Oscar picks

The Academy had their say last weekend, but here's what I'd select for the top film achievements of 2006.

With the caveat that I have yet to see: Running with Scissors, The Good German, The Illusionist, Sweet Land, Old Joy, Factotum, Fast Food Nation, Find Me Guilty, Kinky Boots, A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints, Infamous, Miami Vice and some significant foreign films including Curse of the Golden Flower, Clean, The Death of Mr. Lazarescu, Water, Duck Season, Three Times and Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles.

I also haven't seen enough of the contenders to properly consider a feature length documentary or animated film category (though right now I'd go along with Oscar's choices in each—An Inconvenient Truth and Happy Feet).

Ensemble Cast
The Dead Girl
The Departed
Dreamgirls
Friends with Money
The Good Shepherd

A category Oscar doesn't have, but might as well. There were several high quality ensemble-driven films released last year and all of my choices were brimming with talent, even in small roles.

Winner: Dreamgirls

Foreign Language Film
Letters From Iwo Jima
The Lives of Others
Pan's Labyrinth
Tsotsi
Volver

It's impossible to consider this category the same way Oscar does, with one submission each from countries worldwide. I'll just stick to films in a foreign language released during 2006. That gives me two films nominated in Oscar's corresponding category (Lives and Pan's), one that should've been (Volver), last year's Oscar winner (Tsotsi) and a Best Picture nominee (Letters).

Winner: Pan's Labyrinth

Adapted Screenplay
Casino Royale
The Departed
Dreamgirls
Flags of Our Fathers
Little Children

Not exactly the strongest year on record in this category, nothing against my top choice or runner-up Little Children.

Winner: The Departed

Original Screenplay
The Lives of Others
Pan’s Labyrinth
The Queen
Stranger Than Fiction
Volver

Only one American screenplay in this mix, it was a year for foreign product to shine.

Winner: Pan's Labyrinth

Best Supporting Actor
Sergi López (Pan’s Labyrinth)
Eddie Murphy (Dreamgirls)
Jack Nicholson (The Departed)
Michael Sheen (The Queen)
Forest Whitaker (The Last King of Scotland)

Yes, I do consider Oscar's Best Actor a supporting player, but a worthy nominee in any case. There were a few other strong contenders for this list but that only includes Little Children's Jackie Earle Haley from Oscar's selections.

Winner: Michael Sheen (The Queen)

Best Supporting Actress
Abigail Breslin (Little Miss Sunshine)
Vera Farmiga (The Departed)
Jennifer Hudson (Dreamgirls)
Emma Thompson (Stranger Than Fiction)
Kerry Washington (The Dead Girl)

The year's most competitive category, in addition to two other actresses from The Dead Girl—Marcia Gay Harden and Mary Beth Hurt—performances I'm forced to omit, despite their worthiness, are Maribel Verdú (Pan’s Labyrinth), Carmen Maura (Volver), Juliette Binoche (Breaking and Entering), Adrianna Barazza (Babel), Frances de la Tour (The History Boys), Maggie Gyllenhaal (Stranger Than Fiction and World Trade Center), Eva Green (Casino Royale) and Frances McDormand (Friends with Money).

Winner: Jennifer Hudson (Dreamgirls)

Best Actress
Penélope Cruz (Volver)
Judi Dench (Notes on a Scandal)
Helen Mirren (The Queen)
Gretchen Mol (The Notorious Bettie Page)
Kate Winslet (Little Children)

Oscar got this one just about right, it was pretty difficult to ignore the incredible work of Cruz, Dench, Mirren and Winslet. Mol was the one who slipped through the cracks in a low-grossing indie released early in the year, but her performance was charming and touching, every bit the equal of those other four leading ladies. Still, Oscar got the winner right too.

Winner: Helen Mirren (The Queen)

Best Actor
Leonardo DiCaprio (The Departed)
Will Ferrell (Stranger Than Fiction)
Ryan Gosling (Half Nelson)
Ulrich Mühe (The Lives of Others)
Patrick Wilson (Little Children)

Oh the pain, the unfortunate blunder, of DiCaprio's Oscar nomination for the wrong film. That goof cost the Academy the opportunity to recognize the performance of the year. And so Gosling became the most deserving nominee while Wilson remained Little Children's most undervalued player, Mühe languished in foreign language obscurity and Ferrell found little respect for his dialed-down delivery of the year's best comedic performance.

Winner: Leonardo DiCaprio (The Departed)

Best Director
Bill Condon (Dreamgirls)
Guillermo del Toro (Pan's Labyrinth)
Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck (The Lives of Others)
George Miller (Happy Feet)
Martin Scorsese (The Departed)

As much as I'd like to throw a curveball in here, I can't omit any of the directors of my five favorite films. Each demonstrated an equally strong command of actors, craft and storytelling. If I could consider two films in one then Clint Eastwood would have to make the cut for the combination of Flags of Our Fathers and Letters From Iwo Jima.

Winner: Guillermo del Toro (Pan's Labyrinth)

Best Picture
The Departed
Dreamgirls
Happy Feet
The Lives of Others
Pan's Labyrinth

Yep, they're still my favorites.

Winner: Pan's Labyrinth

And technical categories...

Art Direction/Production Design
Children of Men
Dreamgirls
Marie Antoinette
Pan’s Labyrinth
Perfume: The Story of a Murderer

Winner: Pan's Labyrinth

Cinematography
Children of Men
Dreamgirls
Flags of Our Fathers
Letters From Iwo Jima
Pan’s Labyrinth

Winner: Children of Men

Costume Design
Dreamgirls
Flags of Our Fathers
Marie Antoinette
The Notorious Bettie Page
Perfume: The Story of a Murderer

Winner: Dreamgirls

Editing
The Departed
Dreamgirls
Flags of Our Fathers
Inside Man
Little Children

Winner: The Departed

Make-Up
The Hills Have Eyes
Pan’s Labyrinth
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest

Winner: Pan's Labyrinth

Original Score
The Lives of Others
The Painted Veil
Pan’s Labyrinth
Perfume: The Story of a Murderer
Volver

Winner: The Painted Veil

Original Song
The Book I Write (Stranger Than Fiction)
Call the Law (Idlewild)
I Need To Wake Up (An Inconvenient Truth)
Listen (Dreamgirls)
Song of the Heart (Happy Feet)

I scrapped this category last year due to a lack of worthy contenders (or at least my inability to find them) but it's dramatically different this year. I even had to leave things off this list. Not just the other Oscar nominated Dreamgirls songs (which are solid in the film but a bit thin outside of it), but even better tracks like: Sheryl Crow's Cars contribution "Real Gone"; "In the End," the rousing closing number from indie Shortbus; and Ben Folds' gentle lullaby "Still" from Over the Hedge (a film I've yet to see).

Winner: Listen (Dreamgirls)

Visual Effects
Charlotte’s Web
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest
Superman Returns

Winner: Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest

Good show

So, Martin Scorsese and Helen Mirren finally win and it's now officially easier to win an Oscar if you were on American Idol than it is if you were on Saturday Night Live.

I don't have a whole lot to say, I sort of caught the show in bits and pieces between working on a couple of show photo galleries for work. I did catch Ellen's opening monologue and the presentations for most of the major awards. Any time an interpretive dance number started I immediately went back to work (is the show's producer Laura Ziskin responsible for that dumb decision?).

No major complaints on the winners. I was 15 out of 21 with my predictions (missing supporting actor, animated film, foreign language film, cinematography, costume design and original score) and none of the predicted winners really bothered me, nor do any of my non-predicted winners.

Pan's Labyrinth's loss to The Lives of Others for foreign film is ok considering Pan's won three awards overall and this gives some attention to the worthy German film. And although I wish I had stuck with my gut and predicted Happy Feet for its eventual animated film win I'm much happier predicting it wouldn't win only to see it win rather than vice versa.

I liked Jennifer Hudson's emotional speech the best but Helen Mirren and Martin Scorsese (and his longtime editor Thelma Schoonmaker) also chose their words wisely.

Al Gore and Melissa Etheridge were in a league of their own, reminding viewers of something considerably more meaningful than a silly awards show. To paraphrase both: they weren't making political statements, they were making moral statements.

Ellen seemed to do a nice job, the original song performances didn't sound too dull and there were classy presentations for several categories (the models for costume design; the screenplay excerpts; etc.).

And, in a nice change of pace from last year, this time the best picture actually won. I can't ask for much more than that.

Oscar predictions 2007

I feel a little tapped out on Oscar writing after this piece, which includes predictions on who/what will win and thoughts on who/what I think should win in the categories of Best Picture, Actor, Supporting Actor, Adapted Screenplay, Cinematography and Foreign Language Film. I tried to be fair to a variety of viewpoints in what "should" have been nominated for Best Picture, otherwise the commentary represents how I feel.

But anyway here's a quick rundown of all the categories (except the short films):

Best Picture
Babel; The Departed; Letters From Iwo Jima; Little Miss Sunshine; The Queen

It really is a wide open race this year. But Sunshine seems too small, too minor to be widely considered a "Best Picture." Letters From Iwo Jima simply hasn't made enough money. Babel hasn't made much more than Iwo Jima. The Queen is a darkhorse but a victory would still seem like an upset. The Departed is the only choice that really makes sense. But without a frontrunner it's logical to believe that the votes will be spread out among all five contenders and the winner could have less total votes than any other Best Picture in years.

Best Actor
Leonardo DiCaprio; Ryan Gosling; Peter O'Toole; Will Smith; Forest Whitaker

I think respect for Whitaker's performance among the people who vote on these things has only increased with each award he's won. He's never exactly felt like the sure thing he's turned out to be every step of the way, and that's prevented any feeling that he peaked too soon.

