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In this episode, Ryan, Clarence and I discuss the surprise Oscar ceremony and Clarence’s awards week, among other things.
Have a listen.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
In this episode, Ryan, Clarence and I discuss the surprise Oscar ceremony and Clarence’s awards week, among other things.
Have a listen.
Sasha Stone has been around the Oscar scene since 1999. Almost everything on this website is her fault.
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Is INOCA still happening?
I think you have the wrong site. INOCA is an Awardswatch thing
Hey, where’d everybody go? I was watching Warhol’s Sleep. What have I missed?
meet me on the bridge, I’ll try to explain. https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/efa94ea5540379b3385a5944dfcfca7255bbc93bf97ea8219da8b0d1d36ef939.gif
I’d like to see horror performances get some more love. Florence Pugh absolutely could have been nominated for Midsommar. I just watched Hereditary recently and Toni Collette should have been nominated for that. But there’s still an obvious bias against horror movies.
YES! THIS
The women who spoke after the lights went back up was Miky Lee not the actress who played the housekeeper (Lee Jeong-eun). In more than one podcast now you have all criticized the academy for not recognizing members of the Parasite ensemble and you point out it’s because they didn’t know their names. Yet you cover these movies for a living and are still calling leading players of the best picture winner “the housekeeper,” “the mother,” “the daughter,” etc only taking the time to learn Song Kang-Ho. A quick google search could do you wonders and would help you to educate your biases and that of the academies.
I know you guys didn’t love Little Women, but I’m surprised you thought it wasn’t at least worthy of Best Costumes. They were absolutely exquisite, and character-driven. On merit, I believe they were a good notch above the rest.
They love to crap on Little Women. They spend half their podcasts kicking Greta Gerwig when they can. Sasha just seems to hate her.
You know, it’s nice that they say AD has become a “refuge” for LW fans. But that almost sounds demeaning when it is the team on this site that are in the vast minority on their opinions of Little Women’s quality.
LW has a 91 on Metacritic and 92 Rotten Tomatoes Audience Score with nearly 18,000 people. There are few films released this entire year that could boast numbers anything remotely like that. On the whole, critics loved it. Audiences loved it (over $100 mill domestic, mostly great user reviews, CinemaScore, etc.). And it received 6 Oscar noms, including Best Picture.
I feel like I’m living in an alternate world where us fans of Little Women are made to think that we’re nuts for thinking the film is excellent. Sure, no film is “perfect”, and that includes Little Women. But it’s been a frustrating time. Words like “bad” are used frequently when describing the film’s quality. Or phrases like “Gerwig will learn to become a good filmmaker over time”. That line of thinking just drives us crazy; as many of us believe she made one of the finest films of the last few years. And for what it’s worth, I was not wild about Gerwig’s Lady Bird, at all.
I realize this is their podcast to say whatever they want (Sasha, et al). I love these people and the opinions/thoughts/insights they offer … truly. I just don’t think we’re ever going to see eye to eye on this one. Onto next season. 🙂
“Or phrases like “Gerwig will learn to become a good filmmaker over time”.”
Yeah, it’s that kind of comment that bugs me the most too. (Acting like it’s some objective truth or generally accepted opinion that she ISN’T one already… When clearly neither is the case. I mean, seriously, not even GOOD?! Seems a bit out of touch with reality.)
Not so much off topic, but can we start lobbying to get Honorary Oscars to the Monty Python, John Carpenter and Frank Oz?
If I had to throw darts to who will win next year (and why)
Picture: In the Heights. After the J-Lo and latino absence, this Latino La La Land has enough pedigree (Lin-Manuel Miranda) and looks fantastic enough to manage the trick to overthrow Spielberg’s West Side Story remake as the musical (and maybe film) of the year.
Director: Spike Lee, Da 5 Bloods. Despite winning Adapted Screenplay for BlacKkKlansman, fact is, Lee, one of the most influential american masters would be the very FIRST African-American Director to win Best Picture. And there isn’t anyone more deserving than him, for that honor.
Actor: Sacha Baron Cohen, The Trial of the Chicago 7. He was infamously snubbed for Borat (in acting, he was nominated for the Adapted Screenplay), in which is one of the best (if not simply the BEST) example of improvisation in film history. Now, he is starring in a drama based upon actual events, written by a master, Aaron Sorkin. His dramatic acting chops have been put to test in Netflix’s The Spy and seriously, he delivers and more.
