The Best Supporting Actress Race

This is Wonder Woman??

"The Justice League" film has cast the woman of wonder and this is her..


Some Australian supermodel called Megan Gale. Not very exciting, in fact disappointing. Lets hope she can act 'cause this is an iconic role that should not be messed up. Funny how Wonder Woman fought for the equality of women around the world, and they cast a supermodel. Would she be proud?

The Best Supporting Actress Race

"Charlie Wilson's War" Reviews

"Charlie Wilson's War" has been the big ole question mark of the season. Is it any good? The trailer left me, well, mixed. Tom and Philip looks a hell of alot of fun. Juiia just looked a little deranged (come on...am I the only one who sees Amanda Lepore?)
The film has been reviewed, and not by some AICN fanboy, this time Variety has chimed in and so has The Hollywood Reporter.

Both are extremely promising, and both single out it girl, Amy Adams. Julia get good noticed as does Tom and Philip. The script is raved about so expect Aaron Sorkin to be nominated. Not sure if it can crack Best Actor, Supporting Actress, Supporting Actor and most importantly Best Picture, we will see when more reviews come in and the Box Office has been calculated.

For Andra

8 "Sweeney Todd" clips for you my love!









And to remember the original

I am thief!!

I am stealing from Sasha Stone over at Oscar Watch ooops. Awards Daily, but since I linked her, it is ok.
I did this mainly for my friends to are not as obsessive as me, but find the whole game funny.

Advance word is in...

"The Golden Compass" is another 'meh' movie. Meaning that it is ok, spectacular FX but the story is a bit of a mess. The advance praise for Kidman is wonderful, but in order for a fantasy film to get an Acting nomination the film needs to be a critical darling (like "Star Wars" and "LOTR" were), which this will not be.

Next time love.

The Best Supporting Actress Race

In fitting

Independant Spirit Award Nominations!

The anti Oscars have piped in and kept Cate where she belongs!

2008 SPIRIT AWARD NOMINATIONS by category
BEST FEATURE (Award given to the Producer)
* Executive Producers are not listed.

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Producers: Kathleen Kennedy, Jon Kilik

I'm Not There
Producers: Christine Vachon, John Sloss, John Goldwyn, James D. Stern

Juno
Producers: Lianne Halfon, John Malkovich, Mason Novick, Russell Smith

A Mighty Heart
Producers: Dede Gardner, Andrew Eaton, Brad Pitt

Paranoid Park
Producers: Neil Kopp, David Cress

BEST DIRECTOR

Todd Haynes
I'm Not There

Tamara Jenkins !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The Savages

Jason Reitman
Juno

Julian Schnabel
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

Gus Van Sant
Paranoid Park

BEST FIRST FEATURE (Award given to the director and producer)

2 Days in Paris
Director: Julie Delpy
Producers: Julie Delpy, Christophe Mazodier, Thierry Potok

Great World of Sound
Director: Craig Zobel
Producers: Melissa Palmer, David Gordon Green, Richard Wright, Craig Zobel

The Lookout
Director: Scott Frank
Producers: Roger Birnbaum, Gary Barber, Laurence Mark, Walter Parkes

Rocket Science
Director: Jeffrey Blitz
Producers: Effie T. Brown, Sean Welch

Vanaja
Director: Rajnesh Domalpalli
Producer: Latha R. Domalapalli

JOHN CASSAVETES AWARD (Given to the best feature made for under $500,000; award given to the writer, director, and producer)
* Executive Producers are not listed.

August Evening
Writer/Directpr: Chris Eska
Producers: Connie Hill, Jason Wehling

Owl and the Sparrow
Writer/Director: Stephane Gauger
Producers: Nguyen Van Quan, Doan Nhat Nam, Stephane Gauger

The Pool
Director: Chris Smith
Producer: Kate Noble
Writer: Chris Smith & Randy Russell

Quiet City
Director: Aaron Katz
Producers: Brendan McFadden, Ben Stambl
Writers: Aaron Katz, Erin Fisher, Cris Lankenau

Shotgun Stories
Writer/Director: Jeff Nichols
Producers: David Gordon Green, Lisa Muskat, Jeff Nichols

BEST SCREENPLAY

Ronald Harwood
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

Tamara Jenkins!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The Savages

Fred Parnes & Andrew Wagner!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Starting Out in the Evening

