Movie Reviews: Oscar edition

This year the 5 films nominated for Best Picture are: Atonement, Juno, Michael Clayton, There Will Be Blood, and No Country For Old Men. Out of them I have seen the latter 3 and truthfully who out there thinks that Atonement or Juno actually stands even the slightest of chances? Don't worry, the power of editing will let me delete all of this in case of a Best Picture win for either of them. This blog will talk about the Oscar races and give my prediction for who will win each, among other things. If you are too lazy to read all this I summarize everything at the bottom of this blog.

Lets start with the big one: Best Picture:
As just stated above the 5 nominees are Atonement, Juno, Michael Clayton, There Will Be Blood, and No Country For Old Men. The simplest thing to do is to start with which picture will absolutely not win and that is Atonement which is simply up against too much competition and out of all the films has the least buzz. The clear front runner is No Country For Old Men with 'Blood' and 'Clayton' both being long shots, 'Clayton' being the longest. I saw and loved all 3 of these films and though I predict No Country will get this win though if I had the deciding vote it would have to be a toss up between No Country and Clayton. Many could argue that Blood is the strongest of the films but simply going by how into the story and the experience I was, the film that I was most wrapped up in was Michael Clayton, not to say I didn't love Blood. But that film really got me into the story and had me forget about the outside world for the entire duration. A rarity I almost never experience anymore.

Continuing with: Best Actor in a Leading Role
The nominees are: George Clooney for Michael Clayton, Daniel Day Lewis for There Will be Blood, Johnny Depp for Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, Tommy Lee Jones for In the Valley of Elah and finally Viggo Mortensen for Eastern Promises. For this category it seems as if Daniel Day Lewis, deservingly so, will be getting the Oscar. A great performance I have to say. Who would I like to see win? Clooney was great in Clayton but if it were up to me I'd give it to Paul Dano for his turn as Eli Sunday in There Will be Blood. Yupp, take that Day Lewis! His performance was simply amazing and how he did not get nominated for Best Supporting Actor is beyond me and seeing as how Bardem is going to take that one I'd give him Best Actor and leave it at that.

Best Actress in a Leading Role
The nominees are: Cate Blanchett for Elizabeth: The Golden Age, Julie Christie for Away From Her, Marion Cotillard for La Vie in Rose, Laura Linney for The Savages and Ellen Page for Juno. Now with Blanchett having a good chance of picking up the Best Actress in a Supporting Role win and with Elizabeth being called well frankly by many a piece of crap I am positively say this award will not be her's, with Marion Cotillard also standing no chance of winning. Brining us to Julie Christie, Ellen Page, and Laura Linney. Julie Christie seems like the front-runner though Laura Linney also stands a chance. However who knows, maybe the votes will split between the two of them and Page will be the one to walk away with the gold. I give it to Christie though I'd like to see Linney take it. Ohh and may I say that I always find it very insulting to everyone nominated that this category is called Best Actress. Really? Its best female actress. I know its only the 80th Oscars (80th?) so maybe they just haven't figured it out yet. Maybe in another 80 years.

Best Actor in a Supporting Role
Listing all of the losers just seems like a waste of time. Javier Bardem will win it. Some people say Casey Affleck might steal it from him but that all just seems like b.s. made to give the category a bit of suspense. I for one am not on the edge of my seat. Sure Wilkinson was great in Clayton but really as hard as I try to say ohh maybe he should win its impossible because well Bardem is a serial killer. If you see him do not take his autograph. Run and if you survive consider yourself lucky.

Best Actress in a Supporting Role
The one category where the winner could really be anyone. The nominees are: Cate Blanchett for I'm Not There, Ruby Dee for American Gangster, Saoirse Ronan for Atonement, Amy Ryan for Gone Baby Gone and finally Tilda Swinton for Michael Clayton. Somehow, it seems that the current front runner is Ruby Dee but from what I understand, having not yet seen the film, she has a very small role in the film (with less than 10 minutes of screen time) and though good for her if she wins, I don't think her chances are that good, still don't count her out. Before that it seemed that Blanchett might get it for her turn as Bob Dylan in I'm Not There and well I mean she plays a guy, plus she is also nominated for Best Actress (an award she obviously won't win) so some voters might also give her the vote for that, however, the film is considered quite strange and that might turn many of the voters off. My pick however is going to be Amy Ryan for Gone Baby Gone. A stunning performance by an actress I've liked since she first played Off. Beatrice 'Beadie' Russell on, the best show on television past and present, The Wire. I think we should all assume that whenever anyone from that show is nominated for anything they have my vote.

Best Director
The nominees are: Michel Clayton, No Country For Old Men, There Will be Blood, Juno and The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. Though the front runner is the Coen brothers for No Country, Julian Schnabel also stands a chance for The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. Considering many people were outraged that The Diving Bell and the Butterfly wasn't nominated for Best Picture or Best Foreign Language Film, this might help it. However the Coen brothers for No Country's action sequences and beautiful shots of the vast Texas landscape both deserves the win and stands the best chance out of all the nominees of getting it.

To Summarize:
Best Picture: No Country For Old Men
Should Win: Michael Clayton or No Country For Old Men
Best Actor in a Leading Role: Daniel Day Lewis for There Will be Blood
Should Win: Paul Dano for There Will be Blood (confused because you looked down instead of reading, see you should've read it!)
Best Actress in a Leading Role: Julie Christie for Away From Her
Should Win: Laura Linney for The Savages
Best Actor in a Supporting Role: Javier Bardem
Should Win: Javier Bardem, Javier Bardem, Javier Bardem, Javier Bardem, Javier Bardem
Best Actress in a Supporting Role: Amy Ryan for Gone Baby Gone
Should Win: Amy Ryan for Gone Baby Gone
Best Director: Joel and Ethan Coen for No Country For Old Men
Should Win: Joel and Ethan Coen for No Country For Old Men

Come back Sunday night or Monday to either laugh at me or see me laughing.
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