The Mosquito Coast (1986)

Film: The Mosquito Coast (1986)

Stars: Harrison Ford, Helen Mirren, Andre Gregory, River Phoenix, Martha Plimpton

Director: Peter Weir

Oscar History: No nominations, though both Ford and composer Maurice Jarre got Golden Globe nominations

Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

Each month, as part of our 2026 Saturdays with the Stars series, we are looking at the men & women who created the Boom!-Pow!-Bang! action films that would come to dominate the Blockbuster Era of cinema.  This month, our focus is on Harrison Ford: click here to learn more about Mr. Ford (and why I picked him), and click here for other Saturdays with the Stars articles.

Harrison Ford was not the first actor associated with a specific role or being unable to escape from it.  But in the modern era of filmmaking (i.e. post-Jaws) he really personified the actor whose characters ended up being too popular for him to stop doing them. In the 1980's, this meant that Ford made a number of films as both Han Solo & Indiana Jones (from 1980-84, he made four of them alone, and only took a break for Blade Runner, a rather difficult shoot for the actor despite its later cult status).  But unlike the 1990's, when Ford's dramatic attempts outside of action-adventure would become something of a source of ridicule (and not inspire a lot of critical hosannas), in the 1980's he had a lot of acclaim on this front, particularly in the movie of Peter Weir.  In 1985, he starred in the blockbuster hit Witness, which won him his first (and to date only) Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.  In 1986, he appeared in another dramatic departure from Weir, but unlike Witness it was a flop (he'd recover pretty quickly two years later with the massive success of Working Girl, a movie which got pretty much everyone in the cast but him an Oscar nomination).  The Mosquito Coast is a unique film though (and Ford has frequently cited it as his favorite) given how well it captured a certain type of toxic masculinity, and how brittle & unrelenting Ford's portrayal of the main character is right up until the end credits.

(Spoilers Ahead) The movie is about Allie Fox (Ford), an inventor who hates the American Dream, capitalism, and a global economy that relies upon foreign industries to keep it afloat (there's an early scene where he eviscerates a shop owner for carrying products made in Japan, which in the 1980's you can't entirely tell if this is just him leaning in on Reagan conservatism or makes him truly xenophobic).  After yet another employer being disappointed with his impressive inventions (in this case a house that can make ice), he decides to move his family to the jungles of Belize, where he buys a village in the rainforest.  Allie, his wife Margot (Mirren), whom he constantly calls "Mother," and their four children, including eldest son Charlie (Phoenix) initially find success introducing his impressive inventions to the jungle.  But his paranoia starts to settle in.  He convinces his family that a nuclear war has struck America, destroying the country, and when a group of rebels take over his camp, he murders them (not in the way he planned, initially wanting to freeze them to death but instead having them burned to death in an explosion that pollutes the river).  Eventually he drives his family mad with loyalty tests, and is shot by a missionary whom Allie is convinced is running a Christian concentration camp, killing him as his family finally finds freedom.

It's easy to see, watching the film, why it didn't resonate with Reagan America, even with (or maybe especially because of) Harrison Ford in the lead.  The movie is dark, and shows a toxicity in the male ego that you don't usually find here.  In the 1980's, with Reagan promising a return of the American Dream for white families (and in particular white men) while widening income gaps and unsteady unemployment numbers took its toll on Middle America figures like the Fox family.  Huey Long had said that "every man is a king" and in the 1980's that was the reigning theology for conservative men, and while Allie Fox presents as being anti-capitalist, he is deeply conservative about gender & family life, and that shows in the way that he blames women and people of color for his failures to be truly successful the way he trains his children to think he should be.  It's hard not to watch this film, and in particular the way that he treats his wife Margot (not physically abusing her, but clearly indulging in what we'd now consider emotional abuse) and think of the MAGA movement, and the way that it tries to get back to this era...knowing full well that it is filled with angry men who still blame the world for their failures.

