The Big Day/Predictions

Today is the big day! I can hardly contain my excitement.

My tradition for Oscar Day is to sleep in a bit, but not too late. Wake up mid-morning and watch any Nominated movies I have left. I read up on my Oscar editions of Entertainment Weekly and The Hollywood Reporter. E! starts airing Oscar related programming in the early afternoon. I usually let this start to record for an hour or two before I start watching because I fast forward through the parts where they dress random people up in gowns and last year there was even a tiger involved for some reason. I start watching live for the red carpet and finalize my predictions during this time. When ABC starts airing their red carpet I switch back and forth with E!'s coverage for a bit. E!'s is always better though; they just do this more often. Finally the show starts and it's magical.

This year, my only deviation from my past tradition is that I firmed up my predictions earlier in the day so I could share them here. So without further ado, here are my final Oscar Predictions.

Category	Who will win	Who I want to win
Best Picture	12 Years a Slave. This is an incredibly close race and many are predicting Gravity, but I think it will win in more of the technical races leaving Best Picture to 12 Years a Slave.	This was a strong year for film and I liked all of the Nominees except Captain Phillips. If I could vote on my own Oscar ballot though, my choice would be Nebraska. I think 12 Years a Slave should win, but Nebraska was my favorite.
Best Actor	Matthew McConaughey. This one is pretty much a lock. The only award he didn’t win this season was the BAFTA but he wasn’t even nominated.	All of the performances in this category were award worthy. My favorites were Leonardo DiCaprio and Chiwetel Ejiofor. Both were tour de force performances, but I’m gonna choose Chiwetel Ejiofor.
Best Actress	Cate Blancett. This is another easily predictable category. Blanchett has won every major award for her role in Blue Jasmine.	Cate Blanchett is fantastic. While I thought her performance was great, I found the movie to be wanting.  My favorite performance though, was Amy Adams.
Best Supporting Actor	Jared Leto. There’s no doubt he will win in this category.	I have to choose Jered Leto as well. I was pleasantly surprised by how great Jonah Hill was in Wolf of Wall Street, but Leto completely disappears into his role.
Best Supporting Actress	Jennifer Lawrence. I’m taking a risk on this one because it might be Lupita Nyong’o. But I bet against Lawrence last year and was wrong.	This was a hard decision to make. Lupita Nyong’o is amazing in her role, but there’s something about her that I find un-genuine (and I really disliked her attitude during the BAFTAs). So, I’m going to stick with Jennifer Lawrence.
Best Director	Alfonso Cauron. Just as Ang Lee won last year for directing a technical wonder, so will Cuaron.	Alexander Payne is quickly becoming one of my favorite directors. Nebraska was beautiful and it’s a gutsy choice to shoot a film in black in white when it’s not a period piece.
Best Adapted Screenplay	12 Years a Slave. The WGA Award went to Captain Phillips, but 12 Years a Slave has been winning a lot of the others.	I think it would be pretty cool if Steve Coogan won for Philomena, but I have to go with Julie Delpy, Ethan Hawke, and Richard Linklater for Before Midnight. I love this film trilogy and they deserve some love for keeping the story of these characters fresh for nearly two decades.
Best Original Screenplay	Her. Spike Jonze wrote a truly original story. There’s also a chance David O. Russell may win for American Hustle as he did at the BAFTAs.	Spike Jonze wrote a beautiful and thought provoking script. I have to choose Her.
Best Cinematography	Gravity. Gravity has pretty much swept the awards for this category.	I do think Gravity’s cinematography is great and should win, but I would choose Prisoners because it was my favorite movie of 2013 and this was its’ single Nomination.
Best Animated Feature	Frozen. There’s not really a contest here.	I saw all but one of the Nominees (Ernest & Celestine) in this category and I don’t know that this was the strongest year for Animated films. That said, I’d pick The Wind Rises because at least it isn’t computer animated and it’s Hayao Miyazaki’s swan song.
Best Documentary Feature	20 Feet From Stardom. It’s the lone “feel good” Nominee and is about show biz. There’s still a chance The Act of Killing could take it though.	I really liked 20 Feet From Stardom, but The Act of Killing is the more “important” film.
Best Documentary Short	The Lady in Number 6: Music Saved My Life. A film about the oldest living Holocaust survivor (at the time it was filmed) who survived because she was a concert pianist. Of course this will win.	I saw three of the five nominees and thought The Lady in Number 6: Music Saved My Life was the best.
Best Live Action Short	Avant Que De Tout Perdre (Just Before Losing Everything). There is a chance the more sentimental vote could go to Helium.	I did watch all of these and Helium really moved me, but Avant Que De Tout Perdre (Just Before Losing Everything) was stunning. The filmmakers made a woman’s final flight with her children from her abusive husband feel like a Hitchcockian thriller.
Best Animated Short	Get a Horse! It was the short before Frozen so it’s been the most widely seen short.	I saw all of these as well and I really like Room on the Broom from the same filmmakers who made The Gruffalo a few years ago, but the best was Mr. Hublot.
Best Song	“Let it Go” from Frozen. It’s won everything else.	I would be happy if any of the Nominees in this category won, but I’ll be rooting for “The Moon Song” from Her because I want to see Karen O win an Oscar.
Best Score	Gravity. It’s been winning everything.	As I’ve written before, I really didn’t like Gravity’s score so my choice is Her.
Best Costume Design	The Great Gatsby. It’s a race between the period dramas for this one. I might be wrong and American hustle will take it.	Last May I said The Great Gatsby would win so I’m sticking with that.
Best Production Design	The Great Gatsby. The sets were fabulous.	I made the same prediction last May for this as well; The Great Gatsby.
Best Makeup & Hairstyling	Dallas Buyers Club. I just don’t see most of the older members of the Academy voting for either of the other nominees, especially Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa.	Dallas Buyers Club, of course.
Best Foreign Language Film	The Great Beauty. It seems to have the most support and has been praised for being Fellini-esque.	I’ve only seen two of the five nominees in this category, including The Great Beauty. It was a little bizarre and to existential for my taste, so I pick the moving The Broken Circle Breakdown.
Best Visual Effects	Gravity. There’s no doubt here.	I may have had issues with the movie but there’s no denying the visual effects of Gravity.
Best Editing	Gravity. I’m not sure, but I’m going with this one because of the mix of editing performance with Visual Effects.	Editing is one of those categories that I’m never sure what to pick, but I’ll root for 12 Years a Slave.
Best Sound Mixing	Gravity. This had a great balance of sound and silence.	The Sound Mixing and Sound Editing categories confound me a bit, so Gravity all around.
Best Sound Editing	Gravity.	Gravity.

