The Globes wrapped up a few hours ago, in what can be described as a historical night. Or at least we all hope that it will be. Seth Meyers kicked off with the phrase "Good evening ladies and -remaining- gentlemen" which pretty much summarizes the tone of the night. The monologue was non-apologetic and to the bone, in a way that only Meyers can deliver, with references about Weinstein, Spacey, Allen and of course Trump and he did deliver a prophecy that Oprah will be running for President with Tom Hanks as Vice President. Well... Winfrey-Hanks 2020? Too soon? Well, now we wait and see....

The evening was dominant with the support of the whole room towards the Time's Up and the #MeToo initiative, with almost all winners and presenters making a reference towards the issue. Either in a funny way, with Amy Poehler reclamining her wine, or in a badass way, like Natalie Portman who straight up called out the HFPA when introducing the Best Director category with the phrase "And here are the all-male nominees". Of course Oprah's speech when receiving the Cecil B. de Mille award, was the best summary of the issues being faced in all industries, not only Hollywood and once again she gave us hope on what the future may bring. 

Other highlights of the night were Aziz Ansari being the first man of Asian descent to win Best Actor in a TV comedy, Sterling K. Brown becoming the first African-American Actor to win in the Best Actor-TV Drama category and Oprah being the first African-American woman to win the Cecil B. DeMille Award for lifetime achievement. Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri being the ultimate winner with 4 out of 6 awards and Lady Bird got the recognition that the HFPA failed to give to Greta Gerwig for her directorial work by winning Best Comedy.

One of the funniest moments came from none other than Tommy Wiseau, who hillariously tried to snatch the mic off James Franco during his acceptance speech for Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture — Musical or Comedy in The Disaster Artist! To be honest I was waiting for a "You're tearing me apart Lisa" moment, but I will settle for this.

And here is the complete list of this year's winners: 

Best Picture — Drama
Call Me by Your Name
Dunkirk
The Post
The Shape of Water
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

Best Picture — Comedy or Musical
The Disaster Artist
Get Out
The Greatest Showman
I, Tonya
Lady Bird

Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture — Drama
Timothée Chalamet, Call Me by Your Name
Daniel Day Lewis, Phantom Thread
Tom Hanks, The Post
Gary Oldman, The Darkest Hour
Denzel Washington, Roman J. Israel, Esq.

Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture — Drama
Jessica Chastain, Molly’s Game
Sally Hawkins, The Shape of Water
Frances McDormand, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Meryl Streep, The Post
Michelle Williams, All the Money in the World

Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture — Musical or Comedy
Steve Carrell, Battle of the Sexes
Ansel Elgort, Baby Driver
James Franco, The Disaster Artist
Hugh Jackman, The Greatest Showman
Daniel Kaluuya, Get Out

Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture — Musical or Comedy
Judi Dench, Victoria & Abdul
Margot Robbie, I, Tonya
Saoirse Ronan, Lady Bird
Emma Stone, Battle of the Sexes
Helen Mirren, The Leisure Seeker

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in Any Motion Picture
Willem DaFoe, The Florida Project
Armie Hammer, Call Me by Your Name
Richard Jenkins, The Shape of Water
Christopher Plummer, All The Money in the World
Sam Rockwell, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in Any Motion Picture
Mary J. Blige, Mudbound
Hong Chau, Downsizing
Alison Janney, I, Tonya
Laurie Metcalf, Lady Bird
Octavia Spencer, The Shape of Water

Best Director — Motion Picture
Guillermo Del Toro, The Shape of Water
Martin McDonagh, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Christopher Nolan, Dunkirk
Ridley Scott, All the Money in the World
Steven Spielberg, The Post

Best Screenplay — Motion Picture
Guillermo Del Toro and Vanessa Taylor, The Shape of Water
Greta Gerwig, Lady Bird
Liz Hannah and Josh Singer, The Post
Martin McDonagh, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Aaron Sorkin, Molly’s Game

Best Motion Picture — Animated
The Boss Baby
The Breadwinner
Coco
Ferdinand
Loving Vincent

Best Picture — Foreign Language
A Fantastic Woman (Chile)
First They Killed My Father (Cambodia)
In the Fade (Germany/France)
Loveless (Russia)
The Square (Sweden, Germany, France)

Best Original Score — Motion Picture
Carter Burwell, Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri
Alexandre Desplat, The Shape of Water
Jonny Greenwood, Phantom Thread
John Williams, The Post
Hans Zimmer, Dunkirk

