2014 Academy Award Predictions

Gravity ties Cabaret with 8 Oscars without winning Best Picture.  American Hustle and 12 Years a Slave win 3 each.  Frozen wins two.

Best Picture
12 Years a Slave
*American Hustle
Captain Phillips
Dallas Buyers Club
Gravity
Her
Nebraska
Philomena
The Wolf of Wall Street

Best Actor
Christian Bale (American Hustle)
Bruce Dern (Nebraska)
Leonardo DiCaprio (Wolf of Wall Street)
Chiwetel Ejiofor (12 Years a Slave)
*Matthew McConaughey (Dallas Buyers Club)

Best Actress
Amy Adams (American Hustle)
*Cate Blanchett (Blue Jasmine)
Sandra Bullock (Gravity)
Judi Dench (Philomena)
Meryl Streep (August: Osage County)

Best Supporting Actor
Barkhad Abdi (Captain Phillips)
Bradley Cooper (American Hustle)
Michael Fassbender (12 Years a Slave)
Jonah Hill (Wolf of Wall Street)
*Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers Club)

Best Supporting Actress
Jennifer Lawrence (American Hustle)
*Lupita Nyong'o (12 Years a Slave)
Julia Roberts (August: Osage County)
June Squibb (Nebraska)
Sally Hawkins (Blue Jasmine)

Best Director
Martin Scorsese (The Wolf of Wall Street) 
David O. Russell (American Hustle)
*Alfonso Cuarón (Gravity)
Alexander Payne (Nebraska)
Steve McQueen (12 Years a Slave)

Best Adapted Screenplay
*John Ridley (12 Years a Slave)

Julie Delpy, Ethan Hawke & Richard Linklater (Before Midnight
)
Terence Winter (The Wolf of Wall Street
)
Billy Ray (Captain Phillips)

Steve Coogan and Jeff Pope (Philomena)

Best Original Screenplay
*David O. Russell and Eric Singer (American Hustle)
Bob Nelson (Nebraska)
Spike Jonze (Her)
Craig Borten & Melisa Wallack (Dallas Buyers Club)
Woody Allen (Blue Jasmine)

Best Foreign Film
Denmark, The Hunt
Belgium, The Broken Circle Breakdown
*Italy, The Great Beauty
Palestine, Omar
Cambodia, The Missing Picture

Best Documentary Feature
*20 Feet from Stardom
The Act of Killing
Dirty Wars
The Square
Cutie and the Boxer

Best Animated Feature
The Wind Rises
*FrozenDespicable Me 2
The Croods
Ernest & Celestine

Film Editing
American Hustle
Captain Phillips
Dallas Buyers Club
*Gravity
12 Years a Slave

Best Song
"Happy" (Despicable Me 2)
*"Let It Go" (Frozen)
"The Moon Song" (Her)
"Ordinary Love" (Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom)

Best Original Score
John Williams (The Book Thief)
*Steven Price (Gravity)
Alexandre Desplat (Philomena)
Thomas Newman (Saving Mr. Banks)
William Butler and Owen Pallett (Her)

Best Cinematography
Philippe Le Sourd (The Grandmaster)
*Emmanuel Lubezki (Gravity)
Bruno Delbonnel (Inside Llewyn Davis)
Roger Deakins (Prisoners)
Phedon Papamichael (Nebraska)

Costume Design
*American Hustle
The Grandmaster
The Great Gatsby
The Invisible Woman
12 Years A Slave

Makeup and Hairstyling
The Lone Ranger
*Dallas Buyers Club
Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa

Production Design
American Hustle
*Gravity
The Great Gatsby
Her
12 Years a Slave

Sound Editing
All is Lost
Captain Phillips
*Gravity
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Lone Survivor

Sound Mixing
Captain Phillips
*Gravity
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Lone Survivor
Inside Llewyn Davis

Visual Effects
*Gravity
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Iron Man 3
The Lone Ranger
Star Trek Into Darkness

Short Film, Live Action
Aquel No Era Yo (That Wasn't Me)
Avant Que De Tout Perdre (Just Before Losing Everything)
*Helium
Pitääkö Mun Kaikki Hoitaa? (Do I Have to Take Care of Everything?)
The Voorman Problem

Short Film, AnimatedFeral
Get a Horse!
*Mr. Hublot
Possessions
Room on the Broom

Documentary Short Subject
CaveDigger
Facing Fear
Karama Has No Walls
*The Lady in Number 6: Music Saved My Life
Prison Terminal: The Last Days of Private Jack Hall

Stephen A. Mikalik, Academy Voter

I do not own the above image. Copyright Warner Bros. Pictures.  All Rights Reserved.

