Oscar Luncheon Photos

The Oscar luncheon was held today. So most of the nominees assembled to be a part of the big class of 2011 photo. Well done, all. Congratulations. 

I love that the naked gold man is just standing right smack in the middle of all of them, the reason for the season. 

This one goes out to @AwesomeRob --- What do you think Meryl and Rooney were saying too each other? Or maybe they weren't saying anything. Guess away in the comments.

George Clooney & Jean Dujardin get along famously after the jump.

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Link Nation

CineEuropa Melancholia wins big at the Danish Oscars including Best Actress for Kiki!
Daily Notebook Iranian hardliners not too happy with the Oscars and A Separation. (It still seems surprising that A Separation was submitted by Iran, but thank God.)
MCN Jean Dujardin kills on Leno. Clooney had all the precursor heat but Dujardin and Pitt aren't giving up ~Three way race!
Scanners on The Artist. Everybody loves/hates a frontrunner
LA Magazine Viola Davis goes couture 

Towleroad Daniel Radcliffe covers Attitude magazine and continues to establish his PFLAG-style advocacy
Awards Daily Art Directors Guild wins go to Hugo (period), Harry Potter 7.2 (fantasy) and Dragon Tattoo (contemporary) 
Gold Derby still thinks Meryl Streep is going to win the Oscar for The Iron Lady. Five reasons why.
Cinema Blend Marc Webb wants to differentiate his Amazing Spider-Man from Sam Raimi's blockbuster. Promises Spidy with a sense of humor. 
NPR good piece on Madonna's endurance and the difficult process of aging in public.  

Toon Town!
Rango took top honors at the Annie Awards though there was a Pic/Director split there with Jennifer Yuh Nelson taking the latter for Kung Fu Panda 2. The Adventures of Tintin won Best Score for John Williams. Best short went to Minkyu Lee for Adam and Dog which I bring up because I was just looking at its tumblr and though "huh. I want to see this" and it surprised to beat out more high profile entries like three Oscar nominees La Luna, Wild Life and Sunday. Here's the teaser...

Adam and dog Trailer from Minkyu on Vimeo.

And for those readers that are always suggesting a voicework Oscar category, that particular prize at the Annies went to Bill Nighy for voicing Grandsanta in Arthur Christmas. He beat out Oscar nominee Gary Oldman's peacock villain "Shen" in Kung Fu Panda 2 and five other nominees in that category. No, I don't know why there were so many nominees. There were twice as many in the television voicework category...14 nominees in one category? That is too much people, calm down. 

©Ty Templeton's "Bun Toons"

Parting Shot
Bun Toons comic strip about DC comic's decision to make Watchmen prequels. A must read if you're into comics or Watchmen in any iteration. It applies to basically anything re: Fans Who Loved Too Much. 

Oscar Symposium Day 1: Tinker Tailor Party Guys

Welcome to the Annual TFE Oscar Symposium! The Film Experience is proud to introduce the following guests (in alpha order): Ali Arikan chief film critic for Dipnot TV; Nick Davis Assistant Professor of English and Gender Studies at Northwestern University and the brilliant mind behind Nick's Flick Picks;  Mark Harris author of the instant classic "Pictures at a Revolution: Five Movies and the Birth of New Hollywood" and Oscarmetrics columnist at Grantland; Kurt Osenlund Managing Editor at Slant Magazine's The House Next Door. And I'm Nathaniel Rogers, of course, your host here at The Film Experience. We started our conversation on Sunday night and here it is for you.  

NATHANIEL: Gentlemen. If I had access to the Windsor font I'd list us all in alpha order in white lettering on the same black title card Woody Allen style so that there won't be any tragic Corey Stoll business where the Screen Actor's Guild leaves one of us out when our inevitable Best Ensemble nomination arrives. Instead, as per Nick's suggestion, we're all pictured in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy's conference room. That indelible orange soundproof wall! How did this movie miss an Art Direction nomination?

Despite this visual trapping, I don't for one moment want anyone reading to picture us all as "gray little men" in uncomfortable stuffy suits, withholding. (I am generally too exuberant for secrets and would make a terrible spy.) Though I love Alberto Iglesias compositions for that movie, I'll readily admit that the score inside my head this very moment is more John Williams. Before the opening credits are even over, that man will hit you with the climax, and I'm excited to begin.

