After a momentary holiday lull, it’s back on! Or as Calvin Candie says in Django Unchained. “We got us a fight going on that’s a good bit of fun.” Academy voters were given one extra day to mull over their Oscar nomination ballots, thanks to a voting deadline extension necessitated by complaints and concerns over the Academy’s first-ever electronic voting system. They could use that 24 hours to digest the Producers Guild Award nominations, which were announced Wednesday, a day early.
From here, the awards season proceeds at 48 frames per second, bringing the Oscar race into sharp focus. The Director’s Guild of America nominations for Best Director will be announced Jan. 8, with Oscar nominations announced on the 10th,in advance of the Golden Globes, which will be handed out on the 13th. The PGA ceremony will be held on the 26th, followed by the SAG awards the following night. Feb. 2 brings the DGAs, one of the most reliable Oscar indicators, followed by the Independent Spirit Awards (and the Razzies) on the 23rd and the Oscars on the 24th.
This is the earliest Oscar voting in history, Variety’s Jon Weisman noted, and he feared for the “dark horse” candidates as voters race to catch up to the big ticket films such as Django Unchained and Les Miserables that were released at the end of the year. “We’ll never quantify the impact… on the coming Academy Award nominations, but I’m thinking negative,” he writes.
The Best Picture race was most impacted this week. So, let’s consult the Gold Linings Playbook to see which films benefited from the PGA bump.
Best Picture
Since 1990, the winner of the PGA’s Darryl F. Zanuck Award for Outstanding…
Whether you love or hate the idea of Disney acquiring and expanding the Star Wars franchise, you can’t say the House of Mouse isn’t treating Episode VII like the prestige project is deserves to be. Vulture reports that screenwriter Michael Arndt, who won an Oscar for his Little Miss Sunshine script, and was nominated for another with Toy Story 3, is the leading candidate to write the new Star Wars script
The website cites insiders who say that Arndt, who’s also the screenwriter for The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, has written a 40- to 50-page treatment, and will probably be one of the screenwriters on board when shooting begins in 2014. In addition to being a successful screenwriter who’s worked successfully with Pixar, Vulture notes that Arndt has lectured extensively on “why the original Star Wars ending is so creatively satisfying.” Turns out it’s not because there’s a big explosion at the end.
Although the plot of Episode VII remains the subject of much speculation, Vulture indicates that Disney wants to bring back the three main characters from the original Star Wars: Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia and Han Solo. Reportedly, Harrison Ford is “open” to reprising that last role, despite his apparently conflicted feelings about the character that made him a bankable actor.
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The title character of Ruby Sparks is a 26-year-old painter from Dayton, Ohio played by Zoe Kazan, who also wrote the film’s screenplay, She has bangs and wears brightly colored tights. Her first crushes were on John Lennon and Humphrey Bogart. She loves to cook, can’t drive and doesn’t own a computer. Her problems, as someone points out, are all of the “endearing” variety.
She’s also entirely the invention of Calvin Weir-Fields (Paul Dano), a blocked author who wrote a hit novel at age 19 and 10 years later, has yet to follow it up. Living a solitary life in Los Angeles, he’s advised by his shrink Dr. Rosenthal (Elliott Gould) to write about meeting someone while out walking his dog, Scotty.
Ruby first appears to Calvin in his sleep, and soon he’s fleshing her character out on his typewriter. For the first time in ages, words come to him easily as he tells the story of how his literal dream girl meets and ends up with a guy who’s a lot like him.
Directed by Little Miss Sunshine’s team of Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, Ruby Sparksisn’t the exercise in stevia-dusted whimsy that it sounds like, especially once a flesh-and-blood Ruby suddenly materializes — exactly as Calvin wrote her — with no awareness that she began as a fictional literary character.
This touch of movie magic is actually a way for the filmmakers to tartly examine the cinematic trope of the manic pixie dream girl and the larger problems inherent in searching for someone who’s perfect for you.
