Oscar Predictions!

I feel like I have a pretty good handle on the Oscars this year.  We'll see how I do tomorrow!

Best Picture: Lincoln
Ebert is convinced that Argo is taking it home, and after all the reactionary press Ben Affleck has gotten after his snub, he might be right - but tomorrow I think we're looking at a return to traditional Oscar values, and Lincoln simply has more weight on its side.  I think that the combined powers of Spielberg, Daniel Day-Lewis, the historical biopic subject and the epic scope are going to be too much for the Academy to resist.

Best Director: Steven Spielberg
I really don't see any other contenders in this category (not that the other directors don't deserve to be nominated!).  IF Affleck had been nominated, these two categories might be harder to predict - as it is, I think we're looking at a Lincoln-takes-all kind of evening.

Best Actor: Daniel Day-Lewis, Lincoln
It's the performance of his lifetime.  It's the performance of several lifetimes.  He can't lose.

Best Actress: Jennifer Lawrence, Silver Linings Playbook
Her real competition is Jessica Chastain, but I think Zero Dark Thirty is suffering a little on the awards circuit because of how similar it is to The Hurt Locker.  Lawrence has been getting more and better press than Chastain, plus her performance was unforgettable.  Granted, I haven't seen ZD30, and both women are turning into the kind of actresses that change the landscape of film, but I think the scales are tipped just slightly in Lawrence's favor.

Best Supporting Actor: Christoph Waltz, Django Unchained
If Lincoln is losing anywhere, it's here - and that's because Django isn't winning any other category (in my opinion).  Tarantino is pushing too hard for the Academy to take him seriously, when his material doesn't stand up to that assertion.  Waltz, however, is becoming a virtuoso that plays in Tarantino's key - if anyone can snag an award for Django, it's him.

Best Supporting Actress: Anne Hathaway, Les Miserables
For serious, they should just play the clip of Hathaway singing "I Dreamed A Dream" and let it speak for itself.

Animated Film: Wreck-It Ralph
For the first time in a while I don't think Pixar has a lock on this category.  I waffled hard on this one, because of how much I want ParaNorman to win - unfortunately, too often the Academy plays it conservative with the animated feature, and I think this year Disney's name is going to be too much to resist.  HOWEVER, Wreck-It Ralph was still an excellent movie, and will deserve the award.

Other Awards!

Cinematography: Life of Pi
Costume Design: Mirror Mirror
Film Editing: Argo
Makeup: The Hobbit
Music: Life of Pi
Music/Original Song: Adele, Skyfall
Production Design: Lincoln
Sound Editing: Argo
Sound Mixing: Les Miserables
Visual Effects: Life of Pi
Writing/Adapted Screenplay: Lincoln
Writing/Original Screenplay: Django Unchained

OscarWatch 2012: It Begins!

September is well over and we are deep into OscarWatch - something that was made QUITE clear to me on Sunday, when I went to see Argo.

Argo is a stunning film.  It is tense and claustrophobic, exciting and unbelievable - made even more so by the fact that it IS A TRUE STORY.  I repeat: the CIA inventing a fake Star Wars ripoff, press release and terrible poster included, in order to rescue six people from being publicly beheaded in Iran, ACTUALLY HAPPENED.  As with any film adaptation of historical events, I imagine things may have been spiced up a bit for the screen...although the way Ben Affleck presents it on screen feels very true to life, down to the terrible 70s mustaches and slightly grainy film quality.  It's harrowing, watching the six Americans get more and more convinced that they're going to die in the Canadian Embassy, and thrilling to watch the admittedly half-assed plan take shape.  At one point, Bryan Cranston as the CIA Chief refers to Plan: Argo as "The best, worst idea we've got."  That hopelessness, that desperation, drips off the film - which makes the payoff even more worth it.  Everything about this movie is brilliant and you should go see it, posthaste.

AwardWatch: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay (there's a book!  I wanna read it.).  Possibly a Best Actor nom for Affleck.  Best Visual Effects.  In my fantasies, John Goodman or Alan Arkin pulls a Best Supporting Actor nomination, but I don't think it's too likely.

Let's take a look at the other hardcore Oscar Bait movies I saw trailers for, and make some predictions over what awards these films will pull:

Life of Pi

Stunning, stunning trailer.  I haven't read the book yet (I KNOW), but if one was going to make a film adaptation about a boy in a boat with a tiger, I would want it to look like this.  And Ang Lee has serious philosophical chops (which worked for Brokeback Mountain, not so much for Hulk), so I think we can expect cerebral and gorgeous things from this one.  Plus, the word from the early release at the New York Film Festival has been largely positive.

AwardWatch: Best Cinematography for sure.  Best Adapted Screenplay is also a pretty safe bet.  Best Director and Best Picture, MAYBE, but it depends on how the Academy feels about another 3D feature by someone with less pull than James Cameron.

Cloud Atlas

This feels like the illegitimate lovechild of The Fountain and Tree of Life to me, which gives me conflicted feelings.  I want it to be more Fountain and less bullshit - but it looks potentially overwrought, over-complicated, and unintelligible.  I won't mind the skips around in time and place if the story stays streamlined, and I don't have a lot of hope for that.  Looks pretty beautiful, though.

(On a related note, a Google Image search of "Cloud Atlas" brings up what looks like pictures from seventeen different movies.  This is my concern: that it will not only be overly complicated, but disconnected and incomprehensible.)

AwardWatch: After last year's Tree of Life event, I don't think this one has a lot of hope for Best Picture.  Best Original Screenplay, Best Cinematography and Visual Effects and probably Art Direction, Best Costumes and Best Makeup nominations are assured, and it'll probably pull some other technical awards - I can see Best Film Editing and Sound Mixing, and Sound Track if the Cloud Atlas sonata score was written for the movie.

Lincoln

It is deeply ironic that this film is being released in the same year as Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.  Ironic and a little sad, because AL:VH might have had more pull as a summer action flick if it hadn't drawn the inevitable comparisons to Spielberg's historical beauty.  Ah well.  

AwardWatch: Possibly everything.  Best Actor for Daniel Day Lewis for sure, Best Picture, Best Director.  Best Original Screenplay?  Probably.  Best Costumes and Makeup, because duh, it's a historical.  Best Art Direction, Cinematography, probably a Best Supporting Actor nominee in there (my bet is on Tommy Lee Jones), and Best Supporting Actress for Sally Field.