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HAMMOND ON OSCARS: Still A Wide Open Race Despite Stunners

By PETE HAMMOND | Thursday January 10, 2013 @ 10:33am PSTTags: Amour, Ben Affleck, Kathryn Bigelow, Life of Pi, Lincoln, Oscars, Silver Linings Playbook
Pete Hammond

Let’s throw “conventional wisdom” out the window regarding this morning’s Oscar nominations. In a year when there are so many genuine contenders for the Oscars‘ Best Picture, the Academy has thrown a wrench into the proceedings, instantly cementing early frontrunner status for Lincoln and Life Of Pi along with the “little engine that could” Silver Linings Playbook while dampening prospects of winning the big prize for three other perceived major contenders Zero Dark Thirty (the controversial critical darling), Les Miserables and Argo. All three of those films’ directors were snubbed after winning DGA nominations earlier this week. Did these Best Picture nominees direct themselves?

Related: OSCARS: 85th Academy Award Nominations

The biggest shock waves at the Academy this morning were clearly over the omission of Ben Affleck‘s direction of Argo and Kathryn Bigelow‘s absence for Zero Dark Thirty. Both are still nominees as co-producers of their Best Picture-nominated films, but this has to sting. Instead, Silver Linings’ David O. Russell reversed his snub at DGA and BAFTA with a strong showing where it counts, and wildcard Michael Haneke of Amour (which did exceptionally well for a foreign-language film including a Best Picture and Foreign Language nod) got those spots along with the true shocker of the directing nominees, Beast Of The Southern Wild’s Benh Zeitlin. His tiny Sundance sensation and offbeat film defied expectations earning key Directing, Picture, Screenplay and Actress (for youngest nominee in the category ever, Quvenzhane Wallis). Some people were sure they were mistaken when they heard Zeitlin announced instead of Affleck after the first name Benh was called out. But the Oscars are always known for throwing surprises into the mix. Much like that Wizard of Oz, Oscar has spoken. As Academy COO Ric Robertson (who is also an Academy voter) told me, “I guess we really, really liked Beasts Of The Southern Wild’!” With Zeitlin’s directing nod, that’s an understatement. It is his first movie, by the way, so congratulations Benh, and sorry Ben.

Related: OSCARS: Who Got Snubbed By Academy? READ MORE »

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OSCARS: Who Got Snubbed By Academy?

By DOMINIC PATTEN | Thursday January 10, 2013 @ 5:53am PSTTags: Ben Affleck, Christopher Nolan, Kathryn Bigelow, Oscars, Skyfall

Some Oscar dreams flourished and some were dashed with this morning’s announcement of the 85th annual Academy Award nominations. Academy voters can be as harsh as they can be predictable, and some snubs seem designed to sting. Thankfully some take it with a degree of humor. “I just got snubbed for a flu shot at CVS,” tweeted Prometheus co-writer Damon Lindelof today. Here are some of the directors, films and actors who got left out today even though they might have deserved better.

Related: OSCARS: 85th Academy Award Nominations

Kathryn Bigelow – The Zero Dark Thirty director was the first woman to win a Best Director Oscar for The Hurt Locker– she won’t be repeating that feat this year even though her film about the hunt for Osama bin Laden was nominated for Best Picture. “Kathryn Bigelow was robbed. So f—ed up. #recount,” tweeted ZD30 producer Megan Ellison after the nominations were announced Thursday.

Leonardo DiCaprio – He got a Supporting Actor nomination from the Golden Globes for his Calvin Candie in Django Unchained but nothing today — cast mate Christoph Waltz got the nod.

Marion Cotillard – No Best Actress for her Rust and Bone performance?

The Intouchables – A big hit at home and France’s submission for Best Foreign film, this comedy-drama Weinstein released movie got treated like an untouchable.

Ben Affleck – No Best Director or Best Actor for Argo. Really? Even though it got a Best Picture nomination?

Related: OSCARS: Nominations By Studio & Distributor

Skyfall – Yes it’s a James Bond movie. But, as the PGA recognized, it is a Sam Mendes-directed Bond movie starring Daniel Craig, Judi Dench, Ralph Fiennes and Javier Bardem. It would have been a nice addition to the tribute the Academy plans for the Bond movies’ 50th anniversary during the Oscarcast, but Oscar himself was neither shaken nor stirred beyond Adele’s best song nom.

Cloud Atlas – Not even a technical nomination? The Academy must have really hated it.

John Hawkes – His performance in The Sessions made this past nominee seem a sure thing for a Academy Award nomination – what happened Oscar?