Actress: Jennifer Hudson, Aretha. Think of Hillary Swank and Reneé Zellweger. They won’t mind giving her a second, specially for such a candy role. Amy Adams is waiting in the line, to see if the movie flops, but Hudson has enough presence, charisma and voice to make me think this could be a slam dunk… only problem may be if the film is garbage… also look out for Ana de Armas playing Marilyn Monroe in Blonde.
Supporting Actor: Jimmy Smits, In the Heights. Fantastic character actor, with a consistent career specially in television, and again, the J-Lo debacle may help the film and himself for Oscar consideration.
Supporting Actress: Amanda Seyfried, Mank. She plays Marion Davies, and Mank is warranted huge attention. So, why not? Seyfried has a story with the industry, and looks like the right name, in the right time, and in the right film.
Adapted Screenplay: Da 5 Bloods (it could be considered both Adapted and Original)
Original Screenplay: The Trial of the Chicago 7. Aaron Sorkin, real event, heavy on dialogue.
Animated Feature: Onward
Many are predicting Jennifer Hudson to win next year. There is also the narrative that a black woman has not won the Oscar for Best Actress in almost 20 years since Berry. I can see many people pushing for that win because no POC won in acting this year…. Poor Amy Adams.. Close could maybe win in Supporting.
I love Amy Adams and wish that she would win the Oscar sometime, but I don’t think that Woman in the Window is going to be the movie that does it for her. If I hadn’t been excited about it previously and read the book, I don’t think I would’ve been interested in seeing it based on the lackluster trailer. I saw it before watching Birds of Prey.
Hi Sasha and Ryan, big fan of your podcast and website here. Just wanted to point out that the lady who “rambled on and on” during the Parasite acceptance speech was not the housekeeper but Miky Lee, one of the most powerful persons of South Korea and the reason we all know of the existence of Korean films here in the US.
Thank you for clarifying! Sorry I was too clueless to know that.
I think you meant racist.
Hi Sasha and Ryan, big fan of your podcast and website here. Just wanted to point out that the lady who “rambled on and on” during the Parasite acceptance speech was not the housekeeper but Miky Lee, one of the most powerful persons of South Korea and the reason we all know of the existence of Korean films here in the US.
So here’s the question for this year. Will either Nolan or Fincher get there overdue oscars for director or will they go home empty handed like Tarantino did this year?
The Nolan / Fincher situation could be strangely similar to this year’s Tarantino / Scorsese outcome : a big original summer hit that has everything a BP / BD frontrunner could ask for except an Oscar-friendly release date (OUATIH / Tenet) and a big, nostalgic auteur epic that has everything a BP / BD frontrunner could ask for except for the Netflix stigma (The Irishman, Mank).
P.S. I also think next season will be A LOT more complicated than a Nolan / Fincher showdown. In 2020 we are getting new, baity films from
– a bunch of other previous BD nominees who have never won in BD before including Wes Anderson, Denis Villeneuve, Ridley Scott, Paul Greengrass, Lee Daniels, Spike Lee, Sofia Coppola, Terrence Malick, Jane Campion, George Clooney, John Madden, Kenneth Branagh
– not to mention Oscar winning / nominated screenwriters who will also direct this year including Aaron Sorkin, Taika Waititi, Charlie Kaufman, Theodore Melfi, Taylor Sheridan, John Patrick Stanley, Kevin Macdonald
– and of course directors with no Oscar-cred but having already established themselves with previous acclaimed films shouldn’t be underestimated either, like Francis Lee, Edgar Wright, Chloe Zhao, David Lowery, Joe Wright, Philippa Lowthorpe, Leos Carax, Cary Fukunaga, Justin Kurzel, Judd Apatow, Ryan Murphy, John M. Chu, Sally Potter, Andrew Dominik, Ben Wheatley, George C. Wolfe, Gina Prince-Bythewood, Paul Verhoeven, Joanna Hogg, Robert Eggers, Mary Harron, Kornel Mundruczo, Hirokazu Koreeda, Jon Stewart
– and last but not least the potential breakthrough stars like Emerald Fennell, Reinaldo Marcus Green, Florian Zeller, Jonathan Butterell, Clea Duvall, Gerard Bush & Christopher Renz, Josephine Decker shouldn’t be underestimated, either.
Long story short, this year should be a doozy. Give me a day or two, I will have the list of 140 films with descriptions ready and we can all go through it together.
