Is 'Moneyball' an Oscar heavy-hitter?

"Moneyball" played well on Thursday at its media and industry screening at the Toronto International Film Festival. Thanks to it being truthful to its real-life story, it doesn't have the kind of rousing finale that invites standing ovations, but many viewers admired it as expert filmmaking. Given the pedigree of its creators –- director Bennett Miller ("Capote"), writers Steven Zaillian ("Schindler's List") and Aaron Sorkin ("The Social Network") and star Brad Pitt ("Babel," "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button") -– it's clearly an Oscar contender, but how serious?

Pitt hits it out of the park as Oakland A's general manager Billy Beane. He gets to emote largely here -– his character is freighted with worry, glowing with love for his daughter, hurling furniture across rooms -– but he has a problem. Because he's portraying a sports figure, the role doesn't have artsy pretension. By contrast, his rival role this year in "The Tree of Life" does have that. Yes, Pitt is lead in "Moneyball" and supporting in "Tree of Life," but if academy members wish to hail him only in one role, it will probably be in "Tree of Life."

A double nomination is not impossible, though.  As recently as 2004, Jamie Foxx was nominated in the supporting slot for "Collateral" the same year he won in lead for "Ray."

But this film's big Oscar problem is that it's about baseball, a topic that hasn't done well at the Oscars. Historically speaking, a baseball flick did win at least one Academy Award -- film editing for "Pride of the Yankees" (1947). True, it was nominated for 10 more, including best picture and actor (Gary Cooper) that year, but failed to score. "Field of Dreams" (1989) was nominated for best picture too, but it lost. "Bull Durham" (1988) and "The Natural" (1984) struck out in the top contest completely, despite widespread belief that they might get nominated.

-- Tom O'Neil

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Photo: Brad Pitt in "Moneyball." Credit: Sony Pictures

 

Wednesday roundup: Soderbergh's Spalding Gray doc to premiere at Slamdance

"Informant!" director Steven Soderbergh's latest film, "And Everything Is Going Fine," will be the centerpiece of the 2010 Slamdance Film Festival. The movie, which concerns the late performance artist Spalding Gray, whom Soderbergh directed in 1996's "Gray's Anatomy," is the latest connection between the director and the fest, which began in 1996 when Greg Mottola's "The Daytrippers," which Soderbergh produced, won its Jury Prize.

Soderbergh will also participate in Slamdance's Filmmaker Summit, which highlights new technological venues by which filmmakers can create and distribute their work outside the means currently available to the independent film community. The summit and premiere of "And Everything Is Going Fine" will both take place on Jan. 23; the festival itself runs concurrently with the Sundance Film Festival, which is Jan. 21 to 28.

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Since 2001, the Toronto International Film Festival has been showing its support for Canadian feature films and shorts with its annual Top Ten, which pays tribute to the best in homegrown cinema. They've just released this year's list, which will be shown at TIFF Cinematheque from Jan. 14 to 21. Among the films are such festival favorites as Ruba Nadda's TIFF award-winning "Cairo Time," with Patricia Clarkson as a diplomat's wife who falls for her husband's friend (Alexander Siddig); "Defendor," with Woody Harrelson as a deluded would-be superhero; and "The Trotsky," with Jay Baruchel ("The Sorcerer's Apprentice") as a young man who believes himself to be the reincarnation of Russian revolutionary Leon Trotsky. A selection of shorts, such as "The Spine," by Oscar winner Chris Landreth (2004's "Ryan), will also be included, as well as a panel discussion with Canadian filmmakers, educators and distributors. Planning to be in Ontario in January? You can see the full schedule and buy tickets to Top Ten here.

