Link You, Link Me; Link It Together, Naturally

All Things Fangirl how traditionally trained our Oscar's acting nominees? This is hot. Yay, for new coverage angles.
Towleroad My latest column: Prodigal Sons has opened (finally!) so watch for it in your city. Plus, a few more words from my Lee Daniels (Precious) interview and Kathryn Bigelow's enviable man harem.
Movies Kick Ass Jose unveils his "best of '09"
The Critical Condition helps you win your Oscar pool with the live action and animated shorts
Cinematical "How open are you moviewise?" That's a good question. We like to think all of Film Experience's readers are wide open
I Need My Fix Angelina Jolie is 'Pretty in Paris' filming The Tourist
Pop Watch post Olympic competition, Johnny Weir continues to be awesome. Speaks out for all future girlyboys. Someone give him a medal, now please.
i09 With Dollhouse wrapped, what's next for Eliza Dushku on the bigscreen?

C'est La Gêne (in French) Who is the greatest actress in the world?


Elle s'appelle Nicole Kidman, n'est-ce pas?
Awards Daily Have you been following this whole Chartier mini-scandal?
Nick's Flick Picks YAY. Another year of Nick's Actress Project, 1944. The passage about Ingrid Bergman = Nicole Kidman is especially divine/interesting

BBC News the Olivier Award nominees over in London (home to an ever thriving theater culture) are like a laundry list of people we'd like to see in better movie roles and maybe during future Oscar seasons. Gillian Anderson, Jude Law (i.e. New Hamlet), James McAvoy, Rachel Weisz and Keira Knightley are the most famous ones. But there's still more enticements. Imelda Staunton, Eddie Redmayne, and remember Samuel West who was so bookishly bewitched bothered and bewildered by Helena Bonham-Carter's inner fire in Howards End) and Mark Rylance who, for a brief period was a go to guy for frequently naked dramas (Angels & Insects, Prospero's Books, Intimacy)? They're all nominated. What a group. Makes you want to book a longish trip to London and attend lots of shows.

Snub! The Story of Snub

Each year the Academy's documentary branch finds a new way to enrage film fans everywhere. This year's big casualty: Anvil! The Story of Anvil, the blissfully reviewed heavy metal documentary (my review). That unforgettable music doc's Oscar snub is unsurprising but in a way it only strengthens the movie, adding yet one more pitiable chord of try-try-try never succeed to the engrossing story -- think The Wrestler by way of Spinal Tap if you haven't seen it. Ewwww, I just pitched a movie as two other movies. I am SO sorry. I hate myself right now.

Other big name docs that got the thumbs down: We Live in Public, The September Issue, Tyson and Capitalism: A Love Story. My favorite doc of the year, Prodigal Sons, was not eligible for some sort of funding reason... I'm a little unclear on why.

Here are the 15 finalists that the AMPAS voters actually did love. Five of these will go on to be [drumroll please] ...Oscar Nominees. [cymbal crash]

• The Beaches of Agnes Agnes Varda (yay!)
  
• Burma VJ Anders Ostergaard
• The Cove Louie Psihoyos
• Every Little Step James D. Stern and Adam Del Deo (my review)
• Facing Ali Pete McCormack
• Food, Inc. Robert Kenner
• Garbage Dreams Mai Iskander
• Living in Emergency: Stories of Doctors Without Borders Mark N. Hopkins
• The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers Judith Ehrlich and Rick Goldsmith
• Mugabe and the White African Andrew Thompson and Lucy Bailey
• Sergio Greg Barker
• Soundtrack for a Revolution Bill Guttentag and Dan Sturman
• Under Our Skin Andy Abrahams Wilson
• Valentino The Last Emperor Matt Tyrnauer
• Which Way Home Rebecca Cammisa

I have absolutely nothing to say about the actual semi-finalists because I've seen but one of them. I don't even know what half of them are about. I'll correct that soon. Valentino at least awaits me and I'm anxious to get to it. More on these titles eventually.
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Tues Top Ten: Best of Year (Thus Far)

We're not technically halfway through the year (oops. missed that opportunity) but let's say January releases don't really count. That's not a stretch to say. If the year ended today here's what my top ten would like like (alpha order) with the Best Picture nominees in red. This isn't really the warm up to TFE's awards (unless the remainder of the year is hugely disappointing) it's more like lacing up your gym shoes before heading out to the warm-up. We hope.


