Day of Rest

I need 101 Days of Sleeping but a single day must suffice. In the meantime there's a lot for you to catch up on like The Best of January, voting on who should win on each individual Oscar chart, all the Sundance reviews - forty-two of 'em!, and 14 whole anticipatory episodes of We Can't Wait aimed at 2014.

You should also check out this Variety report behind the Academy's reasoning for disqualifying "Alone Yet Not Alone" from the Original Song field which we were talking about just on Wednesday. Again, I really wish they would look into the music branch for MANY changes, not just this stand alone decision. They've done it before with Documentaries and Foreign Film and they have to have noticed by now how deeply troubled the music branch is, right? Oh god please tell me they've noticed!

We'll be back Sunday early evening yapping like an excited puppy for one final month of Oscar '13 madness.

GALECA & GLAAD: Gay 'Best of the Year' Honors

Though I complain about the proliferation of awards groups some of them serve more of a purpose than others, even if they're also lining up to honor the same things as every other group. Like AIDS related Best Picture nominee Dallas Buyers Club twhich some gay critics don't like at all and on principal but which factors into both of the gay-specific awards recently announced.

Now, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation has made really suspect endorsements over the years (Let us not speak of I Know Pronounce You Chuck & Larry) but they've also highlighted and fought against a very real problem so you have to respect their greasy wheel existence if not always their execution of message. 

As per usual, GLAAD will hold a bicoastal bifurcated awards ceremony, first in Los Angeles in April and then in New York in May, long after Oscar season is over. GLAAD's film (and other medium) nominees as well as the nominees and winners of GALECA (the Gay and Lesbian Entertainment Critics Association) are after the jump with commentary and in some cases links. It's always bugged me that when magazines, blogs, and web articles are nominated for prizes the nominations list rarely have an easy way to check out the nominees so I figure I'm doing a public service by including them. You're welcome. 

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And Then There Were Four. Oscar Nomination Revoked In Yet More Music Branch Drama

As you have undoubtedly heard because the drama is too juicy not to spread, the Original Song nominee that shocked everyone on Nomination Morning is no longer. "Alone Yet Not Alone" from Alone Yet Not Alone, a faith-based movie, has been disqualified due to excessive untoward campaigning. The nomination had been controversial right from the start for multiple reasons. First, no one had heard of the movie (not even one review on Rotten Tomatoes at the time) and people don't like obscure things. Then the amateurish-looking and racist-seeming trailer got passed around mockingly and we learned that anti-gay activists were endorsing the film. The team behind it basically gave God the credit for its nomination. Listen, Oscar night is heaven on earth but God's got nothing to do with it.

More on Oscar's most aggravating branch after the jump... 

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Podcast: Sundance Debrief and DGA Reactions

On this week's special cross-country podcast recorded live from Utah, Nathaniel welcomes back Katey Rich in New York, Nick Davis in Chicago, and special guest Guy Lodge, also in Chicago en route to London. Guy and Nathaniel share their Sundance favorites, the chief crossover being Richard Linklater's Boyhood. 

Other Topics include: The Producers Guild of America and Directors Guild winners and what that might mean for 12 Years a Slave and Gravity come Oscar night, categories where we'd enjoy ties on Oscar night, and favorite "overheard" bits in movie theater lines regarding Dallas Buyers Club and Philomena. 

You can listen to the podcast right here at the bottom of the post or download the conversation on iTunes. Continue the conversation in the comments! 

Which tie would you love to see this year?

Sundance Debrief and Oscar Ties

Box Office: I, Failure

Amir here, with the weekend’s box office report.

It was a quiet weekend for new releases, with only one film opening wide, and it might as well have not bothered at all. I, Frankenstein opened to a catastrophic $8m on a $65m budget. By next weekend, it will most likely be out of the top ten and most definitely out of our collective memory. I really don’t have much to add the pile of ridicule that’s already been heaped on the film, chiefly because I can’t figure out what the hell it’s even about despite the good half an hour I spent this morning researching its advertisements. I will just leave you with this brilliant tweet instead:

Worst part of I, FRANKENSTEIN flopping is that we'll never get treated to @NickPinkerton's hilarious sequel title: II, FRANKENSTEIN.

— Bilge Ebiri (@BilgeEbiri) January 25, 2014

Ride Along remained at the top of the chart after its strong opening weekend, though it’s sure to be dethroned when the bizarrely titled That Awkward Moment opens next week. Meanwhile, Frozen broke yet another record this week and became the highest grossing original animated film of all time. That is a fantastic feat for Disney and an indication that despite what the studios continue to believe, female protagonists can sell as many as tickets as their boy counterparts – though I don’t mean to insinuate in any way that Frozen’s appeal is limited to gender or age; it’s been successful precisely because it’s drawing everybody in. Next weekend it gets a sing-along version in theaters.

BOX OFFICE
RIDE ALONG $21.1m (cum. $75.4m)
LONE SURVIVOR $12.6 (cum. $93.6m)
THE NUT JOB $12.3m (cum. $40.2m)
FROZEN $9m (cum. $347.8m)
JACK RYAN: SHADOW RECRUIT $8.8m (cum. $30.1m)
I, FRANKENSTEIN $8.2m new
AMERICAN HUSTLE $7.1m (cum. $127m)
AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY $5m (cum. $26.5m)
THE WOLF OF WALL STREET $5m (cum. $98m)
DEVIL’S DUE $2.7m (cum. $12.8m)

On the Oscar front, Hustle and Wolf are still going strong, while Nebraska, Dallas Buyers Club and 12 Years a Slave all expanded (or re-expanded, as in the case of the latter) and did modest business. Not enough has been written about the box office success of Steve McQueen’s film, but I personally think $43 is a really solid number for a film that has been constantly dubbed 'brutal' and 'unwatchable' in the media. Irrespective of how well the nominees do in the remainder of their theatrical run, the sum total of their gross will remain the second lowest in the post-5 best picture era after 2011, when only one film (The Help) sold more than $100m.

I didn't hit the theatres this weekend but dedicated my time to some classics instead. What did you watch?