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Burning Questions || ||

From 'Bunker Hill' To Capitol Hill? Ben Affleck's Next Directorial Project Could Be Good For Politics

From 'Bunker Hill' To Capitol Hill? Ben Affleck's Next Directorial Project Could Be Good For Politics

Don't be surprised if the whole Ben Affleck for Senator? media frenzy gets revived in a few years. I just read Deadline's report that Warner Bros. has closed a deal for Nathaniel Philbrick's historical tale, Bunker Hill: A City, A Siege, A Revolution, which will be published in April, and it sure sounds like a great project for a filmmaker who's toyed with the idea of public office. more »

Talkback || ||

Oscars On Ablixa: Five Observations About The Excitement-Challenged Academy Awards

Oscars On Ablixa: Five Observations About The Excitement-Challenged Academy Awards

The early ratings for last night's Oscars indicate that the telecast may have racked up its best numbers since 2007, according to Deadline. Which is good news for Seth MacFarlane, especially if you ignore that the biggest viewership increase came after The Walking Dead ended on AMC and that six of the nine Best Picture nominees had done more than $100 million at the box office.  Otherwise, what do you really remember  from last night's telecast besides Jennifer Lawrence's face plant, the Jaws play-off theme (which was funny exactly once)  and the steamed look on Ben Affleck's mug when he came out on stage after MacFarlane's Gigli remark?

And that brings me to my first Oscars recap observation:

1. Was everybody in the Dolby Theater on Ablixa?  Beginning with the show's weirdly cold opening, the telecast was devoid of the emotional highs and lows, pomp and circumstance that the Oscars used to have and haven't had for a few years. During the Movieline liveblog, I wondered if Harvey Weinstein had gotten Trazodone, which is name-checked in Silver Linings Playbook, added to the Academy Awards gift bag. But I now think the Side Effects antidepressant reference is more appropriate. Even MacFarlane's most out-there insults seemed even-keeled. New York Magazine slammed the Family Guy creator for being sexist, but I thought his bigger sins were being mediocre and cold. It's as if the digital revolution didn't just rewrite the way the film industry makes and releases movies, it reduced the way Hollywood generates excitement into a kind of binary code.  Everything's either a 1 or a 0. That's  what last night felt like, and the only time some of that old-timey Oscar excitement crept back into the broadcast was when Affleck gave his speed-speech. The privilege of being able to make movies is obviously still exciting to him, and he's good at spreading that giddy feeling.

2. The Oscars should not aspire to be the Tonys.  So, I understand why there was a preponderance of musical numbers last night: MacFarlane is a show-tunes freak, Les Miserables, Hugh Jackman and Anne Hathaway were all nominated, and Barbra Streisand was on board to perform a tribute to the late Marvin Hamlisch. But that doesn't mean they were a good thing.  The show was listless to begin with, and  all those musical numbers didn't help. Plus, the Chicago (2002) and DreamGirls  (2006) tributes left me wondering if I'd slipped and fallen into the Hot Tub Time Machine. I half-expected to see Jackman join MacFarlane for some sort of tribute to The Music Man (which Family Guy has parodied more than once).  I'm not going to suggest this is part of a trend, by the way, but have you noticed that a similar things has been happening over at Saturday Night Live?   The practice of having musical guests hosting and performing — as Justin Bieber just did — is not helping the show's comedy cred, and, for a number of seasons now,  an unusual number of skits seem to be built around musical performances. (On a related note, as a big Lonely Island fan,  I just have to say that "YOLO" clip with Adam Levine and Kendrick Lamar was lame.)

THE BIG NIGHT IN PICTURES: CHECK OUT MOVIELINE'S OSCARS RED CARPET PHOTO GALLERY 

3. The only real surprise of the night was Christoph Waltz's win:  Coming as it did near the beginning of the telecast, Waltz's Best Supporting Actor Oscar — which had been predicted in some quarters but mostly as a longshot — left the impression that a night of surprises was ahead. And then everything unfolded as predicted. If you followed all of the pre-season Oscar punditry, I bet you were bored.

4. Was Ben Affleck's comment about not holding grudges directed, in part, at Seth MacFarlane?  One of the more interesting observations Affleck made during his Best Picture acceptance speech was, "You can't hold grudges. It's hard. But you can't hold grudges."  The Argo director could have been referring to the Academy's decision to snub him for a Best Director Oscar, but, he just as well could have been referring to MacFarlane's remark that he'd gone from "starring in Gigli to becoming of the most respected filmmakers of this generation."  The line didn't seem so sharp to me. Gigli is an awful movie. But Deadline reported that Affleck was pissed off by the remark, and the filmmaker did launch a half-hearted jab at MacFarlane when he came out on stage shortly after the Oscars host uttered the punchline. (Affleck said something about it still being possible for MacFarlane to "turn the show around," but wouldn't it have been cool if he just said, 'Argo, fuck yourself"?)  The grudges remark, which Affleck delivered during his Best Picture acceptance speech, was a nice zen-like catch-all that demonstrated that Big Ben wasn't just an Oscar winner, he was an enlightened Oscar winner.

