Salon.com > The King's Speech

Oscar’s best picture nominee numbers vary

Wed, 15 Jun 2011 15:49:00 +0000

Have you been annoyed and confused by the decision to allow 10 nominees for best picture during the Oscars for the last two years? Do you think the academy should allow more than five movies in that category if the year warranted it? Well, you're in luck!

According to a New York Times article today, the number of films up for the best picture award will now range from five to 10, depending on variables you couldn't possibly hope to comprehend, such as the addition of a film past the base five only if it has received 5 percent or more of the total vote. This will apparently keep Oscar contenders biting their fingernails up until the moment their movie is announced, at which time everyone goes back to not really caring how many films are up for best picture. (As long as we keep "Shrek" movies out of the race.)

According to the NYT, this decision was based on several factors, including the recent yo-yo'ing of Oscar viewership, the retirement of academy director Bruce Davis, and "the 2011 Oscar show that was widely criticized for ... the seeming diffidence of one of its co-hosts, James Franco."

Jimmy Kimmel lampoons “The King’s Speech”

Mon, 28 Feb 2011 17:39:00 +0000

Jimmy Kimmel was all over Best Picture winner "The King's Speech" during his show last night. The ABC late night host unveiled a spoof of the film, presented as a trailer for a new, Americanized version of the Oscar champion. It was titled, "The President's Speech," and featured former President George W. Bush and boxer Mike Tyson.

There isn't much that this send-up doesn't have. The 43rd President of the United States struggles to utter a coherent sentence during interviews and speeches, and brings in the "stupendously loquacious" former boxing champ -- who paints oil portraits of unicorns in his free time -- to clear up his vocal disability. This movie is not yet rated, but totally awesome.

Your Oscar night primer

Sun, 27 Feb 2011 15:01:00 +0000

Anne Hathaway and James Franco's purported musical numbers: Bust or must?

I will admit to being totally suckered by the snippet from a "Grease" number that will apparently be performed by Oscar co-hosts James Franco and Anne Hathaway on Sunday night. Sneaking that out the way they did -- via Franco's Twitter feed -- is a nifty use of social media and sends a signal that the Oscars are hipper and savvier under the new regime. Or simultaneously hipper and suffused with nostalgia, which is even better. Now, I'd be delighted if they decide to do the whole damn show as selections from classic musicals: "West Side Story," anyone? "Oklahoma"? "The Band Wagon"? But any tiny flub by either of the stars -- a missed dance step or a mistimed lip-sync -- will launch a tide of snarky Tweets to rival the parting of the Red Sea.

The "updated" set design: Virtual reality or lame-ass PowerPoint?

In praise of Helena Bonham Carter, fashion tragedy

Thu, 24 Feb 2011 16:20:00 +0000

Helena Bonham Carter is as disastrous a dresser as she is brilliant an actress. The 44-year-old, nominated for a best supporting actress Academy Award for her droll, plummy turn as the Queen Mum in "The King's Speech," is a woman for whom the word "kooky" seems to have been invented, the kind who could make Björk and Cher shake their heads ruefully and ask, "You're going out in that?" And that is why, like Björk and Cher, she is fabulous.

As in years past, the bulk of this year's crop of Oscar-nominated actresses has the carefully cultivated aura of Hollywood glamour. You'd never catch Nicole Kidman showing up at the Golden Globes, as Bonham Carter did, sporting bird's nest hair and mismatched shoes. The reliably stunning Amy Adams and Natalie Portman probably won't be going to the Oscars emulating the Queen of the Damned look Bonham Carter went for when she won the BAFTA earlier this month. Melissa Leo has been spending the last few months aggressively distancing her image from that of her big-haired frumpus character in "The Fighter," pulling out all the stops in a sequins- and fur-laden personal campaign. And even 14-year-old Hailee Steinfeld knows how to pull it together in an elegant Marchesa gown.

How “The King’s Speech” gets stuttering wrong

Mon, 21 Feb 2011 23:01:00 +0000

2011 has been a good year for stuttering. Thanks to "The King's Speech" -- the Oscar-nominated film about King George VI's attempt to overcome his speech impediment -- the largely hidden, sporadically mocked and much misunderstood condition is on everybody's lips. The non-stutterer Colin Firth, and the character he portrays, have become the voice of a condition that has long remained mute. But if "The King's Speech" has become a stuttering education for much of its audience, what sort of lesson is it teaching?

On one hand, the film neatly corrects many of the standard depictions. In a performance that is uncommonly impressive, Firth manages to perfectly evoke the experience of stuttering without falling back on a simplistic, Porky Pig-style rendition. He addresses the complex difficulties of one man's speech, the inner silences that tortured a proud man, and the cold fury that his impediment left in its wake. Having stuttered for most of my life, I found the authenticity of the opening scene to be both riveting and uncomfortable to watch. The film opens with the then-duke's speech at the closing of the 1925 British Empire Exhibition in Wembley Stadium. My cheeks redden for him, for us all, as words jam painfully in his throat and spluttered syllables echo mockingly across the silence. My own body tenses as he strangles himself to force out a sound and, as the camera pans to the awkward fidgeting of the crowd, I witness the familiar communal embarrassment.

“King’s Speech” leads Golden Globe nominations

Tue, 14 Dec 2010 14:29:00 +0000

The British monarchy tale "The King's Speech" led Golden Globe contenders Tuesday with seven nominations, including best drama and acting honors for Colin Firth, Helena Bonham Carter and Geoffrey Rush.

Other best-drama nominees were the psychosexual dance thriller "Black Swan," the boxing saga "The Fighter," the sci-fi blockbuster "Inception" and the Facebook chronicle "The Social Network."

Nominees in the Globes' other best-picture category, for musical or comedy, are the Lewis Carroll fantasy "Alice in Wonderland," the song-and-dance extravaganza "Burlesque," the lesbian-family tale "The Kids Are All Right," the action tale "Red" and the romantic thriller "The Tourist."

"The Social Network" and "The Fighter" tied for second with six nominations each. Among nominations for "The Social Network" were Jesse Eisenberg as best dramatic actor, Andrew Garfield as supporting actor and David Fincher as director.

"The Fighter" earned four acting nominations, best actor for Mark Wahlberg and supporting honors for Christian Bale, Amy Adams and Melissa Leo. Its nominations also included a directing slot for David O. Russell.

Johnny Depp earned two nominations, as best musical or comedy actor for "Alice in Wonderland" and "The Tourist."

“The King’s Speech”: Colin Firth’s Oscar-bound performance

Wed, 24 Nov 2010 02:01:00 +0000

I went to "The King's Speech" completely prepared to dig in and resist it: a British period piece, suffused with imperial nostalgia, about a member of the royal family nobly battling a disability. Trustworthy people told me they loved it, but I knew better. Could such a movie be anything but sentimental claptrap, a prettified picture of a long-gone era when kings behaved like kings and commoners knew their place, shamelessly crafted to lure Oscar voters?

Maybe not. There's nothing I can tell you about "The King's Speech" that contradicts that description, except that resistance is futile. It's a warm, richly funny and highly enjoyable human story that takes an intriguing sideways glance at a crucial period in 20th-century history. Its star performance, and probably the best reason to see it, comes from Colin Firth as the monumentally awkward Prince Albert, or Bertie, who became King George VI unexpectedly in 1936 after his older brother, Edward VIII (Guy Pearce), abdicated to marry American divorcée Wallis Simpson (Eve Best).