Ford's portrayal of Allie Fox is really good, and it's in part because he doesn't let up on him.  Most actors, particularly ones who are super reliant upon audiences wanting to root for them, wouldn't have allowed their characterization to be so unsympathetic.  They would've given him redemption, or an apology scene with Helen Mirren at the end of the movie.  But thankfully Weir doesn't do that, and we get with Ford's performance a broken man, one you might understand where he's coming from because he's the product of his environment (capitalism can tear us all apart in the end), but who is also so egocentric he doesn't acknowledge the harm he's doing because it's his harm.  In a year where men like Graham Platner (who put so much of the blame for their failings on others rather than himself) are being celebrated by the left (and Donald Trump, doing the same thing, is a deity for the right), it's hard not to think that Mosquito Coast and Ford's layered performance aren't ahead of their time.

OVP: Picture (2003)

OVP: Best Picture (2003)

The Nominees Were...

Barrie M. Osborne, Peter Jackson, & Fran Walsh, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Ross Katz & Sofia Coppola, Lost in Translation

Samuel Goldwyn, Jr., Peter Weir, & Duncan Henderson, Lost in Translation

Robert Lorenz, Judie G. Hoyt, & Clint Eastwood, Mystic River

Kathleen Kennedy, Frank Marshall, & Gary Ross, Seabiscuit

My Thoughts: Frequently when I look at a list like this, after spending weeks and nineteen articles talking about the movies themselves, the eventual winner for Best Picture (in my mind, maybe not in yours dear reader), is relatively anticlimactic.  Usually Oscar chooses maybe 2-3 nominees that I'd put in my personal Top 10, and then the rest are films that show the clear dividing line between my taste & Oscar's, and to a degree that is true this year (this full list isn't going to repeat with me, even with me choosing ten nominees), but this year...I don't honestly know which movie I'm going to pick at the beginning of this article, and so we're going to have a bit of a conversation as I try to convince myself before we get to my eventual "My Ballot" choices this afternoon.

To delay the inevitable, let's focus on the three films that won't be getting Best Picture (spoiler alert, though if you look at our links to all past races at the bottom of this article, you're going to know that this isn't much of a spoiler).  This isn't because they are unworthy.  After all, Master and Commander has grown on me the past ten weeks quite a bit, both in terms of me rewatching it for these write-ups and truly appreciating the way that it really paints a beautiful, complete picture of life on the high seas.  With solid performances from Russell Crowe & Paul Bettany and Peter Weir's steady hand, it might not always win every battle (I think the character development beyond Crowe & Bettany needed a bit more growth), but it's steadfast & a nominee that has aged well.

Seabiscuit is the clear "fifth nominee" not just in my rankings, but in terms of Oscar's preference.  In the days before the ten-wide fields, there was usually one film that was a crowdpleaser that otherwise couldn't make it in Best Director, and for 2003 it was Seabiscuit.  For me, it's just an underdog sports movie.  It doesn't have any of the heart you'd need to make it rise above cliche, and it doesn't have the kind of sentimental click that occasionally works for me in a field like this (when we get to 1999, you'll find I'm going to be a bit kinder to a movie like Cider House Rules which I connected with more than I did Seabiscuit even though they're cut from the same cloth).  It's not a terrible movie (though I don't even know if it's a good one), but when you put it next to some of 2003's best...it feels woefully out-of-place.

Mystic River is a solid thriller, and speaks to what Clint Eastwood does best (or at least used to do best), turning antiheroes into complicated leading figures that the audience has to deduce where the ethical boundaries lie.  I do feel that the beginning & endings of this movie hide that the middle is a bit rougher; the dialogue is good, but I feel like the treatment of Tim Robbins' character of Dave feels off, partially by some of Robbins character choices & also by Eastwood's treatment of him as the director.  But this is a decent movie, and it's not embarrassing-I get what Oscar fell for here, and even if I wouldn't join them, I respect it.

Which brings us to the two movies I am going to nominate for Best Picture.  Lost in Translation is a wonderful movie, one that is filled with a lot of wisdom that becomes clearer the older you get.  Thoughtful in the way it's romantic but rarely sexual (it would have been a nightmare to make Charlotte & Bob feel like lovers rather than spiritual soulmates), it shows the way that we value different things as we age, our bodies getting older slightly before we do, and how youth becomes elusive, but in brief moments something we can capture for a night or a moment.  If I'm being picky (and I've gotta be at this point), some of the humor feels dated (it's intended to be cringe territory, but I suspect Coppola would today avoid it all-together because there's a mocking element to it), but that's really my only complaint.  I love Lost in Translation.

