Oscar nominee predictions

It's been a strange year for the Oscars. I think you can blame the expansion of the Best Picture nominees to ten, but there's something else afoot that I can't place.

Perhaps it's purely because of the ten. As soon as the news was announced there was speculation that more mainstream films like Star Trek and The Hangover would be nominated. It's possible. It's also possible, and quite likely, that Oscar-bait films which wouldn't normally deserve a nomination will slide in. Either way, this is a new thing (well, we had it for the first few years of the Oscars but there wasn't as much of a following on the Internet back then) and we don't know yet exactly how things will go down.

I've been doing the Oscar prediction thing since 1994. It was my first year after I finished high school and, instead of working or going to university, I sat at home and watched movies. I also had the opportunity to make endless Oscar lists. The time just flew by. I watched videos for two years before I decided to get a job. And here I am now.

Anyway, to the Oscar predictions. I did have detailed explanations for a few categories but decided to do without them. You'll live.

BEST PICTURE
Avatar
District 9
An Education
(500) Days of Summer
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
Julie & Julia
Precious
Up
Up in the Air

BEST DIRECTOR
James Cameron, Avatar
Neill Blomkamp, District 9
Kathryn Bigelow, The Hurt Locker
Quentin Tarantino, Inglourious Basterds
Jason Reitman, Up in the Air

BEST ACTOR
Jeff Bridges, Crazy Heart
George Clooney, Up in the Air
Colin Firth,A Single Man
Viggo Mortensen, The Road
Jeremy Renner, The Hurt Locker

BEST ACTRESS
Emily Blunt, The Young Victoria
Sandra Bullock, The Blind Side
Carey Mulligan, An Education
Gabourey Sidibe, Precious
Meryl Streep, Julie & Julia

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Alec Baldwin, It's Complicated
Woody Harrelson, The Messenger
Anthony Mackie, The Hurt Locker
Stanley Tucci, The Lovely Bones
Christoph Waltz, Inglourious Basterds

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Vera Farmiga, Up in the Air
Anna Kendrick, Up in the Air
Mo'Nique, Precious
Julianne Moore, A Single Man
Samantha Morton, The Messenger

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM
Samson & Delilah (Australia)
The White Ribbon (Austria)
The World is Big and Salvation Lurks Around the Corner (Bulgaria)
A Prophet (France)
Winter in Wartime (Netherlands)

BEST ANIMATED FEATURE
Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs
Coraline
The Fantastic Mr Fox
Mary & Max
Up

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
(500) Days of Summer
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
A Serious Man
Up

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
An Education
District 9
Julie & Julia
Precious
Up in the Air

BEST FILM EDITING
Avatar
(500) Days of Summer
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
Star Trek

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Avatar
The Hurt Locker
Nine
Inglourious Basterds
The White Ribbon

BEST ART DIRECTION
Avatar
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Inglourious Basterds
Julie & Julia
A Serious Man

BEST COSTUME DESIGN
Bright Star
Coco avant Chanel
Julie & Julia
Public Enemies
The Young Victoria

BEST SOUND MIXING
Avatar
Inglourious Basterds
Nine
Public Enemies
Star Trek

BEST SOUND EDITING
Avatar
District 9
Star Trek
2012
Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen

BEST ORIGINAL SONG
"I See You", Avatar
"The Weary Kind", Crazy Heart
"You've Got Me Wrapped Around Your Little Finger", An Education
"Cinema Italiano", Nine
"Down in New Orleans", The Princess and the Frog

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
Avatar
The Informant!
Sherlock Holmes
Star Trek
Up

BEST MAKE-UP
District 9
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
Star Trek

BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
Avatar
District 9
Star Trek

Best Actor - some thoughts

For those following the Oscars, which should be all of you, you may have noticed that it seems the five nominees for Best Actor have been all but sewn up for the best part of a month. This would normally be unimaginable. It's usually Best Actress which you can put your house on predicting 100% correctly, but not this year.

Ask around and the majority of people will tell you that these will be the five Best Actor nominees:

Jeff Bridges, Crazy Heart
George Clooney, Up in the Air
Colin Firth, A Single Man
Morgan Freeman, Invictus
Jeremy Renner, The Hurt Locker

The thing is, it's hard to pick just who misses out if someone comes in to get a surprise nomination. Bridges is the favourite to win so it won't be him, and until Bridges came along Clooney was the early favourite, so you would think he'd be safe.

