The Oscars

[Alex]

Well, having watched Babel last night I have now filled out quite a few categories. It won't have much of an impact on my preferences, though, since there is pretty much nothing I liked about it. The only film nominated for a major award that I think is completely unworthy (for the most part, even if I don't think they were in the top five, it isn't unreasonable that others would).

So, my rankings from actual nominations (best to least):

Best Picture
1. The Departed
2. Little Miss Sunshine
3. Letters from Iwo Jima
4. The Queen
27. Babel

(My pick for best picture, Children of Men, wasn't even nominated.)

Best Actor
1. Peter O'Toole - Venus
2. Forest Whitaker - The Last King of Scotland
3. Leonardo DiCaprio - Blood Diamond
Unseen - Ryan Gosling - Half Nelson
Unssen - Will Smith - Pursuit of Happyness

Best Actress
1. Penelope Cruz - Volver
2. Judi Dench - Notes on a Scandal
3. Kate Winslet - Little Children
4. Helen Mirren - The Queen
5. Meryl Streep - The Devil Wears Prada

Best Supporting Actor
1. Jackie Earle Haley - Little Children
2. Alan Arkin - Little Miss Sunshine
3. Mark Wahlberg - The Departed
4. Djimon Hounsou - Blood Diamond
5. Eddie Murphy - Dreamgirls

Best Supporting Actress
1. Jennifer Hudson - Dreamgirls
2. Abigail Breslin - Little Miss Sunshine
3. Cate Blanchett - Notes on a Scandal
4. Rinko Kinkuchi - Babel
5. Adriana Barraza - Babel

Best Director1. Paul Greengrass - United 93
2. Martin Scorcese - The Departed
3. Clint Eastwood - Letters from Iwo Jima
4. Alejandro González Iñárritu - Babel
5. Stephen Frears - The Queen

Best Original Screenplay
1. Michael Arndt - Little Miss Sunshine
2. Guillermo del Toro - Pan's Labyrinth
3. Iris Yama****a - Letters from Iwo Jima
4. Peter Morgan - The Queen
5. Guillermo Arriaga - Babel

Best Adapted Screenplay
1. Alfonso Cuarón, Timothy J. Sexton, David Arata, Mark Fregus, Hawk Ostby - Children of Men
2. Patrick Marber - Notes on a Scandal
3. Todd Field, Tom Parrata - Little Children
4. William Monahan - The Departed (loss of points for adapting a movie)
36. Sacha Baron Cohen, Anthony Hines, Peter Baynham, Dan Mazer, Todd Phillips - Borat (major loss of points for being essentially an unscripted movie; this isn't "best outline")

Best Cinematography
1. Emmanuel Lubeski - Children of Men
2. Guillermo Navarro - Pan's Labyrinth
3. Wally Pfister - The Prestige
4. Dick Pope - The Illusionist
Unseen - Vilos Zsigmond - The Black Dahlia

Best Art DirectionI've seen four out of five nominations but I don't even know what is being evaluated when you say "art direction." Is that set design?

Best Costume Designi
1. Patricia Field - The Devil Wears Prada
2. Chung Man Yee - The Curse of the Golden Flower
3. Sharen Davis - Dreamgirls
4. Consolata Boyle - The Queen
Unseen - Milena Canonero - Marie Antoinette

Best Sound Mixing
I've seen all five nominees but again can't really form an opinion since it generally isn't something I notice unless it is really, really bad.

Best Achievement in Editing
1. Clare Douglas, Richard Pearson, Christopher Rouse - United 93
2. Thelma Shoonmaker - The Departed
3. Steven Rosenblum - Blood Diamond
4. Douglas Crise, Stephen Mirrione - Babel
5. Alfonso Cuarón, Alex Rodriguez - Children of Men (I'm sure the editing is fantastic but you lose psychological points when your movie is most famous for not editing).

Best Sound Editing
See Best Sound Mixing (saw five of five)

Best Visual Effects
1. Pirates of the Caribbean
2. Superman Returns
3. Poseidon

No strong feelings here, but I thought the effects in Superman Returns and Poseidon were substandard.

Best Make-Up
1. Pan's Labyrinth
2. Apocalypto
3. Click

Best Song
Saw all five nominations but don't have specific memory of any of them.

Best Score
1. Javier Navarette - Pan's Labyrinth
4. Phillip Glass - Notes on a Scandal
Unseen - The Good German

The other two nominations go somewhere between 1 and 4 but I do'nt have specific memory of noticing the score. Pan's I do and it was good, Notes' I do, and it was bad.

Best Short Film, Animated
Only saw The Little Matchgirl and was not particularly impressed.

Best Short Film, Live Action
Saw none.

Best Short Documentary
Saw none.

Best Feature Documentary
Only saw An Inconvenient Truth and while it may be the most important of the group, I don't think it was particularly well made.

Best Foreign Language Film
Only saw Pan's Labyrinth and it is worthy. Have only heard wonderful things about The Lives of Others but haven't seen it myself yet.

Best Animated Feature
1. Happy Feet
2. Cars
3. Monster House

While the number of animated films has boomed in recent years the number of quality efforts hasn't really seen a similar boom. I'd be in favor of dumping this category.