The problem is I also love Return of the King.  It's honestly hard for me to compare the two in part because when you combine Lord of the Rings, which you do subconsciously even if you try not to, pretty much nothing beats it.  Lord of the Rings came out when I was a teenager, and became so synonymous with movies for me that to reward anything else for Best Picture feels like blasphemy; as a collective, it's certainly my favorite film franchise and possibly my favorite movie, period.  But, we are only rewarding Return of the King here, not the entire trilogy (that's the point of the OVP), and like Lost in Translation, if I'm being picky, I think the endings of Return of the King feels like a weak point (which, in contrast, the ending is one of Lost in Translation's finest scenes).  They are also very, very different pictures, so it's hard to grasp how you compare one with the other.

Other Precursor Contenders: The Globes separate their categories into Drama and Musical/Comedy (a tactic I'm envying right now), with The Return of the King winning the former against Cold Mountain, Master and Commander, Mystic River, & Seabiscuit while the latter went to Lost in Translation against Bend It Like Beckham, Big Fish, Finding Nemo, and Love Actually.  BAFTA also went to Return of the King atop Big Fish, Cold Mountain, Lost in Translation, and Master and Commander, while the PGA picked Return of the King against Cold Mountain, The Last Samurai, Master and Commander, Mystic River, & Seabiscuit.  In terms of sixth place, I think it's either City of God (Oscar nominations for Best Director, Editing, & Writing), against Cold Mountain (Oscar cited for Directing, Editing, & two acting trophies, plus the PGA/BAFTA/Globes triumvirate).  I know it's tempting to think it's City of God solely on that Best Director nomination, but I'm going with Cold Mountain-it was a genuine stunner when the Weinsteins couldn't get this movie in in 2003, and I think it was a close call, probably against Seabiscuit.

Films I Would Have Nominated: You'll find out later today. 😉

Oscar’s Choice: There was no stopping Return of the King-it won all eleven trophies in a steamroller effect.

My Choice: Let's work backward.  Seabiscuit is in last, and I'll go Mystic River in fourth.  Master and Commander is a fine bronze, and it's the movie that most grew on me throughout this retrospective.  As for the winner?  My head is saying Lost in Translation, my heart is saying Return of the King...if ties were an option I'd probably tap into that right now, but since they aren't I'm going to go with my heart.  Return of the King defines so much of what I love about movies that I can't bear to give it a loss, even if there are certainly days I'd pick Lost in Translation instead.

And there you have it-another OVP in the books.  Later today we'll do the My Official Ballot, but in the meantime-where did you land?  Do you think that Return of the King is a landslide winner (like it was with Oscar) or are you barely giving it the edge (like me)...or did you choose something else all-together?  And overall-what is your favorite movie of 2003?  Share your comments below!

Also in 2003: Director, Actress, Actor, Supporting Actress, Supporting Actor, Adapted Screenplay, Original Screenplay, Foreign Language Film, Animated Feature Film, Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, Original Score, Original Song, Art Direction, Cinematography, Costume Design, Film Editing, Visual Effects, Makeup, Previously in 2003

Past Best Picture Contests: 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2018, 2019

OVP: Director (2003)

OVP: Best Director (2003)

The Nominees Were...

Sofia Coppola, Lost in Translation

Clint Eastwood, Mystic River

Peter Jackson, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Fernando Meirelles, City of God

Peter Weir, Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

My Thoughts: We're going to be moving into the final two races of 2003 this weekend.  I'm not entirely sure what pace I'll be doing this at after this (we likely won't do them daily, though I will be honest that I'm going to be doing them at a sharper speed than two-a-week as part of a still-secret project I'm trying to accomplish for later in the year).  Today, we're going to move into a pretty solid Best Director lineup.  It is not often that I can say that I'd give a "thumbs up" to all five of the movies in a list, but here I definitely would.  Of course, if you're competing for an Oscar nomination, you should be able to do better than just a thumbs up, and a few of these filmmakers don't quite get far enough, in my opinion.

