Last-minute Oscar predictions

Best Picture: American Hustle (Because Gravity / 12 Years splits the vote Day-Lewis / Nicholson style)
Best Director: Steve McQueen - 12 Years a Slave (Sasha Stone has a point - when it comes to Best Pic / Director splits, the movie everyone "likes" gets Picture, the film everyone "respects" takes Director)
Best Actress: Cate Blanchett - Blue Jasmine (in the bag and overdue)
Best Actor: Matthew McConaughey - Dallas Buyers Club (he's earned it, made himself overdue in just two years, and was on TV being brilliant in True Detective through much of the voting period)
Best Supporting Actress: Jennifer Lawrence - American Hustle (this should be her first. She deserves it, but I would be thrilled if Lupita N'yongo takes it instead)
Best Supporting Actor: Jared Leto - Dallas Buyers Club (they clearly love the film, what with upset nominations in screenplay and editing. Would be happy if Barkhad Abdi upset though)
Best Original Screenplay: American Hustle
Best Adapted Screenplay: 12 Years a Slave
Editing: Captain Phillips
Cinematography, Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, Visual Effects & Original Score: Gravity
Costume Design & Production Design: The Great Gatsby (it would be kinda rad if Costumes went to American Hustle)
Make Up: Dallas Buyers Club
Foreign Language Film: The Great Beauty (upset: The Broken Circle Breakdown)
Documentary: The Act of Killing
Animated Feature: Frozen (although it should be The Wind Rises)
Original Song: Happy - Pharrell Williams - Despicable Me 2

I didn't see any of the shorts. Bummer.

2014 Oscar Nominees

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has announced its nominees for the 86th time this morning, and they've had a pretty respectable year.

You can see all the Oscar Nominees here. I couldn't present them more tidily or comprehensively myself.

This was a fantastic year for midstream (ie, not quite art house, but not quite box office mainstream either) movies, with literally all of my favourite currently working directors - Martin Scorsese, The Coen Brothers, Alexander Payne, Spike Jonze - turning in some of their best work yet (plus we had the privilege of a great Sofia Coppolla - I realise I am fairly alone on that one - and a good annual Woody Allen.

The Academy gave a fairly warm reception to all of these, with the exception of Sofia Coppola and - bizarrely - The Coen Brothers.

Scorsese's controversial Wolf of Wall Street scored 5 nominations, including Picture, Director, Actor (Leonardo DiCaprio), Supporting Actor (Jonah Hill) and Adapted Screenplay. Amazingly, the legendary Thelma Schoonmaker got shafted for editing. Bizarre, considering the editing in the trailer alone made me weep and her replacement appears to be the guys behind Dallas Buyers Club. It is a great moment for DiCaprio, though, who has received much rejection at the hands of the Academy since Blood Diamond. He goes all out for Wolf and this is a lovely way to commence his apparent acting hiatus. Also huzzah for Scorsese's nomination - he had us worried there for a moment when Academy members started declaring his film repulsive and viewers fled from cinemas in disgust. Fortunately, the Academy retained its balls this year and remembered that cinema is not Disney Land.

On that note, they all but completely snubbed Saving Mr Banks which, while I haven't seen the film and am willing to believe its perfectly lovely, was a smart move. Pity about Emma Thompson's nomination, but it became inevitable that Amy Adams had to make the cut - and ousting Thompson's performance over Streep's was probably the right thing to do.

Most perplexingly, after a six year love affair with the incomparable, incorrigible Coen Brothers (which included an inspired Best Picture nomination for the surreal A Serious Man), the Academy has completely overlooked Inside Llewyn Davis, one of the most critically acclaimed films of the year. Sure, they don't care, but in terms of preserving the year in cinema for future generations, that seems like a pretty big oversight. Sure, Please Mr Kennedy didn't qualify for Song, Director was crowded and Actor was way crowded, but no room in the Best Picture race for a Coen masterpiece? More embarassingly, no Screenplay nod? With Cinematography and Sound Mixing we shall be satisfied. Perhaps they can go back to being underdogs rather than Oscar darlings now, which suits them better anyhow.

Alexander Payne has always felt like more of a writer than a director, although he balances dark comedy and poignant drama like no one's business and never fails to extract quiet brilliance from his actors. It seems fitting then that he surplants both Spike Jonze and expected nominee Paul Greengrass as Best Director nominee for Nebraska, his first film from a screenplay he didn't also write. His low key, monochrome drama about family, money and mortality contends across the board, including Cinematography; a first for a Payne film.

Spike Jonze's glorious-looking Her (releasing soon where I live) did smashingly, despite missing out on that Best Director nod. Oh well. Jonze's postmodern digital age love story contends for Best Picture, Best Screenplay, Art Directing / Set Decoration and, perhaps most excitingly, Original Song and Original Score by Arcade Fire (credited as William Butler and Owen Pallett). The Academy has a tendency to sideline rock stars and inventive scores in this category (with the sole exception of The Social Network and perhaps Thomas Newman's work), so this is a solid nod. Don't fret though - the rest of their Original Score nominees - other than Gravity - are predictably pallid. It's a pity Her doesn't contend for Editing and, especially, Cinematography, but let's take small winnings where we can get them.

Even Woody Allen gets a pretty respectable showing for Blue Jasmine, with Cate Blanchett obviously setting the stage for a brilliant acceptance speech on Oscar night, but the delightful Sally Hawkins (she of the dastardly Happy-Go-Lucky snub) and Woody's screenplay come along for the ride. Woody's screenplay almost always comes along for the ride.

Beyond my favourite directors, the three films leading the nominations - and likely battling it out for the top prize - are the life affirming Box Office Special Effects extravaganza Gravity; the gut-wrenching, devastating, gorgeous slavery drama 12 Years a Slave and David O'Russell's crowd-pleasing critical darling ABSCAM con movie American Hustle. It's really no contest. With four acting nods (one for each category) for the second consecutive year, O'Russell is the one to beat for Director and Picture, while Slave missed out on nominations for Cinematography and Score, which does not bode well for its popularity with voters. Gravity will, of course, clean out the technical awards, but if it couldn't even win at the Golden Globes (who anointed Avatar Best Drama), we can stop pretending the Academy is taking it that seriously.

