All hail Willem Dafoe‘s harumphy salty dog in The Lighthouse and Adam Sandler‘s crazy-pinball gambler in Uncut Gems. These, for me, are the two biggest standouts among the just-announced nominations for the 35th Independent Spirit Awards. I have to do an 11 am interview with Beanpole director Kantemir Balagov, so for the time being here’s the Indiewire announcement story. I’ll be back around 12:30 or 1 pm.

2:30 pm update: What happened to Sterling K. Brown‘s Best Supporting Actor nomination for his performance in Waves? Remember that Marriage Story‘s Adam Driver, Scarlett Johansson and Laura Dern weren’t nominated in their respective categories because Noah Baumbach‘s bicoastal divorce drama will instead receive the Robert Altman Award for ensemble, which makes it ineligible for individual acting nominations.

The Spirit Awards will be held on Saturday, 2.9 — a day before the Oscars — under the big tent in Santa Monica.

I’ve boldfaced the likely winners and in some cases offered comment here and there:

Best Feature:
A HIDDEN LIFE (not happening)
CLEMENCY (rounding out the pack)
THE FAREWELL
MARRIAGE STORY
UNCUT GEMS (nope)

Best Director:
Robert Eggers — THE LIGHTHOUSE (definitely should win)
Alma Har’el – HONEY BOY
Julius Onah – LUCE
Benny Safdie, Josh Safdie – UNCUT GEMS
Lorene Scafaria – HUSTLERS

Best First Feature:
BOOKSMART
THE CLIMB
DIANE (should win — easily the best of these five)
THE LAST BLACK MAN IN SAN FRANCISCO
THE MUSTANG
SEE YOU YESTERDAY

Best Female Lead:
Karen Allen – COLEWELL
Hong Chau – DRIVEWAYS
Elisabeth Moss – HER SMELL
Mary Kay Place – DIANE (may lose but better than Zellweger)
Alfre Woodard – CLEMENCY
Renée Zellweger – JUDY

Best Male Lead:
Chris Galust – GIVE ME LIBERTY
Kelvin Harrison Jr. – LUCE
Robert Pattinson – THE LIGHTHOUSE
Adam Sandler – UNCUT GEMS (definitely Sandler!)
Matthias Schoenaerts – THE MUSTANG

Francis Coppola‘s The Cotton Club Encore is a longer (139 minute), blacker, dancier and allegedly better version of his 1984 original, which had a difficult production history, and for all the trouble wound up losing money and getting ho-hummed by critics. Coppola assembled the Encore version on his own dime ($500K) and premiered it at the Telluride Film Festival two-plus years ago.

Have I seen Encore? Uhm, well…no. It played at West L.A.’s Landmark last month, but something always got in the way. (It was press-screened once by Lionsgate — Monday, October 7th at 11am — but I couldn’t get there.) My next shot is snagging the Bluray (out 12.10) or streaming it — I’ll probably choose the latter.

The Encore trailer looks, sounds and feels just right – there’s no denying that.

I’ll tap out my review of Clint Eastwood‘s Richard Jewell (Warner Bros., 12.13) tomorrow, but it’s basically a good ‘un — a matter-of-fact, step-by-step procedural about how a tubby security guard who looked like a wrong one and behaved like a guy with issues….how this poor moustachioed schmuck (Paul Walter Hauser) became an officially suspected terrorist for nearly a three-month period following the Atlanta Olympic bombing of July ’96, and how he finally got past his kneejerk worship of cops and FBI agents.

The general post-screening reaction was thumbs-uppy — an aura of settled satisfaction. The 89 year-old Eastwood looks and sounds great. He has one of the warmest smiles I’ve ever basked in.

After the q & a ended I went to the edge of the stage and reached up to shake Clint’s hand.

