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A head shaker, indeed.
What the hell, though; go Capote!

Aside: I wonder what the odds of Wong Kar-wai being a surprise best director nominee in the semi-token foreign critical darling slot are.

It's kind of weird to be reading news about some Critic Society giving out awards now that the main wave of critic awards has passed. Anyway, good for Capote. Somehow I don't feel that it's too important right now. But then I'm no Dave Poland.

Capote is powered by one of the performances of the year. The supporting players are great as well.Like GNGL, its insights concern the journalistic process and perhaps gains traction with critics. On top of that, it never compromises its complexity and uneasiness. It certainly made my top ten.

Thanks for the encouragement, Bucket.

Wong Kar Wai? Love for it to happen, but not enough people saw the film. While we're at wish nominees, Zhang Ziyi should be nominated for 2046 and not for Geisha.

Capote can make the Oscar list but so can any of ten movies.

Thing is, only the director's branch needs to have seen a movie like 2046 in order to nominate him! I think if this year's Director race an out-of-the-blue nominee ala Fernando Meirelles in 2003 it will be Michael Hanake for Cache (Hidden) or Wong Kar-Wai (2046). It's about time the director's branch recognised Kar-Wai and why not now with 2046, a great movie? It's quite popular as evidenced by this year's critics, so that could parlay over. SPC seems to have actually campaigned for their movies this year.

However, Zhang Ziyi being nommed for Supporting Actress for 2046 would be hands down the nomination of the year.

I must be the only person not that impressed with Cache. I mean, I liked it and there were some parts that were amazing, but it didn't blow me away as something that much better than Haneke's previous films. I also liked 2046 but it was very slow and confusing and the middle section (the one with Zhang Ziyi) was clearly the best part.

Well AHOV was barely ahead of BBM on the early ballots, but a lot of the BBM supports did not show up as they started to vote in room. My guess those who where there was upset that AHOV was going to win so they use Capote, a safe pick to stop AHOV.

I think BBM, Good night/luck, Walk the line, and constant gardener have their places secured for Oscar best picture. Capote and Crash will have to fight for the last spot. They both have SAG/DG/PG/WG nominations but not GG, but at this point I think Capote has the upper hand since race relation although still an important issue, but many past movies had addressed it. I do think Ziyi Zhang's chance of being nominated for best actress is much secured now due to GG/SAG nominations. Plus Asian market is getting so important that Hollywood see the need to have its representation in Oscar.

The question of how "Capote" won can be answered by looking at the NSFC voting rules.

This is how they've been explained to me. (They change over the years, but the basic idea is the same regularly, as I understand.)

In round 1, all ballots from absent and present members are counted equally.

In round 2 (and perhaps in subsequent rounds) the votes of absent members are represented by proxies who are in attendance. So if, say, Kenny Turan can't make it to Sardi's, then he asks somebody to vote for him. It's possible that not every absent member has named a proxy. It's also possible that after a certain number of rounds the proxies no longer count and the vote comes down to the members in attendance.

As the balloting rounds wear on, blocs form around certain films and there are trade-offs: I'll vote for your actor to put that category to bed if you put your proxy votes behind my movie, etc.

Richard Jameson used to write up a big, funny letter about each year's balloting which I was fortunate enough to get each year, and the battles he described -- particularly in the Kael/Sarris years -- were truly hilarious.

But anyhow, this is how a film can rank relatively low in the first round and still win.

What a bizarre process in which those members not present lose their right to vote after a certain number of ballots.

Hoffman is good, if you like impressions of syncophants--but the film was BORING

Sounds like Paull has a prety good read... strong feelings on both sides of AHOV led to a Copote compromise...

Of course, you can't vote against anything at the Oscars...

I agree that the film was slightly boring, and it didn't totally work for me because the dramatic arc seemed completely obvious after the first ten minutes. Hoffman might as well have had a sign on his forehead reading "I'm a smug, complacent highbrow who will never get any comeuppance!"

Well there is no doubt A History of Violence is a movie that will get those number 1 votes on it supporters ballots. Not enought for Best Pic, but it looks like it lock in for screenplay and I still say it get 2 out 3 of supporting actor/actress/Director, or perhaps 3 for 3...

Oscar best picture does not always coincide with what most critics considered the best of the year. But NSFC is definitely not a good indicator of what Oscar best picture winner would be. Chances is pretty low that Capote will be Oscar best picture winner judging on NSFC's past twenty-year record; they only agreed with Oscar three times: 1992, 1993, and 2004. I saw Capote recently and I think it's a nice little picture with great technical performance by Hoffman. But it has no qualities that Oscar voters traditional look for.

So give Hoffman the Frank Gorshen Award--too many other fine performances that demanded real character development from the actor

I kind of like the NSFC process. First, instead of rushing to see the crush of end of year contenders in time to announce in mid December, they actually wait until a week into the new year. There seems to be time for at least some amount of reflection on the films that way. I assume that many of the voters in other critics awards see multiple contenders in the week before voting and have to come to a gut decision very quickly.

Also, the voting process seems to reward passion for a particular film or performance. If you're willing to abandon your top choice to join another coalition, you probably weren't that passionate about it. Alternatively if there was say one performance that just totally blew you away you could use the leverage of being able to give away your vote in other categories to help the one performance that you felt was truly transcendent.