One of them is Clint Eastwood, who was using Mystic River as a way to tee up a comeback in 2004 for Best Director, followed by a decade of major successes, both artistic & (increasingly more importantly to Eastwood) commercial.  Mystic River is the rare one of these movies that he didn't star in, but you've got the Sean Penn character taking on the obvious Eastwood trope of "man against the law."  Mystic River is a good movie that sometimes feels a bit lost in the middle stretch, coasting off of what is a dynamite ending by not focusing enough on where some of the characters (specifically Tim Robbins' Dave) needs to go.  Eastwood is a bit of a lightning rod amongst progressive cinephiles these days due to his conservative politics, but I'll admit that isn't really the problem with Mystic River in the way that it would be years later with American Sniper (which for the first two-thirds is about as strong of a "conservative vantage point" to a political issue as I've seen in a movie, and then totally derails in the final forty minutes).  It's more that it becomes just a film of a few great moments, without enough substance in-between.  If he weren't competing for an Oscar, I wouldn't complain (it's a good movie), but when you're trying to be the best of the year, details matter.

This is also my problem with Fernando Meirelles' City of God-it's too reliant on big moments.  Meirelles has some key sequences that are jaw-dropping, and though this film was mimicked ad nauseam in the years that followed (including by Meirelles), it deserves credit for being the first of this style/visual palette of filmmaking.  City of God, though, relies too often on increasing shock value to get its point across, and that's a problem when the story is as repetitive as it is.  You understand as the film continues which characters are going to escape & which ones won't, and while it's jaw-dropping to see this group of violent teenagers put in unspeakable situations, Meirelles uses the same types of stories repeatedly to the point where it feels like the movie needed editing.  Picky, I know, but again-it's for an Oscar.

Sofia Coppola knows how to make her time judicious.  Even from the opening moments of Lost in Translation, time hangs over the story as a way for us to understand that everything between Bob & Charlotte is precious (but also, that all of life should be treated as precious).  Coppola achieves a sort of "cinematic" approach to Lost in Translation (I'm not entirely sure that's a descriptive enough adjective, but hopefully it comes across), making it feel warm & like this complete vision (she used film, rather than digital, to make the movie, and I wonder if that helps make it look a bit softer onscreen).  Everything about the way that she resists certain romantic impulses, making sure that the framing is perfect in key moments (especially the karaoke scene)-it all just works beautifully.  It was her breakthrough film, and while she's made great ones since, it's still her best.

Oscar-winner Sydney Pollack once said Hollywood's view of the director's job is "less an artist, more a damage containment expert."  This might explain why so many directors get cited for epics, including our final two nominees-both are trying to make sure a gigantic sequence is kept onscreen without sprawling too badly.  Both men pull this off, though.  Peter Weir's film occasionally veers too much into the "handsome, but not enough character development" column for my taste, but it looks great & I think the battle sequences are gorgeous.  Master and Commander also, as we've mentioned a few times, seamlessly combines sound stage, CGI, & real world sequences all into the same film without ever feeling like you can tell them apart, which is certainly a credit to its director.

Peter Jackson won this Oscar nominally for Return of the King but really for his entire brilliant Lord of the Rings series.  I can only count it for Return of the King, though, so I will admit that I have to dock a point or two off for the slightly repetitive nature of the film's endings.  That being said, the rest of the film is such a treasure you won't care.  Particularly strong points for the way that Jackson manages to make the anticlimax of some of the battles (there are very few major character deaths in LOTR, certainly compared to something like Game of Thrones, which makes the stakes feel less high) by giving such detailed emotional sendoffs to each of the primary characters.  Return of the King represents not just a high point for Jackson & 2003, but also for movies in general-few films stand apart quite in the same way that Lord of the Rings does.

Other Precursor Contenders: The Globes preferred Jackson (singling how easily he'd win the rest of the season, as the Globes are pretty genre averse) against Coppola, Eastwood, Weir, & Anthony Minghella (Cold Mountain), while the DGA went with Jackson as well against Coppola, Eastwood, Weir, & Gary Ross (Seabiscuit).  BAFTA favored Weir as their winner, the only blip in Jackson's run (Return of the King did win Best Picture there, for the record), against Jackson, Minghella, Coppola, & Tim Burton (Big Fish).  In terms of sixth place, it's between Minghella & Ross, and while Ross hit more of the hallmarks we associate with Best Director (i.e. Seabiscuit is up for Picture, Screenplay, & Editing), I feel like it was slightly more Minghella, as I think that Cold Mountain feels more like a directing branch preference than what Ross is doing.

