Posts Tagged ‘Oscars’

Jeff Bridges, who has four nominations under his belt, is this year's front-runner for Best Lead Actor for his powerful performance in "Crazy Heart"

Continuing our analyses of the top categories for the upcoming Academy Awards, here is an in-depth look at the nominees up for Best Actor in a Leading Role by our own Marisa Carpico. Tell us what you think!

Also see Best Supporting Actress

Best Actor in a Leading Role

Jeff Bridges already won the Screen Actor’s Guild Award and the Golden Globe for his role in Crazy Heart, so he’s expected to win the Oscar as well.  However, he faces some strong competition from Jeremy Renner, who won an award from the National Board of Review, for his role in The Hurt Locker.  If Bridges and Renner don’t win, the next most likely candidate is George Clooney for his charismatic performance in Up in the Air.  Surprisingly, Colin Firth’s powerful performance in A Single Man gives him an advantage over Oscar-veteran Morgan Freeman, whose portrayal as Nelson Mandela is impressive, but his nomination wasn’t exactly a considered a sure thing so he is the least likely to win.
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This is only Mo'Nique's first nomination, but her wins with the Golden Globes, National Society of Film Critics, and SAG gives her the most momentum

Here at Movie-Thoughts we’re taking it upon ourselves to analyze the nominees for this year’s Academy Awards, figuring out who has the best chance to win their category. We’ll be examining major categories like Best Picture and Best Director, but leading up to these we’ll also examine categories like Best Screenplay and Best Actor. Our Marisa Carpico starts us off with the following evaluation.

Best Supporting Actress

Considering she’s won a Golden Globe, a Screen Actors Guild Award and a Critic’s Choice Award, Mo’Nique is the most likely candidate to win.  If by some shocking turn of events Mo’Nique loses, there’s no telling who could win.  Vera Farmiga’s beguiling performance in Up in the Air is a likely front-runner.  Penélope Cruz is an Oscar favorite, but her role in Nine is far too similar to her Vicky Christina Barcelona character, for which she won the award last year.  Maggie Gyllenhaal gave an interesting performance in Crazy Heart, but it’s the weakest of the group.  The dark horse in this category is Anna Kendrick.  Despite a show-stealing performance in Up in the Air, Kendrick’s youth acts against her and she has plenty of time for another nomination.
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It's that time of year again!

Oscar nominations were released today! See which of your favorite movies/people were nominated, and tell us if you disagree with any of them. Are there any snubs?

We here at Movie-Thoughts are soon going to be starting a continuing piece dissecting these nominations one category at a time, so be sure to check back regularly!

The 82nd Academy Awards will be aired on March 7th, and will be hosted by Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin.

Best picture
“Avatar”
“The Blind Side”
“District 9″
“An Education”
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“Precious”
“A Serious Man”
“Up”
“Up in the Air”

Best actor
Jeff Bridges, “Crazy Heart”
George Clooney, “Up in the Air”
Colin Firth, “A Single Man”
Morgan Freeman, “Invictus”
Jeremy Renner, “The Hurt Locker”

Best actress
Sandra Bullock, “The Blind Side”
Helen Mirren, “The Last Station”
Carey Mulligan, “An Education”
Gabourey Sidibe, “Precious”
Meryl Streep, “Julie & Julia”

Best supporting actor
Matt Damon, “Invictus”
Woody Harrelson, “The Messenger”
Christopher Plummer, “The Last Station”
Stanley Tucci, “The Lovely Bones”
Christoph Waltz, “Inglourious Basterds”

Best supporting actress
Penelope Cruz, “Nine”
Vera Farmiga, “Up in the Air”
Maggie Gyllenhaal, “Crazy Heart”
Anna Kendrick, “Up in the Air”
Mo’Nique, “Precious ”

Best director
James Cameron, “Avatar”
Kathryn Bigelow, “The Hurt Locker”
Quentin Tarantino, “Inglourious Basterds”
Lee Daniels, “Precious”
Jason Reitman, “Up in the Air”

Best foreign-language film
“Ajami” Israel
“El Secreto de Sus Ojos” Argentina
“The Milk of Sorrow” Peru
“Un Prophete” France
“The White Ribbon” Germany

