Copious Notes

Best actress winner Kate Winslet, second from left, is congratulated by some of her predecessors in the honor, including Sophia Loren (left), Nicole Kidman (top right), Shirley MacLaine, Halle Berry (right), and Marion Cotillard (foreground). AP Photo | Mark J. Terrill.

They told us they got it.

Nothing speaks louder in television than ratings, and after years of putting on the longest, most bloated awards show out of the majors, dismal ratings (by Oscars standards) in 2008 told the Academy Awards producers they needed to shake things up. They could no longer say it was the Oscars, and people would watch no matter what they did, which is the spirit of actual quotes I’ve seen from Academy directors in the past.

So, we were told this would be a radically different, surprising Academy Awards ceremony.

It did have its moments.

Probably the best were the acting award presentations, featuring five former winners congratulating this year’s nominees. It gave every nominee something to walk away with.

Michael Shannon walks the red carpet with his girlfriend, Kate Arrington. AP Photo/Amy Sancetta.

Just take our Lexington guy, Michael Shannon. We all knew he would not be winning, up against the performance and the emotional backstory of the late Heath Ledger. But he got this heartfelt public tribute from Christopher Walken: “You were right on target. Well done.” Mickey Rourke suffered a mildly surprising defeat, but had Ben Kingsley declare him, “The returning champ.” And each winner walked into the congratulatory embrace of their predecessors. The appreciation of those moments and arrays of best actors and actresses they gave us were really great.

Also great was host Hugh Jackman’s opening number, a recession-era tribute to the best picture nominees. It even included a Dark Knight moment, acknowledging many people felt the Batman movie should have been nominated for best picture and other awards, and the mind-blowing idea of Anne Hathaway playing Richard Nixon.

The producers couched the show in an storyline of talking about how a film is made, starting with screenplay awards and moving into technical honors. Some of the categories were grouped, like all the visual art awards, and that had to help things go faster and brought the show to a close before midnight. But it was a contrived idea that forced the show to awkwardly work in the awards for films that weren’t scripted, live action features and sort of ignored that before all those technical awards, you have to have a director and stars.

The show also tried some things that didn’t work, including a production number — how 1970s! — celebrating the supposed return of the musical, and a film from Judd Apatow and Seth Rogen that was supposed to honor the comedies, but didn’t do much of anything.

This was by no means a bad show. It had some lovely moments, including the beautiful and dignified best supporting actor acceptance speech by Heath Ledger’s family and Queen Latifah’s bittersweet rendition of I’ll Be Seeing You for the film clips of people who passed away last year.

The Academy Awards producers are on the right track trying to refine this thing, and it still is a huge night. But this year’s edition didn’t offer anything to attract people who wouldn’t be tuning in anyway. And in truth, there really is little the producers can do to attract people that aren’t interested in the contenders. It’s not like the Grammy Awards, where you can turn the ceremony into a big concert, and so what if you’re giving all the awards to an album most of America hasn’t heard.

Oscar can’t do that. It needs blockbuster contenders for blockbuster Oscars audiences, and right now, Oscar-worthy and box-office-champ seem to be mutually exclusive terms.

• One thing this year’s Oscars did have over last year’s ratings bomb was a sense of joy. Last year, you could honor the artistry of No Country for Old Men, but it was like cheering on a funeral, the film was so dark and violent, and the Coen brothers seemed to barely register any pleasure in their victory. Slumdog Millionaire, on the other hand, was this uplifting film that brought along an exuberant cast and crew, including a bunch of cute kids.
• Several post-mortems raise the provocative question, should Oscar dump behind-the-scenes and other “minor” categories from the broadcast? I’ve always liked that Oscar gives people like sound designers and short-subject filmmakers a moment in the global spotlight. But can the show ever truly gain momentum unless it relegates some of these honors to pre-gala ceremonies, like other awards shows do?
• Thanks to Hollywood.com for including Copious Notes in its TwitterNation roundup.

Dev Patel, left, and Anil Kapoor in Slumdog Millionaire. Copyrighted AP/Fox Searchlight photo by Ishika Mohan.

Who wouldn’t like a feel-good story right about now: a tale of redemption, an artist getting her due, last respects for a fallen star. Oscar might give us those warm fuzzies Sunday night when the envelopes start opening. Here are my predictions:

Best actor

Mickey Rourke, The Wrestler

His Golden Globe win was a sign that people really liked this fearless performance and liked Rourke. Sean Penn’s Harvey Milk in Milk and Frank Langella’s President Richard Nixon in Frost/Nixon have their adherents. But Mick has been the comeback story of the year in film, and isn’t it about time for a good comeback story?

Best actress

Kate Winslet, The Reader

Who’s more due: Winslet, nominated five times with no win, or Meryl Streep, ­nominated 10 times without a win since 1983 (for Sophie’s Choice)? Bet on ­Winslet, who could have been nominated for The Reader or Revolutionary Road. She’s truly the best actress of 2008.

Supporting actor

Heath Ledger, The Dark Knight

We would love to tell you that Lexington ­native Michael Shannon will win Sunday night, but would you even want to beat the late Ledger, with all the emotion behind this nomination? Ledger will win a well-earned ­posthumous award for a film that should get more recognition. Shannon will be back.

Supporting actress

Penélope Cruz, Vicky Cristina Barcelona

This is the biggest coin toss of the major categories, and there is some fun in the idea of “two-time Oscar winner Marisa Tomei.” But immensely talented and drop-dead gorgeous have always worked in this category, and it should work for Cruz, who also is due for her brilliant career.

Best director

David Fincher, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Slumdog Millionaire’s Danny Boyle might very well saw off the limb I’m out on here, but 13 nominations connotes some respect for Ben Button, and a lot of that achievement is in the cat-herding task of directing this thing. It’s also hard to imagine a flick going 0-13, which some bet Ben will do.

Best picture

Slumdog Millionaire

Right after the nominations came out, there was some drama: Would accusations that Slumdog exploits Indians derail it? Would Harvey Weinstein bully The Reader to a win? But Slumdog has continued to roll - nearing $100 million at the box office - and Weinstein has lost his ability to surprise people.

~ Watch Sunday here and in the Herald-Leader for our profile of Michael Shannon.

~ I’ll be Twittering the Academy Awards Sunday night, using the hashtag #oscars. Come and  get in on the conversation, and stay with LexGo.com for continuing coverage from L.A.

Clockwise from left: Leonardo DiCaprio as Frank Wheeler, Michael Shannon as John Givings, Richard Easton as Mr. Givings, Kate Winslet as “April Wheeler” and Kathy Bates as Mrs. Givings in "Revolutionary Road." Copyrighted photo by Francois Duhamel.

Click the play button to hear our podcast with Michael Shannon, including the childhood experience that helped inform his performance in Revolutionary Road.

“There were no movie stars on that set,” actor and Lexington native Michael Shannon says of his latest film, Revolutionary Road.

Celebrity chroniclers and film fans may beg to differ: The Sam Mendes picture features the reunion of Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet, who sailed into cinematic history as the doomed lovers in 1997’s Titanic, the all-time box office champ.

That might be a story line helping to sell the film. But when he was there to film, Shannon says, “it was a group of people united by a passion for the material and wanting to honor the book.”

The book is Richard Yates’ 1961 novel about a Connecticut couple who try to break the bonds of mid-20th-century suburbia. Frank Wheeler is a cookie-cutter office worker in New York and his wife, April, cares for their home and two children. She hatches a plan to break their boring routine by moving to Paris, where she will support the family through a high-paying government secretarial job and he can figure out what his passion is and pursue it.

Friends and coworkers politely congratulate them, but privately scoff at Frank and April’s plan as childish.

All except John.

Played by Shannon, John is the son of Frank and April’s real estate agent, played by Kathy Bates.

He was once a gifted mathematician, teaching at a university, but he has since been committed to a sanitarium, where he has undergone dozens of electroshock treatments. When he meets the couple, John seems to have a distinct disdain for suburban life.

“Plenty of people are on to the emptiness,” John says to Frank and April during a walk in the woods, “but it takes real guts to see the hopelessness.”

The question is implied: Is the fact that the crazy guy seems to be the only one supporting the plan good or bad?

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Members of the cast and crew of Slumdog Millionaire arrive at the 66th Annual Golden Globe Awards. From left are, Producer Christian Colson, actor Dev Patel, actor Anil Kapoor, actress Freida Pinto, director Danny Boyle, composer A.R. Rahman and writer Simon Beaufoy. Photo by Matt Sayles | AP.

That clanging you hear from Hollywood could be the bellwether ringing for Slumdog Millionaire.

Things in this year’s awards season were not terribly clear until Sunday night, when Danny Boyle’s story of an unlikely game show winner won four Golden Globes, including best motion picture drama, best director for Boyle and best screenplay for Simon Beaufoy. It seems like everyone who’s seen this movie has tremendous enthusiasm for it, and that is translating to award voters.