Well, that's what I'm sticking to at this point. I saw more Nominated films this year before Oscar night than ever before. The best I've done in years past is getting 19 of 24 Categories correct. Let's see if my extra effort paid off. I hope you all enjoy your Oscar Night! I know I will. Just 30 minutes until the Red Carpet starts!

(I'll be live Tweeting the Red Carpet if you want to follow along @MandaAiley)

Documentaries, Scores and More

Only two days left to go until the big night! Time to tackle some more Oscar Categories.

Documentary
Last night I finished watching all of the Best Documentary Feature Nominees. I watched all five within the past week and I found them all fascinating.  This year, the documentaries have two distinct themes: art and war.

The first one I saw was Cutie and the Boxer, which highlights the lives of married artists Ushio and Noriko Shinohara. I was expecting a documentary purely about art and was pleasantly surprised to find a deeper, complicated view of marriage and lasting love.

Next up was The Square, a look at the young revolutionaries behind the Egyptian Revolution in 2011. I'll admit that when I'd first read the description of this documentary I didn't have much interest in it, but it was a great film. I hope the filmmakers continue to follow what's going on in Egypt and maybe have a series of documentaries as things progress a la the Paradise Lost documentaries.

Continuing with the "war" theme I next watched Dirty Wars, a film featuring journalist Jeremy Scahill's investigation into the role of JSOC in the War on Terror. This was my least favorite of the documentaries. It's interesting and quite frankly scary to think about the power that JSOC has, but I felt like Jeremy Scahill was the star versus the story being the star. Good documentaries are about the story, not the person telling the story.

My penultimate documentary viewing was 20 Feet From Stardom, a delightful behind-the-scenes glimpse at the music industry's back-up singers since the 50's and 60's through today. I really enjoyed this film and it was a nice change of pace after watching so many bleaker films.

Finally I watched The Act of Killing, which truly married the themes of art and war, with my husband. Both of us sat stunned as we watched the story unfold of "gangsters" (essentially mass murderers) who killed thousands of communists in Indonesia in the mid 1960's. What is so stunning about this film though, is that these "gangsters" are being filmed as they make a movie about how they did the killings; most of them with no remorse at all.

