Oscars 2015: The Results

And so this year's Oscars have come and gone. I doubt anyone would have expected it would go down the way it did. There's been a few surprises, to say the least. Who could have foreseen the definite favorite Boyhood would be left almost entirely out in the cold, with the second choices of most, Birdman and The Grand Budapest Hotel, cutting up the pie between them for the most part? I sure didn't, which means my predictions of last month took quite a beating. Just when you think you understand the Academy, they go out of their way to turn the tables on you.

So let's compare my notes with hard reality, shall we?

Best Film:
First Choice: incorrect. Not so obvious apparently. While everybody had Boyhood on their mind, the Academy instead opted for a more off-beat candiate, seemingly applauding its criticism on the American movie industry and its satirical overtones. And thus, Birdman flew off with Best Picture.
Second choice: also incorrect. Of course the movie I preferred didn't win this category, what was I thinking?!

Best Actor:
First Choice: correct.

Best Actress:
First Choice: correct.

Best Supporting Actor: 
First Choice: correct.

Best Supporting Actress:
First Choice: correct.

And then the Academy goes and picks exactly the folks everybody anticipated would win, while for the other major categories they picked the less obvious candidates. Which means everybody is thrown off-guard even more by predictability's comeback in this whole circus. Good for me, as I at least got some categories correct.

Best Director:
First Choice: incorrect.
Second choice: correct. As is exemplary for American society, this show is usually a duel between two clear favorites, with one of them winning Best Picture and the other Best Director. Not so this year: Birdman got both. You'd think a 12-year project that got so much acclaim would qualify for Best Achievement in Directing, but apparently you'd be wrong.

Best Screenplay:
First Choice: correct. Say what you will about Birdman's execution, the script is for the most part top-notch, while Boyhood's is more of on-the-fly work and required less scripting. In that the Academy agrees with me, or vice versa.

Best Adapted Screenplay:
First Choice: incorrect.
Second choice: also incorrect. The straightforward narrative of The Imitation Game seemed to appeal the most to the Academy voters.

Best Animated Film:
First Choice: incorrect.
Second choice: incorrect. This one makes me mad. Laika is severely overdue in terms of winning Oscars. The tremendous craftsmanship displayed in The Box Trolls was nothing short of extraordinary, even though the story wasn't always that inspired. However, the same is true of Big Hero 6, but - apart from the terrific job they did on Baymax - its animation wasn't nearly as compelling. It seems the old styles of animation, be it hand drawn or stop motion, have fallen out of favor with the Academy. For shame. This is definitely the worst mistake of this year's Oscars.

Best Foreign Film:
First Choice: incorrect. Could it be the Academy swayed for Putin's condemnation of this movie critiquing the many flaws of his authoritarian regime? Is there a political game being played behind the curtains here, mayhaps? Or did the Academy simply not care about the film's statement, so the visual art of Ida was picked over poignant ideological content?
Second choice: correct.


Best Cinematography:
First Choice: incorrect. Seriously? A movie which suggests it delivers one giant long take but contains so many not so subtly hidden cuts is picked over a movie which displays its love for cinematography and its long history in almost every shot? Shenanigans!
Second choice: incorrect.

Best Editing: 
First Choice: incorrect.
Second choice: incorrect.

Best Production Design:
First Choice: correct. Well duh...

Best Costume Design:
First Choice: correct. See Best Production Design for details.

Best Hair and Make-up:
First Choice: correct. In case you didn't realize it, Tilda Swinton doesn't actually look like she's in her nineties, that's all make-up.

Best Score:
First Choice: correct. Alexandre Desplat finally gets his due.

Best Song:
First Choice: correct. And so the Academy avoids the discomfort of race riots that might otherwise have erupted across America, because Selma already got snubbed hard. Rap instead gets acknowledged by the Academy, which ought to cool them brothas down a bit.

Best Sound Mixing:
First Choice: incorrect.
Second choice: correct.

Best Sound Editing: 
First Choice: incorrect.
Second choice: incorrect.

