2010 BAFTA Nominations

Below is a list of the nominees for The Orange British Academy Film Awards or BAFTAs.  The awards will be given out Sunday, February 21 at The Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London. Coverage on the BBC begins with a stand-alone red carpet show on BBC Three followed by the ceremony on BBC One.


NOMINATIONS for 2009 Films (presented in 2010):

BEST FILM
AVATAR James Cameron, Jon Landau

AN EDUCATION Finola Dwyer, Amanda Posey

THE HURT LOCKER Kathryn Bigelow, Mark Boal, Nicolas Chartier, Greg Shapiro

PRECIOUS: BASED ON THE NOVEL PUSH BY SAPPHIRE Lee Daniels, Sarah Siegel-Magness, Gary Magness

UP IN THE AIR Ivan Reitman, Jason Reitman, Daniel Dubiecki

OUTSTANDING BRITISH FILM
AN EDUCATION Finola Dwyer, Amanda Posey, Lone Scherfig, Nick Hornby

FISH TANK Kees Kasander, Nick Laws, Andrea Arnold

IN THE LOOP Kevin Loader, Adam Tandy, Armando Iannucci, Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Tony Roche

MOON Stuart Fenegan, Trudie Styler, Duncan Jones, Nathan Parker

NOWHERE BOY Robert Bernstein, Douglas Rae, Kevin Loader, Sam Taylor-Wood, Matt Greenhalgh

OUTSTANDING DEBUT BY A BRITISH WRITER, DIRECTOR OR PRODUCER
LUCY BAILEY, ANDREW THOMPSON, ELIZABETH MORGAN HEMLOCK, DAVID PEARSON Directors, Producers –

Mugabe and the White African

ERAN CREEVY Writer/Director – Shifty

STUART HAZELDINE Writer/Director – Exam

DUNCAN JONES Director – Moon

SAM TAYLOR-WOOD Director – Nowhere Boy

DIRECTOR
AVATAR James Cameron

DISTRICT 9 Neill Blomkamp

AN EDUCATION Lone Scherfig

THE HURT LOCKER Kathryn Bigelow

INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS Quentin Tarantino

ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
THE HANGOVER Jon Lucas, Scott Moore

THE HURT LOCKER Mark Boal

INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS Quentin Tarantino

A SERIOUS MAN Joel Coen, Ethan Coen

UP Pete Docter, Bob Peterson

ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
DISTRICT 9 Neill Blomkamp, Terri Tatchell

AN EDUCATION Nick Hornby

IN THE LOOP Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Armando Iannucci, Tony Roche

PRECIOUS: BASED ON THE NOVEL PUSH BY SAPPHIRE Geoffrey Fletcher

UP IN THE AIR Jason Reitman, Sheldon Turner

FILM NOT IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE
BROKEN EMBRACES Agustín Almodóvar, Pedro Almodóvar

COCO BEFORE CHANEL Carole Scotta, Caroline Benjo, Philippe Carcassonne, Anne Fontaine