Adrienne Shelly!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Waitress

Mike White
Year of the Dog

BEST FIRST SCREENPLAY

Jeffrey Blitz
Rocket Science

Zoe Cassavetes
Broken English

Diablo Cody (Of course)
Juno

Kelly Masterson
Before the Devil Knows You're Dead

John Orloff
A Mighty Heart

BEST FEMALE LEAD

Angelina Jolie (hmmmmm….no Nicole)
A Mighty Heart

Sienna Miller
Interview

Ellen Page
Juno

Parker Posey
Broken English


Tang Wei (Nice little shout out)
Lust, Caution

BEST MALE LEAD

Pedro Castaneda
August Evening

Don Cheadle (Yay!!!)
Talk To Me

Philip Seymour Hoffman
The Savages

Frank Langella (Double Yay!!!)
Starting Out in the Evening

Tony Leung
Lust, Caution

BEST SUPPORTING FEMALE

Cate Blanchett
I'm Not There

Anna Kendrick
Rocket Science

Jennifer Jason Leigh
Margot at the Wedding

Tamara Podemski
Four Sheets to the Wind

Marisa Tomei (Hmmmmmm! Could shake things up)
Before the Devil Knows You're Dead

BEST SUPPORTING MALE

Chiwetel Ejiofor
Talk To Me

Marcus Carl Franklin
I'm Not There

Kene Holliday
Great World of Sound

Irrfan Khan (FAN-BLOODY TASTIC!! Boo for Tabu)
The Namesake

Steve Zahn (They went for him, but not Bale???)
Rescue Dawn

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY

Mott Hupfel
The Savages

Janusz Kaminski
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

Milton Kam
Vanaja

Mihai Malaimare, Jr.
Youth Without Youth

Rodrigo Prieto
Lust, Caution

BEST DOCUMENTARY (Award given to the director)

Crazy Love
Director: Dan Klores

Lake of Fire
Director: Tony Kaye

Manufactured Landscape
Director: Jennifer Baichwal

The Monastery
Director: Pernille Rose Grønkjær

The Prisoner or: How I Planned to Kill Tony Blair
Directors: Petra Epperlein & Michael Tucker

BEST FOREIGN FILM (Award given to the director)

4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days
Director: Cristian Mungiu
(Romania)

The Band's Visit
Director: Eran Kolirin
(Israel)

Lady Chatterley
Director: Pascale Ferran
(France)

Once
Director: John Carney
(Ireland)

Persepolis
Directors: Vincent Paronnaud & Marjane Satrapi
(France)

ROBERT ALTMAN AWARD
(Given to one film's director, casting director and its ensemble cast)

I'm Not There (And so it begins)
Director: Todd Haynes
Casting Director: Laura Rosenthal
Ensemble Cast: Cate Blanchett, Christian Bale, Richard Gere, Heath Ledger, Ben Whishaw, Marcus Carl Franklin, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Bruce Greenwood

The Making of "Sweeney Todd"

Already calling it a master piece, eh? Big words.
To be honest if I went for a shave and the barber said "I can guarantee the closest shave you will ever know" in the way
Johnny does here, I would be running "Scooby Do" cartoon fast! So if someone gets in the chair after that, then my belief will be squashed.
Just a small gripe.

My other one is that there is no mention of the music.

A nice rave for our Nicole

I do love the woman, she may not always make the best decisions when it comes to her roles (usually the 'pay cheque' rolls) but she consistently challenges herself with the lower key material she chooses.
Looks as though she has another role to do so. This time in the mega blockbuster fantasy "His Dark Materials: The Golden Compass"


The Guardian has reviewed it and says this:

"This is the very best sort of part for her: statuesque, elegant, seductive, with a hint of cold steel. In many ways, it's her juiciest character since the sociopathic meteorologist in To Die For."

He goes onto say:

" But it certainly looks wonderful, with epic dash and a terrific central performance from Nicole Kidman, who may come to dominate our children's nightmares the way Robert Helpmann's Child Catcher in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang once did ours."

May be too early to start screaming about possible nominations, but with the possibility of Cate 'I'm a greedy little Oscar whore" Blanchett going to lead for "I'm Not There", there is a space for a star in Supporting Actress.
Read the full review here

Mini Review - "Ratatouille"

I have finally seen “Ratatouille”.

