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By Dan Skip Allen
Mulholland Drive is a famous street above Los Angeles and has a mystique like no other in Hollywood. So go figure one of the most mysterious filmmakers in Hollywood, David Lynch, would make a movie named after this street. The film lives up to the name because it's a weird film, not unlike Lynch's other films and television work like Twin Peaks and Eraserhead.
The film starts with a memorable credits scene with a car driving down Mulholland Drive. The car stops and the men inside tell a woman (Laura Harring) to get out. At that moment, two cars are racing down the street and one of them runs into the limo, sending it careening into a nearby ditch. The woman crawls out of the car and stumbles around, eventually walking down a hill and falling asleep by a bush. She wakes up and goes into another woman's home while she's gone. That's the beginning of this crazy Hollywood story. It's even wilder than it sounds, though. When the woman's niece (Naomi Watts) comes to stay in the house, she helps the woman who now has amnesia find out what is going on. They work together to uncover this mystery. The film also focuses on a film director (Justin Theroux) and a bunch of shady gangsters and assorted other weirdos in darkened rooms and cowboy figures. This film is one of the weirdest David Lynch has ever done, but it's done very well like all of his movies are except Dune. Lynch infuses this film with everything including the kitchen sink. It has a noir feel to t even though much of it is set during the daytime. Lynch knows how to add odd moments like when the two women visit a theater with a trumpet player and then the room turns blue or when the director visits a cowboy at a horse ranch. He talks to him in weird language or riddles if you will. All Lynch's trademark tropes are in this film. The 4K version helps all the colors stand out as well. 
The technical aspects of the film are very good as well. The score by Angelo Badalamenti is moody and helps set the atmosphere while it has a song sung at the theater that is breathtakingly amazing. The cinematography by Peter Deming and production design are both very good. This film goes to a bunch of locations and they all look gorgeous and have a vibe all their own. Only David Lynch could have made this wild, outside-the-box (pun intended) film. It has so much craziness in it it's hard to describe it and what's going on.
The cast has some amazing cameos full of stars viewers might recognize like Robert Forster as a police detective, Billy Ray Cyrus who's having an affair with Justin Theroux's character's wife, Michael J. Anderson as the man in the darkroom, and Dan Hedaya as a gangster. That's just the tip of the iceberg of all the weird and interesting casting choices. Lynch always picks interesting people for roles in his film. This one is no different. Mulholland Drive is among a plethora of David Lynch films in the Criterion Collection. Among them, this one might be the most metta considering it's a film about making a film. It has a lot of other aspects as well: a noir, a mystery, and a love letter to Hollywood. Lynch shows in this film how much he loves Hollywood in his weird and offbeat way... the only way he knows how to make a film. Lynch was nominated for the best academy award for his work on the film. It was very deserved.
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The Criterion Voyages: CITIZEN KANE (Spine #1104) -- A Film That Deserves the Moniker of Masterpiece1/5/2022
By Dan Skip Allen
Citizen Kane is widely considered by many to be the best movie of all time. It's the magnum opus of legendary filmmaker Orson Welles. It is quite an achievement for Criterion to get this great film. Now it's available as Spine #1104, the first 4K Blu-ray in the Criterion Collection. The format lends itself to this great film quite nicely.
The film is about the life of Charles Foster Kane (Orson Welles). Newspaper reporters have found out that the last word from Kane before he died was "Rosebud", so they try to figure out what that word means. They go from person to person trying to get to the bottom of this mystery, from his ex-wives to his best friend, Jedediah Leland (Joseph Cotton), with whom he built his newspaper empire. That famous word is part of what made this film an absolute masterpiece in the eyes of so many people. Welles's filmmaking style is also what helped make this film so great. He has some amazing camera shots in the film. One, in particular, is where he's looking into a stand-up mirror and it seems like it keeps going forever. Other tracking shots and camera movements throughout the film are done impeccably. Fade-ins and so forth are used perfectly to pass time throughout the film. Welles is a master with the camera and framing shots. 
Citizen Kane has various forms of music in it, from one of Kane's ex-wives singing opera to the score by Bernard Hermann, one of the greatest composers of all time. The film has amazing moments of music throughout using various forms of strings and the piano to create moments of joy and or depression. Even bands in the background create a sound for the film.