LET THE RIGHT ONE IN Carl Molinder, John Nordling, Tomas Alfredson

A PROPHET Pascal Caucheteux, Marco Cherqui, Alix Raynaud, Jacques Audiard

THE WHITE RIBBON Stefan Arndt, Veit Heiduschka, Margaret Menegoz, Michael Haneke

ANIMATED FILM
CORALINE Henry Selick

FANTASTIC MR FOX Wes Anderson

UP Pete Docter

LEADING ACTOR
JEFF BRIDGES Crazy Heart

GEORGE CLOONEY Up in the Air

COLIN FIRTH A Single Man

JEREMY RENNER The Hurt Locker

ANDY SERKIS Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll

LEADING ACTRESS
CAREY MULLIGAN An Education

SAOIRSE RONAN The Lovely Bones

GABOUREY SIDIBE Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire

MERYL STREEP Julie & Julia

AUDREY TAUTOU Coco Before Chanel

SUPPORTING ACTOR
ALEC BALDWIN It’s Complicated

CHRISTIAN McKAY Me and Orson Welles

ALFRED MOLINA An Education

STANLEY TUCCI The Lovely Bones

CHRISTOPH WALTZ Inglourious Basterds

SUPPORTING ACTRESS
ANNE-MARIE DUFF Nowhere Boy
VERA FARMIGA Up in the Air

ANNA KENDRICK Up in the Air

MO’NIQUE Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire

KRISTIN SCOTT THOMAS Nowhere Boy

MUSIC
AVATAR James Horner

CRAZY HEART T-Bone Burnett, Stephen Bruton

FANTASTIC MR FOX Alexandre Desplat

SEX & DRUGS & ROCK & ROLL Chaz Jankel

UP Michael Giacchino

CINEMATOGRAPHY
AVATAR Mauro Fiore

DISTRICT 9 Trent Opaloch

THE HURT LOCKER Barry Ackroyd

INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS Robert Richardson

THE ROAD Javier Aguirresarobe

EDITING
AVATAR Stephen Rivkin, John Refoua, James Cameron

DISTRICT 9 Julian Clarke

THE HURT LOCKER Bob Murawski, Chris Innis

INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS Sally Menke

UP IN THE AIR Dana E. Glauberman

PRODUCTION DESIGN
AVATAR Rick Carter, Robert Stromberg, Kim Sinclair

DISTRICT 9 Philip Ivey, Guy Potgieter

HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE Stuart Craig, Stephenie McMillan

THE IMAGINARIUM OF DOCTOR PARNASSUS Dave Warren, Anastasia Masaro, Caroline Smith

INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS David Wasco, Sandy Reynolds Wasco

COSTUME DESIGN
BRIGHT STAR Janet Patterson

COCO BEFORE CHANEL Catherine Leterrier

AN EDUCATION Odile Dicks-Mireaux

A SINGLE MAN Arianne Phillips

THE YOUNG VICTORIA Sandy Powell

SOUND
AVATAR Christopher Boyes, Gary Summers, Andy Nelson, Tony Johnson, Addison Teague

DISTRICT 9 Brent Burge, Chris Ward, Dave Whitehead, Michael Hedges, Ken Saville

THE HURT LOCKER Ray Beckett, Paul N. J. Ottosson

STAR TREK Peter J. Devlin, Andy Nelson, Anna Behlmer, Mark Stoeckinger, Ben Burtt

UP Tom Myers, Michael Silvers, Michael Semanick, Doc Kane

SPECIAL VISUAL EFFECTS
AVATAR Joe Letteri, Stephen Rosenbaum, Richard Baneham, Andrew R. Jones

DISTRICT 9 Dan Kaufman, Peter Muyzers, Robert Habros, Matt Aitken

HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE John Richardson, Tim Burke, Tim Alexander, Nicolas Aithadi

THE HURT LOCKER Richard Stutsman

STAR TREK Roger Guyett, Russell Earl, Paul Kavanagh, Burt Dalton

MAKE UP & HAIR
COCO BEFORE CHANEL Thi Thanh Tu Nguyen, Madeleine Cofano, Jane Milon

AN EDUCATION Lizzie Yianni Georgiou

THE IMAGINARIUM OF DOCTOR PARNASSUS Sarah Monzani

NINE Peter Swords King

THE YOUNG VICTORIA Jenny Shircore

SHORT ANIMATION
THE GRUFFALO Michael Rose, Martin Pope, Jakob Schuh, Max Lang

THE HAPPY DUCKLING Gili Dolev

MOTHER OF MANY Sally Arthur, Emma Lazenby

SHORT FILM
14 Asitha Ameresekere

I DO AIR James Bolton, Martina Amati

JADE Samm Haillay, Daniel Elliott

MIXTAPE Luti Fagbenle, Luke Snellin

OFF SEASON Jacob Jaffke, Jonathan van Tulleken

THE ORANGE RISING STAR AWARD (voted for by the public)
JESSE EISENBERG

NICHOLAS HOULT

CAREY MULLIGAN

TAHAR RAHIM

KRISTEN STEWART
[END]

Review: "Law Abiding Citizen" Has a Rage On

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 7 (of 2010) by Leroy Douresseaux

Law Abiding Citizen (2009)
Running time: 108 minutes (1 hour, 48 minutes)
MPAA – R for strong bloody brutal violence and torture, a scene of rape, and pervasive language
DIRECTOR: F. Gary Gray
WRITER: Kurt Wimmer
PRODUCER: Gerard Butler, Lucas Foster, Mark Gill, Robert Katz, Alan Siegel, and Kurt Wimmer
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Jonathan Sela (D.o.P.)
EDITOR: Tariz Anwar