On that note, though, Steve McQueen just became only the third black man ever nominated for Best Director. It would be monumental if he won, especially since his film is just so damn good, but the Academy rarely splits Picture and Director - and never on purpose. For some reason, everyone is besotted with David O'Russell and he seems to have this in the bag. I'm not complaining - unlike Silver Linings Playbook, Hustle looks legitimately good.

On the outskirts of the Best Picture race, float one of the year's best films; Captain Phillips - a thrilling real-life survival story that also takes the trouble to be a thoughtful, and thought-provoking, meditation on terrorism and the perceived value of a life. Greengrass's craft is exceptional, and he turns a rah rah Hero's story into the year's great tragedy, without any emotional sleight of hand. It's a huge bummer that Tom Hanks and Paul Greengrass missed out on nominations for their brilliant, tightly wound work. Actor and Director were exceptionally crowded this year, and each ends up with a worthy set of nominees - but I'd gladly boot Payne for Greengrass.

Rounding out Best Picture is gritty AIDS drama Dallas Buyers Club - bolstered by two of the most talked-about performances of the year - and Stephen Frears' lovely seeming (nothing's been released here, okay?!) Philomena, floating in from the land of Downton Abbey with Harvey Weinstein's seal of approval, and another pitch-perfect performance from Judi Dench.

Other notable nominees:

• Before Midnight, thankfully nominated for its sensational screenplay
• The Great Beauty, nominated for Foreign Language Film and Cinematography
• Prisoners, remembered for Cinematography, giving Roger Deakins yet another chance to lose
• Frozen, nominated for Animated Feature and Song, and sealing the deal to be the first Disney film to win Animated Feature (and directed by a woman at that)
• August: Osage County, contending for Actress (close call Meryl) and Supporting Actress
• The much-maligned Lone Ranger, nominated for Make Up and Special Effects
• The much-buzzed Lone Survivor, nominated for Sound Mixing and Sound Editing

The big losers:

• Sarah Polley's much-celebrated, highly inventive docu-drama Stories We Tell missing out on Best Documentary 
• Emma Thompson snubbed for Best Actress. Someone had to take the fall. Pity it had to be her. She's so delightful, whatever she does.
• Robert Redford. Crowded category, but still an ouch. 
• Tom Hanks downgrading from potential double nominee to zero nominee
• Pixar's Monster's University snubbed in favour of Despicable Me 2 
• Inside Llewyn Davis sidelined to Sound Mixing and Cinematography
• Saving Mr Banks' sole nomination for Original Score - just to let them know they did see it, they just really didn't like it
• Lana Del Rey. It's possible voters recalled her SNL performance and recoiled in fear. 

American Film Institutes Top 10 Films of 2013

Good list. Good year for cinema.

12 Years a Slave

American Hustle

Captain Phillips

Fruitvale Station

Gravity

Her

Inside Llewyn Davis

Nebraska

Saving Mr Banks

The Wolf of Wall Street

To be honest, American Hustle feels lightweight to me (sight unseen), but the NY Film Critics anointed it Movie of the Year, so I guess I should start adjusting my expectations.

It's a pity some of the fantastic indie fare, like Before Midnight, Mud, Before Midnight, Blue Jasmine and Before Midnight didn't make the cut, but how great is it seeing The Coens, Mr Scorsese, Spike Jonze, Alexander Payne & Steve McQueen dominate (not to mention Paul Greengrass and Alfonso Cuaron)? 

They save their list by nodding Fruitvale Station over The Butler. Smart move.

Review: Gravity

With a Metacritic score as high as 96 and talk of Best Picture gongs, it's best to go into Gravity with normalised expectations.

This is not an arthouse sci-fi extravaganza in the tradition of 2001: A Space Odyssey. It is also not an unspeakable horror film detailing a slow suffocating death in outer space (both a pity and a huge relief).

It is, however, breathtaking visual filmmaking and a marvel to behold. Director Alfonso Cuaron beautifully marries fancy (CGI) camera work (read long, slow, complex shots) with perfectly rendered special effects, a romping spacey score, deathly silence, where needed, and sharp pacing to put us right out in space with Dr Ryan Stone (Bullock) and Matt Kowlaski (Clooney), he taking in the beauty of space while she focuses on fixing whatever it is she is out there to be fixing.

(As a side note, it's weird that Cuaron fought to have a woman in the lead and then gave her a man's name, for no apparent reason. Not important, just odd.)

Disaster ensues, of course, in the shape of Russian space debris of some sort and the next 90 minutes are a breathless survival adventure, during which Dr Stone will learn life-affirming adventures. It's great stuff. It's just not the artistic masterpiece we may have been led to expect. Make no mistake - it's a great, gripping, expertly made film. You'll probably want to see it twice because, visally, it will blow you away. You just have to set your expectations at standard, script wise.
 
It's kind of like Cast Away, in space, with a woman, but much leaner and far more exciting. Like Cast Away, it puts one of the most likeable people in Hollywood in extreme, isolating circumstances where they must learn to let go and stop trying to control life. Unlike Cast Away, the action in Gravity is confined to what must be just a few intense hours in the life of Dr Stone. In Cast Away, Tom Hanks cries over a basketball. In Gravity, Sandra Bullock howl's with a dog. But I digress.

The other important thing about Gravity is that it centers almost entirely on a 50+ woman all alone in space. And still made tons of money at the box office. Take that 14-year-old-boy-demographic. More importantly, it is also the moment that Sandra Bullock finally approaches enough credibility as a character actress to start justifying her Blind Side Oscar as a career Oscar (this will all change for the worse if she manages to steal Cate Blanchett's Oscar). For the most part, her performance as Ryan is understated, heartfelt and appropriately subtle. It's just a pity the script didn't allow the second half of the film - and by extension Dr Stone's journey - to be as understated as the first. It may have tipped a gripping adventure yarn into haunting, devastating masterpiece territory. Or maybe not.

Gravity does have philosophical ambitions beyond the great visuals, but they're closer to Richard Curtis' In Time positivity vibes than Kubrick's abstract ruminations on consciousness in 2001. That's not necessarily a bad thing. Simple contentment may be the smartest thing of all.

