Naked Golden Bits
The Independent Spirit Award nominations have been announced and there was a lot of love for Keep the Lights On including a Best Feature nomination. The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Bernie, Gaybyand How to Survive a Plague also got some lovin'.
Meanwhile, the Gotham Awards have been given and Plague came away with a win.
EW’s Awards guru, Anthony Breznican, offers up his early thoughts on the Oscars. It's worth scrolling through the whole gallery, but I was especially happy to see that he has Wallflower listed as a film that should be considered. "It reminds us that great friends can turn the worst of times into good ol' days."
And over at the L.A. Times Oscar site, The Envelope, Glenn Whipp implores voters to make room for Ezra Miller. Whipp calls it "…easily one of the season’s most dynamic performances." I'm glad it's not just me.
Could we be hearing the words, "Academy Award nominee - Frank Ocean" in our future? It's possible.
Anthony Hopkins is the latest to join the "Oscar Bah-Humbug" club. Speaking to the Huffington Post, the Oscar winner said, "You know, kissing the backside of the authorities that can make or break it; I can't stand all that. I find it nauseating to watch and I think it's disgusting to behold." At least Joaquin Phoenix isn't so lonely anymore.
Did Rise of the Guardians just fall off the Oscar cliff? It's disappointing box-office already has many penning its obituary.
The Hollywood Reporter has its Awards Season Roundtable Series up, and this time we get a lively discussion with Anne Hathaway, Amy Adams, Sally Field, Naomi Watts, Rachel Weisz, Helen Hunt and Marion Cotillard. The entire, hour-long interview can be found here.
Meanwhile, here's a clip where Field talks about how she fought to get the role of Mary in Lincoln.
This clip features Rust and Bone's Cotillard talking about her feelings working with a "bad" director. I would have loved her to win the French version of the Razzie just to hear that speech.
Race and the Oscar Race
Let's get the depressing fact out of the way first.
For the past two years, the Oscar for Best Picture has gone to films (The Artist and The King's Speech) with absolutely no cast members of color. Zip. Zilch. Nada.
The good news… In the past twelve years, this has happened only two other times; A Beautiful Mind (2001) and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003). In every other instance, the winning films have had at least one major character (and, subsequently, actor) of color. Often, a lot more than just one.
More good news… Since 1995, there hasn't been a year in which at least one Best Picture nominee couldn't boast a major character of color. In the vast majority of cases, more than one Best Picture nominee that could make that claim.
Even more good news… There hasn't been a year since 1995 that no actors/actresses of color were nominated. And in eight of those twelve years, at least one person of color took home the gold.
Yes, the Academy Award landscape has become increasingly diverse and reflective of the world the rest of us live in. Boneheaded and jaw-dropping decisions persist (Pollyanna this article isn't) but one could make the very strong case that Oscar has arrived (and built a house with a swimming pool) firmly in the 21st Century.
1995 is a significant year in the diversification of Oscar. That year, when not a single person of color received a nod in the major categories and only one out of 166 total nominations went to a person of color -- Diane Houston, an African-American nominee for the short film Tuesday Morning Ride -- all hell broke loose.
The very loud and very public outcry about this culminated with Jessie Jackson and his Rainbow Coalition organizing protests at ABC affiliates across the country on Oscar night.
No one can say for sure that the protests worked. Maybe the newer members of the Academy brought this desire for varied stories with them. After all, there were nominees of color before 1995 (and even a few winners) though nowhere near as many as there have been post '95.
Now matter how, exactly, this came about, nowadays, it would be more shocking to see an all-white list than not. The Oscars no longer look like the film community version of the Republican National Convention. That is progress absolutely worth celebrating.
This year gives us the gift of a number of films that guide us to even greater heights of diversity and understanding.
Lincoln and Django Unchained tackle the difficult and emotional subject of slavery in (presumably) very different ways. It's great to see filmmakers not ignoring the topic but pushing for new stories to tell within that framework.
Beasts of the Southern Wild, Life of Pi and Cloud Atlas use the fantastical to enhance themes of spirituality, survival and the search for meaning in all of our lives.
Middle of Nowhere and Flight could have been told with white characters, I suppose. And that would've been a shame. These films are about universal experiences. White people should not be the sole cinematic water carriers of the relatable. Not in this day and age.
Then there are the films that gently nudge us towards the bridge we all need to cross in order to make sharing this planet more enjoyable. Films such as The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel and The Intouchables do this to a certain extent.
This level of diverse filmmaking is capturing attention -- but some of it wrong-footed and missing the point entirely.
In an Op-Ed in the New York Times, Kate Masur writes a scathing take on Lincoln, particularly its "passive" black characters.
"Mr. Spielberg’s Lincoln helps perpetuate the notion that African Americans have offered little of substance to their own liberation. ...It reinforces, even if inadvertently, the outdated assumption that white men are the primary movers of history and the main sources of social progress." Uh, what?
The subject of White Savior Movies is something I know a little bit about. And Lincoln is not that film. The film makes it very clear that Abraham Lincoln's aim wasn't to just save African-Americans from slavery, though he has clear moral objections to the idea that human beings could and should ever be owned. His greater goal was to heal the entire nation from the sins of slavery. This is an important distinction, in my opinion.
Secondly, there are no passive African-Americans in the film. Masur mentions the character Slade (Stephen Henderson) as "an avuncular butler, a black servant out of central casting."
Did we see the same movie? Because the film I saw has Slade responding to the question of whether he's ever been beaten by responding, and I'm only slightly paraphrasing here, "Nobody ever hit me that didn't get hit back."
