Indie Spirits Awards Winners
This year will be heavy on “Win on Saturday Friday, Lose On Sunday” with one major exception…
I’ll start by offering the film that will win the most ISAs.
PRECIOUS
BEST FEATURE
BEST DIRECTOR
BEST FIRST SCREENPLAY
BEST FEMALE LEAD
BEST SUPPORTING FEMALE (aka, the very possible exception)
And…
BEST SCREENPLAY
(500) Days Of Summer
BEST FIRST FEATURE
The Messenger
BEST MALE LEAD
Jeff Bridges
BEST SUPPORTING MALE
Christopher Plummer
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Roger Deakins
BEST DOCUMENTARY
Anvil! The Story of Anvil
BEST FOREIGN FILM
An Education
ROBERT ALTMAN AWARD – (Given to one film’s director, casting director, and its ensemble cast)
A Serious Man
(This one is announced, not enveloped… because somehow, the film is eligible for everything BUT Best Picture… and they know Precious is winning… so…)
There is a good chance that all but two of these winners will be an Oscar nominee at the time as well.
Anyone wondering about The Hurt Locker should note that they ran it last year, even though it had not yet been released. That should not have been allowed last year. But ironically, it clears the path for Precious and some other categories this year.
RULES FOR ELIGIBILITY
1. All submitted films must be at least 70 minutes long.
2. Cost of completed film, including post, must be less than $20 million. Any variations are at the sole discretion of the nominating committee. (For verification purposes, all films with total budgets exceeding $15 million or films with budgets under $500,000 applying for the Cassavetes Award are required to submit the top sheets from the film’s Final Cost Report.)
3. Eligible films must have either:
– Been shown a minimum of once a day for one week (7 days) in a commercial theater between January 1 and December 31, 2009; or
– Been shown in 2009 at one of the following six film festivals: The Los Angeles Film Festival, New Directors/New Films, New York, Sundance, Telluride, or Toronto. Films that have or will have domestic theatrical distribution should be submitted the year of their theatrical run.
You know, the thing is, I think that the folks at FIND are sincere about doing this the right way, especially that people who serve on nominating committees. But with the exception of little Oscilloscope, it’s another year of The Dependents & Lionsgate being given another promotional opportunity.
Isn’t there a way to give a shout out to the big “indie” movies of the year each year, while still celebrating the true indies in some real way other than with a few non-started nominations and a couple of “it’s soooo small’ categories? I mean, even the “Best First…” categories are invaded by the bigger movies, which are pretty much assured of winning by what is a popular vote for the wins, as anyone is $95 ($60 for students) away from casting an ISA vote, which is a great bargain on screenings alone.
I imagine I will be in the room, as usual, in March, enjoying the camaraderie and gift bag. I invest a lot of time each year with the people in that room. I support the idea of the Indie Spirits and FIND in a real way. It’s just so frustrating that it is so hard to get right. Part of it is the nature of putting on a TV show that funds a significant percentage of your not-for-profit. Part of it is that the FIND board is made up primarily by studio Dependent execs. If you look at the various committees listed in the Indie Spirit press release, it’s the same group of people deciding these things every year.
This was not a great year for true indies. I was asked to nominate for a couple of the industry awards and I didn’t find it easy to find candidates that stood out this year. It’s not that there wasn’t good work being done, but as the resulting nominations show, there are only so many ones to watch in most years.
And I am sick of slapping at these nominations every year… which is why I didn’t wake up early and go down to see the nominations live. I would have spent 20 minutes afterward chasing my tail, trying to get a direct answer about how A Serious Man qualified for everything but Best Picture. (The answer probably is that it did qualify for Best Picture, but that committee had different priorities than other committees… and a Single Man nod would have made two for Focus, which would piss off Searchlight, Lionsgate, and Sony Classics… and they could never give up the “kinda unreleased” slot that Amreeka gets this year after a 40 screen self-distribution by National Geographic, making it the Great Lost Indie of 2009… and what if A Serious Man upset the ISA apple cart for Precious, which they would like to think could be a Sunday winner this year. But perhaps I am being too cynical and the symmetry, this year as most years, is just a coincidence.)
