Guild Nominations and a Preview of Awards Weekend

So here we are, on the brink of a huge weekend for the film awards season, when two of the bigger precursors, and definitely one of the biggest, will be taking place. Before we preview those, a look at the most recent precursor film selections and honors and other news.

First up, as we've mentioned before, the various guilds are usually some of the best precursors of Oscar success, particularly the Screen Actors, Writers, and Directors Guild awards, all coming soon. But another influential one is the Producers Guild, and they announced their nominees this week. They went with six nominees due to a tie, and their nominees are ...

PRODUCERS GUILD NOMINATIONS
Chicago
Road to Perdition
Gangs of New York
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
Adaptation
My Big Fat Greek Wedding

Well, these nominations by the PGA certainly help Road to Perdition and My Big Fat Greek Wedding, which could very well re-enter this year's Oscar race even though they have been off the radar for so long. This is also a very big help for Spike Jonze's Adaptation to get a major recognition like this one. I still don't know that it can make it to a Best Picture nod, but we will certainly see it represented at the 75th Oscars. The ultimate winner of the PGA award, called the Darryl F. Zanuck Producer of the Year Award, will be announced March 2 at a ceremony at the Century Plaza Hotel in Los Angeles. An interesting stat to note ... the ultimate winner of the PGA Award has gone on to win the Best Picture Academy Award nine out of the past thirteen years.

Another guild announced their 2002 film nominees recently ... the Art Directors Guild. They have two categories for art direction, one for period/fantasy films, and one for contemporary film production design, and their nominees are:

BEST PERIOD/FANTASY FILM PRODUCTION DESIGN
Chicago
Gangs of New York
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
Minority Report
Road to Perdition

BEST CONTEMPORARY FILM PRODUCTION DESIGN
The Bourne Identity
Catch Me If You Can
The Hours
One Hour Photo
Panic Room

It's safe to say we'll probably see the five Art Direction nominees coming from this list of ten, especially from the period/fantasy film list.

In other news this week, in what may have firmly cemented Martin Scorsese's eventual Best Director win at the Academy Awards (which is way, way, way overdue by the way), the Directors Guild of America announced this week that they will be giving their lifetime achievement award to Scorsese himself. Such an interesting choice for him to receive it this year, when he could very well win the Directors Guild award that night for Gangs of New York. The DGA does not give its lifetime achievement award every year, as Steven Spielberg was the last director to receive one, in 2000. DGA President Martha Coolidge said "because of his remarkable, groundbreaking films, his nurturing of young filmmakers and his ever-viligant fight to preserve the legacy of motion picture art for future generations, it is my pleasure to announce that Martin Scorsese has joined this group of film giants."

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