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Will 2017 be the year a superhero movie with fart jokes gets an Oscar nod? Though just about everyone in Hollywood would be surprised to hear “Deadpool” announced as an Academy Award nominee later this month, director Tim Miller’s comic book adaptation has exceeded expectations time and again since its release last February. Few people would have guessed a movie released a week before the 2016 Academy Awards would be part of the Oscar conversation a year later, let alone a long-gestating tale about a superhero obsessed with chimichangas.

Ryan Reynolds’ pet project for nearly a decade, “Deadpool” follows Marvel’s most unconventional anti-hero: Wade Wilson, a former Special Forces operative given superhuman healing powers after a malicious experiment that almost destroys his life. Made for $50 million, the movie grossed nearly $800 million at the worldwide box office, becoming the highest-earning R-rated movie of all time (and the highest-grossing 20th Century Fox...

"Eckhart saw Hell too. He said: The only thing that burns in Hell is the part of you that won't let go of life, your memories, your attachments. They burn them all away. But they're not punishing you, he said. They're freeing your soul. So, if you're frightened of dying and you're holding on, you'll see devils tearing your life away. But if you've made your peace, then the devils are really angels, freeing you from the earth." -- Louis (Danny Aiello) in "Jacob's Ladder" I first viewed "Jacob's Ladder" on VHS several years after its release in theaters, when it received a lukewarm response from audiences (it grossed around $26 million by the end of its run) and received a polarizing response from critics: Roger Ebert called it "powerfully written, directed and acted" while The Washington Post's Hal Hinson charged it with being "garbled and cliched."  My initial reaction to...

At the Independent Spirit Awards Saturday afternoon, John Cassavetes Award winner (and former In Contention contributor) Chad Hartigan told me something I didn't know: He wouldn't have made "This is Martin Bonner" if it weren't for Steve McQueen's "Hunger." He copped a few of the film's lines in his film, some of the camerawork, too. He was inspired, he said, by a filmmaker who could pull something that powerful off with such modest means, both financially and artistically. That, to me, is McQueen's legend. That, to me, is the kind of thing that will endure. These nickel-plated notions of "importance" that people throw around during the Oscar season, straining to associate some arbitrary level meaning to the thing, they can frankly diminish the very fine achievement on display. "I fear all the talk about the historical importance of '12 Years a Slave' almost completely obscures its extraordinary artistic merit,...

Here we are. After months of seeing the films and seeing them campaigned, we’re 72 hours away from the winners being revealed. In the crafts categories, we’ve already had a race for the ages, where highlights have included some legendary accomplishments ("Gravity's" visual effects anyone?), the makeup artists and hairstylists continuing to prove their eclecticism and the division between the costume designers and the production designers proving uneventful, with each branch pretty much behaving in the same manner as before. This isn’t touching the most bizarre element of this year’s race – the controversy in Best Original Song. Expect "Gravity" to dominate the crafts categories. Nominated for seven awards, it appears the favorite in many of the fields throughout. But that’s not to say Oscar night won’t have some exciting moments. Will there be any upsets? Will "The Great Gatsby" really become a double Oscar winner?...

In the lead-up to the 86th annual Academy Awards on March 2, HitFix will be bringing you the lowdown on all 24 Oscar categories with multiple entries each day. Take a few notes and bone up on the competition as we give you the edge in your office Oscar pool! Of all craft categories, Best Film Editing is the one most closely tied to the Best Picture race: nominees from the latter category invariably dominate the former, and as pundits are so fond of reminding everyone, no film has won the top prize without a corresponding editing bid since 1980. That's no quirk or accident, given how heavily editing interacts with script and performance, and though Best Picture no-shows occasionally triumph here (like surprise victor "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo" two years ago), that won't be happening this year. Five Best Picture nominees make up the field, and I strongly suspect they'd...

Academy Award-nominated filmmaker Paul Greengrass has been selected by the Board of Directors of the American Cinema Editors (Ace) to be honored with the organization’s prestigious Ace Golden Eddie Filmmaker of the Year Award.

The award will be presented at the 64th Annual Ace Eddie Awards ceremony on Friday, February 7, 2014 in the International Ballroom of the Beverly Hilton Hotel, it was announced today by the Ace Board of Directors.

“Paul Greengrass is one of the most exciting filmmakers working in cinema today,” stated the Ace Board of Directors. “A Greengrass film simply has its own signature – from the magnificent hand-held camera work, to his ability to engage audiences with riveting storytelling, his canon of work is bold and iconic. His latest film, Captain Phillips, is a masterwork yielding some of the finest filmmaking of the year that has already been honored with four Golden Globe® nominations including Best Director,...

