February 11th, 2003

"How To Lose A Guy" In First Place, Oscar Nods

Once again, you can always count on the romantic comedy. Despite some rather negative reviews, How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days took in a whopping 23.7 million for the weekend. With Valentine's Day next week and not many female-geared films opening within the month, this film should keep doing well. In a nice second was the seuqel Shanghai Knights which brought in 19.6 million. Chicago, in its first weekend of wide release, also climbed back to third with a jazzy 10.7 million. With today's big award news, the film should hold strong for the next couple of weeks and has a good chance of topping over 100 million.

Last week's box office winners, The Recruit and Final Destination 2, held on nicely in fourth and fifth adding 9.2 and 8.3 million to their grosses. The other new romantic comedy this weekend, Deliver Us From Eva, had a solid debut for seventh place with 6.6 million. Rounding out the top ten are Biker Boyz, Darkness Falls and The Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers with 4.2, 3.8 and 3.5 million each.

So, I'm sure you've all heard the big news by now. That's right, Academy Award nominations were announced today! I'll save my predictions until a few days before the ceremony, but here are a few thoughts of mine on this year's nominees:

- My favorite film of 2002, "Spirited Away," scored a nominee for "Best Animated Feature." WOOHOO! While it definitely deserved more than that, I hope it wins the rather new coveted award.
- "The Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers" for Best PICTURE!? Come on, it wasn't THAT good. I was even more surprised that Peter Jackson didn't get a Best Director nomination - that was more deserving than the film itself. Oh well. Damn popuarlity contest!
- Julianne Moore got two nominations - "Far From Heaven" (lead actress) and "The Hours" (supporting). I think it's pretty weird that out of all the three women in "The Hours," she gets the most screen time and gets the supporting nod and Kidman has the least time and she gets the lead nod. Feh, it's all about who can win what.
- "Adaptation" didn't get Best Director. Not that I was expecting it to - or Best Picture even. At least the whole main cast got well-deserved nods.
- No Richard Gere for "Chicago." Oh well. I guess the film can't surpass or tie with the grandeur of "All About Eve" and "Titanic" (each which got 14 nominations).
- "About Schmidt" was more or less snubbed, which did surprise me. I wasn't expecting major nods for it or anything, but I would have imagined some nominations other than acting.
- "Far From Heaven" scored a few nods... but no love for the intense performance from Dennis Quaid. Oh well.
- "Road To Perdition" got quite a few technical award nominations. But how come not "Minority Report"?
- Christopher Walken and Paul Newman for supporting nods = yay. Even if Newman was barely in "Road To Perdition."
- "Y Tu Mama Tambien" and "Talk To Her" didn't get Best Foreign Film nods because their countries didn't choose them to be represented, but both films got well-deserved screenplay nods, and a Best Director nod for Pedro Almodovar ("Talk To Her").
- "Bowling For Columbine" MUST win for Best Documentary.
- "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" got a Best Original Screenplay nod, which was pretty decent I suppose. I wonder if the film didn't become a huge phenom if it'd get the nod at all.
- Lots of well-earned design awards for "Frida" and "Gangs Of New York."

-Zach B.