Kane spent a lot of his fortune on his property known as Xanadu in Florida, as well as expensive trinkets which he littered throughout the expansive property grounds. He built it for his second ex-wife Susan (Dorothy Comingore), an opera singer. It turns out it was just a giant place where he ended up all alone in his final days. Millions of dollars worth of property, art, statues, and everything under the sun that couldn't buy him happiness. Citizen Kane is often claimed to be a film about newspaper magnate William Randolf Hearst. Welles was ruined for years after the film came out in 1941. Hearst considered it an insult and kept Welles from ever becoming the great filmmaker he was destined to be because of Citizen Kane. He was in a few other films and directed a few as well, some of the most notable of which are The Third Man, Touch of Evil, and The Magnificent Ambersons. Even Netflix acquired a lost Wells film, The Other Side of the Wind, that was preserved. People have always devoured anything from Welles. He is such a magnanimous personality and a terrific director.
By Dan Skip Allen
When J.K. Rowling created a book series about a boy wizard it was just that: a book. That is until it grew into a phenomenon that spawned a series of movies, the first of which is called Harry Potter and The Sorcerer's Stone (or Philosopher's Stone in Great Britain). Twenty years ago, this movie series started and it's one of the most popular and profitable in movie history.
From that moment that Hagrid (Robbie Coltrane) uttered those famous words, "You're a wizard Harry," in that dank house on an isolated island who knows where, I was all in on this series of films. Of course, I had read the book already by then, so I was excited to see this book I loved being made into a big-budget feature film. Chris Columbus was already a successful film director by the time Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone was going to be in production, but he wanted to direct this film. His career from working with Macaulay Culkin on the Home Alone films, Adventures in Babysitting, and Mrs. Doubtfire prepared him to direct this film about a bunch of kids in a wizarding school. He has great experience making family films of this ilk. He was a great choice to direct this film. The casting process of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone was quite arduous, but David Heyman, the producer, found the perfect three leads to star in this film. Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter), Rupert Grint (Ron Weasley), and Emma Watson (Hermione Granger) we're all terrific as these three characters. They embodied these three young wizards perfectly. I couldn't see anybody else in these roles. That being said, the films had other characters that had to be cast and these roles weren't given to newcomers. They were won by some of the great British actors of this era the film came out in. Richard Harris (Albus Dumbledore), Maggie Smith (Professor McGonigal), and Alan Rickman (Professor Snape) were all phenomenal as these iconic characters. I could hardly remember other roles these great actors were ever in. That means they were cast perfectly. I love them all in the roles. 
The production as a whole was quite successful. The sets worked as well as they could to embody the place envisioned in Rowling's books. The grand scale of the castle, train station, Gringotts, and various locations in the film looked amazing on screen. The behind-the-scenes people from the set production team, camera people, and costumes, and hair and makeup teams are all first-rate. This film looked amazing from that perspective.
With all the great production value and other crafts departments also comes the music of the film. Herman and Columbus enlisted the talents of probably the greatest composer of all time, John Williams. I'm a little biased on that because I have great memories of him as the conductor of the Boston Pops as a child, as well as some of his most memorable scores such as Jaws, Superman, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, The Empire Strikes Back, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, and Raiders of the Lost Ark which were etched in my brain at that time. He created a wonderful score with great melodies and a beautiful timeless sound to it. The fact remains that when someone creates something like Harry Potter, such as J.K. Rowling, that millions of people around the world are so enamored with it's hard to create something that lives up to the expectations of what people want to see in this material. All of that is set aside when this film is finally released. This film lived up to the expectations perfectly. It was a critical and financial success by anybody's standards. Twenty years after this film was released, we've gotten all the sequels and plenty of physical media releases and television airings of this film and the rest of them. They continue to be watched by millions of families all over the world. They have made billions of dollars and spawned a stage production as well. As a fan of watching movies and reading books, I can honestly say this was the perfect combination of a literary work being turned into a great film. I loved this movie and I've watched it countless times. I never get sick of this film.
By Dan Skip Allen
Albert R Broccoli is the Producer of Dr. No and the rest of the James Bond franchise. He formed a business relationship with Harry Saltzman who had the rights to the books. Albert convinced him to go into business with him making movies. The rest is history. 007 has been on the big screen ever since. These films started out as small indie films and now they are considered big-budget blockbusters.
