Jake Gittes

It's not the matter of good or bad. The next weekend is not exactly a holiday one, mid-Dec openers like KK, TL, SH2, IAL all dropped over 50% there. I think the best case scenario for TH would be a 46% drop of Alice in Wonderland. But it will stabilize after that. IAL dropped 18% on the Dec 28-30 weekend, I think TH could easily have a sub-15% drop to go along with great weekdays.

When it comes to the main categories, I think ZDT is most likely to win Actress, then Screenplay, then BP, then BD. There is at least one other tough contender in the first two categories (Lawrence and QT), Les Mis, Lincoln, SLP, LOP are all more safe BP choices, and Bigelow's recent win will almost definitely prevent her from taking BD again.Right at this point, I think Lincoln wins BP, BD, Actor and Adapted, ZDT wins Actress and Django wins Original. The only bad thing about that scenario would be SLP missing out on all actual awards, but if Chastain and Tony Kushner's work is truly worth it, I won't lose any sleep over it.

Strange that WB didn't even round it up to $85m for the sake of a nice estimate figure, but anyway. Decent number, not really bad but not great either. As for the total, I'll be glad if it at least passes FOTR and maybe takes a crack at AIW/TTT. Any result over $350m should be considered great after this.

I know the same has been said a lot about AUJ, but I'd be very surprised if it didn't. I think it can jump to a $45m Friday and, from there on, to a $105-110m OW. I'd hesitate to predict more though.A lot is going to depend on Smaug, I think - if they really up the stakes as far as the confrontation with him is concerned and indicate so in the promos, a $100m OW will be substantially easier to do.

Seems good for at least $85m on OW and a $325m total. Underwhelming relative to expectations, yes, but still a definite success. Hopefully The Desolation of Smaug pulls off a $100m Dec OW, the WOM should be there for it, and if they nail and successfully sell Smaug in the trailers, they'll be in great shape for a better run than this. I also wonder if PJ is going to take notice of the one widespread criticism of AUJ and give TDOS a tighter edit, perhaps bringing it under 150 minutes. I can't imagine the movie being hurt in any way if he did that.Wouldn't be shocked if AUJ made its way to $350m if it really takes advantage of the holidays, although over 370 seems to be a stretch at this point. So yeah I'd say the very early range is 325-370, and if closer, then 335-360. Let's see how it develops. Personally I predicted 123/430 several weeks ago and started leaning towards 105-110/380-410 in the past several days, so yeah it won't meet those expectations. But, like I said, I don't find anything terribly disappointing about its run and its prospects so far.

If either Di Caprio, Jackson or Hoffman miss out on a nomination because of Arkin... talk about yet another one in a long line of Oscar fuck-ups.

That whole scene terrified me more than anything in Psycho or any other Hitchcock film I've seen. That level of suspense is simply unparalleled.

Buried - the endingMemento - the twistThe Departed - elevator Killer Joe - the chicken legEnd of Watch - the alleywayThere Will Be Blood - the fireAll About Eve - Eve's true selfCabaret - "Tomorrow belongs to me"Chinatown - "my sister, my daughter"Videodrome - "long live the new flesh"L.A. Confidential - Animal Kingdom - the grandmother's revealThe Dark Knight - "the clowns are hostages"The Sunset Limited - White's final monologueThe Tenant - the main character sees himselfLet the Right One In - the swimming pool scenePulp Fiction - "oh man, I shot Marvin in the face"Battle Royale - the whole instructions sequenceFear and Loathing in Las Vegas - the diner sceneTo Live and Die in LA - a shotgun blast to the faceA Serious Man & Take Shelter - the tornado endingsRear Window - the murderer goes after Jimmy StewartInglourious Basterds - "I'll switch back to English now..."Once Upon a Time in the West - flashback with the hangingThe Conversation - the realization of what was actually saidLost Highway - the second time "Dick Laurent is dead" is saidShutter Island - the realization of what happened to the childrenIrréversible - the realization The Proposition - Arthur Burns visits captain Stanley's houseWe Need to Talk About Kevin - Kevin walks out of the school, hands up

Turns out I was the only guy to vote for TTSS, Irreversible, The Third Man, Days of Heaven, Benjamin Button, TGWTDT, 1492: Conquest of Paradise, Godfather II and Once Upon a Time in America. Some of these aren't surprising but others really are. Half of these soundtracks I can hardly imagine anyone not putting in their top list, unless they haven't seen the films. Also, me and baumer were the only ones to vote for Angel Heart. Heh.Other thing that surprised me was how low ROTK is. I think it's a way better, more memorable and powerful score than TTT and at least on par with FOTR.

It's great, but in both its subject and its attitude it's not a very friendly film... to anyone.

Glad Chinatown, TSN and OUATITW made it

For fuck's fucking sake.

I probably was a nolanite for a very short time during a month after the release of TDK, and I anticipated very few films to an extent I anticipated Inception, but I certainly saw flaws in both films and it took me one time to see TDKR to consider it Nolan's first bad film. I will say that Memento is one of my all-time favorite films, and I'll defend Nolan from any elitist types who regard him and his success with contempt (I know a few of such people personally), but I'm not a nolanite. I understand why his work would provoke such an enthusiastic response in many people, but I simply consider him a very gifted and talented filmmaker with both strengths and weaknesses.The only contemporary filmmaker who I'm an absolute unabashed fan of (meaning I love every single one of his movies to death) is Quentin Tarantino, but that's a matter of another discussion.

"In an action movie".

Django Unchained missing out on ANY acting nominations is just plain fucked up. Especially when Arkin and Bardem are in there.

The Turin Horse.

One of the two or three greatest damn films of this century so far. PTA, DDL and everyone else all quite simply at the top of their game.

THL was a character study about a war junkie. ZDT is supposedly a procedural thriller with an obsessed main character a la Zodiac. The obsession angle seems pretty similar, as well as the setting, but ZDT has a more sprawling cast & running time and the objects of obsession are pretty different. Also THL was very apolitical and the same is being said about ZDT.

Alright, come on now. There are great performances, there are Phoenix-level performances, there are DDL-level performances, and then there is Denis Lavant in Holy Motors. Get some balls and give the man some fucking awards.

I can't call myself a big supporter of either Riva or Amour, but even I won't deny she has a perfectly fair chance to be nominated. Hell, at this point, the only two contenders with a noticeably better chance to get in than her are Chastain and Lawrence (who, by the way, hasn't won a single award for her performance yet), and then she basically has as much of a chance as Cotillard, Wallis, Watts and Weisz. Arguably even a better chance than the last two. What would make someone run around trying to prove she's a non-lock (and nobody ever claimed she's locked) I have no idea.

Good to see Moonrise tying for 2nd place for Cinematography. It deserves it completely

Gitesh Pandya ‏@giteshpandya WKND BO: #Skyfall $11M/$261.6M, Guardians $10.5M/$61.9M, Twilight $9.2M/$268.7M, Lincoln $9.1M/$97.3M, Pi $8.3M/$60.9M.

Gitesh Pandya ‏@giteshpandya #Skyfall now bigger than DarkKnightRises at Intl BO w/ $656.6M. $918.2M global, Sony's top grosser ever beating Spidey3.

Definitely. It's now ahead of New Moon by over $1m when it was behind it by $700k last weekend.

Well, it doesn't happen that often, and I personally loved watching HTTYD run. Also, someone has already asked this question a day or two ago.