16 February 2009

Skandies: The "nominees"

Not all that much suspense about who/what remains, so let's answer potential questions about near-misses and no-chances here, as well as give the top picks a little additional airtime. (Sorry it's all text, incidentally—I have virtually no HTML skills and invariably mangle any attempt to combine words and images, except in the most basic just-one-image-up-at-the-top kind of way.)



Best Picture


• The Dark Knight
• 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days
• Rachel Getting Married
• Silent Light
• WALL•E

Overlap with Oscar nominees: None
Notable films that failed to make the top 20: The Duchess of Langeais (#21), Ballast (#22), Milk (#23), The Edge of Heaven (#27), Wendy and Lucy (#28), The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (#29), Frost/Nixon (#35), Waltz With Bashir (#38), Slumdog Millionaire (#71), The Reader (no votes)



Best Director


• Jonathan Demme, Rachel Getting Married
• Cristian Mungiu, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days
• Carlos Reygadas, Silent Light
• Andrew Stanton, WALL•E
• Gus Van Sant, Paranoid Park

Previous "nominations": Only Van Sant, who placed 4th for Gerry in 2003.
Overlap with Oscar nominees: None, though they nominated Van Sant for Milk.
Notable directors who failed to make the top 20: Tomas Alfredson, Let the Right One In (#21); James Marsh, Man on Wire (#26); David Fincher, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (#27); Gus Van Sant, Milk (#29); Danny Boyle, Slumdog Millionaire (#43); Ron Howard, Frost/Nixon (#50); Stephen Daldry, The Reader (no votes)



Best Actress


• Juliette Binoche, Flight of the Red Balloon
• Anne Hathaway, Rachel Getting Married
• Sally Hawkins, Happy-Go-Lucky
• Anamaria Marinca, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days
• Michelle Williams, Wendy and Lucy

Previous "nominations": Only Williams, who placed 2nd in Supporting for Brokeback Mountain in 2005.
Overlap with Oscar nominees: Hathaway
Notable actresses who failed to make the top 20: Angelina Jolie, Changeling (#26); Kate Winslet, The Reader (#77 in Supporting)



Best Actor


• Javier Bardem, Vicky Cristina Barcelona
• Guillaume Depardieu, The Duchess of Langeais
• Robert Downey, Jr., Iron Man
• Sean Penn, Milk
• Mickey Rourke, The Wrestler

Previous "nominations": Almost everyone. Bardem won Supporting just last year for No Country for Old Men, while Rourke took 2nd in the same category for Frank Miller's Sin City in 2005. Penn gets his first nomination since the survey's inaugural year (1995), when he placed for Dead Man Walking. And Downey, in a truly remarkable achievement, finishes in the top five for the third time in four years, having placed 3rd both in 2005 for Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and in 2006 (Supporting) for A Scanner Darkly. Plus he just missed last year for Zodiac, coming in 6th in Supporting. Amazing.
Overlap with Oscar nominees: Penn, Rourke
Notable actors who failed to make the top 20: Clint Eastwood, Gran Torino (#27); Brad Pitt, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (#38)



Best Supporting Actor


• Heath Ledger, The Dark Knight
• John Malkovich, Burn After Reading
• Eddie Marsan, Happy-Go-Lucky
• Brad Pitt, Burn After Reading
• Michael Shannon, Revolutionary Road

Previous "nominations": Like Sean Penn, Brad Pitt gets his first nomination since Year One, when he made the cut for Twelve Monkeys. Ledger and Malkovich, meanwhile, are both past Skandie winners, the former for Brokeback Mountain in 2005 (in Lead, of course) and the latter for Being Guess Who in 1999.
Overlap with Oscar nominees: Ledger, Shannon
Notable actors who failed to make the top 20: None, really.



Best Supporting Actress


• Penélope Cruz, Vicky Cristina Barcelona
• Rosemarie DeWitt, Rachel Getting Married
• Hafsia Herzi, The Secret of the Grain
• Marisa Tomei, The Wrestler
• Laura Vasiliu, 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days

Previous "nominations": Cruz placed 3rd in the lead category two years ago for Volver; Tomei finished 5th in 2001 for In the Bedroom.
Overlap with Oscar nominees: Cruz, Tomei
Notable actresses who failed to make the top 20: Taraji P. Henson, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (#26); Amy Adams, Doubt (#32)



