We’re less than two weeks away from receiving this year’s Oscar nominations, and though none of the major categories are completely predictable just yet, each has at least three or four certain favorites. Meanwhile, the final slots for Best Picture, Best Director and the acting and screenwriting categories may be simply a random grab from small handfuls of rotating contenders. As of now, it doesn’t appear we’ll be seeing any huge surprises come the morning of January 22nd, when the Academy announces the nominees. The Dark Knight is sure to become the first comic book film up for Best Picture, and it won’t even be a shocker if animated feature Wall-E is listed alongside it in the same category.

But the ballots don’t need to be mailed out until Monday, so I’m taking one last chance to reach out to the procrastinators within the Academy membership. If you still don’t know who and what to write in, and you’re unwilling to go the safe route and nominate the expected bunch of films and talent, then consider some of these underdogs, under-appreciated and pretty much unlikely possibilities:
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2008 was not the banner year that ‘07 turned out to be, but there were still plenty of movies worth watching. Sometimes end-of-year lists look like straight Oscar predictions, with little deviance from critic to critic, not so this year. Some of our favorite stuff was not playing in a theatre near you, some of it was. For the record, our complete lists are after the jump.

But first! Wholphin 7 is out now! The geniuses over at McSweeny’s have once again curated a delightful collection of rare and unseen short films. We share our thoughts about a few favorites. One film we both loved, Glory at Sea, is available for free here.

(Subscribe to FilmCouch–Spout’s weekly movie podcast–in the iTunes store or to our RSS feed and an episode will download each Friday)

0:00 - Intro, listener e-mail

2:59 - Wholphin 7

16:18 - Kevin’s list, Paul’s “soup”

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So yesterday, the Los Angeles Film Critics made the stunning move of voting Wall-E as the Best Film of 2008. Stunning, because this is the first time the body has ever given their top honor to an animated film; stunning because last year, they gave it to the decidedly less commercial There Will Be Blood, thereby giving that film one of the boosts it needed to be nominated for Best Picture. The rest of the LAFCA awards were split amongst a wide range of films: Danny Boyle for director, Sean Penn for Actor, Happy-Go-Lucky’s Sally Hawkins as Actor, and, in the biggest wealth-spreading move of all, Waltz With Bashir as Best Animated Film.

Now, today, the New York Film Critics Circle are voting on thier awards as we speak, and the results are leaking in dribs and drabs via member Mike D’Angelo’s Twitter stream. Like their LA counterparts, the New York critics have so far shared the love amongst a number of pictures––Rachel Getting Married for its screenplay, Slumdog Millionaire for its cinematography, Hawkins for Actress, Mike Leigh for Best Director––and so unless Happy-Go-Lucky takes Best Picture, we can either call this magnanimity, or we can call it what it likely is: there is not a single film this year that stands head and shoulders above the rest.

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In a crowded year for Best Actress contention, Anne Hathaway could be the only first-timer to receive an Oscar nomination in the lead category, possibly going up against mainstays such as her Devil Wears Prada costar Meryl Streep and Kate Winslet, as well as the less-nominated vets Nicole Kidman and Kristen Scott Thomas. Her main competition for the outsider, dark horse position is Frozen River’s Melissa Leo (who may benefit from her film’s initiatory screener campaign even though River’s theatrical release was early and hardly noticed), and Happy-Go-Lucky’s Sally Hawkins, whose film just debuted to favorable reviews citing her brilliant (as in talented and bright) performance. But Hathaway is sure to be the victor –– even though her performance in Rachel Getting Married is hardly deserving of such an honor.

The Oscar buzz for Hathaway has been high for weeks now, enough that the actress apparently joked about it in her Saturday Night Live monologue earlier this month (I thought of it as less a current-year expectation than a general career goal, but it’s made Risky Biz Blog’s Steven Zeitchik compare Hathaway to Catherine O’Hara’s buzz-afflicted character in For Your Consideration). The fact that she’s a well-known movie star should make Hathaway’s buzz continually more reportable by the press and more noticeable by both the public and the voters, which gives her some advantage over Leo and Hawkins in terms of cultural consciousness.

