Friday, October 16, 2009

Wild Link Tamer

Towleroad my weekly column on this week's releases. I'm excited for Where the Wild Things Are but I want to see this Jonze doc on Sendak (it might be up for the Documentary Short Oscar) and I don't have HBO. Curses
In Contention Guy Lodge looks at Oscar's racial, gender and sexual orientation divides. How have things changed over the years?
/Film Robert Redford's Lincoln assassination picture The Conspirator begins filming: James McAvoy, Evan Rachel Wood, Justin Long and Robin Wright Penn star
AfterElton Frank Anthony Polito (author of Band Fags) remembers Jon-Erik Hexum. If you grew up in the 80s, you'll remember this TV actor. If you didn't, never mind


Cinematical Penélope Cruz and Liza Minnelli join the cast of Sex & the City 2. It's not like I wasn't going to buy a ticket already. Save the money for a tighter/funnier script this time. I don't need any "special guest stars" if they're going to be as useless as Jennifer Hudson last time around. Now I love Cruz and Minnelli to scary lengths but I see Sex & the City for Carrie, Miranda, Samantha, Charlotte, Steve and Mr. Big (and in that order, too)
Just Jared Naomi and Liev on the town. I feel like we never see Naomi anymore... I mean, other than on that horrible commercial which I shouldn't even bring up because she's just totally selling out one of her best performances (King Kong). It's not quite as depressing as that time when Catherine Zeta-Jones gave up becoming a better actress post-Oscar to be a telephone salesman but it'll do for now
Oscar Submission List The Foreign Film race is on. I've still got a few touchups in store for this chart but everything is now "official". Enjoy

And finally, Awards Daily follows up the Gold Derby story on Oscar's Best Animated Feature race. As you no doubt know, this cute ghetto category can be 5 films wide or 3 depending on how many animated films are eligible. It's not always easy to know since some foreign titles you've never heard of crop up as crazy longshots each year. There are supposedly 15 films in the running which means there'll only be 3 nominees. Fighting it out for the nominations (links go to trailers) are the blockbusters (A Christmas Carol, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, Monsters vs Aliens), the pedigreed efforts (Coraline, Fantastic Mr. Fox, Ponyo), the oddities (The Princess and the Frog, 9, Planet 51, Battle for Terra), the greed-fueled toss offs (Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs, Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure), the foreigners (Astro Boy, Mary and Max) and the eventual winner (Up).

Which toons do you think will get the call on February 2nd?
And why isn't Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel being considered. Wait, don't answer that. Even though that would make it 16 eligible films and a 5-wide category.
*

9 comments:

Jorge Rodrigues said...

Why can't there be five nominees? I get that rule in a year without films with real critical acclaim and filled with blockbusters that are no good...

But this year we have Ponyo, Coraline, Up!, The Fantastic Mr. Fox, Disney's The Princess and the Frog, Mary and Max AND a at-the-very-least decent effort from Dreamworks in the likes of Monsters vs. Aliens...


PONYO
CORALINE
UP!
FANTASTIC MR. FOX
THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG

Is this or is this not a good line-up?



In other news, Cruz and Minnelli in Sex and the City 2? God. What money does to people. Sex and the City wasn't supposed to be about the 4 TV series' girls? I already find the idea of the four of them playing their younger, 25-year-old selves, ridiculous, now we add Cruz and Minnelli to the mix? Huh-oh...

Anonymous said...

I think there can be 5 nominees. Alvin and the Chipmunks was eligible in 07 (?) so why wouldn't the Sequel be (which probably has some other random chipmunk too)? If there are five, I would probably say...

Up *
The Princess and the Frog *
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
Coraline *
Fantastic Mr. Fox


*= if there are three.

Greg Bennett said...

Up and Coraline should be locks. Mary and Max was a lot of fun but I don't see it making the five (definately not the three). My third pick would be Ponyo, unless Fantastic Mr Fox blows me away...

Chris Na Taraja said...

I saw FAME today, and they did cut out the gay character!!....or at least threw him/them back into the closet. Guess we're gonna have to wait for FAME 1 1/2 to see the real Down Low behind the story.

Get real FAME folks, even GLEE has a gay kid, and that's on channel 5!!

Andrea said...

If they expanded BP to 10 nominations, they should expand the Animated category to 5 this year. Especially when the great:bad ratio for animated movies is significantly better than normal movies in general.

Three:
Up
Ponyo
Coraline (ok, haven't seen this, but have heard people rave about this)

Five:
Up, Coraline, Ponyo, Fantastic Mr. Fox, ????. Cloudy W/ Chance of Meatballs is seriously impressing me with its box office run. Only quality enjoyment can translate into such low drop rates.

Anonymous said...

Hmmm.. Watts was praised in Toronto for her perf in "Mother and Child". 2010 will be a great year for her, with the new Allen movie and "Fair Game", in which she plays Valerie Plame alongside Sean Penn.

Greg Bennett said...

Stella you have my three... I can only hope it plays out that way.
I know this isn't what we are discussing but... Mother for best foreign language film... Surely!

Bailey said...

NOOOO! I kept seeing that fucking King Kong commercial and thought to myself every time, "Wow, they really got a dead ringer for Naomi Watts for this." Because, of course, Naomi would never sell out like that. And yes, in her best role! I love that movie, and I'm not ashamed to say I cried a lot. The scene where he's holding her and sliding around the ice with Christmas lights all around at the end is one of the emotional moments I've ever seen on film. Those ads are so depressing now. Fuck DirectTV.

Towelie said...

I just want Up to win and Ponyo to be nominated. And actually, Miyazaki deserved the win for Howl's Moving Castle.