‘The Artist’ tops 69th Golden Globe Nominations

The Golden Globe nominations were announced the middle of last week. In the race for best motion picture The Artist, a silent black-and-white movie about an actor at the time of the transition to talkies, led the pack with six Golden Globe nominations. It is nominated for best picture in the musical or comedy category.

 

George Clooney's two movies each received a nod for best picture, drama. The Descendants seems to be favored over The Ides of March. The former received five nominations, including best feature movie in the drama category, and a best actor nomination for Clooney.

But Ides of March was not slighted by the HFPA. Clooney, Heslov, and Beau Willimon are nominated for best screenplay and Clooney has a best director nomination.

Not nominated? The Tree of Life. Not enough "T and A" in the movie, perhaps, or was the Cannes winner's Transcendental premise over their heads? There is more about the actual nominations but, first, a digression.

I caution you, dear reader, to be aware where the Oscar race is concerned that the Golden Globe Awards are sponsored and the recipients chosen by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA). That is the association of credentialed reporters, etc., from outside the USA, who follow and report on the American entertainment industry. Some live here, some don't. The Globes give awards to both the movie and television industries.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is the sponsor of the Academy Awards (Oscars). The membership of the Academy (AMPAS) consists of people who work in the movie industry, and who are card caring members of an industry guild. Every member must be invited to join. Only members of the Academy can nominate and vote, and awards are only given to the motion picture industry.

I know some people still call these awards, and festivals, "film," but it is a misnomer now because movies are not photographed on film and projectors don't project film, they are all digital in the USA. So, now we should call them the best picture, best motion picture, best movie, best feature, best short motion picture, etc. Technically there is no longer a best film in any category.

Besides, when I was in cinema school, I was taught that film is the medium whereby motion pictures, sometimes called by their shortened slang name, movies, are made. Motion Pictures are the products, one product medium that comprises The Media. Get the picture? If so, enjoy the motion picture festivals and watch lots of movies at your local picture show, as they were originall called. Of course today they are shown in a movie theater, or cinema!

But, quick, amend that. We don't even need to go out to see a movie anymore. We can get it on demand from a provider server There's TV, cable, satellite, or watch it on our computer. On demand, when we want it. Wow! The method of delivering  movies has come a long way, indeed.

Many critics and writers will indicate that the Globe winners predict the Oscars. They do not. What they do is bring the movies before the general public, and probably do cause some Academy members to consider, or reconsider, some movie they have either previously overlooked or dismissed.

For instance, The Hollywood Foreign Press Association and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences last chose the same best picture in 2009, when director Danny Boyle’s Slumdog Millionaire won both.  I picked that movie for best picture in October when it won best picture at the Toronto Festival. After I saw it, I knew I had made the best choice.

Not only do the Globes honor television shows and actors, but they have two categories for best picture: musical or comedy, and drama, as well as the same two categories for best and supporting actors and actresses. The Academy makes the same distinction for actors and actresses, but there is only one best picture, and comedy usually gets the short piece of the wishbone when it comes to the Academy Awards.

The 69th annual Golden Globe Awards ceremony will be held Sunday, January 15th, at the Beverly Hilton Hotel, Beverly Hills, and broadcast live on NBC. Ricky Gervaise will host them again this year.

The Oscar nominations will be announced January 24th at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences,  Beverly Hills.The 84th Academy Awards gala will be broadcast by ABC February 26th, and Billy Crystal will host.

NOMINATIONS FOR BEST MOTION PICTURE - DRAMA

The Descendants, starring George Clooney.
The Ides of March - George Clooney wrote, directed and stars in the Ides of March. To me, it is basically Clooney's take on politics. Of course, it is a liberal-progressive one, so I like that. Tagline: An idealistic staffer for a newbie presidential candidate gets a crash course on dirty politics during his stint on the campaign trail.

 The Help, received nine nominations. Three actresses in the movie were nominated, but not Emma Stone who played Skeeter. These were: Viola Davis (Aibileen) for best actress, Jessica Chastain (Celia) and Octavia Spencer (Minny) for an actress in a supporting role. 


Hugo (Paramount), Martin Scorsese's animated movie is not nominated in the animation category, but for best motion picture. The other Paramount animated movie, Rango, is nominated in the animation category.

 Moneyball, an excellent baseball movie starring Brad Pitt, and costarring Jonah Hill, is for those who love the allure of baseball statistics, and a baseball movie that is all heart, at the same time. Pitt received a best actor nomination for his role as real-life manager Billy Beane, but Jonah Hill did not receive a best-supporting nod.

 War Horse, the latest horse opera. This one is set in World War One, and is directed by Steven Spielberg. Take Kleenex.

Click the title of this post to see the full list of nominations, and much more, on the HFPA's Official Site. Please come back here after the first of the year for some more unique takes on the Golden Globes and the Academy Awards.