I said something along the lines of “I can think of a certain guy in Washington who’s going to see this film about sloppy reporters who spin lies and hound an innocent man, and about an equally sloppy and unreliable FBI that isn’t on the side of truth, and he’ll say to himself ‘this is my movie, my viewpoint…it shares my beliefs about journalists and certain FBI guys.”

And in that gentle and reflective tone of voice that he’s so well known for, Clint said that “we’re living in crazy times” and that some people are going to see crazy things in Jewell’s story, but perhaps they shouldn’t. Or words to that effect.

And yet the Joker screener looks better than that. On my TV, at least. Excellent mastering, hats off.

From Variety‘s Matt Donnelly: “In a last-minute decision, Apple has canceled a planned gala screening of George Nolfi‘s The Banker, one of the tech company’s flagship original films that was meant to close AFI Fest on Thursday in Hollywood.

“Netflix has stepped in and will screen Noah Baumbach’s acclaimed Marriage Story in its place.

“’We purchased The Banker earlier this year as we were moved by the film’s entertaining and educational story about social change and financial literacy,’ Apple said in a statement. ‘Last week some concerns surrounding the film were brought to our attention. We, along with the filmmakers, need some time to look into these matters and determine the best next steps. In light of this, we are no longer premiering The Banker at AFI Fest.”

Deadline‘s Pete Hammond: “A family member has leveled some troubling allegations about Garrett Sr’s son, Bernard Garrett Jr. and shared them with at least one Hollywood trade paper” — i.e., The Hollywood Reporter — “which is planning a story.”

Whatever’s going on, this feels like another black eye for Apple. Not, I feel, because of the “troubling allegations” (which I’m presuming have something to do with the #MeToo realm) but because they seem to have over-reacted. Apple has also pulled FYC trade ads for The Banker.

The Banker is slated to open on 12.6. It was directed and co-written by George Nolfi, and co-written by Niceole Levy.

Mayor Pete Buttigieg has now taken a 10-point poll lead in New Hampshire as well as in Iowa. The first two primary states (actually a caucus and then a primary) and Pete is beating the pants off Elizabeth Warren, Typewriter Joe and Bernie Sanders in both. .

The Saint Anselm College Survey Center poll of 255 likely Democratic primary voters in New Hampshire shows Buttigieg supported by 25 percent. Biden and Warren are tied for second at 15 percent. Sanders is in fourth place at 9 percent.

The poll of likely Democratic primary voters was conducted Nov. 13-18 by landline and cellphone and has a margin of error of 6.1 percentage points.

In a related development, a nationwide poll of African-American voters indicates that POCs of all ages and income levels have abandoned Biden and are embracing Buttigieg across the board. No more suspicion about his handling of the South Bend police chief matter, no more homophobia among older POCs…a complete switchover from attitudes of just a week ago. Yes, I’m kidding…Jesus, lighten up.

The other candidates will be taking aim at Mayor Pete in tonight’s MSNBC Atlanta debate, you bet.

Two days ago I posted an email from Atlanta Journal Constitution Editor-in-Chief Kevin Riley. It shared concerns about accuracy in Clint Eastwood‘s Richard Jewell (Warner Bros., 12.13), which will have its local debut at AFI Fest on Wednesday, 11.20 — tonight. Hollywood Elsewhere will attend a concurrent screening at another location.

Riley’s lead-off concerned the late AJC reporter Kathy Scruggs, portrayed in the film by Olivia Wilde. Scruggs was the AJC reporter who got the initial information that law enforcement was pursuing Jewell.

What we’ve been told, says Riley, is that “the film portrays Scruggs as trading sex with an FBI agent in exchange for a tip on the story.”

“There is no evidence that this ever happened,” Riley says, “and if the film portrays this, it’s offensive and deeply troubling in the #MeToo era. Scruggs was the AJC reporter who got the initial information that law enforcement was pursuing Jewell. She was known as an aggressive reporter and committed journalist who sought always to beat her competition. She has been described by one of her contemporaries as ‘irreverent and savvy.’”