What is it about Pixar? They just seem to create masterpiece after masterpiece.

From the open shot in the country kitchen to the touching review read so eloquently by Peter O’Toole at the end this movie was one of the most wonderful, moving and funny films I have ever seen.

Brad Bird should really direct every movie. He was able to capture taste and smell like so many have tried to, but failed.

The script, the set design, the cinematography, the acting and the direction were all superb

To put it simply this movie is pure magic and should there be another film this year as good or better, well, I will be one happy boy.

There is nothing more to say.

A-

Aren’t Oscars full of sh*t.

The results are here from my latest poll.

I asked who you felt deserved the Best Actress Oscar back in 1989.

The results were shocking!! I had no idea that the eventual winners performance/character was so loved, I fully expected her to get my lone vote and be at the bottom of the heap.

This goes to show just how time can change the minds of many.

Here are the results:

5) With 4% of the votes we have Isabelle Adjani – “Camille Claudel”
Tied with
5) With 4% of the votes we have Jessica Lange – “Music Box”

3) With 7% of the votes we have Jessica Tandy – “Driving Miss Daisy” (The eventual winner)

2) With 18% of the votes we have the lovely Michelle Pfeiffer – “The Fabulous Baker Boys”

1) With a whopping 66% we have Pauline Collins – “Shirley Valentine”
Now I was fully expecting the Pfeiffer to run away with this. I honestly thought she would win by a land slide. Perhaps the reason she came in second was due to the fact that many of my British friends voted. Or maybe people went with the character they loved the best.
Or more likely, I am convinced my friends Dean and Lee logged on to 50 different computers to vote though.
Anyway Congratulations Pauline! You deserved it!

For my next poll we will be looking ahead in the Best Supporting Actress category, 1989.
The women you have to choose from are:


Brenda Fricker – “My Left Foot”
Anjelica Huston – “Enemies, a Love Story”
Lena Olin - “Enemies, a Love Story”
Julia Roberts – “Steel Magnolias”
Dianne Wiest – “Parenthood”

Poll is in the side bar to the right, near the top. VOTE!!!!

Mini Review - "Jindabyne"

So I noticed I had not given “Jindabyne” a review.
In fact the displacement of time between watching it and writing it up is fitting.

You see “Jindabyne” is about displacement.
The town itself was displaced due to rising waters, and it was moved higher up. This is not where the displacement ends. The two lead characters are husband and wife. The wife, Clare (Laura Linney wowing again), is from America, and the husband, Stewart (a wonderful Gabriel Byrne), is Irish.

Why do they live in this small town? Well that is never answered, neither are many questions, the secrets of one family should never be tied up neatly in a two-hour running time.

The basic story is while Stewart is on a fishing trip in isolated hill country with three other men he discovers the body of a murdered Aboriginal girl in the river.
Rather than return to the town immediately, they tie her to a branch with fishing wire and continue fishing and report their gruesome find days later.
Stewart's wife Claire is the last to find out.
Deeply disturbed by her husband's action, her faith in her relationship with Stewart is shaken to the core. She wants to understand and tries to make things right. In her determination to help the victim's family Claire sets herself not only against her own family and friends but also those of the dead girl.

The story enough is fascinating, as it is never about the killer. The film is not treated as a who-dunnit. Instead the audience is more horrified by the actions of these four men. Because there is no suspect, the blame is displaced and focused on these men. They are as guilty as had they murdered her themselves.

Is it ever explained why they did what they did? No, perhaps they were in a state of shock, or perhaps there was good fish to be had, or perhaps the death of an Aboriginal girl does not mean that much to four white men.

I will not go into the plot to much as this really is a film you need to discover for yourself. The acting is superb and the script is sharp.

The most fascinating thing about the film was the way in which it was shot. One minute the viewer is with these men seeing there trip from their perspective, and the next we are seeing them from behind the trees, as though we are watching them from afar.
Ray Lawrence has not only created a film that is about physical, emotional and spiritual displacement, he has also made one that takes this theme and let the audience feel it. In watching this film I felt unsettled, like there was a shift in the room.

I was sympathetic to Stewart, then Claire, then the family of the girl.
It was only until the end of the film that I was reminded who the real villain was and the fact that I forgot that stuck with me for a long time.
B +

The Best Supporting Actress Race

(I know she is campaigning for lead, but she better commit category fraud.)