Best Actress
Penélope Cruz; Judi Dench; Helen Mirren; Meryl Streep; Kate Winslet

Mirren has never won an Oscar and she's only been nominated twice before. So even if it feels like she's always winning awards this has been a long time coming. And it's well deserved.

Best Supporting Actor
Alan Arkin; Jackie Earle Haley; Djimon Hounsou; Eddie Murphy; Mark Wahlberg

A real toss-up, even though it shouldn't be. Murphy is the true standout. Is it really possible voters won't take him seriously to such a degree they'd consider voting for Mark Wahlberg?? Arkin seems the likely victor in case of a Murphy loss. Haley and Hounsou, the two actors besides Murphy to actually have roles of substance in their films, seem to be out of the running.

Best Supporting Actress
Adriana Barraza; Cate Blanchett; Abigail Breslin; Jennifer Hudson; Rinko Kikuchi

Still Hudson's to lose. But if enough voters don't like the thought of a reality show contestant winning an Oscar (for a role where she sings more than she acts, the nerve!!) maybe Barraza will pull an upset. Thankfully she'll probably lose a lot of votes to her co-star. The real question: will we ever see any of the nominees not named Cate Blanchett in an award worthy role again?

Best Director
Clint Eastwood; Stephen Frears; Paul Greengrass; Alejandro González Iñárritu; Martin Scorsese

Scorsese. Yes, it will finally happen. Winning is about timing and luck more than talent, but it's nice to know he's also the most worthy of this group.

Best Adapted Screenplay
Borat; Children of Men; The Departed; Little Children; Notes On a Scandal

It's not even a fair fight for The Departed here.

Best Original Screenplay
Babel; Letters From Iwo Jima; Little Miss Sunshine; Pan's Labyrinth; The Queen

Little Miss Sunshine. This should be more competitive than it probably will be.

Best Animated Film
Cars; Happy Feet; Monster House

Do I go with my head or my heart? Since Oscar voters aren't known for valuing quality above all else I'll say Cars, the least worthy of the nominees, with its Pixar cred. But I hope I'm wrong.

Best Documentary
Deliver Us From Evil; An Inconvenient Truth; Iraq in Fragments; Jesus Camp; My Country, My Country

An Inconvenient Truth losing would be one of the biggest upsets possible.

Best Foreign Language Film
After the Wedding (Denmark); Days of Glory (Algeria); The Lives of Others (Germany); Pan's Labyrinth (Mexico); Water (Canada)

As great as The Lives of Others is, I really hope Pan's Labyrinth isn't snubbed here.

Best Original Song
"I Need to Wake Up" (An Inconvenient Truth); "Listen" (Dreamgirls); "Love You I Do" (Dreamgirls); "Our Town" (Cars); "Patience" (Dreamgirls)

The trio of Dreamgirls performances should be fun to watch, but even though Listen is critical to the movie's creative success there is stiff competition from I Need to Wake Up, and that one isn't competing with two other songs from the same movie.

Best Art Direction
Dreamgirls; The Good Shepherd; Pan's Labyrinth; Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest; The Prestige

The imagination of Pan's Labyrinth should pay off.

Best Cinematography
The Black Dahlia; Children of Men; The Illusionist; Pan's Labyrinth; The Prestige

Boy, is it still hard to swallow The Black Dahlia as an Oscar nominee, no matter what illustrious credits the cinematographer has in his distant past. Luckily Children of Men should have no trouble taking this home.

Best Costume Design
Curse of the Golden Flower; The Devil Wears Prada; Dreamgirls; Marie Antoinette; The Queen

Marie Antoinette is lavish and Prada's contemporary clothes help drive the "plot" but Dreamgirls has the style and the substance.

Best Editing
Babel; Blood Diamond; Children of Men; The Departed; United 93

Babel is this year's Crash, which won the category last year. And United 93 is pretty showy in editing as well. But The Departed should win, especially if it's on its way to Best Picture.

Best Original Score
Babel; The Good German; Notes On a Scandal; Pan's Labyrinth; The Queen

Having not seen The Good German yet (or heard its score) I'm not quite sure what I'm missing. Babel and The Queen would seem to have a leg up as Best Picture nominees but I'll stand by the haunting music of Pan's Labyrinth.

Best Visual Effects
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest; Poseidon; Superman Returns

Pirates of the Caribbean. The year's biggest movie wins an Oscar.

Best Makeup
Apocalypto; Click; Pan's Labyrinth

Pan's Labyrinth. The year's best movie shouldn't have any trouble winning this Oscar.

Best Sound
Apocalypto; Blood Diamond; Dreamgirls; Flags of Our Fathers; Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Dreamgirls

Best Sound Editing
Apocalypto; Blood Diamond; Flags of Our Fathers; Letters From Iwo Jima; Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Letters From Iwo Jima

If you're keeping track, that's four for The Departed, Dreamgirls and Pan's Labyrinth. Two for An Inconvenient Truth. And no more than one for anything else.

How I Did

Best Picture
Four out of five (Babel, The Departed, Little Miss Sunshine, The Queen)

Dreamgirls obviously missed out and Letters From Iwo Jima, which I had as an alternate, got in.

Best Director
Four out of five (Clint Eastwood, Stephen Frears, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, Martin Scorsese)

I thought Bill Condon might be vulnerable but I never would’ve predicted Dreamgirls missing Best Picture, which makes his absence here more understandable. My alternate pick Paul Greengrass (United 93) was the token nominee of a film not up for Best Picture.

Best Actor
Three and a half out of five (Peter O’Toole, Will Smith, Forest Whitaker…Leonardo DiCaprio)

Both of my alternates scored instead. Thankfully Ryan Gosling got in but Sacha Baron Cohen did not. And I had the right actor but wrong film (just like Oscar) for DiCaprio’s nomination.

Best Actress
Five for five (Penelope Cruz, Judi Dench, Helen Mirren, Meryl Streep, Kate Winslet)

Best Supporting Actor
Three out of five (Alan Arkin, Jackie Earle Haley, Eddie Murphy)

I had Departed’s Jack Nicholson and Queen’s Michael Sheen but Blood Diamond’s Djimon Hounsou, an alternate pick, and Departed’s Mark Whalberg, who I mentioned but didn’t believe in, made the cut.

Best Supporting Actress
Four out of five (Adriana Barraza, Cate Blanchett, Jennifer Hudson, Rinko Kikuchi)

Alternate pick Abigail Breslin happily made it in instead of Prada’s Emily Blunt.

Best Original Screenplay
Four out of five (Babel, Little Miss Sunshine, Pan’s Labyrinth, The Queen)

Alternate pick Letters From Iwo Jima (stronger than I expected overall) was nominated, United 93 was not.

Best Adapted Screenplay
Four out of five (Children of Men, The Departed, Little Children, Notes on a Scandal)

Common sense prevailed and The Devil Wears Prada’s script is not nominated. I predicted the wrong token nomination for Borat, which turned up here instead of Best Actor.

Best Animated Film
Three for three (Cars, Happy Feet, Monster House)

Thankfully. Now let’s see the penguins take down Pixar!

Best Documentary (Feature Length)
Three for five (Deliver Us From Evil, An Inconvenient Truth, Iraq in Fragments)

I had Jesus Camp as an alternate. My Country, My Country is the fifth nominee.

Best Foreign Language Film
Four for five (Days of Glory, The Lives of Others, Pan’s Labyrinth, Water)

Denmark’s After the Wedding made it in but Spain’s Volver, ludicrously, did not.

Best Art Direction/Production Design
Three for five (Dreamgirls, Pan’s Labyrinth, Pirates of the Caribbean)

I thought Children of Men and Marie Antoinette would pop up here but instead nominations went to The Good Shepherd (the only nom for a very solid film) and The Prestige.

Best Cinematography
Three for five (Children of Men, The Illusionist, Pan’s Labyrinth)

Not a single Best Picture in the running in this category. I thought Babel and Dreamgirls would crack the list but instead: Cinematographers’ Guild nominee The Black Dahlia and relative surprise The Prestige.

Best Costume Design
Four out of five (Curse of the Golden Flower, The Devil Wears Prada, Dreamgirls, Marie Antoinette)

I had The Queen as an alternate, which made the list over my prediction Pan’s Labyrinth.

Best Editing
Three out of five (Babel, The Departed, United 93)

Surprisingly light on Best Picture nominees. I thought Dreamgirls and Little Miss Sunshine would make it in but nominations instead went to “thoughtful” action films Blood Diamond and Children of Men.

Best Makeup
Two out of three (Apocalypto, Pan’s Labyrinth)

Ok so maybe the makeup in Click is really good, because it landed a nomination over the showy Pirates of the Caribbean. I don’t really want to find out.

Best Score
Two out of five (Babel, The Good German)

I had the right composers but the wrong films for two of the nominations: Philip Glass was nominated for Notes on a Scandal not The Illusionist, and Alexandre Desplat for The Queen and not his superior work on The Painted Veil. Both were my alternates. I really can’t say what possessed me to predict The Da Vinci Code over actual nominee Pan’s Labyrinth (easily one of the year’s great scores).

Best Song
Three out of five (Cars, Dreamgirls, An Inconvenient Truth)

All three Dreamgirls songs made it in but only one was an alternate pick for me. It might be a bad omen that Happy Feet missed out here, but it’s a good thing that Bobby couldn’t get a single nomination.

Best Sound
Four out of five (Blood Diamond, Dreamgirls, Flags of Our Fathers, Pirates of the Caribbean)

I predicted Babel but Apocalypto made it in.

Best Sound Editing
Three out of five (Apocalypto, Flags of Our Fathers, Pirates of the Caribbean)

Blood Diamond and Letters From Iwo Jima are also nominated in the other hotly contested sound category. (Not having a clue what I was doing, I predicted Cars and The Departed.)

Best Visual Effects
Two out of three (Pirates of the Caribbean, Superman Returns)

I thought Poseidon would be too clunky and trashy to nominate. I was wrong. And Casino Royale, which I incorrectly predicted, was completely shut out today.


