It is outrageous that Lincoln won’t win everything, but this is the likely outcome.
Best Picture, Argo. Best Direction Ang Li, Life of Pi. Best Screenplay, Mark Boal, Zero Dark Thirty. Best Adapted Screenplay, Tony Kushner, Lincoln. Best Actor, Daniel Day-Lewis, Lincoln. Best Actress, Emmanuele Riva, Amour. Best Supporting Actress, Anne Hathaway, Les Miserables. Best Supporting Actor, Tommy Lee Jones, Lincoln.
Best Foreign Film, A Royal Affair. Best Cinematography, Lincoln. Best Art Direction, Lincoln. Best Costuming, Les Mis. Best Hair And Makeup, The Hobbitt. Best Editing, Argo. Best Visual Effects, Life of Pi. Best Sound Editing, Skyfall.
It is unlikely Moonrise Kingdom, a fine film, will get anything, or Skyfall, a great film, too much. Argo after The Artist and Slumdog Millionaire is a certainty, as the Academy members get more and more trivial and self-referential. They will be charmed by the joke ‘Argo fuck yourself’ and keen to reward it.
It is just possible Steven Spielberg will get Best Direction for Lincoln, or Michael Haneke for Amour. Amour may also, bizarrely, get Best Foreign Film. I’m unsure how this happens, but it does.
If Anna Karenina gets anything I will blow myself up in the Russian Embassy.
Name:
No list is complete without Silver Linings Playbook. Watching it yesterday it crossed my mind that here was the perfect movie until the last few minutes reverted to the typical Hollywood ending.
David O. Russell directs and is responsible for a screenplay that is second to none. Robert De Niro is back to as good as he gets as the father of an adult son just released a mental institution. Bradley Cooper nailed the part of the son and Jackie Weaver is, as usual, perfect in the role of wife and mother. The script really shines in the scenes where family and friends are in conversation, talking over each other in an attempt to be heard. It’s a movie I’ll watch again and again.
Have you seen it Bob?
Thanks for the hint, Hempanon, will see Silver Lining…
Also Haneke’s Amour.
Yes, I’ve seen it, and loved most of it and was dismayed, like you, by the dance class Hollywood ending.
Best film of all time? I still can’t figure out which was the best film of 1939!
I forget whose quote it was,you may know. The list included
Gone with the Wind
The Wizard of Oz
Mr Smith Goes to Washington
Goodbye Mr Chips
Of Mice and Men
Wuthering Heights
Beau Geste
Dark Victory
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Its a Wonderful World
Jesse James
The Man in the Iron Mask
Ninotchka
Elizabeth and Essex
The Three Musketeers
and yes, Young Mr Lincoln!
Its a cruel world with so much competition for one award.
You forgot another John Ford classic Stagecoach
Peter Bogdanovitch, in Esquire.
Thanks Bob.
For those who are interested, here is his article :
http://www.clivejames.com/peter-bogdanovich/best-american-movies-1939
A view from a couple of people with a vote….
Bob have you seen Amour? What say you?
Am seeing it today.
Ana Karenina - Best Costume. Off you go Ellis. The site of you exploding in the foyer of the Russian Embassy will be something to behold.
I’m in Canberra at the moment till Saturday Bob. Im staying not far from the Russian embassy. If you are coming down with your suicide belt, let me know in advance and i’ll document the event for you and your readers on YouTube.
Don’t do it Bob! Best costume? WTF is that - just above “most important contribution by a three legged dog”!
A big cop out on the best doco. I loved Searching for Sugarman because I have long been a huge fan of Rodriguez and have had his album Cold Fact in various forms since it came out.
But I also watched The Invisible War about rape in the US armed forces and the lack of consequences, and with two films critical of Israel made from both sides of the fence it is easy to see the Academy simply did not want to offend one country.