AwardsDaily is a free-thinking zone. Anyone who is not familiar with this site should be aware of that. This is great in some ways but probably not so great in other ways. Social media has trained us to form tribes and anyone inside one of those tribes would be expected to follow the ideology of that tribe. I don’t run my site that way. Writers here offer different points of view and belong to very different ideologies. I could fire everyone and say I only want writers who mirror my own beliefs but that would be, I think, a boring way to go. You’re kind of screwed either way – you can’t really build a large audience if you don’t adhere to any specific “side.” But you also can’t build a large audience if you only stick to any specific “side.”
Either way, that is what you get here. I am honest as I can be vis-à-vis Oscar and Hollywood analysis. Do I sometimes pull punches for studios and films? Sure. I will keep quiet about a film I may hate so as not to wreck that movie’s chances in the awards race (give or take). I never fake liking a movie. My weakness, like everyone’s, is in boosting films I want to do well as opposed to giving you cold, hard analysis. That is baked-in. If you love movies you can’t help but think the movies you most love will do well.
Love can sometimes be blind. I never regret standing behind a movie I love, however, even if that movie doesn’t go anywhere in the Oscar race. That’s because the Oscar race is just a moment in time, a fleeting glimpse of an industry and a collective trapped in time. Movies last much longer.
Take, for instance, 2014. Anyone reading this site knows I lost my mind over Gone Girl. I still have residual anger that the screenplay made it all the way through the necessary nominations but missed out on an Oscar nod due to Whiplash being placed in the Adapted category at the Oscars. But does anything that happened that year matter? Not really. In the flurry of the season the power accessible for various people shifted. Birdman won and that meant a lot for Alejandro G. Iñárritu and maybe Michael Keaton, even if he didn’t win. Boyhood was proof Richard Linklater had committed his talent to over a decade’s worth of storytelling. It didn’t win but it was still impressive.
No, the only movie anyone really talks about now, remembers, and is as resonate today as it was then, maybe even more resonate is, of course, Gone Girl. Do I feel bad I lost my mind for it? No. Was I right and everyone else was wrong? Of course. I was right because it is a great movie. The Oscar voters were wrong for not recognizing that.
You should never regret loving a movie so much that it obscures your objectivity. Like my dad would have said, “what else have you got to do?”
The irony of 2014 is that I felt resentful of Damien Chazelle’s Whiplash for taking Gone Girl’s slot — and again resentful of La La Land, for some truly sad and inexplicable reason for taking Moonlight’s spot (except it didn’t prevail in the end, famously). First Man turned me into a true believer for Chazelle’s talent. I was so utterly blown away by that movie it caused me to re-evaluate all of his work. Do I regret losing my mind for First Man out of Telluride even though it never made it to the Big Show? No. Of course not. I figure Chazelle is going to keep making movies and those movies will cause others to look back on his previous films, as we do with all of the greats. I just get to say I was there first with First Man and Gone Girl.
So what does all of this mean? It means we’re only human. We should go easier on each other across the board. In Oscars and everything else.
We’re in the midst of a pendulum shift, which I’ve been warning about for a few years now. Where we are as we head towards 2023 is when everything we thought was good for the past 20 or so years will wear out its welcome as the pendulum swings in the other direction. The bummer, at least for me, is that we won’t see a full transformation back to individualism until around 2033, if the theory holds. That means things are going to kind of suck for a while. For me, I wish I had 50 more years of life to see how it all turns out but alas, I do not.
Let’s revisit the book Pendulum: How Past Generations Shape Our Present and Predict Our Future by Roy H. Williams and Michael R. Drew. This book was written around 2011 and published in 2012, and is an interpretation of the book The Fourth Turning, which divides the span of generations into 80-year cycles. Pendulum divides those up into two 40-year cycles of a “me” cycle and a “we” cycle. We are coming to the last desperate gasp of the “we” cycle right now, wherein a “witch hunt” phase emerges.
The “Witch hunt” phase is born out of the idea that the group sees itself as “okay” and seeks to purge those who are not. This has reached extreme heights in our culture right now. No one knows exactly how bad it is going to get before everything breaks apart. Previous Fourth Turnings in America have included WWII, the Civil War, the Revolutionary War, etc. Either way, for our purposes here, I figure things will change as new generations come of age. Can the Oscar race, can Hollywood, survive that?
If the Pendulum theory is any indication, yes. As the pendulum swings, we will get back in the business of what actually drives Hollywood – hero worship, individualism, the free market. We can see now what that looks like without it. In our efforts to make sure no one is left behind and everyone is represented we’ve lost the plot a bit.
Say Drew and Williams:
If history is a reliable guide, we’re about to take a good thing too far. As we approach 2023, the Zenith of our current “We,” we’re about to learn what Steinbeck was talking about when he spoke of a similar time: “a teetotaler is not content not to drink—he must stop all the drinking in the world; a vegetarian among us would outlaw the eating of meat. Yes, “working together for the common good” can quickly become self-righteousness. In the words of novelist David Farland, “Men who believe themselves to be good, who do not search their own souls, often commit the worst atrocities. A man who sees himself as evil will restrain himself. It is only when we do evil in the belief that we do good that we pursue it wholeheartedly.”
And this fun paragraph:
Out of balance: From halfway up a “We” to halfway down that “We” is the time of witch hunts, transparency, and authenticity: “I’m OK, you’re not OK,” the twenty-year season of Holy Wars, us vs. them. “We, the good and righteous defenders of truth and beauty against them, the evil and sinister malefactors intent on destroying our way of life” (2013–2033).
Hey great, sounds good. Looking forward to it! EEEEEK! How much worse can it possibly get than it is right now? Well, apparently a whole lot worse.
As they put together their book way back in 2011, they were trying to imagine who would be the witches and who would be the hunters. They could not have fathomed it because it was also about to kick into gear the year this book was published, 2012, wherein a new brand of social justice was taking root on college campuses and online — self-righteous, judgmental, punitive all in the name of protecting the new frontier of American life.
2013–2033: Who Will We Burn This Time? On the upside, the Zenith of a “We” offers some very specific marketing opportunities. Self-definition—“ branding” if you will—is no longer determined by who you include and what you stand for; instead, it becomes a function of exclusion: who you exclude and what you stand against.
Here’s the payoff: the easiest people in the world to manipulate are those who are focused on a single issue. Be forcefully against whatever they’re against and you can lead them around like a tame calf on a rope. You can’t have insiders without outsiders.
Hey that sounds good. Sounds fun! Sign me up. Just kidding. Where’s the off switch?
Finally, they offer a way to survive this era:
1. Listen with your whole heart, and try not to interrupt. Resist the temptation to put words into others’ mouths. Don’t be accusatory. Try to understand, truly, what “the other side” is saying. The last time we were in this “I’m OK, you’re not OK” cycle, Ernest Hemingway is reported to have offered the perfect advice to his readers: “When people talk, listen completely. Most people never listen.” It’s time to heed that advice once again. WE Instantaneous worldwide communication might be able to help us mitigate the negativity and soften the viciousness of the next 20 years. But you must have the courage to speak up. —Michael R. Drew
2. Be capable of articulating calmly how “the other side” sees it. Always acknowledge that goodness and sincerity can be found on both sides of every argument. Paul Hewitt said, “The person who can state his antagonist’s point of view to the satisfaction of the antagonist is more likely to be correct than the person who cannot.” Most of us cannot articulate the position of our antagonist to the satisfaction of the antagonist because we fear that a clear understanding of their perspective might cause us to change our minds. And in an era of “I’m OK, you’re not OK” this feels like the ultimate disaster because, if that were to happen, we would, by our own self-righteous definition, no longer be “OK.”
When we discuss this Pendulum phenomenon with others, people often ask, “Will the advent of instantaneous worldwide communication (the Internet) accelerate the Pendulum?” The logic of this question is obvious, but we feel the answer is No. If intellect or information drove the Pendulum, the answer would most certainly be Yes. But these things don’t seem to drive the human heart. The pace of deep human change is agricultural—our motivations change at the speed of trees.
Think of a tree—a specific tree whose location you know. That tree seems not to change from day to day, right? And unless it’s very young, it seems not even to change from year to year. But take a snapshot of that tree today and then come back in ten, twenty, or forty years, and it will be astoundingly different. This seems also to be the way of the human heart. Grief counselors are very familiar with this “agricultural” pace of the human heart, as it often takes a complete cycle of four seasons for an emotional wound to heal. When a member of one’s immediate family is lost, a single cycle of four seasons barely begins this process of recovery. The Internet has done nothing to change this.
The good news, however, is that instantaneous worldwide communication might be able to help us mitigate the negativity and soften the viciousness of the next twenty years.
But you must have the courage to speak up. Edmund Burke is reported to have said 240 years ago, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”
This is clearly a different kind of Predictions Friday. It still sort of counts. Some of you have been coming back here for two decades. Some of you have grown up on this site. It’s important to see where we are, what is changing and how it’s changing. In this world, the Oscars and the film industry, things are changing very fast.
I sense a bit of a shift happening both in terms of what audiences want to see (Top Gun: Maverick) and how the Oscars have become too reliant upon the insular world of film critics and film twitter that is becoming increasingly closed off from the outside world. I expect this is why storytelling seems to be so much more free in other countries. They are being held to the same sorts of rules this town is, or the same sorts of moral panics.
With that, here are your predictions as such. Paul Sheehan at Gold Derby has a fresh crop of predictions. These should be taken with a slight grain of salt as no one has seen any of the movies yet. But it’s interesting.
