June 24th, 2009
According to this article by Timothy M. Gray of Variety, ten movies — not five, as in previous years — will be nominated for Best Picture for the next Academy Awards. The announcement was made today by Academy chief Sid Ganis, and those nominations will be announced Feb. 2, 2010.
I’m guessing the Academy decided to do this to counter criticism that the only movies nominated are critics favorites that the general public doesn’t care about, and with 10 slots to fill, there are bound to be some crowd pleasers in the mix. All I know is that my annual Oscar pool just got a lot more complicated.
June 24th, 2009
According to an article in Variety, director David Fincher is, as they say, “in talks” to direct THE SOCIAL NETWORK, a movie about the development of Facebook. Script is courtesy of Aaron Sorkin, write of A FEW GOOD MEN, THE AMERICAN PRESIDENT, and, on TV, THE WEST WING and (ahem) STUDIO 60 ON THE SUNSET STRIP.
“The film will focus on the evolution of Facebook from its 2004 creation on the Harvard campus by sophomore Mark Zuckerberg to a juggernaut with more than 200 million members.”
Look, I love Fincher’s work (FIGHT CLUB is a personal favorite, ZODIAC is arguably the best movie of the 21st century, and even the overlong BENJAMIN BUTTON isn’t bad), but I wonder about a Facebook movie. Sure, it’s popular now, but if the Internet has taught us anything, it’s that there will be another Web fad around before long to grab the public’s attention. Already Twitter has all the buzz (and even it’s getting old). Imagine a movie about MySpace now. Would anyone see it?