All in all, you really have to see Gravity, but just expect a good night at the movies, not your world to be changed. Then you should be fairly blown away.

Another side note: this movie has amazing sets. For real.

And on a final note, Emmanuel Lubezki. Seeing as the whole ship on digital cinematography has clearly sailed (was there ever even a debate), we can accept that the way-overdue Director of Photography (the man behind the camera for Tree of Life, Children of Men, The New World, Lemony Snickets etc) will finally be bagging his first Oscar. 3D seems to do the trick lately, but he is well and truly deserving. For this and everything else he has shot. Huzzah.

Oscar - Best Picture

What a weird year for Best Picture. So many good films, yet such a strange turnout. Let's recap:

Argo

Metacritic: 86
US Box Office: $128 Million
7 Nominations: Picture, Supporting Actor, Editing, Adapted Screenplay, Music - Score,  Sound Editing, Sound Mixing
Awards: Everything (Critics Choice, Golden Globe, BAFTA, Producers Guild, Directors Guild, Screen Actors Guild Ensemble, Writers Guild, Editors Guild, Scripter Award, 9 Critics Groups' Best Picture)

For:

• Admired since its release to date
• No one hates it, everyone can agree on it
• A (mostly) true story with suspense, comedy & a weight of political importance
• NB - Hollywood & the CIA working together to make a happy ending
• When critics scared off Zero Dark Thirty, they nearly unanimously flocked towards Argo, making Ben Affleck seem like a lock for a Best Director nomination
• When the Oscars felt otherwise and excluded Affleck from the Best Director race (marking it as less significant than Amour and Beasts of the Southern Wild), Affleck and Argo became overnight underdogs. And everyone loves an underdog.
• Immediately after Affleck's Oscar "snub" as Director, Argo wins Picture and Director from the Critics Choice and Golden Globe awards
• Argo becomes the little Iranian comedy / thriller that could and goes on to win the Directors Guild Award, the Producers Guild Award, the Screen Actors Guild ensemble award and everything else (significantly, its adapted screenplay beats logical frontrunner Lincoln to both the Scripter and Writers Guild award).
• When even the British Academy Awards name it Best Picture and Affleck Best Director, it's clear we have an unstoppable juggernaut on our hands, barring the Oscars resisting groupthink enough to stick by their guns. 
• NB - Ben Affleck's charm offensive, backed by Producer George Clooney's legendary smile,  continue to win hearts as their film wins all the awards.
• All in all, Argo remains the film everyone likes and no-one hates. That does tend to win Oscars these days. It's not the 1970s anymore.

Against:

• Argo still has no Best Director nomination. No film has won Best Picture without it's Director being in the race since Driving Miss Daisy in 1990.
• Even Lincoln - a period film about a law being passed - has better Box Office
• Lincoln, Life of Pi, Silver Linings Playbook & Les Miserables all have more Oscar nominations than Argo. Box Office and Nominations aren't everything, but they are something. They show to what extent the public and the Oscar voters responded to the film.
• The Academy may resist the peer pressure from the Guilds and stick to their guns - they presumably excluded Ben Affleck for a reason and may decide to back the films they did initially respond to.
• There may even be Argo backlash at this point, considering it's a very good film being held up as a great one. Don't count on it, though. It didn't work for The King's Speech. 

Amour

Metacritic: 94
US Box Office: $4 Million (lowest)
5 Nominations: Picture, Director, Actress, Original Screenplay, Foreign Language Film
Awards: Cannes Palme D'Or, European Film Awards, Cesars, National Society of Film Critics Best Picture of the Year

For:

• Started off with a bang, winning the Palme D'Or (or Parmz Dorz, as Twitter Michael Haneke would say) at Cannes and went on to win every Foreign Language Film Award (excepting the Golden Satellites who went with Intouchables) and clean out the European Film Awards and the French Cesar Awards
• The frontrunner by a mile to win the Best Foreign Language Oscar
• A dark horse to upset Best Actress 
• With the Oscars announcing their nominees early, they couldn't copy and paste the Producers Guild and Directors Guild. Thinking for themselves, they lavished love on Amour, nominating it for five big ones.
• Michael Haneke previously contended for Best Foreign Language Film for The White Ribbon in 2010 but lost, unexpectedly, to The Secret in their Eyes. That gives Haneke a bit of an Oscar IOU.  

Against:

• Subtitles scare the average Cinema goer, and a film that requires them has never prevailed as Best Picture
• Amour is an unsentimental film about the decay of old age, and death. Not a feel good situation. 
• The lowest Box Office of all the nominees suggests that the arty Amour has a select audience only 

Beasts of the Southern Wild

Metacritic: 86
US Box Office: $12 Million
4 Nominations: Picture, Director, Actress, Adapted Screenplay
Awards: Sundance Grand Jury Prize (Dramatic)

For:

• Micro-budget Sundance Jury Prize winner
• An Indie Spirit favourite, with four nominations
• A very early, dark horse Best Picture and Best Actress contender that somehow survived the hype & release of Lincoln, Zero Dark Thirty, Les Miserables and Django Unchained to be embraced by the Academy 
• A wildly unique cinematic experience with a bold perspective and execution, it marks the arrival of a distinct new talent in producer / director / writer / composer Benh Zeitlin  

Against:

• Shoestring indies about poor, 8-year-old black girls' metaphorical, emotionally cathartic journeys, flooded with poetic impressionist imagery and ambiguous magic realism don't tend to win Oscars.
• If the Academy loved it enough to give it Best Picture, they wouldn't have overlooked its exceptional cinematography and score.

Django Unchained

Metacritic: 81
US Box Office: $158 Million
5 Nominations: Picture, Supporting Actor, Original Screenplay, Cinematography, Sound Editing  
Awards: None

For:

• Tarantino is a true original with only one Oscar to his name - for writing Pulp Fiction
• Django joins Lincoln in bringing America's slave history back into the zeitgeist. It's a topic worth talking about 

Against:

• Django is a morally challenging, abrasive film. It is also indulgent and unfocused and, though significant and daring, certainly not Tarantino's best. The only equality at play here is the equal right to an unhealthy gun culture. That is my opinion, but I raise it because I am sure Django is not everyone's cup of tea. It's highly unlikely to be backed by enough Academy members.
• The film's strong black performances - by Jamie Fox, Samuel L Jackson & Kerry Washington - were overlooked
• Leonardo DiCaprio's much buzzed villain was similarly overlooked, indicating a lack of support from Academy voters.

