Anna Kendrick Shines in "The Last Five Years"

Anna Kendrick and co. behind the scenes filming "A Summer in Ohio". 

It seems strange that there was ever a time where Anna Kendrick was not heading a movie musical. In fact, so impossible to realize is that this is the girl that first landed in the general public's consciousness for starring in the dreadful "Twilight" movies as the equally dreadful best friend of Kristen Stewart's character. Fast forward to when she won a wave of critical acclaim for her performance in Jason Reitman's "Up in the Air", which won her accolades from various critics groups and her first Academy Award nomination. If that hadn't been the year of Mo'Nique in "Precious", you can bet that Kendrick would have left the ceremony as the winner.

Rob Marshall Brings 'Into the Woods' to the Big Screen

I've finally caught up with Rob Marshall's adaptation of "Into the Woods" after months of dying to see it. The hype from that DGA screening made the last month a little unbearable, but I'm here to report that it was well worth the wait.

Golden Globe Nominations

See the full list of Film nominees below.

Anna Kendrick is Stuck On The Steps of the Palace

Take a look at an exclusive clip of Anna Kendrick as Cinderella in Disney's "Into The Woods".

Kendrick performs Cinderella's iconic "On the Steps of the Palace" and to say she nails it is an understatement.

Watch the video, and hear the audio of the full song below.

Into the Woods: A Serious Oscar Threat

"Into the Woods" has been a question mark in the awards race throughout the season. Though I have fearlessly (and a bit prematurely, I will admit) predicted the film to appear in categories such as Best Picture and Supporting Actress, most prognosticators have steered clear of placing their chips in Woods' favor. Though there have been film musicals such as "Chicago" and "Les Miserables" have had strong awards recognition, there have been those ("Hairspray", "Nine", "Grease", etc.) that have been largely ignored by the Academy. However, it's clear that after last night's DGA screening of Rob Marshall's adaptation that Into the Woods is coming to crash the party come December 25th. 

Oscar Contenders: Who is Up and Who is Down?

"American Hustle" racked up 10 nominations last year, and you can attribute that to buzz 100%. By the time nomination ballots were filled out, the film had been anointed as the frontrunner by the New York Film Critics Circle (the first major group to hand out awards). The NYFCC blatantly changed their awards date to be the first, before the Los Angeles critics and before the National Board of Review, but this was no accident. It's universally accepted that the group wanted to establish their impact as an organization, and they did by shoving American Hustle firmly into the race. They gave the film Best Picture, Screenplay and Supporting Actress honors, with director David O. Russell coming in 2nd to Steve McQueen, and Amy Adams placing 2nd to Cate Blanchett. The film had a strong early reception from industry insiders, all of which had taken place before anyone of importance had actually seen the film.. and thus it walked away with 10 Oscar nominations. But when voters and audiences sat down to watch the film, the reception had become more divisive. In the end, it walked away with 0 Oscars of those 10 nominations. This is an example of how buzz and hype can build your film up, but also how it can tear you down.

Hype now dominates the Oscar race. What films have the most hype? What are people on the internet talking about? Which films are being talked about the most? Following a film's buzz is arguably the best way to guess where its Oscar standing is. It's been about a month since we last sat down and looked at the Oscar race. Several high profile contenders have been released since, but have they stuck their landing? Let's see where they stand. 

Final Into the Woods Trailer

This trailer is giving me everything I had hoped for from the adaptation... Now to wait and see if this translates as well into the film, which is still over a month away.

The music sounds spectacular, and we finally get to see some more of the actors in action, though Meryl is so obviously front and center (and she looks great).

Take a look below.

Go Into the Woods with a Sneak Peek Featurette

As discussed to almost ad-nausium, the marketing for Disney's "Into the Woods" has been curiously quiet; from that quiet, yet exhilarating teaser dropped back in summer, to the confusing reports of the film's development and Oscar strategy, we don't know a whole lot about it.

In fact, despite being my most anticipated release of the year, I was starting to worry about the film's quality; can it stick the landing? Disney's track record as of late has not been all that promising...

But this morning, a 4 minute featurette was released with new footage (yes! we have some singing finally) and cast interviews that have restored my faith in this adaptation. Though I'm still hesitant, I fully believe there will be more bad, than good to come out of this.

Take a look below.

Into the Woods' Dilemma: The Case of the 3 Women

Disney's "Into the Woods" is arguably the biggest question mark in the Oscar race right now, next to J.C. Chandor's "A Most Violent Year". The Rob Marshall directed musical has the prestige to at least be on the Oscar radar (Marshall directed "Chicago", another musical which won 8 Oscars including Best Picture), several Oscar nominated actors in its very starry cast (Meryl Streep, Anna Kendricks and Johnny Depp) and is based on an acclaimed stage play by Stephen Soundheim, who penned the likes of "Sweeney Todd" (the film adaptation was nominated for 3 Oscars, including Best Actor for Depp). But the buzz on the film has been questionable at best; there were those early reports that the source material was facing "conservative changes", later reported to be false by Soundheim himself. Then there was the report that Streep's new song made special for her and the film itself, was cut, following rumors of a month of reshoots.