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The Palm Springs International ShortFest appears to share the same level of prestige and accuracy of award prediction as its parent festival, the Palm Springs International Film Festival. Since its inception 16 years ago, 69 of the short live action and animated films featured at ShortFest have gone on to earn major awards or nominations, including Cynthia Wade and Vanessa Roth's "Freeheld" (best documentary, short subjects, 2008 Oscars), "This Way Up" (best short film, animated, 2009 Oscars) and "The Dinner" (best short film, special mention, 2008 Venice Film Festival). The 2010 edition of ShortFest has been announced for June 22 through 28 at the Camelot Theatres in Palm Springs

The festival offers 20 prizes in six categories, with $100,000 in cash awards or film production prizes in each category. And all first-prize winners in the live action, animation and best-of-the-fest categories are automatically qualified for nomination consideration by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Early entry deadline for submissions is Jan. 15; the regular deadline is Feb. 15. More information can be found at the festival's website.

-- Paul Gaita

Photo: Steven Soderbergh. Credit: Getty Images

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Monday mega-roundup

Sony takes home 'Chloe'

Variety reports that Sony Pictures has obtained the stateside rights to Atom Egoyan's sexually charged drama "Chloe," starring Julianne Moore, Amanda Seyfriend (pictured above) and Liam Neeson. Produced by Ivan Reitman, Joe Medjuck and Jeffrey Clifford at Montecito Picture Co., the film, which opened to mixed reviews at the Toronto Film Festival last month, is slated for a theatrical release in the first half of 2010. Which Sony label or partner will handle the release had not been made clear at the time of this post.

-- Paul Gaita

Photo: StudioCanal

Sony picks up Duvall-Murray starrer 'Get Low'

And in more post-Toronto International Film Festival news (more? Yes, more), Sony Pictures Classics has acquired the North American rights to the offbeat drama "Get Low," which stars Robert Duvall, Bill Murray, Sissy Spacek and Lucas Black. The pic, which screened Sept. 12 and 14 in Toronto, is the feature debut of director Aaron Schneider, who earned an Academy Award nomination for his live-action short "Two Soldiers." Its other tech credits are equally stellar -- the production designer is Oscar nominee Geoffrey Kirkland ("The Right Stuff"), while composer Jan A.P. Kaczmarek won an Academy Award for "Finding Neverland." Duvall, Murray, Spacek and Black are no slouches, either. 

"Low" is based on a true story about a rural hermit (Duvall) who decides to throw his own funeral with the help of the local undertaker (Murray). Fans of Southern humor with a decidedly Gothic bent, take note.

-- Paul Gaita

Photo: Sony Pictures Classics

TIFF review round-up: 'Triage'

Yes, the Toronto International Film Festival has come to an end, but the reviews of films screened there are still filtering in. Case in point: Danis Tanovic's "Triage," with Colin Farrell as a war correspondent struggling with the trauma he experienced while covering the conflict in Kurdistan. Reviews are, for the most part, mixed -- Variety, like many others, notes that "No Man's Land," Tanovic's 2001 effort (and a previous TIFF hit) about the tragic war in Bosnia, delivered a more effective meditation on the horror of battle ("the depiction of the endless strife and useless loss of life ... is now yielding diminished dramatic returns," sez Todd McCarthy).

But the majority seem to agree that the film's high point is the performance of recently knighted film legend Christopher Lee (in a continuation of an incredible career third act that has included two "Star Wars" features, the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy and several collaborations with Tim Burton) as the grandfather of Farrell's wife (Paz Vega), who arrives to administer psychiatric aid. Art and Culture Maven describes Lee's performance as "astonishing," while Vanity Fair notes that his "tour de force" turn is worthy of an Oscar nomination. And the Hollywood Reporter pays tribute to one of Lee's most enduring screen appearances by saying, "Leave it to an 87-year-old ex-Count Dracula to show 'em how it's done." Right on. Meanwhile, "Triage" is still looking for a U.S. distributor.

-- Paul Gaita

Photo: ASAP Films.

TIFF Q&A: 'White Stripes' director Emmett Malloy

Meg cries.

Anyone wondering whether "The White Stripes Under Great White Northern Lights," directed by Emmett Malloy, is any more than just a simple tour film or concert documentary need only know this fact. During a scene shot after the band's 10th anniversary concert in the summer of 2007, Jack White and Meg White -- the brother/sister, husband/wife, black, white and red rock 'n' roll duo -- sit together on a piano bench as Jack plays a haunting rendition of their song "White Moon."

