Kris Tapley points us to this Peter Bart column wherein Bart proclaims D9’s Oscar chances
The obscure import from South Africa registered a $37 million weekend, but here’s the dirty little secret: “District 9” is an absolutely brilliant movie that could easily sneak away with some Oscars.
Some critics missed the boat on this one (including Variety), but at a packed Academy screening over the weekend at the Samuel Goldwyn Theater, the film received the most applause of any movie in a couple of years. That’s usually a signal.
Not necessarily; Academy members are people too. Just because they were entertained and loved the movie doesn’t mean that they’ll consider it as a Best Pic contender. On the other hand, Bart is an Academy member himself and isn’t too far off their general demographic. If it appeals to everyone young and old it won’t be ignored completely. Bart also suggests that the studios are too afraid of having a flop on their hands to take big chances with untested directors, “So the big question: Are there more potential winners out there that the majors are too timorous to touch?”
This Bart piece strikes me two ways. On the one hand, the news that D9 is a formidable, even probable Oscar contender is interesting. On the other hand, is this Variety trying harder to get into the Oscar game in order to get those Oscar ads flowing? Finally, is it unethical of Bart to talk the Oscar talk if he is a member? Does that influence the vote? Either way, it’s a good story. D9 goes on the Tracker because of it. It’s also worth noting that a reader signalled me to D9’s Oscar chances several days before this story broke, saying he believed the director had a great shot at a nod.
39 Responses for "Bart on District 9’s Enthusiastic Response"
I loved the movie; it’s the best ride of the summer, but I think it’ll top out at several tech nominations, plus possibly Editing, and maybe a very remote chance at Screenplay.
Neill Blomkamp is going to go far, but if Christopher Nolan couldn’t score a Best Director nomination… well, if directing an astonishing sci-fi dazzler ever led to a Best Director nom, then it would’ve happened to more guys than Kubrick, right?
Here’s how best director looks through my foggy telescope
Kathryn Bigelow (The Hurt Locker)
Terrence Malick (The Tree of Life)
Peter Jackson (The Lovely Bones)
Spike Jonze (Where the Wild Things Are)
Rob Marshall (Nine)
then we have this guy, who’ll be nominated in place of one of my favorites (we’ll call it “the Ron Howard slot”).
Clint Eastwood (Invictus)
And then these names
Martin Scorsese (Shutter Island)
Ethan Coen (A Serious Man)
James Cameron (Avatar)
Lee Daniels (Precious)
Jane Campion (Bright Star)
Lone Scherfig (An Education)
Terry Gilliam (…Dr. Parnassus)
Michael Haneke (The White Ribbon)
On the other hand, District 9 is already at #26 on the IMDb Top 250 Zeitgeist Chart — that’s as high as No Country and There Will Be Blood ever got.
Which is damned impressive… and more than a little bit ludicrous.
oh, and the answers to those 3 questions in your last paragraph, Sasha: yes, yes, and no.
It’s fishing for bait with a rusty hook.
Regardless of its ultimate fate, I’m happy to see District 9 on the early tracker. Thanks, Sasha!!
And Ryan, I’m feeling a bit optimistic for The White Ribbon, not sure why. This particular Haneke film seems like something AMPAS might go for.
we’re having a repetition of the last year, which had simply great, awesome genre movies rolling one behind the other, with The Dark Knight and Wall·E at the pole position. We know what happened.
Now, there are ten movies nominated but it’s time to check out the genre movies that could, out there…
Avatar is probably going to eclipse any other one – is the only one I’m predicting, but syphooners from the genre vote would be…
Drag Me to Hell
District 9
Star Trek
Up
Should I continue?
Like Ryan, I can only see Clint being nominated for Invictus. Nelson Mandela, a sports movie with a climax of victory representing all the values that progressive society aspires to (South Africa winning the Rugby World Cup on home soil uniting a divided and scarred society), a South African feel already in the air from District 9, and Eastwood, the great classical craftsman in full formal flow.
