OSCAR Week/Awards Report #8/Re-Thinking the Nominations
THEY WUZ ROBBED!
From 'Sunshine' to Giamatti to Moore, we look at the deserving films and folks that Oscar forgot this year
By Sean AxmakerSpecial to MSN Entertainment
Welcome to the annual Oscar nominee kibbitz!
The rules are simple: Those of us outside the inner circle of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences harrumph over the inevitable slights on the final nominees for each category.
Right, wrong or otherwise, we all come away with our own ideas of the best and worst, and they inevitably skew differently from the company-town voters.
It's an annual event and this year is no different. With most noms going to a few pieces of Oscar bait -- notably Martin Scorsese's lush "The Aviator"; the heart-tugging "Finding Neverland"; Clint Eastwood's pleasingly old-fashioned "Million Dollar Baby"; the musical biopic "Ray"; and the token American indie "Sideways" -- it means that a lot of excellent work by actors, writers, and other artists gets left out of the party.
While we may not get to hand out the little gold man, we can sure offer opinions on those criminally overlooked by the Academy.
So, here's another contribution to the parallel history of Oscar: the nominees that coulda, shoulda, woulda been a contender.
Best Film
What divides the Oscars from other awards (those given out by critics' groups, film festivals and other organizations) is the Academy's deep love of Hollywood style.
Oscar voters favor glamorous style and traditionally-minded stories over quirkiness and creative individuality. And so they snubbed "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind." Screenwriter Charlie Kaufman's slapstick romantic psycho-drama is suffused with the everyday tragedies of loneliness, disappointment and loss, told in an endlessly creative manner that challenges you to keep up with it. So, it's no surprise it was passed over.
And, it's also no surprise that the youth-skewing Online Film Critics Society voted it the Best Film of the Year.
Michael Moore was too optimistic when he pulled "Fahrenheit 9/11" from the documentary category with high hopes of a Best Picture nomination -- too controversial -- while similar controversy is what kept Mel Gibson's smash hit "The Passion of the Christ" out of contention as well. EDITOR'S NOTE: WELL, IT'S ALSO POSSIBLE THAT BOTH OF THESE MOVIES ARE MORE ABOUT THE STORMS THEY UNLEASHED AND THEIR INSULAR GROUP-HUG TO THEIR CORE CONSTITUENCIES THAN THEY ARE ABOUT MOVIE-MAKING. IN BOTH THESE INSTANCES, I WOULD SAY THAT THE ACADEMY MADE THE RIGHT DECISION. I ENJOYED THE LIBERAL BONDING EXERCISE OF GOING TO SEE "FAHRENHEIT 9/11", BUT I'D RATHER SEE "ETERNAL SUNSHINE" OR "SPIDERMAN 2", FOR THAT MATTER, ON THE NOMINATION LIST, THAN EITHER OF THESE EXERCISES IN BROOHAHA.
Unfortunately, Academy voters are still reluctant to put an animated film in the top slot (Disney's "Beauty and the Beast" is the only one to crack that category to date), so "The Incredibles" will have to be satisfied with its Best Animated Feature nomination. More disappointing is the absence here of such lovely little indie gems as "Before Sunset" and "Maria Full of Grace."
Best Actor
How could the Academy recognize "Sideways" for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress and overlook the film's cranky, crusty soul, Paul Giamatti? A quirky but resilient Pinot Noir stuck in a land of smooth, bold, attention-grabbing Merlots and Cabernets, Hollywood's favorite sad sack was shut out in 2003 for "American Splendor," and now the Academy has ignored him again for an even more compelling and understated performance. EDITOR'S NOTE: MY SOAPBOX,.....AGAIN,....... HERE. ALMOST EVERY YEAR THERE IS ONE CATEGORY THAT HAS 10 GOOD CHOICES FOR THE 5 SLOTS. (WHILE SOME OF THE OTHER CATEGORIES HAVE TO PICK PEOPLE UP OFF THE STREET TO FILL THE REQUISITE 5). THIS YEAR, BEST ACTOR LEFT OFF BUNCHES OF PEOPLE. INCLUDING, UNFORTUNATELY, GIAMATTI. The New York Film Critics Circle and the Chicago Film Critics Association (among others) branded it the best of the year. What happened?
Other oversights: The Los Angeles Film Critics gave their award to another Oscar no-show, Liam Neeson, for his dispassionate turn in "Kinsey," while Sean Penn would have been a worthy contender for his off-balance performance in "The Assassination of Richard Nixon." Kevin Bacon's simmering, taciturn performance as a reformed child molester in "The Woodsman" was a long shot -- the material is simply too squirmy -- and Jeff Bridges had the bad luck to deliver an inspired performance in the uninspired "The Door in the Floor." Finally, Javier Bardem gave an astonishingly physical performance as a quadriplegic in "The Sea Inside" from Spain.
Best Actress
Laura Dern delivered the prickliest, most discomforting performance of the year as the unfaithful wife of a cheating husband in "We Don't Live Here Anymore." Her instability and emotional panic charges the dour domestic drama with a nervous energy that makes her desperation all the more poignant. The performance is a revelation, but apparently too naked and uncompromising for Academy voters.
Critical favorite Julie Delpy was a long shot for her fine-boned work in "Before Sunset" -- the art of talking around an issue has never seemed more effortless. Anne Reid dared to strip away sympathy for her emboldened widow in "The Mother," which all but guaranteed that she's be left out of the final five. Laura Linney was wondrous and alive and altogether overlooked in "P.S.," though her nomination for "Kinsey" in the supporting category takes the sting out of that slight. And it would have been too much to ask the Academy to recognize Nicole Kidman's incandescent performance in the strange and squirmy "Birth."EDITOR'S NOTE: I DIDN'T SEE KIDMAN'S PERFORMANCE. BUT SHE ALREADY HAS ONE AWARD MORE THAN SHE DESERVES. GIVE IT A REST.
Best Supporting Actor
What does Peter Sarsgaard have to do to get recognized by the Academy? The most unpretentious character actor in Hollywood has been delivering such understated performances that voters must forget that he's "only" acting. Snubbed last year for "Shattered Glass," he's been again overlooked for his unprepossessing performance as a quiet, reliable research assistant with an adventurous sexual life in "Kinsey." He'll have to settle for his Independent Spirit Award nomination. EDITOR'S NOTE: YOU ANSWERED YOUR OWN QUESTION. UNDERSTATED. UNPREPOSSESSING. UNPRETENTIOUS. HE NEEDS TO BUILD UP A BIGGER BODY OF WORK, AND DO AT LEAST ONE THING THAT GRABS PEOPLE BY THE SHOULDERS AND GETS THEIR ATTENTION. THIS IS HOLLYWOOD WE'RE TALKING ABOUT; MUCH AS I LOVE HIS DELICATE WORK, SUBTLE ISN'T THE BEST TACTIC OUT THERE.
