YOUR AD HERE! SEE SIDEBAR FOR DETAILS.

Just hearing that the Academy Award winning actor Tommy Lee Jones has filed a lawsuit against Paramount (not Miramax?) alleging that they have stiffed him on $10 million of bonus-compensation that he says they promised to pay him if No Country for Old Men proved to be financially successful. Paramount ended up taking in $160 million and the Academy Award for Best Picture. They have not yet offered a public response.

I can't think of anyone in the world of film who had a more impressive 2007 than the legendary cinematographer Roger Deakins. This year, Deakins was behind the camera on three instant-classics—No Country for Old Men, The Assassination of Jesse James, and In the Valley of Elah—and became the first cinematographer since Robert Surtees 36 years ago to earn two Oscar nominations in the same year (for the first two films).

Even if you have been hibernating this awards season, you have seen Deakins' work. He previously earned nominations for The Shawshank Redemption (1994), Fargo (1996), Kundun (1997), O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000), and The Man Who Wasn't There (2001). He also lensed Sid and Nancy (1986), The Secret Garden (1993), Dead Man Walking (1995), The Hurricane (1999), A Beautiful Mind (2001), and House of Sand and Fog (2003). And he has worked on every Coen brothers movie since Barton Fink (1991).

This afternoon, I had the pleasure of chatting with Deakins, a really nice guy, about the origins of his interest in cinematography, how he approaches his work, and what it was like making each of his three extraordinary films this year. He is unusually candid when it comes to discussing the greatest challenges, successes, and failures of each film... and even hints at which of his two nominated efforts would earn his vote! Take a listen...

"Even in the contest between man and steer, the issue is not certain."
—Sheriff Ed Tom Bell (Tommy Lee Jones) in No Country for Old Men

After having already seen Best Picture favorite No Country for Old Men twice (the press screening and then the DVD screener), I decided to give it one final pre-Oscars viewing tonight when my friend left it up to me to choose a movie at the theater. I don't regret doing so—the film's plot (not to mention its utter domination of the awards circuit, thus far) remain somewhat hard for me to explain, but both began to make at least a little more sense upon this third viewing. (In a November podcast, Jeff Wells suggested to Pete Hammond that the story might be a metaphor for post-9/11 life, and I actually found this to be a very insightful and helpful this time around.)

There remain many reasons why I still struggle to believe that No Country will win Best Picture, none more so than the film's unusual denouement, which I believe many members of the Academy—older voters, in particular—will struggle to embrace. The film's ending and overall meaning apparently make profound sense to some... but only slivers of it to many others, myself included. Those who believe they fully 'get it' are very confident about and pleased with their interpretations, and are certainly not shy about touting the film, but I wonder if perhaps their voices are simply louder than a larger majority who, like myself, do not quite share their level of understanding of or affection for what they have seen.

To be completely honest, I think the condescending tone (whether or not it is deliberate) of the film's most aggressive defenders has actually pissed off some who are on the fence about the film, driving them towards other contenders. Consider, for instance, this podcast that several smug, Yeats-quoting critics organized to help the rest of us understand what we missed about the film. The studio apparently thinks this sort of thing helps the film's cause, since they have it up on their official web site, but me? I think it potentially sets the film up for the same sort of rude-awakening that another patronizing, long-winded contender named John Kerry experienced not too long ago when many presumed he had an easy win locked up... and this comes from someone who wanted him to win!

The last film that caused critics to orgasm like this but regular folks (and Oscar voters) to take pause was Brokeback Mountain. I don't mean to open a whole 'nother aspect to this discussion, since I am well aware that many believe Brokeback lost not on the merits but as a result of homophobia... but I think you get my point. Things don't always play out the way the critics, precursors, or loudest voices portend they should.

Anyway, that said, I have the great privilege of speaking tomorrow with this year's Best Supporting Actor front-runner, No Country's Javier Bardem, who was inarguably magnificent in the film, and who might be able to set me straight!

The Producers Guild of America (PGA) has awarded its 19th annual Producer of the Year Award for Theatrical Motion Pictures to Scott Rudin, Ethan Coen, and Joel Coen for No Country for Old Men (Miramax) and for Animated Motion Pictures to Brad Lewis for Ratatouille (Disney). It has been a foregone conclusion that the latter would win this en route to the Academy Award for Best Animated Film, but there have been some—myself included—who have strongly questioned whether the former actually possesses the sweeping support that has been speculated. This win will eradicate almost all remaining doubts and positions No Country for Old Men as the prohibitive favorite to win the Academy Award for Best Picture... failure to do so would be on par with the stunning collapse of front-runner Brokeback Mountain at the Oscars two years ago.

