Another Link

I Need My Fix Michael Fassbender to appear tonight... any moment now I guess given the time difference...on Top Gear (in the UK)
Movie|Line details all the messy pre-release problems surrounding John Carter. I hope to see it soon. I would so much rather see movies than hear about their production for months beforehand.
Rope of Silicon 'the ABCs of cinema'. How many of these 26 movies can you name. I had a tough time since it moves so fast (one minute) but it's a cool animation.
Coming Soon gets its hands on the diaries of Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter

Associate Press Dame Judi Dench is fighting blindness via macular degeneration :(. Having scripts read to her now.
Guardian interviews BAFTA's rising star winner Adam Deacon who is an unknown on these shores.
Serious Film our Michael C reveals his Best Actress ballot. We share three choices.
Animation Mag the theatrical run of the Oscar Shorts package has grown 80% in attendance over the past 7 years. Good to hear.
The Wrap shares the rumor that Jennifer Aniston nixed topless moment in the comedy Wanderlust out of consideration for new boyfriend Justin Theroux. I refuse to believe that Theroux is that touchy about nudity... especially since he's done it himself on my TV screen.

A Streaming Oscar Moment
If you understood Carrie Fisher as a kindred spirit when she famously said "Instant gratification takes too long." you should know that there are two Oscar nominees currently streaming here at Netflix. 

• If a Tree Falls... the documentary feature nominee is on Netflix
• Hell and Back Again another documentary feature nominee is on Netflix
• OSS 117: Lost in Rio is not a nominee but gives you a chance to see Jean Dujardin strut his stuff... with sound!
• Kramer Vs Kramer in case Meryl loses again on Sunday and you need a good cry. That one's a multiple hankie effort and I know some of you haven't seen it because I read your Streep Ranking Ballots
• And finally...

Oh damnit. I was going to list a Woody Allen documentary streaming on PBS but turns out it was only doing that for five days. This is the problem with "instant watch" anywhere and everywhere. SO inconsistent. It's always peek-a-boo. Clearly the distributing channels of entertainment have not quite caught up with audience's "gimmegimme" modern tendencies.

Finally...
Appropos of nothing, I'm kind of obsessed with this music video at the moment Henry Wolfe's "Someone Else". Sure it's almost a year old but I shall not be constricted by currency with my flash obsessions.

The Actress Brit Marling (Another Earth) stars -- you'll remember she just made the Vanity Fair rising stars cover -- and it's directed by Terri's writer/director Azazel Jacobs. I love music videos that treat themselves like short films and get how to take snapshots of larger stories and condense them. Henry Wolfe is, of course, Meryl Streep's son; you can totally see it in his profile. It probably drives the children of famous people crazy that people always mention the famous person they're related to but I really love his music and I might not have ever discovered him if I hadn't been chasing Streep info one day a few years ago and chanced upon one of his performances.

Leigh, Farhadi, Jake & Jury Name Berlinale Winners

Remember a couple of days ago when we shared the video of Jake Gyllenhaal handing Meryl Streep her Honoary Golden Bear in Berlin for a stellar career? Apparently he's making a habit of handing over Best Actress prizes. Here he is at the closing night ceremony with Best Actress winner Rachel Mwanza.

This 14 year old Congolese actress played a child soldier in a brutal sounding movie called War Witch.

MAIN PRIZES
The jury this year was headed by the brilliant Mike Leigh. The jury included Jake Gyllenhaal, Anton Corbijn, Charlotte Gainsbourg, François Ozon, Boualem Sansal, Barbara Sukowa and last year's Golden Bear recipient Asghar Farhadi (A Separation) who will now presumably have to jump on a Berlin to Los Angeles flight to prepare for the Oscars.

Prizes, Gay Films and a Possible Danish Oscar Submissions after the jump

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Australia and Park City Dole Out "Best" Prizes

Nicole says "Hi!"DGA and SAG (tonight!) awards just aren't enough prize-giving for one weekend so let's talk two more.

AUSTRALIA via WEST HOLLYWOOD
Have you ever heard of the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts International Awards? Neither have I. It's okay because they're newborn babes in the awards woods. Apparently they eyed an empty clearing in the great forest of movie awards and voila! (Seriously why are there so few awards shows? Magical unicorns they are.)