Sean Connery was the first actor to portray the suave ladies man James Bond. His favorite drink, a martini, shaken not stirred, became famous around the world where liquor is sold. Ian Fleming created this fantastic character that everyone can relate to. He flies around the world, visits luxurious places, and gets with beautiful women everywhere he goes. How could men not relate to this cool character? This is how this iconic character has lasted so long. James is called into M's office because a high-ranking member of the government has been killed in Kingston, Jamaica. He has to find out what happened to him. He finds out suspicious goings-on are happening in Crab Key. People have been reported missing and dying. A man named Dr. No (Joseph Wiseman) is up to no good. While trying to sneak onto the secret base, James runs into Honey Ryder (Ursula Andress). They both are public enemy number one. She has a bone to pick with Dr. No as well. Can 007 and Honey Ryder stop this megalomaniac from sabotaging the United States Space Program? The glitz and glamour of James Bond is something that makes him so fun and entertaining. His catchphrases like, "Bond, James Bond," are synonymous with this iconic character. The beautiful beaches and resorts in Jamaica help transport those watching to this secret world of spies and secret organizations like SPECTRE (Special Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge, and Extortion) which are trying to take over the world. During the Cold War of the '60s, the world ate up this fantastical spy game that is the James Bond franchise. Dr. No isn't the best of the James Bond films, but it is a good start to this worldwide phenomenon known as 007. Movies were still in the phase of whitewashing, so a white man is dressed to look Asian, Dr. No. The time period is still a little old seeing as how we've got 58 years of this character. He is a little dated. That's fine though because bigger films, badder villains, and more beautiful women known as Bond Girls are on the horizon. Dr. No is just the tip of the iceberg in this fantastic franchise.
By Dan Skip Allen
Courtroom dramas are a dime a dozen in Hollywood. A lot of them have flashy lawyers played by a who's who of Hollywood A-listers. The lawyer is usually considered the star of courtroom dramas. In the case of Primal Fear, the star lawyer in the film is Martin Vail, played by Richard Gere. He's a hot defense attorney on the news at night and the cover of magazines. The star power of Richard Gere is all a film like Primal Fear needed, but it has a hell of a lot more star power in it. The least of which is Academy Award nominee Edward Norton as Aaron Stampler.
Martin Vail (Richard Gere) is a hotshot lawyer who defends the biggest criminals in Chicago. He gets them settlements and results for himself. When an altar boy, Aaron Stampler (Edward Norton) is caught running from a murder scene at the house of a prominent priest in Chicago, Archbishop Rushman, covered in his blood. Vail zeroes in on this high-profile case. This could be the whale he's been trying to catch for his entire career. Does all the evidence point to this altar boy or is there more to this case than meets the eye? Looking back at Primal Fear is an incredible thing because of the story based on the novel by William Deihl. This is an amazing story of mistaken identity or possibly multiple personality disorder. This film has an amazing cast that all play their roles terrifically. From the prosecutor Janet Venable (Laura Linney) to the shrink Molly (Frances McDormand) to the Judge Shoat (Alfre Woodard), this cast is packed! Andre Braugher, John Maloney, Maura Tierney are just a few more names in this film that all do excellent work. The real star is Edward Norton! It's the role of a lifetime for him and he got robbed of an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. 
Primal Fear has a great story, but it's the twist that makes it work. Gere's character has to sell his side of the story. If he does, the jury and audience can buy into the twist. This film is a classic whodunnit, but everybody already knows who done it. Or do they? The twists and turns in this film are off the wall, which makes it a great courtroom drama. This film isn't straightforward. That's a good thing because it keeps everybody on the edge of their seats throughout. All great courtroom dramas have this effect.
The director, Gregory Hoblit, takes the words of the author and puts them into capable hands: the actors'. He creates an atmosphere that the actors bring their a-game in every scene. He films the courtroom scenes with a lot of up-close shots so the viewers can see all the emotions on the actor's faces as they perform this great dialogue. All great films start with the script and the source material. This film is no different than all the rest in that regard. Primal Fear takes the classic courtroom drama and turns it on its head. It has great performances from the entire cast, but most notably from Gere and Norton. They both give career-best performances in this film. Hoblit put the camera in the right places every time including a lot of close-ups. The script is terrifically acted out by everybody involved in the film. The suspense was there every moment Norton was on screen. He gives one of the best performances ever as the altar boy with multiple personalities. This is the main reason why this film is so great!
By Dan Skip Allen
It's no secret that George Lucas and Steven Spielberg were fans of the pulp serials of the early '40s and '50s. They loved the movies, don't get me wrong, but they really loved the pulp serials of Batman, Buck Rogers, Tarzan, and the like which kept them coming back week after week. The cliffhangers were almost unbearable for the duo as kids growing up on the verge of becoming filmmakers decades later. These serials were what gave Lucas the idea for Indiana Jones. With that, he got his good friend Spielberg to come along for the ride on this extraordinary adventure.
