Sam Rockwell Getting No Oscar Love from Sony

There will be no official push for Sam Rockwell from Moon in the Best Actor category. Sony Classics didn't do a whole lot to get the film in a lot of theaters this summer, and director Duncan Jones has Tweeted his disappointment that, once again, the arthouse division of one of the biggest studios in the world is not stepping up for his film. "We have more than asked.. we've knocked heads. They have chosen the films they are backing and we are not in their plans," he wrote, adding "They say it costs too much for our little film as they would need to be water-marked copies as our DVD isn't out yet in the US." The Hollywood Reporter reveals that the move by Sony has not gone unnoticed, and that celebrities like Jon Favreau and Neil Gaiman are among those calling out the studio for leaving one of the year's better, more unique films completely high and dry at the only time of the year that it could conceivably find a larger audience, which would be key in driving the product on the home video market. Moon barely missed our end-of-the-year top ten, and Rockwell has once again delivered a terrific performance. I remember several years ago, as a voter for the Phoenix Film Critics Awards, we were one of the only if not the only critics group to name Rockwell Best Actor for Confessions of a Dangerous Mind. An actor with his chops can't go widely ignored forever, can he? There is now apparently a petition to get Rockwell's work awarded with an Oscar nomination. It's a tough race this year - Bridges, Clooney, Renner, and Colin Firth, along with possible obligatory votes for Morgan Freeman - and Rockwell would be solidly in a second group of contenders that would include Sharlto Copley from District 9 and maybe Tobey Maguire from Brothers. But without Sony Classics lifting a finger to help the film (pushing An Education much more aggressively and, it seems, exclusively), Rockwell doesn't have much of a chance, I'm afraid. But let's return to the water-marked screeners excuse. I don't know how many awards voters there are in the US. There are about 5,000 Oscar voters and then you've got critics groups, so maybe another 3,000 - 5,000 there. Whatever it is, let's for the sake of this discussion say there are 10,000 discs individually watermaked so that the movies I get on DVD are embedded with information saying they went to me and not a Golden Globe voter. It helps prevent piracy, or make it easier to track down the source if a movie is pirated from that screener. Sony can excuse critics from its list, because we're more likely to remember a movie from earlier in the year than a lot of Oscar voters, who don't see new movies every week and then have to cram a bunch of films in their schedules in December and January. So focusing solely on Oscar voters, Sony is on the hook for 5,000 digitally watermarked copies of a movie. How much could that possibly cost? True, it would be easier if the film was already on DVD, then Sony just dips into its vaults and does a mail merge for shipping, but if you've got a movie that deserves to be in the conversation, I'd think you wouldn't work against it being mentioned along with the rest of the year's great films.

Comments

[knives]

The weirder thing is that the DVD hits in less then two weeks, so they must have several discs pressed and shipped to retailers already.

[Lengthy Johnson]

I was thinking about this the other day. More and more worthy films seem to be failing because of a lack of marketing support from the studios.

It seems a strange logic to go through all the trouble of making a product (movie) and then realeasing it without any advertising. I almost seems that the studios don't want to do anything to draw attention from the big earning blockbusters.

In the case of Moon, it was made on a minute budget and got mostly excellent reviews. So it must have been a fairly safe bet for the studio to sacrifice some advertising dollars on it. As it were, very few people saw it in either the US or UK.

Had it got more attention during its run I am sure it would have been better placed for an Oscar bid today.

Although I must say I've always had a problem with Sam Rockwell. Basically he's got two modes that he switches between: "smug" and "bemused". Confessions of a Dangerous Mind is an excellent example of this.

[Brick Hardmeat]

Even though Sony won't support Moon and Sam Rockwell for an Oscar, we can still help: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TuBs01Uwi8E