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tealinThe shortlist for the Academy Awards was released this week, and I'm going to see Benjamin Button tonight, so I thought I should do my picks before my judgment was tainted by actually having seen any of the main contenders.
I'm only doing categories most people care about ... I'm sure there are people who care about Documentary Short Subject but I don't think they visit my blog.
If you are new here or perplexed, visit last year's Oscar blog for more on the Best/More theory.
Apart from the Best/More theory, my reason basically follows a subjective points system. I believe most Oscar votes are cast keeping in mind how your vote reflects on you as a person. It doesn't matter that no one sees what you voted for; you watch yourself cast the ballot so there's always an audience. People in the movie biz want to be thought of as artistic, profound, progressive, and politically sensitive, so your vote will earn you points in one or more of three categories: Politics, Humanism, and Art. The more categories a film can tick off, the higher chance it has of winning. It also gets bonus points for references to WWII, which could be chalked up to Politics + Humanism but is so much of a trump card that it really deserves a special category all of its own.
Visual Effects
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Dark Knight
Iron Man
Benjamin Button probably has the best effects, but both The Dark Knight and Iron Man had more and bigger ones. I pick Dark Knight because it was less of a popcorn movie, the effects were slightly more like performance art, and it's friggin' Dark Knight. Woe betide any movie that is not Dark Knight this year.
Sound
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Iron Man
Wanted
Slumdog Millionaire
Wall-E
The Dark Knight
I don't know much about the difference between editing and mixing sound, so I'm putting the nominees for both categories in one list and picking two. The Dark Knight for many of the same reasons as Visual Effects, and Wall-E because it's bold and experimental and uses sound in place of dialogue 2/3 of the time. Voting for Wall-E gives you +5 Art Points.
Best Animated Short Film
La Maison en Petits Cubes
Lavatory - Lovestory
Oktapodi
Presto
This Way Up
Not many people care about this category either but I've actually seen two of the nominees so I feel obliged. La Maison en Petits Cubes was cute and poignant and about aging and the human experience, but we've got Benjamin Button filling that niche this year. It would give you more Art Points than Presto, but Presto was a loving wink at Old School cartoons which carries some weight as well. The clincher is that it was attached to Wall-E and gets extra Politics Points by association. Interestingly* the film I thought would be the best contender for this award, Skhizen, isn't on the list. Perhaps it didn't meet distribution requirements. I am prepared to be wrong on this one; Presto only has a 51% chance against Petits Cubes in my head, and it has the disadvantage of being upbeat and entertaining. All that said, though, my usual rule of thumb is 'the ugliest short wins.' Petits Cubes is way uglier than Presto but it's possible one of the others is even uglier!
*okay, probably not
Make-up
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Dark Knight
Hellboy II: The Golden Army
Again, Benjamin Button probably has better makeup, but Hellboy definitely has more. That movie is makeup central. And it's actually really good. It's good enough to earn the Oscar as well as get it, and I say this even though I know that some of the makeup in Dark Knight was on Heath Ledger's face. So I may well be wrong.
Film editing
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Dark Knight
Frost/Nixon
Milk
Slumdog Millionaire
Again, don't know much about editing, but Dark Knight is my pick on account of a)being an action movie, which is a great place to show off your flashy editing skillz [see Best/More] and b)it's friggin' Dark Knight.
Costume design
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Australia
Milk
The Duchess
Revolutionary Road
I really liked the costumes in Australia, especially at the beginning where they contributed to the cartoony feel of the film. On the other hand The Duchess had pretty dresses and Keira Knightley, who is an excellent clothes horse, especially if the movie includes corsets in the wardrobe. Plus movie people seemed not to like Australia much.
Cinematography
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Changeling
The Dark Knight
Slumdog Millionaire
The Reader
I know I'm going against Dark Knight here, but my theory is you can sit back and see the cinematography in Benjamin Button. This may have been a bad judgment.
Art Direction
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Changeling
The Dark Knight
The Duchess
Revolutionary Road
I am voting against Dark Knight again, but Changeling is a period piece and, judging by the trailer, involved a lot more image manipulation through filters and such in post-production.
Best original song
Down To Earth - Wall-E
Jai Ho - Slumdog Millionaire
O Saya - Slumdog Millionaire
It may feel good to vote for ethnic music but even that cannot defeat the combined force of environmentalism and Peter Gabriel. Also the title can be taken two different ways, how cool is that?
Best original score
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Defiance
Milk
Slumdog Millionaire
Wall-E
Thomas Newman has been nominated for an Oscar 10 times and has never won. Add that sob story to being the go-to guy when you want your audience to cry (the Academy loves crying at movies) and the Midas touch of Wall-E and I think this may be his ticket to the little golden man. He might even have earned it, too, as the music carried the story almost as much as the sound effects ... which means it has a better chance of being noticed in the first place.
