In Contention

Tag: Pamela Martin

  • OSCAR GUIDE: Best Film Editing

    I’m afraid you’ll find that I’m having trouble getting all that excited about this year’s race for Best Film Editing. How can I when the absolute best editing job of the year (from a true master, no less) was shunned altogether, while a cruel joke was played in the form of “Inception” editor Lee Smith getting the shaft, too.

    The below is a decent set of contenders with an array of virtues. It’s just a shame that the editor’s branch is so slavishly devoted to Best Picture frontrunners, especially when truly exceptional work that doesn’t necessarily find itself dovetailing with Oscar bait is ignored each and every year. Nevertheless, the statistic remains: in 30 years, no film not nominated here has gone on to win Best Picture.

    The nominees are:

    “Black Swan” (Andrew Weisblum)
    “The Fighter” (Pamela Martin)
    “The King’s Speech” (Tariq Anwar)
    “127 Hours” (Jon Harris)
    “The Social Network” (Angus Wall and Kirk Baxter)

    (more…)

  • TECH SUPPORT: Final analysis, part two

    Yesterday I began a final look at the crafts categories. Today, a look at the four remaining fields: Best Art Direction, Best Cinematography, Best Costume Design and Best Film Editing.

    BEST ART DIRECTION

    The precursors of the BFCA, BAFTA and Art Directors Guild have been fairly consistent in citing four titles in this category. Last year’s winner, Robert Stromberg, seems poised to dip again for creation of a 3D world on Tim Burton’s “Alice in Wonderland.” Eve Stewart, on the other hand, will likely be returning to the fold after an 11 year absence for “The King’s Speech.”

    Guy Hendrix Dyas and Jess Gonchor also have got all necessary precursors, and have fashioned surefire Best Picture nominees, in “Inception” and “True Grit” respectively. It is true that they have had difficulty being nominated in the past but Gonchor has also never had such an Oscar-friendly opportunity, whereas the impressive, integral-to-the-story nature of Dyas’s work has been especially embraced by the precursors.

    (more…)

  • AFI FEST: ‘The Fighter’ crashes the party

    I decided to come home and give “The Fighter,” which saw its world premiere at a “secret screening” at AFI Fest tonight, some real thought rather than rushing back to review.  How novel.

    Given the amount of press on hand, one imagines Paramount publicity was besieged with ticket requests following the last minute announcement of the screening yesterday morning, but the film played well to a largely public audience. And by “well” I mean they were kind of swinging from the rafters, as David O. Russell’s film is a mainstream crowd-pleaser through and through.

    There is much to admire about the film. For starters, there’s a unique energy that’s palpable throughout, owed largely to the camera work of DP Hoyte Van Hoytema and, especially, film editing from Pamela Martin. The fights were filmed in a retro early-90s video vein, duplicating the original HBO telecasts of “Irish” Micky Ward’s matches, and they have an energy that crackles. There is the sense of sterile choreography here and there, but for the most part, these scenes are quite uplifting and stand out against the usual boxing sequences we’ve seen over the years.

    (more…)

  • TECH SUPPORT: Best Film Editing — Volume II

    So important but so hard to notice. That’s how I would describe the work of our best film editors – those cutting artists who blend and juxtapose frames together to make films coherent, establish a flow and also set the mood in a manner that suits the screenwriter’s words and the director’s vision.

    The Academy Award for Best Film Editing is, more than any other category, very much tied to the Best Picture race. Despite a blip from 2005-2007, this category always has at least three – usually four, sometimes all five – of its nominees also nominated in the big category. Now that there are 10 nominees, however, one cannot help but wonder if we are ever going to again see a nominee here also not cited in Best Picture.

    Apart from Best Picture contention, being a war film, action film or musical never hurts here. I must say, however, that since I last previewed this category in August, I continue to believe that the three titles I had leading the way then are still out in front.

    (more…)

  • TECH SUPPORT: Best Film Editing — Volume I

    I still remember when I was 12 and getting into the Oscars for the first time. My Dad said, “How can you tell if the film has good editing?” To a very large extent, I had to concede his point, as the best editing is often that which we don’t explicitly notice. Rather, it simply “becomes” the film as we become immersed in what is on the screen, not remembering that everything was staged from different angles on different days.

    Film Editing brings films to agreeable length, coherent narrative and appropriate pacing so as to engage the audience in accordance with the director’s vision.  The Academy Award for the art form has definitely shown a tendency toward “showy” editing in the past, though.  War films, musicals, action films and movies that are not told linearly all frequent this race. But perhaps the best predictor of the editing nominees is what is occurring in the Best Picture race.   Most of the nominees show up here.  Now that we have ten Best Picture nominees, I would think at least four nominees will also be there.

    All things considered, Lee Smith’s editing of Christopher Nolan’s “Inception” has got to be considered the leader in this race. The film was well received, is a Best Picture favorite, was certainly told in a “unique” manner and Smith was nominated last time he and Nolan worked together. I fully expect him to earn his third nomination this year.

    (more…)