Performers from otherwise nomination-neglected films can usually find support in the supporting categories. This year the big films sewed up the slots, leaving these solid and surprising turns unrecognized: Liev Schreiber as the coolly shrewd and mentally tormented "Manchurian Candidate";EDITOR'S NOTE: OOO, HE WAS WONDERFUL! Mark Wahlberg as the fireman in an existential crisis in "I Heart Huckabees"; and Golden Globe nominee and cult icon David Carradine as the Zen assassin in "Kill Bill Vol. 2."
Best Supporting Actress
The Academy's recognition of "Hotel Rwanda" co-star Sophie Okonedo, a busy British actress largely unknown stateside, is such a pleasant surprise that it's almost forgivable that they overlooked Sharon Warren, the newcomer who played Ray Charles' tough-love mother in "Ray." Almost. Then again, her greatest competition in this category could have come from her own co-stars: Kerry Washington as his ever-forgiving wife, plus Regina King and Aunjanue Ellis as back-up singers-turned-mistresses. The Raylettes have nothing on this quartet.
And it's too bad that room could not be found for Meryl Streep's cold, shrewd turn as the dragon lady of "The Manchurian Candidate."EDITOR'S NOTE: YEAH. EARLIER IN THE YEAR, I WOULD HAVE SAID SHE WAS A SHOO-IN. CREEPY/GREAT PERFORMANCE. Ok, so she's been nominated 14 times, but still it's the kind of juicy little part that movie stars get when they age-out of starring roles and Streep relishes every icy utterance. EDITOR'S NOTE: YOU COULD TEACH A CLASS WITH JUST THE LINE-READINGS SHE GAVE IN THIS MOVIE. (EXTRA CREDIT IN THE COURSE TO THE LINE-READINGS OF ALAN RICKMAN AND MAGGIE SMITH. IN ANYTHING).
Best Director
Michael Mann's "Collateral" may not have been the best film of the year, but this coolly attenuated thriller was certainly one of the best directed. Mann steered the film away from the script's less plausible detours with sharp, clean execution and visceral action scenes, turning this nocturnal cab tour of L.A. into one of the most riveting rides of the year. Like the characters that he is so drawn to -- both criminal and civilian -- Mann is a consummate professional doing a consummate job and deserves recognition.EDITOR'S NOTE: HAVE WE FORGIVEN HIM FOR "MIAMI VICE" YET?
Marc Forster was considered by many a shoe-in for directing the Best Picture nominee, "Finding Neverland" (the Director's Guild certainly thought so when they gave him one of the final five noms), but Richard Linklater's graceful, un-showy direction in "Before Sunset," and Michel Gondry's spirited, inventive, and empathetic work on "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" are just as worthy and just as neglected.
More Thievery:
- Original Screenplay -- Hard to fault the titles in this category, but it's still too bad that room could not have been made for Bill Condon's intelligent and insightful "Kinsey" or Joshua Marston's sympathetic "Maria Full of Grace."
- Adapted Screenplay -- I'm at a loss to explain why "Before Sunset" is considered an adapted screenplay rather than an original screenplay: What exactly is this sequel to the 1995 original screenplay adapted from? Regardless of its pedigree, the words are wonderful and the nomination well deserved.
- Cinematography -- How did the sleek, steely, night saturated work of Dion Beebe and Paul Cameron on "Collateral" miss the cut?
- Animated Film -- Anyone who has seen "Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence" knows that that it is a more ambitious and adventurous film than the tongue-in-cheek "Shark Tale" and "Shrek 2."
- Original Score -- While I have a certain fondness for the Michael Giacchino's playful tip of the hat to the James Bond-ian musical mood in "The Incredibles," I'm more perplexed by the continued absence of Jon Brion's delectable minimalist film compositions. This year he had a pair of perfect scores: "I Heart Huckabees" and "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind." Time for some recognition...
-------------Sean Axmaker is a film critic for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and a DVD columnist for the Internet Movie Database. He is a regular contributor to Amazing Stories, Asian Cult Cinema, Greencine.com, and StaticMultimedia.com.
EDITOR'S NOTE: BUT WAIT...MORE KVETCHING AND SECOND-GUESSING!
Missing persons
Some familiar names are conspicuous by their absence from Oscar nom list.
By Gregg Kilday
Where was Paul Giamatti, the hapless loser in "Sideways"? Liam Neeson, the brave sex researcher in "Kinsey"? Marc Forster, the director of best picture nominee "Finding Neverland"?
Inevitably, Oscar announcements are as much about the omissions as they are a celebration of those who make the grade.Many expected Giamatti, who spoofed his relative obscurity last weekend on "Saturday Night Live," to be recognized for "Sideways," even if he was fighting an uphill battle to win Academy kudos for a comedy.Leonardo DiCaprio, who was nominated in that category, said of Giamatti's absence, "He's a fantastic actor, and he gave a great performance in that movie. I'm a huge fan of that performance. I was surprised." If there was any comfort to be had, it was that Giamatti wasn't alone. "A lot of people were missing," noted his "Sideways" co-star Thomas Haden Church. "Javier Bardem (of 'The Sea Inside') and Liam Neeson weren't nominated either. It was a tough field." EDITOR'S NOTE: AND JIM CARREY.
Laura Linney, the lone nominee from "Kinsey," agreed. "I certainly wish Liam had been nominated and that (writer-director) Bill Condon had gotten some more recognition."
As for "Neverland," producer Richard Gladstein said that, despite seven nominations, "The bittersweet part is that our director is not a part of the seven. It's surprising. I have no idea why."Seconded the film's nominated screenwriter David Magee: "When a film gets nominated for seven awards, the man at the helm should really get some credit. It's a disappointment for me, and I think he deserved it."
Plenty of other names, who at one time and according to various handicappers looked to figure in to this year's Oscar race, were left standing by the wayside. Kevin Spacey wasn't hailed for playing Bobby Darin in "Beyond the Sea," Al Pacino for playing Shylock in "The Merchant of Venice," Emmy Rossum for enduring the phantom's advances in "The Phantom of the Opera," Meryl Streep for plotting against the government in "The Manchurian Candidate" or Cloris Leachman for dispensing wisdom in "Spanglish."
But it's almost as if every nominee, each too aware of who assisted them in their quest for a nom, had a private list of regrets. Kate Winslet, for example, while enjoying her acting nomination for "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," regretted that the movie's cinematographer, Ellen Kuras, wasn't sharing in the spotlight.
