The Highs and Lows of Oscar Afterglow

Kurt here from Your Movie Buddy

Even barring the obvious perennial faves like Meryl Streep and Randy Newman, don't the Oscar nominations continually feel like class reunions? For every John Hawkes, there's an Amy Adams. For every Aronofsy, a Coen brother. Of this year's nominees in the eight major categories (that'd be producers, actors, directors and writers), 20 of them earned prior nominations within the last six years. Now, this is of course partly due to the fact many of these folks are indeed the best in the business (if Scott Rudin promises to produce a movie like The Social Network every year, I'll start digging a mine just for the purposes of throwing gold at him), but it also joins December's annual jam-packed awards-bait schedule as further proof that the Academy's short-term memory dictates much of their decision-making.

And that can yield some positive outcomes for Oscar-watchers. Harvey Weinstein's gag-me-with-a-doily campaign for The King's Speech aside, Colin firth deserves every bit of the praise – if not, perhaps, every freakin' award – he's received for his heroic star turn, and if his recognition for A Single Man helped that along, then all the better. Likewise, if a recent victory at the Kodak podium is what caused a performance like Javier Bardem's in Biutiful to derail a veteran bone-throw to Robert DuVall, I'm all for it.

YOU AGAIN: Bardem, Firth, Bridges

But then there's the issue of undeserved honorees who choke out the worthy competition because of who they are and how freshly familiar they are among the comfort-over-quality voters. I don't think there's any way Melissa Leo's LOOK AT ME!! white-trash theatrics weren't going to get the attention they demanded, so I won't waste sentences describing my personal distaste for the performance (I know Nathaniel feels differently)and the belief that a Frozen River paved her road. But how about Jeff Bridges? Isn't his Rooster Cogburn, however amusing, a rather snoozy portrayal that would have been passed over if not for the newly-Oscared man behind the eye patch?

The Coens: Oscar's power coupleAnd what about those Coens? It's thrilling that their richly deserved No Country For Old Men win has given them carte blanche in Hollywood, but did they really need to be in the running yet again? They already snagged a preposterous, space-filling Best Picture nod last year with their most outre effort to date, and now they've unseated Christopher Nolan, which they themselves have acknowledged with innuendos. What's it going to take for them to alleviate all the Academy swooning? A black-and-white, foreign-language documentary about black transgendered prostitutes? (Get crackin', boys!)

Of course, this whole phenomenon isn't new (one need only look at the careers of guys like Tom Hanks and Johnny Depp for evidence of Oscar's afterglow tendencies), but it does seem to be an increasing norm, and not just because the nominees are pros in their primes. Per the pattern, we don't exactly need a crystal ball to envision which of this year's hopefuls may well be back in 2012. David Fincher has The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, which already has the combination of proven craft and surefire box office to make it a contender. If Like Crazy can ride the same Sundance-to-Oscar wave as Winter's Bone, then co-star Jennifer Lawrence could find herself in the discussion again. And we're certainly all familiar with James Franco's output. Who's to say he won't be the next to shine in the afterglow light?

Fincher, Lawrence and Franco: Future afterglow beneficiaries?

Do you think Oscar afterglow is good? Bad? Both? Some of this year's nominees will surely be benefitting soon.

"New Year's Eve" Throws Pfeiffer in the Trash

The headline may be provocative but it's unfortunately (and literally) true. To my great distress veteran director Garry Marshall has decided to throw Michelle Pfeiffer in the garbage in a scene from the all star "comedy" New Year's Eve (2011). Here she is filming in NYC.

Sigh.

Honestly Mr. Marshall, this just seems like asking for trouble. If you make jokes involving movie stars and garbage, aren't you daring the reviews to write themselves? It's not like the star-studded lead-in Valentine's Day (2010) was a critical darling!

And if you're going to cast Michelle Pfeiffer why do you want her drabbed down? I hate it when they make her mousy. She looks better than this just walking around with her husband without a team of makeup artists handy. Mousy Michelle is not what audiences come to see. There better be a makeover moment later in the film.

New Year's Eve, which like its predecessors charts the intertwining lives of several couples and singles throughout a holiday, has a couple dozen stars in it including other big names like Hilary Swank, Julie Andrews, Halle Berry, Sarah Jessica Parker,  some TV biggies (Sofia Vergara, Lea Michele) and many more but apparently La Pfeiff is paired with a bike riding Zac Efron somehow (mother/son? fateful strangers?)

I can't decide whether I should be happy to see her onscreen again on December 9th or dread the very likely probability that she is adding another terrible movie to her weirdly haphazard filmography.

On that note the actress herself has generously demonstrated this How I Feel / How I Wish I Felt conundrum for me.

When thinking about this movie, which look best describes your mood: left or right?

Podcast: Return Engagements, 2010 Memories

It's part 2 of the last pre-Oscar podcast. Nick, Nathaniel, Katey and Joe complete their role swap conversation. Other features include.

• "Range" does Jesse Eisenberg have it?
• Melissa Leo's filmography
• Sofia Coppola, John Cameron Mitchell, Nicole Holofcener
• Matt Reeves and other directors to watch
• What directors learn from success or failure
• Mark Harris' GQ piece on Inception's box office
• Tilda & Luca
• Christian Bale and Oscar nominees in superhero films
• Statistics about 2nd nominations
• When does Amy Adams become "overdue"?

Join in the conversations in the comments. Which young directors will one day be occupying the Aronofsky/Fincher spots of "finally breaking through" with Oscar? Which of this year's newbies will come back for second nominations?

Podcast: 2010 Memories, Return Engagements

My Own Private Franco

In his ongoing hipster efforts to become the gayest straight man of all time, or maybe just the most storied and/or most interesting celebrity of the new millenium, James Franco recently joined  forces with his Milk (2008) auteur Gus Van Sant for another look at the gay hustler drama My Own Private Idaho (1991) starring Keanu Reeves and the late great River Phoenix. They've collaborated on a two film exhibit for the Gagosian called "Unfinished". It opens this saturday so that Franco may completely own the weekend. He's hosting the Oscars on Sunday.

The films are called Endless Idaho, which is 12 hours long featuring unused footage from the film shoot as well as footage shot years before that Van Sant showed Franco during the Milk period, and My Own Private River, which is described like so.

My Own Private River consists largely of shots of Phoenix 's character, Mike, woven into a compelling portrait. Franco describes being mesmerized by Phoenix 's "uninhibited acting" in this unreleased footage, and his edit captures the gifted actor at his most emotionally expressive and physically dynamic. The score is by Michael Stipe, who is an art school drop-out.

If I were in Beverly Hills, I'd gladly take this in. River Phoenix's "Mike" is one of the best performances of the Nineties if you ask me, and he was criminally denied an Oscar nomination (the film was completely snubbed though River did win the Independent Spirit Award). I still vividly remember receiving the news of his death, a shock so sudden and dispiriting for the cinema that I have (gratefully) only ever experienced it's like one other time (Heath Ledger).

"Chris, that was no dream"

Too funny not to share, though I was suspicious at first. Hilarious, really, all told. The video pokes good fun at Black Swan, The Social Network and Christopher Nolan's Inception in particular and has the smarts to end before the 3½ minute mark. [Thanks to Jorge for the tip]