Directors I Would Have Nominated: I'll have my My Ballot out tomorrow, so I won't spoil the contenders quite yet.  Suffice it to say, this is a good list...that I plan on totally upending.
Oscar's Choice: After two years of misses across all of the categories he was cited in, Peter Jackson was inevitable.  Not even Academy favorite Clint Eastwood could give him a race.

My Choice: I'm a bit closer than AMPAS both because I'm not giving this award for the full series and because I do think that Return of the King is the weakest of the three Lord of the Rings films AND it's competing against a movie as flawless as Lost in Translation.  But Jackson wins this-he manages to make it 3/3 in Grade A quality for a film series which is next to impossible to do, and I will argue that Lost in Translation is slightly more a writer's/actor's triumph than it is a directing one (it's close though-both are being mentioned tomorrow).  Behind them would be Weir, Eastwood, & Meirelles, in that order.

Those were my thoughts-how about yours?  Does everyone cosign the Peter Jackson gravy train or does someone want to stand apart?  Do we think that Sofia Coppola, whose filmmaking style has slightly fallen out of favor with Oscar, will ever get back into this lineup again?  And was it Ross or Minghella who was just out-of-reach in sixth place?  Share your thoughts in the comments!

Also in 2003: Actress, Actor, Supporting Actress, Supporting Actor, Adapted Screenplay, Original Screenplay, Foreign Language Film, Animated Feature Film, Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, Original Score, Original Song, Art Direction, Cinematography, Costume Design, Film Editing, Visual Effects, Makeup, Previously in 2003

Past Best Director Contests: 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2018, 2019

Who Doesn't Have an Oscar?

With Piero Tosi’s recent Honorary Oscar, it got me thinking about a certain record no one at the Oscars probably wants (though from the outside-in, it’s probably still better than nothing): most Academy Award nominations without a win.  Tosi is currently the living person with the most Costume Design award nominations without actually winning a competitive Oscar.  I thought it would be fun to check in with the living people with the most nominations without a win and see what the odds are that they’ll ever win a competitive Oscar.

(Notes: These totals are from Wikipedia, which is sometimes as reliable as a Republican Tea Party congressman, so if you notice any mistakes, I won’t be offended-share in the comments and I’ll correct and give you credit!  Also, unless otherwise noted, this is the record most nominations for a living person, not just in general)

Best Picture

Most Nominated Without a Win: Kathleen Kennedy

How Many Nominations? Eight

Does She Hold the All-Time Loss Record in the Category? Yes, and she’s tied as the most nominated producer, period.

Most Recent Nomination: Lincoln, in 2012

Best Shot at Winning: Hard to say.  She’s arguably in second place at least twice, potentially three times (for E.T., The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, and arguably for Lincoln). 

Will She Ever Win? If Steven Spielberg ever wins Best Picture again she’s certain to take it.  Either way she’ll receive the Thalberg at some point.

Best Director

Most Nominated Without a Win: Peter Weir

How Many Nominations? Four

Does She Hold the All-Time Loss Record in the Category? No-Robert Altman, Clarence Brown, Alfred Hitchcock, and King Vidor all outdo him with five apiece.

Most Recent Nomination: Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, in 2003

Best Shot at Winning: I honestly don’t feel like he was ever truly close.  His best shot was probably in a different category (he’s been nominated for screenwriting and producing as well, but never won in any category)-1990’s Original Screenplay.  If I had to pick one, I’d say Witness in 1985, where he was possibly second and third at the worst.

Will She Ever Win? Doubtful-he’s only been on Oscar’s radar once in the past ten years (a Makeup nod for The Way Back) and as he’ll soon be in his seventies, he seems to be in the twilight of his career.

Best Actor

Most Nominated Without a Win: Peter O’Toole

How Many Nominations? Eight

Does He Hold the All-Time Loss Record in the Category? Yes

Most Recent Nomination: Venus, in 2006

Best Shot at Winning: O’Toole got put in one of those rare circumstances in 1962 where he would have won in almost any other year but Gregory Peck managed to take the trophy for To Kill a Mockingbird.  It’s very possible that he was in second place for The Lion in Winter in 1968 (I get the sense that Cliff Robertson won a close race over O’Toole and Alan Bates).  O'Toole also was nominated for The Stunt Man and My Favorite Year in the early eighties, and may have been in second or third place those years, but I doubt he could have overtaken Robert de Niro or Ben Kingsley.