Top Ten as of July 14th
larval stage

• (500) Days of Summer
• Coraline
• Duplicity
• Hunger
  
• The Hurt Locker
• Moon
  
• Julia
• Prodigal Sons
• Star Trek
  
• Up

I bent my usual roles (no documentaries -- since the goals are so different than regular feature films. How does one compare?) because I love Prodigal Sons so very much and want to keep reminding you about it before it premieres. This is the last "best of year (thus far)" post you'll get before the awards in January. Here's everything I've seen thus far. The three films I most regret missing and shall try to catch up with are Sin Nombre, Drag Me to Hell and Summer Hours.

And now the acting categories... my preferences NOT how Oscar might view them. That's an important distinction (Hunger for instance is not eligible at the Oscars this year due to a one week run in LA last year). Obviously the heavyweight Oscar hopefuls have not yet entered the room. Hollywood saves them for the holidays.

Best Actress

• Amy Adams, Sunshine Cleaning
• Emily Blunt, Sunshine Cleaning
• Zooey Deschanel, (500) Days of Summer
• Michelle Pfeiffer, Chéri
• Tilda Swinton, Julia

Only one of these women (Pfeiffer) can be expected to see awards season traction. But unless Chéri gets a significant Golden Globe or DVD boost, we might not have seen any of the eventual nominees yet.

Best Supporting Actress

• Patricia Clarkson, Whatever Works
• Marion Cotillard, Public Enemies
• Alicia Delmore, Humpday
  
• Carrie Preston, That Evening Sun / Duplicity
  
• Kristin Scott Thomas, Confessions of a Shopaholic

This category is a wasteland thus far. That's not to knock these performances but they're mostly minor pleasures: Clarkson is typically strong but the character is a caricature. Cotillard handles the big emotional scenes very well but can't make sense of the nonsensical screenplay (in regards to her character Billie) and the voice is wrong. Etcetera. Silver lining: I will be watching Carrie Preston's career closely. Those are two very different performances and both detours from her Arlene character in True Blood. Well done.

Best Actor

• Michael Fassbender, Hunger
• Hal Holbrook, That Evening Sun
• Joseph Gordon Levitt, (500) Days of Summer
• Jeremy Renner, The Hurt Locker
  
• Sam Rockwell, Moon

In case you're wondering, the only 2009 man with an actual shot at Oscar's shortlist so far (Johnny Depp, Public Enemies) would be my runner up here (give or take Ciarán Hands in The Eclipse). I liked what Depp was doing as John Dillinger but I needed him to do more of it. If someone decides to release Holbrook's vehicle, That Evening Sun, there's a chance he could be in the Oscar race, too, playing a defiant old codger who knows his time is winding down. It's not a grossly sentimental work (thank you!) but it definitely has an emotional current that the Academy could get pulled along with given the proper campaign and release.

Best Supporting Actor

• Jim Broadbent, Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince
  
• Paul Giamatti, Duplicity
• Anthony Mackie, The Hurt Locker
• Ray McKinnon, That Evening Sun
• Tom Wilkinson, Duplicity

And just for fun a few craft categories...

Best Art Direction

• Laura Fox, (500) Days of Summer
• Alan McDonald, Chéri
• Henry Selick, Coraline
• new Stuart Craig, Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (eek. I forgot this the first time through. sorry)
  
• Alex McDowell, Watchmen
• Ricky Nierva, Up
  

Best Cinematography

• Dairus Khondji, Chéri
• Barry Ackroyd, The Hurt Locker
• Sean Bobbitt, Hunger
• Yorick Le Saux, Julia
• Dante Spinotti, Public Enemies

Best Costume Design

• Colleen Atwood, Public Enemies
• Consolata Boyle, Chéri
• Hope Hanafin, (500) Days of Summer
• April Napier, Julia
• Michael Kaplan, Star Trek

Best Original Score

• Bruno Coulais, Coraline
• Alexandre Desplat, Chéri
• Jordan Lehning, Make-Out With Violence
• Clint Mansell, Moon
• Michael Giacchino, Up
  

What are your favorite filmthings of the year thus far ?
Talk me into loving something else or something more. Do you expect your favorites will be washed away by the greatness of the fall / winter movies?

Vodcast: Best of 2009 So Far

I hadn't seen the same movies as Katey this week so instead of reviewing a movie, we're both listing our top five of January through May. The requirement was that the films already had opened. Otherwise my list would have included Prodigal Sons (discussed here) and maybe (500) Days of Summer (discussed here).



The 2009 film I'm most worried about having missed at this point is the well reviewed Sin Nombre (trailer) so I'll be seeking that out. Obviously our rankings are subject to change, given the "sticky" factor (you never know which films will refuse to leave your mind until a month or three later) and the comparative factor (does upcoming film B suddenly reveal cracks in similar earlier film A?). It's been a good year thus far but I still doubt we've seen many of our Oscar competitors even if we have most definitely seen two or three future film experience nominees.

