The Faith and Film Critics: Preparing the Best of 2007 Awards
Thanks to Ron Reed for making it public!
This year's nominees for the best films of 2007 according to the Faith and Film Critics Circle are quite surprising! That is to say, when the critics were polled, their favorite narrative films did not include one of the titles you'd most expect to see there. You'll see what I mean in the list below.
The winners will be announced next week.
Who are the Faith and Film Critics Circle? Find out here. I managed this endeavor for a while, and eventually had to step down due to the increasing demands of my writing endeavors. But I'm still a voting member, and the group goes on. I'm excited about this year's nominations.
Most Significant Exploration of Spiritual Themes
After the Wedding
Amazing Grace
Atonement
Into Great Silence
Into the Wild
Lars and the Real Girl
Best Narrative Film
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Lars and the Real Girl
No Country for Old Men
There Will Be Blood
Best Documentary
The Devil Came on Horseback
In the Shadow of the Moon
Into Great Silence
The King of Kong
No End in Sight
Best Film for the Whole Family
The Bridge to Terabithia
Dan in Real Life
Enchanted
In the Shadow of the Moon
Ratatouille
Best Director
Paul Thomas Anderson - There Will Be Blood
Brad Bird - Ratatouille
Joel and Ethan Coen - No Country for Old Men
Todd Haynes - I’m Not There
Julian Schnabel - The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Best Performance by an Actor
Christian Bale - Rescue Dawn
Russell Crowe - 3:10 to Yuma
Daniel Day-Lewis - There Will Be Blood
Johnny Depp - Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
Ryan Gosling - Lars and the Real Girl
Best Performance by an Actress
Amy Adams - Enchanted
Julie Christie - Away from Her
Marion Cotillard - La Vie en Rose
Laura Linney - The Savages
Ellen Page - Juno
Best Performance by a Child
Dillon Freasier - There Will Be Blood
AnnaSophia Robb - The Bridge to Terabithia
Saoirse Ronan - Atonement
Ed Sanders - Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
Thomas Turgoose - This Is England
Best Supporting Performance by an Actor
Casey Affleck - The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Javier Bardem - No Country for Old Men
Paul Dano - There Will Be Blood
Philip Seymour Hoffman - Charlie Wilson’s War
Hal Holbrook - Into the Wild
Best Supporting Performance by an Actress
Cate Blanchett - I’m Not There
Jennifer Garner - Juno
Emily Mortimer - Lars and the Real Girl
Amy Ryan - Gone Baby Gone
Tilda Swinton - Michael Clayton
Best Ensemble Cast
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
I’m Not There
Juno
Lars and the Real Girl
Michael Clayton
Best Cinematography
Roger Deakins - The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Roger Deakins - No Country for Old Men
Robert Elswit - There Will Be Blood
Eric Gautier - Into the Wild
Janusz Kaminski - The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Best Original Screenplay
Brad Bird (et al.) - Ratatouille
Diablo Cody - Juno
Todd Haynes & Oren Moverman - I’m Not There
Anders Thomas Jensen & Susanne Bier - After the Wedding
Nancy Oliver - Lars and the Real Girl
Best Adapted Screenplay
Ben Affleck & Aaron Stockard - Gone Baby Gone
Paul Thomas Anderson - There Will Be Blood
Joel and Ethan Coen - No Country for Old Men
Andrew Dominik - The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Ronald Harwood - The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Sooni Taraporevala - The Namesake
Best Original Score
Klaus Badelt - Rescue Dawn
Nick Cave & Warren Ellis - The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Michael Giacchino - Ratatouille
Jonny Greenwood - There Will Be Blood
Dario Marianelli - Atonement
Philip Sheppard - In the Shadow of the Moon
Why the Academy's Foreign Language Film Oscar is a Joke
 
Thanks to the Oscars, a few moviegoers will rush out to see The Counterfeiters, feeling adventurous for taking time out for the Best Foreign Language Film of the year. But here's a saddening bit of information: The award won by The Counterfeiters doesn't mean a thing.
Why?
Culture.ish discovers Auralia's Colors
Thanks to reviewer Jason Panella for his thoughtful look at Auralia's Colors at Culture.ish.