Best Original Song — Motion Picture
“Home,” Ferdinand
“Mighty River,” Mudbound
“Remember Me,” Coco
“The Star,” The Star
“This Is Me,” The Greatest Showman

Best Television Series — Drama
The Crown, Netflix
Game of Thrones, HBO
The Handmaid’s Tale, Hulu
Stranger Things, Netflix
This Is Us, NBC

Best Television Series — Comedy
Black-ish, ABC
The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Amazon
Master of None, Netflix
SMILF, Showtime
Will & Grace, NBC

Best Television Limited Series or Motion Picture Made for Television
Big Little Lies, HBO
Fargo, FX
Feud: Bette and Joan, FX
The Sinner, USA
Top of the Lake: China Girl, Sundance TV

Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series — Drama
Jason Bateman, Ozark
Sterling K. Brown, This Is Us
Freddie Highmore, The Good Doctor
Bob Odenkirk, Better Call Saul
Liev Schreiber, Ray Donovan

Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series — Drama
Caitriona Balfe, Outlander
Claire Foy, The Crown
Maggie Gyllenhaal, The Deuce
Katherine Langford, 13 Reasons Why
Elisabeth Moss, The Handmaid’s Tale

Best Performance by an Actor in a Television Series — Comedy
Anthony Anderson, Black-ish
Aziz Ansari, Master of None
Kevin Bacon, I Love Dick
William H. Macy, Shameless
Eric McCormack, Will & Grace

Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series — Comedy
Pamela Adlon, Better Things
Alison Brie, GLOW
Rachel Brosnahan, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel
Issa Rae, Insecure
Frankie Shaw, SMILF

Best Performance by an Actress in a Limited Series or Motion Picture Made for Television
Jessica Biel, The Sinner
Nicole Kidman, Big Little Lies
Jessica Lange, Feud: Bette and Joan
Susan Sarandon, Feud: Bette and Joan
Reese Witherspoon, Big Little Lies

Best Performance By an Actor in a Television Limited Series or Motion Picture Made for Television
Robert De Niro, The Wizard of Lies
Jude Law, The Young Pope
Kyle MacLachlan, Twin Peaks
Ewan McGregor, Fargo
Geoffrey Rush, Genius

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Series, Limited Series, or Motion Picture Made for Television
David Harbour, Stranger Things
Alfred Molina, Feud: Bette and Joan
Christian Slater, Mr. Robot
Alexander Skarsgaard, Big Little Lies
David Thewlis, Fargo

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Series, Limited Series, or Motion Picture Made for Television
Laura Dern, Big Little Lies
Ann Dowd, The Handmaid’s Tale
Chrissy Metz, This Is Us
Michelle Pfeiffer, The Wizard of Lies
Shailene Woodley, Big Little Lies

There you have it! This year's Golden Globe winners can certainly give us a sense of what to expect on January 23rd when the Academy Awards nominations will be announced. So, stay tuned, because awards season is just starting... 

Tonight the 2014 Athens International Film Festival, aka Opening Nights comes to an end. 11 Days with tons of films for all tastes! This year I managed to see 4 films: The Drop, Palo Alto, When Animals Dream and What If.

Before getting into the films, let me say that this year the festival seemed more alive than ever before, despite the 20 years that have passed. The selection of films was amazing, with many Greek productions, including Xenia by Panos Koutras, the crowd was amazing and the organization was almost impeccable, except from the problems in the Nick Cave screening (perhaps that was jinxed by all of us who did not find a ticket). The film ‘71 (Yann Demange’s tale of a British soldier accidentally abandoned by his unit at the riots in Belfast in 1971) won the ultimate prize, the Golden Athena award. 

Now, regarding the films that I did get to see.

Palo Alto, is the first film by Francis Ford Coppola’s granddaughter, Gia Coppola, based on the short stories by James Franco. Starring Emma Roberts and the man himself (James Franco), Palo Alto is the tale of April, a shy virgin teenager (Emma Roberts), who while trying to connect with a sweet classmate (Jack Kilmer) has to deal also with her soccer coach (James Franco) hitting on her. Through April and her friends’ tales, we get to see the anxiety and issues that teenagers deal with, the mistakes that they make and how they deal with it. Coppola’s exquisite cinematography showed us that it must be in the genes (seriously, can this family ever get it wrong?) and reminded me a bit of good old Auntie Sofia’s debut film “The Virgin Suicides”. Overall a great debut film! 

When Animals Dream, is a Danish film by Jonas Alexander Arnby, about a 16 year old girl living in an isolated Danish town, with her sick mother and her father, who will discover that something weird is happening to her body, making her transform little by little to something not human… I will not reveal too much about this film as the element of surprise plays a very important part. What I can say, is that the direction and photography were amazing, adding to the whole mystery of the story and that the newcomer Sonia Suhl, is breathtaking in her film debut. 