P.S. If you're looking for a Tuesday Top Ten the series will relaunch properly soon. My favs (disregarding release schedules) thus far in descending order go like so: Prodigal Sons, Hunger, Coraline, Up, Julia, (500) Days of Summer, Duplicity, Star Trek, Anvil: The Story of Anvil and... uh... three way tie for 10th -- it's early don't make me decide -- between Moon, Chéri and That Evening Sun.
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Best of the Fest ~ Goodbye Nashville

As you read this I am quite possibly thousands of miles above you in a huge aluminum alloy vessel, travelling back to NYC. Nashville was a treat and I hope I get invited back to NaFF in some capacity. Here's a quick run down of the cinematic highlights for me. I was on the short film jury and didn't have a chance to see some of the narrative features so this is from a limited pool.

Best Overall Prodigal Sons Filmmaker Kimberly Reed tells me she'll be ineligible for the Oscar for Best Documentary because of something to do with BBC screening or funding (?) which is a real shame because I could see it getting nominated. Other goodies: (500) Days of Summer and That Evening Sun, pictured left. [more on Prodigal / more on Summer]
Best Actress Zooey Deschanel in (500) Days of Summer
Best Actor Hal Holbrook as "Abner Meecham" in That Evening Sun. It's based on the short story by William Gay about a farmer who escapes the old folks home and returns to his beloved farm only to find it occupied by new tenants. The film is well directed by Scott Teems, graduating from short films to his first feature, and an Oscar campaign could materialize for Holbrook if this movie gets a solid enough release. Holbrook plays a stubborn old ornery codger... one could say it's an Eastwood'ish role with less of Clint's squinty menace and more of Hal's weary sensitivity. Honorable mention: Joseph Gordon-Levitt in (500) Days of Summer

Best Supporting Actress Three standouts for me. Don't make me choose. It's actresses.

Kaitlin Olsen in Weather Girl pictured right. At first I thought she was doing just an amusing but generic perky blonde sendup. Then she took a late film monologue much farther than I believed it could go. Laugh out loud funny. 4realz. I actually LOLed. Shellie Marie Shartzer in Make-Out with Violence. She has no lines to speak of as dead girl "Wendy" but man does she sell the conceit and work her physicality [more on Make-Out]. Remember that woman that Clive Owen comically seduced over martinis in Duplicity? That's Carrie Preston who is moving in That Evening Sun as a woman who is trying to stand by her man. Mia Wasikowska is also good as her restless friendly daughter. [You'll be seeing the In Treatment regular a lot onscreen soon. She's in Amelia later this year and then Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland]. She wants to get away from Daddy as soon as possible.

...speak of the devil.

Best Supporting Actor Ray McKinnon as Lonzo Choat in That Evening Sun. He plays the tenant of Meecham's old farm. They both want each other off the land. They both intend to stay. McKinnon never once lets his white trash role teeter towards dimensionless bad guy, even though he does despicable things and is pitted against the ultra sympathetic Holbrook. That's quite a feat and this treatment of the character really girds up the central conflict. You might remember McKinnon as Revered HW Smith on Deadwood.

I didn't see the performance that won a special prize for acting from the main jury here (Vincent D'Onofrio in The Narrows) but since the character is disabled I don't know how much to trust that prize. You know how disabled equals kudos as acting goes.

I don't know if I'll have time to talk about the dozens upon dozens of short films I screened but Nick has done a frankly awesome job of relating what our jury decisions were about and reviewing many of the best shorts along his way.

Here's his take on the animated shorts (my favorite was Western Spaghetti) documentary shorts (The Witness was tops and I wanted Steel Homes for our honorable mention but I couldn't convince my fellow jurors to go with it for the prize. grrrr) and several posts on the plethora of live action shorts. We watched for hours upon hours.

Oh, look here's Western Spaghetti. It fills me with delight.

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Transgendered Siblings & Zombie Girlfriends

NaFF ~ Day Five
Yesterday I caught the film that got Nicole Kidman and her hubby here on day three, a documentary called Prodigal Sons. I have no idea why Kidman herself chose it (perhaps it was research for The Danish Girl?) but she chose well. The film is from transgendered filmmaker Kimberly Reed and begins by recounting her journey to her 20 year high school reunion. Her hometown knew her as football quarterback Paul. For the film's first several minutes I expected that the movie would be a traditional but queer slanted memoir doc. I assumed it would recount this reunion and disparate reactions to Paul's new identity as Kim and Kim's own struggles with accepting her past (a lot of post-operative transgendered types destroy all photos and pretend that said past didn't exist). I underestimated it.

