Trailer - Mike Leigh's 'Another Year'

Mike Leigh has received six Oscar nominations in 13 years, pretty good for a guy who has only made half a dozen movies in that time. Twice, he's been nominated for directing and his script in the same year. It's not a certainty that will happen this year, of course, but I'm not betting against the screenplay for Another Year.

The movie debuted at Cannes and was instantly beloved, as his work generally is among critics and arthouse patrons. What is interesting about Leigh's approach is that he doesn't really have a script, as such. He and the actors work from a pretty general outline of what the scenes are to accomplish. It's really working without a net, but it's just another way to do it. Woody Allen, to whom Leigh is frequently compared because of both mens' facilities with different kinds of stories and their secretive nature, among other things, does it a completely different way. He writes every stitch of the script, and while there are probably changes here and there once the production happens, there's not the organic growth of the story through that character-finding process Leigh and his actors go through. Check out the trailer:

Click to read more ...

Oscar Week: They've Never Won an Academy Award

We're bringing back another column from last year's Oscar Week, because it's just as relevant this year. Kate Winslet was mentioned in this space 12 months ago because she had earned her sixth Oscar - at the age of 33, no less - and had no wins to show for it. She was in a three-way tie for most nominations for an actress with no trophy. This year, Jeff Bridges joins a group of five male performers with at least five nominations and no wins. He won't be part of that group for long.

The record for no wins, at least among actors, is the legendary Peter O'Toole, and it goes without saying that he's among the greatest of all time. Eight nominations with no statuette. And they weren't cheap nominations in empty years, either: The Lion in Winter, Goodbye, Mr. Chips, The Ruling Class, The Stunt Man, My Favorite Year, Venus, and something called Lawrence of Arabia. He got the honorary Oscar a few years back, before Venus, and his speech was among the most eloquent I've ever heard watching that broadcast. He's just a class act, and it's a real shame he never "earned" his profession's highest honor. Now, the all-time records for futility in non-acting categories belong to Kevin O'Connell, with 20 nominations as a sound engineer and zero wins. He's been nominated 18 out of the past 26 years, and two years, he was nominated twice. That's gotta hurt. Randy Newman was nominated 15 times before finally winning Best Song for Monsters, Inc., although his "When She Loved Me" from Toy Story 2 is one of the absolute great integrations of a song into a film. That one lost to the completely forgotten tune from Tarzan. In terms of the heavyweights, though, here are some names to remember that the Academy has never chosen as a winner:

Click to read more ...

They Never Won an Academy Award

There's a better than average chance that Kate Winslet will pick up an Academy Award Sunday night for The Reader. It's neither my favorite performance in that category, nor is it her best work, but at 33, she's already something of an Oscar spinster, having been nominated six times with no trophies to show for it.

Among actresses, Winslet is tied for the most nominations without a win. Deborah Kerr and Thelma Ritter have six, too, and curiously, all of them were sandwiched in a short amount of time, like Winslet. Kerr amassed six nods between 1949 and 1960, while Ritter did her damage between 1950 and 1962. Kate has lost for Sense and Sensibility, Titanic, Iris, Eternal Sunshine, and Little Children. The record for no wins, at least among actors, is the legendary Peter O'Toole, who it goes without saying is among the greatest of all time. Eight nominations with no gold. And they weren't cheap nominations in empty years, either: The Lion in Winter, Goodbye, Mr. Chips, The Ruling Class, The Stunt Man, My Favorite Year, Venus, and something called Lawrence of Arabia. He got the honorary Oscar a few years back, before Venus, and his speech was among the most eloquent I've ever heard watching that broadcast. He's just a class act, and it's a real shame he never "earned" his profession's highest honor. Now, the all-time records for futility in non-acting categories belong to Kevin O'Connell, with 20 nominations as a sound engineer and zero wins. He's been nominated 18 out of the past 25 years, and two years, he was nominated twice. That's gotta hurt. Randy Newman was nominated 15 times before finally winning Best Song for Monsters, Inc., although his "When She Loved Me" from Toy Story 2 is one of the absolute great integrations of a song into a film. That one lost to the song from Tarzan. In terms of the heavyweights, though, here are some names to remember that the Academy has never chosen as a winner: 1 - Alfred Hitchcock - 5 nominations It's frightening to think that the greatest, most influential, and most successful director in Hollywood's golden era never won squat. They gave him the Before You Die award, but to only warrant five nominations is pretty scandalous. No nominations for Vertigo or North by Northwest just doesn't compute to me. Now, he did lose to guys you don't mind winning - Billy Wilder (twice), John Ford, and Elia Kazan - and Hitch shouldn't have won in '46 when Leo McCarey took home the award for Going My Way. That probably should've been Wilder again, for Double Indemnity.

