Tag Archives: academy awards

The Oscar scorecard: Your cheat sheet

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ARGO

‘Argo’ is the unlikely frontrunner for best picture.

For years, the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences has tried to add some drama to the Oscarcast — hard, since by the time Oscar night rolls around, so many other groups have presented their awards, few surprises remain.

Well, this year, they finally may have achieved their goal — if for the wrong reasons.

With nine films nominated for best picture, but only five nominated for best director, there were bound to be some shut-outs, but the snubs of directors Ben Affleck (Argo), Kathryn Bigelow (Zero Dark Thirty), Top Hooper (Les Miserables) and Quentin Tarantino (Django Unchained) — all prior Oscar winners — in favor or two newcomers sent predictions into a tailspin. Add to that the continuing success of Argo in best picture competitions (Golden Globes and BAFTAs; the Screen Actors Guild’s equivalent, best ensemble) and Affleck’s own victory as director, not only is Argo the unlikely frontrunner for best picture, there is no frontrunner for best director.

So what’s gonna happen?

That’s what the Academy hoped you’d ask.

When the world goes upside down like this, almost anything is possible — especially in the best actress category, which is wide open, and best supporting actor, which looks like a two-man race but which could allow a spoiler. Here are your best bets to win the office Oscar pool (the Oscars will be presented Sunday night, broadcast on ABC):

NOTE: If you wanna challenge yourself with Oscar trivia from me, I’ll be hosting a show Sat., Feb. 23 on Facebook’s Hollywood Babylon fan site starting at 1 p.m. Central!

Continue reading “The Oscar scorecard: Your cheat sheet” »

—  Arnold Wayne Jones

Holding gold — an Oscar in Dallas

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RobertEmery

Attendee Robert Emery thanks all the little people.

Yesterday afternoon, I got to pretend I was a big Hollywood actor.

No, I didn’t go back into the closet and marry my female agent and adopt kids. I got to meet Oscar, the foot-tall statuette that everyone will be coveting on Sunday night. It was part of #OscarRoadTrip, a three-week cross-country tour where two very attractive folks take Oscar No. 3111 (they are all numbered) around the U.S., letting folks hold it for a few seconds and get their picture taken with a naked man who they didn’t meet on a cruise.

It was pretty fun.

The event, hosted by the USA Film Festival and the Angelika Film Center, was well-attended if a bit crowded and hectic, but it takes just a second to take the statue from the muscle-bound security guard, get your pic snapped and hand it off. No one dashed. One guy showed up in a tuxedo (I suspect he’ll use it on his Match.com profile to deceive prospective dates), but most of us didn’t look like Oscar winners — we looked like movie fans. And we were.

—  Arnold Wayne Jones

The Oscar noms: Tons of surprises

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The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences has been trying desperately to shake up their Oscar nominations, and they finally succeeded. In what was generally considered one of the strongest movie years in a decade, the nominations this morning had tons of surprises — many exactly of the kind they wanted, including a powerhouse appearance by indie hit Beasts of the Southern Wild.

Still, many of the predicted frontrunners did expectedly well, with Lincoln scoring the most nominations (12, including three for acting — tied for the most ever acting noms from a Steven Spielberg-directed film), followed closely by my favorite film of the year, Ang Lee’s Life of Pi, which, with 11 nods, has the most ever for a film that didn’t receive a single acting nomination. Also, the dreadful Silver Linings Playbook did well, largely via the push by Harvey Weinstein, despite being the worst movie of 2012. Bernie and Cloud Atlas were completely snubbed, as was Matthew McConaughey, who did four films with some buzz last year.

The biggest upsets were in the direction category, with four of the frontrunners — former Oscar winners Kathryn Bigelow, Tom Hooper, Quentin Tarantino and Ben Affleck — all being passed over for inferior work from David O. Russell for SLP, and Beasts‘ Ben Zeitlin in his film debut.

Some good surprises include gay filmmaker David France’s AIDS movie How to Survive a Plague nominated for best documentary feature and The Simpsons‘ cartoon The Longest Daycare snagging a nom for animated short.

All the nominations after the jump.

Continue reading “The Oscar noms: Tons of surprises” »

—  Arnold Wayne Jones

Handicapping the Oscar nominations

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The Oscar noms come early this year, and once again as many as 10 films may be up for best picture. But which ones? And how many?

Here I have a handicapping, in descending order, of the most likely nominees in all the categories. After the nominations come out Thursday morning, check to see how well we (and you) did. My picks are below.

