TKaM is probably the best book-to-film adaptation ever. On the commentary, the director points out that the only big added scene was the one after Atticus put the kids to bed, and Scout asks Jem about their mother. As the oh-so-sad-to-listen-to questions continue on, the camera pans out to Atticus sitting on the porch, listening just as we are. Peck's face is just heartbreaking to watch.

I'm getting a Hoffman/Huffman vibe for best actor and actress.

I'm down with the Hoffman part. I haven't seen Transamerica so I shouldn't judge but I'm really pulling for Reese Witherspoon. I just loved her so much as June Carter Cash.

Some of Wise's credits.

As an editor:

The Magnificent Ambersons (1942)
The Devil and Daniel Webster (1941)
Citizen Kane (1941)
Dance, Girl, Dance (1940)
My Favorite Wife (1940)
The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939)

As a sound editor:

Top Hat (1935) (sound effects editor) (uncredited)
The Informer (1935) (sound effects editor) (uncredited)
The Gay Divorcee (1934) (sound effects editor) (uncredited)

As a director:

The Andromeda Strain (1971)
The Sound of Music (1965)
The Haunting (1963)
Two for the Seesaw (1962) (Robert Mitchum & Shirley Maclaine?)
West Side Story (1961)
Odds Against Tomorrow (1959) (another cool noir)
I Want to Live! (1958) (great noir/melodrama)
The Set-Up (1949) (as Frank notes, a classic noir/boxing film)
Blood on the Moon (1948) (Western Noir! No really, it's good)
The Body Snatcher (1945)
The Curse of the Cat People (1944)

The Magnificent Ambersons (1942)

If the Sound of Music hadn't doomed him with the hipsters, this credit would haunt him with the film geeks as the man who ruined Welle's second masterpiece. Granted, there's a lot more to it than that (Welle's had basically taken a powder to Rio to film footage for a film that never got finished, as detailed in IT'S ALL TRUE), and Wise didn't really have a choice - someone was going to cut it down, and Wise probably hurt it less than some others would have.

I can't believe you didn't include STAR TREK - The Motion Picture. It's a notable credit certainly. And I've heard his re-edit for the DVD release actually made the picture a lot better. Probably wasn't much he could do about the uniforms, though.

Oh, and THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL - that IS a sci-fi classic.

Sleepless in Seattle trailer is awesome!

I liked Keira in P&P very much. I would not be surprised if there were 5 superior performances by leading actresses this year, but I would also not be surprised if there were not. Who would you guys suggest replacing her nomination with?

I have not seen Crash.

Who would you guys suggest replacing her nomination with?

Anyone who didn't turn Elizabeth Bennet into a giggling child? t /bitter

But mostly Q'orianka Kilcher.

And then doesn't it turn out that she's not actually malevolent? I saw it a couple of times, but it's been years. I remember it being almost Lynch-ian... not much happens, what does happen is ambiguous, and yet it's oddly fascinating.

Well, there were some darker hints. Irena makes Amy promise to never tell anyone about her, and there's that odd scene where they're burning leaves and her mood is hard to read. But she's always sweet to the little girl, and they imply that she somehow locks Barbara Farren in her room and saves Amy from her drunken/delusional rage. So, much more benevolent as a ghost than as a living cat person.

I liked her in P&P. She was a little more light-hearted than MY Elizabeth Bennett, but I thought it was a believable, charming performance.

Anyone who didn't turn Elizabeth Bennet into a giggling child?

I read the book after seeing the movie. I found Elizabeth to be fairly giggly (and young - she's, what, 19?) in both, though the giggling was broken up by pages and pages of unnecessary telling-not-showing description of society, the way girls think, and general blah blah blah in the novel. t /also bitter Seriously, though, she comes across to me (in both the movie and the book) as a mature-beyond-her-years, very intelligent, sensible, somewhat rebellious girl, a sparkling model for feminism, who also occasionally giggles about cute boys with her older sister. Generally a person I'd quite like to meet. And even if you have a different perception of Elizabeth Bennet - isn't that more the writing than the acting? I completely lost myself in Keira's interpretation - I stopped thinking of her as an actress at all and felt I could flesh Elizabeth out as a person all her own - which is how I measure a good performance.

I haven't seen The New World, so I have no opinion on Pocahontas. The really bad novel I was forced to read as a kid has completely turned me off from anything having to do with that story ever, to the point that I hear the name "John Smith" (combined with some context that sets in the 17th century) and nearly hurt myself with the wincing, so I probably won't see it. Unfortunate, I'm sure.

Whenever I hear about the story, I think of that Conan O'Brien "In the Year 2000" bit where they say Central Park is reopened to the public for the first time after the Pocahontas Riots of 1995.