Overall: 70 out of 99, or 71%. Counting the alternates: 83 out of 99, 84%.

Just watch the SAGs instead...

Today's Oscar acting nominees match the Screen Actors Guild nominations EXACTLY with the lone exception of Leonardo DiCaprio's "supporting" nomination for The Departed, replaced at the Oscars with his co-star Mark Wahlberg. zzzz...

I'm torn...

The Good:
Abigail Breslin nominated for Best Supporting Actress
Ryan Gosling nominated for Best Actor
Letters From Iwo Jima (a deserving film) nominated for Best Picture and Director
The Devil Wears Prada NOT nominated for Screenplay (or anything besides Streep and costumes)
Six nominations for Pan's Labyrinth
Dreamgirls getting the most nominations overall
Expected nominations for The Departed, Martin Scorsese, Jennifer Hudson, Eddie Murphy, Penelope Cruz, Kate Winslet, Helen Mirren, Judi Dench, Forest Whitaker, Jackie Earl Haley, Happy Feet, The Lives of Others

The Bad:
Leonardo DiCaprio nominated for Blood Diamond instead of The Departed
Dreamgirls' exclusion from the top categories (Picture & Director)
Volver not nominated for anything besides Penelope Cruz (including foreign film)
Mark Wahlberg as The Departed's ONLY acting nominee
Michael Sheen failing to be recognized for The Queen
The Black Dahlia is an Oscar nominee (for cinematography)
Poseidon is an Oscar nominee (for visual effects)

Those are pretty bad, especially the first four.

I still believe this is The Departed's Best Picture to lose. But Babel is now the most nominated Best Picture (7 nominations vs Departed's 5...The Queen has 6, Sunshine and Iwo Jima have 4). Only Babel and The Departed are nominated in the "key" Best Editing category. The dynamic has really changed. And sadly I think the race is a lot less interesting without Dreamgirls.

Oscar nominee predictions 2006

Oscar nominations are due out Tuesday morning, so it's annual prediction time.

It's really difficult to predict how Clint Eastwood's one-two punch of Flags of Our Fathers and Letters From Iwo Jima will factor in to this year's race. Will the films cancel each other out, since neither one really took off on their own at the box office?

Other wildcards include the 9/11 films (can Oliver Stone really make a Sept. 11 movie that gets zero nominations?) and box office underperformers like Blood Diamond, Bobby, The Good German and The Painted Veil. They should be shut out of major categories but are they doomed to go unrecognized entirely?

For "historical" context: last year's predictions, and how I did.

Best Picture
Babel
The Departed
Dreamgirls
Little Miss Sunshine
The Queen

Alternates: Letters From Iwo Jima, United 93

There's not much guessing involved here. The Producers Guild and Directors Guild both selected these five nominees. Anything else would be a big upset. (Incidentally Little Miss Sunshine won the top prize from the Producers Guild this weekend. Not a bad sign but not a major harbinger of things to come either: six out of the last ten winners went on to win Best Picture but the last two winners, Brokeback Mountain and The Aviator, did not.)

Best Director
Bill Condon (Dreamgirls)
Clint Eastwood (Letters From Iwo Jima)
Stephen Frears (The Queen)
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu (Babel)
Martin Scorsese (The Departed)

Alternates: Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Faris (Little Miss Sunshine), Paul Greengrass (United 93)

The Sunshine team managed a nomination from the Directors Guild and that's impressive but I don't think Picture and Director will match 5/5 this year. Bill Condon also, unfortunately, feels vulnerable. Children of Men's Alfonso Cuaron is a hotly championed contender, but this is a year overflowing with possibilities.

Best Actor
Sacha Baron Cohen (Borat)
Leonardo DiCaprio (The Departed)
Peter O'Toole (Venus)
Will Smith (The Pursuit of Happyness)
Forest Whitaker (The Last King of Scotland)

Alternates: Leonardo DiCaprio (Blood Diamond), Ryan Gosling (Half Nelson)

Is Borat too big a sensation to ignore? And Half Nelson too small a movie to make an impact? That's what I'm thinking right now. But I'm most anxious over what voters decided to do about DiCaprio's double duty.

Best Actress
Penelope Cruz (Volver)
Judi Dench (Notes on a Scandal)
Helen Mirren (The Queen)
Meryl Streep (The Devil Wears Prada)
Kate Winslet (Little Children)

I'm not even going to bother with alternates. Maybe in another year Annette Bening (Running with Scissors), Maggie Gyllenhaal (Sherrybaby) and even Beyonce (Dreamgirls) would've had a shot. But this year anyone other than these five would be a big surprise.

Best Supporting Actor
Alan Arkin (Little Miss Sunshine)
Jackie Earl Haley (Little Children)
Eddie Murphy (Dreamgirls)
Jack Nicholson (The Departed)
Michael Sheen (The Queen)

Alternates: Djimon Hounsou (Blood Diamond), Brad Pitt (Babel)

The most frustrating category to predict. Only Eddie Murphy was on both the Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild lists. I'm going on a limb by predicting Sheen, who has been ignored so far. I'm not sold on Arkin but I'm not sure who else to turn to. Pitt's star power, and the relative popularity of his film, could serve him well but I still believe the performance is underwhelming. And Golden Globe nominee Mark Wahlberg (The Departed) is a popular contender, but his part is so small...not that that hurt William Hurt last year.

Best Supporting Actress
Adriana Barraza (Babel)
Cate Blanchett (Notes on a Scandal)
Emily Blunt (The Devil Wears Prada)
Jennifer Hudson (Dreamgirls)
Rinko Kikuchi (Babel)

Alternates: Abigail Breslin (Little Miss Sunshine), Toni Collette (Little Miss Sunshine)

Everyone here seems like a lock except Blunt, who I'm predicting will upset the Sunshine contenders (though I'd much prefer a nom for Breslin). Shoulda-beens like Emma Thompson (Stranger Than Fiction), Vera Farmiga (The Departed) and Maggie Gyllenhaal (World Trade Center) have been ignored in awards leading up to this. And Catherine O'Hara (For Your Consideration) got some critical support but her movie is weak, and forgotten at this point.

Best Original Screenplay
Babel
Little Miss Sunshine
Pan's Labyrinth
The Queen
United 93

Alternates: Letters From Iwo Jima, Volver

I want to work in Volver, Almodovar could develop into a perennial Oscar pick the way Woody Allen was for awhile, but I'm not sure what to drop. Stranger Than Fiction got a Writers Guild nom but I'm afraid it will have to make due with just that.

Best Adapted Screenplay
Children of Men
The Departed
The Devil Wears Prada
Little Children
Notes on a Scandal

Alternates: Dreamgirls, Thank You For Smoking

A tough, strange category. The Departed is clearly a lock but beyond that...Little Children isn't a very popular film and the other three scripts, frankly, aren't that great. But genre will probably hold back Dreamgirls. I'm skeptical of Smoking but it earned a Writers Guild nom. So did Borat, in this category, so I assume Oscar voters will have to consider it here. There's also The Last King of Scotland, co-scripted by a hot writer of the moment (Peter Morgan, who also wrote The Queen).

Best Animated Film
Cars
Happy Feet
Monster House

Alternates: Flushed Away, Over the Hedge

DreamWorks muscle might be enough to push in Hedge. Fondness for Aardman could do the trick with Flushed.

Best Documentary (Feature Length)
Deliver Us From Evil
An Inconvenient Truth
Iraq in Fragments
Jonestown: The Life and Death of People's Temple
The War Tapes

Alternates: Jesus Camp, Shut Up & Sing

Beyond Inconvenient Truth, the likely winner, I'm just guessing really, but I'd like to see Shut Up & Sing actually make the cut.

Best Foreign Language Film
Days of Glory (Algeria)
The Lives of Others (Germany)
Pan's Labyrinth (Mexico)
Volver (Spain)
Water (Canada)

Alternates: Avenue Montaigne (France), Black Book (Netherlands)

This category had a "semi-final" round this year and only nine films made it in. Denmark's After the Wedding and Switzerland's Vitus (the only one I'd never heard of) are also in the running. There are only 30 people total voting on this category...that could be dangerous.

Best Art Direction/Production Design
Children of Men
Dreamgirls
Marie Antoinette
Pan's Labyrinth
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Alternates: Babel, Curse of the Golden Flower

I also buy into predictions for Flags of Our Fathers, Letters From Iwo Jima, The Good German, Apocalypto and The Queen.

Best Cinematography
Babel
Children of Men
Dreamgirls
The Illusionist
Pan's Labyrinth

Alternates: The Departed, The Good Shepherd

It'd be nice to see one of Eastwood's films represented here but this category had the strangest corresponding Guild nominations of the year. I don't believe the Oscar list will be so removed from the Best Picture contenders.

Best Costume Design
Curse of the Golden Flower
The Devil Wears Prada
Dreamgirls
Marie Antoinette
Pan's Labyrinth

Alternates: The Illusionist, The Queen

Can Prada buck the preference for period work by using clothes to drive the story? Who cares really? A nomination for Little Miss Sunshine would be a lot more fun. Other period contenders include Bobby, The Good German, Miss Potter, The Painted Veil, The Prestige and Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest.

Best Editing
Babel
The Departed
Dreamgirls
Little Miss Sunshine
United 93

Alternates: Letters From Iwo Jima, The Queen

Brokeback Mountain's failure to land a nomination here last year turned out to be a warning sign of the foul play yet to come. So watch this one closely.

Best Makeup
Apocalypto
Pan's Labyrinth
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Alternates: The Prestige, X-Men: The Last Stand

The only other films qualified are Click and The Santa Clause 3. I feel pretty confident in my three choices.

