Can 'The Artist' win a best picture Oscar?

With the 84th Academy Awards ceremony just a week away, by now you've surely heard about "The Artist," a front-runner for the best picture award that earned 10 nominations in all. The film already has won three Golden Globes, swept Britain's BAFTA awards and earned the top Producers Guild Award, an industry honor that frequently predicts the best picture Oscar. "The Artist" has taken home so many awards -- including a Golden Collar for canine co-star Uggie, a 10-year-old Parson Russell terrier -- that Wikipedia created a stand-alone entry to list them all.

Nevertheless, chances are good that you still haven't seen it.

For all its awards and critical acclaim, "The Artist" has been slow to win over mainstream audiences, taking in only $24 million since its Nov. 25 release, according to the website BoxOfficeMojo.com. Though ticket sales spiked after the Golden Globes and Oscar nominations in January, they've since steadily declined. At this rate, "The Artist" could join the list of low-grossing best picture winners like 2009's "The Hurt Locker," an Iraq War film that earned a scant $17 million.

A tough sell

What seems to be the problem? There are three things most people know about "The Artist" -- it's from France, it's in black and white, and it's silent. And for most people, those are three reasons not to see it. At a time when movies are rapidly embracing snazzy new technology, such as digital cameras, 3-D effects and higher frame rates for sharper clarity, "The Artist" may simply be asking too much of modern audiences.

"People are not always as adventurous as one would wish," says Dylan Skolnick, co-director of Huntington's Cinema Arts Centre, which opened "The Artist" on Christmas Day. Though the film has done respectable business there, Skolnick says, it's never easy to convince viewers to sit through a silent film. "When you say that, they give you this look, like: 'What are you trying to make me do?'"

"The Artist" is not a "vegetable" movie, the kind that viewers try to choke down because it's good for them. The story of a silent film legend (French actor Jean Dujardin) who falls for a chatty new starlet (Bérénice Bejo, the Argentine wife of the film's French director, Michel Hazanavicius), "The Artist" has been heralded as a crowd-pleaser ever since its May premiere at Cannes, where its standing ovation reportedly lasted anywhere from 10 to 20 minutes. Subsequent reviews, almost all of them breathless, have played up the movie's light, upbeat tone as much as its lost-art-form appeal. At the Golden Globes, "The Artist" won best comedy or musical, not best drama.

To market, to market

Nevertheless, the film has been a marketing challenge for The Weinstein Co., whose co-chairman, Harvey Weinstein, bought "The Artist" just before the Cannes Film Festival in May. "You can't just do the traditional poster and TV spots and trailer, and then people will show up," says Stephen Bruno, president of marketing at Weinstein. "It had to be a very careful and detailed plan."

That included giving the film to festivals big and small, including the Hamptons International Film Festival, where supporting actors James Cromwell and Penelope Ann Miller showed up to help the hype. Advertisements focused less on the film's novelty -- "we found the word 'silent' stood out to people as something 'old,' " Bruno says -- and more on its romantic story line. Recent ads have found a way to embrace both aspects with the tagline, "You don't have to say anything to feel everything." (Technically, the film is not completely silent; there are sound effects, a score and two spoken lines.)

Nevertheless, Weinstein has been somewhat slow to expand the film's release beyond the usual metropolitan centers and into Main Street multiplexes. Last year, the studio aggressively pushed "The King's Speech" -- the eventual best-picture winner -- into wide release at more than 2,500 theaters in early February, turning the film into a word-of-mouth juggernaut as it headed toward the Oscars. "The Artist," by contrast, was in only 800 theaters last weekend and has reportedly struggled in smaller markets. In late January, its weekend grosses were just $500 in Frisco, Texas, and Sunrise, Fla., according to the Los Angeles Times.

"I expected something more," says Regina Quadrino of Huntington Station, a 48-year-old mother of two who pronounced the film "predictable and boring" after seeing it at Cinema Arts Centre last month. "I thought there would be something at the end, like a 'pow!' -- like the reason for all the awards," she says. "But it never came."

