The Best Director Race

For the films of 2018
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Mister Tee
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Re: The Best Director Race

Post by Mister Tee »

MaxWilder wrote:
Mister Tee wrote:Adam McKay was nominated by this group before, and remember: this branch is very apt to go with previous nominees.
Is it? Ridley Scott had his best chance to win best director in 2015 (for The Martian), but the directors branch kept him off the ballot in favor of Lenny Abrahamson (Room). In 2012 recent winner Kathryn Bigelow lost a spot to Behn Zeitlin (talk about a one-hit wonder). Ben Affleck wasn’t a previous directing nominee but his omission was a big shock.
I actually thought Ridley Scott suffered from the triviality of his film (much the way I think Coogler might, this year). The Bigelow miss is harder to countenance, but note that, even with her omitted, three nominees that year were repeaters (Lee, Russell and Spielberg).

And, just in the past few years, "surprise" directing nominees (those who hadn't been DGA nominees) include Alexander Payne 2013, Bennett Miller 2014, Mel Gibson 2016 and Paul Thomas Anderson last year -- repeaters all.

It's an excellent long-term bet that at least one former nominee will be among the five the directors nominate -- I think, post-about 1930, there are only two years when all five nominees were first-timers. OF course, Cuaron and Jenkins are also around to fill that bill this year.
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Re: The Best Director Race

Post by MaxWilder »

Mister Tee wrote:Adam McKay was nominated by this group before, and remember: this branch is very apt to go with previous nominees.
Is it? Ridley Scott had his best chance to win best director in 2015 (for The Martian), but the directors branch kept him off the ballot in favor of Lenny Abrahamson (Room). In 2012 recent winner Kathryn Bigelow lost a spot to Behn Zeitlin (talk about a one-hit wonder). Ben Affleck wasn’t a previous directing nominee but his omission was a big shock.

This category is the lockiest of locks. Bradley Cooper is already winning best actor, so voters won’t feel too bad about giving Cuarón his second directing Oscar instead of Cooper his first.
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Re: The Best Director Race

Post by Big Magilla »

Vice looks to be as soulless as its subject. The low Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic scores redeem my faith in critics. It's the one Oscar hopeful I dreaded having to see. Now I won't feel obligated to see it until it shows up on cable TV in six months or whenever.

I see Cuaron, Cooper, Lathimos and Lee as likely nominees with Jenkins a strong candidate for the fifth slot with Pawlikowski the spoiler. Farrelly has a shot, but I think he's more likely to get a nomination for Screenplay than Direction.
The Original BJ
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Re: The Best Director Race

Post by The Original BJ »

I generally agree with a lot of what's been said here, but I'll try to add a few things that haven't been touched on.

Agree that Cuarón and Cooper (barring an Affleck-style shocker) are the most likely candidates for nominations.

The biggest thing helping Lanthimos seems to be the centrality of his film to the main race -- The Favourite feels like the leader in Original Screenplay, and will pick up three acting nominations, with Colman a solid threat to win Best Actress. That Lanthimos is also 1) a cool auteur and 2) clearly worthy for this film gives him an extra boost, but it's rare for directors whose films are otherwise such strong candidates to be excluded.

The fates definitely seem to be aligning for an "at last" Director nomination for Spike Lee. (This is maybe a conversation for another thread, but I feel like his overdue status really might carry the day in Adapted Screenplay -- doesn't his accumulation of career points and general enthusiasm for his film, along with the fact that this seems like A Star is Born's shakiest major category, make him a possible frontrunner for the writing prize at this point?)

I rate Jenkins pretty high on merit as a directorial candidate, though I think his actual nomination chances are a bit iffier, simply due to the nature of the film. But in an earlier era, wouldn't he seem like a very possible lone director-type nominee? His film is on the artier side, but certainly not too outre, and the fact that he's in the club already only helps. I could see him making the Oscar list even without Globe and DGA citations.

I'm not sure what to make of Vice at this point. It feels like a movie whose showing at the Globes was helped by the late release -- before some of the nastiest reviews dropped -- but as someone on the higher end of enthusiasm for it myself, I don't think the early nominations are just some kind of knee-jerk "this will be a contender" reaction; I can see the people who like it REALLY liking it throughout the season. But yeah, it still does seem tough to become a top-tier candidate with a 59 Metacritic score.

Coogler seems like someone who really NEEDS a DGA nomination to keep his chances alive. Without it, I think he's toast completely. With it, I'd still probably say that he's more likely than not going to follow in Christopher Nolan's footsteps, boxed out at the Oscars due to lack of enthusiasm for popcorn blockbuster fare.