Best Adapted Screenplay
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Doubt
Frost/Nixon
The Reader
Slumdog Millionaire
F Scott Fitzgerald. He's famous and respected in the literary community. That the movie is generally well-liked by people who might have read the original gives it 50% more Art Points. To a lesser degree we've got some Best/More going on as well; the original was a short story and they turned it into a movie that's over two and a half hours long – that's a lot of adapting! I'm not so sure if that applies to this category, though; I suspect there might be some small value placed on faithfulness to the original.
Best Original Screenplay
Happy-Go-Lucky
Milk
Wall-E
In Bruges
Frozen River
Voting for writing on a movie which doesn't have any dialogue until halfway through is bold and experimental (but in this case also accessible!) and wins you Bonus Art Points. (Wait, why isn't Dark Knight in this category? Could it be you actually didn't like the story that much?? You've blown your cover, Academy!)
Best Animated Feature Film
Bolt
Kung Fu Panda
Wall-E
The only way this would have been a toss-up is if Wall-E had landed a nomination for Best Picture. Since it didn't, it has to win here.
Best Foreign Language Film
Revanche - Austria
The Class - France
The Baader Meinhof Complex - Germany
Departures - Japan
Waltz With Bashir - Israel
It's not about WWII but it is war + Israel, which almost = WWII's poor cousin. Also it is stylized (Art Points!), is personal, delving, and dreamlike at times (Humanism Points!), and challenges our prejudices regarding the conflict in the Middle East (Politics Points!). In a shocking and profound twist, the last few minutes are live-action archive footage! Double Art Points!
Best Supporting Actor
Josh Brolin - Milk
Robert Downey Jr - Tropic Thunder
Philip Seymour Hoffman - Doubt
Heath Ledger - The Dark Knight
Michael Shannon - Revolutionary Road
Is this even a question.
Best supporting actress
Amy Adams - Doubt
Penelope Cruz - Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Viola Davis - Doubt
Taraji P Henson - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Marisa Tomei - The Wrestler
Amy Adams may get it if Meryl Streep does not get hers, and Marisa Tomei if Mickey Rourke doesn't win, but to the best of my judgment this one's a mystery ... I decided to play the race card as tiebreaker.
Best Actress
Anne Hathaway - Rachel Getting Married
Angelina Jolie - Changeling
Melissa Leo - Frozen River
Meryl Streep - Doubt
Kate Winslet - The Reader
Hollywood loves scandal and has a perverse fascination with the religious. If the priest in Doubt turned out to be innocent, Kate Winslet's chances improve, but if it's left open-ended, or Meryl Streep's character continues in her certainty to the end even in the face of evidence, or is so shaken by the result that she quits the Catholic church and at the end of the movie faces an uncertain world and/or a loss of identity, she's more or less got it in the bag.
Best actor
Richard Jenkins - The Visitor
Frank Langella - Frost/Nixon
Sean Penn - Milk
Brad Pitt - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Mickey Rourke - The Wrestler
Voting for Sean Penn is like voting no on Prop 8 again! +5 Politics Points! Second place would be Mickey Rourke, +3 Humanist Points for an identity crisis and the human experience. I don't think anyone could watch themselves vote for Brad Pitt, even if Best/More is on his side.
Best Director
Danny Boyle - Slumdog Millionaire
Stephen Daldry - The Reader
David Fincher - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Ron Howard - Frost/Nixon
Gus Van Sant - Milk
This is closely tied to Best Picture – whoever wins that category could throw off Director, either in their favour or against. It's like a crazy tilt-o-wheel of Hollywood politics! I'm going with Danny Boyle here because I'm not confident Slumdog will win Best Picture, and I've heard his name in connection with his movie more than any of the other directors' with theirs (though that may be the influence of the BBC).
Best picture
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Frost/Nixon
Milk
The Reader
Slumdog Millionaire
My theory is that Benjamin Button and Slumdog will split a large percentage of the vote, leaving The Reader's voters with a majority. It has something to do with the Holocaust, which is always a good sign, and is also about guilt, national identity, love, coming to grips with your past, and other human experience stuff. If it's depressing, that's even better! Its only drawback is that it hasn't gotten much publicity and they're trying to make the Oscars more 'accessible' to the masses by voting for movies the masses have actually heard of, so ... who knows? Milk also has a chance for the same reasons as Sean Penn, but I think chances are higher in the Best Actor category.
Can I just mention how glad I am Dark Knight wasn't nominated for Best Picture? Thanks.
2:17 am
Having now seen Benjamin Button, I hope it wins everything, even categories it's not nominated for. The end.