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• Is it a sign of the end of the world, or simply an effect of the economic crisis and the presidential election? Beverly Hills Chihuahua has won the hearts of an America that apparently doesn’t want anymore serious content to think about. The talking dog movie came out on top for the second weekend in a row with $17.5 million (for a total of more than $50 mil.), easily defeating Leo, Russell and Ridley, and especially Bill Murray, whose City of Ember barely beat out the Christian hit Fireproof to make it into the top 10. An announcement about Beverly Hills Chihuahua 2 is expected by the end of the week.
• At least specialty division films are doing well enough, with The Duchess expansion bringing the period piece into the top 10 and both RocknRolla and Happy-Go-Lucky debuting in limited markets with per screen averages around $20,000. Rachel Getting Married is also still seeing success with its old-fashioned slow rollout, now grossing about $17,000 on each of its 27 screens. And Religulous continues its path towards surpassing Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed as the top grossing doc of 2008.
• Ridley Scott will finally direct the epic sci-fi adaptation The Forever War, which he describes as “a bit of The Odyssey by way of Blade Runner” and which he’s been attempting to make for 25 years. Is it terribly cynical of me to think that it will be a major disappointment? Certainly the expectations are going to be extremely high since Scott’s other efforts in the genre are two of the most influential sci-fi films of all time.
• Back to signs of the end of the world: Variety posted this ludicrous sentence, which fits with audiences favoring dumb, happy fare during hard times, late last Friday: “So if Oscar voters rebel against the pervasive darkness, does this mean “Mamma Mia!” and “High School Musical 3″ could become front-runners?”

This story originally appeared during the Telluride Film Festival. Mike Leigh’s Happy-Go-Lucky opens in theaters today.

Mike Leigh’s Happy-Go-Lucky begins as a leisurely yet engaging character study, seemingly unconcerned with a traditional conflict/resolution narrative. Sally Hawkins’ performance as Poppy, a bubbly, sarcastic, and endearing elementary school teacher is a delight to watch. An hour into the film, I pleasantly resigned myself to enjoying it as a disconnected series of episodes. This could have been annoying, if not for the stellar performance by Hawkins. Her comedy and breezy demeanor nearly covers Poppy’s immaturity and apparent fear of commitment, while still giving us a glimpse that something more lurks beneath all the giggles and quips.

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If the titles of the three films mentioned in the title don’t evoke a sense of anxiety about the present, I’m not sure what will. At the same time, they’re all immensely different films. Fernando Meirelles’s new film, Blindness, opens tonight. Will it replace Children of Men as our favorite recent film about societal collapse?

Karina joins us to talk about one hit and one miss from the New York Film Festival thus far. While Happy-Go-Lucky inspired homicidal thoughts, I’m Gonna Explode did not disappoint.

The financial mayhem of the day made us remember a little known documentary from 2006, In Debt We Trust (which can be viewed for free on SnagFilms.com). We call director Danny Schechter to talk about what’s been going on in the two years since his nearly prophetic film was released.

 

 FilmCouch 90 [39:41m]: Play Now | Download

(Subscribe to FilmCouch–Spout’s weekly movie podcast–in the iTunes store or to our RSS feed and an episode will download each Friday)

0:00 - Intro, is the world ending?

3:26 - Blindness

16:00 - Karina reports from the New York Film Festival on Happy-Go-Lucky and I’m Gonna Explode

23:52 - In Debt We Trust, Danny Schecter interview

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The Telluride Film Festival is what Sundance would be if it took place in heaven. Every year the tiny mountain hamlet hosts four days of hassle-free cinema paradise. There were grumblings about the lack of American films, but we still found plenty to love. Mike Leigh (Secrets and Lies, Vera Drake) came with his delightful new movie, Happy-Go-Lucky. He sat down for a disgruntled yet insightful interview. Paul Schrader (Affliction, Hardcore) seemed as blow away as we were by his latest film, Adam Resurrected, starring Jeff Goldblum.

 

 FilmCouch 86 [33:52m]: Play Now | Download

(Subscribe to FilmCouch–Spout’s weekly movie podcast–in the iTunes store or to our RSS feed and an episode will download each Friday)

0:00 - Intro, Telluride faves: Waltz with Bashir, Revanche, The Good, the Bad, and the Weird, Tulpan, The Rest is Silence.

7:04 - Happy-Go-Lucky, with Mike Leigh interview.

19:52 - Adam Resurrected, with Paul Schrader interview.

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Mike Leigh’s Happy-Go-Lucky begins as a leisurely yet engaging character study, seemingly unconcerned with a traditional conflict/resolution narrative. Sally Hawkins’ performance as Poppy, a bubbly, sarcastic, and endearing elementary school teacher is a delight to watch. An hour into the film, I pleasantly resigned myself to enjoying it as a disconnected series of episodes. This could have been annoying, if not for the stellar performance by Hawkins. Her comedy and breezy demeanor nearly covers Poppy’s immaturity and apparent fear of commitment, while still giving us a glimpse that something more lurks beneath all the giggles and quips.

