It happens almost every year.

This is deeply disappointing but unfortunately not surprising at all. The two best documentaries I’ve seen this year have just been screwed out of a shot at an Oscar nomination.

“Anvil! The Story of Anvil” and Michael Moore’s “Capitalism: A Love Story” were not picked as one of 15 films deemed eligible by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to be nominated for an Oscar.

Also left off the list was Oscar winner Davis Guggenheim’s “It Might Get Loud” starring Jimmy Page, The Edge, and Jack White and the high-profile doc “The September Issue.” WTF?

These movies join a long and distinguished list of classic documentaries that got screwed by the Academy such as “The King of Kong,” Werner Herzog’s “Grizzly Man,” Kurt Kuenne’s “Dear Zachary,” “Hoop Dreams” (which was nominated for Best Editing),  “Crumb,” and “American Movie.”

“Soundtrack for a Revolution,” which features the Roots, the Blind Boys of Alabama, John Legend, and Wyclef Jean, however, was nominated. This is the first time I’m hearing about this movie.

By the way, “Michael Jackson’s This Is It” wasn’t released before the Oscar deadline, so it’s ineligible for the documentary category this year. Some insiders say it has a chance at the Best Picture category (which is now expanded to 10 nominees).

Here are the lucky nominees. The three most high-profile docs are in italics:

• The Beaches of Agnes
• Burma VJ
• The Cove
• Every Little Step
• Facing Ali
• Food, Inc.
• Garbage Dreams
• Living in Emergency: Stories of Doctors Without Borders
• The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and The Pentagon Papers
• Mugabe and the White African
• Sergio
• Soundtrack for a Revolution
• Under Our Skin
• Valentino The Last Emperor
• Which Way Home

What are some of the other high-profile worst Oscar documentary snubs in history?

Tags: 2009, anvil, capitalism: a love story, documentary, included, ineligible, left, Michael, moore, not, off, oscar, screwed, shortlist, snubbed

“Let the Right One In” will not be competeing for an Academy Award this year. This happened a while ago, but with the shortlist being announced yesterday, it’s new news to me. Each country is allowed one submission and Sweden chose “Everlasting Moments” instead. Turns out, though, that it may be the Academy’s difficult and silly eligibility rules that kept the “right one” out this year. It could be that Sweden didn’t choose it because he film is not eligible before next year. The eligibility year is not a calendar year for this category, and “Let the Right One In”  premiered in the U.S. after September 30, 2008. I’ve been doing research online to find out if this is the eactual reason Sweden never submitted the film. If you can find a reliable source that confirms this, please leave a comment!

From ComingSoon.net: Nine films will advance to the next round of voting in the Foreign Language Film category for the 81st Academy Awards. Sixty-five films had originally qualified in the category.

The films, listed in alphabetical order by country, are:

Austria, Revanche, Gotz Spielmann, director;
Canada, The Necessities of Life, Benoit Pilon, director;
France, The Class, Laurent Cantet, director;
Germany, The Baader Meinhof Complex, Uli Edel, director;
Israel, Waltz with Bashir, Ari Folman, director;
Japan, Departures, Yojiro Takita, director;
Mexico, Tear This Heart Out, Roberto Sneider, director;
Sweden, Everlasting Moments, Jan Troell, director;
Turkey, 3 Monkeys, Nuri Bilge Ceylan, director.

In the meantime, “Let the Right One In” competed directly with  the movie Sweden chose instead in that country’s movie awrdsjust two days ago. Variety reports that “Let the Right One In” won five awards at the Golden Bugs, the equivalent of the Oscars in its native Sweden. The ceremony took place Monday night.

The movie took prizes for Director (Tomas Alfredson), Script (John Ajvide Lindqvist, based on his novel), Cinematography (Hoyte van Hoytema), Set Design (Eva Noren) and Sound (Per Sundstrom and Ljudteamet). When it came time for the biggie, though, Best Film, it lost out to Jan Troell’s “Everlasting Moments.”

Tags: academy awards, film, foreign, ineligible, language, Let the Right One In, not picked, not submitted, oscar, shortlist, sweden, wins, won

Since 1981, every day before the Oscar ceremony is held, the Golden Raspberry Awards are handed out. Not surprisingly, the winners themselves are usually not present to pick up their shameful plastic trophies. Notable exceptions: “Showgirls” director Paul Verhoeven, “Freddy Got Fingered” writer/star/director Tom Green (who accepted five awards for the movie, which I think is a brilliant, misunderstood piece of modern art), and Halle Berry, who won Worst Actress for “Catwoman.”

Julian Sancton’s Vanity Fair Little Gold Man blog says “Leave Sly alone,” but I think his defense of 29-time nominee Sylvester Stallone (a Raspberry record) is misplaced. My cry? “Leave ‘Speed Racer’ alone!” Oh well, you’ve all heard that ad nauseum from me, so I’ll stop now.