I’ve spent this column space looking at the Oscar race and trying not to offer any of my opinions about how the whole thing was shaping up.

But now the Oscar race is almost over, the voting deadline has passed, and there’s little else to do but judge the outfits, open the envelopes and listen to the speeches. So, I think it’s time I stated my opinion about the film that now seems poised to win Best Picture.

After important wins from all of the industry guilds, including Producers, Directors and, most perplexing, Writers, Argo seems to be the obvious frontfunner for Sunday night's biggest prize. Considering the strength, depth and individualistic voice of most of the other nominees, this, in my humble opinion, is a depressingly mediocre choice.

Neither the most intelligent nor the most audacious film in the running by a country mile, the only...

It's time again for the best party in Hollywood (at least during awards season) -- the 70th annual Golden Globe Awards, honoring the best in movies and television from the past year.

Which films will be taking home the hardware? "Les Miserables," "Lincoln," "Argo"? "Silver Linings Playbook"? And which television programs will be honored? The annual favorites like "Breaking Bad" or "Mad Men"? Or newcomer "Homeland," which took home many Emmys last September. Perhaps U.K. import "Downton Abbey" will sneak in there.

Check back here at 8 p.m. Et/Pt for the Zap2it live blog, chronicling all the highlights and lowlights of the Golden Globes. The show airs live on NBC.

All times Eastern.

7:57 -- Who's excited about Tina Fey and Amy Poehler hosting? We have high hopes for two of the funniest ladies in entertainment.

8:00 -- Fey and Poehler look outstanding in their gowns. Love the colors.

(Publisher's Note: The 2011 Academy Award Winners are presented below, along with select relevant quotes from Courtney Enlow's Oscar Live Blog)

Remember that shot right at the end of 127 Hours after Aaron's been rescued and he's at some kind of press conference and Franco plays it looking super confused and weird? That's how he's looked the whole show tonight.

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Art Direction and Set Design

Alice and Wonderland

Now that piece of shit will forever get to sell itself as "the Academy Award-winning abortion Alice in Wonderland." Grodes.

Cinematography

Inception

I'm sorry, The Applause Was Cutting Into Your Time? Asshole. No one cares about your stupid award anyway.

Best Supporting Actress

Melissa Leo, The Fighter

Best Animated Short

The Lost Thing

Best Animated Feature

Toy Story 3

I wonder if non-TS3 people bothered getting dressed.

Adapted Screenplay

Aaron Sorkin, The Social Network

Aaron Sorkin: Decidedly less orange than he looked at the Globes,...

We start the Top 7. You finish the Top 10.

I won back my five dollars from my Oscar party pool last year, but I was 0-7 in my predictions considering the ceremony moments I wanted to see occur during what is probably the most important night in movies. Jeff Bridges did end up beating Colin Firth, Up in the Air didn’t win, and Mo’Nique didn’t do Jack Palance push-ups after receiving her award for “Best Supporting Actress.”

There is hope, however, as even the nominees this year don’t always lend themselves towards an easy win. This year it seems we’ve got a “Best Picture” battle between The King’s Speech and The Social Network, two films that have been playing tug-of-war with previous various award shows. On top of that, we’ve got the potential for a few surprises in the top categories – Natalie Portman isn...

After announcing the 58 films in four categories that would be eligible for awards at Sundance, the film fest has now announced the next 57 movies to be screened this coming January. These 57 films are of course out of competition and will be included in Premieres, Next, Spotlight, New Frontiers and Midnight categories. Most are big name projects from already established filmmakers and some have already made their way around film festival in 2010. The list includes Kevin Smith’s Red State, Tom McCarthy’s Win Win, Morgan Spurlock’s documentary The Greatest Movie Ever Sold, Submarine, I Saw the Devil (which had plenty of buzz at Tiff) and my most anticipated film of 2011, Hobo With a Shotgun.

Here is the full list:

Premieres

To showcase the diversity of contemporary independent cinema, the Sundance Film Festival Premieres section offers the latest work from American and international directors as well as world premieres of highly anticipated films.

