Tonight is the night when we feeble schlubs get to dip our toes in the lake of glamour that is the Academy Awards, staring in disbelief at the staggering beauty of our betters. I say this without sarcasm, as I am powerless to resist it. The award period is like my Christmas (with the summer season of robots, monsters, superheroes and explosions being my extended birthday). This year, though, has been particularly frustrating, as the likely winners seem more predictable than ever. It's obvious that, by now,
Slumdog Millionaire is going to win most awards. That frustrates me enough as I'm on record as hating the damnable thing, but also because it has robbed us of some speculation fun. Last year I might have
had a terrible time picking winners, but it was a lot more fun guessing.
Before revealing my picks (can you bear the suspense?), first the results of our poll to find out the most popular longshot Oscar winner from this year's nominations. It was pretty clear who was the favourite.
Kung Fu Panda (Animated Feature Film) - 6 (50%)Martin McDonagh (Original Screenplay - In Bruges) - 3 (25%)Richard Jenkins (Actor- The Visitor) - 2 (16%)Melissa Leo (Actress - Frozen River) - 1 (8%)Michael Shannon (Supporting Actor - Revolutionary Road) - 0 (0%)Viola Davis (Supporting Actress - Doubt) - 0 (0%)Gus Van Sant (Director - Milk) - 0 (0%)Thomas Newman (Soundtrack - Wall*E) - 0 (0%)Peter Morgan (Adapted Screenplay - Frost/Nixon) - 0 (0%)Wally Pfister (Cinematography - The Dark Knight) - 0 (0%)The Baader Meinhof Complex (Foreign Language Film) - 0 (0%)Milk (Picture) - 0 (0%)Iron Man (Visual Effects) - 0 (0%)Hellboy II: The Golden Army (Makeup) - 0 (0%)The Dark Knight (Sound Editing) - 0 (0%)Wanted (Sound Mixing) - 0 (0%)Kung Fu Panda's win in this most insignificant of polls warms my heart. KFP has been damned with faint praise since its release ("It's surprisingly good for a Dreamworks movie!" "It's a lot of fun, but it's not profound like the Pixar film!" etc.), though that didn't stop it
sweeping the board at the Annies, recently. Recently I rewatched
Wall*E, hoping I would like it more second time around, but sadly no. As usual, I offer the usual caveats. It's beautiful, it's got a lot of incredible ideas and imagery, and the sound design is stunning, but the second half is flat, and
Wall*E spends far too much of the movie falling over or having things land on him. In
Kung Fu Panda the slapstick has a purpose (Po's clumsiness is the source of his kung fu strengths, as his unpredictability makes him unstoppable), whereas in
Wall*E it's more like punctuation at the end of scenes, something I have a real problem with. The analogy I ended up with was that
Kung Fu Panda was a Buster Keaton movie (it's all about the story and the spectacle), and
Wall*E was a Charlie Chaplin movie (convinced of its own importance, and deeply unfunny). Keaton beats Chaplin any day of the week. Sorry, Pixar.
The votes for Martin McDonagh, Richard Jenkins (who had a really good year with great work in Burn After Reading and Step Brothers as well), and Melissa Leo were cool too, but the latter two are in categories that seem decided already. Martin McDonagh has a better chance, as his category of Best Original Screenplay is kinda weak, but even so,
In Bruges was too filthy and odd to win votes from the staid Academy members. Shame. No one else got a single vote. Maybe I chose badly, or maybe readers of this blog haven't seen the movies I picked. No matter. Thanks to everyone who participated.
And now, my picks for this year. Except for a couple of categories, it was a no-brainer. Even if the Weinsteins have been trying to turn people against
Slumdog, it's just not going to happen. To be honest, I may have hated
Slumdog, but I might hate
The Reader more. Not only is it of questionable value as a comment on post-Nazi German guilt (I think
these comments and these reviews sum up my feelings far better than I could express), it's also a really stupid and pompous movie, filled with wall-to-wall cliches and laughable dialogue. David Hare and Stephen Daldry should hang their heads in shame. The list of nominees seems even worse now that I've seen that fucking appalling exercise in static worthiness. And so, I think the Oscars will, should, and can't (due to stupidity) go to the following...
