We're going to start getting some official reviews of Don't Look Up the first week of December. Early notices look positive, and momentum seems to be building that this could be a serious contender at the Academy Awards. I realize this may be a little early, as most, if not all of us have not yet seen the movie. But part of the fun of awards season is speculation! With that in mind, I'm curious to see where people think this has the best chance for nominations. Early buzz indicates Picture, Director and Actor in a Leading Role (Leonardo DiCaprio) are good bets, with Meryl in Supporting Actress, Mark Rylance or Jonah Hill in Supporting Actor, and Original Song as possibilities as well.
Would love to see Meryl get nominated in another film that's nominated for Best Picture. Christmas can't come soon enough!
After a pair of screenings in Los Angeles just before the weekend, we've gotten the first "social media sentiments" about Don't Look Up. There are a lot of tweets I could post, and I don't want to be biased, so I'll just toss out a few that I feel generally represent the reactions from film pundits:
Adam McKay’s Don’t Look Up is a dead serious and hilarious end of the world comedy, a Melancholia meets Dr. Strangelove —with a top ensemble in fine form, led by DiCaprio, Lawrence, and Streep. DiCaprio had been seeking a film to address the climate crisis in just the right way.
Don’t Look Up is really REALLY good. It’s sporadically silly as well as serious, and while it can be little on the nose the big laughs, emotion and humanity blend together to keep it fresh. The whole cast completely crushes too. Without a doubt one of the best films of the year. pic.twitter.com/BhUndsU22n
We’ve seen how the U.S. reacts to an impending apocalyptic disaster in other movies, but how would we REALLY react? #DontLookUp is a hilarious & horrifying satire about how painstakingly hard it is for us to actually save the day. It’s what you expect, but it’s super entertaining pic.twitter.com/MmjDztw5nX
Streep is excellent and has a great scene partner in Jonah Hill while Cate Blanchett gets to cut loose as a gossip reporter paired with the wonderful Tyler Perry. Jennifer Lawrence absolutely nails a woman screaming truth into the abyss to a world that shrugs.
Don’t Look Up has some smart ideas and some obvious ones, but despite its length and meandering nature it’s certainly compelling? Not sure it’s as funny as it wants to be. The drama is much more interesting. Doesn’t balance the tones well. Ariana Grande has a fun song in it.
— Gregory Ellwood - The Playlist 🎬 (@TheGregoryE) November 19, 2021
DON’T LOOK UP has some sharp capitalist and political satire if inconsistent humor. Leonardo DiCaprio is incredibly great here and gets an explosive Peter Finch in Network moment. Streep, Lawrence and Rylance are all good. Ariana Grande’s song is fucking hilarious. #DontLookUppic.twitter.com/7VIhj0NAwV
Of course there are a few out there that basically insist that the film is complete trash, but like I said, I think the above handful of reactions is a fair representation of what's out there. Leonardo DiCaprio has the greatest praise as far as the cast. He'll likely be a strong (if somewhat unexpected) contender in Best Actor race. Jennifer Lawrence doesn't get as many positive mentions, but nothing bad. Meryl is getting generally good notices, but nothing earth-shattering. She's got a "decent" chance in this I think for an Oscar nomination. She's certainly going to be in the conversation, especially if once full reviews come out the film is lauded and her performance gets some more specific praise.
I can picture the film landing somewhere in the low 80s on Rotten Tomatoes and low to mid 70s on Metacritic, which should indicate generally positive reviews. If memory serves, the embargo ends on December 7.
I found the trailer to be entertaining and a good representation of what me can likely expect the tone of the film to be. Some humorous parts as well, although nothing I found myself laughing out loud at. Jonah Hill's character is going to bug the hell out of me.
Meryl doesn't actually feature too much in it, and she receives the "...and Meryl Streep" notice at the end of the trailer and new poster (which is pretty good I'd have to say):
Overall the trailer is strong, and along with the star-studded cast, it should serve the movie well in regard to buzz leading up to the holidays. I'm really looking forward to some critics reactions following screenings later this week.