Earlier tonight, and as predicted by this web site and the majority of others, the Directors Guild of America honored Ethan Coen and Joel Coen with their 2007 DGA Award for Outstanding Directorial Achievement for their film No Country for Old Men. (Tom O'Neil was in attendance and has posted the audio of their acceptance speech.) This win positions the brothers as the irrefutable front-runners to win the Academy Award for Best Director next month, which would make them just the second duo (and first siblings) to win the honor. Less certain are the Best Picture prospects for their film, which is in a tough race with four other viable contenders, but is also regarded by most pundits as the odds-on favorite. The upcoming Producer Guild of America Award should help confirm or rebut that impression.

It seems like a very welcoming country for Old Men, if you ask me: the script of No Country for Old Men, which Ethan Coen and Joel Coen adapted from the book by Cormac McCarthy, has won the 2007 USC Scripter Award. (Thanks to AwardsDaily for the heads up.) As I mentioned earlier, this is almost an award you don't want to win, based on USC's horrendous track record at predicting the Adapted Screenplay winner at the Oscars, but I'm sure the winners have no plans to give it back.

All is not well in Oscarland. There is an intense debate brewing among top pundits regarding the Coen brothers' No Country for Old Men (Miramax) and whether or not it should/will be nominated for Best Picture. Among those strongly in the film's corner are Peter Travers (Rolling Stone), Jeff Wells (Hollywood Elsewhere), and Sasha Stone (Awards Daily), the latter of whom believes it will actually win Best Picture. Then there is the other camp that feels it isn't going anywhere as far as a Best Picture nomination, which includes Tom O'Neil (The Envelope), Kris Tapley (Variety), and myself.

This weekend, several of the aforementioned pundits made their cases for or against No Country: Tom argues people are reading too much into the strong critical response to the film, which is no guarantee of a nomination (think Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, etc.), and Kris has dropped it from his Best Picture projections (at least for the time being, he cautions) for similar reasons. Sasha, meanwhile, thinks they're both wrong—"Academy voters may have their biases, but they are not stupid," she argues in a rebuttal to Tom's piece on her site, which has featured a constant stream of pro-No Country material for a few weeks now. "It's as obvious as can be," she insists, that No Country will win it all.

There are elements of No Country that are unquestionably brilliant, but its advocates have to think about a few things:

• Is it a little overlong?
• Does it offer any message of real importance?
• Does it leave you feeling good about humanity?
• Does it offer any real sense of resolution?
• Is it too violent?
• Has the Academy ever honored westerns that don't feature a grand, sweeping message on an epic scale (Dances with Wolves) or some major star wattage (Unforgiven)?

These are things that will run through voters minds, consciously or subconsciously, when they evaluate a film. Sure, they look the other way and make exceptions by nominating films that violate some of these 'rules' some of the time, but never all of them.

Personally, I think it is conceivable that No Country will get nominated for Best Picture, but unlikely. It is more of a critics movie than a populist movie, and we should have learned in recent years that when current Academy members sit down in private to fill to out their ballots, they vote for the films and people who touched their hearts, not necessarily who they're 'supposed' to according to the critical consensus. How else can we explain the wins of Crash, Eminem, Adrien Brody, Three Six Mafia, The Departed, Alan Arkin, etc., which in past years would have been unimaginable?

My hunch is that when all is said and done, No Country will have won Best Supporting Actor (thanks to Javier Bardem's strong performance and great respect among his peers) and garnered nominations for Best Cinematography, Best Adapted Screenplay, and possibly Best Editing. I think a Best Director nomination for the Coen brothers is possible, but unlikely, partly because it has never helped to have two people up for an award (Little Miss Sunshine), and partly because I think the Academy will not bite on the film for the aforementioned reasons, which will impact the Director race.

People should remember that the Coen brothers' film Fargo (1996) received just as good if not better reviews than No Country; reached a far wider audience than No Country ever will; and was even included on the AFI's list of the 100 Greatest Movies of All-Time the very year the film was released... and still only won two Oscars, Best Actress for Frances McDormand and Best Screenplay for Ethan and Joel. True, it was nominated for Best Director (Joel alone that time) and Best Picture, but failed to win either (losing to Anthony Minghella and his mediocre-at-best film The English Patient), even though it was the weakest year in recent memory.

Add that up with the zero nominations for Blood Simple (1984), zero nominations for Raising Arizona (1987), zero nominations for Miller's Crossing (1990), 3 nominations and zero wins for Barton Fink (1991), zero nominations for The Big Lebowski (1998), 2 nominations and zero wins for O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000), 1 nomination and zero wins for The Man Who Wasn't There (2001), zero nominations for Intolerable Cruelty (2003), and zero nominations for The Ladykillers (2004), and you have to wonder how much the Academy really goes for the Coen brothers' sorts of films.

To me, the trend is that Coen brothers movies garner, if anything, nominations for Best Cinematography (thanks to Roger Deakins' great work), occasionally for Best Screenplay (which celebrates the quirky and creative), and sporadically for a very memorable supporting performance... which I believe is pretty consistent with my predictions for No Country for Old Men.