Alcon Entertainment and Warner Bros. have announced the start of production of director Denis Villeneuve’s (Incedies) dramatic thriller Prisoners.  The film stars Hugh Jackman as a working-class Boston father who sets out to track down the man he believes is responsible for kidnapping his daughter and her friend. Along the way, he runs up against the big city detective (Jake Gyllenhaal) assigned to the case.  Filming is underway in Georgia, with an impressive supporting cast that includes Paul Dano, Maria Bello, Terrence Howard, and Viola Davis.

The screenplay was written by Aaron Guzikowski (Contraband), and Mark Wahlberg is onboard as one of the film’s executive producers.  Moreover, genius cinematographer Roger Deakins (Skyfall, No Country for Old Men) is handling the camera work.  Hit the jump to read the full press release.  Prisoners opens on September 20th of this year.

If you need more proof that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is insane, look no further than Roger Deakins.  Deakins is one of the greatest cinematographers of all-time, and before this year, he had racked up nine Oscar nominations without ever taking home the statue.  He picked up his tenth nomination this year for Skyfall, and tonight he won the Feature Film Award from the American Society of Cinematographers.  It was his third award from the ASC after having won in 1995 for The Shawkshank Redemption and in 2002 for The Man Who Wasn’t There.  He also received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the ASC in 2011.  Oscar prognosticators are still putting Life of Pi as the favorite to win Best Cinematography, but perhaps tenth time will be the charm for Deakins.

Hit the jump for the press release.  The 85th Academy Awards will be held on February 24th at 7pm EST on ABC.

The nominations for the 85th Academy Awards have been announced, and it’s quite a whirlwind of nominees.  As expected, Lincoln landed the most nominations with 12, followed with Ang Lee’s Life of Pi which nabbed 11.  The big story here, though, is the Best Director category.  Shockingly, only two (two!) of the DGA nominees for Best Director made the Oscar cut: Ang Lee and Steven Spielberg.  The rest of the category was filled out by Benh Zeitlin for Beasts of the Southern Wild, David O. Russell for Silver Linings Playbook, and Michael Haneke for Amour.  It was almost guaranteed that Ben Affleck and Kathryn Bigelow would be landing nominations for Argo and Zero Dark Thirty, respectively, but shockingly neither made the cut.  Apparently those films just directed themselves.  Based off today’s nominations, it now looks like it’s (surprisingly) down to Lincoln vs. Silver Linings Playbook for the big win.

Hit the jump to check out the list of nominees, and click here to check them against my predictions (somehow I predicted the Best Picture and Supporting Actor categories perfectly).  The 85th Academy Awards will take place on February 24th.

In anticipation of the announcement of the nominations for the 85th Academy Awards tomorrow morning, the American Society of Cinematographers has announced its list of nominees for outstanding achievement in cinematography.  Roger Deakins was singled out for his gorgeous work on this year’s Skyfall, as was Claudio Miranda for the breathtaking Life of Pi.  The list of nominees is rounded out by Seamus McGarvey for Anna Karenina, Danny Cohen for Les Miserables, and Janusz Kaminski for Lincoln.

Deakins has been nominated by the ASC for a total of 11 times now, winning for The Shawshank Redemption and The Man Who Wasn’t There.  Shockingly, he has never won an Academy Award despite being nominated for fantastic work like The Assassination of Jesse James, No Country for Old Men, and True Grit, but this could very well be his year.  Hit the jump to read the full press release, and click here to read my predictions for tomorrow’s Oscar nominations.  The ASC Awards will be held on February 10th.

In past years for my “Best of” list, I’ve been able to provide fun categories like “Best Kill” and “Best Quotes”, but sadly, that won’t be happening this year.  I keep notes throughout the year, but in July, my hard drive crashed, and because I am a foolish person, I didn’t back up the notes to a separate drive.  However, I do have enough information to do the traditional categories as well as Breakthrough Performance, “A Very Good Year”, Best Villain, Best Surprises, Biggest Disappointments, and a new category, “Best Movie You Probably Missed This Year.”  One final note: unlike previous years, the film had to come out in 2012; festival-only flicks don’t count, so that’s why there’s no love for The Place Beyond the Pines on this year’s list.

