James Franco Has a Breakthrough Year

The Hollywood Film Festival will award special praise upon James Franco and Sally Hawkins as this year’s breakthrough actor and actress when it places laurels on Oct. 27. Both appear in top Oscar-contending films: Franco as Sean Penn’s partner in Gus Van Sant’s “Milk” and Hawkins as an unflaggingly peppy British schoolmarm in Mike Leigh’s “Happy-Go-Lucky.” “Milk” scribe Dustin Lance Black will also get a breakthrough award.

The Hollywood Awards will also honor “Doubt” helmer and author John Patrick Shanley, “Wall-E” and director Andrew Stanton plus the special effects supervisors of “Ironman,” John Nelson and Ben Snow.

The Hollywood Awards are co-chaired by Paul Haggis (”Crash,” “Million Dollar Baby”) and look to try to anticipate who’ll emerge as major Oscar players every year.

They usually do an OK job, but because the praises come so early in derby season, they can sometimes miss. Last year, for example, they appointed Ellen Page (”Juno”) as the breakout actress and Casey Affleck (”Gone Baby Gone,” “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford”) as the breakout actors of the year.

In the top races for best actor, actress and supporting actress last year, they picked, respectively, Richard Gere (”The Hunting Party,” “I’m Not There”), Marion Cotillard (”La Vie en Rose”) and Jennifer Connelly as best supporting actress for “Reservation Road.” The Hollywood Film Festival has not announced the honorees for this year.

James Franco rules!