As of right now I'm struggling between whether I think The Act of Killing or 20 Feet From Stardom will win come Sunday night. The Act of Killing is a strong contender and has been sweeping up most of the awards this season, but it has disturbing subject matter and can be difficult to watch. If the Academy ends up swinging towards 12 Years a Slave for Best Picture members may not want to reward another sad, difficult movie. 20 Feet From Stardom would be the answer. It's sparkly, mostly happy, full of singing, and a behind-the-scenes look at show-biz, which the Academy loves. 20 Feet From Stardom also has the best production value of all the Best Documentary Feature Nominees.

Score
Last weekend I finished watching all of the Best Original Score nominees and this is the category that I have the most issues with. I've written before about how great the scores were for 12 Years and Slave and Nebraska and now that I've seen all of the nominees I think they should have been included over others.

The first score I found to be wanting is from Gravity. In fact, I was a little underwhelmed by the whole movie. I didn't see it until it had been out for four months and it didn't quite live up to the hype. Good movie, but not the most fantastic thing ever. For a movie that takes place in a the vastness of space there needs to be a score that can fill part of the void. However, Steven Price's score doesn't do this. It had some high points, which were all featured in the trailer, but beyond that I found it to be rather forgettable. What was more interesting was director Alfonso Cuaron's use of silence in key scenes. (I would trade in Hans Zimmer's 12 Years a Slave score here.)

The other Nominee that I think could have been replaced  is Thomas Newman's score for Saving Mr. Banks. The movie was charming (I'm little surprised Emma Thompson wasn't nominated for Best Actress, but I'm not sure who she would have replaced) and so was the score, but not necessarily Oscar worthy. I want more originality out of my Oscar nominated scores and I think Mark Orton's score for Nebraska had more character.

The Nominee that surprised me the most was John Williams' score for The Book Thief. I went into the movie expecting to not be wowed by the score because it seems like some years Williams is nominated because he's "John Williams", not because it's a great score.  However, I  was pleasantly surprised. It was a nice movie, though the pacing was a bit slow at times, but the score really stood out and kept the movie moving even through the slower parts.

I really like the final two nominees even though they are very different. William Butler (of Arcade Fire) and Owen Pallett's score for Her was fun and quirky. In the past few years the Academy has been rewarding fun, original, inventive scores like A.R. Rahman's score for Slumdog Millionaire and Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross' score for The Social Network. It would be interesting if Butler and Pallett win for Best Original Score and Karen O wins for Best Original Song, not just because they're both nominated for Her, but it would also be a win for the indie rockers.

Finally, I'd be really happy if Alexandre Desplat won for his score for Philomena. I thought the score fit perfectly with the movie and Desplat is incredibly adept at hitting the emotional cues without being showy. He's fast becoming one of my favorite film composers. I listen to his score for Wes Anderson's Moonrise Kingdom in my car all the time and can't wait to see what he's done with Anderson's The Grand Budapest Hotel in March.

Visual Effects
Best Visual Effects is the Category that tends to include more of the summer tent pole movies and this year is no exception. Iron Man 3, The Lone Ranger, and Star Trek Into Darkness all came out last spring or summer. All three had spectacular effects, but who would have thought last July that The Lone Ranger would be an Oscar Nominee? And it's a double nominee (for Best Makeup and Hairstyling)! The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug also has great effects. They created a fabulous dragon, but there's only one nominee that seems to matter this year. Gravity. Even though I was underwhelmed by the movie as a whole, there's no denying that it's visual effects are dazzling.

Makeup and Hairstyling
As I just wrote, The Lone Ranger was a surprising inclusion on the Oscar Nominee list, though it did have some impressive facial hair. (Not at much as in The Hobbit, though.) However, the Nominee that shocked me the most in this Category was Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa. I'll admit I have not seen this movie and have absolutley no desire to do so. It is very rare that I'll refuse to see an Oscar Nominated movie, but after I was dragged to see the last Jackass movie and had to leave the theatre half way through because I was about to throw up, I swore to never watch another one. I'm rooting for the third nominee, Dallas Buyers Club. It's a great movie and the makeup was done really well. It takes a lot to make Matthew McConaughey look bad and Jared Leto's makeup was fabulous.

Well, that's enough for tonight. I meant to have this up before midnight but that didn't quite work. Also, I was featured in the local paper yesterday in an article about trying to see all of the Oscar Nominees. Check it out here:  http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/life_and_entertainment/2014/02/27/fans-hustle-to-see-top-titles-before-oscars.html

Until tomorrow!