Kicking Off the Fall Season

[Big Magilla]

12 Years a Slave is a dark film (no pun intended) but it's also inspirational - the protagonist does survive to write the book the film is based on more than 150 years later. It's definitely in the Academy's wheelhouse, more so than No Country for Old Men, another very dark film that won in recent years.

[OscarGuy]

As I said previous, the Academy has been trying to get away from its old white guy reputation. The opening up of the membership to a number of people, including the documentary branch, may change the dynamic beyond what we can see. Perhaps the influx of documentarians will skew the results towards something with more historical perspective. But the Academy has never honored a film about the black experience. Crash sure as hell doesn't count. Lincoln didn't make it through, so that could be bad news for 12 Years a Slave. I'm still interested in seeing how audiences love it before I get too far, but other than a small number of films we haven't heard from yet this year, 12 Years seems like the best bet among a crowded field. It's gotten more respect than August: Osage County, which I'm sure Harvey won't love. I could also see him and Oprah trying to push The Butler to the front of the conversation about the black experience, not necessarily to beat 12 Years, but to siphon votes from it in favor of another film more of his choosing?

[FilmFan720]

Slumdog Millionaire became "the film to beat" after Toronto. So, it's not like 12 Years a Slave would be unprecedented.

And were Michel Hazanvicius, Ben Affleck, Tom Hooper, Kathryn Bigelow, Danny Boyle, Paul Haggis. Of the last eight winners of Best Picture, six were directed by people who wouldn't be considered overdue for Oscar consideration, so that defense doesn't hold a lot of water.

I'm not saying 12 Years a Slave will win. Yes, it's my current prediction, but things change. I think people are trying too hard to find some reason for the film NOT to win. I think Slumdog Millionaire may well be the BEST comparison for 12 Years a Slave. Danny Boyle had a few critically acclaimed films beforehand, but was he really "overdue?" Hazanvicius only directed comedies; Hooper TV; Bigelow schlock; Haggis nothing of import. Affleck might have seemed overdue after two previous celebrated efforts, but that's as much as McQueen has.

Wesley, read my post again. When I talked about overdue Oscars, it was only in terms of strong frontrunners holding on.

As to Slumdog Millionaire, it was a crowd-pleaser to the nth degree, perfectly fitting in with the type of film that our current Academy loves voting for.

Finally, I'm not saying that 12 Years a Slave won't win, but I don't see it sailing to the podium like so many (particularly away from this board) seem to be saying. It doesn't seem to play into the types of films that win Best Picture this day, but with Schindler's List like praise it may well do that. With any sort of backlash, especially historically, it may well fall by the wayside. I can't say.

[OscarGuy]

Slumdog Millionaire became "the film to beat" after Toronto. So, it's not like 12 Years a Slave would be unprecedented.

And were Michel Hazanvicius, Ben Affleck, Tom Hooper, Kathryn Bigelow, Danny Boyle, Paul Haggis. Of the last eight winners of Best Picture, six were directed by people who wouldn't be considered overdue for Oscar consideration, so that defense doesn't hold a lot of water.

I'm not saying 12 Years a Slave will win. Yes, it's my current prediction, but things change. I think people are trying too hard to find some reason for the film NOT to win. I think Slumdog Millionaire may well be the BEST comparison for 12 Years a Slave. Danny Boyle had a few critically acclaimed films beforehand, but was he really "overdue?" Hazanvicius only directed comedies; Hooper TV; Bigelow schlock; Haggis nothing of import. Affleck might have seemed overdue after two previous celebrated efforts, but that's as much as McQueen has.

[Mister Tee]

Two other things:

First, just a technicality: Schindler's List was an early contender only if you mean early December. The movie didn't open till the second weekend or so of December, and won all the critics' prizes almost immediately thereafter. So, unlike here, all the competition was on the field when most of us, quite reasonably, concluded a film that highly praised, by a hugely popular filmmaker who was as Oscar-overdue as anyone who ever lived, on a subject already established as an Academy soft spot, was the runaway favorite.