I will likely not believe in a Farrelly nomination until I hear it announced on Oscar morning. It's just exactly the kind of movie the directors DON'T nominate. (And given the kinds of directors who have been added to THIS branch in the last couple years, I see no reason to think they're inclined to start doing so.)
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Re: The Best Director Race

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If you want an indication of how inferior 2018 is to 2017: last year, Luca Guadagnino and Martin McDonagh failed to match their best picture nods with director slots, and Denis Villeneuve's visionary reworking of Blade Runner wasn't even in consideration. This year, we're talking about Peter Farrelly, and Ryan Coogler for a Marvel movie.

I'm not sure anyone qualifies In absolute terms -- i.e., there's no one who "would be there in any year". Cuaron is the overwhelming critical favorite, but in some years he'd be a lone-director sort. And Bradley Cooper, being a novice matched to a remake, would be a prime candidate for a James L. Brooks-like omission. This year, of course, I agree they're in without question: they're the foundation of the slate.

I think Lanthimos deserves to be there -- and I think directors might be more appreciative of him than some critics' groups (and the Globes). But I'll be a bit hesitant right up till the nominations are read, because I think the impression has locked in with some that the film is strictly a writer's triumph.

I don't think Spike Lee's work on BlackkKlansman is so noteworthy as to assure a nomination. But, based on what I've seen so far (from the Globes, AFI, the Broadcasters), it seems like his film might be one of the few broadly popular choices this year. And Spike has deserved recognition for so long that I don't think many will begrudge him making the cut on that basis.

I think Barry Jenkins' work on If Beale Street Could Talk IS that noteworthy -- in some ways, I was more impressed by this film than by Moonlight. And the new film has at least started off like an art-house hit, and accumulated key nods from the Globes and Broadcasters. But the SAG omission of even Regina King makes one wary of the film's chances -- best picture, with more slots, is probably near a lock, but the tight-five-ness of best director could lock him out.

Adam McKay was nominated by this group before, and remember: this branch is very apt to go with previous nominees. But okri is right to note Vice's super-low Metacritic score. The weird thing is, you can find lots of legit critics who quite like the film. What's killing that score seems to be people who REALLYREALLYHATE it -- they're throwing 20's and 25's at it, the kind of scores usually reserved for the basest Hollywood trash. I'm not saying the low score isn't indicative of something; I'm saying it might not matter as much compared to the enthusiasm of those who DO like it.

Never say never, but I think it's been a long time since a movie like Green Book got a directing nomination. It's not just a movie with retro racial politics (the people who like it most will tell you, in the next breath, that they just don't understand why these players would kneel during the national anthem), it's also a mechanical, storytelling-by-numbers effort -- the kind of movie where all the surprises arrive on schedule. It's exactly the kind of best picture nominee that directors' branch has made its reputation snubbing, even when there were just five best picture slots. Now we have a field of ten, and there are more such films (like Lion and HIdden Figures, showing up in the same year, both being bumped by the directors). Green Book seems to fall into that group.

I feel equally un-sanguine about Ryan Coogler's chances. I like Coogler's Fruitvale Station, and thought his Creed was at least a lively piece of work. But Black Panther is, to my eye, just a comic book movie..and no comic book movie has ever been nominated by the directors' branch. Now, I recall that I was equally adamant three years ago that a pure action movie would not pass muster with the branch, and Mad Max: Fury Road proved me wrong. But Max became an undisputed critical cause celebre -- going so far as to win best director from the LA Film Critics. Black Panther hasn't soared that high. It's thought to be a best picture possibility, but likely in the bottom five rather than the top five. That doesn't suggest to me it'll have the strength to overcome the branch's innate resistance to commercial cinema.

But I can't say for sure, because, again, it's a year without many obvious candidates. Someone like Granik or Pawlikowski might also be able to slip in, simply because the field is so thin.