Best Score
Babel
The Da Vinci Code
The Good German
The Illusionist
The Painted Veil

Alternates: Notes on a Scandal, The Queen

Philip Glass is responsible for Notes and Illusionist and Alexandre Desplat is behind Painted and Queen. So either, or both, could easily be double nominees. I was also thinking of Apocalyto and Volver here.

Best Song
I Need to Wake Up (An Inconvenient Truth)
Listen (Dreamgirls)
Never Gonna Break My Faith (Bobby)
Our Town (Cars)
Song of the Heart (Happy Feet)

Alternates: Patience (Dreamgirls), Til the End of Time (Little Miss Sunshine)

Ugh, this category is always frustrating. It could wind up with less than five nominees, like last year. Voters could show an unexpected fondness for indie rock and go for the Sunshine song, especially since it's a Picture contender. Dreamgirls has one other original song: Love You I Do. Sheryl Crow has songs from both Cars (Real Gone) and the instant-disaster Home of the Brave (Try Not to Remember). I also feel like mentioning Ordinary Miracle from Charlotte's Web and O Kazakhstan from Borat as potential spoilers.

Best Sound
Babel
Blood Diamond
Dreamgirls
Flags of Our Fathers
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Alternates: Casino Royale, The Departed

Best Sound Editing
Apocalypto
Cars
The Departed
Flags of Our Fathers
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

Alternates: Casino Royale, Superman Returns

Best Visual Effects
Casino Royale
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
Superman Returns

Alternates: Night at the Museum, Poseidon

The only other possibilities are Eragon and X-Men: The Last Stand, both frightening. I wouldn't be surprised if Pirates and Superman were the only nominees.

Golden Globes preview

We're still in the thick of award season and all of the major Hollywood guilds have announced their nominations: Actors, Directors, Producers, Writers, Cinematographers, Editors. The big news there is that both the Directors Guild and the Producers Guild selected the same five nominees: Babel, The Departed, Dreamgirls, Little Miss Sunshine and The Queen. It seems like it will take an act of the movie gods to prevent these five movies from being Oscar's Best Picture nominees.

But there's still a lot that feels up in the air about this year's awards, and the Golden Globes may give us the some clues in a few of the more competitive categories.

Nothing that happens at the Golden Globe awards will actually alter who will or will not be nominated for an Oscar. The votes have been cast, the ballots were due in yesterday. That said, there is momentum to be gained, or lost, for potential winners.

A few Globe categories are hardly in play. Helen Mirren, Sacha Baron Cohen and Meryl Streep are sure bets in the lead film categories. A loss for any would be a major upset. It should also be a given that all three will deliver entertaining speeches.

Also likely but not necessarily locked: Dreamgirls duo Jennifer Hudson and Eddie Murphy in the supporting categories. Hudson will face roughly the same competition at SAG and probably on Oscar night. Tomorrow could/should be the first of three big wins for her. Murphy is the only Globe supporting actor nominee also nominated by SAG, so a win or a loss for him probably doesn't mean as much.

But the real races to watch...

Lead actor in a drama:
This could be where Forest Whitaker builds on the dominance he's established from the critics' awards and steamrolls his way to an Oscar.
OR
This could mark a shift toward support for Peter O'Toole or Will Smith. If either were to win here and go on to win at SAG they'd be the man to beat on Oscar night.
OR
Double nominee Leonardo DiCaprio could beat himself. Again, what happens at the Globes doesn't matter, his Oscar nomination fate has already been sealed: he'll be up for The Departed, Blood Diamond, neither, or theoretically both (if enough Oscar voters placed him in lead for Blood Diamond and supporting for The Departed). A Globe victory for Leo would be huge, but a lead Oscar nom for The Departed is the more important nail-biter.

Foreign language film:
Two of the nominees: Apocalypto and Letters from Iwo Jima are not eligible for Oscar's foreign film category because they're American productions. The other three: Germany's The Lives of Others, Spain's Volver and Mexico's Pan's Labyrinth are considered the Oscar front runners.

Eastwood's Iwo Jima has been faring miserably so far in award season, yet it still has to be considered the favorite here. A Globe would be nice but probably won't help increase its box office or awards traction. However, a win for one of the films from another country would be big and help give it prime positioning for Oscar.

Animated film:
This is the first year the Globes have had this category and it will be interesting to see how they vote. At times there's a little too much emphasis put on the "foreign" part of the Hollywood Foreign Press organization that votes on the Globes, but adhering to that cliche Happy Feet should have the edge. Cars was still a bigger hit and comes from well respected Pixar. Monster House is a scrappy underdog.

At any rate it's generally expected these will be the three Oscar nominees for animated film as well. So a win here is probably important.

And the biggies:
Comedy/musical and drama film:
Neither of these feel as up in the air as the other categories but they do seem like honest two way races.

Dreamgirls should have the edge in comedy/musical but Little Miss Sunshine is seen as a possible upset Oscar victor. Beating Dreamgirls for a Globe would make that momentum snowball.

The Departed seems like the likely drama champ (and Scorsese a likely winner in directing, though the Globes don't "owe" him anything the way Oscar does) but the Globes showered Babel with nominations and that "foreign" part of Hollywood Foreign Press is enough to convince pundits it has a shot at a big win. Sometimes, perception is everything. I don't expect Babel to be a real threat for an Oscar win but a Globe victory does seem possible.


On the TV side I'll be cheering for Ugly Betty in both its categories and expect America Ferrera to win. I'm also hoping for an Alec Baldwin win (anything to bring more attention to the undeservedly struggling 30 Rock). And any win for Bleak House would be great (but unlikely).

Otherwise TV is a bit of a snooze. I haven't seen most of the telefilms, including Elizabeth I and Tsunami, or Showtime's Dexter. Wins for Heroes would be nice but I'd rather see that show prove itself a little more.

I'd also love to see Edie Falco win, both to recognize an undervalued season of The Sopranos and to acknowledge that her competition is incredibly lame.

Globe reactions

Late, as usual, but here we go.

Nominees are here if you want to follow along.

It's a fairly blah list overall, despite some very deserving (but mostly expected) nominees. Babel leading the field in the film categories pretty much sums it up. I wasn't excited by that movie and I'm not excited by these nominations.

Bobby's semi-surprising nomination as best drama film stands out as particularly bad. The Globes often make lousy choices but as I noted in my previous post I give them credit for skipping over Crash last year (although it's likely they would've nominated it if the voters knew it was headed for its Oscar victory, Globe voters always want to beat Oscar and Emmy to the punch). But Bobby, a sloppy drama that merits zero award consideration, is a far worse film than Crash.

Another poor choice worth singling out: Evangeline Lilly's lead actress nomination for Lost. Yeah, that's right, Kate is the only acting nominee from Lost. It would be hard to justify in any year, but it's especially moronic when Sally Field in Brothers and Sisters (how'd she miss out?), Jeanne Tripplehorn in Big Love and Mary McDonnell in Battlestar Galactica go unnominated.

And yet they nominated Ellen Pompeo for Grey's Anatomy. Lame.

TV was pretty much as expected, but it was a respectable surprise to see Masi Oka actually get a nom as Heroes' favorite Hiro.

It's par for the course these days to undervalue The Sopranos (Edie Falco got a nom but not Gandolfini or the series) and skip over Battlestar Galactica, Deadwood and The Shield. The Globes had a chance to right Emmy's wrong and recognize Forest Whitaker's work in The Shield, but they didn't. It's even weirder since one of the year's biggest Globe trends was double nominations and Whitaker is unsurprisingly nominated for his work in The Last King of Scotland.

Among the actual double nominees: Toni Collette, Emily Blunt, Chiwetel Ejiofor (a real surprise nominee in film's lead actor comedy category for Kinky Boots) and Annette Bening.

Clint Eastwood and Leonardo DiCaprio scored two nominations in the same category (directing and lead actor drama respectively). Clint can be a double nominee come Oscar time but, due to category rules, Leo can't. That causes concern that his two great performances this year may divide his support and he could wind up without an Oscar nomination. That would be a shame, since he truly is the year's Best Actor thanks to his career-best work in The Departed.

Helen Mirren also competes with herself in the telefilm lead actress category (for PBS' Prime Suspect and HBO's Elizabeth I, neither of which I've seen) and she trumps all multiple Globe nominees with a third mention for The Queen. Unless her TV work splits votes it's hard to imagine her not winning two awards. (If she does split votes maybe Annette Bening will make up for her Emmy loss, or Bleak House's very deserving Gillian Anderson.)

One of the biggest Globe surprises (besides Chiwetel Ejiofor): Maggie Gyllenhaal's best actress nomination for Sherrybaby, a movie which hasn't even made $300,000 in the U.S. Love Maggie, haven't seen the movie yet.

However, World Trade Center, another, much more successful, film featuring Maggie Gyllenhaal was shut out. Ditto fellow 9/11 drama United 93.

On the other hand arty suburban nightmare Little Children fared a little better than expected (a good thing). Nominations for best drama film, best actress and best screenplay might finally convince New Line to open the movie in more than a handful of cities.

The inaugural Animated film category was just as expected with Cars, Happy Feet and Monster House getting nominations. Go penguins!

Foreign language film also was predictable but satisfying with U.S. productions Apocalypto and Letters From Iwo Jima nominated with Germany's The Lives of Others and Spanish language Pan's Labyrinth and Volver. I haven't seen the American ones yet but the other three are easily among the year's best films.

Is it a good thing or a bad thing when foreign film is a much more exciting race than the main best picture categories?

Critics awards and Globes preview

The Golden Globe nominations will be announced in just a few hours but before the film award focus shifts to those I should acknowledge several critics groups that have announced awards in the past week or so.

The Los Angeles film critics and the National Board of Review both selected Clint Eastwood's Letters From Iwo Jima as the best film of 2006. I haven't seen the film yet but I look forward to it, especially since I immensely enjoyed Eastwood's WWII companion piece Flags of our Fathers.