Ruby is perfect for Calvin because he wrote her to be that way. She’s not your stereotypical pneumatic blond lust object because while sex is certainly part of the relationship Calvin is looking for, control and security are more important. She’s adorable but vulnerable because she’s been treated badly. She’s eager…
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“For a film that claims to be sexually responsible, the Twilight movies are awfully dependent on teenage sex to attract viewers,” James Franco, actor/director/writer/student and now film critic, reveals in his write-up of Breaking Dawn – Part 1 in the Paris Review. “The actors prance about like pieces of meat, their disturbingly developed bodies on full display; Taylor Lautner’s rippling teenage chest is just a little better than the child beauty-pageant stars at the end of Little Miss Sunshine.” For Franco’s complete thoughts on Team Jacob vs. Team Edward and Bella’s nightmare pregnancy, click here. [The Paris Review]
Fifteen-year-old Abigail Breslin, America’s erstwhile Little Miss Sunshine, is growing up — not too fast, like some of her Hollywood peers and predecessors seem to be, but in her own time. Still: In the upcoming New Year’s Eve, she’ll share her first movie kiss; next year, she takes on the role of a real life teen killer. To kick off this new phase in her career, Breslin plays her first official teenage role in this week’s music-themed Janie Jones, starring (and performing her own vocals) as a capable young girl forced on a road trip with the rock star father she never knew.
Abandoned by her ex-groupie mother (a trembling Elisabeth Shue) to be cared for by her father (Alessandro Nivola), the narcissistic lead singer of a fading rock band, Breslin’s Janie channels her fears and frustrations into song — bonding with her reluctant dad in the process. The story is loosely based on the experiences of writer-director David M. Rosenthal (See This Movie), who met his own daughter when she was 11 years old. The music, written for the film by Irish singer-songwriter Gemma Hayes (for Janie) and Clem Snide’s Eef Barzelay (for Nivola’s Ethan), is performed by its stars and required Breslin to take up the guitar and sing; now, she co-fronts her own band, Cabb (with Cassidy Reiff), whose first song was released last week.
Movieline spoke with Breslin last week in Los Angeles about Janie Jones, how it sparked her own musical interests, her love for Glee (and desire to guest star on the show), having her first movie kiss and flashing her bra in New Year’s Eve, and…
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Imagine if Sofia Coppola’s Somewhere had been about a girl who bonds with her estranged musician father while on tour instead of a girl who bonds with her estranged movie star dad at the Chateau Marmont. That alternative scenario is exactly what writer/director David M. Rosenthal explores in Janie Jones, which stars Abigail Breslin as the titular offspring and Alessandro Nivola as her struggling rocker father.
Unlike Elle Fanning’s character in Somewhere, Breslin plays a slightly older, slightly more damaged daughter who eventually brings her rocker father joy through acoustic song and insults directed at bar patrons rather than ice-skating routines and slumber parties. (You’d probably be a little damaged too if you were raised by a former groupie who suddenly dumps you into your unfit father’s tour bus.) Altogether, it looks like a grittier, more realistic father-daughter tale than the privileged father-daughter dreamworld that Coppola created.
After making its premiere last year at the Toronto International Film Festival (a week after Somewhere premiered in Venice), Janie Jones finally wanders into theaters October 28.
VERDICT: I’m in, if only to see Little Miss Sunshine tackle something more adult than Rick James choreography.
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Also in this Wednesday edition of The Broadsheet: Chris Pine and Josh Brolin lead a couple of short lists… Arnold Schwarzenegger officially back… Lone Ranger might have found its leading lady… and more ahead.