CRIME/SUSPENSE/THRILLER with elements of action and mystery

Starring: Jamie Foxx, Gerard Butler, Colm Meaney, Bruce McGill, Leslie Bibb, Michael Irby, Gregory Itzin, Regina Hall, Emerald-Angel Young, Christian Stolte, Annie Corley, Richard Portnow, and Viola Davis

In the 1970s, movie studios produced what were called black exploitation, or “Blaxploitation,” films. The films starred predominately black actors and featured subject matter of interest to Black people, such as racism, violence, and crime, although not all Blaxploitation films dealt with those subjects.

I believe that there are also “Whiteploitation” films. I call them that because they are films that exploit the fears of White Americans, especially fears concerning urban crime and violence, particular crime committed against white people by brown people (African-Americans, Latinos, Asians, etc.) and lower class whites (white trash).

The recent film, Law Abiding Citizen, focuses on an assistant district attorney at odds with a criminal mastermind who virtually controls a city from the confines of his prison cell. This could be seen as a white exploitation film, exploiting issues of violent crime and a broken justice system in hopes of tapping into the resentments of its predominately white audience. While Law Abiding Citizen initially deals with these issues, in a somewhat substantive fashion, it eventually morphs into a standard thriller full of violence and largely unfocused rage – again to appeal to the prurient interests of a young male audience.

In the film, Clyde Shelton (Gerard Butler) is traumatized by the brutal murders of his wife and daughter at the hands of two men during a home invasion. Nick Rice (Jamie Foxx) is the ambitious, hotshot, young prosecutor, assigned to the case. Nick offers one of the suspects a light sentence in exchange for testifying against his accomplice, but the criminal who gets the plea deal is actually the worse of the two. Rice ignores Shelton’s objections to this deal.

Ten years later, Shelton kills the two men who murdered his wife and child. Thrown into prison, Shelton begins a campaign of vengeance against the entire system. Soon, Nick Rice and the city of Philadelphia are held in a grip of fear, with authorities powerless to halt Shelton’s reign of terror. With police Detective Dunnigan (Colm Meaney) at his side, Nick desperately races against time to stop a deadly adversary who seems always to be one step ahead, even though he’s in prison!

When it was about victims of violent crime and revenge, Law Abiding Citizen had potential. When it became a suspense thriller, it became just another… well, suspense thriller. The film makes some legitimate points about victims of crime and the criminal justice system, which makes it similar to “Whiteploitation” flicks like Death Wish and Sudden Impact. However, at the point when Clyde Shelton goes from righteous vengeance to acts of terrorism against society, the film loses what moral standing it had.

Law Abiding Citizen mixes elements of V for Vendetta (shadowy figure holds city in grip of fear), the Jason Bourne movies (former operative uses special skills for payback), and the Saw franchise (torture and gruesome murder), with a dose Charles Bronson revenge movie. It’s entertaining and quite often it offers the kind of genuine stimulation a good, taut thriller should. But to second Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly, I no longer enjoy Gerard Butler’s “mush-mouthed bravura” (and only liked it for a little while). Jamie Foxx gives a good performance, but compared to his best work (Ray, Collateral), his performance here seems like only a dutiful effort to justify the large paycheck he received for this movie.

I also want to give the producers credit for hiring a perfectly capable African-American director and for giving us a satisfying ending.

5 of 10
B-

Friday, February 19, 2010

NOTES: 2010 Image Awards: 2 nominations for motion picture actor (Jamie Foxx) and director (F. Gary Gray)

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Review: "THX 1138 Director's Cut" is a New Look at Early George Lucas

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 188 (of 2004) by Leroy Douresseaux

THX 1138 – The George Lucas Director’s Cut (2004)
Originally released as THX 1138 (1971)
Running time: 88 minutes
MPAA – R for some sexuality/nudity (Director’s Cut)
EDITOR/DIRECTOR: George Lucas
WRITERS: Walter Murch and George Lucas; from a story by George Lucas (based upon his screenplay for the short film)
PRODUCERS: Lawrence Sturhahn
CINEMATOGRAPHERS: Albert Kihn and David Meyers