And to add to FilmFan's point: I'd say that not only is McQueen, in Oscar terms, the opposite of overdue, I would describe his two previous films as being as far from Oscar-friendly as is cinematically possible. I like both films, but in terms of narrative drive, audience appeal, warmth -- all the things Oscar voters have shown over the years they love -- he's almost anti-matter. To fit as an Oscar front-runner, he'd have to have made a film that barely seems made by the same director. It's possible he's done it, but I'm going to have to see it to believe it.

[FilmFan720]

The two films that people keep bringing up here are Schindler's List and Return of the King...probably the only two films in modern times which held their frontrunner status seemingly all year right up to the ballot being opened and won the big prize. But both of those had something that 12 Years a Slave does not have---the sense of being due. For Return of the King, it was three years in the making of one of the most impressive (at least in terms of scale of size) undertakings in Hollywood history that had to be honored. For Schindler's List, it was an important story told by who is considered our greatest American director, who had never won a competitive Oscar.

Tell me, who in 12 Years a Slave is "due" to win, at least in the general eyes of the public? I'm not saying it can't happen, but it is missing that large piece.

[ksrymy]

I am glad this is finally (well, with only three films created, I don't know how much weight the word carries) the time for the Academy to acknowledge McQueen. Hunger was too small/indie for voters and the outright sexual nature of Shame seemed to turn them off despite its beautiful acting and directing. I'm hoping this gives a much-deserved boost to both McQueen and Fassbender's careers.

[OscarGuy]

I had a suspicion (did it come through in my post below)...and it came to pass. 12 Years a Slave is now a Toronto Audience Award winner. That does put a damper on the accusations that the film might be a tough sell to most audiences. I know some aren't Steve McQueen fans, but I wonder how different a more expansive film like 12 Years is compared to his much more contained films like Shame.

[flipp525]

To paraphrase the tagline for The Song of Bernadette, for those who believe no explanation is necessary, for those who do not, no explanation is possible.

I just had this vision of you waking up and reciting this mantra daily while praying in front of a picture of Judi Dench in Philomena.

[Okri]

The only victory I feel comfortable predicting at this point is Gravity for visual effects.

I'm cut from a slightly different cloth than Mister Tee. I don't actually actively dislike year round predictions. But for me, the year round predictions are less about actually predicting the oscar race and more about focusing my enthusiasms (so I can assert my participation doesn't create an echo chamber effect, which admittedly is the reason year round predictions suck). I predicted Werner Herzog and Ken Loach to get directing nominations in 2006, to give you an example, just because I thought that it would be cool to see them nominated. But the way people speak in clearly declarative tones confuses me. You would think that after time and time again seeing "expected" nominees crash out, genuinely close races play out along with yes, runaway victories, one would realize that operating in that idiom doesn't make sense.

That's not to say "early films to beat" can't actually win. Return of the King was the early film to beat and it carried on with a massive crash of momentum to tie the win record.

So, in that vein, I have no idea if 12 Years a Slave can win. I do think the reviews suggest that critical support will be there vis-a-vis awards, though.

I'm curious about the Wolf of Wall Street (Scorsese + Terrence Winter is a terrific combo) and loved the trailer.

The Argo vs Lincoln vs Zero Dark Thirty race is actually pretty instructive. All three seemed like strong candidates at one point during the race, and the way that race shifted momentum was pretty cool.

[OscarGuy]

Let's also be honest that we don't know what kind of decisions the "New" Academy will make. This year's invitation's were a more eclectic group of actors, filmmakers and craftsmen. There are a few more minorities than normal and a HUGE influx of documentarians. Will this ultimately change the dynamic of the Academy? We won't know for sure. We do know that this year's possible slate of Best Picture winners looks the strongest since we went to the 10-slot field. Studios seem more desirous of getting higher quality films out there and the festivals suggest there are a LOT of excellent movies on the horizon.

Though, I do resist all this talk that David O. Russell and Martin Scorsese are de facto contenders. Scorsese can claim Shutter Island, Bringing Out the Dead, Casino, Kundun. Just because he finally won an Oscar after 30+ years of trying doesn't mean he's suddenly going to get nominated each time he makes a movie. The same can be said for Russell who has only recently emerged from Oscars-ignore territory. American Hustle has big stars in it sure, but I'm reminded more of American Gangster than anything. We've learned in recent years sight-unseen declarations are as dangerous as early front-runner declarations (which more often than not deflate late in the process).

