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As we move out of the Toronto fray, Venice and Telluride already a memory, we look to the season ahead. The starting gun echo of those three early fall festivals is beginning to fade away, and with the dust settled or settling, it’s interesting to note the lack of an inarguable emerging player. In fact, [...]
OFF THE CARPET: The great, appreciated unknown
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 5:47 pm · September 19th, 2011
Filed in: Off the Carpet
OSCAR TALK: Ep. 61 — Wrapping up Toronto, ‘Moneyball’ and Brad Pitt’s Oscar positioning, Roland Emmerich’s ‘Anonymous,’ ‘Rampart’ and turning out the lights
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 8:53 am · September 16th, 2011
Welcome to Oscar Talk. In case you’re new to the site and/or the podcast, Oscar Talk is a weekly kudocast, your one-stop awards chat shop between yours truly and Anne Thompson of Thompson on Hollywood. The podcast is weekly, every Friday throughout the season, charting the ups and downs of contenders along the way. Plenty [...]
Filed in: Oscar Talk
Clooney on ‘Descendants’ at Telluride, with clips
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 7:40 am · September 14th, 2011
Via our new partners at HitFix, specifically Greg Ellwood’s Awards Campaign blog:
Filed in: Daily
OFF THE CARPET: Strong year for double-dippers
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 8:58 am · September 12th, 2011
We find ourselves right in the middle of the big Toronto press junket, er, film festival, where 200-plus films are landing, many of them as world premieres, and the landscape of this year’s Oscar race is really beginning to take shape. As I looked out at the various films in play this year, it suddenly [...]
Filed in: Off the Carpet
9/12 OSCARWEB ROUND-UP: Clooney on self-competition, Woodley ready for her close-up, genre movies at the Oscars
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 8:03 am · September 12th, 2011
• Bill Desowitz calls “The Lion King 3D,” which hits theaters Friday, “a noteworthy achievement for post-converting hand-drawn animation.” Agreed. He also talks to those responsible for it. [Thompson on Hollywood] • Clooney: Clooney vs. Cooney just hype. [Variety] • Shailene Woodley, meanwhile, is ready for her close-up in Toronto. [The Guardian]
Filed in: Daily
OSCAR TALK: Ep. 60 — A sprint Telluride recap, ‘Descendants,’ ‘Albert Nobbs,’ disagreeing on ‘Dangerous Method,’ thoughts on Eddie Murphy, Toronto preview (ish)
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 9:07 am · September 9th, 2011
Welcome to Oscar Talk. In case you’re new to the site and/or the podcast, Oscar Talk is a weekly kudocast, your one-stop awards chat shop between yours truly and Anne Thompson of Thompson on Hollywood. The podcast is weekly, every Friday throughout the season, charting the ups and downs of contenders along the way. Plenty [...]
Filed in: Oscar Talk
9/8 OSCARWEB ROUND-UP: Pond picks Payne, Von Trier steps in it further, Waxman knocks ‘Warrior’ strategy
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 8:59 am · September 8th, 2011
• Steve Pond lays it all out for “The Descendants” winning Best Picture, trying to make good on his two-year streak (though at least he had seen the other two before making those calls). [The Odds] • At Telluride, meanwhile, Sasha Stone laid down a cool 20-spot on Viola Davis taking Best Actress. (I’m a [...]
Filed in: Daily
OFF THE CARPET: And we’re off!
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 3:09 pm · September 6th, 2011
This morning’s interview with “Into the Abyss” director Werner Herzog represented my last Telluride communique (though I guess I was already home) from this year’s 38th annual festivities. Five days, 18 posts, nine movies and three interviews. It was a dense sprint to start the race, and now, with Venice still in-progress and Toronto set [...]
Filed in: Off the Carpet
INTERVIEW: ‘The Descendants’ actress Shailene Woodley
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 2:10 pm · September 5th, 2011
Telluride Film Festival If anything or anyone is a break-out, on-the-rise element of this year’s Telluride Film Festival, it’s 19-year-old “The Descendants” star Shailene Woodley. She stars in the film opposite George Clooney as a teenager with the appropriate angst but gives a performance that has captured the attention of many in attendance here. Naturally, [...]
