Rooster and Mattie draw a bead on HFPA
We’ve never placed much stock in the Hollywood Foreign Press Association and their self-congratulatory, not-so-Golden Globes.
So it didn’t come as much of a surprise when the Coen brothers‘ ambitious TRUE GRIT was shut out of this year’s HFPA nominations. There has been speculation as to why: The foreign press don’t cotton to Westerns. The foreign press have never cared much for the Coens’ dark dark humor. The foreign press … but you get the idea.
The truth of the matter is the foreign press have gotten used to being wined and dined and lavished with junket trinkets, and the Coens don’t play that game. They do their jobs and let the work speak for itself. In my interviews with them I’ve found they don’t care much for the media in general, but they loathe sniveling, suck-up entertainment scribes in particular.
(And what can you say about an organization that nominated your FARGO in its musical-comedy category … and didn’t nominate your NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN for best picture?)
Anyway, this year’s HFPA had its petty revenge on the independent-spirited Joel and Ethan.
But like Rooster Cogburn galloping full-on at Ned Pepper and his boys, “True Grit” has come charging back.
The bold re-telling of Charles Portis’s novel did itself proud at this morning’s Oscar nominations, receiving 10 nods, including those for best picture, best director, best supporting actress, best adapted screenplay, and, for Jeff Bridges‘ blustery, one-eyed marshal, best actor.
Mattie Ross’s spunk and determination have paid off when it really mattered.
CinemaDope 
03/01/2011 at 11:07 AM |
First accessed the column out of curiosity–now I wouldn’t miss it. Good going, Glenn! Incidentally, personally James Franco is a nice friendly guy–also an agent provocateur on the set. I was a “background actor’ in “Milk” with one word (much later in the script). So I was sitting in the faux camera shop, looking attentive, when Franco–playing Scott Smith, Harvey’s lover, sitting behind the shop’s desk–suddenly asks: “Hey, Robinson, did you get laid last night?” I have no lines but I’ve been writing dialog for 50 years so I wasn’t going to be trapped. I made up a dirty joke on the spot, bought down cast and crew, and was immediately promoted to SAG. I am, courtesy of Franco, the highest paid writer in the world–on a per word basis (the only one that got into the completed film). A really nice guy and I owe him but, sadly, he was miscast as an Oscar host. — Frank
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