Rise Of The Guardians – That must have really hurt over at DreamWorks Animation this morning.

Related: OSCARS: Nominations By Picture

Quentin Tarantino – The Golden Globes gave the Django Unchained helmer a nomination and the Academy gave the movie itself a Best Picture nomination today but no Best Director for Quentin? Too much controversy?

Perks Of Being A Wallflower – If any movie called out for Best Adapted Screenplay, it was this coming of ager directed and written by Stephen Chbosky based on his own acclaimed 1999 novel. And yet Oscar offered no perks at all.

Christopher Nolan – Holy Oversight, Batman! Even though Inception was nominated for Best Picture in 2010 and he’s picked up a pair of writing noms, The Dark Knight Rises director has never received a nomination for his helming work — including on the hugely successful Batman franchise. And just like with 2005’s Batman Begins and 2008’s The Dark Knight, Nolan was again left off the Best Director list. Read More »

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Bad News For Weinstein As Major Studios Take Over DGA Race: Analysis

By PETE HAMMOND | Tuesday January 8, 2013 @ 11:18am PSTTags: Ang Lee, Ben Affleck, DGA, Kathryn Bigelow, Steven Spielberg, Tom Hooper
Pete Hammond

This morning’s just-announced DGA Award nominations are good news for the major studios and bad news for Harvey Weinstein. With Ben Affleck for Warner Bros’  Argo, Kathryn Bigelow for Sony’s Zero Dark Thirty, Tom Hooper for Universal’s Les Miserables, Ang Lee for 20th Century Fox’s  Life Of Pi and Steven Spielberg for Disney/Dreamworks Lincoln, it was a clean sweep for the majors — a continuing roaring comeback in Oscar contenders for the big boys who the past two years have watched The Weinstein Company take Best Picture (and top DGA) honors with small indies like The Artist and The King’s Speech. Clearly, even as their focus is on money-making blockbusters and popcorn entertainment, the majors are no longer sitting on the sidelines when it comes to the Oscars and seem fully invested in the process this year at least.

Related: DGA Award Nominations Announced

It’s highly unusual since the advent of the Miramax takeover of  Oscar seasons the past quarter century to see no independent contender in a strong position. But, at least as far as the DGA is concerned, that’s the story here, along with the fact that four of the five nominees are past DGA- and Oscar-directing winners, with Affleck the only newcomer to the DGA club after directing only his third feature film (he is an Oscar winner for co-writing Good Will Hunting). Bigelow and Hooper both won in the last three years and have made a quick return to the golden circle. Spielberg, meanwhile, is the Big Kahuna of the DGA as he is a three-time winner (The Color Purple, Schindler’s List, Saving Private Ryan) and now 11-time nominee as well as winner of the guild’s Life Achievement Award. Lee’s enormously impressive technical feat in bringing what was thought to be an unfilmable book, Life Of Pi, so successfully to the big screen is clearly something that appealed to the sensibility of directors, so his nomination was definitely expected.  This will make for one of the tightest and most interesting directing races in years at the DGA. Read More »

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‘Argo’s’ Real-Life People Speak Out About The Mission And The Movie: Video

By PETE HAMMOND | Thursday December 27, 2012 @ 12:53pm PSTTags: Argo, Ben Affleck, Sony Pictures, Warner Bros, Zero Dark Thirty
Pete Hammond

EXCLUSIVE: Appearing on several year-end ten best lists and nominated for 5 Golden Globes, 2 SAG and 7 Critics Choice Movie Awards, Ben Affleck’s Argo is clearly one to watch when Oscar nominations are announced on January 10th. … Read More »

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Ben Affleck On Senate Run Rumors: Video

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Thursday December 20, 2012 @ 5:05pm PSTTags: Argo, Ben Affleck, Face The Nation

The Argo director and star was asked by CBS News’ Bob Schieffer in a segment for the next Face The Nation about his name being bandied about among others for a U.S. Senate run in his native … Read More »

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Oscars: Parties, Q&As, Campaigning More Rampant Than Ever As Voting Continues

By PETE HAMMOND | Thursday December 20, 2012 @ 3:46pm PSTTags: Argo, Ben Affleck, Hugh Jackman, Jane Fonda, Les Miserables, Lincoln, Matt Damon, Mel Gibson, Oscar Campaigning, Robert De Niro, Silver Linings Playbook, The Impossible, The Weinstein Company
Pete Hammond

Joaquin Phoenix and Anthony Hopkins may not approve, but Oscar season campaigning on the party circuit has been at fever pitch.

