In Contention

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  • OFF THE CARPET: Calm before the storm

    Sean Penn in MilkThe season is upon us.  One month from today the industry’s first major stepping stone on the way to the Kodak Theater will arrive in the form of the Toronto International Film Festival: 10 days of put up or shut up by a number of the year’s prospective contenders.

    Oddly enough, however, there will be a few considerable no-shows at this year’s festivities.  In a business increasingly proving the precariousness of an early “frontrunner” status, studios and publicists seem to be slowing the machine down…but a few hands have been forced this season.

    Heavily anticipated entries like “Revolutionary Road” and “Milk” will be absent at Toronto next month.  Neither is expected to be ready, actually.  Sam Mendes has been hard at work on “Farlanders,” while Focus Features would probably prefer to take the slow road after emerging from Toronto as the “frontrunner” in 2005 and 2007, but ultimately coming up short on Oscar night.

    This is probably for the best on both.  Gotta maintain those expectations.  Early raves are as dangerous as early pans.

    Meanwhile, the lineup is currently littered with modest independent efforts that depend on the festival circuit to find their groove: “Happy-Go-Lucky,” “The Other Man,” “Rachel Getting Married,” “The Secret Life of Bees,” etc.  The major stuff — so far — seems to be steering clear.

    Regardless, we’ve got one more month of full blown speculation before the season begins to settle into a tangible state…so let’s get to it.

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  • Nat Rogers calls dibs on Hathaway

    You’ve all surely seen the trailer for “Rachel Getting Married,” Jonathan Demme’s supposed return to form, by now. And while it’s true that it has generally raised expectations for the film, I wonder if Nathaniel Rogers over at The Film Experience isn’t getting a bit over-excited. Treating a Best Actress nomination for Anne Hathaway as a virtual fait accompli, he gloats as follows:

    Long before the other Oscar sites glommed on to it, I was touting the possibility of “Rachel Getting Married” being a return to form for Jonathan Demme. As a dedicated actressexual Demme is a director I’m inordinately fond of … I had the feeling that he had another Best Actress nominee in him. Not to blow my own horn –ok ok, I’m blowing! But remember, when Hathaway is walking those carpets: I called this one first.

    I don’t like to rain on anyone’s parade (not least since I did my own share of wafty Best Actress speculation last week), but isn’t it a little early in the game to call anyone a certain nominee, particularly for a film we haven’t seen yet? There are a lot of Academy heavy-hitters (Streep, Winslet, Linney, Theron, etc) waiting in the wings, and the less familiar likes of Melissa Leo and Sally Hawkins are angling for position too. The Best Actress race is actually looking rather crowded for a change – at least until we know more about some upcoming films.

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  • Off topic…

    Go team.

    Wasington Redskins

  • ‘Kiss’ on DVD…at long last!

    Kiss of the Spider WomanSpeaking of the home market, Hector Babenco’s “Kiss of the Spider Woman,” one of the great films of the 1980s, finally arrived on my desk this week from the good folks at City Lights Entertainment. It has not been available on DVD until now. Kris previewed the release last month.

    Having not seen the film for more than 20 years, I anxiously popped it into my player and sat down to enjoy it once again with my wife. To my surprise, the film’s raw power is still there, the performances of William Hurt and Raul Julia have seemed to deepen over the years and the picture’s independent spirit remains intact.

    William Hurt was on the rise in Hollywood when he agreed to take the role after more than 14 months of the producers and director working with Burt Lancaster fell apart. Lancaster had very strong ideas about how he saw the film, and after a triple by-pass, the prducers went elsewhere for the part of Molina.

    Known as an intellectual actor, William Hurt would go on to win the Academy Award for his brilliant performance as a jailed homosexual who falls in love with his cellmate (a revolutionary portrayed with intense brilliance by Raul Julia). Shot on location in Brazil, the film had a gritty, honest look that attracted critics upon the poicture’s release in 1985.

    To the shock of even the producers it was nominated for four Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (Hurt) and Best Adapted Screenplay. Strangely, and sadly, Julia was snubbed for a nod alongside Hurt. James Garner probably took the nod that might have been his for “Murphy’s Romance.” Hurt’s ultimate win was something of a surprise over the heavily favored Jack Nicholson (in “Prizzi’s Honor”), scoring a point for indy films in the 1980s.

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  • ‘Godfather Restoration’ on DVD generates excitement

    The Godfather RestorationI wonder if any of us really understands the impact of home entertainment, beginning back in the early 1980s with the advent of the VHS and BETA tapes one could rent to play on new machines known as VCRs.