Best Picture:Will Win:
Slumdog Millionaire Should Win:
Milk Should've Been Nominated:
The Dark Knight /
Rachel Getting Married /
The WrestlerI may have had some reservations about
Milk, but it's far and away the best movie of a really poor bunch, and by an order of magnitude in the case of
Slumdog and
The Reader. The snubs for the three films I have listed truly grate on me. I've said it before, and I'll say it again; this is the worst nominations list I can remember, which is another thing that has robbed me of my enthusiasm.
Best Director:Will Win: Danny Boyle –
Slumdog Millionaire Should Win: David Fincher –
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button Should've Been Nominated: Christopher Nolan -
The Dark Knight / Jonathan Demme -
Rachel Getting MarriedAn easy pick, though I chose Fincher as the Should Win as there was so much work done on
Benjamin Button that I thought he edged it over Van Sant, who also did excellent work on
Milk (though, as
I've said before I would have liked a bit more unconventionality in it). None of this matters, though. Boyle will win it for the worst film of his career. Yuk.
Best Actor:Will Win: Mickey Rourke –
The WrestlerShould Win: Mickey Rourke –
The WrestlerShould've Been Nominated: Robert Downey Jr. -
Iron ManThis has to happen. If someone else won it would be the biggest upset of the night. And by upset, I mean, I would turn off the TV and not bother watching to the end. Come on, Mickey!
Best Actress:Will Win: Kate Winslet –
The Reader Should Win: Anne Hathaway –
Rachel Getting Married Should've Been Nominated: Kate Winslet -
Revolutionary Road / Julianne Moore -
BlindnessI love Winslet and think she's one of the great actors of our time (seriously), but for
The Reader? Nuh-uh. She's good in it, but that movie deserves no reward. Having her nominated for that and not the far superior (and not despicable)
Revolutionary Road is testament to the efficacy of the Weinstein's strong-arming tactics, but that's little consolation to us. I'd love for Anne Hathaway to win instead, just to rob the Weinstein's of their little victory, but that would also rob Winslet, who has deserved Academy recognition for about ten years at least.
Best Supporting Actor:Will Win: Heath Ledger –
The Dark Knight Should Win: Heath Ledger –
The Dark Knight Should've Been Nominated: Aaron Eckhart -
The Dark Knight / Bill Irwin -
Rachel Getting MarriedAnother no-brainer. And deservedly so.
Best Supporting Actress:Will Win: Penélope Cruz –
Vicky Cristina BarcelonaShould Win: Marisa Tomei –
The WrestlerShould've Been Nominated: Rosemarie DeWitt -
Rachel Getting Married I would have plumped for someone else in this category, but Tomei isn't winning (even though the Academy might like to legitimise her
Vinny award), and Cruz will get it for losing out on a justified award for
Volver.
Best Original Screenplay:Will Win:
Milk - Dustin Lance Black
Should Win:
In Bruges - Martin McDonagh
Should've Been Nominated:
The Wrestler - Robert D. Seigel
See above for my feelings on this.
Milk wasn't a bad screenplay, but it was pretty unimaginative, and filled with clunky exposition. Seigel's work on
The Wrestler, on the other hand, was feather-light. It would have been nice for a former Onion employee to get a nod.
Best Adapted Screenplay:Will Win:
Slumdog Millionaire - Simon Beaufoy
Should Win:
Frost/Nixon - Peter Morgan
Should've Been Nominated:
The Dark Knight - Christopher Nolan / Jonathan Nolan / David Goyer
A particularly weak field. Beaufoy's script is shockingly poor, a stream of one-dimensional characters, contrivance, phony uplift, and childish humour. That said, David Hare's adaptation of Bernard Schlink's novel is equally vapid. I would love for them both to lose to Peter Morgan, even if his screenplay was also loaded with some silly Cliff Notes-style exposition to help the viewer along (though the amount of contextual information in that film has to go somewhere if it's going to be less than fifteen hours long).
Best Animated Feature:Will Win:
WALL-E – Andrew Stanton
Should Win:
Kung Fu Panda – Mark Osborne and John Stevenson
Should've Been Nominated:
Fear(s) of the Dark - Various
I've not even seen
Fear(s) of the Dark, but it sounds great, and it would be fun to see Charles Burns getting a nomination (read
Black Hole; it's awesome). That would have meant
Bolt misses out, which is a shame, as it's a lot of fun, and the nomination is a nice present to Disney Animation, which has had a difficult couple of years.