5. You know that the media is burning out on Oscar coverage when... Reporters are asking Jennifer Lawrence if she tripped on purpose. I'm surprised no one asked if Jessica Chastain was the culprit.

[Deadline]

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Close Reads || ||

Genuine Affleck-tion! 'Argo' Is The Best Picture To Beat

Genuine Affleck-tion! 'Argo' Is The Best Picture To Beat

Two weeks after carrying home the big prizes from the Critics’ Choice and Golden Globe Awards, Argo firmly established its Oscar front-runner status with another one-two punch in the form of the PGA's Motion Picture Producer of the Year honor and the SAG Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast. And in a season of confusion and contradiction, that front-runner status gives Argo traction that none of its Best-Picture rivals have. more »

Burning Questions || ||

Michael Haneke Has Little 'Amour' For Parody Twitter Account

Michael Haneke Has Little 'Amour' For Parody Twitter Account

Amour director Michael Haneke is aware of the parody Twitter account that bears his name, and, as you might expect from a filmmaker who's made an incredibly intense, Oscar-nominated film about love, life and death, he's not too worked up about it.  more »

Awards || ||

After Golden Globes Win, Is 'Argo' The People's Film?

After Golden Globes Win, Is 'Argo' The People's Film?

Last night’s Golden Globes cemented Argo as the People’s Film from an awards season stand-point, setting the scrappy underdog to stand toe-to-toe with the monolithic Lincoln. Theoretically, the “People’s Film” would be The Hunger Games, which won Favorite Movie at the People’s Choice Awards, but in the context of the Oscars, the populism is relative to the awards — and none of the elite awards are more populist than the Golden Globes.
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Newswire || ||

Iran Planning Its Alterna-'Argo'

Iran Planning Its Alterna-'Argo'

Argo received eight Oscar nominations and has grossed over $166.4 million at the box office worldwide and now Iran wants in on the action. But don't expect the Islamic Republic to toe the line of how events transpired in the version directed and starring Ben Affleck.
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Newswire || ||

Ben Affleck Goes For Gracious Post-Oscar Passover

Ben Affleck Goes For Gracious Post-Oscar Passover

"I would like to thank the Academy… I'm kidding, I'm kidding. This is the one that counts," joked Ben Affleck Thursday night at the Critics Choice Awards, accepting his Best Director prize at the event hosted by the Broadcast Film Critics Association. If Affleck was more than simply disappointed by being passed up by the Academy in the Best Director category for Argo in yesterday's Oscar nominations, he didn't show it at last night at the event.
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Awards || ||

Critics Choice Awards Spread The Love Around, Name 'Argo' Best Picture

Critics Choice Awards Spread The Love Around, Name 'Argo' Best Picture

On the heels of this morning's surprising and not-so-surprising Oscar nominations, the Broadcast Film Critics Association handed their Critics Choice Awards to a rather familiar bunch as Lincoln, Silver Linings Playbook, Argo, Zero Dark Thirty, and Skyfall nabbed multiple major honors. In fact, the BFCA, an organization comprised of TV, radio, and online journalists, spread the love around to cover just about every Oscar favorite and token consolation prize there is. Take your bow, Cloud Atlas!
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Awards || ||

Directors Guild Award Nominations: Was The Wrong Director Snubbed?

Directors Guild Award Nominations: Was The Wrong Director Snubbed?

Quentin Tarantino and David O. Russell were edged out of the pack in today's Directors Guild Award nominations announcement, giving way to a rather conservative quintet of Oscar hopefuls. So let the DGA backlash begin: Between Ben Affleck (Argo), Kathryn Bigelow (Zero Dark Thirty), Steven Spielberg (Lincoln), Tom Hooper (Les Miserables), Ang Lee (Life of Pi), which nominee should have gotten the shaft to make the DGA race even remotely interesting?
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Behind the Camera || ||

The Passion Of The...Kee-rist! 'Good Will Hunting' Was Almost Directed By Mel Gibson

The Passion Of The...Kee-rist! 'Good Will Hunting' Was Almost Directed By Mel Gibson

We all remember Good Will Hunting as the touching drama about a troubled genius who works as a janitor (and something about apples, right?) The combination of an Oscar-winning script by Ben Affleck and Matt Damon, and Gus Van Sant, a director who, up to that point, had a career consisting of expert societal button-pushing, made magic. But as touching as the movie turned out, it's important to note how different it could have been. Violently different. more »

Lists || ||

'Argo' Named Best Film By Roger Ebert For 2012

'Argo' Named Best Film By Roger Ebert For 2012

There are Top 10s galore this time of the year, but no doubt Ben Affleck is taking a bit of extra notice on this one. Uber critic Roger Ebert gave Argo his choice for the Best of 2012.

