way into discussing movies. And Tony didn’t have a lot of big screen luck there. His work as producer of TV movies like “The Gathering Storm” and series like “The Good Wife” found Emmy love, but his theatrical work was always relegated to the below-the-line elements.

It’s fitting, really, as so often it was the craftsmanship (though certainly stemming from directorial vision) of his films that stood out. The sound of “Unstoppable,” “Crimson Tide,” “Days of Thunder” and “Top Gun,” for instance, with film editing nods thrown in here and there.

Greg P. Russell was one of those craftsmen. He worked with Scott on films like “Days of Thunder,” “Crimson Tide,” “Enemy of the State,” “Spy Game” and “Deja Vu” as a sound re-recording mixer. “He was the most passionate and exciting director to mix for,” Russell told me. “He loved making movies and he embraced sound like no other. I will treasure my memories sitting at the console with Tony laughing and having the time of our lives. We always had a blast with Tone. My heart goes out to his family with my deepest condolences and we will all miss him very much.”

Fellow mixer Kevin O’Connell spent much of his career partnered up with Russell on projects, including a few of those mentioned above. “He was the best director I ever worked with,” O’Connell, who it should be said has also worked with filmmakers like Rob Reiner, Wolfgang Peterson, Michael Bay, Lawrence Kasden, Barry Sonnenfeld, Mel Gibson, Rob Marshall, Ron Howard and Michael Mann, told me this afternoon. “From ‘Top Gun’ to ‘Unstoppable,’ we always remained close friends. I will miss him greatly.”

Scott was also a big champion of rising talent, which is unfortunately rare in this cutthroat business. Coming back to Carnahan, who worked with Scott on “The A-Team” and this year’s “The Grey” he Tweeted, “I’ve been extremely fortunate in my career, a career I wouldn’t have without Tony Scott’s persistence, love and relentless support…Tony GAVE me my commercial career at a time when when the marquee should’ve said: ‘Films by Tony Scott, John Woo & Who The Fuck Is That Guy.'”

And perhaps my favorite nugget: “After [he] saw ‘The Grey’ I got this call, that familiar rasp. ‘Joe, it’s Tone, fuckin’ movie’s great man, don’t let ’em fuck it up, yeah?'”

Scott Free teamed up with Leonardo DiCaprio’s Appian Way production company recently to produce Scott Cooper’s “Crazy Heart” follow-up “Out of the Furnace.” It meant a lot to Cooper to have the protection of guys like that while he was out in Braddock, Pennsylvania taking a gamble on his second feature film, the one he knew could make or break his career. And he was, of course, rocked by the news.

To say nothing of what Scott’s taking on an up-and-coming writer’s script, “True Romance,” meant to a young Quentin Tarantino in the early 1990s. Scott’s legacy will be his encouragement as much as it will be his singular voice.

Beyond that, indeed, an entire industry is reeling. The Tweet collectives are out there to be found. The Hollywood Reporter has a decent one, full of all you’d expect: sadness.

Everyone picks favorites so I might as well spring for my own. “Top Gun” helped define a generation. It was, early on, one of those movies that stood out as bigger than the usual list of marquee titles at the theater. It hit the pop culture in a more significant way, and as a kid with an interest in movies, that kind of thing sticks with you. But I’ll spring for “The Last Boy Scout” and “Spy Game,” too, films often considered in line with Scott’s lesser work that I find to be somewhat under-appreciated. His swan song, “Unstoppable,” was an unexpected delight in 2010, I have to say. And “Crimson Tide” was probably his most complete film, a real treasure of that era.

Tony Scott was 68 years old. He is survived by his wife, Donna, and their twin sons, Frank and Max.

With screenings of Paul Thomas Anderson’s “The Master” suddenly popping up all over the place — to the consternation, I believe, of Venice festival brass, who usually secure world premiere slots for their Competition titles — Terrence Malick’s “To the Wonder” stands as the greatest unwrapped enigma of the fall festival season. Typically for the publicity-shy director, details of the narrative and stylistic construction of his latest have been spare. There’s been no trailer. No poster, either. And while a single still has been floating around online for over a year, no others have joined it to show us what visual poetry Emmanuel Lubezki might have up his sleeve this time round.

