Kevin Spacey's Career Is Kaput
In case you haven't heard, the string of sexual assault revelations out of Hollywood continues, and this past week's primary perpetrator was Kevin Spacey (Se7en, House of Cards). Once one of the more celebrated actors of our time, that is no longer the case after multiple men, including Star Trek: Discovery actor Anthony Rapp and Richard Dreyfuss's son Harry, came out and revealed their stories of being assaulted by Spacey. What was particularly shocking and disturbing were the ages of some of these victims. Rapp and Dreyfuss were both teenagers; Dreyfuss was even assaulted while his father was in the room, unaware that Spacey was groping his son while rehearsing a script. It made his lackluster apology (where he came out as gay) sound hollow in light of the new information. In light of all of this, Netflix has fired Spacey from flagship show House of Cards's final season and canceled post-production on their Gore Vidal film starring Spacey. All the Money in the World, in which he was directed by Ridley Scott, has canceled its Oscar campaign and was pulled from AFI Film Fest, and the fate of Billionaire Boys Club is still undetermined. I think it is safe to assume this is the death knell of Kevin Spacey's career, and in the shake-up happening in the film industry (both press and production), this is a good thing.
They're Taking the Hobbits to...Amazon Prime?
In one of the most bizarre tales of film and television news, Amazon Studios is in talks with the Tolkien estate to adapt The Lord of the Rings for television. In a long history of bad ideas, this is not one of the worst (examples of those would be in the prior story), but it is certainly not the best. Peter Jackson's original Lord of the Rings films still stand up amazingly well fifteen years later, and it still feels fresh considering we got the Hobbit trilogy only a couple of years ago. I can understand why Amazon may want to pursue this option. The Middle-Earth legendarium is mind-numbingly vast, and the Lord of the Rings story alone is well-structured for a series (it's composed of six books of around 10 chapters that have their own arcs). But considering the price for the rights alone ($200-250 million), and God knows the budget for producing the story for television, it would be wise for Amazon to shop elsewhere for a fantasy property, or at least revisit it in a decade. Maybe once Elijah Wood ages.
Mickey Mouse Continues to Take Over the World
After purchasing Marvel Entertainment and Lucasfilm, announcing their intentions to start a Disney-exclusive streaming service, demanding 65-70% of profits and ornery restrictions from Star Wars: The Last Jedi for all movie theaters, and banning the Los Angeles Times from prescreening any of their movies (with other publications standing in solidarity), the Mouse House continues its goal for world domination (are we sure Pinky and the Brain aren't the mice in charge?) by having off-and-on talks to purchase most of 21st Century Fox, including its film studio 20th Century Fox, one of the original Hollywood studios.. This deal, if pursued, would exclude Fox News (insert joke here), Fox Business, and Fox Sports. So on the one hand, the X-Men and the Fantastic Four return to Marvel Studios. On the other hand, Walt Disney Studios is developing into the right hand of the Antichrist. Pixar's Coco is in theaters this Thanksgiving.
Warner Bros. Wants the Oscars to Float, Too
Horror author and Hollywood's hottest property Stephen King recently retweeted a Screen Geek article that detailed Warner Bros. plans to launch an Oscar campaign for monster hit It in every eligible category, with Sophia Lillis (Bev) as their horse in the acting race. This fascinates me. I think it would be great representation for the horror genre, which has had a historically low presence at the ceremony, if It were nominated. Does it (haha!) have a chance, though? Let's break it down.
Screen Geek suggests that the studio will push for a Best Picture, Best Directing, and Best Adapted Screenplay nod. As much as I dug the movie, I think it has as much a chance getting a nomination in these categories as Georgie does getting his paper boat back. It's a great movie, but one has to consider that horror is so rarely represented at the Oscars as is that it would take more than a Stand by Me meets Nightmare on Elm Street take on the story to garner a nomination in any of these categories. Even with Adapted Screenplay, while it is a marvelous product of a tremendous undertaking to adapt half of King's doorstopper, it just doesn't seem like the Oscars are going to take the bait. I'm hoping The Big Sick gets a nomination in the Screenplay category, and the talk of the town is that Get Out is going to be represented in all three of these. With these in mind, it doesn't look like It has a chance in the screenplay category, and Get Out, while I didn't love it as much as I did It, has enough commentary, subtext, and originality to be the horror/thriller representative of this year's Oscar ceremony. Even if the Academy is generous to genre films this year, they're more apt to give Guillermo del Toro's romantic monster fairytale The Shape of Water some love over It.
Now for the rest. I thought all the actors were fantastic in It, especially the Losers Club. I am glad Sophia Lillis is getting some love from the studio for her emotionally difficult performance as Bev, but I'm surprised they're not campaigning for the star of the show: Bill Skarsgard as Pennywise! His may be my favorite performance of the year--unpredictable, memorable, and original--so they must be expecting a stacked category in the male Acting awards. I think there are chances for nominations in all of the other categories. My memory of the film is too fuzzy to try to explain why it should or should not be nominated for Editing or Sound Mixing, and I haven't heard enough film Scores this year to make a sound call. I would not, however, hedge my bets on the Visual Effects category. While I appreciated the otherwordly, unsettling, and weird Pennywise effects and the Beetlejuice vibe they gave off, they were one of the most divisive parts of the film. With Planet of the Apes, Star Wars, and so many other effects-heavy blockbusters to nominate, I don't see it happening.
That's my take on the news. What do you think? Do you want to see It get some Oscar love? What chance do you think it has? Should Amazon take on Tolkien, and is Disney out of control? Whatever you have to say about me or the movies, comment below!
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