As I’ve mentioned before, the Oscars were never about quality, but after last year they’ve become nothing more than a bad joke. Still, I am compelled to predict them: as I’ve also mentioned before, film culture is my lifeblood, and unfortunately, these awards are part of film culture. So, with six days until the ceremony this Sunday, here are my predictions. Let it be noted, in 2004 and 2005 my prognostication records were 23/24 and 17/24, respectively.
(I hope I don’t need to make it clear that these aren’t what I’d pick; even my “should win” picks are rarely what I would have liked given the entire list of eligible films in 2006).
Best Picture
Babel
The Departed
Letters from Iwo Jima
Little Miss Sunshine
The Queen
Will win: Little Miss Sunshine
Should win: Letters from Iwo Jima
Okay, so I can piss and moan about hating the dog-and-pony show, but sometimes it is genuinely exciting, nowhere moreso than this category this year. Never can I remember a year when none of the five nominees would really be surprising; usually the winner is a dead lock ages in advance (Brokeback Mountain‘s loss last year doesn’t count, it was a horrible accident that virtually nobody was predicting and absolutely nobody agrees with).
So here’s how I got where I went: Letters from Iwo Jima, one of the two critics’ darlings, with only four nominations, no box office, and subtitles, has already received its award from getting nominated. I think we’re all comfortable with that claim. The Queen, the other darling, is too quiet and simple and British. The Helen Mirren Factor – the notion that the strong lead performance is all the movie has working for it – will cost it the win.
Of the remaining three, it’s hard to immediately discount any of them: Babel has the most nominations and the most gravitas, The Departed has the prohibitive favorite for Best Director, and Little Miss Sunshine is the little indie that could (the Director snub is a non-issue). I think Babel – by far the worst-received of the five, critically – is too similar to Crash to take the win. And between the last two, I shall use the classic theory that the film that the Actors Branch loves, wins: Little Miss Sunshine won the SAG ensemble award, and it got two semi-surprising nominations in the form of Alan Arkin and Abigail Breslin. The Departed has one nomination for Mark Wahlberg, while Jack Nicholson got snubbed and Leonardo DiCaprio got in for Blood Diamond. LMS it is, and I can’t even say that makes me very sad.
Things to watch for: if Letters wins Director, it’s in; if Babel wins Screenplay, it’s in. The Queen and Little Miss Sunshine can’t win without Screenplay, but a win there is not a guarantee of a win here. If Arkin or Wahlberg win, their film wins.
Best Director
Clint Eastwood, Letters from Iwo Jima
Stephen Frears, The Queen
Paul Greengrass, United 93
Alejandro González Iñárritu, Babel
Martin Scorsese, The Departed
Will win: Martin Scorsese
Should win: Stephen Frears
At long last, Marty will leave behind such hacks as Hitchcock, Kubrick and Altman, and join the ranks of the cinema’s true luminaries: Robert Zemeckis, John Avildsen, Ron Howard, James L. Brooks.
(Not much to say about this very locked category, except that it’s a shame that Frears’s career-best work will lose out to a film that does not quite hit Scorsese’s top 10).
Best Actress
Penélope Cruz, Volver
Judi Dench, Notes on a Scanal
Helen Mirren, The Queen
Meryl Streep, The Devil Wears Prada
Kate Winslet, Little Children
Will win: Helen Mirren
Should win: Helen Mirren
Yeah…
Best Actor
Leonardo DiCaprio, Blood Diamond
Ryan Gosling, Half Nelson
Peter O’Toole, Venus
Will Smith, The Pursuit of Happyness
Forest Whitaker, The Last King of Scotland
Will win: Peter O’Toole
Should win: Ryan Gosling
No guts, no glory time: Even though my brain screams Whitaker, I truly can’t imagine that they’ll send O’Toole away empty-handed for the eighth time, and there’s the model of 1986 to prove that a universally heralded performance (Bob Hoskins in Mona Lisa) can lose to a vet with no Oscars to his name (Paul Newman in The Color of Money). Which doesn’t mean that Whitaker isn’t better, even if he is supporting.