We’ve known for some time that “To the Wonder” — the first film of Malick’s career with a more or less contemporary setting — is a romance of sorts, centering around a reunion between childhood friends Ben Affleck and Rachel McAdams. The synopsis from production company FilmNation offers a few more specifics — as well as an explanation of the film’s only superficially oblique title — that suggests the autobiographical urges that propelled last year’s “The Tree of Life” may once more be at play here.

The synopsis reads:

After visiting Mont Saint-Michel – once known in France as the Wonder – at the height of their love, Marina (Olga Kurylenko) and Neil (Ben Affleck) come to Oklahoma, where problems soon arise. Marina makes the acquaintance of a priest and fellow exile (Javier Bardem), who is struggling with his vocation, while Neil renews his ties with a childhood friend, Jane (Rachel McAdams). An exploration of love in its many forms.

Over at Hollywood Elsewhere, Jeff Wells has been joining the dots between the skeleton of the blurb and the thrice-married Malick’s own romantic past — in particular, the dissolution of his second marriage to Frenchwoman Michele Morette. Shortly after divorcing Morette in 1998, Malick married Alexandra Wallace, whom he had allegedly previously known and dated when they were both students at St. Stephen’s Episcopal School in Austin, Texas.

Clearly, it doesn’t take a genius to deduce that Malick hasn’t conjured this story out of thin air, but Wells’ assertion that the evident autobiographical parallels are “ironic given his mania for privacy” don’t really fly when you consider at once how much and how little Malick revealed of his childhood in “The Tree of Life,” which evokes his own small-town adolescence in Waco, Texas, addresses his conflicted relationship with his own domineering father and pivots on the death of a brother — Malick’s younger brother, Larry, committed suicide as a young man, having earlier broken his own hands to end his music career.

Still, you’d be hard pressed to call the film particularly open or confessional: the memories are there, but scrambled, amid larger, less intimate musings on the natural and spiritual words. I imagine “To the Wonder” will take a similarly indirect, outwardly mirroring approach; personal catharsis seems of less interest to Malick than universalization.

I don’t think it’s particularly ironic for a private artist to use his personal history as a creative springboard, when he’s the one who gets to ration, contextualize and even disguise it for our interpretation: Venice director Alberto Barbera has remarked that Malick’s latest is characterised by a “main recurring theme [of] crisis — the economic crisis, which is having devastating social effects, but also the crisis of values, the political crisis.” Wells professes bafflement at this possibility, but it seems to be expected that a film drawn from Terrence Malick’s romantic past would be about most things but Terrence Malick’s romantic past. I’m reminded of a lovely quote from Niles Schwartz’s excellent essay on “The Tree of Life” in The Point, in which he suggests the actual motive of Malick’s supposedly personal filmmaking: 

Malick”s Song of Himself is also a Song to our Selves, and to the Great Self. We are imprisoned, shackled, encaged in modernity”s forms and banal tropes, in our lives and in our arts and entertainments. But Malick wants to take us home, where our masks fall off and wash away in the collective ocean. That bridge that ends the picture is a modern Jacob”s Ladder, designed to carry us back before the accidents of being-in-the-world that make us what we appear to be in Time. At the end of Malick”s journey, we encounter ourselves, and in ourselves, we see everyone else.

I’ll be seeing “To the Wonder” at Venice in exactly 13 days’ time. I can hardly wait.

I’m not really sure what’s left to be said in the great film vs. digital debate, but if nothing else, Christopher Kenneally’s “Side by Side” brings things to a head nicely as it represents the layman’s way into the discussion. These things always reach broader consideration last and no film, to date, has been as thorough and definitive as this.