Meg listens and mouths the occasional few words, seeming increasingly overcome by emotion as tears start to roll down her cheeks. As Jack finishes the song, he reaches to console her and she buries her face in his shoulder and sobs.

"It's a very powerful scene and hard for me to watch," Jack White said during a press conference Friday afternoon before the film's world premiere later that night. "And hard for Meg to watch. But I think there's so much about it that I can't even tell you about. It's beautiful. What I like about it is it goes above and beyond anything about the band or anything about the film itself. The whole film opens up, and you forget what you even watched for the last 90 minutes. It's the perfect end to it and I'm glad Emmett was able to catch something like that."

Ostensibly capturing the band's tour of Canada -- which found them audaciously playing every province and territory in the country, including small towns not used to hosting big rock shows -- the film is also a startlingly intimate look at the mysterious dynamic between Jack and Meg.

"Northern Lights" captures some sense of their connection -- Jack talks over Meg as he asks her to explain why she doesn't talk much and she speaks so quietly her lines are mostly subtitled -- while also featuring crackling live performances. Just as the band's post-postmodern take on folk, blues and rock 'n' roll with its daring blend of the real and the fake, the authentic and the emotionally true, has catapulted them to associate with the Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan, "The White Stripes Under Great White Northern Lights" can credibly be included alongside such canonical rock-docs as "Gimme Shelter" and "Don't Look Back."

Thursday afternoon I sat down with director Emmett Malloy to discuss the film, the band's dynamic and working with the exacting Jack White. As White said at Friday's press conference, "I kind of can't be involved with anything without being involved with everything about it."

While there is some great concert footage of the band playing live, the film functions as so much more than just a concert doc or typical tour film. It really explores the dynamic between Jack and Meg.

Certainly the priority was to get the shows and the music and the experience but it was all the other things that kind of made the film a little more than the average shoot where once you've seen one song you've seen them all. We were at different locations and each show we were trying to present it a little differently. And that's why people are able to sit through this and feel like this is kind of like a movie, there's a relationship, there's this milestone of the band's 10th anniversary and the vintage cars and meeting weird people and the dynamic in the relationship. And I think that's the cool thing about the movie is at the end you learned a lot but you also didn't really learn anything. You're left with just as many questions.

Did you realize you could explore this dynamic, that it could drive the movie, while you were editing or while you were shooting?

For sure while we were shooting. There were definitely a couple times I was standing there with the camera thinking, "I'll just stand here until they tell me to get out, because I feel like I shouldn't be here right now." But the comfort was there early on with us, and Jack knows the power of editing, like, "We're only filming right now." And nothing crazy went down, it was just emotional. I could sense it was an intense time for them. I don't know how to quantify or define that. I think the one thing I will say is whatever you call them -- brother/sister, husband and wife, or friends -- there is a love between them that's very genuine and real.

Jack was involved in the editing?

Right from the first edit I made it a point to show Jack everything. The good thing is he was busy, so that gave me a lot of freedom. But he has full approval. It's fun to talk about this film, and to have the role I played in it, but at the end of the day it's The White Stripes, it's not my film.

-- Mark Olsen

TIFF Q&A: Tom Ford

"A Single Man," the debut film as director and screenwriter from fashion designer Tom Ford, was undoubtedly one of the most talked-about items at this year's Toronto International Film Festival. Just days before it rolled into town, the film had picked up two prizes (including best actor for Colin Firth) at the Venice Film Festival, heightening the expectant buzz. Following the first screening of "A Single Man" in Toronto, there was a dazzlingly glamorous party which in turn launched an all-night bidding war and the festival's most high-profile sale. Plus it's a good, an emotionally resonant, impeccably stylish adaptation of the novel by Christopher Isherwood.

As the film opens, George Falconer (Firth) awakes with a start. Leaving his finely appointed Lautner-designed house in his spotless Mercedes, he heads to his job as a professor of English at a small Los Angeles college. It soon becomes clear that he intends to kill himself by the end of the day, torn up over the death of his lover (Matthew Goode). As things take on a certain finality -- a last sunset, dinner with an old friend -- George begins to see the world anew, reconsidering the possibilities of living.

