2019 Academy Governors Awards

[LawrenceA]

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences have announced this year's choice for the Governors Awards. Receiving Honorary Oscars are:

• David Lynch, director (The Elephant Man, Blue Velvet, Mulholland Dr)

• Lina Wertmuller, director (Seven Beauties, Swept Away, Love and Anarchy)

• Wes Studi, actor (The Last of the Mohicans, Geronimo: An American Legend, Hostiles)

The Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award will be given to Geena Davis for "her work in fighting for gender equality".

The award ceremony is scheduled for November 2.

[jakeem]

Congratulations to all! Since Turner Classic Movies traditionally does a salute to the Governors' Award honorees in January, does anyone have any favorite films they'd like to see?

I wouldn't mind seeing Wertmüller's 1973 film "Love and Anarchy" again. It features Giancarlo Giannini (pictured below) as an anti-fascist plotting to assassinate Mussolini before World War II. Of course, Giannini also was in the director's films "The Seduction of Mimi" (1972), "Swept Away" (1974) and "Seven Beauties" (1975), so maybe we're guaranteed to see one of their collaborations. 

As for the other honorees:

• Lynch's "Dune" (1984) would be interesting to see in prime time.
• Studi is a memorable villain opposite Sir Daniel Day-Lewis (as Hawkeye) in Michael Mann's 1992 remake of "The Last of the Mohicans." 
• Davis won her competitive Academy Award -- a Best Supporting Actress statuette -- for the 1998 drama "The Accidental Tourist," based on the 1985 novel by Anne Tyler.

[sewhite2000]

I couldn't be more delighted about the Academy's choice to honor Lynch, certainly one of our most unique and visionary filmmakers of the last 40 years. I think the Academy has always had an unusually notable appreciation for his work, honoring him with four Best Director nominations (The Elephant Man, Blue Velvet, Mulholland Dr. and The Straight Story), though he's rarely even remotely approached anything like major commercial success (outside of Season One of Twin Peaks on television).

The other two I'm pretty unfamiliar with. It's often mentioned that Wertmuller (who's apparently Italian, despite that Germanic surname?) was the first woman to ever get a Best Director Oscar nomination. Studi is a name I've heard, but I would have to go over his imdb resume to learn how many of his films I've actually seen. I'm sure he's partly being honored for bringing a dignity and authenticity to Native American roles in an industry that historically didn't even bother to cast actual Native Americans and often made the roles terribly stereotypical.