A year after “Hugo” brought concepts of film preservation into a narrative fold and fed a meta fire throughout a season very much about Hollywood and the history of cinema, the debate rages on. That film’s director, Martin Scorsese, the great protector of celluloid, appears to be throwing in the towel, while recent pop-up screenings (with one more still to come) of Paul Thomas Anderson’s “The Master,” shot on 65mm, doubled as a benefit for Scorsese’s film preservation-dedicated Film Foundation. These are very divided, even contradictory times.

Partly that’s what makes “Side by Side” so interesting. It never takes sides. It uses the thoughts and considerations of today’s filmmaking talent — a wide swath including Scorsese, George Lucas, David Fincher, Steven Soderbergh, Danny Boyle, Richard Linklater, James Cameron, Christopher Nolan and David Lynch, as well as cinematographers such as Michael Ballhaus, Anthony Dod Mantle, Dick Pope and Wally Pfister — to convey a watershed moment in history.

And it doesn’t pigeonhole their opinions, either. None of these guys are putting on blinders and ignoring the big picture. They know the pros and cons of each philosophy better than probably anyone, and to hear them wax on about it is indeed required viewing for film fans.

There is a healthy debate to be had about the photochemical process being at its end and, therefore, the need to grow and advance the digital process, as well as the dangers of a digital Dark Ages where content is lost to the obsolescence of technology while celluloid remains the best form of preservation. And this film has that debate. It hangs it all out there without deigning to aim for an answer.

But most riling to me in the film is when discussion among celluloid proponents leans toward a gatekeeper, keys-to-the-kingdom mentality. The sense that digital has sparked an anyone-can-do-it revolution clearly chafes for some of these people. Indeed, one of the most annoying comments of the entire film — I forget the talking head — was, “There isn’t a taste-maker involved.” Producer/narrator/interviewer Keanu Reeves’s “wow” in response was the nice way of putting it.

So we move into another season that could certainly keep the debate sparked. Films representing a wide range of celluloid like “The Master” (70mm*), “The Dark Knight Rises” (IMAX) and “Beasts of the Southern Wild” (16mm) will square off against equally diverse digital offerings like “Life of Pi” (Arri Alexa), “Flight” (Red Epic) and “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” (Red Epic). Great DPs like Roger Deakins (“Skyfall”) will move further into the digital realm after getting their toes wet only recently, while others will continue to dig in and stick with the film process they feel is superior.

It’s an exciting time in the history of cinema. And no one has the answers. Perhaps that’s precisely what makes it so exciting.

“Side by Side” is now playing in limited release. It hits Video On Demand on August 22.

*Some have expressed confusion over the 65mm/70mm thing, so if you’re one of those, it’s as simple as this: A 70mm production is shot on 65mm film. It is exhibited in 70mm. The extra 5mm is for the soundtrack.

It’s been a while, but welcome (back) to Cinejabber, your weekend space to spill whatever film-related thoughts are on your mind.

For me, it’s still the Sight & Sound poll — the gift that keeps giving. Or taking, perhaps: it’s certainly vacuumed up far too much of my free time. Just as the analyses and arguments over the Top 100 announced at the start of the month had begun to dissipate, the conversation was re-juiced when they released the full results online, cross-referencing all 846 individual Top 10 lists from the critics’ poll contributors. I already revealed my list on these pages last week again, but here it is in Sight & Sound format, with additional commentary.

Just last night, Kris was bemoaning the lack of a single vote for Sidney Lumet’s “Network.” It’s one of several high-profile (and Oscar-guzzling) American films — ranging from “Schindler’s List” to “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” to “The Silence of the Lambs” — that don’t feature at all in a pile of over 2000 titles that does include such timeless classics as “Hitman,” “Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest” and “The Sapphires.” (Okay, I like one of those. But, well, you know.) I like these odd anomalies, a sign of a list built by unconnected individuals rather than a committee, though not everyone is equally amused.

