As if more proof was needed that Canadians are everywhere in Hollywood, this year's list of Oscar nominees announced yesterday is one of the strongest for Canadian filmmakers in Academy history.
"Not only is this good for Canada, but it's got to be the best showing London, Ont., has ever had," joked London-raised writer-director Paul Haggis, who, along with Iris Yamashita, is nominated for best original screenplay for the Clint-Eastwood-directed Letters From Iwo Jima. Fellow Londoner Ryan Gosling is up for best actor for his role as a drug-addicted junior-high-school teacher in Half Nelson.
Mr. Gosling, who also grew up in the Ontario cities of Cornwall and Burlington, said he plans to take his family to the Academy Awards on Feb. 25. "I have to take my ma," the actor said yesterday. "It's weird. She's crying harder because I've been nominated than she would have been if I hadn't been. I can't make sense of anything she's saying right now. She's a wreck."
Meanwhile, in a year when foreign films were front and centre on best-of-2006 lists, Toronto-based director Deepa Mehta managed to edge out other formidable competitors and earn a nomination for Water in the best foreign-language film category. Rounding out the Canadian contingent was Norwegian-born Montrealer Torill Kove, nominated for best short animation for The Danish Poet.
Water's Deepa Mehta (CP)
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The films are hardly standard Hollywood fare, and the detachment and freshness of not having grown up in L.A. could have worked in the Canadians' benefit. Mr. Haggis's and Ms. Yamashita's original story for Letters From Iwo Jima depicts the Second World War battle from the perspective of the Japanese army. Meanwhile, Half Nelson wears its social consciousness prominently on its sleeve. Both have an independent spirit much sought after in the industry.
Wayne Clarkson, executive director of Telefilm Canada, said the reason Hollywood is embracing Canadian talent in a bigger way is simple: the U.S. film industry is finally recognizing the worth and power of independent cinema "and that is our heart and soul."
Still, "Canadians have always had a high profile as far as their talent went and their work went," veteran director and past Oscar winner Norman Jewison said. And while he cautions that artistry gets recognized regardless of the artist's passport, "We really produce so much talent, if you really start to analyze [it.]"
For Canadian actors, though, the only option is to succeed in a big way or return home to bit parts.
"The only way to get [working] visas in the States is to get lead parts," Mr. Gosling said. "So by leaving, you're resigning yourself to only auditioning for the lead roles. That is more difficult, but the payoff is bigger. My hope is that we can take what we've established for ourselves back home -- and use that momentum to focus the light on other Canadian talent and our projects."
Canada has had a presence at the Oscars from the start, from Mary Pickford winning for best actress in the late 1920s, to In the Heat of the Night, directed by Mr. Jewison, winning the 1967 Oscar for best picture. But the tipping point was the 1997 Oscars, when the Kapuskasing, Ont.-born director James Cameron and Toronto-based filmmaker Atom Egoyan were both up for best director, for Titanic and The Sweet Hereafter respectively. Together, they represented both Canada's blockbuster capabilities and also its indie side. Mr. Cameron walked away with the statuette that year. Later highlights included Nia Vardalos's 2002 best original screenplay nomination for My Big Fat Greek Wedding, director Denys Arcand's 2003 best foreign-language win for The Barbarian Invasions, and Mr. Haggis's best picture and best original screenplay awards last year for Crash.
In the lead-up to this year's Oscars, Ms. Mehta's richly shot, Hindu-language feature Water, about the ostracism of widows in traditional India,had been touted for months as a contender for best foreign-language film. But that didn't make it a shoo-in. In fact, yesterday it wound up beating the higher profile Spanish film Volver for a best foreign-language nomination.
"I'm usually a very pessimistic person, so for me, it was a real shock," Ms. Mehta said. "[Water is] a quintessentially Canadian film because it really does show what I believe in and what's been happening in Canada recently, which is that we are a multilingual country. And that for me is unlike America."
Given the political attacks against her film when it was originally being shot in India, which forced production to be restarted years later in Sri Lanka, the Oscar nomination "isn't a question of vindication, but I feel that the film deserved it," Ms. Mehta said.
Finally, The Danish Poet continues the National Film Board of Canada's habit of producing at least one nominee in the documentary, live-action short or animation categories. According to the NFB, this is its 69th nomination. It has won 11, including a special Oscar given to the entire organization in the late 1980s for its artistic and technical excellence.
Possibly the most personal and simplest drawn of the animated shorts vying for an Oscar, Ms. Kove's film tells the story of how a series of chance encounters led to the meeting of her parents.
"Out in the world, the NFB is like a quality stamp. That doesn't mean everything that they are going to see is going to be fabulous. But it's something that it is recognized. I don't think it's coincidence that the NFB routinely gets a nomination. They get good films done here."
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Deepa Mehta
Sarala, the actress who plays an eight-year-old widow, in Water.
Bio: Toronto-based director in her 50s whose trilogy of films -- Earth, Fire and
Water -- mark her as a leading voice of India's women.
Category: Foreign Language Film.
Film: Water.
Up against: Denmark's After the Wedding, Algeria's Days of Glory (Indigènes), Germany's The Lives of Others and Mexico's Pan's Labyrinth.
Odds: 5 to 1: Ms. Mehta's accessible and moving story will go over well, but the competition is strong, with a solid German entry and a high-profile Mexican film, Pan's Labyrinth, that has five other Oscar nominations.
***
Ryan Gosling
Bio: Highly respected 26-year-old James Dean-ish actor with an edgy, intelligent presence.
Category: Actor in a Leading Role.
Film: Half Nelson.
Up against: Forest Whitaker, Leonardo DiCaprio, Peter O'Toole and Will Smith.
Odds: 50 to 1. He should have picked an easier year. Mr. Gosling is easily the long shot in this category and in this case, the nomination is recognition of a major rising talent.
***
Paul Haggis
Bio: Raised in London, Ont., the screenwriter and director of Crash and Million Dollar Baby fame, who won two Academy Awards for Crash and has been nominated for four in the past three years.
Category: Writing (Original Screenplay).
Film: Letters from Iwo Jima.
Up against: Babel, Little Miss Sunshine, The Queen, Pan's Labyrinth.
Odds: 3 to 1. Pity the bookie on this one. Mr. Haggis has the golden touch now but the film's screenplay is in Japanese. There's another American competitor, the very funny Little Miss Sunshine, The Queen's script is like a finely tuned watch, and Pan's Labyrinth's story is visionary, although in Spanish. He should prepare a speech and, for good measure, a demand for a recount.
***
Torill Kove
Bio: Norwegian-born Montreal animator and no stranger to the Academy Awards. She was previously nominated for a 1999 Short Animation Oscar for My Grandmother Ironed the King's Shirts.
Category: Short Film (Animated).
Film: The Danish Poet.
Up against: Lifted, The Little Matchgirl, Maestro and No Time For Nuts.
Odds: 4 to 1. The Danish Poet has already made the rounds of the festivals, but animation awards are fickle territory. To win, it'll have to appeal to Academy members' literary side and love of a great, though gentle, story. The simplicity of its drawing style may dissuade the whiz-bang, computer-animation types.