Either way, the 26-year-old Ryan Gosling outperforms them both handily, and every other male in an English-language film this year; but these are the Oscars, not the “Good Things to Good People” awards.
Best Supporting Actress
Adriana Barazza, Babel
Cate Blanchett, Notes on a Scandal
Abigail Breslin, Little Miss Sunshine
Jennifer Hudson, Dreamgirls
Kikuchi Rinko, Babel
Will win: Jennifer Hudson
Should win: Abigail Breslin
No real need for commentary, Hudson has picked up every award you can name, even the BAFTA, for God’s sake. And I can’t claim she won’t deserve it: they all deserve it, this is the strongest of all four acting categories. I do have a soft spot for child actors who can stand out in a crowd of people four times their age, though.
Best Supporting Actor
Alan Arkin, Little Miss Sunshine
Jackie Earle Haley, Little Children
Djimon Hounsou, Blood Diamond
Eddie Murphy, Dreamgirls
Mark Wahlberg, The Departed
Will win: Alan Arkin
Should win: Jackie Earle Haley
Perhaps the worst slate of the entire awards. Arkin was, at most, the third-best male in Little Miss Sunshine and the very best performance in The Departed was absolutely Alec Baldwin (although I find it pleasing that Marky Mark is an Oscar nominee. I recently wondered: how close are we to the point when most filmgoers reflexively think of him as “Oscar Nominee Mark Wahlberg”? Andthen I wondered who else has that tiny niggling voice that still can’t help but think of him as “Donnie Wahlberg’s younger brother.” Long parenthetical). Hounsou was a one-note performance in a terrible role, Murphy was stretching beyond his traditional schtick as little as possible. Haley is shockingly good for such company (my favorite performance in an unnaturally well-acted film), but he plays a totally unsympathetic character: ‘bye, Oscar.
Of what’s left, Eddie Murphy has long been the obvious frontrunner, but his buzz seems to have run flat against the mighty edifice of Norbit. He can absolutely lose this, although he’s still a teeny bit in front; I’m going ahead with Arkin, because he’s part of a well-loved film, and he just won the BAFTA.
Best Original Screenplay
Babel, by Guillermo Arriaga
Letters from Iwo Jima, story by Iris Yamashita, written by Iris Yamashita & Paul Haggis
Little Miss Sunshine, by Michael Arndt
Pan’s Labyrinth, by Guillermo del Toro
The Queen by Peter Morgan
Will win: Little Miss Sunshine
Should win: The Queen
Speaking personally, I loved the modern-day Shakespearean angle to The Queen ever so slightly more than I loved the bottomless humanity of Letters, and either one of those is a decent choice, but we’re overdue for a quirky comedy win in this category, and Little Miss Sunshine is such a screenplay movie. Besides, it won the Writer’s Guild Award. Babel is obviously weak on the script, and Pan’s Labyrinth is all about the visuals.
(Hey, how long has it been since more BP nominees were Original Screenplay than Adapted? Ages, right?)
Best Adapted Screenplay
Borat, story by Sacha Baron Cohen & Peter Baynham & Anthony Hines & Todd Phillips, screenplay by Sacha Baron Cohen & Anthony Hines & Peter Baynham & Dan Mazer
Children of Men, by Alfonso Cuarón & Timothy J. Sexton and David Arata and Mark Fergus & Hawk Ostby
The Departed, by William Monahan
Little Children, by Todd Field & Tom Perotta
Notes on a Scandal, by Patrick Marber
Will win: The Departed
Should win: Children of Men
I don’t think any person of reasonable intelligence can disagree that Children of Men is head and shoulders above the other nominees; but we’re talking about the Oscars. Intelligence doesn’t enter into it. The Best Picture nomination and WGA nod for The Departed are huge here, and I have a very hard time seeing anything else winning.
