While we may not see a non-fiction film nominated for Best Picture anytime soon, the Best Documentary Feature has for many risen from a minor category rarely given its due attention to a battleground for some of the most important movies in a given year. 2010 was no exception, and in this year and in this category there are an impressive collection of docs addressing a variety of subjects in unique ways that truly exemplify the personalities of the filmmakers behind them. If no other year has convinced you the documentary is a great art form, this one should. But perhaps more significantly, this year exhibits such a variety of films that it throws the simplistic notion that a documentary should occupy one single mode of address out the window: here we have ambitious and stylish massive doc about a very complex subject, an intimate biographical advocacy piece, some on-the-ground investigative journalism, some trash art, and that film everyone’s been talking about all year that puts the entire notion of artistic truth into question. Only one of these films will take home the gold at the end of the night, but I’ll be damned if they’re not all impressive pieces of non-fiction filmmaking. And the nominees (with my prediction in red) are…

Two years ago, we were on a boat in the middle of a lake somewhere near Austin, Texas. Last year, we were in an abandoned 6th century church somewhere deep in the heart of Eastern Europe. This year, we’ll be in our living rooms. Times have been tough all over. Still, that shouldn’t stop you from joining us for our getting-slightly-more-infamous-every-year Live Blog of the Oscars! What else are you going to be doing that night besides yelling every time you “called it” and driving your friends crazy? Now you can do that and enjoy the hilarious antics of the Rejects. Participate in meaningful polls about the armpit hair of presenters, test your wits with our trivial challenges, and scratch your head as Adam Charles accidentally live-blogs the movie Oscar featuring Sly Stallone. Check out our full Oscar coverage up until now and mark your calendars for Sunday:

There has been much hullabaloo over speculation as to what will happen if the Banksy directed doc Exit Through the Gift Shop ends up winning the Academy Award for Best Documentary. Banksy is a popular street artist who maintains a lot of his mystique through hiding his identity. He narrated Gift Shop shrouded in a hood and with voice modulation. Whenever pictures are shown of him, he is usually wearing a ridiculous monkey mask. Most likely, if Banksy were ever to be unmasked, we would all be faced with the stunning realization that he is… some guy. That’s why it’s very important that he maintains his secrecy. Mystery equals intrigue; intrigue equals people shelling out boatloads of cash for his work. The Academy has been around show business for quite some time. They understand what Banksy is doing here. And yet, up until this point, they have made it clear that showing up to the Oscars wearing a monkey mask would be completely unacceptable. Academy president Tom Sherak reportedly told Banksy’s representatives, “We suggested to them that it might be a good idea that if he did win, one of them would accept in his place – that it would not be dignified for the Academy to have somebody come up wearing a monkey’s head.”

This article is part of our Oscar Week Series, where you will find breakdowns and predictions for all of the major categories. The Best Supporting Actor category is one of the most interesting. As Cole and I discussed last week, there really is no stable definition of what constitutes a “supporting” role, so this category can run the gamut from scene-stealers (Heath Ledger for The Dark Knight) to memorable parts with a limited amount of screen time (Hal Holbrook for Into the Wild) to nominations that seem only to be banking off the presence of a film in other categories (Matt Damon for Invictus). Fortunately this year saw five pretty strong nominees (and three first-time nominees), but this year also exhibits the potential variance of the category. Here we have a crack addict, a sperm donator, a townie gangster, an unqualified speech therapist, and somebody named “Teardrop.” Let’s see how these five incredibly different performances size up against one another. With my winner prediction in red, here are the nominees:

There’s no secret that the certified sub-sections of “best picture” are not only somewhat backhanded, they’re getting increasingly more robbed of any shred of surprise at who the potential winner is as the Academy expands the number of films qualifying for the biggest prize. Increasing the number of nominees to ten whilst retaining the sub-categories of, generally, the same award (best animated *film*, best foreign *film*, best documentary *film*…) seems nearly needless; especially in this particular category because Pixar has removed any degree of competitiveness the past two years.