Sheehan has given a bit of a glossary outlining each movie which you can read at GD:
All of his “strong contenders” are auteur films, written or co-written by their director:
“Amsterdam” (20th Century – Fall)
Director: David O. Russell
Writer: David O. Russell
“Avatar: The Way of Water” (2oth Century – Winter)
Director: James Cameron
Writer: James Cameron
“Babylon” (Paramount – Winter)
Director: Damien Chazelle
Writer: Damien Chazelle
“The Banshees of Inisherin” (Searchlight – Fall)
Director: Martin McDonagh
Writer: Martin McDonagh
“Bardo” (Netflix – Fall)
Director: Alejandro G. Iñárritu
Writers: Iñárritu, Nicolas Giacobone
“Empire of Light” (Searchlight – Fall)
Director: Sam Mendes
Writer: Sam Mendes
“The Fabelmans” (Universal – Fall)
Director: Steven Spielberg
Writers: Steven Spielberg, Tony Kushner
“The Greatest Beer Run Ever” (Apple TV+ – Fall)
Director: Peter Farrelly
Writers: Brian Hayes Currie, Peter Farrelly and Pete Jones who adapted the non-fiction book of the same name by Joanna Molloy and John “Chickie” Donohue.
“Women Talking” (UA – Fall)
Director: Sarah Polley
Writer: Sarah Polley, who adapted the novel of the same name by Miriam Toews.
Moving on to the “strong contenders” it’s along those same lines – written and directed by the same person:
“Armageddon Time” (Focus – Fall)
Director: James Gray
Writer: James Gray
“Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” (Disney – Fall)
Director: Ryan Coogler
Writers: Ryan Coogler, Joe Robert Cole
“Everything Everywhere All at Once” (A24 – Spring)
Directors: Daniel Kwan, Daniel Scheinert
Writers: Daniel Kwan, Daniel Scheinert
“The Son ” (SPC – Fall)
Director: Florian Zeller
Writer: Florian Zeller, who adapted his play of the same name.
“Tar” (Focus – Fall)
Director: Todd Field
Writer: Todd Field
“White Noise” (Netflix – Fall)
Director: Noah Baumbach
Writer: Noah Baumbach, who adapted the novel of the same name by Don DeLillo.
“The Woman King” (Sony – Fall)
Director: Gina Prince-Bythewood
Writers: Gina Prince-Bythewood and Dana Stevens; story by Maria Bello
And then we move on to the collaborations — different writers and directors:
“Bones and All” (UA – Fall)
Director: Luca Guadagnino
Writer: David Kajganich, who adapted the novel of the same name by Camille DeAngelis.
Cast: Michael Stuhlbarg, Timothée Chalamet, Mark Rylance, Chloë Sevigny
Plot: Maren, a young woman, learns how to survive on the margins of society.
“Causeway” (Apple TV+ – Winter)
Director: Lila Neugebauer
Writer: Elizabeth Sanders, Luke Goebel, Ottessa Moshfegh
“Don’t Worry Darling” (WB – Fall)
Directors: Olivia Wilde
Writers: Katie Silberman, Carey Van Dyke, Shane Van Dyke
“Poor Things” (Searchlight – Fall)
Director: Yorgos Lanthimos
Writer: Tony McNamara, who adapted the novel “Poor Things” by Alasdair Gray
“She Said” (Universal – Fall)
Director: Maria Schrader
Writer: Rebecca Lenkiewicz, who adapted the non-fiction book of the same name by Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey.
Then we get to the possible contenders, first the auteurs:
“Blonde” (Netflix – Fall)
Director: Andrew Dominik
Writer: Andrew Dominik who adapted the novel of the same name by Joyce Carol Oates.
“Decision to Leave” (MUBI – Fall)
Director: Park Chan-wook
Writers: Park Chan-wook, Jeong Seo-kyeong
“Elvis” (Warner Bros. – Summer)
Director: Baz Luhrmann
Writers: Baz Luhrmann, Sam Bromell, Craig Pearce, Jeremy Doner
“Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery” (Netflix – Fall)
Director: Rian Johnson
Writer: Rian Johnson
“Triangle of Sadness” (Neon – Fall)
Director: Ruben Ostlund
Writer: Ruben Ostlund
And those that are collaborations:
“I Wanna Dance with Somebody” (Sony – Winter)
Director: Kasi Lemmons
Writer: Anthony McCarten
“A Man Called Otto” (Sony – Winter)
Director: Marc Forster
Writer: David Magee, who adapted the novel of the same name by Fredrik Backman.
“Till” (UA – Fall)
Director: Chinonye Chukwu
Writers: Michael Reilly, Keith Beauchamp, Chinonye Chukwu
“Top Gun: Maverick” (Paramount – Spring)
Director: Joseph Kosinski
Writers: Ehren Kruger, Eric Warren Singer, Christopher McQuarrie; Story by Peter Craig, Justin Marks
“The Whale” (A24 – Fall)
Director: Darren Aronofsky
Writer: Samuel D. Hunter
The first thing I’d note is simply that auteurs as sole screenwriters don’t win Picture, Director and Screenplay very often. It happens — but usually there is a co-writer, as with Iñárritu and Birdman and Bong Joon-Ho with Parasite. Somehow we all seem to dive into the Oscar race still believing that someone is going to win all of those major prizes. The reason they don’t is that, with ten nominees, voters like to “spread the wealth.”
CODA — Picture, Screenplay, Supporting Actor
Nomadland — Picture, Director, Actress
Parasite — Picture, Director, Screenplay (co-writer)
Green Book — Picture, Screenplay (co-writer), Supporting Actor
Shape of Water — Picture, Director
Moonlight — Picture, Screenwriter (co-writer), Supporting Actor
Spotlight — Picture, Screenplay (co-writer)
Birdman — Picture, Director, Screenplay (co-writer)
12 Years a Slave — Picture, Screenplay, Supporting Actress
Argo — Picture, Editing, Screenplay (different writer)
The Artist — Picture, Director +
The King’s Speech — Picture, Director, Screenplay (different writer)
The Hurt Locker — Picture, Director, Screenplay (different writer)
CODA appears to be the only film that won Screenplay and Picture with a single writer, just not director. Not nominated for Director either so there’s that. Would it have won all three? Maybe. Who knows.
My other comment on Paul’s list is to have Elvis down so low at this stage of the game is what I would consider to be dereliction of duty and/or allowing one’s personal dislike of a movie cloud their judgment. Elvis has legs. Word of mouth is driving it at the box office. Last weekend it was still holding at #7 with $128 million. We likely have a strong Best Actor contender with Austin Butler — and Best Actor is pretty much married to Best Picture. He also has Top Gun Maverick too low, considering what a massive impact it has had culturally this year. So yeah, I’d rethink these Paul! With due respect to my buddy.
My own imaginings for Best Picture would look something like this, starting with what we know and moving backwards to what we imagine might happen — for nomination only, not wins:
Top Gun: Maverick
Elvis
Everything Everywhere All at Once
These three films have been seen, did well, and should be remembered by year’s end.
Then we move on to what sounds good or “sexy” to me as a Best Picture choice:
Babylon
The Fabelmans
She Said
The Greatest Beer Run Ever
Avatar
Bardo
Empire of Light
My next in line would be:
Wakanda Forever
Till
Poor Things
The Woman King
Causeway
Don’t Worry Darling
The Son
Amsterdam
But it’s early yet. You can see some themes emerging from some of this. It looks like a great year so far.
I have definitely worn out my welcome with this post. Wishing you all a great weekend.
Seriously, while the artsy festival horses jockey for Oscars contention based on the hype leading up to their premieres, RRR: Rise, Roar, Revolt + Top Gun: Maverick + Everything Everywhere All at Once further solidify into the Best Picture status of “MUST NOMINATE OR WE’RE REPREHENSIBLE SNOBS”.
As for Best Original Song, I just want The Bob’s Burgers Movie’s “Lucky Ducks” + RRR’s “Dosti” + “Naatu Naatu” to make the final category. Please.
A moment of silence and appreciation to remember a true icon who passed today.
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Speaking of 2014. It was a great year for films: Boyhood, Whiplash, Clouds of Sils Maria, Interstellar, Still Alice, Gone Girl, Maps to the Stars, Camp X-Ray.
Birdman was great too
Intersteller does not get enough love and respect. Easily should have been a best picture nominee, same with Gone Girl. Whiplash ❤️
The Grand Budapest Hotel, Birdman, Inherent Vice, Under the Skin, Foxcatcher, Nightcrawler, Babadook…
Funny that you mention 2014 as strong year and then not even list 3-4 best films released that year.
KStew loves you.
‘Twas a really decent year
1. Under the Skin
2. Inherent Vice
3. The Babadook
4. Boyhood
5. Whiplash
6. Mr. Turner
7. Calvary
8. Nightcrawler
9. Gone Girl
10. Jimmy’s Hall
11. Foxcatcher
12. Jauja
13. Birdman
14. Winter Sleep
15. The Immigrant
16. The Look of Silence
17. Charlie’s Country
18. Still Life
19. The Rover
20. Kumiko the Treasure Hunter
Stranger By The Lake is a landmark gay film from that year, many consider it an all time great for the “genre”
For me the best film is easily Leviathan by Andrey Zvyagintsev. It’s a remarkable film that shows that political propaganda can run both ways when designed properly. On one hand it’s extremely critical of the contemporary Russian justice system and one reads it was supported by Putin, a casual Western viewer of the film would say “Hey, I like Putin, maybe he is trying to change things.”
But when viewed by a Russian viewer it serves as a warning, “don’t rock the boat, or you will suffer” and it’s a message easily accepted. It’s been that way for decades, for entire lifetimes. Those in rural areas know nothing else.
But even if you strip all of the politics away, you are left with a suspenseful crime drama with deep emotion and a wicked conclusion. Love or hate its politics, it’s impossible to say it wasn’t extraordinarily well-crafted.
For me, the best gay film was Tiger Orange. Nothing special, just a character study, but that’s what I like best.
Yep I saw that Leviathan in theaters, it was excellent but not in my top 20 (#27).
I’m not gay myself nor focused on queer cinema, but there were a number of good queer/lgbt-related films that year, quickly skimming I see stuff like Appropriate Behavior, The New Girlfriend, The Way He Looks, Lilting, Carlotta (telemovie), Pride, The Skeleton Twins, etc.
there were a few, especially some mainstream ones like The Imitation Game (and some would include Foxcatcher, I would not). But overall it was a weak year. I feel like “Pride” is the only one that mainstream audiences will remember years from now.
