Oscar Noms, Book Adaptations
Commenting on the slate of Oscar nominations announced yesterday, Entertertainment Weekly notes,
“Well, it’s certainly going to be one white, male Oscars.
With no people of color nominated in the acting categories, no stories about women included in the best picture race, and even Gone Girl novelist/screenwriter … Gillian Flynn omitted from the best adapted screenplay category, the Academy demonstrated its lack of diversity today in a big way.”
Angelina Jolie’s Unbroken, based on the book by Laura Hillenbrand, was not nominated for either Best Picture or Best Director. It only received nominations for Best Cinematography, Sound Editing and Sound Mixing.
Neither is Unbroken nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay. The nominees in that category are:
American Sniper, Jason Hall — based on Kyle, Chris, American Sniper, (HarperCollins/Morrow, 2012)
The Imitation Game, Graham Moore — Hodges, Andrew, Alan Turing: The Enigma, (S&S, 1983; re-released by Princeton U. Press, 2012)
Inherent Vice, Paul Thomas Anderson — Pynchon, Thomas, Inherent Vice, (Penguin Press, 2009)
The Theory of Everything, Anthony McCarten — Hawking, Jane, Traveling To Infinity: My Life With Stephen, (Alma Books, 2007)
Whiplash, Damien Chazelle
If you’re wondering about the latter, so are many others, including the film’s creators. The Academy decided that since writer/director Damian Chazelle released another short film on the same subject in 2013, also called Whiplash, the feature film technically falls into the category of being “based on material previously published or produced.”
The other major nominations for book adaptations are:
American Sniper, Best Picture, Actor (Bradley Cooper), Adapted Screenplay, Film Editing, Sound Editing, Sound Mixing — based on Kyle, Chris, American Sniper, (HarperCollins/Morrow, 2012)
The Imitation Game, Best Picture, Director, Actor (Benedict Cumberbatch), Supporting Actress (Keira Knightley), Adapted Screenplay, Original Score, Film Editing, Production Design– Hodges, Andrew, Alan Turing: The Enigma, (S&S, 1983; re-released by Princeton U. Press, 2012)
The Theory of Everything, Best Picture, Actor (Eddie Redmayne), Actress (Felicity Jones), Adapted Screenplay, Original Score — Hawking, Jane, Traveling To Infinity: My Life With Stephen, (Alma Books, 2007)
Still Alice, Best Actress (Julianne Moore) — Genova, Lisa, Still Alice, (S&S/Pocket Books, 2009)
Gone Girl, Best Actress (Rosamund Pike) — Flynn, Gillian, Gone Girl, (2012)
Wild, Best Actress (Reese Witherspoon), Supporting Actress (Laura Dern) — Strayed, Cheryl, Wild, (RH/Knopf 2012)
The following has a book tie-in, which was released around the same time as the movie:
Foxcatcher, Best Director, Actor (Steve Carell), Supporting Actor (Mark Ruffalo), Best Original Screenplay — Mark Schultz & David Thomas, Foxcatcher: The True Story of My Brother’s Murder, John du Pont’s Madness, and the Quest for Olympic Gold, (Penguin/Dutton, 11/4/14).
Why is Foxcatcher getting a nomination for Original Screenplay? It’s a complicated story, but it seems that Schultz sent the unpublished book to the filmmakers. The movie they made was based on the story, with Schultz consulting, but not technically the book, which was published later.
For Best Animated Feature, three of the nominations are adapted from print sources:
Big Hero 6 — Seagle, Steven T. and Duncan Rouleau, comics (Marvel)
The Boxtrolls — Alan Snow, Here Be Monsters!, (Atheneum, 2008, rereleased 8/5/14)
How to Train Your Dragon 2 — characters by Cressida Crowell