NEVADA FILM CRITICS ASSOCIATION PLUMP FOR 12 YEARS, BUT ONLY JUST

The Nevada Film Critics Association's benevolent neighbours, the Las Vegas Film Critics Society, bestowed upon 12 Years a Slave five awards earlier in the week. The Nevada lot have given Steve McQueen's film just the one, but it's the big one: Best Picture. Gravity, winning Best Director, Dallas Buyers Club and August: Osage County all take home more awards each, with August winning Meryl Streep her first, and possibly last, Best Actress award of the season. I don't trust any group which sees fit to hand out an award for Visual Effects, though, and not Screenplay.

Best Film

12 Years a Slave

Best Director

Alfonso Cuaron (Gravity)

Best Actor

Matthew McConaughey (Dallas Buyers Club)

Best Actress

Meryl Streep (August: Osage County)

Best Supporting Actor

Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers Club)

Best Supporting Actress

Jennifer Lawrence (American Hustle)

Best Cinematography

Emmanuel Lubezki (Gravity)

Best Production Design

Dan Hennah (The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug)

Best Visual Effects

Gravity

Best Ensemble Cast

August: Osage County

Best Animated Film

Frozen

Best Youth Performance

Sophie Nelisse (The Book Thief)

THE FAULT IN OUR STARS POSTER

I surprised myself by rather enjoying Josh Boone's debut film as director, Stuck in Love, earlier this year. Maybe his upcoming film, The Fault in Our Stars, will surprise me too. If I'm gonna enjoy it even half as much as Stuck in Love, it'll bloody well have to. A US release is set for the 6th of June 2014, with a UK one on the 20th.

I SAW THE DEVIL REMAKE IN THE WORKS

Korean cinema is among the strongest and most idiosyncratic national brands of film in the modern marketplace, so one can both understand the current Hollywood compulsion to remake all things Korean (South Korean, that is, obvs), and be utterly perplexed by it. Kim Jee Woon's I Saw the Devil is a decent thriller, to which producers of also-decent thriller Dredd 3D Adi Shankar and Spencer Silna have acquired remake rights. Meh.

NEW TRAILER AND POSTER FOR THE GRAND BUDAPEST HOTEL

You know, it's Wes Anderson at his most insufferably twee, but it just looks so fucking good I don't care.

TRANSCENDENCE TEASER TRAILERS

I thought we were over this shit. Didn't it die with the Millennium Bug? Isn't that why nobody gives a shit about the Terminator movies any more? Between this and Spike Jonze's Her, I think it's now safe to say that it's not safe at all out there! Throw out your phones! Smash up your television sets! Burn your computers! Actually no, plz don't, I need the pageviews kthx. Out on the 18th of April 2014 in the US, and the 25th in the UK.

ROMAN AND SOFIA COPPOLA HEADED TO FAIRYLAND

Alysia Abbott's book Fairyland: A Memoir of My Father details her own childhood as the daughter of writer and activist Steve Abbott during the 1970s and '80s. Steve's wild lifestyle tailored for Alysia a most unconventional upbringing, which eventually turned tragic as her father contracted AIDS at the peak of the epidemic in the US. Brother and sister Roman and Sofia Coppola will adapt the true story book, with Sofia speculated to take on directing duties also.

ALLIANCE OF WOMEN FILM JOURNALISTS PICKS 12 YEARS A SLAVE

I was in a right foul mood when I posted the AWFJ nominations, but I'm in a better mood now, not least because I approve of their choices. As per, 12 Years a Slave dominated the main awards, though there was considerable support for Gravity... again, as per.

AWFJ Best Of Awards

Best Film

12 Years a Slave

Best Director (Female or Male)

Steve McQueen (12 Years a Slave)

Best Actor

Matthew McConaughey (Dallas Buyers Club)

Best Actress

Cate Blanchett (Blue Jasmine)

Best Supporting Actor

Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers Club)

Best Supporting Actress

Lupita Nyong’o (12 Years a Slave)

Best Screenplay, Original

Spike Jonze (Her)

Best Screenplay, Adapted

John Ridley (12 Years a Slave)

Best Cinematography

Emmanuel Lubezki (Gravity)

Best Editing

Alfonso Cuarón and Mark Sanger (Gravity)

Best Music or Score

T-Bone Burnett (Inside Llewyn Davis)

Best Ensemble Cast

American Hustle

Best Animated Film

The Wind Rises (Miyazaki Hayao)

Best Documentary

Stories We Tell (Sarah Polley)

Best Non-English Language Film

The Hunt (Thomas Vinterberg) – Denmark

REVIEW - ANCHORMAN 2: THE LEGEND CONTINUES

If 2004's Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy had been twice the length (and thus interminable), this might have been its second half. They're identical films in many respects, which means that Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues lacks the vibrancy of helping #1 of Ron Burgundy, but is still a successful comedy. A cash-in this may be, but the cast and writers have been generous with their skills, and respectful toward their characters. That the well of ideas is drying up doesn't matter very much. A thorough narrative and stylistic retread of the first film would have been pretty awful no matter how many laughs they could generate, so it's thankful that Will Ferrell and Adam McKay don't linger over material that has little new to add. New is the offensive quotient, less absurd than the first film's quaint sexism, at times disarmingly brutal, almost too brutal for the Anchorman brand. It is tremendously funny, though the general absence of said absurdity contributes to a loss of character for the film. A particularly strong sequence as Ron experiences the requisite plunge into despair following a wondrous high in the second act thrives off its more ridiculous elements, however. The naughty jab at the state of contemporary broadcast journalism in the US is perhaps stressed a bit too heavily, but then when was Anchorman ever supposed to be subtle? An elephantine ensemble of comics and other actors (mainly in cameos) is here for novelty value, but it's dang good value too; on the other hand, Kristen Wiig's scenes must surely, on reflection, have been last-minute additions, and they're sometimes lacking in zest. The film's leading men mostly don't see their roles expand much on last time, except David Koechner's Champ, hilariously portrayed here as an aggressive, frustrated, latent gay man.