White Noise opens Venice and New York. Very good outlook. As would Palme d’Or winner Triangle of Sadness. Margot Robbie, Cate Blanchett, Jennifer Lawrence looking good for Best Actress with with 6 or 8 others in contention; Michelle Williams supporting. But it is all wild guesses till September 18.
According to World of Reel, one source says that ‘Don’ t Worry, Darling’ is… “an absolute misfire and absolute mess, not even fun in the least. ”
Disappointing to read that. Trailer looked good.
i don’t believe him
It didn’t look good to me. Or at least it didn’t look like something I’d be interested in. Still, wishing Florence Pugh good luck. I’m most skeptical about Amsterdam having seen its trailer
Pugh’s rumored “rift” from Wilde could be as simple as the film being bad and Pugh distancing herself from it early
Maybe. We’ll have to ser.
As a general rule, it’s never good when a Blacklist script is taken and rewritten so much that the original authors get booted down to a “Story by” credit.
sounds like the Bible
Jason Sudeikis must be silently laughing his ass off about this.
It’s been pointed out by others that this is a WB property too, and their new CEO has opened up a big time floodgate by citing screening reaction as the reason to spike Batgirl. Batgirl may in fact be as bad as rumored, but WB has some optics issues. Pretty much every bad film they release now will get the “But you shelved Batgirl instead” snark.
I take a LOT of what Ruimy says with more than a few grains of salt.
True.
for ones who are predicting white noise did you read the book well Unsympathetic and offbeat characters, a loose plot mainly revolving around characters’ anxiety around death, unless baumbach changed the material i can’t see it a big player
I don’t find them unsympathetic at all. They seem like normal people trying to get through the day, to me.
Sure, DeLillo’s style prevents him from expressing compassion for his characters but that doesn’t mean they are necessarily unlikeable or offbeat. As for anxiety, do you know many Americans? And some of our great movies and award winners are all about anxiety.
I can’t wait to see the final shot.
i loved the book and i wish it gets nominated but the academy gave green book and coda best picture you think they would love that
they’ve given out the award to a wide variety of movies over the past few decades, even satires of American life.
By the way, where are all the Jordan Peele sycophants now that Nope is going to do about $65 million less than his previous two films on a budget that was 15x and 3.5x greater the other film’s budgets.
Raise your hand if you called M. Night Syndrome.
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You seem to be one of those people who gets a kick of seeing people fail. I wonder why people don’t like you? Jeez!
Not at all. Wes Anderson, Terrence Malick, Barry Jenkins, Greta Gerwig, Debra Granik, David Lowery, The Coen Brothers, Celine Sciamma, Robert Eggers, Steve McQueen, the list goes on and on for iconoclastic filmmakers I root for each and every time they have a new work come out. Peele was a media-created darling who is now finally being exposed.
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I’d hardly call 77 MC score being found out. Is box office the only sign of great quality? It’s harder than ever to combine big box office with critical acclaim and even the best fail these days. How was he created by the media when you’re judging him best on box office takings? That’s baffling. Isn’t it more correct to say the public created him by flocking to his films? The thing that created him has let him down this time around. That’s showbiz. And there’s a big tell in where you’re coming from when you criticise him for how others perceive him. Is it his fault how the media portrays him? It seems to me that you’re objecting more to the media hype of him than his films. I don’t think that’s a healthy way to look at things. I believe it’s best to evaluate people on what they do and judge them on their work. Judge Peele or any filmmaker on their films. When I don’t like a filmmaker, I state my reasons for not liking them, but I’m also always hopeful that they’d make something I like. I resent people getting undeserved praise and try to point out why that is wrong. However, I don’t gloat when they fail. I just don’t get it what’s the point of that. Either you live for seeing people fail, or you’re trying to make a petty point. Isn’t the fact his film did badly at the box office enough? that’s if you care so much about that. What do you feel you need to point it out? You’re like one of those gleeful kids who can’t help but point when someone falls over.
So now we’ve gone off the receipts and are using the Godhead that is Metacritic to determine a film’s success. All Peele fans kept citing was how great his first two films did financially and now that Nope will barely break even, let’s go back to METACRITIC???
He’s always been a Rod Serling-wannabe and the critics played along. Rod Serling was a genius, Jordan Peele is a very nice fellow.
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No, you created this criteria to suit your arguments against Peele. How else can it be when we can’t see the people you’re referring to? Did you invent these people out of thin air or something? If you’re responding to those people it’s one, but you’ve brought this up all by yourself as if you couldn’t help yourself from gloating. And since I’m the person who brought up the MC score of Nope, you’re making me out to be one of those Peele fans who apparently cited his huge box office. We can clearly see through your silly little games. Do these people actually exist or is it all in your head, Chase? If they do exist, then take it up with them. What I think is the right thing to do is to make an objective assessment of filmmakers rather than simply responding to nonsense claims by fans of any particular filmmaker. An objective opinion would say Peele has done very well in his first three films, at least in critical terms. It’s more difficult to get great scores in a genre like horror, but then I suppose it’s lot easier to make money with horror film.
If you want to talk first three films, there is absolutely no comparison between whet Jordan Peele has done and what Robert Eggers has done. They’re not even in the same film universe.
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LOL oranges and apples buddy. oranges and apples. A really stupid argument.
I was responding to a comment that was about first three films. It was a comparative comment about current filmmakers who work in the same genre. And apples and oranges are both fruits, so the argument holds up quite well, thank you very much.
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I think it’s safe to say your evaluation of films would be much more appreciated if you hadn’t spent a great deal of your time last year telling us how CODA was the best film out of the ten nominees. I’ve only seen two of Eggers movies and they’re not better than Peele’s. However, Peele already has a masterpieces in Get Out, and I don’t think Eggers has a film that can match that yet. But I’ve not seen The Witch, so that might be one that matches up to Get Out. It seems unlikely since Get Out was lauded pretty much everywhere and was near the top of the polls in its year. Maybe The Witch was an overlooked masterpiece? I’ll have to see it before I can make that judgement. Anyway, I don’t see the point of comparing one good filmmaker with another just for the purpose of trying to make one of them look bad. Even if one is better than other, it doesn’t mean by any measure that the other one is bad.
The Witch is one of the great movies of the last decade. Far better than Get Out or Us in my opinion.
The Witch just gets set aside as a horror film (much like the recent They/Them) even though it’s so much more.
That’s because they’re not even attempting to do things in the same “film universe”
it’s actually not lost money – for now it has tied it’s production budget in the U.S.
I didn’t say it has lost money, I said it will most likely break even, IF the studio is feeling charitable. A film needs to earn 2 1/2 times its investment for it generally to considered profitable. The budget was 68 with easily another 30 thrown in for advertising. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix supposedly lost nearly $175 mil despite nearly generating $1 billion worldwide. It’s like the kidnapper said in Taken…good luck.
It hit 98M this weekend. So it has already broken even.
CODA bo: 1.6M hahahahahahahahaha
CODA – Oscars for Best Picture, Adapted Screenplay, Supporting Actor; SAG Award Best Cast In a Motion Picture;
PGA – Best Motion Picture;
WGA – Best Adapted Screenplay;
BAFTA – Best Adapted Screenplay
and the highest amount $(25 million) ever paid for a Sundance film
Nope – Well, there’s always the Saturn Awards!
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CODA was as Oscar bait as they come, but horror films struggle to get any traction unless they are among the very best of the year. However, any middlebrow rubbish can get nominated at Oscars and even win big awards. And you keep changing the criteria of quality. Box office is important until it’s not, and you pick and choose to suit your arguments.
I’m simply responding to the Texas two-step Peele fans do of it’s all about the MC score…no, wait, it’s about the gross…no wait, it’s about respect for horror films. And one’s anger over CODA speaks more about the character of those trashing it, than the tastes of the multiple organizations that rewarded it.
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You can trash The Power of The Dog and other films, but other people aren’t allowed to trash CODA? Is it a protected species or something?
Everyone is free to trash everything!
there’s nothing Oscar-bait about CODA, it’d just a family friendly feel good drama. It’s just better made than most of them.
And if it were Oscar Bait, why would Apple kind of dump it in the middle of August and give it no promotion?
What saved it was a few critics put it in their best of the year lists, causing more critics to check it out, then suddenly Troy Kotsur started winning some critics awards, causing more people to check it out and then probably eeked it’s way on the Best Pic list, causing even more people to check it out and then after seeing all of the “best” movies of the year decided that CODA was the best of an overpraised lot.
An Oscar bait isn’t necessarily a film made with the sole intention of winning Oscars. No, we would call an Oscar bait A film that ticks many of the boxes of films that win major awards, especially the Best Picture. CODA isn’t merely a feelgood film (whatever that means), but a feelgood outside it too. You would had to have been in a coma to miss the narrative of that. And as we’ve seen in recent years, the Oscars are suckers or that kind of thing. One more thing, if you really believe CODA was the best film of the nominees and deserved to win, that’s fine. But please let’s not rewrite history and make up things in order to make sense of CODA’s big surge at the death. It was a last gasp win from nowhere. A film that does that badly in nominations at the Oscars, guilds, BAFTA and Golden Globes can’t be taken seriously as a good winner. Look at the stats of all the winners in Oscar history. CODA is statistically the worst Best Picture winner in Oscar history.
I never said it was the best of the lot, just that the rest of the films weren’t grabbing the Academy’s attention. I wouldn’t call CODA the best of the lot since I haven’t seen all of them.
As for CODA’s path. It’s called a late-bloomer. Such things are rare these days since there is an industry out there promoting films to the voters.
But sometimes voters find one they like all on their own. And sometimes it takes a couple of months as they talk amongst themselves about what they have personally enjoyed.
Just because an entire group of pundits ignored it doesnt mean it’s a bad film, just that pundits are pretty shitty at their jobs. It’s easier safer and easier for them to agree with everyone else than go out on a limb.
