In Contention

Tag: Georgie Henley

  • Best in show 2005: the year in superlatives

    It’s time to really round out the year and offer up my picks for awards in 2005.

    In addition to the typical categories – which finally see their winners announced today – you’ll find some other fun arenas for awards citation. Call it a mish-mash of MTV-Awards-type kudos and other frequently heralded categories we find time to time in various critics’ awards and precursor ceremonies.

    No one is better at this sort of thing than Nat Rogers over at The Film Experience, so I recommend you all take a look at his Film Bitch awards when he dishes them out in the coming weeks.

    These will likely be my last extensive thoughts on the awards season this year, barring any brief comments I may or may not make here and/or there. There will, of course, be one final predictions update before the end of the year.

    It feels good to wrap everything up before Christmas vacation, I have to tell you. But the Oscar season is by no means over, so I’ll be diving right back in once 2006 finally rolls around.

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  • REVIEW: “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” (***1/2)

    The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the WardrobeJeff Wells is half right when he says “There’s a new Best Supporting Actress contender in town…10 year-old Georgie Henley, the soul and natural light-beam of ‘The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe’…came out of nowhere…but she’s Drew Barrymore in “E.T.” without the cloying I-know-I’m-cute-and-you’re-going- to-adore-me attitude.

    “Henley’s serene little-girl aura…her beauty, obvious intelligence, cultured British accent, etc…plus the generosity of feeling from within make for a potent combination.”

    Henley is nowhere near a Best Supporting Actress nomination (especially with co-star Tilda Swinton chewing the scenery), but she is one of the cutest and most talented youthful actor discoveries in a long time.

    “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” is inevitably going to find itself compared to Peter Jackson’s “The Lord of the Rings” franchise. And in the wake of those films, it will likely come off as old news to an Academy so desperately out of touch with depth of cinema over external labeling.

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