THE BIG SHORT – We Are Movie Geeks

THE BIG SHORT Wins 2016 PGA Award

On Saturday evening the Producers Guild of America (PGA) announced this year’s winning motion picture, television, and new media productions at the 27th Annual Producers Guild Awards ceremony at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza in Los Angeles.

The Jerry Seinfeld-created web series, “Comedians In Cars Getting Coffee” won the Producers Guild Award for Outstanding Digital Series for the second year in a row.

The television program “Game of Thrones” (Season 5) and its producers David Benioff, D.B. Weiss, Bernadette Caulfield, Frank Doelger, Carolyn Strauss, Bryan Cogman, Lisa McAtackney, Chris Newman, and Greg Spence won the Norman Felton Award for Outstanding Producer of Episodic Television, Drama.

Closing the evening, the film THE BIG SHORT and its producers Brad Pitt & Dede Gardner and Jeremy Kleiner won the Darryl F. Zanuck Award for Outstanding Producer of Theatrical Motion Pictures. This category is one of the most eagerly-anticipated of season, as it is widely considered a strong prognosticator for the Best Picture Oscar.

In 1990, the Producers Guild held the first-ever Golden Laurel Awards, which were renamed the Producers Guild Awards in 2002. Richard Zanuck and Lili Fini Zanuck took home the award for Best Produced Motion Picture for DRIVING MISS DAISY, establishing the Guild’s awards as a bellwether for the Oscars.

Last year, the PGA awarded BIRDMAN with its Darryl F. Zanuck Award for Outstanding Producer of Theatrical Motion Pictures, marking the eighth consecutive year the Producers Guild has presaged the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ choice.

Read Scott Feinberg’s (THR) analysis of THE BIG SHORT’s win and how it affects this year’s awards race.

LIST OF 2016 PRODUCERS GUILD AWARD WINNERS

The 2016 Producers Guild nominated films and television programs are listed below in alphabetical order by category, along with producers. The producers’ names for each nominated production are listed in alphabetical order and are not necessarily the proper order of credits. The winners are indicated in bold and with an asterisk (*).

The theatrical motion picture winners are:

The Darryl F. Zanuck Award for Outstanding Producer of Theatrical Motion Pictures:

The Big Short

Producers: Brad Pitt & Dede Gardner, Jeremy Kleiner

The Award for Outstanding Producer of Animated Theatrical Motion Pictures:

Inside Out

Producer: Jonas Rivera

The Award for Outstanding Producer of Documentary Theatrical Motion Pictures:

Amy

Producer: James Gay-Rees

The television winners are:

The David L. Wolper Award for Outstanding Producer of Long-Form Television:

The Long-Form Television category encompasses both movies of the week and mini-series.

Fargo (Season 2)

Producers: Noah Hawley, John Cameron, Ethan Coen, Joel Coen, Warren Littlefield, Kim Todd

The Norman Felton Award for Outstanding Producer of Episodic Television, Drama:

Game of Thrones (Season 5)

Producers: David Benioff, D.B. Weiss, Bernadette Caulfield, Frank Doelger, Carolyn Strauss, Bryan Cogman, Lisa McAtackney, Chris Newman, Greg Spence

The Danny Thomas Award for Outstanding Producer of Episodic Television, Comedy:

Transparent (Season 1)

Producers: Jill Soloway, Andrea Sperling, Victor Hsu, Nisha Ganatra, Rick Rosenthal, Bridget Bedard

The Award for Outstanding Producer of Non-Fiction Television:

The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst (Season 1)

Producers: Marc Smerling, Andrew Jarecki, Jason Blum

The Award for Outstanding Producer of Competition Television:

The Voice (Seasons 7 and 8)

Producers: Audrey Morrissey, Mark Burnett, John de Mol, Marc Jansen, Lee Metzger, Chad Hines, Jim Roush, Kyra Thompson, Mike Yurchuk, Amanda Zucker, Carson Daly

The Award for Outstanding Producer of Live Entertainment & Talk Television:

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (Season 2)

Producers: Tim Carvell, John Oliver, Liz Stanton

The Award for Outstanding Sports Program:

Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel

The Award for Outstanding Children’s Program:

Sesame Street

The Award for Outstanding Digital Series:

Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee

The Producers Guild of America presents the 2016 Producers Guild Awards honoring excellence in motion picture, television and new media productions, as well as some of the living legends who shape the profession.