CODA is following in the steps of many other nonentities that won best picture because they were easy to digest and made the Academy feel good about themselves. It’s like Argo, which is funny because when certain people bring it up so many times I find myself thinking of the main catchphrase from Argo.
I agree.
If hiding behind Metacritic scores is cowardly and simply people attempting to prop up a movie that isn’t successful, isn’t hiding behind Oscar wins as just a worse version of that same thing
It wasn’t just the Oscars, but writers, producers, and the British, a notoriously snooty bunch, who all agreed. You know, the people who actually CREATE the movies, rather than passive critics pushing social agendas.
Still, claiming that someone is hiding behind the opinions of one group of people when merely mentioning that clearly not everyone agrees with you and then bringing up the opinions of another group of people and using them to shield your opinion has a bit of a bizarre look to it. The weirdness of your argument is not really alleviated by the fact that the group you praise for awarding CODA and which will (most likely) ignore Nope has awarded Peele in the past either, because it would imply that the people who we should point to as arbiters of greatness didn’t realize that he was according to you a “media-created darling who is now finally being exposed” and threw nominations and a win at him anyway.
Also, if critics were so easy to sway with “social agendas”, doesn’t CODA also have one of those (at least in the ridiculous way people use that phrase these days)? So why was the critical reaction to that movie not incredibly enthusiastic (as a matter of fact, its score is three points lower than Nope’s)?
I’m not arguing that Peele won an Oscar from the same group. I’m arguing he made a bad film with Nope, as proven by both critical and audience reaction. And the media-created darling is proven when they start referring to Peele as “The modern master of horror and suspense”. They used the same idiotic moniker with DePalma in the 70s and Carpenter in the 80s. It was embarrassing then and it’s embarrassing now.
Even if you weren’t arguing that Peele won the Oscar from the same group (which is logical since I brought up Peele’s Oscar win), the point still stands: if CODA is inherently a good film/a better film than Nope because the industry liked it, then by all logic Peele should be given similar praise for making Get Out. And who did Peele win the Oscar from if not the industry?
Also, 77 on Metacritic and notable box office for a film not directly adapted from anything is still solid. You can say as much as you want that that Nope is considered to be a worse film than Us or Get Out based on both audience and critical reception (although it seems like you’re willing to use critics as an argument when the argument works for you, thus again questioning your previous comments) but let’s keep our sense of scale here: 77 is decent on Metacritic (as I just mentioned, a movie won best picture just last year with less) and it is still the second-highest grossing movie of the year not based on previous material or a real-life famous person (and it seems reasonable to assume that it might still get the $8 million more to beat The Lost City for first place)
If you choose to paint with a fine-tipped brush, you’re missing the obvious. Nope is the highest grossing original film of the year for a film that has only two syllables, as well. And the MC argument is specious at best, because critics are predisposed to like, and are more appreciative of, original content more than the endless brandings, reboots, and sequels.
it has surpassed one hundred million it was made for 68 – and that is just state side. For an indie film that’s pretty dope.
It was financed by Universal, that most indie of indies. Make sure you don’t give yourself a hernia turning yourself into a pretzel while trying to rationalize the box office underperformance of Nope.
Make sure YOU don’t push so hard to be right that you bust a nut. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/jordan-peele-nope-movie-surpasses-100-million-at-box-office/
Will someone please explain to this fine person how a film’s box office success is determined. We are clearly on different planets.
i work in the industry
I hated the cop out ending of Get Out ! ! The “hero’ of Night of the Living Dead was a black man and he get’s killed ! If you want to do a dark horror movie with something to say make it dark ! Look at The Mist ! A very political movie with one of the darkest endings in the history of film !
And by the way I haven’t even seen The Fablemans and I’m tired of it !
Peele makes ORIGINAL films that are rich in themes, subtext and layers. Whatever he does will be, at least, interesting. I don’t care if his latest film is not “on par” with what are actually two masterpieces… and just becomes a great film… because that is what we could have said about Tarantino, when he delivered “Jackie Brown” and the reception wasn’t on par to “Reservoir Dogs” nor “Pulp Fiction”. Or, Spielberg when he delivered “1941” after “Jaws” or “Close Encounters of the Third Kind”…
So yeah, on the verge of trolling, Chase, and not the first time.
Just because it says “Written by” rather than “Screenplay by” doesn’t necessarily mean it’s original.
yes, sure… I guess you need to go to film school and actually learn how to deconstruct film, and the basics of what allegory, satire and metaphores are (spelling?), and THEN, you will be surprised of how much effort has been used to construct almost perfect satires in both “Get Out” and “Us”. Are you one of those cinephiles that still didn’t get why critics went ga-ga with “Babe” or “The LEGO Movie” yet? Or with “Mad Max: Fury Road”? They are meticulously designed and written satires (basically, “Babe” was a twisted, delightfully evil update of George Orwell’s “Animal Farm”, and “The LEGO Movie” brilliantly updated the “shift change” iconic scene of Fritz Lang’s “Metropolis” to introduce us to the idiocratic world of LEGO City and how merrily obedient and submissive their citizens are… while “Mad Max: Fury Road” was a furious take on capitalism, and specially in the (ab)use of female in the male-centric culture in which human beings become merely objects, Max as a blood bag, women as a way to just procreate).
I haven’t seen “Nope” yet – it hasn’t opened here – but from the spoiler-free reviews, it’s seems to be a 3rd in a row success for Peele on the same trend of his main interest (use genre to satire society)
What are you basing your opinion on Nope being the third in a row success?
reviews… you’re basically obsessed with the fact that the MC and RT aren’t as high as with his previous films and that b.o. (post-pandemic!!!) isn’t on the same levels (which is BEYOND unfair).
Isn’t it more a wishful thinking from you, of Peele’s career crashing?
Nope: 7.5 IMDB rating, 82% RT and 77 MC…
… yes, it’s YOU.
He made a bad film, that’s all I’m saying. You’re defending a film you have no personal knowledge of, thereby making it personal. Did you defend The Happening before you saw it because M. Night made The Sixth Sense?
sorry to point the obvious (again), but The Happening wasn’t well received. Nope, is.
In comparison to Peele’s other films, it has the lowest critical rating, the lowest audience rating, and the lowest grosses.
But that’s relatively to really well received films. The comparison with Shyamalan doesn’t quite work. You’ll have to wait for real turkeys first before you can make that comparison. You’ve jumped the gun a bit early there, Chase. You’ll have wait a little and hope your wish comes true. You might need to do some praying.
I imagine all that spinning has to make one a little dizzy after a while.
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… and still has beautiful numbers? Undoubtedly you want him to fail and you’re just trashing it, because it simply didn’t score as high as the other two, that you seem to hate as well… then, I wonder, why did you go to see “Nope”, in the first place?
As I’ve said repeatedly, but you seem to miss in order to fit your own false narrative, Peele is a great guy and I loved his work with Key. He made a bad film that has underperformed both critically and financially, but fanboys simply cannot absorb that fact. I went to see it with an open mind that this was the latest work from an award-winning director. It failed. This is not rocket science.
no, again, he made a BAD film to YOUR aprecciation. Reviews and audience feedback aren’t agreeing with you, yet you seem to not be able to understand, that objectively speaking, “Nope” ain’t a misfire at all, just an inch under the previous Peele films. Box-office wise, isn’t performing as well, but “Nope” is a post-covid release, and we know that the market isn’t the same, so it is extremely unfair to compair the b.o. performance of “Nope” – still to open in many markets, like mine, Spain – with the ones of “Get Out” and “Us”. The one using a false narrative, is you.
OMG, Top Gun just became the 7th highest grossing domestic release of all-time in this “post-covid release..market isn’t the same” miasma of a marketplace, according to you. Totally laughable excuse for the underperformance of the film, which has garnered the weakest in terms of critic’s reviews, audience reviews, and financial success of any of his three films. Those are what are known as….FACTS.
BTW, what was your favorite scene in the film you’re so vehemently defending?
reason why TGM is probably NOT going to be in the BP conversation, when the big guns fire, is something I’ve discussing extensively. Beyond technicals is bound to not show up anywhere in above the line categories, for example, and it is a film that would not achieve a lot of support internationally (remember, AMPAS is diverse in nationality which is completely inmune to patriotic war devices like TG).
you know it still needs to open here, and that I am not defending “Nope” as any kind of masterpiece… just pointing YOU out about that the film, critically and in audience feedback is being WELL received, just not being the smashing blockbuster that people – for some unknown reason – where thinking it was going to be. It’s underperforming in b.o. but as we talk, it is about to surpass 100 million domestically in about 20 days only… with a budget of just 68… and with ALL other markets still to open, worldwide.
So, again, who’s manipulating and trolling?
68 and you’re not including P & A, and you’re not employing the Hollywood studio math used to determine financial success. Thor in its 5th week even had a smaller weekend drop than Nope in its third, and nobody likes Thor. Nope also lost 791 screens, the biggest hemorrhaging of screens of ANY film in release and August is a barren wasteland for film, so there’s no reason NOT to keep it on the screens, EXCEPT theater owners can read the writing on the wall.
again, you’re only looking at B.O. because it is uninteresting for you (and obviously would contradict your argument) the fact that the reviews and audiences feedback is way more than good enough. You can think whatever you want, but you just outed yourself as merely some other troll that yearns for attention. Kisses, Chase, my regards to Bruce.
And we’re doing this once again, okay check out Cinemascore. It has a B, which is not great for that service, and is currently the lowest rated film of any major release. Nope has garnered the lowest RT scores for both critics and audiences of any of his films, and has the lowest MC score of any of his films,
“lowest” doesn’t mean bad. Which is how you try to manipulate. “B” is a good Cinemascore, not a “bad” nor that audiences hated it.
Actually, B in Cinemascore is not really good…at all. The people grading are notoriously easy on films, unless it’s something that’s universally reviled.
which it is kind of a populist argument? So, very good reviews, more than decent b.o. and a decent cinemascore (actually a “very good” one, which just indicate people isn’t nuts about the film, but liked it), translate to you into an apocalyptic disaster and proof that Peele is finished? Wow.
