Name 5 things you're currently obsessing over!

Apologies for the sparse posting the past couple of days we've been buried in screenings & events and the like. I'm currently obsessing about five things...

1) How wrong I was assuming the character of Amy could not be the MVP of any iteration of Little Women (hi, Florence!) so our SAG screening guest was correct. 

2) Potential trickery in the Original / Adapted screenplay placements with Ford v Ferrari attempting a Gangs of New York 'no, we're an original! a category in which they have virtually no chance of scoring... (so what is the campaign reasoning? Bizarre) and The Two Popes attempting a 'never mind that play the screenwriter wrote, we're an original)

3) TODD PHILLIPS DIRECTING STYLE ON JOKER WHICH IS THE MOVIE EQUIVALENT OF CAPS LOCK FOR AN ENTIRE DOCUMENT. 

4) How we're seeing Glenn Close on the campaign trail tonight stumping for Jonathan Pryce in The Two Popes and how lovely that is that she is undeterred by her own horrible recent loss and right back out there. 

5) We've updated Picture / Director / Screenplay / Actor and Supporting Actor Oscar charts but we know you're just waiting for the ladies and we'll do them tomorrow! 

Spirit Award nominations spread the wealth for 2019.

by Nathaniel R

Nominations for the 35th annual Independent Spirit Awards have been announced with the wealth really being spread. For example the 5 nominees for the top prize “Feature” only crossover with “Best Director” on a single film, the Safdie brothers Uncut Gem which co-led the nominations with 5 prizes though it’s yet to open in theaters. Tying that films lead for most nominations was The Lighthouse even though that black and white oddity did not score a nomination for Best Feature!

Interestingly enough, the just-opened indie Waves was (almost) entirely shut out even though it’s a Best Feature nominee at the often quite parallel Gotham Awards. On a similar note the acting nominations aren’t heavily dependent on Best Feature love, either. 

A complete list of nominations plus commentary after the jump...

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Grammy Nominations for Movie People !

by Nathaniel R

The Grammy Awards aren’t really a crucial topic for The Film Experience. Except when they are. We do love to share the movie adjacent stuff that doesn’t get much press (‘hey, I didn’t know that actor ____ recorded a spoken word album’ etcetera). So herewith some key movie adjacent bits.

Beyonce’s efforts for The Lion King are up for a few pop prizes but that's no surprise since Queen B is a Grammy favourite. Former movie star and still legendary chanteuse Barbra Streisand, another Grammy favourite, has her presumably umpteenth nomination for Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album for her latest “Walls”... the one with the unexpected unintended Girl-in-the-pit Silence of the Lambs homage cover.  

But there are some less expected showings, too.

Iconic cult director John Waters is up for Best Spoken Word Album for “Mr Know-It-All” where he’s competing with Former First Lady Michelle Obama. That juxtaposition is insane and we couldn’t love it more...

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5 Things We Learned from the New CATS Trailer

by Chris Feil

After meow-ny long and empty weeks, we were finally treated to another trailer for Tom Hooper's Andrew Lloyd Webber's T.S. Eliot's CATS. And you might say that it was a little bit of a disappointment after the first look sent the internet into a giant flame of gleeful schadenfreude (or maybe we're all still waking up from the release of its catnap-inducing original song candidate "Beautiful Ghosts"). This quick tease featured no singing and was a bit too fast-paced to glimpse any of the dancing. But the final trailer did give us a few bits of new information to be both earnestly and ironically excited about:

1. It's apparently the "Most Joyous Event of the Holiday Season". Like the previous "You Will Believe" tagline, this also sounds like a threat.
2. LOTS more dialogue than expected highly suggests that the film will try to lean into some semblance of a plot or overexplain its "new life" conceit.
3. The cats have boobs and love to shake them.
4. The trippiest element may be the proportions of the cats to their environment. See: kitty door flap, trash cans, shoe sizes, entire miniature ice cream parlor, etc.
5. Idris Elba might be the slithering, villainous, sexy (?) MVP.

Did you notice anything new that made you more (or less) excited for Cats next month?

"Garden Left Behind" Trailer

Check out the trailer for the indie trans drama The Garden Left Behind. This directorial debut from the Brazilian filmmaker Flavio Alves been wracking up numerous best of fest awards at film festivals this past year -- we told you about it once before -- so check it out when it arrives in theaters in early 2020. We basically demand just that in text form in the trailer.