Berlinale goes for genderless acting prizes

There were quite a few comments the other day wondering why we hadn't shared the news that Berlinale, one of the world's top film festivals, will no longer be giving out separate Best Actress and Best Actor prizes. Instead they'll now be giving out two genderless acting prizes, one for a leading role and one for a supporting role. The reason we hadn't yet shared the news is that we found it self-sabotaging and depressing. A disclaimer before we continue: Before yet another angry comment explosion wherein we're accused of not having any perspective -- 'the world is burning, who cares about movie awards,' etcetera, you know the drill -- we must state upfront that we're fully aware that film awards are not the most important thing going on in the world. To which we must also state "duh!" reflectively and pre-emptively. But this is a film site, and a film site that is obsessed with film awards so please just let us do our thing. If you want to read about the world burning, you're at the wrong website anyway. This one is built for talking about arts and entertainment with a heavy emphasis on the filmed kind.

Now let's continue to the Berlinale topic...

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Poland's Oscar stats and the first 2020 news of the International Feature Race

If you've been reading TFE for any length of time, you already know we're obsessive about Oscar's Foreign Language Film race, last year retitled to Best International Feature Film. Normally we've long since begun talking about the submission list, but 2020 remains an unruly unusual beast. But we do have two pieces of news to share regarding our favourite non-actress based category.

First, we've neglected to mention that Oscar's longer-than-usual release eligibility period has also affected Best International Film...

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1938: Doris Nolan in "Holiday"

Before each Smackdown, Nick Taylor highlights alternates to the Oscar nominations for Best Supporting Actress... 

I’ve written about a lot of movies for this series that have meant a great deal to me, both because I love them and because they are very, very good. With only three events left in this current Smackdown season, I think I can safely guess that I will not be writing about a film that has touched me quite as dearly as Holiday has. Along with being an indisputable peak in classical Hollywood filmmaking, in the romantic comedy genre, in the careers of its directors and its leading couple, the film is also a deceptively sharp ensemble feature. To say any performer matches the heights Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant reach would be hard to argue, but to call Doris Nolan's savvy, multifaceted supporting turn as the character who kicks the whole plot into motion a sterling achievement all its own is a claim I'd be very happy to make...

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Emmy Review: Lead Actress in a Comedy

By Abe Friedtanzer

I’m still sad that Elle Fanning isn’t here for The Great and I can’t understand how Better Things gets nothing but rave reviews and somehow Pamela Adlon isn’t nominated? That said, the list of actresses here is strong, And you'd think that previous winner Rachel Brosnahan would be the frontrunner with last year’s tough competition, victor Phoebe Waller-Bridge (Fleabag) and six-time consecutive champ Julia Louis-Dreyfus (Veep) out of the way. The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel may be the comedy nominations leader, but Brosnahan isn’t likely to eclipse Moira Rose. 

I’ll try to avoid major plot details in my analysis – but if you’d like more spoiler-filled descriptions, click on the episode titles. Let’s consider each nominee…

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Alain Delon on Criterion

by Cláudio Alves

For some people, the word handsome isn't enough. Such beauty defies description and almost seems to bend reality, becoming uncanny in its perfection. French star Alain Delon is one such person. It's no wonder that many a master filmmaker has lost themselves looking at the actor, making devotional songs to his besotting allure in the shape of cinema. Antonioni, Clément, Godard, Malle, Melville, Visconti were some of those masters of cinema and their works have immortalized Alain Delon in poems of celluloid that are some of the best films ever made… 

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