Will He Ever Win? Though he does have an Oscar (an Honorary one in 2003, and O’Toole correctly protested that his career wasn’t over yet since he got another nomination three years later), he’s retired so the competitive trophy is off the table at this point.

Best Actress

Most Nominated Without a Win: Judi Dench, Marsha Mason, and Vanessa Redgrave all tie

How Many Nominations? Four

Does She Hold the All-Time Loss Record in the Category? No-Deborah Kerr had six before she died.

Most Recent Nomination: For Dench it was 2006’s Notes on a Scandal, for Mason it was 1981’s Only When I Laugh, and for Redgrave it was 1984’s The Bostonians

Best Shot at Winning: Dench surely came the closest in 1997’s Mrs. Brown, where she won the Drama Golden Globe and was in a close race with Helen Hunt (her film’s Best Picture nomination surely helped her across the finish line).  Mason won Globes for her 1973 and 1977 nominations (Cinderella Liberty and The Goodbye Girl, respectively), though I suspect the strangeness of the 1973 field probably made her closest that year.  Redgrave has never really been close to winning-all four of her years she would have been lucky to have gotten third place. 

Will They Ever Win? To be fair, Redgrave and Dench both have Supporting Actress Oscars, which surely helps the sting here.  Of the three, though, Dench is the only one who still works in the “right” kind of pictures to get nominated or win again, and may well break the tie with this year’s Philomena.

Best Supporting Actor

Most Nominated Without a Win: Jeff Bridges, Robert Duvall, Ed Harris, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Al Pacino

How Many Nominations? Three

Does He Hold the All-Time Loss Record in the Category? No-Claude Rains and Arthur Kennedy both have four a pop.

Most Recent Nomination: This is a laundry list, but they are: 2000’s The Contender (Bridges), 1998’s A Civil Action (Duvall), 2002’s The Hours (Harris), 2012’s The Master (Hoffman), and 1992’s Glengarry Glen Ross (Pacino)

Best Shot at Winning: I don’t feel like any of Bridges’ nominations came close to winning-all three had fairly well-established frontrunners.  Harris was considered the frontrunner by many in 1995 and 1998 for Apollo 13 and The Truman Show, respectively.  Duvall was surely in the conversation for Apocalypse Now! (though Melvyn Douglas had a solid lead that year) and was second to Harris from predictions in 1998 (James Coburn's surprise win was one of the biggest upsets of that decade).  Hoffman was in second place in 2008 for Doubt and probably was in the running for last year’s The Master.  And finally Pacino was surely in second place for his lead work in The Godfather, which was put in supporting to ensure Brando had a clear path to victory (and we all saw how that turned out).

Will They Ever Win? All but Harris have won an Oscar in the leading categories, and while I do feel Hoffman will get a second trophy at some point, I just don’t feel the same way about Harris.  He still works regularly and won great praise for Game Change, but he doesn’t campaign, which hurts when you want an old-age honor.

Best Supporting Actress

Most Nominated Without a Win: Amy Adams

How Many Nominations? Four

Does She Hold the All-Time Loss Record in the Category? No-Thelma Ritter does with six (she’s also the most nominated period in the category)

Most Recent Nomination: 2012’s The Master

Best Shot at Winning: I once made the comment that Amy Adams was likely in fourth place in all four of her Oscar-nominated years, and I stand by that assessment.  The tightest race was probably 2010’s The Fighter, but fourth place is not close to winning. 

Will She Ever Win? She’s got a good shot this year, but in Best Actress.  The Academy clearly adores her, but if she can’t stick the landing in a few years, she’s going to be in tough shape.

Best Original Screenplay

Most Nominated Without a Win: Mike Leigh

How Many Nominations? Five

Does He Hold the All-Time Loss Record in the Category? No-Federico Fellini won six nominations but no trophies

Most Recent Nomination: 2010’s Another Year

Best Shot at Winning: Secrets & Lies (1996) resulted in Leigh getting a Best Director nomination (one of only two in his career) and had it not been for the Coen Brothers’ Fargo, he surely would have won.

