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Female Filmmaker Friday: Little Women, 1994 (dir. Gillian Armstrong)
Full disclosure: I have not actually read Louisa May Alcott’s book (it’s the first thing I am going to read in 2015, though.) I have, however, seen Gillian Armstrong’s masterpiece more times than any other movie. I first saw it when it was in theaters. I went with my mother and we both loved it so much and when it was over she told me all about how much she loved the book (and its sequel), and yet for some reason I still haven’t read the book! *holds head in shame* This movie celebrates its 20th anniversary on Sunday and as far as I can tell the studio that has the distribution rights doesn’t give a hoot and isn’t doing anything for it; no anniversary Blu-ray, no anniversary screenings in LA, nothing! So I thought I would pay tribute to this beautiful film by writing about it for Female Filmmaker Friday right around its anniversary.
Movie Quote of the Day – Laurel Canyon, 2002 (dir. Lisa Cholodenko)
Jane: Are we ever gonna have a relationship?
Sam: We’re having a relationship. Here we are – having it.
Movie Quote of the Day – The Fighter, 2010 (dir. David O. Russell)
Alice Ward: Hello.
Mickey Ward: Alice, this is Charlene.
Charlene Fleming: Hi.
Alice Ward: I’ve heard a lot about you.
Charlene Fleming: Really? I’ve heard a lot about you, too.
Alice Ward: What’s that supposed to mean?
Charlene Fleming: Same thing you meant.
Movie Quote of the Day – Velvet Goldmine, 1998 (dir. Todd Haynes)
Curt Wild: We set out to change the world. . .ended up just changing ourselves.
Arthur Stuart: What’s wrong with that?
Curt Wild: Nothing, if you don’t look at the world.
Updated Precursors Chart, A Look At Best Supporting Actress
I’ve added a few more winners to the precursors chart. The Social Network, Fincher and Sorkin still lead their categories. Colin Firth leads Best Actor, Natalie Portman leads Best Actress and Christian Bale leads Best Supporting Actor.
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What has recently become interesting is the Best Supporting Actress category. At first Jacki Weaver for Animal Kingdom seemed to be primed for the award, with a win at the National Board of Review and a Golden Globe nomination. But she failed to receive a SAG nomination and that could hurt her chances. Melissa Leo in The Fighter has been picking up steam, with five critic awards wins, a Golden Globe and SAG nomination. Recently joining the race and picking up major momentum is Hailee Steinfeld from True Grit. Although she didn’t receive a Golden Globe nomination, she also have five critic award wins and a SAG nomination. With all the other acting fields relatively predictable (as well as most of the tech categories), Supporting Actress seems to be the most interesting race of the year.
State of the Race, Updated Precursors Chart
Still seeing several frontrunners – The Social Network for Best Picture, David Fincher for Best Director and Christian Bale for Best Supporting Actor in The Fighter. Best Actress seems to be split between Natalie Portman in Black Swan and Jennifer Lawrence in Winter’s Bone. Toy Story 3 seems to be the one to beat for Best Animated Film (no surprise there). A lot of the critics groups only have one screenplay category and Aaron Sorkin continues to dominate there. The SAG and Golden Globe nominations really help us get a shortlist of what actors will compromise the nominees for the Oscars, though they sometimes throw us a curveball. Once the PGA, WGA and DGA release their nominees we’ll have a better idea of what we might see Oscar nomination-wise.
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“The Social Network” Sweeps Boston Society of Film Critics Awards
Jesse Eisenberg, David Fincher and Aaron Sorkin all received awards. They also pushed Christian Bale even further into frontrunner status, naming him Best Supporting Actor of the year. Juliet Lewis is still in the mix, winning Best Supporting Actress of the year for Conviction.
Best Picture
The Social Network
Runner up: Toy Story 3
Movie Quote of the Day – American Psycho, 2000 (dir. Mary Harron)
Patrick Bateman: Harold, it’s Bateman, Patrick Bateman. You’re my lawyer so I think you should know: I’ve killed a lot of people. Some girls in the apartment uptown uh, some homeless people maybe 5 or 10 um an NYU girl I met in Central Park. I left her in a parking lot behind some donut shop. I killed Bethany, my old girlfriend, with a nail gun, and some man uh some old faggot with a dog last week. I killed another girl with a chainsaw, I had to, she almost got away and uh someone else there I can’t remember maybe a model, but she’s dead too. And Paul Allen. I killed Paul Allen with an axe in the face, his body is dissolving in a bathtub in Hell’s Kitchen. I don’t want to leave anything out here. I guess I’ve killed maybe 20 people, maybe 40. I have tapes of a lot of it, uh some of the girls have seen the tapes. I even, um… I ate some of their brains, and I tried to cook a little. Tonight I, uh, I just had to kill a LOT of people. And I’m not sure I’m gonna get away with it this time. I guess I’ll uh, I mean, ah, I guess I’m a pretty uh, I mean I guess I’m a pretty sick guy. So, if you get back tomorrow, I may show up at Harry’s Bar, so you know, keep your eyes open.
Precursors Chart and Some Frontrunners
It’s that time in Awards Season wherein I start maintaining a Precursors Chart, a handy chart that lets you know what films have won what awards. So far the char only has the Washington D.C. Film Critics, National Board of Review and Hollywood Film Award winners. But I’ll update it once a week or so as the various critics associations and guilds announce their winners.
(Click on the picture to see it full-sized)
So far the main frontrunners are The Social Network for picture, director and adapted screenplay, Christian Bale in The Fighter for supporting actor and Toy Story 3 for animated film. The rest of the categories are still pretty spread out, although we do have a pretty good look at possible nominees.
The National Board of Review – Awards Season is Officially Open
Like I said on my earlier post, winning at the NBR doesn’t necessarily mean winning come Oscar night. But it does help jump-start a film or a performance into the race and often is a good look at what the nominees could look like.
For example, Winter’s Bone‘s inclusion on their Top Ten list is a big push for a little film. So is Jennifer Lawrence’s win for Breakthrough Performance. Last year the NBR gave that award to two performances: Gabby Sidibe in Precious and Jeremy Renner in The Hurt Locker. Both performances wound up with Academy Award nominations.
the diary of a film history fanatic 