For Your Consideration: Gauging a Crowded and Female-Friendly Spirit Award Field

This article was originally published in early November, and has been re-purposed in anticipation of the The Film Independent’s Spirit Awards nominations, which will be revealed tomorrow, November 30.

With the recent announcements of the Gotham Award nominations and the British Independent Film Award nominations, it only seems appropriate for this week’s column to take on the grand daddy of independent film awards: The Film Independent’s Spirit Awards. With nominations to be announced November 30 - just under a month from now - the awards promise to (as always) - be a surprising and at times unexpected representation of the year in American independent film.

One thing that can be expected though. This year’s event promises to be much more crowded and much less predictable than last year’s Spirits, which turned out to more or less become the “Precious” show. In large part due to “The Hurt Locker”‘s ineligibility (it was nominated the year prior), “Precious” ended up taking home five major awards including best feature, best director, best first screenplay and acting honors for Gabourey Sidibe and Mo’Nique. There were certainly other films that factored into the mix - including “Crazy Heart,” “A Serious Man,” “A Single Man,” “Sin Nombre,” “The Messenger” and “(500) Days of Summer” - but in general it seemed like a much less congested year than usual. From the outset, it was hard to imagine anything other than “Precious” taking the top prize heading at the ceremony.

This year, this is unlikely to become the case. Sure, Debra Granik’s “Winter’s Bone” (which, like “Precious” won Sundance’s top prize) certainly seems like this year’s indie darling, but what about Darren Aronofsky’s “Black Swan,” Derek Cianfrance’s “Blue Valentine,” Lisa Cholodenko’s “The Kids Are All Right,” John Cameron Mitchell’s “Rabbit Hole,” and Sofia Coppola’s “Somewhere”? All seem likely to eligible for the Spirits, and all have their fair share of supporters. Not to mention Jay and Mark Duplass’s “Cyrus,” Aaron Schneider’s “Get Low,” Nicole Holofener’s “Please Give,” Lena Dunham’s “Tiny Furniture,” and maybe even Matt Reeves’ “Let Me In” (which factored into the Gotham nominations, but straggles a limitation with a reported $20 million - exactly the budget cutoff). That’s a whole lot of indie going on, suggesting a “Winter’s” sweep might be a very unreasonable assumption when the awards head back to the beach in February. Not to say it won’t be a major presence at the awards, and deservedly so. It’s just that it’s going to have a lot of competition. Perhaps more competition than the Spirits have seen in many years.

So let’s break it down with respect to a few of the Spirits’ major categories to see where things might be headed.  Keep in mind the awards’ eligibility rules when considering what is seemingly left out. For example, “127 Hours” is budgeted at $30 million, while “Fair Game” is reportedly budgeted at $22 million, placing them both just outside the limitations of a budget under $20 million. Meanwhile, while “Animal Kingdom,” “Another Year,” “Biutiful,” “I Am Love,” “The King’s Speech” and “Made in Dagenham” are all not American productions, thus excluding them from all categories except “foreign film,” where one would suspect a lot of them will pop up. There’s also the tricky thing of films that haven’t been theatrically released showing up thanks to their festival screenings (“The Hurt Locker” did this in 2008, for example). Mike Mills’ “Beginners,” Gregg Araki’s “Kaboom,” Aaron Katz’s “Cold Weather,” and especially Kelly Reichardt’s “Meek’s Cutoff” would be the films to watch out for if that ends up being the case in their regard. So that all said, here’s a best guess (and check out the predictions in chart form here):

Best Lead Male

Prediction: Aaron Eckhart (Rabbit Hole), James Franco (Howl), Stephen Dorff (Somewhere), Robert Duvall (Get Low), Ryan Gosling (Blue Valentine)
Spoilers:  Casey Affleck (The Killer Inside Me), Ronald Bronstein (Daddy Long Legs), Michael Douglas (Solitary Man), James Gandolfini (Welcome To The Rileys), Kevin Kline (The Extra Man), John C. Reilly (Cyrus), Ben Stiller (Greenberg)

Comparatively weak relative to its female counterpart but still offering some fine work, the lead male category could see a pretty awesomely mixed bag of actors. From bonafide Oscar contenders, like “Blue Valentine”‘s Ryan Gosling, “Get Low”‘s Robert Duvall and “Rabbit Hole”‘s Aaron Eckhart, to worthy underdogs, like “Somewhere”‘s Stephen Dorff, “Howl”‘s James Franco, and “Solitary Man”‘s Michael Douglas, to performances that the Spirits were created to honor, such as Casey Affleck in “The Killer Inside Me” or Ronald Bronstein in “Daddy Long Legs” or John C. Reilly in “Cyrus.” Of course there’s always the potential for an Adam Scott in “The Vicious Kind”-type nomination (which last year occurred over favorites like “The Messenger”‘s Ben Foster and “A Serious Man”‘s Michael Stuhlbarg), so who knows how these nominations may pan out. Though a Gosling vs. Duvall showdown (both previous winners in this category, for 1998’s “The Apostle” and 2006’s “Half Nelson,” respectively), seems like a good bet for the ceremony itself.

Best Supporting Female and Best Supporting Male

Female Prediction: Dale Dickey (Winter’s Bone), Elle Fanning (Somewhere), Barbara Hershey (Black Swan), Sissy Spacek (Get Low), Dianne Wiest (Rabbit Hole)
Female Spoilers: Greta Gerwig (Greenberg), Rebecca Hall (Please Give), Mila Kunis (Black Swan), Melissa Leo (Welcome To The Rileys), Kristen Stewart (Welcome To The Rileys), Marisa Tomei (Cyrus), Kerry Washington (Mother & Child), Mia Wasikowska (The Kids Are All Right)

Male Prediction: Chris Cooper (The Company Men), John Hawkes (Winter’s Bone), Bill Murray (Get Low), John Ortiz (Jack Goes Boating), Mark Ruffalo (The Kids Are All Right)
Male Spoilers: Vincent Cassel (Black Swan), Jonah Hill (Cyrus), Josh Hutcherson (The Kids Are All Right), Samuel L. Jackson (Mother & Child), Alex Karpovsky (Tiny Furniture), Paul Reubens (Life During Wartime), Sam Rockwell (Conviction), Michael Shannon (The Runaways), Miles Teller (Rabbit Hole)

The Spirits tend to get even more wildly unpredictable when it comes to the supporting categories (who predicted Dina Korzun in “Cold Souls” and Natalie Press in “Fifty Dead Men Walking” over “Crazy Heart”‘s Maggie Gyllenhaal and “A Single Man”‘s Julianne Moore” last year?), so continue to take these suggestions cautiously. But it’s hard to imagine the “Winter’s Bone” supporting duo of Dale Dickey and John Hawkes being left out of these categories, or the many outstanding supporting performances from films like “Rabbit Hole” (Dianne Wiest, and maybe Miles Teller as well), “Black Swan” (Barbara Hershey, and perhaps Mila Kunis or Vincent Cassel), “Cyrus” (Jonah Hill and/or Marisa Tomei), “Get Low” (Bill Murray and/or Sissy Spacek), and “The Kids Are All Right” (Mark Ruffalo and/or his biological children Mia Wasikowska and Josh Hutcherson). Whatever happens, expect a diversity of performances in true Spirit Award-spirit, and a much less predictable outcome of winners (last year Woody Harrelson and especially Mo’Nique were essentially assured their trophies).

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xoxo
Carrie