Music nominations lack star power of years past
Conventional wisdom sometimes turns out to be just that: conventional.
On the music side, at least, the 2005 Academy Award nominations finally might put to rest the old saw that the Golden Globes are a harbinger of Oscar things to come.
This year, the Academy saw fit to ignore the Globe winners in both the original motion picture score and song categories.Three-time Oscar winner Howard Shore's score for "The Aviator," the top-nominated picture with 11 noms, was disqualified by the Academy's music branch, while Mick Jagger and Dave Stewart's song "Old Habits Die Hard," written for the remake of "Alfie," failed to secure Oscar favor. EDITOR'S NOTE: AND OF COURSE, THE BEST SCORE OF THE YEAR, CLINT EASTWOOD'S SCORE FROM "MILLION DOLLAR BABY" DIDN'T GET NOMINATED CAUSE SOMEONE AT HIS COMPANY NEGLECTED TO FILE THE PAPERWORK!
Musing on this year's best song field, nominee Glen Ballard said: "There are surprises that pop up every now and then. It makes me think that people are really listening. They're not just checking out what's familiar."EDITOR'S NOTE: OH GET REAL. 75-85% OF ALL BEST SONG OSCARS GO TO SONGS THAT ARE....EXCUSE THE FRENCH...CRAP.
Ballard's "The Polar Express" collaborator Alan Silvestri said, "All of these things move in some kind of wave, and it's come around to this kind of configuration (in the category) right now."
The absence of the Rolling Stones' Jagger and Eurythmics' Stewart robs the best song slot of some star allure. The original song category has long been the Oscars' destination for music biz glitter, but this year -- once again dodging the conventional -- the music branch has largely ignored familiar pop names.
Rock band Counting Crows' "Shrek 2" entry "Accidentally in Love" is the only nominee by an established chart power. It was probably this year's slam-dunk nominee: "Shrek 2" spawned the biggest soundtrack album of 2004, currently homing in on 1 million units sold.
Songwriter-producer Ballard, noted for his work establishing singer-songwriter Alanis Morissette's career, collaborated with Silvestri on the nominated tune "Believe" from "The Polar Express."
A new song by Andrew Lloyd Webber for the screen version of his Broadway evergreen "The Phantom of the Opera" and two foreign-language compositions for independent pictures complete the best song field.
The latter songs are by writers far better known at home than they are abroad. Bruno Coulais -- who co-wrote "Vos Sur Ton Chemin" for the best foreign-language film nominee "The Chorus" ("Les Choristes") with lyricist and director Christophe Barratier -- has racked up two Cesar Awards in his native France, where the soundtrack album was a huge smash. Jorge Drexler, who penned "Al Otro Lado Del Rio" for "The Motorcycle Diaries," has captured a Latin Grammy Award nomination.EDITOR'S NOTE: AND JUST TO INSURE THE SONG NOMINEES' SLIDE INTO OBSCURITY, MOST OF THEM WILL BE SONG BY BEYONCE. SO NOT ONLY WEREN'T THEY ALL THAT DISTINCTIVE TO BEGIN WITH, NOW THEY'LL ALL DEFINITELY BLEND TOGETHER!
The original score category is split between first-time nominees Jan A.P. Kaczmarek ("Finding Neverland") and John Debney ("The Passion of the Christ") and Academy war horses John Williams, James Newton Howard and Thomas Newman, now with a total of 56 nominations (seven for Newman, six for Howard and -- tying Alfred Newman's record in the music categories -- 43 for WilliamsEDITOR'S NOTE: GO, JOHNNY, GO!!) to their credit.
Kaczmarek said he was thrilled to be part of a strong field this year but wasn't shy in evaluating his dark horse status. "I'm in the company of such extraordinary composers," he said. "It's great, great company to be with. My chances, I wouldn't speculate ... (but) I would say shamelessly that I'm not in a totally hopeless situation here."
Stirring the sources
Rex Pickett, author of the novel upon which Alexander Payne's Oscar-nominated "Sideways" is based, likes to say, "I did better last year than Thackeray."
The reference is to William Makepeace Thackeray's classic 19th-century novel "Vanity Fair," adapted by Julian Fellowes for the Reese Witherspoon movie that came and went last fall and has been forgotten during awards season.
In that comparison is a hint of the challenge that faces screenwriters who peer into the pages of books (or other sources, like plays) and try to figure out how to turn the words into images.
I don't think Pickett would claim he wrote a better novel than Thackeray. But the screenwriters' branch of the Motion Picture Academy believes that Payne and his writing partner, Jim Taylor, have written a better adaptation than Fellowes.
Payne and Taylor share this year's Adapted Screenplay Oscar ballot with "Million Dollar Baby" screenwriter Paul Haggis, "Finding Neverland's" David Magee, "Motorcycle Diaries'" Jose Rivera, and the four authors of "Before Sunset."
As they count down to the Oscars, the nominees may reasonably wonder: On what basis will the Academy gauge their work and pick the winner? Will they simply vote for the movie they like best, or will they read the source material to see what the nominees did with it?
"My hunch, regrettably, is that not many read," says Robert Towne, who has been Oscar-nominated for two original screenplays (winning for "Chinatown") and two adaptations. "I think they vote for the movie they like best." EDITOR'S NOTE: SAFE BET. NOT TOO MANY PEOPLE IN HOLLYWOOD CAN READ, WOULD BE MY GUESS. BUT THE AWARD IS STILL FOR BEST MOVIE-MAKING, SO I DON'T THINK I'D QUARREL TOO MUCH WITH HOW THIS IS DETERMINED.
This is hardly an Oscar outrage. The Academy has been splitting screenplay awards into "original" and "adapted" categories for a half century, without protest, and it's safe to assume that voters never bothered to read all the source material.
But having read the novel, the book of short stories, the play and the two diaries behind the current nominees, I recommend it to anyone who has an interest in the process of filmmaking. EDITOR'S NOTE: ACTUALLY, THAT WOULD BE A FUN CHALLENGE. WE SHOULD TRY THIS SOME TIME.
The 2004 nominees present a wide range of challenges, from "Before Sunset," which has no conventional source, to "Sideways," which is about as faithful to a novel as a screenplay can be.
"Rex wrote a story that was pretty solid," Taylor says. "And the dialogue was good. That's a gift when you're adapting."
Still, the choices Payne and Taylor made in distilling and refining the characters and events in the novel were brilliant. The novel, which follows two middle-age friends on a girl-chasing tour of California wine country, is bawdier than the movie, at times spilling into slapstick.