In addition to its competitive awards, the PGA presented special honors to Jim Gianopulos with the Milestone Award; producer David Heyman with the David O. Selznick Achievement Award in Theatrical Motion Pictures; Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) with the Visionary Vanguard Award, accepted by Lynwen Brennan and John Knoll; and producer Shonda Rhimes with the Norman Lear Achievement Award in Television. The Stanley Kramer Award was presented to the feature documentary, THE HUNTING GROUND, accepted by producer Amy Ziering, which included a special performance by Lady Gaga who sang “Til It Happens To You” her Oscar-nominated song written for the film by Diane Warren and Lady Gaga.

THE BIG SHORT – The Review

Making a comedy about a serious subject is a tricky thing. But it has been done – think DR. STRANGELOVE or THE GREAT DICTATOR. THE BIG SHORT is a dark comedy with biting wit about the real estate bubble and meltdown that triggered the Great Recession. Or at least it is funny to start, until remembering all that greed and misbehavior begins to make you angry all over again.

Many will find THE BIG SHORT a brilliant, intelligent, pointedly funny film. Whether you like “The Big Short” or not might depend on how you feel about those events and the fact that no major figures went to jail. The right-leaning media seems determined to call the film terrible, despite its appearance on many critics’ top-ten lists.

Christian Bale heads up a terrific ensemble cast that includes Steve Carrell, Ryan Gosling, and Brad Pitt. Director Adam McKay adapted the Michael Lewis book of the same name. The film opens with voice-over by Gosling and Michael Burry (Bale), a physician turned investor, uncovering what he thinks is an anomaly in the market, one he can exploit by “shorting” investments that are considered some of the safest, ones backed by home mortgages, long considered rock-solid reliable. Pitt’s character Ben Rickert, a former investor who has dropped out of the rat-race to live out in the woods, is based on Ben Hockett, Gosling portrays Jared Vennett, a character based on the real Gregg Lippman, one of several investors looking into mortgaged-backed securities and discovering the problems that will eventually crash the economy.

Among these high-powered, often eccentric individuals mining financial information for overlooked investment gold are Mark Baum (Carell), somewhat based on the real Steve Eisman. All these guys are strikingly unique but Baum’s foul-mouthed, high-stress character is among the most eccentric, as well as funny. Baum engages in a running back-and-forth with his wife (Marisa Tomei), in which she tells him he should quit his job because he hates it while Baum insists he loves it.

This story requires the use of some technical financial talk, which director McKay handles in a clever way. Margot Robbie soaks in a bubble bath, sipping champagne while explaining sub-prime mortgages, one of several interludes where unlikely celebrities, such as Anthony Bourdain and Selena Gomez, to provide definitions and brief explanations of financial terms. The effect is both humorous and informative, a far better solution than the usual one of stopping the dialog for some exposition by the characters…

The film is fast and funny, switching from person to person. As befits the irrational exuberance that proceeded the crash, the film has a breathless pace and driving energy. Gosling’s voice-over helps us keep track in this rapid-paced, cleverly presented story that sometimes plays a bit like an action thriller. But the comic tone starts to drop away as these clever people start to realize how far down the rabbit hole this problem goes, the chain of responsibility that runs all the way to the top, and its incendiary potential for the U.S and world economies and people’s individual lives. Coming at all that makes the revelations all the more chilling.

THE BIG SHORT is one of the year’s best films in a year that has seen some other great films about real-world subjects, such as SPOTLIGHT. Human folly and our capacity for short-sightedness as well as greed are major themes in this brilliant, worthy film. THE BIG SHORT starts out with comedy but ends with tragedy for those not in on the secret under the market.