The character is so delightful, in fact, it almost comes as a surprise when conflict eventually erupts between her and her driving instructor Scott, played by Eddie Marsan. It’s a marvel that the animosity between these two characters, and the eventual resolution, is so well-rendered, considering how late it appears in the film. This is by no means sloppy filmmaking on the part of Leigh. On the contrary, he has perfected a sort of inverse method of story telling. Whereas normally we are dumped into a narrative-in-progress and bombarded by exposition to let us know who the characters are supposed to be, Leigh takes his time, building his characters first, then letting the drama follow.

When I asked him if the conflict between Poppy and Scott was part of the initial concept of the film, he said, “No…you explore and develop, and out of it comes the drama. It can’t be there at the beginning because you have to have the characters there before you have the drama.”

More from Leigh after the jump.

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There seems to be some consensus around and abouts on the Interwebz that this year’s Telluride Film Festival line-up is a non-starter. Its collection of foreign films, documentaries and classic films - along with a smattering of the more usual fare - seems to fly in the face of the perception of the festival as a launching pad for the next great independent-minded-but-mainstream-accessible crossover hit. Considering last year’s festival included first looks at Juno, There Will Be Blood, The Savages and others that went on to some mainstream success, such reaction is to be expected.

But the - let’s generously say “oddly”  - formed 2008 list doesn’t mean a crossover success is completely outside the realm of possibility. Let’s look at five movies that could wind up getting some decent buzz coming out of Telluride and heading into the remainder of festivals and awares season.

Happy-Go-Lucky: Anything from director Mike Leigh is sure to come with some expectations around it and this is likely to be no exception. While the odds are good this will be somewhat lighter in tone than some of Leigh’s previous films I wouldn’t bet on it being any less a sharp character study. And never underestimate the power of a powerfully perky female lead, which could help Happy-Go-Lucky become a feel-good hit in the non-entertainment areas of the country that are looking for an endearing story featuring a strong love story.

Adam Resurrected: The perception - at least among the staffers at here at Spout HQ - is that a good deal of Jeff Goldblum’s appeal comes from his unpredictability. So with a career that’s had him saving the world, dodging dinosaurs and turning into a fly his latest turn is as a Jewish entertainer in Nazi Germany who survives because of his ability to entertain the children being held at the concentration camps. Combine that with the fact that he and co-star Willem Dafoe are directed by Paul Schrader and you have a film that could make a decent splash with audiences and awards voters.

I’ve Loved You So Long: Kristen Scott-Thomas stars in a story about the members of an estranged family who find themselves coming together after one of them spends 15 years in prison. The emotional arc the story is sure to take Scott-Thomas on is one that is, at least on paper, seemingly tailor-made to please critics (there’s a lot of “Best Actress Oscar” talk from those who’ve seen it). While not a crowd-pleaser it could turn out to be something along the lines of There Will Be Blood should enough critics get behind it and turn the story of someone who might not be completely likable into a must-see movie.

Youssou Ndour - I Bring What I Love: Known primarily in the U.S., I’m guessing, for his work with Peter Gabriel in the late 80’s, Youssou Ndour’s story is certainly a compelling one. There’s usually one documentary that breaks out from the pack and earns a place in the queues of people who don’t normally watch them and since the subject matter here is a tad more accessible than that of some other docs, this could be that one.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button: No, it’s not actually screening at Telluride, but a sneak peak of it is being included in the presentation of Zodiac: The Director’s Cut that’s happening. If the footage that’s shown of the movie, which stars Brad Pitt as a man who ages in reverse, is any good at all, Telluride could become the launching pad for a lot of buzz going into the remainder of the year.

Relaxed and genteel with a disarming smile and quick wit that strike you immediately upon meeting him, James Ponsoldt, the Athens, GA native who made a big impression at Sundance 06′ with his tragically underseen Nick Nolte high school baseball umpire drama Off The Black, is a well-rounded guy. He has a masters degree from Columbia, was the president of his class at Yale, edited the student paper, was a receiver on the varsity football team and reads modernist literature with regularity. Perhaps more importantly, the Filmmaker Magazine contributor and Sundance Institute Lynn Auerbach Screenwriting Fellow for his adaptation of Benjamin Percy’s Iraqi war short story Refresh, Refresh was also one of the founding members of Yale’s Porn n’ Chicken club, where students gathered to watch XXX films and eat fried chicken.