I have to say, a lot of this morning's poo-pooing of the Oscar ceremony last night is a bit hyperbolic for my taste.  The mixed critical reactions, that is.  I found the night to be rather swift and host Jon Stewart to be at the top of his game.  Sure, there were a number of montages that should have been nixed.  The Best Picture bit that Jack Nicholson presented comes to mind as considerably unnecessary.  But by my watch, the thing was over in less than four hours, something around three and a half...and that's ALWAYS a good thing.  Right?

But let's get into it.  The season has come to a close and the Coen brothers, Scott Rudin and "No Country for Old Men" had their day to shine.  Good for all involved.  It's the most un-Academy win since "The Silence of the Lambs," but that's the way things go sometimes.

There were surprises in store for some.  Such as Marion Cotillard and Tilda Swinton taking the leading and supporting actress trophies, swooping in at the last minute to steal away the thunder of the night's frontrunners.  Personally, I saw this coming, but no one could deny the possibility was there and the situations were ripe for upsets.  Both speeches, by the way, were quite good.  Cotillard was appropriately emotional (as was Diablo Cody, who even choked me up with her teary acceptance).  Swinton, meanwhile, offered that Tilda charm and sass that has become something of a staple this season for the "Michael Clayton" star.

The biggest shocks of the night for me came in the craft races, where "The Bourne Ultimatum" snuck in and grabbed the sound editing and sound mixing statuettes.  The latter category had been primed as a race between "Transformers" and "No Country for Old Men," a considerable media concentration given the nominations tally of Kevin O'Connell and Greg P. Russell.  Sadly, they missed yet again and this was their last shot at getting it together.  They'll go off and, obviously, churn out great work separately, so this isn't the end of days.  But it would have been a nice bow on their partnership, to be sure.

I think the best moments of the evening both involved the film "Once."  The first was Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova's performance of "Falling Slowy," which elicited a huge cheer from the crowd.  The second was Jon Stewart's insistence that Irglova come back out and be given her moment to offer what ultimately was, let's face it, the bes speech of the evening.  Trigger happy bands really piss me off and someone needs to key them into the fact that some people you just don't scoot away like that.  This was a songwriting DUO, the two STARs of the film, for Pete's sake.  Give them both their moment, please.

The "Enchanted" numbers became a bit tedious after a while, and I couldn't help but wish Eddie Vedder had been there to mix things up.  There are no two ways about it.  The music branch embarassed itself this year.  That's my opinion, in any case.

Apparently the ratings were the lowest ever, which it is foolish to attribute (as some have) to the actual show.  I would say one need only look at the slate of rather unpopular Best Picture nominees to find out why the public at large wasn't very interested.  Personally, I thought it was the best year for movies in a long while.  But just look at the box office rankings to see what people preferred.  It's not in line with Oscar.

Anyway, now we look ahead to next year, right?  RIGHT?  Well, those of us who are nuts, in any case.  Scott Rudin and the Coens will be back, for different projects.  Josh Brolin, Sean Penn, Angelina Jolie, Frank Langella, Russell Crowe, George Clooney -- all heading back to the race.  Returning filmmakers include Ridley Scott, Joe Wright and David Fincher, while Paramount Pictures once again has the glut of product to consider.  And there'll be a "titanic" reunion in store for the nostalgic romantics in the crowd.

But we'll get there.  For now, let's just all enjoy the release of another Oscar year in the rear view mirror.  It's been a blast contributing here at variety this season,a nd I hope you've all enjoyed reading.  We'll weather the fallout in the coming days and call it quits at the end of the week.

Happy Monday.

The boys are livid as "Transformers" misses out on Best Sound Editing and Best Sound Mixing, and lets face it, that Kevin O'Connell and Greg P. Russell remain Oscarless is a total crock.  And now, they'll have to aim for thg old separately as "Transformers" was their final collaboration.  Also handed out was Best Actress, a three-way race and a big question finally answered.  Check it out.

I know we're harping on and on about the sound team of "Transformers" lately, but hey, it's an exciting race packed with creative and deserving nominees, regardless of the nom tally represented by Greg Russell and Kevin O'Connell.

That said, Russell passed along this bitchin' "Behind the Sound" reel that was created in house for the pic.  It really gives you an idea of what went into the work of the sound editors on the team, and there are some nice shots of Russell and O'Connell mixing the tracks with director Michael Bay in the middle, watching it come to life.

Take a look:



Meanwhile, Tom O'Neil has some comments up regarding the Buzzmeter rankings, which have prognozticators taking the dive for "No Country for Old Men" in the Best Sound Mixing category, with "The Bourne Ultimatum" close behind and finall "Transformers" at the #3 spot.  He also gets into some of the brief history surrounding O'Connell and Russell, of which I'm sure plenty of you are aware.