Two things – how interesting it will be to compare the two South Africa movies, District 9 and Invictus, one using genre science-fiction to echo and resonate the stratifications, poverty, violence and tensions that have divided and continue to divide that society, one a movie in the classical biographic tradition that touches on the higher values and aspirations embodied in Nelson Mandela and the meaning of sport and rugby in a post-colonial society full of conflict, inequality and division.
Lastly, will it be a surprise if Morgan Freeman gets an Oscar nomination for his portrayal of Mandela? You know he is going to be good, because he is Morgan Freeman, and I don’t think it can do anything but please the Academy because of the gravity both of the actor, and the subject.
Freeman is the frontrunner at either cathegory he’s running.
He’s so respected that nobody would mind to give him a 2nd Oscar in 5 years, specially knowing that by this time, he should have 3-4 in a more fair world.
Yeah, but let’s not discount the problem Freeman has with the whole, you know, having an affair with his step-granddaughter that started when she was 17. If you don’t think that rival studios are going to whisper about that “controversy” during the campaign, you’re naive. Hell, Woody Allen made national freaking news for months doing a similar thing, no?
Ryan, lol on the questions. Yeah, I don’t know. It’s just too early to say. It’s really hard for me to predict what hasn’t opened yet. I am like a sad robot. I can only see what’s right in front of me. I guess there have been too many movies that seemed right at the outset but then fell flat and vice versa…I think D9’s potential as a nominee will just have to do with what else is coming down the pike – I am hoping two women, at least, will be in the game this year – so Kathryn Bigelow, maybe Jane Campion. We’ll have to see. I’m excited of the idea of ten noms for BP, though, because the possibilities are kind of endless.
Loved District 9. But as a Best Picture nominee or Director nominee (with the latter being even more difficult since it’s stuck with only 5 nominiations).
Directors we have: Cameron, Jackson, Bigelow, Marshall, Scorsese, Clint, Soderbergh, Malick. Don’t see the room for Bloonkamp right now.
I could see it getting love in V/FX but to be honest not sure where else.
D9 should not be overlooked in effects category. Copley is deserving of a nod and this is, overall, fantastic year for newcomers (to the awards game, at least) – Renner, Copley, Waltz, Galifiankis, Gordon- Levitt, Mackie, Quinto are all worthy of awards attention. Most of them will not be considered, however, once usual suspects roll out their stuff.
I like Blokamp`s directing style (even though the movie didn`t blow me away like it did critics) and I wouldn`t mind him sneak into director spot. I also disagree that D9 is in worse position than TDK. TDK is a superhero movie. AMPAS has never been kind to superhero genre. D9 is sci fi and there were sci fi contenders before. So it stands a fairly good chance to be the token geeks-pleaser 10th spot nominee unless Avatar really fucks eyeballs as promised.
District 9 was fine, but I can’t help but think that the buzz surrounding it stems from the fact that this was a lukewarm summer in terms of wide releases. Sure, The Hurt Locker was great and I enjoyed In the Loop and Whatever Works quite a bit (as well as the surprising Shrink and Jerichow), but I’d consider all of them as “limited” releases even if Locker and Whatever Works ended up in a decent amount of theaters at some point.
We’d never be talking about District 9 being a contender if there were only five nominees and we’d never be discussing it if this summer had brought us anything worthwhile wide-release-wise. I guess there’s Up (which I think is highly overrated and Pixar’s second-worst film to date…I realize I lose any type of credibility among most after saying such a thing), but beyond that, nothing else even has a shot at getting nominated for Best Pic (where’s the love for Drag Me to Hell?).
I thought District 9 was a perfectly acceptable summer flick, but I really don’t get the universal praise…
i thought the movie was amazing
it deserves a lot of noms
and i thought there were only 5 noms for Best Director
????
BD:
Scorsecese
Cameron
Katheryn Bigelow
thats it for me.