Best Foreign Language Film
Efter brylluppet [After the Wedding] (Susanne Bier, Denmark)
Indigènes [Days of Glory] (Rachid Bouchareb, Algeria)
El laberinto del Fauno [Pan’s Labyrinth] (Guillermo del Toro, Mexico)
Das Leben der Anderen [The Lives of Others] (Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck, Germany)
Water (Deepa Mehta, Canada)
Will win: El laberinto del Fauno
Should win: El laberinto del Fauno
WHERE THE HELL IS VOLVER?
Having only seen three of the five (and I’ll be seeing Indigènes before the ceremony), it’s a little hard for me to argue what “should” win, but in terms of what “will,” this has been a race between Pan’s Labyrinth and The Lives of Others for a while now, and they’re both really pretty great, though it’s hard to deny that del Toro’s is the more extraordinary & cinematic achievement. But never forget, that the Academy likes gravitas, and the German film has much more of that. Not to mention that this category has a requirement that the voter has seen all five nominees, so popularity isn’t much of a factor. Think 2001, when Amelie lost to No Man’s Land. But after all that, I can’t credit that a film with six overall nominations will lose in this category.
Best Animated Feature
Cars (John Lasseter)
Happy Feet (George Miller)
Monster House (Gil Kenan)
Will win: Cars
Should win: Happy Feet
Sometimes, one must go with one’s gut, and Happy Feet just doesn’t “feel” like an Oscar winner. Monster House is obviously an also-ran.
Best Documentary Feature
Deliver Us from Evil (Amy Berg)
An Inconvenient Truth (Davis Guggenheim)
Iraq in Fragments (James Longley)
Jesus Camp (Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady)
My Country, My Country (Laura Poitras)
Will win: An Inconvenient Truth
I’ve actually seen one of these, which is good for me, and it’s going to win, which is better. I’m still not sold on how good of a “film” An Inconvenient Truth really is, but it’s a movie that actually managed to bring the long-dormant subject of global warming back to the forefront of America’s social dialogue. How do you not reward that sort of thing?
Best Cinematography
The Black Dahlia, Vilmos Zsigmond
Children of Men, Emmanuel Lubezki
The Illusionist, Dick Pope
Pan’s Labyrinth, Guillermo Navarro
The Prestige, Wally Pfister
Will win: Children of Men
Should win: Children of Men
Two years in a row, this category has not a single weak nominee. Pan’s Labyrinth is probably the most popular film here, which helps immensely, but Children of Men is a bit flashier (hellooooo tracking shots!). The other three aren’t films that a whole lot of people saw or loved, and that hurts bad, especially for The Illusionist.
Last night’s ASC win cements it.
Best Editing
Babel, Douglas Crise and Stephen Mirrione
Blood Diamond, Steven Rosenblum
Children of Men, Alphonso Cuarón and Alex Rodríguez
The Departed, Thelma Schoonmaker
United 93, Clare Douglas, Richard Pearson and Christopher Rouse
Will win: Babel
Should win: Children of Men
I had this whole thing set up where it was all very logical and sensible, and then the damn ACE award last night was a tie between Babel and The Departed. That’s only happened once before, in 1988, and the ultimate Oscar winner was neither of the tied films. Which almost emboldens me to stick with United 93, my initial pick – while I hated the film, I can’t deny the amount of work it must have taken to shape that footage into any plot at all. Now, there’s always the argument that the film with the most confusing structure wins, which preferences Babel and United 93, and I’m going to go ahead and say that the Best Picture nomination for the former pushes it just far enough ahead that it will comfortably reside as Babel‘s one and only win.
Thank God that the question of which of the five is actually best isn’t so hard: I’m always biased for films with very deliberate editing, in which every cut has the impact of a bullet to the head, and that would be my sweet, Oscar-hated Children of Men.