Click to read more ...

National Society of Film Critics Honor 'Bashir,' 'Happy-Go-Lucky'

The last major group of film critics has awarded its 2008 honors, with the National Society of Film Critics going heavily against the grain, picking Waltz with Bashir the year's best picture, and giving the most trophies to Mike Leigh's character comedy, Happy-Go-Lucky.

The Society is comprised of major newspaper critics in Boston, New York, Chicago, and Philadelphia, as well as critics from Time, Newsweek, and Salon.com. Several key Oscar contenders were shut out completely, with Gran Torino, Benjamin Button, The Wrestler, Doubt, and Frost/Nixon going home emptyhanded. Does that bode well for Waltz with Bashir or Happy-Go-Lucky? Perhaps, but because with very, very few exceptions, journalists are not members of AMPAS, it's a different group of voters for the Oscars. What these wins can do is focus a little more attention on the triumphant films, which could put them on the radar of Oscar voters. Whether or not they're swayed by the awards given out by any critics' group - or whether the voters will even bother watching them - is the big question mark.

Click to read more ...

The Big Picture Interview with Mike Leigh

It might surprise you to learn that Mike Leigh has earned five Oscar nominations in the past 12 years, both as a writer and director. There's every likelihood that more nominations will follow for his latest homegrown effort, Happy-Go-Lucky. The film focuses on a tremendously positive character named Poppy, and for her work, Sally Hawkins seems destined for one of those nominations.

Leigh makes no bones about...well, anything. He's completely upfront and a complete original. We had a chance to talk to the famed British director on his first visit to the Arizona desert. And, as always, he had plenty to say.Happy-Go-Lucky, even though it seems very much like a Mike Leigh film, is playing different notes than we've heard from you in the past decade or so.Maybe it is, but I try to do something different every time I make a film. I mean, Naked was startlingly different for everybody following High Hopes and Life is Sweet - which, by the way, those resonate with Happy-Go-Lucky in some ways. Career Girls was slightly different from Secrets and Lies, and nothing was more different from everything else than Topsy Turvy. So my job is to serve up a different dish every time to come for supper. Is that the job? Do you feel any pressure to do it that way?There isn't any pressure to do that, it's my inclination to do it. I'm a storyteller - I'm not going to tell you the same joke every time I tell you a joke. Apart from anything else, it's good fun to keep you, the audience, on your toes. And for me, I call this an anti-miserabilist film, really. This is about being positive in an age when there's a great deal to be gloomy about, which we don't need to explain. We can be as gloomy as we like, but there are people in the world getting on with it.As I watched the film, it dawned on me that Poppy is not the kind of character we see in leading roles in American films. She's a bit of an odd penny and we don't give her the spotlight in our films; she's always the supporting character, the best friend. Was that part of the appeal of exploring this character, that we don't see her type too often?No, to be honest, until you've said that, it had never occurred to me. She just is a fascinating character. I'd never really thought about that. Is it true? It may be. I don't think of the films in terms of [fitting in to] Hollywood, so no. I've never thought of it.Well now, Hollywood is thinking of it.And that's its prerogative. Fine - that's good (laughs).And that's been your position all along, right? That if these things come, OK, but you don't make films to win Oscars.No, but I do care. I'm very flattered if we get Oscar nominations. It's one's peers and it's celebrating our work. I think it's the novelist's prerogative to not care about the Pulitzer Prize, because novelists work by themselves. But you don't make a film by yourself. There's a huge number of people involved. And when you get the likes of the Palme d'Or or the Golden Lion or Oscar nominations, it's as much for them as for anybody else.But also, more important than anything else, I'm not some Trappist monk up a mountain; I'm in show business. I make films for people to see. And the likes of Oscars and all the rest, it's all about getting the films out there.

Click to read more ...