That may be an unusually negative reaction, but backlash against an Oscar front-runner is natural this time of year, says Keith Simanton, managing editor of the Internet Movie Database. "I think the hype was such that it was impossible for it to live up to the expectations that folks had by the time they saw it," he says. "For heaven's sake, it's a silent film. It's incredible what it's done, in my opinion."

For nominees, it's not all gold at the box office

BY RAFER GUZMAN, rafer.guzman@newsday.com

Big money at the box office doesn't always translate into Oscar gold. Among this year's best picture contenders, the top-grossing film ("The Help") seems a long shot for the award, while one of the lowest grossers ("The Artist") is widely considered the front-runner. Here are the grosses of the nine nominees, which are listed roughly in order of their chances to win.

THE ARTIST -- Widely considered a lock for the Oscar, this silent film has taken in only $24.6 million since its Nov. 25 release.

THE DESCENDANTS -- The presence of George Clooney -- nominated for best actor -- surely helped this small-scale drama earn $71.5 million since Nov. 16.

HUGO -- Martin Scorsese's family film, released Nov. 23, has been a middling performer at $64.8 million but earned 11 nominations, more than any other film this year.

THE HELP -- This racially themed drama proved a hit, taking in $169.6 million since Aug. 10. Its best Oscar chances lie with Viola Davis (up for best actress) and Octavia Spencer (supporting actress).

WAR HORSE -- Steven Spielberg released his World War I epic with much fanfare on Christmas Day. Its $78.3 million gross is respectable, but the movie has become an awards-season laggard.

MIDNIGHT IN PARIS -- Woody Allen's light comedy, released May 20, became his highest-grossing film, pulling in $56.5 million. Allen is also nominated for best director and original screenplay.

MONEYBALL -- A critical and commercial favorite, this unorthodox sports film has earned $75.6 million since Sept. 23. Brad Pitt and Jonah Hill are up for acting awards.

EXTREMELY LOUD AND INCREDIBLY CLOSE -- Another Christmas Day release, but its 9/11 theme didn't exactly promise holiday cheer. It has grossed a low $29.7 million.

THE TREE OF LIFE -- Terrence Malick's polarizing art film got the worst of all worlds: mixed reviews, a mere $13.3 million since its May 27 release and last place on most Oscar betting boards.

SOURCE: Box office totals from BoxOfficeMojo.com.

5 silent films that will leave you speechless

BY RAFER GUZMAN, rafer.guzman@newsday.com

Even if you loved "The Artist," you may not be convinced that old silent films have much to say to a modern audience. But many of them can be terrifically entertaining, funny, moving, even scary. Here are five classics worth watching.

HELL'S HINGES (1916) -- Before Clint Eastwood's "Unforgiven" there was this violent and psychologically complex Western, starring the great William S. Hart as Blaze Tracy, a gunslinger struggling against his demons. The fiery finale is a stunner.

NOSFERATU (1922) -- This German vampire film remains a real skin-crawler, thanks largely to Max Schreck as Count Orlok, one nasty-looking sucker. His slow emergence from a rat-infested death ship is one of the great moments in movie horror.

THE FRESHMAN (1925) -- Adam Sandler owes a debt to this Harold Lloyd football comedy about a hapless team member -- a water boy, actually -- who becomes a hero and gets the girl. A breezy, funny, irresistible treat.

METROPOLIS (1927) -- Fritz Lang's sci-fi epic, full of awesome sets and swooping camerawork, has been repeatedly tampered with -- color-tinted, grafted to a rock soundtrack -- but seek out the recently reconstructed version with newly discovered footage. Even at two hours and 33 minutes, it's spellbinding.

CITY LIGHTS (1931) -- An enduring Charlie Chaplin favorite, in which his Little Tramp falls for a blind flower girl (Virginia Cherrill). Full of great slapstick, but bring a hankie for the famous heart-tugging ending.