Dr. Henry Jones (Harrison Ford) is a professor for his day job, but on the weekends he goes by Indiana, whether it was the dog's name will soon be determined in later installments of the franchise. He galivants around the globe on a crazy adventure and dangerous exploits. When his friend and sometimes assistant, Dr. Marcus Brody (Denholm Elliott), comes to him with the idea that the Ark of the Covenant still exists and they need to find it before the Nazis, he can't resist the chase and the danger that goes along with it. The Nazis make the perfect villain! They are set on world domination and the ark can help them get it. Like a lot of the shorts, Indiana Jones has its share of heart-pounding escapes. He also has to deal with "Snakes? Why does it have to be Snakes?" a phobia we didn't know about until that moment. Disney even adapted one of his most famous hair's-breadth escapes into a show at their theme parks. He encounters several natives and sword-wielding assassins, as well as men who turn their back on him when he needs them the most. He does have a few friends though, Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen) who he meets on his trip, and Sallah (John Rhys Davies) his trusty ally in far-off lands. The stage is set for an epic adventure for the ages. 
Another frequent collaborator to Lucas and Spielberg is the composer of the Boston Pops, John Williams. He has done epic scores for the Star Wars movies, Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial by this point in his career, six of the most famous compositions in his long and storied career as a composer. He would need to do something even greater for Indiana Jones though. It had to live up to everything he had done in the past, but bring something new to the table. He did just that. His Raiders of the Lost Ark score is one of the best he ever did. It had such a great catch to it. It was a perfect addition to this amazing film.
Harrison Ford was an established actor by this point in his career. He had a small role in American Graffiti, but his big role came when he got the no-good swindler himself, Han Solo. He brought a sense of colorful suave ladies' man to the table in the Star Wars films. He brought an entirely different side to his performance in the Indiana Jones films. He got to flex his action muscles in Raiders of the Lost Ark. This film required a lot of running and jumping which was very vigorous and hard on him. He enjoyed every moment of it though. He loved playing Indiana Jones, and it showed on screen. As a kid, I was looking for different kinds of films that I could get behind. I loved everything growing up. I'm not as old as Lucas and Spielberg so I didn't grow up on these serials as they did. I sure as hell grew up on Indiana Jones, though. I was about 7 when the first Indiana Jones film came out and I had never seen anything like it before. The action and adventure were off the charts. The acting, campy at times, was funny and cool. The score by Williams was so amazing as well. Everything combined for a great experience for me and a lot of other people I'm sure of. Forty years later Raiders of the Lost Ark stands up better than ever. Nothing like it has come since so it makes sense.
By Dan Skip Allen
In the last couple of decades, some mergers and acquisitions have been going on. Some of them are from Disney. They acquired Marvel, Pixar and just last year they made a huge move by buying 20th Century for 86 billion dollars. They got their entire library of films, Fox Searchlight, all the Marvel properties they owed, and their cable tv stations. Those were just the tip of the iceberg on all the mergers and acquisitions that have been made in recent years. The landscape of film and entertainment is always changing. With streaming becoming a huge media outlet, things will continue to change as long as people want to keep digesting it.