SCI-FI

Starring: Robert Duvall, Donald Pleasence, Don Pedro Colley, and Maggie McOmie

THX 1138 was filmmaker George Lucas’s first feature length film, and he based it upon a short film he made while in film school, THX 1138:4EB. The film is set in a 25th-century totalitarian state that has stripped mankind of any individuality. People are numbered drones who are encouraged to work hard, be safe, watch out for their fellow workers, and consume. The state religion is a kind of therapy in which pre-recorded voices push mantras about “the masses.” There is a government-enforced program that uses sedating drugs to control the populace. The state is always watching people through cameras and monitors, and when a citizen opens his medicine cabinet, a voice suggests which drugs he should take. To not take drugs earns a citizen immediate notice and is a serious crime.

When the title character, THX 1138 (Robert Duvall), stops taking the mind-numbing drugs, he irrevocably changes his life. He has sex with his mate (who is more like a platonic roommate), LUH 3417 (Maggie McOmie), and sexual intercourse is a felony. After LUH 3417 is impregnated by their intercourse, the couple is throne in prison, and THX, his mind clear now that he is drug free, looks to escape the system.

THX 1138 was originally released in 1971, but in September of 2004, THX 1138 – The George Lucas Director’s Cut was re-released theatrically in a small number of cities (reportedly 20), and that re-release is the subject of this review. While some may consider the film’s look and the way it delivers it themes to be dated, the film is actually timeless. Political states ostensibly exist to protect the populace, but they do so mostly by controlling some or all aspects of citizens’ lives. An ideal situation is that the state interferes as little as possible, if at all, but the truth of that matter is that many states grow more controlling as they grow older, or if some disaster, man made or natural, causes so much havoc and destruction, that the state has to take total control to bring things back to some state of normalcy.

Lucas makes all of this feel real; the drama is palatable, and the fear of retribution from the state is a threat even the audience can feel. The threat of punishment from authority and the portrayal of an omnipresent society in which privacy is almost nonexistence is chilling. The film’s lone flaw, a serious one, is that it seems alternately too dry and too cold. The ideas behind the story, the production values, and the atmosphere are dead on, but the execution is often flat. The almost symbolic ending precariously straddles the fence of being appropriate or clumsy. Still, for lovers of that sci-fi sub-genre, dystopian futures, this is a good bet.

6 of 10
B

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Curtiss Cook Talks about Being Part of "Shutter Island" (Negromancer News Bits and Bites

Actor Curtiss Cook talks to Wilson Morales of AOL Black Voices about working on Martin Scorsese's Shutter Island:

How did you get attached to the film?

Curtiss Cook: I got attached to 'Shutter Island' the way I would think most g-list actors like myself do --- not like Mr. Washington or Mr. Smith get approached. I got the first call to come and audition for the casting. I read the scenes for the camera, heard a very nice thank you and left the office trying to put it out of my mind. I was able to do this because I didn't hear anything from them for a good three months later and that was a call saying that Mr. Scorsese wanted to meet with me. Cloud nine, that's where I was, on cloud nine.

Review: "Young Frankenstein" is Eternally Funny

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 51 (of 2005) by Leroy Douresseaux

Young Frankenstein (1974) – Black & White
Running time: 105 minutes (1 hour, 45 minutes)
DIRECTOR: Mel Brooks
WRITERS: Gene Wilder and Brooks – screen story and screenplay (based upon the novel Frankenstein by Mary Shelley)
PRODUCER: Michael Gruskoff
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Gerald Hirschfeld
EDITOR: John C. Howard
Academy Award nominee

COMEDY/HORROR with elements of drama, sci-fi, and romance

Starring: Gene Wilder, Peter Boyle, Marty Feldman, Madeline Kahn, Cloris Leachman, Terri Garr, Kenneth Mars, and Gene Hackman

Mel Brooks’ Young Frankenstein is a tribute to Mary Shelley’s classic novel, Frankenstein, by way of parody. The film pokes fun at the various film versions of the novel, in particular the Universal Pictures versions. Parody’s work best when the parody looks a lot like the material at which it’s poking fun; that is why Young Frankenstein and Brooks’ other famous send-up, Blazing Saddles, work so well. Saddles looks, sounds, and walks like a western, and Young Frankenstein is a beautiful, black and white dream that looks as if it were born right next to the Universal’s Frankenstein films. In fact, this film was shot on the same set with the same props and lab equipment as the original 1931 film, Frankenstein.

