There is indeed much to celebrate in France with the multiple Oscar wins by THE ARTIST, which has made film history as the first silent film to win Best Picture in 80 years and the first wins by a French director and actor in their respective categories. The five Oscar wins by THE ARTIST (matched only by Martin Scorsese's exquisite period film HUGO, which dominated the technical prizes), its sweep of the Cesar Awards and all the other awards that the film has won during this seemingly...
The Gotham Awards, one of the first events of the awards season, have announced the nominees for their 21st edition. The big winners were THE DESCENDANTS (Alexander Payne) and MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE (Sean Durkin), which each led the pack with three nominations each. Films nominated in the top category of Best Feature include THE TREE OF LIFE (Terrence Malick), THE DESCENDANTS (Alexander Payne), BEGINNERS (Mike Mills), TAKE SHELTER (Jeff Nichols) and MEEK’S CUTOFF (Kelly Reichardt). I...
The Gotham Awards, one of the first events of the awards season, have announced the nominees for their 21st edition. The big winners were THE DESCENDANTS (Alexander Payne) and MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE (Sean Durkin), which each led the pack with three nominations each. Films nominated in the top category of Best Feature include THE TREE OF LIFE (Terrence Malick), THE DESCENDANTS (Alexander Payne), BEGINNERS (Mike Mills), TAKE SHELTER (Jeff Nichols) and MEEK’S CUTOFF (Kelly Reichardt). In a sur...
Austin, Texas, the state capitol and the venue for the South By Southwest Film, Music and Interactive Festival (SXSW), is an island of liberalism in a sea of conservative attitudes. While Texas is the definite "red" state, characterized by its conservative politics and rigid social attitudes, SXSW is by design and nature a progressive affair. This slightly schizophrenic relationship has created some interesting moments at SXSW in the past week, with a film that uncovers the hidden secrets behind...
Austin, Texas, the state capitol and the venue for the South By Southwest Film, Music and Interactive Festival (SXSW), is an island of liberalism in a sea of conservative attitudes. While Texas is the definite "red" state, characterized by its conservative politics and rigid social attitudes, SXSW is by design and nature a progressive affair. This slightly schizophrenic relationship has created some interesting moments at SXSW in the past week, with a film that uncovers the ...
When your movie defies the odds and sweeps the major categories at both the Oscars and the British Academy Awards (as in Best Film, Best Director, Best Actor and Best Screenplay), there is no question that as a producer you see your stock rise. For the trio of producers of THE KING'S SPEECH, a decidedly indie film with a budget of less than $15 million, the gates to Hollywood are now open, and they are stepping through.
Iain Canning is a 31-year-old Londoner who has mainly made low ...
Long live the King……or The King’s Speech that is. The historical biopic made a nearly clean sweep of the Orange British Academy Awards this evening in London. The awards, best known as the BAFTAs, crowned actor Colin Firth as Best Actor, while recognizing his fellow thespians, including best supporting actress Helena Bonham Carter and best supporting actor Geoffrey Rush. The film also won as Best Film, Best British Film and for its Original Screenplay. Firth was honored wi...
While most of the Oscar nominations announced last week were rather predictably the names and titles that we have been expecting, there were a number of surprises and snubs. Although the Academy has expanded the Best Film contender list to ten titles in order to spread the love, the acting and directing categories still can only include five people, so invariably there are those worthy of attention who fall off the list. Maybe there were number 6 or number 7, but if they did not make t...
With THE SOCIAL NETWORK winning top prize at both last week's Golden Globe Awards and with other critics associations, the inevitability of its winning the Best Picture Oscar seemed more than assured. However, this past weekend's upset win for its closest challenger has now made the Oscar race less certain then it was a few days ago.
The Producers Guild of America (PGA) is one of the most reliable guilds when it comes to predicting Oscar success. It is the only one that actually...
BAFTA, the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, has announced its "longlists", a rather quaint annual exercise that reduces the number of potential candidates for BAFTA Awards to 15. At the moment, in one of the key races of the awards season, the historical epic THE KING'S SPEECH and the ballet-goes-mad BLACK SWAN are tied for most mentions (to be translated in a few weeks time to most nominations). Not far behind are the films INCEPTION and THE SOCIAL NETWORK. The Leading Actor candi...
The Writers Guild of America, the most prestigious membership organization for television and film writers, announced its nominations this week for top scribes of the year. The nominees, an indicator of the Oscar nods due later this month, are not without controversy. Several of the year's most celebrated films have had their scripts disqualified due to the WGA's convoluted "minimum basic agreement" rules. The injunctions are rather hard to explain but disqualify film scrip...
Jesse Eisenberg in THE SOCIAL NETWORK
As a media junkie (guilty as charged), I cannot help but be inundated this time of the year with all manner of critics pontificating on their "top ten" favorites of the year in the worlds of film, theater, music, art, fashion, politics, etc. While in the past, anxious readers waited with breath that is baited for what the New York Times writers and other major critics singled out as the year's best cultural attractions, the in...
