Hollywood Babble On & On #1210: Oscar Nomination Snark Attack!!

The Oscar nominations are out, and here's the list with my snarky commentary.

Film

"American Sniper" - Unlikely to win for being too "right wing" but Academy voters don't want Clint Eastwood to kick their ass, so they're going to at least nominate the movie.

"Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)" - Academy voters love a comeback story and this is Michael Keaton's show. However, they might give him an acting trophy and pass on the best picture.

"The Grand Budapest Hotel" - It's nominated because it looks and sounds like it should be an Oscar nominee, but Academy voters think Wes Anderson is too fucking twee to win.

"The Imitation Game" - Front-runner, because it's a costume drama biopic of a dead British guy who did great things, and was oppressed for being gay. The last thing the Academy wants is Harvey Weinstein calling them homophobes during the run up to the final vote.

"Selma" - Nominated to avoid accusations of racism, but won't win because the film dared to bad-mouth LBJ, and most Academy voters were also LBJ voters back then.

"The Theory of Everything" - Second runner, might win if Hawking dies between now and the final vote, or if the producers can guarantee them that he'll give the acceptance speech.

"Whiplash" - Won't win.

Lead actress 

Marion Cotillard, “Two Days, One Night”

Felicity Jones, “The Theory of Everything” 

Julianne Moore, “Still Alice”

Rosamund Pike, “Gone Girl” 

Reese Witherspoon, “Wild” 

It'll be a fight between Moore and Witherspoon, with Moore having an edge since this is her fifth nomination without a win, and Witherspoon won for Walk The Line. 

If there's a vote split it won't go to Cotillard, because she dropped some 9/11 truther talk a while back, and Pike's movie was too commercial, so Felicity Jones could come right up the middle for a surprise win.

Lead Actor 

Steve Carell, “Foxcatcher”

Bradley Cooper, “American Sniper”

Benedict Cumberbatch, “The Imitation Game”

Michael Keaton, “Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)”

Eddie Redmayne, “The Theory of Everything" 

Michael Keaton has an edge, but there's still time for Harvey Weinstein to threaten to call the Academy homophobic if Cumberbatch doesn't win for playing a gay character, even if they sanitized most of Turing's gayness out of the movie.

Director

Alejandro G. Iñárritu, “Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)” Won't win.

Richard Linklater, “Boyhood” Won't win. He's too "un-Hollywood" without being fashionably un-Hollywood.

Bennett Miller, “Foxcatcher” Won't win.

Wes Anderson, “The Grand Budapest Hotel” Won't win.

Morten Tyldum, “The Imitation Game” Will win. The Academy loves movies about dead British men.

Selma director Ava Duvernay was shut out of the directing nominations. Most are criticizing the shutout as being because she's an African-American woman, but it's most likely because of the aforementioned unsaintly portrayal of LBJ, who really had opposed civil rights up until he realized he could use it for his own political advantage.

Supporting actress

Patricia Arquette, "Boyhood" - Could win, but she works mostly in TV, which Academy voters are still wildly snobby about.

Laura Dern, "Wild" - If she wins and Reese Witherspoon doesn't, Witherspoon will strangle her on stage.

Keira Knightley, "The Imitation Game" - Too young and pretty to win.

Emma Stone, "Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)" Meryl Streep, "Into The Woods" - Too young and pretty to win.

Supporting actor 

Robert Duvall, "The Judge" - Past winner, curmudgeon. Odds are about even.

Ethan Hawke, "Boyhood" - Slim chance.

Edward Norton, "Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)" - Better chance, the Academy seems to like him.

Mark Ruffalo, "Foxcatcher" - Won't win because he does The Avengers now.

J.K. Simmons, "Whiplash" - If there's going to be a surprise winner, it'll be Simmons who is probably one of the best character actors working today.

Animated feature film 

"Big Hero 6" 

"The Boxtrolls" 

"How To Train Your Dragon 2" 

"Song of the Sea" 

"The Tale of the Princess Kaguya" 

Documentary feature 

“CitizenFour” - Front runner if the director promises to blame Bush during their acceptance speech.

