It\u2019s Oscar time again. Ladies and gentlemen here are the runners and riders\u2026<\/p>\n
The ones I\u2019ve seen already\u2026<\/p>\n
Tying with American Hustle<\/i> for most nominations (ten, one more than 12 Years A Slave<\/i>) it\u2019s perhaps a little surprising to see this getting quite so much Academy love. Pared-back and innovatively-shot it may be, but it\u2019s still essentially a blockbuster thrill-ride at its core. What\u2019s even more surprising is that it hasn\u2019t been overlooked in the \u201cbig six\u201d department. Alfonso Cuar\u00f3n is nominated for Best Director as is Sandra Bullock for Best Actress. To be honest, I don\u2019t think it has much of a chance in any of these categories, except possibly Best Picture ironically. I wouldn\u2019t give myself odds of better than 4-1 but since Paddy Power was offering 12-1 I\u2019ve put a tenner on it. My full review is here<\/a>.<\/p>\n Another one-person-against-the-odds movie (Robert Redford\u2019s All is Lost<\/i> didn\u2019t get a nod), Paul Greengrass makes a huge virtue of his lean, documentary shooting style and Tom Hanks makes an appealingly unsympathetic hero \u2013 although his real-life crew insist that the real guy was even a bigger asshole \u2013 but what knocked me out is the total collapse of the Captain Phillips character when the ordeal is over. Tom Hanks\u2019 raw, authentic, bewildered inability to cope with his recent experience is some of the very best screen acting I have ever seen and his failure to be nominated is utterly confounding \u2013 especially when antagonist Barkhad Abdi has got a nod for Best Supporting Actor. This is not to take anything away from Abdi\u2019s performance which is very fine, but Hanks\u2019 snub would be easier to understand if the Academy had failed to notice any of the acting in the movie. Anyway, this won\u2019t win the big prize.<\/p>\n A delightful, personal, and very moving film showcasing a completely different side of Steve Coogan, who abandons Partridge-style mugging completely to carve out a much more detailed and intimate portrait of a journalist whose compassionate zeal never tips the story into mawkish sentimentality. In fact the whole film pulls off a very delicate balancing act between humour, soap opera, detective story and politics. The detective story is the loser, but it\u2019s by far the least interesting and necessary component. Judi Dench also gets yet another acting nomination. Nothing for Coogan as actor (which would have been surprising but not wholly undeserved) but the screenplay gets a hat-tip.<\/p>\n Alexander Payne continues an extraordinary run beginning (for me at least) with the brilliantly spiky Election<\/i>, continued with the more subdued but still excellent About Schmidt<\/i>, the splendidly freewheeling Sideways<\/i> and the truly marvellous The Descendents<\/i><\/a> which readers may recall I favoured over eventual Best Picture winner The Artist<\/i>. Nebraska<\/i> is a very, very simple story. In fact my only real criticism is how noisily the plot gears were grinding in the first twenty minutes to achieve its fairly straightforward set-up, viz – septuagenarian Woody Grant mistakenly believing himself to have won a million bucks in a sweepstake stops off in his old home town en route to collect his winnings.<\/p>\n As soon as we arrive in Hawthorne, however, we are off to the races as Woody reunites with old friends, family and rivals, most of whom are eager to get their hands on his new-found dough. Accompanied by his son (SNL\u2019s Will Forte \u2013 a revelation), and eventually his wife (June Squibb, delightful) and brother (Bob Odenkirk), Woody drifts through much of the movie in somewhat of a senior daze, but this lack of desperate questing serves to give the rest of the movie time to settle. Much of the dialogue is peppered with one-liners, but nothing ever seems forced, except possibly the final pay-off which is just a little too neat.<\/p>\n Immaculately shot in cool, grainy black-and-white, this is a real treat and it\u2019s great to see \u201clittle\u201d movies like this and Philomena<\/i> getting the Academy\u2019s attention as well as the big spectaculars, all-star casts and \u201cimportant\u201d movies \u2013 see below.<\/p>\n The ones I haven\u2019t seen yet\u2026<\/p>\n A strong contender in the three horse race for Best Picture, only a year after Silver Linings Playbook<\/i>, director David O Russell assembles much of the same cast and gets them nominated in all four acting categories again. I was dissatisfied with Silver Linings<\/i> because I felt the ending sold the characters down the river. Early reports of this suggest that the plotting also goes awry towards the end, but we\u2019ll see. Like Argo<\/i><\/a>, this could make it if the Academy finds Gravity <\/i>too frivolous and 12 Years A Slave<\/i> too self-important.<\/p>\n This is the one I know the least about. Part of the recent rehabilitation of Matthew McConaughey which began with 2012\u2019s rather unsatisfactory The Paperboy<\/i>, it also stars Jared Leto as a transgender character and follows the tale of a drug smuggler \u2013 not cocaine but untested HIV pharmaceuticals. It\u2019s released in the UK on 7 February so look out for a full review some time after that date.<\/p>\n One of the worst ideas I\u2019ve ever heard for a movie, grinding through the unproductive furrow of the wretched S1m0ne<\/i>, and the absurd Electric Dreams<\/i> as well as the ghastly AI<\/i> and the limp Bicentennial Man<\/i>. I didn\u2019t see Robot and Frank<\/i> so maybe that was better. On the other hand, this is Spike Jonze who can usually relied on to be interesting, so let\u2019s give it a whirl. It\u2019s released here, appropriately enough on Valentine\u2019s Day.