Feel free to change the setting at any time (the magic of cinema) but we begin at Tinker Tailor's sad little Christmas party (Don't ask me to explain why MI6 is hosting this party to which it was not invited). All the Best Pictures just walked in. Let's mingle. Who will you avoid? Who do you trust implicitly? Where do you see tension brewing. I think it only looks like Midnight in Paris is friendly with The Artist and Hugo. He secretly judges them for trusting so fully in their own nostalgia.

MARK HARRIS: I'm enjoying this party--who doesn't love wide lapels, long sideburns and ugly plastic eyeglass frames? As for who I'd avoid: The Artist, because I'm pretty sure it'd come up to me, lick my face, hump my leg, do a little dance at my feet, and instantly want to be best friends. Too much too soon--stop being so ingratiating and let me get some punch! I think I'd go seek out The Tree of Life--the cool movie glowering in the corner that nobody's talking to because it never gets invited to parties like this.

And I would be very cautious about eating those little tarts that Octavia Spencer is passing around on a silver tray.

ALI ARIKAN: I've just been talking to "Midnight in paris," who makes for a splendid company.  That guy's full of pithy anecdotes about literary figures of yore.

Well, let's stay at that Christmas party at the Circus.  My favourite scene of the year is set there, when a spook dressed as Father Christmas and sporting a Lenin mask, leads the troops in a rendition of the Soviet National Anthem as Smiley discovers his wife's infidelity.  That's one of the two times where Smiley lets his emotions out (the other being his angry "What are you, then, Bill?" at the end of the film), and we can see how devastated he is.  Oldman's nomination was well deserved. But that film was robbed on so many fronts.  Art direction, as you mention, as well as direction and a supporting nod for Tom Hardy, who is magnificent.  

KURT OSENLUND: Being in any sized room with Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close is, in my opinion, too close. Moneyball and I are already flashing each other von Sydow-style hand signals. 'Is this guy bothering you?' 'YES.' We meet on the dancefloor, and tap a bit with Jean Dujardin, before heading to see what Smiley is staring at out the window. Is that...Harvey Weinstein? Smooching with Oscar voters?

More including The Artist, critical wars, Moneyball, Songs, and elevating your film...

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Virgin Nominees

It took Gary Oldman *forever* to get an Oscar nomination. Do you think he'll return for a second?Five years ago I did a study of Oscar's acting categories and multiple vs. singular honors. I discovered that 64% of Oscar nominees never return for a second nomination.

That year I polled readers who voted Transamerica's Felicity Huffman, Good Night and Good Luck's David Straithairn, Crash's Matt Dillon and (OOPS) Junebug's Amy Adams least likely to return. Readers had the most confidence in return engagements for (OOPS) Cinderella Man's Paul Giamatti... but weird that he hasn't been back, right?, Syriana's Clooney, Capote's Phillip Seymour Hoffman and (OOPS) Hustle & Flow's Terrence Howard! So some of y'all got it pretty right in the polling and also way wrong which just goes to show you that you never know!

The Streeps and Winslets are a true rarity. Even major movie stars across the decades have had to settle for one. And sometimes people just get snubbed forever.

poll by twiigs.com

P.S. Have your say in the comments: why'd you vote the way you voted? 

New Oscar Post - Snubs That Hurt 

Nathaniel's Ballot: Best Actor

Another few hours, another write up. I might have to quit here... quickly losing energy and must store some up for the Oscar onslaught on the morrow. 

One thing that's really been bothering me about The Artist backlash is the notion that the movie doesn't really understand silent films, drawing as much from 1930 and 1940s and even 1950s cinema visually and aurally as it does from the 1920s. My very erudite response to that criticism: So what?!?

A pure "found film" is not what Michel Hazanavicius and team were going for here which you can see quite obviously in [SPOILER ALERT] the dream sequence and the finale which both work like sound films [END OF SPOILER]. I love that Jean Dujardin pulls so liberally from Gene Kelly (1940s and 1950s) rather than strictly silent movie stars for example since The Artist is polyamorous in its loves. People have reduced it to a love letter to the silents but it's just as smitten with the very tumult of movie stardom and the idea of Hollywood in general and those things span decades. We're still in love with them in 2011! 

MY BEST ACTORS
Each year it seems like I have at least one acting category -- two at the most! -- that closely align with Oscar and Best Actor is where we might meet sorta see eye to eye. Crossing my fingers for Michael Fassbender's Shame to resonate with enough voters, though I've predicted otherwise.