“We’ve never seen anything like this. We’re exhausted. We are out every night it seems and the invitations keep coming,”  one Oscar-winning Academy member told me recently. He was referring to the glut of invites to parties, lunches, screenings with Q&As and everything else for which Oscar season campaigning has come to be known. He pointedly added that none of it has ever influenced his vote but he is not turning down the elaborate food spreads and the chance to mingle with contenders. “Just don’t tell anyone who invites me to these things, but  it doesn’t really have much impact on the way I fill out my ballot,”  he added with a smile.

That won’t stop Oscar strategists from trying and the campaign activity this season seems like it pushed into high gear much earlier than normal and hasn’t let up, even as the Christmas break quickly approaches and the town starts to shut down. Don’t tell that to the relentless Weinstein Company who will still have some of their contenders out on the stump even over this holiday weekend. Quentin Tarantino who, despite seeing his Los Angeles premiere for Django Unchained cancelled Tuesday night out of sensitivity to the Newtown tragedy, was out doing a Q&A and reception for a packed screening at the Academy last night and will be doing the same thing for BAFTA-LA Friday night. Read More »

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OSCARS: Will Criticism Or Praise Affect Race?

By PETE HAMMOND | Wednesday December 19, 2012 @ 8:39pm PSTTags: Argo, Ben Affleck, Daniel Day-Lewis, John McCain, Lincoln, Mark Boal, Sony Pictures, Steven Spielberg, Zero Dark Thirty
Pete Hammond

It looks like the U.S. Senate, a body used to politics of every stripe, is now injecting itself into Hollywood’s Oscar politics by taking visible public stands on two major Oscar contenders, Lincoln and Zero Dark Thirty. Disney/Fox/Dreamworks’ Oscar contender Lincoln was the beneficiary of an almost unheard of bi-partisan screening for the U.S. Senate tonight. But that was almost overshadowed earlier today when Deadline broke news of a bi-partisan letter from three key U.S. Senators, Republican John McCain and Democrats Dianne Feinstein and Carl Levin, to Sony Pictures. It complained about certain aspects of the depiction of torture in the hunt for Osama bin Laden as characterized in the studio’s major Oscar contender Zero Dark Thirty. (It opened today in limited release and goes wide on January 11th, the day after Oscar nominations are announced). The scenes in question were roundly denounced by the trio: “We write to express our deep disappointment with the movie Zero Dark Thirty. We believe the film is grossly inaccurate and misleading in its suggestion that torture resulted in information that led to the location of Osama bin Laden.” They said they have reviewed CIA records and know the film’s “implications”  are incorrect.

Whether this kind of ringing denouncement of the admittedly “fictional” film about the hunt for bin Laden is true or not, this is not the kind of publicity the studio wants for its Oscar campaign even though controversy is usually great for box office. With Oscar voting just starting this week any suggestion that the film’s credibility is lacking (particularly from the likes of such high ranking members of the Senate’s Armed Services Committee and Select Committee on Intelligence) is not generally on any Oscar strategist’s wish list.  But Zero Dark Thirty has been enveloped in controversy right from the beginning, and today Sony strongly suggested that the pic is being misunderstood in certain quarters. The Senators are asking the studio to put a disclaimer on the film regarding events depicted as “facts” in the movie. Whether that has any ultimate effect on the film’s awards prospects, particularly at the Oscars, remains to be seen. So far it has cleaned up with critics groups’ year-end honors and fared very well with Golden Globe and Critics Choice Movie Awards nominations. It was also named one of the AFI’s top 10 movies of the year.

Related: ‘Zero Dark Thirty’ Gives Sony Early Awards Heat

Controversies like this have made their mark in past Oscar races with mixed results. Attacks on the credibility of the 1999 biopic, The Hurricane, in which Denzel Washington played boxer Read More »

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Ben Affleck No Longer Attached To ‘Focus’

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Wednesday December 19, 2012 @ 4:52pm PSTTags: Ben Affleck, Focus

Ben Affleck has dropped out of the Warner Bros con-artist comedy Focus. Word is Affleck didn’t feel he had the time to make the April start date because of his numerous other commitments. Affleck has been … Read More »

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OSCARS Q&A: Ben Affleck

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Tuesday December 18, 2012 @ 8:41pm PSTTags: Argo, Awardsline, Ben Affleck, Oscars

Christy Grosz is Editor of AwardsLine.