Prodigal Sons quickly morphs into something much greater. It's a complicated, well judged and rather astounding study of identity (not just Kim's), family history and dynamics, shared phantoms, mental illness, grief, biological and adoptive parenting, and even some old Hollywood history. I don't want to tell you more than the tag line does "a brotherly rivalry between a man and a woman... and Orson Welles" because I'm really glad I went into it blind. There were moments that hit me like a truck emotionally. I assume it will find distribution and get a major market theatrical release and when it does, go. A-

The other film I saw yesterday was called Make-Out with Violence, a real oddity about two brothers and the girls they pine over, one of whom is dead. Here is the trailer.



The film surprisingly won the top honor at the festival (from the jury that included Elvis Mitchell and Girlfriend's director Claudia Weill). I assume that they were responding to its promise and on that I'd agree. I'd definitely like to see a second picture from the Deagol Brothers. I wanted to love it a lot more than I did but it's worth a look.

On the plus side it has a few really terrific moments, solid visual ideas, beautiful cinematography (it doesn't often look like a low budget indie) and an extremely creepy and well performed twist on the notion of "zombies". In the minus column, it struck me as quite messy: too many characters (two of whom could have been extracted from the picture with very minor script changes), dropped implicated plot threads and an overly repetitive structure. But most problematic I thought was its absolutely bizarre sense of pacing. Nick told me he actually liked its arrythmic feel but it didn't work for me. Initially I gave this film a B- but it linger well. So I'm bumping it up to a B. I am a tough grader [sigh]. I think people who tend to respond to unusual takes on horror or dreamy takes on privileged kids (there's a teensy bit of a Sofia Coppola feel going on within the cinematography) will like it a lot more than I did. I hope some distributor picks it up and asks for another round of editing because the Deagol Brothers have something here but some fine tuning never hurt.

more later...
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I Missed Nicole! And Other Festival Stumbles

Nashville Film Festival ~ Day 2
Began the day with the Inuit drama Before Tomorrow and fantastical optimism. Basically I was expecting another Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner. Atanarjuat, one should know, is nearly impossible to repeat. Followed that with a tiny indie called Mothers & Daughters (so tiny it doesn't have an IMDB page) which... I hesitate to talk about. It was so in love with its actresses that I imagine it would be the type of movie I would make (warts and all) if someone handed me production equipment and several eager actresses eager to chew on scenery. Not that anyone should hand me those.

<--- You'd probably be more interested to hear that it was preceded by a short called Water Pills which starred none other than Winona Ryder. She played a shaky sweating desperate hot mess of a former actress / addict. Um... ouch. She attacked the role so aggressively that I kept thinking she was going for a deglam Oscar. Apparently nobody had the heart to tell her that it was only a short film and you can't win gold for those.

That said, Noni fared better in front of the camera than other big 90s stars did behind it... but more on Demi Moore and Courtney Cox later.

Nashville Film Festival ~ Day 3
Finished jury discussions/ selections today (must keep private until the reveal closing night) so for the rest of the fest I'm off the hook for official duties. Now it's just about seeing movies and trying to spot celebrities. Today there was a lot of excitement on the red carpet but I didn't recognize most of the people causing the rubbernecking. You'd be safe to assume that that's because I know zilch about country music and this is Nashville. The only country stars I'd recognize are those who've married A list actresses (i.e. Chesney & Urban), tried their hand at acting (Reba, Mr & Mrs. McGraw-Hill) or played themselves in movies I'm obsessed with (I do not ♥ Shania Twain but I sure do ♥ Huckabees)

Giancarlo Esposito and Dominique Swain working the crowds

Nick and I did speak briefly with Giancarlo Esposito in the VIP tent after the screening of his directorial debut Gospel Hill. I told him I was thrilled to see Angela Bassett again -- we don't see her enough -- and he said that he was glad to have finally met her through this movie (they didn't know each other before? Or maybe he said he was finally able to work with her through this movie. It was noisy in there). The movie is loaded with celebrities as first films from known actors tend to be. The Bassett but also: Taylor Kitsch, Danny Glover, Nia Long, Samuel L Jackson, Adam Baldwin. Julia Stiles also appeared working her absolutely favorite miniscule niche: down white girl in interracial dramas. It's more niche than Jodie Foster in tight spaces.

A few minutes after meeting Giancarlo I learned that ♥Nicole Kidman♥ was in the building! If you must know, she and Keith were attending the premiere of the documentary Prodigal Sons in the next theater while I was watching Gospel Hill (so close and yet so far!). They chased it with Antonio Campos' Afterschool (which I saw at NYFF last year). I waited in vain for her to come out of the latter but she was too sneaky. Secret exit! I should have known. Basically I have zero in the way of stalking skills. I love my favorites but I'm mostly content to do so virtually and from afar.
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