Of course, I must remind people that it may have been some time ago, but Schindler's List became the film-to-beat early and stayed that way. It was a film about an important social subject from a major American filmmaker who was delving into his own history. The major difference is that 12 Years a Slave isn't a film from a major filmmaker (McQueen has a short resume) and he's not even American. That doesn't immediately disqualify him, but until audiences make up their mind about the film, we'll have no idea how it plays with the Academy. Fox Searchlight has done well getting films nominated, but they haven't "sealed the deal" since Slumdog in 2008. I still think they could and pushing the "major film about black history has never won Best Picture and neither has a black director" angle could bolster the film's chances (Harvey's used that technique all too frequently). It's entirely possible this could be the year (finally). We'll just have to wait and see until it's out. 12 Years could sweep the critics and still not win Best Picture.

[FilmFan720]

Yeah, the idea that The Hurt Locker is more lighthearted than Inglorious Bastards or Avatar doesn't make sense to me as a comparison.

But yeah - we still don't know much.

Yeah, The Hurt Locker was not my best example...I was thinking more about the epicness of the other two versus the small Hurt Locker.

[Big Magilla]

To paraphrase the tagline for The Song of Bernadette, for those who believe no explanation is necessary, for those who do not, no explanation is possible.

[ksrymy]

Regardless, I think our first black or Hispanic Best Director will win this year.

[The Original BJ]

12 Years is a fact-based history lesson that will appeal strongly to an Academy membership that liked The King's Speech more than they did The Social Network and with no Argo on the horizon, there doesn't seem to be a spoiler lurking in the wings to zap its front-runner status a la Lincoln last year.

With no disrespect meant, Magilla, there is literally not one thing about this sentence that makes any sense to me.

As far as I'm concerned, The King's Speech over The Social Network example strikes me as one you'd use to argue that the Academy would NOT vote for 12 Years a Slave as Best Picture than that they would. The Social Network was a hit drama with overwhelming movie-of-the-year acclaim that I thought was well within the range of the type of mainstream efforts that typically win Best Picture, and it STILL lost to King's Speech, a very traditional, crowd-pleasing piece of uplift. By all accounts, 12 Years a Slave is a very dark, violent movie, from a director whose previous films suggest his sensibilities are a lot more of an acquired taste than Tom Hooper's (and frankly, even David Fincher's.) I'm not sure how the fact that 12 Years is a historical movie and King's Speech is a historical movie mean Oscar voters will unquestionably respond to both movies in the same way, when pretty much everything else about them is totally different.

And I'm not even sure what the argument that there's no Argo on the horizon even means. In broad terms, you seem to be suggesting that there's no movie out there that could beat 12 Years a Slave. I think that's a completely baffling statement to make -- there's a whole SLEW of movies that have yet to be released (some which haven't even been seen by ANY audiences), and a lot of them strike me as having strong awards prospects. Frankly, I don't see that much difference between "nothing can beat 12 Years a Slave" and "nothing can beat Munich" or "Best Picture is between Dreamgirls and Flags of Our Fathers," the kind of definitive declarations bloggers made around this time in years past that turned out to be off, and not just by a little.

But furthermore, I don't even understand the specifics of the Argo/Lincoln comparison. Argo was released BEFORE Lincoln, and many at the time pegged Argo as a potential Best Picture winner. And then, throughout the season, quite a number of movies emerged as candidates that many thought COULD win the top prize -- Lincoln, Life of Pi, Silver Linings, Zero Dark Thirty. (I recall some people even insisting that Les Mis could go all the way. ) So to characterize last year as "Lincoln was the front-runner, then Argo swooped in to snag the prize" seems to be a simplification of a race where quite a number of movies seemed in play. And to bring things back to this year...I would argue that there's no reason to think we might not have another year like that, with a handful of movies that seem like they could seriously contend for Best Picture.

Given my enthusiasm for Shame (and, to a lesser degree, Hunger) I'm greatly looking forward to 12 Years a Slave, and the enthused Toronto reaction has peaked my excitement even more. But I see no reason to declare it another Return of the King today.