By John H. Foote The Race for the Academy Award for Best Actor has changed yet again, with scenes from a trailer making it clear Christian Bale is going to be a nominee for Best Actor for his alarmingly accurate performance of Dick Cheney. Bale, known to be among the finest actors of his generation,…
By John H. Foote Warner Brothers announced today that the new Clint Eastwood film The Mule will be released in December. In the past, an Eastwood release in December could mean Oscar. Never forget that Million Dollar Baby (2004) was a late December release and snatched the Oscar from The Aviator (2004) and Martin Scorsese.…
By John H. Foote There was a time finding five actresses to nominate was a chore…no more. At this writing, there are eighteen actresses, that we know of who could be nominated. Being there are just five slots some great work is going to be Snubbed. The list of potential nominees is made up of…
By John H. Foote After TIFF ended last year, there was no question Gary Oldman was on the path to the Oscar for Best Actor for his acclaimed performance as Winston Churchill in Darkest Hour (2017). Frankly, I was not impressed with the performance, I could not decide if it was Oldman doing the work…
By John H. Foote Citing that the idea for an award for Best Popular Film merits more study and greater thought, the Academy has killed the award for now. Turns out the Academy is not made up entirely of fools. Oh OK, the dummies that voted Chariots of Fire (1981) Best Picture are still fools,…
By John H. Foote The decision of the Academy Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to create a new category, Best Popular Film, has left many, myself included, shaking their heads in disbelief and disgust. What does that even mean? Will they hand an Oscar to the film that makes the most money? Or will they…
By John H. Foote In recent years the category for Best Actress has been overcrowded, which is something it had never been before. In the last five years, the Academy could have easily nominated ten actresses for the Best Actress award. This year is no different, the category is proving to be very tough to…
By John H. Foote Historically, this is always crowded category, and this year is no exception but the days of the seventies, when four of the five nominees could be the winner are gone. In past years we have pretty much known which actor was going to win by Oscar night, the Casey Affleck award…
By John H. Foote Since 1970, the following Oscar winning Best Pictures were also major box office hits. Bear in mind these are Best Picture WINNERS, if I were to list the nominees that were hits the list grows substantially. And if we’re to go backwards, into the sixties, awestruck West Side Story (1961), Lawrence…
By John H. Foote In the hopes of bringing back young audiences, the Academy, in their infinite wisdom (yep, sarcasm) will add a new category, Most Popular Film. This further dilutes the Best Picture category, as moving from five to up to Ten Best Picture nominees did. The night’s biggest award has become Best Director,…