Colin Firth and Helena Bonham-Carter in THE KING'S SPEECH
The London Critics' Circle has weighed in with its announcements for its is 31st Film Awards. Two British films, The King's Speech and Another Year lead the nominations, celebrating another strong year for British cinema, with seven apiece. Pre-Oscars favourite The King's Speech is nominated in categories including the Sky 3D Award for Film of the Year, Actor of the Year, and the Actress of the Year award. Mike Leigh's...
Film Comment, the highly respected film magazine that is the publishing initiative of New York's Film Society of Lincoln Center, has thrown its hat into the ring of the current awards season with an announcement this week of its Top Ten Films of the Year. Since the film journal is known for its international and eclectic taste, the list is not a carbon copy of the ones that are the mainstay of the awards roundelay, but point to lesser known titles that are worthy of greater attention....
While it limits its nominations to acting awards for film and television, the Screen Actors Guild Awards are considered very prestigious because they are given to actors by their fellow thespians. The awards ceremony, which used to be a private affair for guild members, is now televised in the United States and internationally, thus adding another layer in the run-up to the Academy Awards in February.
As with the Golden Globe Award nominations announced on Wednesday, Na...
The "usual suspects" were evident at the announcement of the 2011 Golden Globe Awards by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association. Both the historical biopic THE KING'S SPEECH and the zeitgeist drama THE SOCIAL NETWORK received the most nominations, with such celebrated films as BLACK SWAN, THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT, INCEPTION, BLUE VALENTINE and THE FIGHTER making strong showings.
THE KING'S SPEECH has to be considered the current frontrunner, capping seven nominations...
It has been quite a year for director Roman Polanski…..house arrest in Switzerland, Silver Bear at the Berlinale, legal victory and return to his adopted home of Paris, and film adaptation of the international theatre sensation “God Of Carnage”. Now, Polanski caps a year full of ups and downs with a sixtuplet win at the European Film Awards, held this evening in the Nokia Concert Hall in the Estonian capital city of Tallinn.
“The Ghost Writer”, Polanski’s adapta...
Bruno Ganz in WINGS OF DESIRE (Wim Wenders)
Veteran Swiss actor Bruno Ganz, best known for his role as Adolf Hitler in the biopic "The Downfall", will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award at tonight's European Film Awards, to be held for the first time in Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. Ganz was born in Zürich to a Swiss mechanic father and a northern Italian mother. He knew from an early age that he wanted to be an actor and found his first success in live thea...
WINTER'S BONE, the debut feature by director Debra Granik that won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival, continues to cement its status as this year's "indie it" film with major wins at the Gotham Independent Film Awards, which were held in New York City on Monday evening. The 20th edition of the Awards gala, which is sponsored by the IFP, the indie filmmakers membership organization that also sponsors the New York Film Week market and screenings each Sept...
The Moet British Independent Film Awards (BIFA) have announced two of its honorees for its glamorous awards gala next month. Actress Helena Bonham Carter will receive the coveted Richard Harris Award and the Variety Award will be bestowed on actor Liam Neeson. The awards gala takes place at Old Billingsgate on Sunday, 5 December. The Richard Harris Award was introduced in 2003 in honor of veteran actor Richard Harris and recognises outstanding contribution to British film by an act...
With the British film industry still reeling from proposed massive budget cuts from governmental agencies, there is definitely an atmosphere of uncertainty in the air (which I experienced last week while attending the BFI London Film Festival). However, as far as the British films that will be hitting screens in the coming weeks, it actually appears to be a rather prolific period. This can be interpreted as either a brief celebratory calm before the storm, or just another indicator th...
Indiana Jones himself will be on the scene when the Santa Barbara International Film Festival will present its fifth annual Kirk Douglas Award For Excellence In Film to legendary actor/producer Harrison Ford. The black-tie Gala, which serves as a fundraiser for the Festival will take place at the Four Seasons Biltmore in Santa Barbara on Friday, November 19.
Ford, one of the planet's biggest stars for more than 3 decades, has made an astonishing 43 feature films, 12 of which hav...
Sofia Coppola walked away with the top prize at the Venice Film Festival this past weekend, winning the Golden Lion for her new film SOMEWHERE. The film, which inexplicably did not make the cut at the Toronto or New York film festivals (festival envy?), stars Stephen Dorff and Elle Fanning in a dramatic story of a father who tries to connect with his daughter after years of neglect. The fact that the dad is also a famous actor adds spice to this satire of Hollywood's self-obession and...
Film, at its most loftiest, can be a unifying force on the planet and the people who work in it, both in front and behind the camera, can be its "global citizens". That is the spirit that has inspired the Martha's Vineyard International Film Festival (MVIFF) to bestow their first ever Global Citizen Award to actor/activist Matthew Modine.
The award, created by local sculptor Barney Zeitz, will be presented on Saturday, September 11, 2010, following the screening of TH...
The Chinese film WINTER VACATION (Han Jia) has won the top prize, the Pardo d’oro/Golden Leopard for its director Li Hongqi at the Locarno Film Festival, which ended its 63rd edition on August 15. The award includes a 90,000 CHF cash prize. The film also won the FIPRESCI International Critics Prize, shared with fellow Chinese production KAMARAY by Xu Xin, which received a special mention.
WINTER’S VACATION centers on four idle, aimless adolescents who gather...