I think the Raspberry Awards are at their funniest when they reward stuff that was supposed to be good and really revolted people, like M. Night Shyamalan’s “The Happening” and “The Day the Earth Stood Still.” Some of these possible nominees are too easy a target: “High School Musical 3,” “Postal,” “The Hottie & the Nottie.” Hell, I’ve never even heard of that last one. Although I will admit that those soul-killing, witless spoof movies from Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer (”Meet the Spatans,” “Disaster Movie”) need to stop immediately. Satire without context or content is not satire at all, just a lot of really unfunny and outdated jokes.

I’ll make this prediction for the winner before the final nominees are even announced: Mike Myers’ “The Love Guru.” Bank on it. Anyway, here’s the shortlist of possible nominees:

Worst Picture: Speed Racer, Disaster Movie and Meet the Spartans, The Day the Earth Stood Still, High School Musical 3, The Hottie & The Nottie, In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale, The Love Guru, Postal, Rambo, The Happening, Meet Dave, Witless Protection

Worst Actor: Zac Efron, Dane Cook, Larry the Cable Guy, Eddie Murphy, Al Pacino, Keanu Reeves, Sylvester Stallone, Tom Cruise (Valkyrie), Will Ferrell, Ashton Kutcher, Mike Myers, Adam Sandler, Mark Wahlberg

Worst Actress: Paris Hilton, Jessica Alba, The cast of The Women, Camilla Belle, Cameron Diaz, Kate Hudson, Diane Keaton, Jennifer Connelly, Zooey Deschanel, Vanessa Hudgens, Eva Longoria-Parker, Reese Witherspoon

Worst Screen Couple: Any couple from HSM 3, Cameron Diaz & Ashton Kutcher, Paris Hilton & Joel David Moore, Kate Hudson & Dane Cook, Kate Hudson & Matthew McConaughey, Larry the Cable Guy & Jenny McCarthy, Any couple from Mamma Mia, Eddie Murphy & Eddie Murphy (Meet Dave), Al Pacino & His Hair, Mark Wahlberg & Zooey Deschanel, Mark Wahlberg & Mila Kunis, Sylvester Stallone & His Ego

Worst Director: Uwe Boll, Scott Derrickson, Jason Friedberg & Aaron Seltzer, Tom Putnam, Marco Schnabel, Sylvester Stallone, Jon Avnet, Diane English, Roland Emmerich, Brian Robbins, Kenny Ortega, M. Night Shyamalan

Worst Prequel, Sequel, Remake or Rip-Off: Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, High School Musical 3: Senior Year, Rambo, Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Disaster Movie, Meet the Spartans, An American Carol, The Women, The Day the Earth Stood Still, Prom Night, Speed Racer, The X-Files: I Want To Believe

Worst Career Achievement: Uwe Boll, Jason Friedberg & Aaron Seltzer, Madonna, Keanu Reeves, Sylvester Stallone

What is the name of the perfume that is advertised throughout the graphic novel “Watchmen” (not the one shown only at the end)? HINT: It’s not Millenium.

Tags: 2008, 2008 golden raspberrys, 2009, 2009 golden raspberrys, golden raspberry awards, love guru, nominees, shortlist

Well, the short list for Oscar Documentary nominations has been released. Last year, the committee snubbed the best doc of the 2007, “The King of Kong.” This year, one of the biggest non-fiction films of the year, “Young@Heart,” was declared ineligible for a nomination because it was shown on TV first. Also, Alex Gibney’s “Gonzo: The Life and Work of Hunter S. Thompson” and Larry Charles’ “Religulous,” starring Bill Maher, is notably absent from this list.

It’s always something with those guys.

Anyway, here’s the list of eligible films. “Man on Wire,”  (above) one of my favorite movies of the year so far, is probably considered a frontrunner. And, even though his highly-acclaimed “Grizzly Man” was snubbed in 2005, Werner Herzog’s “Encounters at the End of the World” (also pictured) should also make it in. Also notable: the esteemed Errol Morris’ “Standard Operating Procedure,” which came and went so fast this Spring, I didn’t even get a chance to see it.

These 15 films will be voted on in order to narrow the field down to five Oscar nominations in the Documentary category. Last year’s winner was Alex Gibney’s Taxi to the Dark Side,” which was viewed as somewhat of an upset over Michael Moore’s “Sicko.”

“At the Death House Door”
“The Betrayal (Nerakhoon)”
“Blessed Is the Match: The Life and Death of Hannah Senesh”
“Encounters at the End of the World”
“Fuel”
“The Garden”
“Glass: A Portrait of Philip in Twelve Parts”
“I.O.U.S.A.”
“In a Dream”
“Made in America”
“Man on Wire”
“Pray the Devil Back to Hell”
“Standard Operating Procedure”
“They Killed Sister Dorothy”
“Trouble the Water”

Tags: 2008, announced, documentary, encounters, for, gonzo, list, man, nominations, oscar, released, Short, shortlist, standard, wire