FYI, I added the "Why So Serious" poster to the "Dark Knight" item below, now that a high res version is available from the studio.

Remember when "Batman" was on the way in the summer of 1989, and people were stealing subway posters left and right?  The anticipation was through the roof!  Well, things are close to that level of anticipation for Christopher Nolan's "Batman Begins" sequel, "The Dark Knight."  Or I could just be speaking for myself.

Anyway, this isn't Oscar related -- well, not YET anyway (we can hope) -- but Warner Bros. released these two teaser posters for "The Dark Knight" today (in addition to the creepy "Why So Serious?" Joker poster that's at theaters as we speak).  I'm LOVIN' it:


  

Regarding the item I posted yesterday about Technicolor screeners supposedly being an issue for voting members in the industry, it turns out the problem is the voter's DVD player in that You Tube video.  Technicolor assures me that of the hundreds of thousands of screeners sent out by the company, this was the only problem that popped up.

Someone directed me to this video yesterday of someone attempting to play a technicolor screenr of "Rendition" this awards season and displaying the fact that they seem to get hung up and not allow playback.  Hopefully studios that used technicolr will take note.

Thanksgiving vacation or not, I was planning on keeping the blog alive while taking a few days leave here in the Bay area.  Alas, the glorious South of Market hotel I'm crashing in has Babylonian-era Wi-Fi and grabbing a signal has been difficult.  Today, the green bars were illuminated for a brief spell,. long enough for me to give you a blip on the radar.

There's plenty to talk about, but rather than get into the hub-bub now and risk losing it all to the broadband Gods, I'll update later tonight in full.  I hope you all had a miraculous holiday weekend.

Yeah, apparently this little thing was for "Mad Money."  The 1-18-08 on the other side of that tag threw me off.  I'm a moron.  Moving on...nothing to see here.

The Weinstein Company, which is understandably searching for a big awards contender amongst likely smaller successes in "Control" and "I'm Not There," will be pulling out "The Great Debaters" for a December release aimed at awards contention, as reported last month.  Well, a trailer has finally arrived (as of Monday, in fact -- been meaning to comment on it ever since).

Produced by Oprah Winfrey and directed by Denzel Washington (who also stars), the film seems to have that golden hue Oscar voters love so much.

Or, rather...that Oscar voters USED to love so much.

I've been wondering, as of late, whether the Academy of today is no longer the Academy Harvey Weinstein so clearly understood in years past.  Tugging those heartstrings, aiming for the "meat and potatoes" voters, a term Weinstein coined, this was the honcho's MO during his hey-day.  But the Academy that took stands for "Shakespeare in Love" and "Life is Beautiful," among others, seems to be a different group than that which has gone on the record for "The Lord of the Rings," "Brokeback Mountain" and "The Departed" in recent memory.

Weinstein himself felt the sting last year when "Bobby," a seemingly tailor-made Academy film that nailed down major nominations from the Hollywood Foreign Press Association and the Screen Actors Guild, failed to make it into Oscar's final five.  Granted, the film hit a big critical snag (I'm one of the few who really enjoyed it), but I also think the critical assessment of today is a touch different than it was in the pre-9/11 era.

And that brings about a whole other can of worms.  Much as I hate to bring an Oscar discussion into that realm, it is worth pointing out the somber nature of cinema en masse in recent years and, especially, in the last ten months.  2007 has been a downer year for the ages.

"Before the Devil Knows You're Dead," "Gone Baby Gone," "In the Valley of Elah, "Into the Wild," "Margot at the Wedding," "Michael Clayton," "No Country for Old Men," "Reservation Road," "There Will Be Blood," "Things We Lost in the Fire," "Zodiac" -- these are not bastions of uplifting cinema.

Even "Beowulf," an exhilerating spectacle of a film, ends on the ambiguous, almost cynical note of perpetual corruption and moral perversion at the highest levels of leadership.

I don't know what kind of fair weather "The Great Debaters" should hope for in the coming weeks as it continues to screen for a critical community that would rather scowl than feel all gooey inside.  But at least it'll assumably have a unique feel-good quotient going for it this season, alongside films like "Juno," "The Kite Runner" and "Once."  When Academy members sit down to vote, they've shown us time and again that there is something to be said for an alternative to the year's emotional status quo.