The great unsolved mystery of all of these organizations that have been popping up (I'd like to see a study but it does seem like each year brings at least one new organization along with it) is this: how do they get the celebrities to show? Even brand new ventures like this one bring out the stars. When you can convince Nicole Kidman and Meryl Streep to attend your inaugural awards maybe there will be a second year for your prizes!  Then again the AFI Awards had one televised ceremony (early 2002) and the stars came out for it en masse and there was never a second year of prizes, so we'll see. 

Meryl looked gorgeous at the Australian International ceremony held in Beverly Hills AACTA Winners

• Screenplay (tie) The Ides of March (George Clooney, Grant Henslove and Beau Willimon) and Margin Call (JC Chandor). A rare occurence: Midnight in Paris losing a screenplay nomination.
• Director Michel Hazanavicius The Artist
• Actor Jean Dujardin The Artist
• Actress Meryl Streep The Iron Lady
• Film The Artist 

I can't tell you why their press release lists only film winners when they have television right there in the title.

They'll show this intimate ceremony (held in West Hollywood with Australian Academy president Geoffrey Rush naming the winners) or at least clips of it on Australia television on the 31st. 

And now [drumroll] the first awards for the 2012 Movie Year (!!!)

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Foreign Film Finalists: "A Separation" Sheds Many of Its Chief Rivals

With just six days until Oscar nominations, the Academy has released the finalist list for Best Foreign Language Film. Iran's wondrous A Separation (see my top ten list) might just go all the way. While it's true that most pundits are already predicting just that, I've been more cautious. Masterpieces are often tripped up in this category by more heartwarming or traditonally baity mass-appeal films in the final heat. The biggest surprise here might be the omission of Lebanon's 'can't we all get along' musical Where Do We Go Now? which some pundits, including myself, had suspected might be a real threat given its populist pull. It won the People's Choice at Toronto which generally bodes well for Oscar traction. Not this time.

Poland's "In Darkness" is "A Separation"'s chief rival now; it's a Holocaust drama.

The Finalist List

• Belgium (5 noms) "Bullhead" Michael R. Roskam
• Canada (5 noms | 1 win) "Monsieur Lazhar" Philippe Falardeau
• Denmark (8 noms | 3 wins) "Superclásico" Ole Christian Madsen (I'm a fan)
• Germany (16 noms | 3 wins)  "Pina," Wim Wenders
• Iran (1 nomination)  "A Separation" Asghar Farhadi (#1 of the Year)
• Israel (9 nominations) "Footnote" Joseph Cedar
• Morocco (never nominated) "Omar Killed Me" Roschdy Zem
• Poland (8 nominations) "In Darkness" Agnieszka Holland
• Taiwan (3 noms | 1 win) "Warriors of the Rainbow: Seediq Bale" Wei Te-sheng

Omissions
Lebanon's entry is not the only high profile entry to be shown the door. France's amazing Declaration of War -- which obliterates 50/50 on the cancer dramedy battleground -- was probably too contemporary and eccentric for Oscar's foreign volunteer committees. Mexico's lauded Miss Bala about a would be beauty queen struggling to survive a drug war is probably the snub that will prompt the most anger from film buffs. I do wonder if Miss Bala had stuck to its original release plans (it was supposed to open in 2011) if it might have built up enough of a reputation to avoid being set aside here. Finally, there's at least three auteurist cinephile darlings on this cutting room floor: Finland's Le Havre, Turkey's Once Upon a Time in Anatolia, and Hungary's The Turin Horse. 

Records To Be Broken
The dance documentary Pina is still gunning for a fascinating record. It might become the first film to ever be nominated in both the documentary and foreign language film categories... and though I'd have to triple check I believe it would be the first documentary every nominated for Best Foreign Film even if it loses out on the documentary shortlist.

Morocco is the only country that might be looking at a first time nomination.

Our favorite Israeli actor (not that we're that familiar with a plethora of them) Lior Ashkenazi (Late Marriage, Walk on Water) in "Footnote"

Israel has been on a roll with Oscar. If Footnote is nominated it will be the fourth Israeli film in five years to score a nomination. Their previous best run was from 1971 through 1977 when they scored four nominations. Despite frequent nominations they've never won the gold making them the Deborah Kerr or Peter O'Toole of the foreign film Oscars.

If Taiwan is nominated a fourth time this year for their battle epic it will be the first time they've ever been nominated outside of the Ang Lee filmography.

CURRENT PREDICTIONS

This &That: Makeup Finals, Foreign Beauties, Rule Changes

So I spent all of last night exuberantly "Oh No You Maggie Smith'nt!"* with friends over the 2 hour season premiere of Downton Abbey. Then I spent the better part of today at a table full of Oscar voters picking their brains (in a polite conversational way, mind you) at a luncheon for The Artist. More on both of those events soon but between last night and today, so many OscarQuakes or at least golden tremors.

