OSCAR 2013: LET THE CONTEST BEGIN...

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) kept the 2013 nominations relatively close to the industry’s spiritual home with the announcement overnight of this year’s Oscar contenders. Ceremony host Seth McFarlane, hinting at the low-brow/hit-miss humour we can expect on the big night (a Hitler joke? really?), and actress Emma Stone (pictured below, right) fronted the media throng in Los Angeles to present this years list of hopefuls.

Records were set in the Best Actress category, where 85 year old Emmanuelle Riva (Amour) and 9 year old Quvenzhané Wallis (Beasts of the Southern Wild) represent the oldest and youngest nominees ever in that category. Although a handful of nominees came from the international sector (Amour; the Brit pics Les Misérables and Anna Karenina; and, three Australian acting nods) or were low-budget indies (...Beasts; the documentary Chasing Ice), the finalists were mostly from the not-unexpected pool of studio pics that have figured heavily in the award season to-date.

Building what many analysts believe to be insurmountable momentum is Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln, which leads the pack with 12 nominations. Coming in the same weeks as its sweeping of the BAFTA categories, the historical epic’s leading man, Daniel Day Lewis, seems to already have the Best Actor trophy in his cabinet. In line with many of the recent end-of-year honours, other leading contenders include Ang Lee’s Life of Pi (11 nominations); Les Misérables and Silver Linings Playbook (both with 8 nominations); Argo (7 nominations); and, Amour, Django Unchained, Skyfall and Zero Dark Thirty (each with 5 nominations). Filling out the field are Beasts of the Southern Wild (4), Anna Karenina (4), The Master (3), The Hobbit (3), Flight (2) and Snow White and The Huntsman (2).

As is often the case, the list of names not nominated makes for far more compelling reading. We break down the major categories below. The ceremony will be held on February 24 at the Dolby Theatre inside the Hollywood & Highland Center.    

BEST PICTURE
It’s early-season release and only-ok box-office took some of the lustre off Beasts of the Southern Wild’s awards momentum, so credit to the Academy for keeping the little film’s dream alive; Moonrise Kingdom wasn’t so lucky. No consideration here for what the public loved (The Avengers, Ted, Magic Mike, The Hobbit, Skyfall and The Dark Knight Rises all missing out). The Hollywood Foreign Press corps love for Salmon Fishing in the Yemen also, oddly, did not resonate with Oscar’s voting body.
Amour, Argo, Django Unchained, Les Misérables, Life Of Pi, Lincoln, Zero Dark Thirty, Beasts Of The Southern Wild, Silver Linings Playbook.

BEST DIRECTOR
Much noise is being made about the omission of Argo’s Ben Affleck and Zero Dark Thirty’s Kathryn Bigelow, but Tom Hooper (Les Misérables), Quentin Tarantino (Django Unchained), Paul Thomas Anderson (The Master), Robert Zemeckis (Flight), Christopher Nolan (The Dark Knight Rises) and Wes Anderson (Moonrise Kingdom) could all rightly feel aggrieved.
Life Of Pi - Ang Lee, Lincoln - Steven Spielberg, Amour - Michael Haneke, Silver Linings Playbook - David O. Russell, Beasts Of The Southern Wild - Benh Zeitlin.

BEST ACTOR
Even with his film scoring 11 nominations, Life of Pi’s leading man Suraj Sharma was left out, though he is in good company. Jean-Louis Tritignat (Amour), Jamie Foxx (Django Unchained), Bill Murray (Hyde Park on the Hudson), John Hawkes (The Sessions), Richard Gere (Arbitrage), Anthony Hopkins (Hitchcock), Matthew McConnaughey (Killer Joe) and Affleck again were all rightly in the running. Beasts... Dwight Henry couldn’t ride that films good favour to recognition. But this is looking the night’s sure-thing category, with Daniel Day Lewis’ towering performance as Lincoln a lock (pictured, left).
Denzel Washington – Flight, Bradley Cooper - Silver Linings Playbook, Daniel Day-Lewis – Lincoln, Hugh Jackman - Les Misérables, Joaquin Phoenix - The Master.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
No clear front-runner, as is often the case with the support players (hence left-field surprises like Kevin Kline for A Fish Called Wanda). Arkin may take the career-vote honours; Waltz and Jones (who did his best work this year in Hope Springs) are past-winners; Hoffman is also Oscar friendly but The Master was wildly divisive. De Niro may takes home the gong, ensuring a trophy for Silver Linings Playbook, which may get swamped elsewhere. Glaring omissions – Leonardo Di Caprio flavoursome bad guy in Django Unchained; John Goodman, who was superb in Argo, Flight and Trouble with the Curve; Javier Bardem’s Skyfall villain; McConaughey again, for Magic Mike or Bernie.
Alan Arkin – Argo, Christoph Waltz - Django Unchained, Robert De Niro - Silver Linings Playbook, Philip Seymour Hoffman - The Master, Tommy Lee Jones – Lincoln.