After years of trying to live down the family’s reputation, Frederick von Frankenstein (Gene Wilder) is summoned by a will to his late grandfather, Victor von Frankenstein’s, castle in Transylvania. He is joined at the castle by Inga, (Terri Garr), who tells Young Frankenstein that she is his assistant, and by Igor (Marty Feldman), whose grandfather worked for Frederick’s grandfather. Frederick eventually discovers his grandfather’s step-by-step manual explaining how to reanimate dead tissue. He repeats granddad’s experiments and creates The Monster (Peter Boyle). However, despite his imposing size and frightful face, The Monster only wants to be loved, but the local villagers aren’t buying it. The Monster repeatedly tries to escape the fright and ignorance that wants to destroy him, but Frederick wants to bring him home and teach him to live amongst people.

1974 was a good year for Brooks because it also saw the release of his classic send up of westerns, Blazing Saddles. Young Frankenstein is still considered by many to be his best film (I take the other side saying Saddles is his best), and the film remains a gorgeous black and white ode not only to Frankenstein movies, but also to the beauty of black and white films and how the splendor of their superb costume designs and lavish and ornate sets were still evident even without the benefit of color photography.

The cast is also superb, and no one single person needs to be singled out because everyone is at the top of his or her game. However, the late Marty Feldman wasn’t shy about playing up the fact that he was acting in a comedy. Paying special attention to him every time he’s on screen is worth the patience when paid off in comic gems. The film also has a lot of good jokes and clever gags, and the timing is impeccable – apparently due to a lot of editing. That’s probably the best thing about this film; watching it gives the sensation that everything works, makes sense, and that the humor is true. Young Frankenstein is one of the great film comedies, and is not to be missed.

8 of 10
A

NOTES:
1975 Academy Awards: 2 nominations: “Best Sound” and “Best Writing, Screenplay Adapted from Other Material”


1975 Golden Globes: 2 nominations: “Best Motion Picture Actress – Musical/Comedy” (Cloris Leachman) and “Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture” (Madeline Kahn).


2003: the National Film Preservation Board, USA added the movie to the National Film Registry.

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Review: "Four Christmases" Kicks that Holiday Spirit in the Butt

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 6 (of 2010) by Leroy Douresseaux

Four Christmases (2008)
Running time: 88 minutes (1 hour 28 minutes)
MPAA – PG-13 for sexual humor and language
DIRECTOR: Seth Gordon
WRITERS: Matt Allen & Caleb Wilson and Jon Lucas & Scott Moore; from a story by Matt Allen and Caleb Wilson
PRODUCERS: Gary Barber, Roger Birnbaum, Jonathan Glickman, Vince Vaughn, and Reese Witherspoon
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Jeffrey L. Kimball
EDITORS: Mark Helfrich and Melissa Kent

COMEDY

Starring: Vince Vaughn, Reese Witherspoon, Robert Duvall, Sissy Spacek, Jon Voight, Jon Favreau, Mary Steenburgen, Dwight Yoakam, Tim McGraw, Cedric Yarbrough, Brian Baumgartner, and Kristen Chenoweth

Once upon a time, I hated Christmas movies, but now I enjoy the good feelings they bring. Four Christmases brings along lots of good feelings, simply because it is so funny. Packed with lowbrow, vulgar, and slob humor, Four Christmases works because it connects crude laughs with the rudest joke of all – Christmas with relatives.

Brad McVie (Vince Vaughn) and his girlfriend Kate (Reese Witherspoon) are an upscale, happily unmarried San Francisco couple. Because both their parents divorced, they aren’t thinking about marriage, even after three great years of dating, nor have they visited their parents since getting together. After their Christmas vacation in Fiji gets sidetracked by fog, they become obligated to finally visit their parents. That means not two, but four stops, where childhood, adolescent, and family wounds are reopened and resentment thrives. Somewhere along the way, Brad and Kate reexamine their relationship and future.