We shall see...

"There Will Be Blood" reviews drop like hand grenades:

•  Todd McCarthy starts the rukus with a respectable thumbs up. [Variety]

•  Anne Thompson offers up a modest appreciation, draws in some other view points from alternative sources. [Thompson on Hollywood]

•  David Poland writes nearly 2,000 words, manages to pull out his favorite whipping boy ("Jesse James"), somehow thinks Robert Elswit's gorgeous cinematography compares to his work in "Michael Clayton" and goes so far as to say Danny Huston would have been a better casting decision than Daniel Day-Lewis -- wowsers!  [The Hot Blog]

•  And yours truly lets it all hang out in a rave.  I liked it, ok?? [In Contention]

•  With the commotion out of the way, Jeffrey Wells says he'll hold his thoughts until Monday, when he'll get man-on-the-street responses following the San Francisco screening. [Hollywood Elsewhere]

•  Ryan C. Adams responds to McCarthy's review. [Awards Daily]

•  And Tom O'Neil takes on the subject of personal opinion impeding on prognostication as it pertains to the film at hand and past examples. [Gold Derby]

•  If you're still with me...Thompson announces SAG nominations to be revealed on December 20. [Thompson on Hollywood]

•  Mark Olsen adds that Terrence Howard and Kate Walsh will be announcing the nominees. [The Envelope]

•  Gerard Kennedy talks to sound mixers Randy Thom and Ethan Van der Ryn about "Beowulf" and "Transformers" respectively. [In Contention]

•  In his best column in some time, Poland ponders the meaning of the awards season's progression through a WGA strike. [Movie City News]

•  Scott Feinberg talks to "Rendition" scribe Kelley Sane. [And the Winner Is...]

I don't know how many people have kept up with the viral marketing plan that Seattle-based 42 Entertainment has implemented on behalf of Warner Bros. for the upcoming "Batman Begins" sequel "The Dark Knight," but it's quite an undertaking.

Everything began with an intense scavenger hunt at Comic-Con in San Diego (while the rest of us were inside at the lame WB panel hoping for something -- anything -- from the film).  A new website devoted to -- devotees -- launched at that time and many a Dark Knight geek was in wonderland.  Personally, I thought the whole process yielded a lame outcome, but hey, a lot of work went into it.

Now, following a nation-wide scavenger hunt yesterday, the process has become more involved and -- yet again -- yielded a lame result...a new image of Heath Ledger as the Joker.  Oh yeah, and yet another website.

Anyway, my woes are my own regarding this viral marketing (which probably deserves an award unto itself for sheer depth), but in any case, I actually have a point for bringing this subject up on an Oscar blog.

Jack Nicholson got a lot of awards attention in 1989 for his zany, iconic portrayal of the Clown Prince in Tim Burton's "Batman," including nominations for Best Actor in a Comedy or Musical (weird placement, I know) at the Golden Globes and Best Supporting Actor at the BAFTAs.  Ledger's portrayal is sure to be a much more sinister characterization that will draw on great works like "The Long Halloween" and the classic Joker stories of the 1940s that were extremely dark.  But I'll just get to the question...

If the performance and the character separate themselves from the fray in as definitive a manner as Nicholson did in 1989, could Ledger be an awards contender next year for "The Dark Knight?"  Stranger things have certainly happened.

Ledger will also potentially be visible elsewhere in 2008 in Terrence Malick's "Tree of Life" opposite Sean Penn, should production get a move on in time.

The Orange County Register has the first pic of Frank Langella in Ron Howard's upcoming "Frost/Nixon," an adaptation of the Peter Morgan play that was a smash in London last year and grabbed Langella a Best Actor trophy for the New York run this past spring.

Makes sense, I guess.  Nixon was born in Yorba Linda.

There's a lot to expand upon from the play, which is really just a drop in the bucket story-wise.  I actually had a chat earlier this year with a likely-to-be-Oscar-nominated writer who cracked me up when he said "if I knew all you had to do to tell a story was have a side character stand in the middle of the stage and spout off exposition, I'd have written a play a long time ago."