Best Visual Effects:
First Choice: incorrect. The Academy once again fails to grasp the true pioneering that the FX industry is undergoing thanks to motion capture. Insanity triumphs as the visually rather dull Interstellar is picked against reason over Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. When the mo-capped apes truly take over the FX business in the coming years, the Academy members will be the first against the wall, mark my words.
Second choice: also incorrect. The Academy also doesn't like talking trees and raccoons. Bunch of speciesists...

Best Documentary: 
First Choice: incorrect.
Second choice: incorrect. And then the Academy suddenly embraces progressive thinking and social pioneering by picking a movie about Edward Snowden. You really can't get the hang of these people, can you?

Finaly tally

Correct: 10
Second choice correct: 3
Incorrect: 11
Oh my, I'm getting worse at this. More wrongs and less rights here compared to both last year and the previous one. But then, this year showed just how much of a guessing game these final Oscar results are, much more strongly than the last few years. The Academy is a fickle thing, and occasionally they need to reaffirm that fact. Too bad films so deservedly of a win, like The Box Trolls and Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, are sacrificed to make that statement ring true.

Oscars 2014: the results

Well, the Academy has finally held its annual ritual, so let's see how many Oscar winners I guessed right. Or expertly deduced correctly, if you prefer.

Best Picture: correct! It seems the time was right for a movie directed by a coloured man to win in this category. This is the Age of Obama after all. Too bad he didn't also win Best Director, but let's not push things, right?
I have yet to see 12 Years a Slave.

Best Actor: incorrect. Matthew McConaughey seems to have been on a roll last year with Mud, The Wolf of Wall Street and the movie he won for, so he was really actively pushing for that Oscar, and successfully so it appears. Though I won't deny him his prize, I feel kinda sad for both Bruce Dern and Chiwetel.
Second choice: also incorrect.
I have yet to see Dallas Buyers Club.

Best Actress: correct! This one just seemed a given. Blanchett deserved a Best Lead win for a change, Best Supporting Actress is good, but just not as good. Woody Allen's recent sex scandal hasn't hurt Blanchett for starring in his film.

Best Supporting Actor: incorrect. I should have known the Academy wouldn't go for a first-time actor, no matter how impressive his performance. Jared Leto proved a more conservative winner, despite him playing a transsexual.
Second choice: also incorrect.

Best Supporting Actress: incorrect. Jennifer Lawrence got her spotlight moment last year and she tripped over her dress while walking the stairs... never again! Plus, 'twas all white folks winning acting awards so far, so this evens the score a little.
Second choice: correct.

Best Director: incorrect. Considering all the technical stuff, I didn't see this one coming. The Academy has a tendency to overlook such aspects of filmmaking when it comes to this particular category, in favor of more trite but true apporaches. No more it seems. Apparently all the technical stuff was just too groundbreaking to ignore for a change.
Second choice: also incorrect.

Best Original Screenplay: incorrect. Poor American Hustle got snubbed good! A story about man and his increasingly accepting mentality towards anthropomorphizing non-human machinery fit right in with appreciating Cuaron's technical stuff. The Academy has finally learned to embrace the digital age then.
Second choice: correct.
I have yet to see Her.

Best Adapted Screenplay: correct! There just had to be a few more wins for 12 Years a Slave to go with that Best Picture win. Right before Gravity took all the rest.

The Academy clearly didn't take a hint from Gravity's tag line.


Best Animated Feature: correct! When Disney gets good again, all other animation is silenced. Like it or not. Let it go.

Best Foreign Film: correct! It just had to be, considering all the raving critical acclaim. Its competitors just didn't stand a chance.
I have yet to see La Grande Bellezza.

Best Cinematography: correct! Duh!

Best Editing: correct! See above.

Best Production Design: correct! Gatsby may not have felt like a great movie, but it sure looked like one.

Best Costume Design: correct! Same.

Best Make-Up: correct! The performances of McConaughey and Leto were undoubtedly stirred to great heights thanks to the way they looked.