BP:
Avatar
SHutter Island
D9
Nine
Hurt Lucker
UP
Lovely Bones
An Education
Public Enemies
Amelia
BP tops:
D9
Avatar
Shuttler Island
i can’t think of any more.
I think D9 or Shutter or Avatar is going to win. any of them
“I am like a sad robot.”
WALL-Eeeeee! You’re right Sasha, it’s entirely possible that Avatar and The Lovely Bones could underwhelm, likewise Shutter Island or Nine. One of the movies we’re precumming about now will surely tank, and all we’ll be left with is a wet spot.
Then, like you say, District 9’s reach beyond the first wave of geek love is as important as what hopefuls might fail and fall out of its way. If this impressive box-office sticks and builds — to $150 mil or more, which isn’t unlikely, D9 will become really hard to ignore for a BP slot — and I’ll be thrilled by that. Like a lot of other readers, I think it’s much more deserving and stands a greater chance than Star Trek. And we were seriously talking about that 2 months ago.
There’s been no more amazing directorial debut than this in years — but again, Best Director is a tough ticket for newcomers. Sam Mendes came with his theater credentials and movie packed top-to-bottom with name-brand nominees.
I wrote that first comment before dawn and then had to be away from the desk all morning. I should have made clear that I think the idea of Blomkamp as a Best Director nominee is really exciting. At the same time, if we agree that he only breaks in if many other directors we love end up fumbling, then I don’t want to be in the position of wishing the year will be that shitty.
Yeahhhh for a movie like District 9, I think you have to wait awhile and see what kind of traction it gets. I don’t think one person’s opinion piece should necessarily be a deciding factor here. It will most likely not get big nominations but who knows?
“a repetition of the last year, which had simply great, awesome genre movies rolling one behind the other”
Jesus, I think we’re going to find that Shutter Island is more of a genre film, too, in the purest sense. In a good way. In the same way that Scorsese always elevates genre films to a heightened level of brilliance.
What do these titles have in common?
Frankenstein (1931)
The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)
Forbidden Planet (1956)
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
Planet of the Apes (1968)
Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
Alien (1979)
Blade Runner (1982)
Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Kahn (1982)
The Terminator (1984)
Aliens (1986)
Robocop (1987)
Akira (1988)
T2: Judgment Day (1991)
A.I. (2001)
Children of Men (2006)
Two things they have in common. One, they all most would consider to be most of the cream of the crop for sci-fi cinema for their time.
Two, none of them were nominated for Best Picture.
I saw yesterday Public Enemies and was one of the best films I’ve seen this year. It should be in the tracker, really. It was quite different.
District 9 is not showing here in Lima until September or October I think
And Minority Report. Don’t forget Minority Report.
Having 10 nominees may shake things up, but I doubt. It’d be well deserved, though.
District 9 culminates in a guy in a mech suit firing a pig from a gravity gun. It’s not going anywhere near Oscar unless the world really is ending and hell has frozen over.
Public Enemies didn’t cause even the tinyest bit of a stir, unfortunately – it just kind of came and went.
D9 better get effects nom because they were great, never overwhelming and the ship was iconic. It should win on that ship alone. The lighting they used on it depending on the time of the day or angle from which it is seen is phenomenal. less is more. Also, HBP for cinematography win. Nothing that came out or is coming out (judging by trailers) looks to be the thing of beauty like Bruno`s work in this movie.
These are categories where these 2 movies should not miss out nominations if there`s justice.
I think D9 should totally sweep the ceremony and outdo Titanic and Ben-Hur’s records. Why? Because it would set a new low for the Academy, which apparently is wallowing in desperation for ratings and industry support given their 10 best picture nominees revelation. I think the integrity of the ceremony has already been compromised in recent years with wins by Gladiator, Lord of the Rings, Chicago and most recently Slumdog Millionaire. Does it really matter who wins anymore? It’s all become a sick joke.
