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STATUETTE STAKES: I’m First! No, I’M First!

Posted October 20, 2011 by Mitch Salem

> For many years, the National Board of Review has been the self-appointed first group on the calendar to announce awards for Best Picture and other categories.  The NBR is sort of like the Golden Globes without super-powers; they’re 110 people tangentially related to the world of film whom you’ve never heard of and whose […]

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THE DAY AFTER: Oscar Thoughts

Posted February 25, 2013 by Mitch Salem

  There are 4 ways an Oscar night can be memorable: A Great Host:  Seth MacFarlane was bad–maybe not James Franco bad, but bad.  The ways he was bad, though, weren’t in any way unexpected.  Meta-gags and courting offensiveness are the things that have made him very, very rich.  When you hire Seth MacFarlane, you’re […]

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OSCARS MINUS 3: Second Choice

Posted February 21, 2013 by Mitch Salem

  The odds-on favorite for this year’s Best Director Oscar can’t win. There’s little doubt at this point that if Ben Affleck had only been nominated for Best Director this year, he would have run away with the award.  That’s probably true even if the dynamics of the Best Picture race had been changed by […]

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THE EMMY AWARDS: Analysis and Review

Posted September 18, 2016 by Mitch Salem

  There weren’t a lot of surprises at tonight’s EMMY AWARDS, and the truth is that where television is right now, there didn’t need to be.  (A full list of winners is here.)  Game of Thrones and Veep were arguably coming off their best seasons ever, and it would be hard to begrudge them their […]

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SHOWBUZZDAILY Review: The Oscars

Posted February 22, 2015 by Mitch Salem

  There were no surprises of any scale at tonight’s ACADEMY AWARDS (a full list of winners is here) , and that went for the telecast, too.  Neil Patrick Harris was as personable a host as anticipated, and he/his writers were sometimes quick on their feet, as when he had a gag ready about a Documentary […]

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OSCAR STRATEGIES: What the Nominees Are Doing–and Should Be

Posted January 10, 2013 by Mitch Salem

  OK, so you’ve got your Best Picture nomination.  You’re one of the chosen 9 films with a chance to reap the glory (and success) that follows an Academy Award win.  You’ve got 46 days until the awards are given out, and 41 days until the polls close.  What do you do now?  Here, title […]

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SBD AWARDSWATCH: “Argo” Springs a Small Leak

Posted October 15, 2012 by Mitch Salem

  Mitch Metcalf will have more to say about this weekend’s actual boxoffice numbers versus Sunday’s studio estimates later today, but one point is worth noting for its Oscar implications.  It was important to Warner Bros that ARGO, the studio’s big awards season hope and the fruit of its golden-boy director Ben Affleck (and also […]

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OSCARS MINUS 5: The Sure Thing That Is, and The One That Isn’t

Posted February 19, 2013 by Mitch Salem

  The voting has just closed for this year’s Academy Awards, and here at Oscar Central, we are ready to make the following call: Daniel Day-Lewis is going to win the Best Actor Oscar for Lincoln. I know, way out on a limb.  And sure, Buster Douglas beat Mike Tyson, nothing is certain in this […]

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