In any case, Langella's performance was a wonderful one when I saw the play in May (though some say he got more and more over the top toward the end of the run).

(Thanks to Obssessed with Film for the tip, which has a shot of the real Nixon peace sign moment up for juxtaposition.)

No, it isn't Oscar news, but the AP is reporting the passing of singer Robert Goulet.

In his honor, what I still find to be the funniest commercial in a very long time:

Universal Pictures has finally cooked up a one-sheet for Mike Nichols' "Charlie Wilson's War," and I have to say, it's a little bland.  ComingSoon.net has the exclusive.

Word has it the studio is calling the film a "black comedy" and may even be looking to position it in the comedy category for Golden Globe consideration (though this may simply be chatter and speculation on Uni's part getting blown into bigger proportion by the press).  I can't say whether that's the strategy or not, but this psuedo-Hugh Grant-ish, high-key-lit, glossy little thing is certainly a step in that direction.

I thought the script for "Charlie," which has been widely read, it seems, was a biting piece of Aaron Sorkin goodness.  Certainly it had its comedic elements (and the trailer has played up these moments, to be sure), but there was a richness to the drama and socio-political gravitas on the page that could certainly have been cultivated through production.

I guess we'll get a better idea in the coming weeks.  Uni doesn't plan to screen the film until the middle of next month.  Nichols is probably hunched over an Avid somewhere right now shaving frames off a sequence that will likely get cut anyway.  He's meticulous, that one.

Now I know not EVERYONE who comes to this page is an Oscar obssessive with stored-up knowledge on the season.  So if you haven't read George Crile's book and want some backdrop on the "Charlie" plot, take a look at the Charlie Wilson Wikipedia page.

The Buzzmeter at The Envelope has been a somewhat anemic experiment the last two years, offering the opinions of a mere handful of participants.  This year, however, under the editorial expertise of Gregory Ellwood and Sheigh Crabtree, the site is taking on a lot more and revamping into something more distinguished on the Oscarweb.  This includes a spiffy new direction for the Buzzmeter, inflating the number of participants to over 30, according to administrators.  God knows who they've included as "experts," but it's nonetheless set to be the biggest prognosticating collective on the net.

The Buzzmeter will launch later today and should be an interesting foil for Movie City News' "Gurus o' Gold" (which shares some of its participants with the Buzzmeter this year).

Keep a lookout later today for the new launch.  Should be interesting to see where the cards fall.

It's always helpful to an Oscar campaign if high-profile supporters are willing to be ambassadors for the cause.  Just ask controversial director Roman Polanski, who experienced a marshalling of troops in 2002 that led to three unexpected Oscar wins for his Cannes sensation "The Pianist," including Best Director.

Perhaps in the way of giving back a little, Polanski himself hosted a screening last week of Julian Schnabel's "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" at the Pathé Films headquarters in Paris - and he invited a slew of friends, sources tell me.  Guests in attendence included Oscar-nominated actress Anouk Aimée and filmmaker Jean-Jacques Annaud.  Also attending, of course, was Polanski's wife, Emmanuelle Seigner, who plays the pivotal role of Céline in Schnabel's film.

It's always difficult for a foreign film to push into Best Picture contention.  It's only happened four times in the past, after all (five if you count last year's "Letters from Iwo Jima").  But it's also worth keeping in mind the cronyism involved when you have someone like Roman Polanski campaigning for your film, not to mention the producing combo of Kathleen Kennedy and Jon Kilik, six Best Picture nominations between them.  "Diving Bell" could have a healthy amount of support heading into the race that we may not have suspected before.

Miramax is actually enjoying a lot of good will from the industry this year, it seems.  In this week's issue of Newsweek, western author Larry McMurtry writes an essay about Cormac McCarthy and the Coen brothers' adaptation of "No Country for Old Men."  According to Miramax honcho Daniel Battsek, McMurtry approached the studio about writing something for the film, they didn't seek out his sponsorship.  And what a sponsor to have.

I neglected to mention the Glen Ballard/Alan Silvestri track "A Hero Comes Home," from the "Beowulf" soundtrack, in Saturday's item.  The duo was nominated in 2004 for "Believe" from "The Polar Express."

