I guess we won't be seeing the first female President of the United States in 2009, but we could at least see the first female cinematographer nominated for an Academy Award (in the cinematography category, that is). In the 80 years of the Oscars there hasn't been one female nominee for Best Cinematography. Shocking, isn't it? But fortunately there's a chance for next year's ceremony: Mandy Walker, who shot Baz Luhrman's war epic Australia, could be a shoo-in for one of the five nomination slots if the film is Oscar-worthy in general.

The Oscar blog In Contention points out the possibility in a recent post celebrating Walker's reception Tuesday evening of the Kodak Vision Award at the Women in Film's Crystal + Lucy Awards (other honorees included Salma Hayek, Sherry Lansing, Ginnifer Goodwin, Jeffrey Katzenberg and Diane English and the ensemble of The Women). Clearly we only need to look at the trailer to see that Walker's work on the film is gorgeous and might have a shot. In Contention also notes Walker's previous achievements, such as her Independent Spirit Award nomination for Shattered Glass.

There's a piece of video being hosted over at Slashfilm that came from a Youtube guy who digitally messed around with the sound levels on Sofia Coppola's Lost in Translation, and claims to have uncorked the movie's biggest secret -- what is being said to Scarlett Johansson by Bill Murray in that famous final scene. I'm not going to give it away here, but I'm not even sure this spoiler is legit -- even amplified as best it can be, the words still require subtitles for you to follow along and it doesn't even seem like that's what Bill Murray is saying. The first part is especially a stretch I think, although I'd probably guess the last part is more or less accurate. And I will concede that it does seem like something that Murray's character would say and something that Coppola would write -- it's not, as some expected, Murray telling Johannson what he had for lunch or anything.

Lost in Translation was not my gateway film into Coppola -- for me, it was Marie Antoinette, so for me, this isn't some major cinematic mystery that I was dying to solve in the first place. I'm more concerned with the how and why Marie Antoinette got completely shafted at the Academy Awards and I look forward to the day when the Academy makes up for that huge mistake. Coppola will one day be recognized as a chip off the old block and hopefully, she'll also have more productive years and less time in the cinema wilderness than her pops. Check out the Lost in Translation video after the jump ...

It is always a curiosity when Hollywood families come together for a project. I love seeing the Estevezes (aka Sheens) appear together -- sure, even in Men at Work. And sometimes the Coppolas do well with one another -- Talia Shire in her brother's Godfather movies, for example. But often it is a bad idea to work with or cast family members. The most obvious case is Sofia Coppola (Shire's niece) being in her father's The Godfather: Part III. Just recently Jake Paltrow received a paltry reception for a movie he made featuring his sister, Gwyneth. Now, another new filmmaker is attempting a similar feat: According to Variety, Bruce Dern will make his directorial debut with Hart's Location, in which he'll appear alongside his ex-wife, Diane Ladd, and his daughter, Laura Dern. Written by Ashley Reed, the film will appropriately be about family estrangement. Laura will star as a woman seeking to regain custody of her son while also attempting to locate her father, who left when she was 3.

It is worth noting that Diane Ladd has been nominated for three Oscars, all for films in which her daughter also appears (Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore; Wild at Heart; Rambling Rose). The last of these even saw a nomination for Laura, as well, marking the first time a mother and daughter were ever recognized by the Academy for the same film. So, for the women, at least, Hart's Location seems to be a great idea. Maybe there's more Oscars in their future. On the other hand, it also seems to have a sort of novelty to it, like the badly-received It Runs in the Family, which featured a lot of the Douglases (Michael, Kirk, Cameron and Diana), in what appeared to exist just for the stunt-casting. Like that movie, Hart's Location also unites a real-life divorced couple (Dern and Ladd parted ways in 1969). Interestingly enough, though, Ladd has already directed her ex-husband, in 1994's little-seen Mrs. Munck. Hopefully Dern can do better in this reversal of roles. As long as he spends more attention on making a good movie rather than on working out his personal issues (he told Daily Variety that the project makes sense for them because it's about the things you wish you'd said to your family members), then I'll be looking forward to it. The film begins shooting in New Orleans in February.

Anyone who reads Cinematical regularly knows that Oscar and I went through an amicable divorce a long while back. The Academy hasn't picked the best film of the year as the Oscar winner in at least ten years, in my opinion, nor are they above handing the big prize to a film that's not only unworthy, but legitimately bad. Crash? A Beautiful Mind? I'm not going to throw Chicago into that category, but it certainly didn't even deserve to be on the top ten list of any respectable critic, let alone walk away with the Best Picture statuette. Chalk up another major blunder this year. No matter which film walks away with Oscar -- whether it's Babel, The Departed, The Queen, Letters From Iwo Jima, or Little Miss Sunshine -- a really splendid work of art, Marie Antoinette, will go unrewarded. Normally, this is the part of the piece where I would launch into how all the critics were wrong and I was right, but the odd thing about the oversight of Marie is that the major critics seemingly agree with me.