“Finding Vivian Maier”

“Last Days in Vietnam”

“The Salt of the Earth”

“Virunga” 

Documentary short subject 

“Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1” “Joanna”

“Our Curse”

“The Reaper (La Parka)” 

“White Earth” 

Foreign language film

“Ida” (Poland) 

“Leviathan” (Russia) - Will win if Putin threatens to annex Beverly Hills.

“Tangerines” (Estonia) 

“Timbuktu” (Mauritania) 

“Wild Tales” (Argentina) 

Adapted screenplay 

Jason Hall, “American Sniper” - Won't win.

Graham Moore, “The Imitation Game” - Might win.

Paul Thomas Anderson, “Inherent Vice” Anthony McCarten, - Won't win, Academy voters don't "get it"

“The Theory of Everything” Damien Chazelle, - Might win.

“Whiplash” - Wasn't even an adapted screenplay.

Original screenplay 

Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Nicolás Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris Jr. and Armando Bo, “Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)”

Richard Linklater, “Boyhood” - Might win because they love it when someone takes their time.

E. Max Frye and Dan Futterman, “Foxcatcher” - Might win as consolation for being shut out of everything else.

Wes Anderson (screenplay), Wes Anderson and Hugo Guinness (story), “The Grand Budapest Hotel” 

Dan Gilroy, “Nightcrawler” 

Animated short film 

“The Bigger Picture” “The Dam Keeper” “Feast”

“Me and My Moulton” “A Single Life” 

Live action short film 

“Aya”

“Boogaloo and Graham”

“Butter Lamp (La Lampe au Beurre de Yak)” “Parvaneh”

“The Phone Call” 

Makeup and hairstyling 

“Foxcatcher,” Bill Corso and Dennis Liddiard

“The Grand Budapest Hotel,” Frances Hannon and Mark Coulier 

“Guardians of the Galaxy,” Elizabeth Yianni-Georgiou and David White - Will win.

Original score 

“The Grand Budapest Hotel,” Alexandre Desplat 

“The Imitation Game,” Alexandre Desplat 

“Interstellar,” Hans Zimmer

“Mr. Turner,” Gary Yershon 

“The Theory of Everything,” Jóhann Jóhannsson

Zimmer and Desplat will fight for it.  

Original song 

“Everything Is Awesome” in “The Lego Movie”

“Glory” in “Selma” - Selma's consolation prize for being shut out of everything else for being mean to LBJ.

“Grateful” in “Beyond the Lights”

“I’m Not Gonna Miss You” in “Glen Campbell ... I’ll Be Me” 

“Lost Stars” in “Begin Again” 

Cinematography 

“Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance),” Emmanuel Lubezki - The film's really long takes might be seen as enough of a challenge to get him the trophy.

“The Grand Budapest Hotel,” Robert Yeoman 

“Ida,” Lukasz Zal and Ryszard Lenczewski

“Mr. Turner,” Dick Pope 

“Unbroken,” Roger Deakins 

Costume design 

“The Grand Budapest Hotel,” Milena Canonero 

“Inherent Vice,” Mark Bridges - Too many Academy voters have similar outfits in their closet. Won't win.

“Into the Woods,” Colleen Atwood 

“Maleficent,” Anna B. Sheppard and Jane Clive

“Mr. Turner,” Jacqueline Durran

Film editing 

“American Sniper,” Joel Cox and Gary D. Roach 

“Boyhood,” Sandra Adair

“The Grand Budapest Hotel,” Barney Pilling 

“The Imitation Game,” William Goldenberg 

“Whiplash,” Tom Cross 

Sound mixing 

“American Sniper,” John Reitz, Gregg Rudloff and Walt Martin

“Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance),” Jon Taylor, Frank A. Montaño and Thomas Varga 

“Interstellar,” Gary A. Rizzo, Gregg Landaker and Mark Weingarten

“Unbroken,” Jon Taylor, Frank A. Montaño and David Lee

“Whiplash,” Craig Mann, Ben Wilkins and Thomas Curley 

Sound editing 

“American Sniper,” Alan Robert Murray and Bub Asman

“Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance),” Martín Hernández and Aaron Glascock 

“The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies,” Brent Burge and Jason Canovas

“Interstellar,” Richard King

“Unbroken,” Becky Sullivan and Andrew DeCristofaro 

Production design 

“The Grand Budapest Hotel,” Adam Stockhausen (production design) and Anna Pinnock (set decoration) - Front runner.