Life of Pi

Metacritic: 79
US Box Office: $112 Million
11 Nominations: Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay, Editing, Cinematography, Production Design, Music - Score, Music - Song, Sound Editing, Sound Mixing, Visual Effects 
Awards: None (other than every Visual Effects Award, almost every Cinematography Award, a Golden Globe for Score and two surprise Sound Mixing Awards)

For:

• Eleven nominations suggest the Academy loved Life of Pi, and certainly it's an easy film to like and a hard one to hate.
• With Life of Pi, Ang Lee filmed an "unfilmable" book (can we please stop using that clearly irrelevant term?) which previous directors (Jean Jeunet for one) had attempted and walked away from. He stretches himself technically and has to balance the spectacle of the film with its nuanced spiritual undertones. He pulls it off beautifully and clearly the Academy noticed. It's a distinctive visual film with enough heft and gentle emotion to feel like a significant Oscar contender.
• It's the clear frontrunner to win Score, Cinematography and Visual Effects, and a strong contender for Sound and Sound Mixing as well. Wins beget wins and these could translate to bigger categories like Best Director and, at a stretch, Best Picture.
• Ang Lee appreciation has really taken off in the weeks leading up to Oscar night

Against:

• It may be too lightweight or family friendly for a Best Picture winner.
• No wins so far other than the technical categories.

Lincoln

Metacritic: 86
US Box Office: $177 Million (highest)
12 Nominations: Picture, Director, Actor, Supporting Actress, Supporting Actor, Adapted Screenplay, Editing, Cinematography, Music - Score, Production Design, Costumes, Sound Mixing
Awards: None (other than every Best Actor Award, a Screen Actors Guild award for Supporting Actor and some Critics Awards for Supporting Actress)

For:

• Spielberg's biopic is such a lovingly detailed, layered, respectful, immersive work. It's a pity it has so many people actively campaigning against it - wait, that's against. I'll get there.
• Pre-release, it was already considered a strong Best Picture contender, just based on calibre
• Post-release (to critics), it had lived up to expectation, even exceeded it, and was cemented as a Best Picture contender
• Post-release (to the public), the public loved it, earning it the highest box office of all the Best Picture contenders, the president loved it, screening it at the White House, Bill Clinton loved it, endorsing it at the Golden Globes
• With 12 nominations, the most of all this year's contenders, the Academy clearly loved it.
• If any director was to join ???, a??? and ??? in the distinction of having three Best Director Oscars, wouldn't you want it to be Spielberg?
• A huge cast led by the brilliant and universally acclaimed Daniel Day-Lewis, Sally Field and Tommy Lee Jones.

Against:

• Jeff Wells, & a whole bunch of critics / bloggers actively campaigning against Lincoln, mainly on grounds of it being boring (regardless of its great box office)
• The NY Times, at least for more ostensibly moral / historical reasons 
• Spielberg already has two Oscars
• Despite consistent nominations across the board, Lincoln has yet to win a major award outside of the acting races.
• There's no way Tony Kushner should have lost the Scripter and Writer's Guild awards for his adapted screenplay. But he did. 
• Although each of its 12 nominations are richly deserved, it is the frontrunner in only one - Best Actor. It's even only a strong threat in two - Best Supporting Actor and Best Director.

Les Miserables

Metacritic: 63 (Lowest)
US Box Office: $146 Million
8 Nominations: Picture, Actor, Supporting Actress, Music - Song, Production Design, Costumes, Make Up & Hair, Sound Mixing
Awards: Golden Globe Best Picture (Comedy / Musical) (Also every Best Supporting Actress award and Best Actor (Comedy / Musical) Golden Globe)

For:

• Pre-release expectations for Les Miserables were epic
• Although divisive on release, those who loved it were giving tear-soaked standing ovations and declaring it the obvious, hands-down Best Picture winner.
• Anne Hathaway's live, single-close-up-take rendition of I Dreamed a Dream is zeitgeist dynamite
• Wolverine sings in a tenor and weeps, and wins a Golden Globe
• Les Mis beat Silver Linings Playbook, which is understandable as the Globes are such suckers for Musicals they even nominated Mama Mia, but still significant, considering Playbook's general momentum

Against:

• Wall to wall singing isn't everyone's cup of tea
• Hooper's creative choices - mostly his preference for extended close-ups - have been criticised
• The live singing trick has been as much criticised as celebrated; mostly it is celebrated in reference to Anne Hathaway & criticised in reference to Russell Crowe.
• Hooper's snub in Best Director implies appreciation, but not passion, from the Academy

Silver Linings Playbook

Metacritic: 81
US Box Office: $103 Million
8 Nominations: Picture, Director, Actor, Actress, Supporting Actor, Supporting Actress, Adapted Screenplay, Editing
Awards: Golden Satellites Best Picture (and sweep)

For:

• It's this year's quirky little indie that could. Who can resist a quirky, crowd pleasing romantic comedy? Well, many, actually, but far many more ate it up hook line and sinker and those who really support it, really support it
• No one really cares about the Golden Satellites, but when an indie comedy wins pretty much everything, people do notice, and wonder if the movie can repeat the trick elsewhere
• Bradley Cooper - he of The Hangover - gives a career-changing performance, and instantly ups Oscar telecast ratings
• Jennifer Lawrence's brilliant, sudden rise to the very top of the A-List with this & Hunger Games' $408 Million box office
• David O'Russell's comeback - he fell badly out of favour when he screeched insane insults at Lily Tomlin on the set of I Heart Huckabees - yes, you can relive it here - and pissed off George Clooney by allegedly assaulting extras, but made a big comeback with 2010's The Fighter, earning universal praise, his first Best Director nomination and Oscars for Christian Bale and Melissa Leo. That appreciation clearly remains, as he is the very unlikely recipient of a Best Director nomination over presumed frontrunners Kathryn Bigelow & Ben Affleck.
• More than that, O'Russell has a great PR story, making no secret of the fact that he adapted Matthew Quick's book to make his son, who suffers from unspecified mental illness, feel he has a place in the world. Even I can't resist that story, and I only mostly like the film.
• The film was nominated in every category it reasonable could have been - including each of the four acting categories: an honour it share with Sunset Blvd, A Streetcar Named Desire, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, Network and, most recently, Reds (amongst others). The Academy clearly like this movie. A lot.
• Dr Oz, who has helped lend the film a heft of seriousness as an important film about the stigmas around mental illness.  The jury's out on that one, but the speculation can't hurt it's Oscar campaign.