Festival Adds New Native Showcase

As Previously Announced, Slacker to Screen From the Collection

Park City, Ut – Sundance Institute announced today the lineup of films selected to screen in the 2011 Sundance Film Festival out-of-competition sections Next (<=>), Spotlight, New Frontier, Park City at Midnight, as well as a new Native Showcase. The 2011 Sundance Film Festival runs January 20-30 in Park City, Salt Lake City, Ogden and Sundance, Utah. The complete list of films is available at http://www.sundance.org/festival/.

Trevor Groth, Director of Programming said, “The Sundance Film Festival is uniquely a festival of discovery and we are once again privileged to showcase the work of talented new artists, including a special section devoted to Native filmmakers. But it’s also exciting to see returning directors honing their skills and emerging with dazzling new films. And the Next section highlights visionary work that shows aesthetic creativity is not limited by budget.

Yes, you read that right, they are out of competition but into lesbians courtesy of the midnight lineup.

What do we have to look forward to waiting two years for? Let's see..

Hobo With a Shotgun

Codependent Lesbian Space Alien Seeks Same (you had me at lesbian)

Attenberg (I'm loving the coming Greek weird wave)

And many many more films, some of which we'll probably never get to see. Damn.

Full list after the break.

Next ()

Eight American films selected for their innovative and original work in low- and no-budget filmmaking. Each is a world premiere.

Bellflower / U.S.A. (Director and screenwriter: Evan Glodell) - A ballad for every person who has ever loved and lost - with enough violence, weapons, action and sex to tell a love story with apocalyptic stakes. Cast: Evan Glodell, Jessie Wiseman, Tyler Dawson, Rebekah Brandes.

The Lie / U.S.A. (Director: Joshua Leonard; Screenwriters: Jeff Feuerzeig,...

Following yesterday's announcement of the U.S. and World Cinema Dramatic and Documentary Competitions, the Sundance Film Festival has unveiled the second part of their lineup, which includes the more starry-eyed Premieres section, the best-of-fests Spotlight section, the sure-to-be-culty Park City at Midnight section, the low-budget Next section, and the more experimental New Frontier section (an extension of New Frontier Program, the collection of video art installations which has already been noted here for playing James Franco's dramatic multimedia examination of "Three's Company.")

In addition to the return of filmmakers like "Chuck & Buck"'s Miguel Arteta, "Clockwatchers" director Jill Sprecher, Kevin Smith and "The Station Agent"'s Thomas McCarthy to Park City, the festival will also welcome less frequent or first-time Sundance attendees such as Hollywood types Al Pacino ("Son of No One") and Tobey Maguire ("The Details") and mumblecore alums Joe Swanberg ("Uncle Kent," which announced it's been...

The Sundance Film Festival announced the in competition film line-up for the film festival running January 20th through January 30th 2011 in Park City, Utah.

Today the festival has announced the line-up for the non-competition films and there is one hell of a line-up! There are a ton of great films that will be premiering at the festival, and if you're going you have a lot of great films to choose from!

Each film has an incredible cast and a great story. These films include Cedar Rapids, about a man traveling to an insurance conference, featuring Ed Helms, John C. Reilly and Sigourney Weaver; Kevin Smith's Red State, about a group of misfits encounter extreme fundamentalism in Middle America; The Details, about domestic tensions spawned by raccoons with Tobey Maguire, Elizabeth Banks, Laura Linney, Ray Liotta, Dennis Haysbert; I Melt With You, starring Thomas Jane, Jeremy Piven, Rob Lowe, Christian McKay,...

Well, yesterday, we saw the full list of films in-competition; today, we get to see those titles that have been selected for Sundance 2011′s out-of-competition lineup.

And as I said with yesterday’s post, I’ll be going over the complete list, highlighting titles that need to be, taking into consideration this blog’s specific interests. The only title that immediately stands out is Brit John Akomfrah’s The Nine Muses, which MsWOO positively reviewed, after seeing it at the London Film Festival in October. Read her review Here.

But look for future posts profiling any other titles I deem worthy. I’ve applied for press credentials to attend next year’s festival. I won’t know until the 23rd of this month, whether I’ve been granted press access or not. If I am, I will attend the festival; and if I’m not, well, I probably won’t.

Wednesday, the 2011 Sundance Film Festival announced the 58 films in four categories [1] that would be eligible for awards. Today, they've announced the next slice of their line up - 57 out of competition films in the Premieres, Next, Spotlight, New Frontiers and Midnight categories. This is generally where you get many of the bigger name projects and this year is no exception. We already knew [2] that Kevin Smith's Red State would be on the list, but there's also Tom McCarthy's new film Win Win, Morgan Spurlock's documentary The Greatest Movie Ever Sold, the highly buzzed-about Submarine, Fantastic Fest darling I Saw the Devil as well as Hobo With a Shotgun and a whole bunch more including films with Al Pacino, Tobey Maguire, Jeremy Piven, Kevin Spacey, Demi Moore, Paul Rudd and others. As we said yesterday, the announcement of the movies playing the 2011 Sundance Film Festival is like looking into our film futures.

