Following the announcement that "The Descendants" and "The Tree of Life" were among the pack in contention for 2012's best picture Oscar, we caught up with the movies' producers, Edina native Jim Burke and Bill Pohlad. Each first-time nominee was low key, aw-shucks and Midwestern modest to a fault.
Burke's Hawaiian family drama stars George Clooney as a family man struggling to be a better parent after his wife is left comatose in an accident. In addition to the top prize, there was a best actor nomination for Clooney, best director for Alexander Payne, best adapted screenplay and best film editing.
Multiple nominations in key categories "means that the movie has got some wind in its sails," Burke said by phone from Los Angeles. "We depend on these kinds of things, Oscar nominations, Golden Globes. Those kinds of things, along with critical reviews, are what movies like ours need. We don't really make high concept films so these are like the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval." Burke was not sure how many competitors his film would be contending with until Tuesday's live broadcast of the list. "How many films would be nominated was a mystery to us until this morning. I feel like if there were five we'd still be nominated." While he leaves the bare-knuckle brawling to others, Burke said he feels confident about Clooney's chances against his best actor rival Jean Dujardin of "The Artist." At the Golden Globes, Clooney won for drama, Dujardin for comedy. "I like George. He's a great actor, he's beloved by his fellow actors and he's in a role that really shows his range as an actor. It's far different than we've ever seen George Clooney before. He's vulnerable in this film and in most movies he plays the guy, the man with the plan. This one, he's kind of coming up with the plan as it goes." Burke's post-nomination plan is to put as many Motion Picture Academy voters as possible in front of his film. "I guess it's called campaigning. We take the film and screen the movie for audiences and talk about it later with them. We've found this is a picture that really kind of provokes conversation, causes people to think and ask questions. It's a really great experience." At his River Road Entertainment offices in Minneapolis, Pohlad said he was "thrilled and shocked" by the morning's news. "We went sort of heads down into awards season," he said, anticipating that "The Tree of Life" would earn cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki his fourth Oscar nomination, but hedging his bets about additional honors. Because director Terrence Malick's film debuted in May, "we thought nobody was going to remember it." "It's hard not to pick up the vibe. We haven't been in the conversation so much lately so I was surprised," he said. "When I heard them say Terry's name (as a best director nominee) it was great, really a thrill" and a hint that a best picture nod might follow. "We knew we were pushing the envelope. This is a film that wasn't for everyone necessarily. You really don't know how they'll react. But winning the Palme d'Or in Cannes (the international festival's top honor) was a really great thing. The critics have been quite supportive and Fox Searchlight did a fantastic job of getting it out there, thankfully. It's harder to get challenging films out there to people; they're not as open to it as they were 10 years ago. But even with challenging material people are open to it if it has substance to it." Unlike the other producer nominees, Pohlad's name was not read aloud in the televised announcement. "It sounds ominous," he admitted, but said a minor detail. "Tree" had five producers, including star Brad Pitt, and the Academy allows only three to accept. "We're working on that. It's not a matter of controversy." Pohlad's next project will be a historical drama co-produced with Pitt. "12 Years a Slave," based on the 1853 autobiography by Solomon Northrup. The film reunites the "Shame" team of Michael Fassbender and director Steve McQueen. Chiwetel Ejioror stars as Northrup, a free black man who was tricked into slavery. The film is slated to commence production this summer. Burke's followup will be another collaboration with Payne, "Fork in the Road," adapted from Denis Hamill's romantic novel about an American filmmaker visiting Dublin and a dangerous, beautiful gypsy thief. It's scheduled to go before the cameras this year. But until the Oscars are announced on Sunday Feb. 26 on ABC, the producers will be promoting their current films and hoping. As Burke put it, "ever since January we've been going to banquets and awards shows and everywhere we go we run into the same people with the same movies. Sometimes they hand us the plaque and sometimes they hand them the plaque."