He called the year "one of the best recent years in cinema," noting that he wrote over 300 reviews over the year, which is a personal record. He also noted that it was "unusually difficult" to leave out films in the top ten.

Picking Argo, Ebert noted that the feature had the "classic values of a Hollywood thriller" and noted the story, based on true events, "reveals surprises about a story we all lived through. It is told with classic comedy and tension."

Oscar power-house Lincoln placed third on Ebert's list after Ang Lee's Life of Pi. He called Daniel Day-Lewis' performance "powerful," while describing Pi as a "miraculous achievement."

Also making the list was Sundance winner Beasts of the Southern Wild and perhaps surprisingly considering the momentum of the Oscar race, End of Watch Oslo, August 31 and A Simple Life.

Notables not making the cut in the top ten at least include Zero Dark Thirty, Django Unchained, Les Misérables and Silver Linings Playbook.

Ebert has long taken a course of his own. You can see his comments on his Top 10 here.

Roger Ebert's Top 10:

1. Argo by Ben Affleck

2. Life Of Pi by Ang Lee

3. Lincoln by Steven Spielberg

4. End Of Watch by David Ayer

5. Arbitrage by Nicholas Jarecki

6. Flight by Robert Zemeckis

7. The Sessions by Ben Lewin

8. Beasts of the Southern Wild by Benh Zeitlin

9. Oslo, August 31st by Joachim Trier

10. A Simple Life by Ann Hui

Newswire || ||

Ben Affleck Is Not Senate Bound

Ben Affleck Is Not Senate Bound

After speculation mounted last that Ben Affleck would possibly hang up his filmmaking and acting hats for a U.S. Senate run from Massachusetts, the Argo director and star said he won't be running for office at least for the time being.

Last week, Boston's CBS affiliate reported that Massachusetts Democrats were wooing Affleck to run for the seat that will be vacated by John Kerry after his likely confirmation as Secretary of State, replacing Hillary Rodham Clinton. The low probability that he'd run did get a bit of a boost when his publicist didn't directly deny he was considering a run and he didn't completely say 'no' when asked about running during an appearance on CBS' Face the Nation Sunday.

But, Affleck took to Facebook to give final confirmation of his Senate bow out. He will continue to work for the Eastern Congo Initiative, a non-profit group that gives humanitarian aid in the war-torn African region and other causes. Affleck has gone to Congress to testify on behalf of his work for the group. In his Facebook message, he also gives a shout-out to the presumed new Secretary of State.

Affleck's Facebook statement follows:

I love Massachusetts and our political process, but I am not running for office. Right now it's a privilege to spend my time working with Eastern Congo Initiative (ECI), supporting our veterans, drawing attention to the great many who go hungry in the U.S. everyday and using filmmaking to entertain and foster discussion about issues like our relationship to Iran.

We are about to get a great Secretary of State and there are some phenomenal candidates in Massachusetts for his Senate seat. I look forward to an amazing campaign.

Happy Holidays to All.

[Source: A.P.]

Newswire || ||

[UPDATED] Ben Affleck For Senator? He And His Rep Aren't Denying It

Actor Ben Affleck and Cindy McCain, wife of US Senator John McCain,(L) arrive prior to testifying on Congo before the House Africa, Global Health and Human Rights Subcommittee on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, March 8, 2011. AFP PHOTO / Saul LOEB (Photo credit should read SAUL LOEB/AFP/Getty Images)

Ben Affleck  and his spokesman aren'texactly batting down a report that the Argo director's name has been floated for the Massachusetts Senate seat that Sen. John Kerry will vacate if President Obama chooses him to replace Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State. more »

Watch This || ||

Terrence Malick's 'To The Wonder' Trailer Hints At Love Torn Asunder

Terrence Malick's 'To The Wonder' Trailer Hints At Love Torn Asunder

Javier Bardem booms out, "You shall love (pause) whether you like it or not." Bardem is seen dressed as a priest in 'To The Wonder,' the latest film by Terrence Malick, which debuted at the Venice Film Festival. The trailer opens with a couple walking across what looks like a bridge over the Seine in Paris who then head to what looks like the tidal island Mont Saint-Michel before heading back to more suburban locales and then pastoral expanses.
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Awards || ||

Golden Globes Nominees React! Bigelow, Affleck, Hathaway & More Respond To Nominations

Golden Globes Nominees React! Bigelow, Affleck, Hathaway & More Respond To Nominations

Happy Golden Globes Nomination Day everyone! While you mull over this year's crop of obvious picks ("Argo f*** yourself," Academy) and not so obvious surprises (Salmon Fishing in the Yemen, Hope Springs, Taylor Swift and Jon Bon Jovi? Are we really doing this, HFPA?) let's delight in the reactions of the chosen few who'll vie for Golden Globes glory on Sunday, January 13. (Updated as nominee reactions roll in...)
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