I sat down briefly with Ford the morning after the Toronto premiere of "A Single Man," just moments before the announcement was released of the film's sale to The Weinstein Company.

Your work in fashion, both in the advertisements and the clothes themselves, often has a strong sense of implied narrative, of storytelling. I'm wondering if part of the appeal of shifting to filmmaking for you was the chance to tell the whole story?

First of all, I think a fashion designer, some people say, "Do you think of yourself as an artist?" Now, there are fashion designers who are artists. I'm not. I'm a commercial artist in fashion. Fashion for me is an artistic endeavor, but it's really about selling something. It's selling something beautiful, something that enhances peoples' lives and that you love. Film for me, the way I approach film is that it's a complete expression. It's the most artistic thing I've ever done, really the purest form of expression.

If you are a designer or someone who likes to tell a story, fashion is very fleeting. The moment you design something, there's a certain new quality to it, a certain thing that kind of disturbs you; it's powerful. The moment a man or woman walks into a room beautifully dressed wearing the next thing, there's a rush that you get that's just so powerful. Six months later, those shoes that gave you that rush, they're still pretty but they're just shoes. Film is the ultimate design project; you can design whether people live or die, what they say, how they say it, what the room looks like, what they're wearing, what happens, what the mood is. And it is sealed forever in that world. It's a permanent thing you can create. And it's the closest thing, and I don't mean this in a bad way, to being God, to creating an alternate universe.

Was that why you made a period film set in the 1960s, so that you could more fully seal off that world?

No, the book was set in that period, and I would have had to alter the story a little bit. It's not a gay film, it's a universal story; however in today's world being gay is something that's not even discussed, so we would have lost a bit of that isolation George feels. His isolation is a human isolation, but his isolation is also because he can't be himself in front of anyone. So we would have lost that. Also, of course stylistically, you can take a lot more liberties with a period film. It has more opportunity to be stylish and that is something that is very much me. I'm going to probably never make a film that's grungy. And I'm not comparing myself to Mr. Hitchcock, but he's one of my favorite directors and all his films were stylish. And for me to create this alternate universe, I'm more interested in creating an alternate universe that is beauty. And I don't want to overemphasize the beauty because for me beauty is nothing without substance. Substance comes first.

-- Mark Olsen

TIFF review roundup: 'Leaves of Grass'

If it seems that most of these round-up posts begin with the phrase "reviews are mixed," well, it's because they are. It's not like I'm making 'em up. But honestly, reviews ARE mixed in regard to actor-director Tim Blake Nelson's eccentric comedy "Leaves of Grass," which screened on Sept. 14 at the Toronto International Film Festival and stars Edward Norton as polar-opposite twins who reluctantly reunite while visiting their mother (Susan Sarandon). The Hollywood Reporter pulls no punches in its dismissal of the film, noting that Nelson has gone "absolutely bonkers" in his attempt to inject some humor into this oddball tale of redneck crooks, pot dealers and Jewish gangsters; the problem is that "he really doesn't know how." Ouch. Screen Daily is much kinder, citing Norton's "bravura performance" (it's not the first time he's played twins) as the key to its success. Variety splits it down the middle -- Norton's turn(s) is/are fine, but the pic is a "mixed bag of mismatched ideas" that will have trouble winning over both the mainstream and indie crowds. Same goes for Row Three -- Norton is boss, but the film "didn't bring much to the table" by way of comedy or drama. But Roger Ebert at the Chicago Sun Times took the high road, calling "Leaves" a "sweet, wacky masterpiece," and quite rightly notes the use of John Prine's "Illegal Smile" as a high point.

-- Paul Gaita

Photo: Millennium Films & Langley Films

Weinstein delays 'Revolt' release

The Weinstein Company (TWC) announced on Thursday that it would move the release date of "Youth in Revolt" from Oct. 30 to Jan. 15. According to a Dimension rep, the decision to reschedule "Revolt," directed by Miguel Arteta and based on the popular novel by C.D. Payne, was based on the positive response the film received at the Toronto International Film Festival, where TWC purchased the film.