Best Foreign Language Film:Will Win:
The Class (France) in French - Laurent Cantet
Should Win:
Waltz with Bashir (Israel) in Hebrew - Ari Folman
Should've Been Nominated:
Gomorrah (Italy) - Matteo Girrone
I suspect
The Class will win as much for its quality as for not being the far more controversial
Waltz With Bashir. I've not yet seen
The Class, and it might be amazing, but I can vouch for the incredible
Bashir, a film that moved me to horrible tears. I just can't see something that bleak winning an Oscar. Though it would ruin my spread, I'm hoping for a
Bashir win here.
Best Animated Short:Will Win:
This Way Up - Alan Smith and Adam Foulkes
As I've not seen anything in this category, I don't feel right commenting on what should or shouldn't have been nominated, but I will make this prediction, based on my super-scientific method of picking the one I've heard of (this short was
profiled in the Times this week). Besides, it
looks pretty cool.
Best Art Direction:Will Win:
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button – Donald Graham Burt, Victor J. Zolfo
Should Win:
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button – Donald Graham Burt, Victor J. Zolfo
Should've Been Nominated:
Hellboy II: The Golden Army - Stephen Scott
The wide-range of time periods for this movie, and the amount of work in replicating them, ensures this win. Either that or
The Duchess will win for Removal of Contemporary Items From Stately Homes. Yawn.
Best Cinematography:Will Win:
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button – Claudio Miranda
Should Win:
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button – Claudio Miranda
Should've Been Nominated:
The Spiderwick Chronicles - Caleb Deschanel /
The Fall - Colin Watkinson
It was ravishing! How can it lose? It won't win anything not in the non-technical categories, so this is a sure thing (he said with obnoxious over-confidence).
Best Costume Design:Will Win:
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button – Jacqueline West
Should Win:
Milk – Danny Glicker
Should've Been Nominated:
The Fall - Eiko Ishioka
As in the previous category, an egregious snub for
The Fall. I know the movie wasn't seen by many people, but even just looking at the trailer should be enough of a showreel to get some attention. It was one of the most beautiful movies ever made, and no one noticed. I'd feel sorry for the director, for which this was a work of great personal significance, but I imagine worldly things do not matter to the mighty... TARSEM!
Best Documentary Feature:Will Win:
Trouble the Water Should Win:
Man on Wire Should've Been Nominated:
Standard Operating ProcedureBoy, I was looking forward to watching
Trouble The Water on More4 this week, but our Sky+ record function has gone kerflooey, so that's not happening any time soon. I would think that will win over
Man On Wire due to the subject matter, no matter how good it is (I hear it's wonderful, but I wouldn't know). Maybe I'm being too cynical. I'll happily eat my words later, if necessary.
Best Documentary Short:Will Win:
The Conscience of Nhem En – Steven Okazaki
As with the animation short, I've not seen any of the nominees in this category, so I won't insult everyone here, and will plump for this nominee as I have heard of it as well.
Best Film Editing:Will Win:
The Dark Knight – Lee Smith
Should Win:
The Dark Knight – Lee Smith
Should've Been Nominated:
Speed Racer - Roger Barton, Zach Staenberg
There is an awful error in
The Dark Knight, during the Batpod sequence, where Batman shoots a glass door, drives through a building, shoots another glass door, and then is back in the building even though it should have driven out. GAH! It drives me crazy every time I watch it. Even so, the editors do an amazing job of cutting a big complex movie down to a manageable size (it should have been a lot longer).
Best Live Action Short:Will Win:
On the Line (
Auf der Strecke)
Here is where my foolproof method for selecting the hard-to-find nominees fails. I've not heard anything about any of these movies. ::sigh:: Sorry, short film filmmakers. I'm going for
On The Line as it's the top of the list. Oy, that's some crappy motivation.
Best Makeup:Will Win:
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button – Greg Cannom
Should Win:
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button – Greg Cannom
I didn't select a film that should have been nominated, as I think they picked the best three films of the year, though I will say I suspect
Tropic Thunder didn't get picked for Robert Downey Jr.'s blackface makeup as the Kodak theatre would explode from the white liberal confusion over it. I think Ben Stiller et al have a good defense when they say that the character of Kirk Lazarus is a lampoon of actorly pretension, and it's a hilarious turn, but I really don't think we're ready to be handing out awards for that kind of divisive and explosive makeup just yet.