A few years ago, the telecommunications giant AT&T acquired Warner Media which included HBO, Warner Brothers Studios, and DC Comics, amongst others. This would help make AT&T one of the largest entertainment conglomerates in the world. It didn't last long. The COVID-19 pandemic caused some problems for AT&T and its plan to be a major player in the world of entertainment. They couldn't put their movies out in theaters. Which meant they could make the money back that they spent on making them. So as a stop-gap measure they decided to put their films on their streaming service, HBO Max. If you had this service, it would seem like a good idea. In the overall scheme of things, it's not a great business move. AT&T wasn't getting much money back by putting their films on HBO Max and in theaters at the same time. They were losing money. Also, people balked at this decision, especially some of their biggest talents such as Christopher Nolan and Denis Villeneuve. And James Gunn said he would never work with them again. This all led to the decision last week to spin off Warner Media from AT&T. Discovery Media is to merge with Warner Media, which includes HBO/HBO Max, Warner Bros. Studios, and DC Comics for 43 billion dollars. Discovery is in the entertainment industry. They are a better fit for Warner Media. On the heels of the AT&T spin-off of Warner Media, last week came the merger of Amazon and MGM. Amazon acquired MGM for 8 billion dollars, give or take a few hundred thousand. With this acquisition also came some of the big IPs, namely 4,000 plus films including the James Bond franchise, co-owned by Eon/The Broccoli Family, the Rocky franchise, Robocop, Stargate, the Silence of the Lambs franchise, the Pink Panther franchise, and the Legally Blonde franchise. Amazon also acquired the 17,000 tv shows that MGM has created in its past. All this would help strengthen Amazon Prime which is the streaming service of Amazon. They are looking to use some of these IPs to create new shows and movies down the road. The acquisition would help strengthen Amazon in the entertainment industry which is continuing to move more and more toward streaming services. This may have been a great deal for Jeff Bezos and Amazon. With these major sales and acquisitions comes the inevitable question. What is going to happen to physical media involving these companies? With both Discovery and Amazon focusing on streaming services and theatrical releases, does physical media still have a chance with these power moves? Amazon already has a deal in place with Warner Media to sell their discs on their service Amazon Prime. The Warner Archive store is now on Amazon Prime. MGM has a huge library of shows and movies. This may lend itself to create exclusives for Amazon Prime so they get all the money, leaving Best Buy and Target out of the loop on these properties. The 4K format could really benefit from exclusive boxed sets for some of the James Bond films, Rocky, Robocop, and the others. Currently, MGM has deals in place with Criterion and Arrow Video that release physical media, but this could change with this acquisition. It may benefit everybody in the end, including Discovery who is merging with Warner Media. It would all come full circle for these companies
By Dan Skip Allen
In Hollywood, there have some great comedic duos: Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin, Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels, and Eddie Murphy and Nick Nolte. But arguably one of the best films that have an iconic teaming is Midnight Run. The teaming of Robert De Niro and Charles Grodin is one of genius. They are two distinctly different types of actors. One is one of the best dramatic actors of all time and the other is a comedic genius. Martin Breast knew what he had with this teaming of these two complete opposites. This film and its cast turned out to be comedic gold.
Robert De Niro plays tough-nosed bounty, Hunter Jack Walsh. He is hired by Joe Pantoliano's character to find and bring a mob accountant to Los Angeles. What he didn't know on this country-long road trip is that the authorities and the mob themselves are looking for The Duke, what they call Grodin's character. If Walsh can survive this trip across the country he has to deal with the erratic personality of The Duke which is more he bargained for. This was supposed to be a simple midnight run, as the film's title suggests. 
Charles Grodin has made a career of playing characters that have neurosis or neurotic personalities in his past. Characters that are put in situations he doesn't want to be in, such as the father in the Beethoven franchise or So I Married an Axe Murderer. These are the types of characters Grodin has been known for. His nervous nature is a perfect way for him to get laughs because people can relate to this kind of character. We all have a little scary cat in us at times. Gordon played into that with a lot of his characters in movies and on television.
Midnight Run is a fun movie because it has a fish out of water story involving Grodin's character. It also puts De Niro in a lot of comedic moments which at this time in his career he wasn't familiar with. He would eventually become very comfortable playing the straight man to some great comedic actors such as Ben Stiller and Billy Crystal. His teaming with Grodin though would be his first of such a nature. These two polar opposites were made for each other. They have great chemistry throughout the film. Midnight Run takes familiar tropes such as a road trip movie and runs with it. It has some great chase scenes and some first-rate action. Breast mixes in all the action and comedic moments perfectly. The relationship throughout the film between the two leads. This film has transcended its release in 1988 because it's funny, has a lot of action and the road trip aspect of it brings fans of these two legendary actors together for an entertaining and memorable film team-up. By Dan Skip Allen  The last Golden Globes ceremony was mired in controversy due to an article that came out saying that the HFPA didn't have any black members in its ranks. This led to a statement during the show from some of the members that they need to change that and are going to change that. After the latest article from Variety, an online Hollywood magazine, came out NBC literally canceled the broadcast until change was made.
