Welcome to the Academy

The Academy has released the annual list of new invitations to their hallowed ranks. Now you can blame THESE people next time you don't like a nomination or win! I hope none of these people are reading because I'm going to be divvying them up into the following categories:  

"duh!" an obvious choice that makes sense based on current career or recent nomination.
"starfucking" the public or the industry is hot for them now.... even if they're not exactly "oscar worthy"
"now?" isn't this too early OR too late?
"curious" Perplexing choices. Some of them are wonderful but we still can't figure out why they've been given this great honor... especially if their fame is largely TV based (There's another Academy for that. You may have heard of them since they also give out coveted statues.)
"wtf" we do not approve.

New Actors
Duh!: Vincent Cassel, Jesse Eisenberg, John Hawkes, Mila Kunis, Jennifer Lawrence, Anthony Mackie, Lesley Manville, Ellen Page, Mia Wasikowska, Jacki Weaver
Starfucking: Russell Brand, Gerard Butler, Bradley Cooper, Beyonce Knowles
Now?: Rooney Mara, Jennifer Garner, Nastassja Kinski, Tea Leoni, Connie Nielsen, Wes Studi
Curious: Robbie Coltrane, Rosemarie DeWitt, Peter Dinklage, Dominic Monaghan
WTF: John Corbett, David Duchovny...

....John Corbett is obviously qualified to judge the artistry of Tilda Swinton and Daniel Day-Lewis, don't you agree?

New Directors
Duh!: Susanne Bier (In a Better World) and Tom Hooper (The King's Speech) both won Oscars last year and Lisa Cholodenko (The Kids Are All Right) and Debra Granik (Winter's Bone) both directed Best Picture nominees. Cholodenko and Granik were also invited to the writer's branch so they'll be able to nominate in three categories: Picture, Director and Screenplays.

Surprising but welcome choices: Gregg Araki and John Cameron Mitchell

Curious: Yojiro Takita (do they always invite the foreign directors whose films win? He directed Departures) Now?: Neil Burger (The Illusionist, Limitless).
♥: Gregg Araki (Kaboom) and John Cameron Mitchell (Rabbit Hole)

But that's not all...

Click to read more ...

Will Glenn Close Become a Double Nominee at the Oscars?

Glenn Close has been fighting to get Albert Nobbs, the 19th century drama about a cross-dressing woman in Ireland, made into a film for some time. She starred in the play in the summer of 1982, the same summer that her debut film performance in The World According to Garp arrived in theaters. She was famously Oscar-nominated for that debut.

Not only is she playing the role again 29 years later for the screen but she's co-written the adaptation*. It's her first screenplay credit and it could theoretically win her another "first timer" Oscar nomination. Once I imagined this scenario and narrative (AMPAS does respect a dream project) I couldn't let it go. Sometimes Oscar narratives get stuck in my head for weeks, impervious to all logic**.

A play poster; Mia Wasikowska and Glenn Close in the film.

Oscar obsessing takes up an alarmingly large percentage of my cerebrum and this blog and the charts (SCREENPLAY Predictions are ready for you***) are the results. But sometimes it gets a little out of hand. Neurologists were alarmed to discover that that same gold shiny fixation has now drifted to my brain stem. Studies show that my Oscar obsession is now a completely involuntary function... like breathing. They've asked me to donate my gray-gold matter to science when I'm dead.

*If she accomplishes this it won't be the first time. At least four other actors have written roles that they were Oscar nominated for both writing and performing. Can you name them?

** Logic like this troubling fact: none of Rodrigo García's well meaning but muted films have attracted much awards recognition. My personal theory is that someone needs to jolt him with electric shock on ocassion. I really want to love his films and I suspect he's a kindred spirit given his devotion to actresses but there's something too sleepy about the movies. And I don't mean boring. Does anyone feel me here? I just think they need some filmmaking crackle that's not entirely performance-driven.

*** I felt weird about not excluding Carnage in the predictions but the more I think about it the more I'm unsure of how well it will transfer to the screen.

Garp, The Big Chill, The Natural, Fatal Attraction, Dangerous Liaisons

P.S. (God shut up already, Nathaniel.) How would you rank Glenn's Oscar nominations? I still don't get what that 1984 bid was about at all -- other than involuntary nominating reflex, blame the AMPAS brain stem-- but fuckyeah on her 1980s run all told, right? She was nearly as Oscar ubiquitous as Streep. if they're both nominated this year for Albert Nobbs and The Iron Lady it'll be their third head-to-head showdown.