After directing two successful features, Gone Baby Gone in 2007 and The Town in 2010, Ben Affleck has come into his own, perhaps finding greater creative success behind the camera than he ever has as an actor performing in front of it. In fact, the Oscar-winning screenwriter stands a good chance of earning another nom, this time for helming Argo, an almost unbelievable real-life story about how the CIA teamed up with Hollywood to rescue six diplomats stranded in Iran after the Shah’s fall. Affleck also stars in the film, and he’s clearly still passionate about acting. “The director part of me thought it would be too much trouble not to give the actor the part. I’d never hear the end of it,” he says about taking on the role of agent Tony Mendez. He recently spoke with AwardsLine about directing himself and the challenges of shooting the film’s pivotal embassy-takeover scenes.

Related: OSCARS: Ben Affleck And Team On The Making Of ‘Argo’ Read More »

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Kristen Stewart Confirms ‘Focus’ With Ben Affleck

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Saturday December 8, 2012 @ 7:33pm PSTTags: Ben Affleck, Focus, Kristen Stewart

Twilight Saga star Kristen Stewart confirms that she’ll be joining Ben Affleck in the con-artist comedy Focus. The project starts filming in April, and Stewart plays an inexperienced con artist who hooks up with the more seasoned Affleck. … Read More »

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‘Argo’ Behind The Scenes Featurette: Video

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Wednesday December 5, 2012 @ 2:15pm PSTTags: Argo, Ben Affleck

The Ben Affleck-directed period drama, which was just tapped to receive the Ensemble Performance Award at the Palm Springs festival in January, continues its awards push. Here’s a featurette that dropped today.

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OSCARS: Ben Affleck And Team On The Making Of ‘Argo’

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Tuesday November 20, 2012 @ 11:28pm PSTTags: Argo, Awardsline, Ben Affleck, Oscars

Christy Grosz is Editor of AwardsLine.

With more than 120 speaking parts and a key scene that required 2,500 Persian extras, Argo couldn’t have struck the right note of realness without showing faces that lived through the 1979 Iranian Revolution, and that meant heading somewhere in the Middle East to shoot. Several locations were on the short list including Jordan and, in Southeastern Europe, Bulgaria), but ultimately Turkey won out for having the right Persian look. (Director and star Ben Affleck jokes that Turkey having a posh Four Seasons Hotel is what really clinched the deal.)

Related: OSCARS – SAG Cast Award As Predictor

“In truth, it really was very similar architecture, and it was next to Iran, so I felt like we’d be able to get a lot of Farsi-speaking extras,” Affleck says. “As it turned out, that was a false assumption; most Iranians were afraid to be in the movie because of reprisal against their family, which kind of brought home the seriousness of the real story.”
Read More »

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Ben Affleck To Receive Modern Master Award At Santa Barbara

By THE DEADLINE TEAM | Monday November 12, 2012 @ 7:53pm PSTTags: Argo, Ben Affleck, Santa Barbara International Film Festival

Santa Barbara, CA- The Santa Barbara International Film Festival, presented by lynda.com, will honor director, producer and actor Ben Affleck with the Modern Master Award at the 28th edition of the Fest, which runs January 24 -February 3, 2013, it was announced today by SBIFF Executive Director Roger Durling. The Tribute will take place on Saturday, January 26, 2013 at the historic Arlington Theatre.

Read More »

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Kristen Stewart Eyeing ‘Focus’ With Ben Affleck

By DOMINIC PATTEN | Friday November 2, 2012 @ 6:58pm PDTTags: Ben Affleck, Kristen Stewart, The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2, Warner Bros

The Twilight Saga star is in talks to join the Warner Bros con artists film, an insider confirms to Deadline. Kristen Stewart would star in Focus with Ben Affleck. Stewart’s role would be an inexperienced con … Read More »

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Casting Society To Honor Ben Affleck With Lifetime Nod

By PATRICK HIPES, Managing Editor | Wednesday October 24, 2012 @ 4:09pm PDTTags: Artios Awards, Ben Affleck

EXCLUSIVE: The Casting Society of America will bestow its Lifetime Achievement Award on Ben Affleck during its 28th annual Artios Awards, set for October 29 at ceremonies in Los Angeles and New York.  The CSA also is … Read More »

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‘Argo’s Ben Affleck Eyes Dennis Lehane Novel ‘Live By Night’ As Next Directing Vehicle

By MIKE FLEMING JR | Thursday October 11, 2012 @ 3:05pm PDTTags: Argo, Ben Affleck, Big Deals Film, Dennis Lehane, Warner Bros
Mike Fleming

EXCLUSIVE: As Warner Bros prepares for tomorrow’s release of the Ben Affleck-directed Oscar -entry Argo, Affleck is in talks at the studio to make Live By Night the next film he will write-direct-produce and star in. The project is based on the new novel by Dennis Lehane that was just published by William Morrow. Affleck made his directorial debut with the superb Gone Baby Gone in 2007, based on the mystery novel series written by Lehane.

