Best Costume Design and More...

It's Eye Candy weekend

Do you have a favorite horse in the Costume Design race? Sandy Powell (The Young Victoria) and Colleen Atwood (Nine) are facing off yet again. They both have 8 nominations and 2 wins behind them. The elaborate rags of The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus and two movies with self-made fashionistas as protagonists (Coco Before Chanel and Bright Star) are also in the running. I've whipped up a gallery for your edification. So, why don't you take a looksie and then vote in the poll. And if you love this sort of thing (and you should!) you can also see my personal ballot (and medalists).



I'm assuming that The Young Victoria will take the Oscar because, the beauty of its costume aside for a moment, Royalty Porn nearly always triumphs in this category. Royalty Porn is to this category what psycho killers are to Supporting Actor and what longsuffering girlfriend/spouse is to Supporting Actress and what DeGlam is for Best Actress (though not so much this year). In other words, it's their drug of choice.

P.S. An interview with my favorite working costume designer is coming up soon!

P.P.S. New readers choice polls require your attention, too: Director, Original Score, Cinematography. You can see how the collective polls for the major categories are shaping up right here ...and there's only a few days left to vote on all of them.

(Un)Lucky Star.

Jose here bringing you some more award news.

The Costume Designers Guild announced their nominees for 2009.
In what's becoming a ridiculous set of snubs, Jane Campion's Bright Star was once again ignored for much less remarkable achievements (odd considering how much the costumes are actual part of the movie's plot). After the egregious snub by the Cinematographers Guild it's been clear how much people have decided to just pretend the movie doesn't exist.
You didn't have to like the film to see how great the cinematography and costumes were, right?

Now on to the nominees,

Fantasy

• Avatar (Mayes C. Rubeo, Deborah Lynn Scott)
• The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (Monique Prudhomme)
• Star Trek (Michael Kaplan)

The fact the CGI loincloths from Avatar were nominated in this category is a reminder of how much people are dying to reward this film.

Contemporary

• (500) Days of Summer (Hope Hanafin)
• Bruno (Jason Alper)
• Crazy Heart (Doug Hall)
• Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire (Marina Draghici)
• Up in the Air (Danny Glicker)

Bruno being here proves my previous point about Bright Star. Both movies have fashion as essential plot elements, of course one's crass, the other's class, but still that doesn't diminish or improve their technical achievements.
I find it strange that they snubbed The Lovely Bones here though or did they think it was more fantasy?

Period

• Coco Before Chanel (Catherine Leterrier)
• Julie & Julia (Ann Roth)
• Nine (Colleen Atwood)
• Sherlock Holmes (Jenny Beavan)
• The Young Victoria (Sandy Powell)

I'm guessing this could be what Oscar's lineup will look like. With AMPAS favorites Atwood, Roth and Powell leading the way we might have ourselves another Oscar win in this category where the most blah movie takes the prize on account of how many ruffles and bows the gowns have.
I find it interesting that Coco Before Chanel made it here, especially because the most notorious costumes from the movie were actually Karl Lagerfeld's work.
I guess that guild members assumed that to snub a movie about a designer would be insane.
Which, don't make me say it, but only reminds me of the John Keats movie...

What was your favorite costume on a movie last year? do you think these nominees represent 2009 well?

Linkables and NINE

In Contention no Kidman in Woody Allen's 2010 picture. Sorry folks. I don't wanna say I told ya so. But...
Low Resolution on the Whatever Works trailer. Woody may be back in NYC but he's never really approached southerners and gay characters before, has he?
Boy Culture a very gay 'blind item'
Cinema de Merde on X-Men Origins: Wolverine

Should you watch it? No, you should probably clean your room instead

And Your Little Blog, Too sees Debbie Reynolds in concert. Molly Brown, still Unsinkable
Hollywood Elsewhere on the talk about Sherlock Holmes "bromance" between Jude Law and Robert Downey Jr
The Quiet Earth Sweden has another vampire movie.
Art of the Title Sequence looks at the Hulk movies
The Post Game Show American Idol's God vs. Devil showdown. It's no secret that I don't care a whit about AI. I think it's rotting people's brains ever faster than the Hulu aliens could have dreamed. But despite that, I made it all the way through this article and enjoyed it which means ~ must read (if you're into AI).
Thompson on Hollywood keeps us up to date on Sony Pictures Classics. They're buying what's selling at Cannes. In addition to new films from Almodovar, Allen and Michael Haneke, they've actually bought both Coco Chanel pictures: Coco Avant Chanel and Coco Chanel and Igory Stravinsky. I know the spin is that they want them both but I'm guessing it's so that someone else doesn't release one of them at the same time as the one they really wanted. Or am I too cynical?

And finally, ET's Nine preview (via). It's hard to pull anything really fron this preview really... all quick cuts and circling ladies... bad sound. But the marketing team is leaning heavily towards Dame Judi Dench, don't you think?



This just in 05/14: THE REAL TRAILER HAS ARRIVED