The first big organization to put out its nominations this year is the Independent Spirit Awards. The quasi-Fantasy/SF fim TAKE SHELTER tied the nouveau Silent film THE ARTIST and THE BEGINNERS with most nominations with 5 and all 3 joined 50/50 and the terrific DRIVE for Best Film nominations.

TAKE SHELTER was interesting, but the murky psychological drama aspects never quite jelled with the apolcalyptic vision it seems to be leading to. ANOTHER EARTH got two nominations, and Lars Von Triers' MELANCHOLIA got a foreign film nod.

the complete list:http://moviecitynews.com/2011/11/2012-film-independent-spirit-award-nominations/

And, hey, The Artist starts out with a funny sci-fi-ish pastiche, too, part of the everything that is wonderful about this movie.


... Wait, 50/50 is indie enough for the Spirit Awards?  Huh.

The Boston Film Critics have picked their Best Films of the year (Ed Symkus?? Ed?). I haven't seen all the films yet (and some have yet to open commercially), but there are some interesting choices. The best news is that there wasn't a major Boston based film this year so no prostituting themselves by honoring Marky Mark, Ben Affleck. THE TOWN etc.

  Personally, I don't get the hosannas that Pitt, Albert Brooks and Clooney are getting all around for solid, but unspectacular work. HUGO is lesser if still half-worthy Scorsese. As noted in the DRIVE thread ( http://sf.theboard.net/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1318164506/0) its one of the better films of the year & Cliff Martinez' music really helps...uh...drive the film. MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE is an interesting indie that doesn't quite come off in the end. PROJECT NIM isn't simply one of the year's best Documentaries, but like the same director's MAN ON WIRE - one of the best films of the year period. As is the Foreign film winner INCENDIES and runner-up POETRY.

The Winners(from Awardsdaily.com):

    Best Picture: THE ARTIST (close seconds: HUGO and MARGARET)
    Best Director: Martin Scorsese for HUGO. Close runner-up: THE ARTIST.
    Best Actor: Brad Pitt for MONEYBALL Runners up: George Clooney for THE DESCENDANTS, Michael Fassbender for SHAME
    Best Actress (another competitive one!): Michelle Williams for MY WEEK WITH MARILYN.
    Best Supporting Actor: Albert Brooks for DRIVE
    Best Supporting Actress: Melissa McCarthy for BRIDESMAIDS. Jeannie Berlin: close second for MARGARET

    Best Ensemble: CARNAGE (“MARGARET was a fairly close runner-up”)
    Best Screenplay: MONEYBALL
    Best Use of Music: Cliff Martinez, DRIVE and Ludovic Bource, THE ARTIST (a tie)  Runner up: THE DESCENDANTS
    Best Editing: Christian Marclay for THE CLOCK Runner-up: HUGO.
    Best Cinematography: Emmanuel Lubezki, THE TREE OF LIFE. Runner-up: HUGO.
    Best New Filmmaker (David Brudnoy Award): Sean Durkin for MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE. Runner-up: J. C. Chandor for MARgIN CALL.
    Best Documentary : PROJECT NIM (James Marsh, who made MAN ON WIRE). Close second: BILL CUNNINGHAM NEW YORK.
    Best Foreign Film: INCENDIES  Runners up: A SEPARATION and POETRY)

I'm ashamed to admit I haven't seen any of the films of the AFI top 10 of 2011 list.

Caleb451 wrote on Dec 12^th, 2011 at 10:45pm:

I'm ashamed to admit I haven't seen any of the films of the AFI top 10 of 2011 list.

Yeah, but would you be ashamed to admit you saw the NC-17 movie SHAME?   ;D

I've seen 8 of the 10 on the AFI list. NONE of those 8 will be on my Top 10. I didn't hate any of them, but they are mostly just ok, rather than Top 10 material. I still have to see the as yet released DRAGON TATTOO and WAR HORSE



Here is the Top 10 AFI list (note: THE ARTIST which is winning a number of Best Of awards this season wasn't eligible since the AFI only awards American films):

    The Descendants
    The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
    The Help
    J. Edgar
    Hugo
    Midnight in Paris
    Moneyball
    The Tree of Life
    War Horse
    Bridesmaids

Jay Seaver wrote on Nov 29^th, 2011 at 2:03pm:

And, hey, The Artist starts out with a funny sci-fi-ish pastiche, too, part of the everything that is wonderful about this movie....

THE ARTIST is at the top of my Must See list (along with some still unreleased films like DRAGON TATTOO, WAR HORSE etc.).

How may of the AFI Top 10 list have the board members out there seen? Opinions???????

Four for me - liked The Descendants, Midnight in Paris, and Moneyball; loved Hugo.  I'll likely see Dragon Tattoo and War Horse when they come out, catch up with J. Edgar sometime in the next couple of weeks, and maybe I'll catch Tree of Life when it pops up at the Brattle at the end of the month.

Though they should be a mainly discredited bunch, the Golden Globes does get a ton of attention. Their nominations came out today. As usual for this group of Star-F#@#ers, there's a ton of high wattage celebrities who's films get nominations such as Clooney, Pitt, Angelina Jolie, DiCaprio and even two for Madonna's extremely poorly received directing effort W/E.

As far as genre films are concerned: MIDNIGHT IN PARIS got 4 noms, HUGO got 3 and Almodovar's SKIN I LIVE IN got a Foreign film nod.

the complete list: http://www.goldenglobes.org/blog/2011/12/the-69th-annual-golden-globe-awards-nominations/

P.S. Some of the other critics groups have given nods to ANOTHER EARTH and ATTACK THE BLOCK, usually as "Breakthrough" recipients, although the San Diego critics gave ANOTHER EARTH's Brit Marling the Best Actress honor! I guess all those cleaning sequences struck a deep chord there!  :D

It was an all Adam Sandler night at the big awards show.

The RAZZIES that is. Sandler and JACK AND JILL won all 10 awards!

http://news.yahoo.com/sandler-sets-worst-movie-record-razzies-sweep-023250929.html

Not a fan of the Razzies but I can't find much fault here  ...........