Forget Best Supporting Actor — it’s time to honor Andy Serkis’“Special...
There has been a lot of talk this week about Andy Serkis’ stirring performance-capture portrayal of ape rebellion leader Caesar in “Rise of the Planet of the Apes.” In many quarters, writers are...
View ArticleTHE LONG SHOT: It was always you
“Let me get this straight. The one’s about a precocious computer geek who’s also a bit of an asshole.” “Yeah.” “And the other’s about King George VI.” “Yeah.” “And King George VI has a disability.”...
View ArticleTHE LISTS: Top 10 below-the-line elements of Fincher films
With “The Social Network” hitting theaters this weekend, audiences are reminded once again of director David Fincher’s skill and vision as a craftsman. The eight films he has assembled throughout an...
View ArticleHope for Saldana
The closes to a breakthrough with motion capture, and/or animation being added to an actor’s performance would be Brad Pitt in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. Most of the acting Pitt did was as...
View ArticleAlexandre Desplat: Hollywood’s most prolific composer
A quick glance at Alexandre Desplat’s 2009 resume reveals a whopping seven titles. That’s pretty prolific for someone who offers up quality work each and every time out, rather than coasting on...
View ArticleDesplat wins Composer of the Year award
You’d be hard pressed to disagree that Alexandre Desplat is pretty much at the top of the game in contemporary film scoring. In addition to his genius (“Birth” looks likely to remain my favorite score...
View ArticleTECH SUPPORT: Kicking the tires on a new season
Today marks the beginning of a fourth year of Tech Support here at In Contention. Over the past four years, we’ve sought to bring the otherwise under-reported crafts categories and crafts artists the...
View Article‘Button’ sparkles on Criterion Blu
The Criterion release of David Fincher’s “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” is a superlative piece of home entertainment to say the least, especially on Blu-ray. Claudio Miranda’s photography was...
View ArticleVote on the next Criterion Blu-ray release
I’ve gone head-first into the tank for Blu-ray ever since I broke down and bought a player last year. And despite a high retail tag in most quarters, Amazon.com remains the number one spot for finding...
View ArticleToo much, too soon?
I’m not as outraged as some are by the news that “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” is to be granted a Criterion Collection DVD release in May — as has been pointed out, if not one but two Michael...
View ArticleTECH SUPPORT: Postmortem
What can I say? It was a big night for “Slumdog Millionaire” at the 81st Annual Academy Awards on Sunday. While I do like the film a great deal, I found its dominance this awards season unnecessarily...
View ArticleAndy Trudeau reviews the Oscar nominated scores for NPR
One of my favorite pre-Oscar specials is music critic Andy Trudeau’s analysis of the Oscar nominated original scores on NPR’s weekend edition. He used to stretch the piece over two weekends and...
View ArticleTwo more industry awards: MPSE and VES
We should link to these for closure, so “The Dark Knight,” “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” “Slumdog Millionaire” and “WALL-E” won big at the Motion Picture Sound Editors awards, while “Button”...
View ArticleYou were right, I was wrong: Guy’s final predictions
(Expanded thoughts and reasonings on yesterday’s list of predictions.) It’s years like 2008 when I throw my hands up and admit (albeit with great reluctance) that my family and friends have been right...
View ArticleWant to win cinematography? An art direction nod helps.
I’m surprised I completely forgot about this little, some might say meaningless statistic, but with all the predictions for “Slumdog Millionaire” taking the cinematography win at tomorrow night’s Oscar...
View ArticleContributors’ picks
Well, this is it. The big show is Sunday night and we’re pretty much out of things to discuss at this stage, no? But I’ve gone ahead and wrangled up all of our contributors’ predictions in each...
View ArticleOFF THE CARPET: Taking a final stab
Well, this is what it all boils down to. I almost DON’T want to go on the record, but I kind of have to, right? Anyway, this is the first year I’ve actually seen every single nominated frame of film...
View ArticleWho deserves it? Poll results!
The readership of In Contention has spoken. Here’s who you all think deserves to win across the 24 Oscar categories we polled you on. A couple of these races were very close but we didn’t have time...
View ArticleTECH SUPPORT: Final predictions
After six months of Tech Support previews and interviews, the films have arrived, the nominations have been announced and the guilds, the critics and BAFTA have all announced their preferences. Today...
View ArticleNot so very shocking
Dave Karger has posted a list of ten potential “shockers” that he thinks could (however faintly) foreseeably shake things up on Oscar night. Many of them have been raised before, and are suitably...
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