I'm only doing categories most people care about ... I'm sure there are people who care about Documentary Short Subject but I don't think they visit my blog.
If you are new here or perplexed, visit last year's Oscar blog for more on the Best/More theory.
Apart from the Best/More theory, my reason basically follows a subjective points system. I believe most Oscar votes are cast keeping in mind how your vote reflects on you as a person. It doesn't matter that no one sees what you voted for; you watch yourself cast the ballot so there's always an audience. People in the movie biz want to be thought of as artistic, profound, progressive, and politically sensitive, so your vote will earn you points in one or more of three categories: Politics, Humanism, and Art. The more categories a film can tick off, the higher chance it has of winning. It also gets bonus points for references to WWII, which could be chalked up to Politics + Humanism but is so much of a trump card that it really deserves a special category all of its own.
Visual Effects
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Dark Knight
Iron Man
Benjamin Button probably has the best effects, but both The Dark Knight and Iron Man had more and bigger ones. I pick Dark Knight because it was less of a popcorn movie, the effects were slightly more like performance art, and it's friggin' Dark Knight. Woe betide any movie that is not Dark Knight this year.
Sound
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Iron Man
Wanted
Slumdog Millionaire
Wall-E
The Dark Knight
I don't know much about the difference between editing and mixing sound, so I'm putting the nominees for both categories in one list and picking two. The Dark Knight for many of the same reasons as Visual Effects, and Wall-E because it's bold and experimental and uses sound in place of dialogue 2/3 of the time. Voting for Wall-E gives you +5 Art Points.
Best Animated Short Film
La Maison en Petits Cubes
Lavatory - Lovestory
Oktapodi
Presto
This Way Up
Not many people care about this category either but I've actually seen two of the nominees so I feel obliged. La Maison en Petits Cubes was cute and poignant and about aging and the human experience, but we've got Benjamin Button filling that niche this year. It would give you more Art Points than Presto, but Presto was a loving wink at Old School cartoons which carries some weight as well. The clincher is that it was attached to Wall-E and gets extra Politics Points by association. Interestingly* the film I thought would be the best contender for this award, Skhizen, isn't on the list. Perhaps it didn't meet distribution requirements. I am prepared to be wrong on this one; Presto only has a 51% chance against Petits Cubes in my head, and it has the disadvantage of being upbeat and entertaining. All that said, though, my usual rule of thumb is 'the ugliest short wins.' Petits Cubes is way uglier than Presto but it's possible one of the others is even uglier!
*okay, probably not
Make-up
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Dark Knight
Hellboy II: The Golden Army
Again, Benjamin Button probably has better makeup, but Hellboy definitely has more. That movie is makeup central. And it's actually really good. It's good enough to earn the Oscar as well as get it, and I say this even though I know that some of the makeup in Dark Knight was on Heath Ledger's face. So I may well be wrong.
Film editing
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
The Dark Knight
Frost/Nixon
Milk
Slumdog Millionaire
Again, don't know much about editing, but Dark Knight is my pick on account of a)being an action movie, which is a great place to show off your flashy editing skillz [see Best/More] and b)it's friggin' Dark Knight.
Costume design
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Australia
Milk
The Duchess
Revolutionary Road
I really liked the costumes in Australia, especially at the beginning where they contributed to the cartoony feel of the film. On the other hand The Duchess had pretty dresses and Keira Knightley, who is an excellent clothes horse, especially if the movie includes corsets in the wardrobe. Plus movie people seemed not to like Australia much.
Cinematography
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Changeling
The Dark Knight
Slumdog Millionaire
The Reader
I know I'm going against Dark Knight here, but my theory is you can sit back and see the cinematography in Benjamin Button. This may have been a bad judgment.
Art Direction
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Changeling
The Dark Knight
The Duchess
Revolutionary Road
I am voting against Dark Knight again, but Changeling is a period piece and, judging by the trailer, involved a lot more image manipulation through filters and such in post-production.
Best original song
Down To Earth - Wall-E
Jai Ho - Slumdog Millionaire
O Saya - Slumdog Millionaire
It may feel good to vote for ethnic music but even that cannot defeat the combined force of environmentalism and Peter Gabriel. Also the title can be taken two different ways, how cool is that?
Best original score
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Defiance
Milk
Slumdog Millionaire
Wall-E
Thomas Newman has been nominated for an Oscar 10 times and has never won. Add that sob story to being the go-to guy when you want your audience to cry (the Academy loves crying at movies) and the Midas touch of Wall-E and I think this may be his ticket to the little golden man. He might even have earned it, too, as the music carried the story almost as much as the sound effects ... which means it has a better chance of being noticed in the first place.
