Winners, Day One: The 2024 Hollmann Awards

Today is the first of three days' worth of the 2024 Hollmann Awards; the full list of nominees can be seen here. Six categories we'll discuss today, beginning with:

The 1992 Retro Hollmann Awards, Day One

The awarding of the 1992 Retro Hollmann Awards begins! Reference the Top Ten, check out the full list of nominees, then sit back and enjoy as we cover the first nine categories, including Director, Original Screenplay, and Score, and beginning with....

1992, Day Seven: Actor

Personally, I think it's interesting to look at the 1992 Best Actor lineup and not only see that there is one former winner, but that it is neither Clint Eastwood (this was his first acting nomination), nor is it Al Pacino (though that would soon be corrected). It's Denzel Washington.

Washington was already on his third nomination in 1992, having been nominated as a Supporting Actor for Cry Freedom and Glory; it was the latter that resulted in his first Oscar win. Malcolm X was his first nod for Lead Actor; his next five nominations would all follow suit: 1999's The Hurricane, 2001's Training Day (another win), 2012's Flight, 2016's Fences (for which he should have won a third Oscar) and 2017's Roman J. Israel, Esq. All told, that's eight nominations, exactly the tally Pacino had before he finally won his first:

Since then, there's been some debate over who should have won this year. Hell, it's a debate that goes even further back, to 1974-75: if Pacino won for either The Godfather: Part Two (as he could've) or Dog Day Afternoon (as he should've), would there have been less pressure to give him a career Oscar, thereby allowing Washington to take what Spike Lee claimed was rightfully his? Would Washington have even won? A second Oscar in three years doesn't always happen, and there were three other nominees, all on their first time; I can especially see a case for veteran Eastwood becoming the first actor-director to claim both prizes in one night. And what about Stephen Rea, star of the indie film du jour and Best Picture contender The Crying Game?

Fortunately, I'm here to settle once and for all not just the coulda-woulda - but more importantly, the shoulda:

Best Supporting Actor, 1987

This has got to be the first time this happened in Academy Awards history: the studio made the right call...but the voters committed category fraud! Two of the nominees for Best Supporting Actor - Broadcast News' Albert Brooks and Cry Freedom's Denzel Washington - were being pushed for Lead by their respective campaigns. Washington even received a Golden Globe nomination in that category. Yet when the nominations were announced, both men found themselves here.

Another arguably leading man taking up a spot was Street Smart's Morgan Freeman. Though already named Best Supporting Actor by NSFC, the LA Film Critics Association, and Independent Spirit Awards, Freeman's Bill the Butcher to Christopher Reeve's Amsterdam Vallon. Also: this was the first time in history two black men were nominated in the same acting category.

Then there's former James Bond Sean Connery, with his first and only nomination, and not just a sentimental favorite but a worthy choice, for The Untouchables. And Vincent Gardenia, previously nominated for Bang the Drum Slowly, was up for Moonstruck, which took the Academy by storm, as first evidenced yesterday. So who took home the gold?

(It is so odd to me that in both Supporting categories, the presenters were two co-stars of a nominee who really didn't have a shot at winning.)

This is one of the strongest lineups in the category's history, I think. Let me tell you why...

The 2016 Hollmann Awards

The Oscar nominations are tomorrow...and so now is as good a time as any to present my own awards for the best in 2016 cinema. These are the Hollmann Awards.

Best Supporting Actress

Jiang Wenli as Master Zou, the Madame

The Final Master

2. Viola Davis, Fences; 3. Song Jia, The Final Master; 4. Jena Malone, The Neon Demon; 

5. Lupita Nyong'o, Queen of Katwe

Lupita Nyong'o, expressing disapproval with the little "hmms" she makes, giving those looks children the world over know too well - yet in her eyes, there's guarded hope. Jena Malone, deadpanning her way through an off-kilter performance that boasts three jaw-dropping moments for her. Song Jia, the mysterious wife who enters into a marriage as a transaction, suddenly finding a strength and love for her husband she didn't count on possessing. Viola Davis, breaking our hearts and reflecting every hard-working woman out there who stood to the side so her man could feel like a Man.

But my favorite supporting actress performance this year came from Jiang Wenli, as a smirking, cruel, calculating gang boss who hides behind the cloak of "continuing my husband's name" - while consolidating power for her own ends. She is strong, she is cunning, she is a force to be reckoned with. And Jiang plays her like a cat with a bowl of cream.

(the rest of the awards are after the jump)

Casting Coup Week: Julius Caesar

Andrew Kendall and I are prepping the way with a very special CASTING COUP WEEK! And our subjects: the Best Picture nominees of 1953!

We begin with Julius Caesar....

Casting Coup Tuesday: The Towering Inferno (a DISASTERPIECE)

It's Disaster Film Month. If you want to watch alongside the Silver Screener, check out A Crack in the World on Netflix Instant tonight. Dana Andrews, Janette Scott and Alexander Knox. But for now...
 
We begin our special Disasterpiece Theatre edition of Casting Coup Tuesday with The Towering Inferno.

As the regulars know, I am not a huge fan of the film, which is disappointing since it's the most famous and awarded of a subgenre I adore. I see nothing wrong with a two-and-a-half-hour ensemble disaster flick (Independence Day clocks in at 2h33min and is masterful), nor do I have a problem with a disaster flick that takes itself seriously (it's how camp classics like The Swarm are born). No, the biggest crimes of The Towering Inferno are a lack of focus and a dull pace. Lead characters are poorly developed or quickly pushed aside, motivations are muddled, relationships are obscured, the editing is working against the thrills of the plot, etc.

The greatest shame is that The Towering Inferno should be amazing. The cast assembled is incredible, with most of the performances delivering. Steve McQueen, Richard Chamberlain and William Holden are best in show, along with surprising, brief turns from Sheila Allen and Susan Flannery. John Williams' score is better with repeated listenings, even if it doesn't measure up to Earthquake. I don't even hate that it's obviously two different books thrown together -- the buoy escape seems so dangerous that there has to be a backup plan, and even though keeping million-gallon water tanks on top of the roof seems...bizarre...I can totally accept that. Because it's outrageous. And that's the problem with The Towering Inferno: it gives you this outrageous situation and treats it with all the sobriety of Munich.

Which is why it needs a kick-ass remake. And isn't it fun to think about who can fill the shoes of the original actors? Click on the title below to continue....

DEATH TOLL: 5 (leads only)

ROMANCES: 4 (leads only)