All this drama has me wondering about A.) The potential quality of the film and B.) The film's role in the Oscar race.

First Official Poster For Into The Woods; Meryl Front and Center

Disney's "Into the Woods" is largely a player in the Oscar race simply because of actress Meryl Streep, who plays the largely coveted role of The Witch in Rob Marshall's adaptation. The role has been played by veteran musical theater actresses Bernedette Peters and Vanessa Williams in the past on Broadway, so obviously Disney needed a huge name to put in the marquee role.

Though Meryl was nominated for a Golden Globe for her last musical project ("Momma Mia"), her performance outside of that lone nomination wasn't warmly embraced (the Globes nominate her more often than the Oscars do; she has a record 28 nominations). It's an easy call now to predict that she'll have 29 by the end of this year when the nominations are announced, but what is going on with Woods' Oscar chances?

Meryl Streep's Song Reportedly "Cut" From Into the Woods & Unbroken Test Screens

Meryl Streep as The Witch and Mackenzie Mauzy as Rapunzel in Disney's "Into the Woods".

Remember that wonderful news that composer Stephen Soundheim wrote a new song just for Meryl Streep for the onscreen adaptation of "Into the Woods"? Remember how excited she was? Remember how excited we were? Well unfortunately, director Rob Marshall ("Chicago") tells us that the song has been cut from the film.

First Into the Woods Trailer

Well well well, just as I mentioned last night that Disney was being curiously aloof about not yet releasing a trailer for "Into the Woods", one pops up the next day, and boy does it do the job.

The trailer does a great job at not only introducing the scope of the film (which is seriously epic), but all of the principal players, with Streep at the forefront. It seems like she's going to be the film's main selling point... smart strategy.

Take a look below.

First Official Images from Disney's "Into the Woods"

The promotion for the upcoming musical adaptation "Into the Woods" has been strangely very quiet... though it's not due out until Christmas Day, you'd think there would be at least a teaser trailer out at this point (Angelina Jolie's "Unbroken", which also is opening on Christmas Day, has released 2 trailers thus far). The musical is increasingly popular, however, so I guess Disney is relying a lot on the core, die hard audience (in the same way "Les Miseerables" did back in 2012). I'm sure they're waiting to strike, and with such a starry cast, there's no doubt in my mind that box office success will elude the film.

That being said, Disney has released some really gorgeous looking stills from the film, never seen before featuring Anna Kendrick, Meryl Streep, Emily Blunt, Christine Baranski and a glimpse of Johnny Depp as The Wolf.

Take a look below at the stills.

The Rest of Our Acting Contenders: Old and New Faces

Emma Stone and Michael Keaton could receive their first Oscar nominations for "Birdman"

A few days ago, I ran through our long list of Best Actress contenders (a list that doesn't even really encompass all of the hopefuls this season has to offer, just those with the best chances at even being recognized). Though Best Actor is even more stacked than last year's massive pool, the Supporting categories are as weak as ever (at least they are right now), especially Supporting Actor.

"Birdman" has 3 contenders hoping for a nomination; leading man Michael Keaton, best known for his role in Tim Burton's "Batman" films, along with co-stars Ed Norton (a previous 2 time nominee) and Emma Stone (it would be her first Oscar nomination. She also will be seen in Woody Allen's "Magic in the Moonlight"), while the men of "Foxcatcher" all seem like safe bets in their respective categories; at this point, Leading Actor is between Steve Carrell and Channing Tatum, with Carrell having a slight edge (he has goodwill from being left out for "Little Miss Sunshine" a few years ago).

But enough yammering on, let's go through the rest of the acting categories. Take a look at my FULL list of nominations here

A Few Words on our Best Actress Contenders

At this point in the game, we have a rousing 17 contenders (that stand a good chance) at being nominated for Best Actress in a Leading Role. As we all know, however, there can only be 5, and even though we're going purely on buzz at this point, it's pretty easy (based on Oscar's own predictability) to narrow it down to at least 2 or 3 nominees.

There really aren't a whole lot of contenders (particularly in this category) from films that have premiered thus far to compete against the women who are waiting in the wings. Sure, there's Shailene Woodley from "The Fault in Our Stars", and while critics are banging the drum for her now, will they still be banging when "Big Eyes" premieres? Or when Meryl Streep and the rest of the "Into the Woods" women show up onscreen? It's hard to say.

But as I said before, there's at least 2 or 3 that you can (probably) safely bet on seeing next year at the Oscar telecast.

Into The Woods Receives "Conservative" Changes

"Into the Woods" is one of the more curious films to land this year. For one thing, its source material is the heavily acclaimed musical by Stephen Soundheim. Not to mention that director Rob Marshall ("Chicago") is directing, with a cast including Emily Blunt, Anna Kendrick, Meryl Streep, Johnny Depp, Chris Pine and James Corden.

Early Oscar Predictions

With this year's Cannes Film Festival finished, we have (un)officially began the 2014 Oscar season... which makes my brain hurt because it doesn't even seem like that long ago that I was watching Lupit Nyong'o and Jennifer Lawrence duke it out for Best Supporting Actress. But as it does every year, Oscar season seems to start just as it ends.