Hit the jump to check out my miscellaneous “Best of 2012″ picks.  Be sure to keep checking back this week as we’ll be running Top 10 lists from Adam, Dave, and me.

Director Kathryn Bigelow’s drama Zero Dark Thirty continues its dominant critics awards path, as it has picked up two more Best Picture wins from the New York Film Critics Online and Boston Society of Film Critics groups, adding to its previous wins from the New York Film Critics Circle and National Board of Review.  Bigelow also won Best Director from both organizations, while Daniel Day-Lewis took home Best Actor for Lincoln.  Emmanuelle Riva won Best Actress from New York and Boston, while she shared the award in a tie with Jennifer Lawrence for Silver Linings Playbook in the Los Angeles Film Critics Association.

Los Angeles broke from the mold a bit by naming director Michael Haneke‘s devastating French-language film Amour the Best Film of the year.  They also awarded Paul Thomas Anderson Best Director for The Master and Beasts of the Southern Wild’s Dwight Henry the Best Supporting Actor honor in a couple of pleasant surprises.  Hit the jump for the full list of winners from all three critics groups.

At the recent Los Angeles press day for Skyfall, I was able to speak with director Sam Mendes.  During our extended conversation we talked about fan reaction to Skyfall, whether it was tough to land cinematographer Roger Deakins, deleted scenes, what will be on the eventual Blu-ray, whether he will direct another James Bond film, Javier Bardem’s character’s sexuality, crafting his own version of a Bond story rather than being beholden to the Bond mythos, and a lot more.  In addition, we talked about his Preacher adaptation, whether he would direct a comic book movie like Justice League (and his thoughts on the comic book movie genre), his vampire hunter TV series featuring Van Helsing with John Logan (which he will produce and possibly direct the pilot), and more.

I absolutely loved Skyfall.  Sam Mendes has crafted one of the best James Bond movies ever made.  While the Bond franchise is now 50 years old, Mendes has shown the best might be yet to come.  I really can’t recommend this film enough.  For all our Skyfall coverage including our review, clips, posters, my set visit and more, click here.  Skyfall also stars Judi Dench, Javier Bardem, Helen McCrory, Ralph Fiennes, Naomie Harris, Berenice Marlohe and Ben Whishaw.  Hit the jump to watch the interview.

The James Bond film franchise has stood for 50 years.  It has lived, died, returned, died some more, returned again, and as the longest-running blockbuster franchise in history, it constantly walks the line between life and death regarding the series’ potency.  There likely will always be another James Bond film, but the character’s relevancy is always in question.  Can the modern audience accept Bond in a world where a grittier spy like Jason Bourne seemingly has more power to engage audiences?  Isn’t James Bond a relic that can’t convincingly survive in a post-9/11 world?  The latest Bond film, Skyfall, explores these question is a fascinating, compelling manner and does so within one of the series’ most exhilarating, perfectly crafted, and absolutely captivating entries to date.

At the recent New York press day for Skyfall, I was able to speak with Daniel Craig.  We talked about how this is a very grounded and realistic Bond film without the crazy gadgets, what it was like to work with Roger Deakins, was he more nervous to do Bond at the Olympics or host Saturday Night Live, what was the first thing he ate after they wrapped, how proud he is of Skyfall, and more.  In addition, I asked him if there was any update on the sequel to The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (The Girl Who Played With Fire).

Let me be very clear: I absolutely loved Skyfall.  Director Sam Mendes has crafted one of the best James Bond movies ever made and it’s also one of my favorite films of the year.  While the Bond franchise is now 50 years old, Mendes has shown the best might be yet to come.  I really can’t recommend this film enough.  For all our Skyfall coverage including clips, posters, my set visit and more, click here.  Skyfall stars Daniel Craig, Judi Dench, Javier Bardem, Helen McCrory, Ralph Fiennes, Ben Whishaw, Berenice Marlohe, and Naomie Harris.  Hit the jump to watch the interview.