Continue reading “Handicapping the Oscar nominations” »

—  Arnold Wayne Jones

DFW Film Critics bestow 2012 awards

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The Dallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association, a rough assemblage of about 30 print, online and broadcast film commentators from across the Metroplex (including yours truly), released the results of their annual poll this morning for their awards of the best of the year at the movies, and the big winner was Lincoln, taking five prizes. Here are the results for our collective picks (not mine, mind you, though I had my say as well — my own top 10 will come out next week) for 2012:

Best Picture: Lincoln came in first place, followed by Argo, Zero Dark Thirty, Life ofPi and Les Miserables rounding out the top 5. Dallasite Wes Anderson’s Moonrise Kingdom, Silver Linings Playbook, Skyfall, The Master and Beasts of the Southern Wild complete the top 10

Best Director: Kathryn Bigelow, Zero Dark Thirty, with Steven Spielberg in second for Lincoln and Argo‘s Ben Affleck, Life of Pi‘s Ang Lee and Wes Anderson rounding out the top 5.

Best Actor: Daniel Day-Lewis, Lincoln. Following him were Joaquin Phoenix, The Master, John Hawkes, The Sessions, Hugh Jackman, Les Miserables and Denzel Washington, Flight.

Best Actress: Jessica Chastain, Zero Dark Thirty, followed by Jennifer Lawrence, Silver Linings Playbook, Helen Mirren, Hitchcock, Emmanuelle Riva, Amour, and a tie for fifth between Quvenzhane Wallis for Beasts of the Southern Wild and Naomi Watts for The Impossible.

Best Supporting Actor: Texan Tommy Lee Jones, Lincoln, then Philip Seymour Hoffman, The Master, Christoph Waltz, Django Unchained, Alan Arkin, Argo and Robert DeNiro, SLP.

Best Supporting Actress: Sally Field, Lincoln, then Anne Hathaway for Les Miserables, Amy Adams for The Master, Helen Hunt for The Sessions and Ann Dowd for Compliance.

Best Screenplay: Zero Dark Thirty‘s Mark Boal, who also wrote The Hurt Locker for director Bigelow. He beat Quentin Tarantino for Django Unchained.

Best Cinematography: Life of Pi, followed by Skyfall.

Best Musical Score: Lincoln.

Best Foreign Language Film: Amour, followed by A Royal Affair, The Intouchables, Holy Motors and The Kid with a Bike.

Best Animated Feature: ParaNorman, which features a gay character — though we only find out at the end. Frankenweenie came in second.

Best Documentary Feature: Searching for Sugar Man beat out two gay-themed docs: Bully and How to Survive a Plague. The other two in the top 5 were West of Memphis and The Invisible War.

The Russell Smith Award, presented for outstanding in cutting-edge independent filmmaking (named for the late gay film critic for the Dallas Morning News), went to Beasts of the Southern Wild.

—  Arnold Wayne Jones

Oscar watching parties

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And the Oscar goes to…

From area venues:

*Barbara’s is having an Oscar party!! Watch the Academy Awards on the big screen. Fill out a nominee list with the ones that you think are going to win. The person with the most correct winners wins a great prize. We have the list for you to fill out, and all entries must be in before start time. And of course, you can wear your evening dress or tux if you would like to.

DEETS: Barbara’s Pavilion, 325 Centre St. 7:30 p.m.

*Movie Awards Viewing Party brought to you by the 5013c Oak Cliff Foundation and the  Oak Cliff Film Festival! Come watch the spectacle unfold before your eyes on the big screen. Of course this is a fine opportunity to dress to the nines and party like a star! Enter the Pick the Winners poll for $3. Winner will be announced at the end of the night and will get 2 free badges to the 2012 Oak Cliff Film Festival.

DEETS: The Texas Theatre, 231 W. Jefferson Blvd. 6 p.m. TheTexasTheatre.com.

*

—  Rich Lopez

Movie Monday: Oscar nominated doc shorts at Texas Theatre

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Oscar countdown

Be proud if you’ve seen all the major nominees for this year’s Oscars, but impress your watching party by throwing down some knowledge when this category comes up. The Texas Theatre helps round out those slightly obscure awards by featuring this year’s crops of documentary shorts. And the nominees are The Barber of Birmingham: Foot Soldier of the Civil Rights Movement, God Is the Bigger Elvis, Incident in New Baghdad,  Saving Face and The Tsunami and the Cherry Blossom. The theater screens ‘em all save for God, but that’ll be enough to make an informed decision and give you the edge on that Oscar pool.