Best Screenplay


• Joel Coen & Ethan Coen, Burn After Reading
• Charlie Kaufman, Synecdoche, New York
• Guy Maddin, My Winnipeg
• Martin McDonagh, In Bruges
• Christopher Nolan & Jonathan Nolan, The Dark Knight

Previous "nominations": The three all-time most nominated writers in this category are all represented this year, as it happens. The Coens get a record fifth nod, having previously placed 3rd for Fargo (1996, back when there were two categories), 4th for O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000), 3rd for The Man Who Wasn't There (2001), and 2nd last year for No Country for Old Men. Kaufman has three past nominations and three wins: 1st for Being John Malkovich (1999), Adaptation. (2002) and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004). Chris Nolan has two past nominations and two wins: 1st for Memento (2001) and The Prestige (2006). (J. Nolan shared the latter and so gets his own second nod.) Between them, Kaufman and Nolan have won this category in five of the past ten years. Or is it six...?
Overlap with Oscar nominees: McDonagh, oddly enough.
Notable screenwriters who failed to make the top 20: Dustin Lance Black, Milk (#24); Peter Morgan, Frost/Nixon (#27); Gus Van Sant, Paranoid Park (also #27); Michael Haneke, Funny Games (#41); Simon Beaufoy, Slumdog Millionaire (#43); Courtney Hunt, Frozen River (#72); Nick Schenk, Gran Torino (also #72); José Luis Guerin, In the City of Sylvia (no votes); David Hare, The Reader (no votes); Hou Hsiao Hsien and François Margolin, Flight of the Red Balloon (no votes); Jia Zhang-ke, Still Life (no votes); Eric Roth, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (no votes)



Best Scene



Nah, I gotta save something as a surprise.


16 comments:

wug said...

No glaring surprises here. Rosemarie DeWitt was my favorite supporting of the year, but I'd have no problem seeing Hafsia Herzi get the win (not going to happen though). I predict WALL*E comes out on top for Picture, mainly because SILENT LIGHT was probably not seen by as many people.

Anonymous said...

These should be the Oscar nominations! Well, almost (I agree with three out of five in nearly category, though I have yet to see Silent Light, which has not played in L.A. and apparently never will).

Anonymous said...

That should read "in nearly every category."

Anonymous said...

Silent Light is playing in Ithaca next week; how has it not gotten to LA?

Andrew Dignan said...

The only LA screenings I know of for Silent Light were the ones that Film Independent put on for Spirit voters. And as someone who spent 4 years in Ithaca and now lives in LA, I can assure you we have nothing as handy as Cornell Cinema out here.

Anonymous said...

Kinda disappointed, but not surprised, that Tarra Rigss didn't make the Top 20 Best Supporting Actress list for Ballast. Here's a category where everyone constantly bitches and moans about the difficulty of coming up with ten worthy performances, and for my money Riggs's pretty much popped off the screen. Shame, AVB.

Also, now I can finally stop prattling on about how The Duchess of Langeais placed two actors in the top ten, a screenplay and its director in the top twenty, but failed to crack the Top 20 best pictures. #21. Damn. More than any other picture, the Rivette was hurt by the Erickson / McCloud double abstention.

STEPHEN THE GOLDBERGER said...

These are infinitely better than the Oscar nominations but I'm slightly disappointed. I guess it was too much for me to hope Adam Scott or Kathryn Hahn would get nominated for Step Brothers.

Steve C. said...

You're right, that's way too much to hope for.

Julius_Goat said...

Well, I now look forward to the Skandies far more than the Oscars.

You guys are my Netflix queque.

Steve said...

Robert:

Silent Light is currently available through the magic of the Internets, in quite good (DVD-rip) quality. Granted it's not the same as seeing it in a theater, but very few people have had that opportunity.

Ryan said...

Looks like someone will Beat MuseMalade again this year. I missed a number of obvious nominees including Marsan, Tomei, and Maddin. And I doubt scenes will save me.

Still can't figure out why Maddin finally had a breakthrough this year after years of superlative work. Maybe it speaks to the weakness of the field.

Anonymous said...

I'm sure it is available on the internet, but I'd just as soon wait for the DVD. I don't have to see it that badly.

Adam Villani said...

Silent Light played the AFI Fest in L.A. back in November 2007. I know, that doesn't help you now.

Anonymous said...

It did? Are you sure? Because I actually checked the schedule to see if it was playing there and I didn't see it listed.

Andrew Dignan said...

Adam is correct. http://tinyurl.com/agzt8r

I alas skipped it there as well.

Anonymous said...

Oh, duh, I missed the "2007" part of his post.