Best Art Direction
Dreamgirls, John Myhre and Nancy Haigh
The Good Shepherd, Jeannine Claudia Oppewall, Gretchen Rau and Leslie E. Rollins
Pan’s Labyrinth, Eugenio Caballero and Pilar Revuelta
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest, Rick Heinrichs and Cheryl Carasik
The Prestige, Nathan Crowley and Julie Ochipinti
Will win: Pan’s Labyrinth
Should win: The Prestige
WHERE THE HELL IS CHILDREN OF MEN?
So, Pan’s Labyrinth and Dreamgirls have the most love all over, which leads me to assume this is a two-horse race, and a fairly faithful recreation of Detroit in the 1950s is a little bit more prosaic than the Academy likes to go here. Not to mention that Pan’s Labyrinth really does have kick-ass production design at every turn. That said, there was something oh-so-Gothic and tasty about The Prestige that I adored, and that doesn’t matter, because the Academy sucks.
(POTC? Really? Okay…)
Best Costume Design
Curse of the Golden Flower, Yee Chung-Man
The Devil Wears Prada, Patricia Field
Dreamgirls, Sharen Davis
Marie Antoinette, Milena Canonero
The Queen, Consolata Boyle
Will win: Dreamgirls
Should win: Marie Antoinette
It’s easy to say that the super-duper lusciousness of Canonero’s work with Sofia Coppola is a shoe-in, but I’m not persuaded a lot of people even saw Marie Antoinette, and I know that a lot of the people who did hated it, including myself. The Queen and The Devil Wears Prada aren’t exotic enough, and I never trust the Oscar to go to little-seen foreign films on the techs.
Best Original Score
Babel, Gustavo Santaolalla
The Good German, Thomas Newman
Notes on a Scandal, Philip Glass
Pan’s Labyrinth, Javier Navarette
The Queen, Alexandre Desplat
Will win: Pan’s Labyrinth
Should win: Notes on a Scandal
Five fine nominees, none of them exceptional. And Glass and Newman were seemingly writing music for films other than the ones they had been hired to score (yet I leave Glass as my pick; for he is still Philip Glass). I kind of want to say Desplat will win, in honor of his much better work on The Painted Veil, but I don’t think this category really works that way, and The Queen‘s score isn’t very “grabby.” Really, I’m predicting Pan’s Labyrinth just out of a sense that it’s a widely-loved movie. Santaolalla would be the easy pick if he hadn’t just won last year.
Best Original Song
“I Need To Wake Up,” by Melissa Etheridge; from An Inconvenient Truth
“Listen,” music by Henry Krieger and Scott Cutler, lyric by Anne Preven; from Dreamgirls
“Love You I Do,” music by Henry Krieger, lyric by Siedah Garrett; from Dreamgirls
“Our Town,” by Randy Newman; from Cars
“Patience,” music by Henry Krieger, lyric by Willie Reale; from Dreamgirls
Will win: “Listen”
Should win: “Our Town”
I find in my roamings around the internets that “Listen” leads the Dreamgirls bloc rather conclusively, and that scuttles my initial prediction that those three would vote-split their way to an Etheridge win. Frankly, I couldn’t pick any of the three out of a lineup, although I know that “Patience” is the one that sounds like a circa-2006 Beyonce single and not like a Motown knock-off. Too bad, because it would have been pretty amusing to see the Culture Warriors get all frothy about the lesbianization of AMPAS.
As to my somewhat arbitrary choice for “should win,” I can’t remember how it goes, but I know that the other four all really suck. And hey, Randy Newman. We like Randy Newman.
Best Sound Mixing
Apocalypto, Kevin O’Connell, Greg P. Russell and Fernando Cámara
Blood Diamond, Andy Nelson, Anna Behlmer and Ivan Sharrock
Dreamgirls, Michael Minkler, Bob Beemer and Willie D. Burton
Flags of Our Fathers, John T. Reitz, David E. Campbell, Gregg Rudloff and Walt Martin
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest, Paul Massey, Christopher Boyes and Lee Orloff
Will win: Dreamgirls
Should win: Blood Diamond
Always, always, always goes to the musical, especially when said musical leads the nomination race (although in this case, said musical had kind of crappy sound design: the songs feel like they were pasted onto the soundtrack). Me, I really dug the ambient noises in Apocalypto and Blood Diamond, but I am not an Academy voter.