The New York film critics went with United 93, a critical favorite earlier this year.

All three of these groups selected The Last King of Scotland's Forest Whitaker and The Queen's Helen Mirren as the year's best actor and actress (although Whitaker tied with Borat's Sacha Baron Cohen in Los Angeles).

Other key critics groups to announce awards include Boston film critics (who selected The Departed as the year's best film), Washington D.C. critics (United 93), New York online critics (The Queen) and San Francisco critics (Little Children). (And if you're dying to see their choices in other categories check out Movie City News.)

The Broadcast Film Critics also announced their nominations in a number of categories (they seem to pride themselves on trying to predict Oscar nominations, which makes their selections less interesting than other organizations) and AFI announced its annual top ten list of American films (and also TV shows).

2006 has developed into a pretty respectable year for films and the diversity in these awards demonstrates that to at least some degree. But the Globes will be the first awards of the year to really catch the general public's interest (and the only until Oscar nominations come out).

This year's presumed Oscar frontrunners will be scattered across three categories at the Globes making for a very broad race. Expect to see The Departed and The Queen nominated for best drama film, Dreamgirls and Little Miss Sunshine competing in best comedy/musical and Letters From Iwo Jima regulated to the foreign film category (per Globe rules). (And yes those five films are the top Oscar contenders for Best Picture.)

Babel has deservedly seen its Oscar hopes fade (due mostly to poor box office) but it should be up for drama film here along with some combination of Flags of our Fathers, United 93, World Trade Center, Notes on a Scandal, The Pursuit of Happyness and The Painted Veil. While Borat, The Devil Wears Prada, For Your Consideration and Stranger Than Fiction will be angling to join in the comedy/musical fight. Happy Feet, one of the year's best films, would have a stronger shot at a comedy/musical nomination if the Globes hadn't recently introduced an animated film category.

Of course we could be in for a repeat of last year's unexpected Globe nominations, where smaller, more unlikely, films like Match Point and A History of Violence made the cut. Films as varied as Bobby, Children of Men, Half Nelson, Little Children, Miss Potter and A Prairie Home Companion would fit the bill this year.

It's worth noting that last year's "Best" Picture come Oscar time wasn't even nominated by the Globes. They'll always have that working in their favor.

On the TV side I'm most interested in how several new series will fare. I expect noms for Heroes (drama series), Ugly Betty (comedy series, lead actress and maybe supporting actress for Vanessa Williams), 30 Rock (lead actor and possibly comedy series), Brothers and Sisters (lead actress for Sally Field, longer shot Calista Flockhart, even longer shot Rachel Griffiths and fairly long shot for drama series) and probably Studio 60 (maybe drama series, maybe lead actor/actress, maybe Sarah Paulson in supporting). Showtime's Dexter also likely has a shot at drama series and lead actor nominations.

Other key comedy contenders include Entourage, The Office, My Name is Earl, Scrubs, Desperate Housewives, Weeds and presumably Arrested Development (which aired five episodes in 2006). There's also Two and a Half Men if they want to be boring, or It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia if they want to be adventurous. Curb Your Enthusiasm sits this year out.

Dramas eligible include 24, The Sopranos, Deadwood, Big Love, Lost, Grey's Anatomy, House, The Shield, Battlestar Galactica and Rescue Me. Nominating any series outside of this list or the new contenders mentioned above would be a real surprise (even the critically acclaimed Friday Night Lights, given the competition).

By the time anyone reads this nominations will probably have been announced and you'll know how right or wrong I am.

Aftermath

The reactions to Oscar's folly keep pouring in.

Be sure to check out this amazing commentary by Steve Lopez from the LA Times, which directly challenges the Worst Best Picture Ever from a Los Angeles perspective and Dateline Hollywood's very amusing explanation of why this happened (third graph from the end is comedy gold, and Haggis was asking for it on the Brecht reference in his speech).

Then, if you must, check out the commentary of a pompous jackass in the Chicago Sun Times.

Roger Ebert has been extremely annoying this entire award season but he reached a new low with this, and I had to respond. So posted below is the e-mail I sent him in response to his column:

Re: The Fury of the 'Crash'-lash

Roger,

Your insistence on spinning information in order to justify the Oscar debacle is as shameful as it is embarrassing.

In your article, which primarily attacks Kenneth Turan and Nikki Finke, you state that "What is intriguing about these writers is that they never mention the other three best picture nominees: "Capote," "Good Night, and Good Luck" and "Munich.""

Did you even read Turan's article? If so you must have missed this:
" "Brokeback," it is worth noting, was in some ways the tamest of the discomforting films available to Oscar voters in various categories. Steven Spielberg's "Munich"; the Palestinian Territories' "Paradise Now," one of the best foreign language nominees; and the documentary nominee "Darwin's Nightmare" offered scenarios that truly shook up people's normal ways of seeing the world. None of them won a thing."

And Finke's article, which was published before the Oscar travesty and seems especially prescient now, includes this passage:
"It’s not that Crash isn’t Oscar-worthy and Brokeback is. Both are good, if flawed, movies."

Acknowledging Finke's personal opinion would have given your readers a better idea of where she was actually coming from in this debate, but unfortunately it doesn't support your viewpoint that critics and entertainment media just won't leave poor Crash alone. Or recognize it for the genius, Dickensian work that it apparently is.

As a critic you are, of course, entitled to your opinion and the general public is entitled to agree or disagree. But if you're really trying to figure out why so many Brokeback Mountain fans are so upset with the Crash victory maybe you should consider, and maybe even inform your readers, of the amount of "Best Picture" awards that Brokeback Mountain won prior to Oscar night:

BAFTA
Golden Globes
Independent Spirit Awards
Venice Film Festival
Los Angeles Film Critics Association
New York Film Critics Circle
Broadcast Film Critics Association
Golden Satellite
Critics groups from: Boston, Dallas-Fort Worth, Florida, Iowa, Las Vegas, London, St. Louis, San Francisco, Southeastern U.S., Utah and Vancouver

Brokeback also won "Best Picture" equivalents from the Directors Guild and Producers Guild and won Best Adapted Screenplay from the Writers Guild. It also received the highest ranking of any Best Picture nominees on both the Village Voice and Film Comment critics polls AND made more money at the U.S. box office than any other nominee.

In comparison Crash won top awards from the Actors and Editors Guilds. It won the original screenplay prize from the Writers Guild. It was voted Best Picture by the Chicago Film Critics and won the NAACP Image Award. Not a bad showing but not even in the same universe as Brokeback when it comes to awards and acclaim.

Crash also failed to receive a Golden Globe nomination as Best Drama (nominations went to far more artistically successful films like A History of Violence and The Constant Gardener) and it was nominated as "Best First Feature," rather than "Best Feature," by the Independent Spirit Awards (even though Tommy Lee Jones' debut film, The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, was nominated as "Best Feature").

I admire you for standing up for the minority opinion on this sad and shocking moment in Oscar history but I wish you wouldn't pretend to be so clueless about why so many people are outraged.

You're smarter than that.

Best,
Geoff Berkshire

Los Angeles, California

The Morning After

Now that some of the blinding rage has subsided (some, not all), I realized I made a big, embarrassing mistake in my post of outrage: Million Dollar Baby didn't lose a script Oscar to Lord of the Rings, it lost a script Oscar to Sideways, which is fine and as it should be. Mystic River lost to Lord of the Rings, but we'll let that go...

Since the world hasn't actually ended I'll go ahead and mention a few things I liked about this year's Oscars:

1) Reese Witherspoon's speech (and George Clooney's wasn't so bad either)
2) The honorary Oscar segment, with a fantastic presentation by Meryl Streep and Lily Tomlin and a rather inspiring speech from Robert Altman
3) The mock political attack ads for the Best Actress and Best Sound Editing categories; cheeky, brilliant
4) Jon Stewart's presence throughout the show; his opening monologue was weak (and I did miss Chris Rock) but Stewart improved as the show went on, which was vital for a ceremony short on surprises or otherwise riveting moments; that said I have a feeling it'll be back to Crystal or Martin next year, one of them will probably be willing to give it another go

And I think that's about it. Not a really great production (literally, what was up with all the sound flubs?), but even if it had been a great show the ending would've ruined everything.

Kenneth Turan has his say on Oscar's folly, it's a great read.

What is there to say?

I've been disappointed in the past (like when Saving Private Ryan lost to Shakespeare in Love), I've been prepared for disappointment (like when Jack Nicholson beat Peter Fonda, or Traffic and Crouching Tiger both lost to Gladiator), I've been slightly appalled by surprise choices (like when Adrien Brody beat Jack Nicholson, or Paul Haggis' Million Dollar Baby script lost to Lord of the freakin' Rings) but I've never been AS DISGUSTED as when I heard Jack Nicholson announce Crash as the Academy Award winner for Best Picture of 2005.

Best Picture. Crash.

As someone who likes movies, loves movies, really cares about movies, I am dumbfounded by such blatant stupidity. Such cluelessness. Such utter disregard for movies as an art.

To single out such mediocrity in what was a pretty damn good year for filmmaking (and for Oscar nominations) is beyond absurd. It's pathetic.

And here's the thing. Mediocre is the key word when it comes to this "Best" Picture. I don't consider Crash to be a terrible film. I don't think it's an abomination. It has some good qualities and it's impossible to say it's not well intentioned. I understand why people like it.

But liking it is completely different from calling it the best film of the year, or choosing it as the best film when your other choices are Brokeback Mountain, Capote, Good Night and Good Luck and Munich. That is what I simply can not wrap my head around, and never will.

There are a lot of people (and organizations) to fault for this ridiculous victory. But I'm confident about how this will play in the record books. A "controversial" choice at best, an all-time Oscar low point at the worst.

