The FAC Looks at Film Editing and Cinematography / Oscar Biz Buzz: Fences, Miss Sloane and Moonlight

Welcome to Thursday...


THE FAC LOOKS AT TWO NEW CATEGORIES: FILM EDITING AND CINEMATOGRAPHY

One of the most common refrains in Oscar season is that a Best Picture contender needs a film editing nomination to be a real player for the big prize.  Last year's winner: Spotlight, fulfilled that criteria.  A film doesn't have to win it, but it does seem to be helpful to get the Film Editing nomination.  So we're going to take our first look today at the films that the The FAC Oscar pundits think have the inside track for a nomination there as well as for Cinematography...which for the first time in three years will NOT be won by Emmanuel Lubezki (2013-Gravity, 2014-Birdman, 2015-The Revenant).

I have used the publicly available Oscar predictions from the following pundits:

Erik Anderson/Awards Watch
Clayton Davis/Awards Circuit
Greg Ellwood/The Playlist-Awards Campaign
Scott Feinberg/The Hollywood Reporter
Joey Magidson/Hollywood News
Nathaniel Rogers/Film Experience
Sasha Stone/Awards Daily
Kristopher Tapley/Variety-InContention
Anne Thompson/Indiewire

TFF #43 films are in Bold.

Here's the first FAC for those two categories:

FILM EDITING

1) La La Land
2) Silence
3) Arrival
4) Moonlight
5) Live by Night

6) Fences
7) Jackie
8) Lion
9) Sully
10) Hacksaw Ridge

Comment:  If true when the nominations are actually announced, TFF #43 films would be three of the five nominated films in this category.


CINEMATOGRAPHY

1) La La Land
2) Silence
3) Arrival
4) Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk
5) Jackie

6) Live by Night
7) Rules Don't Apply
8) Hail Caesar
9) The Jungle Book
10) Cafe Society

Comment: La La Land would add another nomination here as would Arrival.



OSCAR BIZ BUZZ

THE VIOLA DAVIS MOVE

I reported here Monday that Viola Davis will be campaigning for Best Supporting Actress for her role in Fences rather than Best Actress.  That creates a completely different dynamic for both categories. The decision almost certainly opens a spot in the Best Actress categories and also crowds out someone in the Supporting category as well as making it a much more competitive race.

Indiewire's Anne Thompson takes a look at the ramifications.

MISS SLOANE TO POP AT AFI

We've been waiting to see the complete American Film Institute's full lineup as well as if John Madden's Miss Sloane starring Jessica Chastain would play there for some time now.  We got our answer Tuesday as The AFI folks have set the film for its World Premiere on Nov. 11.

Details of the AFI announcement are here from Variety.


AWARDS CHATTER PODCAST

Scott Feinberg talks to Oscar Best Supporting Actor contender Mahershala Ali about his role in Barry Jenkins Moonlight as well as other topics in the most recent edition of The Hollywood Reporter's Awards Chatter.

You can find the article and the link to the podcast here.


That's a wrap for Thursday.

EMAIL:  mpgort@gmail.com OR michael_speech@hotmail.com

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COMMENT to the Blog itself.

The Guardian Predicts / The Euro Producers; The French-Cinecinema/Cine+ / Fences Swings for the Fences

Good Thursday World!


THE GUARDIAN PREDICTS

Britain's The Guardian posted a "40 Films We Predict Will Premiere at Venice, Toronto or Telluride" story yesterday.  The predix offer some surprises.  Breaking it down: the article bresks the 40 films into three categories-Dead Certs, Quite Likely and If It's Ready.

The piece names Telluride as a specific possibility for two films that we already know will play somewhere before the BFI/London Fest owing to their status their as European premieres: A United Kingdom and The Queen of Katwe.  United Kingdom seems to me to be the more likely T-ride player of the two.  Venice is listed as a specific designated fest probability for Planetarium while Toronto is listed for A United Kingdom, The Queen of Katwe, The Girl on the Train, Free Fire and The Seagull.

Among their "Dead Certs" the best Telluride potentials look like: Denial (from Bleeker Street which partnered with Netflix last year on Beats of No Nation), One or the other of TWC's The Founder or Lion and Arrival.  Outside T-ride shots in this category: The Secret Scripture, The Mercy and the Malick double play of Weightless and The Voyage of Time.

Interestingly, The Guardian lists Warren Beatty's Rules Don;t Apply in the Dead Cert category which is very intriguing,

In the Quite Likely category you'll fins Telluride possibilities such as HHhH and Gold (the other two Weinstein fall films...at least for the moment), 20th Century Women, War Machine (from Netflix), Wilson and How to Talk to Girls at Parties.

Among the "If It's Ready" films I don't find anything that's A) likely to be ready and B) if it is, likely to be a Telluride bound...though I'd really like to put in a word for Miss Sloane.

It's worth noting that The Guardian sponsored TFF #42.

Check the complete article here:

https://www.theguardian.com/film/filmblog/2016/jul/20/40-films-predict-premiere-venice-toronto-telluride-festivals




THE EURO PRODUCERS: THE FRENCH-CINECINEMA/CINE+

CineCinema changed over to Cine+ within the last few years but it's all the same.  This production company has often been represented at Telluride over the last few years:

2005: Lemming, Live and Become
2006: The Page Turner, Indigenes
2007: The Diving Bell and The Butterfly
2008: With a Little Help from Myself
2009: Farewell, Coco Before Chanel, A Prophet, Inferno
2010: The Illusionist, The Princess of Montpensier, Of Gods and Men
2011: Goodbye First Love, The Kid with a Bike, Le Havre, The Artist
2012: Rust and Bone, Superstar, The Attack, Amour
2013: The Past, Blue is the Warmest Color, Le Maison de la Radio
2014: The Gate. The Price of Fame, Two Days One Night, Diplomacy
2015: Marguerite

The best opportunities for Cine+ to play Telluride this year is Slack Bay.  After that their slate doesn't look, at this point, to offer a lot of other possibilities.


FENCES SWINGS FOR THE FENCES

Fences still from Deadline.com

We missed mentioning this acouple of days ago but Denzel Washington's adaptation of August Wilson's Fences has been dated for an awards season qualifying time frame.  Mutiple reports put the film which Washington both directs and stars in as being released in a limited fashion on Dec. 16 and then going wider on Dec. 25.  Fences is from Paramount which is loaded with titles for this awards season.  In addition to Fences they have Allied, Arrival and Silence.

Admittedly, Fences is an unlikely Telluride film...but you never know...

Coverage of the Fences date announcement:

http://variety.com/2016/film/news/denzel-washington-fences-december-release-1201816381/

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/denzel-washingtons-fences-snags-awards-912004

http://www.ew.com/article/2016/07/18/denzel-washington-fences-release-date

That's it for Thursday.  Come back tomorrow for the latest Telluride Ten Bets.  It's the last one before announcements from Toronto and Venice.

Contact MTFB at:

mpgort@gmail.com

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