Best Original Score:Will Win:
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button – Alexandre Desplat
Should Win:
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button – Alexandre Desplat
Should've Been Nominated:
The Dark Knight - Hans Zimmer, James Newton Howard
Doesn't it seem ironic now that
The Dark Knight's ineligibility caused so much fuss, and all for nothing? Repeated viewings have shown how complex, unorthodox, and stirring that soundtrack is. The eventual snub is deeply frustrating. And why did I choose Desplat's soundtrack over A.R. Rahman? Because Desplat is super-awesome and I just don't want
Slumdog to keep winning things. Please?!
Best Original Song:Will Win: "Down to Earth" from
WALL-E – Peter Gabriel and Thomas Newman (music), Peter Gabriel (lyrics)
Should Win: "Down to Earth" from
WALL-E – Peter Gabriel and Thomas Newman (music), Peter Gabriel (lyrics)
Should've Been Nominated: "The Wrestler" from
The Wrestler - Bruce Springsteen
This category is utter bullshit this year. I can understand
Slumdog and
Wall*E getting a nomination each, but leaving out Springsteen makes absolutely no sense. It's good news for Peter Gabriel, though.
Slumdog should, again, win, but I suspect (as does Richard Corliss in his picks) that the Slumdog vote will be split, leaving Gabriel free and clear to win.
Best Sound Editing:Will Win:
WALL-E – Ben Burtt and Matthew Wood
Should Win:
WALL-E – Ben Burtt and Matthew Wood
Should've Been Nominated:
Speed Racer - Dane A. Davis, Mike Chock, Drew Yerys
Big no-brainer. Burtt's work is the main reason
Wall*E works at all.
Best Sound Mixing:Will Win:
The Dark Knight – Lora Hirschberg, Gary Rizzo, Ed Novick
Should Win:
The Dark Knight – Lora Hirschberg, Gary Rizzo, Ed Novick
Should've Been Nominated:
Speed Racer - Felix Andriessens, Christian Wegner
The Dark Knight is the big action film of the year. This is the way this kind of voting goes.
Best Visual Effects:Will Win:
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button – Eric Barba, Steve Preeg, Burt Dalton, Craig Barron
Should Win:
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button – Eric Barba, Steve Preeg, Burt Dalton, Craig Barron
Should've Been Nominated:
Speed Racer - John Gaeta
The last no-brainer, though I'm still upset with the FX voters for yet again snubbing John Gaeta's work. The same thing happened with the two
Matrix sequels. No matter what you think of those films, the effects were ground-breaking and beautiful. Who has this guy pissed off in the FX community to keep getting snubbed like this? I'd put
Speed Racer above the competent
Iron Man work any day of the week.
And that's that. Sorry for going on at such great length. After tonight I hope to stop thinking about this for at least eight months. Getting annoyed by something so trivial is exhausting.
In the City of Sylvia [En la ciudad de Sylvia] - dir. José Luis Guerín - 2007 - Spain - N/A - with Xavier Lafitte, Pilar López de Ayala
All About My Mother [Todo sobre mi madre] - dir. Pedro Almodóvar - 1999 - Spain - Sony Pictures Classics - with Cecilia Roth, Marisa Paredes, Penélope Cruz, Antonia San Juan, Rosa María Sardá, Candela Peña, Toni Cantó, Eloy Azorín
Deconstructing Harry - dir. Woody Allen - 1997 - USA - Fine Line Features - with Woody Allen, Hazelle Goodman, Judy Davis, Bob Balaban, Elisabeth Shue, Billy Crystal, Kirstie Alley, Eric Lloyd, Robin Williams, Demi Moore, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Stanley Tucci, Richard Benjamin, Mariel Hemingway, Caroline Aaron, Amy Irving, Julie Kavner, Tobey Maguire, Stephanie Roth
Fat Girl [À ma soeur!] - dir. Catherine Breillat - 2001 - France/Italy - Criterion - with Anaïs Reboux, Roxane Mesquida, Libero De Rienzo, Arsinée Khanjian, Romain Goupil, Laura Betti
Possession - dir. Andrzej Żuławski - France/West Germany - 1981 - Blue Underground - with Isabelle Adjani, Sam Neill, Heinz Bennett, Margit Carstensen, Michael Hogben, Johanna Hofer