Best Adapted Screenplay
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Doubt
Frost/Nixon
The Reader
Slumdog Millionaire
F Scott Fitzgerald. He's famous and respected in the literary community. That the movie is generally well-liked by people who might have read the original gives it 50% more Art Points. To a lesser degree we've got some Best/More going on as well; the original was a short story and they turned it into a movie that's over two and a half hours long – that's a lot of adapting! I'm not so sure if that applies to this category, though; I suspect there might be some small value placed on faithfulness to the original.
Best Original Screenplay
Happy-Go-Lucky
Milk
Wall-E
In Bruges
Frozen River
Voting for writing on a movie which doesn't have any dialogue until halfway through is bold and experimental (but in this case also accessible!) and wins you Bonus Art Points. (Wait, why isn't Dark Knight in this category? Could it be you actually didn't like the story that much?? You've blown your cover, Academy!)
Best Animated Feature Film
Bolt
Kung Fu Panda
Wall-E
The only way this would have been a toss-up is if Wall-E had landed a nomination for Best Picture. Since it didn't, it has to win here.
Best Foreign Language Film
Revanche - Austria
The Class - France
The Baader Meinhof Complex - Germany
Departures - Japan
Waltz With Bashir - Israel
It's not about WWII but it is war + Israel, which almost = WWII's poor cousin. Also it is stylized (Art Points!), is personal, delving, and dreamlike at times (Humanism Points!), and challenges our prejudices regarding the conflict in the Middle East (Politics Points!). In a shocking and profound twist, the last few minutes are live-action archive footage! Double Art Points!
Best Supporting Actor
Josh Brolin - Milk
Robert Downey Jr - Tropic Thunder
Philip Seymour Hoffman - Doubt
Heath Ledger - The Dark Knight
Michael Shannon - Revolutionary Road
Is this even a question.
Best supporting actress
Amy Adams - Doubt
Penelope Cruz - Vicky Cristina Barcelona
Viola Davis - Doubt
Taraji P Henson - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Marisa Tomei - The Wrestler
Amy Adams may get it if Meryl Streep does not get hers, and Marisa Tomei if Mickey Rourke doesn't win, but to the best of my judgment this one's a mystery ... I decided to play the race card as tiebreaker.
Best Actress
Anne Hathaway - Rachel Getting Married
Angelina Jolie - Changeling
Melissa Leo - Frozen River
Meryl Streep - Doubt
Kate Winslet - The Reader
Hollywood loves scandal and has a perverse fascination with the religious. If the priest in Doubt turned out to be innocent, Kate Winslet's chances improve, but if it's left open-ended, or Meryl Streep's character continues in her certainty to the end even in the face of evidence, or is so shaken by the result that she quits the Catholic church and at the end of the movie faces an uncertain world and/or a loss of identity, she's more or less got it in the bag.
Best actor
Richard Jenkins - The Visitor
Frank Langella - Frost/Nixon
Sean Penn - Milk
Brad Pitt - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Mickey Rourke - The Wrestler
Voting for Sean Penn is like voting no on Prop 8 again! +5 Politics Points! Second place would be Mickey Rourke, +3 Humanist Points for an identity crisis and the human experience. I don't think anyone could watch themselves vote for Brad Pitt, even if Best/More is on his side.
Best Director
Danny Boyle - Slumdog Millionaire
Stephen Daldry - The Reader
David Fincher - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Ron Howard - Frost/Nixon
Gus Van Sant - Milk
This is closely tied to Best Picture – whoever wins that category could throw off Director, either in their favour or against. It's like a crazy tilt-o-wheel of Hollywood politics! I'm going with Danny Boyle here because I'm not confident Slumdog will win Best Picture, and I've heard his name in connection with his movie more than any of the other directors' with theirs (though that may be the influence of the BBC).
Best picture
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Frost/Nixon
Milk
The Reader
Slumdog Millionaire
My theory is that Benjamin Button and Slumdog will split a large percentage of the vote, leaving The Reader's voters with a majority. It has something to do with the Holocaust, which is always a good sign, and is also about guilt, national identity, love, coming to grips with your past, and other human experience stuff. If it's depressing, that's even better! Its only drawback is that it hasn't gotten much publicity and they're trying to make the Oscars more 'accessible' to the masses by voting for movies the masses have actually heard of, so ... who knows? Milk also has a chance for the same reasons as Sean Penn, but I think chances are higher in the Best Actor category.
Can I just mention how glad I am Dark Knight wasn't nominated for Best Picture? Thanks.
2:17 am
Having now seen Benjamin Button, I hope it wins everything, even categories it's not nominated for. The end.
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Date: 2009-01-28 04:05 am (UTC)