"I was a little afraid the movie would be trivial, or just a farce," Taylor says. "We wanted to make sure you are not completely repelled by these people." EDITOR'S NOTE: THEY CAME RIGHT UP TO THE EDGE SEVERAL TIMES, I GOTTA SAY. (AND DWEEBPAL KARLA WOULD PROBABLY SAY WAY OVER IT, SEEING AS HOW SHE DUBBED "SIDEWAYS" HER "TITANIC" JUST THIS MORNING!)
The major change made in the adaptation was to Maya, a divorced waitress who begins dating Miles, a failed writer with a crush on Pinot Noir wines. In the book, Maya accepts $1,000 from Miles' friend Jack to sleep with Miles.
"We didn't want to see her do that," says Taylor. If she had, it's unlikely that Virginia Madsen, who plays Maya, would be a front-runner for Best Supporting Actress.
The best example from "Sideways" of great adaptation writing is the scene, likely to become a classic, in which Miles and Maya end their first date by revealing themselves through their feelings about wine. In a speech that contains 133 words, Miles describes the Pinot grape in a way that subtly but unmistakably describes his own fragile nature.
"How about you?" he says, when he's finished.
In a speech four words longer, Maya describes her relatively recent discovery of fine wines in a way that reveals how she has been opened to life after a cloistered marriage.
It's a love scene, and a beauty. But, here's how author Rex Pickett described it in the novel: "We sipped the Tantara and talked on for what seemed like hours ..."
Pickett saw the speeches evolve in the drafts sent to him. "It just blew me away," he says of the scripted scene. "I wish it was in the novel." EDITOR'S NOTE: OK. THAT JUST GAVE ME GOOSEBUMPS. THAT THE LANGUAGE OF FILM CAN BE EVEN MORE LITERARY....AND LITERATE....THAN THE SOURCE NOVEL. NEAT!
TWO TALES BECOME ONE
Paul Haggis, a first-time screenwriter, nearly gulps when he says that director Clint Eastwood shot his first draft of "Million Dollar Baby" - "every word of it."
"When I wrote it, I knew it was a troubled script and that it would probably end up in a drawer," Haggis says. "Luckily, I found an artist who could bring it to life."
"Million Dollar Baby" is adapted from two of the six short stories in the late F. X. Toole's "Rope Burns." Haggis says he got to know Toole before he died and used him as the model for boxing trainer Frankie Dunn. He found Frankie in the story titled "Million Dollar Baby," which traces Frankie's relationship with his female protege Maggie Fitzgerald. That story is the through-line for the script, and ends the same way.
Haggis found Scrap Iron Dupris (Morgan Freeman) in the story "Frozen Water" and made him both Frankie's best friend and the story's narrator. "I'm not a big fan of narration," EDITOR'S NOTE: I'VE ALWAYS RESPECTED PAUL HAGGIS, BUT NOW EVEN MORE. NARRATION IS USUALLY A VERY BAD SIGN. A SIGN THAT THE MOVIE-MAKERS DON'T KNOW HOW TO SHOW US WHAT WE NEED TO KNOW, AND FEEL THEY HAVE TO TELL US. BUT HE'S RIGHT....IN "MILLION DOLLAR BABY", IT WORKS. he says, "but I felt I needed it to tell Frankie's interior journey and externalize it."
Having Scrap narrate also gave Haggis a chance to use Toole's intimate descriptions of the fight game. I'm no fan of narration, either, but the writing here - a collaboration between Toole and Haggis - is as good as it gets.
Frankie's estrangement from his own daughter is not to be found in "Rope Burns."
"I went through a painful period with my own daughter," Haggis says. "I made mistakes that I felt very guilty about. You take things from your own life and use them."
"Before Sunset" doesn't really belong on this ballot. A sequel to the 1995 "Before Sunrise," it is almost entirely dialogue, and all of it original.
But the Academy rule book says that all sequels are adaptations, even when they're not.
"I wish we'd been nominated for an original screenplay, which is what it is," says actress Julie Delpy, who shares the writing credit with co-star Ethan Hawke, director Richard Linklater and writer Kim Krizan. "But I'm just glad to be nominated."
Magee, another first-time screenwriter, adapted Allan Knee's play "The Man Who Was Peter Pan" on spec more than six years ago. It drew dust until Marc Forster signed on to direct it and lit up like Tinkerbell when Johnny Depp said he wanted to star as "Peter Pan" author J.M. Barrie.
The play is very different from the script. "The Man Who Was Peter Pan" is a rather sober affair following Barrie from his meeting with the children who would inspire the Lost Boys to late in his life after most of them had grown up and died. Magee narrowed the focus to the period when Barrie was conceiving "Peter Pan."
"For me, the arc of the story was Barrie as a man who wants to remain a boy forever, and Peter is a boy who has to grow up too quickly," says Magee. "The condensing of time determined which aspects to leave in and what to take out." EDITOR'S NOTE: YES, BUT THE LATER STORY IS WORTH READING ABOUT. YOU HAVE TO PRETTY MUCH LOOK AT THE MOVIE AS FICTION, SO MUCH CHANGES WITH THE CHARACTERS' LATER LIVES.
In both the play and the movie, the central conflict is between Barrie and Peter, who resents Barrie taking his dead father's place.
"I always saw them ending up on the park bench having changed each other," Magee says. "Barrie has grown up and takes care of those around him, and Peter allows himself to grieve."
For "Motorcycle Diaries," a buddy movie based on a cross-South America trip taken by the future revolutionary Che Guevara and his friend Alberto Granado in the early 1950s, New York playwright Jose Rivera was given the men's published diaries about that trip.
Rivera says he relied mostly on Che's diary for feelings and on Granado's for details. What wasn't in the books, he got from interviews that the film's director, Walter Salles, conducted with the elderly Granado in Cuba. "What Walter brought back was invaluable for getting into Che's head," Rivera says.
His main objective was to avoid "looking back on the great man from history."
"We wanted no knowledge of the future," Rivera says. "The only violence is when Che throws a rock at a truck, and there is no epiphany - the moment when he takes up the cause of the people."
AND THE WINNER IS...
So, considering the sources, what was the best adapted script in 2004? Before I started reading, I would have said either "Sideways" or "Million Dollar Baby," which happen to have been my favorite movies last year. I still feel they're the best.
All things considered, however, Haggis had the biggest challenge. He had to a find a central story among Toole's six and shape it in a way that would allow the director to realize Toole's unique and poetic perspective on the boxing world. That he accomplished it with the first draft of his first script is amazing, and if he wins for it, he'll have the perfect ending.
Still, my heart is with "Sideways," one of the greatest screenplay comedies ever written. Even having read everything, if I were marking a ballot, I'd probably do what everyone else does and vote for the movie I like best.