I've never been convinced about Colin Firth, but that might be because I've never been a fan. I've been puzzled by some early talk by pundits and blog commenters saying that Firth is overdue for a nomination. Firth is a lot of things, but overdue for a nomination isn't one of them. I struggled to think of what film he could have been nominated for, and after looking at his filmography on IMDB I was even more confused. Still, he's considered a lock for a nomination even though there's a very real chance his will be the film's only nomination.

Jeremy Renner is shaping up to be the previously unknown actor who manages to get nominated. We see at least one every year. They rarely, if ever, win, but it's always nice to see it happen. He's another lock. I'm thinking he could be like another sort-of-unknown (well, to the great unwashed anyway) actor who people thought would be nominated for a film which was winning every major critics awards leading up to the nominations. That man was Paul Giamatti for Sideways.

The one person who I think might miss out, who I think is the most vulnerable, is Morgan Freeman. The film wasn't really that popular with those who saw it and people seem to just be taking it for granted that he'll get a nomination. I haven't seen the film so he may well deserve to get in, but I think if anyone misses out it will be him.

So who would replace whoever misses out? It could be Viggo Mortensen for The Road. Tobey Maguire got a surprise Golden Globe nomination for Brothers, but I don't see that happening. Matt Damon has a lot of supporters for The Informant! but Oscar buzz pretty much died as soon as the film was released. Michael Stuhlbarg's chances plummeted as soon as A Serious Man's poor showing with the critics awards became apparent.

There are two others I'll mention. District 9 seems to have a lot of support - I'm putting it down for a few nominations, including Best Picture and (against my better judgement) Best Director - and since its release quite a few people have thought that perhaps Sharlto Copley could get in. If the Academy is full of fans of The A-Team then maybe they could nominate him in anticipation for his turn as Murdoch, but then Mr T didn't get much buzz for D.C. Cab way back when, so I'm not sure if this theory will pan out.

The last one is one of the most critically acclaimed performances of the year, but almost everyone is assuming it won't happen. I'm not sure why - something about Sony not sending out screeners or something? - but it would be a damn shame if Sam Rockwell isn't nominated for his simply awesome work in Moon. If I didn't know better I'd give him the fifth slot straight away. But I do know better. I know the Academy can't think for themselves and need to be spoon-fed names and films to nominate, and it sounds like Sam Rockwell and Moon weren't included.

In which I have a dream about the Oscars...

I had my first Oscar dream in 1992. In it, Basic Instinct was nominated for several Academy Awards including Best Picture. That was pretty much all there was to the dream, but it's stuck with me since. It didn't come true, by the way, for those who aren't up on Oscar history. Just two nominations for Film Editing and Original Score.

Last night I had another one. I may have had some between 1992 and now but I can't remember them. However, I'll remember this one for quite some time.

It was 5pm and I was sitting down to watch the live telecast of the Oscars. This is unusual because, being in Australia, it would mean that the Oscars were delayed several hours. I didn't think anything of it when I settled in to watch the TV. I was just happy to watch the Oscars live again. In Australia, live Oscar telecasts are a very new thing. 2009 was the first time we got to do it down here which meant that I no longer had to endure a media blackout so as not to find out the winners. It was wonderful.

Strange thing is, not only was I watching it on TV but I was also at the ceremony, a ceremony which seemed to have the atmosphere of a corporate party than the Oscars. Everyone was standing around engaging in smalltalk, drinking and being merry.

The first category of the evening was Best Actor. I think Meryl Streep presented, but I can't remember who the nominees were. The winner was Jamie Foxx. I don't know which film he won for. I really should research these things.

Jamie didn't get to go up on stage right away. For thirty minutes there was... well, I don't know what it was. Meryl started gushing, saying how wonderful it was that he won. Then I noticed that Helen Mirren was standing next to me, so I walked over for a chat.

"Jamie Foxx now has more Oscars than Al Pacino," I said.

"Pardon?"

It wasn't that loud, so I'm not sure why she had trouble hearing me.

"I said, Jamie Foxx now has more Oscars than Al Pacino."

She frowned.

"One more time."

