Tuesday, January 04, 2011

PGA Nominations: No Winter's Bone

And for best Pro Golfer the nomin--- er, oh yes yes.
The Producers Guild of America. Righty-o.

Best Picture
127 Hours Danny Boyle, Christian Colson
Black Swan Scott Franklin, Mike Medavoy, Brian Oliver
Inception Christopher Nolan, Emma Thomas
The Fighter David Hoberman, Todd Lieberman, Mark Wahlberg
The Kids Are All Right Gary Gilbert, Jeffrey Levy-Hinte, Celine Rattray
The King's Speech Iain Canning, Emile Sherman, Gareth Unwin
The Social Network Dana Brunetti, Cean Chaffin, Michael De Luca, Scott Rudin
The Town Basil Iwanyk, Graham King
Toy Story 3 Darla K. Anderson
True Grit Ethan Coen, Joel Coen, Scott Rudin

The snubbee here in terms of Oscar buzz is Winter's Bone. But it's a tiny indie and maybe that's not what the PGA wanted to value? Still it's absence reminds us that the Best Picture race, is really down to those 11 films. Last year, there were only about 12 films standing before Oscar nominations were announced. Is it always going to be this simple to predict with the new widened Best Picture field. If so, sadness. Predicting should be tougher. But at least it's tough to say which of the 11 is getting the Oscar boot.



I'm currently assuming that it's either 127 Hours or The Town on the outs come January 25th but who knows? Maybe it'll be something that breaks my heart more like The Kids Are All Right or --GASP-- how will the internet go on living if it's Inception? When there is just one too many strong precursor candidates in any category (see also supporting actress) sometimes the person/film left out is not the one everyone thought was most vulnerable.

Animated Pictures:
Despicable Me John Cohen, Janet Healy, Christopher Meledandri
How To Train Your Dragon Bonnie Arnold
Toy Story 3 Darla K. Anderson

Despicable Me eh? I guess you have to give the producers credit for how good that looked and how successful it was despite a budget that was far lower than most of the animated films that were hits this year.
Documentary Pictures:
Client 9 Awaiting final credit determination
Earth Made of Glass Reid Carolin, Deborah Scranton
Inside Job Charles Ferguson, Audrey Marrs
Smash His Camera Linda Saffire, Adam Schlesinger
The Tillman Story  John Battsek
Waiting For 'Superman' Lesley Chilcott

I'm proud of them for not restricting themselves to only Oscar finalists here. Though I still don't really get the enthusiasm for Client 9, Inside Job and Waiting For 'Superman'... as they seem to be such straightforward docs. I guess I'm drawn to more creative / surprising let's informational documentaries.

Episodic TV, Comedy
30 Rock
Curb Your Enthusiasm
Glee
Modern Family
The Office

Episodic TV, Drama
Breaking Bad
Dexter
Lost
Mad Men
True Blood

Longform TV
Murder on the Orient Express
Pillars of Earth
Temple Grandin
The Pacific
You Don't Know Jack

I sometimes have nightmares that in the year 2014 people will still be nominating Temple Grandin for prizes. Isn't that already like 3 years old?

NonFiction TV
Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations
Deadliest Catch
Intervention
Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D-List
Undercover Boss

Live Entertainment and Competition TV
The Amazing Race
The Colbert Report
Project Runway
Real Time With Bill Maher
Top Chef

24 comments:

E Dot said...

I really hope 127 Hours makes the short list. It'll break my heart if it doesn't. :(

NATHANIEL R said...

i mean who knows... i sense that beyond the top 5 or so... it's about equal pockets of fandom. anything could slip out i suspect.

adam k. said...

Yeah, Winter's Bone is probably getting in... I feel like The Town is vulnerable, since it's just so darn minor, relatively speaking.

127 feels like it has too much support across to many categories to miss in a 10-wide field.

What are the top 5, exactly, Nat? I think it's TSN and TKS in the top tier, then Inception and Black Swan in another tier, and then everything else is about equal in taking up the rear. The Fighter, I guess? Maybe True Grit now? But it might even be something like TKAAR in 5th... it's kind of sad that we'll never know (and no, I don't think whichever film gets a director nod is the 5th slot, since that could even be Danny Boyle there).

Robert Hamer said...

"...how will the internet go on living if it's Inception?"

My day started out pretty crummy, but you've already made it brighter with that quip.

OtherRobert said...

It's going to be a USA, A-OK year for animated film, isn't it? Just like 2005? I can take comfort in knowing that there are four solid American animated films to choose the three nominees from, even if it means a more experimental title is left out in the cold. Would Despicable Me or Tangled being the third nominee be any worse for the category than Shark Tale or Surf's Up being able to promote themselves as Academy Award nominated films?

