Month: January 2025
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24th AARP Movies for Grownups Nominations
The AARP voters are surprisingly astute this year with few head-scratchers. Gladiator II is the biggest headscratcher. Though, Jude Law, Ridley Scott, Pedro Almodóvar, and Connie Nielsen are all pretty loco too. Nominations Tallies (6) Conclave (5) A Complete Unknown (4) Gladiator II (3) The Brutalist, Emilia Pérez, September 5, Sing Sing (2) Dìdi, Here,…
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29th Art Directors Guild Nominations
Due to the fires in southern California, several groups have postponed their nominations announcements. The Art Directors Guild wasn’t one of them. There’s a great deal of overlap between this group and the Set Decorators Society of America, suggesting almost everything here is a contender. Films that failed to show up at either include Blitz…
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Rating the Nominees, Group 4, #10
Over the next several weeks, we’ll be looking at the quality of the Oscar nominees. In most of the major categories, you’ll be asked to rank the nominees in a specific category on a scale from 1 to 10 with ten being best, 1 being worst. Even if you don’t like a movie, please be…
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Oscar Profile: Winton C. Hoch
Born July 31, 1905, in Storm Lake, Iowa, Winton C. Hoch is the only cinematographer of note working in the black-and-white era of film that never lensed a black-and-white feature film. Moving to California in 1924 and graduating in 1931 as a chemist from the California Institute of Technology, Hoch was a research physicist who joined…
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Oscar History: January 9 (2025)
Here’s what happened today in Oscar History. Born 1908: William B. Murphy (62 at death) {1 Nom, 0 Wins} Oscar Nomination: Editing 1941: Susannah York (70 at death) {1 Nom, 0 Wins} Oscar Nomination: Supporting Actress 1955: J. K. Simmons (70) {2 Noms, 1 Win} Oscar Nominations: Supporting Actor Oscar Win: Supporting Actor 1956: Imelda…
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77th Directors Guild Nominations
Today’s other major guild announcement is good news for some, bad news for others. Coralie Fargeat, Denis Villeneuve, and Jon M. Chu all desperately needed a citation here to stay in contention for the Oscars. The all-male list might spur the Academy to replace someone (probably Mangold) with Fargeat. Chu had always seemed like an…
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Rating the Nominees, Group 3, #10
Over the next several weeks, we’ll be looking at the quality of the Oscar nominees. In most of the major categories, you’ll be asked to rank the nominees in a specific category on a scale from 1 to 10 with ten being best, 1 being worst. Even if you don’t like a movie, please be…
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31st Screen Actors Guild Nominations
There was no live announcement this year because of the California wildfires but the nominations have been announced and are below. The five Best Cast nominees have likely secured Best Picture berths as all five have been in the conversation for nominations. The admiration of Wicked, with nominations in all but one category (but including…
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The Contenders 24/25: Dec. Retrospective/Feb. Forecast
We’re looking at Oscar contenders as they release and trying to determine which films have potential and which have wasted it. Let’s look back at the month of December and see what films succeeded and faltered. Then we’ll look forward to February and see what has some potential. Wesley Lovell’s Thoughts December Retrospective Our final…
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Oscar History: January 8 (2025)
Here’s what happened today in Oscar History. Born 1892: Gordon Hollingshead (60 at death) {23 Noms, 7 Wins} Oscar Nominations: Assistant Directing, Documentary Short, One-Reel Short Film, Two-Reel Short Film Oscar Wins: Assistant Directing, Documentary Short, One-Reel Short Film, Two-Reel Short Film 1903: Robert Webb (87 at death) {1 Nom, 1 Win} Oscar Nomination: Assistant…