    My parents, God bless them, bought one right away, perhaps a way to get their eldest son (me), away at college, to come home and visit weekends. I did indeed, and after Dad would pick me up at the bus station, we would stop at the video store and grab 10 or so movies for the weekend.

    I rarely went for new releases.  Instead I chose films that I had seen once on the late show, perhaps, or films of interest I might have heard about.  Sometimes I might even have gone for the films I had never heard a thing about but were directed by someone I recognized or featured an actor I knew.

    I was 19 when I hit university and felt I was pretty well educated cinematically, having seen many films at the rep theaters in town.  I would set my alarm for the late shows, attending showings at the libraries and consuming every book I could find on film. So the advent of the VHS tape was a film lover’s wet dream.

    I watched literally thousands of films at home, over and over, studying them and finding something new each time. When I became a professional critic (when someone finally paid me for it) I made it clear that in addition to reviewing new releases in theatres, I must be permitted to review what was out for the home market.

    The generation of film-goers that followed me me (I am 49) are far better equipped with film knowledge than I was as a teen, but they have seen probably thousands more films than I had seen at that age as well. Furthermore, the special features on DVDs provide audiences with extraordinary knowledge that we were simply never privvy to.

    Yes I know there are disadvantages to home viewing.  Perhaps it has bred bad manners in movie theaters — talking, coming and going, cell phone use — but I still believe that films should be seen on a movie screen whenever possible.

    I am thrilled that Paramount and Francis Ford Coppola have gone back to restore “The Godfather” and “The Godfather Part II” in the upcoming “The Godfather Restoration,” which will also include the film that does not exist in my universe, the wretched “The Godfather Part III.”  Entirely new generations will get to see two of the greatest films ever made, enjoy the insightful commentary and documentaries that come with the set, and hopefully, come to understand that art can also be entertainment.
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  • Sight & Sound celebrates Eastwood

    Now I know I mention British film publication Sight & Sound quite often (I don’t work for them, honest), but they keep printing such good stuff. The September issue, just out, has an extensive career profile, with accompanying interview, on Clint Eastwood – a happy coincidence in the week that our friend Mr Foote’s book on the man has emerged.

    The piece, by the venerable Geoff Andrew, echoes the oft-stated view – one I understand, but still don’t share – that Eastwood is America’s finest living filmmaker, one who “believes in the old-fashioned art of drawing us into a film rather than in displays of virtuosity.”

    There’s also an evaluation of “Changeling” in which Andrew disagrees with S&S’s editor, and matches the breathless trade paper reviews at Cannes, making lofty comparisons to “Chinatown” and “LA Confidential” to boot:

    J. Michael Straczynski’s deft script and Eastwood’s measured, quietly meticulous mise en scene manage to fashion (many) disparate elements into a complex, multi-stranded but entirely coherent drama … What’s possibly most impressive is the way Eastwood makes it all look so easy; as the story steadily grows broader and deeper in its import, it still feels like a damned good yarn.

    With each review I read, I change my mind regarding the contender status of this oddly-scheduled film – Andrew’s take certainly suggests it has the gravitas to the distance, though there’s nothing on Angelina Jolie’s much-hyped performance. (Neither the profile nor the interview, however, feature any reference to “Gran Torino,” which is still something of a mystery package sitting in prime awards-season territory.)

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  • Don’t give up on Maria Bello

    It is a well-known fact (okay, okay, this writer’s opinion) that Maria Bello was robbed of a 2005 Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress for her taut, unnerving performance in Cronenberg’s “A History of Violence,” despite a gong from the New York critics and a (lead) nomination at the Globes. (She wasn’t far off for “The Cooler” a year previously, either.)

    Now you may recall (though I wouldn’t blame you if you’d already forgotten) that the winner of Best Supporting Actress that year was Rachel Weisz for her agreeable and, in my opinion, wholly unremarkable work in “The Constant Gardener.” It’s a win I’ve never really understood.

    Now, in a depressing twist of fate, Bello finds herself taking over Weisz’s role in the godawful “Mummy” franchise, the latest installment of which Kris seems less than keen on. If you ever needed a textbook demonstration of the difference an Oscar (or at least a nomination) can make to an actor’s career, there you have it.

    However, in an interesting Guardian interview with the excellent film writer Ryan Gilbey, Bello appears to be making the best of a bad situation. The usually more indie-minded actress tells Gilbey that she’s always hankered after just such a part:

    I’ve been telling my agent for years that I wanted an action movie, but no one saw me like that. Two weeks before my 40th birthday, I guess I’d given up. I mean, how many action roles are there for women over 40? Soon after that, I got a call to say they were considering me for the part.