Best Music: incorrect. Despite all the innovations, a grand picture still needs a solid soundtrack. Gravity got one.
Second choice: also incorrect.

Best Song: correct! The Academy, too, let it go. Good for them!

Best Sound Mixing: correct! It didn't matter that in space, nobody can hear you scream. For your information.

Best Sound Editing: correct! *insert second joke about the uneasy relationship between space and sound here*

Best Visual Effects: correct! The most obvious winner of the bunch, courtesy of the year's most jaw-dropping sights.

Best Documentary: incorrect. This unexpected pick is the one I take umbrage with the most. There's this hugely unsettling, daringly executed, effectively engaging shock doc about Indonesian genocide, and the Academy opts for a bunch of singing people instead. I'd say they 'let it go' a little too much in this case.
Second choice: also incorrect.

Correct: 14
Second choice: 5-2.
Incorrect: 7

Last year's results: 6 correct, 5 second choices correct and 9 blatantly wrong. There's some personal improvement there!
Most of the choices in the "lesser" categories were just glaringly obvious this year. It was an easy year in that regard. However, the 86th Academy Awards ceremony just proved once again how fickle Academy members can be when it comes to the acting categories. And also just how much the Academy likes to compromise. Then again, American Hustle received 10 nominations and ended up completely empty handed... Maybe because we once again didn't see Jennifer Lawrence's boobs? Oh well, let it go.

Oscars 2013: Where's Jagten and what's with the love for Amour?

Still being a worm in my mother's Apple. Hopefully this ghastly situation won't last much longer and I can finally go about making good on my noble intentions for the year and update my blog like three times a week instead of three times a month. Still not happening though, but at least I'm now taking the time to have a go at the Oscar nominees, before the Academy Awards for 2012 have happened.

Ah, the Oscars. That awful Academy Award ceremony where a bunch of feeble-minded rigid  Hollywood conservatives decide what movies of the year are the best, after which the rest of us movie buffs all just have to live with their at times nonsensical, but equally often utterly predictable choices. There's a lot of good movies competing this year, but there's also a few illogical nominations going around: someone please explain to me why a non-English spoken movie like Amour is up for no less than five (!) awards. Like last year, here are my own thoughts as to which movies will win what award, with a back-up choice for each category.




-Best Picture: Zero Dark Thirty. Despite its controversy, Kathryn Bigelow remains a favorite at the Oscars. Being similar in nature to The Hurt Locker, which also won Best Picture, this is a likely choice.
-Second choice: Amour. There's much ado about this movie, it might as well be the first fully French spoken movie to run away with Best Picture.

-Best Actor: Joaquin Phoenix for The Master.
-Second choice: Daniel Day-Lewis for Lincoln. It's D. D.-L., he wins every time. Why should this time be any different?

-Best Actress: Emanuelle Riva for Amour. Very demanding role, played completely believable and totally compelling.
-Second choice: Jessica Chastain for Zero Dark Thirty.

-Best Supporting Actor: Philip Seymour Hoffman for The Master. After all, he's The Master.
-Second choice: Tommy Lee Jones for Lincoln.

-Best Supporting Actress: Anne Hathaway for Les Miserables. She can act, she can sing, she can starve herself to appear for real. So she can win.
-Second choice: Amy Adams for The Master.

-Best Director: Michael Haneke for Amour.
-Second choice: David O. Russell for Silver Linings Playbook.

-Best Screenplay: Zero Dark Thirty.
-Second choice: Moonrise Kingdom.

-Best Adapted Screenplay: Argo.
-Second choice: Silver Linings Playbook.

-Best Cinematography: Life of Pi. Shows you just how much you can do with a boy, a tiger, a boat and a camera. In 3D no less.
-Second choice: Django Unchained.

-Best Costume Design: Anna Karenina. Keira Knightley + Costumes = Oscar. Wouldn't be the first time.
-Second choice: Lincoln.

-Best Sound Mixing: Lincoln.
-Second choice: Les Miserables.

-Best Editing: Zero Dark Thirty.
-Second Choice: Life of Pi.