2011 Cannes IFF: A Big Wrap

 

Poster for 'Midnight in Paris' with Owen Wilson

One of the most pleasant surprises of the 64th Festival de Cannes, which ran May 11 - 22, and wrapped Sunday, was the good reception of Woody Allen's latest movie, MIDNIGHT IN PARIS, an imaginative romantic comedy where a character takes a late night walk in Paris and is transported back to the 1920s. He finds himself hobnobbing with literary giants Ernest Hemingway, Gertrude Stein, Picasso, plus Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald.

The film had its international premiere on Opening Night, screening out of competition. Some of the buzz words from critics were: "upbeat", "funny", "very enjoyable", "Allen's best in years," and the film they most often compared to it? THE PURPLE ROSE OF CAIRO (1985), starring Mia Ferrow, Jeff Daniels and Danny Aiello, in which a character walks out of a film and into the life of a vulnerable young New Jersey woman in the 1930s.

MIDNIGHT IN PARIS was filmed last year in the French capital. Allen brings together a broad international cast, including Owen Wilson, Rachel McAdams, Marion Cotillard, Kathy Bates, Adrien Brody, Carla Bruni-Sarkozy (First Lady of France), Gad Elmaleh and Léa Seydoux.

The other surprise movie at Cannes that received accolades was THE ARTIST* by French director Michel Hazanavicius. It was not made in the 1920s, but is set in that era. Shot in black and white, it is a silent movie, a study in light and shadows. (* denotes an Cannes award winner.)

THE ARTIST screened in competition. The viewers and critics absolutely loved this movie about movies. Where is it written that all movies today must be shot in color, in high def or 3D, and have dialogue, a pop music score, and a budget of astronomical proportions?  Yes, this one is special for more than one reason. It is also a French movie filmed in Hollywood, no less.

Another buzzed-about movie is Joseph Cedar's Hebrew-language black comedy FOOTNOTE* (Israel). Three years ago, Cedar's BEAUFORT was nominated for a foreign-language Oscar, and he won two Silver Bears at Berlin for directing it, and for the screenplay. But whereas that movie is rich with political overtones, FOOTNOTE does not overtly deal with things political, but with a complicated relationship between a Jewish son and his father. Sony Picture Classics snatched up the North and Latin American rights immediately. 

Also, on Opening Night, the Italian director Bernardo Bertolucci was presented an honorary Palme d'or for lifetime achievement (see previous posts), and 17 May the Festival honored French actor Jean-Paul Belmondo with a special day. In the ‘60s and ‘70s, Belmondo worked with the Crème de la Crème of cinema auteurs such as Jean-Luc Godard, Jean-Pierre Melville, François Truffaut, Claude Lelouch, Alain Resnais, Vittorio de Sica and Alberto Lattuada, in THAT MAN FROM RIO, BREATHLESS, PIERROT LE FOUR, MISSISSIPPI MERMAID, LE MAGNIFIQUE and STAVISKY AND BORSALINO, just a few movies in which he starred that showed his extraordinary acting range.

Like Bertolucci on his night, Belmondo walked the Red Carpet surrounded by friends and admirers. Later, he attended the première of Vincent Perrot and Jeff Domenech’s documentary BELMONDO, THE CAREER. The screening was followed by a dinner and party.

It would not be a film festival without a controversy, and Danish director Lars von Trier, MELANCHOLIA *, set off a storm when he spoke at a press conference about finding out when his mother was on her death bed that
he was not a Jew. His controversial statement was something like, "I have nothing against Jews, but, O.K., I'm a Nazi." 
 
Lars von Trier apologized for his remarks, but was banned from Cannes with this statement, "The board of directors firmly condemns these comments and declares Lars Von Trier a persona non grata at the Festival de Cannes, with effect immediately."

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Closing Night the official Jury of this 64th Festival de Cannes, presided over by Robert De Niro, revealed the prize winners during the Closing Ceremony. Actress Jane Fonda was escorted onstage at the Grand Théâtre Lumière by Mélanie Laurent. Fonda presented the Palme d'or for the best film among the 20 in Competition.

The evening closed with the screening of Christophe Honoré's BELOVED (Les Bien-aimés), starring Catherine Deneuve, Chiara Mastroianni (Deneuve's daughter with Marcello),  Ludivine Sagnier, Louis Garrel and Milos Forman. 

Poster for 'The Tree of Life' with Brad Pitt and Sean Penn

And the awards went to:

FEATURE FILMS

Jury headed by U.S. actor/director/producer Robert De Niro. Members of the Jury were: French writer/director Olivier Assayas; Argentinian producer Martina Gusman; director Mahamat-Saleh Haroun who was born in Chad; U.K. actor/producer Jude Law; producer of Chinese-language films Nansun Shi; U.S. actress Uma Thurman; Hong Kong director Johnnie To; and Norway-born writer and journalist Linn Ullmann.

Terrence Malick

   Palme d'or - THE TREE OF LIFE (USA), written and directed by Terrence Malick, starrng Brad Pitt, Sean Penn, Jessica Chastain, and Hunter McCracken. In 1979, Malick won the best director at Cannes for DAYS OF HEAVEN. More about this movie in the next post.

