Tis the Awards Season

While the rest of the country is brining turkeys and battling grocery-store crowds, Los Angeles appears to have flipped a switch overnight and turned on awards season. Sure, things have been heating up since the beginning of the month, but it looks like Paramount and Focus Features decided that last night was the time to start campaigning in earnest. I received no fewer than five emails from Paramount between 6 and 10p.m. for events and interview opportunities in conjunction with "Super 8," "Young Adult" —which was fantastic, by the way— and "Adventures of Tintin." Plus, Focus has two "Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy" meet-and-greets coming up: cocktails with the cast on Dec. 4 and lunch on Dec. 7.

The flurry of activity is no surprise, considering that Thanksgiving is usually the soft deadline for sending out screeners to guilds, screening for critics groups and solidifying a film's entry into the awards conversation. It just seemed like an awful lot for a Monday night.