Talk to Her [Hable con ella] - dir. Pedro Almodóvar - 2002 - Spain - Sony Pictures Classics - with Darío Grandinetti, Javier Cámara, Lenor Watling, Rosario Flores, Mariola Fuentes, Gerladine Chaplin, Lola Dueñas, Chus Lampreave, Paz Vega, Fele Martínez, Elena Anaya
Basic Instinct - dir. Paul Verhoeven - 1992 - USA/France - Tri-Star - with Michael Douglas, Sharon Stone, George Dzundza, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Dennis Arndt, Leilani Sarelle
The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things - dir. Asia Argento - 2004 - USA/UK/France/Japan - with Asia Argento, Dylan Sprouse, Cole Sprouse, Jimmy Bennett, Jeremy Renner, Marilyn Manson, Peter Fonda, Ornella Muti, Kip Pardue, John Robinson, Ben Foster, Lydia Lunch, Jeremy Sisto, Michael Pitt
Mighty Aphrodite - dir. Woody Allen - 1995 - USA - Miramax - with Woody Allen, Mira Sorvino, Helena Bonham Carter, F. Murray Abraham, Peter Weller, Michael Rapaport, Olympia Dukakis
Wild at Heart - dir. David Lynch - 1990 - USA - MGM - with Laura Dern, Nicolas Cage, Diane Ladd, Willem Dafoe, J.E. Freeman, Harry Dean Stanton, Isabella Rossellini, Grace Zabriskie, Calvin Lockhart, David Patrick Kelly, Sherilyn Fenn, Crispin Glover, Freddie Jones, John Lurie, Jack Nance, Sheryl Lee
Oh no! New Yorker bids farewell. What's going to happen to Céline et Julie??
Why I bother reading user comments about the Oscar show is an issue that I should address with my analyst, but as I did again this year, hearing people bitch and moan about Hollywood's "liberal agenda" being thrown out in acceptance speeches just annoys me to no end. "I want escapism," I heard one person say... well, fine, go see Taken again. The Oscars are, and have always been, self-congratulatory, so unless that's your idea of "escapism," I'd suggest going elsewhere (although Slumdog Millionaire being named the Best Picture of the year does suggest that the commenter isn't alone in his thoughts). However, what people fail to mention is how the Academy Awards are the perfect platform for such "liberal agenda." Sean Penn isn't wrong in calling Hollywood a bunch of "homo-lovin', commie bastards," but emphasis should be on homo-lovin', not actually "homo." As much as I reject earnestness in most of its forms, Dustin Lance Black's acceptance speech actually struck a chord with this cynic. People fail to recongize that for a young homo, there's really no one to look up to. Sure, they've got plenty of support, with GLAAD commercials with Rachel Griffiths and celebrities like Ricki Lake, Rose McGowan and Drew Barrymore marching for their equal rights, but who do they have to look up to? Hollywood's still so gay shy that outside of Ian McKellan, who can they even look up to? I'm not saying that having support from the heterosexual community isn't sufficent enough, but when you've got your pick of Boy George, Rupert Everett, Clay Aiken and some guy on Gray's Anatomy, it's still a pretty sad state of affairs. The Oscars, thus, form the perfect media outlet to spread Hollywood's "liberal agenda." I suppose things are heading in the right direction (albeit slowly), but I'll take that "liberal agenda" any day of the week. PS: Can Tina Fey and Steve Martin host the Oscars next year? And yeah, I can never resist posting photos of Tilda Swinton.
I know people bitch that we don't have Hollywood stars like we used to, but if only a moment like Marlon Brando's refusal to accept the Oscar for Best Actor for The Godfather had happened last night... then we might actually have something to talk about the following day. Hell, I didn't even hear anyone boo when Jerry Lewis got on stage.
You can jazz the Oscars up and put Beyoncé in as many red outfits as you want, but the sad fact will still remain: the Oscars are still a bore and another unmemorable film has been declared the best by the Academy. Kate Winslet has finally won her deserved Oscar for easily the worst of her six nominated performances, and the night's only surprise win came in a category where I didn't want to be surprised: foreign film. (Keep in mind, I haven't seen Departures). Congratulations to Penélope Cruz and Sean Penn.