It seems more and more studios are putting out a concerted effort to rally behind tech categories this season, as a number of films have received publicity treatment for craft nominations in the form of high profile demos and Q&A events.

The "Transformers" team got together at the end of last week for just such an event, and I kept forgetting to link to Anne's reaction piece.

Toward the end of the story, Anne gets to the subject of sound mixers Kevin O'Connell and Greg P. Russell, as well as their combined 32 Oscar nominations without a win.

I'm sure it was a splendid session (I regret that school took priority on the evening in question), but I wanted to know even more about what each specific contributor added to the film after reading Anne's piece, and even though I'm friendly with Russell and give a lot of attention to the tech categories, I still don't have all the screws tightened on this stuff (nor does, I'm sure, a large number of Academy members).  So I called him up to get a little more out of him.

This is how Russell broke down each individual contribution on what he calls the most difficult and complex sound job of his career:

•  Production mixer Peter Devlin (one of the three nominees for Best Sound Mixing) provided dialogue tracks to the sound team that were "well-recorded," Russell said, despite the challenging circumstances Devlin faced on the set.

•  Russell had the responsibility of handling all of the film's many aural effects, while sound editing nominees Ethan Van der Ryn and Erik Aadahl created a vast palette of sounds for the mixers to work with.

•  (This is where it becomes greek to many -- myself included -- but certainly reflects a rather involved process.)  Russell and company pre-dubbed sound effects for five weeks and had a total of 29 "sound effects pre-dubs" per reel, nine of which were dedicated just for the robots.

•  The biggest challenge, Russell said, was conveying a quotient of believability to the robot stars of the picture.  Russell said it was "like a kid in a candy store" for him and co-nominee/former mixing partner Kevin O'Connell.

•  Creating the robots' voices was a challenge for co-sound supervisor Mike Hopkins, Russell said.  Together with O’Connell, he used clever processing techniques and even placed the voices in each of the speakers at times (including the subwoofer), giving the robots that "larger than life feeling."

•  Finally, Van der Ryn and Aadahl had to come up with signature sounds for the different robots to give them variation and personality.  Thompson touches on this in her piece when she writes that "the sound of Optimus Prime, voiced by Peter Cullen, is about air.  Bumble Bee is about buzzing."

Well, there you go.  You learn something every day and I honestly think I could hang around with these guys a solid week and still be dizzy with the amount of work that goes into post-producing a flick like "Transformers."

Other stories of interest:

•  Gerard Kennedy interviews Kevin O'Connell about the ubiquity of Oscar. [In Contention]
•  Martin Grove talks to the sound team behind "Transformers" [The Hollywood Reporter]
•  Greg P. Russell chats up his 12th nomination with yours truly. [Red Carpet District]

Actor in a Leading Role Daniel Day-Lewis
Art Direction Jack Fisk (Art Direction); Jim Erickson (Set Decoration)
Cinematography Robert Elswit
Directing Paul Thomas Anderson
Film Editing Dylan Tichenor
Best Picture JoAnne Sellar, Paul Thomas Anderson and Daniel Lupi, Producers
Sound Editing Christopher Scarabosio and Matthew Wood
Writing (Adapted Screenplay) Written by Paul Thomas Anderson

(This wraps up our nominees series.  Hopefully it brought back some good memories for viewers and voters alike.  Four more days until polls close!)

Film Editing Christopher Rouse
Sound Editing Karen Baker Landers and Per Hallberg
Sound Mixing Scott Millan, David Parker and Kirk Francis

Finally I came across the panels for the crafts behind "No Country for Old Men."  Miramax has put each of them up as a handomse effort to generate buzz and support for the cinematography, sound and art direction of the piece.  Check it out.

•  Ryan Adams posits the Oscars as a repeat of the Super Bowl, with "No Country" repping the undefeated Pats and "Atonement," should it take down a BAFTA victory, standing in for those Cinderella G-Men. [Awards Daily]

•  The sound crew from "No Country" continues to make the rounds. [Variety]

•  Jeffrey Wells chimes in on the Weinstein strategy for Cate Blanchett in "I'm Not There" -- free "reel" in copies of yesterday's Variety. [Hollywood Elsewhere]

•  Sasha Stone ponders the evergreen question: Who really marks up these ballots every year? [Awards Daily]

•  Todd Martens looks at the year's Grammy nominated film music, including work from Glen Hansard ("Once") and Eddie Vedder ("Into the Wild"). [The Envelope]