There are rumblings that the full trailer for Don't Look Up is going to be released this week. It makes sense considering they're having two well-publicized screenings with Q&As afterward on Wednesday and Thursday. And now we also have an extended clip (sorry, no Meryl):
A new clip from #DontLookUp starring Jennifer Lawrence, Leonardo DiCaprio, Tyler Perry, Cate Blanchett and more has been released. pic.twitter.com/wMLJkifftP
Jennifer Lawrence comes off a bit camp here, but having read the script, I think that her character's words are used as a sort of meme, and her reaction needed to be pretty over the top. Cate Blanchett is perfectly excruciating as the very done-up anchor, alongside Tyler Perry with their obtuse and rosy spin on what is utterly catastrophic news.
There were a handful of new still released today from Don't Look Up, three of which include Meryl:
Meryl with Mark Rylance
Leonardo DiCaprio
Jennifer Lawrence & Dicaprio
It's also been announced that the film will have two separate screenings next week: Wednesday for BAFTA and Thursday for a Netflix event. Both will be in L.A. with Q&As with director Adam McKay, Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Lawrence and Meryl afterward (Thursday's will also include Jonah Hill apparently). I love these types of panel discussions and I really hope they get posted to video as well!
I have to expect there's going to be a full trailer any day now.
It just keeps getting bigger and better. Of course I have no idea to what extent all these actors are going to interact with each other, but I've thought for a long time how great it would be if Meryl could work with Edward Norton. Now she may get that chance. Deadline is reporting that Norton, along with Cherry Jones, Keri Russell, Michael Gandolfini and Indira Varma have joined the cast of the Apple TV+ series Extrapoloations.
All of the new members have a brief character description in the article, which continues to leave Meryl as the only one about whose role we have zero details. Would love if we could get a snippet soon of what we might be able to expect from her character.
The climate change anthology series is currently in production.
I can't believe it's been over five years since I've done a post in this tag! Probably a good sign...Meryl usually makes it into the top five for high-profile projects. But thinking about how Golden Globe nominations are now just a week away, it got me to thinking about how little love she was was shown from awards bodies last year with TWO lead roles in contention.
This post could realistically be about either of the two films in question. Let Them All Talk was a Steven Soderbergh film for HBO which followed a pretentious Pulitzer Prize-winning author as she makes a crossing of the Atlantic with her two college buddies, played by Dianne Wiest and Candice Bergen. The film did well with critics, but of course we don't have box office returns to show because it wasn't really released in theaters. And despite it not perhaps having as large of a platform for getting the most eyeballs on it, I'm fairly shocked it didn't get more traction.
There was a fair amount of buzz early on about Candice Bergen, as she ended up being a bit of a scene-stealer in the film. That obviously never panned out. Meryl never really got mentioned much for her role. I happen to think it absolutely deserved at least a Golden Globe nomination. last year. It's a subtle, funny, and exquisitely acted part. As usual, Streep does a nice job of making it difficult to remember it's her--which in this case is particularly hard to do, as it might not be difficult to see how she'd conjure up the behavior a pretentious artist. But it's like no other character we've really seen her play, which after forty years isn't easy. And they ad-libbed a lot of their lines!
I have to expect that it's possible that Meryl's better chance with Globe voters might have been with Netflix's The Prom. It wasn't a critics darling, but it was more greatly anticipated considering its star-studded cast and with a director, Ryan Murphy, who's had a lot of success in recent years. Plus, it was a musical! That in itself sometimes feels like it'll be a no-brainer...especially for Meryl. I really thought she was going to get in for it. When I saw that Kate Hudson made it for Music, I honestly wondered if the Hollywood Foreign Press was trying to make some kind of statement by leaving Streep out.
Alas, she got zilch last year. While The Prom may have been expected to garner the greater batch of nods (for crying out loud even James Corden got nominated at the Globes), I maintain that Streep's greater work was as Alice in Let Them All Talk. Either were deserving for recognition in the Musical/Comedy category, and if she had had only one or the other for voters to choose from, I wonder if she would've been able to secure a greater number of votes.