To play devil's advocate, what if there was some kind of bizarre backlash against animated films because of Up being nominated for Best Picture last year? Could The Town and Winter's Bone both get in while Pixar sits on the sidelines, once again relegated to Animated Feature? How often do sequels get nominated for any big awards?

NATHANIEL R said...

OtherRobert -- i've considered that myself but I think TOY STORY 3 is just too strong to be subject to that backlash. But unlike the rest of the internet I do suspect that backlash is coming sooner rather than later.

animated films do seem to get an easy pass with critics

(even the mediocre ones tend to get solid thumbs up), an easy pass with audiences (mostly they're big hits) and an easy pass towards awards glory (MUCH easier to get oscar glory when you're competing against 3 handfuls of pictures instead of hundreds like live-action films have to do)

at this point so i could understand if the hundreds of thousands of flesh and blood people working on live action films started resenting them.

Evan said...

^I've wondered about Toy Story 3, but assume there are too many people who call it the best of the year.

I liked it, but this "Pixar is automatically amazing and any Toy Story pic automatically deserves a 99 on Rotten Tomatoes" precedent is a little tiresome.

AnthonyDC said...

"Competition and Live TV" in one category -- ha. "Project Runway" vs. Bill Maher?!?

NATHANIEL R said...

anthony -- right? it's like the producing challenges of THE AMAZING RACE and THE COLBERT REPORT are so similar ;)

cheeseybits said...

Natalie Portman wasn't nominated? ;-)

Volvagia said...

Each should have had their own category, preferably with only 3.

Competition:

Project Runway
The Amazing Race
Top Chef
(if 5: Add Chefs Vs. City and Wipeout)

Live Entertainment (misnomer, I don't think any of those people straight out broadcast live. Non competition would be a better title.):

Colbert
Maher
Stewart
(if 5: Add Ace of Cakes and Home Edition.)

J said...

I think "127 Hours" is extremely vulnerable. Perhaps "The Town" as well...an off chance for TKAAR. But I surmise that 9 are locked and it's coming down to WB vs. 127H for the final slot.

If "Inception" somehow does not get into Picture, AMPAS will immediately go back to 5 nominees. There is no point for 10 otherwise.

Volvagia said...

About your statement of True Grit and Black Swan should be examples: Yes, they should. You spend about 200 million on a kind of garish and sloppily edited (one edit every second and a half) sand picture, yet you have a tautly edited and fairly cheap movie by your standards about the creation of facebook that got some BANK. And yet you keep churning out Yogi Bear level movies year, after year, after year. (Hint: Don't release movies every week if you're not going to be trying for quality product. Flooding the market place probably doesn't help in the long run.)

Anonymous said...

Writer's Guild noms:
http://www.wga.org/content/default.aspx?id=4468

Alex Constantin said...

I really don't see THE TOWN making it... That ending really lowered my rating for the film: it's an action-based movie and there's nothing action-like about the last 5 minutes! When you're putting all your money on one card, why not go all the way till the very last shot?!

Unknown said...

How can they nominate Curb Your Enthusiasm, when it didn't air any episodes in 2010?

Paul Outlaw said...

Addicted as I am to Glee and True Blood, I still have to shake my head and roll my eyes at those nods.

Anonymous said...

RE: Nathaniel

"at this point so i could understand if the hundreds of thousands of flesh and blood people working on live action films started resenting them. "

Have you seen the credits of Toy Story 3? Hundreds upon hundreds of people worked on that film as well.
Am I to believe those people were all computer generated?

A film with a budget over 150 million bucks tends to employ a TON of people.

NATHANIEL R said...

anon -- oh for sure. but small industries are notoriously cliqueish. i'm guessing there's not a TON of overlap between the people who are regularly employed making animated features with the people making live action films (which greatly outnumber them)

I'm not disparaging animated films. I love cartoons. I'm just saying i wouldn't be surprised at all if there's some resentment brewing.

adam k. said...

Toy Story 3 will not get significant backlash. Too strong. It has Quentin Tarantino calling it the best of the year (he's academy, after all) and it's the best reviewed film of the year after Social Network.

But next year we may not see an animated nominee...

adam k. said...

Not to mention it's the #1 film of the year and the #2 animated film of all time (#1 worldwide).

Anonymous said...

The Ghost Writer or Shutter Island might sneak in. Who knows?

Glenn said...

I would've expected Winter's Bone over 127 Hours since one has been a nice little hit for its budget and has done so much better throughout the season than people expected, whereas the other is actually kind've a big disappointment (barely making $10mil).

John T said...

I think it will come next year, actually. Cars 2 could be the first Pixar film to miss out on an Animated Feature nomination.