“The Imitation Game,” Maria Djurkovic (production design) and Tatiana Macdonald (set decoration) 

“Interstellar” Nathan Crowley (production design) and Gary Fettis (set decoration)

“Into the Woods” Dennis Gassner (production design) and Anna Pinnock (set decoration)

“Mr. Turner” Suzie Davies (production design) and Charlotte Watts (set decoration) 

Visual effects 

“Captain America: The Winter Soldier,” Dan DeLeeuw, Russell Earl, Bryan Grill and Dan Sudick 

“Dawn of the Planet of the Apes,” Joe Letteri, Dan Lemmon, Daniel Barrett and Erik Winquist 

“Guardians of the Galaxy,” Stephane Ceretti, Nicolas Aithadi, Jonathan Fawkner and Paul Corbould 

“Interstellar,” Paul Franklin, Andrew Lockley, Ian Hunter and Scott Fisher

“X-Men: Days of Future Past,” Richard Stammers, Lou Pecora, Tim Crosbie and Cameron Waldbauer

Doesn't matter who wins, they'll all be bankrupt before the next Academy Awards.

By the way.

My crime novella MINDER is now available in paperback from Amazon with 2 bonus crime stories.

Get it for yourself, get it as a gift for a friend, just get it.

Hollywood Babble On & On #1209: What It Takes To Make Movie Studio

Reading The Genius Of The System by Thomas Schatz is an eye opening experience, letting you know exactly what it takes to make movies and to build a company that makes and releases movies on a professional level.

Making a movie is relatively easy when you boil it down to the basic elements: Money & Time.

Anyone with the money and the time to make a movie can do it.

Whether or not they make a good movie is totally up to the talent of the filmmakers.

But what does it take to make and release movies on a consistent professional basis?

Well, that takes, not just an army, as Orson Welles said, but an organization, perhaps a company or what we have come to call a "studio" whether they actually own real physical studios or not.

Let's have a little thought experiment.

Let's say that Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, and the Sultan of Brunei all drop dead, and the shocker is that they have left their combined fortunes to you. You, as a movie fan, decide you're going to make movies, but without buying a major studio, you're going to start your own.

What will you need?

Well, it's not so much what you need, but who you will need.

Your intention is not to make a bunch of movies no one will see, you want to make movies that people see, and build a self-sustaining business. Now let's look at who you will need.

Let's start at the top, titles may vary, depending on the structure and nature of the company, so I made up some vague descriptions.

Artist's conception of a movie studio's executive board.

BUSINESS ADMINISTRATOR: Every business needs someone to run it. Someone to handle the money, negotiate contracts, and oversee the business aspects of the company as a whole.

PRODUCTION CHIEF: This is the person who decides what to do in the creative realm. They're the one who picks and develops projects, forges relationships with other producers and talent, and oversees the creation of the company's output from script to screen.

Then we move onto the departments:

PRODUCTION DEPARTMENT: This answers to the Production Chief and can consist of producers or production supervisors who each oversee individual productions and do what they can to see they come in on time and on budget.

DISTRIBUTION: This department oversees the how, when, and where the movies will be released in theatres. 

MARKETING: This department oversees the selling of the movies to the general public.

HOME VIDEO: This department handles release and marketing of DVDs/Blu-Rays, and licensing to television broadcasters, and video-streaming services.

FINANCIAL: This is the department of accountants and bookkeepers who monitor spending, revenue, and all the other financial doodads and report directly to the business administrator.

That's the core people and departments that a film company needs.

Now what sort of intangible qualities does a film company need?

INSPIRATION: Despite what the Harvard MBAs say, a movie studio is in the business of selling stories. Stories that people will pay money to see, and hopefully inspire merchandise, theme park rides and other money-making ventures.

DISCIPLINE: Inspiration is one thing, but to build a company that's viable requires intense self control on the part of the filmmaker and the studio. This goes beyond staying within budgets and on schedule, it's also important to practice creative discipline. That means not letting ego make decisions that your creativity should be doing, which I will be getting to in just a second.

