Minghella-Pollack Film to Open for Oscar Run

Kate Winslet stars in The Reader, produced by the late Anthony Minghella and Sydney Pollack. 

Anthony Minghella and Sydney Pollack both died this year, much to the great loss of the film industry. Because of their deaths, it looked like The Reader, the film they produced together, would be delayed until next year. Co-producer Scott Rudin has two other films–Revolutionary Road and Doubt–coming out at the end of this year, so presumably the delay would have been related to having no one to guide it through its final stages or advocate for it.

However, Variety reports that the film, which stars Kate Winslet and Ralph Fiennes, had a test screening in New York and was so well-received that The Weinstein Company is now going to rush to get the film out for a run before the end of the year in order to be Oscar eligible. This means get a release date and organize the marketing material (though to be honest, they shouldn’t kill themselves with marketing–this isn’t a big expensive action film that needs to score at the box office on its opening weekend).

So if you’re trying to open a film to make it Oscar eligible, this means it must be expected to be award worthy. If it was up for Best Picture, the late Minghella and Pollack would be nominated. Considering many people are expecting Heath Ledger to gain a nomination for The Dark Knight, this could be the year of the posthumous Oscars.  

Historically, Oscar hasn’t been kind to posthumous nominees. There have been about seventy posthumous nominees and only fifteen winners. Out of that fifteen, just one came from the acting categories–Peter Finch for Network in 1976. It’s been speculated that Finch’s win–got a push from the fact that he died in January 1977, right around the time when the Oscar voting is taking place. Not to say it wasn’t a great performance, but with his death fresh on voters’ minds, there was no need to deal with awkward marketing campaigns that must try to be aggressive, but tasteful.

This wouldn’t apply to producers like Minghella and Pollack, of course, as in their case the film is being marketed, not them personally. But it’s just interesting to note the low number of posthumous winners.