In this morning’s roundup of Oscar news ‘n’ notes from around the web, the Best Actress race apparently nears its conclusion, and Stephen King picks favorites.
If Jeff Wells is right, Natalie Portman will soon have reason to be thankful. The physical training she underwent to play the lead role in “Black Swan,” whittling her body down to dancer proportions and learning the ballet moves, is pretty much going to guarantee her the Best Actress statuette, he says. “Once this settles in among the rank-and-file, it’s over.” He may well be right – but will the movie itself scare away those members of the rank-and-file who, let’s face it, would be entirely comfortable with an Annette Bening win? (Hollywood Elsewhere)
Steve Dollar, meanwhile, explores the making of “Black Swan” with director Darren Aronofsky and co-star Mila Kunis. Aronofsky says that as a “normal boy,” he didn’t connect with ballet until he saw an American Ballet Theater production of “Swan Lake,” a ballet that he claims has pushed many a ballerina “over the edge.” (The Wall Street Journal)
Dave Karger trots out his Best Actress predictions, and both Portman and Bening are in the “Best Bets” category. Surprisingly, so is Bening’s “The Kids Are All Right” co-star Julianne Moore, who many Oscar-watchers think may be overlooked in the rush to reward Bening. Karger’s theory – to which I also subscribe, though I’m not as sure about it as he is – is that voters who love the film will think of the two women as inseparable, and vote for both of them. He has five more actresses competing for the final two slots: Nicole Kidman in “Rabbit Hole,” Jennifer Lawrence in “Winter’s Bone,” Lesley Manville in “Another Year,” Michelle Williams in “Blue Valentine” and, in another surprise of sorts, Halle Berry in “Frankie & Alice.” In the comments section of Karger’s blog, one of his readers then tells you everything you could possibly want to know about the 33 instances in which two actresses were nominated in the same category for the same movie. (OscarWatch)
Moving on to a man who’ll probably win an Oscar … On the eve of the opening of “The King’s Speech” – which only seems as if it’s been out for months, what with all its rapturously-received screenings – Colin Firth talks to Steven Zeitchik about the ways in which playing the stuttering King George VI affected him mentally and, perhaps surprisingly, physically. He also addresses the fact that after acting for 25 years, much of it in comedies, he’s suddenly made two movies in two years (this new one and last year’s “A Single Man”) that have placed him squarely in Oscar contention. “Someone asked me this morning: ‘Did you get better?” he said. “I’ve just carried on doing what it says in the manual.” (Los Angeles Times)
Has Stephen King come up with the year’s first Top 10 list? Probably not, but it’s the first one I’ve seen. Entertainment Weekly hasn’t put it online yet, but Peter Sciretta has the rundown – three films that should figure in the Oscar race (“The Town,” “Inception” and “The Social Network” at numbers two, three and four), a bunch that won’t (“Jackass 3D,” “Kick-Ass,” “Monsters,” “Takers”) and in the top spot, a horror-film remake that got positive reviews but likely isn’t the Academy’s cup of tea, “Let Me In.” (/film)
Scott Feinberg’s anonymous Academy member, “Deep Vote,” reviews three more movies at length, though most of that length seems devoted to recapping the plots. He doesn’t like “Get Low.” He doesn’t like “The Kids Are All Right.” And he likes “The Social Network,” but he doesn’t like Facebook so he hopes he finds a better movie to vote for. I’m getting the feeling that this guy is not much of a guide to how Oscar voters think. (ScottFeinberg.com)