Also, it seems the Annie Lennox tune "Lost" from "In the Valley of Elah" isn't getting a push from Warner Independent after all.  Maybe they know that a closing credits track just won't fly anymore.

Finally, Roger Friedman is reporting that "The Golden Compass" will contain songs from Coldplay, but there is no indication as to whether it will be original material or not.

Finally, Todd Martens is tossing about speculation regarding tracks from "Dan in Real Life" at The Envelope.

It seems Universal Pictures will be campaigning Steven Zaillian's screenplay for "American Gangster" in the original screenplay category this year at the Oscars.  But conventional wisdom had it that the script was based on Mark Jacobson's New York Magazine article "The Return of Superfly," which recounted the life and times of Frank Lucas (portrayed by Denzel Washington in the film).

The fact is there is actually no major mention of Detective Richie Roberts (Russell Crowe's cleaner-than-thou cop) in the article and that the screenplay was "not based on the article at all," according to somone close to the campaign.  "Articles in magazines or newspapers," he adds, "are oftentimes not enough for the [writers] branch or WGA to measure it as a 'based on.'"

The things we learn along the way.  Though I probably could have just been a little more observant at my screening of "Gangster" last month during the closing credits.

Also, a brief glance at a "For Your Consideration" ad for the film "In the Valley of Elah" shows that Warner Independent is going with the original screenplay rather than positioning it as adapted from the article Mark Boal wrote for Playboy in 2005.  Maybe there's something to this.

I called the guild to inquire about these designations and a representative (a rather snooty one, mind you -- but I guess there's a lot going on over there this week, huh?) said that there is indeed a gray area with magazine articles.  It's not like a novel or a play.  An article could be telling a story but have no narrative to speak of, and that's kind of the situation with "American Gangster."

I haven't read Boal's article, so I can't speak to that.

Looking through the RSVP sidebar of a screening schedule for Warner's upcoming "The Bucket List," my eye was drawn to a contender for Best Original Song that I hadn't come across yet.  The track is called "Say" and both the lyric and vocal are by John Mayer.  Perhaps a soft, breathy track from the celebrated vocalist can get into the mix for a seemingly warm-hearted movie like this one?

The original song category already seems stacked this year as opposed to previous years where it seemed stretched a bit thin.  To begin, there's already four songs from Sean Penn's "Into the Wild" in play.  All are from Pearl Jam front man Eddie Vedder.  "Guaranteed" is the track prevalent throughout the film, and therefore might be deemed the most attractive choice.  "Society," however, is also integral to the narrative and could push through.  Vedder, you might recall, was passed over by the Academy in 2003 for his song "Man of the Hour" on the "Big Fish" soundtrack.

Paramount Vantage is getting out ahead of their music contenders again this year, mind you.  A modest event is already scheduled next weekend with Penn on the scene and Vedder crooning three of the tracks from the movie live.

Marc Shaiman, meanwhile, added three new tunes to the "Hairspray" set list that have to be taken seriously.  Most seem to be leaning on the Zac Efron ditty "Ladies' Choice."
 
Speaking of musicals, the little summer film that could -- "Once" -- is adding a one-two punch with "Falling Slowly" and "If You Want Me" (the former seems to be the best bet).

Alan Menken is back on the scene with Stephen Schwartz in Disney's "Enchanted."  Apparently the duo wrote a whopping five new songs for the film, which is already garnering lead actress buzz for Amy Adams.

Elsewhere there's the closing credits number "Lost" from Annie Lennox on "In the Valley of Elah."  However, given the song's usage, it might not pass the test.  New rules figure in the way a song is integrated into the film and the story.

There's also new Shakira material in "Love in the Time of Cholera," namely a track called "La Despidida."  And will Stephen Sondheim offer new material to the soundtrack of "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street?"  I'm in the dark on that one.

So that's 18 potential contenders without breaking a sweat.  There are others eligible, but these seem to be the real threats.

Paramount Vantage showed Paul Thomas Anderson's "There Will Be Blood" to a mere four -- count 'em -- four members of the Los Angeles entertainment press corps last night...but don't expect any reviews yet.

That's right, we're all expected to be nice enough to hold our thoughts until the Nov. 5 unveiling of the film in San Francisco, at which point the flood gates will certainly go down in a hurry.

