HOWARDS END: Great To Be Nominated
Howards End, the best of the five Oscar nominees for best picture of 1992, will be the final film screened in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences‘ "Great To Be Nominated" series. Howards End will screen on Monday, August 20, at 7:30 p.m. at the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills.
Oscar-nominated director James Ivory and associate producer Donald Rosenfeld will participate in an onstage discussion following the screening.
Based on E.M. Forster’s novel, Howards End interweaves romance, class distinctions, family relationships, human kindness, and human nastiness — all with Ivory’s trademark classiness and controlled passion. Ruth Prawer Jhabvala’s literate screenplay and Emma Thompson’s superb (and multiple award-winning) performance — warm, honest, unaffected — helped turn Howards End into one of most pleasurable film experiences of the 1990s.
Howards End also happened to be the next-to-last good film made by Ivory and his partner, Ismail Merchant. Following the equally classy and profound The Remains of the Day in 1993, the duo failed to make films that pleased either audiences or reviewers.
Howards End received a total of nine Academy Award nominations, taking home Oscars for Actress in a Leading Role (Emma Thompson as Margaret Schlegel), Art Direction (Luciana Arrighi; Set Decoration: Ian Whittaker) and Writing – Screenplay based on material previously produced or published (Ruth Prawer Jhabvala). The film also received nominations for Best Picture (Ismail Merchant, producer), Actress in a Supporting Role (Vanessa Redgrave, left, as Ruth Wilcox), Cinematography (Tony Pierce-Roberts), Costume Design (Jenny Beavan, John Bright), Directing (James Ivory) and Music – Original Score (Richard Robbins).
For the record, the Oscar winner that year was the grossly overrated Unforgiven, directed by U.S. critics’ celluloid idol Clint Eastwood. (Sometimes I wonder if Unforgiven, Mystic River, and Million Dollar Baby had been directed by some unknown talent — especially if in a language other than English — if U.S. critics would have paid any attention to any of those films.) The other 1992 nominees made for an eclectic trio: The good (The Crying Game), the bad (Scent of a Woman), and the puny (A Few Good Men).
Sam Karmann’s Oscar-winning live action short Omnibus, about a commuter who has accidentally boarded an express train, and Paul Berry’s Academy Award-nominated Gothic animated short The Sandman will be screened prior to the feature. (Berry is the man chiefly responsible for the look of The Nightmare Before Christmas, directed by Tim Burton.)
"Great To Be Nominated" will return in spring 2008 with its fifth installment, screening films that were honored between 1993 and 2007.
Tickets for Howards End are $5 for the general public and $3 for Academy members and students with a valid ID. Tickets may be purchased by mail, in person at the Academy during regular business hours or, depending on availability, on the night of the screening when the doors open at 6:30 p.m.
Tickets also may be purchased online at www.oscars.org/events. There are no minimum order requirements and no transaction or processing fees. Tickets may be purchased online until noon PST on the day of the event.
Curtain time is 7:30 p.m., and pre-show elements will begin at 7 p.m. The Academy is located at 8949 Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills. For more information, call (310) 247-3600.
Photos: © A.M.P.A.S.
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