Oscar Predictions
 

So, tomorrow (tuesday) they announce the nominations for the 2006 Academy Awards!!

What are your predictions???

Mine for Best Picture -
Little Miss Sunshine
The Queen
The Departed
Babel
Flags of our Fathers

I'll post my predictions when I get back into the office tomorrow.

Sheesh, you'd think with all those screeners, I'd remember some of the movies that aspire to Oscar nominations. But I think I overloaded, and forgot most of them.

My pics for best pic:

Children of Men
Little Children
The Queen

yep, those are the ones I liked.

I found The Departed over-rated. Loved Pan's Labyrinth, but it's a foreign language shoe-in. Casino Royale is probably my favorite film of the year, but it's not Oscar-worthy. I hated Babel for a best picture Oscar worse than Gemini Cricket hated Crash last year for the same. Dreamgirls was craptacular, imo. And I've yet to see Notes on a Scandal, so I hope a nomination is forthcoming to inspire me to actually go to the movies.

I think Leonard DiCaprio should be nominated for both his films (as he was for the Globes) and I think Cate Blanchette deserves at least two nominations as well. Helen Mirren is sure to get one. Mark Wahlberg and Jack Nicolson were both great in The Departed. Toni Collette deserves a nom for Little Miss Sunshine and Kate Winslet one for Little Children.

I'm cutting it close! We're up early to watch the announcements. (Such geeks!)

For best pic:
Little Miss Sunshine
The Departed
The Queen
Letters from Iwo Jima
Dreamgirls

(Of the movies I actually liked, swap out Departed for Pan's, and Dreamgirls for Volver. I'm already taking a chance on Iwo Jima, hoping that Babel polarized the audience enough to pass it by.)

Mine, assorted:
Best actress, Helen Mirren, Kate Winslet, Judi Dench, Meryl Streep, Penelope Cruz
Best supporting actress, Abigail Breslin, Toni Colette, Jennifer Hudson
Best supporting actor, Djimon Honsou, Alan Arkin, Michael Sheen, Jack Nicholson, Eddie Murphy
Best actor: I didn't love any performance enough to care.
Director, Iwo Jima, Little Miss Sunshine, The Queen, The Departed
Editing/Art Direction/Cinematography: Children of Men, Pan's Labyrinth


Tom's, for best pic:
Departed
Dreamgirls
Babel
Little Miss Sunshine
The Queen

Interesting...

No Best Pic nom for 'Dreamgirls'.
No Best Acting nom for 'Borat'.
No Best Supporting nom for 'The Queen'.
No Best Director nom for 'Volver'.

Love that Abigail Breslin and Alan Arkin got nominated for 'Sunshine'.
Love that 'Pan's' and 'Children of Men' got a few noms.
Love that 'United 93' got a directing nom.
Love that Gore might go up there to receive an Oscar.

Interesting nominations.

I hope I get to see Jesus Camp. I wanted to go see it at the Tribeca Film Festival. The clips I've seen are just bizarre!

It's coming via Netflix to me today sometime. I'm really interested. Bizarre is the word.

My relief at Dreamgirls getting shut out of Best Picture and Best Director does not compensate for my disapppintment at the cluelessness of the general Academy in nominating Babel for both awards. Bah.

Though I'll readily admit the two women who got best supporting nods from that picture were terrific. I'm glad Kate Winslet got a best actress nom for Little Children. That's a great picture and should be more widely seen, imo.

I'm ecstatic about Peter O'Toole's best actor nod. He was fantastic, and Venus likewise deserves greater visibility.

I'm pleased that Paul Greengrass got a best director nom for United 93, and that it got an editing nomination. That was just a terrific movie. If Greengrass goes on to win, it might just make up for his movie missing its just desserts as a Best Picture nominee.

The acting noms for Little Miss Sunshine are cool, but I think Toni Collette was wrongly overlooked. Meryl Streep, while I adore her, was merely a supporting player (imo) in The Devil Wears Prada ... but I guess when you're Meryl Streep, your persona looms larger than your actual role.

Mark Wahlberg's nom for best supporting was d'uh ... but I'm surprised Nicolson got nada. It was his best performance in decades. He actually didn't play Jack Nicholson in the role. It's nice that DiCaprio's nod came for Blood Diamond instead of The Departed. He was good in both films, but - - heheh, I loved his SouthAfrikan accent in his nominated performance.

Bah that Children of Men got only screenplay, cinematography and editing. It had terrific performances by Clive Owen and Michael Caine, was fantastically directed by Alfonso Cuaron, and was simply the best movie I've seen in a long time.

It's also too bad that the far-more pedestrian Letters from Iwo Jima shone in the noms much brighter than Flags of Our Fathers, which got only a few tech nods.

Helen Mirren's nom as The Queen was approrpriate. Now I've got to go out and see Forest Whitaker as Idi Amin and Judi Dench in Notes on a Scandal. All things being equal, I'll likely root for Judi Dench, playing a fictional character.

I'm also going to have to catch Penelope Cruz's performance in Volver and Ryan Gosling in Half Nelson. I'm surprised at how many best actor and actress nominated performances were missed in my annual screener deluge. Seems I'll be hitting a few pre-Oscar movies at the cinema after all.

Comedies barely ever win best pic. Even a dark comedy has the odds against it. Still, I'll be rooting for Little Miss Sunshine. :)

Am I truly in a tiny minority when I say that I don't like dramas all that much? I'm not saying they're bad. When I do see them I "enjoy" them, but most of the time, I don't want to cry my eyes out and think depressed thoughts for a week after seeing a film.

That said, I'm still kinda bummed we haven't seen The Departed yet.

Three songs from Dreamgirls? THREE? :rolleyes: Yeah, I haven't seen it, but that seems a bit much.