Steven Spielberg, Spike Lee and Crazy Rich Asians (which many thought it was snubbed) director Jon M. Chu also direct this year, and with films that will gain attention. And those we all mention are mostly from the anglo-saxon sphere… if we go really international, like REALLY, the competition is mind-blowing… I haven’t checked out even which spanish prominent directors are offering this year, after the two biggest (Almodovar and Amenabar) clashed last year at the Goyas. I never keep far from my head that Nacho Vigalondo and Javier Fesser (who are both already Oscar nominees in short film) MAY probably win some day at least Original Screenplay, given the characteristics of his work and their talent… so, we always in check that there are some obscure names or rookies that may steal the flame and land a nomination, even a win. Seriously, one year from now, before Cannes, who even thought South Korea, of all countries, would be the first one to land a Best Picture Oscar for a film not in English and in no way related to any anglo-saxon country or producer?
This list is dizzying. So looking forward to all of these.
What’s interesting to me is that based on the past year’s trend, who is the non-American filmmaker who has a film this year that could win Directing Oscar. Last season has Mendes and the eventual winner Bong. I wonder who this year? I’m really hoping for The Woman in the Window to be really good so that Joe Wright could get a chance to be in contention. Someone like Bong is always a welcome come-from-behind win. Cannes will definitely give us a preview of some possible contenders. Then again, when you have American films from the likes of Coppola, Anderson, Scott, Kaufman, and Shanley in the mix then one can only hope for their respective films to be as really good as they are on paper. For now, looking at Weerasethakul’s Memoria and for Zhang’s One Second to surpass the Chinese censors to be the possible 2020 releases that may take the Parasite route, or any film from an international director. It’s really great that the Academy is opening their doors to more international films to compete with their own American films.
I sincerely hope Disney won’t drop the ball on The Woman in the Window. They kinda already have with the probably completely unnecessary reshoots and moving it from an Oscar-friendly release date to May, but if it gets rave reviews they better pull out all the stops for Adams and Wright because both have been long overdue for some Oscar love.
I am almost done with a pdf with a list of 140 films coming out in 2020 (and 2021) that could figure into the next Oscar season. I’m adding premises, directors and notable cast members. I will put it up somewhere here when I’m done.
yay! send it priority express mail directly to me and we’ll get a poll built around it!
Cool ! Should be done in a day or two.
Here you go : https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ihJL7Qx69664BIV1PIh9TgN4A4QCOmP2/view?usp=sharing
This is an incredible and wonderfully comprehensive list! I hope that you’re not offended by this but if this is the basis of the “most anticipated of the year” poll, there’s some stuff that I’d like to add that while not for Oscar consideration (and I’d imagine not on your list because of that), very exciting movies that are possibly coming up in 2020 as well (plot and cast information from Letterboxd):
Blossoms (Wong Kar-wai)
Providing an image of the daily life of ordinary Shanghai people, the story is carried out over two periods: from the 1960s to the mid-1970s, the end of the Cultural Revolution; and from the 1980s to the start of the 21st century.
Starring Kris Wu
How Do You Live? (Hayao Miyazaki)
15-year-old boy Junichi Honda and his uncle move to new neighborhood, as Junichi deals with spiritual growth, bullying, poverty, education, work, courage, and how to live as a human being.
Shulan River (Hou Hsiao-hsien)
Taking place in modern-day Taipei, Hou Hsiao-Hsien focuses on a lonely river goddess whose waterways have now been covered by modern roadways.
Bergman Island (Mia Hansen-Løve)
The picture revolves around an American filmmaking couple who retreat to the island for the summer to each write screenplays for their upcoming films in an act of pilgrimage to the place that inspired Bergman. As the summer and their screenplays advance, the lines between reality and fiction start to blur against the backdrop of the Island’s wild landscape.
Starring Mia Wasikowska, Tim Roth, Vicky Krieps
Untitled Lou Reed/Velvet Underground Project (Todd Haynes)
Documentary covering influential American rock band The Velvet Underground and their iconic frontman Lou Reed, who rose to prominence during the 1960s and 70s.
Zombi Child (Bertrand Bonello)
Haiti, 1962: A man is brought back from the dead only to be sent to the living hell of the sugarcane fields. In Paris, 55 years later, at the prestigious Légion d’honneur boarding school, a Haitian girl confesses an old family secret to a group of new friends – never imagining that this strange tale will convince a heartbroken classmate to do the unthinkable.
Starring: Louise Labèque, Wislanda Louimat, Katiana Milfort, Mackenson Bijou, Adilé David, Ninon François, Mathilde Riu, Ginite Popote, Néhémy Pierre-Dahomey, Sayyid El Alami, Saadia Bentaïeb, Patrick Boucheron
Memoria (Apitchatpong Weerasethakul)
A Scottish orchid farmer visiting her ill sister in Bogota, Colombia, befriends a young musician and a French archaeologist in charge of monitoring a century-long construction project to tunnel through the Andes mountain range. Each night, she is bothered by increasingly loud bangs which prevent her from getting any sleep.
