Movie On 2022

Last Saturday, December 15, the European Film Academy had their ceremony in Seville, Spain where they announced current year's award winners.  Was able to watch it live on TV and was lazy enough to wait until today, when there are too-many industry news, to write post even do I'm glad the BIG winner of the night was none other than Pawel Pawlikowski visually stunning with awesome music (love jazz) Cold War. Will share that the most emotional and exciting moment in the ceremony was undoubtedly the acceptance speech by Carmen Maura that brought tears to my eyes and I wasn't the only one as Pawel Pawlikoski admitted during one of his acceptance speeches, he was also with tears in his eyes plus all the anonymous people in the public when camera panned.  The rest of the show was unsurprising and at times a bit boring. Sigh. So a few days later here are the winners. European Film : Zimna Wojna (Cold War), Pawel Pawlikowski, European Discovery- Prix FIPRESCI : Girl , Lukas Dhont E...

Yesterday the Academy announced the films that will advance to be considered for a nomination in several categories; one of them is the foreign language film where nine (9) films advance. Most of us recall the process but for those that don't here it is: Los Angeles-based Academy members from all branches screened the original submissions in the category between mid-October and December 10. The group’s top six choices, augmented by three additional selections voted by the Academy’s Foreign Language Film Award Executive Committee, constitute the shortlist . There are no surprises in this shortlist as includes the five that believe will obtain a nomination and if they don't, then that will be a huge surprise.  I'm talking about Roma, Cold War, Shoplifters, Burning and Capernaum.  Among the other four perhaps the most unexpected is Kazakhstan submission but we have to remember that film got the Best Actress award at 2018 Cannes. Some are surprised with submissions from Italy,...

A few days back, on November 29 the 2018 APSA awards ceremony took place in Brisbane, Australia and for the first time top award went to a Japanese film as Shoplifters won Best Feature Film. The Jury Prize went to Burning; so, APSA is honoring the two films that are penetrating the 2018 American Awards season with nominations and wins in the best foreign language film category as well as in other tech categories. Remarkable is the spread of awards as represent the geographical and cultural diversity of the Asia Pacific region, awards ent to films from Australia, India, Indonesia, Israel, Japan, Lebanon, China, Korea, Russia, Singapore and Turkey. The Cultural Diversity Award under the Patronage of UNESCO was awarded to Garin Nugroho and Ifa Isfansyah for Memories of My Body (Kucumbu Tubuh Indahku) (Indonesia) and accepted on the night by lead actor Muhummad Khan. The winner was determined by the APSA Cultural Diversity International Jury comprised of Jury Chair Khadija Al-Salami (Yemen...

Last night the so-called " most powerful " group of American critics voted their 2018 awards and to the surprise of many as it doesn't happens often (only 13 times in 45 years), their top award matched their east coast counterpart.  Yes, LAFCA gave top award to Roma which was New York Film Critics Circle top award.  Then quite a few critics groups between the east and west coast have also given top award to Roma, which makes me think that critics at least when it comes to Best Film seems to have a consensus that wonder if will repeat when Academics vote. Do not mind at all that critics are honoring Roma as really wish film could get a major Oscar as, according to many industry pundits, will give a huge push to still consider as films to those being consumed by audiences outside movie theaters.  No doubt that most industry players need to recognize that WE the audience nowadays have many options to consume films.  Not long ago situation was different as to watch movie...

Yesterday the east coast group voted their annual winners for the 87th edition and seems that there is no visible trend from an independent film award and the two major film critics, as for example Best Film category in Gotham went to The Rider, in NBR to Green Book and the NYFCC to Roma.  Data up-to-this-moment suggests there are high probabilities current award season will again be interesting and perhaps even unpredictable which makes all exercises a lot more fun. In previous years the call-by-many "harbingers of the Oscars nominations" score have been on the lower side but let's hope for the future of cinema that Roma gets an Oscar nomination and hopefully the top AMPAS award.  It's only then -according to several industry articles- that theaters will start to understand how much films distribution has changed thanks to how audiences -we- consume films nowadays.  I don't want theaters to disappear and well-understand they will not relinquish their power withou...

Yesterday afternoon the NBR announced its winners and its choices gives us a sight into the Awards Season that seems this year will be not surprising but a little bit unpredictable with perhaps honors wealth spreading all over the place.  We have to recall the NBR is made up of film enthusiasts, industry professionals, academics and filmmakers which makes the organization a quite interesting blend from all walks of life. In past awards seasons group have honored films that went to have Oscar nominations and/or wins.  Last year their top winner was The Post but also honored The Florida Project, Lady Bird, Phantom Thread, Call Me By Your Name, and Coco, all of which ended up receiving Oscar nominations.  So, the group heterogeneity gives them good predictable record for nominations.  Still, believe group has a spotty record for predicting winners. This year's top award went to a film that " surprised " internet film pundits as not many were predicting or expecting Gree...

Today, Monday, February 4th, 2019 the post has become final with the inclusion of the last group winners. By now we know that film critics/journalists and those who make the movies are really in different mind sets when they evaluate films released in 2018. From the five categories with summaries here and with the exception of best actress, film critics have clear winners: Roma if best film, Alfonso Cuaron in best director, Ethan Hawke in best actor and, Mr. Rogers doc in best documentary. From those four categories Industry and film critics only coincide, up-to-today- with Alfonso Cuaron winning directing and Roma still has possibilities as has 11 Oscar nominations and one is for Best Picture.  But when it comes to best actor category they are far away as Ethan Hawke doesn't have an Oscar nomination; same happens with Won't You Be My Neighbor?, so, there are no chances to coincide at all. This award season has been strange, unusual and highly atypical; not clear for the reaso...