Oscar Volleys: The Worldbuilding of Production Design

Team Experience will be discussing each Oscar category as we head into the precursors. Here's Eurocheese and Nick Taylor... 

AVATAR: THE WAY OF WATER

EUROCHEESE: Hi Nick! We have an exciting group of larger-than-life worlds to conquer for Production Design, but maybe it would be best to start with the elephant in the room: Despite some mixed reviews on Babylon, I have to imagine if nothing else it will make its coked-up presence known here, as homage to Hollywood's glory days. Then we have two blockbuster sequels to previous Best Production Design winners, with Black Panther Wakanda Forever and Avatar The Way of Water both asking similar questions: will the branch be excited enough for an encore nomination? I'm actually leaning towards no, now that we've seen the CGI-heavy worlds. Both might make more sense in other craft categories.  I'm curious to hear your thoughts though...

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ADG & ACE winners spread the wealth

by Nathaniel R

The Art Directors Guild and the American Cinema Editors Guild announced their winners last night. The results indicate support for multiple films vying for Best Picture with Encanto (not a Best Picture nominee) the only film to win at both ceremonies last night. King Richard made news winning the Drama Editing prize over presumedly stronger Best Picture hopefuls like Dune and Power of the Dog but who knows what Oscar might choose. Statistically, believe it or not, this win is not necessarily a big plus in King Richard's column (other than to be recognized which if of course wonderful on its own!). AMPAS has a differnet voting body and they often choose differently in the editing category.  

Winners and commentary after the jump for both guilds after the jump...

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Hit Me With Your Best Shot: Nightmare Alley (2021)

Welcome back to the series, "Hit Me With Your Best Shot" by Nathaniel R. Each week we'll discuss a single movie via a particular shot. Anyone who'd like to participate can choose their own!

Best Prop

When you're reading your mark, as former circus psychic Pete (David Strathairn) teaches us, you're searching for external clues to internal damage. The fatal flaw of Nightmare Alley, up this year for Best Picture, may well be that Guillermo del Toro, though a gifted filmmaker, isn't much for interiority. But oh his surfaces! Overly lacquered beauty and the ugly rot it's faililng to hide are the greatest assets of his latest film. On that note we must pause to honor the funhouse sequence early in the film which operates like a veritable FYC ad for the Oscar-nominated Production Design. The set amazes and one particular prop in the 'funhouse', a mirror stating "TAKE A LOOK AT YOURSELF  SINNER" is a perfect offhand joke. We know very little about Stanton Carlisle (Bradley Cooper) but he already knows he's "no good". The camera lingers for a second on the mirror, to make sure we do... 

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Oscar Volley: Can anything dethrone 'Dune' in Best Production Design?

With just over a week until nominations are announced Cláudio Alves, Mark Brinkerhoff, and Nathaniel Rogers discuss the Best Production Design race…

DUNE is in it to win it.

CLÁUDIO: The Art Directors Guild of America recently announced their nominees, and I'm in love with the Period Feature lineup. The French Dispatch, Licorice Pizza, Nightmare Alley, The Tragedy of Macbeth, and West Side Story offer such a varied approach to the matter of scenography, either swinging towards hyper-stylization or aiming for immersive historical accuracy. Honestly, I'd be OK if AMPAS just copied the guild's picks, though that's not likely to happen. Not with Dune in the conversation. As far as I'm concerned, it'd be a massive surprise if Patrice Vermette's conception of a dilapidated future doesn't end up winning it all. The scale of the achievement is undeniable, the sense of monumentality and balance between Villeneuve's sense of severe sci-fi and Frank Herbert's Baroque descriptions.

The question, then, is which of the period nominees will get the chop and if there are other outside contenders to consider. Examining the history of AMPAS' relationship to Paul Thomas Anderson's flicks, my guess is that Licorice Pizza is the most vulnerable. What do you think, Mark? 

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ADG Nominations - Good news and bad news for presumed Oscar Contenders

by Nathaniel R

Adam Stockhausen scored a double nomination at the ADG (French Dispatch and West Side Story)

The Art Directors Guild of America has released its nominations for the 2021 film (and television) year offering some surprise omissions (no Power of the Dog in period) and some delightful inclusions (In the Heights and The Green Knight for contemporary and fantasy respectively). The nominations for guild awards (any kind of guild awards) generally suggest as much about what the industry is watching as they do about whatever craft the awards are for. This is particularly true in "contemporary" categories, where we see year in and year out that the films are usually the ones with buzz in Best Picture, whereas in the Period of Fantasy category that's less important presumably because the work is so much more noticeable.

Their nominations plus punditry notes after the jump... 

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