In Contention

Tag: Kristin Scott Thomas

  • “The stuff of legend”

    That’s what Jeff Wells is calling Kristin Scott Thomas’ performance in “I’ve Loved You So Long.”

    Strong words, sure, but as I’ve said before, it is a mesmerising piece of work. Not everyone might connect with this very soft, low-key film — but Wells’ response is an indication of how passionate its supporters are. It’s the kind of performance that inspires first-place votes on the ballots of a devoted band of the actors’ branch, even as it may skip the radar of others. In this year’s unusually competitive Best Actress race, Scott Thomas is the one name I feel 100% confident about placing in my projected five.

    I’ve had the pleasure this week of speaking to both Scott Thomas and her equally impressive co-star Elsa Zylberstein who, if there’s any justice, should be in the mix for Best Supporting Actress. Watch out for those interviews on these pages soon, as well as some others — I’m having an actressy week, as it turns out.

  • Italy leads the charge at European Film Awards

    Proof positive that 2008 is a banner year for Italian cinema: Matteo Garrone’s “Gomorrah” and Paolo Sorrentino’s “Il Divo,” both masterpieces of a very different stylistic ilk, lead all nominees for the European Film Awards, with five nominations apiece.

    Joing them in the hunt for Best European Film are “The Class” and “Happy-Go-Lucky,” which makes four of my favourite films of the year in the list. Rounding out the nominees in that category are “Waltz With Bashir” and “The Orphanage,” neither film one to be sniffed at either.

    By any standards, that’s one hell of a group — I would be very surprised if the eventual five Oscar nominees for Best Picture match that collective quality. I’d be hard pressed to pick a personal favourite, though my gut says the Italian nominees will split the vote, and the wonderful “The Class” will emerge victorious.

    Four of those six reappear in the Best European Director category, with Steve McQueen (“Hunger”) supplanting Mike Leigh as the British nominee in that race. More puzzlingly, Leigh is also absent in the Best European Screenwriter category — curious, since “Happy-Go-Lucky” strikes me as more of a writerly achievement than the nominated “Waltz With Bashir.”

    More thoughts, and a full list of nominees, after the cut.

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  • ‘Hunger,’ ‘Bruges’ lead British Independent nominees

    The British Independent Film Awards are an odd, under-the-radar institution that frequently like to avoid the obvious and champion the underdog. Last year, for example, they bypassed the starrier likes of “Eastern Promises” and “Notes on a Scandal” to award their top prize to Anton Corbijn’s magnificent, under-rewarded “Control.” The previous year, they were even more daring: Best Film justly went to “This Is England” over “The Queen,” while Helen Mirren and Forest Whitaker — gasp — lost to the unknown leads of Andrea Arnold’s “Red Road.”

    So it is this year that the nominations feature one doozy of a snub: while the top prize, Best British Independent Film, features such obvious contenders as “Slumdog Millionaire” and “Hunger,” Mike Leigh’s “Happy-Go-Lucky” is nowhere to be found. Ditto Best Director and Best Screenplay — the omission particularly galling when the likes of (gack) “Son of Rambow” made the cut. Did Leigh run over the voters’ dogs or something? Sanity at least prevailed in the acting categories, where Sally Hawkins, Eddie Marsan and the wonderful Alexis Zegerman all made the cut.

    Zegerman’s category, Best Supporting Actress, is an indication of how slim the pickings were this year: nods for the mediocre likes of Hayley Atwell in “The Duchess” and Sienna Miller in “The Edge of Love” don’t suggest a very deep pool of nominees. Meanwhile, Kristin Scott Thomas’ mention for the fun but flimsy trifle “Easy Virtue,” which I saw this morning at the Festival, is clearly an indirect nomination for her ineligible awards-bound work in “I’ve Loved You So Long.”

    Still, there’s plenty to cheer about here, not least the impressive showing for Martin McDonagh’s superb “In Bruges,” which jointly leads the field with “Hunger,” both films receiving seven nominations. The inevitability of the nominations for “Hunger” and “Slumdog Millionaire” doesn’t make them any less deserving, and “Man on Wire” is a pleasingly left-field choice in the top category.

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  • Kristin Scott Thomas to be honored at Santa Barbara fest

    Kristin Scott ThomasThe press release, in part:

    The Cinema Vanguard Award was created in recognition of an actor who has forged his/her own path – taking artistic risks and making a significant and unique contribution to film. Formerly known as The Independent Award, it was bestowed last year to Ryan Gosling. This year’s well-deserving recipient is Kristin Scott Thomas, and she will be feted on Tuesday, January 27, 2008.

    Comments [SBIFF Executive Director Roger] Durling, “A masterful performance by a British actress in a French film and a triumphant Broadway debut in Chekhov in the same year – Kristin Scott Thomas is in a league by herself and an artistic force to be reckoned with.”