· The last time Edward Norton played the bad guy in a big studio production, it was The Italian Job and he wore a moustache. Let’s hope this one works out a little better. Per Variety, Norton is in talks with Universal about playing the heavy in The Bourne Legacy opposite Jeremy Renner. Not bad! Toss in the fact that Rachel Weisz also co-stars, and the perpetually underrated Tony Gilroy directs, and Legacy has some decent potential. This despite being a sequel/reboot that you probably didn’t really want. [Variety]
· Rumor time! TwitchFilm reports that Josh Brolin tops the Mandate Productions wish list of male leads for the Spike Lee-directed Oldboy remake. Meanwhile, Chris Pine leads the MGM wish list for the Robocop reboot. [TwitchFilm, TwitchFilm]
· It’s official: Arnold Schwarzenegger will take the leading role in The Last Stand as a sheriff trying to save his town from drug dealers. [Deadline]
· Early guess: if a deal is worked out and Ruth Wilson does sign on to play the female lead in Lone Ranger opposite Johnny Depp, she will appear on at least two magazine covers in December of 2012. The Luther actress — unknown to most here — is in talks to play someone named “Rebecca” in the Gore Verbinski-directed film. [Deadline]
· Your friendly Movieline editors are pretty excited about He Loves Me — the Little…
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Annette Bening is one of our most celebrated four-time Oscar losers, right up there with Julianne Moore. (Glenn Close glowers menacingly from her 0-5 cell.) Now that she’s picked her first role since No. 4 loser The Kids are All Right, is Bening assured that a gold statuette is in her future? Let’s investigate ahead.
The film is He Loves Me — directed by Little Miss Sunshine duo Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris — and Bening is in talks to play mother to Sunshine’s best actor Paul Dano. Per Variety:
Dano stars as Calvin, a once-great novelist who is creativity blocked due to heartache and loneliness. That changes when he writes his dream girl, who comes to life to be his girlfriend. That role will be played by Dano’s real-life girlfriend, Zoe Kazan, who also wrote the script.
Bening will play Gertrude, an [sic] painter who’s curious about Calvin’s new girlfriend but worried about how much he hates her second husband, a hippie named Mort.
That makes Bening most likely a supporting character in He Loves Me, which would hearken back to 1990’s The Grifters; she scored her sole nomination for Best Supporting Actress in the Stephen Frears-directed film. That role was bubbly and conniving; this one sounds concerned and supportive — perhaps more akin to Holly Hunter’s role in Thirteen than anything in Bening’s own oeuvre, and you betcha Hunter picked up a nomination for that. The appearance of Paul Dano is also a help; he’s been in two movies in five years where costars picked up trophies. His offbeat panache makes movies seem respectable, guys!
What do you think? Does He Loves Me have the potential to…
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Also in this Monday edition of The Broadsheet: Navy SEALs continue to be hot right now… James Badge Dale enlists in World War Z… Ben Affleck casts an Oscar winner in his next directorial outing… and more ahead.
· Tom Hanks’ Playtone Productions is going to be quite busy over the next few years. In addition to planning an HBO series adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s American Gods, Playtone will potentially team with director Robert Zemeckis for the 3D family adventure Major Matt Mason, based on the Mattel action figure. Hanks himself would star, as well as write the script with Graham Yost. If this all sounds familiar, that’s because a Hanks-led Major Matt Mason has been in the works for over two years. [THR]
· Relativity Media has acquired the rights to the finished Navy SEALs action thriller Act of Valor. The film — which stars unknowns and real-life SEALs — “had unprecedented Naval access resulting in high-octane combat sequences and never-before-seen military operation scenes which are composited from actual events in the lives of the men appearing in the film and their comrades.” Relativity will slot Act of Valor on the schedule in 2012, likely over President’s Day weekend in February. [Deadline]
· Former Rubicon star James Badge Dale is in talks to join Brad Pitt in World War Z. [Variety]
· In other casting news, Ben Affleck would like Alan Arkin to co-star in Argo. The Little Miss Sunshine Oscar winner would play a Hollywood producer in the Affleck-directed Iran hostage drama, which focuses on a C.I.A. scheme to get six American diplomats out of Tehran in 1979. [Variety]
· The Tony Awards…
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At least some of the gang is officially reunited! Deadline reports that Fox Searchlight will distribute the previously announced He Loves Me, the first film from co-directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris since Little Miss Sunshine earned multiple millions (and Oscar nominations) for the studio in 2006. Keeping with the reunion theme, Paul Dano co-stars, but — as of now — he’s the only Sunshine actor in the cast. On the upside: Jeff Bridges is being discussed for another role. Sorry, Alan Arkin! [Deadline]