One explanation for the curious process is, of course, that it's a *national* group: Not everybody can attend the actual voting sessions, so they needed a process to give those people *some* input while dealing with their absence.

It would be fairer, perhaps, to rotate the site of the balloting -- East, West, Midwest, etc. -- in alternating years. But as a practical matter the current process seems pretty good.

don't have much problem with that list although 2 on there I haven't seen. WOuld prefer HOV out at number 1, though.

I notice The World on this list. I was amused when I saw it was Jonathan Rosenbaum's #1 of the year. Could a more Rosenbaum-friendly movie possibly exist?

I think the key is that there are two films that people are passionate about on both sides of this year--Brokeback and History of Violence. The question mark, especially in a limited universe of votes like an Oscar BP race, are twofold:

1. How big is that "Brokeback #1, no matter what" voting bloc? (My guess is that it's going to run around 20% of the Academy.)
2. Is there another film that the "not Brokeback" group unifies around? In the final vote, it's "pick one of five" with a plurality winner. So, will people vote strategically in a "stop Brokeback" manner by informally unifying around something else (the most likely contender seeming to me to be "Good Night and Good Luck.")

It's all interesting speculation, but Academy voters tend not to vote as a herd (they don't gather together for voting, it's mailed-in ballots). I believe backlash against any film (BBM or Munich or whatever) is minimal and would be more prevalent among those who obsess about awards season (like all of us here on this board).

What are people picking for BP noms?

Mine:

BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN (winner)
GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK
MUNICH
CRASH
WALK THE LINE

I really don't think Capote is going to pull through with a BP nom. And those are just what I think will get nominated, not what I think should be (otherwise, we'd be seeing Squid & Whale and Constant Gardener -- far superior films to Crash especially).

I think Best Picture noms will be even bigger pics than that Hepwa.

I can see Narnia, Walk the Line(and I predict it will win--it's an actor's movie), maybe even Geisha for its melodrama. WOuld Charlie and the Chocolate Factory even rate? What about all the love in public places for March of the Penguins? Maybe Munich (hope so); Maybe Crash (hope NOT).

I would say Good Night and Good luck will get Strathairn and Clooney a nom but Best Picture? Depends on how well seen it was--it has a great rating on IMDB with >4000 votes. I think it's a good movie but Best Picture noms are usually Big tepid stuff that arent so great.

Capote and BBM, while good, the subject matter may not get enough acceptance amongst older academy voters.

I hope Cinderella Man gets fuck all.

Geisha doesn't have a chance. Have you seen it? Oscarbait all the way, and pretty boring, although it'll get nominations for costumes and production design. Crash is the turgid melodrama that has a better chance.

"Oscarbait all the way, and pretty boring"

Well Jeff, you may have just picked the Next Oscar Best Picture.

Yeah I saw it. I don;t comment on flicks I haven't sat completely through.

Like I said on another thread--the kids scenes were pretty decent. adults stuff borrrrring. and worse yet, it really was bad in English, should have been in any other language except Engrish.

how bout Spanish? Now THAT would been some M-E-L-O-D-R-A-M-A. Does anyone in Geisha throw anyone else down a flight of stares? Go into a coma? Or better yet, get murdered during Siesta by a mystery balaclava-clad mad and who turns out to be the victims long-lost brother...? Man, I'd vote for that in a second.

One of things about this year's BP race is that there are certain films that elicit PASSION in people. Sure, last year's movies like Ray, Finding Neverland (worst BP nominee ever) and even The Aviator didn't have people foaming at the mouth over them (although The Aviator did have a lot of big supporters) and only M$B and Sideways had a big huge passionate uprising.

This year you can add movies like Brokeback Mountain, Crash, Constant Gardener and Good Night & Good Luck that have really passionate supporters. I suppose Capote also has a decent group. And less-likely for a nom would be History of Violence And while I'm sure it doesn't have a lot of die hard fans, Walk the Line, i'm sure, would appear on a whole lot of forms in some capacity. Same for Munich just at a lesser level. My predix as of now are BBM, Constant Gardener, Crash, GN&GL and Walk the Line. When ballots were sent out recently those were the films with the momentum. Capote has some now, but how many have already sent in their forms?

Just saw Capote, and it felt very very long for a 1hr 38 min movie. While Hoffman's portrayal was right on, the story was basically very dull. The best performance was Perry Smith - don't know the actor's name, and actually without him in the movie, it wouldn't have been much of a movie. Can't see how it will win an Oscar nom for best picture.

Ray didn't have passionate supporters? It has given Jamie Foxx a second career as a singer it's so well loved.

The awards just finished...Loved that Terrence Howard got best song! Yeh! Loved the music and the beat of H&F...too bad he couldn't win the best actor award, which I felt he deserved over Seymour Hoffman...however, Hoffman will probably win best actor simply because of all the supporting roles he's had over the years, a very impressive body of work.

Chicago Critics: Mickey Rourke for Sin City -- we forgot about his stupenduous remarkable role in that movie...hope he's not forgotten at oscar time.

Jamie Foxx got tonnes of passionate love that overflowed to the movie. But I don't really think that many thing the movie itself is the greatest thing since sliced bread (which it clearly is not, and neither was Foxx who's better lead performance last year was in Collateral)

Pretty much everything about Sin City is overrated.

oh YES. Chicago also gave their award to Joan Allen! Bonza!!!

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