The year is almost done and let’s face it, the late-game Oscar season isn’t going to change the race much. “Gran Torino” and “Defiance” have screened for press (and us) and while decent, the Best Picture category frame won’t change. Though it’s noted some people are in the tank for Clint Eastwood in the former film. He’s fine enough, but not an Oscar nom in our minds. That’s not saying we don’t think he won’t get nominated, he stands a chance cause of political sympathies, but its us saying, we’ve seen better. We can all tell by the press “Valkyrie” probably won’t be a contender and has to escape daggers before it can even remotely think about nominations (which frankly, it’s probably not going to get).
“Australia” as we all know has officially fallen off the map. Sucks for Baz Luhrman and studios probably now reluctant to fund big-budget fantasy from indie auteurs. “Doubt” and “Revolutionary Road”? Support seems high for “Doubt” while ‘Road’ was snubbed by the populist Critics Choice Awards. We should also note that our gut sees “Milk” as strong enough to earn multiple awards, probably as many as any other film (sorta like the Critics Choice Awards), but we’re not sure if it’s stand-out-ish enough to take multiple awards. We could easily see it being one of those films that has the distinction of being one of the most nominated of 2008, but the film walking away with only one-two awards.
We’ve seen “Seven Pounds” as well, but we probably can’t say anything about it without Sony houndogs tracking us down immediately too, right? We can probably say though it’s not going to change the frame either though.
We should note, the L.A. Film critics poll just gave “Wall-E” the Best Picture over “The Dark Knight,” Sean Penn the Best actor over Mickey Rourke, Danny Boyle Best Director over Christopher Nolan and Sally Hawkins (“Happy-Go-Lucky”) over Melissa Leo (“Frozen River”) that latter award we say, yay! Does that change the game? Mmm, a little. We still don’t see “Wall-E” penetrating. ‘TDK’ still has a serious shot, but our gut this week tells us support is falling a bit. Then again, critics and Academy voters are two different things.
What’s left to screen for most critics? Not much. “The Spirit” (ha) and for some people “The Wrestler,” but that one only has actor shots and mostly just Rourke. We’ll finally see “Revolutionary Road” tomorrow and director Sam Mendes will be in attendance.