Filed in: Interviews
TELLURIDE: Sony Classics, IFC and Searchlight party into the night
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 12:47 am · September 4th, 2011
I opted out of tonight’s screening of “Butter” largely because — sorry to say — the Galaxy theater is just too cramped and uncomfortable and hot to fully enjoy a film experience. For me, anyway. I tend to be a furnace regardless, but they need to pump some AC into that joint. By some accounts, [...]
Filed in: Daily
TELLURIDE: Clooney takes center stage
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 5:43 pm · September 3rd, 2011
George Clooney has been tapped this year for one of Telluride’s three big tributes, and it’s certainly the biggest of the trio. Whether it’s press and patrons schmoozing with the star at yesterday’s Patron Brunch, whispers around town (“Did you hear George Clooney is here?” “I really hope ‘The Ides of March’ is a TBA.”) [...]
Filed in: Daily
TELLURIDE: ‘Descendants’ Q&A
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 9:49 am · September 3rd, 2011
Thanks to Sasha Stone at Awards Daily for grabbing video of yesterday’s post-screening Q&A with “The Descendants” stars George Clooney and Shailene Woodley and director Alexander Payne, which I had to miss:
Filed in: Daily
TELLURIDE: Payne’s ‘Descendants’ plays, but doesn’t quite reach the bar he’s set for himself
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 4:23 pm · September 2nd, 2011
Over the years Alexander Payne has been invited to Telluride to debut various films, but conflicts with other festivals have always kept that from becoming a reality. He finally attended his first SHOW here two years ago as a Guest Director for the festival. And today, he finally brought a film with him, debuting “The [...]
TELLURIDE: Settling in for the 38th annual
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 2:42 pm · September 1st, 2011
So here I sit in Telluride, a nice view of the mountainside gondolas out the window, a swift flight and gorgeous shuttle ride later. As always, we were greeted with the festival program upon boarding the charter this morning, which also carried filmmakers Werner Herzog and Alexander Payne, actress Tilda Swinton, etc., their presence at [...]
Filed in: Daily
THE LISTS: Top 10 most anticipated films of the 2011-2012 Oscar season
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 8:11 am · August 30th, 2011
If you haven’t noticed, this week has pretty much launched our 2011-2012 Oscar season coverage in earnest. Since it has been ages since we dusted of our lists feature here at In Contention, it seemed a good way to peek into the season was offering up a personal list of anticipations. I’ve seen a few [...]
Filed in: The Lists
OFF THE CARPET: Fall fests look to boost early Oscar hopes
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 9:00 am · August 29th, 2011
On a warm Saturday afternoon in Telluride last year, I sat in the crowded Chuck Jones Cinema and felt the warmth in the room as Tom Hooper’s “The King’s Speech” screened for its first audience of the year. Six months later, at the end of a road with plenty of twists and turns, the film’s [...]
Filed in: Off the Carpet
Telluride guessing game
Posted by Kristopher Tapley · 10:34 am · July 28th, 2011
(UPDATED: 8/29) Now that the Toronto and Venice line-ups have been unveiled (though we have a few more Toronto announcements to come), I figured I’d take a few stabs at sussing out the Telluride crop this year. I haven’t been a good journalist and called around or anything. Just spinning my wheels. One studio that [...]
Filed in: Daily
‘Descendants,’ ‘Moneyball,’ ‘Twixt’ among Toronto premieres
Posted by Guy Lodge · 10:00 am · July 26th, 2011
As usual, there are few surprises in the newly unveiled lineup for September’s Toronto Film Festival — which is largely because, as usual, the lineup consists of pretty much everything. We know by now to expect a cherry-picked selection of proven successes from previous festivals, including Cannes (“The Artist,” “Drive,” “We Need to Talk About [...]
Filed in: Daily