Anyway, the absence of a once-lauded and award-showered film like “Schindler’s List” got me thinking about just how differently a critics’ poll like this and the Academy’s own list of champions reflect on cinema history. It’s hardly headline news that critics and Oscar voters rarely agree on the best film of a given year, least of all after a few decades have passed. And it has already been noted by other awards pundits just how little correlation there is between the S&S list and the Academy’s hall of fame.

Give or take “Sunrise,” the highest-ranking Best Picture winner on the poll is “The Godfather” in 21st place, while you can count the number of others in Top 250 (“The Godfather Part II,” “Lawrence of Arabia,” “Casablanca,” “Annie Hall,” “The Apartment,” “Gone With the Wind” and “All About Eve”) on your fingers, with change. (Compare that to 38 in the IMDb Top 250 — the only place where people still seem to rate “A Beautiful Mind” — and perhaps the Academy isn’t as out of touch with the general public as everyone says they are.) 

So, does that make those eight films the least arguable Best Picture winners of all time? Of course not. “Gone With the Wind” and “All About Eve” both beat films ranked higher than them in the S&S list (“The Wizard of Oz” and “Sunset Blvd.,” respectively). And “Lawrence of Arabia” and “The Apartment” both placed behind unnominated films from the same year. Which leaves “Annie Hall,” “Casablanca” and the two “Godfather” films as the only four Best Picture winners that the critical collective — as measured by one magazine, at any rate — truly thinks the Academy got right.

What does it all mean? Well, aside from the fact that I haven’t been sleeping well lately and have therefore had plenty of time to figure this out, not much.

What’s on your mind this weekend? Tell us below.

I kept looking through the “N-O” section. Surely I missed it. Is there a “next page” link? No. Am I in the right…no, I’m not on the wrong page. I’m in the “all films” section. Let me search by director, for the Lumet films. There’s “Dog Day Afternoon.” There’s “Night Falls on Manhattan.” There’s “12 Angry Men.” One vote each. Maybe it’s a glitch. Only three Lumet films? I’m getting side-tracked.

Finally it just settled: 846 top 10 lists from correspondents in 73 countries citing 2,045 different films, and not one of them — not a single one — thought 1976’s “Network” deserved a mention. “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End” gets to call itself one of the lot, but not one of the greatest films of all time, indeed, the greatest screenplay of all time.

Are…you…f***ing…kidding…me?

My feelings on Lumet’s film have been conveyed. They don’t really matter, though. Here’s a film that — okay, let’s get it out of the way, even if it is an indicator of nothing — nailed down 10 Oscar nominations, including five in the acting arena. Wins for Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actress and Best Original Screenplay. So, you know, it’s not exactly obscure (though maybe that would have helped it).

“Seems to me that Sight & Sound has a kind of technocratic thing going for it,” a Twitter follower suggested earlier tonight. “‘Network’ was a triumph of writing more than form.”

Come again? Isn’t a triumph a triumph? And what, was it not mannered enough? Not overt enough? Not enough of a stylistic stroke? Maybe that’s what held Lumet’s work back on the whole. He was, in his time and anyone else’s, one of the finest filmmakers to give it a go. But his style was to get out of the way, to an extent. Nevertheless, it was always about crisp, focused visual storytelling.

“There are some films that are specific to the American narrative that don’t resonate the same way,” said another (Awards Daily’s Sasha Stone, in fact). Okay, but not one AMERICAN critic could go there? Not that I believe that a prescient treatise on the entertainmentization of news media is a strictly American consideration, mind you. I don’t.

Oh, and by the way, Lumet wrote what is widely considered one of the best books on the “form” that there is. This, I’m sorry, won’t do.

But I guess it will have to. Not that there should be cause for shock. It was even worse for Lumet in 2002, when not a single critic sprung for his work. Maybe he was too far out of critical favor at that time. Or maybe he, as I think happened throughout his career, was taken for granted. But here is a guy who was doing it until he dropped dead, and he went out with a bang. He was impressive enough to pop up twice on my own top 10 of all time, so that’ll have to do for me. (And “Network” also showed up on Drew’s list, so there’s that. But we weren’t polled, so…)

Anyway, here’s hoping the filmmakers’ poll will be a little more considerate of Lumet’s contribution to the “form” when it’s ultimately revealed. But I don’t know. They didn’t come out for him 10 years ago, either.

