I’ve just been reading a sketch of the upcoming major motion picture, Safehouse, a film being supported by Ira Riklis. I’m already on the edge of my seat, waiting to see how the story unfolds. Given Ira Riklis’ other films, like The Lemon Tree, I’ve no doubt it will be just as full of spell binding tension. The film is due for major release in 2010.

The story will focus on two women, one assigned to protect the other, living in a safe house in London until one of the two women recovers from radical plastic surgery financed by the Israeli Mossad. The other woman, the body guard, is trying to see this last assignment through before withdrawing into a normal life with her family after three years in Africa. The woman whose undergone the surgery is Lebanese and used to work for the affluent and the connected before suffering horrible burns.

Now, while recuperating, various agencies are at war around the safe house: the Mossad trying to protect their asset, the Arab secret service trying to find and eliminate the women, and the British MI5 trying to figure out what is going on under their noses. Pretty good, huh.

With the recent news about the American Academy of Motion Pictures doubling the number of candidates for Best Picture, I have been wondering what Ira Riklis thinks.

After all this increase should help independent films such as Ira Riklis’ The Lemon Tree, given the stated rationale from The Academy that the increase in the number of films being considered should also increase the variety of potential films. On the other hand does this increase water down the potential payoff of exposure – and more importantly, viewership – that recognition in a smaller field of contenders might offer?

And what will all of the film pundents do now that keeping track of contending films requires more than one hand? Isn’t it maddening enough with all of the films that cry out their Oscar nomination credentials? Eventually, there will be an award for the Best Awards Show, Best Show Host, and Best Awards Show Orchestra. The conductor, of course, would be in a separate category.

Does this move by The Academy build or reduce interest? We’ll find out next Oscar season. Perhaps it is worth the wait. The only real solution for gaining an audience, as Ira Riklis already knows, is to just keep making good films.

Isn’t applause, gratitude and the purchase of a ticket enough?