It isn’t because Pixar has a stronghold on the award of Best Animated Film itself (despite their current 4 for 6 record and running on 3 consecutive), but mainly because now that the Best Picture category has been extended to 10 films they’re more likely to have already announced the winner of a sub-category film by having announced the nomination of one (and only one) of the sub-category films in the larger category.

It is still nice to see as many films as possible get deserved recognition even though there’s about as close to a guarantee that they will lose as can possibly be without actually being able to guarantee a guarantee. Though, assuming the illogical can actually occur it would be interesting to see the black hole in the Oscarverse that would develop if Toy Story 3 is not announced as the victor.

As such, the Winner and two “Waydagoers” are…

Famed British filmmaker Mike Leigh recently received his fifth screenwriting nomination for Another Year. Another Oscar nomination for a highly celebrated filmmaker should be surprising to no one except, in this special case, for the fact that precisely zero of Leigh’s nominated films actually use screenplays. Leigh’s films are constructed through a painstaking and long-term process of creating characters and scenarios with his cast and creative team. His films aren’t improvised in the sense of, say, a Christopher Guest film, where a basic framework exists and actors are allowed to ad-lib and play with(in) that paradigm. Leigh’s films are instead created from the outset through an involved collaborative process. Leigh’s regular team of actors bring to each individual film their construction of a character from scratch. Details arise eventually through this collaboration, and the final work projected onscreen is the end result of a long selection of various possibilities. The only reason Leigh’s films even qualify for screenwriting awards is because of the written script that Leigh creates after the end product has been made. The physical screenplay, in this case, is nothing more than a transcription written after the fact, or a record of a much larger event (whose details are largely unknown to the audience). While Leigh is the sole nominee for Another Year, the creation of the script (or, in this case, the transcript) is just as indebted to the creative efforts of other individuals involved. Stars Jim Broadbent and Lesley Manville are, in a sense, just [Due to Content Scraping and Theft, we have been forced to try abbreviated feeds. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and woud very much appreciate you clicking through to view the full article on FilmSchoolRejects.com]

This article is part of our Oscar Week Series, where you will find breakdowns and predictions for all of the major categories. If you want to separate the actors who are just good from the ones who are truly great, the best way to do it is to look at the winners of the Best Actor Oscar. Without exception the greats are the ones who win the award, and the ones who don’t are proven to just not be elite level actors. It’s science. Or, probably, none of that is true at all. The fact is: there are a lot of reasons someone might be nominated for an Academy Award and someone else might not be. And there are even more reasons why one of those nominees goes on to win and the others don’t. Quality of performance is not necessarily the end-all be-all. But the Best Actor award is probably one of the Oscars that has best retained its credibility over the decades. There aren’t a lot of stinker performances that have been wrongly praised muddying up the list. To have your name appear alongside greats like Clark Gable, Spencer Tracy, Humphrey Bogart, Marlon Brando, Sidney Poitier, Paul Newman, Robert De Niro, and Sir Nicolas Cage is still seen as being a rare honor. So what does the field look like this year? With my guess highlighted in red, the nominees are…

This article is part of our Oscar Week Series, where you will find breakdowns and predictions for all of the major categories. Some of you might be confused as to what the Best Actress category is exactly. Don’t worry; it’s easy enough to explain. You see, Best Actress is just like the award for Best Actor, except it’s for people with lady parts only. Why there needs to be a gender distinction when it comes to giving out awards for acting performances is beyond me. Is there something inherent in one of the genders that would give them the edge when it comes to acting? Or maybe this is a relic of an older Hollywood where all of the really meaty roles were written for men and actresses didn’t have much more to do than be the object of affection? I think we’re past that point now. I would argue not just that female actors put out work equal to male actors in 2010, but also that they were on the whole given more interesting characters to play. I say that this is the year where we need to band together and call for the end of award discrimination. Who’s with me? Maybe you should look over the nominees first. They are as follows, with my winner prediction in red.