You know, I just watched Dances With Wolves and Cabaret a few days ago and remember thinking to myself, Hollywood just doesn’t make epic movies like these anymore. It’s all glitz and glamor or art house gimmicks nowadays. Nobody takes risks in this day and age. Nobody moves beyond artificial emotions, in-your-face action and mainstream pandering.
The fact that the likes of District 9 and Star Trek are earning Best Picture buzz is just sort of embarrassing. Mike Judge was right in “Idiocracy”–the world is getting dumber. Another two decades and AT&T’s Jack Ass In 3-D and YouTube sensation Dramatic Chipmunk III will be scoring nominations in respective categories.
Seriously, my top Five Oscar winners this year.
BEST PICTURE: District 9
BEST DIRECTOR: Michael Bay
BEST ACTOR: Spock
BEST ACTRESS: The girl in Coraline
BEST SCREENPLAY: Fast & Furious
Hooray Academy! Let’s hope you get a whopping 15.0 rating next year.
Ryan, I hope I’m wrong, but Shutter Island could end being considered a better shot and acted version of “Gothika”. No matter how great it could be, deemed a “minor” Scorsese and therefore, forgotten nomination time.
Mitchell
1. I’m curious as to how Lord of the Rings was either an art house gimmick or mainstream pandering.
2. While I will agree that Slumdog’s win was a sort of sideways makeup Oscar that should have gone to City of God in 2002, it was far and away the best of the five BP nominees last year.
3. Your last three BP winners have been directed by Danny Boyle, the Coen Brothers, and Martin Scorcese. What was that about how the Oscars have been “compromised” again?
I left out The Departed and NCFOM because I’m as sentimental as the next guy and wanted my favorites to win that year. But even The Departed has to be considered Martin Scorsese-Lite and caffeine free compared to his earlier stuff. So in order to win the biggest award in showbiz, Scorsese had to dumb himself down? Kinda sad.
LOTR, what can I say, I know a lot of people loved it. To me it was just a bunch of elves, dwarfs, resurrected wizards, skeletons and hobbits fighting a huge eye in the sky. OK fine, it was good…10 hours though? Was that really necessary?
The point is, I just can’t imagine the same Academy that awarded Godfather, Gone With the Wind and Gandhi would seriously consider District 9 as Best Picture material. Maybe the academy is just too drunk to care anymore. The real problem may be with second-rate film critics who are too eager to embrace the “next big thing” and continue to influence academy member decisions. That, and of course, the stubborn rule that suggests anything that makes money is automatically Oscar-worthy.
Who’s betting that the Pride and Prejudice and Zombies adaption will score some major nods? Hey, if Entertainment Weekly loves it that’s all that matters.
I praying right now for someday we could have the refined taste you have in films.
Do you have any other films to trash?
“That, and of course, the stubborn rule that suggests anything that makes money is automatically Oscar-worthy.”
The Late Mitchell Warren, personally I think you have it backwards. When was the last time in the past few years where a movie got nominated for that reason?
Edit: Just read a few more posts back, and I see you listed some examples. My bad. I do disagree though. Those films all had merit and I pretty much love every single one of them.
“I just watched Dances With Wolves and Cabaret a few days ago and remember thinking to myself, Hollywood just doesn’t make epic movies like these anymore”
++++++
In one breath you offhandedly talk about how the Academy is a joke for a variety of movies they priveliged, in the other you praise a mediocre Kevin Costner movie that was garlanded in the year that Goodfellas was made.
Now, I happen to think that the elevation of that elongated, portentous matinee flick over one of the greatest American films of the last thirty years is the most egregious travesty in recent Oscar history. That farcical judgment cripples the rest of what you say.
“Dances with Wolves” is as far from mediocre as you can get. It’s a fucking beautiful film. “Goodfellas” is an excellent film as well. You can like both films, did you know that?