Wow, have you ever thought about campaigning for Trump 2024? #stopthesteal!
I am a “commie”, darling.
Don’t worry, darling.
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as a Geographer and cum laude on Contemporary History – thanks about a year-long study on the causes and consequences of the fall of the soviet block, oddly enough – that later made the practise working for the government of my country in a country – Angola – ruled by a communist party (MPLA) that was developing the wildest capitalims you can witness… I can assure you that NONE of the “communist” countries you think, was actually communist in the slightest, but country-sized corporations using communism as excuse to submit their people and play as giants in the international capitalist market. So I am a commie, on the actual philosophy of communism, NOT a suporter or monsters like Stalin, Mao, Castro and the like.
That being said, do you think Emma Thompson’s performance in Good Luck To You, Leo Grande will be remembered?
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if we are actually trying to get her in the conversation on this talkbacks… I doubt it
but still better than Green Book.
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See, I thought Fury Road was an exercise in creative masturbation. I doubt any society so lacking in resources could survive in so blatantly wasting them. In that first sequence, just tossing the water into the crowd when most would be lost just peeved me to no end. It made Stalin look angelic by comparison.
because it’s satire… never ment to be taken literally… that way of distributing water actually mirrors our world’s
I might have taken a different approach had I not just read the book Bloodlands which is about eastern Europe from 1932 to 1947. I had never really new of the “famine” in Ukraine before and how 3,000,000 were killed, most intentionally. Seeing that water cut off just sickened me in a very real way.
in MM:FR there are plenty of allegories, and going over-the-top is one of the key aspects of a good satire
I will give it a second shot only because your opining on films is always thought-provoking.
George Miller excels at satire and his films tend to be on the left and with huge political / social background… including Happy Feet 1 & 2… and maybe his masterpiece was directed by Chris Noonan, as he wanted a more naturalistic approach to animals, with “Babe”. But MM:FR rivals Babe as his best film. Depending on the day I would say Babe, or I would say Mad Max: Fury Road
Babe is just wonderful. Of the nominated films for BP that year, it was easily the best.
I can’t stop thinking about it, and watched it again. And Again i was able to find remarkable insights – which is what he is great at — making you think. I know Chase probably likes his paint by numbers movies – but …
Especially when the painter is a true artist like Robert Eggers.
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there are multiple YouTube essays about the symbolism and philosophy both of “Get Out” and “Us”… absolutely jawdropping the insight of Peele.
Jackie Brown is the masterpiece for me.
100% very underrated Tarantino film.
Great Gerwig? Really? OKKKKK
Wait….people don’t like Chase?!
I like me some me.
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A bit of narcissism never hurt anyone, did it?
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Exactly!
Well, I think someone who’s gleeful about other people’s failures and their defects is probably not liked by many people. Some people just call it trolling, but I try to understand why they are doing it.
Remember the words of Lizzo…truth hurts.
nope is dope
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yep.
In other news, Netflix has pushed Rustin and Spaceman to 2023. Re: Rustin not all that surprising bc it doesn’t make sense to have it compete with Shirley. Totally bummed though. Could care less about
AdamSandlerSpaceman though.I’ve made it to the 20 movie mark (ranked in order from fave to least fave, eel free to debate me):
Interesting to note that so many movie titles are being re-used and they’re just putting in The or removing the The to make it not confused as a brand with the previous entry like
Hustle (a 2019 Soderbergh film), Master (a 2012 Paul Thomas Anderson film), and Bubble (a 2006 Soderbergh film)
1. Top Gun: Maverick
2. Where the Crawdads Sing
3. Metal Lords
4. Deep Water
5. The Bubble
6. Death on the Nile
7. Elvis
8. The Batman
9. The Valet
10. The Lost City
11. The Bad Guys
12. Hotel Transylvania 4
13. Dr Strange and the Multiverse
14. The Hustle
15. The Adam Project
16. Spiderhead
17. Senior Year
18. Master
19. Interceptor
20. Marry You
Where’s Marcel?
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Didn’t really have much interest in that one. If i couldn’t make it through the youtube video, I had a feeling the movie wasn’t for me
And Senior Year was???? As Herb Morrison once said, “Oh, the humanity!”
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Well, I rated it pretty low.
I thought the plot was ridiculous and the hero stopped becoming rootable way before Mary Holland and Sam Richardson called her out on it. Also the high school was so free of any kind of conflict, it kind of felt like there wasn’t much to go off of, and was every guy in the film queer in some way? The popular guy in the school being a cross-dresser or something, and embracing the feminine role in his relationship, I was bothered by it somehow. I guess because I didn’t get what he was? Maybe that was some massive homophobia on my part.
But, I made the mistake o watching too many films before June when the good stuff gets out, so I’ll naturally have a lot of clunkers in there.
Are you giving me flack for seeing it in the first place?
I’m saying if you saw Senior Year, you owe it to your SOUL to see Marcel. Nana Connie is the best female character of the year.
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Apparently, Hildur Gudnadottir exits ‘Amsterdam’. No official reason was given for her departure.
She has her Oscar. She can do whatever she pleases.
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I have no problem with this. Hildur is fine this season with TAR and Women Talking.
Couldn’t care less about ‘Amsterdam’.
the discource around white noise , the whale , babylon and ampire of light is gonna be very funny
“The first thing I’d note is simply that auteurs as sole screenwriters don’t win Picture, Director and Screenplay very often. It happens — but usually there is a co-writer, as with Iñárritu and Birdman and Bong Joon-Ho with Parasite. Somehow we all seem to dive into the Oscar race still believing that someone is going to win all of those major prizes. The reason they don’t is that, with ten nominees, voters like to “spread the wealth.””
I’ll take irrelevant stats for 300, Alex
I think it’s funny that so many of you just recycle predictions other people are making.
I see very few people considering source material and whether this material will translate to film, especially under the director’s watch.
And of course there are original tales in the mix, but even then people aren’t evaluating the reasons such films are being made and whether such movies are merely “vanity” projects.
Everyone has Fablemans at the top or near the top and we know nothing about it. I just see it as a soppy mess. Spielberg is completely unable at creating an emotional or sentimental piece of film without resorting to cliche and over-manipulation. He doesn’t know how to let a moment speak for itself, he has to layer some sort of trickery or over-acting to drive home his point. And it’s a shame, often such scene are quite good until he indulges his worst instincts.
So I can’t imagine a film about childhood could possibly work. I know, I know, people say “ET” but unless this one has a cute alien I don’t see anyone caring because if you look at that film closely, there really is nothing interesting about it when looking at the central family. It’s pretty simple stuff. He just got lucky he found Drew Barrymore.
And that comes down to Spielberg’s main problem as a director. He’s not interested in creating characters. He’s more interested in impressing the audience with his superior technical skills.
And it’s funny, when you look over the winning films of the past decade or so, not one of them seems an obvious choice when you look at the basic one or two line description of the movie along with the director’s past Oscar successes.
Sure, some of these films had directors with great works in their past. McQueen with Shame and Hunger, Zhao with The Rider both come to mind. But how many Oscar Nominations did those films get?
Sure, many of them had good pedigrees, but if I had all of the July predictions lists in front of me, I would bet that only one or two would actually be in the top 5 possibilities. Looking over an article from September 2016, it looked like Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk was going to be a big contender (and I am sure I was on that bandwagon).
“so many of you just recycle predictions other people are making”
Well, it’s called consensus. There are films that are OBVIOUSLY tailor-made to fit into the conversation…
The Fabelmans
The Son
Babylon
Amsterdam
She Said
Women Talking
etc.
And others are already too big to be ignored, like Elvis, Top Gun: Maverick and EEAAO.
We’re not copying each other, we use similar tools to value the race and who’s where, in which position.
In my personal p.o.v. I think Elvis and TGM will just score some techs noms (TGM might win Sound) and EEAAO has “it” to actually even win, when dust settles. I am not that confident on The Fabelmans, as it may backfire quite easily if it’s not disarmingly personal, and feels fake (something that is one of Spielberg’s main weaknesses, overplaying drama, as happened in Schindler’s List… his best delivery of drama, in my opinion, was The Color Purple, which still went almost over the top in a couple of moments)… and The Son may be deemed as a The Father sequel in spirit, and therefore set aside of the main conversation as “we already rewarded this in a big way” a couple of years ago… I could go on.
I understand what you are saying with regards to “concensus” All I am saying is that concensus is stupid.
Sasha may be misguided in a number of ways (especially wasting time on this silly book she wrote about in the past) but she’s not a bandwagon jumper. And that places her miles ahead of virtually everyone else in the business.
honestly i hope the whale , white noise all make it
Consensus? We all know what happens when people pay attention to consensus.
Woof woof!
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Erm, Best Picture requires a film to have a consensus. I mean, that’s the whole point of preferential ballot. Not all consensus is right and you have yo separate the right ones from the wrong ones.
women talking respectfully isn’t oscar bait it’s more on line of moonlight it’s artsy not basic same as the son annd babylon is edgy and weird according to the script they aren’t green book or coda
In terms of critics, those arguments against Spielberg would be right, although his films are great despite his tendencies for melodramatic. ET is a personal favourite if mine, so I’m not going to accept anyone trashing it. However, it’s a very different story when it comes to the Oscars. Spielberg is the most nominated director and producer in Oscar history. His films rarely ever fail to get at least a BP nomination unless they’re pure blockbusters.
I read source material more times than not: Revenant, Brooklyn, Killers of the Flower Moon. I want to read She Said sometime soon but may run out of time.
Disagree with you totally on Spielberg. (sorry)
Totally off-topic. But I watched Peacock’s They/Them today and was thoroughly surprised at how much I enjoyed it, not so much as a horror flick but as a metaphor for how we eventually find a new community. It doesn’t just have to mean gay, lesbian and transgendered, but any group that finds itself outside of the mainstream. The whole film is a metaphor on how authority tries to determine what “community” should look like. That the youth reject all forms of adult contributions is rather empowering (I am talking in generalities here so I don’t spoil). I really hope people see this film, it seems most of the reviews of the film I’ve read kind of missed everything I enjoyed.