-Best Sound Editing: Django Unchained.
-Second choice: Skyfall.

-Best Visual Effects: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.
-Second choice: The Avengers.

-Best Makeup: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.
-Second choice: Hitchcock.

-Best Original Song: Skyfall. Really catchy. I reckon the guys at the Oscars can't get it out of their heads either. So let's face it all together. At Skyfaaa-hahahall.
-Second choice: Les Miserables.

-Best Music: Lincoln.
-Second Choice: Life of Pi.

-Best Foreign Film: Amour. Foreign, but still a lot of love for this one so also might win Best Picture. Typical insane Hollywood hypocrisy.
-Second choice: En Kongelig Affaere. Mads Mikkelsen is in this. Speaking of which, where is Jagten in all this?! Shenanigans says I!

-Best Animated Feature: Frankenweenie. Lousy year for computer animated films, but excellent for stop motion, and this one was the best.
-Second choice: The Pirates! Band of Misfits. Frankenweenie was the best, but this one was the most fun. Pirate Award here, please!

-Best Production Design: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. Middle-Earth still looks spectacular. The opening scene alone, delving deeply into Dwarf history, was Oscar-worthy.
-Second choice: Lincoln.


I'm confident I got at least ten of these right. Time will tell. Hopefully my PC will be back to normal by the time the Oscars are handed out so I can report on my triumph/failure in predicting these sodding prices everybody is always so full about but nobody could really care less for.

Oscars 2011: the results

-Best Picture: correct!

-Best Leading Actor: correct!

-Best Leading Actress: incorrect...

Second choice: correct.

-Best Supporting Actor: incorrect...

Second choice: correct.

-Best Supporting Actress: incorrect...

Second choice: correct.

-Best Director: correct!

-Best Original Screenplay: incorrect...

Second choice: correct.

-Best Adapted Screenplay: correct!

-Best Animated Movie: incorrect...

Second choice: correct.

-Best Foreign Movie: incorrect...

Second choice: incorrect...

-Best Cinematography: correct!

-Best Editing: incorrect...

Second choice: incorrect...

-Best Art Direction: correct!

-Best Costume Design: incorrect...

Second choice: incorrect...

-Best Makeup: correct!

-Best Score: correct!

-Best Song: correct!

-Best Sound Mixing: incorrect...

Second choice: correct.

-Best Sound Editing: incorrect...

Second choice: correct.

-Best Visual Effects: incorrect...

Second choice: correct.

-Best Documentary: incorrect...

Second choice: correct.

Correct: 9

Correct on second choice: 9

Fully incorrect: 3

Not a bad score overall. Surprising to see how many of my second choice hunches proved to be right. I guess I should listen to that silly voice inside my head more... And Rango won! Wow, who would have thought the Academy would condone a gritty weird movie about talking animals appropriating an iconic American genre, with a fair amount of jokes about alcohol and inbreeding? There's hope yet for oddball animation in mainstream cinema!

So, are there some decisions I feel like bitchin' about? Sure. Drive didn't even get that one Oscar it was nominated for, the Academy must really hate that movie! Also, it's obvious the potential of Motion Capture is still way over the Academy's head, robbing the Apes of their prize. I'm also quite disappointed by the choices of winning actresses. It's no news Meryl Streep is a good actress, and it's harsh to see poor Rooney Mara paying the price for that, losing to that old hag. I guess two Oscars for Streep just wasn't enough, eh? A similar feeling rose when Bérénice Bejo didn't get the Oscar for a performance just as gripping as Dujardin's. They really made The Artist work together, neither of them did it single handedly. Giving one an award and the other none seems cruel. Other than that, me and the Academy seem to be largely on the same page. So where can I apply for Academy membership again? I still see room for improvement!

Oscars, Oscars everywhere, but not a Drive to win!