The Variety article suggested that the HFPA has accepted various gifts in the form of vacations, watches, monetary manipulations due to various fraudulent charities, and so forth. In other words, the money went into charities which then, in turn, went to pay the members of the HFPA themselves. This whole group is just designed to ensure they have access to celebrities, parties, screenings, and high-class studio gatherings for the intent and purpose of gathering favoritism for nominations. As in Emily in Paris, Music, and other unworthy nominees. This week, celebrities such as Scarlet Johansson and Tom Cruise have waged in on the controversy. Johansson has come out and said in an interview she had with the HFPA (Hollywood Foreign Press Association) that they borderline on sexual harassment, she was very uncomfortable in the interview. Tom Cruise has stated that he would return all three of his Globe trophies... This is coming off of Mark Ruffalo saying he was embarrassed to have won a globe at this past globes award ceremony. The HFPA has since come out with another statement saying they will expand their ranks by twenty new members by August. Is this too little too late? A valid possible candidate was quoted in the Variety article saying they were told they didn't want to expand when they tried to join in recent years. People are saying that they won't believe what the HFPA is saying until they see it for themselves... The proof is in the pudding as they say. The NBC announcement comes off of two major studios saying they won't campaign their films for completion in the Globes ceremony. Amazon and Netflix are the two studios that are backing out on the Globes until a sweeping change is implemented. This is why NBC has decided to cancel the show next year. Could there be a show on another network? Who knows. An announcement was made in 2008 following the writer's strike but no show was broadcast. Could this be the avenue they go down? Only time will tell. This is a combustible situation, to say the least. I will say I enjoy the Golden Globes ceremony. They get a host that can be themselves and make me and another laugh. The show itself allows for the actors and celebrities to enjoy themselves as well. The HFPA likes to wine and dines its nominees with a great party of food and drink. This makes for a loose ceremony. The fact remains you can't take them seriously though. They split the major categories into drama and comedy or musical. This doesn't allow for a true idea of who might be the favorite come Oscars time. For instance, Rosamund Pike and Andra Day won the actress awards this year and neither contended for the Oscar in the best actress category, even though Day was nominated. The fact remains the HFPA has to make sweeping changes. And they need to bring in more diverse members into their ranks. All of this controversy in the end is a good thing because it allows the world to point a finger at the HFPA and say you need to get your act together if you want to see your awards on tv again. NBC still has plans to air the 2023 broadcast if they are happy with the changes the HFPA has made. Here hoping they do. This show and its members need to be more on the up and up in the future. This was the best thing that could happen.
By Dan Skip Allen
The Film Independent Spirit Awards are a little different than other awards shows. The awarded films have been made for under 30 million dollars. These are considered independent films in the film industry. Usually, they are made with money from donations and not big studios such as Disney, Warner Brothers, or Universal Pictures. A24 and Amazon are companies that buy up small movies and release them under their labels. These small films are the ones that get nominated for Indie Spirit awards.
A lot of the Indie Spirit awards don't translate to the academy awards because they aren't compatible with the Academy Awards categories. And sometimes people are nominated for Indie Spirit awards and vice versa for Oscars that don't have a crossover. There are a handful of categories that do crossover though. These could give some clues on what the Academy Awards might do come Sunday night. The Best Lead Actress Award went to Carey Mulligan which is a good precursor because both Viola Davis and Frances McDormand were nominated beside her in that category. Riz Ahmed won the Best Lead Actor award. This was interesting because Chadwick Boseman was also nominated with him and he had previously won all the similar awards leading up to this point in awards season. Steven Yeun was also nominated in this category. The two supporting actor awards went to Youn Juh-Yung and Paul Raci. This is the third award of this caliber Yuh-Yung won this awards season, making her the odds on favorite to win the Academy Award in the Best Supporting Actress category. Paul Raci's win just proves the Indie Spirit voters loved Sound of Metal because it won both male acting awards. This may not translate into Oscar wins, but you never know. Stranger things have happened. Nomadland once again swept the best feature and director categories at another award show making a sure bet to win both categories at the Oscars. It also added the best cinematography and editing. These two categories will be two to watch because they could go to other films. My bet would be Nomadland wins cinematography, but not editing. That could go to Sound of Metal or The Trial of the Chicago 7. The screenplay awards went to Promising Young Woman and Palm Springs. This may be the award that put that film and its writer/director Emerald Fennel. Sound of Metal also won the first feature for its director Darius Marder. Quo Vadis Aida? won the Best International feature, but Another Round wasn't nominated in this category, so this probably won't happen at the Oscars. Another Round has won this award everywhere leading up to this point. Crip Camp won the best documentary in a category that had four of the five Academy Award nominees in it, but not My Octopus Teacher. That could be a telling sign of why it won. The Indie Spirit Awards were like a lot of the other ceremonies. They got a lot right and some things wrong based on industry pundits and predictions people have been making. They usually award films that aren't involved in the academy awards as a whole. This year is different because there are so many indies nominated. This year some of its winners make more sense and could come home with Oscars. This is the last awards ceremony before the Academy Awards broadcast on April 25th. All will be revealed on Sunday night on ABC. |