As I mentioned in my predictions post, Brokeback Mountain has won the top awards from BAFTA, the Directors Guild, the Producers Guild, the Writers Guild, the Golden Globes, the Venice Film Festival and the Broadcast, Boston, Dallas-Fort Worth, London, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Southeastern U.S. and Vancouver critics groups. It has the highest ranking among Best Picture nominees on both the Village Voice critics poll and the Film Comment critics poll and it's the highest grossing nominee as well.

Add to that list Brokeback's victory over the weekend at the Independent Spirit Awards (where Crash was relegated to Best First Feature, not allowed to play with the big boys, although it could've been nominated as Best Feature if it had the support: Tommy Lee Jones' debut film The Three Burials of Melqiuades Estrada was nominated in the Best Feature category this year). And throw in critics groups from Florida, Iowa and St. Louis that I neglected to mention (probably others as well).

So yes, it will look like a mistake. It already does. But let's not kid ourselves, the Best Picture Oscar is the big one. It's the one award that Brokeback deserved more than anything else. For it to have lost to a good film would be unfortunate, for it to have lost to a film that didn't even deserve a nomination is...disgusting.

I never hated Crash.

I do now.

Oscar predictions 2006

And here we go... lots of predictions this year for "unpredictable" things happening. The nominees were much easier to forecast than Oscarwatchers were expecting and I think the winners will be to. Honestly I hope so, because in most cases the frontrunners will make for a very nice winners' circle.

Best Picture
Brokeback Mountain; Capote; Crash; Good Night, and Good Luck.; Munich

Brokeback Mountain has won the top awards from BAFTA, the Directors Guild, the Producers Guild, the Writers Guild, the Golden Globes, the Venice Film Festival and the Broadcast, Boston, Dallas-Fort Worth, London, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco, Southeastern U.S. and Vancouver critics groups. It has the highest ranking among Best Picture nominees on both the Village Voice critics poll and the Film Comment critics poll and it's the highest grossing nominee as well. It's not just a great movie, it's a great zeitgeist movie. That's what Oscar really loves. Even in such a great year for nominees anything else winning would be a mistake for the record books.

Best Actor
Philip Seymour Hoffman; Terrence Howard; Heath Ledger; Joaquin Phoenix; David Strathairn

Hoffman is the actor's actor. Generally unrecognized by award groups until his work in Capote he's been on a tear all year, and it won't end here.

Best Actress
Judi Dench; Felicity Huffman; Keira Knightley; Charlize Theron; Reese Witherspoon

Possibly the only category with a "superstar" winner: was there anyone Witherspoon didn't charm with the best country music film performance since Sissy Spacek 25 years ago?

Best Supporting Actor
George Clooney; Matt Dillon; Paul Giamatti; Jake Gyllenhaal; William Hurt

The one where no one knows anything. But Clooney is the golden boy of the moment, with good reason. (My nagging doubt: when actors prove themselves as filmmakers they usually don't win an Oscar for acting.)

Best Supporting Actress
Amy Adams; Catherine Keener; Frances McDormand; Rachel Weisz; Michelle Williams

The name that keeps going through my head is Marisa Tomei, who pulled off a shocker of a win 13 years ago that many people credit to video screeners. If enough people watch Junebug then the same thing might happen for Adams. But I fear the movie is too small, and The Constant Gardener is too well liked, and Weisz becomes the latest actress nobody thought would win an Oscar to win an Oscar.

Best Director
George Clooney; Paul Haggis; Ang Lee; Bennett Miller; Steven Spielberg

Lee. A master filmmaker winning an Oscar for one of his best films doesn't happen very often. Enjoy it.

Best Adapted Screenplay
Brokeback Mountain; Capote; The Constant Gardener; A History of Violence; Munich

I hope Larry McMurtry & Diana Ossana have a good speech ready when Brokeback wins.

Best Original Screenplay
Crash; Good Night, and Good Luck.; Match Point; The Squid and the Whale; Syriana

Crash has had a lock on this for months, unfortunately.

Best Animated Film
Howl's Moving Castle; Tim Burton's Corpse Bride; Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit

Wallace & Gromit has to be one of the night's surest locks.

Best Documentary
Darwin's Nightmare; Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room; March of the Penguins; Murderball; Street Fight

I wouldn't consider those mega-grossing Penguins locks, but I think they'll, uh, march off with the win anyway...

Best Foreign Language Film
Don't Tell (Italy); Joyeux Noel (France); Paradise Now (Palestine); Sophie Scholl-The Final Days (Germany); Tsotsi (South Africa)

I was wrong with this at the Globes but I'm sticking by Tsotsi for the Oscar (South Africa's first after two consecutive nominations).

Best Original Song
"In the Deep" (Crash); "It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp" (Hustle & Flow); "Travelin' Thru" (Transamerica)

I'm actually looking forward to the performances for once but I feel incredibly uncertain about who will win. Dolly Parton (who wrote Travelin') is the respected vet, but things haven't been going so well for vets lately in this category. Pimp is showcased the best in its film, it's undeniably catchy and voters have already embraced rap with Eminem's win three years ago. But Bird York has been promoting her song like crazy and Crash is nominated for Best Picture. I want Dolly to get her Oscar (imagine how great her speech would be!) but I think In the Deep takes it.

Best Cinematography
Batman Begins; Brokeback Mountain; Good Night, and Good Luck.; Memoirs of a Geisha; The New World

Memoirs of a Geisha won at BAFTA and the Cinematographers' Guild but the whole Oscar body votes on this and I think it'll be Brokeback's one tech win.

Best Editing
Cinderella Man; The Constant Gardener; Crash; Munich; Walk the Line

Crash. :(

Best Original Score
Brokeback Mountain; The Constant Gardener; Memoirs of a Geisha; Munich; Pride & Prejudice

John Williams has two nominations this year and has won five times in the past. I think he'll win again for Geisha (but that Brokeback score is awfully catchy...).

Best Visual Effects
The Chronicles of Narnia; King Kong; War of the Worlds

King Kong

Best Art Direction
Good Night, and Good Luck.; Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire; King Kong; Memoirs of a Geisha; Pride & Prejudice

Memoirs of a Geisha

Best Costume Design
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory; Memoirs of a Geisha; Mrs. Henderson Presents; Pride & Prejudice; Walk the Line

Memoirs of a Geisha

Best Sound
The Chronicles of Narnia; King Kong; Memoirs of a Geisha; Walk the Line; War of the Worlds

Walk the Line

Best Sound Editing
King Kong; Memoirs of a Geisha; War of the Worlds

King Kong

Best Makeup
The Chronicles of Narnia; Cinderella Man; Star Wars: Episode III

Cinderella Man

According to my predictions Brokeback Mountain will win four awards and Crash and Memoirs of a Geisha will win three. King Kong and Walk the Line take two.

What a weird year.

The (Not So) Alternative Oscars

One of the most interesting things about the Independent Spirit Awards is just how long it takes to get from nominees to winners. Here are my ridiculously quick, thoughtless and utterly unreliable predictions on who'll win at that show that happens the day before the Oscars...

John Cassavetes Award (for ultra low budget feature): Room (although Brick has the highest profile)
Truer Than Fiction Award: Occupation: Dreamland
Producers Award: Caroline Baron
Best Foreign Film: Paradise Now (the category's Oscar nominee)
Best Cinematography: Good Night, and Good Luck. (the category's Oscar nominee)
Best Documentary: Grizzly Man (not the Oscar nominee, that would be Enron, but a popular choice nonetheless)
Best First Screenplay: Junebug (if there's any justice...although Me and You and Everyone We Know would be a smart choice too, but Transamerica would not)
Best First Feature: Crash (ew)
Best Screenplay: The Squid and the Whale
Best Supporting Female: Amy Adams (I hope, but Michelle Williams has just as good a shot)
Best Supporting Male: Matt Dillon (sadly)
Best Female Lead: Felicity Huffman
Best Male Lead: Philip Seymour Hoffman (but if Terrence Howard's gonna upset anywhere it would be here, right?)
Best Director: Ang Lee
Best Feature: Brokeback Mountain

The British Have Spoken

This is a little late, but just for the record, the BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Arts) award ceremony took place on Sunday, and was broadcast in the U.S. on BBC America. Even though not many Americans are even aware of their existence, the BAFTAs are a pretty fun event to watch. It's a lot more relaxed than many award shows (and it's British—who'd have thought?) and the longtime host, Stephen Fry, is witty and ironic in the best way. They even play rock/pop music when the presenters take the stage (yes that's The Chemical Brothers or The Killers or The White Stripes you hear when Patrick Stewart or Pierce Brosnan or Kristin Scott-Thomas appear on stage after an appropriately amusing introduction from Fry).

Winners in the big categories were:
Best Picture - Brokeback Mountain
Best Director - Ang Lee (Brokeback Mountain)
Best Actor - Philip Seymour Hoffman (Capote)
Best Actress - Reese Witherspoon (Walk the Line)
Best Supporting Actor - Jake Gyllenhaal (Brokeback Mountain)
Best Supporting Actress - Thandie Newton (Crash)

Pretty much how it's expected to go at the Oscars, except in those supporting categories where Gyllenhaal pulled an "upset" (BAFTA showered George Clooney with more nominations than anyone else this year—that's saying a lot—but his noms for both Syriana and Good Night and Good Luck in the supporting actor category probably hurt his chance for a win) and Newton, who isn't Oscar-nominated, surprised as well (Oscar frontrunner Rachel Weisz, who is British, was up for lead actress at the BAFTAs for The Constant Gardener). It's the first ever major award win for either of them (although Gyllenhaal was recognized by the National Board of Review earlier in the season and Newton was part of Crash's ensemble cast win at SAG).