Best Picture
1. Gravity

2. Her

3. 12 Years a Slave

4. The Wolf of Wall Street

5. Nebraska

6. Captain Phillips

First, I believe only movies I give ****1/2 or more deserve to be Best Picture.  So, Dallas Buyers Club, American Hustle & Philomena are out.  My 3-6 are actually my personal 6-9 for the year.  As great as the nearly everything in Her was, Gravity, after a second viewing, holds up physically & emotionally.

Best Actor
Christian Bale (American Hustle)
Bruce Dern (Nebraska)
Leonardo DiCaprio (Wolf of Wall Street)
*Chiwetel Ejiofor (12 Years a Slave)
Matthew McConaughey (Dallas Buyers Club)

This was way closer of a race than I thought it would have been.  DiCaprio & Ejiofor were the heart & souls of their movies, but without the perfect subtlety from Ejiofor, 12 Years A Slave would have been almost unwatchable.

Best Actress
Amy Adams (American Hustle)
*Cate Blanchett (Blue Jasmine)
Sandra Bullock (Gravity)
Judi Dench (Philomena)
Meryl Streep (August: Osage County)

Like I said, everything in Gravity held up the second time, with Bullock at the forefront.  But, who are we kidding, Blanchett put on a clinic this year.

Best Supporting Actor
Barkhad Abdi (Captain Phillips)
Bradley Cooper (American Hustle)
*Michael Fassbender (12 Years a Slave)
Jonah Hill (Wolf of Wall Street)
Jared Leto (Dallas Buyers Club)

In any other year, I could have voted for any 4 of these guys (sorry, Bradley).  In fact, as I was typing this, I changed my mind.  I changed from Leto to Fassbender.  The middle-of-the-night confrontation by lantern did it for me.

Best Supporting Actress
Jennifer Lawrence (American Hustle)
*Lupita Nyong'o (12 Years a Slave)
Julia Roberts (August: Osage County)
June Squibb (Nebraska)
Sally Hawkins (Blue Jasmine)

As close as the race appears to be, in my mind, there is no debate.  Nyong'o is pitch perfect in the last half of 12 Years A Slave.

Best Director
Martin Scorsese (The Wolf of Wall Street) 
David O. Russell (American Hustle)
*Alfonso Cuarón (Gravity)
Alexander Payne (Nebraska)
Steve McQueen (12 Years a Slave)

If only one of my votes could count, it would be here.  If any little bit of Gravity was off, the entire movie crumbles.  Cuarón. Was. Perfect.

Best Adapted Screenplay
John Ridley (12 Years a Slave)
*
Julie Delpy, Ethan Hawke & Richard Linklater (Before Midnight
)
Terence Winter (The Wolf of Wall Street
)
Billy Ray (Captain Phillips)

Steve Coogan and Jeff Pope (Philomena)

12 Years is great, but my goodness, I gotta give my personal #1 of 2013 something.  So why not give it to its best (and only nominated) element.

Best Original Screenplay
David O. Russell and Eric Singer (American Hustle)
Bob Nelson (Nebraska)
*Spike Jonze (Her)
Craig Borten & Melisa Wallack (Dallas Buyers Club)
Woody Allen (Blue Jasmine)

Not going to mince words: Only two of these scripts are Oscar-worthy.  My pick and Nebraska.

Best Animated Feature
The Wind Rises
*FrozenDespicable Me 2
The Croods
Ernest & Celestine

Only saw three of these.  Not an anime guy and foreign stuff barely comes to Pittsburgh.  DM2 sucks and The Croods starts off terribly before ending up ok.  Frozen was the lone bright spot in the animation world last year.

Film Editing
American Hustle
Captain Phillips
Dallas Buyers Club
*Gravity
12 Years a Slave

Seamlessness is a thing of beauty.