Starring: Tilda Swinton, Jeanne Balibar, Daniel Giménez Cacho, Juan Pablo Urrego, Elkin Díaz
First Cow (Kelly Recihardt)
A taciturn loner and skilled cook has traveled west and joined a group of fur trappers in Oregon Territory, though he only finds true connection with a Chinese immigrant also seeking his fortune; soon the two collaborate on a successful business, although its longevity is reliant upon the clandestine participation of a nearby wealthy landowner’s prized milking cow.
Starring: John Magaro, Orion Lee, Clayton Nemrow, Todd A. Robinson, Alia Shawkat, René Auberjonois, Toby Jones, Ewen Bremner, Lily Gladstone, Gary Farmer, Ted Rooney, Scott Shepherd
About Endlessness (Roy Andersson)
Inspired by “One Thousand and One Nights,” the celebrated collection of Middle Eastern and Indian folk tales, “About Endlessness,” in its juxtaposition of tableaux capturing moments in life, explores the preciousness and beauty of our existence, awakening in us the wish to maintain this eternal treasure and pass it on.
Days (Tsai Ming-liang)
Kang lives alone in a big house, Non in a small apartment in town. They meet, and then part, their days flowing on as before. Tsai Ming-Liang’s quietly observational film is about these two men embracing.
Starring: Lee Kang-Sheng, Anong Houngheuangsy
Vitalina Varela (Pedro Costa)
Suddenly, in the sumptuous darkness of a neighborhood haunted by solemn shadows, the deep red of bloody sheets. Vitalina Varela is too late; all she can do now is settle her husband’s affairs. She will mourn no unfortunates: facing bitter and fallen men, she resolves to rebuild the memory of a solid shared house in Cape Verde, blueprint by blueprint and wall by wall, fighting the sad reality of a life that could not be built under a decent roof in Portugal.
Starring: Vitalina Varela, Ventura, Lina Varela, Manuel Tavares Almeida, Francisco dos Santos Brito, Imídio Monteiro, Marina Alves Domingues
The Card Counter (Paul Schrader)
William Tell, a gambler and former serviceman who sets out to reform a young man seeking revenge on a mutual enemy from their past.
Starring: Oscar Isaac, Willem Dafoe, Tiffany Haddish, Tye Sheridan, Shia LaBeouf
It Must Be Heaven (Elia Suleiman)
Filmmaker Elia Suleiman travels to different cities and finds unexpected parallels to his homeland of Palestine
Starring: Elia Suleiman
Bloody Nose, Empty Pockets (Turner Ross, Bill Ross IV)
A portrait of the lives of a disparate group of patrons and employees at an American watering hole today.
Prisoners of the Ghostland (Sion Sono)
The film centers on notorious criminal Hero who is sent to rescue an abducted girl who has disappeared into a dark supernatural universe. They must break the evil curse that binds them and escape the mysterious revenants that rule the Ghostland, an East-meets-West vortex of beauty and violence.
Starring: Nicolas Cage, Sofia Boutella, Bill Moseley, Ed Skrein, Nick Cassavetes, Teresa Ruiz, Takato Yonemoto, Yurino, Narisa Suzuki, Shin Shimizu
Undine (Christian Petzold)
Undine works as a historian lecturing on Berlin’s urban development. But when the man she loves leaves her, the ancient myth catches up with her. Undine has to kill the man who betrays her and return to the water.
Starring: Paula Beer, Franz Rogowski
Selvajaria (Miguel Gomes)
A chronicle of a bloody war that pitted the inhabitants of the hamlet of Canudos, led by their prophet, against the army of the young Brazilian Republic in 1897.
Macbeth (Joel Coen)
Macbeth, the Thane of Glamis, receives a prophecy from a trio of witches that one day he will become King of Scotland. Consumed by ambition and spurred to action by his wife, Macbeth murders his king and takes the throne for himself.
Starring: Denzel Washington, Frances McDormand, Brendan Gleeson, Corey Hawkins, Moses Ingram, Harry Melling and Ralph Ineson
Wet Season (Anthony Chen)
Set during the monsoon season in Singapore, Wet Season follows the plight of Ling, a Chinese language teacher, whose marriage and school life is falling apart because she is unable to bear a child. An unlikely friendship with a student helps her reaffirm her identity as a woman.
