Jake Gittes

Tom Bennett - Love & Friendship Alden Ehrenreich - Hail, Caesar! Colin Farrell - The Lobster Sarah Gadon and Logan Lerman - Indignation John Goodman - 10 Cloverfield Lane Ryan Gosling - The Nice Guys Kate McKinnon - Ghostbusters Glen Powell - Everybody Wants Some!! Mark Rylance - The BFG Harvey Scrimshaw and Anya Taylor-Joy - The Witch Kristen Stewart - Café Society Everyone - Hell or High Water

Her cracking up during "City of Stars" is such a wonderful touch all by itself. At this point I'm not even sure the Oscar is gonna be "between" anyone, it's hers to lose.

One film is what you asked for. ("what was the last time?") before The Revenant there was Straight Outta Compton. Before that there was American Sniper. Before that there were Gone Girl, American Hustle, Django Unchained, Lincoln, The Help, True Grit. Slumdog Millionaire made 141m eight years ago and that was an English-language Bollywood movie for chrissake. No, I'm not saying LLL will definitely make 150m, I only question you being "100% sure" that it won't. As for musicals you answered your own question. Les Mis stopped just 1m shy of 150. Into the Woods did 128, and that was never in contention for Best Picture. Chicago flew over 150m fourteen years ago.

So... someone predicts this will make 150m, you ask "When was the last time an adult drama made 150m?" seemingly in a counterargument and clearly suggesting that you think this is an adult drama, and when you get an answer, suddenly this isn't so much of an adult drama anymore? So what was the point of your question in the first place? Also, for someone who's been following box office for such a long time, I wouldn't think you'd be "100% sure" about something like this but if that's how you roll. Musicals have made 150m before. Adult dramas have made 150m before. Heavy crowd-pleasing Oscar players have done 150m before. And this is all three in one.

The Revenant, early this year?

I'm gonna melt.

Yep. 10CL too. And when you got a sure-fire huge hit it's not necessary to create a marketing blitz many months beforehand either. I remember when the trailers for Revenge of the Sith and Pirates 3 hadn't come out until March, don't think that hurt them any. When you've got something huge and risky, sure... I think Inception, for example, certainly benefited from generating intrigue for months in advance. But often it's not necessary. Certainly not with the mid-level stuff.

But not the Slant writers.

La La Land is probably going to win Best Picture at next year's Oscars. Full Review… | December 7, 2016 John Lui The Straits Times (Singapore) The best RT blurb.

I don't think it even has to do with kid's roles (does Oz the Great and Powerful star any kids? Does The Muppets?) as much as with genre. If it's a fantasy, an adventure, or otherwise conventionally "family-friendly" it can get a PG. If La La Land were purely an old-fashioned inoffensive precious musical, it might have gotten a PG, but since it also has the relationship drama element they probably decided they don't wanna confuse the audience, even though technically nothing in the film absolutely warrants a PG-13. ("Some language" is the weakest excuse possible). Makes sense, though personally I'm not sure it benefits the movie all that much, it shouldn't be PG-13 just because it feels like it should. I remember from experience that just because a movie's subject matter doesn't seem to be for kids doesn't mean a kid can't get something out of it. Would have been neat if a PG actually encouraged some of them to go check this out. Adults who are interested would all go see it in any case.

Isn't it a thing where studios will actually push for a movie to get a more adult rating than the one it might have otherwise gotten, in order to get across that the movie is "mature" even though in contains no profanity/sex/nudity/violence etc., or simply to not confuse the audience? I think that's the only real reason There Will Be Blood got an R instead of PG-13 (or even PG), they just didn't want teenagers wandering in. Maybe this got PG-13 because they feel that's their audience even though it would have probably been G in 1960s.

I can't wait to see it myself but the runtime really makes me doubt its win.

I'd predict 13th, Eagle Huntress, OJ Made in America, Weiner and Cameraperson. One of the first two will probably win, as they are the main Important one and the main Inspirational one respectively.

They could nominate some good stuff for Musical/Comedy if they knew where to look - there's Everybody Wants Some!!, The Nice Guys, The Edge of Seventeen, Sing Street, The Lobster even. Add La La Land, 20CW and Love and Friendship and it's a decent field.

I'm not even sure why NYSM is in this conversation, I mean it's Fast and Furious with magicians except even dumber than that sounds.

I'm thinking no more than 175 myself. TF4 dropped 30% from TF3, wasn't as well-liked, and this trailer doesn't really show anything new or revelatory in terms of spectacle (don't tell me anyone is watching this shit for story), so it should keep dropping at the same speed. But if it actually drops all the way down to 100-125m... that would be a sight to see.

Demand is there but obviously these movies depend way more on quality and WOM than brand-name blockbusters do, and those are harder to predict, plus it doesn't help that ticket prices are going up and if you've got enough time you can get more and more of a quality adult drama fix on TV. In order to hope for a real breakout, you still gotta rely very heavily on Oscar hype and/or a big-name director applying his style to a story with some big hook to it and/or an actor people like getting cast in exactly the right role. Scorsese, Tarantino, Eastwood, Fincher and DOR's recent hits, plus stuff like Arrival, True Grit and The Revenant, and, on a smaller scale, even The Grand Budapest Hotel and Midnight in Paris, all more or less apply. But it's dismaying that a less show-offy no-frills drama like Manchester By The Sea, despite seeming to resonate a lot with not just cinephiles, has to actively build its WOM in limited release and basically fight to become even a small success (when it would have been one of the highest-grossing films of 1976 and probably even a solid success in 1996). Or that films like Room and Whiplash, the former based on a bestseller and the latter having since penetrated popular consciousness far more than its $13m gross would suggest, aren't placed in good enough conditions to find a sizable theatrical audience in the first place. (Seriously, my ears still remember the applause that erupted at Whiplash's end credits. I remain fascinated by what it could have made if SPC just immediately dropped it into 1500-2000 theaters with some well-placed advertising, and then let WOM do the work). I'm no longer sure where I'm going with this, I guess it's nothing original but yeah, people are interested and producers/studios should work more actively to satisfy that interest, which in turn would hopefully make people more interested, etc. 'Cause every year there are invariably these adult breakouts, big and small, and still every year even the people who produce these films throw their hands up in the air and proclaim that the small/mid-budget film is on the verge of dying. Maybe it won't be if you actually put more faith both in your artists and your audiences. (Arrival's stupid initial theater count is actually another perfect example of this lack of faith).

I would laugh so hard if the audiences actually IDR'd this come June.

High hopes for this after Hell or High Water. One of my most anticipated of 2017. And finally some quality dramatic material for Renner and Olsen to chew on.

IIRC he's said that he enjoys doing these hammy paycheck roles so it probably didn't take too much persuading. Though I do wonder if he's read the script for this 200 times too, seems like that wouldn't be good for your mental health.

Probably a bunch especially since he's gonna be nominated as a producer (and will almost certainly lose).

If that's wrong I don't wanna be right.

I think critics are certainly helping Affleck as well, he's sweeping for now. Sure, so was, say, Jeremy Renner in 2009, but Affleck has been around for longer, is a previous nominee, his movie is looking to break out in the box office, and his only real competitor has already won twice so unless he's absolutely God-level in Fences I think the voters are more likely to recognize Affleck. Ali in a similar boat in relation to Bridges for now. Huppert's awards will obviously never get her close to an actual Oscar, the only question is how many critical awards will Stone and Portman manage to get between them. Supporting Actress is still likely going to Viola with a possible Naomie Harris upset, no change there.