Greta Gerwig on the "Frances Ha" Gotham Snub

I had the good fortune to speak with Greta Gerwig earlier today. She's had a terrific year co-writing and headlining the comedy Frances Ha, one of the year's true cinematic triumphs. But, due to the timing of our scheduled conversation, I also had the misfortune of being the bearer of bad news. I didn't realize when I clumsily brought up the Gotham snub, that she hadn't yet heard that the first awards show of the season, which previously honored her with a "breakthrough" nomination for Greenberg (2010) had passed this time around. But she was game enough to answer my questions about movie awards, anyway. She likes to watch, she quickly offered but "it's not really party of my orbit" 

But that led me to wondering if the reception of her work is important to her at all, or if she's one of those actors that's solely focused on the process.

I'm incredibly about how it's received but I don't -- but awards seem to be even beyond that. It has, like, its own rules. I want people I respect to like what I've done. I hope it touches people. I'm not making art in a closet because I want to have the experience of people watching it and liking it.

But awards are so kind of arbitrary. I think it's amazing to be recognized and I think good films are certainly recognized but I don't really see any connection between...

Her voice trails off then before she wraps the topic up with a funny bow.

I think if you're in the film business long enough they eventually get around to you somehow. Or at least when you die a picture of you goes up onscreen.

Um, but I don't know. I also think filmmakers who I love -- sometimes the movies they get recognized for aren't as good as some of their other movies.  'Oh, we sat on it when it was fascinating in the 80s,' or something 'so now we're going to do it!' 

That's some truth telling, right there. That's exactly how it works. This fine actress knows more about awards season than she thinks.

Frances Ha is currently available for pre-order from Criterion Collection and arrives on November 12th. The Film Experience's full interview with Greta Gerwig in which we talk musicals, filmmaking, and casting is coming soon.

Gotham Award Nominees: Short Term Sad

The Gotham Awards, which are kind of the East Coast sibling of the Spirit Awards, have been announced. Unfortunately it wasn't great news for my beloved Short Term 12 (sigh). And though I don't feel as proprietary about Frances Ha, it's complete snub is just bizarre (SO I HAD TO TALK TO GRETA GERWIG ABOUT IT). 

Breathe Kaitlyn, breathe. Being in a great movie is its own reward.

The nominating committee preferred mostly films by already established lauded filmmakers like The Coen Bros, Steve McQueen, and Richard Linklater. Short Term 12, the year's most heartfelt indie miracle, managed only one nomination for Best Actress (Brie Larson, interviewed here), which is a new category for the Gothams who have previously only awarded "Breakthrough" acting. Perhaps the Spirit Awards will come through for Short Term 12 if they can tear themselves away from barely independent studio-funded Oscar bait?

THE GOTHAM  NOMINEES

Best Feature

12 Years a Slave (Fox Searchlight Pictures)

Ain’t Them Bodies Saints (IFC Films)

Before Midnight (Sony Pictures Classics)

Inside Llewyn Davis (CBS Films)

Upstream Color (erbp)

Their Best Feature rarely has much correlation with Oscars... and that's a good thing since indie film awards ought to be thinking independently. [MORE...]

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The Halfway Mark Pt 2. Actors & Actresses

I assume that the entire time you were reading the Halfway Mark Best Screenplays & Pictures you were thinking "get to the actors already!" because, damn you're predictable and also so am I and I love to pay homage to great performances. So, here they are in six categories for your perusal and debate and "I guess I'd better watch that" list-making pleasure.

Best Actor in a Limited or Cameo Role (THUS FAR): Lior Ashkenazi (of Late Marriage fame) temporarily energizes the unfortunately bland Yossi by temporarily attempting to to rub off on and up against Yossi himself with pushy sleaze; James Badge Dale, who also won a nomination in this category at 2012's Film Bitch Awards for Flight, is in every big movie now (World War Z, The Lone Ranger, Iron Man 3) and pretty much great in all of them though the roles are growing exponentially and he's already too large for this category!; Kyle Chandler memorably flips his 'clear eyes, full hearts' image on its head as an absent father in The Spectacular Now; Cheyenne Jackson is robbed of his signature voice entirely in Behind the Candelabra as a disgruntled employee/protege/lover but it turns out he doesnt need it absolutely nailing every tiny gesture and facial expression; and finally, I liked Jamie Sheridan's conflicted big business father in The East.

Best Actress in a Limited or Cameo Role: Hillary Baack, is moving in a key brief role as The East's hearing impaired member; Zoe Kazan wins best in show for a group acting exercize masquerading as a movie called Some Girl(s) with an agonizing backstory; Debbie Reynolds, is a real hoot and unrecognizable in the Liberace flick Behind the Candelabra; Orly Silbersatz Banai adds wonderful depth and shading to her history of denial in Yossi; And in a fine cast in Stoker, Jacki Weaver, makes the most of her tense few scenes as the deservedly worried unannounced visitor Aunt Ginny; and my apologies to Grace Gummer in Frances Ha who I didn't quite have room for but I liked her prickly Ivy League alumna

4 More Acting Category "Bests" after the jump

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Three Quickies: Mud, Identity Thief, Frances Ha

In an effort to say at least a few words on everything I see this year, here are three short takes on recent pictures we haven't discussed much. I'd love to hear your thoughts if you've seen 'em (or want to).

