The last guild to sound off this season is the Costume Designers Guild, which announces its winners tonight. It won't have any influence on the Oscar race because final ballots are due to the Academy today, but we can still have fun guessing what the costume designers will want to reward.
Excellence in Period Film contains four of the Oscar-nominated costumers, the odd one out being Sharen Davis' swell threads from The Help which fell pray to the grabby ruffles and frills of Anonymous with the Academy's costume branch. I'll guess that Hugo, my Oscar alternate, will rule the day, but a win for The Artist (which won the BAFTA a little more than a week ago) would be perfectly understandable and deserved.
I'm still miffed that Excellence in Fantasy Film found room for Thor and X-Men but not the year-best costumes of Captain America. At any rate, I'm guessing it'll end up being Harry Potter, simply on account of it being the best reviewed nominee of the five, and as a final tip of the hat to the series. With all the Oscar attention it gets in Art Direction, people forget that Jany Temime has indeed done outstanding work on the entire franchise as well.
Excellence in Contemporary Film usually serves only as an excuse for the guild to recognize a Best Picture contender, which leads me to believe they'll spring for The Descendants here, even if it should be Drive by a country mile.
