Mark Ruffalo – This Had Oscar Buzz

100 Years, 100… Snubs! – Part Five

We’ve arrived at the grand finale of our blowout May miniseries 100 Years, 100… Snubs! It’s all been leading up to this Red and Wild strawberry social with guests arriving, boots handed out with abandon, and our picks for the biggest Oscar snub of all time! We also dive into a feast of topics including hating Braveheart, corny 1970s disaster movies, running times of nominated Documentary Features, international feature eligibility issues, double Supporting Actor nominations in 1991, Nicole Kidman’s gaze, which one of us is a bigger You Can Count on Me fan, and 100 Years, 100… Snubs! SNUBS. Special thanks to all of our listeners for sticking with us week after week, film after film — we hope you all had fun with this miniseries!!

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199 – Shutter Island

This episode, we return to the work of director Martin Scorsese, with one of his very few films to receive zero Oscar nominations, 2010′s Shutter Island. The film was Scorsese’s highly anticipate follow-up to The Departed after finally securing his overdue Oscar win, and reunited him with that film’s star Leonardo DiCaprio. Adapted from Dennis Lehane’s novel about a WWII veteran investigating a woman’s disappearance from an island-bound mental institution, the film allowed Scorsese to indulge in Hitchcock and Asian horror genre tropes alike. However, Paramount’s financial woes couldn’t afford the awards campaign cost for such a behemoth in late 2009, and the film was pushed to February 2010.

Once released, critics were somewhat divided on the film and its somewhat cliche final twist, and another DiCaprio vehicle would earn higher praise and awards success that year: Christopher Nolan’s Inception. This episode, we discuss our own divided opinions over which 2010 DiCaprio performance we prefer and which overall DiCaprio performance we consider a favorite. We also talk Patricia Clarkson’s post-Oscar nomination career, the National Board of Review’s top ten of 2010, and the other few Scorsese films with no Oscar love.

Topics also include what films Paramount gave the 2009 Oscar push, the Ben Kingsley’s M4Gs nomination, and hype for next week’s massive 200th episode!

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184 – Rumor Has It

This week, we’re looking at the less fondly remembered half of Shirley MacLaine’s 2005 buzzed grandmothers (after praising In Her Shoes in a previous episode) with Rumor Has It. Starring an immediately post-Friends Jennifer Aniston as a woman who believes her grandmother was the inspiration The Graduate’s Mrs. Robinson, the film assembled a prestigious cast for its conceptual take on movie nostalgia that made for a high-profile holiday release. But the film casts Kevin Costner as the would-be Benjamin Braddock that might become either Aniston’s love interest… or her father. Yeah, you can see why this one ultimately earned its reputation as a reviled misfire.

But the film was also plagued with production woes that saw screenwriter and original director Ted Griffin fired, only to be promptly replaced by Rob Reiner. This episode, we discuss Reiner’s later career of bad and unnoticed movies, Griffin’s career as a noteworthy screenwriter, and frustration around this year’s Oscar telecast.

Topics also include our parents’ viewing habits, Tower Heist, and who is best and least best in the Steel Magnolias ensemble.

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183 – Margaret (with Patrick Vaill)

#TeamMargaret, your day is here! This week, we are joined by actor Patrick Vaill to discuss the contentious backstory and reemergence story that is Kenneth Lonergan’s Margaret. Originally filmed in 2005, the film follows Anna Paquin as Lisa Cohen, a New York City teenager who witnesses a horrific accident and her search for restitution when she deems herself partly responsible. But Lonergan’s ambition with the film and its themes resulted in an arduous editing process, resulting in the ire of the film’s producer and Fox Searchlight. The years-long process led to lawsuits and the intervention of Martin Scorsese in the editing room, ultimately delivering a film that quietly snuck into a few theatres amidst contentiousness. Soon, a critical mass began to build along with change.org petitions and online outcry, and now Margaret is seen by some as one of the greatest films of the new century.