The final film that I saw was my favorite! What If, is a Canadian-Irish co-production, directed by Michael Dowse and starring Daniel Radcliffe and Zoe Kazan (Elias Kazan’s granddaughter). The story is quite simple: boy meets girl, boy likes girl, girl likes boy, but girl has a boyfriend, boy decides to be friends with girl but of course falls for her. Despite that it is considered a romantic comedy, to my opinion it was an anti-romantic comedy that made fun in a way of many genre clichés. A fresh, well written comedy, with talented protagonists that share great chemistry! Daniel Radcliffe shows that his Harry Potter days are far behind him and the lovely Miss Kazan, who we had already noticed in the film Ruby Sparks that she had also written, proves that she has inherited her fair share of her grandfather’s talent.  

Well, that was for this year’s festival! Let’s focus now, on the very busy cinema & TV Fall that has already started!!  

That’s a wrap! The 86th Academy awards just ended with 12 years a slave winning Best Picture. But it was Gravity the one that was the big winner with 7 Oscars!

This year’s awards might have been long and without any impressive dance routines or video edits, but it was one of the most fun Academy Awards I’ve watched in years! I guess Ellen had a lot to do with it! She nailed it and took the awards to a completely different level, involving social media, breaking twitter and ordering pizza for everyone!

Lupita’s touching speech, Jared’s inspiring words and the references to the lates Sarah Jones and Harold Ramis, were some of the highlights of this evening. Such an interactive show! How awesome as Lupita, Meryl & Amy Adams dancing to Pharrell’s Happy? And Brad serving Pizza? 

Other highlights: Cate Blanchett telling Julia Roberts to suck it, Ellen selfies (again) and Kevin Spacey photobombing them! 

Here is the full list of winners

BEST PICTURE

12 Years a Slave

BEST ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE

Matthew McConaughey (Dallas Buyers Club)

BEST ACTRESS IN A LEADING ROLE

Cate Blanchett (Blue Jasmine)

BEST ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE

Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers Club)

BEST ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE

Lupita Nyong'o (12 Years a Slave)

BEST ACHIEVEMENT IN DIRECTING

Gravity  - Alfonso Cuarón

CINEMATOGRAPHY

Gravity  - Emmanuel Lubezki

COSTUME DESIGN

The Great Gatsby - Catherine Martin

DOCUMENTARY FEATURE

20 Feet from Stardom-Morgan Neville, Gil Friesen and Caitrin Rogers

DOCUMENTARY SHORT SUBJECT

The Lady in Number 6: Music Saved My Life - Malcolm Clarke and Nicholas Reed

FILM EDITING

Gravity - Alfonso Cuarón and Mark Sanger

FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM

The Great Beauty - Italy

MAKEUP AND HAIRSTYLING

Dallas Buyers Club - Adruitha Lee and Robin Mathews

MUSIC

Original Score

Gravity - Steven Price

MUSIC

"Let It Go" from FROZEN Music and Lyric by Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez

PRODUCTION DESIGN

The Great Gatsby - Catherine Martin (Production Design); Beverley Dunn (Set Decoration)

SHORT FILM

Animated

Mr. Hublot - Laurent Witz and Alexandre Espigares

SHORT FILM

Live Action

Helium-Anders Walter and Kim Magnusson

SOUND EDITING

Gravity-Glenn Freemantle

SOUND MIXING

Gravity-Skip Lievsay, Niv Adiri, Christopher Benstead and Chris Munro

VISUAL EFFECTS

Gravity-Tim Webber, Chris Lawrence, David Shirk and Neil Corbould

WRITING Adapted Screenplay

12 Years a Slave Screenplay by John Ridley

WRITING Original Screenplay

Her Written by Spike Jonze

ANIMATED FEATURE FILM

Frozen

Tonight’s the big night and hours before we find out together (I will be live posting at Her Dudeness Facebook page) who this year’s big winnesr will be, let’s see again the nominations and my predictions/hopes/fears:

BEST PICTURE 

American Hustle
Captain Phillips
Dallas Buyers Club
Gravity
Her
Nebraska
Philomena
12 Years a Slave
The Wolf of Wall Street

Well, all the signs show that 12 Years a Slave is going to be the big winner. The film has already gained lots of awards, including Golden Globe, BAFTA & the Independent Spirit Award for Best Film. If it was up to me, I would award Alexander Payne’s Nebraska, but unfortunately, the competition is really hard, and if 12 years a slave will not get the award, I think American Hustle, Dallas Buyers Club or Gravity will get it. In that order.