All of this despite the fact that the film was kinda, sorta reviewed here at Variety by a stringer out of the Fantastic Fest in Austin, mind you.  Marjorie Baumgarten of the Austin Chronicle had some thoughts in print at that outlet as well as on Variety's festival blog "The Circuit."  John DeFore, meanwhile, ran a full review out of the fest at The Hollywood Reporter.  So the sanctioned cat, if you will, is somewhat out of the bag.

But like I said...we're being nice.

More to come...

According to Fox Searchlight publicity, Jason Reitman's awards hopeful "Juno" will get a Dec. 5 limited release in Los Angeles and New York, up one week from the previous Dec. 14 platform release.  A little more room for the film to get some traction with the guilds, and perhaps in response to Tom O'Neil's item regarding the issue earlier this week?

You know the awards season is approaching full swing when studios send out screener copies of their awards hopefuls with a vengeance.

Fox Searchlight started the party nearly two months ago when they sent out copies of "The Namesake," "Once" and "Waitress" to the membership.  Universal came a little later with copies of "Knocked Up," aiming for some screenplay and supporting actress love no doubt.  Paramount Pictures is back on top of it this week, sending out "Things We Lost in the Fire" day-and-date of release and, now, copies of David Fincher's "Zodiac: The Director's Cut" arrive, accompanying a fresh new advertising campaign.

Maybe the film isn't as confined to the also-ran ranks of an early-year release as we might have thought?

When "Zodiac" was released in March, there were some who felt holding it until the fall awards season would have been a better course of action for Paramount.  Still one of the best reviewed films of the year, "Zodiac" was considered a clear awards hopeful in any other release pattern.  Many outlets found Robert Downey, Jr.'s performance to be particularly worthy of consideration, while plenty others were willing to drop a mention of the eerie, moonlight look of Harris Savides' cinematography.

Well with this new campaign structure for the film, hope might be renewed for those praying "Zodiac" wouldn't remain a quality product dumped in a void free of awards consideration.  Paramount clearly has plans in store.

We'll get to more of a day-to-day update scenario in due time, but this first look at the spectrum includes much of the week's activities across the Oscarweb:


•  "Atonement," Daniel Day-Lewis stays on top of the Gurus o' Gold consensus.  Ryan Gosling and Sam Riley duke it out for "Most Unexpected Nomination." [Movie City News]

•  Meanwhile, Anne Thompson keeps an even keel, warns "some pics haven't been seen." [Thompson on Hollywood]

•  Gurus 2.0 reflects sideshow guessing from a group largely unfamiliar with the titles in play beyond existing media coverage. [Movie City News]

•  Gerard Kennedy handicaps the race for Best Original Score at "Tech Support." [In Contention]

•  Todd McCarthy says awards hopeful "American Gangster" "delivers, but doesn't soar." [Variety]

•  Newsweek launches an Oscar blog, though David Carr might need to sue for character infringement. [The Gold Digger]

•  Sasha Stone wonders why Hollywood is neglecting the original ideas of industry screenwriters in favor of sequels and adaptations. [Awards Daily]

•  Patrick Goldstein chastises the Academy (anyone surprised there?) for their Best Foreign Language Film category restrictions. [Los Angeles Times]

•  Tom O'Neil ponders a Best Picture snub for "Juno" due to potential lack of DGA exposure. [Gold Derby]

•  Nathaniel Rogers kicks off a new weekly Oscar column: "Hollywood needs to make more movies like this: sharp, thoughtful, dramatic, relevant and populated with classy thespians." [The Film Experience]


And in the news...


•  Anne Thompson reports Hal Holbrook will campaign for "Into the Wild" in November. [Thompson on Hollywood]

•  "Control" leads the field of nominees at the British Independent Film Awards. [Variety]

•  "Great World of Sound" and "Into the Wild" among nominees for 17th annual Gotham Awards. [Variety]

•  First awards notice for Oscar-hopeful "Hairspray" at the Diversity Awards [Variety]

•  David Poland says Wes Anderson's Hotel Chevalier has been Oscar-qualified for Best Live Action Short. [The Hot Blog]


More awards news at Award Central.