This episode, we discuss the various available versions of the film and Lonergan’s distillation of post-9/11 New York. We also unpack the brilliant central performance by Paquin, along with a stellar supporting cast of actresses including J. Smith-Cameron as Lisa’s actress mother, Jeannie Berlin as Lisa’s surprise confidante, and a one-scene-wonder Allison Janney (who joins our Six Timer’s Club).

Topics also include formative double features of The Apostle and Kundun, standing ovations for Andrea Martin, and what makes up J. Smith-Cameron’s “EGOT of television acting.”

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138 – All the King’s Men

We’re finally getting around to one of the most notorious of aughts era failed awards plays, Steven Zaillian’s All the King’s Men. A remake of the former Best Picture winner and originally heavily predicted in the 2005 season, the adaptation was unceremoniously punted into the following year. The next September, the film had a disastrous debut at TIFF and was in and out of theatres within a month. Incoherent and uninspired with a barking Sean Penn at the center, the film is a soup of accents and flat convolutions that makes for a flop that is more boring than cringeworthy.

Zaillian has yet to direct a film since, but we look back at his other directorial efforts like Searching for Bobby Fisher, as well as a writing career that’s paired him with a top tier of directors. This week, we look at the 2006 Toronto International Film Festival packed with successful Oscar plays and remembered for its thwarted Borat premiere. And we discuss The Departed and Scorsese’s winding road to Best Picture, almost again blocked by a stealth Clint Eastwood. Mark Ruffalo quiz alert!

Topics also include Kate Winslet’s odd lineup of 2006 titles, why Jude Law is better when not playing a traditional leading man, and the traumatic cinema experience that is Jack the Bear.

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126 – Reservation Road

For our first episode of the new year, we’re taking things back to the very This Had Oscar Buzz beginning. Back when this old podcast was just a single service Tumblr, the first THOB entry was 2007′s Reservation Road, a domestic drama starring Joaquin Phoenix and Jennifer Connelly as a family mourning the loss of a son in a hit-and-run and Mark Ruffalo as the assailant filled with guilt. The film dominated early predictions and went on to a dismal reception at the Toronto International Film Festival before barely opening in theatres.

This episode, we look back at Phoenix’s Best Actor campaign for Walk the Line and the I’m Still Here shenanigans that would begin the more definitive stage of his career. We also discuss Connelly’s post-Oscar career stuck in wife roles that underserve her abilities and director Terry George’s underwhelming filmography after the success of Hotel Rwanda.

Topics also include the goofy Hollywood Film Awards, Oscar’s love of stories about family tragedies, and Lifetime’s daytime talk show Attitudes.

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047 – In The Cut (2003 – Part Four)

For our fourth of four films in our 2003 miniseries, we placed the responsibility squarely on you: the listener. (Please try to disregard that Joe repeatedly refers to “readers” in this episode; to him, podcasts are books you read with your ears.) Out of a poll that included The Company, Shattered Glass, and The Station Agent, you chose director Jane Campion’s sex-charged thriller In the Cut, and a more notorious Oscar flop you could not have found. A decade after breaking ground as only the second woman ever nominated for Best Director, Campion was pretty much run out of town for this tonally deliberate meditation on sex, violence, and a sleaze-stached Mark Ruffalo expressing a penchant for cunnilingus and anilingus. Both!

Then of course there was Meg Ryan, who stepped in to replace Nicole Kidman and instead stepped in front of a firing squad made up of critics and audiences who were not ready for her to be playing a schoolteacher who gets off quite literally on her proximity to danger. When Harry Met Sally and Then Sally Went Looking for Mr. Goodbar was not the movie people wanted.

Chris and Joe discuss Meg, Mark, and Jane, as well as Jennifer Jason Leigh, “F” Cinemascores, and much more. You asked for this! And by “this” we mean “Mark Ruffalo’s visible penis.”

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