Oscar day is less than two days away now, so I thought I'd skip the usual discussion of a movie I watched the last few days and discuss my particular pick of winners instead, either movies I think will win, or movies I hope will win (wouldn't it be great if these two were one and the same?). First of all, I must protest against the Academy's decision not to nominate Drive for Best Picture, which it easily deserves. What is the point of expanding the number of Oscar nominees for Best Picture from five to ten if you ignore the tenth? So only nine nominees this year, but at least most people agree which movie would have been number ten, and which movie would have won in general. By omitting Drive and not picking a tenth movie, the Academy might as well have outright stated this movie would have won if it wasn't too violent for the Academy's taste, even though decreasing the gore levels would have made Drive a less effective movie. Similarly, also very disappointing to see Michael Fassbender is not nominated for Best Actor for his revealing role in Shame, but of course we can't have a civilized institute like the Academy promoting nudity in movies. Both cases of severe neglect were rather predictable, the Academy being the rigid backward uptight American institute it is, obviously uncomfortable with actors showing what they consider 'explicit nudity' (a penis) or films displaying extreme violence (a man getting his head kicked into pulp while using an elevator), despite such actors and films being actually excellent and already enjoying a rather large amount of positive critique around the globe. It's the same small minded thinking that robbed Mickey Rourke of his well deserved Oscar for The Wrestler just for using a swear word the day before the ceremony, but it's the way it is so we can do nothing but complain about it. A lot.

So, eliminating two given winners, what remains? Still a fair amount of good motion picture making fortunately, though also a decent amount of nonsensical nominations (War Horse for best picture? Really?). So here are my predictions:

-Best Picture: The Artist. Not only is it celebrating Hollywood's roots (and to some extent, the Academy's) in a fantastic way, it's also the most original constructed piece among the nine nominees, using all the ancient techniques that started it all. Plus, it's actually from France, and it would be deliciously ironic to have a French movie win this American price by largely just eliminating the language barrier altogether, yet illustrating that a well crafted motion picture can charm audiences everywhere. Also, with Drive out of the picture, the competition just doesn't seem up to it. All good movies, sure, but few of them seem like actual Best Picture material.

Second choice: Hugo.

-Best Leading Actor: Jean Dujardin for The Artist. Such a riveting and charming performance! The full emotional spectrum, but doing away with dialogue, thus making it harder for the actor to convey his character's feelings, and Dujardin excelled at this.

Second choice: George Clooney for The Descendants.

-Best Leading Actress: Rooney Mara for The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. A very challenging and sometimes shocking performance, made more difficult by various metal appliances, some excessive body paint and an obligatory Swedish accent (though in this movie her male counterpart didn't need one, since he's already an established star and apparently doesn't need to show why he is by turning to silly accents). Considering Rooney's limited experience so far this is a genuine tour-de-force. Definitely a young actress to keep watching!

Second choice: Meryl Streep for The Iron Lady.

-Best Supporting Actor: Kenneth Branagh for My Week with Marilyn. One great Shakespearean actor playing another, and doing a grand job at it. Besides, the poor man has been nominated four times before for an equal number of different departments of making movies, and he always left empty handed. Fifth time is the charm, or keeping with tradition?

Second choice: Christopher Plummer for Beginners.

-Best Supporting Actress: Bérénice Bejo for The Artist. Same reasons as Jean Dujardin above, plus the fact she's even more charming and just generally cute. Just as we want this pair to live happily ever after together in the movie, we want them to leave with one of those funny gold statues together.

Second choice: Octavia Spencer for The Help.

-Best Director: Michel Hazanavicius for The Artist. I could tell you why, but I don't want to sound repetitive by now. So I'll just say he should win an Oscar because he made a good movie that really, really deserves it. And I might also refer you to my article on The Artist, since I'm not above shameless self-promotion.

Second choice: Martin Scorsese for Hugo.

-Best Original Screenplay: The Artist. You try and write a screenplay for a movie that has no dialogue.

Second choice: Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris.

-Best Adapted Screenplay: The Descendants. The other nominees, except for Hugo, seem too politically charged or too subversive to win in this category under the current conservative climate in the Academy. So it's a toss-up between Hugo and The Descendants, and I go for the latter because the Academy usually favors a movie that is all about characters, while Hugo (which of course is not at all lacking in the character department) also has that visual element to it the Academy often seems to regard with a bit of disdain. If there's one category that's basically a wild guess, it's this one.

