November
12The Oscar Poker Game Heats Up
The 2008 Oscar race is like a very cautious poker game in which all the players arrived late to the table and are fretful about the stakes.Screenings for Oscar voters and guild members have finally started, and the results have been promising. Audiences have fallen in love with Danny Boyle’s “Slumdog Millionaire.” There is also wide admiration for “Milk,” “Doubt” and “Frost /Nixon,” among others.
Several performances have dominated the conversation – Sean Penn as Harvey Milk, Frank Langella as Richard Nixon and Mickey Rourke as “The Wrestler.” A poignant and charismatic ambassador for his own work, Rourke could emerge as a favorite as he works the town.
Several major films are still being shielded by their over protective parents. Fox will finally unveil “Australia” next week, amid a thicket of rumors about changed endings and expansive running time. MGM-UA doesn’t seem to want anyone to see “Valkyrie” till the eleventh hour when Oscar voters will be hurtling between a melee of events.
Finally, Paramount is inviting a select few into its “Benjamin Button” club, but first you have to pass through CIA-like screenings. The movie reportedly is two hours, 45 minutes long but has elicited superb responses.
One experienced poker player who suspects he has a solid hand this year is Peter Rice of Fox Searchlight. As tactical as he is taciturn, Rice finessed “Slumdog Millionaire” from Warner Bros. (the studio apparently didn’t know what to do with it) and bought “The Wrestler” at a confusing auction in Toronto when some potential buyers couldn’t even figure out who represented it.
Meanwhile Searchlight’s “The Secret Life of Bees” was a hand-off from Will Smith’s company and it has quietly passed $30 million in the U.S.
Some of the movies in Oscar contention, of course, have been seen by everyone – “The Dark Knight,” “WALL-E” and “Vicky Cristina Barcelona,” for example. A few, like Will Smith’s “Seven Pounds,” have just emerged from postproduction. The same for Clint Eastwood’s “Gran Torino.” Sony Classics actually had the courage to open its superbly crafted “Rachel Getting Married” in prime time this fall, rather than holding it for December, and has been doing very well with it.So now the poker players have to show their hands, One senses that there’s been a tacit agreement amongst themselves to keep it calm. “Don’t let the betting get out of control,” is the mantra.
It’s been a very gentlemanly game, but somebody’s got to emerge the winner.
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