The Film Experience

The Artist, Albert Brooks, Michelle Williams and The Tree of Life's cinematography continue to assert dominance in the regional critics prizes as two more circles & societies weigh in. How long until we have 60 US critics organizations, one for each state plus a handful of redundant consolidating regional groups and another handful of national groups?

11 perfs by 9 women have divvied up Critics Supporting Actress prizes in North America

Meanwhile Supporting Actress --which is a real clusterf*** to predict with 6 women doing superbly in precursors and 2 more super lauded performances waiting eagerly for a miracle stumble from one of those 6 -- continues to be a total free for all among critics groups as I've illustrated with this map of the prizes thus far... so exciting! Would that more races would inspire this much healthy difference of opinion, art being subjective and all.

I've been discussing the Best Supporting Actress race with other pundits recently and I'm finding it amusing how "obvious" everyone claims it is despite no one agreeing on who is out front or who gets dumped. How then, can it be obvious? Even the statistics don't solve this equation as will be noted after the jump...

Erik Childress at Movies.com did a statistical break down a week back using the Chicago Film Critics Association as an unusual indicator (they don't get that much attention outside of Chicago) and 25 of 27 Supporting Actresses who did as well as Jessica Chastain, Octavia Spencer and Bérénice Bejo have been doing in precursors went on to be Oscar-nominated. From there it gets very inconclusive (numbers wise) and he thinks four other women are still totally in the race making this a 7 way race for the 5-wide shortlist.

"I'd probably be more comfortable with six... it's a lot of energy to deal with."

Here is what he adds to that discussion by email printed with his permission of course:

Melissa McCarthy got BFCA, SAG and Chicago nods

Shailene Woodley got BFCA, Globes and Chicago nods.

Janet McTeer got SAG and Globes

Carey Mulligan got BFCA and Chicago

Here is who that puts them in league with:

McCarthy - Steinfeld (True Grit), Keener (Capote), Adams (Junebug)

3-for-3

Woodley - Weaver (Animal Kingdom), Moore (A Single Man), Connelly (A Beautiful Mind)

2-for-3 (*Connelly was nominated lead by the SAGs that year)

McTeer - Cruz (Nine), Latifah (Chicago), Bello (The Cooler)

2-for-3

Mulligan - Bello (A History of Violence), Harden (Mystic River), Streep (Adaptation)

2-for-3

This race is WIDE open.

And that still doesn't account for Vanessa Redgrave... who I am stubbornly holding on to for a few more days. Perhaps BAFTA will come through?

If you're just going by Statistics I wonder if it's Woodley who is dropping out... (Connelly doesn't really work as a comparison due to the basically lead role and SAG lead nomination) but then again... The Descendants is one of the strongest BP hopefuls so perhaps that's insane.

Oklahoma Film Critics Circle
Picture The Artist (top ten in descending order: Drive, The Descendants, Hugo, Shame, Moneyball, Midnight in Paris, Melancholia, The Tree of Life and The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo)
Director Michel Hazanavicius, The Artist
Actress Michelle Williams, My Week With Marilyn
Actor George Clooney, The Descendants
Supporting Actress Octavia Spencer, The Help
Supporting Actor Albert Brooks, Drive
Original Screenplay: The Artist
Adapted Screenplay: Moneyball
Animated: The Adventures of Tintin
Documentary: Page One: Inside the New York Times
Foreign Film: The Skin I Live In
First Feature: Sean Durkin, Martha Marcy May Marlene
Obviously Worst Film: Transformers: Dark of the Moon
Not-So-Obviously Worst Film: The Hangover Part II
Guilty Pleasure: Fright Night

Ahhh, Fright Night. I keep forgetting that was this year. Colin Farrell was terrif. But doesn't some other group also do this "obviously" and "not so obviously" prize? Maybe they're sister organizations? Or share members?

Also as much as I love The Artist, I'm a bit disappointed they didn't go with Drive because of variety of critical opinions is the only reason to have a variety of film critics awards.

Phoenix Film Critics Society
Picture The Artist (rest of top ten in alpha order: The Descendants, Drive, The Help, Hugo, Midnight in Paris, Moneyball, My Week With Marilyn, Super 8, and The Tree of Life)
Director Michel Hazanavicius, The Artist
Actress Elizabeth Olsen, Martha Marcy May Marlene
Actor Jean Dujardin, The Artist
Supporting Actress Bérénice Bejo, The Artist
Supporting Actor Albert Brooks, Drive
Original Screenplay: The Artist
Adapted Screenplay: The Help
Ensemble: Super 8
Animated: Rango
Documentary: Page One: Inside the New York Times
Foreign Film: The Skin I Live In
Family Film The Muppets
Overlooked Film A Better Life
Original Song "Life's a Happy Song" The Muppets
Original Score The Artist
Cinematography The Tree of Life
Editing The Artist
Production Design Hugo
Costume Design The Artist
Visual Effects Hugo
Stunts Drive
Breakthrough On Camera Thomas Horn Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
Breakthrough Behind Camera Michel Hazanavicius
Best Performance by a Youth in Lead or Supporting, Male Thomas Horn
Best Performance by a Youth in Lead or Supporting, Female Saoirse Ronan, Hanna

Extremely Loud seems to be following the "Nine" route. Opening super late and then pissing people off instead of delighting them.

Unfortunately the Phoenix Critics decided to do the shameless "We predicted the Oscars!" thing on their website since they went with The King's Speech last year when everyone else was joining The Social Network. Therefore it's hard to take them seriously. A) One should not brag about preferring TKS to TSN ;) and B) Obvious Broken Record Note We Will Keep Saying Until Critics Orgs Listen: It is the job of film critics to discuss films. It is not the job of film critics to predict the Oscars. If that's what ur doing with ur "Best Film" award, ur doin it wrong.

Also: How schizo is their top ten? Did they each get to pick a movie without consulting the others?