I always look forward to Film Comment’s year-end poll of critics, filmmakers and curators. This year’s results are pretty interesting to sift through.

Fresh off the early-year release of “Vortex,” one of the best movies of his career, French director Gaspar Noé is already hinting at what he might be doing next.

It’s obvious to say that “The Fabelmans” has lost a lot of Oscar momentum since its release. The reviews are still very good, but it didn’t connect with a wide audience. This doesn’t necessarily mean it can’t win, but many people are starting to wonder…

We weren’t really sure if this one was actually happening, but then a week ago I broke the news that Ridley Scott was scouting locations for “Gladiator 2.” Now we have more details …

Michelle Williams was basically the frontrunner to win the Supporting Actress Oscar as it was, and still is, a very weak field of contenders this year.

You can scratch Terrence Malick’s “The Way of the Wind” off your Cannes 2023 predictions. It’s not ready. As for the rest of the year (Venice/Toronto), it’s all up in the air. Malick’s arduous post-production process is still ongoing.

The 600-member CCA announced their nominees for the 28th Annual Critics Choice Awards. “Everything Everywhere All at Once” (A24) led the film contenders with 14 nominations.

People already predicting a doom and gloom box-office scenario for Damien Chazelle’s “Babylon” should probably check out these numbers.

A full-length trailer for Darren Aronofsky’s “The Whale” has been released. Finally. It’s already playing in New York and Los Angeles theaters. Better late than never.

A biopic about Amy Winehouse, titled “Back to Black” and helmed by “Nowhere Boy” director Sam Taylor-Johnson, will start production in January. A late 2023 release is not out of the question.

A surprise hit, Tommy Wirkola’s “Violent Night” is basically a “Die Hard” ripoff, but replace Bruce Willis with Santa Claus.

A major update has been done on the Gold Derby charts. Again, these are fairly accurate rankings and probably the same ten nominees that I would predict as of today, but maybe not in the same order.

I always look forward to ScreenSlate’s year-end polling of directors and critics. They’ve chosen the best films of the year and half the titles in the resulting top ten will be on my own (soon to be published).

It’s obvious Rotten Tomatoes made a mistake when dating Martin Scorsese’s still-unfilmed “Roosevelt” for July 14th of next year. Did they mean “Killers of the Flower Moon”? That makes way more sense given the Cannes rumors …

I’ve just come out of James Cameron’s “Avatar: The Way of Water.” I’ll try to keep my thoughts as briefly thorough as I possibly can, since I’m writing this on a laptop in some coffee shop. I might update this post later on.

So, there you go. Ari Aster’s “Disappointment Boulevard” is now called “Beau is Afraid,” according to A24.

It’s quite obvious what’s happening here. Most critics have now seen Brendan Fraser’s performance in “The Whale” and they are quickly realizing that his rise to the top was unearned hype.

Molly Ringwald has penned a New Yorker essay about her odd friendship with Jean-Luc Godard, noting that they stayed in touch after the 1987 “King Lear.”

It’s official. Hayao Miyazaki’s next animated film, titled “How Do You Live,” will be released next summer..

This is crushing news. Maestro composer Angelo Badalmenti has passed away at the age of 85.