Best Song
"Alone Yet Not Alone" (Alone Yet Not Alone)
"Happy" (Despicable Me 2)
*"Let It Go" (Frozen)
"The Moon Song" (Her)
"Ordinary Love" (Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom)

No explanation necessary.  Best movie song since "Falling Slowly".

Best Original Score
John Williams (The Book Thief)
Steven Price (Gravity)
Alexandre Desplat (Philomena)
Thomas Newman (Saving Mr. Banks)
*William Butler and Owen Pallett (Her)

Gravity is close, but Her was consistently fantastic throughout.

Best Cinematography
Philippe Le Sourd (The Grandmaster)
Emmanuel Lubezki (Gravity)
*Bruno Delbonnel (Inside Llewyn Davis)
Roger Deakins (Prisoners)
Phedon Papamichael (Nebraska)

Gravity was mostly special effects.  Inside Llewyn Davis is mostly spectacular.

Costume Design
*American Hustle
The Grandmaster
The Great Gatsby
The Invisible Woman
12 Years A Slave

Best element of the most nominated movie.  Easily.

Makeup and Hairstyling
The Lone Ranger
Dallas Buyers Club
*Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa

Don't really care.  So why not?!

Production Design
American Hustle
Gravity
The Great Gatsby
Her
*12 Years a Slave

Toughest decision.  Again, Gravity was mostly digital.  This was all real.

Sound Editing
All is Lost
Captain Phillips
*Gravity
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Lone Survivor

Where's Rush?

Sound Mixing
Captain Phillips
*Gravity
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Lone Survivor
Inside Llewyn Davis

Seriously, where's Rush?!?!

Visual Effects
*Gravity
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
Iron Man 3
The Lone Ranger
Star Trek Into Darkness

Like I said, everything had to be perfect.  These had to be the most perfect.  They were.

Entertainment, Film Criticism & POMPEII

I do not own the above image.  Copyright Tri-Star Pictures. All Rights Reserved.

            Just going to say it: Peter Bart is a moron.  Now, why in the world would I call Variety’s editor-in-chief and former Paramount Pictures executive a buffoon, joker, idiot, et cetera?  In his post-Oscar nominations column, Bart posed the question: “Ever try toget a critic to smile?”  I know what you're thinking: Why the typographical error?  Well, dear reader, if you read Bart’s column here, you’ll see that that is how Bart asks the question.

            But what you're really asking is if Bart is right.  I wish I could say that’s a simple question to answer.  I mean, if you ever join me for a movie once, you’ll know the answer is a definite YES.  You saw THE LEGO MOVIE right?  How does one not smile at the absurd humor of Legos™?

But Bart never brings that up.  Bart’s argument is with critics groups and their awards.  Two of the most acclaimed movies are 12 YEARS A SLAVE and INSIDE LLEWYN DAVIS.  Bart argues that audiences, and in turn Oscar voters, prefer uplifting & fun movies while critics “ respond…higher on technique than on entertainment value”.  While it is true that the two movies I mentioned are wonderful on a technical level, are depressing at times and not blockbusters in any way shape or form ($52 million combined), the storytelling by the Coen Brothers is the best they have ever done and so near perfect that the viewer has ample opportunity to smile.

So, Mr. Bart, I took your advice and saw POMPEII, a movie made by a (supposed) crowd-pleasing director in Paul W.S. Anderson for purely popcorn-consumption purposes.  What I actually saw was a two hour Gladiator-by-way-of-Pearl-Harbor bland, dumb rip-off.

Milo (Kit Harrington of ‘Game of Thrones’ fame) is an orphan child-slave-turned-gladiator from Rome-conquered Scotland.  On his journey to Pompeii as a purchased gladiator, he serendipitously meets Cassia (Emily Browning), who herself is her way home to Pompeii, by mercy-killing one of her injured horses.  Yes, a meet cute thanks to a dead horse.  Once in Pompeii, Milo adjusts to life as a gladiator by being housed with African one-victory-until-free gladiator Atticus (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje).  Meanwhile, Cassia’s father is trying to finish a reconstruction deal with Senator Corvus (Kiefer Sutherland).  The cost: Cassia’s hand in marriage.

All this sounds (not) very interesting but what about the stuff that blows up real good?  Well, over the course of movie, Mt. Vesuvius rumbles, grunts & groans, causing increasingly more damage that gets decreasingly more exciting.  The entire third act focuses on the main eruption, where the action feels less like a volcanic eruption and more like the most expensive Mystery Science Theater 3000 alien invasion.  All the while, the above stories have to be finished, by any means possible.