What qualities should a film company avoid?

As I said just a couple of lines ago, the ego, when out of control, can overwhelm creativity and lead to these two destructive tendencies:

INDULGENCE: We've seen it with filmmakers, where a director with clout spends over a hundred and fifty million dollars to turn what should have been a simple romantic comedy into an overlong, self-important mess. But it can also happen to producers and studio executives who think that bloating a project will improve their own importance. It's an all too common problem, especially with blockbusters, where the solution to every problem is to just overdo everything.

INTERFERENCE: This is a tendency among studio executives and certain producers to meddle needlessly in a production. This differs from enforcing discipline because discipline in needed. Interference is unnecessary.

Legendary super producer David O. Selznick burnt himself out while just in his 40s because he lost the ability to tell the difference between discipline and interference.

After the gruelling creation of his monster-hit Gone With The Wind, he began to believe that he was more than just indispensable and that everyone, regardless of talent, could not do the simplest, smallest job without his intricately detailed instructions. His meddling had gone from above-the-ordinary to downright nuclear proportions and it alienated his talented staff until they all left for other companies as soon as their contracts allowed. This forced Selznick to expend immense amounts of unnecessary energy and money out of ego and fear. During the making of his last big mega-epic Duel In The Sun, he burned through 8 directors, countless writers, and several million dollars because every single camera angle of every scene had to pre-approved by Selznick.

His output dwindled, and so did his once legendary stature within the industry, and he was pretty well spent and out of the business at an age when most studio heads would be hitting their peaks.

Those are the basics of what you need, and what you need to avoid when you're starting a movie company.

You Asked For It: An Apocalyptic Question

I didn't watch the Golden Globes last night. So instead of judging a show I didn't watch, I'm going to answer a reader's questions.

Nate Winchester asked: 

I heard someone say before, I'll tweak their point now: 

D, do you think zombies and all the other apocalypse films/tv/etc are filling the airwaves right now because Hollywood senses that their end is coming? 

In light of that, what do you think the post-apocalyptic scene will look like? When Hollywood collapses because it's chopped off its own legs, what do you think might happen next? (doesn't have to be accurate, just tell us a story)

One thing you have to know about Hollywood is that they don't really sense anything. Deep feelings of foreboding over their own future requires something Hollywood doesn't have, which is depth. Also they're lacking in long term thinking, being only able to see the next quarterly report and their next bonus and/or stock option.

What they do have is a sense of sight, and when they see a dystopic or post-apocalyptic project sell big, like The Hunger Games, or The Walking Dead, they hop on the bandwagon.

Apocalyptic projects sell because of a sense among the general population of just how fragile their comfortable first world lives are because they're technology dependent.

I lose my internet connection for an hour and I'm ready to go full Mad Max on everyone by minute thirty-five.

As for what happens to Hollywood after the end of their unique civilization…

The major studios are faltering, but they have enormous bulk and infrastructure on their own, and almost all of them are part of even bigger media conglomerates. Conglomerates that span the world, and keep on growing.

Steve from Mergers & Acquisitions.

That means that any alternative can easily be subsumed, and ultimately consumed by the already existing media mega-conglomerates. Possibly via homicidal android merger & acquisition specialists, but I won't make any promises.

But seriously...

What we might see is a replay of what happened back in the turn of the century and the teens. Back then the fledgling movie biz was dominated by the Edison Trust. A clique of companies who sought a monopoly on the movie business.

They did everything they could to maintain that monopoly, from lawsuits to goons doling out threats and vandalism, and seemed unassailable.

They're all out of business now.

What happened?

The studios we know today were independent upstarts who rebelled against the Edison Trust. They beat the Edison Trust not in court, but with the audience.

You see the Trust's companies had two policies which doomed them. They suppressed the development of "stars" to keep salaries artificially down, by keeping their names out of the public eye, the most famous being the star known only as the "Biograph Girl". Also the Trust decided that the audience would want stories that the Trust told them to want.

The upstarts rebelled by creating the "star" system, by giving popular performers credit and using them to promote their films. The upstarts also looked at what the audience was looking for in the way of stories and they delivered.

