Oscar Completism: Unfinished Business and Happy Endings?

Baby Clyde's Oscar Completist Diaries -- Part 2
(If you missed part one read that first!)

When COVID hit I happened to be in Colombia. I wasn’t frolicking on the beach in 90-degree heat or scuba diving in the beautiful clear blue Caribbean Sea but watching the Best Actress nominees of 1969 (That’s what holidays are for right?). Jean Simmons and Liza Minnelli had somehow passed me by over the years and with my new Russian pal I was able to fill in all the gaps. By the time I was back in London and lockdown had kicked in, I’d decided to make a project of it. Using Kevin Jacobson’s And The Runner-Up Is podcast as my companion I started watching every nomination in reverse order from 1969 down to 1927. I rewatched everything I’d already seen and added in the first-time watches along the way, noting everything down on a colour coded spreadsheet as I went and listening to the corresponding podcast episode (I promise I’m really not as sad as this suggests. I used to be a cool 90’s Club kid, remember!!!). This made for some very interesting stats on my Letterboxd Most Watched List – The best place on the entire internet.

2020 was full of stars of the 50’s and 60’s (Sophia Loren won) whilst 2021 was made up of the biggest names from the 30’ and 40’s (And Beulah Bondi). Cary Grant came out on top. By the end of the year Kevin had invited me on the podcast to discuss the Best Picture race of 1935. I waffled on for 2 hours and 20 minutes...

The further I went the harder it became...

Click to read more ...

BSFC, LAFCA, and NYFCO winners

by Nathaniel R

"ALL THE BEAUTY AND THE BLOODSHED" won three more prizes today

A big Critics awards day today the night before Oscar begins voting on its finalist lists for the categories that use that process (i.e. not the ones that get the most press). After the jump one of the three most important critics associations, Los Angeles Film Critics Association, plus the enduring and usually interesting Boston Society of Film Critics, and the relatively new group New York Film Critics Online (not to be confused with the biggie, NYFCC, which already announced).

Today's three critics groups had some similaries but agreed unanimously on two things: Ke Huy Quan for Best Supporting Actor and All the Beauty and the Bloodshed for Best Documentary. We're happiest of course with complete disagreements since TFE loves the spreading of wealth. Best Animated Feature and Best Supporting Actress for example, resulted in a different winner at each of these orgs. Winners and a few comments are after the jump...

Click to read more ...

Touring 'The First Lady' Suites

By Abe Friedtanzer

Showtime’s new anthology series The First Lady debuted this past weekend. The series looks simultaneously at three First Ladies throughout history: Eleanor Roosevelt (Gillian Anderson) in the 1930s and 40s, Betty Ford (Michelle Pfeiffer) in the 1970s and Michelle Obama (Viola Davis) in the 2000s and 2010s. The Film Experience will be covering its run (more soon on invididual episodes). 

The network is rolling out a very specific type of red carpet to celebrate the series as it begins airing. Reporting for The Film Experience I was able to visit one of the First Lady Suites, which is a transformed presidential suite at the Ritz-Carlton in downtown Los Angeles. This is also happening in New York, Chicago, and Washington D.C. This was quite the lavish and detailed visual experience.

I snapped a few photos to complement my written descriptions of the visit…

Click to read more ...

Behind the Scenes at an Annual Oscar Party!

By Christopher James

We come to this place for magic. We come to the Dolby theaters to love, to cry, to watch a truly unhinged Oscar night. The Oscars have reached an interesting inflection point in their history. How do they adapt to the changing times without leaving behind what makes them special? As a movie fan, of course, like Nathaniel I want the Oscars to err on the side of more-is-more. They should be the Super-Bowl of movies that everyone is excited to watch or, yes, half watch. How have we (by we, I mean people who don’t have an interest in football) been conditioned to watch the Super-Bowl each year? Simple: the Super-Bowl party. Who doesn’t love an excuse to party and hang out at a friend’s house on a Sunday and watch something that everyone will talk about the following day? The Oscars should be longer, bigger, more fun and be the type of event that people want to throw parties for.

Throwing an Oscar party each year (sans last year for obvious reasons) has been one of my greatest joys. I invite you behind the scenes of (East) Hollywood’s biggest night (aka me packing thirty rowdy Oscar watchers in a small apartment)...

Click to read more ...

Doc Corner: A 'Whirlybird' over Los Angeles

By Glenn Dunks

There is a shot about 30 minutes in Matt Yoka’s Whirlybird that made me gasp. Not necessarily because of how shocking or surprising it is, but because of the decision-making process that must have occurred to choose to include it. It took what was up until that point a nice trip through Los Angeles news history and made me view the rest of this documentary through different eyes. The shot in question is live news footage taken from a helicopter over L.A. with a network chyron that reads "Rock Hudson Battles AIDS” while footage shows the actor being transported to hospital surrounded by medical staff.

It is hardly surprising that anybody would film this. What is surprising is that Yoka’s film doesn’t seem all that fussed about addressing it. In fact, at one point news camera hounding of Madonna and Sean Penn is used as a journalistic punchline in an effort to boost the image of what were essentially paparazzi with a bigger budget. Which speaks to the whole film, too, really...

Click to read more ...