Yesterday we revealed the in-competition line-up for this years Sundance Film Festival. Today the programmers have announced the second wave, the out-of-competition line-up. It includes six categories and you can check them all out below. We already knew Kevin Smith‘s Red State would be screening, as he announced on his podcast last night. The rest of this out-of-competition line-up is pretty unbelievable.

We get Cedar Rapids (from Youth In Revolt‘s Miguel Arteta), Mark Pellington‘s I Melt With You, My Idiot Brother starring Paul Rudd, Tom McCarthy‘s Win Win, as well as Dito Montiel‘s third feature The Son of No One. We also have new documentaries by Morgan Spurlock and Eugene Jarecki. Some of my favorite Tiff films are also making an appearance, including Submarine (pictured above) and Meek’s Cutoff. Check it out below.

Premieres

To showcase the diversity of contemporary independent cinema, the Sundance...

Back in July, Angelina Jolie's name was being thrown around for a biopic about Elizabeth Taylor, who famously played Cleopatra in the 1963 film about the Egyptian queen. While we haven't heard anything about the project since, it now appears that Jolie is skipping the Taylor approach and may do so with James Cameron behind the lens. Deadline reports that James Cameron and Sony are currently discussing the possibility of making a new film about Cleopatra, based on the book by Stacy Schiff. Jolie is already attached to the project while Brian Helgeland, who won the Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar for L.A. Confidential, is writing the script. The article does put in the caveat that while they're seriously considering having Cameron come on, there's no "certainty that it will happen." If they truly have to make another Cleopatra movie (news flash: they don't), I'm not sure they could do...

Very few actors have worked with the caliber of directors that Leonardo DiCaprio has. From the age of 21 until now, the actor has worked with Sam Raimi, James Cameron, Ridley Scott, Danny Boyle, Steven Spielberg, Sam Mendes and Christopher Nolan, not to mention the fact that he has been Martin Scorsese's actor-of-choice for the past eight years. Now he gets to add yet another Academy Award winning director to his resume: Clint Eastwood. Deadline is reporting that DiCaprio has officially signed on to play former FBI director J. Edgar Hoover in an untitled biopic for Eastwood. Scripted by Dustin Lance Black, who won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay in 2009, the film is scheduled to go into production later this year for Warner Bros. While I understand that a biopic of Hoover will likely contain many great stories - such as the formation of the FBI and busting crime...

James Cameron took home the Best Director and Best Drama awards in the Hfpa's 67th Annual Golden Globe Awards. Jason Reitman won Best Screenplay for his "Up in the Air" George Clooney starrer. Jeff Bridges and Robert Downey Jr. enjoyed wins as Best Actors in "Crazy Heart" and "Sherlock Holmes" and Meryl Streep and Sandra Bullock won for "Julie and Julia" and "The Blind Spot." One I cannot agree with is "The Hangover," a vastly overrated comedy which took home a Best Comedy kudo. TV drama-wise, Michael C. Hall won for his work on "Dexter" and "Grey Gardens" took home two awards - one for Best Mini-Series or Motion Pictures Made for Television and another for Drew Barrymore's efforts. As announced, here is the full list with winners noted in black.

After a few years’ absence, the Fangoria Chainsaw Awards are back in their original format, giving you the chance to vote for the best genre films, filmmakers and actors from the past year. There was such a bumper crop of good stuff released in 2008 that narrowing down the nominees to five in certain categories was truly tough; a couple of movies (most notably Splinter) will wait till next year when they’ve gotten more DVD exposure.

E-mail your votes (be sure to vote in all categories; personal e-mails only, no mass ballots) to postalzone@starloggroup.com. For the Fango Hall of Fame, be sure not to vote for Dario Argento, Rick Baker, Clive Barker, Mario Bava, Rob Bottin, Doug Bradley, Tim Burton, Bruce Campbell, James Cameron, John Carpenter, Jeffrey Combs, Don Coscarelli, Wes Craven, David Cronenberg, Jamie Lee Curtis, Peter Cushing, Joe Dante, Guillermo del Toro, Brad Dourif, Robert Englund,...