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  • Let’s all hold our breaths…

    …and pray that “The Dark knight” can manage to stay on top this weekend rather than be dethroned by the worst film of the year so far.

  • Are they FINALLY getting it now?

    A story with these particulars has been a long time coming.  Sad to say the reality isn’t embraced by others, but it remains just that…the reality.

  • ‘Rachel Getting Married’ Trailer

    httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbv_DB-6TXk

    The return of Jonathan Demme? I’ll admit, this role looks like it fits Anne Hathaway perfectly. I’m not sold on her Oscar buzz yet (Globes, sure), but I’m not as skeptical as I was. 

  • Poland takes his first stab

    Benicio Del Toro in CheDavid Poland has dipped his toes into the Oscar waters of 2008 and come up with…well, the same thing we’ve all got at the moment, to tell you the truth.

    The one point he touches on that we haven’t brought up in this space yet is the notion that The Weinstein Company’s “The Reader” will likely find its way to screens in 2009 rather than this year.  There’s a discrepancy of preference between the studio and producer Scott Rudin, but we can guess who wins that battle at the end of the day.  Rudin has plenty to keep his 2008 attention with John Shanley’s “Doubt” and Sam Mendes’s “Revolutionary Road.”

    Here are Poland’s brief asides on that:

    There still could be a backdoor surprise effort, like the Weinsteins’ Scott Rudin movie, The Reader… but probably not.  (The one 2009 title that screams “They could make December!” is DreamAmount’s The Lovely Bones, though Par needs Benjamin Button to make a LOT of money and awards talk will help and DW’s side of that mountain is pushing The Soloist hard as they exit the auditorium.)…

    …The Reader also happens to be the last picture made by Mirage under Pollack and Minghella.  But, the in-control producer on board is Scott Rudin, who always has a lot of awards pictures out there and probably doesn’t want this one to threaten Doubt or his beloved Revolutionary Road (which also stars Kate Winslet).  And for that matter, Rudin is probably appalled with the idea of an appeal for The Reader being made by invoking two lost Oscar-winning filmmakers… especially Pollack, for whom Rudin went well out of his way to keep the keep the press at bay as Polack dealt with his illness and efforts at recovery.

    He’s also got his first big list of title up as well, including some love for “W” (after that trailer?) and mentions for “The Secret Life of Bees” (the one film Fox Searchlight will be taking to Toronto) and “Che” (which will go before North American audiences at the New York fest but still is unlikely to see the light of day in 2008…unless director Steven Soderbergh suddenly decides to make a buck for an interested studio rather than perpetuate his long-ish vision of the film.

    Read up on Poland’s column here, and check out his chart here.

    And check back Monday for our updated charts here at In Contention.

  • SHORT TAKE: “Tropic Thunder” (***)

    DreamWorks SKG's Tropic ThunderI walked into “Tropic Thunder” expecting anything from a disaster to a bona fide comedic gem.  After all, the ubiquitous Ben Stiller’s work in front of the camera has evolved into a wretched sort of self-caricature, while his work behind the camera has yielded interesting failures and surprising successes with equal measure.

    His latest as director is somewhere in between, an ambitious vision born out of the actor/director’s consistent obsession with the hyperbole of character and cinema, and yet spread across a canvas somewhat lacking the scope it deserves.

    You know the general idea of the narrative, but the real power of the comedy comes from a solid ensemble, one that doesn’t necessarily work organically but certainly affords individual highlights.

    I wouldn’t say Robert Downey Jr. cranks out an “Oscar-level thing,” but he definitely shoots for the moon as Kirk Lazarus, the ambitious and “serious” Australian actor taking on the role of a quick-talking African American infantry grunt.  Stiller thankfully manages to relegate Jack Black’s antics to the periphery as the over-exposed former character actor gets the right laughs at the right times, while the director himself gets out of his own way for the most part.

    The real story of the film, however, and giving the performance that will be talked about perhaps more than any other this year (save, of course, for the late Heath Ledger’s work in “The Dark Knight”), is Tom Cruise in the role of film producer Les Grossman.

    Cruise’s first moments on screen — a video conference call sequence — leads one to believe he’ll be reaching throughout the performance, trying too hard to connect the dots of Stiller’s absurdist comedy.  But somewhere along the line, it becomes clear that Stiller knows how to best capture the performance: taking it over the top isn’t nearly enough.  You have to keep doing it over and over until it’s funny again, and that is where the director’s choice to linger on Cruise’s antics provides a showcase that demands side-splitting laughter.

    And bravo to Cruise for going there.  It’s probably the smartest thing he could do at this dicey time in his career.  And when he slowly dictates his opinion of action star Tugg Speedman’s career, it’s difficult to imagine he wasn’t thinking of himself in some small part.