Released back in October, before the calculated late-December releases begin muscling their way into the voters' memories, Marie was greeted by an ebullient four-star review by Roger Ebert. The Los Angeles Times' Carina Chocano seconded, calling the film "startlingly original," which it is. The Times A.O. Scott remarked -- "What to do for pleasure? Go see this movie, for starters." The Washington Post, Salon.com, The Hollywood Reporter, The Philadelphia Enquirer, Entertainment Weekly, and smaller outlets like Slant.com all heaped praise on the film, and declared it to be among the best of the year. Add in the pedigree of the director -- an important young filmmaker and prior Oscar winner, Sofia Coppola -- and it seems like the film would have been swept along by the tide until finally walking away the big winner tonight. Instead, the film will have only one opportunity to win an Oscar, in the throwaway category of Best Achievement in Costume Design. Yes, the costume work is good, but let's not kid ourselves -- it's a booby prize for a serious film, if it's won at all.

Do you prefer fact to fiction or fiction to fact? I think it's inevitable after watching any film based on real life individuals or happenings that you may find yourself fact checking choices made by the filmmakers. Did Johnny Cash really ask June Carter to marry him on stage like in Walk the Line? Yes, he did. But what if he didn't? Would you be annoyed or angry by the writer, director, and actor's choice to make the story more whimsical?

Variety did a little fact checking of their own on this year's films with notable historical references. The article rated films such as Catch a Fire, Pursuit of Happyness and The Last King of Scotland according to their historical relevance and gave a little synopsis of the filmmaker's "spin" on the story.

Almost all the films had a high rating according to factual validity although none scored a perfect ten. Why all the twisting of the truth to make an already good story better? Well first of all, most stories do not come with that tried and true "Hollywood Ending" that viewers love so much. A story, no matter how difficult it is throughout (Hotel Rwanda anybody?) ultimately needs to have an awe-inspiring ending -- leaving the audience member uplifted and with a sense of hope.

So which movies ranked the highest and the lowest? World Trade Center received a nine on the fact meter. The story is about two NYPD officers who survived after their extraordinary heroism following the attacks on 9/11. Writer Andrea Berloff had the upper hand though as she had direct accounts from the real life survivors; whereas Sofia Coppola couldn't have a word with Marie Antoinette. If she had a dialogue with the late queen she may have found out that Manolo Blahniks were not yet available at street markets and New Order wouldn't be arriving on the scene for a couple hundred more years -- but that doesn't mean the film is any less fun.

I say, write it well, direct it well, perform it well and then maybe I won't even care if it's fact or fiction.

On October 20 of this year, Roger Ebert published a glowing, four-star review of Sofia Coppola's third film, Marie Antoinette. It was matched by unvarnished praise from The Times' A.O. Scott -- "What to do for pleasure? Go see this movie, for starters" -- and The Los Angeles Times' Carina Chocano, who declared it "startlingly original." The Washington Post's Ann Hornaday went further, attacking the film's critics for having "missed the point." Entertainment Weekly, Salon.com, The Hollywood Reporter, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Rolling Stone and others raved. My own review on Cinematical was one of the only times this year that I actually lavished praise on a film, and rightfully so. Now, both main critics for Slant Magazine have stepped up, each declaring the film to be among the best of the year. So, the question asks itself -- what gives? Why is the film absent from nearly every recently released end-of-year list from the gilded halls of cinematic officialdom?

Obviously there were some substantive critics who simply disagreed with those I noted above, but a quick look at Rotten Tomatoes also reveals a lot of shin-kicks from websites I've never heard of and lazy quotes from other non-opinion makers like Richard Roeper, who dully declares the film to be "dreadfully dull." Did they poison the well? If you are a critic or a serious film fan who disliked the film, please humor me by summarizing one or two points in the comments section below. Do you really think a film like Marie Antoinette should be shut out while dreck like Bobby receives the highest praise from the Golden Globes? Also, if Marie supporters want to turn this post into an ad hoc petition, feel free.

Last week's 48-hour press blitz for Marie Antoinette was covered tag-team style by Netscape at the Movies and Cinematical, with the former covering the film's NYFF press conference and the latter covering junket roundtables at Sony headquarters. At both events, the Converse questions came fast and furious. For those who haven't yet seen the film, there's a scene where an impossible-to-miss pair of Chuck Taylor All Star Converse show up at 18th century Versailles. One journalist at the roundtables was so irked by this that she decided to interrogate Sofia Coppola on that and other other points of historical inaccuracy, down to and including Antoinette's panties. Coppola wasn't easily rattled, however. She displayed a relaxed-but-unshakable manner and patiently addressed the charges one by one. The next day at the press conference, however, Coppola was again asked why she decided to include the sneakers. This time she immediately spit back "Because I could." I think that's a pretty great answer.

