I take everything I said back.



I should have realized, the first sure-fire nominee of this upcoming year is, and always was, A Scanner Darkly for Best Animated film. There is zero percent chance at this point that it doesn't get a nomination.

Not sure about that. Since it is filmed first and then animated, Oscar viters likely will prefer completely animated movies. They're too traditional. BTW by calling it, you jsut destroyed its chances. You know that, don't you?

I'll have you know that I only wish I was so important that my eccentric "callings" of films' receptions and recognitions truly affected their futures! Mighty deity that I am.


They're not that conservative, btw. They gave Triplettes of Belleville the greenlight (I loved that movie). I said nomination, not win, but judging by how all the animated movies thus far have performed, it might even win. Its pretty much down to it and Cars, right?

In a sense, Scanner Darkly isn't much different than Polar Express. Neither are traditional animated films.

I also would hope that Scanner being a film not aimed at kids would help its chances.

Don't count Over the Hedge out

Ouch. this tread shows the benefit of hindsight.

i'm not sure if Darkly has a big chance either. Hope im wrong though.

Of course DPT succeeded more then Dot the I, since as the latter had one of the worst ending in film ever.

[spoil]Indie films should never end with the villain monlooguing, dear god did I want to shut the mian actrsses boyfriend, it ruined the whole bloody film.[/spoil]

They shafted Waking Life for Jimmy Neutron, so A Scanner Darkly still has a lot of ways to go.

Aha, we've all been fools.

The first sure-fire nomination, is also the first absolute lock winner of the year.

...Cars.

Departed had a screening today and it's suppose to be really good. Im hearing it's Marty back to true form.

Really? That's not what I'm hearing ...

"Simply put this film does some things a bit better that I.A but overall it isn’t a better film." - http://www.aint-it-cool-news.com

"a glorious sloppy mess of a movie that can’t quite decide what it wants to be ... I suspect it won’t be quite as good as everyone (myself included) probably hoped." - http://alfonsomangione.blogspot.com/200 ... rsese.html

Yeah those were posted links at Oscarwatch. The AICN review was written from the perspective of someone who really likes Infernal Affairs, but both sound like they were willing to give a remake a chance, but that it didn't really thrill them.

Hrm.

I also am not certain about A Scanner Darkly. I've read some bad-mediocre reviews of the film and regardless of the technical animation achievement of the film, if it doesn't come across as a "great" film it probably won't have a nomination chance.

Pixar will probably score Oscar #2 for Cars, but it is a pretty safe bet for a nomination at this point. The only other films released at this point that I think might have a shot at any nominations are An Inconvenient Truth and United 93 and maybe Road to Guantanamo.

Really the only "Oscarish" film released so far is United 93. Something where chances, "importance", and critic reviews all line up in the way that could give it a major nomination.

One thing that the film does is make the mob boss character a complete psycho who in one scene participates in a three way in which one of the women is donning a strap on. Is this scene really necessary? I was really disappointed with Nicholson’s performance as it was a bit too over the top for me and it had a few too many comedic moments, including his death scene.

WTF?

How can a movie where all Jackie boy takes a strap on be bad?

Yeah, seems as though the negative is coming in, I was getting hyped too after hearing good things on Chud and IMDb. There is a new review on http://www.aint-it-cool-news.com/display.cgi?id=23536 didnt love it, didnt hate it.

It got a new ending (partially) and it flat-out sucks compared to the original. Bleh.

Is there really anyway Flags of our Fathers isnt the frontrunner right now? The script is suppose to be amazing and all other oscar hyped films such as Departed & Good Shepherd dont seem to be living up to the hype.

Eastwood has got it again, they should just hand it to him right now.

I'm not necessarily sure I would call Flags the frontrunner, but it's definately there. I also think his other movie might conflict a little with it. I'm not sure.

I think what they should do is release Red Sun, Black Sand after the Oscars, so if Eastwood's Flags does end up winning it should help out the movies BO tremendously, they shouldnt release the movie one or two months after Flags, like you said it could cause problems, but at the sametime it could also help. Hollywood would really appreciate such a bold move such as make two different movies in different perspectives.

I agree. I think releasing these two films within 2 or so months of each other is a bad idea. This is why (for example) Warner Bros. only submitted/promoted The Matrix Reloaded for consideration so it wouldn't split any votes with Revolutions (not that it helped it). Or they could try to pull a Soderberg. But he was nominated for two vastly different films, and that doesn't happen often.

I'm looking forward more to Red Sun, Black Sand than Flags of our Fathers anyway.

I don't think both will be nominated. And even if he is nominated and the film is brilliant, I think there may be a little bit of a "we just awarded him two years ago" syndrome.

You never know, it could end up being the better film. It's the more interesting concept, gotta have tons of respect for Eastwood to do something like that.

I suspect Par will focus their efforts on getting Flags Academy attention and release Red Sun after the nomination period has expired. That way they can have both films in the marketplace, maximising buzz and audiences in the runup to the Oscars, but just one collecting votes. The trouble with putting two films into competion from the same director/company is that they end up competing against each other as well as other nominees. Why take that risk? Besides Red Sun is, as Eastwood has said, made for Japan. The cast are all huge stars over there and that Tokyo press conference attended by Eastwood and the cast recently had something like 150 cameramen and six hundred writers covering it. Red Sun looks like a huge deal for Japanese audiences and I'm not sure how much that's fully appreciated on this side of the world. So I'm pretty confident the world premiere will be in Japan and that will likely scotch any chance of a US December release. We'll see.

I don't know how about general promotion, but as far as Visual Effects go, I am pretty sure WB submitted Revolutions only (grave mistake).

Damn you Clint Eastwood! Marty's movie might not even make it to the big show judging by this though, so it won't be as heartbreaking.

I don't think The Good Shepard is dead quite yet though. All we've gotten is an AICN review saying it's too long, right? And even in that review, he said the movie was good, it just needed editing. Who knows.

I think Flags' biggest competitor will be something unknown though, at this point. A movie under the rader like MDB, or all the indies last year.

Honestly, usually movies that are considered "frontrunners" by this time of the year don't end up winning, so Eastwood fans should not be so excited. Last year, it were Memoirs of a Geisha and Munich, the year before the last it was The Aviator. Then other films came up rather unexpectedly and took the statue.