Hammond: From Tinker Tailor To Angelina Jolie & Brad Pitt, Oscar Talk Is Everywhere

‘Tis the season. Studios and distributors are pulling out all the stops tobring attention to their big awards contenders.The drumbeat has been so loudsince Thanksgiving that it’snot uncommon to be invited to 4 or 5 sceenings, parties, events, and Q&As in a single night. I get the feeling everyone ispushing a lot harder this year than ever beforebecause of relaxed pre-nomination Academy Of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences rules and the feeling that the race is wide open.And with ballots due bySunday for LA Film Critics, Critics Choice, and Golden Globe awards,AFI Top 10, and others, the crush washeavy this week. Witness Focus Features’push for Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. Gary Oldman and cast including Colin Firthand key crewhave been in town doing one screening after another to packed Industry crowds for the likes of SAG, BAFTA, DGA guild awards. A post-premiere party Tuesday night drew swarms of Academy members while Oldman and company held court.At a Sundaycocktail party attended by members of the Los Angeles Film Critics, Hollywood Foreign Press Association, and other groups, I ran into the film’s directorTomas Alfredson (Let The Right One In) who is new to the Hollywood awards scene but doesn’t seem fazed by it. When I asked if he was upset by his very British film’s inexplicableloss to the lower profile minor film Tyrannosaur at that day’s eccentricBritish Independent Film Awards, he said, “I don’t think they consider Working Title and Universal too independent.”Still, how a movie on the level ofTinker Tailor could lose to a dreary thing like Tyrannosaur is one of the quirks of critics awards. In fact theTinker Tailor contingent is pretty thrilledabout their ownreviews and current 86% fresh score at Rotten Tomatoes plus the industry reaction.At a KCET/American Cinematheque post-screening Q&A Saturday, Oldman was presented witha career achievement Lumiere award. The actoris known forportrayingfar less restrainedcharacters. But hetold me playing George Smiley and walking in Alec Guiness’footsteps was a career highlight and he is hoping to do another turn based on John LeCarre’s Smiley’s People. Tinker Tailor opens in the U.S. today so box officeand perhaps awards attention may figure in that decision to go forward with another Smiley project. Angelina Jolie also has been busy promoting her writing and directorial debut, the Bosnian war drama In The Land of Blood and Honey which is getting attention from news shows likeNightline, 60 Minutes, and This Week With Christiane Amanpour. Jolie uses a virtually unknown cast of local actors and shot the film in both English and the native Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian language – but it is releasing in the latter, complete with English subtitles. At least for now.Thursday night’s Los Angeles premiere party at Boulevard 3 swarming withwell-wishers, Jolietold meshe wanted the pic to betrue to the events that happened and did what was best for the film. An HFPA officer in charge ofeligibilityfor the Golden Globes confirmed to me that Jolie’smovie will be considered for their Best Foreign Language Film prize. In fact, if you did not know who directed this movie, you might think it is the work of a great European auteur.It is not eligible, however,for the AcademyAwards’ Foreign Languagecategory due to more complicated rules. It is, of course, eligible in regular categories for the Oscars. One ofthe manyoffering congratulations was former Presidential candidate General Wesley Clark who introducedJolie to his son, a budding filmmaker himself. Clark told me he thought the movie, about a war he knew very well, was just “incredible”. That’s the exact word Jolie’s proudfather, Jon Voight, also used to describeher uncompromisingfilm which opens on December 23rd. GK Films and Film Districttoppers Graham King and Peter Schlessel also weresinging the star’s praises. I suggested to King that he personally could be nominated in an unprecented 3 picture categories when next week’s Golden Globe nominations are unveiled: Best Picture Drama for Hugo, Best Animated Feature for Rango, and Best Foreign Language Film for In The Land Of Blood And Honey. “Iwould be happy just to get one,” he said with a smile. Meanwhile, in another corner of the room stoodBrad Pitt, who could nab a couple of those nominations for himself for Moneyball and The Tree of Life. Pittseemed alternately fascinated and amused as wetalked aboutthe whole circus and strategiesof awards season.He couldn’t believe guys like me cover this thingyearround now. (“You should write a book in a few years,”he laughed.)He told me hewas very happy about his Best Actor award from the NY Film Critics and also very proud of Jolie’s movie. The Academy’s relaxed rules mean the food and wine are flowing at these screening/party events. And Academy members I have seen on the circuit seem to be enjoying it more with studios sending out the invites directly to them for the first time. There are Q&As everywhere and, for the likes of The Iron Lady’s Meryl Streep and War Horse’s Steven Spielberg in just past week, they arewebcast live around the world, too, to give studios the biggest bang for their campaign bucks. So far no webcasts of thenumerous parties aimed at attracting voters: like the post-screening fete for Drive Wednesdayat the Andaz Hotel on the Sunset Strip that drew Supporting Actor hopeful Albert Brooks and Cannes-winning director Nicolas Winding Refn among others. Earlier that night there was a packedreception at Spagofor the Chinese Foreign Language entry, The Flowers of War that had Academy and HFPA members mingling withdirector Zhang Yimou and stars Christian Bale and Ni Ni just before all of them had to catch a plane for the movie’s world premiere in Beijing. Some of those attendees then headed over to ICM for a special screening event of Cuba’s entry Habanasation hosted by Michael Moore which drew Sean Penn among others to offer support. Meanwhile, Warner Bros was showing off its late-inning release, Extremely Loud And Incredibly Close, at an industry screening and reception at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, similar to an event they did for J. Edgar there a few weeks earlier. Not to be outdone, Dreamworks did their industry screening of War Horse the night before at the Academy. And all of this is just a small sample of goings on out on the circuit all week. This non-stop awards train is enough to drive you insane this time of year.