From 'Sunshine' to Giamatti to Moore, we look at the deserving films and folks that Oscar forgot this year
By Sean AxmakerSpecial to MSN Entertainment
Welcome to the annual Oscar nominee kibbitz!
The rules are simple: Those of us outside the inner circle of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences harrumph over the inevitable slights on the final nominees for each category.
Right, wrong or otherwise, we all come away with our own ideas of the best and worst, and they inevitably skew differently from the company-town voters.
It's an annual event and this year is no different. With most noms going to a few pieces of Oscar bait -- notably Martin Scorsese's lush "The Aviator"; the heart-tugging "Finding Neverland"; Clint Eastwood's pleasingly old-fashioned "Million Dollar Baby"; the musical biopic "Ray"; and the token American indie "Sideways" -- it means that a lot of excellent work by actors, writers, and other artists gets left out of the party.
While we may not get to hand out the little gold man, we can sure offer opinions on those criminally overlooked by the Academy.
So, here's another contribution to the parallel history of Oscar: the nominees that coulda, shoulda, woulda been a contender.
Best Film
What divides the Oscars from other awards (those given out by critics' groups, film festivals and other organizations) is the Academy's deep love of Hollywood style.
Oscar voters favor glamorous style and traditionally-minded stories over quirkiness and creative individuality. And so they snubbed "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind." Screenwriter Charlie Kaufman's slapstick romantic psycho-drama is suffused with the everyday tragedies of loneliness, disappointment and loss, told in an endlessly creative manner that challenges you to keep up with it. So, it's no surprise it was passed over.
And, it's also no surprise that the youth-skewing Online Film Critics Society voted it the Best Film of the Year.
Michael Moore was too optimistic when he pulled "Fahrenheit 9/11" from the documentary category with high hopes of a Best Picture nomination -- too controversial -- while similar controversy is what kept Mel Gibson's smash hit "The Passion of the Christ" out of contention as well. EDITOR'S NOTE: WELL, IT'S ALSO POSSIBLE THAT BOTH OF THESE MOVIES ARE MORE ABOUT THE STORMS THEY UNLEASHED AND THEIR INSULAR GROUP-HUG TO THEIR CORE CONSTITUENCIES THAN THEY ARE ABOUT MOVIE-MAKING. IN BOTH THESE INSTANCES, I WOULD SAY THAT THE ACADEMY MADE THE RIGHT DECISION. I ENJOYED THE LIBERAL BONDING EXERCISE OF GOING TO SEE "FAHRENHEIT 9/11", BUT I'D RATHER SEE "ETERNAL SUNSHINE" OR "SPIDERMAN 2", FOR THAT MATTER, ON THE NOMINATION LIST, THAN EITHER OF THESE EXERCISES IN BROOHAHA.
Unfortunately, Academy voters are still reluctant to put an animated film in the top slot (Disney's "Beauty and the Beast" is the only one to crack that category to date), so "The Incredibles" will have to be satisfied with its Best Animated Feature nomination. More disappointing is the absence here of such lovely little indie gems as "Before Sunset" and "Maria Full of Grace."
Best Actor
How could the Academy recognize "Sideways" for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress and overlook the film's cranky, crusty soul, Paul Giamatti? A quirky but resilient Pinot Noir stuck in a land of smooth, bold, attention-grabbing Merlots and Cabernets, Hollywood's favorite sad sack was shut out in 2003 for "American Splendor," and now the Academy has ignored him again for an even more compelling and understated performance. EDITOR'S NOTE: MY SOAPBOX,.....AGAIN,....... HERE. ALMOST EVERY YEAR THERE IS ONE CATEGORY THAT HAS 10 GOOD CHOICES FOR THE 5 SLOTS. (WHILE SOME OF THE OTHER CATEGORIES HAVE TO PICK PEOPLE UP OFF THE STREET TO FILL THE REQUISITE 5). THIS YEAR, BEST ACTOR LEFT OFF BUNCHES OF PEOPLE. INCLUDING, UNFORTUNATELY, GIAMATTI. The New York Film Critics Circle and the Chicago Film Critics Association (among others) branded it the best of the year. What happened?
Other oversights: The Los Angeles Film Critics gave their award to another Oscar no-show, Liam Neeson, for his dispassionate turn in "Kinsey," while Sean Penn would have been a worthy contender for his off-balance performance in "The Assassination of Richard Nixon." Kevin Bacon's simmering, taciturn performance as a reformed child molester in "The Woodsman" was a long shot -- the material is simply too squirmy -- and Jeff Bridges had the bad luck to deliver an inspired performance in the uninspired "The Door in the Floor." Finally, Javier Bardem gave an astonishingly physical performance as a quadriplegic in "The Sea Inside" from Spain.
Best Actress
Laura Dern delivered the prickliest, most discomforting performance of the year as the unfaithful wife of a cheating husband in "We Don't Live Here Anymore." Her instability and emotional panic charges the dour domestic drama with a nervous energy that makes her desperation all the more poignant. The performance is a revelation, but apparently too naked and uncompromising for Academy voters.
Critical favorite Julie Delpy was a long shot for her fine-boned work in "Before Sunset" -- the art of talking around an issue has never seemed more effortless. Anne Reid dared to strip away sympathy for her emboldened widow in "The Mother," which all but guaranteed that she's be left out of the final five. Laura Linney was wondrous and alive and altogether overlooked in "P.S.," though her nomination for "Kinsey" in the supporting category takes the sting out of that slight. And it would have been too much to ask the Academy to recognize Nicole Kidman's incandescent performance in the strange and squirmy "Birth."EDITOR'S NOTE: I DIDN'T SEE KIDMAN'S PERFORMANCE. BUT SHE ALREADY HAS ONE AWARD MORE THAN SHE DESERVES. GIVE IT A REST.
Best Supporting Actor
What does Peter Sarsgaard have to do to get recognized by the Academy? The most unpretentious character actor in Hollywood has been delivering such understated performances that voters must forget that he's "only" acting. Snubbed last year for "Shattered Glass," he's been again overlooked for his unprepossessing performance as a quiet, reliable research assistant with an adventurous sexual life in "Kinsey." He'll have to settle for his Independent Spirit Award nomination. EDITOR'S NOTE: YOU ANSWERED YOUR OWN QUESTION. UNDERSTATED. UNPREPOSSESSING. UNPRETENTIOUS. HE NEEDS TO BUILD UP A BIGGER BODY OF WORK, AND DO AT LEAST ONE THING THAT GRABS PEOPLE BY THE SHOULDERS AND GETS THEIR ATTENTION. THIS IS HOLLYWOOD WE'RE TALKING ABOUT; MUCH AS I LOVE HIS DELICATE WORK, SUBTLE ISN'T THE BEST TACTIC OUT THERE.
