The Oscars: Predictions and Predilections - Part I

Quick Note: In my previous columns, I forgot to mention My Week with Marilyn, one of the most smug, hollow, worthless, candy-coated wank-fests in a year full of them. Yet another period-piece pseudo-biopic (why so many? Because they write themselves. The great thing about using real people in your script is that you don’t have to create characters and can just coast by on nostalgic recognition). But this over-costumed navel-gazing is the worst kind of tripe; a film about a film production (ooh, how meta).

And look, by an amazing coincidence, the two films most nominated this year at the Oscars are Hugo and The Artist, two movies about making movies. The only thing the Academy loves more than movies ABOUT movies….is honoring those movies with all those shiny gold statues that they give themselves (oh, what a web of self-infatuated masturbatory excess they weave). And with that…onto the show.

ACTUAL CONVERSATION (after watching The Descendants)

“I didn’t really like it.”
“Me neither. It’ll probably win best picture.”
“But it doesn’t deserve to win.”
“Exactly. That’s why it’s a lock.”

The key to accurate predictions is not letting your personal feelings towards the movie or the actual quality of the film...get in the way and affect your judgment. These things have nothing to do with what wins. Just remember; 'Best Picture is rarely the best film of the year. Usually, it's not even that good.' That's why Oscar prognosticating is all about the secondary factors like raincheck awards and message movies that end in tragedy and whether the nominee is black/gay/in possession of some kind of other tragic backstory?

Stop asking yourself “Does it deserve to win?” and ask yourself, "Is it safe and mediocre enough to win?" (see: Crash, A Beautiful Mind, The King’s Speech, and most other Best Picture winners whose titles I’ve forgotten for the reasons stated above). Your feelings towards the movies you love (and want to see triumph) or the actual quality of the movie itself…these things are irrelevant. To predict the Oscars most effectively, flash forward in your mind into the future. Imagine that the Academy Awards are over and the winners have been announced and you feel both bored and disappointed. Now think, ‘Why do I feel this way?’ And voila; you’ll have your answer in all the categories that count.

There's a science, not an art, to picking the Oscars.

The Descendants seemed like a lock a while ago (it had all the requirements – big star, 50+ million, director long overdue for an Oscar). But The Artist and Hugo have the most nominations…and like I said, both those movies stroke Hollywood’s ego in just the right way. Hugo will probably win most of the technical awards and The Artist will win the awards that matter. Descendants might steal a few but…not the big prizes. Not director, not picture, not actor...well, probably not.

The screenwriting category is usually the only one that gets it right (excluding exceptions like Precious and Milk and the aforementioned King’s Speech, which won for all the wrong reasons that Best Pictures usually win). The smart money is on Alexander Payne and Woody Allen. The fact that The Artist is nominated for Best Screenplay at all is hilarious (the only script with less dialogue than Lost in Translation) and only further points to a sweep for that middling whimsically-average Weinstein-express-of-a-film.

As for acting awards…who cares? The only reason why acting awards matter is that actors make up the largest block of Academy members and usually, a movie can't win best picture without at least getting nominated for acting (this is why Crash won - full of famous actors). Usually, the movie that wins an Oscar for script and an Oscar or two for acting is the lock for best picture. But if not, it's the winning screenplay and the most acting nominations (Titanic being one of the few exceptions to this rule).

Who will win? Either George Clooney for playing sadsack with his face frozen in ‘concerned-parent’ for 120 minutes or Jean Dujardin for being French and smug (is that even acting?). For supporting male, Christopher Plummer (because he plays a dying homosexual - he's a lock).  For supporting, Bérénice Bejo for being french and adorable or Octavia Spencer for being black and sassy (again, is this acting? Well, if Monique and Jennifer Hudson can win…at least she’s much more talented than both of them combined). And then there’s Best Actress…

It’ll either be Meryl Streep getting her trifecta raincheck oscar after 20 years of not winning and mostly deserving to…or it'll be Viola Davis for playing yet another long-suffering morally-uncorrupted black woman. Yessiree, here come the Academy Awards, the great liberal bastion of equality and political correctness…planning to give another golden statue to a black woman for playing a maid (or worse, two golden statues to two different black women for playing a pair of maids).

If the Help wins, it'll be 1940 all over again, Hattie McDaniel, for playing maids...except this time, we let the black folks sit at the same tables as the white folks (as opposed to Hattie and her escort who were forced to sit alone at a segregated ‘table for two’). 70 years later…nothing’s really changed. There are three non-white nominees in the four acting categories: Two are black women nominated for playing maids. And one is a Hispanic man (Demián Bichir) nominated for playing a gardener.


You can't make this shit up, folks.

Tomorrow, I’ll give my thoughts on the top nine nominees for Best Picture (really, nine movies, Academy committee? Not 10? Not 8? Up to 9? That precise?). As if there were nine great movies made this year. I’m not even sure there were five. This is the first year in a while without a Holocaust movie (thank Christ – the ‘Not another Holocaust movie!’ groaners can take a breather). But more importantly, this is the first year in a while without a Coen Brothers movie. And that actually matters.

No Coen brothers movie this year? Where are my saviors, where art thou?

No Coens? No Good. Their absence makes 2011 the worst year for movies since last year...which was the worst year for movies since the year before...which was…etc, etc.

There are actually critics saying that 2011 has been one of the best years for movies, if you can believe the insanity. Of course, these are people who think that Tree of Life was classic-film-making perfection and Bridesmaids was a non-stop-hilarious laugh riot. These people need their brains examined, for both holes and rot. 2011 is the worst year since 2010. And Bridesmaids isn't funny (it's better than most comedies written by women but that's not saying much - again, lowered expectations with a dash of political correctness, that 'women are just as funny as men can be too so we're all equals' bullshit).

But the critics just eat this shit up. Lowered expectations. 'Better than bad is not good.' Hey, if you had to see every movie, you’d think these were the ‘best’ too.

Every year for the past decade, I look at the recent year of movies and think, “It can’t possibly get any worse than this.” And every year, Hollywood and the major studios manage to top themselves. Then they wonder why attendance is shrinking and nobody is buying DVDs. “Must be piracy. Yup, that’s it. (sighs contently) Problem solved.”