Movie News After Dark
The day’s top headlines in bite-size portions.
The day started with nominations for the 23rd annual Screen Actors Guild Awards, some of which were downright confounding. But let’s get the obvious stuff out of the way: Manchester by the Sea was your leader here with four noms, one for the Cast, one for Actor in a Leading Role (Casey Affleck), one for Actress in a Supporting Role (Michelle Williams), and one for Actor in a Supporting Role (Lucas Hedges). Moonlight and Fences tied for the second-most nominations with three apiece.
Over in the TV column, five series garnered a trio of nominations apiece: Stranger Things, Westworld, The Crown, Game of Thrones, and The People vs O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story.
As far as those confounding selections, easily the biggest is Emily Blunt’s inclusion in the Actress in a Leading Role category for The Girl on the Train. Blunt beat out such seemingly obvious contenders as Annette Bening in 20th Century Women, Isabelle Huppert in Elle, Taraji P. Henson in Hidden Figures, and Ruth Negga in Loving. All of the movies I just mentioned have been universally well-received, while The Girl on the Train garnered a measly 43% on Rotten Tomatoes, and Blunt’s performance as an alcoholic has been singled out in particular as borderline parodic. But there she is.
Captain Fantastic was another surprise, but the good kind. Matt Ross’ film snagged two nods, one for star Viggo Mortenson and one for the Cast. When you add the Golden Globe nomination Viggo got on Monday, suddenly this little film has a lot of momentum rolling into Oscar season.
Two films that are losing momentum as quickly as Captain Fantastic is gaining it are Clint Eastwood’s Sully and Martin Scorsese’s Silence, which were both left holding big fat goose eggs from the Globes and the SAGs: zero nominations apiece. Both have been highly-praised and even touted as among the best of their respective directors’ illustrious and long-spanning careers, but neither received any awards love, making their chances for Oscar recognition slim at best.
But let’s end this on a high note, shall we? Hands down, for my money at least, the best nomination of the day came in the Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series category: Millie Bobby Brown, “Eleven” from Stranger Things, picked up her first major, individual nod. She’ll be up against Claire Foy for The Crown, Robin Wright for House of Cards, Thandie Newton for Westworld, and her co-star Winona Ryder. I for one think she’s got a shot. Find out Sunday, January 29th when the SAG Awards are broadcast live on TNT and TBS.
Your complete list of nominees:
Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture
Captain Fantastic
Fences
Hidden Figures
Manchester by the Sea
Moonlight
Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role
Amy Adams ‐ Arrival
Emily Blunt ‐ The Girl on the Train
Natalie Portman ‐ Jackie
Emma Stone ‐ La La Land
Meryl Streep ‐ Florence Foster Jenkins
Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role
Casey Affleck ‐ Manchester by the Sea
Andrew Garfield ‐ Hacksaw Ridge
Ryan Gosling ‐ La La Land
Viggo Mortensen ‐ Captain Fantastic
Denzel Washington ‐ Fences
Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series
The Crown
Downton Abbey
Game of Thrones
Stranger Things
Westworld
Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series
Millie Bobby Brown ‐ Stranger Things
Claire Foy ‐ The Crown
Thandie Newton ‐ Westworld
Winona Ryder ‐ Stranger Things
Robin Wright, House of Cards
Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series
Sterling K. Brown ‐ This Is Us
Peter Dinklage ‐ Game of Thrones
John Lithgow ‐ The Crown
Rami Malek ‐ Mr. Robot
Kevin Spacey ‐ House of Cards
Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series
The Big Bang Theory
Black-ish
Modern Family
Orange is the New Black
Veep
Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series
Uzo Aduba ‐ Orange is the New Black
Jane Fonda ‐ Grace & Frankie
Ellie Kemper ‐ Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt
Julia Louis-Dreyfus ‐ Veep
Lily Tom ‐ Grace & Frankie
Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series
Anthony Anderson ‐ Black-ish
Tituss Burgess ‐ Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt
Donald Glover ‐ Atlanta
William H. Macy ‐ Shameless
Jeffrey Tambor ‐ Transparent
Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role
Viola Davis ‐ Fences
Naomie Harris ‐ Moonlight
Nicole Kidman ‐ Lion
Octavia Spencer ‐ Hidden Figures
Michelle Williams ‐ Manchester by the Sea
Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role
Mahershala Ali ‐ Moonlight
Jeff Bridges ‐ Hell or High Water
Hugh Grant ‐ Florence Foster Jenkins
Lucas Hedges ‐ Manchester by the Sea
Dev Patel ‐ Lion
Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Television Movie or Miniseries
Bryce Dallas Howard ‐ Black Mirror
Felicity Huffman ‐ American Crime
Audra MacDonald ‐ Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar & Grill
Sarah Paulson ‐ The People v. O.J. Simpson
Kerry Washington ‐ Confirmation
Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Television Movie or Miniseries
Riz Ahmed ‐ The Night Of
Sterling K. Brown ‐ The People v. O.J. Simpson
Bryan Cranston ‐ All the Way
John Turturro ‐ The Night Of
Courtney B. Vance ‐ The People v. O.J. Simpson
After a few initial castings that included Michelle Yeoh, Doug Jones, and Adam Rapp, the first Star Trek television series in 10 years, Discovery, has finally found its lead in The Walking Dead star Sonequa Martin-Green, who will play an as-yet unammed lieutenant commander upon the Starship Shenzhou. Martin-Green’s casting is consistent with the diversity Discovery already boasts with Yeoh, the first Asian lead of the franchise, and Rapp, whose character is the first of the franchise to be openly gay. Though Martin-Green isn’t playing the Captain of the Starship ‐ that’s Yeoh ‐ she is considered the series lead, making her the first African-American female in that position. Martin-Green is currently still a cast member on The Walking Dead, where she’s played Sasha Williams since season three. No word if she’ll work double duty, but given her current show’s reputation for killing off characters at the drop of the dime, her tenure there was never a sure thing.
Star Trek: Discovery starts shooting early next year for release on CBS All Access.
The National Film Registry today announced 25 films to be inducted into its archives in 2016, and among the bigger titles are The Lion King, Ridley Scott’s Thelma and Louise, Hitchcock’s The Birds, John Hughes The Breakfast Club, and Wes Anderson’s Rushmore.
Since 1988 the Library of Congress with some help from the National Film Preservation Board has designated films for inclusion that are at least 10 years old had have some cultural, historical, or aesthetic significance.
On the more obscure side of things, Penelope Spheeris saw her documentary The Decline of Western Civilization make the list, as did the horror-comedy-documentary Atomic Café.
Check out the complete list of inductees, as listed alphabetically:
Atomic Cafe (1982)
Ball of Fire (1941)
The Beau Brummels (1928)
The Birds (1963)
Blackboard Jungle (1955)
The Breakfast Club (1985)
The Decline of Western Civilization (1981)
East of Eden (1955)
Funny Girl (1968)
The Lion King (1994)
Lost Horizon (1937)
Musketeers of Pig Alley (1912)
Paris Is Burning (1990)
Point Blank (1967)
The Princess Bride (1987)
Putney Swope (1969)
Rushmore (1998)
Solomon Sir Jones films (1924–28)
Steamboat Bill, Jr. (1928)
Suzanne, Suzanne (1982)
Thelma & Louise (1991)
Time and Dreams (1976)
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1916)
A Walk in the Sun (1945)
Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)
Following up on a news item from earlier this week, Emmy Rossum has successfully negotiated her bid for equal pay to co-star William H. Macy on the Showtime series Shameless. Hit the link for all the before-details, but the long and short of it is, after years of being paid significantly less than Macy despite having more screen time and narrative importance than the actor, Rossum is now earning the same per-episode as the Emmy nominee. Rossum’s contract negotiations had threatened to delay or even shut down the series ‐ which is currently airing its seventh season and is about to start production on its eighth ‐ but the actress herself confirmed the news on Twitter this morning:
Playing Fiona Gallagher has been one of the great privileges of my life. I'm so happy to continue w my SHAMELESS family!Back to work in May!
For his part, Macy was 100% in Rossum’s corner, telling TMZ after the story initially broke that “She works as hard as I do. She deserves everything.” Even in tough times those Gallaghers stick together.
And lastly today, a pair of big trailers made their way online, including one for Dunkirk, Christopher Nolan’s WWII drama which I wrote about here, and also the trailer for Despicable Me 3, which you can watch below.
Both films bow in 2017, Dunkirk on July 21st and Despicable Me 3 on June 30th.
That’s the day in news. Check back tomorrow for fresh developments.