Other winners included:
Best Adapted Screenplay - Brokeback Mountain
Best Original Screenplay - Crash
Best Cinematography - Memoirs of a Geisha
Best Costume Design - Memoirs of a Geisha
Best Editing - The Constant Gardener
Best Make-up/Hairstyling - The Chronicles of Narnia
Best Original Score - Memoirs of a Geisha
Best Production Design - Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
Best Sound - Walk the Line
Best Special Effects - King Kong

All of these winners are nominated in the corresponding Oscar categories as well (and none of them were shown on the BBC America broadcast).

In awards specific to the BAFTAs, Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit won for Best British Film (over the likes of Constant Gardener and Pride & Prejudice, ha ha) and Pride & Prejudice director Joe Wright won an award for Most Promising Newcomer.

The show's most disturbing win was James McAvoy's triumph over Gael Garcia Bernal, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Rachel McAdams and Michelle Williams for the inaugural general-public-selected Rising Star Award. No disrespect to McAvoy (who was perfectly charming as Mr. Tumnus in The Chronicles of Narnia) but he was up against four of the best "Rising Star" candidates possible. I guess that's what playing a faun does for you.

Even the BAFTAs' career-achievement award was more interesting than the usual rote tribute, thanks to a very moving speech from the honoree, producer David Puttnam, that included praise for the films of 2005 and an extended reference to The Sixth Sense. You kinda had to see it to get it...

More Oscar (and how'd I do?)

I don't have many more reactions to add, it was pretty easy to take in and react to this morning. Instead I'll offer a few random tidbits:

Last year that all five Best Picture nominees also received Best Director nominations: 1981 (Warren Beatty's Reds, Hugh Hudson's Chariots of Fire, Louis Malle's Atlantic City, Mark Rydell's On Golden Pond and Steven Spielberg's Raiders of the Lost Ark; Beatty won for director, Chariots won picture)

Number of years running the Best Picture nominees match the Directors Guild of America nominations: 4

Last year my favorite film of the year was nominated for Best Picture: 2001 (Traffic)

Last year my favorite film of the year won Best Picture: 2000 (American Beauty) (Go Brokeback!)

Last year four films on my top ten were nominated for Best Picture: 2005 (last year - The Aviator, Finding Neverland, Million Dollar Baby, Sideways; this year - Brokeback Mountain, Capote, Good Night, and Good Luck., Munich; and the fifth nominee in both years, Ray and Crash, was nowhere near my list)

Percentage of nominations I correctly predicted: 78%

Percentage of final nominees I correctly predicted or listed as an alternate: 85%

Percentage of correct predictions in the top six categories: 87% (90% with alternates)

Here's how I did, category by category:

Best Picture

I got four out of five: Brokeback Mountain, Capote, Crash and Good Night, and Good Luck. The fifth nominee, Munich, was an alternate pick. My incorrect prediction was Walk the Line.

Best Director

Also four out of five: George Clooney (Good Night, and Good Luck.), Paul Haggis (Crash), Ang Lee (Brokeback Mountain), Bennett Miller (Capote). My alternate pick, Steven Spielberg (Munich), trumped my prediction David Cronenberg (A History of Violence).

Best Actor

Direct hit: Philip Seymour Hoffman (Capote), Terrence Howard (Hustle & Flow), Heath Ledger (Brokeback Mountain), Joaquin Phoenix (Walk the Line), David Strathairn (Good Night, and Good Luck.)

Best Actress

Four out of five: Judi Dench (Mrs. Henderson Presents), Felicity Huffman (Transamerica), Charlize Theron (North Country), Reese Witherspoon (Walk the Line). And I was happy to be wrong because it meant my alternate pick Keira Knightley (Pride & Prejudice) was nominated instead of Zhang Ziyi (Memoirs of a Geisha).

Best Supporting Actor

Four out of five: George Clooney (Syriana), Matt Dillon (Crash), Paul Giamatti (Cinderella Man), Jake Gyllenhaal (Brokeback Mountain). My "daring" prediction of Terrence Howard (Crash) is replaced on the actual list with the closest thing to main category surprise: William Hurt (A History of Violence).

Best Supporting Actress

Five for five: Amy Adams (Junebug) (yay!), Catherine Keener (Capote), Frances McDormand (North Country), Rachel Weisz (The Constant Gardener), Michelle Williams (Brokeback Mountain)

Best Adapted Screenplay

Five for five: Brokeback Mountain, Capote, The Constant Gardener, A History of Violence, Munich

Best Original Screenplay

Five for five: Crash, Good Night, and Good Luck., Match Point, The Squid and the Whale, Syriana

Best Animated Film

I'm very happy to get this one right! Three for three: Howl's Moving Castle, Tim Burton's The Corpse Bride, Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit

Best Foreign Language Film

A surprising four out of five: Joyeux Noel (France), Paradise Now (Palestine), Sophie Scholl-The Final Days (Germany), Tsotsi (South Africa). I predicted Hungary's Holocaust-related Fateless instead of actual nominee, Italy's Don't Tell.

Best Documentary (Feature Length)

Three out of five: Enron: The Smartest Guys In the Room, March of the Penguins, Murderball. I missed Darwin's Nightmare and Street Fight.

Best Art Direction

Three out of five: Good Night, and Good Luck., King Kong, Memoirs of a Geisha. I incorrectly said Brokeback Mountain and Walk the Line instead of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (a real surprise to me) and Pride & Prejudice.

Best Cinematography

Three out of five: Brokeback Mountain, Good Night, and Good Luck., Memoirs of a Geisha. I incorrectly said The Constant Gardener and King Kong. I mentioned actual nominees Batman Begins and The New World, but not as alternates.

Best Costume Design

Four out of five: Memoirs of a Geisha, Mrs. Henderson Presents, Pride & Prejudice, Walk the Line. I went with a wild card pick, Casanova, but the Oscars went with Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

Best Editing

Three out of five: Capote, The Constant Gardener, Crash. I said Brokeback and Good Night, Oscar said Cinderella Man and The Constant Gardener.

Best Makeup

Two out of three: The Chronicles of Narnia, Cinderella Man. In my eagerness to predict a near shut out of Star Wars: Episode III I selected it as an alternate and incorrectly said The New World would get a nom instead.

Best Original Score

Four out of five: Brokeback Mountain, Memoirs of a Geisha, Munich, Pride & Prejudice. I'm a little surprised that Cinderella Man missed out but it did, and The Constant Gardener got in.

Best Original Song

Two out of three: "In the Deep" (Crash), "Travelin' Thru" (Transamerica). With five picks (no one knew for sure how many would be nominated in this category) I should've nailed this. But I predicted "Hustle & Flow" from Hustle & Flow would be nominated. Right movie, wrong song. Instead it was "It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp." This is probably the first year in a long time, maybe ever, when all the original song nominees are from films that are also nominated in an acting category.

Best Sound

Three out of five: King Kong, Memoirs of a Geisha, Walk the Line. I said Batman Begins and Munich but instead both of my alternate picks made the cut (the lion's roar of Chronicles of Narnia and the alien invasion of War of the Worlds).

Best Sound Editing
Two out of three: King Kong, War of the Worlds. I said Chronicles of Narnia but the rather inexplicable reality was Memoirs of Geisha.

Best Visual Effects

Two out of three: King Kong, War of the Worlds. Star Wars: Episode III got the smackdown (voters must have taken the "too busy" criticism seriously). The mediocre effects of Chronicles of Narnia, an alternate pick, made the cut instead.

Oscar morning

The nominations are... not very surprising. What seemed like a wide-open year has led to a very straightforward list of nominees. Best Picture and Best Director even matched 5 for 5, not a common occurrence.

That helped with my predictions, and the few major ones I missed I'm mostly glad I did. It's great to see Keira Knightley up for best actress and Munich up for best picture rather than my predictions of Zhang Ziyi and Walk the Line. And I went into the nominations hoping for a few serious noms for A History of Violence. I would've preferred my prediction of David Cronenberg for best director but I shouldn't complain about William Hurt's mildly surprising nom for best supporting actor (and can't really complain at all about Steven Spielberg's director nom "instead" of Cronenberg). It really is too bad voters couldn't support both Amy Adams and Maria Bello in supporting actress but I'm extremely happy Adams got in (seriously, now's the time, rent Junebug).

A quick look at the rest of the noms makes me think I did pretty well (even in foreign film, for a change) but I'll tally it up later.

Quick reactions to a few other categories:

It's GREAT that the animated film nominees are Howl's Moving Castle, Tim Burton's The Corpse Bride and Wallace & Gromit; just as they should be. Way to go animation committee!

I'm surprised the documentary committee actually nominated Darwin's Nightmare, a film with a very strong, important message that is very difficult to watch.

I'm not TOO surprised that the Original Song committee limited their selections to three. They had the option to nominate nothing. I'm strongly backing Dolly Parton here but I think Hustle & Flow might take it (and I feel stupid having predicted the other song from the movie instead of the more obvious choice, the movie's centerpiece: It's Hard Out Here for a Pimp).

I really like seeing Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire nominated in the art direction category. I expected the Oscars to entirely overlook the fourth film in the series, but instead it's the first art direction nominee since the original Potter film (and gives it the same amount of nominations as the more tech-award hyped Star Wars: Episode III).

About the only category Brokeback Mountain unexpectedly missed in was editing, a category usually representative of the best picture nominees. Fellow picture nominee Good Night, and Good Luck. is sitting it out too, in favor of Cinderella Man (editors love boxers) and The Constant Gardener.

Now it's back to bed, zzzzzz...

Razzie surprise

Here's a real award season shocker: The Island and Stealth were snubbed by the Razzies!

Two of this summer's biggest disasters, the movies that cemented the great "box office slump" of 2005, combined for a grand total of ZERO Razzie noms. (If you don't know, the Razzies proudly dishonor the worst in film every year.) How Stealth missed out as a Worst Screenplay finalist and both films were snubbed in the Worst Director category is beyond me.

