Hail River and Leo
Frozen River's Melissa Leo was handed the Breakthrough Actor trophy at last night's Gotham Independent Film Awards, and River itself won the Best Feature award. With Leo also looking like a front-runner for a Best Actress Spirit Award, it is now up to the Academy to recognize reality (both artistic and political) and hand Leo a Best Actress nomination as well.
Gotham Awards at two-thirds mark, Cipriani Wall Street -- Tuesday, 12.12, 9:10 pm. The breakthrough director prize went to Ballast helmer Lance Hammer. Zeitgeist Films' Trouble the Water -- the King Kong of hand-held video jiggle-nausea docs -- won for documentary. And the unpronouncable, barely spellable Synecdoche, New York won for ensemble performance.
Tribute awards were given to Penelope Cruz, HBO 's Sheila Nevins (who asked me during the pre-party to please stop gesturing sharply with my hands, as one of my karate chops came very close to her head), and directors Gus Van Sant and Melvin Van Peebles.
The organization behind the east coast Gothams is the Independent Feature Project (IFP). The west coast Spirit Awards, which are handed out in February just before the Oscars, are run and fortified by Film Independent (FIND). IFP and FIND used to be the same outfit, but they divorced in 2006 over some issue involving organizational ego and bluster and territoriality.
I attended the Gothams at Cipriani Wall Street as well as the pre-party at the Museum of American Finance, which are right across the street from each other. (Wall Street is quite narrow, like a driveway.) I ran into several familiar faces -- Richard Jenkins, Bob Berney, Melissa Leo, Fox Searchlight's Peter Rice, Marina Zenovich, Roger Friedman, Michael London, Susan Norget, Jonathan Demme, Jeff Goldblum, Rosemarie DeWitt, Gus Van Sant, the Ballast guys, etc.
I actually arrived a bit early, which isn't my style. I wore my black suit, tapered medium blue dress shirt, a plaid-y checkered blue-gray tie and a pair of deeply uncomfortable, Chinese foot-binding Aldo loafers that I'm thinking of giving away. The pork chop hors d'eouvres at the pre-party, served with a tangy mustard sauce, were luscious. Ditto a very flavorful sea-foody omelette that was served as an opening appetizer at Cipriani Wall Street.
Posted by Jeffrey Wells on December 3, 2008 at 5:31 AM
comment #1
actionman
says ...
"And the unpronouncable, barely spellable Synecdoche, New York won for ensemble performance."
It's both easily pronouncable and spellable. C'mon, Well -- don't turn into one of the animal-level clowns you so despise. This is a movie about thought, for people who like to think when they're inside of a movie theater. How you aren't doing hosannas and cartwheels over this film mystifies me. It's a brilliant piece of work. And for all the people bitching and moaning about the title, it makes PERFECT sense.
Can't wait to see Frozen River; I believe a DVD date was recently announced...need to check up on that...
Completely unrelated, but last night I watched Step Brothers, and while the film was only mildly amusing overall (the best stuff belonged to Adam Scott and the actors playing his family), Richard Jenkins stole many scenes. He's one of the best we have at the moment.
I'm crushing hard-core on Rosemare DeWitt at the moment.
Posted by actionman
at December 3, 2008 7:17 AM
comment #2
LauraReeling
says ...
The hand held stuff in Trouble the Water is limited to the amateur footage which is what - 15-20 minutes of the total film? Why are you going on about this? It is the *most* moving Katrina doc that's out there of the 4 or so that I have seen. Hang it up.
Posted by LauraReeling
at December 3, 2008 7:46 AM
comment #3
lucky
says ...
Loved Melissa Leo since her Homicide days. She stood out in an outstanding cast.
Posted by lucky
at December 3, 2008 8:05 AM
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at December 3, 2008 8:51 AM
comment #5
MikeSchaeferSF
says ...
I'm one of those "people who like to think when they're inside a movie theater", and Synecdoche lost me after a half-hour. It was making sense when it was grounded in reality, but once he introduced the house on fire it went off the rails for me, and got progressively murkier. Credit for trying, certainly (I look forward to what Kaufman does next), but there's a difference between making people think and making them shake their heads in "WTF?" disbelief.
Posted by MikeSchaeferSF
at December 3, 2008 8:55 AM
comment #6
actionman
says ...
Southland Tales had me shaking my head in WTF disbelief.
Synecdoche, NY worked a spell over me like Barton Fink.
Posted by actionman
at December 3, 2008 9:00 AM
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