"Revolt" is the second Weinstein pic to vacate its October release date -- "The Road" was moved to Nov. 25 to vie for Oscar contention alongside Rob Marshall's adaptation of "Nine."

-- Paul Gaita

Photo: Michael Cera stars in "Youth in Revolt." Credit: The Weinstein Company

Colin Farrell and Neil Jordan talk more on 'Ondine'

During last year's writer's strike in Hollywood, filmmaker Neil Jordan returned to his home in a scenic, un-touristy portion of southwestern Ireland and began to write a story just for himself, just to write.

"I'd had this image for a while of this fisherman pulling a girl up in his nets, finding this beautiful girl and pulling her out of the water," Jordan said. "It was kind of an extraordinary image and I didn't know what to do with it. I sat down and said, 'I'll see where this wants to go.' "

That single image led Jordan to "Ondine," which had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival. The film stars Colin Farrell -- "I kind of wrote it with Colin in mind," Jordan allowed -- as Syracuse, a fisherman in an isolated Irish fishing village who indeed pulls a woman (Alicja Bachleda) up in his nets. Believing her to be some sort of sea creature, Syracuse takes her in and protects her, and she in turn interjects herself into his life, especially his relationship with his terminally ill daughter.

In building out the story, Jordan, an Academy Award winner for his screenplay for "The Crying Game," crafted a film that explores the need for fantasy in everyday life, the extent to which we can accept the most outrageous of ideas if we want to believe badly enough. Grounding the story is Syracuse's turbulent relationship with the mother of his daughter and his own struggles with alcoholism. In a town too small for an Alcoholics Anonymous group, Syracuse goes to confession and makes the begrudging local priest (frequent Jordan collaborator Stephen Rea) his impromptu sponsor.

"That's for me when the character began to make sense," said Jordan of the gently comic scenes between Syracuse and the priest. "He doesn't loathe the church, but it's a set of moral precepts that haven't helped him. He insists on going in there and saying, 'You're my AA buddy, you're going to listen to me'. And on the one hand it expressed the character, and it also expressed that strange need for balance between fantasy and reality that story as a whole expressed."

Farrell has been open in the past about his struggles with alcohol abuse, and so it is natural to want to read his real-life back story into the life of his character. In some sense it is even tempting to consider "Ondine" as Farrell's variation on last year's "The Wrestler" with Mickey Rourke, where an actor and role intersect at just the right moment in time.

"It doesn't make it any more attractive, or make me hesitant to be a part of it," said Farrell of considering to play the part of an alcoholic. "Maybe what it does is the whole world of addiction and alcoholism is demystified for me. I understand what it is because I've been through my version of it. So it's completely demystified, which means I'm cool to have a little bit of fun with it, and I also understand the gravity of it. It's serious business, and I understand the mechanism of it a little bit.

Nevertheless, Farrell saw the dramatic potential of the role straight-away.

"I had tremendous empathy for the character of Syracuse and the nobility of his journey through life, because he completely lacked in any sense of self-pity," Farrell said. "This is a man who lost his father, possible never met his father."

"His father was a traveler," interjected Jordan. "Critical information."

"Why didn't we get into that?" asked Farrell before continuing his original thought. "His wife left him, he's a recovering alcoholic and he's got a terminally ill daughter. As an actor you go, oh, the drama, the pain -- or I do anyway, as I tend to the potential to be histrionic. But he has no self-pity at all. He's just getting on with the business of living and doing the best he can do."

Perhaps adding to the intersection of fact and fiction, fantasy and real life in "Ondine,"  Farrell, who also had the film "Triage" playing at the festival, confirmed while in Toronto that he and costar Bachleda are expecting a baby together. 

"I think he's a pretty rare actor, and not just for Ireland," said Jordan of his leading man. "You're always looking for two things, you're looking for stardom, that huge marquee thing, and you're looking for authenticity. And in a way they are totally opposite of each other, and to find them in the same person is just remarkable."

-- Mark Olsen