Category: Cinema

Boo Hiss.

Y’know, after RotK‘s commanding sweep last year, I’d almost forgotten about Chicago, A Beautiful Mind, The English Patient, and all the myriad ways Oscar tends to be generally lame. But today’s nominations brought it all roaring back.

No Eternal Sunshine for best picture? That’s the most egregious snub since Three Kings, Being John Malkovich and Fight Club were all overlooked in favor of the much-overhyped American Beauty (to say nothing of ghastly drek like The Cider House Rules and The Green Mile.) Neither Jim Carrey nor Paul Giamatti for Best Actor? Giamatti’s snub is particularly cruel, given that both Thomas Haden Church and Virginia Madsen were nominated. Clive Owen and Natalie Portman? I think highly of them both, but as I said of the Globes, Closer was a lousy, over-the-top flick that confused explicit talk for serious purpose, and has no business being up for anything. (The same might be said of Johnny Depp in Finding Neverland — Depp rarely gives a bad performance, but, from what I gather, Neverland is a rote, by-the-numbers biopic. I haven’t seen it, though.)

To be honest, these choices generate zero excitement on this end (even if there’s a very outside chance I win a Soctopus that evening.) But, for tradition’s sake…

Best Picture: It’ll come down to The Aviator or Sideways, and my bet is this is the year the Academy honors Scorsese (partly for making Old Hollywood look so glamorous.)

Best Director: Martin Scorsese, The Aviator. See above. It’s Scorsese’s year…and that’ll be the lead for the evening.

Best Actor: Leonardo di Caprio, The Aviator. I could see Don Cheadle winning here, but, when in doubt, pick the actor playing the crazy and/or mentally deficient guy. (Jack Nicholson/As Good as it Gets, Geoffrey Rush/Shine, Tom Hanks/Forrest Gump, Anthony Hopkins/Silence of the Lambs, Dustin Hoffman/Rain Man, etc. etc.) I need to see the blueprints…

Best Actress: Kate Winslet, Eternal Sunshine. Besides being an Oscar darling, she’s helped by the fact that the movie got screwed in all the other categories. (Kinda like how the Moulin Rouge enthusiasts put Jim Broadbent over-the-top for Iris.)

Best Supporting Actor: Alan Alda, The Aviator. (This could just as easily have Alec Baldwin in the same film.) You could make a strong case for Jamie Foxx in Collateral, but I’m guessing his vote splits between here and Ray. Plus, Alda best fits the elder statesman role that generally wins these (Michael Caine/The Cider House Rules, James Coburn/Affliction, Martin Landau/Ed Wood, Gene Hackman/Unforgiven, Jack Palance/City Slickers.)

Best Supporting Actress: Cate Blanchett, The Aviator. This category can surprise, and Virginia Madsen and Natalie Portman are her closest competitors. But I figure the gist will be that Madsen should be happy to be nominated and Portman was a good performance in a bad film. (That being said, Portman’s role as a stripper is exactly the type of thing that often wins in this category — see: Kim Basinger/L.A. Confidential, Mira Sorvino/Mighty Aphrodite.)

Best Original Screenplay: Eternal Sunshine. The fan-favorite movie that the Academy feels bad for not quite “getting” generally goes here (Pulp Fiction, The Usual Suspects, Lost in Translation), and Eternal Sunshine will be no exception.

Best Adapted Screenplay: Sideways. I could see Before Sunset winning here, possibly. Still, I’ll say Sideways as recompense for the Giamatti snub.

Best Animated Feature: The Incredibles. No contest.

Married & Buried.

Citizens of Halloweentown and other devotees of stop-motion divertissement: you’ll be frightfully happy to hear that the trailer for Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride is now online (even if it does look quite a bit like Sleepy Hollow II.)

December Spawns a Monster.

Quint, one of the AICN crew, recently enjoyed a month-long visit to PJ’s King Kong set in New Zealand, and now he’s telling us about it. Kind of spoilerish at times, but if you want the Cliff Notes: “Peter Jackson is making a modern day two hundred million dollar Ray Harryhausen film.” Update: Part 2 here. Update 2: And Part 3.

Going Back to the Well.

In the Bad Idea film bin today, De Niro and Scorsese contemplate a Taxi Driver 2, Mel Brooks’ Spaceballs becomes a TV series, and Joel Schumacher is currently hard at work creating a “10th Anniversary Extended Director’s Cut” of Batman & Robin. Oof…is that really necessary?

That Ol’ Janx Spirit.

“Being asked to do the voice of The Guide is like having your birthday on Christmas Day, discovering a winning lottery ticket in your stocking and having chocolate poured all over you.” Longtime Hitchhiker’s fan and Adams compatriot Stephen Fry talks about his role in the upcoming film. I’d say his inclusion is another touch of class that bodes well for this project.

It’s Clobbering Time.

In case you never saw the 20-sec promo last week, the full-on Fantastic Four trailer is online now and, well, what is there to say, really? Like Spiderman and X-Men, The Fantastic Four is one of Marvel’s signature franchises…so I’m surprised how leaden this one’s turning out. In no way does this look or feel like FF to me, with the possible exception of Michael Chiklis’ early-Kirby Thing look. Turning Doom into a deranged budget Emperor Palpatine was a particularly bad call.

Speaking of which, not to get too old-school fanboy up in here, but what is Julian McMahon doing with them up there in space anyway? (And what’s with the space station? I seem to remember a 4-seater test shuttle…don’t fix it if it ain’t broke, y’all.) Oof, I’ve got a bad feeling about this…could this actually end up being worse than The Hulk?

Some Pig.

Paramount and Nickelodeon announce the voice talent for the forthcoming live-action Charlotte’s Web (a la Babe), and it’s an all-star cast, including Julia Roberts (Charlotte), Steve Buscemi (Templeton/Rat), John Cleese (Samuel/Sheep), Oprah Winfrey and Cedric the Entertainer (Gussy and Golly/Geese), Reba McEntire and Kathy Bates (Betsy and Bitsy/Cows), and Thomas Haden Church and Andre 3000 (Brooks and Benjamin/Crows). No word on who’s Wilbur yet, although the ubiquitous Dakota Fanning is Fern. I’ve always had a soft spot for Charlotte’s Web — it’s the first book I ever remember reading — so I expect I’ll probably check this out (even if Julia is the spider.)

Dark Globe.

A weekend of playoff football (ugh, so close, Jets) has fed into the Golden Globe awards which, I must say, have been pretty disappointing this year. I root for both Clive Owen and Natalie Portman in general, but Closer was a lousy film, and I would have much preferred to see some love for Eternal Sunshine at some point in the evening, even if Sideways and The Aviator are deserving in their own way. (I have yet to see Million Dollar Baby or Ray, but would be very surprised if they turned out better than Charlie Kaufman’s magnum opus.) Ah well, perhaps this’ll help Jim Carrey beat the Golden Globe curse.