  • ‘Doubt’ poster debuts…

    Shades of “There Will Be Blood”:

    Miramax Films\' Doubt

    (Courtesy: Cinematical)

  • “Seein’ as our sherrif’s about as much use as tits on a boar…”

  • It’s not just about Howard and Zimmer

    I have now seen “The Dark Knight” three times, and listened to the score several times. While the flaws of the film as a whole have become more apparent (though I still maintain it is excellent), the collaboration of Hans Zimmer and James Newton Howard keeps growing on me as an integral part of the film and character building, especially for Batman and the Joker.

    The nature of the collaboration will almost certainly keep the duo out of the Oscar race due to the rules on such matters. But I still can’t help but wonder…why does this remain the only category where two artists who work together and, as such, enrich each other’s work, not allow such artists to be awarded for it? I need only point out the Nick Cave/Warren Ellis score to “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford” last year as another example.

    I…just…don’t…get…it

  • Banning the paparazzi

    City Councilmember Dennis Zine has proposed an anti-paparazzi Public Safety Law in Los AngelesI’ve been mulling over this story all day, wondering where I stand, weighing the pros and cons of any legislation whatsoever that could be painted as First Amendment violation.  I’ve come to the conclusion that Los Angeles is incredibly inept at addressing serious concerns (traffic, a new spike in gang violence, managing tax dollars with an appropriate balance), let alone issues of such triviality.

    Then the local news ran a package a few moments ago, and my brains is turning over the matter all over again.

    In a nutshell, City Councilmember Dennis Zine proposed a “Personal Safety Law” in Februrary, essentially to afford a personal space of some sort for celebrities and a protection against paparazzi packs that tend to prohibit stars from entering or leaving medical facilities.  Today, a number of individuals testified on the matter, including actor Eric Roberts (spinning something about celebs naming their kids after fruits for a reason…or something) and singer John Mayer (proclaiming himself a “rock star” in the linked item, a stretch by my standards but so be it).

    Being a former police sergeant, one would think Zine would understand the futility of the attempt, just as Chief Bill Bratton does.  Of course, the ever-colorful Bratton presents a carnival of ignorance when he proclaims at press conferences, “Stay home, it’d make our job a lot easier” (quoted from the news package, not the NY Times story).

    The paparazzi issue has hit a new level of saturation in the Britney/Paris/Lindsay era, and we all recall that surfer pack throwdown on paps trying to snap shots of Matthew McConaughey.  The environment is ripe for such a legislation to recieve some fair attention, but…I don’t know…it all seems like a giant waste of time and a distraction for an underpaid, understaffed police force that is challenged with the law and order of typicality as it is.

    So what if a few paps suffer broken toes because they can’t get the fuck out of the way when a star’s SUV is plowing through?  So what if a group of paps get their asses kicked by sun-stained beach bras with nothing better to do but play out Darwin’s law for our viewing pleasure?  No one wants to suffer through something like the Princess Diana trgedy again, but this is the life.

    I spent a lot of my time writing about this Amy Winehouse breakdown or that while I was in London over the summer.  The issue of stars gone stupid isn’t relegated to La-La Land.  And of course, the morons of celebrity are not the only ones hounded (poor Eric Roberts seems unable to handle the attention in the weeks since “The Dark Knight” landed).  But presenting legislation — vague, ill-advised and thin legislation at that…sigh.  At least the local news had something to cover this evening.

    You tell me.  Am I out of line here?

    (More coverage at the Los Angeles Times.)

  • ‘Nick and Norah’ trailer

    I was a big fan of Peter Sollett’s NYU student film “Five Feet High and Rising” and doubly impressed when he expanded those ideas in 2002 as “Raising Victor Vargas.”  So count me in for the upcoming “Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist,” which gets a trailer today:

    (Courtesy: /Film)

  • In Contention on Facebook

    Many of you may have noticed the Facebook tag in the right sidebar for our modest In Contention group.  A number of you have already joined up, and we love you for it.  We’re just sort of testing the waters of alternate Web communities to spread the IC word, so thanks for helping us out.

    Currently there are two groups.  One is the regular In Contention Facebook group, fit with posted items from the site, a message board for spouting off and, of course, a Wall for you to tell us to keep up the good work or shove it, whatever your pleasure.  If you haven’t jumped on the bandwagon, join up now!

    There’s also a blog networks application we added, which will include RSS feeds, rating system, and…of course…a Wall.  Probably over saturating it, but it’ll the feed is a nice touch.  Become a fan today and tell us how much we stink at this!