I’m surprised it’s taken this long for me to have to write one of these posts — international submissions for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar usually start trickling through in July or so. So expect a lot more of these announcements before the October 1 deadline for submissions. We’ll be keeping track of them — or doing our best to, as they begin flooding in in the thick of festival season — on our Contenders page for the category.

Anyway, Morocco is first out of the gate this year, having selected Faouzi Bensaidi’s socially-minded thriller “Death for Sale” as their best hope for awards glory. Perhaps the country’s selectors are feeling a little more confident, having unexpectedly cracked the nine-film longlist for the first time back in January with the under-the-radar prison drama “Omar Killed Me,” and therefore having come tantalizingly close to their first Oscar nomination. Not a prolific film industry by any means, Morocco has only entered the race eight times since 1977.

For those of you who don’t know the drill in this eternally tricky category, here’s how it works. Rather than selecting the Best Foreign Language Film nominees from the year’s eligible releases in the US, as is the system in all other feature film categories (including, as of this year, Best Documentary Feature), the Academy instead invites all countries to independently submit one film to represent their industry in the race. It needn’t be a 2012 release in the US — though it does have to have been released in its home country at some point in the 12 months preceding the October 1 deadline.

It’s a system designed to level the playing field between modest film-producing nations like, say, Morocco and world cinema powerhouses like France, though it has its own problems. All too often, local politics and committee mentality conspire to prevent countries submitting their most exciting or most internationally acclaimed films: as in 2002, when Spain chose the pleasant but minor “Mondays in the Sun” ahead of Almodovar’s masterful “Talk To Her,” which wound up winning the Best Original Screenplay Oscar. Sometimes, however, a counter-intuitive pick pays off: eyebrows were raised last year when Belgium slighted the Dardennes’ Cannes favorite “The Kid With a Bike” for the far bleaker “Bullhead,” but their tough-sit selection wound up on the final nominee list.

Once the submissions list has been finalised in October, the Academy begins formally screening all the contenders to volunteer voters in the category: it’s at this stage that you can begin to hear rumblings about what’s really impressing them. In January, the top six vote-getters from the branch voters are joined by a further three picks from a smaller executive committee — designed to rescue worthy but less broadly appealing films that might have slipped through the cracks in the initial voting. From this official longlist of nine, the branch then votes again to determine the final five nominees.

It is, year after year, a category with no safe bets whatsoever: for every winner like “A Separation” that seems predestined, there’s another critical and/or festival darling that fails to impress voters as much as something far less celebrated. (Hello, Academy Award winner “Departures.”) So, at this stage, Morocco has as good a chance as any of making the grade, even if “Death for Sale” was hardly a talking point at the Berlin Film Festival back in February, where it premiered. (I confess this is the first I’ve heard of it.)

Bensaidi’s film is apparently a politically-tinged noir, centering on a petty thief who turns police informant to free his prostitute girlfriend from prison, only to fall in with old underworld acquaintances for one last heist. Reviews at Berlin were encouraging rather than ecstatic: Variety’s Alissa Simon wrote that the film’s “gripping realistic digressions… make for far more compelling viewing than the stylized noir theatrics.” It did, however, win the CICAE Award in Berlin’s Panorama strand, and will pop up again in Toronto.

One country that has a stronger on-paper case for a nomination than most is Denmark — yesterday, the country announced their shortlist of three possible submissions, and their selectors are spoilt for choice between three very Academy-friendly propositions: Susanne Bier’s “Love Is All You Need,” Bille August’s “The Passion of Marie” and Nikolaj Arcel’s “A Royal Affair” (already on release in the States).