Best adapted screenplay
Neill Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell, “District 9″
Nick Hornby, “An Education”
Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Armando Iannucci, Tony Roche, “In the Loop”
Geoffrey Fletcher, “Precious”
Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner, “Up in the Air”

Best original screenplay
Mark Boal, “The Hurt Locker”
Quentin Tarantino, “Inglourious Basterds”
Alessandro Camon and Oren Moverman, “The Messenger”
Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, “A Serious Man”
Bob Peterson, Pete Docter, Tom McCarthy, “Up”

Best animated feature film
“Coraline”
“Fantastic Mr. Fox”
“The Princess and the Frog”
“The Secret of Kells”
“Up”

Best art direction
“Avatar”
“The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus”
“Nine” “Sherlock Holmes”
“The Young Victoria”

Best cinematography
“Avatar”
“Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince”
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“The White Ribbon”

Best sound mixing
“Avatar”
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“Star Trek”
“Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen”

Best sound editing
“Avatar”
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“Star Trek”
“Up”

Best original score
“Avatar,” James Horner
“Fantastic Mr. Fox,” Alexandre Desplat
“The Hurt Locker,” Marco Beltrami and Buck Sanders
“Sherlock Holmes,” Hans Zimmer
“Up,” Michael Giacchino

Best original song
“Almost There” from “The Princess and the Frog,” Randy Newman
“Down in New Orleans” from “The Princess and the Frog,” Randy Newman
“Loin de Paname” from “Paris 36,” Reinhardt Wagner and Frank Thomas
“Take It All” from “Nine,” Maury Yeston
“The Weary Kind (Theme from Crazy Heart)” from “Crazy Heart,” Ryan Bingham and T Bone       Burnett

Best costume design
“Bright Star”
“Coco Before Chanel”
“The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus”
“Nine”
“The Young Victoria”

Best documentary feature
“Burma VJ”
“The Cove”
“Food, Inc.”
“The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers”
“Which Way Home”

Best documentary short
“China’s Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province”
“The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardner”
“The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant”
“Music by Prudence”
“Rabbit a la Berlin”

Best film editing
“Avatar”
“District 9″
“The Hurt Locker”
“Inglourious Basterds”
“Precious”

Best makeup
“Il Divo”
“Star Trek”
“The Young Victoria”

Best animated short film
“French Roast”
“Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty”
“The Lady and the Reaper (La Dama y la Muerte)”
“Logorama”
“A Matter of Loaf and Death”

Best live-action short film
“The Door”
“Instead of Abracadabra”
“Kavi”
“Miracle Fish”
“The New Tenants”

Best visual effects
“Avatar”
“District 9″
“Star Trek”

Maryl Streep as Julia Child in "Julie and Julia"

An article on HollywoodReporter.com, written by Steven Zeitchik, talks about how up to this point in time in the Oscar race very few actresses have made much of an impression. Maryl Streep will likely be nominated (yet again) for her role as Julia Child in Julie and Julia, and Zeitchik claims that only two other leading actresses (Carey Mulligan and Gabourey Sidibe for An Education and Precious) have a shot at taking home the gold statuette.

One possible reason that Zeitchik postulates deals with the kinds of roles available for women in mainstream Hollywood. Independent films (such as An Education and Precious) offer many more dynamic, “serious” leading roles for women than Hollywood does (the reasons for which are up for speculation), but being in an independent flick doesn’t downgrade one’s performance in the eyes of the award voters. The Academy is not averse to giving the Best Leading Actress award to a “new face,” so-to-speak (ex. Jennifer Hudson, Marion Cotillard, etc.). Zeitchik later argues that unless you’re the likes of Angelina Jolie or Hillary Swank it’s hard for a woman to land a “serious” part in mainstream Hollywood. So shallow is the Oscar nomination pool for leading actresses, Zeitchik says, that Sandra Bullock is getting award buzz (for her role in The Blind Side).

Those who don’t think much of this year’s lack of standout performances by leading actresses chalk the issue up to the cyclical nature of each category, while some others speculate that it relates to bigger (supposed) issues like Hollywood making less award-worthy films. Zeitchik attempts to debunk such a speculation by noting that the Best Leading Actor category is overflowing with quality nomination possibilities (ex. George Clooney, Colin Firth, Jeff Bridges, Jeremy Renner, etc.).