Warner Bros acquired Live By Night in April when it was in galley form, to be produced by Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Davisson Killoran’s Appian Way. Appian Way, which had a pre-existing relationship with Affleck that came together during its production of Runner, Runner, will now produce with Pearl Street, the WB-based company that Affleck shares with Matt Damon.

Live By Night uses some of the characters from Lehane’s sprawling period novel The Given Day and brings them into Prohibition. The focus is Joe Coughlin, the black-sheep son of a police captain who gets involved in escalating levels of organized crime. The deal with Lehane and his agent Amy Schiffman at IPG made back then brought Warner Bros rights to The Given Day. That sprawling classic of a novel had originally been optioned by Sam Raimi, but didn’t go anywhere. Lehane will complete the series as a trilogy but Affleck’s focus will be Live By Night and he certainly has shown a flair for bringing Lehane’s fiction to the screen. Read More »

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Ben Affleck In Talks To Star In Warner Bros Grifter Tale ‘Focus’

By MIKE FLEMING JR | Tuesday October 9, 2012 @ 9:56am PDTTags: Argo, Ben Affleck, Big Deals Film, Focus, John Requa, Warner Bros
Mike Fleming

EXCLUSIVE: As Warner Bros prepares to open Ben Affleck’s Oscar-season entry Argo, the studio is in early talks with Affleck to star in Focus. Glenn Ficarra and John Requa wrote the script and will direct. Denise DiNovi is producing. All of this is subject to finding the right female lead, but it all sounds promising and Warner Bros is eager to move quickly and get this into production. Focus tells the story of a veteran con man who gets involved with a newcomer to the grifter business. They become  involved romantically but that becomes perilous in a business where they lie and cheat for a living. The complications of the encounter haunt them when they meet up again in the future. Read More »

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Oscar Buzz Increases As Ben Affleck, George Clooney Celebrate ‘Argo’s’ Hollywood Premiere

By PETE HAMMOND | Friday October 5, 2012 @ 10:27am PDTTags: Alan Arkin, Argo, Ben Affleck, Bryan Cranston, CIA, George Clooney, Warner Bros
Pete Hammond

After extremely successful film festival launches in Telluride and Toronto, Warner Bros. thriller and big Oscar hopeful, Argo (10/12), finally hit Hollywood last night with a West Coast premiere at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences’ Samuel Goldwyn Theatre. And … Read More »

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Toronto Oscar Talk: Ben Affleck’s ‘Argo’ And Paul Thomas Anderson’s ‘The Master’

By PETE HAMMOND | Saturday September 8, 2012 @ 12:00am PDTTags: Argo, Ben Affleck, Bryan Cranston, The Master
Pete Hammond

Toronto’s film festival isn’t content to do just one, or even two, major gala premieres a night like, say, Cannes. No, it has about 10 of them and Friday night was really buzzing with at least four major ‘must-see’ events all coinciding. Paul Thomas Anderson’s The Master premiered in North American to a sold-out crowd at the massive Princess Of Wales theatre and sparked lots of immediate Oscar talk just like in Venice. (The Master And Joaquin Phoenix Draw Raves.) The acting from Joaquin Phoenix and Philip Seymour Hoffman, particularly in a killer scene near the end, doesn’t get much better than this. And controversy about whether it really is – or isn’t – about the beginnings of Scientology will only spark more interest. But with the Oscar season just getting going in earnest, a lot of contenders are finally emerging.

Related: P.T. Anderson In Venice On ‘The Master’ & Scientology

Just as it did in its sneak previews in Telluride, Ben Affleck’s Argo  killed in Toronto at its official World Premiere Friday at the Roy Thomson Hall. And why not? After all, some of the plot revolves around the Canadians helping to shelter 6 Americans from the radical Iranians who held nearly 60 others hostage for well over a year in 1979. And the Warner Bros brass turned out in force seeing the film receive a highly enthusiastic standing ovation. That included Jeff Robinov, Sue Kroll, Dan Fellman who know they have a likely hit on their hands.

At the after-party, director/star Affleck told me this was one of the best screenings he has ever had for a movie. “They got every reference and recognized all the Canadian names we put in there,” he said. After the highs of the Fall festival circuit, Affleck is just hoping filmgoers turn out when it opens October 12th. “I am doing something I haven’t done for a movie in years and hitting many different cities to promote the film,” he told me. Read More »

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