Starring: Yann Yann Yeo, Christopher Lee Ming-Shun, Koh Jia Ler, Yang Shi Bin
Where Is Anne Frank? (Ari Folman)
The film follows the journey of Kitty, the imaginary friend to whom Anne Frank dedicated her diary. A fiery teenager, Kitty wakes up in the near future in Anne Frank’s house in Amsterdam and embarks on a journey to find Anne, who she believes is still alive, in today’s Europe. While the young girl is shocked by the modern world, she also comes across Anne’s legacy.
Starring: Emily Carey, Sebastian Croft, Skye Bennett, Stewart Scudamore, Ruby Stokes, Nell Barlow
Dick Johnson Is Dead (Kristen Johnson)
With this inventive portrait, director Kirsten Johnson seeks a way to keep her 86-year-old father alive forever. Utilizing moviemaking magic and her family’s dark humor, she celebrates Dr. Dick Johnson’s last years by staging fantasies of death and beyond. Together, dad and daughter confront the great inevitability awaiting us all.
Joan of Arc (Bruno Dumont)
Dumont’s sequel to Jeannette picks up where the previous film left off, with Jeanne’s military victories, her capture, trial, and ultimate execution.
Starring: Lise Leplat Prudhomme, Fabrice Luchini
On a Half Clear Morning (Bruno Dumont)
A celebrity journalist, juggling her busy career and personal life, has her life over-turned by a freak car accident.
Starring: Léa Seydoux, Blanche Gardin, Benoît Magimel
Martin Eden (Pietro Marcello)
Italian-French historical romance drama film loosely based on the 1909 novel of the same name by Jack London about a young proletarian autodidact struggling to become a writer.
Starring: Luca Marinelli
One Second (Zhang Yimou)
A story about a movie fan in a remote farmland who strikes a relationship with a homeless female vagabond.
Starring: Zhang Yi, Fan Wei, Yu Ailei
The Halt (Lav Diaz)
It is the year 2034 AD and Southeast Asia has been in the dark for the last three years, literally, because the sun hasn’t shone as a result of massive volcanic eruptions at the Celebes Sea in 2031. Madmen control countries, communities, enclaves and bubble cities. Cataclysmic epidemics razed over the continent. Millions have died and millions have left.
Starring: Piolo Pascual, Joel Lamangan, Pinky Amador, Shaina Magdayao
When the Waves Are Gone (Lav Diaz)
A re-telling of The Count of Monte Cristo, the film revolves around a prisoner freed after thirty years, embarking on a bloody trail of revenge against his former best friend to reclaim all that he has lost.
The Woman Who Ran (Hong Sang-soo)
While her husband is on a business trip, Gamhee meets three of her friends on the outskirts of Seoul. They make friendly conversation, as always, but there are different currents flowing independently of each other, both above and below the surface.
Starring: Kim Min-hee, Seo Young-hwa, Song Seon-mi, Kim Sae-byuk, Kwon Hae-hyo, Shin Seok-ho
Kajillionaire (Miranda July)
A woman’s life is turned upside down when her criminal parents invite an outsider to join them on a major heist they’re planning.
Starring: Evan Rachel Wood, Gina Rodriguez, Debra Winger, Richard Jenkins, Da’Vine Joy Randolph
Swimming out till the Sea Turns Blue (Jia Zhang-ke)
Filmmaker Jia Zhangke chronicles his local literature festival in Shanxi, China which includes a multi-generational roster of the country’s most esteemed writers.
The Perfumed Hill (Abderrahmane Sissako)
A love story between Africa and China.
Wolfwalkers (Tomm Moore, Ross Stewart)
In a time of superstition and magic, when wolves are seen as demonic and nature an evil to be tamed, a young apprentice hunter comes to Ireland with her father to wipe out the last pack. But when she saves a wild native girl, their friendship leads her to discover the world of the Wolfwalkers and transform her into the very thing her father is tasked to destroy.
Il Buco (Michaelangelo Frammatino)
In 1961, a group of speleologists discover the world’s second deepest cave, the Bifurto Abyss.
Bad Hair (Justin Simien)
In 1989 an ambitious young woman gets a weave in order to succeed in the image-obsessed world of music television. However, her flourishing career may come at a great cost when she realizes that her new hair may have a mind of its own.