THE BIG SHORT opens in St. Louis on Wednesday, December 23rd, 2015.

OVERALL RATING: 5 OUT OF 5 STARS

Win Run-Of-Engagement Passes To See THE BIG SHORT In St. Louis

Opening in theaters this Wednesday is director Adam McKay’s excellent film, THE BIG SHORT.

Based on the true story and best-selling book by Michael Lewis (The Blind Side, Moneyball), and directed by Adam Mckay (Anchorman, Step Brothers) THE BIG SHORT stars Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling and Brad Pitt.

WAMG is giving away Run-Of-Engagement passes to see THE BIG SHORT.

Check out this scene from the film.

For your chance to win RUN-OF-ENGAGEMENT passes to see the film in the St. Louis area, enter:

YOUR NAME AND E-MAIL IN OUR COMMENTS SECTION BELOW. WE WILL CONTACT YOU IF YOU ARE A WINNER.

Pass is valid beginning Monday, December 28th.

OFFICIAL RULES:

WINNERS WILL BE CHOSEN FROM ALL QUALIFYING ENTRIES.
NO PURCHASE NECESSARY.

Passes are good at local St. Louis AMC Theatres.

The movie has been rated R for pervasive language and some sexuality/nudity.

www.thebigshortmovie.com

THE BIG SHORT opens on December 23, 2015.

Left to right: Ryan Gosling plays Jared Vennett and Jeffry Griffin plays Chris in The Big Short from Paramount Pictures and Regency Enterprises

This Week’s WAMG Podcast – CHIPMUNKS, THE BIG SHORT, A CHRISTMAS STORY and More!

This week’s episode of our podcast WE ARE MOVIE GEEKS The Show is up! Hear WAMG’s Michelle McCue, Jim Batts and Tom Stockman discuss the weekend box office. We’ll review ALVIN AND THE CHIPMUNK ROAD TRIP, THE BIG SHORT, and IN THE HEART OF THE SEA. We’ll preview SISTERS, and STAR WARS THE FORCE AWAKENS. We’ll talk about A CHRISTMAS STORY and WHITE CHRISTMAS, both playing in St. Louis this week and talk about the St. Louis Film Critics Association Awards nominees and other film critics awards that are rolling in. WE ARE MOVIE GEEKS The Show is a weekly podcast and can be heard streaming at ONStl.com Online Radio.

Here’s this week’s show. Have a listen:

Watch The New Featurette For Adam McKay’s THE BIG SHORT

Director Adam McKay’s THE BIG SHORT opens in theaters on Friday.

This week, the movie received both Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild nominations. Enter our contest here for a chance to win tickets to the special advance screening of the film.

In this new featurette, see how this group of outsiders came to be.

When four outsiders saw what the big banks, media and government refused to, the global collapse of the economy, they had an idea: The Big Short. Their bold investment leads them into the dark underbelly of modern banking where they must question everyone and everything. Based on the true story and best-selling book by Michael Lewis (The Blind Side, Moneyball), and directed by Adam Mckay (Anchorman, Step Brothers) The Big Short stars Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling and Brad Pitt.

Paramount Pictures will release the film on in theaters December 11, 2015; playing everywhere December 23, 2015.

The movie has been rated R for pervasive language and some sexuality/nudity.

www.thebigshortmovie.com

Win Passes To The Advance Screening Of THE BIG SHORT In St. Louis

Based on the true story and best-selling book by Michael Lewis (The Blind Side, Moneyball), and directed by Adam Mckay (Anchorman, Step Brothers) The Big Short stars Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling and Brad Pitt.

THE BIG SHORT Opens in St. Louis Wednesday, December 23rd.

WAMG invites you to enter for a chance to win a pass (Good for 2) to the advance screening of THE BIG SHORT on Wednesday, December 16th at 7PM in the St. Louis area.

We will contact the winners by email.

Answer the following:

The film is based on the best-selling book by Michael Lewis. Brad Pitt starred in what other big screen adaptation of a Michael Lewis best-seller?