Grand Prix - BIR ZAMANLAR ANADOLU’DA (Once Upon A Time In Anatolia) by Nuri Bilge Ceylan, and THE KID WITH A BIKE, directed by Jean-Pierre & Luc Dardenne.

Best Director - Nicolas Winding Refn for DRIVE.

Jury Prize - POLISS by Maiwenn.

Best Performance for an Actor - Jean Dujardin in THE ARTIST, directed by Michel Hazanavicius.

Best Performance for an Actress - Kirsten Dunst in MELANCHOLIA, directed by Lars von Trier.

Award for the Best Screenplay - Joseph Cedar for FOOTNOTE.


SHORT FILMS IN COMPETTION

Palme d'or - CROSS-COUNTRY by Maryna Vroda, and Jury Prize - BADPAKJE 46 (Swimsuit 46) by Wannes Drstoop.

CAMERA d'or - LAS ACACIAS  by  Pablo GIORGELLI, presented in the framework of the the CRITICS' WEEK.

UN CERTAIN REGARD - 21 May, presented 21 films directed by 22 directors hailing from 19 different countries. Two of the works were first films. The Jury was presided over by Emir Kusturica (Director, actor and musician - Serbia). The Jury members were: Elodie Bouchez (Actress - France), Peter Bradshaw (Critic-The Guardian - U.K.), Geoffrey Gilmore (Chief Creative Officer-Tribeca Enterprises - USA), Daniela MICHEL (Director of the Morelia Festival - Mexico).

PRIZE OF UN CERTAIN REGARD Ex-æquo - ARIRANG by Kim Ki-Duk, shared with HALT AUF FREIER STRECKE (Stopped on Track) by Andreas Dresen.

SPECIAL JURY PRIZE - ELENA by Andrey Zvyagintsev.

DIRECTING PRIZE - BÉ OMID É DIDAR (Au revoir), Mohammad Rasoulof.

CINEFONDATION - Presented 20 May and Showcasing Student Films:

The Cinéfondation and Short Films Jury (Julie Gayet, Jessica Hausner, Corneliu Porumboiu, João Pedro Rodrigues and President Michel Gondry) awarded the Cinéfondation Prizes during a ceremony in Buñuel Theatre before the screening of the winning films.

Sixteen student films coming from Asia, America and Europe composed this year’s program. They have been selected out of 1,600 entries.

First Cinéfondation Prize - DER BRIEF (The Letter) by Doroteya Droumeva, dffb, Germany, awarded € 15,000; Second Cinéfondation Prize - DRARI  by Kamal Lazraq, La Fémis, France, awarded € 11,250; Third Cinéfondation Prize, YA-GAN-BI-HANG (Fly by Night) by Son Tae-gyum, Chung-Ang University, South Korea, awarded € 7,500.

MOVIE & ART EVENTS IN NYC

1. Exhibit of Famous Spanish Artists. The exhibit "Barcelona and the Modernity: Gaudí to Dalí" opened Wednesday, 7 March, at the Metropolitan Museum, NYC, Special Exhibition Galleries, The Tisch Galleries, 2nd floor.

Andalusian Pablo Picasso, the Catalans Joan Miró, Salvador Dalí and Antoni Gaudí are represented in the exhibition that will close 3 June. The president of the Metropolitan, Emily Rafferty, referred to the exhibition as one of the biggest international exhibitions of modern art."

The Metropolitan Museum is located at 1000 Fifth Avenue. New York, New York 10028 -0198. It appears that admission prices are recommended: Adults, $20; Seniors (65 and older) $15; Students, $10 (with some restrictions); and Children under 12 with an adult are free. For more specific information call 212-535-7710. Visit online.


2. "Monday Nights With Oscar®" Screenings. The movie NETWORK (1976) will screen at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences® (AMPAS®) Theater at Lighthouse International in New York City, Monday, 19 March. NETWORK opens the "Monday Nights With Oscar" screening series in New York City (NYC). The movie contains the famous line, “I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!”

Hosted by Robert Osborne, host of Turner Classic Movies, the special guest will be the movie's director Sidney Lumet, and showtime is 7:30 p.m. The Theater at Lighthouse International is located at 111 East 59th Street, New York.

Tickets are $5 for the general public and $3 for Academy members and students with a valid ID and may be reserved over the phone by calling 1-888-778-7575. Depending on availability, tickets may be purchased in person the night of the screening. Doors open at 7 p.m. For more information.

General Information

Tickets for these, and other, Academy programs may be purchased by mail, at the Academy during normal business hours, or at the box office which opens one hour before the start of the event.

The Academy's main national office is at 8949 Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills, California. Office hours are 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, except most major holidays. For further information on all Academy events and exhibitions in Los Angeles, call (310) 247-3600, unless otherwise noted.

The Academy's New York office is at 111 East 59th Street, New York, New York, closed most major holidays. For further information on all Academy events and exhibitions in New York, call (888) 778-7575, unless otherwise noted.