Minor spoiler ahead in this paragraph. Some would complain at how quickly the jock joined the community during the group sing-a-long. But I loved it. His eagerness to let go of his homophobia and join the joyous crowd was exhilarating. It showed that to change all you need is a willingness to do so.
Underrate “EEAAO”‘s chances at your own risk. It CAN win: Supp. Actor + Original Screenplay + Film Editing are strong chances for the win (and actually, possible frontrunner in these three categories at this point… you’re just expecting the tide to go lower, but every single year, the tide goes down… and goes up again, as the feeling about the film is firmly stablished in voter’s minds and EEAAO is an ORIGINAL film with top notch, daring performances all around, and the polar opposite of last year’s winner, which gives it the upper hand over most competitors.
Plus, I doubt that any other film that’s about to come, is going to surpass the sympathies that this film has earned already. The only 2 factors that work against it are 1) critics circle awards SHOULD remember it, to position it in the race for the final stage and 2) A24 has to really not overkill its campaigning, and not eclipse it with other horses they have (most recent: Bodies Bodies Bodies, which is being received very well)
scared they are gonna eclipse with the whale
Regarding EEAAO’s Academy chances, it’s best to remember the immortal words of Tommy Lee Jones.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/a63052ea07047667e9dafb1529e681be615068972072e626bc51f7d89001c4a6.gif
still trolling, dear Chase? Go back to Batman 😉
remember, on the Oscar game, I am a snipper. What I say, may not happen in the end, but I don’t write it as a fan, but after analyzing all the factors. EEAAO is a film that comes in the right moment for A24 to attempt an assault to Best Picture (and an extra: A24 has built a public image of being a completely trustable studio in terms of quality, which will undoubtedly pay off, sooner or later… if not this year, really soon… just check out what the reviews of Bodies Bodies Bodies, a film that was supposed to be ANOTHER Scream rip-off, are saying)
A snipper? Ok, I take it long in the back, short on the sides. And you haven’t even mentioned the best A24 film this year. which you need to see.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/bf7b0ec4dab853ef375624f9ad064e3caa314d4bb863684d83ccb2fd6254e8df.gif
oh, Chase… that’s why I am a snipper and you aren’t.
I look in the long term…
1) it doesn’t have the acting branch appeal that EEAAO has (it can get up to 4 acting noms and SAG Ensemble and SAG Stunt Ensemble).
2) this kind of film is an even more difficult horse to get into BP because it may be ellegible for Animated
3) the only aspect that it seems a strong contender is… VFX?
A24 knows that wether if Marcel is better or worse or the best, doesn’t matter that much, they should campaign for the horse that has a more clear way into BP and that one is already clear as crystal water… unless something along the way, eclipses it. THEN, they may switch to Marcel, but this one is an extreme longshot at best, at this point. It’s not a matter of “best”, it’s a matter of what “can”
Neither you’re take on Everything Everywhere’s chances or that line being immortal are anywhere near true. I’m kind of the middle. I think it will Editing, Screenplay and at least one acting nomination and that’s more than enough for Best Picture nomination. I think it will do very well at SAG and it’s the kind of film they go for. In fact, it fits perfectly because it’s a popular film and has a predominantly poc cast. And cast is geeat too. For me the film was overwhelming and felt lost in it, but it’s highest points were the performances of all the main cast and its emotional impact at the end. Everything Everywhere is really a family drama/trauma and existentialist film disguised as a Sci-fi/ action flick.
It’s a pretentious wank, and remember everyone was sure Spidey was in there last year because the real films hadn’t shown up yet.
Umm, no and no. That’s just wrong. Hiw on earth are you comparing a totally unique film like Everything Everywhere to a retread like Spider-Man 8? You’ve been way off on this. You seem to have your sights on this film early on and I wonder why that is? Out of all the films, this is the film you’re so convinced will do badly at Oscars.
Not saying it will do badly with nominations, could easily be up for about 5, but ZERO wins. Some fanboys (and girls) keep saying this will actually WIN Oscars. Once again, wait until films with more gravitas start emerging.
lmao original screenplay is more open to those kind of wins see promising young woman , her , eternal sunshine , talk to her , get out
Well, we don’t that. We don’t even know what competition it has in each category. Didn’t we learn anything from last year that we shouldn’t make assumptions too early? Even after the nominations, as it happens.
I predict it wins SAG Ensemble. I might change my m8nd as the season progresses but at the moment I don’t see another obvious alternative.
perfect summary i think it will win supporting actor more
I appreciate this post, Sasha. You’re all over the map, as you acknowledge, but I think all of us longtimes get the gist.
And it’s funny that you centerpiece Gone Girl, because when I think of you absolutely going all-in on a film, it’s TGWTDT. And you were right with that one as well.
to make my point again, check out this state of the race from Summer of 2009. For some reason it’s dated 2014.
https://www.awardsdaily.com/2009/08/30/the-state-of-race-its-the-movies/
Only Precious, Up in the Air, An Education and A Serious Man were mentioned, afterthoughts in a list of 40 or more films.
Precisely. Trying to guess anything right now is like trying to tell us who’s going to win the Super Bowl this season. You need to actually…oh, I don’t know…SEE THE FILMS! Guaranteed at the start of next year everyone will have Barbie up for everything because it’s Greta. And I love Greta, but c’mon…
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/40049ebb68141fc007c4f61080dba2499453a3d489127823d7eec14633ec8183.gif
Jesus Christ!
So Gerwig now has become female version of PTA, Scorsese and Fincher – all in one person? How that happened? Because of Lady Bird and Little Women? Give me a break…
Someone like Kelly Reichardt has invented film directing for this self-centered little brat.
Fincher is not a true auteur because he doesn’t write.
So Hitchcock, Kubrick and Scorsese aren’t auteur filmmakers? Has the meaning of auteur changed in recent years? It’s got nothing to do with directors writing their films. Auteur director simply means you can tell a film was made a particular director just by watching it. It’s having a unique style or artistic signature.
Kubrick wrote, Hitchcock wrote, Scorsese writes.
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A director who also writes is called writer/director. The term auteur would be redundant if it was just referring to writer/director. Hitchcock didn’t write any of his films from 1932 onwards. And Kubrick and Scorsese rarely ever wrote their films, although they did do a lot of improvisation. An auteur is someone who has the biggest influence in how their film comes out. Many elements can be responsible for that, but the director is usually in charge and gets to tell the story the way he wants. It’s the style of filmmakers and artistic fingerprints.
Wikipedia: “An auteur (/oʊˈtɜːr/; French: [otœʁ], lit. ‘author’) is an artist with a distinctive approach, usually a film director whose filmmaking control is so unbounded but personal that the director is likened to the “author” of the film,[1] which thus manifests the director’s unique style or thematic focus.[2] As an unnamed value, auteurism originated in French film criticism of the late 1940s,[3] and derives from the critical approach of André Bazin and Alexandre Astruc, whereas American critic Andrew Sarris in 1962 called it auteur theory.[4][5] Yet such[clarification needed] first appeared in French during 1955 when director François Truffaut termed it policy of the authors, and interpreted the films of some directors, like Alfred Hitchcock, as a body revealing recurring themes and preoccupations.”
This is a good description but one thing that I think is essential to remind current-day audiences is that the notion of auteur is not necessarily in all cases a comment on the quality of the work and at least if I recall correctly that the Cahiers critics considered few people to actually be auteurs. The way I always think about it is “no matter what script you give this person, the finished movie will be in terms of themes and aesthetics fully and unimistakably theirs”. Even if you don’t like Clint Eastwood (described by former Cahiers editor Jacques Rivette as an auteur in the 90s), this quality mostly still applies and thus auteur status should be considered whereas no matter how much you like for example Danny Boyle, you would probably not be able to clearly connect Yesterday and Trainspotting to the same director. In fact, I would slightly question the notion that for example Fincher and Scorsese are auteurs simply because both have the kind of thematic and stylistic variation in their filmography that doesn’t seem to fully fit within the bounds of the auteur for me. But at the very least, writing credits do not define an auteur because as Julie says, there are several ways of writing a movie, and even not noting that, I think with these kinds of auteur directors work comparable to a writing credit is often considered to be implied simply by them directing the film.
Michael Bay is an auteur. You might not like his films, but he’s certainly an auteur. It isn’t about quality or anything like that. It’s more about particular preoccupations of the director. And I feel you’re bit restrictive in your definition. Many directors will pursue films that are different to their usual ones, but Hitchcock stuck to a single type of film and that made it easier for him to pursue the similar themes and stories: Blonde women and their obsessive, controlling men and she usually ends uo beng murdered. Kubruck made different types of films and in different genres yet his films were remarkably consistent in their depictions of outsiders, lonely men and toxic masculinity. I feel most uneasy in Kubrick films when his characters look at the camera. It’s like their judging us the viewers. They do those weird stares as if to say, it’s you who’s doing this, not me. None are creepier than the stares by Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange and Jack Nicholson in The Shinning. I think Scorsese has similar themes to Kubrick, except Scorsese is more interested in the physicality of male violence and pursue of power. There’s that creepy stare by De Niro in Taxi Driver, which looks very similar to McDowell’s in A Clockwork Orange. Scorsese also uses mirrors as reflection for his characters. Kubrick did that as well, but it’s more a pattern in Scorsese films while Kubrick is more at looking at the camera. They are both using it as a reflection back at viewers. I think it’s important to look at the consistent work of filmmakers to determine what kind of filmmakers rhet are and there’s no question that the vast majority of Scorsese films go into particular category that are his own. It’s less clear with Fincher, I suppose. However, his style stands out easily so it’s hard to say he’s not an auteur. I think the thing that defines him most is the meticulous and intricacies of his films. Spielberg is an auteur and his films consistently have rhe same themes: dead parents/abandoned children and divided family that comes together at the end.
