Awards Season Begins

The end of the calendar year brings with it a host of tried-and-true rituals: the shortened hours of wintry daylight, the long inky darkness of night, the frenzied shopping spree that has replaced religious feeling, the endless recycling of sound bites and video clips and the crystal-ball contemplation by "experts" of what the New Year has in store.

In the film world, end of the year means only one thing: a flurry of critics awards and "ten best" lists, all building momentum to the grand kahuna of them all: the nominations for the Academy Award. Forget the recent rancor over the choosing of the President of the United States, dismiss the disintegration of peace talks in the Middle East, disregard the signs that the world economy is headed towards recession, the talk at cocktail parties and street corner gatherings is whether Tom Hanks will win his third Oscar for his bravura performance in Robert Zemeckis' Cast Away, set to open on Christmas Day.

With theater attendance in the US at its lowest level in years, the disturbing announcements of bankruptcy by some of the most prominent theater chains, the continued competition from television, video games and the Internet, it is remarkable how film (and I do mean films that are projected on to a screen in a darkened theater) regains its cultural prominence at this time of the year as the most important cultural product. Whether it is the lead critic of the New York Times or the self-styled pundit with his own Internet website, the debate over the quality of this year's crop of movies is the stuff of lively conversations, strident arguments and even the occasional fist fight. Who would have thought that a 100-year-old art form could inspire such intensity in our technologically sophisticated age?

This year's awards season comes after a year that has been widely acknowledged as one of Hollywood's weakest in years. Yes, Ron Howard's The Grinch has crossed the $200 million domestic box office mark, Ridley Scott's Gladiator showed its muscle in the US and overseas and Adam Sandler continues his puzzling winning streak as the world's most unlikely movie star, but no film has captured the public's imagination on a par with James Cameron's Titanic or Steven Spielberg's Saving Private Ryan.

The weakness of the big Hollywood product has opened the doors to a number of smaller American independent and foreign language films to dominate the upcoming awards season. So far, the critics prizes that have been announced point in this direction. The National Board of Review, an amalgam of film critics, teachers and executives, gave its Best Picture nod to Phillip Kaufman's Quills, a modestly-budgeted film largely made with German money, being released by an American indie distributor (Fox Searchlight), starring an Australian actor (Geoffrey Rush) in a story about a decadent French aristocrat (the Marquis de Sade). Javier Bardem, a Spanish actor making his English language debut in Julian Schnabel's Before Night Falls, was the Board's choice for Best Actor, and suddenly an actor virtually unknown in the US has become the one to beat for the Academy Award.

The New York Film Critics Circle, one of the most prestigious opinion makers in the US but also known for their eclectic tastes, gave Best Picture honors to Steven Soderbergh's Traffic, a multi-character tapestry of a film about America's failed anti-drug war that features an all-star cast headed by Michael Douglas, Dennis Quaid, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Benicio del Toro (whose performance as a Mexican border cop has emerged as a leading contender for Best Supporting Actor). The film, which has not even opened yet in the United States, is also being distributed by an independent studio (USA Films) and is certainly not a surefire box office hit, considering its gritty subject matter and its Robert Altman-esque mix of stories and personalities.

Laura Linney, an unassuming rather "anti star" actress who has been appealing in supporting film roles in the past, was acknowledged by the New York Critics as Best Actress for her subtle work in You Can Count On Me, one of the few breakout American indie films of the year. This very modestly budgeted film, written and directed by theater veteran Kenneth Lonergan, has been on the map since it shared a Best Picture Award at last year's Sundance Film Festival, but has steadily been building up steam as it has been the one film to appear on all major Ten Best Lists.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, the rousing Ang Lee martial arts film that premiered at the Cannes Film Festival was chosen by the Los Angeles Film Critics Circle as the Best Picture of the Year, the first time in its 25 year history that the Critics group awarded a foreign language film its top honors.

Aside from the personal triumphs of winning awards and the boost to individual careers, the most important element of this awards season is that it has the potential to bring much needed exposure to the smaller films that must often struggle to get noticed by the public. In the current theatrical marketplace, where a film is judged a hit or a miss on the virtue of its opening weekend box office gross, films that require a "word-of-mouth" build up of recognition often are overlooked and, more seriously, dumped by theaters at the first sign of weakness. Not every film can emerge as a surefire hit on its first weekend, particularly when it does not have major stars or a mega advertising budget. If such films are given a bit more breathing room to build, indeed everyone from the film's producers to the theaters that have the good taste to show them, will eventually benefit. And no one will benefit more than film audiences.

Sandy Mandelberger