The black Union soldiers at the beginning of the film (played by Colman Domingo and David Oyelowo) certainly weren't passive. In fact, Oyelowo's character politely but forcefully challenges Lincoln on the idea that he may risk his life in the same way as a white Union soldier, but he's paid significantly less for doing so.
And Elisabeth Keckly (played by Gloria Ruben) is quietly defiant as Mary Todd-Lincoln's assistant; fearful of the future and hopeful at the same time.
Meanwhile, before the film was even seen, Cloud Atlas was generating controversy for supposedly yellow-facing several of its characters.
"It appears that to turn white and black actors into Asian characters, the make-up artists believed they only had to change their eyes, not their facial structure and complexion," said Guy Aoki, president of Media Action Network for Asian Americans. Oh…kay…
It would take actually seeing the film to know that Asian characters (along with its white and African-American characters) will play different races, genders, even humans and devils. In fact, every actor will have make-up that minimally alters their appearance -- the point (clear once the film is seen) is that we are watching the souls of people in different skins moving through millennia and fighting against oppression. This isn't make-up designed to hide. We're supposed to be able to look through the make-up to see the humanity underneath.
At the absolutely must-read Awards Daily, Oscar expert Sasha Stone (never afraid to address how race, gender, and sexuality intersects with the Oscar race) addresses the controversies in her article"Hollywood, the Oscars and Race"
"Our need to redefine identity through American film is vital to progress — but it can also choke the life out of artistic expression, particularly when the complaints are overblown."
The article is worth reading in its entirety. And, while some of the films she points to I have my own problems with, she makes a valid point when she states, "The pressure of hypersensitive scrutiny has all but shut out serious treatment of these groups from mainstream Hollywood films and, thus, the Oscars, leaving only films by and about the white community to flourish because they are unassailable."
Amen, Sister.
Look, there's no guarantee that all of these films will get Oscar recognition. But quite a few of them will, I'm willing to bet. And that is an encouraging sign.
In an age where Hollywood wants to play it safe with pre-sold concepts and marketing tie-in deals with McDonalds, the very fact that these films are made at all is a miracle.
That there are bold statements, enormous story-telling risks, insane amounts of money and thrilling, inspiring creativity behind these films with people of color at the center of them feels more than just miraculous.
It feels like it's about time.
I want to give a special thanks to Doug. This was supposed to be a brief response to his reader question, but I was inspired to make the subject the centerpiece of this week's column.
For Your Consideration
No one expects to see The Cabin in the Woods earn any sort of award love (except for maybe a Saturn or two) this year. It's a razor sharp horror comedy that features a "Redneck Zombie Torture Family" rising from the grave. It gives not terribly insignificant screen time to the subject of husband bulges. It's a genre film.
And as we all know, the cabal of trophy-givers has a notoriously blind eye to genre films, no matter how clever or critically acclaimed they happen to be (and with a 91% approval rating at Rotten Tomatoes, which is higher than some of the films that have "realistic" chances for awards, it's safe to call the film acclaimed).
But just because the film won't get any love doesn't mean that doesn't deserve it. Because Cabin is an absolutely brilliant and diabolical meta-comedy; one that simultaneously deconstructs the horror genre and the audience that consumes them. I have a lot of films to see before I can make any claim to it being the ten best of the year. But I have real trouble imagining who'd knock it out.
Joss Whedon (The Avengers, TV's Buffy the Vampire Slayer) and Drew Goddard (TV's Lost) co-wrote and co-produced the film, with Goddard taking the reigns in the director's chair. Anyone familiar with their twin reputations for subverting genre troupes know better than to expect yet another horror film about five friends being hacked and slashed to death in the woods.
It isn't simply that they play with our collective experiences with these kinds of films (the way we approach them, the cues we've been trained to expect) that makes Cabin worthwhile. The endless parade of Scream movies did that much.
No, it's the way they play with our experiences that proves its worth as an intelligent film with a lot more on its agenda than racking up a high body count. There are tantalizing questions stewing at its margins. Is there something about watching fictional people die in gruesome ways that erodes our humanity? Who are the real monsters?
But to say any more would be unforgivable to those of you who haven't seen it. Oh, and speaking of which, go and see it, already.
I'm not naïve enough to expect that the film will be recognized in any way. That would require a level of imagination and out-of-the-box thinking that I'm not certain voting bodies are capable of.
But I absolutely want advocate for the brave choices, quality filmmaking, and amazing performances that do exist outside of Oscar's narrow margins. A genre film can rise to the level of artistic triumph. After all, this one did.
Trivia Time
Last week, in answer to the question of how many actors/actresses has Steven Spielberg directed to Oscar wins, the answer is…
…A big fat goose egg.
Despite directing plenty of great actors to nominations, including Tom Hanks, Whoopi Goldberg, Oprah Winfrey, Liam Neeson, Ralph Fiennes, Anthony Hopkins, and Christopher Walken, no actor has ever won an Oscar for a film directed by Spielberg.
Thanks to everyone who participated. The winner of the BriOut ShoutOut is ... joeyhegele
This week's trivia question…
Late actor Ian Bannen was fired from a lead role in a film because he was too nervous about what kissing another man on-screen would do to his career. The actor that replaced him wasn't too nervous and, thus, received an Oscar nomination for the role. Name this replacement actor and the title of the film.
Fun or serious questions about the award season ahead? Send them in to our (possibly snarky) Q&A section. To participate, use the comments section or email me at BriOutAE@gmail.com. Depending on the response, answers will appear in next week's column.
