Two recent trade editorials have driven us crazy enough to write long hair-pulling screeds in response. We're bald now! The first was a 'dishonorable' defense of our #1 gripe Category Fraud and we'll be quicker about this one which is about our second biggest pet peeve of Oscar season: 'the holiday glut' aka the ghettoization of adult movies into the final quarter of each year.
The Hollywood Reporter's "Everybody Cannibalized Each Other" - Harvey Weinstein
Weinstein begins his guest editorial by calling the final quarter glut of awards-hopefuls a "pet peeve" which is fine if we say it... but him?!? He championed it for 20 years with his own actions!
Carol is actually set around Christmas time. A late year release that actually feels justified for a change
He writes...
The fall has become...so top-heavy with adult-driven awards releases that it has made it almost impossible for quality films to reach their full potential unless they dare release at another time of year, where they are quickly forgotten come awards season.
That's true. But Weinstein's Miramax and Weinstein Co history popularized the 'wait until the last quarter' and it did so at the expense of richer films from other studios that were released earlier in those years. Over the years other distributors have copied his methods and we have this exact problem of late year glut which he now calls "a dangerous track"...
We're all going for the same audience... and because of that no one is able to make a huge impression.
That's partially true but it's hard to read this, knowing the source, and not feel that he just isn't happy that he's now forced to share the strategies he pioneered. Now that he sometimes loses the competions.
Weinstein's Miramax and then later his Weinstein Co, regularly landed nominations for last second release patterns that he's complaining about in this piece. The strategy is actually ideal for films that are fast fades but have the air of prestige. Films that would not have devoured so many nominations or any at all if people had had the opportunity to truly weigh them. We're speaking of trifles or artistic partial-misfires like Cider House Rules (Dec 17th, 1999), Chocolat (Dec 22nd, 2000), Gangs of New York (Dec 20th, 2002), Cold Mountain (Dec 25th, 2004), The Reader (Dec 12th, 2008), Nine (Dec 18th, 2009), The Iron Lady (Dec 30th, 2011), August: Osage County (Dec 27th, 2013). Etcetera...
When Weinstein begins to sing the praises of films from other studios that were released earlier this year that don't seem to be in play like Far From the Madding Crowd, it's kind of lovely. But then the love curdles. It's just an elaborate setup to push his own movies. He turns his complaints about the system he engineered into a free FYC ad for his own movies.
I've released two films in the "off season" this year, Woman in Gold and Southpaw, that feature unbelievable lead performances from Helen Mirren and Jake Gyllenhaal, respectively, both worthy of all the adulation and respect they received from critics and audiences at the time of their release — but because of the stigma of their release dates, aren't taken as seriously as they should be.
The only thing "unbelievable" about Helen Mirren's work in Woman in Gold is how phoned-in it was. Even by her standards! Tatiana Maslany is running circles around her as the younger version of the character. As with controversies about the lack of female directors getting work or the lack of people of color nominated for Oscars, you undermine righteous arguments when you use less than deserving examples.
I can't even get into the bit where he defends Rooney Mara's category fraud for Carol
I know there’s been controversy ...we decided, for the good of the movie, that we had to play as a team with this one.
Play as a team? That's what Cate & Rooney do so spectacularly in the movie. That is not what lying about the size of Rooney Mara's role is doing. Don't pretend that Cate carried it alone. This is a duet from the very start to the very finish. If the Weinstein Co were 'playing as a team' with Carol they'd realize that the perpetually employed but still underappreciated Sarah Paulson is a spectacular character actress worthy of a campaign herself but you've shoved her to the side like she's meaningless because you'd like both of your leading ladies to win Oscars. This is virtually the opposite of playing as a team.
But back to release schedules. Harvey helped create the giant year-end monster and now objects to its enormous appetite and the beautiful little gardens it tramples on it hunt for Oscars.
Still, for the sake of the industry, I'd like to know that if we released Carol in August or Hateful Eight in July, we could have the same results while spreading out the marketplace.
Then try it! Don't just ask other distributors to get out of your way in December because you didn't release these films in the summer.
Harvey than asks pundits and writers to champion early releases vigorously which is a reasonable request. We do that all the time here. But it is unfortunately true that media types call things Oscar worthy all the time and then don't ever bring them up again at the end of the year when the new shiny toys arrive.
Then Harvey is back to his side of the screen...
As distributors, we need to continue releasing smart and bold films year-round.... Otherwise, our worst fears will be realized, with intelligent, daring adult dramas marginalized and cannibalized, and nothing but tentpoles left in their wake.
Weinstein is absolutely right about the dangers of ghettoizing adult films into the final quarter. But you know that old saying "Don't shoot the messenger!"? What if the message is just fine but it's the messenger that's dubious?