Every week, Landon Palmer and Cole Abaius log on to their favorite chat client of 1996 as CriterionCollector85 and JP2themax in order to discuss some topical topic of interest. This week, they puzzle over how to define a Best Supporting Role. What does that support mean? Or look like? Does it matter how long someone is on screen or how big a catalyst they are? Since the Oscars don’t seem to know…what the hell is a supporting role anyway?

In order to make sure everyone is up to speed with the nominees by the time the Academy Awards are broadcast on February 27th, many of AMC’s theaters are screening marathons of all ten films that are up for best picture over the next two Saturdays. This Saturday, the 19th, they will be screening Toy Story 3, 127 Hours, The Kids Are All Right, True Grit, and The Fighter. Next Saturday, the 26th, they will show Winter’s Bone, Black Swan, Inception, The Social Network, and The King’s Speech. A two day pass to see all 10 films will run you $60 and a one day pass to see either set of five will be $35. In addition to this, fifteen participating theaters will be doing a marathon of all 10 films starting at 10 am on the 26th and spanning to well into the morning on Oscar Sunday. Tickets to the 24-hour marathon will go for $50.

James Franco already seemed to be apologizing for this year’s Academy Awards telecast in a sit down with Vanity Fair’s The Screening Room. When asked about how he and co-host Anne Hathaway came about getting the hosting position Franco explained, “They know we’re not Billy Crystal or Chris Rock. They’re not asking us because they’re expecting that. The show is going to be designed for what we can do.” So if what guys like Billy Crystal and Chris Rock can do is fill up the show with comedy and musical numbers, what is that thing that Franco and Hathaway can do? Will Franco spend most of the ceremony with his arm trapped under a statue while Hathaway romps around on stage in her underwear? If so, I don’t see what the concern is. This is clearly going to be the greatest Oscars ever. But even if it goes in the exact opposite direction, Franco doesn’t seem concerned. He goes on to say, “If it’s the worst Oscars ever, who cares? It’s like; it’s fine. It’s like one night. It doesn’t matter. If I host the worst Oscar show in the history of the Oscars, like, why do I care?” It seems that Franco has studied at the Ricky Gervais school of awards show hosting. Will 2011 go down as the year that everyone stopped buying in to the pomp and circumstance of Hollywood awards shows? Has the egoism of the whole undertaking finally become so much that it’s eating away [Due to Content Scraping and Theft, we have been forced to try abbreviated feeds. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and woud very much appreciate you clicking through to view the full article on FilmSchoolRejects.com]

French Canadian film Incendies has gotten a trailer to promote its release in US theaters. The film is directed by Denis Villeneuve and tells the story of a set of adult twins who are set out on a journey to the Middle East by their mother’s last will and testament to find their long-lost father and sibling. It has already made a splash with critics by touring the festival circuit, gotten itself a nomination for Best Foreign Language Film by the Academy Awards, and is now set to be released in select theaters on April 22nd by Sony Pictures Classics. For all of you Oscar buffs and year-end completists, this one is going to have to be on your must see lists. Check out the trailer below:

This week, on a very special episode of Reject Radio, Awards Season junkie and editor-in-chief of In Contention, Kris Tapley, joins us to shoot the bull on the Oscars. We’ll be roasting that bull on a spit and serving it for our live-blog next month. Could Natalie Portman lose her sure-thing Oscar? Why did Inception never have a chance at Best Picture? Who will win Best Costume Design?!? We ask the tough questions. And then answer them. Plus, we also review The Mechanic in case you’d rather see something blow up besides an actor giving a thank you speech. Listen Here: Download This Episode

With every week that passes, it feels like things just keep getting better and better around here. It’s becoming increasingly easy to put this very column together. New writers and very soon, we’ll have some new columns to tout. There’s a reason why the tagline “The Cure for the Common Movie Blog” now graces our homepage. Because if we’re anything around here, it’s uncommon. And you can find out why with the links that I’ve strategically placed after the jump. It’s all part of a little game I like to call The Week That Was.