There are five Oscar winners in Four Christmases: Reese Witherspoon, Robert Duvall, Sissy Spacek, Jon Voight, and Mary Steenburgen. Usually this might mean a poignant Christmas drama full of family and healing. Four Christmases is full of family and healing, but it’s damn funny. It’s also damn honest. Getting together with family over the holidays, especially Christmas, is worse than nightmare on Elm Street or any street. We tolerate the toad relatives because they come with some beloved family that we’re genuinely happy to see.

Vince Vaughn and Reese Witherspoon must be really good actors or their screen chemistry is the real deal. They are so good together that they should always be together, like a great screen couple. Vaughn performs his shtick to maximum effect, and Witherspoon is, as always, solid. Together, they make even this film’s turn towards serious relationship drama late in the story not seem phony.

Four Christmases captures the joys and the miseries of the holiday so well and with so many laughs that it is bound to be an impolite (but not boorish) Christmas classic. Also, watch for the always good Kristen Chenoweth doing some enjoyable scene stealing.

7 of 10
B+

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

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You Can Count on Me Counts on Superb Characters

TRASH IN MY EYE No. 38 (of 2003) by Leroy Douresseaux


You Can Count on Me (2000)
Running time: 111 minutes (1 hour 51 minutes)
MPAA – R for language, some drug use, and a scene of sexuality
WRITER/DIRECTOR: Kenneth Lonergan
PRODUCER: Barbara De Fina, John N. Hart, Larry Meistrich, and Jeffrey Sharp
CINEMATOGRAPHER: Stephen Kazmierski
EDITOR: Anne McCabe
Academy Award nominee

DRAMA

Starring: Laura Linney, Mark Ruffalo, Matthew Broderick, Rory Culkin, Jon Tenney, J. Smith-Cameron, Gaby Hoffman, and Adam LeFevre

Laura Linney (The Truman Show) earned an Academy Award nomination for her role as a single mother whose life is thrown into turmoil when her drifter brother (Mark Ruffalo) returns to their hometown in Kenneth Lonergan’s You Can Count on Me. There is a standard and easy way to describe this film, a real movie about real people with real emotions – no supermodels, no disease of the week with actors emoting contrived hysterics, just a film where the actors act like real people.

Lonergan, the screenwriter of Analyze This, is a first time director who also earned an Oscar nomination for this screenplay. He helms this film with the verve of a master. Surprisingly for a character piece, this film possesses the viewer’s attention with a spell like that of a classic suspense thriller, yet this is an intensely driven character piece.

Eschewing any kind of standard plot line that one would usually find in movies, Lonergan focus his story on Samantha “Sammy” Prescott (Ms. Linney) and her brother Terry (Rufflalo). Even without a plot, the film is still “about something,” the deeply felt relationship and bond of need between the siblings. As soon as the two meet for the first time on screen, Lonergan reveals the status quo of their relationship. What the movie is about is the urgent need for that relationship to evolve.

Ms. Linney isn’t alone in her outstanding performance. Anxious, confused, and weary, Ruffalo (Ride with the Devil) deftly draws us completely into his world. As Sammy’s son Rudy, Rory Culkin turns in a nice performance, and leaves us wanting more.

Although his characters occasionally seem stuck in the rut of their angst and pain, Lonergan gives us the kind of character-driven piece that puts you right inside the characters. You Can Count on Me is feels so much like real life that you understand that what we see on the screen is a small part of a larger story. And this chapter is so good that you can’t help but care for what happens past the fade out.

9 of 10
A+

NOTES:
2001 Academy Awards: 2 nominations for “Best Actress in a Leading Role” (Laura Linney) and “Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen” (Kenneth Lonergan)


2001 Golden Globes: 2 nominees “Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama” (Laura Linney) and “Best Screenplay - Motion Picture” (Kenneth Lonergan)


2001 Independent Spirit Awards: 2 wins for “Best First Feature” Kenneth Lonergan (director), John Hart (producer), Jeff Sharp (producer), Barbara De Fina (producer), and Larry Meistrich (producer) and “Best Screenplay” (Kenneth Lonergan); and 3 nominations for “Best Debut Performance” (Rory Culkin), “Best Female Lead” (Laura Linney), and “Best Male Lead” (Mark Ruffalo)