Performers from otherwise nomination-neglected films can usually find support in the supporting categories. This year the big films sewed up the slots, leaving these solid and surprising turns unrecognized: Liev Schreiber as the coolly shrewd and mentally tormented "Manchurian Candidate";EDITOR'S NOTE: OOO, HE WAS WONDERFUL! Mark Wahlberg as the fireman in an existential crisis in "I Heart Huckabees"; and Golden Globe nominee and cult icon David Carradine as the Zen assassin in "Kill Bill Vol. 2."
Best Supporting Actress
The Academy's recognition of "Hotel Rwanda" co-star Sophie Okonedo, a busy British actress largely unknown stateside, is such a pleasant surprise that it's almost forgivable that they overlooked Sharon Warren, the newcomer who played Ray Charles' tough-love mother in "Ray." Almost. Then again, her greatest competition in this category could have come from her own co-stars: Kerry Washington as his ever-forgiving wife, plus Regina King and Aunjanue Ellis as back-up singers-turned-mistresses. The Raylettes have nothing on this quartet.
And it's too bad that room could not be found for Meryl Streep's cold, shrewd turn as the dragon lady of "The Manchurian Candidate."EDITOR'S NOTE: YEAH. EARLIER IN THE YEAR, I WOULD HAVE SAID SHE WAS A SHOO-IN. CREEPY/GREAT PERFORMANCE. Ok, so she's been nominated 14 times, but still it's the kind of juicy little part that movie stars get when they age-out of starring roles and Streep relishes every icy utterance. EDITOR'S NOTE: YOU COULD TEACH A CLASS WITH JUST THE LINE-READINGS SHE GAVE IN THIS MOVIE. (EXTRA CREDIT IN THE COURSE TO THE LINE-READINGS OF ALAN RICKMAN AND MAGGIE SMITH. IN ANYTHING).
Best Director
Michael Mann's "Collateral" may not have been the best film of the year, but this coolly attenuated thriller was certainly one of the best directed. Mann steered the film away from the script's less plausible detours with sharp, clean execution and visceral action scenes, turning this nocturnal cab tour of L.A. into one of the most riveting rides of the year. Like the characters that he is so drawn to -- both criminal and civilian -- Mann is a consummate professional doing a consummate job and deserves recognition.EDITOR'S NOTE: HAVE WE FORGIVEN HIM FOR "MIAMI VICE" YET?
Marc Forster was considered by many a shoe-in for directing the Best Picture nominee, "Finding Neverland" (the Director's Guild certainly thought so when they gave him one of the final five noms), but Richard Linklater's graceful, un-showy direction in "Before Sunset," and Michel Gondry's spirited, inventive, and empathetic work on "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" are just as worthy and just as neglected.
More Thievery:
- Original Screenplay -- Hard to fault the titles in this category, but it's still too bad that room could not have been made for Bill Condon's intelligent and insightful "Kinsey" or Joshua Marston's sympathetic "Maria Full of Grace."
- Adapted Screenplay -- I'm at a loss to explain why "Before Sunset" is considered an adapted screenplay rather than an original screenplay: What exactly is this sequel to the 1995 original screenplay adapted from? Regardless of its pedigree, the words are wonderful and the nomination well deserved.
- Cinematography -- How did the sleek, steely, night saturated work of Dion Beebe and Paul Cameron on "Collateral" miss the cut?
- Animated Film -- Anyone who has seen "Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence" knows that that it is a more ambitious and adventurous film than the tongue-in-cheek "Shark Tale" and "Shrek 2."
- Original Score -- While I have a certain fondness for the Michael Giacchino's playful tip of the hat to the James Bond-ian musical mood in "The Incredibles," I'm more perplexed by the continued absence of Jon Brion's delectable minimalist film compositions. This year he had a pair of perfect scores: "I Heart Huckabees" and "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind." Time for some recognition...
-------------Sean Axmaker is a film critic for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and a DVD columnist for the Internet Movie Database. He is a regular contributor to Amazing Stories, Asian Cult Cinema, Greencine.com, and StaticMultimedia.com.
EDITOR'S NOTE: BUT WAIT...MORE KVETCHING AND SECOND-GUESSING!
Missing persons
Some familiar names are conspicuous by their absence from Oscar nom list.
By Gregg Kilday
Where was Paul Giamatti, the hapless loser in "Sideways"? Liam Neeson, the brave sex researcher in "Kinsey"? Marc Forster, the director of best picture nominee "Finding Neverland"?
Inevitably, Oscar announcements are as much about the omissions as they are a celebration of those who make the grade.Many expected Giamatti, who spoofed his relative obscurity last weekend on "Saturday Night Live," to be recognized for "Sideways," even if he was fighting an uphill battle to win Academy kudos for a comedy.Leonardo DiCaprio, who was nominated in that category, said of Giamatti's absence, "He's a fantastic actor, and he gave a great performance in that movie. I'm a huge fan of that performance. I was surprised." If there was any comfort to be had, it was that Giamatti wasn't alone. "A lot of people were missing," noted his "Sideways" co-star Thomas Haden Church. "Javier Bardem (of 'The Sea Inside') and Liam Neeson weren't nominated either. It was a tough field." EDITOR'S NOTE: AND JIM CARREY.
Laura Linney, the lone nominee from "Kinsey," agreed. "I certainly wish Liam had been nominated and that (writer-director) Bill Condon had gotten some more recognition."
As for "Neverland," producer Richard Gladstein said that, despite seven nominations, "The bittersweet part is that our director is not a part of the seven. It's surprising. I have no idea why."Seconded the film's nominated screenwriter David Magee: "When a film gets nominated for seven awards, the man at the helm should really get some credit. It's a disappointment for me, and I think he deserved it."
Plenty of other names, who at one time and according to various handicappers looked to figure in to this year's Oscar race, were left standing by the wayside. Kevin Spacey wasn't hailed for playing Bobby Darin in "Beyond the Sea," Al Pacino for playing Shylock in "The Merchant of Venice," Emmy Rossum for enduring the phantom's advances in "The Phantom of the Opera," Meryl Streep for plotting against the government in "The Manchurian Candidate" or Cloris Leachman for dispensing wisdom in "Spanglish."
But it's almost as if every nominee, each too aware of who assisted them in their quest for a nom, had a private list of regrets. Kate Winslet, for example, while enjoying her acting nomination for "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," regretted that the movie's cinematographer, Ellen Kuras, wasn't sharing in the spotlight.
Music nominations lack star power of years past
Conventional wisdom sometimes turns out to be just that: conventional.