Against:

• Don't tell anyone, but ultimately this is just a romantic comedy, which drops in quality somewhat in the second half. It's still a really good rom com, but as a film about mental illness it feels underdeveloped, and it may not hold up well as a Best Picture winner. 
• Bradley Cooper gives a good performance, yes, but his portrayal of bi-polar highs and lows doesn't stand up against 10 minutes of Claire Danes in Homeland. Sorry bro.

Zero Dark Thirty

Metacritic: 95 (highest)
US Box Office: $90 Million
5 Nominations: Picture, Actress, Original Screenplay, Editing, Sound Editing
Awards: National Board of Review Best Picture, 10 Critics Groups' Best Picture

For:

• Still the best reviewed film of the year
• Jessica Chastain's Maya remains one of the definitive screen characters of 2012 (okay that's just my opinion, but it will endure to be true. Just watch!)
• Pre-release, Zero Dark Thirty was one of the most hotly anticipated films of the year and, post-critics-release, it didn't disappoint, being hailed almost universally as a masterpiece
• Before the torture debate started, it was winning every single Critics Choice Award available, paving a seemingly unstoppable path to an Oscar clean sweep.

Against:

• Even before the torture debacle really took off, the possibility of Bigelow joining the distinguished company of Frank Capra, Fred Zinneman, Robert Wise, William Wyler, Billy Wilder, Elia Kazan, David Lean, Milos Forman & Clint Eastwood as history's two-time Best Picture / Best Director winners - in the span of only three years no less - freaked people out. Some felt her career filmography simply doesn't warrant this kind of distinction, which is probably a fair point. Personally, I feel if she made the best movie of the year twice in a row, power to her. As for being distinguished by Oscars, Kevin Costner had one before Scorsese. Sandra Bullock has one, but Julianne Moore doesn't. Mira Sorvino has one, but Annette Bening doesn't. The list goes on. Career filmographies and Oscar wins are clearly separate things.
• Then the torture debate began and things got really ugly. Bigelow & writer Mark Boal were accused of being pro-torture, the CIA was accused of sharing classified information and actors like Ed Asner & Martin Sheen (although he later clarified his position) actively campaigned against Zero Dark Thirty. It stopped winning awards and ended up nominated only in the most unavoidable fields.
• Critics needing something new to vote for quickly bandied behind Argo, a lighter, happier, non-controversial middle eastern alternative to Zero Dark Thirty.
• Its lack of nominations for Directing, Sound Mixing, Score and Cinematography are telling.

What will win: Argo
What should win: Zero Dark Thirty
What might win: Lincoln

After the cut, the Best Picture contenders ranked by Metacritic scores & Box Office:

Oscar Forecasting (and, oddly, defending the Golden Satellite Awards)

This is an interesting year for observing the Oscars. Academy voters are under pressure to have their nominations in super early (final submission of ballots has been extended to 4 January, i.e. today), which is way earlier than usual. It puts voters under pressure to see everything with "awards potential" within days of the festive season (because, obviously, they all actually watch all the screeners they're sent for free). It also puts voters at a bit of a loss, as their votes will have been submitted by the time most of the big precursor Awards roll in. Which means no carbon copying this year - Oscar voters will have to tell us what they really liked - for better or worse.

The only precursor nominations really influencing voters at this point will be the Screen Actors Guild (for the four acting categories), The Golden Globes (which is a bit less reverent and a bit more of a college popularity party than the Oscars), to an extent the National Board of Review winners, the Critics Choice Award nominees and, for last-minute voters, the Producers Guild Awards' Top 10 films. As for directing, editing and all the rest, Oscar voters are on their own (note: the Art Directors Guild also released their nominees recently, but with three categories of nominees - Contemporary, Period and Fantasy - they offer a shortlist of contenders at best).

Of course, there are other awards for the conscientious to look to, but these are mostly made up of festivals (Sundance, Cannes), niche interest groups (Independent Spirit Awards, Gotham Awards, NAACP Image Awards) or non-trend-setting, independent-minded curiosities like the Golden Satellite Awards (who, say what you will, have an uncanny knack for highlighting that annual female performance whose singular brilliance seems to have flown under the radar of every other awards body -  think Gillian Anderson in The House of Mirth (2001), Toni Collette in Japanese Story (2004), Laura Linney in P.S. (2005), Gretchen Mol in The Notorious Betty Page (2006), Tilda Swinton in Stephanie Daley (2007), Shohreh Aghdashloo in The Stoning of Soraya M (2009), Tilda Swinton in I Am Love (2010), Vera Farmiga in Higher Ground (2011) and this year's Emilie Dequenne in Our Children).  

This leaves Oscar voters to either make up their own mind (which either means seeing everything or voting for what's popular and ticks the right boxes), or trawl through the reams of Critics Group nominations. In the past, however, Academy voters have shown some resistance to being influenced by the Critics Groups, only yielding nominations where the critics threw unanimous, overwhelming support behind a particular film (Sideways comes to mind) or performance (Melissa Leo, Frozen River / Richard Jenkins, The Visitor) to the point where ignoring it becomes unhip. Of course, this doesn't always work (lament The Dark Knight Rises, the brilliant Paul Giamatti in Sideways, and The Social Network winning Best Picture). It will be interesting to see to what extent the Academy allows themselves to be influenced by the Critics' precursor picks.

For purposes of this forecast, let us refer to the top consensus of nominations from the various Critics Groups as "The Critics", and the most nominated contenders from the current precursor awards bodies as "The Precursors". Handy, extremely geeky Excel Spreadsheet extracts will offer support.

