What the heck, I'm going to go ahead and name my choices to win the Academy Awards this year:
1. Best Picture: The Hurt Locker - Lots of good candidates this year, and certainly Avatar is a heck of an achievement, but I think if the winner is the movie with the best story, then it'll go to The Hurt Locker.
2. Best Actor: Jeff Bridges, Crazy Heart - It just seems like Bridges deserves it for his career of work as much as for the outstanding job he does here.
3. Best Actress: Sandra Bullock, The Blind Side - This is a tough one to name, but I think Bullock gets it for the same reason as Bridges. But it's tough to vote against Mirren or Streep.
4. Best Supporting Actor: Christoph Waltz, Inglourious Basterds - Mostly because everyone's raving about him. I haven't seen the movie yet (it's on my NetFlix list).
5. Best Supporting Actress: Mo'Nique, Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' by Sapphire - No idea on this one, so this is my "wild guess" entry.
6. Directing: Kathryn Bigelow, The Hurt Locker - I was tempted to choose Cameron on this, because Avatar is such an achievement, but I still think the Best Director and the Best Picture winners go hand in hand (or should go together, anyway).
7. Animated Feature Film: Up - I'll be really shocked if this is nominated for Best Picture and doesn't win Best Animated Film.
8. Original Song: "The Weary Kind (Theme from Crazy Heart)" from Crazy Heart - Ryan Bingham and T Bone Burnett - Again, a wild guess (and I hate to vote against Randy Newman), but what the heck.
2 comments:
Good Choices! I love how some of yours are exact opposites of mine lol!
I make a point to see all the best picture nominees every year, and this year was a little more difficult since they doubled the list. It was a very broad list, and in my opinion, although the list is expanded it's still not as strong as the list from the past couple of years. All that being said,
1. Best Picture: Avatar. It may not have the strongest story but it pushed the envelope as far as film making goes and really has set new standards for action and special effects films. (And if it was based solely on best story, I still wouldn't pick Hurt Locker. I'd probably go with Up or Precious.)
2. Best Actor: Jeff Bridges. Simply brilliant work. Perhaps the easiest category to pick. Not just the best of the year, but probably the best work of his career. In fact, Crazy Heart is better than several of the best picture nominees.
3. Best Actress: Meryl Streep. This is the single most difficult category to pick. I personally liked Carey Mulligan in An Education the best, but I don't think she has a shot with the heavy weights. The Blind Side was easily the best work I've ever seen Sandra Bullock do.
4. Best Supporting Actor: Christoph Waltz. He was an absolute delight. Tarantino does such a nice job writing stand out parts for his supporting actors. Honorable mention to Stanley Tucci. He was very very creepy.
5. Best Supporting Actress: Mo'Nique. All of the performances were pretty good, but Mo'Nique's is the one that stands out. (I'm actually surprised they picked Penelope Cruz as the one out of Nine.)
6. Directing: James Cameron. I'll go with the best picture gets best director theory. My big problem with The Hurt Locker wasn't that the scenes weren't intense and compact, but that it was very slow between big moments.
7. Animated Feature: Up. Out of all the categories, this is the one I've seen the least of, but if big picture sentiment didn't cause me to pick Avatar, I would've picked Up. It was by far my favorite movie of the entire year.
8. Original Song: The Weary Kind. It's a stand out in the film, and I think the notice Bridges is getting will carry over into this category also.
Bonus: Here's my rank of the best picture nominees.
10. Serious Man (Too artsy for me.)
9. District 9 (Didn't meet the hype.)
8. Hurt Locker (Liked it, but loved the others.)
7. Up in the Air (Good, but not as good as Juno or Thank You For Smoking.)
6. An Education (Brilliant performances, and a very pretty picture.)
5. Inglorious Basterds (Guilty pleasure film of the year. I could watch this one several times.)
4. Precious (Fantastic story and film. I do not want to see it again. It is very difficult to watch.)
3. The Blind Side (Very, very uplifting. And who doesn't love based on a true story?)
2. Up (A legit story in animated format.)
1. Avatar (It blew my mind. I actually thought it was going to stink. Pleasantly surprised.)
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