Will He Ever Win? Doubtful.  Leigh’s approach with screenplays is largely toward having his actors improvise, which can’t sit well with the writers’ branch.  But the Academy surely likes his films, so he could very well overtake Fellini’s record and has an outside shot at an Honorary Award at some point.

Best Foreign Film

Most Nominated Without a Win: Israel

How Many Nominations? Ten

Does It Hold the All-Time Loss Record in the Category? Yes

Most Recent Nomination: 2011’s Footnote

Best Shot at Winning: No idea-trying to predict the winner in this category is generally impossible-the also-rans would be a fool’s errand.

Will It Ever Win? Certainly-Israeli cinema is on the rise (four of these nominations came in the past six years), and will likely win pretty soon.

Best Cinematography

Most Nominated Without a Win: Roger Deakins

How Many Nominations? Ten

Does He Hold the All-Time Loss Record in the Category? No-George Folsey hit thirteen without a win.

Most Recent Nomination: Last year’s Skyfall

Best Shot at Winning: 2007-he received two nominations for Best Cinematography that year, and had to be a close second to Robert Elswit’s There Will Be Blood (Deakins did the Best Picture-winning No Country for Old Men).

Will He Ever Win? I’m starting to lean toward no.  He’s not terribly old (he’s 64) and works regularly (he’s had three nominations in the past five years, and has a decent shot at an eleventh this year for Prisoners), but he doesn’t lens a lot of visual effects-laden films, which seems to be the trend of this category.  He’s a genius though (I’ve given him two OVP awards already) and could be a great candidate for an Honorary Award.

Best Costume Design

Most Nominated Without a Win: Piero Tosi and Patricia Norris both tie

How Many Nominations? Five

Does He Hold the All-Time Loss Record in the Category? Yes, though the late Howard Shoup also has five.

Most Recent Nomination: Neither work frequently anymore.  Norris’s last one was 1988’s Sunset (I’d never heard of it either) and Tosi’s was 1982’s La traviata.

Best Shot at Winning: I honestly don’t feel like Tosi ever really came close, though it’s hard to say whether his earlier foreign language films had a higher rate of people seeing them (foreign films being more readily honored by the Academy in those days).  I’m going to assume that both came the closest  in 1982, when Gandhi inexplicably won this category.

Will They Ever Win? Tosi is winning an Honorary Award this year, and while Norris probably deserves to be mentioned for one as well, I doubt she’ll take it (it’ll be a while before they pick another costume designer, and she’s 82).

Best Original Score

Most Nominated Without a Win: Thomas Newman

How Many Nominations? Ten

Does He Hold the All-Time Loss Record in the Category? No-Alex North has it with fourteen nominations before his death.

Best Shot at Winning: My gut says that 1999’s American Beauty is probably the closest he came.  The Red Violin from that year was something of a surprise, and if I recall correctly, Newman was the frontrunner to beat it.

Will He Ever Win? Yes.  Newman has had an incredible bad luck streak, but he’s so regularly nominated in a field that favors default nominees that loves to re-nominate and is only 57, so he’ll time will come.  I wouldn’t be stunned if he made it an eleventh nomination in this category with the upcoming Saving Mr. Banks, for starters.

Best Sound Mixing

Most Nominated Without a Win: Kevin O’Connell

How Many Nominations? Twenty (that is not a typo)

Does He Hold the All-Time Loss Record in the Category? Yes-he’s also the most nominated person in Academy history to never win an Oscar.

Best Shot at Winning: For all the fanfare about O’Connell’s many, many snubs (it’s ridiculous), he hasn’t been close to winning very often.  I’d say he was within striking distance for 1983’s Terms of Endearment, 1996’s Twister, and 2007’s Transformers, but that’s probably it.

Will He Ever Win? Possibly, though he hasn’t gotten one in a while by his standards (for some reason he dropped out of the Transformers franchise, otherwise he’d be at 22 losses), and he typically makes the sort of films that get you nominated but don’t let you win.  He still works like crazy, though, so it could happen.  If nothing else, this is a clear case of AMPAS owing the man an Honorary Oscar.

And those are it for now.  If anyone knows who the Film Editing, Adapted Screenplay, Original Song, Art Direction, Sound Editing, Visual Effects, and Makeup leaders are let me know and I’ll add them to the list (I couldn’t find them).  And what are your thoughts-do you think any of these men or women will end their losing streaks (or at least continue them to break the all-time records?)  Share your thoughts on when they should have won, if they’ll win, or why they shouldn’t have this many nominations to begin with in the comments!

