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The Oscars || ||

Oscar Index: The Beginning of the End

Oscar Index: The Beginning of the End

There's good news and bad news to begin this post-nomination, next-to-next-to-next-to-next-to-last installment of Oscar Index. The good news? It's kind of almost over! The bad news? Oy. Please don't make me repeat it.
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The Oscars || ||

Hugo Dominates; Tree of Life, Extremely Loud Shock 2012 Oscar Nominations

Hugo Dominates; Tree of Life, Extremely Loud Shock 2012 Oscar Nominations

Give the Academy some credit: They made awards season fun for a little bit longer. At least my mind was blown this morning as AMPAS president Tom Sherak and Jennifer Lawrence announced The Tree of Life, Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, Demián Bichir and a few other shocks among the 2012 Oscar nominations.
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The Oscars || ||

Oscar Index Special Edition: Predicting the 84th Academy Award Nominations

Oscar Index Special Edition: Predicting the 84th Academy Award Nominations

We're a little more than half a day away from learning who and what will compete for the 84th annual Academy Awards -- an elite class through which Movieline's Institute for the Advanced Study of Kudos Forensics had combed for four months in its fail-safe, fool-proof and bracingly handsome Oscar Index. This calls for one last sweep through each of the Academy's categories (with the exception of live-action, animated and documentary short, about which even our pointiest-headed Oscar wonk cannot speak yet with authority); check our team's work against your own, and drop back by Movieline tomorrow morning at 8:30 a.m. ET/5:30 a.m. PT as we deliver nominations, reactions, analysis and more.
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The Oscars || ||

Oscar Index: Left Out in the Gold

Oscar Index: Left Out in the Gold

Smack in the middle of a two-week frame yielding two awards shows and a pair of nomination announcements that will culminate in this year's Oscar nods, the researchers at Movieline's Institute for the Advanced Study of Kudos Forensics have gained minimal insight into where the Academy may take the 2011-12 awards race in next Tuesday's final nominations. Or maybe they're all just sleeping. It's been that kind of year. Let's check their work in this week's Oscar Index.
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Quick Take || ||

Finally, a Critic Who Really Gets The Iron Lady

Finally, a Critic Who Really Gets The Iron Lady

Spoiler alert? "I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the preoccupation the director shows with Maggie’s shoes. There are so many shoe-shots in the film, it’s downright laughable. When she leaves number 10 for the last time, the shot lingers long enough on Streep’s walking feet it made me wonder if there was a shoe fetishist behind the camera. She wasn’t Imelda Marcos, after all. And the final scene of the movie: Maggie washes out her teacup in the sink. How tragic! Nah-nah-nah-nah-nah! The filmmakers could not resist that final, petty, hate-filled blow." [Big Hollywood]

The Oscars || ||

Oscar Index: They Shoot Horses, Don't They?

Oscar Index: They Shoot Horses, Don't They?

What a week at Movieline's Institute for the Advanced Study of Kudos Forensics, where the pundits' hustle harmonized with the guilds' bustle to create a heavy-duty wake-up call for some otherwise dormant awards-season underdogs. They also telegraphed danger for a few juggernauts once thought unassailable. What does it all mean as we head into the Critics Choice and Golden Globe Awards weekend? To the Index!
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The Oscars || ||

Oscar Index: Draggin' Tattoo? Don't Bet on It

Oscar Index: Draggin' Tattoo? Don't Bet on It

The first Oscar Index entry of 2012 finds Movieline's Institute for the Advanced Study of Kudos Forensics a little hungover from the holidays and lot bored from the protracted inertia of awards season. Not even this week's Producers Guild Award nominations could do much to shake up a contest that appears to be both wide open and solidifying into place at the same time. Let's investigate...
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Review || ||

REVIEW: Bad Mummy! The Iron Lady Oversimplifies — and Sucks Up To — Margaret Thatcher

REVIEW: Bad Mummy! The Iron Lady Oversimplifies — and Sucks Up To —  Margaret Thatcher

Phyllida Lloyd and Meryl Streep work a puny bit of flim-flammery in The Iron Lady: They turn Margaret Thatcher into a folk hero, a woman who, poor lamb, had to make sacrifices in her personal life in exchange for political power. This is a watery, artfully evasive picture, anchored by a stupendous feat of mimicry. Some people call that acting.

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The Oscars || ||

Oscar Index: Giddyup, War Horse!

Oscar Index: Giddyup, War Horse!

Well, this should go pretty fast: The holiday week has offered a dearth of new narratives to trace and pulses to take, with only one film demonstrating any significant mobility in the studies coming out Movieline's Institute for the Advanced Study of Kudos Forensics. Let's get to it!

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Awards || ||

Watch Meryl Streep's Friends Campaign For Her Oscar... During Her Kennedy Center Tribute

Meryl Streep at the Kennedy Center Honors 2011

Last night, during the 34th Annual Kennedy Center Honors telecast, Meryl Streep's friends feted the honoree in grand fashion. There were video montages introduced, touching anecdotes told, funny memories recounted, musical numbers performed and splits done in her honor --  by Robert De Niro, Mike Nichols, Stanley Tucci, Emily Blunt, Kevin Kline, Anne Hathaway and Tracy Ullman (who co-starred with Streep in Plenty). It was an epic ode to the actress's "superhuman" onscreen ability -- one, that after ten minutes of increasingly heaping praise, began to feel like one of the most elaborate Oscar campaigns to date.

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Awards || ||

Oscar Index: Enough About Bridesmaids, Already

Oscar Index: Enough About Bridesmaids, Already

Screw Christmas. Forget Hanukkah. To hell with New Year's. There is only one holiday we celebrate in the dank, windowless labs of Movieline's Institute for the Advanced Study of Kudos Forensics, and that is Oscar Night. Thus the latest edition of Oscar Index, offering all the festive year-end joy you can possibly stand. Let's get to it!

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Awards || ||

New York Film Critics Circle Kicks Off Awards Season By Anointing Streep, Pitt, The Artist

The New York Film Critics Circle made waves by moving their awards announcement up to November 29 in an effort to claim "First!" but Oscar-watchers have to admit: Between the NYFCC Twitter roll-out and this morning's Spirit Awards nominations, there's a crackle in the air on an otherwise slo-o-o-w news day. So what if the New York critics didn't get a chance to see everything before voting today? They saw Tree of Life! (Clearly.) Hit the jump for the list of winners.

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Awards || ||

Oscar Index: Extremely Artist and Incredibly Horse

Oscar Index: Extremely Artist and Incredibly Horse

It's week three of the 2011-12 Oscar Index, and the latest measurements, readings and conclusions are in from Movieline's Institute for the Advanced Study of Kudos Forensics. And aside from a few startling exceptions, they don't look that different than the ones disseminated here last week. But make no mistake: Like it or not, stuff is happening! Read on for the latest developments.

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Newswire || ||

Talkback: Which Actors Should Play Opposite Themselves?

Talkback: Which Actors Should Play Opposite Themselves?

I keep eyeing the news of Jesse Eisenberg's dual role in Richard Ayoade's next movie The Double, based on Fyodor Dostoyevsky's novella, with excitement about people who aren't even involved with the project. If The Double, about "a Russian government clerk whose life unravels after what he believes is a literal facsimile of himself -- same appearance, same name, same hometown -- begins working in his office," is a hit, will it popularize the idea of other actors playing dual roles? And who would we want to see act against his/her own mirror image?

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