2012 Oscar Prediction Post Addendum
Posted on February 26, 2012 Posted by John Scalzi 15 Comments
Every year when the Oscar nominations are announced I make predictions in the top six categories (here’s this year’s), and then closer to the ceremony I (if necessary) tweak my initial guesses. This year I need to do some tweaking, so here’s what I think will go down.
Best Picture & Best Director: In these categories I was leaning toward The Descendants and Alexander Payne, respectively, although I mentioned at the time it was a razor-thin contest between The Descendants/Payne and The Artist/Michel Hazanavicius. In the interim it looks like The Descendants has lost some steam, so now I’m going for The Artist and Hazanavicus to win. It’s that whole “Harvey Weinstein knows how to win Oscars” thing. There’s an outside chance Hugo/Martin Scorsese might sneak in there, but it really is an outside chance.
Supporting Actress: I went with Melissa McCarthy because, I don’t know, I thought the Academy might be adventurous this year. at this point, however, I suspect the relatively safe choice of Octavia Spencer. Although given the momentum of The Artist, it’s entirely possible that Bérénice Bejo might sneak off with this one. If she does, it’s going to be a long night for everyone involved with every other film, because The Artist is going to sweep.
Supporting Actor: I picked Max von Sydow here, but everyone tells me it’s Christopher Plummer’s year. Well, fine. As a “body of work” award, von Sydow should get it, but I’m not going to complain if Plummer picks it off, since he’s not exactly chopped liver in the career category either.
As noted when I first made predictions, this year’s been pretty opaque for me in terms of making guesses, and I’m sort of resigned to doing rather worse than my usual 5-for-6 record when it comes to Oscar predictions. I am not-so-strangely okay with this, however, since it suggests a more interesting Oscar year than other years. In any event we’ll find out this evening.
Regarding Supporting Actress, I’ll have to disagree. It would not be “adventurous” for the Academy to give this to Melissa McCarthy, it would be wrong. McCarthy is a fine actress, better in Gilmore Girls than either Bridesmaids or Mike & Molly, but her work in Bridesmaids is not worthy of an Oscar. Maybe Octavia Spencer is the “safe” choice but she is also more deserving than McCarthy. Honestly, Berenice Bejo or Janet McTeer are far more deserving. Oscars may not always go to the best actor of the year (yes, I’m looking at you, Marisa Tomei), but choosing someone just because it would be adventurous or shake things up is not the better option.
The French equivalent to the Oscar ceremony, the “César”, was held yesterday ; The Artist did indeed sweep there — basically, all major categories, except best actor.
Stupid questions, hope you don’t mind. Everyone asks, “what would your ‘last meal’ be”. What would your ‘last movie’ be? What is one old movie you really recommend because it does not get enough respect?
My first reaction to ‘last movie’ was Citizen Cane but that is almost cliche so I’ll cheat & say The Third Man
I also think Leap Of Faith does not get the credit it deserves (and suspect it may be because Steve Martin is the lead in a serious movie. They are reviving it as a Broadway Musical so I bet it will get remade with a “serious” actor & does very well.
I would not be surprised if “The Artist” did sweep. I saw it this afternoon with my daughter in anticipation of the Oscars. Really quite good, but also really quite different.
It’s looking like Hugo‘s night so far.
…or, maybe not.
OK, Meryl Streep won for another mannered, over-rated performance.
Gary Oldman didn’t win for a performance that reminded us he can do a lot more than masticate innocent scenery.
Hereby is made an irrefutable case for euthanizing the acting wing of The Academy, or at least trying to get the average age of the voting membership down a couple of decades.
Plummer won. Nice to see an old Klingon get some recognition ;-)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chang_(Star_Trek)
PS my ‘last movie’ would be ‘The Adventures of Robin Hood.’ Why not?
You know, ever year I find out more people I know stop watching the Oscars. They “lost” their wonder for my generation (X) about a decade ago. Which is fine, since they started out to be a ceremony by the industry for the industry; the general population only got sold on it as part of the “glamor” of Hollywood.
But to those who won: Congratulations.
What struck me is that Oscar seems to have turned his golden back on literary adaptations this year. Hugo, The Help, The Descendants, War Horse, and TTSS are all adaptations, and for the most part they were shut out in favour of a silent film. Hugo won a bunch of technical awards, but that also continued the evening’s trend of showcasing films about film.
One of the montages showed a bunch of popular films, including for example, Star Wars. I’m curious how many of those films received nominations for picture, director, acting or screen play e.g. stuff other than visual effects & makeup. How many received any nominations at all?
It makes me think a bit about SF awards. In SF, the Nebulas are analogous to the Oscars, but in my opinion, people are generally more interested in Hugos which I suppose are more akin to the People’s Choice awards.
@Mike: Star Wars was nominated for Best Picture, Director and Original Screenplay (really); Alec Guinness also got a nod for Best Supporting Actor.
“Star Wars was nominated for Best Picture, Director and Original Screenplay (really)”
Oops. I admit I didn’t look it up. Original screenplay?
I don’t have a list of the films in the montage to look up, but gut impression was that they were films that had done better in the box office than at the academy. I’m certainly prepared to be wrong and it certainly wasn’t universally true. Rocky was in the montage did well at the Oscars. Will the equivalent montage 30 years from now include The Artist?
The Oscars went as expected. My only disappointment was Best Actress. Viola Davis was far more deserving.