At first glance, the obvious choice would appear to be Bier. The internationally renowned director has brought her country its only two nominees in the category in over 20 years: “After the Wedding” in 2006, and “In a Better World” in 2010, which wound up taking the gold. Her latest, reportedly in a lighter, more comic vein than those earnest melodramas, underlines her crossover appeal (particularly to voters with less exotic tastes) with a cast that includes Pierce Brosnan and Paprika Steen. The film will premiere in a few weeks at the Venice Film Festival, where I’ll be sure to report on it.

Bier isn’t the only Oscar winner in the running, however: August won the prize in 1988 for “Pelle the Conqueror,” which led to an English-language career (trading in such Europuddings as “The House of the Spirits” and “Les Miserables”) that never quite caught fire. Five years after his flop Mandela drama “Goodbye Bafana,” he has finally returned to his home country for a period biopic, depicting the tempestuous romance between 19th-century Skagen painters Marie and Peder Severin Kroyer.  

As baity as that sounds, however, my hunch is that another historical biopic could be the one to watch: it may sound like rote corset porn, but “A Royal Affair,” for all its hoop-skirted splendor, is a surprisingly brisk and invigorating account of the love triangle between 18th-century Danish monarch King Christian VII, his queen and the court physician — played by Mads Mikkelsen. The film took critics by surprise at Berlin, where it wound up winning Best Screenplay and Best Actor for Mikkel Folsgaard, and his since done healthy arthouse business internationally. If selected, it’s easy to imagine voters warming to it, and it’s a dark horse to watch in the design categories as well.

The Danes won’t announce their final selection for another month, but I’m intrigued to see what shape of bait they opt for. (EDIT: A commenter below quite understandably asked why Thomas Vinterberg’s “The Hunt” — which was very well received at Cannes, and won the Best Actor prize for Mikkelsen — isn’t in the running. The answer, curiously enough, is that it’s only being released in Denmark in January 2013, months after other European territories get it, and therefore falls outside the eligibility window. It’s an unusual situation, but the film remains a strong possibility for next year’s submission.)

One of the first screenings I caught here in New York this week was Ben Lewin’s “The Sessions,” which I saw yesterday. The film debuted at Sundance (where it was called “The Surrogate”) to much acclaim and became an instant contender for Best Actor (John Hawkes) and Best Actress (Helen Hunt). William H. Macy’s supporting performance could also be a player.

It’s a very emotional film, ultimately, even if it gets there with a lighter touch. Much of that has to do with Hawkes’s fantastic performance, carving an endearing portrait of real-life polio sufferer Mark O’Brien. O’Brien was a Berkeley poet and journalist who spent the majority of his waking hours in an iron lung and, toward the end of his life, wanted to know the pleasure of being with a woman. But the film ends up being about way more than the physical joy of sex, navigating a path of spirituality and humanity toward that most important of life’s offerings: intimate human connection.

Hunt is great throughout, sporting her birthday suit bravely while traveling along a profound personal character arc, while Macy — the crux of much of the film’s interesting religious considerations — is a fine constant throughout. I would have liked a more dynamic edge to his character, however, maybe a few considerable moments that would have fleshed his character out more. But the story of the film is Hawkes, and I’ll join the chorus in believing he’s on course for a Best Actor nomination.

Hawkes’s recent history with Sundance has been intriguing. “The Sessions” was his third-straight premiere in Park City. The first of that run, “Winter’s Bone,” brought him a Best Supporting Actor nod and really threw him onto the radar for those who weren’t already aware of his considerable character actor capabilities.

And now, “The Sessions” brings him into leading man territory, finally. He’s so moving in the role, so real, and just so lovable. It could be an interesting race between him and his “Lincoln” co-star Daniel Day-Lewis this season.

It’s worth pointing out that Jessica Yu’s 1996 film about O’Brien, “Breathing Lessons: The Life and Work of Mark O’Brien,” took home the Oscar for Best Documentary Short. You can actually watch that, courtesy of Snag Films, at the bottom of this post.