Starring: Ella Lorraine, Vanessa Williams, Jay Pharoah, Lena Waithe, Blair Underwood, Laverne Cox
The Traitor (Marco Bellocchio)
Palermo, Sicily, 1980. Mafia member Tommaso Buscetta decides to move to Brazil with his family fleeing the constant war between the different clans of the criminal organization. But when, after living several misfortunes, he is forced to return to Italy, he makes a bold decision that will change his life and the destiny of Cosa Nostra forever.
Starring: Pierfrancesco Favino
The Whistlers (Corneliu Porumboiu)
A Romanian police officer, determined to free from prison a crooked businessman who knows where a mobster’s money is hidden, must learn the difficult ancestral language (Silbo Gomero) used on the island of Gomera.
Starring: Vlad Ivanov, Catrinel Marlon, Rodica Lazăr, Sabin Tambrea, Agustí Villaronga
Ahed’s Knee (Nadav Lapid)
Plot Unknown
Starring: Avshalom Pollak
Nocturne (Gianfranco Rosi)
Plot Unknown
Soul (Pete Docter)
Joe Gardner is a middle school teacher with a love for jazz music. After a successful gig at the Half Note Club, he suddenly gets into an accident that separates his soul from his body and is transported to the You Seminar, a center in which souls develop and gain passions before being transported to a newborn child. Joe must enlist help from the other souls-in-training, like 22, a soul who has spent eons in the You Seminar, in order to get back to Earth.
Starring: Jamie Foxx, Tina Fey, Ahmir-Khalib Thompson, Phylicia Rashād, Daveed Diggs
Shanghai Youth (Wang Bing)
Liming is a worker district close to Shanghai – the richest city in China. Every year, many young people leave their villages and move there. They are between 17 and 20, all from rural Yunnan Province, 2,500 km west, where the Yangtze River has its source. These young Yunnanese often live at their place of work, in dormitories, unsanitary rooms, or sometimes in small studios. Time and space to meet is missing them. So they communicate through QQ, MSN China. They live as adults but they are teenagers, and the unstable situation, economic pressures, geographical dispersion, burn their innocence and youth. Wang Bing will spend a year with them in Liming: at work, at home, on the Internet, every day of their professional, romantic, and friendly relations. At the end of the year he will follow them in the opposite direction to their province of origin, to be with their family and celebrate Chinese New Year.
Vivo (Kirk DeMicco)
The film follows a monkey who loves music and adventure, leading him to make a dangerous journey from Havana to Miami to fulfill his destiny.
The Bears’ Famous Invasion of Sicily (Lorenzo Mattotti)
Our story starts with Tonio, the son the bears King, being kidnapped by some hunters in the Sicilian mountains. Because of the harshness of a winter that threatens its clan with famine, the Bear King decides to invade the land of men (in the hope of finding his son). Thanks to his powerful army and the help of a wizard, he will succeed at both quests but he will soon find out that bears are not meant to live in the land of men.
Starring: Leïla Bekhti, Jean-Claude Carrière, Thierry Hancisse, Thomas Bidegain, Arthur Dupont
After Blue (Bertrand Mandico)
After Blue is a ‘chimeric virgin planet’ upon which only women can survive. When teenager Roxy frees a criminal buried in the sand, a ruthless woman who quickly kills several people. As punishment, Roxy and her mother are exiled, forced to hunt down this criminal and kill her.
Starring: Elina Löwensohn, Vimala Pons
Liberté (Albert Serra)
774, shortly before the French Revolution, somewhere between Potsdam and Berlin. Madame de Dumeval, the Duke de Tesis and the Duke de Wand, libertines expelled from the puritanical court of Louis XVI, seek the support of the legendary Duc de Walchen, German seducer and freethinker, lonely in a country where hypocrisy and false virtue reign. Their mission is to export libertinage, a philosophy of enlightenment founded on the rejection of moral boundaries and authorities, but moreover to find a safe place to pursue their errant games, where the quest for pleasure no longer obeys laws other than those dictated by unfulfilled desires
Starring: Helmut Berger, Marc Susini, Laura Poulvet, Alex Garcia Duttmann, Lluís Serrat, Francesc Daranas
Personalien (Albert Serra)
The notorious director Rainer Werner Fassbinder terrorizes his cast and crew while preparing to stage an 18th-century play about debauchery in Berlin.
Starring: Lluís Serrat, Xavier Grataós
The Salt of Tears (Philippe Garrel)
Luc travels to Paris for the first time to sit the entrance exam for a carpentry school. There he meets Djemila, a young worker with whom he enjoys a short romance, before returning to his home town and beginning a relationship with Geneviève, whom he has known since childhood. Caught between two passions, Luc runs, resolving to fulfil his father’s dreams by devoting himself to his future… until finally, he experiences true love.