I repeated myself again and she looked at me with realisation on her face. "Oh, yes!" she said, laughing politely. Then she motioned to the other side of the room.

"Who's that man over there?"

I followed her hand and looked at the gent she was asking about.

"Him? He's a friggin' hack," I snarled.

"Really? Who is he?"

"That's Peter Travers from Rolling Stone."

And then I woke up.

Update - the 365 films thing

Lucky nobody reads this thing, otherwise people would tell me that it's a bit of a dog's breakfast at the moment! Early days, people.

I've decided not to talk about every single film I see this year. I just can't be bothered. This isn't a film review blog, it's just a film blog. If the 365 films thing was the main focus of this site people would get bored rather quickly. So instead, once I figure out how I can have a page dedicated to it which I can update when I like, I'll start listing the films. Maybe in the sidebar? I know not.

So yeah. There you go.

Top twenty-four of the decade

Maybe I'm a year early with this, but everyone else is assuming that the decade ended on December 31, 2009, so I'll just go with the flow. I'm cool with that.

Here, then, is my list of my twenty-four favourite films of the decade. There seems to be some unwritten list of films doing the rounds on the Internet which everyone is supposed to include on their top twenty-fours... I'm just going by the comments I see on various blogs advising the mistakes various bloggers and critics have made in compiling their lists by including, or omitting, particular films. Thankfully nobody reads this blog yet so I'm pleased to advise that the film snobs would have a coronary if they saw this.

These aren't the critical powerhouses of the decade.  These aren't the ones it's cool to like.  These are just the films that I couldn't imagine not seeing again.  I love them.

Onwards, then.

Reviewing the Oscar winners - Best Original Song

Apparently I have masochistic tendencies because I've decided to listen to, and review, the winners of the Best Original Song Oscar over the years.  I don't know what possessed me to do this.  I'm sure as hell not going to pay to download the songs, and I don't download illegally because I'm a nice boy, so I'm going to rely on the song being on YouTube.  Hey, I might even provide a link.  How's that for service?

Note:  I usually hate every nominee in this category for each year.  Also, even if a song is by Irving Berlin or someone else one is meant to like, if I think it's bad then I'm going to say so.

What this be

Oh, hello there.

I like movies.  I've been watching movies seriously for close to twenty years now (note: by "seriously" I mean knowing who directors are, etc; I'm not one of those people who analyze films, appreciating the mise en scene and all that) and over the years have amassed a large collection of DVDs.  I have roughly seven hundred now.

I like buying DVDs, but I rarely get around to watching them.  Look at my collection and you will most likely see a fair amount unopened.  I buy them so that I can watch them at my leisure, which is probably why I don't rent DVDs.  I don't want the pressure of having to watch them by a certain date.

Looking at my DVDs, I notice that there are quite a few films that I've never actually seen before.  This, then, was what made me decide to do what I'm planning to do in 2010.

In 2010 I want to attempt to watch 365 films.  This is not original - plenty of people have attempted to do it.  I haven't taken any interest in these people so I don't know if they were successful or not.  It sounds very doable though.

The rules, then:

1. I will start off with the films that I haven't watched yet.  Looking at a DVD rack now I can see that I will watch the following first up:  The Dam Busters, Jules et Jim, Scarface (Brian De Palma version), American Splendor, Fiddler on the Roof, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Blow, Once Upon a Time ni the West and Half Nelson.
2. I won't be watching one film per day.  Some days I just won't be able to - I do have TV commitments, after all - so this will be an attempt to watch 365 films in a year.  I could watch seven films over a weekend which means I won't have to watch anything until the following weekend.  This, I agree, could backfire if I don't watch anything for quite a while.  I don't want to come around to December and be 150 films behind.
3. If I see a film at the cinema, which I rarely do these days, then it will count.  Of course.
4. I'm not a film critic so I won't be writing detailed reviews on each film.  I'll just sum up my thoughts.  I will try and make this more than "great film" or "meh" but I can't promise anything.
5. Oh - once I finish the films I haven't seen before I'll then start on the films I have seen.  Obviously.  Might even do theme weeks and the like, but probably not.
   

I will also be posting my general thoughts on movie news and such when I feel like it.  You know, so that there might actually be something interesting to read.  Yeah.

Anyway, there you go.  I hope I stick to it, and I hope someone follows it.