*joke stolen from Patton Oswalt

Let's discuss four of them immediately! 

1. Hunger Games beauty Jennifer Lawrence will announce the Oscar nominations.
Usually people dress somewhat sedately for that super AM event but we're hoping Jennifer pulls out another one of those va va voom numbers she kept finding for last year's awards circus. The nomination event happens so early in the morning and if Jennifer wears skin tight white or form fitting red again, that's better than a pot of steaming coffee as an eye opener.

P.S. Is the publicity team behind Hunger Games the hardest working team in showbiz? You know this is all part of that evil world domination blitz. 

2. Documentary Rule Changes
Michael Moore and others proposed some Oscar Rule changes to the Academy and they've been adopted. The most controversial one, which we're totally fine with, involves requiring a review from the Los Angeles or the New York Times. The idea behind this rule is that the papers have a policy of reviewing each film that opens for a full week engagement. But it seems silly to stipulate that a review is required when the whole point is to get the movie in theaters for a full week. Why not just say "must play a week in Los Angeles and New York City to qualify?" Seems strange to put the qualification requirement on newspapers. According to Michael Cieply at the New York Times documentarians are not on board with these changes which would drastically reduce the number of qualifying entries.

I take a rather hard stance on this topic all the time and I assure you that it is not an anti-filmmaker stance. My stance is only a pro audience stance. I do not believe that films should be eligible for awards if they are not playing for the public. I'm tired of this elitist film culture where people only show their films in very discreet ways for very select audiences and hope that they'll win awards by which they will then try to lure paying audiences. On an individual case by case basis it's easy to see why the vast majority of pundits and filmmakers side with filmmakers on this topic and back these rules that make peekaboo engagements possible. But if you back up and look at the full picture it is much healthier for the survival of cinema if theatrical engagements are required and the audience is included. If movies aren't made to be seen there is no point in making them. If you want an engaged audience you have to create one. And to create one you've got to get the films out there in the marketplace. 

3. Makeup Citations
The bakeoff for Oscar's continually confounding Best Makeup category has finally happened and seven films are moving on to compete for the 3 wide nomination list. I've never found any reasonable explanation as to why this category has such a tiny amount of nominees given that a huge portion of movies require wig and makeup and prosthetics work but it is what it is. Despite "Best" often equating with "Most" J. Edgar and Green Lantern did not make the cut. Neither did that much talked about Michelle-to-Marilyn transformation wow them.

So your finalists go like so...

• Albert Nobbs
• Anonymous
• The Artist
• Gainsbourg: A Heroic Life
• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2
• Hugo
• The Iron Lady

I am not remotely a fan of The Iron Lady but I think it'd be a very deserving nomination in that category since the makeup work on Streep is just flawless / transformative. The rest of the field I don't have strong opinions of. Do you? It's worth noting that no Harry Potter film has ever been nominated for Makeup though a few of the previous films have made it to pre-nomination lists like this one. 

4. Foreign Film Finalists Will Be Announced on... TBA?
I wish I knew when. If so I could plan better. Every day I wake up in fear that I will miss my chance to tell you how much I liked movie A or B before Oscar cuts them in the winnowing process, he says pessimistically. And every day I run out of time. I need a deadline! Last year they announced a week ahead of the regular nominations so I guess that gives me... 5 or so more days?

Left (France's Declaration of War) Right (Denmark's SuperClásico with the always awesome Paprika Steen)

For the record in case I get no other chance to say it should the Academy not respond well to them the 'Movie A' in question is France's cancer dramedy Declaration of War which is super lively, passionate, funny, and tearful (Take that 50/50... You are nothing to me now!) and the 'Movie B' in question is Denmark's divorce comedy SuperClásico starring the inimitable Paprika Steen (Applause) who you already know I 'stan for whenever I get the chance.

I interviewed her recently (we'll get to that eventually) and much to my delight she dubbed me a "nerdy film blogger!" Her exact words! Now I love her even more. I wish American directors would hire her because she speaks English fluently and is a great actress who can do both intense drama and spiky comedy. What more do they need? Why should the Nykqvists, Mikkelsens and Skarsgaards be the only Scandinavian actors Hollywood has on speed dial? Paprika can act circles around so many people. Get on that, Hollywood! Time is a wasting.