Starring: Logann Antuofermo, Oulaya Amamra, Louise Chevillotte, Souheila Yacoubm André Wilms, Aline Belibi, Martin Mesnier, Teddy Chawa
Family Romance, LLC (Werner Herzog)
A man is hired to impersonate the missing father of a 12-year-old girl.
Starring: Yuichi Ishii, Mahiro Tanimoto, Miki Fujimaki, Takashi Nakatani, Shun Ishigaki, Umetani Hideyasu, Take Nakamura
Over the Moon (Glen Keane)
A girl builds a rocket to travel to the moon in hopes of meeting the legendary Moon Goddess.
The Jonsson Gang (Tomas Alfredson)
A reboot of the famous Swedish saga “Jonssonligan”.
Starring: Henrik Dorsin, Anders Johansson, David Sundin, Hedda Stiernstedt
Ema (Pablo Larraín)
A couple deals with the aftermath of an adoption that goes awry as their household falls apart.
Starring: Mariana Di Girolamo, Gael García Bernal
Waiting for the Barbarians (Ciro Guerra)
A Magistrate working in a distant outpost begins to question his loyalty to the Empire.
Starring: Mark Rylance, Johnny Depp, Robert Pattinson, Greta Scacchi
Palm Springs (Max Barbakow)
When carefree Nyles and reluctant maid of honor Sarah have a chance encounter at a Palm Springs wedding, things get complicated as they are unable to escape the venue, themselves, or each other.
Starring: Andy Samberg, Cristin Milioti, J.K. Simmons, Camila Mendes, Meredith Hagner, Peter Gallagher
I Was at Home But… (Angela Schanelec)
After having disappeared for a week, a 13-year-old boy returns home one day without saying a word.
Starring: Maren Eggert, Franz Rogowski, Lilith Stangenberg, Jirka Zett
Onward (Dan Scanlon)
In a suburban fantasy world, two teenage elf brothers embark on an extraordinary quest to discover if there is still a little magic left out there.
Starring: Chris Pratt, Tom Holland, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Octavia Spencer, Mel Rodriguez, Ali Wong, Lena Waithe, John Ratzenberger
The Nest (Sean Durkin)
Rory is an ambitious entrepreneur who brings his American wife and kids to his native country, England, to explore new business opportunities. After abandoning the sanctuary of their safe American suburban surroundings, the family is plunged into the despair of an archaic ’80s Britain and their unaffordable new life in an English manor house threatens to destroy the family.
Starring: Jude Law, Carrie Coon
Brilliant additions, thanks ! My pdf is up now and I am way too lazy to update it but these should indeed be added to the AD poll. And for the record, I see several on your list that could break through at the Oscars, too, it is a brave new world post-Parasite … or at least it better be. I’m just cautiously optimistic because I expected the Academy to be more inclusive after Halle Berry and Kathryn Bigelow, too, and yet those historic victories remain one-offs in their respective departments.
that looks pretty professional.thanks for the effort.
I’ve seen the columns at the Dolby Theater, and I agree, they are impressive.
I had my picture taken in front of one of them.
very very cool. everybody knows about these but me, apparently.
So, 2020 is going to be a battle of giants…
David Fincher (Mank, Netflix)
Steven Spielberg (West Side Story, Dreamworks)
Christopher Nolan (Tenet, Warner Brothers)
It is going to be a bloodbath… still, my thought is to watch out for In the Heights, WB, Jon M. Chu, fresh from Crazy Rich Asians, which seems like a latino La La Land and even has the respected character actor in probably an Oscar candy role, Jimmy Smits. After the J-Lo debacle of 2019, the lack of latino representation card might be extremely useful to help this film’s chances. If I had to bet one year in advance, I would be betting In the Heights for Picture, Supporting Actor, Song and maybe a Sound category… then, maybe Cinematography, judging from the trailer.
What do you think about Mike Mills “C’mon C’mon” ? Do you think it has chance to get nominated/win for director and actor (phoenix) ? I hard that A.Hopkins delivered also a great performance this year at sundance. For director spielberg is probabily the favourite but i’m not sure nolan will be in the battle. I see spielberg, fincher, w.anderson, francis lee and probabily Howard and larrain.
at this point, every huge contender has the potential to be Cats and every outsider has the potential of becoming Parasite.