Over the next 20 years the Edison trust companies crumbled and either faded into oblivion or were taken over by the upstarts who are the major studios we know today.

How do I see history repeating itself?

First, it won't repeat itself exactly as it happened before.

The means of making and delivering content have exploded. It's now possible to create Hollywood grade entertainment in your own basement if you have the time, money, and talent.

However, making something, and getting it out for sale is one thing, another is selling it to an audience. It's hard to compete against a major studio's ad-buy that's bigger than the annual budget of a third world government budget. 

But it's not impossible.

So what I think is that we'll see outfits like Netflix, Amazon, and their upcoming competition begin to drift away from working solely with the major studios, because they can't produce the quantity and quality these outlets need. They'll look more to indie companies, who, if they play their cards right will grow, then be bought by the major studios.

The majors will then eventually sanitize what made them successful out of these upstart companies, go right back into the rut that made the upstart possible, and go and buy the next upstart.

The studios will then shift not from being content producers into consumers of actual content producers on a corporate level.

At least that's what I see in my crystal ball.

Hollywood Babble On & On #1208: Prestige/Mid-Reputable/Good/Bad.

The AV Club ran this article about the rise of what they call "mid-reputable" television. 

The gist of the piece, if you're too lazy to click the link, is that while shows like Mad Men, The Newsroom, Louie, and Girls get all the prestige and award nominations, there are shows like Arrow, The Flash, that have dedicated fan-followings, and get all sort of critical praise, they're just not considered as "classy" as their cousins.

This reminds me of something I saw on a travel show.

It was a food-centric show, and the host was visiting Paris, and he was looking into what many were calling the decline of "fine dining" in the famed City of Lights. 

Fine dining is where you make a reservation, dress up to the nines, wait in line, slip the maitre'd a c-note to get to sit at the table you booked within your lifetime, the table has a silk tablecloth handwoven by Hopi shamans, then you look at a menu hand-calligraphied by a master artist in squid ink that has no prices on it, because if you have to ask how much, you shouldn't even be there. You get the picture.

What's taking the place of fine dining in Paris was the rise of what are called "casual dining" establishments. Places with no reservations, no dress codes, and reasonable prices printed either on the menu or on a chalkboard over the main counter.

But there's a twist.

These casual restaurants are owned & staffed by chefs who would have been top names in the fine dining business ten years ago. They deliberately eschewed the fancy decor, the prestigious awards like Michelin Stars, the ritualistic serving style, and the crippling financial overhead and put all their energy into the food they're selling. Which means the quality and innovation found in casual restaurants is not only catching up to the prestigious high-brow joints, but will probably soon leave them in the dust.

Does this strike you as familiar?

Not every fine-dining, star-rated prestigious restaurant, gives the customer a satisfying experience. That's because to them it's not about the food they serve, it's about the importance and prestige of the people selling it to you.

This happens in television. Mad Men lost me a few seasons ago when the show stopped being about Don Draper, his family, friends, and lovers, and became about Matt Weiner and just how brilliant Matt Weiner really is. The enjoyment from the show died, at least in my eyes. The Newsroom was never about the news business, it was about Aaron Sorkin telling you how he thinks the world should be because he's smarter than you. I've met people who watch The Newsroom, but none seem to enjoy it.

Breaking Bad never fell into this trap, and stayed being all about Walt, Jesse, Skyler, and the rest, and not about Vince Gilligan. That's why it will probably be considered a touchstone of quality for years to come.

Anyway, back to the so-called "mid-reputable" shows.

Who cares if some critics and award voters don't consider them prestigious?

Prestige is no guarantee of quality. Critics and awards voters can bestow "prestige" onto a show for reasons that have NOTHING to do with the quality of the show's writing and presentation.

Which is why when I check out a new show, I always ask these questions about it:

How well is the story written?

Am I interested in the characters, whether I like them or not? 

Am I entertained?

Note, I do not ask if I think the show will make other people think I'm smart for watching it, because I don't have time for that shit anymore.

So I say, let the "mid-reputable" keep getting better, because in the end, they'll probably be the shows we look back on the warmest when we think of this television golden age.

Hollywood Babble On & On #1207: Random Sick Thoughts

Welcome to my first blog post of 2015.