In addition to Sofia Coppola, stars Kirsten Dunst and Jason Schwartzman, who play the blundering King Louis and Queen Antoinette of France, were also on hand to participate in the roundtables and offer their views on the making of the film. Cinematical's official digital tape recorder was strategically placed to capture all of the best and worst questions from the event. Here's a sampling of what went on:

Marie Antoinette is a strangely beautiful Impressionist daydream, painted in the candy colors of teenage imagination. It offers only a bird's eye view of the history churning around its main character, so Marie Antoinette "buffs" -- if there are any -- be warned. Thematically, this film is no different from Sofia Coppola's last film, about cosmopolitan birds moving from one nest to another. Instead of America and Japan, the loci are now Austria and France, late 18th century. Louis, the doughboy dauphin of the Bourbon clan, needs a bride. The Austrian court presided over by Empress Marianne Faithfull -- what, no King Jagger? -- decides to gift him with one. Marie is mailed off via chariot, and after a long ride, her entourage is halted at the border between the two countries, where an elaborate archway has been constructed. The idea is for her to pass through it, like some kind of Franconizing carwash, after which her only problem in life will be "the problem of leisure -- what to do for pleasure" sung about by Gang of Four over the film's hot pink intro titles.

As a filmmaker, Coppola has a preoccupation with environments that are governed by strict social codes, which is probably natural enough for someone born into a crucible of celebrity. With The Virgin Suicides, it was the kill-or-be-killed (or kill yourself) world of high school. Lost in Translation was more about avoiding embarrassment when faced with an impenetrable social code, i.e. the Japanese. Anyone who's read the Antonia Fraser biography that Marie Antoinette takes off from will marvel at the sheer memory power that would have been necessary to keep all the layers of social etiquette straight. Since only a select few people were legally allowed to speak with the Queen, it fell to her to keep up with which bedchamber attendant or "princess of the blood" had earned the privilege of handing her a hanky to blow her nose. Marie is a character so buried under protocol and dedicated to pleasing her intimates that it's easy to believe she never said "Let them eat cake" about the destitute of Paris. "Let who eat cake?" would be more like it.

Imagine that you are a 14-year-old girl, part of a wealthy and powerful family, and you're sent to a foreign land, to marry a man you've never met in the name of peace and power. Everything is foreign to you: The codes, the rituals, the etiquette. And you're saddled with a single expectation: Produce a son who will be the heir to the throne; everything else you might do or might want is irrelevant. This is Marie Antoinette's story.
 
Unfortunately, it's not the story in Marie Antoinette -- or, rather, while those elements are in Sofia Coppola's new film about the historic French Queen, they're not its focus. Actually, the question of what, exactly, is Coppola's focus is a good one: Marie Antoinette takes a historical, epic story and doesn't really focus on the historic or epic parts of it, choosing instead to show us pretty images and lavish production values.

Imagine that you are a 14-year-old girl, part of a wealthy and powerful family; you're sent to a foreign land, to marry a man you've never met in the name of peace and power. Everything is foreign to you: The codes, the rituals, the etiquette. And there is only one expectation of you: produce a son who will be the heir to the throne; everything else you might do or might want is irrelevant. This is Marie Antoinette's story.

Unfortunately, it's not the story in Marie Antoinette -- or, rather, while those elements are in Sofia Coppola's new film about the historic French Queen, they're not the focus of the film. Actually, the question of what, exactly, is the focus of Coppola's film is a good one: Marie Antoinette takes a historical, epic story and doesn't really focus on the historic or epic parts of it, choosing instead to show us pretty images and lavish production values.

Marie is played by Kirsten Dunst, a high-born Austrian whose engagement to France's Prince Louis (Jason Schwartzman) will bond both countries -- if, that is, the couple produce a male heir. King Louis XV (a bluff, hearty Rip Torn) is pleasant enough to Marie, but he's occupied with his mistress, the countess Du Barry (Asia Argento). And Marie's love life with her husband is a little lackluster -- and yours would be too, if you had a hundred members of the French court tucking you in on your honeymoon night and a bishop on hand to give a blessing before you got to be alone.

When Marie Antoinette focuses on the mores and manners of the 18th century French court, its interesting stuff; those moments, though, come few and far between. Much of Coppola's film is given over to sequences of dancing, trying on clothes or relaxing -- all of which may have been important elements of Marie Antoinette's life, but which hardly make for thrilling cinema.

It's hard to assess the performances in Marie Antionette -- Dunst's wigs are far better-developed than her character. There are a few standout turns from the other actors -- Rip Torn's booming-voiced King, Steve Coogan's helpful-but-hesitant Austrian Ambassador to France and Jason Schwartzman's easily-befuddled but essentially decent Louis. Of course, every time we get a scene that looks like it's moving towards actually being about something, Coppola then shows us another montage of eating, fashion or a musical sequence. The musical sequences incorporate modern songs like Siousxie and the Banshee's "Hong Kong Garden" or Bow Wow Wow's "I Want Candy"; it's a pretty artificial device, and it just strengthens the shallow, surface feel of the film overall.

History can't say for certain if Marie Antoinette, confronted by the idea that France's men and women were starving, actually said "Let them eat cake." After watching Marie Antoinette, I kept picturing Sofia Coppola offering up a big plate of icing -- not even cake -- for audiences, pink, creamy costumes and music and sumptuous visuals with nothing under it to give the sugar-shock immediate buzz of the movie any real weight.