Predix: Supporting Actor and The Matter of Young Leads

Jim Broadbent as Dennis ThatcherWhen it comes to blindfolded Oscar predictions, almost nothing beats the supporting categories. I have this vague fantasy of time travel and returning to propose all 10 supporting acting nominees correctly one April to reams of laughter from the internet. They can be so hard to see coming for so many reasons including: adaptations sometimes lean on different characters than the novels or plays that birthed them, ensembles are tricky because you don't know who will win "best in show" reviews, one lead films are tricky because the huge role at the center (The Iron Lady, J. Edgar) sometimes end up sucking up all the oxygen and other times have coattails. Then there's the small matter of Oscar being more diverse aesthetically when it comes to supporting work. Here is where comedy, horror, sci-fi, fantasy  and even comic book movies (Dick Tracy, The Dark Knight) can show up even though they rarely if ever get play in lead categories.

Kenneth Branagh? Christoph Waltz? Philip Seymour Hoffman x 2? Viggo Mortensen x 2? Armie Hammer or Josh Lucas? Ben Kingsley? Christopher Plummer? Jim Broadbent -- his Iron Lady performance already has tongues (and fingers) wagging -- Richard E Grant or Anthony Head? Nick Nolte? Brad Pitt? You can drive yourself crazy thinking about all the possibilities. Maybe you have?

The first predictions for 2011

NEW TOPIC: This is as good a year as any, I assume, to prove my frequent statements about Oscar's double standards with gender. There are at least three very high profile films with young male leads this year: HUGO CABRET (Asa Butterfield is 14 years old), WAR HORSE (Jeremy Irvine is ??? years old), and SUPER 8 (Joel Courtney is ??? years old).

Asa Butterfield, Jeremy Irvine and Joel Courtney

If you've ever doubted my assertion about this double standard -- some people have objected to the statements -- watch how these performances are treated this year while keeping in mind how Hailee Steinfeld's work was greeted in True Grit as if the heavens or the red sea had parted. The media, critics and Oscar voters are quick to shove aside experience and accomplishment in women when a "fresh player" enters but not so with male actors. My prediction: at least one of these three does work on par or better than Hailee's and doesn't get anything like her traction. Watch and see.

Obviously there are exceptions, as there are to every rule: There was no denying Haley Joel Osment's gift in The Sixth Sense (1999) although he did get demoted to Supporting and lost to somebody who already had an Oscar, and Justin Henry won a nomination at 8 (!) for Kramer Vs. Kramer. In both cases the films were absolute sensations at the box office. Dramas no longer explode with audiences like Kramer vs. Kramer did but in today's dollars its box office haul was truly insane. We're talking a domestic haul closer to the latest Harry Potter than a True Grit or King's Speech. In other words, even Oscar doesn't ignore the zeitgeist.

♪ if i said i want ur blog/site now, would u link it against me? ♫

TwitVid Jake Gylllenhaal and Pee Wee Herman. tee hee.
Cinesnatch runs down that Streep Tease show in LA for you. It sounds fun. I especially love the idea of a one-man conversation between multiple Meryl characters. Hopefully I'll get to see it next time I'm in LA. Whenever that is...
Business Spectactor Speaking of Meryl Streep, this is how you know someone's cinema achievements (of any sort)  have totally entered the realm of the popular mythic, when they're brought up in totally non-cinema related ways. Streep as defense of aging executives! Haha
Awards Daily I keep meaning to link up to this article on astrology and Oscar. Super interesting chart if you're into signs, baby. And it's all about Aries apparently.
The House Next Door Gregg Araki's new muse Thomas Dekker.
Twitch has a piece on how the PG-13 rating killed the films it was meant to protect, the films aimed at very young teenagers.
Senses of Cinema here's an interesting piece on Leo McCarey, his 1937 Oscar win and his preference for his drama Make Way For Tomorrow over his indisputable screwball classic The Awful Truth. I haven't seen Make Way... but I've never though artists were the best judge of their own art.
Rants of a Diva has an Oscar winning dream.
Serious Film has great advice for screenwriters of romantic comedies.
Capital New York. A fine review of Certified Copy starring Juliette Binoche though I'd urge you to see the movie first before reading it. It's a must-see film but one of the most beautiful things about it is the sense of evolving surprise as the film keeps shifting. So maybe read no reviews at all until afterwards. Then you'll want to read them all.

Finally La Daily Musto shares the news that that Barbra Streisand version of Gypsy that we were all excited / worried / shocked about has been cancelled already. Just as we'd gotten used to the idea. Apparently Stephen Sondheim is to blame. So here is Babs singing one of her best songs about nostalgia for what once was or what could have been.

Take it away Babs.

I love the guy bouncing up and down in the audience as she starts (notice him to the far right?). Babs fans were very excitable from the very start!

