Francophiles have a lot to look forward to this Academy Awards. If award ceremonies had themes, the clear pick for this year’s Oscars would be France, and more specifically, Paris.
Though a French film is absent from the list of nominees for best Foreign Language Film, the Academy has done one better by nominating French silent film The Artist in 10 categories, including best picture and best director.
The nominations for The Artist mark a few different firsts, and wins will mean a few more. The Michel Hazanavicius-directed film is the first silent film to be nominated for an Oscar since 1927 and could be the first French production to ever win Best Picture. Star of the film, Jean Dujardin, is nominated for Best Actor and would be the first Frenchman to take home the prize, thought not the first nominee.
Much of the film’s success in Hollywood could be attributed to the fact that The Artist is set in the United States, includes American actors, and has no French dialogue to speak of, but the fact that the key players both on screen and behind the camera are French does not negate the film’s French sensibilities. Dialogue or no, score one for the Francophiles.
Hugo, with one more nomination than The Artist, does take place in France and is joined by Midnight in Paris (with four nominations) in increasing the French presence at this year’s ceremony. Both films, directed by Martin Scorcese and Woody Allen respectively, take place in Paris and put the magic of the city on full display. Hollywood’s apparent love for the city even extends to the Best Animated Feature category where A Cat in Paris is among the nominees.
Don’t hesitate to find out what all of the buzz is about. If you’re in the mood for a cinematic love letter to Paris or even one addressed to Hollywood sent from France, you will find it in this year’s nominees across all of the categories. And whether it is Hazanavicius’s silent homage to the Hollywood of another time, Scorcese’s 3-D adventure drama about a boy who lives alone in a Paris railway station, Allen’s tale of time travel in Paris, or another film altogether that takes home the Best Picture trophy, admirers of all things French are already winners.
By Monica Burton