On the music side, at least, the 2005 Academy Award nominations finally might put to rest the old saw that the Golden Globes are a harbinger of Oscar things to come.
This year, the Academy saw fit to ignore the Globe winners in both the original motion picture score and song categories.Three-time Oscar winner Howard Shore's score for "The Aviator," the top-nominated picture with 11 noms, was disqualified by the Academy's music branch, while Mick Jagger and Dave Stewart's song "Old Habits Die Hard," written for the remake of "Alfie," failed to secure Oscar favor. EDITOR'S NOTE: AND OF COURSE, THE BEST SCORE OF THE YEAR, CLINT EASTWOOD'S SCORE FROM "MILLION DOLLAR BABY" DIDN'T GET NOMINATED CAUSE SOMEONE AT HIS COMPANY NEGLECTED TO FILE THE PAPERWORK!
Musing on this year's best song field, nominee Glen Ballard said: "There are surprises that pop up every now and then. It makes me think that people are really listening. They're not just checking out what's familiar."EDITOR'S NOTE: OH GET REAL. 75-85% OF ALL BEST SONG OSCARS GO TO SONGS THAT ARE....EXCUSE THE FRENCH...CRAP.
Ballard's "The Polar Express" collaborator Alan Silvestri said, "All of these things move in some kind of wave, and it's come around to this kind of configuration (in the category) right now."
The absence of the Rolling Stones' Jagger and Eurythmics' Stewart robs the best song slot of some star allure. The original song category has long been the Oscars' destination for music biz glitter, but this year -- once again dodging the conventional -- the music branch has largely ignored familiar pop names.
Rock band Counting Crows' "Shrek 2" entry "Accidentally in Love" is the only nominee by an established chart power. It was probably this year's slam-dunk nominee: "Shrek 2" spawned the biggest soundtrack album of 2004, currently homing in on 1 million units sold.
Songwriter-producer Ballard, noted for his work establishing singer-songwriter Alanis Morissette's career, collaborated with Silvestri on the nominated tune "Believe" from "The Polar Express."
A new song by Andrew Lloyd Webber for the screen version of his Broadway evergreen "The Phantom of the Opera" and two foreign-language compositions for independent pictures complete the best song field.
The latter songs are by writers far better known at home than they are abroad. Bruno Coulais -- who co-wrote "Vos Sur Ton Chemin" for the best foreign-language film nominee "The Chorus" ("Les Choristes") with lyricist and director Christophe Barratier -- has racked up two Cesar Awards in his native France, where the soundtrack album was a huge smash. Jorge Drexler, who penned "Al Otro Lado Del Rio" for "The Motorcycle Diaries," has captured a Latin Grammy Award nomination.EDITOR'S NOTE: AND JUST TO INSURE THE SONG NOMINEES' SLIDE INTO OBSCURITY, MOST OF THEM WILL BE SONG BY BEYONCE. SO NOT ONLY WEREN'T THEY ALL THAT DISTINCTIVE TO BEGIN WITH, NOW THEY'LL ALL DEFINITELY BLEND TOGETHER!
The original score category is split between first-time nominees Jan A.P. Kaczmarek ("Finding Neverland") and John Debney ("The Passion of the Christ") and Academy war horses John Williams, James Newton Howard and Thomas Newman, now with a total of 56 nominations (seven for Newman, six for Howard and -- tying Alfred Newman's record in the music categories -- 43 for WilliamsEDITOR'S NOTE: GO, JOHNNY, GO!!) to their credit.
Kaczmarek said he was thrilled to be part of a strong field this year but wasn't shy in evaluating his dark horse status. "I'm in the company of such extraordinary composers," he said. "It's great, great company to be with. My chances, I wouldn't speculate ... (but) I would say shamelessly that I'm not in a totally hopeless situation here."
Stirring the sources
Rex Pickett, author of the novel upon which Alexander Payne's Oscar-nominated "Sideways" is based, likes to say, "I did better last year than Thackeray."
The reference is to William Makepeace Thackeray's classic 19th-century novel "Vanity Fair," adapted by Julian Fellowes for the Reese Witherspoon movie that came and went last fall and has been forgotten during awards season.
In that comparison is a hint of the challenge that faces screenwriters who peer into the pages of books (or other sources, like plays) and try to figure out how to turn the words into images.
I don't think Pickett would claim he wrote a better novel than Thackeray. But the screenwriters' branch of the Motion Picture Academy believes that Payne and his writing partner, Jim Taylor, have written a better adaptation than Fellowes.
Payne and Taylor share this year's Adapted Screenplay Oscar ballot with "Million Dollar Baby" screenwriter Paul Haggis, "Finding Neverland's" David Magee, "Motorcycle Diaries'" Jose Rivera, and the four authors of "Before Sunset."
As they count down to the Oscars, the nominees may reasonably wonder: On what basis will the Academy gauge their work and pick the winner? Will they simply vote for the movie they like best, or will they read the source material to see what the nominees did with it?
"My hunch, regrettably, is that not many read," says Robert Towne, who has been Oscar-nominated for two original screenplays (winning for "Chinatown") and two adaptations. "I think they vote for the movie they like best." EDITOR'S NOTE: SAFE BET. NOT TOO MANY PEOPLE IN HOLLYWOOD CAN READ, WOULD BE MY GUESS. BUT THE AWARD IS STILL FOR BEST MOVIE-MAKING, SO I DON'T THINK I'D QUARREL TOO MUCH WITH HOW THIS IS DETERMINED.
This is hardly an Oscar outrage. The Academy has been splitting screenplay awards into "original" and "adapted" categories for a half century, without protest, and it's safe to assume that voters never bothered to read all the source material.
But having read the novel, the book of short stories, the play and the two diaries behind the current nominees, I recommend it to anyone who has an interest in the process of filmmaking. EDITOR'S NOTE: ACTUALLY, THAT WOULD BE A FUN CHALLENGE. WE SHOULD TRY THIS SOME TIME.
The 2004 nominees present a wide range of challenges, from "Before Sunset," which has no conventional source, to "Sideways," which is about as faithful to a novel as a screenplay can be.
"Rex wrote a story that was pretty solid," Taylor says. "And the dialogue was good. That's a gift when you're adapting."
Still, the choices Payne and Taylor made in distilling and refining the characters and events in the novel were brilliant. The novel, which follows two middle-age friends on a girl-chasing tour of California wine country, is bawdier than the movie, at times spilling into slapstick.
