Oscarwatch 2012 – An Introduction

SO.  As those of you were around last year know, being a total film nerd, my Award Season goal was to see every single picture nominated in the major categories (The Big 6 – see below) before the awards at the end of Feb and prognosticate accordingly.  Last year, I managed to knock off a respectable 13/15 which resulted in my WORST EVER batch of predictions (3/6 – see the total interweb devastion HERE).  Turns out, it’s a lot easier to pick your James Coburns and your Marcia Gay Hardens (suck on that Losers) when you haven’t seen the films and you just go by gut.  I mean, in all fairness, Tom Hooper’s win was the most pointless win in the history of Sandra Bullock, mostly because the Kings Speech may as well have been directed by my sofa.  But, I’ll take my lumps (damned permanent internet history ruining all chances of revisionist history..) and have another go this year.

As my major movie orgy progresses, I’ll be updated with my own personal preference rankings based on who deserves it, as well as who I think is going to win.  Unfortunately, this also means I’m going to have to actually watch things like Albert Nobbs, which still sounds uncomfortably like a British Gay Porn movie from the 1970’s.  But, there are 18 movies rounding out the Big 6 this year and, currently, I’ve seen 4 of them.  So, I’ve only got 14 to go and 4 weeks to make it happen.  EASY.

So, here is each category as it stands so far.  I’ve grouped each one into two groups, the above being the ones I’ve already seen, in order of who I think DESERVES to win and the bottom the ones I’ve yet to see in order of some random pattern based on the first letter of each of their titles.  It’s kind of like my Netflix queue, if there were Netflix queues for Oscar Trophies (or, if I had any idea of how a Netflix queue works – basically, everything I know about Netflix I learned from Kelly Kappoor).

Here we go :-

BEST PICTURE

The Artist
The Descendants
Midnight In Paris

Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close
The Help
Hugo
Moneyball
The Tree Of Life
War Horse

BEST ACTOR

George Clooney – The Descendants
Jean Dujardin – The Artist

Demian Bichir – A Better Life
Gary Oldman – Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
Brad Pitt – Moneyball

BEST ACTRESS

Glenn Close – Albert Nobbs
Viola Davis – The Help
Rooney Mara – The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
Meryl Streep – The Iron Lady
Michelle Williams – My Week With Marilyn

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Kenneth Branagh – My Week With Marilyn
Jonah Hill – Moneyball
Nick Nolte – Warrior
Christopher Plummer – Beginners
Max Van Sydow – Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Melissa McCarthy – Bridesmaids
Berenice Bejo – The Artist

Jessica Chastain – The Help
Janet McTeer – Albert Nobbs
Octavia Spencer – The Help

BEST DIRECTOR

Michael Hazanavicius – The Artist
Woody Allen – Midnight In Paris
Alexander Payne – The Descendants

Terrence Malick – The Tree Of Life
Martin Scorcese – Hugo

I’ll also update each week with my general thoughts on the movies I’ve watched that particular week.  I’d love to do proper reviews, but methinks that 14 movies in 4 weeks is ambitious enough project as is for a busy career woman such as myself.  I will give a special mention now though to several actors who have every right to go all Kung Fu Panda on the Academy’s asses though

Tilda Swinton – We Need To Talk About Kevin
Kirsten Dunst – Melancholia
Shailene Woodley – The Descendants
Patton Oswalt – Young Adult
Owen Wilson – Midnight In Paris
Kirsten Wiig – Bridesmaids
John Goodman – The Artist
Ryan Gosling – Drive
Charlize Theron – Young Adult
Matt Damon – Contagion
Pretty Much the Entire Supporting Cast of Midnight In Paris – Midnight In Paris (particularly Marion Cottilliard, Alison Pill, Kathy Bates, Adrien Brody and Corey Stoll)

oh and UGGIE THE DOG – The Artist

The Top 3 or 4 of those in particular really deserve to be livid.  AMAZING performances.

Anyway, I’m off to bed early as I’m going to knock off either Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy or Hugo 3D tomorrow night, so need my rest.  Plus, I just saw The Artist, so I have to knock a few out to Jean Dujardin.  And then lay in bed and fantasize idly about silently spending the rest of my life with him.