What's so strange about this is that huge Hollywood disasters are usually exactly the kind of movies the Razzies shower with nominations. But this year the voters (anyone willing to shell out cash for a membership) picked on some of the smaller atrocities like Son of the Mask (which got the most nominations, 8, including one for Mrs. Henderson Presents Oscar contender Bob Hoskins), Deuce Bigalow: European Gigolo and Jenny McCarthy's blink-and-you-missed-it vanity project Dirty Love. Also passed over were big contenders like Elektra, Aeon Flux and Herbie: Fully Loaded.

The Razzies did get in a few typically absurd noms (sure Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes were an insufferable tabloid target all year long but neither deserved "worst" performance consideration for their work in War of the Worlds and Batman Begins; Cruise was especially strong) but for the most part their targets (Tara Reid, Rob Schneider, Paris Hilton, Jessica Simpson, Jessica Alba, Hayden Christensen, etc.) are hard to argue with.

It may seem harsh to put Will Ferrell up for Worst Actor but that's what he deserves if he can't say no to crap like Bewitched and Kicking and Screaming. (On the other hand why pick on The Rock for Doom? The movie blew but at least it blew a little less when he was on screen.)

I'm proud to say I haven't seen a lot of the nominees but I did have the misfortune of viewing Bewitched, Into the Blue and Alone in the Dark and wholeheartedly agree with all of their nominations.

You gotta love the Razzies. After all if it wasn't for them what else would Uwe Boll aspire to?

Oscar Nominee Predictions 2005

I've been doing this since 1998 and I can't say I've gotten any better. It's not a science, but it's fun.

For those of you who are new (or otherwise have no idea what this is about) I list predictions for nominees in every Oscar category except the shorts. I give myself two, and only two, alternate selections that represent what I think will be in place if one of my actual predictions is wrong. I'm usually about 70% right on straight-up predictions, closer to 80% when alternates are included. At my best I'm in the 90% and over range with the top six categories.

These are only predictions. They are not reflective of what I WANT to be nominated (in many cases I'll be angry/annoyed/disappointed when/if some of these things ARE nominated). [For a look at what I'd nominate click here.]

That's the deal, take it for what it's worth. Tuesday morning we'll get the real list.

Best Picture
Brokeback Mountain
Capote
Crash
Good Night, and Good Luck.
Walk the Line

Alternates: The Constant Gardener; Munich

This is what I've been thinking since the guilds weighed in with their choices. No reason to change my mind now.

Best Director
George Clooney (Good Night, and Good Luck.)
David Cronenberg (A History of Violence)
Paul Haggis (Crash)
Ang Lee (Brokeback Mountain)
Bennett Miller (Capote)

Alternates: Fernando Meirelles (The Constant Gardener); Steven Spielberg (Munich)

The only other serious contender is James Mangold for Walk the Line. Anyone else would be a bit of a surprise at this point. Spielberg was DGA nominated but he also received guild, but not Oscar, noms for Amistad and Empire of the Sun and the reaction to Munich has been closer to those than any of his other Oscar contenders. Cronenberg has been getting buzz almost all year long as the overdue arty pick, I hope it happens. And Meirelles is looking for his second nom on his second film after surprising pretty much everyone with his nomination for City of God two years ago. Haggis and Miller would be Oscar nominated for directorial debuts.

Best Actor
Philip Seymour Hoffman (Capote)
Terrence Howard (Hustle & Flow)
Heath Ledger (Brokeback Mountain)
Joaquin Phoenix (Walk the Line)
David Strathairn (Good Night, and Good Luck.)

Alternates: Russell Crowe (Cinderella Man); Ralph Fiennes (The Constant Gardener)

Tough, tough category. Some think Strathairn could be this year's Paul Giamatti (snubbed because he's not "flashy" enough, but I think playing a real person will help him) and Howard is still an underdog. Fiennes, with no Globe or SAG attention for his work, would be the real upset.

Best Actress
Judi Dench (Mrs. Henderson Presents)
Felicity Huffman (Transamerica)
Charlize Theron (North Country)
Reese Witherspoon (Walk the Line)
Zhang Ziyi (Memoirs of a Geisha)

Alternates: Joan Allen (The Upside of Anger); Keira Knightley (Pride & Prejudice)

Joan Allen is becoming a popular prediction despite her lack of prior nominations this season. It's a bit hard for me to believe in a nomination for Zhang but she surprised me with Globe and SAG noms. I'm waiting for a real surprise here. Maybe Laura Linney from The Squid and the Whale (even though it's a supporting performance) or Maria Bello bumped up from supporting for A History of Violence?

Best Supporting Actor
George Clooney (Syriana)
Matt Dillon (Crash)
Paul Giamatti (Cinderella Man)
Jake Gyllenhaal (Brokeback Mountain)
Terrence Howard (Crash)

Alternates: Don Cheadle (Crash); Bob Hoskins (Mrs. Henderson Presents)

Picking Howard here might be foolish, Cheadle could easily be up for his second straight nom instead. This category is also ripe for a left-field pick like Frank Langella from Good Night, and Good Luck., someone from A History of Violence or another player from Syriana.

Best Supporting Actress
Amy Adams (Junebug)
Catherine Keener (Capote)
Frances McDormand (North Country)
Rachel Weisz (The Constant Gardener)
Michelle Williams (Brokeback Mountain)

Alternates: Maria Bello (A History of Violence); Shirley MacLaine (In Her Shoes)

Before SAG I didn't even think a nomination for Adams was possible. I really hope Oscar voters watched Junebug. Since they need the support of Oscar's indie-friendly voters I fear that Adams and Bello can't both make it in, so I'm going with the more endearing performance (plus Bello has been undeservedly snubbed in the past). Speaking of the previously snubbed, I don't expect Scarlett Johansson to actually get in here. This time that's a good thing.

Best Adapted Screenplay
Brokeback Mountain
Capote
The Constant Gardener
A History of Violence
Munich

Alternates: Pride & Prejudice; Walk the Line

Munich is controversial and History of Violence could be overlooked completely but will writers think nominating Walk the Line is worth it?

Best Original Screenplay
Crash
Good Night, and Good Luck.
Match Point
The Squid and the Whale
Syriana

Alternates: Cinderella Man; Hustle & Flow

Syriana didn't campaign in this category (the studio didn't know Oscar officials had classified the script as original, not adapted, until right before voting closed), so it may miss out. But here's hoping Woody Allen's overrated Match Point script misses instead.

Best Animated Film
Howl's Moving Castle
Tim Burton's The Corpse Bride
Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit

Alternates: Chicken Little; Madagascar

It's doubtful the three best animated films of the year actually will be nominated but will the usually taste-challenged animated film voters opt for Disney (Chicken Little, which came out later) or DreamWorks (Madagascar, the highest grossing animated film of the year) and who will they pass over (Burton or Miyazaki)?

Best Foreign Language Film
Fateless (Hungary)
Joyeux Noel (France)
Paradise Now (Palestine)
Sophie Scholl-The Final Days (Germany)
Tsotsi (South Africa)

Alternates: C.R.A.Z.Y. (Canada); Two Sons of Francisco (Brazil)

I did well in this category one year...

Best Documentary (Feature Length)
The Boys of Baraka
Enron: The Smartest Guys In the Room
March of the Penguins
Murderball
Unknown White Male

Alternates: The Devil and Daniel Johnston; Mad Hot Ballroom

This always seems easier than it actually is. The list of possibilities isn't very long but there's always an oddball choice (or two, or three).

Best Art Direction
Brokeback Mountain
Good Night, and Good Luck.
King Kong
Memoirs of a Geisha
Walk the Line

Alternates: Cinderella Man; The New World

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is a popular pick too but I don't know where to put it.

Best Cinematography
Brokeback Mountain
The Constant Gardener
Good Night, and Good Luck.
King Kong
Memoirs of a Geisha

Alternates: March of the Penguins; Munich

Batman Begins was also nominated by the cinematographers' guild and if The New World is getting any Oscar noms it might be here.

Best Costume Design
Casanova
Memoirs of a Geisha
Mrs. Henderson Presents
Pride & Prejudice
Walk the Line

Alternates: Brokeback Mountain; The Producers

Best Editing
Brokeback Mountain
Capote
The Constant Gardener
Crash
Good Night, and Good Luck.

Alternates: March of the Penguins; Munich

And it might be foolish to ignore Walk the Line...

Best Makeup
The Chronicles of Narnia
Cinderella Man
The New World

Alternates: Mrs. Henderson Presents; Star Wars: Episode III

Best Original Score
Brokeback Mountain
Cinderella Man
Memoirs of a Geisha
Munich
Pride & Prejudice

Alternates: King Kong; March of the Penguins

Best Original Song
"Hustle & Flow" (Hustle & Flow)
"In the Deep" (Crash)
"The Remains of the Day" (Tim Burton's The Corpse Bride)
"Same in Any Language" (Elizabethtown)
"Travelin' Thru" (Transamerica)

Alternates: "Mad Hot Ballroom" (Mad Hot Ballroom); "There's Nothing Like a Show on Broadway" (The Producers)

Last year voters went a little foreign, so "Dicholo" from The Constant Gardener is a possibility if that happens this year. The only other key contender I can see is "Can't Take It In" from Chronicles of Narnia. It's the first time we actually have a list of "eligible" songs, so predicting this should be a little easier than normal.

Best Sound
Batman Begins
King Kong
Memoirs of a Geisha
Munich
Walk the Line

Alternates: The Chronicles of Narnia; War of the Worlds

The one everybody waits for...

Best Sound Editing
The Chronicles of Narnia
King Kong
War of the Worlds

Alternates: Star Wars: Episode III; Walk the Line

Best Visual Effects
King Kong
Star Wars: Episode III
War of the Worlds

Alternates: The Chronicles of Narnia; Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire