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Oh god, I saw the trailer for that, it looked like the kind of saccharine garbage Harvey Weinstein would turn up his nose at

Actually, he's apparently distributing/remaking it!

It was a modest arthouse hit here (about $10 million), but it's the highest-grossing domestic film ever in France (not adjusted for inflation, of course), and apparently France's biggest film ever globally (bigger than Amélie).

Yeah The Intouchables has done very well here. Took it out of the theaters only to bring it back last month due to popular demand. Disappointing, Holy Motors was the best film I'd seen in quite some time.

the Village Voice wisely identifies Beasts of the Southern Wild as one of the worst films of the year

They're dead right about Hitchcock, at any rate.

Looks like the Oscars may inadvertently skew younger this year thanks to its new, problematic "e-voting" system

The real victims here are Mickey Rooney's grandchildren, who will surely be called for tech support.

PGA Motion Picture Nominees
Argo
Beasts of the Southern Wild
Django Unchained
Les Misérables
Life of Pi
Lincoln
Moonrise Kingdom
Silver Linings Playbook
Skyfall
Zero Dark Thirty

Animated
Brave
Frankenweenie
ParaNorman
Rise of the Guardians
Wreck-It Ralph

Documentary
A People Uncounted
The Gatekeepers
The Island President
The Other Dream Team
Searching For Sugar Man

Hooray for Moonrise Kingdom. I don't think it can win the Best Picture Oscar, but seeing it get a nomination would be very satisfying to me.

Man, folks hated The Master

Or were indifferent to it.

I should reiterate how amusing it will be to see Seth perform in front of people he possibly eviscerated on any of his shows.

The guy's successful and could get them work in a high grossing film, they won't mind/care outwardly even if they actually don't have a sense of humor about themselves

Writers Guild Awards Nominations
ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Flight, Written by John Gatins
Looper, Written by Rian Johnson
The Master, Written by Paul Thomas Anderson
Moonrise Kingdom, Written by Wes Anderson & Roman Coppola
Zero Dark Thirty, Written by Mark Boal

ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
Argo, Screenplay by Chris Terrio
Life of Pi, Screenplay by David Magee
Lincoln, Screenplay by Tony Kushner
The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Screenplay by Stephen Chbosky
Silver Linings Playbook, Screenplay by David O. Russell

DOCUMENTARY SCREENPLAY
The Central Park Five, Written by Sarah Burns and David McMahon and Ken Burns
The Invisible War, Written by Kirby Dick
Mea Maxima Culpa: Silence in the House of God, Written by Alex Gibney
Searching for Sugar Man, Written by Malik Bendejelloul
We Are Legion: The Story of the Hacktivists, Written by Brian Knappenberger
West of Memphis, Written by Amy Berg & Billy McMillin

Wesley Morris (who just left The Boston Globe) has a good Oscar preview up at Grantland.

I don't know who does Samuel L. Jackon's PR, but between this, the A.O. Scott tweet from earlier this year and other things, he's coming off as a real prick. (FWIW, Pulp Fiction was the better movie, IMHO, but Landau as Lugosi was still better than Jackson as Jules.)

Yeah... I don't know about that. I was a huge Pulp Fiction fan then and thought Jackson was great in it, but Landau (maybe even Scofield) deserved it that year before him and I still feel that way.

He was amazing in Django, though, and I would love to see him win for it. But the fact he wasn't nominated for a Golden Globe probably hurts his chances. As does the fact DiCaprio chews the scenery (and rightfully so) in every scene he's in, which will more than likely distract voters from Jackson.

Chazz Palminteri was better in Bullet Over Broadway than all of them, but Landau was already an Academy favorite (he was nominated for Tucker, for Christ's sake!) and Jackson had no chance

I really don't mind when actors are honest about their disappointment over not winning an award for work they feel particularly proud of. It's similar to how I don't mind the fact that Eric Dickerson publicly and desperately clings to the fact that he has the NFL single-season rushing record and openly acknowledges the fact that he never wants anyone to break the record and take that accomplishment away from him. It's a little bit sad that these public-figures appear to be performing primarily for a sense of accomplishment rather than a love of their craft, but I don't really care what motivates them to keep striving for greatness - even if it kind of seems petty once revealed that their work only serves as fuel for their growing ego - just as long as they are able to find inspiration to continue to perform outstanding work and I get to enjoy it. I actually appreciate their honesty at being somewhat bitter about the perceived slight from their peers.

Of course, this part...

I understand what the Golden Globes is. It's the only show they [the Hollywood Foreign Press Association] have and is their biggest moneymaker so you have to pack the room with people that are going to make people tune into that show. With popular actors and the popular television shows, it’s whoever they think people want to see on the red carpet and hope that they win, not necessarily the quality of work you’ve done

... kind of makes me shake my head, because based on this part...

You know they were saying 'Martin’s been nominated a few times and you’re going to be around for a while. Don’t worry.' I was thinking I didn’t know it was a thing where if you get nominated for a few times you automatically get one. I thought it was supposed to be about impact

... it's pretty obvious that Jackson clearly doesn't (or, I guess at the time, didn't) understand how the Academy Awards work.

Sam should have been nominated for Die Hard With A Vengeance.

National Society of Film Critics
The National Society of Film Critics, made of 60 of the country’s most prominent writers on film, today voted Michael Haneke’s “Amour” the best film of 2012. A full list of the other awards follows, with the winner designated by an asterisk and the first and second runners up listed with the number of votes each received.

BEST ACTOR
*1. Daniel Day-Lewis – Lincoln – 59 (Dreamworks/Touchstone)
2. Denis Lavant – 49
2. Joaquin Phoenix – 49

BEST ACTRESS
*1. Emmanuelle Riva – Amour – 50 (Sony Classics)
2. Jennifer Lawrence – 42
3. Jessica Chastain– 32

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
*1. Matthew McConaughey – Magic Mike (Warner Bros.), Bernie (Millennium Entertainment) – 27
2. Tommy Lee Jones – 22
3. Philip Seymour Hoffman – 19

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
*1. Amy Adams – The Master (The Weinstein Co.) – 34
2. Sally Field – 23
3. Anne Hathaway – 13

BEST PICTURE
*1. Amour (Sony Classics) – 28
2. The Master – 25
3. Zero Dark Thirty – 18

BEST DIRECTOR
*1. Michael Haneke (Amour) – 27
2. Kathryn Bigelow – 24
2. Paul Thomas Anderson – 24

BEST NONFICTION
*1. The Gatekeepers – Sony Pictures Classics – 53
2. This Is Not a Film – 45
3. Searching for Sugar Man – 23

BEST SCREENPLAY
*1. Lincoln (Dreamworks/Touchstone) – Tony Kushner – 59
2. The Master (P.T. Anderson)– 27
3. Silver Linings Playbook (David O. Russell) – 19

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
*1. Master (Mihai Malaimare, Jr. ) – 60
2. Skyfall (Roger Deakins) – 30
3. Zero Dark Thirty (Greig Fraser) – 21

The award for best experimental film was given to Jafar Panahi’s “This Is Not a Film,” from Iran. Film Heritage Awards were given to Laurence Kardish, Senior Film Curator at MoMA, for his extraordinary 44 years of service, including this year’s Weimar Cinema retrospective, and to Milestone Film and Video for their ongoing Shirley Clarke project.

This year’s award were dedicated to the late Andrew Sarris, one of the most original and influential American film critics as well as a founding member of the Society as well as a founding member of the National Society.

Directors Guild nominees
Ben Affleck, Argo
Kathryn Bigelow, Zero Dark Thirty
Tom Hooper, Les Misérables
Ang Lee, Life of Pi
Steven Spielberg, Lincoln

I'm continually amazed that Life of Pi and Ang Lee have been undeterred awards season picks considering that the film hasn't excelled at the box office and the critical reviews have been mostly positive but not raves. It's a respectable film, but where it's receiving this momentum despite a sea of other worthy contenders is a mystery to me. Any insights?