A History of (Firsts) for Women in Film

Today for the International Women's History Centennial, a few "firsts" in movies. Add some in the comments if you want!  I was 2/3rds done with this when I spotted Cinematical's "women in cinematic history but I wanted to make this a little more "first"y and loopier and obviously a bit more awardsy in nature since we play it like that.

A Mary Pickford biography | Florence Lawrence "The Biograph Girl"

Silents

First movie star: That's "The Biograph Girl" Florence Lawrence OR...
First "Oprah" i.e. first woman in entertainment to basic control the universe: Mary Pickford was, like Florence Lawrence, famous by sight before actor names went in credits. Pickford was also known as "America's Sweetheart" a title that the media has virtually never tired of passing on down to newish popular actresses ever since. Mary was one of the founders of AMPAS and a studio founder too. She also commanded astronomical wealth. In a time when average US incomes were somewhere around $3,000ish, she was pulling in $10,000 a week plus a $300,000 annual bonus plushad her own production company plus co-founded movie studios and AMPAS. One can only imagine...

First woman to direct a full length feature: Lois Weber for The Merchant of Venice (1914)
First woman to go nude in a motion picture: Audrey Munson in The Inspiration (1915) playing an artist's model. She did it for the art, you see!

1920s

First woman to win an Oscar: Janet Gaynor, Best Actress on May 16th, 1929. She was a new 22 year old sensation, beating out veteran movie queen Gloria Swanson establishing Hollywood's voting preferences for the Best Actress category for the next 82 years! Gloria declined her invitation to pick up "honorable mention." I'm not begrudging Gaynor her statue -- she's pretty terrific in her 1929 trio Seventh Heaven, Sunrise and Street Angel but I'm just saying... ;)

the die is forever cast: ingenue vs. seasoned pro.

Gaynor also held the status of "youngest best actress winner" for five decades until newbie Marlee Matlin won at 21 for Children of a Lesser God in early 1987 triumphing over seasoned movie queen Kathleen Turner.

1930s

First woman to receive a "special" Oscar: Shirley Temple, miniature superstar in 1934. It was a miniature Oscar. No child star has ever rivalled her popularity since. She was the #1 box office attraction for years.
First Oscar win for Katharine Hepburn: Morning Glory March 16th, 1934. She'd go on to 3 more wins making her the numero uno Oscar Actress
First woman to win Best Supporting Actress Oscar: Gale Sondergaard for Anthony Adverse (1936)
First woman to win Back-to-Back Best Actress Oscars: Luise Rainer (The Good Earth and The Great Ziegfeld). Katharine Hepburn later repeated the trick in the 1960s. Luise is currently the oldest living Oscar winner.
First marriage for Zsa Zsa Gabor: 1937. She's still ahead of Liz Taylor by one (9:8) for the title of Most Married Hollywood Actress

Michele Morgan in La Symphonie Pastorale

1940s

First actress to become an elected US official: Helen Galaghan, the wife of Oscar winner Melyvn Douglas (and stepgrandmother to Ileanna Douglas) played the dangerous title character in scifi cult classic SHE (1935) see my review. In the 40s she served in the Congress for California and gave Richard Nixon that derogatory nickname that stuck "Tricky Dick" but her political career was destroyed during the McCarthy era witchhunts. A more recent example of an actress going into politics: two time Best Actress Oscar winner Glenda Jackson gave up the movies and became a Member of Parliament in Britain. 
First winner of Cannes Best Actress: Michèle Morgan for Jean Delannoy's La Symphonie Pastorale (1946). She played a blind girl whose sight is miraculously restored but which destroys her happiness.

1950s

First woman to receive an honorary regular-sized Oscar: Greta Garbo in 1954. Yep, after 20 or so men had been given one. After another 15 or so men were given non-competitive statues the next woman was Onna White for choreographing Oliver! (1968).

The ratio continues this way: 1970s men: 14; women: 3; 1980s men: 8; women: 1; 1990s men: 9;women: 3; 2000s men 12: women: 1; This year men: 3; women: 0; What the hell is AMPAS's problem with women, exactly?

First woman to win Best Actress for her debut performance: Shirley Booth for Come Back Little Sheba (1952). She only made 3 more features and was largely a stage and TV star. She remains the only woman in her fifties to ever win Best Actress. She's one of 12 women to have won Oscars for their debuts on the big screen. Only two men have ever managed that feat, Dr Haing S Ngor for The Killing Fields and Harold Russell for The Best Years of Our Lives, both wins often associated with their non-acting backstories. (The reason men rarely win or even get nominated for their debuts -- the ratio is crazy to compare -- has to do, obviously, with Oscar's whole thing of valuing men for their experience and longevity and valuing women for... other reasons.)

