Spin a Globe, Save a Sailor

By Steven Zeitchik

The Globes' cancellation has inflicted casualties of the butterfly-effect sort.

There's the grant-less USC film student.

The L.A. economy.

And the dressmakers. O the dressmakers.

(Reporters who enjoy tallying up financial tolls--and the guesstimating economists only too happy to provide random ballpark figures -- seem to be doing just fine, on the other hand.)

But chasing the hidden victim might take us past the obvious one: the movies themselves.

Here are a few films we've come up with that were counting on a lot more chairs in the Beverly Hilton ballroom this coming Sunday -- with our conclusions based on several days of conversation, extrapolation, and, of course, guesstimating economists.

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*"American Gangster"--Early release meant it fell off some awards radars. Globes nom was the chance to bring it back.

*"The Great Debaters"--Can a brother get a break? The Weinsteins finally get their much-needed best pic nomination...and now this. So it's on to the Peggy Siegel machine, which was cranking into gear at a "Debaters" event at Ron Perelman's East Side apartment Tuesday night in Gotham.

*Casey Affleck--No, really. His turn in "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (you may know it as the movie with the title mostly likely to have been written by Dave Eggers) was his big chance to nab red-carpet respect/finally steal the limelight from that guy who shares his last name.

*"Sweeney Todd"--Not completely without respectability at $39 million in box office, the movie still could have used a Depp appearance to overcome potential ticket-buyers flummoxed by R-rated musical murkiness.

*Marion Cotillard--The little-known French dynamo is just starting to gain a profile in Hollywood, and those managing her campaign were hoping the Globes would be the thing to do it. Now it's on to this.

*Viggo Mortensen--See under: "American Gangster."

*There Will Be Blood--It's foolproof: Open late, widen through January, wait for Globes attention to shower down. Oops. Now P.T. Anderson's biggest awards-play yet needs love for Lewis and word-of-mouth.

*Julian Schnabel--We're not sure what he's losing without the Globes. But given his candor on the circuit (our favorite: "Do we give a shit about this question? I feel like we're like Howard Cosell all of a sudden") it was bound to make for some Sacha Baron Cohen-ishness Sunday night. The WGA wins. America loses.

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Of course for awards-starved publicists there's always the possibility of tapping into another nationally televised awards event--the Oscar nominations on January 22. The way things are going, it may be the only Oscar event we see this year.

Comments

[Jay Lisker]

Sounds like the TV show/event about the movie is now, itself, a subject.
Cant wait for the award gala for best award ceremony! We can call it the META-GALA!!

and....the META-GALA goes to...........(wait for it)....The Oscars.....sorry Golden globe, maybe next year!!!

[Machonik]

I guesstimate that the striking writers have golden skin by now after having sun bathed long enough on the beach. Get back to work!