Frances Ha
Modern dancer Frances (Greta Gerwig), suddenly apartment hunting when her best friend Sophie (Mickey Sumner) moves out, struggles to get her act together while her friends are increasingly settling into career and relationship grooves
Quickie Take: Less an explicit psychological mural than a suggestive sidewalk sketch but what artistry! Palpable energy and magical color. [In black and white]. A-

Frances Ha tickles me

Best in Show: Greta Gerwig but then she IS the show. The supporting cast is fine too including newcomer Mickey Sumner as best friend Sophie, Broadway star Charlotte D'Amboise as a dance guru, and Grace Gummer as an irritated former classmate.
Oscar? I'd love to emphatically promise that it has a true darkhorse shot at Actress (Greta Gerwig is at her most Gerwigian and it's beautiful), Director (this is arguably Noah Baumbach's finest film), Editing, and Original Screenplay (at least!) but these days little charming movies stay little (sigh). I know I sound like an ol' curmudgeon - GET OFF MY LAWN - but in truth this movie made me feel young... post-college young to be specific. Quarter century life crisis! 

IDENTITY THIEF
Sandy Patterson (Jason Bateman continuing his variety-free post Juno rut), family man and accountant, must apprehend conwoman "Sandy Patterson" (Melissa McCarthy) to undo the damage she's done to his reputation and bank account. 
Quickie Take: Lazily assumes joke-free laughs. Shamelessly pursues atonal "Redemptive Arc". Excruciating length, rail thin characterizations, plot girth D-

 

Best in Show Melissa McCarthy wins the only laughs but at what price? Rex Reed is an a-hole but maybe he had a a teensy-tiny possible point embedded in the awful rhetoric of his infamous "hippo" review. 
Oscar Chances? LOL. No, but it might unfortunately hurt the next Melissa McCarthy's chances at hardware for a Bridesmaids style comic breakthrough; This is what you've chosen to do with that well-earned goodwill?

MUD
A young teenager (Tye Sheridan) discovers a wanted man (Matthew McConaughey as "Mud") holed up on a nearby island in an abandoned motorboat, awaiting word from his woman (Reese Witherspoon) who is herself in some kind of trouble.
Quickie Take: Emotionally expressive, rarely weighed down by repetitive structure. Never content to do just one thing per scene, Mud attempts coming of age adventure, family drama, and romantic thriller with nearly equal flair.  B+

Jeff Nichols and Matthew McConaughey on the set of "Mud"

Best in Show: McConaughey but the whole cast is strong and Sheridan proves that Terence Malick was on to something when he cast him in Tree of Life. He's beautifully natural onscreen, never "child actor" forced. Can we start campaigning for him to receive a Best Young Actor nomination at the BFCA Critics Choice Awards next January?
Oscar Chances? Like Magic Mike before it, it will more likely bolster Matthew McConaughey's shot at an actual statue for something else entirely. Still, both Oscar and career opportunities are all about momentum and this movie, so quick on the heels of Take Shelter is setting writer/director Jeff Nichols up to break through in a major way. If he keeps up this pace and this quality, what a career he's going to have.
And Also: Congratulations to longtime frienquaintance Kris Tapley on getting the poster quote!

Box Office: Little Willie Style

Absence doesn't always make the heart grow fonder. Will Smith quit headlining movies very abruptly 5 years ago. He stuck a toe back in box office waters last year for another Men in Black but the one-time king of summer movie blockbusters couldn't even beat a Jesse Eisenberg ensemble picture or a 6th edition of a long-in-the-tooth franchise with no bankable stars outside of that franchise? That's some sort of wake-up call but to whom and for what? Will? The Smith Family Players? M Night?

For his next trick, he'll make Will Smith giant-sized bankability disappear

BOX OFFICE TOP TEN
01 FAST & FURIOUS 6 $34.5 (cum. $170.3)
02 NOW YOU SEE ME  $28.5 *NEW* 
03 AFTER EARTH  $27 *NEW* M Night Shyamalan's Fall
04 STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS  $16.4 (cum. $181.1) The Dumbing Down of Star Trek
05 EPIC $16.4 (cum. $65.1)
06 THE HANGOVER PART III $15.9 (cum. $88)
07 IRON MAN THREE $8 (cum. $384.7) Reviewed & Podcasted
08 THE GREAT GATSBY $6.2 (cum. $128.2) Reviewed & Dreamt About
09 MUD  $1.2 (cum. $16.8)
10 THE CROODS $.6 (cum. $180.5)

In limited release Frances Ha nearly cracked the top ten in its third week and will pass Margot at the Wedding's gross quickly. The real test will be if it can break through to Squid and the Whale levels without the aid of awards buzz since we're not in the season.  Meanwhile, Before Midnight, which in a perfect world would be a $100 million blockbuster, wasn't very aggressive in expansion in its second week. I wonder what the future will hold for it?

What did you see this weekend?
I binged (hence the lack of posting) with two oldies having big anniversaries Adventures in Robin Hood and Cleopatra - good christ but that movie is a slog to watch in one sitting! - and three 2013 offerings (The East, Mud, and What Maisie Knew) so I should write something about something soon, shouldn't I?