What Was It You Wanted?
 
Jean Bethke Elshtain, in Books and Culture, contemplates Todd Haynes' film about Bob Dylan -- I'm Not There -- and Andrew Dominick's film about a different, but similarly enigmatic, hero -- The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. And she contemplates the resilient ghosts of both Dylan and James, digging deep into the questions we confront as we pursue both elusive figures.
Scorsese's "Shutter Island" to star Williams, Ruffalo, and... yes... DiCaprio
The Hollywood Reporter is reporting on Hollywood. So all is right with the world. And today, the HR site reports on Martin Scorsese, who appears to have a crowded calendar for '08.
Alas, while I've been eagerly awaiting updates on Scorsese's adaptation of Shusaku Endo's Silence, it appears that another project has developed that will be filmed and released first:
"Shutter Island"... is an adaptation of a Dennis Lehane novel that follows two U.S. marshals who are sent to a federal institution for the criminally insane located in Boston's Outer Harbor to capture a violent female escapee. DiCaprio, Mark Ruffalo and Michelle Williams are on board to star in the production, which is due to go before cameras in March.
The Browser, Post-Oscar edition 2/25: Best Day Ever!, Critics picks, and Raymond Chandler
Thank you for making this the best day ever at Looking Closer. My blog stats inform me we've had a record number of visitors here in the last 24 hours, meaning that the Oscars proved a bigger deal than The Lord of the Rings and The Golden Compass controversy among Looking Closer readers.
How do critics' picks differ from the Academy?
Now, let's forget about the Academy for a moment. Let's look at the Best Films of 2007 according to those who *study* hundreds of movies every year. Here's indieWIRE's article about the favorites of 100+ movie critics, and then the list itself. Note how many of their favorites have never been distributed in the U.S., and how many were overlooked entirely (or disqualified) by the Academy Awards.
Raymond Chandler on the Oscars
Author Raymond Chandler ponders the Academy Awards, and the art of cinema. A thought-provoking article. Do you like to have your thoughts provoked? (Thanks to Scott Coulter for bringing it to my attention.)
... the motion picture is not a transplanted literary or dramatic art, any more than it is a plastic art. It has elements of all these, but in its essential structure it is much closer to music, in the sense that its finest effects can be independent of precise meaning, that its transitions can be more eloquent than its high-lit scenes, and that its dissolves and camera movements, which cannot be censored, are often far more emotionally effective than its plots, which can. Not only is the motion picture an art, but it is the one entirely new art that has been evolved on this planet for hundreds of years. It is the only art at which we of this generation have any possible chance to greatly excel.
In painting, music, and architecture we are not even second-rate by comparison with the best work of the past. In sculpture we are just funny. In prose literature we not only lack style but we lack the educational and historical background to know what style is. Our fiction and drama are adept, empty, often intriguing, and so mechanical that in another fifty years at most they will be produced by machines with rows of push buttons. We have no popular poetry in the grand style, merely delicate or witty or bitter or obscure verses. Our novels are transient propaganda when they are what is called "significant," and bedtime reading when they are not.
But in the motion picture we possess an art medium whose glories are not all behind us. It has already produced great work, and if, comparatively and proportionately, far too little of that great work has been achieved in Hollywood, I think that is all the more reason why in its annual tribal dance of the stars and the big-shot producers Hollywood should contrive a little quiet awareness of the fact. Of course it won't. I'm just daydreaming.
Larry Norman is Dead. Long Live Larry Norman.
"The father of Christian rock" -- Larry Norman -- is dead. And as you might expect, Andy Whitman has written something appropriate to this solemn event.
UPDATE: CT on Larry Norman.
The Oscars, and How to Pick a Real Winner...
Who will take home those golden chunks of cheese tonight?
My Oscar predictions, Christian Oscars(?), and Left Behind
If "Falling Slowly" from Once doesn't win, it's just another confirmation that the Academy voters don't know anything about good songwriting. (Remember when Celine Dion's Titanic histrionics beat Elliott Smith's Good Will Hunting song?)
But okay, enough already. I never do very well at this game, but as a film critic, I'm required to submit my predictions for Sunday night's glamour-bash. So here we go...