BEST ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE

Christian Bale (American Hustle)

Bruce Dern (Nebraska)

Chiwetel Ejiofor (12 Years a Slave)

Matthew McConaughey (Dallas Buyers Club)

Leonardo DiCaprio (The Wolf of Wall Street)

Well, do I really need to say it? I bet that the first thing we are going to hear in this acceptance speech is: “Alright, alright..” McConaughey has a certain win, unless the Academy finally acknowledges the magnitude that is Leonardo DiCaprio. Yes, my mind says McConaughey but my heart screams DiCaprio, not only for his amazing word in The Wolf of Wall Street, but for Gatsby, Aviator, The Blood Diamond, Inception, The Departed, The Gangs of New York… well, every single movie he has played in.

BEST ACTRESS IN A LEADING ROLE

Amy Adams (American Hustle)

Cate Blanchett (Blue Jasmine)

Sandra Bullock (Gravity)

Judi Dench (Philomena)

Meryl Streep (August: Osage County)

Seriously they need to rename this category to: the one that Meryl Streep is in. I have seriously lost count of her nominations! Hasn’t she? Anyway, this is not Meryl’s year, although I am pretty sure that Cate Blanchett is going to mention her in her acceptance speech (this award seems as certain as McConaughey’s) along with Phillip Seymour Hoffman. The only one that’s a threat to her, is Amy Adams for her brilliant work at the American Hustle, but to my opinion Blanchett’s role in Blue Jasmine screamed OSCAR and she totally nailed it, so sorry Amy, better luck next year.

BEST ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE

Barkhad Abdi (Captain Phillips)

Bradley Cooper (American Hustle)

Michael Fassbender (12 Years a Slave)

Jonah Hill (The Wolf of Wall Street)

Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers Club)

Again, do I really need to say it? Jared Leto, end of story. The best performance in this category by far. I rest my case.

BEST ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE

Sally Hawkins (Blue Jasmine)

Jennifer Lawrence (American Hustle)

Lupita Nyong'o (12 Years a Slave)

Julia Roberts (August: Osage County)

June Squibb (Nebraska)

Well, everyone is saying Jennifer Lawrence, but I have a feeling that Lupita Nyong’o is going to win this one. And frankly I would like her to win it, just for Lawrence to lose something for a change…

BEST ACHIEVEMENT IN DIRECTING

American Hustle - David O. Russell

Gravity  - Alfonso Cuarón

Nebraska  - Alexander Payne

The Wolf of Wall Street - Martin Scorsese

12 Years a Slave - Steve McQueen

Finally as regards who’s the Best Director this year, well, let’s put it this way: it is highly unlikely that David O. Russell will get it, Alfonso Cuarón seems to be a threat the last weeks, but will not get it,  Alexander Payne should get it (to my opinion), Martin Scorsese is not likely to get it this year (with this competition and with the editing he did for the Wolf…) and as you guessed it, Steve McQueen is the front runner.

About the rest of the categories, the best original screenplay, will be either Dallas Buyers Club or The American Hustle (although I think that Her should win this one) and the Adapted Screenplay will go to 12 years a Slave (I am not sure who else would beat that), the Best Animated Film will be awarded 99% to Disney’s Frozen, Best Foreign Film to La Grande Bellezza and Best Original Song, most likely to U2, although I have a feeling that Pharrell might be a surprise…

Well, in a couple of hours we will know the winners! 
Enjoy the awards everybody! 

The story behind the film

One flew over the cuckoo’s nest is based on a Broadway play, which is based on the same titled book. The story about making this film starts 12 years before it was shot, in 1963 when Kirk Douglas was starring at the Broadway play. Douglas bought the film rights and intended to also star in the film. While touring in Eastern European countries on behalf of the state department, he met Milos Forman who he found ideal to direct the film. He gained Forman’s attention to the project and promised to send him the book, once returning to the States, which he did. But the director never received the novel. Ten years passed and the two men met again. Meanwhile, Forman had become famous worldwide with films such as “Black Peter”, “Loves of a Blonde” and “The Firemen’s Ball” and Douglas had continued his efforts to produce the film, but with no luck. As Douglas was no longer young enough to play the part, in 1971 he turned over the project to his eldest son, Michael.  Without Michael knowing that his father had shown interest to Milos Forman directing the film, he later on approached him to take over the job. So, the project was back on and one of the greatest American films went into production.