OSCAR NOMINATIONS 7 - 4 WEEKS TO GO

Oh holy shit it's less than a month away now! I've noticed lately that Dallas Buyers Club is on its way up, and now I think it'll be nominated for Best Picture, alongside eight other films, and that's leaving out Saving Mr. Banks! So many films, so few spaces!

Best Picture

·          12 Years a Slave

·          American Hustle

·          Captain Phillips

·          Dallas Buyers Club

·          Gravity

·          Her

·          Inside Llewyn Davis

·          Nebraska

·          The Wolf of Wall Street

Best Director

·          Alfonso Cuarón (Gravity)

·          Spike Jonze (Her)

·          Steve McQueen (12 Years a Slave)

·          David O. Russell (American Hustle)

·          Martin Scorsese (The Wolf of Wall Street)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role

·          Bruce Dern (Nebraska)

·          Chiwetel Ejiofor (12 Years a Slave)

·          Tom Hanks (Captain Phillips)

·          Matthew McConaughey (Dallas Buyers Club)

·          Robert Redford (All Is Lost)

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role

·          Cate Blanchett (Blue Jasmine)

·          Sandra Bullock (Gravity)

·          Judi Dench (Philomena)

·          Meryl Streep (August: Osage County)

·          Emma Thompson (Saving Mr. Banks)

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role

·          Barkhad Abdi (Captain Phillips)

·          Daniel Brühl (Rush)

·          Michael Fassbender (12 Years a Slave)

·          James Gandolfini (Enough Said)

·          Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers Club)

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role

·          Jennifer Lawrence (American Hustle)

·          Lupita Nyong’o (12 Years a Slave)

·          Octavia Spencer (Fruitvale Station)

·          June Squibb (Nebraska)

·          Oprah Winfrey (Lee Daniels’ The Butler)

Best Original Screenplay

·          American Hustle

·          Enough Said

·          Her

·          Inside Llewyn Davis

·          Nebraska

Best Adapted Screenplay

·          12 Years a Slave

·          Before Midnight

·          Philomena

·          Short Term 12

·          The Wolf of Wall Street

DUBLIN FILM CRITICS CIRCLE'S RESULTS ARE WIDELY VARIED

The Dublin Film Critics Circle may have chosen Gravity and Alfonso Cuaron for their top awards, and indeed conventional choices for their other ones, but their expansive lists are full of interesting choices. Some holdovers from last year's awards season, as their Irish release dates were perhaps earlier in 2013, so films like Django Unchained and No get some traction long after their glory several months ago. Also, Steven Soderbergh's Behind the Candelabra was theatrically released in many territories outside of North America, and it too has proven popular with the DFCC. European critics remain smitten with The Great Beauty, and I'm delighted to see significant support for The Act of Killing and The Selfish Giant.

ghgh

Best Film

1.        Gravity

2.        The Great Beauty

3.        The Act of Killing

4.        Blue Is the Warmest Colour

5.        Before Midnight

6.        Behind the Candelabra

7.        Django Unchained

8.        Beyond the Hills

9.        Blue Jasmine

 The Selfish Giant

 Zero Dark Thirty

12.     What Maisie Knew

Best Director

1.        Alfonso Cuarón (Gravity)

2.        Paolo Sorrentino (The Great Beauty)

3.        Clio Barnard (The Selfish Giant)

4.        Kathryn Bigelow (Zero Dark Thirty)

 Abdellatif Kechiche (Blue Is the Warmest Colour)

 Steven Soderbergh (Behind the Candelabra)

 Quentin Tarantino (Django Unchained)

8.        Ben Wheatley (A Field in England)

9.        Richard Linklater (Before Midnight)

10.     Derek Cianfrance (The Place Beyond the Pines)

11.     Shane Carruth (Upstream Colour)

12.     Cristian Mungiu (Beyond the Hills)

13.     Woody Allen (Blue Jasmine)

 Joshua Oppenheimer (The Act of Killing)

Best Actor

1.        Bruce Dern (Nebraska)

2.        Tom Hanks (Captain Phillips)

3.        Michael Douglas (Behind the Candelabra)

4.        Daniel Day-Lewis (Lincoln)

5.        Toni Servillo (The Great Beauty)

6.        Matthew McConaughey (Mud)

7.        Hugh Jackman (Prisoners)

8.        Brady Corbet (Simon Killer)

 Leonardo DiCaprio (Django Unchained)

10.     Daniel Brühl (Rush)

 Ethan Hawke (Before Midnight)

12.     Gael García Bernal (No)

Best Actress

1.        Cate Blanchett (Blue Jasmine)

2.        Adèle Exarchopoulos (Blue Is the Warmest Colour)

3.        Judi Dench (Philomena)

4.        Julie Delpy (Before Midnight)

 Emma Thompson (Saving Mr. Banks)

6.        Paulina García (Gloria)

7.        Sandra Bullock (Gravity)

 Rooney Mara (Ain’t Them Bodies Saints)

9.        Greta Gerwig (Frances Ha)

10.     Émilie Dequenne (Our Children)

 Julianne Moore (What Maisie Knew)

12.     Lake Bell (In a World…)

13.     Onata Aprile (What Maisie Knew)