Is Cuaron really going to win this thing? Because, while it's hard to see how anyone else does, it's not that easy to see him
winning, either.
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Re: The Best Director Race

Post by Okri »

a) Sabin, I think you've got the order right for the first four though I wonder if Lee is a bit further back and could be snubbed.

b) Vice is in an interesting position. It's metacritic score is at 59, which is surprisingly low. We knew it would be divisive (I have to admit Adam McKay directing a Dick Cheney "satiric" biopic sounds torturous), but it also does seem like a movie that Hollywood would like more than critics, but the gap would have to be VERY significant to overcome was appears to be serious disdain.

c) Yeah, Green Book is going to be hit with a tsunami of negativity and I think that pretty much thwarts Farrelly's chances, when he was already the type of candidate who would struggle with the directors anyway. I'm not convinced AMPAS as a whole feels the need to seen as "woke" but he strikes me as someone who could be knocked out.

d) I'd predict Jenkins with your four for now.

e).... but Coogler's an interesting case and one I'm curious about. I'm probably one of the more negative people when it comes to BP's oscar chances (Nathaniel has it as a lock, which is CRAZY) and it strikes me that he's one of the ones who it'll be easy to rule out (say, no DGA nomination) than rule in. But Sabin's comment is really provoking in that I absolutely agree (he stands as a prominent author alongside Marvel) but feel like it's still more due to the marketing than anything he's actually done on screen.
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Re: The Best Director Race

Post by Big Magilla »

Sabin wrote:What are we thinking for Best Director?
The smart money seems to be on Peter Farrelly for Green Book but I don’t know. Nobody seems to have an unkind word to say about the comic director but the slings and arrows are out for this one. Charges against the film have gone beyond a lack of “wokeness.” Charges are emerging from Dr. Don Shirley’s family that they were never consulted and that the characters played by Ali and Mortensen were never friends in real life, that their relationship was one of employer/employee. Farrelly can count on 100% of the Pro-Green Book vote but will that be enough?
There are two sides to every story. Green Book was written by Tony Lip's son who remembers it one way. Don Shirley's brother and nephew remember the relationship another way if they remember it at all. They did say that Shirley had lots of chauffeurs, none of whom lasted more than two months if I remember the quote correctly, yet even though neither of them were around Shirley during the time the film takes place, they know he and Lip weren't friends.

If they have a different story to tell they should hire a writer and tell it.

Sometimes these things backfire. Remember all the provable inaccuracies in A Beautiful Mind including a Nobel Prize acceptance speech that wasn't made (they're not allowed), yet the film won a slew of awards including a Best Picture Oscar. It could happen again.
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The Best Director Race

Post by Sabin »

What are we thinking for Best Director?

It certainly seems as though there are two sure things in this race. Alfonso Cuaron and Bradley Cooper will be nominated. I’m fairly certain this would be the case in any year. Certainly for Alfonso Cuaron. Perhaps in a year full of strongest contenders, Bradley Cooper's directorial contributions might end up passed over but I just don't see that happening.

Despite his Golden Globe snub, Yorgos Lanthimos also seems like a strong bet. He’s already a previous nominee for Best Foreign-Language Film and Best Original Screenplay. And given the weak competition and the general well-regard BlacKkKlansman is held, Spike Lee is probably a good bet as well. In a more crowded year, I would be less certain as the film owes much of its emotional weight to a closing credits replay to the death of Heather Heyer.

Then who?

The smart money seems to be on Peter Farrelly for Green Book but I don’t know. Nobody seems to have an unkind word to say about the comic director but the slings and arrows are out for this one. Charges against the film have gone beyond a lack of “wokeness.” Charges are emerging from Dr. Don Shirley’s family that they were never consulted and that the characters played by Ali and Mortensen were never friends in real life, that their relationship was one of employer/employee. Farrelly can count on 100% of the Pro-Green Book vote but will that be enough?

Adam McKay could certainly get in for Vice but we have yet to see how the film does. My gut tells me it's not quite focused enough for those who hate the man, and for those on the fence it'll be too bitter a pill to swallow. I feel as though it's highwater mark for the Oscar season was its six Golden Globe nominations.

I’ve yet to see If Beale Street Could Talk but Barry Jenkins seems the likeliest bet simply by virtue of his film being the most artistically accomplished. But it seems like a quiet affair.

Who else? Marielle Heller for Can You Ever Forgive Me? Paul Schrader for First Reformed? Pawel Pawlikowski for Cold War? Debra Granik for Leave No Trace? First Man is faring so poorly I forgot to include Damien Chazelle in the conversation for a moment.

While I tend to be on the bullish end of Black Panther’s chances, Ryan Coogler remains a question mark to me. With Fruitvale Station and Creed under his belt, he’s a major talent. More so than Joss Whedon, he’s managed to stand alongside his Marvel Movie as prominent author. He has a chance for sure.

Obviously the DGA will clear up some mysteries but I have a hard time pinning this race down.
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