This looks to me more like a feel-good summer crowdpleaser with a political message than another La La Land. And even if it was another La La Land, I think the Academy might have a “been there, done that” attitude towards it.
the Latino card is going to be played heavily with it… I forgot to add Spike Lee is also back
to me it resounds more to Hairspray thematically, but the looks are 100% La La Land in a Latino key. That may be simply irresistible, specially when compared to a REMAKE of West Side Story… I wonder how many critics will wonder why Spielberg would choose to remake a 10 Oscar winner musical, over adapting anything still waiting to get to the screen (Wicked, for example, which looks completely on his alley…). Which leads me to plead to hollywood…
Trey Parker’s Book of Mormon
Taika Waititi directing Spamalot
… just saying.
I don’t know how well The Book of Mormon would work on film, but I would loooove to see it. My favourite stage musical of all.
And honestly I don’t see much resemblance of La La Land, visually, in this film. That was a visually quite distinctive film with plenty of visually breathtaking bits (the opening number, the planetarium, the rapidfire camera pans at the jazz club…) which I see no trace of here, at least from the trailer. Maybe I’ll be wrong. We’ll see.
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I forgot to properly reply… the opening number of La La Land was… HORRIBLE. Like a Coca Cola superbowl advertisement. The song was kind of OK at best, the dancing number was OK, however everyone was beautiful till they noticed they have forgotten that there are, you know, real average people in a traffic jam and decided to throw in at the truck moment some fat, somewhate not so beautiful people. Still, the biggest problem with La La Land, and as I spoke with some artist, is that it completely diminishes the value of the sacrifices one makes for their career… in the end, with that what if? fantasy, the result is that they would have been happy and successful either way they took, rendering the sacrifice of their relationship completely pointless. And I think, enough people understood that, that it was a just ok musical with a couple of beautiful moments (the planetarium specially) and that in no way it deserved to be a 14 nominations for the Oscar film… It is in no way a bad movie, but just a good one, and frankly it was embarrassing that for some seconds it looked like it defeated a true complete masterpiece as Moonlight for Best Picture.
I strongly disagree with this La La Land take. I think the opening song is beyond fantastic (but that’s subjective, of course), and the dancing nicely fits the dancing style of the film (which never really tries to look ‘impressive’ in the way of the old musicals).
And I just rewatched it, and I don’t think the people are particularly beautiful at all, they are mostly quite average-looking. (Except for maybe the very first girl, who might be above average.)
I have a very different read on the “what if?” sequence as well. It’s not suggesting that this would have happened if they’ve stayed together, it’s just an idealized scenario they play out in their heads. It’s sort of the “perfect world” they wanted to reach, but decided that it’s unreachable or unlikely when they broke up.
But anyway, the thing is, La La Land was a long-time pet project of a wunderkind director just fresh off his second feature winning three Oscars and being a Picture and Script nominee. It got a prestigious festival release in addition to the massive hype (and of course the stellar reviews), which of course made it a major Oscar player.
In The Heights, though, is a summer release, and Jon M. Chu, despite the success of Crazy Rich Asians, still isn’t considered a major Oscar player, especially as his previous credits are all relatively poorly reviewed. As I said, surprises can happen, of course, but I don’t expect it to be in the awards conversation.
Chazelle, wunderkind? He is a skilled director, no doubt about it, but a terrible author. Grand Piano was bonkers in its cheating proposal (he wrote it). Whiplash threw away trough the window all logic in its obsession to show the two most obsessed persons ever graced the silver screen, it was bonkers and completely unbelievable in the skeleton of the story. La La Land, was bland, posh, these pair was impossible to relate to at any moment of the film. First Man, his best film, still was about… I am still thinking about it. It was a technical masterpiece about… nothing of depth? Just a biopic? Ratings…
Grand Piano *** (thanks to the direction, not to the screenplay by Chazelle, who did not direct it)
Whiplash ***
La La Land ** 1/2
First Man ****
… all out of 5 stars.
Don’t forget “Dune.”
To be fair 2019 was going to be a battle of the giants – Tarantino v Scorsese early on then v Mendes (who is almost a giant by this point) and none of them ended up winning! This year looks really packed though like we are getting more from Spike Lee and Wes Anderson and Denis Villeneuvre as well as those 3. I’m super excited for in the heights too – I was lucky enough to see the stage musical a few years ago and it was so good!
I will always imagine what would have happened if Parasite and Joker were 2020 films and not 2019. The film mostly benefited from that would have been Pain and Glory, I think… Parasite stole the limelight everywhere but in acting, and then Phoenix won everything by the industry, BUT it was Banderas winning the biggest critics groups, not Driver (LAFCA, NYFCC).