Congrats to all the nominees. None of you deserve my institutional disdain diminishing your achievements. I just wish I could get through one of these nominations announcements thinking, “Yeah… they pretty much got it right… it feels indie… they haven’t left people out… there aren’t Oscar nominated English-language films set to steal the foreign film category thunder (even if the film is deserving)… all the players are there… it doesn’t feel like the nods were dealt out so much as considered…”
Maybe next year.
(EDIT: I made The Single/Serious Man Error in the next to last graph… now corrected)
(EDIT 2: Much as I love the idea of “reculting,” it was a typo.)
Of all categories, I really thought “A Serious Man” would be in there under Best Screenplay and would, in fact, win. If “(500) Days of Summer” ends up winning Best Original Screenplay at the Oscars, I wonder which won – Neustadter or Weber – will continue the tradition of having a nude online photo scandal soon thereafter.
“one”
I love this awards show and all but WHERE THE HELL IS “MOON?!?!?!?!?!” Is it a foreign film or something?? If it’s not and was just passed over, that’s outrageous.
A Single Man is Weinstein Company. A Serious Man is Focus. But you knew that.
Actually, that was a classic Single/Serious typo. I meant Serious where Single was.
So who is going to beat Jeff Bridges on Sunday?
Freeman’s stock will likely fall with the lukewarm critical reception, no?
Jeremy Renner! *sigh*
Why is The Messenger not in the conversation for Best Picture? Lack of marketing budget, I suppose…but it’s easily in the top 5 of the year IMO. Nice to see Woody Harrelson and Samantha Morton get nominations here, but Ben Foster was robbed.
Agree about Foster. All three did outstanding jobs but Foster had the “quiet” role…the kind that goes unnoticed.
And again…can anyone tell me why “Moon” was snubbed?? Was it straight up snubbed or was it not eligible for some reason?? I can’t imagine passing over Duncan Jones for Best First feature or even Someone to Watch. Obviously the specific categories (best feature, screenplay) are a bigger matter of taste and whatnot, but c’mon. No Rockwell for Best Actor?? Just….wow.
Moon is a Sony pick-up and I believe its UK funding DQs it from the ISAs, like An Education. These are actually The Independent American Spirit Awards.
I haven’t seen any of the December releases, but Harrelson and Morton would be my choices for supporting actor and actress at this point.
David, for the love of all that is holy, please proofread! I just spent time looking up the word “reculting” so I could understand what you meant by “the reculting nominations.” I feel a little sheepish now that I realize that you must meant “resulting.”
Grrrrr.
And of course after scolding you for a lack of proofreading, I see that I left out the word “have” as in, “…you must have meant….”
Hi, Pot, I’m Kettle. Nice to meet you.
Anyway, another thing that has my metaphorical panties in a wad: Where the %$*& is Hal Holbrook’s nod???
THANK YOU David…clears it up.
Now I can be peeved “Worlds Greatest Dad” got totally snubbed instead.
Hal Holbrook deserved a Best Actor nomination for That Evening Sun, no doubt about it. But at least his co-stars — Ray McKinnon and Mia Wasikowska — got some richly deserved notice. Maybe that will encourage more people (like voters for other awards) to pop the screeners in their DVD players.
I’m with Don on the worthiness of Moon. Why couldn’t it have been nominated in the Best Foreign Film category?
Good point, Joe. I hope you are right that Academy voters will be more likely to pay attention to That Evening Sun since it did get some ISA noms.
I would think it makes sense for Firth to win at these awards and then lose the Oscar one day later to Bridges. Or vice versa?
leydon — good call on holbrook… unfortunately, the studio said they don’t have much of a budget for a campaign so screeners will be few if any….. maybe the mckinnon/wasikowska nods will prompt them to dig a little deeper…
Scoot: I think they’ve changed their strategy. Screeners have already gone out to the Houston Film Critics Society.
that’s really interesting…could be they’re going for regional appeal as teems was big on pushing the ‘southern gothic’ aspect of the film….
Hal Holbrook was so heartbreaking in Into the Wild, why is he not recognized for anything?! Dave, sure you won’t be the first to confuse Serious & Single!
Re: screeners for Holbrook…then put up his “nomination reel” on YouTube and send out links to voters! C’mon! You KNOW they don’t have to see the whole film…in any GREAT performance there are one or two scenes that clinch it!