The cast

Apart from Nicholson, who had already made a name in Hollywood and had already gained an Academy Award nomination and William Redfield who had already an active career, most of the cast are actors first appearing on the screen. Also, many of the extras are actual mental patients. In this film, we get to see Danny DeVito in his first major feature role, Christopher Lloyd and Brad Dourif in their first ever feature roles. Louise Fletcher might have had a series of roles before this film, but it was One flew over the cuckoo’s nest that built her career.

The plot

The film follows the admittance of R.P. McMurphy (Jack Nicholson), a small time criminal to a mental institution, and his influence to the patients’ daily life, as well as the relationship with the oppressive head nurse (Louise Fletcher).

One flew over the cuckoo’s nest deals with issues such as mental health, the health system, power and authority and human relationships. The actors’ magnificent performances and the director’s focus on detail make this film a historical treasure worthy of being studied in film schools.

Things you might not know

Things were not so great though during shooting. Legend has it that Nicholson and Forman had completely opposite opinions on how the narrative should play out and during production, they spoke to each other through the cinematographer, but faked a friendly relationship when the media and studio personnel would show up to the set.

Author Ken Kesey was so bitter about the way the filmmakers were "butchering" his story that he vowed never to watch the completed film and even sued the movie's producers because it wasn't shown from Chief Bromden's perspective (as the novel is). Years later, he claimed to be lying in bed flipping through TV channels when he settled onto a late-night movie that looked sort of interesting, only to realize after a few minutes that it was this film. He then changed channels.

Awards

The film won 5 Academy Awards in all 5 major categories: Best Film, Best Direction, Best Actor, Best Actress and Best Adopted Screenplay. It broke a record that Capra’s film “It Happened one night” was holding since 1934. It also received 6 Golden Globes, 6 BAFTAs and another 13 awards.

My Film Club

Next week we will look into a film by one of the greatest directors: Ingmar Bergman’s Persona (1966)

 
Sources: IMDb, Universal (DVD extras) & HerDudeness-pedia 

The Academy can (and does) make mistakes sometimes… Especially when they have failed to award the best film of all times: Citizen Kane.

And the list goes on and on…

As for directors, well, let's say that everytime that Hitchcock, Scorsese, Kubrick or Tarantino lost, well.. the Academy must have been blind! 

Finally, there have been times that brilliant films, actors or directors were not even nominated.
Here's a video that sums up the Academy's snubby choices over the years.....

Only 2 days left to day 0 and today we take a look at last year's winner: Argo! 
Ben Affleck's adaptation of Tony Mendez's book, earned 3 Oscars: Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Film Editing. 
Affleck lost (surprisingly) the Best Direction award to Ang Lee for the life of Pi, he was acknowledged though at the Golden Globes and the BAFTAs. 

So, we still have another 2 days till the big night,  and we are out of Oscar winning films! Well, not exactly.. Tomorrow we are going to take a look at some losers that deserved a better fate and on Sunday, well, it's betting time! Who will win this year? Who should win this year? Who I want to win this year?? Frontrunners and underdogs: they all have a chance to win an (uncle) Oscar!

Today we take a look at the picture that dominated the 84th Academy Awards: The Artist. Although released in 2011, this is a silent, black and white film. The innovative film by Michel Hazanavicious, won also Best Direction, Best Actor in a leading role (Jean Dujardin) , Best Costume Design and Best Original Score.

The competition in the Best Picture category was hard, with Alexander Payne's The Descendants, The Help, Midnight in Paris and Moneyball being some of the other nominated films, The Artist's old school Hollywood glow though, did the trick for the Academy and earned the title of the best film in 2011.

The 83rd Academy Awards, were filled with great performances nominations. So no wonder, a film based on great performances by both main and supporting roles, won the Best Picture award.

The King's Speech, the true story of King George VI and his speech therapist who helped the unsure monarch become worthy of his rise to the throne, gave Colin Firth his first Academy Award (with his second consecutive nomination, after A Single Man) and won another two awards: Best Directing & Best Original Screenplay.

With 5 days to go until day 0, today we take a look back at the 82nd Academy Awards.

In a year that 10 (!) films were competing for Best Picture, it was an even bigger win for The Hurt Locker, especially, since it was competing with the innovative Avatar. Another big win for the film, was that Kathryn Bigelow was the first woman to ever win the Best Direction Award. 

Fun fact: Bigelow's ex husband (James Cameron) was also nominated that year for Best Direction (Avatar)... 

The film took home another 4 awards: Best Original Screenplay, Best Film Editing, Best Sound Mixing, Best Sound Editing.