  • 10/27 Oscarweb Round-up

    Robert Downey Jr. in Iron Man• Nathaniel Rogers kick-starts an Oscar revamp, starting with the fellas. [The Film Experience]

    • Jeffrey Wells is nervous about Josh Brolin’s Oscar hopes in “W.” [Hollywood Elsewhere]

    • I stopped when he didn’t clue into why it’s called what it’s called.  Welcome to the Rex Reed Members Only lounge. [Peter Bart]

    • Lou Lumenick gives good ink to the Oscar hopes of Angelina Jolie and Kristin Scott Thomas. [Lumenick on Film]

    • “The French Connection” and “Serpico” top a readers’ poll of the best cop films. [New York Daily News]

    • Peter Debruge looks at the year’s issue-focused Oscar hopefuls through the lens of precendence. [Variety]

    • Adam Dawtrey, meanwhile, zeroes in on the obvious: this year’s Oscar product seems to have skipped the festival route. [Variety]

    • And Justin Chang stands up for the performances of fanboy cinema. [Variety]

  • 10/23 Oscarweb Round-up

    Philip Seymour Hoffman and Hope Davis in Synecdoche, New York• Tom Tapp rallies behind Kristin Scott Thomas’s work in “I’ve Loved You So Long.” [The Daily Beast]

    • Anne Thompson, meanwhile, thinks the actress leads the field.  (Sorry — the film just didn’t speak to me.) [Thompson on Hollywood]

    • After Spielberg and Greengrass bowed out, “The Trial of the Chicago 7” might end up in the hands of…Ben Stiller?  WTF? [The Hollywood Reporter]

    • Michael Ordoñachats it up with Hope Davis, probably the least interesting female component of Charlie Kaufman’s “Synecdoche, New York.” [Los Angeles Times]

    • John Horn, meanwhile, writes a love letter to Clint Eastwood with “Changeling” set to bow nationwide. [Los Angeles Times]

    • Anthony Breznican gets some quality “Gran Torino” time with Clint Eastwood, plus some exclusive looks at the film’s first materials. [USA Today]

    • Missing the boat on so much of the subtle brilliance to be found in “W,” Christopher Rosen thinks Oliver Stone has simply gotten old. [New York Observer]

    • The director, meanwhile, takes part in an esteemed panel discussing the marks to be left by the current administration. [Slate]

    • Peter Bart makes the completely wrong-headed decision to chalk slumping ad sales revenue up to studios displaying a lack of talent support. [Peter Bart]

  • Memo: Uh, the Best Actress race is VERY heated

    Kate Beckinsale in Nothing But the TruthAs a few commenters have been discussing elsewhere, it seems that some supposedly attentive Oscar bloggers figure 2008 to be a weak year for the lead actress race.  We’ve been calling it the most competitive derby in years around these parts for quite a while now, so the notion that anyone would find it to be thin is perplexing to say the least.

    Well, I’m happy today to see that Pete Hammond is on our bandwagon, writing the following at his Notes on a Season blog:

    This year, however, it is already clear that the race, for all intents and purposes, is backloaded with the most imposing and competitive list of genuine best actress possibilities in many years.

    A tsunami is coming, and [Melissa] Leo and [Penélope] Cruz are getting out of the way by taking their best shot now, hoping it’s enough to stay alive when the big storm of contenders hits shore.

    He then launches into a laundry list of contenders, all of them thoroughly covered before.

    We’re currently banking on Kristin Scott Thomas, Angelina Jolie, Kate Winslet and Meryl Streep around these parts.  Those are four slots that seem secure.  After that, it’s a toss-up between Anne Hathaway, Melissa Leo, Penélope Cruz, Michelle Williams and Sally Hawkins in the indie sector.  If it’s not an indie performance the AMPAS wants to recognize, they’ll have high-budget fare to choose from in Cate Blanchett and Nicole Kidman.

    I’m sticking with Kidman for now.  Makes as much sense as any other contender.

    Have your say. Who are you predicting for Best Actress right now?

  • 10/4 Oscarweb Round-up

    (from left) Leonardo DiCaprio and Russell Crowe• Dave Karger “rounds up” the best bets for Oscars hitting cinemas this week. [Oscar Watch]

    • Off the cuff with Mike Leigh across the pond. [Los Angeles Times]

    • Tom O’Neil wonders whether Kristin Scott Thomas can grab an Oscar and a Tony in the same year… [Gold Derby]

    • …and thinks Clint Eastwood might be able to pull Angelina Jolie out of her Oscar funk. [Gold Derby]

    • On the heels of Rotten Tomatoes’ list of 50, John Campea runs down the 10 best animated films of all time amid a spiffy new layout for his site. [The Movie Blog]

    • Errol Morris to screen “Standard Operating Procedure” at 27 medical schools around the country.  Talk about grass roots. [Thompson on Hollywood]