DEETS: The Texas Theatre, 231 W. Jefferson Blvd. 7 p.m. $9. TheTexasTheatre.com.

—  Rich Lopez

Some observations on my Oscar experience

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Even though I’ve written a book about the Oscars, I’ve never actually attended any of their events, or come much closer than watching the show when it airs.

That changed earlier this week, when I attended the announcement ceremony from the Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Hollywood. I had to wake up at 3 a.m. to get there for the media breakfast and be in place for the announcements, which took place at 5:38 a.m. (so that they were in time for the East Coast broadcasts of the morning news shows). It was a surprisingly lively event. Here are some of my thoughts at it was happening.

• The lobby is covered in red carpet — I guess that saves a lot of time laying it out every 15 seconds so celebs know where to go.

• The security is tight but the people are friendly. This is L.A. after all — you can never be sure who’s some journo from Dallas and who might be a segment producer for Access Hollywood. Or Harvey Weinstein’s personal assistant.

• An old man at my table at the media breakfast just got his foot wrapped on my bag’s strap, which was pressed next to my chair. “I’m gonna kill myself on that! Putting it under the table is better.” “Picking up your feet when you walk isn’t a bad idea, either,” I mutter. He then sat down and nearly took the table cloth with him when it gets caught on his foot. What’s the common denominator here? My bag or this guy?

• Some folks are wearing swag from previous Oscars. I am not among them. I decide this is a good thing, because then people might want to talk to you about it and I’m just a faker who bought my swag anyway.

• The breakfast looks busy and well-attended to me, but a few veterans of the event note that there are “fewer and fewer every year… They’re all going to Sundance.”

• Small world: I just bumped into Amy, a publicist for ABC. I had met her only the day before, at a friend’s house — she is the girlfriend of his roommate. She does a mean Madonna impersonation, though not here.

• I’m surprised that more people are not talking about the Oscars themselves, or even the movie business — handicapping who they think the nominees will be, what films they expect to get snubbed. I wonder if they are playing it close to the vest or really have become so bored by it this is just an inconvenient assignment. Or maybe they are afraid to look too anxious and fan-boy crazy.

• There is one exception. A guy I’m sitting near apparently has a gig as a handicapper of the visual effects category. He says Hugo isn’t feeling the love and neither is Harry Potter — those will likely be passed over. The surprise nominee, he predicts, may be Real Steel, though he wonders if it and Transformers 3 — two robot movies — will both get nominated. He does predict Rise of the Planet of the Apes is the frontrunner to win “as compensation for not nominating Andy Serkis.” Captain America also seems a lock…

• Only he’s wrong. Yes, Rise and Steel both get nods, but so does Transformers and so do Hugo and Potter. Captain America is overlooked.

• After so much cool, a few minutes before the velvet rope is removed to allow folks into the theater, and without any public announcement, the “first admit” passholders magically start lining up like airplane travelers jockeying for the shortest wait. They care…

• Finally, the ceremony is over and folks are pouring over the press release, looking not just at what movies got nods, but who. They are not all journalists here — some probably are Harvey Weinstein’s assistants, or at least folks from corporate who have bosses in the running. Or personal grudges. “No, he didn’t make the list,” one says into a cell phone. “Ohh, she got nominated — he’ll be pissed!” another observes. Half of show business is business…

—  Arnold Wayne Jones

Shabby Shriek of the Week: Meital

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We’ve made a slight change here in Shabby Shriek of the Week. We’ve switched out the Sounds Like analysis with a lyric sampling in Words Up, so you can be better informed before making your “shab” or “fab” vote for the next pop princess.

Now, let’s take a look at Meital’s “Yummy Boyz.”

WTF IS Meital?

Apparently she’s a big deal — in Israel. Meital Dohan is singer/actress/playwrite who most American audiences might know from her recurring role on Weeds as Yael Hoffman. She’s also been nominated for two Israeli Academy Awards and won an Isreali Tony Award. Who knew?

Now she’s going after gay audiences with her foray into music. I received a disc of seven remixes of her first single “Yummy Boyz.” The hook has promise, but the lyrics — meh. The song is from her upcoming album, I’m in Hate with Love.

Continue reading “Shabby Shriek of the Week: Meital” »

—  Rich Lopez