•  Speaking of Vedder, New York Magazine isn't keen on Pearl Jam's latest pro-Obama track. [Vulture]

•  The Buzzmeter favors "No Country," save a select few holdouts. [The Envelope]

•  Tom O'Neil takes note. [Gold Derby]

•  Yes, the biggest Hollywood party of the year has been cancelled. [New York Times]

•  Mark Olsen sits down with Oscar nominee (and dark horse supporting actor contender) Casey Affleck. [The Envelope]

•  Donn Freydkin sits down with Javier Bardem in one of a slew of interviews the actor has been giving in recent weeks. [USA Today]

Gerard Kennedy took some time this week to speak with two of the nominated sound mixers from "No Country for Old Men": Craig Berkey and Peter Kurland.  The aural qualities of the Coen brothers film have been a talking point for some time, substituting thematically relevant room tone and production sound for original musical accompaniment.

The film was nominated for both sound mixing and sound editing, the latter being a surprise even to those of us obsessive enough to follow the crafts races.

Here's a quick look at Kennedy's piece:

Kurland has been working with the Coens for nearly 25 years (he was the boom operator on “Blood Simple”) and loves their joint efforts.

“There’s never any hysteria or screaming on the set,” he says. “They are exceptionally well prepared. It isn’t that there aren’t surprises but there are very few completely unexpected elements.”

Berkey adds to the notion that the helmers know exactly what they want to do, having “the whole thing laid out as they’re writing the script. But they also listen to new ideas regarding sound, having the confidence to have a minimal score in a film like this.”

Having been on the set with the brothers on many occasions, Kurland says new challenges still manage to arise on each shoot. He says this was definitely the warmest set apart from “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” and that, being out in the desert, wind was a large problem (as it always is for production sound). But the work was particularly pivotal in this film and had to be recorded just right. He also notes a new and somewhat bizarre element on the production called “dusk panic.” Only about 10 takes were done in the daylight and the rest were done during sunset or sunrise, with very little time to get those shots right.

Also, I particularly liked this bit of insight into building the character of Anton Chigurgh with sound elements:

Berkey also says he and his colleagues attempted to keep the mix quiet, at the same time trying to create a “theme” of sound for Bardem’s character akin to what might be present in a score, notably in the fact that the sound of a train almost always accompanies, or slightly precedes, his presence. “We wanted to get the idea that a big bad freight train is coming,” he recalls.

It is probably worth noting that this film is the biggest competition for Kevin O'Connell and greg P. Russell at the moment, and the infamous 32 nominations they claim between them.  But there is no denying the sheer complexity of the sound work in "Transformers," so at least we're looking at a race between equally deserving candidates rather than finding a musical in the mix that keeps the Academy from actually THINKING about this section of the ballot.

Check out the rest of Kennedy's column.

Animated Feature Film  Brad Bird
Music (Score)  Michael Giacchino
Sound Editing  Randy Thom and Michael Silvers
Sound Mixing  Randy Thom, Michael Semanick and Doc Kane
Writing (Original Screenplay)  Screenplay by Brad Bird; Story by Jan Pinkava, Jim Capobianco, Brad Bird

Sound Editing  Ethan Van der Ryn and Mike Hopkins
Sound Mixing  Kevin O'Connell, Greg P. Russell and Peter J. Devlin
Visual Effects  Scott Farrar, Scott Benza, Russell Earl and John Frazier

(To put a face to the season beyond the coverage, I thought I'd introduce this little series.  Nothing special, just the trailers from each of the nominated films.  A couple a day.  We'll start things out with the "frontrunner.")



Directing  Joel Coen and Ethan Coen
Actor in a Supporting Role  Javier Bardem
Cinematography  Roger Deakins
Film Editing  Roderick Jaynes
Best Picture  Scott Rudin, Ethan Coen and Joel Coen, Producers
Sound Editing  Skip Lievsay
Sound Mixing  Skip Lievsay, Craig Berkey, Greg Orloff and Peter Kurland
Writing (Adapted Screenplay)  Written by Joel Coen and Ethan Coen

•  The final guild out of the gate, the Motion Picture Sound Editors, annouce nominees for the Golden Reel Awards. [Variety]

•  Sasha Stone cooks up one of her infmaous Oscar comparison charts.  This time: SAG vs. Oscar. [Awards Daily]

•  Jeff Anderson finds plenty of room to complain about this or that, re: the nominations.  He also reveals a profound ignorance for certain crafts categories. [Cinematical]

•  Tom O'Neil has a new theory in the books.  Somethign about multile nominated contenders yielding one win, I think.  I got lost in the data.  You give it a shot. [Gold Derby]