University of Jacksonville professor of forensics Joseph Scott Morgan

Yesterday morning I spoke with author Joseph Scott Morgan, a former Atlanta forensic specialist and a book author (“Blood Beneath My Feet“), and obtained another, somewhat distanced view of Scruggs.

Currently a Professor of Applied Forensics at Jacksonville State University in Jacksonville, Alabama, Morgan was working for the Fulton County medical examiner at the time of the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games bombing. The facility was located on Coca Cola Place, right behind Grady Memorial Hospital.

Morgan: “I was a new investigator in Atlanta. I was working around a lot of older guys, older cops who were assigned to work with medical examiners. I would never rub elbows with reporters, and [yet] Kathy Scruggs sort of materialized in the office.

“She would sit around and talk. And was dressed very, very provocatively. Short leather skirts, halter tops, all kinds of stuff. These guys showed a lot of deference to her. ‘She’s a friend of ours,’ they told me. ‘She works with AJC. A straight shooter. Gives as good as she gets.’

“Any time there was [an active] case, Scruggs would come to the medical examiner’s office. She had inserted herself into this environment and was doing her job. [But] she was kinda crude. She really had no business being in this area. She made me feel professionally uncomfortable. The combination of her presentation and the fact that she was allowed in a restricted area. It was untoward.

One more time: If a winged God on horse hooves was to swoop down from the sky and knock on my door to me and say “from here on and for the rest of our life, you will NEVER hear the popular vocal version of Steve Miller Band‘s ‘Jet Airliner‘ ever again…you will ONLY be permitted to listen to the instrumental version sans vocals,” I would say “fine, I can totally live with that…no problem!”

I love jangly rhythm guitar…makes my heart go pitty-pat.

Early this morning that a Tatiana Siegel Hollywood Reporter story appeared about Joker futures, and specifically about (a) a Phillips-directed Joker sequel starring Joaquin Pheonix being “likely” and (b) a story that six weeks ago (or on 10.7) Phillips met with WB Pictures Group chairman Toby Emmerich to pitch “a portfolio of DC characters’ origin stories.”

An hour ago a source close to the orbit of Joker director Todd Phillips told me that Siegel “got it wrong — it was anticipatory at best.”

By “wrong” he didn’t mean that a Joker sequel led by Phillips and Phoenix won’t happen — it would be bizarre if it didn’t — but the part about Phillips wanting to make Joker-style origin stories about other D.C. characters…well, hold your horses and calm down.

Deadline‘s Mike Fleming: “The Joker sequel news that hit a trade today is great click bait, but multiple inside sources said that while a sequel to the billion dollar grossing film is an obvious likely eventuality that makes all the financial sense in the world, at this point there are no deals for a sequel, nor even any negotiations with director Todd Phillips or his co-writer Scott Silver to craft one.

“Those sources add that the linchpin of today’s THR story — that a week after Joker‘s opening, Phillips met with Warner Bros film chief Toby Emmerich to pitch a portfolio of DC character origin stories — is as flat false as earlier stories that Martin Scorsese contemplated directing the first Joker (Scorsese was originally going to be a producer, but dropped out because of his crowded schedule).

“Multiple sources said no such October 7 meeting between Phillips and Emmerich occurred, and that Phillips hasn’t even considered overseeing other DC character films.”

In Chris Sanders‘ The Call of the Wild (20th Century Fox, 2.21.20), grumpy, gray-bearded John Thornton (Harrison Ford) bonds with Buck, a St. Bernard-Scotch Shepherd augmented with CGI, during a journey from California to the Alaskan Yukon. A much younger version of Thornton was portrayed by Clark Gable in William Wellman’s 1935 version. He was fairly young in the original Jack London novel also.

Pic was written by Michael Green (Logan, Alien: Covenant, Blade Runner 2049). Costarring Dan Stevens, Omar Sy, Karen Gillan, Bradley Whitford, Colin Woodell and Cara Gee.