We hinted on the Academy Anonymous podcast that with The Testament of Ann Lee still on the bidding table one of the art-house (and Oscar friendly) specialty labels would pounce – but only after their homegrown stock either failed to launch or fizzled! There were rumblings at TIFF about Netflix jumping on board, which we wrote about previously and it made some sense given the streamer’s release of Emilia Pérez. But that didn’t come to pass. Neither did suspicions of Sony Pictures Classics pan out – though the Oscar stalwart certainly didn’t have the debut they were hoping for at the Toronto International Film Festival, given the early reactions to their awards bet Nuremberg. Searchlight finally picked up Mona Fastvold’s latest after their positioning of Rental Family proved to be a misstep. It seems that the bulk of their awards hopes for the Branden Fraser vehicle were all tied-up to the pivotal People’s Choice Award at TIFF. Once it failed to register enough with audiences to even be listed among the festival favorites, it likely became clear that a shift in strategy was in order. We thought they would possibly wait-out the premiere for Oscar nominee Bradley Cooper’s third directorial effort Is This Thing On? (which premieres later this month at the New York Film Festival) before pressing the panic button but alas there was little time left for the indie label to stall!
We’ll look to see how Cooper’s latest lands out of NYFF63, but this move certainly “looks” like a vote of no-confidence. Could they be miscalculating public and critic reception for this low-key, heartfelt tragicomedy? It’s out of step with the films Bradley Cooper has helmed thus far (both Oscar bound after their premieres), but it may be the more indie, grounded effort he needs to get over the hump with Academy Awards voters. Or maybe the higher-ups at Searchlight already have early word on the film and it’s not looking great? Who knows.
Don’t You Know History Repeats Itself ?
Either way, this isn’t the first time Searchlight snatched a massive Venice breakout. They pulled a similar play in 2016 when they acquired the late-breaking Natalie Portman vehicle Jackie which rocked critics and audiences at the festival. A hard-won lesson we’ve learned over our years of “Oscar watching” here at the Academy Anonymous podcast is this – “DON’T YOU KNOW HISTORY REPEATS ITSELF?” Words branded upon our minds from master sequel-connoisseur, Hollywood fanboy, and all-around cinephile (and of course slasher-looney) Mickey from Wes Craven’s king-of-sequels Scream 2 – played with giddy gusto by Timothy Olyphant. It was in 2016 that Searchlight (then still Fox Searchlight) was scrambling for a contender after a tumultuous opening with the revisionist remake The Birth of a Nation. And just as the door was closing for the indie label built on perpetual Oscar pedigree, Pablo Larraín and Natalie Portman’s take on Jackie Kennedy’s experience after the JFK assassination handed them a lifeline and opened a desperately needed window.
The fine print here, however, is that Fox Searchlight was likely already too late by the time it made a move for Jackie in 2016. That was the last time the label failed to get any sort of recognition in the Best Picture category – a quintessential element the indie powerhouse, famous for releasing Slumdog Millionaire and 12 Years a Slave, had made its legacy on. Since that meaningful lapse, they have more than recovered, not only featuring every year since but even doubling-up in Best Picture nominations the following year in 2017 with The Shape of Water and Three Billboards Over Ebbing, Missouri. Their gamble on Jackie was probably undone by the fact that the subject matter and creative vision of the film presented the company with a more challenging release than they were accustomed to handling. It at the very least would have required a dedicated year-long push to adequately nurture the film’s release and confidently reach audiences and Oscar voters. In addition, it didn’t help that the film was being helmed by the Chilean filmmaker Larraín, which Academy Awards members were largely unfamiliar with. Introducing the voting body to a new filmmaker’s creative voice usually requires a prolonged effort from the distributor and considerably more work.
A Streak at Stake
The big issue at hand for Searchlight then, is that acquiring The Testament of Ann Lee puts them in EXACTLY the same boat as in 2016. We noted on the Academy Anonymous podcast episode forecasting the Venice Film Festival that it was mightily strange to see Yorgos Lanthimos’ Bugonia and Chloe Zhao’s Hamnet enter the awards season without Searchlight in tow. After all, both filmmakers had tremendous runs with their previous collaborations at Searchlight. It was especially striking in the case of Lanthimos’s Bugonia, since it was the first time Yorgos went to Venice without Searchlight. More importantly, it was the first time in a very long time that Searchlight would not premiere any film at the Venice International Film Festival.
It certainly seems like something is amiss at the Searchlight house, and we knowingly got that impression after it seemed like the prestige studio was zeroing in on a Jojo Rabbit-esque strategy with Rental Family – which we were among the few Oscar pundits not to take the bait on. Still, perhaps Rental Family can recover when general audiences finally see it. Or maybe Searchlight has prematurely sidelined Bradley Cooper’s Is This Thing On? – seasoned Oscar watchers will recall that Dustin Hoffman’s similarly themed Lenny was an Oscar hit in 1974. Or maybe The Testament of Ann Lee is indeed their best bet for major Oscar nominations this year. And if that is the case, aside from Seyfried’s bonafide contention in Best Actress, the indie studio has a lot of work to do if they hope to transcend the ceiling of Jackie, score nominations across the board, and not torpedo their own Best Picture streak again! All that to say, I don’t think they can churn out 70mm IMAX prints fast enough for The Testament of Ann Lee and the first preview footage should have been out two weeks ago! The clock is ticking…