While there’s certainly a section of Scorsese’s filmography which is as you say about male violence power struggle, I think there is a point where his films transition away from that or at the very least fundamentally shift in the way they depict those ideas. This is certainly not a problem, I often prefer the Scorsese films that come after this shift but to me there is this shift in his aesthetic and point of view that to me doesn’t quite fit in the concept of an auteur. It kind of seems to me like in the second half of his career he’s kind of just embraced an ability to explore the possibilities of being one of the biggest directors in Hollywood and has as a result created an incredibly varied filmography.
As for Fincher, I feel like the crime genre casts a weirdly large net under which people forgive a lot of stuff. To me The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is a fundamentally different kind of movie than Gone Girl or The Game not only thematically but also stylistically. And on top of that something like Mank (which is an interesting script that I think
Fincher’s direction almost completely fails) breaks it down to the point where the only real “auteurist” qualities that I could pinpoint in Fincher are a certain approach to digital cinematography (which feels largely theoretical to me because it feels tied to the material he’s shooting on rather than somehting that shows in his movies shot on film
and is blurred even when something like a 35mm print of Zodiac. This differs from someone like Michael Mann for whom you can see digital cinematography was a way to perfect an aesthetic that as already there) and amorphous concepts of precision and obsession (which he seems to handle in ways that are often tangentially related to one another.
I think the term auteur feels largely redundant now. It was a great way to define directors who were constrained by the big studios yet still managed put their imprint on their films. Some great directors are auteurs and not so great directors are too. A great director is a great director regardless of whether they’re auteur or not. I have to say I do prefer when directors try something new and make diverse filmography. However, when you have a filmography as great as Hitchcock’s, who cares? I suppose having diverse filmography will allow more people to appreciate your films? These days the writer-directors are prevalent and some of them are also among the best directors. On Fincher, I’m not sure about an obvious theme except deception. But what I like most about his films is the way they look and the great attention to details and precision filmmaking. I think I like the aesthetics of his films more than any other director working today. His films are unmistakable and unlike any other director’s. I remember a few years ago my best description of his films was that I felt like they were talking to me. In a similar way to Kubrick, I thought there was more going on than meets the eye. There are little things going on in each scene that you wouldn’t notice normally, but it give his film a pulsing quality. Best example of that is Zodiac, at least for me. The basement scene is among my favourites this century.
I don’t know whether it’s the rhythmic camera movements, blocking, production design, or cinematography. Probably a combination of all those. I think Cinematography is very important for the look of his films and I especially like that yellow hue he gives it. A darkish yellow and very earthy, is how I’d describe it.
This is not true by the definition of auteur. It deals with style or focus of the movie, not just the words on the page. An auteur can “write” without using words.
I agree. Gerwig hitched her wagon to the right Hombre, hombre.
Is that closing sentence an attempt to imply that Gerwig is somehow similar to Reichardt or just a random Reichardt criticism?
It wasn’t criticism of Reichardt at all. I consider her to be one of the best female directors right now.
My last sentence was criticism of Gerwig whose directing work so far I consider (just my personal opinion) greatly overpraised by the critics.
I actually think Barbie will do well because I think it will be filled with sharp social commentary, and yet still be hilarious.
What this country needs is a good or even great satire but you don’t have to look up if you don’t want to. But that doesn’t mean Asteroid Barbie isn’t going to rock this world.
funny to see [rec 2} listed… it would have been (as the first one, also would have) a FANTASTIC Best Picture nominee… It could/should have landed nominations for Picture, Adapted Screenplay, Film Editing and both Sound categories (at the time), if it had any exposure… it was to the original, what James Cameron’s “Aliens” was to “Alien”
Anyone else likes ‘Don’t Worry Darling’ trailer? It looks much better than I expected.
Just hope this isn’t Revolutionary Road 2.0. That movie was underwhelming.
hopefully they changed the script
Is it that bad?
it was but they did big rewrites
Psst, don’t get too excited.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b4c369725606df2cfef0b8c2d819de1487e4508d5de2116a654468b0a82f678a.gif
I love the trailer. But I also loved Revolutionary Road. So, I’ll meet you halfway.
Movies from Sasha’s list I’m confident in or I’m not dismissing completely are in bold letters:
Top Gun: Maverick – iffy cause it doesn’t have an extra social commentary that AMPAS loves in blockbusters they nominate. NWH last year had the same problem though 10 spots should help Top Gun. It’s also under threat of getting upstaged by late in the year blockbuster.
Elvis -safer. It’s a biopic aka AMPAS catnip.
Everything Everywhere All at Once – Editing and Original Script should be enough to get it in the Picture line-up.
These three films have been seen, did well, and should be remembered by year’s end.
Then we move on to what sounds good or “sexy” to me as a Best Picture choice:
Babylon – a movie about Hollywood, all star cast and director, if Mank could than this should be pretty safe bet in Top 10.
The Fabelmans – AMPAS nominated Roma and Belfast so director’s childhood movies are obviously popular. Also an uplifting movie about Hollywood unlike She Bombs.
She Said – zzzzz Bombshell 2.0 minus stars is also yet another movie about Hollywood. Fabelmans and Babylon should do better. All 3 won’t make it.
The Greatest Beer Run Ever – no idea what this is but title is based af
Avatar – threat to Top Gun. 10 spots could get 2 blockbusters in (a la Avatar and District 9). Will have socio-political commentary like the first one which AMPAS loves. Buckeload of techs.
Bardo – another 3 hours long Netflix movie so I guess it’s in.
Empire of Light – sounds like an Actress play only.
My next in line would be:
Wakanda Forever – they didn’t like the first all that much since it got zero above the line nominations so it sin’t like they expect a ROTK-like finish. The story is less compelling this time.
Till – Actress play
Poor Things – no clue this is
The Woman King – looks like a generic action movie with massively revisionist history. People depicted as heroic freedom fighters were actually proud slavery nation until Brits abolished slavery which proud slavery nation didn’t like.
Causeway – no idea what this is
Don’t Worry Darling – looks like Stepford Wives but without a clear hook. Wilde is overrated and gossip sites from Page Six to blind items are having a field day with the feud between Pugh and Wilde/Styles.
The Son – everyone expect big things from that one so I’ll trust them
Amsterdam – couldn’t even finish the trailer. looks rancid.
yep poor things is an arthouse lanthimos period movie it’s more akin to the favourite
Favorite was nominated, no?
yeah
My personal notes of interest + some Oscar thoughts:
Amsterdam: I don’t trust David O. Russell anymore.
Avatar: I can’t say I’ve ever wanted to rewatch the original, even though I suppose I liked it. Still, I’ll never deny Cameron’s technical abilities and I’ll be curious how he’s used technology after all these years. I’ll watch it on the big screen – and hey, if it makes $500+m domestic and has good reviews, it could be in the 10 nominees again.
Babylon: While his stories often aren’t exactly what I’m interested in, he does make good films. So, I’ll watch. Seems an early frontrunner, since AMPAS loves Hollywood and a good chance it’s a well made film.
Banshees: I half loved 3BB. I probably over-praised it, even knowing it didn’t fully work. That’s how I normally am with McDonagh films. Seems less a player for Best Pic, but, hey, I’ll probably watch it and may half love it again.
Bardo: Honestly, 3 hours for this story? Sigh. I’ll need to take breaks at home from my couch. That said, a nominee but never a winner? Seems a good chance. Got The Irishman vibes in this regard.
Empire of Light: I mean, like I’m going to turn down a Colman or Jones film. Mendes is talented. Again, another cinephile film. Seems a likely player and even potential winner.
Fabelmans: I’m still always down for Spielberg. I still want one more great blockbuster like the old days. But, watching his most personal film has my attention. A winner? Maybe.
Greatest Beer Run: Doesn’t seem a player, but I’ll probably watch it.
Women Talking: Seems one of the best bets for a female director to stand out this cycle – story sounds great. Interested in what Polley makes of the tale.
Armageddon Time: Another personal tale always has my attention. Though, seems like maybe less attention than Fabelmans for that lane this year?
Black Panther: I’m not a comic book person, but, if Avatar is less likely to be in the Top 10 this time, seems Black Panther would be as well? Doesn’t seem to have as much Zeitgeist as the original.
Everything Everywhere: Wasn’t for me, but seems like a very real contender for Top 10, even if it’s not ever going to win.
The Son: The Father was so good, I’m definitely coming back for this one. A player? Could be.
Tar: Todd Field! Todd Field! Obviously, Blanchett is likely to be great. So, a strong Best Actress nom could mean a strong Screenplay/Picture nominee.
White Noise: Baumbach and I don’t get along these days. But since this one’s not about wealthy people in NYC/LA, maybe I’ll like it. (Well, it still might be about the same type of wealthy people, but it seems less about them complaining about their lives as much). But, also why it seems less likely a nominee to me?
The Woman King: Could be interesting, not convinced a player yet, though got to assume Davis scores a SAG nom early in the season.
Other Random Notes:
Don’t Worry Darling: I’m intrigued. If good, Wilde could get some zeitgeist attention.
Poor Things: I mean, hey Yorgos. See you there.
A Man Called Otto: These remakes don’t often get much traction, but if decent, I could see it scoring with audiences and maybe some AMPAS love.
She Said: Seems an obvious film that is both about Hollywood (AMPAS loves themselves) + industry redemption (see, if we nominate it we’ve purged our sins!) + topical for today. So, seems a player.
Till: Seems an obvious player and could get some early SAG love.
Top Gun: Wouldn’t we be shocked if it misses at PGA? Thus, seems like could be in running for a spot all season – though wouldn’t surprise me if it misses. But, yea, could you imagine if a few Avatars, Top Guns got in? The Oscars would be back in the popular discussion. (Or maybe they won’t be no matter what anymore, regardless?)
The Whale: Everyone in town loves Brendan Fraser because he’s a wonderful person. Seems a great narrative for an acting nom all season, even if perhaps the film doesn’t go much further than that. But, if he’s tracking more toward a win, then I could see Screenplay/Pic noms for sure.