Sorry, it's so late, first came the holidays, which were really busy and frantic, then came gastroenteritis. I will spare you the awful details, let's just say it was nasty.

Anyway, I'm feeling better and ready to pass off some random thoughts…

*

While I was sick a cable channel ran a Portlandia marathon. I had only caught snippets and individual sketches before, and found what I had seen funny, and since I wasn't going anywhere I decided to dive into the show head first.

First thing I thought was that Carrie Brownstein's work was well worth the hype, the second thought was that she and co-creator Fred Armisen had the most purely natural comedic chemistry I've seen in a team in ages, and the last thought was that this was the gentlest satire I had seen since the days of SCTV.

Too many satirical comedy vehicles see themselves as a battle tank, crashing through barriers, destroying, obliterating, and decimating their targets. That's because too many comedians, especially on television, see themselves not so much as performers, but as advocates. They cannot have fun with the foibles of the people they like, they must use comedy to crush those they hate, see them driven before them, and hear the lamentations of their women.

Portlandia reminds me of SCTV in that it while SCTV made fun of television, movies, and show biz, there was a lot of affection for their subject matter. The creative core of Portlandia, Armisen and Brownstein, have a lot of fondness for Portland, its people, and its place as a perpetually quirky 1990s never-never-land. There's no attempt to make a point, or to destroy anyone, they just want you to laugh.

You don't really see much of that these days. Maybe because to do it, the bit must be about the performance and not about the performer.

*

While I was ill I was also doing a lot of reading. One book is Thomas Schatz's The Genius of the System, about filmmaking in the golden age of the Hollywood studios. One story about MGM stuck with me as an illustration of what I call keeping the eyes on the prize.

MGM was created in the mid-1920s when theatre conglomerate Loew's Inc. merged the large, but struggling, Metropolitan Pictures, with the powerhouse Goldwyn Pictures, and upstart Louis B. Mayer Productions. Mayer's company was purchased not because of its big library, or physical assets like studios and theatres, but because of the men who ran it: the titular Louis B. Mayer, his New York based deputy Robert Rubin, and the boy-wonder producer Irving Thalberg who had started as a senior executive at Universal almost right out of high school.

Mayer handled all business negotiations, as well as distribution, marketing, and corporate administration, Rubin handled relations with the theatres, the banks, and their parent company, while Thalberg found the material, and put everyone and everything together to turn it into a movie. To keep these three as happy employees of Loew's Inc. their contract dictated that they split 20% of MGM's profits between them. Mayer got 53%, Rubin got 27% and Thalberg got 20%. 

This unprecedented deal came about because the trio were running a tiny company that was making top grade product for the coveted "first run" market, successfully competing with exponentially larger studios. The folks running Loew's thought was that if this trio had bigger resources to work with, they'd do even bigger things.

They were right. MGM very quickly became a juggernaut fighting off competition and even the Great Depression. Everyone recognized that a key player in the studio's success was young Thalberg, since it was his skill at picking material and nurturing talent was essential to keep the hits rolling out. This was when Louis B. Mayer made what many today would call a crazy move.

He cut down on his own share of the MGM profit package by 10% and gave it to Thalberg. Essentially giving the youngster a raise of at least $250,000 a year, a king's ransom in the early 1930s.

Now at the surface it seems crazy generous, and it was.

It was also the smart move.

Thalberg was the key reason their profit share package grew. If the boy wonder had a bigger stake in it, then he would be more inclined to keep it growing even bigger. There was an element of risk to the move, but Mayer didn't reach the top of the movie business without being a risk taker. He saw talent, and made the right move to nurture it for the good of the company, its stakeholders, and yes even himself.

It's enlightened self-interest at its best.

Ironically it's exactly the sort of thing you would never see a modern studio executive even contemplate. They have no stake, even emotional, in the companies they run, they're just functionaries picked more for their backgrounds from elite schools, and their ability to spout corporate jargon, than their abilities as administrators and filmmakers. If a young whippersnapper turns out to be a hit machine, the first instinct of the modern executive is to oust them for fear of losing their own position to the wunderkind. 

Crying shame, it might solve a few of the problems that currently plague the industry.

That's what I thought of while I was off sick.