Best Picture

There's little reason to think Oscar's Best Picture will veer far from the Producers Guild's Top 10, even if voters handed in their ballots before the PGA announced their nominations. In a very strong year for movies, critical consensus seems to have formed surprisingly easily around at least 9 films:

The two important-feeling political thrillers:

• the controversial Zero Dark Thirty
• the massively entertaining Argo

And their companion piece, Spielberg's best-in-years Historical Political Drama, feeling perhaps more relevant and important than any and anchored by an already legendary lead performance:

• Surprise Box Office success Lincoln 

  The two little indie movies that could:

• Beasts of the Southern Wild
• Moonrise Kingdom

The divisive literary / stage adaptations (and fair box office successes):

• Les Miserables
• Life of Pi

And the (mostly) crowd pleasing comedy / drama (/Western)s:

• Silver Linings Playbook
• Django Unchained (arguably also a political historical thriller of some sort with a weight of importance behind all the cool and gags)

Which leaves, potentially, one spot open for a tenth film (Oscar's Best Picture nominees are decided by a preferential balloting system which basically requires a film to have a minimum number of First Place votes to become a Best Picture contender - there will be as many nominees as there are films with enough number one votes, but never less than five. Last year we had nine.)

Conventional wisdom says the tenth spot should be reserved for one of the year's respectable action blockbusters - The Dark Knight Rises, Marvel's The Avengers or the Producers Guild pick, Skyfall - or critically respected money-maker Flight, but don't count out critical darlings The Master or Amour for the Tree of Life art-house slot. For my money, if there are ten nominees, bank on The Impossible getting in. It's been all but missing from the race so far, but it's a major tearjerker with acclaimed performances and recent support from the likes of Angelina Jolie and Reese Witherspoon. If The Blind Side, War Horse and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close have taught us anything, it's Don't Underestimate the Power of Sentiment. 

There's also popular Golden Globe Comedy and Screen Actors Guild Ensemble nominee The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, but if that makes the cut I simply won't acknowledge it.

Well, then, let's have a look at what The Critics loved most in 2012 (plenty of info, so click on image to enlarge):

And The Precursors:

They agree 100% on the Top 10 of:

• Zero Dark Thirty (critics frontrunner, torture porn allegations notwithstanding)
• Argo
• Lincoln
• The Master
• Beasts of the Southern Wild (Precursor frontrunner, thanks to plenty of festival and indie niche attention)
• Moonrise Kingdom
• Silver Linings Playbook
• Life of Pi
• Les Miserables
• Django Unchained

But somehow, The Master just feels like it has fallen out of favour. Rounding out the outskirts of both lists are Amour, Skyfall, Looper, The Dark Knight Rises, The Sessions, Middle of Nowhere and The Perks of Being a Wallflower.

   

RESULTS! The Best Best Picture of the 90s

Opinion was FAR more divided on the 90s, with almost all contenders getting a piece of the action. Were there more great movies & performances to choose from or were there just less clear standouts?

Whatever the reason, the early 90s reign supreme! Here are YOUR winners (unless you didn't vote in which case you suck, but you're forgiven) :

The Best Best Picture(s) 1990 - 1999 (TIE)

WHAT a pair!

The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

Forrest Gump (1994)

The Best Best Actress 1990 - 1999

Jodie Foster - The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

(narrowly edging out Kathy Bates, Hilary Swank & Frances McDormand)

The Best Best Actor 1990 - 1999

Anthony Hopkins - The Silence of the Lambs (1991)

(by a significant lead)

The Best Best Director 1990 - 1999

Steven Spielberg - Schindler's List (1993)

RESULTS - The Best Best Picture of the 00s!

Voting has closed & the results are a landslide victory for 2007 (except Best Director). A great year for cinema indeed, and apparently a year where the Academy chose well. There was really no competition here.

The winners:

The Best Best Picture 2000 - 2009

No Country for Old Men (2007)

The Best Best Actor 2000 - 2009

Daniel Day Lewis - There Will Be Blood (2007)

The Best Best Actress 2000 - 2009

Marion Cotillard - La Vie en Rose (2007)

The Best Best Director(s) 2000 - 2009 (TIE)

Ang Lee - Brokeback Mountain (2005)

Joel & Ethan Coen - No Country for Old Men (2007)

VOTE for the Best Best Picture of the 90s

VOTE for the Best of a decade that gave an Oscar to Kevin Costner over Martin Scorsese, ignored Spike Lee entirely & gave top honours to five films that kill off their protagonist. It's the 90s & it's the decade where I started caring about the Oscars, so vote for the Best of the Academy's Best & shake your head in disapproval of their poorer choices.

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I find the Best Actor pattern particularly interesting: two villains, three very sympathetic & physically impaired heroes, two tragic heroes with intense psychological demons & three dramedies, two of which are as tragic as they are funny. Fun stuff. 

VOTE for the Best Best Picture of the 00s

VOTE! For the Best of the (Academy's) Best of the Noughties!

Sure, the Oscars get it wrong as often as they get it right, and some winners go on to big things while others fade into obscurity, but how would the best of the Academy's best fare if competing against each other? You decide:

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Guild Winners: We have ourselves a race

Three major guilds decided their winners in the past week, shaping the way for the final outcome of the Oscar race. The good news is that, at least in the lead acting categories, we do have an actual race!

Producers Guild of America 

Thomas Langmann wins for producing The Artist, 

basically confirming the trajectory it has been on since Cannes. It is taking the prize, people! 

For animated features, Peter Jackson, Kathleen Kennedy & Steven Spielberg win for producing The Adventures of Tin Tin, not that that will help any on Oscar night, as their film was not nominated.

On TV, Martin Scorsese & co take the Episodic Television Drama prize for Boardwalk Empire, the extensive list of Modern Family producers which I don't care to re-type win for Episodic Television Comedy and Julian Fellowes et al take the Long-form Television prize for Downton Abbey.

Directors Guild of America

Martin Scorsese had an outside chance with Hugo, but Michel Hazanavicius's way to the Oscar podium has been solidly paved with his expected win for The Artist. 

