Oscar: Awards Season Frenzy Hits A Pinnacle At WGA and ACE. Is The End In Sight?

When the awards season kicked into gear at Telluride and Toronto it appeared the movie to beat was going to be Fox Searchlight’s The Descendants, but then along came the big momentum for the little-silent-movie-that-could, The Artist , and that was all she wrote — that is until this last weekend before ballots are due on Tuesday. Descendants has been on a tear these last few days, almost seeming to say ‘it ain’t over til it’s over’. With significant victories for Best Adapted Screenplay at the WGA awards Sunday night preceded by the prestigious USC Scripter Award and Best Drama Feature Editing win at the ACE Eddie awards Saturday , not to mention writer/director Alexander Payne’s special award from ACE, you have a pretty impressive haul. But is it too late to turn around the momentum of The Artist? After all, ballots are due at PriceWaterhouseCoopers by Tuesday at 5pm, and with the President’s Day holiday on Monday slowing postal delivery the only way to getballots in on time is to have them hand- delivered. Still one major rival nominee (and loser at WGA) told me it was such a reliefnot to have to hear the name of The Artist called Sunday night at WGA (it was ineligible for nominations since it was not produced under guild auspices). However the two big screenplay winners at BAFTA the week before, The Artist and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy,although ineligible for WGA are up for Oscars next week. They could upset the apple cart and veer fromtraditonsince even though WGA winners can be predictive of Oscar winners, it usually is just one out of two that repeat due to the fact that the writers unionmakes so many non-union films ineligible. But in my view both of tonight’s big scripting winners at the ceremony held simultaneously on both coasts (Zooey Deschanel and Joel McHale were hosts at the Hollywood Palladium), Woody Allen’s Midnight In Paris and The Descendants would appear to hang on to front runner status in their respective writing categoriesat the Oscars. Yes, if there is an Oscar sweep for The Artist that can easily include original screenplay but it seems more likely the Academy will want to spread the wealth and award a personal favorite, Midnight In Paris. It is doubtful that the WGA ceremony, coming as late as it does in the season , has any direct impact on the final vote but it appears the two voting bodies may be of like mind this year. And this weekend’s myriad awards shows brought especially good news for Descendant’s helmer AlexanderPayne who received the ACE’s special filmmaker award, saw his longtime editor Kevin Tent take a surprise Eddie for editing The Descendants (Hugo veteran Thelma Schoonmaker was thought to be the winner) and on top of all that, won the USC Scripter award. When I caught up with him at the Beverly Hilton Saturday night still celebrating the ACE wins 40 minutes after the show ended, I gave Payne the happy news that he had just won the USC Scripter Award. He seemedpleased, but in a unique moment that shows just how long awards season can be he then asked me, “Okay , what is the USC Scripter Award”? Hey, it’s not easy keeping up with every award you win, especially when you are on a roll like Payne is right now. At any rate he was thrilled to bag two honors in one night and then follow it up on Sunday with yet another. It puts Descendants back in front runner postion for the Adapted Screenplay Oscar and adds some intrigue in the late innings of the race. The American Cinema Editors , which hand out the Eddies ,is the one guild that most closely resembles the actual voting pool of the Oscars and pound for pound have by far the biggest crossover of members in common. Statistically speaking an editing nomination is a must if you have serious Best Picture aspirations and the win by Descendants, which also has an Oscar nod in the category, is important. The Eddie victory is tempered by the Eddiewin of The Artistfor director Michel Hazanavicius and Anne-SophieBionin the comedy or musical editing category so the two will be going head to head at the Oscars with both having the added bonus of Eddie triumphs. Hazanavicius has really been running non-stopthis season and had just arrived from Paris hours before the ceremony Saturday. He goes back right away for the Cesar awards being held next Friday night and then hops a plane back to L.A for the Oscars Sunday, and hopefully the Independent Spirit Awards Saturday afternoon in Santa Monica, but he expressed doubt that he , wife and Best Supporting Actress nominee Berenice Bejo, star Jean Dujardin and producer Thomas Langmann will even make it back in time to the Indie Spirits. He said whatever happens he is very grateful to Harvey Weinsteinfor the whole experience of this awards season. He said Harveydid not cut a frame of The Artist before releasing it in America (depsite a sometimes-bad rap for fiddling with films). Solo at the Eddies,he said he sent Bejo and their newborn (she gave birth in September at the beginning of the season) to a spa in the south of France for some much needed rest before the last leg of this marathon run towards Oscar. One audience member in attendance for both WGA and Eddie awards shows told me the speeches were so good it’s a shame these ceremonies didn’t take place a month ago so they could have maximum impact on the Oscar vote. Indeed Payne made a truly great acceptance speech at the Eddiesdrolly observing, “when they called me up to receive this, I asked them: ‘who passed it up’?”And there was one after another great speechat the WGA Sunday especiallyfrom The Help’s Tate Taylor who won the Guild’s Paul Selvin award and Eric Roth (Forrest Gump) who took the Paddy Chayefsky Laurel Award and delivered aterrific speech (one that NY Times Film Critic Manogla Dargis won’t want to hear)that was preceded by a brilliantly wry and funny David Fincher taped intro. The best acceptance of the night though was not from the movie side but rather TV’s Modern Family which in winning Best Comedy Series gave each of its writers a chance to put a “downer” on their victory. Creator Steve Levitan never fails to preside over the best awards acceptance speeches in the business. The two long-overdue writingawards for AMC’s riveting Breaking Bad were also nice to see. The Cinema Audio Society awards (Hugo got the big movie prize) and Golden Reel awards for Sound Editing were also given out this weekend. The last major Guild craft ceremony is Tuesday for the costume designers and then it is on to Oscar and an end to all this madness.