<\/p>\n I can\u2019t remember the last time I looked forward to a Martin Scorsese movie this much. I couldn\u2019t get on board with The Departed<\/i> which began by examining the mirror-image moral conundrums faced by a cop-turned-mobster and a mobster-turned-cop, then turned the movie over to Jack Nicholson who proceeded to Nicholson all over the middle third. After his character\u2019s demise, the afore-mentioned moral conundrum is entirely lost in a welter of gunfire and bodies hitting the decks. It scarcely seems to matter what moral choices any of these characters make, today everybody dies. Completely pointless in my view. Shutter Island<\/i> was diverting but ultimately a rather empty puzzle-box picture, and Hugo<\/i> was very disappointing (full review here<\/a>). This, on the other hand, seems to have a much clearer direction to head in, a crackerjack cast and \u2013 hey! \u2013 jokes! I doubt it will sweep the board though, in what is looking like a pretty strong year.<\/p>\n And here it is \u2013 the bookies\u2019 favourite and the likely front-runner, but it remains to be seen after Django Unchained<\/i><\/a>, Lincoln<\/i><\/a> and The Help <\/i><\/a>how much more guilt-porn the Academy can take. It also remains to be seen if it\u2019s any good. I haven\u2019t seen either The Hunger<\/i> or Shame<\/i> but I\u2019ve heard extremely mixed reports about both. 12 Years<\/i> has been largely praised by critics and has done decent box office, but I worry that it will be too worthy and not engaging enough as a piece of narrative.<\/p>\n As well as All is Lost <\/i>missing out, I had expected to see Inside Llewyn Davis<\/i> get a mention and possibly August: Osage County<\/i>. I feared that the execrable Blue Jasmine<\/i> would appear and vaguely wondered if The Butler<\/i> was in with a chance. Although I loved Saving Mr Banks<\/i> and although the Academy generally appreciates Hollywood-devours-itself movies, that film always looked too\u2026 breezy to be in with a chance. In fact, the breezy parts I liked the best. When it attempts to wring psychological depth out of a piece of fruit, and when we spend endless tediously repetitive minutes cavorting with Colin Farrell in what is meant to be small-town Australia, I want to check out.<\/p>\n If it all goes Steve McQueen\u2019s way, and it still could, then Chiwetel Ejiofor has a good chance for Best Actor and McQueen himself for Best Director. Best Actress is probably going to Cate Blanchett \u2013 it\u2019s hard to overlook such a stellar performance if, like me, you didn\u2019t think much of the script. For people who liked the rest of the movie, it must have seemed virtually god-given.<\/p>\n As is often the case, the supporting nominations are a little more open. Michael Fassbender is probably the front-runner, again for 12 Years A Slave<\/i>, but I wonder if Jared Leto might just nick it. For Best Actress, June Squibb must be a good bet. The Academy loves them some old ladies and if those old ladies are on film lifting up their skirts in a graveyard in order to taunt an old suitor in his grave, so much the better.<\/p>\n Best Director will probably go the same way as Best Picture, so if they give it to Alfonso Cuar\u00f3n, and your bookie is still open, put a big bet down on Gravity<\/i> immediately. On the other hand if, as seems more likely, it isn\u2019t Gravity<\/i>\u2019s night, I can see these two awards splitting between Slave <\/i>and Hustle<\/i> although I\u2019m not sure which way around is more likely.<\/p>\n Finally, screenplays and as usual we have two bites at the cherry as the Academy distinguishes (sometimes eccentrically) between original screenplays and adaptions. In the Original Screenplay category, I imagine American Hustle<\/i> has it sewn up, and likewise I would expect Adapted to go to 12 Years A Slave<\/i>. If, say, The Wolf of Wall Street<\/i> pinches Best Adapted Screenplay, we could be in for some 3:00am surprises.<\/p>\n Okay, that\u2019s where we\u2019re at. More reviews coming soon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It\u2019s Oscar time again. Ladies and gentlemen here are the runners and riders\u2026 The ones I\u2019ve seen already\u2026 Gravity Tying with American Hustle for most nominations (ten, one more than 12 Years A Slave) it\u2019s perhaps a little surprising to see this getting quite so much Academy love. Pared-back and innovatively-shot it may be, but […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[25,11],"tags":[12,364,19],"class_list":["post-1410","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-at-the-cinema","category-culture","tag-movies","tag-oscars-2014","tag-reviews"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5JY5l-mK","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/tomsalinsky.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1410","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/tomsalinsky.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/tomsalinsky.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tomsalinsky.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tomsalinsky.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1410"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/tomsalinsky.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1410\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2397,"href":"http:\/\/tomsalinsky.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1410\/revisions\/2397"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/tomsalinsky.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1410"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tomsalinsky.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1410"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tomsalinsky.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1410"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Captain Phillips<\/h3>\n
Philomena<\/h3>\n
Nebraska<\/h3>\n
American Hustle<\/h3>\n
Dallas Buyers Club<\/h3>\n
Her<\/h3>\n
The Wolf of Wall Street<\/h3>\n
12 Years A Slave<\/h3>\n
What wasn\u2019t nominated<\/h3>\n
Other predictions\u2026<\/h3>\n