You’ve stumbled upon Circle of Jerks, our sporadically published, weekly feature in which we ask the questions that really matter to our writers and readers. It’s a time to take a break from our busy lives and revel in the one thing that we all share: a deep, passionate love of movies. If you have a question you’d like answered by the FSR readers and staff, send us an email at editors@filmschoolrejects.com. The Oscars are coming up quick. Nominations are out this week. So, let’s say you have a time machine and can go back to any year to nominate a movie for Best Picture that didn’t get nominated. What would you pick? Me? Probably ALIEN. – Johnathan K.

Emotions are running high in Hollywood this morning after the announcement of this year’s Academy Award nominations. Or at least that’s the sort of thing that people say when they talk about the Academy Awards. I don’t know if anybody really takes this kind of stuff seriously or not. Variety has been hard at work getting reactions from as many of the nominees as possible, which may just give us some insight. Joel and Ethan Coen may have given the most sincere response by saying, “Ten seems like an awful lot. We don’t want to take anyone else’s,” but they weren’t the only ones who avoided the word “journey” like 90% of the pack.

David Fincher’s highly acclaimed flick The Social Network just took the top prize (and just about everything else it could) from the National Board of Review awards announcement. Just another stepping stone on the way to Oscar, right? Maybe not. Although it’s difficult to do anything but speculate on the complex nature of what a NBR win might do in the eyes of the Academy voters, if we can use the past to predict the future, The Social Network might have just won an albatross around its neck. The National Board of Review almost never picks the same winner as the Oscar voters.

If you’re like me, you remember a time when Billy Crystal was the only person that hosted the Oscars, every year, forever and ever. There was something comforting about having a comedian on stage because it meant a hilarious opening bit that mocked Clint Eastwood (in song) and guaranteed that a stuffy evening wouldn’t be taken too seriously. Now, the Academy has chosen James Franco and Anne Hathaway to co-host the next presentation of awards. Not counting Hugh Jackman (who brought his own musical flair to the proceedings), the last time that the show didn’t have a comedian as host was either technically the ’89 broadcast (which had no host) or the ’75 broadcast where Walter Matthau shared the duties with Goldie Hawn, Gene Kelly, Robert Shaw, and George Segal. It’s a modern convention to have someone notable for their hosting (like Jon Stewart) or their stand up comedy (like Jon Stewart) take center stage as emcee. Franco and Hathaway will no doubt bring a different energy, though, and that comes with some good and some bad.

With the release of Pixar’s Up, last year saw a great deal of conversation surrounding the ghettoization of animated movies at major awards shows. This debate resulted in something of a minor, qualified victory for animated cinema of 2009, as Up was the first animated movie to be nominated for Best Picture since Beauty and the Beast, but then again it sat amongst a crowded bevy of nine fellow nominations, and animated films remain unthreatening to their live action competitors because of the separate-but-unequal Best Animated Feature Category. I’d like to take this space to advocate for the big-category acceptance of yet another marginalized and underappreciated category around awards time: non-fiction films.

Last week, the recipients of the Honorary Oscars were announced, the awards ceremony taking place at the Academy Governor’s Awards Dinner on November 13 (an evident pushback from the typical televised reception of the Honorary Oscar at the actual ceremony in the first quarter of the following calendar year). Honorary awards are being given to Veteran actor and senior-senior-citizen Eli Wallach, film historian and preservationist Kevin Brownlow, legendary French New Wave auteur Jean-Luc Godard, and the Irving G. Thalberg memorial award for excellent producing has been bestowed (to the surprise of no one) to the occasionally brilliant cinematic patriarch and wine magnate Francis Ford Coppola. According to the Academy’s executive director on August 25, attempts were made to contact Godard directly (by phone, fax, and through associates), but to no avail. Unbeknownst to the fact there does indeed exist television and the Internet in Paris, members of the Academy interpreted Godard’s behavior as elusive rather than evasive. Godard has a history of rejecting awards of the honorary or lifetime achievement variety, so until he makes a statement that provides an official stance, it remains likely that Godard will simply and inevitably turn this one down as well. And as well he should.