"I was a little afraid the movie would be trivial, or just a farce," Taylor says. "We wanted to make sure you are not completely repelled by these people." EDITOR'S NOTE: THEY CAME RIGHT UP TO THE EDGE SEVERAL TIMES, I GOTTA SAY. (AND DWEEBPAL KARLA WOULD PROBABLY SAY WAY OVER IT, SEEING AS HOW SHE DUBBED "SIDEWAYS" HER "TITANIC" JUST THIS MORNING!)
The major change made in the adaptation was to Maya, a divorced waitress who begins dating Miles, a failed writer with a crush on Pinot Noir wines. In the book, Maya accepts $1,000 from Miles' friend Jack to sleep with Miles.
"We didn't want to see her do that," says Taylor. If she had, it's unlikely that Virginia Madsen, who plays Maya, would be a front-runner for Best Supporting Actress.
The best example from "Sideways" of great adaptation writing is the scene, likely to become a classic, in which Miles and Maya end their first date by revealing themselves through their feelings about wine. In a speech that contains 133 words, Miles describes the Pinot grape in a way that subtly but unmistakably describes his own fragile nature.
"How about you?" he says, when he's finished.
In a speech four words longer, Maya describes her relatively recent discovery of fine wines in a way that reveals how she has been opened to life after a cloistered marriage.
It's a love scene, and a beauty. But, here's how author Rex Pickett described it in the novel: "We sipped the Tantara and talked on for what seemed like hours ..."
Pickett saw the speeches evolve in the drafts sent to him. "It just blew me away," he says of the scripted scene. "I wish it was in the novel." EDITOR'S NOTE: OK. THAT JUST GAVE ME GOOSEBUMPS. THAT THE LANGUAGE OF FILM CAN BE EVEN MORE LITERARY....AND LITERATE....THAN THE SOURCE NOVEL. NEAT!
TWO TALES BECOME ONE
Paul Haggis, a first-time screenwriter, nearly gulps when he says that director Clint Eastwood shot his first draft of "Million Dollar Baby" - "every word of it."
"When I wrote it, I knew it was a troubled script and that it would probably end up in a drawer," Haggis says. "Luckily, I found an artist who could bring it to life."
"Million Dollar Baby" is adapted from two of the six short stories in the late F. X. Toole's "Rope Burns." Haggis says he got to know Toole before he died and used him as the model for boxing trainer Frankie Dunn. He found Frankie in the story titled "Million Dollar Baby," which traces Frankie's relationship with his female protege Maggie Fitzgerald. That story is the through-line for the script, and ends the same way.
Haggis found Scrap Iron Dupris (Morgan Freeman) in the story "Frozen Water" and made him both Frankie's best friend and the story's narrator. "I'm not a big fan of narration," EDITOR'S NOTE: I'VE ALWAYS RESPECTED PAUL HAGGIS, BUT NOW EVEN MORE. NARRATION IS USUALLY A VERY BAD SIGN. A SIGN THAT THE MOVIE-MAKERS DON'T KNOW HOW TO SHOW US WHAT WE NEED TO KNOW, AND FEEL THEY HAVE TO TELL US. BUT HE'S RIGHT....IN "MILLION DOLLAR BABY", IT WORKS. he says, "but I felt I needed it to tell Frankie's interior journey and externalize it."
Having Scrap narrate also gave Haggis a chance to use Toole's intimate descriptions of the fight game. I'm no fan of narration, either, but the writing here - a collaboration between Toole and Haggis - is as good as it gets.
Frankie's estrangement from his own daughter is not to be found in "Rope Burns."
"I went through a painful period with my own daughter," Haggis says. "I made mistakes that I felt very guilty about. You take things from your own life and use them."
"Before Sunset" doesn't really belong on this ballot. A sequel to the 1995 "Before Sunrise," it is almost entirely dialogue, and all of it original.
But the Academy rule book says that all sequels are adaptations, even when they're not.
"I wish we'd been nominated for an original screenplay, which is what it is," says actress Julie Delpy, who shares the writing credit with co-star Ethan Hawke, director Richard Linklater and writer Kim Krizan. "But I'm just glad to be nominated."
Magee, another first-time screenwriter, adapted Allan Knee's play "The Man Who Was Peter Pan" on spec more than six years ago. It drew dust until Marc Forster signed on to direct it and lit up like Tinkerbell when Johnny Depp said he wanted to star as "Peter Pan" author J.M. Barrie.
The play is very different from the script. "The Man Who Was Peter Pan" is a rather sober affair following Barrie from his meeting with the children who would inspire the Lost Boys to late in his life after most of them had grown up and died. Magee narrowed the focus to the period when Barrie was conceiving "Peter Pan."
"For me, the arc of the story was Barrie as a man who wants to remain a boy forever, and Peter is a boy who has to grow up too quickly," says Magee. "The condensing of time determined which aspects to leave in and what to take out." EDITOR'S NOTE: YES, BUT THE LATER STORY IS WORTH READING ABOUT. YOU HAVE TO PRETTY MUCH LOOK AT THE MOVIE AS FICTION, SO MUCH CHANGES WITH THE CHARACTERS' LATER LIVES.
In both the play and the movie, the central conflict is between Barrie and Peter, who resents Barrie taking his dead father's place.
"I always saw them ending up on the park bench having changed each other," Magee says. "Barrie has grown up and takes care of those around him, and Peter allows himself to grieve."
For "Motorcycle Diaries," a buddy movie based on a cross-South America trip taken by the future revolutionary Che Guevara and his friend Alberto Granado in the early 1950s, New York playwright Jose Rivera was given the men's published diaries about that trip.
Rivera says he relied mostly on Che's diary for feelings and on Granado's for details. What wasn't in the books, he got from interviews that the film's director, Walter Salles, conducted with the elderly Granado in Cuba. "What Walter brought back was invaluable for getting into Che's head," Rivera says.
His main objective was to avoid "looking back on the great man from history."
"We wanted no knowledge of the future," Rivera says. "The only violence is when Che throws a rock at a truck, and there is no epiphany - the moment when he takes up the cause of the people."
AND THE WINNER IS...
So, considering the sources, what was the best adapted script in 2004? Before I started reading, I would have said either "Sideways" or "Million Dollar Baby," which happen to have been my favorite movies last year. I still feel they're the best.
All things considered, however, Haggis had the biggest challenge. He had to a find a central story among Toole's six and shape it in a way that would allow the director to realize Toole's unique and poetic perspective on the boxing world. That he accomplished it with the first draft of his first script is amazing, and if he wins for it, he'll have the perfect ending.
Still, my heart is with "Sideways," one of the greatest screenplay comedies ever written. Even having read everything, if I were marking a ballot, I'd probably do what everyone else does and vote for the movie I like best.
posted by QOTD (the Queen of the Dweebs) at 2:57 PM
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