It would be an interesting contrast to last year if Slumdog continued its run into the Academy Awards. While the awards, so far, have not seen the return of blockbusters, which we thought we might see, Slumdog is a much more hopeful film than last year’s pitch black winner, No Country for Old Men.

Kate Winslet poses with her two Golden Globe Awards, which she won on Sunday. Photo by Mark J. Terrill | AP.

While last night’s honors seemed to put Slumdog into a solid frontrunner position, they also raised some interesting possibilities for the Academy Awards, which announces its nominations Jan. 22. Like, is Woody Allen’s Vicky Cristina Barcelona, the winner for best motion picture comedy or musical, now a best picture contender? What about Kate Winslet? Does her dual win, as best actress in a drama for Revolutionary Road and supporting actress for The Reader, indicate this is the year the five-time Oscar nominee might win one of the guys? And will she have to contend with Sally Hawkins, who beat out award perennials Meryl, Emma and Frances for best actress in a comedy or musical for her performance in the little seen Happy-Go-Lucky?

Will everything be a huge disappointment if we don’t get to hear Mickey Rourke give another acceptance speech? After he won for The Wrestler, the star, who looked like he thought he was at the Grammys, gave an oddly-touching and  funny address in which he thanked his dogs and had to have had somebody’s nervous finger ready to hit the censor button.

It was actually a night to push FCC boundaries and reminded us why this cocktail party is so much better than having Billy Bush read the winners’ names, which is what happened last year, due to the writers strike. Winning best actress in a TV show musical or comedy, Tina Fey invited her Internet tormentors to do something I don’t think I’m allowed to say on a newspaper-affiliated blog. At the end of the night, Slumdog producer Christian Colson said a word I know I’m not allowed to repeat here after being told to wrap up his best drama acceptance speech.

That’s OK. He’ll probably have more chances to get it right.

Check out my Twitter for my random thoughts while watching last night.

The late Heath Ledger could be up for a posthumous Oscar in February for his performance in "The Dark Knight." Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures.

After this year’s Academy Awards, the question was whether the Oscars were still relevant, or if they were going the way of art galleries and modern dance, perceived as too elite and avant garde to appeal to the masses.

Of last year’s best picture nominees, none of them had cracked the Top 10 or $100 million mark at the box office.

Numerous reasons were cited, including studios obsessed with movies calculated to open big, art be damned, and the presence of boutique subsidiaries such as Paramount Vantage and Warner Independent Pictures to release “specialty” and “prestige” fare.

Well, the buzz is Oscar night 2009 may look quite different.

Not that we will suddenly see Harold and Kumar contending for best picture or anything like that.

But you could have Batman.

The late Heath Ledger, a 2006 best actor nominee for his performance in Brokeback Mountain, is seriously being talked about as a best actor possibility for his consumed-by-evil turn as The Joker in Batman: The Dark Knight.

Think that’s funny?

Tugg Speedman (Ben Stiller, left) and Kirk Lazarus (Robert Downey Jr., right) are shooting an epic war movie and wind up in a real battle in “Tropic Thunder.” Photo by Merie Weismiller Wallace | DreamWorks.

A lot of people think that Robert Downey Jr. was brilliantly funny as a method actor who darkened his skin to play a black soldier in Ben Stiller’s Hollywood-bashing Tropic Thunder. Now, he’s a serious contender for a best supporting actor nomination for the box office hit that has made more than $110 million.

Dark Knight, also considered a best picture and director contender, as well as a shoe-in for numerous technical award nominations, now sits atop this year’s box office chart, and it’s likely to stay there. Why? For a while, during the summer, Dark Knight was threatening to overtake Titanic for the all-time box office record of $600 million, though with a home video release of the Batman movie set for Dec. 9, it appears that won’t happen.

Speaking of Titanic, the 1998 Oscar winner for best picture marked the last time the Oscars generated true mass hysteria, and its leading man and woman are back together this year. A Paramount Vantage offering with the downbeat plot of a crumbling 1950s marriage, Revolutionary Road isn’t likely to be all the rage with teenage girls like Titanic was. But it does have an intriguing A-list cast with Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio.

Other A-listers on short lists for Oscar contention include Brad Pitt, Clint Eastwood, Will Smith, Angelina Jolie and, seriously, Beyonce Knowles for her role in Cadillac Records. We should also mention that Lexington native Michael Shannon is getting buzz for Revolutionary Road.

This isn’t any concerted effort to help Oscar avoid going the way of the Tony Awards in terms of its national spotlight. But there are a few trends that may be boosting the awards’ star power and box office relevance this year and in years to come:

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