First black woman nominated for best Actress: Dorothy Dandridge for the musical Carmen Jones (1954)
First savvy woman to popularize the dread "DeGlam" Oscar trick: Grace Kelly for The Country Girl (1954) in which a lesser performance beats a miraculous one (Judy Garland, A Star is Born) because the lesser one features a great beauty pretending to be plain... ACTING!
First (and most) pregnant Oscar winner: Eva Marie Saint for On the Waterfront in April 1955 who said

I may have the baby right here!

She gave birth two days later by some accounts. Other sources say two weeks.
First (and only) Asian woman to win an acting Oscar: Miyoshi Umeki for Best Supporting Actress for Sayonara (1957)
First women on the Hollywood Walk of Fame: Joanne Woodward (aka Mrs Paul Newman) in September 1958 is the most famous of the first batch of 8 recipients barring Burt Lancaster. Two other actresses represented that day were from silent films: Olive Borden and Louise Fazenda. The myth that Woodward received the first star ever, is according to Wikipedia, because she was the first celeb to have her photograph taken with her star. That's now the only way it ever happens, as a big photo op.

1960s

First woman to win the "Triple Crown" of acting, Emmy/Tony/Oscar: Ingrid Bergman completed the feat in 1960 with an Emmy but the Oscars were first (and last) in her career. She won three, second only to Katharine Hepburn.
First woman to be paid $1 million for a single film: Elizabeth Taylor in Cleopatra (1963). Despite the film being a huge flop on a cost-to-gross ratio, she actually earned $7 million all told due to various contractual bits and bobs.

1970s

First woman to win the EGOT: Barbra Streisand completed the quad by 1970... though some claim she's not a true EGOT'er since the Tony was a non-competitive prize. If you don't count Babs the first woman to achieve showbiz's Holy Quad is Helen Hayes who had all four by 1976. Rita Moreno was the first (and only) Hispanic woman to do it the following year.
First woman to win an Oscar and an Emmy in the same year: Liza Minnelli for Cabaret (1972) and Liza with a Z (1972). For what it's worth LIZA WITH A Z is an absolute must-have on DVD. It is amazeballs.

First woman to win Best Picture at the Oscars: Julia Phillips for The Sting (1973). She later wrote the very bitchy tell-all Hollywood bestseller "You'll Never Eat Lunch In This Town Again"
First woman nominated for Best Director at the Oscars: Lina Wertmüller for Seven Beauties (1976). She was nominated against luminaries like Ingmar Bergman, Alan J Pakula and Sidney Lumet. Rocky's John G Avildsen won the Oscar.
First woman to say "no" to Warren Beatty: I'm joking. He can't have never been turned down given how often he made advances but the legend holds that he did ask Julie Christie to marry him and she refused.
First Meryl Streep Oscar Nomination: The Deer Hunter (1978). She'd go on to a total of 16 making her the most nominated actor, male or female, in Oscar history.

1980s

First actress on a US postage stamp: I believe it's Ethel Barrymore in 1982. Some sources online say Grace Kelly in 1993 but maybe they mean a solo stamp. Ethel shared hers with two other members of the Barrymore dynasty.
First actress to create a fitness empire: Jane Fonda. Workout Starring Jane Fonda is still the best selling fitness video of all time. She was 45 when she made it.
First (and only) back-to-back Best Actress Cannes winner: Barbara Hershey for Shy People (1987) and A World Apart (1988), both of which are little seen now which is a real shame. At least she's back in the public eye a bit with Black Swan.
First woman to direct a blockbuster: Penny Marshall, former television star (Laverne & Shirley), directed Big (1988). It wasn't even her only blockbuster. A League of Their Own later crossed the $100 million mark in the 90s.

1990s

First African American woman to direct a movie that won general theatrical release:  Julie Dash had a success d'estime with Daughters of the Dust (1991)
First woman to get properly laid by Brad Pitt onscreen: Geena Davis in Thelma & Louise (1991)

2000s

First African American woman to win Best Actress: Halle Berry in Monster's Ball on March 24th, 2002.
First American woman nominated for Best Director: Sofia Coppola for Lost in Translation (2003)

2010s

First (and only) female winner of Oscar's Best Director: Kathryn Bigelow for The Hurt Locker on March 7th, 2010.

Firsts we're still waiting for...

• a woman to direct a Pixar movie
• a woman to be nominated for Cinematography at the Oscars
• an out gay woman being nominated for an acting Oscar. It's pretty empy on the male side as well though as least we've had Sir Ian McKellen.
• an Asian woman to win Best Actress. Only one has even been nominated (Merle Oberon who hid her ancestry for years back when racism was a much bigger problem that it is now)