“D9 better get effects nom because they were great, never overwhelming and the ship was iconic. It should win on that ship alone. The lighting they used on it depending on the time of the day or angle from which it is seen is phenomenal. less is more. Also, HBP for cinematography win. Nothing that came out or is coming out (judging by trailers) looks to be the thing of beauty like Bruno`s work in this movie.
These are categories where these 2 movies should not miss out nominations if there`s justice.”
I completely agree bambi. HBP was a beautiful film. I know they are switching director of photography for the next film, but it was stunning. Saw it in IMAX and that truly sticks out. And I agree about D9, the effects really were there to service the film, not vice versa. Something about how they lit the ship, much like how they lit the launching area in Star Trek, seems to be a huge improvement in visual effects.
“Ryan, I hope I’m wrong, but Shutter Island … could be deemed a “minor” Scorsese and therefore, forgotten nomination time.”
Notice I have Scorsese in my second tier of Best Director predictions, Jesus, and (for a change) I’m holding off forming an opinion based solely on the script. But neither the novel nor the screenplay seem to have anything near the depth and significance we expect from Best Picture nominees. I’m gonna have to come up with a better way to say this, but for now I’ll fall back on the same thing I’ve written before. Shutter Island needs to be as good as the best of Hitchcock before it can overcome it’s pulp thriller origins. If anybody can do that though, it’s Marty.
I loved D9 and think it deserves to be considered in these categories:
PICTURE
DIRECTOR
ACTOR
EDITING
CINEMATOGRAPHY
SCREENPLAY
VISUAL EFFECTS
SOUND
Yay for 8-time nominee District 9. I know this won’t happen…and if it did, which I doubt, it would only win two: editing and visual effects…possibly. It’s like how much I would like for Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel to be nominated for Actor and Actress (a la Woody Allen and Diane Keaton in ‘Annie Hall’), but it won’t happen. =(
“Dances with Wolves” is as far from mediocre as you can get. It’s a fucking beautiful film. “Goodfellas” is an excellent film as well. You can like both films, did you know that?”
++++++++
Who said you couldn’t like them both?
The point is, Goodfellas humiliates Dances With Wolves in every way, and is the greater movie, and should have won the Oscar for best film that year.
Pauline Kael was perfect about DWW.
Disagreed. “Dances with Wolves” takes the cake for sweeping majesty, pitch-perfect cinematography and being a genuinely warm, enormously moving film. “Goodfellas” can’t put claim to any of that, as tightly constructed and forceful as it is. It’s mechanical.
Zombieland for best pic!
(since there are so many posts about Dances With Wolves, I figured I would go with something completely random…albeit more interesting to talk about…)
Oscar was ill in the 1990’s. Not physically, but mentally. Not a memorable winner from 1993 to 2001. Sure, some of the films were good, but most were crap. Or manipulative garbage. Shakespeare in Love was a nice win – rarely do literate romantic comedies even get made, so it’s nice to see an entertaining one win, even if A Simple Plan and Gods and Monsters were much better films.
But seriously, Schindler’s List, Forrest Gump, Braveheart, An English Patient, Titanic, American Beauty, Gladiator, and Schizophrenic Aussie. I can’t decide which one of these is the most embarrassing win (OK – I can – it’s Braveheart!) But all are crap when viewed a second or third time. Now I know some will fault me for throwing in Schindler and AB on the crap pile, but both are unexciting, uncreative, uninspiringly made films. Neither has any soul. Yeah, both are technically great, but neither has any semblance of humanity in them as all are filled with people whom I’ve never met.
Now, I’d throw Chicago and LOTR on this list, but at least those were entertaining.
But after LOTR, Oscar stood atop the mountainside and yelled “What Have I Done!” and decided to nominate five films each year that would have been overlooked by audiences almost entirely had they not been nominated.
