Tuesday, January 3, 2012

The Producers Guild Forecasts a Bland Outlook at the Oscars

Today the Producer's Guild of America (PGA) helped narrow down the potential list of Best Picture nominees.  Sometimes this group throws in some commercial success stories, i.e. Bridesmaids this year.  Bridesmaids making this list shows that it is gaining more and more momentum towards a Best Picture nomination.  People have compared this film to The Hangover, but Bridesmaids has already done much better than that laugher, and this film is a serious threat.  The other surprise nominee that needs to be taken a little more seriously today is The Ides of March.  March has four Golden Globe nominations and could be a serious contender.  The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo's nomination is less surprising because the producer is genius Scott Rudin, but this could help propel the film to more major nominations.
One film that is most likely out of the running is Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2.  If Potter could not get a nomination from this guild then the odds of a Best Picture nomination are pretty much dead in the water.  Two smaller films Drive and The Tree of Life were noticeably left off this list as well.  If this trend continues look for this to be one of the most generic celebrations of film. 
The not so surprising nominations were The Artist, The Descendants, The Help,Hugo, Midnight in Paris, Moneyball, and War Horse.  These are the films that are out front for nominations, and to win the Best Picture honor.  Looking at this list of seven films makes me feel as though the the Academy (for the most part) like this Guild, will play it safe this year.  Films like Shame, Tinker Taylor Soldier Spy, Martha Marcy May Marlene, and many other will be ignored. While I am excited for films like The Artist, Midnight in Paris and Hugo, I can't help but hope the Academy will take more risks.  The upcoming Guild awards will help paint a clearer picture, but I predict a very bland year at the Oscars  
THE ARTIST-Producer: Thomas Langmann
BRIDESMAIDS-Producers: Judd Apatow, Barry Mendel, Clayton Townsend
THE DESCENDANTS-Producers: Jim Burke, Alexander Payne, Jim Taylor
THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO-Producers: Ceán Chaffin, Scott Rudin
THE HELP-Producers: Michael Barnathan, Chris Columbus, Brunson Green
HUGO-Producers: Graham King, Martin Scorsese
THE IDES OF MARCH-Producers: George Clooney, Grant Heslov, Brian Oliver
MIDNIGHT IN PARIS-Producers: Letty Aronson, Stephen Tenenbaum
MONEYBALL-Producers: Michael De Luca, Rachael Horovitz, Brad Pitt
WAR HORSE-Producers: Kathleen Kennedy, Steven Spielberg

1 comment:

Organic Author said...

It's been a really unfortunate year for movies. Too bad "The Iron Lady" couldn't have come out sooner!