For an American Guild award, this is the second consecutive year that the DGA awarded a foreign director over a viable American option. Which is frankly admirable.

TV-wise, Patty Jenkins wins the Dramatic Series prize for directing The Killing pilot, Robert B Weide takes the Comedic Series prize for Curb Your Enthusiasm episode, Palistinian Chicken & Jon Cassar wins the TV Movie / Mini-series prize for directing The Kennedys.   

Screen Actors Guild of America

The Screen Actors Guild takes things in a slightly different direction than what we saw at the Golden Globes, meaning that we have a race on our hands!

Female Actor in a Leading Role
Viola Davis - The Help

The Golden Globes gave their prize to Meryl Streep (Drama) & Michelle Williams (Musical / Comedy), but with Viola Davis' SAG (& previous Critics' Choice) win, we have a three-legged race on the go. Meryl Streep won the SAG in 2009 for Doubt (the Oscar went to Kate Winslet for The Reader) & has often given strong support to Viola Davis' campaign. The Help has huge Box Office earnings behind it & a big cast of respected actresses, so a Help sweep at SAG was to be expected (it took three in total). At the Oscars, however, it's not just the actors calling the shots and Meryl Streep's third Oscar (her second as Best Actress & her first out of 13 nominations since 1982) is long overdue. The Streep / Davis race is on, and I'm sure it's a bittersweet one for both Actresses. Second runner-up Michelle Williams should start preparing her speech in case a Davis/Streep vote split puts her on the podium as it did Adrien Brody in 2002 - when frontrunners Jack Nicholson (About Schmidt) & Daniel Day Lewis (Gangs of New York) cancelled each other out.  

Male Actor in a Leading Role
Jean Dujardin - The Artist


SAG leans comedy & awards Jean Dujardin's charming old-school physical comedy performance, propping him up as a very real contender to George Clooney for The Descendants. My money is on Dujardin getting swept up in the The Artist wave.

Performance by a cast in a Motion Picture
The Help

I don't see this as a sign that The Help could in any way upset The Artist's Oscar chances. Nevertheless an impressive win.

Female Actor in a Supporting Role
Octavia Spencer - The Help


As expected, and all the way to the Oscar podium.

Male Actor in a Supporting Role
Christopher Plummer - Beginners


Ditto.

Male Actor in a TV Movie / Mini-series

Paul Giamatti - Too Big to Fail

Female Actor in a TV Movie / Mini-series

Kate Winslet - Mildred Pierce

Male Actor in a Drama Series

Steve Buscemi - Boardwalk Empire

Female Actor in a Drama Series

Jessica Lange - American Horror Story

Male Actor in a Comedy Series

Alec Baldwin - 30 Rock

Female Actor in a Comedy Series

Betty White - Hot in Cleaveland

Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series

Boardwalk Empire

Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series

Modern Family

Awards Tracker: Best Picture

The critics agreed on a top five that took the significant majority of their nominations, and all their wins: The Artist (18), The Tree of Life (18), The Descendants (15), Drive (15), Hugo (13).

The next five are a mixed bunch: Midnight in Paris (8), Moneyball (6), The Help (5), Win Win (4) & Take Shelter (4).

The awards groups took things a little more sentimentally; arthouse darlings Tree of Life & Drive are pushed out of the top five (& snubbed out of the Producers Guild top ten), replaced by War Horse & The Help. The Tree of Life & Drive do feature in the overall top ten, together with Moneyball, Midnight in Paris & Bridesmaids, but the Producers Guild snubs (in favour of Ides of March & Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) are not a good sign. If you ask me, the Critics Choice came the closest to a healthy mix of art & mainstream, but the BAFTAs have the classiest Top 5.

It is nigh on impossible to predict Best Picture accurately this year, as we do not know how many nominees there will be (the voting system determines the number of nominees based on a required percentage of support). All in all, I'm going to aim for the quality in the middle of the road, with some wishful thinking thrown in for good measure:

If there are 8:

The Artist

The Descendants

Hugo

The Help

Midnight in Paris

Moneyball

The Tree of Life

War Horse

If there are 10: 

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

The Ides of March

Alternates:

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (don't bet against Stephen Daldry)

Bridesmaids

Midnight in Paris - Review

Woody Allen's biggest box office success ever is a fun, irreverent history lesson and a celebration of the greatest times in Parisian history, including the present.

Built around little more than a whimsical plot twist and a glowing love for Paris, Allen's film is somewhat uneven but endlessly charming & uncharacteristically sweet. Owen Wilson makes a better screen Woody Allen than Allen has in years; his boyish goofball charms mix well with Allen's rambling neuroses. Eternally disenchanted writer though he may be, Wilson's Gil is more the lovably distractable artist than the impossible neurotic.

Allen's script has been widely celebrated and, while it is certainly joyously inspired, it is not his best. The writing has its problems - the under-developed "present world" set up & characters feel rushed & churned out (Allen could have mined more comedy / humanity out of spoiled Republicans missing the point of Paris), while a number of elegantly illustrated points are undermined by promptly being spelled out by Wilson's Gil (making him all the more quintessentially Allen). It feels like one more edit, or just a touch of restraint, could have delivered a leaner, sharper, more enduringly effective script.

Thes flaws, however, are easily over-shadowed by the success of Allen's loving characterisations of the creative powerhouses haunting Paris in the 20s - and the subsequent increasingly post-modern plot inversions. His Hemingways, Fitzgeralds, Dalis & Steins come vividly to life in a Paris that is almost impossibly magical.

Performances are inspired all round - although Rachel McAdams struggles with a fairly unforgivably self-centred American snob. The modern-day cast mine some good, if easy, laughs, but the 20s cast - and sets, cinematography & costumes - are dynamite. Adrien Brody has a memorable one minute cameo as a loopy Salvador Dali, you wish there were more of Tom Hiddleston & Alison Pill's F Scott & Zelda Fitzgerald, Marion Cotillard is a dreamily seductive Parisian muse, but Corey Stoll & Kathy Bates steal the show as Ernest Hemingway & Gertrude Stein - literary forces to be reckoned with. Even with his head way up his own derriere, Stoll's Hemingway is an immensely magnetic character & had Allen written him just one more payoff scene, he'd easily have walked off with the film - and a chance to go home with an Oscar.