“The film doesn’t build in some over-the-top manipulation in order to make its points, but instead focuses on the small details,” Drew McWeeny wrote of “The Sessions” out of Sundance in his measured review. “As a result, when it does pay off, it’s in a very organic way.”

Meanwhile, MSN Movies has debuted the first poster for the film. It plays heavily on light-hearted hues. I wouldn’t say it necessarily betrays the spirit of the movie (because Lewin — whose script is well-wrought — never bogs down in drama), but it does seem to represent a feeling that I didn’t really take from the film. I prefer the first attempt. Anyway, check the new one out below as well.

“The Sessions” plays the Toronto Film Festival next month. It opens in limited release on October 26.

Okay, so, I said it yesterday, but to reiterate: a busy week for NYFF. Robert Zemeckis’s “Flight,” Ang Lee’s “Life of Pi” and David Chase’s “Not Fade Away” have been tapped for big world premieres, and today, the full line-up has been unveiled by Film Society of Lincoln Center.

As usual, there are some Cannes carry-overs, chief among them Michael Haneke’s Palme d’Or-winning “Amour.” Also in the mix are Christian Mungiu’s “Beyond the Hills,” Leos Carax’s “Holy Motors” and Pablo Larrain’s “No,” among others.

Continuing along the fall festival circuit will be Brian De Palma’s “Passion” (already set for Toronto/Venice and a potential Telluride play, too), Noah Baumbach’s “Frances Ha” (set for Toronto) and Olivier Assayas’ “Something in the Air” (Venice). And there is another world premiere noted: Allan Berliner’s “First Cousin Once Removed.”

“The films making up the main slate of this year’s NYFF, have in common a general quality of fearlessness that unites otherwise very disparate works,” said Selection Committee Chair & Program Director of the Film Society of Lincoln Center Richard Peña via press release. “These are films that go all the way, works willing to take the risk or chance that by doing so they may be bringing audiences to places they might rather not go.”

Check out the full slate of offerings from the fest below.

Opening Night Gala Selection
“Life of Pi”
Director: Ang Lee
 
Centerpiece Gala Selection
“Not Fade Away”
Director: David Chase
 
Closing Night Gala Selection
“Flight”
Director: Robert Zemeckis
 
“Amour”
Director: Michael Haneke
 
“Araf/Somewhere in Between”
Director: Yesim Ustaoglu
 
“Barbara”
Director: Christian Petzold
 
“Beyond the Hills”
Director: Cristian Mungiu
 
“Bwakaw”
Director: Jun Robles Lana

“Caesar Must Die”
Directors: Paolo and Vittorio Taviani

“Camille Rewinds”
Director: Noémie Lvovsky

“The Dead Man and Being Happy”
Director: Javier Rebello

“Fill the Void”
Director: Rama Burshtein

“First Cousin Once Removed”
Director: Alan Berliner
 
“Frances Ha”
Director: Noah Baumbach

“The Gatekeepers”
Director: Dror Moreh
 
“Ginger and Rosa”
Director: Sally Potter
 
“Here and There”
Director: Antonio Mendez Esparza

“Holy Motors”
Director: Leos Carax

“Hyde Park on Hudson”
Director: Roger Michell

“Kinshasa Kids”
Director: Marc-Henri Wajnberg

“The Last Time I Saw Macao”
Director: João Pedro Rodrigues

“Leviathan”
Directors: Lucien Castaing-Taylor and Véréna Paravel
 
“Like Someone in Love”
Director: Abbas Kiarostami

“Lines of Wellington”
Director: Valeria Sarmiento

“Memories Look at Me”
Director: Song Fang

“Night Across the Street”
Director: Raul Ruiz

“No”
Director: Pablo Larrain

“Our Children”
Director: Joachim Lafosse
 
“Passion”
Director: Brian De Palma

“Something in the Air”
Director: Olivier Assayas

“Tabu”
Director: Miguel Gomes

“You Ain’t Seen Nothin’ Yet”
Director: Alain Resnais

The 50th annual New York Film Festival runs September 28 – October 14.