•  Daniel Day-Lewis hits the daily talk show circuit with the owner of the world. [Oprah.com]

•  Gerard Kennedy begins reacting to Oscar's tech nominations, some surprising, most expected. [In Contention]

•  The Gurus o' Gold chime in post-noms.  "No Country for Old Men" and "There Will Be Blood" take the #1 and #2 spots.  Scott Rudin does back-flips. [Movie City News]

•  Mike Russell sits down with "Persepolis" creator Marjane Satrapi in 2-D black and white. [Culture Pulp]

•  T.L. Stanley thinks there is no backlash in the cards for the most backlash-prone of the Best Picture contenders. [Gold Rush]

•  In a long interview never lacking the color of its subject, Mick Brown sits down with the Oscar-nominated Julian Schnabel to talk art, Schnabel, "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly" and Schnabel.  Good times. [The Daily Telegraph]

•  After years of disavowing Oscar bloggers, Stu VanAirdale finds his new role as...Oscar blogger. [Little Gold Men]

•  He also agonizes over the glut of Oscar prognosticators.  I'm sure he still cashes the checks, though. [Little Gold Men]

...because it's a slow day and I'm bored, but the sound crew on "Cloverfield" better find some kind of love to last throughout the year.

The Features department continues to plough exhaustively through the season, this week spotlighting the sound mixers, sound editors and visual effects artists.  There's also a roundup of contending producers.

Additionally, you'll find a phase one wrap-up that starts with a look behind the veil at the Academy's preferential voting process.  Peter Debruge follows that up with a look at the Academy's short film categories, and the philosophy that those arenas are considered an "incubator for future talent" by AMPAS.

Finally, the issue closes on an interesting piece about the "controversial, unexpected or downright puzzling" endings of films such as "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford," "Atonement," "No Country for Old Men" and "There Will Be Blood."  Andrew Barker has the byline.

•  T.L. Stanley ponders awards-caliber double-dippers cancelling each other out. [Gold Rush]

•  Tamara Jenkins writes up Phil Bosco for Landmark. [Landmark Theaters]

•  Pete Hammond looks at Academy screenings, actor campaigns and the overall pre-holiday chatter. [The Envelope]

•  Paramount releases video of Johnny Depp singing in "Sweeney," Tom O'Neil jumps. [Gold Derby]

•  Yours truly isn't impressed by "The Bucket List." [In Contention]

•  Gerard Kennedy, meanwhile, sizes up the Best Sound Editing race. [In Contention]

•  Noah Forrest is thankful for a lot of the year's Oscar contenders... [Movie City News]

•  ...and his editor calls him a "bug" for copping his style...while being thankful himself, of course. [The Hot Button]

•  Jeffrey Wells gets pissy over Anne Thompson reading the "Zodiac" tea leaves for what they are. [Hollywood Elsewhere]

•  He also holds Nate Parker's "Great Debaters" performance in high regard. [Hollywood Elsewhere]

•  Lou Lumenick calls "I'm Not There" "artsy-fartsy," "punshingly overlong" and "self-satisfied."  OUCH. [New York Post]

•  AND he debunks Amy Adams Best Actress talk. [New York Post]


Have a Happy Thanksgiving!

•  Paramount mouthpiece Harry Knowles sees "Sweeney Todd," calls it Tim Burton's best film since "Ed Wood." [Ain't It Cool News]

•  Reactions from Anne Thompson and Sasha Stone. [Thompson on Hollywood, Awards Daily]

•  James Rocchi talks to Jeffrey Wells about a variety of issues surrounding the upcoming Oscar season. [Cinematical]

•  Susan King talks to Jason Bateman about his work in comedy contender "Juno." [Los Angeles Times]

•  Susan Wloszczyna previews the two-sided holiday movie season and all it's awards hopefuls. [USA Today]

•  Bob Welkos talks to Oscar telecast producer Gil Cates about the WGA strike and it's potential effect on the show. [The Envelope]

•  Tom O'Neil catches flak for his brazen "'Sweeney Todd' will win Best Picture" prediction from Lou Lumenick. [New York Post]

•  Two reporters get by-lined in a story that states the obvious: studios hope fall awards product will click financially. [Wall Street Journal]

•  "Once" starts the season off with its first award, at Moscow's 2Morrow Film Festival. [Variety]

•  The Visual Effects Society tap Spielberg for lifetime achievement award. [Variety]

•  The Motion Picture Sound Editors, meanwhile, will hand Michael Bay their Golden Reel Filmmaker Award. [Variety]