You can read the full article here, which includes other related topics such as the possibility for three women to be nominated for Best Director, which is an unprecedented feat.

Quick Opinion: I can’t be certain that the number of quality leading roles for women in Hollywood is going down, if for no other reason than because it’s a more complex issue than one might think at first. Sure, maybe this year’s crop isn’t all that extensive, but last year saw 5 great actresses in the nomination pool, which led to hugely diverse speculation before the awards show about who was going to win. And being that Hollywood is still a big supporter of patriarchal ideology (for better or worse), there is and probably always will be plenty of quality leading roles available for men. Who’s to say, though, that there simply aren’t a lot of good scripts with great leading roles for women making the rounds around Hollywood? Script ‘X’ may have a dynamite female lead character, but if its overall story stinks then it doesn’t matter. Studios don’t typically buy works-in-progress. In any case, why would they take a chance on a lousy script just to satisfy a male/female ratio of leading roles? I’m all for equal representation of the sexes in the arts, but the film industry is a business (the biggest financial risk-takers being Hollywood studios) and if it were to adopt some brand of affirmative action to assure such equality I would speculate that the industry would suffer both financially and artistically. Simply put, you can’t tell an industry dealing in creativity what to create.

 Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has released a list of the semi-finalists eligible for nomination for the Best Documentary Oscar. The list was narrowed down from 37 to 8, and will later be further narrowed down to 3, or possibly 5. The official nominees will be released February 2nd.

The list of films currently still eligible to be nominated are:

• China’s Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province, Downtown Community Television Center, Inc.
• The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardner, Just Media
• The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant, Community Media Productions
• Lt. Watada, Chanlim Films
• Music by Prudence, iThemba Productions
• Rabbit a la Berlin, MS Films
• Tell Them Anything You Want: A Portrait of Maurice Sendak, Outside Productions
• Woman Rebel, Women Rebel Films

Source: Variety

Come closer to Oscar time Movie-Thoughts will have more in-depth information on the nominees for all categories.

Five more nominees, but still just one of these.

Is the Change Good or Bad?

Cliff – This past June, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciencesannounced it would increase the number of nominees for Best Picture from 5 to 10, starting with the upcoming 82^nd Academy Awards taking place March 7^th. Reportedly, the reasons for the surprise change were to, among other things, increase viewership of the Academy Awards. The academy board of governors (which delegate certain awards such as the one for lifetime achievement) felt there were more than five films that deserved to be nominated for Best Picture last year, with The Dark Knight being the most popularly cited example.

It can be said that every year there are films that get “snubbed” by the academy that deserved to have been nominated for Best Picture. Last year was no different. The main reason for the change, which the academy admits is only one of many, is to attract more casual viewers. Many filmgoers have expressed either dissatisfaction or disinterest in the Oscars over the past few years because none of the movies they saw and enjoyed were nominated for any kinds of awards outside of special effects, sound, or editing -the kinds of awards that people tend to spend the time using the restroom or refreshing drinks. Last year The Dark Knight became the fourth-highest grossing film of all time worldwide (second domestically behind only Titanic). This alone should mean nothing to the academy, but the film was also one of the most critically acclaimed films of the year (ex., it earned a 94% on RottenTomatoes.com). For such a popular and well regarded movie not to get a Best Picture nomination seemed rather perplexing to many people, including yours truly. Luckily, however, Heath Ledger’s win for Best Supporting Actor helped alleviate some of this frustration. Read the rest of this entry »

Forever Enthralled

China’s Film Bureau released yesterday that the People’s Republic of China has elected the film Forever Enthralled, directed by Chen Kaige, to be China’s Academy Award nominee for the Best Foreign Language Film category. The film is a biopic of China’s most famous Peking opera performers, with Beijing-born pop star Leon Lai in the title role as Mei Lanfang. Kaige has directed two other Oscar nominated films from China (Farewell My Concubine and The Promise).

Austria has also submitted their candidate for Best Foreign Language Film category, For a Moment Freedom. Directed by Iranian-Austrian filmmaker

Arash T. Riahi, the movie tells the story of Iranian refugees and their journey to Austria through Turkey. It has garnered a lot of critical momentum on the festival circuit, earning honors like Best Austrian Film at the Vienna Film Festival and first feature kudos in Montreal and Zurich.

Sources: Variety and Hollywood Reporter