Now, of course, with 10 nominations, things may open up a bit. Yeah, Wall-E and Dark Knight probably would have made the cut last year, but I think they would be exceptions to the rule. With 10 nominations, I expect more of the same – quality indie films and respected studio pieces that appeal to limited audiences.
I know that sounds counterintuitive, but since 2004, I can’t think of any film that was a monster hit before it was nominated or decorated with a slew of year-end notices.
Well, Project 9 nor Star Wars is a Dark Knight or a Wall-E. Only UP has a shot at a BP nomination. You’re fooling yourself if you think otherwise.
(In my opinion Up, The Hurt Locker and (500) Days of Summer have the best chances thus far, and all will benefit by having a DVD release this fall. But in a year with only 5 nominations, none of these 3 would be discussed 4 months from now.)
The Best Picture race hasn’t even begun.
(Now of course, I am proven wrong with Crash, but oh well. I predicted The Departed would win when I first heard of its existance and no one even discussed it during the summer months of the year it won.)
D9 is almost a gauranteed BP nod.
The 10 nominations won’t in my mind be an attempt to include “geek love” films, it will be more an attempt to include great films that may not necessarily include the best director.
D9 doesn’t even fall into this category. It will get Director, Actor, Cinimetographer, and screenplay nominations. If that happens it will also get a BP nom. In fact it would have gotten the nom in the old system.
The additional 5 are going to be for films like Precious. Which will also get a BP nom. But this time it won’t get a director nod becuase the director sucks. But Monique is a gauranteed Actress nom and its a gauaranteed adapted screenplay nom. Films like this traditionally wouldn’t have gotten the BP nom, but now with 10 it has a great shot.
I think many of the people commenting on this board havn’t seen D9 yet. Its not a geeky SF movie. It is gripping, powerful, well acted, and has a message. Everything comes together well. This is the most original movie of the year, possibly the decade.
A good indicator, my wife, who hates violent movies, hates science fiction, loved this movie.
This movie is 100x better than the dark night. That movie was all crowd pleasing effects and cheesy hollywood formula. Its gimmik was that it was dark and had dark in the title, but if you really think about it it wasn’t even that dark.
Even heath ledger was overrated. The main actror in D9 was truly amazing. Look at his transformation. Look at the scene at the end of the movie where they go back to the doc footage at the beginning ans see how much he changed. Ledger was just creepy thropughout.
What do the following have in common:
Slumdog
Crash
Finding Neverland
TWBB
Moulin Rouge
CTHD
They all got best picture noms (some even won). All were pretty good films overall, but have one thing in common. Very original and nothing like we had seen before. D9 has that “I’ve never seen anything like that before” quality. Which in my mind make it not only a likely nomination, but also a possibility for an upset or suprise win.
All the poster in this forum seem to be stuck in the 90. With big overdone epic films filling the BP. Film has changed. Its rare for those types of movies to be made anymore and even rarer for them to be any good.
Looks like no science fiction movie has ever won. This could be the year. Because D9 isn’t primarily a science fiction.
To say that D9 is the most original movie of the decade is quite an overstatement. I really fail to see how anything in the movie is terribly original. Then again I haven’t seen anything terribly original since I saw the deceptively simple Vanya on 42nd Street.
Vanya on 42nd Street, in my opinion, was so original in its concept, a filmed version of a rehearsal of a play. No costumes, a dilapidated set, an audience of 10 people or so. But what results is so immediate, so intensely personal and so satisfying, it’s amazing a film can create such a mood without anything that movies so desperately spend millions on. Just a great script and some great performances are all a movie needs and a director that knows how to let the material speak for itself.
With that said, probably the most original movie I’ve see in recent years was Once. I would never claim that it’s the most original movie of the decade, but when a movie just lets its characters be themselves and the script allows everything to progress naturally, well, for Hollywood, that’s extremely original.
[...] a wide-ranging reaction to District 9 at this point. Whereas we have people calling for an Oscar nod, we also have people saying the film’s importance and quality are completely overblown. There [...]
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