BEST ACTRESS
It was too much to hope that the LA-centric AMPAS voters would honour two French actresses here, thus explaining the absence of Marion Cotillard’s highly-touted turn in Rust and Bone; Riva was favoured. The octogenarian aside, the category reflects a refreshing acceptance of the new young wave of leading ladies; no Meryl Streep (Hope Springs), Maggie Smith (Quartet), Helen Mirren (Hitchcock) or Judi Dench (Skyfall, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel).
Emmanuelle Riva – Amour, Jennifer Lawrence (pictured, right) - Silver Linings Playbook, Jessica Chastain - Zero Dark Thirty, Quvenzhané Wallis - Beasts Of The Southern Wild, Naomi Watts - The Impossible.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Will probably be the category that allows AMPAS to tip its hat to the love it/hate it musical Les Misérables; Hathaway’s better-than-expected turn as Catwoman will also help her chances. Notable no-shows include Nicole Kidman, who had season momentum for her sad small town tramp in Lee Daniel’s The Paperboy; National Board of Review winner Ann Dowd from Craig Zobel’s Compliance; and, Mary Elizabeth Winstead’s reforming alcoholic in James Ponsoldt’s Smashed.   
Amy Adams - The Master, Anne Hathaway - Les Misérables, Helen Hunt - The Sessions, Sally Field – Lincoln, Jacki Weaver - Silver Linings Playbook.

BEST ANIMATED FILM
Some big names missed out here - Ice Age 4, The Lorax, Rise of the Guardians, Madagascar 3, the wonderful Hotel Transylvania. Brave has the popular vote and Pixar has the runs on the board, but the pick of this category is Frankenweenie. Will AMPAS honour the brilliant career of Tim Burton with a nod for his pet project (no pun intended)? Good - the category contains three hand-configured stop-motion works; bad - a tad all-American. Apparently no room for short-listed works such as Japan's beautiful From Up on Poppy Hill, France's The Painting or U.K's A Liar's Autobiography: The Untrue Story of Monty Python's Graham Chapman (below, the film's trailer).
Brave; Frankenweenie; Paranorman; The Pirates!; Wreck-it-Ralph.

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
The Hobbit could find no love in this category, and it needed to as an indicator as to which side of the ‘brilliant/indulgent’ argument the Academy sided with. Hard to see where Beasts... will find traction if not here, but there is the behemoth that is Tony Kushner’s Lincoln script to contend with. The ‘old-man institution’ tag fits the Academy’s bias when superb portraits of teenager angst such as Stephen Chbosky’s reworking of his own novel The Perks of Being a Wallflower are overlooked.   
Chris Terrio – Argo, Lucy Alibar, Benh Zeitlin - Beasts Of The Southern Wild , David Magee - Life Of Pi, Tony Kushner – Lincoln, David O. Russell - Silver Linings Playbook.

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
If AMPAS want to honour Haneke with more than just the night’s Foreign Film honours, it will be here. Would be too edgy for the voting members to honour another of Tarantino's ‘n-word’ littered scripts. John Gatin’s Flight over Paul Thomas Anderson’s The Master is this categories most egregious miscalculation.
Michael Haneke – Amour, Quentin Tarantino - Django Unchained, Wes Anderson, Roman Coppola - Moonrise Kingdom, Mark Boal - Zero Dark Thirty, John Gatins – Flight.

CINEMATOGRAPHY
Claudio Miranda’s contribution to the mostly-CGI Life of Pi is hard to pin down to casual observers. Richardson perfectly captured old-school western iconography through his lens and may be Django’s sole winner. But if Lincoln takes picture honours, these top-tier tech categories could easily follow suit.
Anna Karenina - Seamus McGarvey (pictured, right), Django Unchained - Robert Richardson, Life Of Pi - Claudio Miranda, Lincoln - Janusz Kaminski, Skyfall - Roger Deakins.

COSTUME DESIGN
Heartening to see the specific skills of Ishioka and Atwood honoured in otherwise poorly received works; would have been entirely fair to see Kym Barrett’s and Pierre-Yves Gayraud’s work on the equally maligned Cloud Atlas similarly honoured. Maybe Les Mis, probably Lincoln.
Anna Karenina - Jacqueline Durran, Les Misérables - Paco Delgado, Lincoln - Joanna Johnston, Mirror Mirror - Eiko Ishioka, Snow White And The Huntsman - Colleen Atwood.

BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
As great as it is to see outside bolters like 5 Broken Cameras (pictured, left) make the cut, the absence of Bully, West of Memphis and, in particular, The Imposter, hurts this category’s credibility. With several awards in the bag already, expect Searching for Sugar Man to pip the The Gatekeepers.
5 Broken Cameras, The Gatekeepers, How To Survive A Plague, The Invisible War, Searching For Sugar Man.

BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT
Inocente, Kings Point, Mondays At Racine, Open Heart, Redemption

BEST FILM EDITING
William Goldenberg’s masterful touch with Ben Affleck’s handheld aesthetic will earn Argo the nod.
Argo - William Goldenberg, Life Of Pi - Tim Squyres, Zero Dark Thirty - Dylan Tichenor, William Goldenberg, Lincoln - Michael Kahn, Silver Linings Playbook - Jay Cassidy & Crispin Struthers.

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM
Not even the Harvey Weinstein touch could up mega-hit The Intouchables into consideration. Haneke’s time has come; Amour will win. But why no Asia Pacific films in the mix? Are AMPAS members missing out? Or is the region’s cinema just in a creative lull? Hong Kong’s Life Without Principle, India’s Barfi! and Thailand’s Headshot all must have come close, right?   
Amour – Austria, Kon-Tiki – Norway (trailer, below), No – Chile, A Royal Affair – Denmark, War Witch - Canada

BEST MAKEUP & HAIRSTYLING
The vastness of the task she faced and the skill with which she brings it off should ensure Lisa Westcott’s efforts on Les Misérables are rewarded.
Hitchcock - Julie Hewett, Martin Samuel, Howard Berger; The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey - Peter Swords King, Richard Taylor, Rick Findlater; Les Misérables - Lisa Westcott.

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
He has four Oscars, but John Williams hasn’t won since 1994 (despite being nominated 17 times since then!) Certain to be one of Lincoln’s gongs.
Anna Karenina - Dario Marianelli, Argo - Alexandre Desplat, Life Of Pi - Mychael Danna, Lincoln - John Williams, Skyfall - Thomas Newman.

BEST ORIGINAL SONG
The year’s sleeper hit, Ted, gets its only nod here so may be rewarded (director Seth McFarlane has clearly wooed AMPAS power-brokers to get the hosting gig). But Adele’s Skyfall theme song is a classic Bond tune in a year when Bond hit big and celebrates its 50^th anniversary.
'Before My Time' from Chasing Ice, 'Everybody Needs A Best Friend' from Ted, 'Pi's Lullaby' from Life Of Pi, 'Skyfall' from Skyfall, 'Suddenly' from Les Miserables

BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN
Traditionally where the historical epics are rewarded, meaning this category is between Anna Karenina (did enough voters see it?), Les Misérables (did enough voters like it?) and Lincoln (will the inevitable backlash have kicked in by then?). Probably Lincoln...
Anna Karenina, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, Les Miserables, Life Of Pi, Lincoln

BEST ANIMATED SHORT
Having only seen Maggie Simpson in The Longest Daycare and Paperman (pictured, left), it’s tough to make a call. Paperman accompanied Wreck it Ralph into cinemas and offered more magic over its few minutes than all of the feature presentation, so I’ll side with it for now.
Adam and Dog, Fresh Guacamole, Head Over Heels, Maggie Simpson In The Longest Daycare, Paperman.

BEST LIVE FILM SHORT
Asad, Buzkashi Boys, Curfew, Death Of A Shadow, Henry

BEST SOUND EDITING
The ultra-realism of Zero Dark Thirty does not come easy and its stunning soundscape may see it take the category here. Although, the same could be said of Argo...
Argo, Django Unchained, Life Of Pi, Skyfall, Zero Dark Thirty.

BEST SOUND MIXING
Skyfall’s five nominations mean that it has already wowed the tech guild AMPAS members, so expect it to take a few of these below-the-line honours. Unless it’s a Lincoln sweep...
Argo, Les Miserables, Life Of Pi, Lincoln, Skyfall.

BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
Given the whole movie is a ‘special effect’, this will be Life of Pi’s trophy. The Dark Knight Rises and the otherwise well-received The Amazing Spiderman were unlucky.
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey , Life Of Pi, The Avengers , Prometheus , Snow White And The Huntsman.

Comments

[Bruno]

Prometheus no best original screenplay nod?!?!