Fun fact: with 18 nominations and zero wins, Kevin O’Connell is the losingest person in Oscar history. That’s not going to be much help to a sound guy.
Best Sound Effects Editing
Apocalypto, Sean McCormack and Kami Asgar
Blood Diamond, Lon Bender
Flags of Our Fathers, Alan Robert Murray and Bub Asman
Letters from Iwo Jima, Alan Robert Murray and Bub Asman
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest, George Watters II and Christopher Boyes
Will win: Letters from Iwo Jima
Should win: Flags of Our Fathers
In order, always goes to: 1) the loudest film; 2) the war film. I can’t imagine Flags actually winning an Oscar, but I also can’t really remember what POTC “sounds” like. So to hell with patterns in history, and let’s just say that the Academy won’t let Clint’s adventures in WWII go totally unnoticed, although I’d really be a lot more comfortable saying that if Letters had taken the Flags spot in Mixing. I do like its sibling film a tiny bit more; in my admittedly unprofessional opinion, it seems like it was the harder job.
Best Makeup
Apocalypto, Aldo Signoretti and Vittorio Sodano
Click, Tsuji Kazuhiro and Bill Corso
Pan’s Labyrinth, David Martí and Montse Ribé
Will win: Pan’s Labyrinth
Should win: Pan’s Labyrinth
Three words: The Pale Man. And dude, that mouth scene. Did you see that mouth scene? Dude.
Best Visual Effects
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest, John Knoll, Hal T. Hickel, Charles Gibson, Allen Hall
Poseidon, Boyd Shermis, Kim Libreri, Chas Jarrett, John Frazier
Superman Returns, Mark Stetson, Richard R. Hoover
Will win: Pirates of the Caribbean
Should win: Pirates of the Caribbean
How exactly did Poseidon get in here, again? Anyway, Superman Returns is fine and all, but there ain’t nothing in it that shrieks “LOOK AT MY SFX!!!1!” quite like Davy Jones in POTC.
Best Animated Short Film
“The Danish Poet” (Torrill Kove)
“Lifted” (Gary Rydstrom)
“The Little Matchgirl” (Roger Allers)
“Maestro” (Géza M. Tóth)
“No Time for Nuts” (Chris Renaud & Mike Thurmeier)
Will win: “The Little Matchgirl”
Should win: “The Little Matchgirl”
Oh my God, I’ve actually seen four of these. And three of them are pretty damn good (My antipathy towards “The Danish Poet” is documented). But there’s little to no chance that it’s not going to “The Little Matchgirl,” the best thing with the Disney name on it since Lilo & Stitch, and the best Disney short since “Toot, Whistle, Plunk and Boom.”
(I’ve not seen Pixar’s “Lifted,” for the curious).
Best Live-Action Short Film
“Binta and the Great Idea” (Javier Fesser)
“Éramos pocos” (Borja Cobeaga)
“Helmer & Son” (Søren Pilmark)
“The Saviour” (Peter Templeman)
“West Bank Story” (Ari Sandel)
Will win: “Éramos pocos”
I’ve only seen one of these, but it just happens to be the front-runner: “Éramos pocos” has been winning awards all over the world, and I don’t see any reason to assume it will stop now, even though it’s not terribly memorable.
Best Short Documentary
“The Blood of Yingzhou District” (Ruby Yang)
“Recycled Life” (Leslie Iwerks)
“Rehearsing a Dream” (Karen Goodman and Kirk Simon)
“Two Hands” (Nathaniel Kahn)
Will win: “The Blood of Yingzhou District”
This one is a goddamn crapshoot when there’s no WWII documentary in the mix, and that’s only going to be more and more common… Let’s see, it’s about China and it has “Blood” in the title. That sounds like gravitas to me!