As it stands, it's the overall winning charm, the gorgeous production, the real thoughtfulness, completely unabashed romanticism and significant box office that will secure Allen's 47th film as director a spot among this year's Best Picture nominees.

The intricate puppetry behind War Horse

Awesome TED Talk showing the South African puppet masters behind the long-running (and recently Tony sweeping) stage production of War Horse. They start with a masterful little hyena and work their way to the War Horse designs. Fascinating and beautiful, I can see why the stage play was and is such a hit. I just wonder how Spielberg is going to recreate the magic on the big screen with horse actors.

Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close - Trailer

Stephen Daldry has an exceptional track record - three movies, three Best Director nominations, two Best Picture nominations. One of those (Billy Elliot) was a film led by an unknown child actor and the other two (The Hours, The Reader) were tricky literary adaptations (and Best Actress winners). So by all accounts Daldry fits Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close like a glove. Jonathan Safran Foer's source novel is an eccentric, stylised journey through the five burroughs of New York, seen through the eyes of a highly intelligent and unusual young narrator, Oskar Schell, searching for the lock to fit the mysterious key left behind by his father  in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. In the process, the story delves into his unusual family history and those historic last moments before September 11th became 9/11.

It is a difficult novel to bring to the screen, mainly because it's strength lies in the ornate prose and the verbose ramblings of its charming, complex protagonist, but Eric Roth (Forrest Gump, Benjamin Button)'s screenplay is by all accounts deeply emotional. The success of the film hinges on newcomer (and Junior Jeopardy winner) Thomas Horn as Oskar. Daldry did excellent work with Jamie Bell in Billy Elliot, so let's hope he can repeat his success here. The obvious Oscar bait is Sandra Bullock and Tom Hanks as Oskar's parents, but the real meaty roles are Oskar's grandparents, played by Zoe Caldwell and the legendary Max Von Sydow.

The trailer makes is all seem a touch too sentimental, but it is just a trailer, I suppose. Daldry has no reputation for sentimentality, but Roth, Bullock and Hanks sure do (although Roth also scripted the far meatier The Insider and Munich). Time will tell. In the meantime, Daldry's track record and the story's 9/11 themes leaves Extremely Loud at the top of the Oscar pile, seen or unseen.

The Help - Review

The large cast works well together, but The Help owes its entire success to Viola Davis' vivid, authentic  performance as tired, burdened, compassionate Aibileen, followed closely by Octavia Spencer's fiery Minny. Both actresses should have no trouble making their way onto Oscar ballots. Although Emma Stone's Skeeter is the ostensible lead, the film starts and ends with Aibileen's voice over, every other actress is at her best when they share a scene with her and she is the heart, soul & spine of the film. It feels very justified that she is being campaigned as Lead Actress. Octavia Spencer, meanwhile, is far more than the supporting comic relief as fiesty, "sassmouthing" Minny. She is a real, strong-willed woman with an unpredictable, unstoppable fire in her belly and an unwillingness to suffer fools gladly. But she does have all the funniest bits.

On the white side of things, Emma Stone is naturally charming as the independent, "different" girl - the hair and make up department do a very good job of playing down her looks- but Alison Janney and, particularly, Jessica Chastain are the highlights among the white "madams", as morally compromised cancer patient / concerned grandchildren-less mother and tippling, floozy farmgirl, respectively. Bryce Dallas Howard, however, struggles to bring life to her callous, shallow villain, settling too often for cartoonish mean girl antics. It is as much a fault of the writing than the performance that Hilly is a shrill, relentless ubher bitch who is easy to hate, but very difficult to take seriously, but if Howard could have surrendered herself to Hilly's misguided convictions, she could have been a formidable force to be reckoned with. As it is, Howard herself can't seem to take her quite seriously, and drops the ball on the films funniest sequence - the pie. There is a line that divides an over-the-top character from an over-the-top performance and, unfortunately, Howard lands on the wrong side of that line. But Viola Davis more than makes up for it.

Although understandably some of the character detail is lost in the transition from novel to screen, The Help is nevertheless a strong and relevant story, effectively evoking a frankly disturbing chapter of American History (not only for the blatant racism, but for the demented picket-fence suburban dream). Director Tate Taylor continually favours the serious side of the story over the easy laughs and relies on his cast to bring home the message. I wish I could say The Help was merely a window into a dark past, but it is regrettably still a window on our present. I can think of more than one example, within my own, ostensibly liberal, circle of friends and family where maids still have "their own" plates and cups set aside because they "like having their own." Perhaps because the underlying darkness of the film still rings true, The Help, although not without its flaws, is the first film I have sat in since As it is in Heaven to leave a packed theatre nailed to its seats until the final credits have rolled.

Oscar Casualties - Best Picture

One of the reasons why I started following the Oscar race is because I was always fascinated by the films and performances that were in the running, but just missed the cut. 

With the final 5 (or 10 for Best Picture, these days) often being determined by fairly random or unpredictable factors – box office, popularity, topicality, timing, serendipity – there are usually a handful of deserving shut outs that there simply was not space for - often just as good or better. These are the forgotten gems of the Oscar race, and they're often more fun to dig out. 

So here are the more significant casualties of this year's Oscar race, as I see them:

Best Picture:

With 10 slots for Best Picture, there aren't really too many movies that could realistically have been nominees but didn’t make it. In a way, it makes the race more satisfying, in another way it is less dramatic (no big Into the Wild-style shut outs). Many argue that 10 nominees is less prestigious, and they may have a point, but I would argue that it gives a better, more well-rounded view of the specific year in film. By being able to cater for more tastes and styles, they create a better snapshot of the year, and become more relevant, if slightly less prestigious.

This year’s list is pretty great & diverse, with indie favourites (Winter’s Bone, The Kids Are All Right), art-house hits (Black Swan), Box Office brilliance (Inception, Toy Story 3) & just plain solid (True Grit, The Fighter, The King’s Speech) and topical (The Social Network) dramas. I’m not sure exactly where 127 Hours fits in – probably a little bit of all of the above.

For the coulda-been-contenders, go ahead & click :