If Fabelmans is actually good, how can it not be considered the frontrunner. Many of the top contenders you listed have potential pitfalls and/or divisive elements.
Well, isn’t it one of the few films to be guaranteed to be nominated? Spielberg almost never fails to get a BP nomination unless it’s really bad. And he’s been getting close in recent years that he’ll get it one of these days, surely? A nomination is so obvious, but a win is a different issue
if it wins tronto i might take it in directing win
I’ve got to say, between Skyfall and 1917 Mendes has my full attention these days. American Beauty was my favorite film once.
Have you seen it lately. It’s laughably bad, and i too once loved it.
I too think Chazelle is a talented filmmaker. I think Whiplash was probably his best, and most of his aren’t necessarily my favourite of the year (I suppose most are topics that I’m only partially interested in), but he can direct a scene, so I’m always interested in his next project.
Totally agree, including that Whiplash is Chazelle’s best.
“Be capable of articulating calmly how “the other side” sees it.”
Okay! The other side is led by a pathological liar who tried to overthrow American democracy.
I can see clearly now, as Johnny Nash used to say..
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/87cd884b0eb1fc619e58d77982d5fd7b8bcd4f2129d5a19bedc9be7d1408dc20.gif
Ok, sure. You don’t get it. Perhaps you are incapable.
And make no mistake, these people hate you. Let’s also acknowledge Trump has at least a 33% chance of resuming his presidency in 2 years.
All that being said, Sasha’s message is a very good one. Listen. Try to understand their concerns. Just for fun, assume they are not inherently evil. You may discover something.
How is the alternative working out for you?
You mean the alternative of keeping American democracy? Why, it’s working just fine, thank you very much!
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/19de7c2a19ed0a85048c87036fc603ced46c0c5899beaf9bba92549991116615.gif
excuse me, what democracy? I wouldn’t call a system that has selected for over 200 years between two eerily similar political views, considering the political spectrum worldwide, a “democracy”… specially since the whole country is been submitted to corporate interests for more than 100 years… voting means nothing if the options won’t even try to change the essential problems and actually become symbiotic.
it’s difficult to run a presidential campaign from prison.
Or from a country that doesn’t have an extradition treaty.
Hahahaha, rent-free as usual.
Really don’t think ‘Amsterdam’ is going anywhere near major awards this season.
looks like utter Sith.
Lol, true.
But hey… it’s AMPAS so I wouldn’t be surprised at all.
the year seems very strong so Sith won’t have “oh well we have to fill in 10 movies quota” leeway.
well imagine with all those bold picks and then farelly wins lol
amen
i really think EEAO will take it by OS + Supporting actor a parasite like run sag + eddie + wga i want the son , the whale , women talking or white noise to take it but they seem more consolation prizes also anything but a mid crowdpleaser we have plenty of bold picks
when y’all stop underestimating women talking ? even if it’s divsive if things like tree of life , drive my car and the favourite got in it will get in , the toronto president said she made it far accessible
EEAO did better at the boxoffice domestically (English speaking) but cratered internationally unlike Parasite that was a juggernaut there. So it may not play as well with internaitonal voters that propped Parasite.
I read Women Talking and I don’t see anything appealing to AMPAS. Amish women talk about their religion mostly, and smoke in a barn. That’s literally it. Nothing happens. Poor characterisation. Unless Polley re-wrote the whole thing, this will be oversold by critics only.
guess i think farelly will win again that’s what wins
what’s his Oscar pony this year?
the greatest beer run ever lol
OMG! YES! YES! PLz win for meltdowns!
which might win adapted screenplay lol also the toronto and brad pitt said she changed the whole book lol
EEAO has a path, very similar to Birdman in a lot of ways. But A24 is going to need to run a perfect campaign to pull it off. Apart from Fabelmans and maybe Empire of Light, the other listed contenders will either be too small or too divisive to run the table. EEAO made 100 million dollars, so this isn’t CODA coming out of nowhere.
yes i know hihi as long it’s not that farelly movie i would be happy but yeah a parasite run is good because PGA might go with the fabelmans they love spectacles so eeao path is sag + wga + eddie + bafta screenplay
I suppose the barometer for its chances will be if Kuan starts landing in precursors. He’s the key because I am in no way convinced that the Daniels are landing in DGA or Oscar for Directing
he can win sag and bafta like troy
I don’t think EEAO will have the momentum or topicality that helped Parasite — and, it’s too weird for AMPAS voters to win. Yes, I think it may very well be nominated and have its fans, but I can see the “brutally honest Oscar voter” pieces now in the trades saying, “What was that about!?” I could see it “perhaps” winning editing, but that’s about it in terms of wins. But, even then, I think there are a lot stronger players this year than the Parasite year, plus Parasite was a Zeitgeist film that also won internationally, was about topical issues, and filled a void with a charming campaign season narrative + a much more well known director. Good films don’t win best picture per se – narrative campaigns do, and I just don’t see that lane for EEAO this cycle.
it has narrative about yeoh and Quan and it’s about immigration but yeah i guess it could win screenplay since that category loves those kind of winners see promising young woman or get out or talk to her or eternal sunshine
I could see perhaps some love there or supporting, the more you mention it. I still think it’s a stretch for the reasons noted — we’ll see how savvy the A24 folks are at framing some of the narratives you mention. And, of course, we’ll see the campaigns for these others too. Seems a lot of players this year, but always gets consolidated to a few, for sure.
I find myself looking at the lineup wondering what’s going to be the consensus movie that you can sit anyone down in front of. What’s going to be the little sweet puppy that no one wants to kick? In my gut I don’t think Babylon or Fabelmans will get across the finish line for BP/BD. Right now, based on absolutely nothing, I think it might be The Son or something we have barely heard of yet.
Based on history, I bet that my favorite movie will not be the winner.
I’m always almost weirded out when my favorite (at least of the nominees) wins. 🙂
Out of curiosity, when has that been the case recently? I loved Parasite and really liked Nomadland, but otherwise the recent winners haven’t been particularly memorable/impressive in my view.
for me parasite , 12 years a slave , spotlight and moonlight
in nomadland year i prefered promising young woman
2017 was the best year when my top two favourites of the nominees were fighting ut out. And they both won Best Picture, except it turned out the first one was just a mistake. Then 12 Years, THL, No Country For Old Men and Lord of the Rings. Worst years were Boyhood and The Social Network losing.
birdman was kinda good
Yes, but it wasn’t as good as Boyhood and The Grand Budapest Hotel. Or even Whiplash.
i hope it’s eeao honestly it’s bold and beloved
I haven’t watched it yet, but I am going to. My friend liked it!
it’s great personally i hope it wins
Please consider that the AVERAGE Oscar voter is a 62-year-old white male, and then imagine how long they’d last watching EEAAO.
they gave best picture to a woman fucking a fish and a korean social thriller and they gave an arthouse lanthimos movie 10 noms
It wasn’t a fish.
a fishman
Yes, but those were all arthouse fare with venerable directors. Let’s be honest, EEAAO is a SJW version of a Marvel film made by directors whose previous claim to fame was a farting Daniel Radcliffe. It ain’t gonna happen.
I’m curious as to what you feel the “SJW” parts of the movie are? I saw it two weeks ago and didn’t see anything even remotely like that. But please point out what you think I missed politically.
same i saw the movie many times
On its face, the film ticks all boxes in that you have a female empowerment story, told through a POC viewpoint, with an LGBTQ subplot woven in the fabric.
Michelle Yeoh is kind of an icon, the film likely doesn’t get made without her in it.
And that’s fine, she’s the best thing in it, but unfortunately, she’s probably going to potentially steal a lot of year end awards from possibly better performances because she’s “overdue”.
And? Happens every year. Everything everywhere has issues, but politics isn’t it.
also she is overdue and beloved icon most people love her like fraser
I have to agree. Not because of my own thoughts on it but because of the rules of how Oscar campaigns work, and then nothing about it that makes me think it has any chance of winning. Nominated, sure. Winning? I’d have to say ‘never’ this far out for the reasons you mention on a few of these.
EEAAO checks the “opposite of previous winner” box. Where CODA was Lifetime, EEAAO is bold and arty but in accessible way (70M domestic and almost 100M worldwide don’t lie).
AMPAS tend to award movies that are some kind of reaction to the previous winner. Question is only what kind of reaction. Many expected that AMPAS would go for something popular after Nomadland but it went for a small feelgooder that broke several stats of winning which was unprecedented. Could this year winner be a return to stats domination? With Editing and Original Script nominations likely, EEAAO is in a prime position. I would also be shocked if it missed SAG ensemble.
its last hurdle is dga nom
“AwardsDaily is a free-thinking zone. Anyone who is not familiar with this site should be aware of that. ”
BS. My posts got on hold (and deleted) cause I typed S and F words and once because I typed ch*nk in the armor. Your free-thinking system thought I was using a slur. So how about you fix that and then we can talk freedom? I can’t freely express my thoughts without S and F explatives.
“AwardsDaily is a free-thinking zone. Anyone who is not familiar with this site should be aware of that. ”
BS. My posts got on hold (and deleted) cause I typed S and F words and once because I typed ch*nk in the armor. Your free-thinking system thought I was using a slur. So how about you fix that and then we can talk freedom? I can’t freely express my thoughts without S and F explatives.
I love Chazelle. Can’t think of many directors whose first three films were as strong.
Ready to get this season rolling.
I despised Wiplash and La La Land, and enjoyed First Man moderately. And his screenplay for Grand Piano was the weakest point of that film, by the way.
Chazelle is an apt director but terrible screenwriter
babylon script is so edgy and risky and great too i read it
Peter Bogdonovich: first three were incredible. After that, not so great.
How can you forget about PTA? And that’s in recent years, but I’m sure it was more the norm in the good old days.
I am not PTA’s biggest fan, my favorite of his is Phantom Thread
So it’s more a case of different taste than an overlooked?