I must admit, I have never seen an episode of Game of Thrones but if Harrington is a main character, I may not want to wash.  Granted, the script by the married writing team of Lee & Janet Scott Batchler w/ revisions by Michael Robert Johnson severely lacks in interest in the characters.  But Harrington and (to a less extent) Browning aren’t that interesting on-screen to begin with and watching them try to convince the audience that their rich girl/slave boy love is real isn’t captivating.

Who’s supposed to smile during this?  Maybe a teenager who has seen maybe 8 movies in his life, 5 of which being Adam Sandler comedies.  Kiefer Sutherland was smiling, hamming it up for the camera, channeling his inner Donald Sutherland.  Tri-Star Pictures hopes to be smiling from the box office grosses.

But, for once, Peter Bart is right.  Film critics, for the most part, will not smile during or after POMPEII.  POMPEII represents the cynicism of people like Mr. Bart who believe this is what audiences want.  Expensive, underwhelming special effects.  Pretty faces.  Cookie cutter stories & dialogue.  But some people will show up.  People always do.  But I guarantee you, Mr. Bart, most will not be smiling.  There is little-to-nothing to smile about here.

*

Winter's Tale

I do not own the above image.  Copyright Warner Bros. Pictures. All Rights Reserved.

            There are times where a movie plays in front of me and my body does stuff that it normally doesn't do at the movies.  Sometimes my mouth goes agape, amazed at what I’m seeing.  Others I shift violently repeatedly in my seat, through fits of unease or boredom.  And every once in a while, I have the urge to stand up & leave, only to realize I have a public service to tell you whether to see a movie or not.  WINTER’S TALE performed the trifecta.

            In 1916, orphan Peter Lake (Farrell) has pissed off his boss Pearly Soames (Crowe) for the final time.  A professional thief, Lake goes off on his own, with a mysterious white horse as his companion.  On one of his first jobs, he discovers & falls for Beverly Penn (Brown Findlay), the older daughter of a widowed newspaper publisher.  Beverly is dying of tuberculosis and can’t physically love anyone.  Will the two star-crossed lovers be able to consummate their new found love? Will Soames find & end Peter’s life first? 

            Sounds like a straight forward story, right?  Too bad the marketing campaign is deceitful.  That mysterious horse?  It can fly and might be some sort Native American spirit.  Mafioso Pearly Soames?  He’s a demon whose job is to stop people’s miracles from occurring.  The first scene of the movie?  Peter Lake walking into modern-day Grand Central Station.

            Based on Mark Helprin’s novel and adapted to the screen by Akiva Goldsman, WINTER’S TALE is, to put it simply, a mess.  Right out of the gate, it makes no sense.  If you are going to place mythical creatures or fantastical elements in a real world setting, you need to have a coherent set of rules.  WINTER’S TALE neither has a set of rules nor is it coherent.  Crowe’s Pearly Soames’ mythology is particularly confusing.  He’s a demon yet he runs a crime syndicate.  Was he once human?  If he wasn’t, do his lackeys know?  Are they demons too?  He’s Peter’s boss.  How long have they worked together, considering Peter is supposed to be 21?  What pissed Soames off?  The movie takes place in 1916 NYC.  Do normal folks know of their existence?  Do they live in fear of their hopes & dreams coming true if it means possibly being confronted by Soames and his ilk?

            Similar questions arise throughout the secret, 45 minute third act that is not alluded to in any of the marketing.  Lake is still alive in modern-day New York, still waiting for a miracle to happen.  I won’t spoil it, but a few moments answer questions while still adding a few more.

            WINTER’S TALE looks gorgeous at times.  The $46 million budget had to go somewhere I guess.  The only thrilling & interesting moment takes place in the dark with a superstar cameo that needs to be seen to be believed. 

WINTER’S TALE reminded me of a failed cable television pilot extended to a full feature.  It reminds us once again that, yes, Goldsman is responsible for the screenplays to LOST IN SPACE and BATMAN & ROBIN.  During the end credits, my wife told me it reminded her of an episode of Supernatural.  Well, that explains a lot!

½*