Second choice: Hugo.

-Best Animated Movie: Kung Fu Panda 2. I would have said Rango, but I figure it's much too subversive and bizarre for the Academy's limited taste. Kung Fu Panda 2, though potentially suffering from being a sequel (also something the Academy often is intolerant of), seems like a safer bet. The other choices are either too artsy or simply not Oscar material (Puss in Boots? Come on!).

Second choice: Rango.

-Best Foreign Movie: In Darkness. Holocaust drama. What more needs there to be said about this one? Kate Winslet is living proof.

Second choice: Rundskop.

-Best Cinematography: Hugo. Martin Scorsese + 3-D = kickass camera work.

Second choice: The Tree of Life.

-Best Editing: The Artist. Though containing a lot of fairly straight forward montage due to the use of old techniques needed to give the movie a classic feel, there's also some fabulous split-screen and wiping going on which is simply too beautiful to ignore. Striving not to be boring, the editor and director turned to various daring pieces of editing (some nearly extinct these days) to convey the overall mood much more dramatically.

Second choice: Hugo.

-Best Art Direction: Hugo. Only a master of motion pictures like Scorsese could make such a wonderful combination of history and fantasy come alive so breathtakingly visually, making use of the set dressing in such a vivid fashion. The other contestants, though good in their own right, don't even come close.

Second choice: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2.

-Best Costume Design: Anonymous. Underwhelmed by this year's offer of costumes, I go for the safe bet of splendid Elizabethan outfits. Fairly typical.

Second choice: Jane Eyre.

-Best Makeup: The Iron Lady. Look what they did to poor Meryl Streep, she looks like an old hag! And so did Margaret Thatcher.

Second choice: Albert Nobbs.

-Best Score: The Artist. Very little dialogue and sounds effects, so the music has an even bigger job at making the action feel compelling and emotional, and it succeeds at every turn.

Second choice: The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn.

-Best Song: 'Man or Muppet' from The Muppets. Great song, also kinda catchy (like it or not). You haven't lived until you've wondered whether Jim Parsons could actually be a Muppet while pretending to be singing to this song. Anyway, it's the Muppets, song is their forte. Plus, the competition is practically non-existent.

Second choice: Rio.

-Best Sound Mixing: Transformers: Dark of the Moon. Okay, so the movie is utter trash, but the sound effects are great, again. It's not enough to carry the movie, but at least it makes these digital robots turning into cars feel somewhat real.

Second choice: Hugo.

-Best Sound Editing: Drive. Making great use of simple sound effects and good songs to achieve a maximum level of dynamics and full audience participation in this hellish joy ride. Besides, Drive should at least take home one Oscar after being ignored so drastically. Since this is the only category it's nominated for (Humbug! Shenanigans!), it might as well be this one. Otherwise, I would feel fine if the director of the movie winning Best Picture (unless it be The Artist) gets viciously assaulted by the director of Drive while on the elevator with this films's score in the background. Seems poetic justice.

Second choice: Hugo.

-Best Visual Effects: Rise of the Planet of the Apes. It's about time Andy Serkis got an Oscar for mo-capping so many fantastic digital creatures (even though he won't be the one to accept it). Motion Capture is a grand effects breakthrough but the Academy has yet to really acknowledge its potential. Here's their chance to right this wrong.

Second choice: again, Hugo.

-Best Documentary: Pina. A documentary about ballet, making full use of 3-D's potential. Seems like quite a cinematic achievement, for 3-D, documentaries and ballet.

Second choice: Undefeated.

And there you have it. Time will prove me right. Or wrong. Or 7 out of 21 right or wrong. Or another possible combination. Depending on how wrong I was, expect a follow-up to this piece next week. If I turn out to be 100% correct (fat chance!), I'll leave it at this and celebrate it by watching a Drive/Shame double feature.