OVP: The Way Back (2010)

Film: The Way Back (2010)
Stars: Jim Sturgess, Colin Farrell, Ed Harris, Saoirse Ronan, Mark Strong
Director: Peter Weir
Oscar History: 1 nomination
Snap Judgment Ranking: 3/5 stars

The films of Peter Weir have long been a part of the Oscar tradition.  With six Oscar nominations himself, and three Best Picture nominees amongst his credits (and one film that was almost certainly in sixth place), he may not have a statue, but his films are most certainly an event of which to take note.  After his Master and Commander received ten nominations, he waited seven years to make another picture, The Way Back.  While it's always good to have a director of distinction behind the camera, I will admit freely that I was a bit disappointed that it didn't hit some of the heights he had previously hit with some of his best-loved pictures.

(Spoilers commence now) The Way Back takes place during the 1940's, where Stalin has imprisoned those who opposed his regime in Siberian work camps, and our main character, Janusz (Sturgess), has been wrongly imprisoned there.  An optimist, and one of great moral character, he first latches onto Khabarov (Strong) a man whom he is certain will be able to get him out, and talks a good game about how to get to Lake Baikal, and then onto Mongolia, where they will be free.

However, Khabarov has been there for years, and is simply using Janusz to feed his delusional hope.  Instead, when Janusz tries to leave, Khabarov resists, and is clearly intent to stay there forever.  So Janusz assembles a set of five other men, including a mysterious American named Mr. Smith (Harris) and a live wire scoundrel, Valka (Farrell), to make the long journey from Siberia, and eventually, as we learn, to India.

Peter Weir's films rely heavily on the subtle, and he's not one to make easy, cliched choices with his movie, and it's worth noting that the film doesn't run into a large number of hackneyed roadblocks that other, lesser directors would throw in for the audience.  For example, while Valka remains true to his seedy ways, he never once betrays the men he is traveling with, and the film doesn't spend time cutting back to the Siberian guards trying to track them down (since, quite frankly, they wouldn't have).  Instead, we are treated to some stunning visuals of this largely untouched-by-man land, and the perils that nature has in-store for our journeymen.

Along the way, they encounter a young girl Irena (Ronan), who, after some resistance from Mr. Smith (who, in one of the few admittedly cliched moments, softens his reserve to her despite an initially crusty reaction), joins their group.  They also learn, at the Mongolian border, that the country has also become Communist, and so the group must travel all the way to India to ensure their freedom.

The film is at its best in the largely wordless, man-encountering-nature scenes.  Despite strong actors like Harris, Ronan, and Farrell, no one seems to be doing terrificly heavy-lifting, acting-wise, even if they are taking on an incredibly physical undertaking.  Like Master and Commander, Weir tries to make the story the focus, but this film doesn't have the inherent gravitas to carry it like that film did (and admittedly, I was less than impressed by Master and Commander to begin with-my favorite Weir film so far is surely The Truman Show).  The movie never quite gets its proper balance, defining its characters' intentions, instead focusing on survival over character development.  It pays off when it needs to (the film is impressive when we encounter a new climate, whether it be taiga, desert, or the majestic Himalayas), but it doesn't give us enough time knowing the characters to make the film's ultimate reunion between Janusz and his wife meaningful.

The film received a sole Oscar nomination (an incredibly low count for an Academy-favorite like Weir), that of Best Makeup.  It's an odd nomination, not because the Makeup isn't fine (it is), but because it's a lot more subtle than the Academy is used to in this category-the Makeup falls largely into the background, and while it shows the slow deterioration of our characters, it also doesn't pop in the way the Academy usually gravitates toward with their fondness for prosthetics and old-age makeup.

And that's a wrap for The Way Back-as I mentioned yesterday, just a handful of films left until we do the big 2010 extravaganza, but in the meantime-what did you think of The Way Back?  Do you have a favorite in the filmography of Peter Weir?  Do you think Weir (or one of his favorites, 4-time nominee Ed Harris) will ever get an Oscar?  And what are your thoughts on the Best Makeup of 2010?