All right, let's get our picks in before the ceremony starts.
Disclaimer: We have seen a grand total of THREE of the movies under consideration for best picture ("Avatar," "District 9," and "The Hurt Locker"). These ill-informed picks are, therefore, for entertainment purposes only, and should not be used for the purposes of gambling--unless you want to lose your shirt.
Best Picture: "Avatar" has the most nominations, and it won the Golden Globe award for Best Drama. But you need to remember that the Golden Globes are awarded by the Hollywood FOREIGN Press Association. Presumably, a large number of their constituents are non-English speakers, for whom "Avatar" is a perfect movie: beautiful to look at; immersive 3-D; spectacular battle scenes. And THEY don't have to deal with Cameron's clunky dialogue.
The two other top contenders in a standard year would have to be "The Hurt Locker" and "Up in the Air," the former a compelling (and surprisingly apolitical) war movie, the latter a well-crafted human-interest vehicle for George Clooney. "Precious" is the perennial "dark horse" sentimental favorite. "Up" is the beautiful movie that won't win because it's animated.
The other five movies wouldn't even have been nominated last year, when there were only five nominees, so they merit little discussion, except insofar as they will siphon votes from the other nominees. Thus, for example, if we were voting, we might be tempted to vote for "District 9," not so much because we think it's superior to "The Hurt Locker" (which it isn't) but because we would want to send a message to all the "Avatar" groupies that it IS superior to THAT film. In a year when the "Best Picture" could garner as little as 11% of the vote, who's to say what's going to happen. That being said, the Solipsistic pick is: "The Hurt Locker."
Best Director: Although James Cameron DOES deserve some props for putting "Avatar" together, we'll go the safe route. If "Hurt Locker" is going to be the best picture, then the best director will be: Kathryn Bigelow (James Cameron's ex-wife, by the way).
Best Actor: This is a lock. Jeff Bridges has been nominated four times--and egregiously NOT-nominated two other times ("The Fisher King," "The Big Lebowski"). He's a popular, likable Hollywood veteran, and there really is no major competition. George Clooney would be the other likely winner, but he's already won an Oscar ("Syriana"), and he'll have loads of future opportunities. Morgan Freeman, similarly, has already won an Oscar, and he won't win another for a movie nobody saw. Colin Firth was also in a movie that nobody saw. And as good as Jeremy Renner was, unless it's a TOTAL "Hurt Locker" sweep, he won't make it. The Dude will abide with an Oscar after tonight: Jeff Bridges.
Best Actress: Meryl Streep may well have given the best performance of the year. The problem for her is that she's not really competing against the other actresses; she's competing against herself. Meryl Streep is the best actress of her generation and arguably the greatest film actress of all time. If you ask who the best actress of 2009 was, the answer is Meryl Streep. The answer HAS been Meryl Streep since "Sophie's Choice." But because of this, Academy voters may be less inclined to vote for her: Sure, she's great, but is her performance in "Julie and Julia" worth an Academy Award, given that we all know she's going to be transcendent in anything she does? We doubt it.
Let's skip over Carey (who?) Mulligan and Helen (already won and in a movie that nobody saw) Mirren. That makes this a race between newcomer Gabourey Sidibe ("Precious") and box-office babe Sandra Bullock ("The Blind Side"). It is a testament to the dearth of meaty roles for women that Bullock gets nominated for what is essentially a Hallmark Hall-of-Fame type role. Let's assume that she's good in the movie--she probably is--the movie and the role themselves are not Oscar caliber. On the other hand, Sidibe is playing an indisputably meaty role. The fact that she's a newcomer might work against her. Academy voters like people to pay their dues (see Jeff Bridges). At the same time, while many first-time nominees provoke justifications along the lines of, "I didn't vote for her THIS time, but she'll be back," will that really be the case for Sidibe? Let's face it, she is something of a "type" unto herself. To put it another way, while just about any competent actress of a certain age could have played Bullock's role in "The Blind Side," not even Meryl Streep could have pulled off "Precious." (Oh, who are we kidding? Of course she could have!) We're going to vote our hopes instead of our fears: Gabourey Sidibe.
Supporting Actor: We know virtually nothing about any of the movies under consideration, except that every reviewer absolutely raved about Christoph Waltz in "Inglourious Basterds." Thus, that is our pick.
Supporting Actress: See above: Mo'Nique.
Mark your ballots now, folks.
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