    • Scott Bowles kicks off a DiCaprio/Crowe interview piece with one hell of an interesting lede. [USA Today]

  • 9/22 Oscarweb Round-up

    Quantum of Solace• “Real” men of the screen are a dying breed, according to Peter Bart. [Peter Bart]

    • Journos keep beating a dead horse about the new “At the Movies” failure. [eFilmCritic]

    • And again. [The Hot Blog]

    • Anne Thompson salutes Telluride and New York for steering clear of high profile American cinema, but as she notes, was there really a choice this year? [Thompson on Hollywood]

    • Erik Davis talks Bond with Daniel Craig and Marc Forster. [Cinematical]

    • Speaking of Bond, apparently the character won’t be uttering a few of his infamous lines in the latest installment. [The Independent]

    • John Horn sits down with Diablo Cody on the set of “Jennifer’s Body.” [Los Angeles Times]

    • Dennis Lim, meanwhile, chats it up with “Class” director Laurent Canet in the wake of his film landing the official French foreign film selection for this year’s Academy Awards. [New York Times]

    • Giles Hattersly gets some quality time with “I’ve Loved You So Long” star Kristin Scott Thomas. [The Times]

    • Kevin Kelly talks to “Zack and Miri Make a Porno” director Kevin Smith at Fantastic Fest. [Spout Blog]

  • REVIEW: “I’ve Loved You So Long” (****)

    Sony Pictures Classics' I've Loved You So LongA quietly extraordinary debut from French novelist and screenwriter Philippe Claudel, “I’ve Loved You So Long” interweaves so many narrative strands familiar from various other domestic dramas it’s hard to believe this particular story hasn’t been told on screen before.

    Yet these elements — sisterly estrangement, parental insecurity and the social rehabilitation of a chronic introvert among them — have been assembled here with such authorial dexterity, emotional immediacy and narrative audacity that the resulting film feels at once inventive and essential. This is that rarest of things in contemporary cinema: a story that needed to be told.

    It seems perverse, then, that I am unable to furnish this review with anything more than the most fundamental aspects of said story. But to do otherwise would detract both from the delicacy and patience with which Claudel unfurls his narrative, and the visceral emotional response felt by the viewer upon each successive revelation. (In my opinion, some readers may indeed have learned too much already from reading certain gauche reviews.)

    Claudel’s storytelling accumulates information on a strictly need-to-know basis, forming a structural house of cards in which each plot point fragilely supports the next — until, in the film’s very last reel, the intricate system of withheld knowledge can no longer sustain itself, and the protagonist’s staggering truth emerges.

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  • Jeff Wells calls it for Scott Thomas

    There has been so much hype around Kristin Scott Thomas’ apparently devastating performance in Philippe Claudel’s “I’ve Loved You So Long” that a lot of the press I’ve read tends to sideline the film itself.

    Now Jeff Wells has rectified that with a piece in which he declares it the best film of the year so far:

    The film itself is a landmark-level achievement. It’s remarkably tight, absorbing and affectng every step of the way — a genuinely profound growth journey taken with quiet and gentle steps. Whatever happens on the Oscar nomination front, this film has immediately shot to the top of my list of the year’s best films.

    Not that he neglects to discuss the film’s esteemed British star. Indeed, he thinks she’s a shoo-in for an Oscar nod — and possibly more:

    She’ll definitely land a Best Actress nomination, and she just might win, considering that she achieves so much in ILYSL with very little “acting” plus the fact that she’s been around for a couple of decades.

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  • Let’s hear it for the ladies!

    Meryl Streep in DoubtWow, what a damn fine year for lead actress performances.  When was the last time you heard anyone say that?

    I caught some flack recently when I took Meryl Streep off my predicted five nominees in the category.  “How can the Goddess miss?”  Well, she can, and she has, but regardless, the point is that there is some really stiff competition this year for the leading ladies, and man, that’s exciting (and unique)!

    Sally Hawkins (“Happy-Go-Lucky”), Charlize Theron (“The Burning Plain”), Kristin Scott-Thomas (“I’ve Loved You So Long”), Angelina Jolie (“Changeling”), Penélope Cruz (“Elegy”), Melissa Leo (“Frozen River”) and Michelle Williams (“Wendy and Lucy”) represent the seen and raved performances.  Anne Hathaway’s work has also been viewed, but we’ll get to that at the end of the week.  Rest assured, she’ll have her fans as well.

    On the horizon we’ll have Nicole Kidman (“Australia”) and the aforementioned Streep (“Doubt) in big Oscar hopefuls, not to mention Kate Winslet’s double dip in “The Reader” and “Revolutionary Road” (which ought to make home life interesting for the five-time nominee around campaign time).

    There are still fringe possibilities for Keira Knightley in “The Duchess” or Emily Blunt in “The Young Victoria,” while Laura Linney could add an Oscar nod to her Emmy success if “The Other Man” finds a distributor in Toronto.

    There’s always Julianne Moore lurking with her work in “Blindness” should the mixed reaction from Cannes prove to be a different story in Toronto, and Kate Beckinsale, by the way, is fantastic in Rod Lurie’s “Nothing But the Truth,” so who knows?

    So let’s not get our panties in a twist over shifting and sliding in this category over the next few months.  I don’t need consistent emails asking “Why did you take so and so out of your Best Actress chart,” because the fact of the matter is, there are a lot of horses in this particular race.

    Which is what we want, right?

  • Alone: when you hate a movie everyone else seems to love

    Miramax Films\' The English PatientIn 1996 I remember sitting in a packed screening room watching “The English Patient”; it was close to the end when Ralph Fiennes leaves Kristin Scott-Thomas in the cave, promising to come back, never to return, leaving her (through no fault of his own) to perish.

    I couldn’t help thinking at the time: “For fuck’s sake woman, DIE so we can all go home.”  I hated the film — hated it, hated it, hated it — and yet the reviewes were pretty much raves.  Of course the damned thing won nine Academy Awards including Best Picture and Best Director. I did not believe the love connection between the leads (there was no heat) nor that anyone, quite frankly, could fall for an ice queen like Scott-Thomas, much less risk their life for her.

    And yet all around me was this avalanche of praise.  Even the person I did a TV show with named the film the best of the year.  I went with “Trainspotting.”  “The English Patient” was being hailed as this great historical epic while I championed “The Crucible,” which Fox fumbled in releasing, and as the critic who disliked the film, I looked very silly.

    I admire the craftsmanship with which Anthony Mingehlla made his film, but I think he surpassed it with “The Talented Mr. Ripley” and the wonderful “Cold Mountain.”  And of course “The Englsih Patient” was not the first critically acclaimed film I disliked, nor will it be the last, but it does put one in an odd position. You second guess yourself (sometimes) and wonder if you missed something along the way.

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  • Cinematical swoons over Scott Thomas

    Compared to the drought of previous years, where the five nominees have been all but pre-determined for months in advance, the Best Actress race is looking rather crowded at this point. (It’s certainly the major category that gave me the most pause when I updated my predictions this morning.)

    What’s gratifying to see is that the field features so many contenders from independent films, including the much-discussed Sally Hawkins, Charlize Theron (coming off a lot of Venice buzz), Anne Hathaway, Melissa Leo and Michelle Williams.

    But perhaps the darkest horse of all is Kristin Scott Thomas, an actress whose star has dimmed somewhat Stateside since receiving her only Oscar nomination twelve years ago. In that time, she’s been working more and more frequently in her adopted homeland of France, and she now returns to prominence with the French-language “I’ve Loved You So Long,” a dark domestic drama in which she plays a woman reconnecting with her family after fifteen years in prison.

    Scott Thomas has been garnering steady acclaim since the film bowed at Berlin in February. Now, in the wake of its Telluride screening, and in the midst of a rave review declaring the film a “rare masterpiece,” Cinematical joins the chorus with this bold assertion:

    Thomas’s performance here has been generating Oscar buzz for a while now, and deservedly so; she will almost certainly garner a Best Actress Oscar nod for this film.

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  • Foreign film race begins… get ready to groan

    Variety carries details of the first official entry that I’ve heard of in the Best Foreign Language Film derby – Denmark has put forward “Worlds Apart,” from director Niels Arden Oplev. The country has a pretty good track record in this category, having won back-to-back in the 80’s with “Babette’s Feast” and “Pelle the Conqueror,” while Susanne Bier’s popular “After the Wedding” nabbed a nomination two years ago.

    “Worlds Apart,” which has already secured US distribution, is a small-scale pic focusing on a teenage Jehovah’s Witness forced to make a difficult choice when she falls in love with a non-believer. It all sounds terribly earnest, but that’s right up the Academy’s alley when it comes to this category. Reviewing the film at the Berlin festival back in February, Variety called it a “provocative, well-turned drama,” and speculated that a US remake could be on the cards.

    Apparently, the Academy has invited 96 countries to enter the race this year, with the submission deadline looming large on October 1. They should be looking to regain some credibility in this category after the embarrassing fiasco of last year’s race, which saw a banner year for world cinema reduced to the most tepid slate of foreign-language nominees in recent memory, as landmark pictures like “4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days,” “Lust, Caution” and “Persepolis” were, one by one, either snubbed or disqualified.

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  • ‘I’ve Loved You So Long’ trailer

    Stealing this from Jeff Wells, but Kristin Scott Thomas’s performance in the upcoming “I’ve Loved You So Long” has made an early splash in the industry as the awards season looms on the horizon.

    Here’s a look at the new trailer:

    httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlMPS_qcRaM