Daniel Craig is currently making the press rounds for The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo so it’s only natural that people want to talk about the next James Bond film, Skyfall.  But in a recent interview, Craig explained why the script for Casino Royale is what brought him to the franchise and then how the writer’s strike is what caused Quantum of Solace to be so terrible.

Hit the jump for more including what Craig says he finds encouraging about Skyfall, which opens November 9, 2012.

In last week’s “Top 5″, I painfully admitted to not having seen either Moneyball or 50/50. Moreover, I put my credentials as “mildly credible film blogger” up as collateral in the case that I hadn’t checked both out by this week. Sadly, I’ll have to forfeit my title as I’ve only managed to catch 50/50 so far. On the bright side, I thought that film was great and is definitely one of my favorites of the year thus far. As for Moneyball, well there’s always this week.

In spite of my lack of mild credibility, I hope you’ll still choose to check out this week’s “Top 5″ where you’ll find new hi-res images from The Avengers, the return of Arrested Development, our In Time set visit coverage, and interviews for George Clooney’s political drama The Ides of March and Shawn Levy’s robot boxing extravaganza Real Steel. Hit the jump for a brief recap and link to each.

Earlier this year, I got to visit the set of In Time, the new sci-fi thriller from writer/director Andrew Niccol (Gattaca, The Truman Show). While it was exciting to be on a film set and watch stunt work and interview stars Justin Timberlake and Amanda Seyfried, the real highlight of the day was seeing nine-time Oscar nominated cinematographer Roger Deakins working with digital for the first time.

Deakins used the Arriflex ALEXA camera system to shoot In Time, and camera’s capabilities seem almost as futuristic as the film’s settings.  Read on to learn about how a modern master is pushing the technological envelope.

As a general rule, animated films are family films.  The cost of animation is simply too high for a studio to invest in anything other than the lowest-common denominator fare.  It’s rare that any studio other than Pixar will craft an animated feature that not only appeals to kids, but has the wits and edginess that will also charm adults.  Rango is one of those rarities.  Director Gore Verbinski skillfully blends the broad slapstick of animated creatures having goofy adventures with smart movie references, gorgeous visuals, and impressive animation.

As we reported back in October, Jay Baruchel, Craig Ferguson, America Ferrera, Jonah Hill, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, T.J. Miller, and Kristen Wiig will reprise their roles in DreamWorks Animation’s sequel to How to Train Your Dragon.  Empire now reports that Gerard Butler, who played Hiccup’s father, Stoick the Vast, will return as well.  Dean DeBlois, who co-directed the first film, will go solo on the sequel.  Also, in his recent interview with Steve, cinematographer Roger Deakins (True Grit) revealed that he would be consulting on the picture.

Not much is known about the new film other than it will be “epic” and go far beyond the tiny Viking island of Berk.  The sequel to How to Train Your Dragon is set for release in 2013.

Inception cinematographer Wally Pfister won the American Society of Cinematographers Outstanding Achievement Award in the feature film category.  It was Pfister’s first win from the ASC.  He had previously been nominated for The Dark Knight and Batman Begins.  This year’s other nominees included Matthew Libatique (Black Swan), Danny Cohen (The King’s Speech), Jeff Cronenweth (The Social Network), and Roger Deakins (True Grit).  All five of these men have also been nominated for the Oscar for Best Cinematography and it’s tough to argue that they don’t deserve it.

While Pfister’s win from the ASC may give him a slight edge in the Oscar race, I still think this is going to be Deakins’ year.  It’s his ninth nomination and I think/hope that the Academy will finally give him his due.  However, if Pfister takes home the statue, you won’t hear me complaining.