TO ENTER, ADD YOUR NAME, ANSWER AND EMAIL IN OUR COMMENTS SECTION BELOW.

OFFICIAL RULES:

1. YOU MUST BE IN THE ST. LOUIS AREA THE DAY OF THE SCREENING.

2. A pass does not guarantee a seat at a screening. Seating is on a first-come, first served basis. The theater is overbooked to assure a full house. The theater is not responsible for overbooking.

3. No purchase necessary.

The movie has been rated R for pervasive language and some sexuality/nudity.

www.thebigshortmovie.com

Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling and Brad Pitt Star In New THE BIG SHORT Trailer

Paramount Pictures has released a second trailer for director Adam McKay’s THE BIG SHORT.

The film stars Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling, Brad Pitt, Melissa Leo, Hamish Linklater, John Magaro, Rafe Spall, Jeremy Strong and Marisa Tomei.

Read Variety’s review here. Andrew Barker says, “Despite sturdy, energetic performances from all the actors mentioned above, only Carell’s Baum manages to register as a genuine, empathetic character; not coincidentally, he’s also the only one to express believable compunctions about getting rich off a looming fiscal catastrophe.”

When four outsiders saw what the big banks, media and government refused to, the global collapse of the economy, they had an idea: The Big Short.

Their bold investment leads them into the dark underbelly of modern banking where they must question everyone and everything. The film is based on the true story and best-selling book by Michael Lewis (The Blind Side, Moneyball)

THE BIG SHORT opens in limited release Dec. 11 followed by a nationwide release on December 23, 2015.

Visit the film’s official site: www.thebigshortmovie.com

Christian Bale, Steve Carell Talk THE BIG SHORT Director Adam McKay In New Featurette

Christian Bale, Steve Carell and Ryan Gosling discuss working with director Adam McKay in new featurette for THE BIG SHORT.

The film will have its world premiere on Thursday at the AFI Film Fest.

THE BIG SHORT opens in theaters December 11, 2015.

Visit the official site:

www.thebigshortmovie.com
twitter.com/TheBigShort
www.instagram.com/TheBigShortMovie
www.facebook.com/TheBigShortMovie

(Yahoo! Movies)

THE BIG SHORT Poster Is Here

Paramount Pictures has released the first poster for their upcoming film THE BIG SHORT.

The movie will have its World Premiere as the Closing Night Gala on Thursday, November 12.

THE BIG SHORT opens in Theaters December 11, 2015.

www.thebigshortmovie.com

Left to right: Steve Carell plays Mark Baum and Ryan Gosling plays Jared Vennett in The Big Short from Paramount Pictures and Regency Enterprises. © 2015 PARAMOUNT PICTURES. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

THE BIG SHORT Trailer Stars Christian Bale, Steve Carrell, Ryan Gosling and Brad Pitt

Paramount Pictures has released the brand new trailer for their upcoming film, THE BIG SHORT.

The American Film Institute (AFI) announced today that the World Premiere of Paramount Pictures and Regency Enterprises’ THE BIG SHORT will be the Closing Night Gala of AFI FEST 2015 presented by Audi on Thursday, November 12 at the historic TCL Chinese Theatre in Hollywood, California.

Directed by Adam McKay with screenplay by Charles Randolph and Adam McKay, based on the Michael Lewis book, “The Big Short: Inside The Doomsday Machine,” THE BIG SHORT stars Academy Award winners Christian Bale, Brad Pitt, Melissa Leo and Marisa Tomei; Academy Award nominees Steve Carell and Ryan Gosling; and Hamish Linklater, John Magaro, Rafe Spall, Jeremy Strong and Finn Wittrock.

THE BIG SHORT opens in limited release on December 11; nationwide on December 23.

http://www.thebigshortmovie.com/

https://www.facebook.com/TheBigShortMovie

https://twitter.com/TheBigShort

https://instagram.com/TheBigShortMovie

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OVERALL RATING: 5 OUT OF 5 STARS

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