One Category at a Time: Best Supporting Actor

As it was with Supporting Actress, I managed to guess three of this past year's nominees from a year out. I was relatively confident about some of those early picks too, but I can't say the same thing about any of today's advanced predictions.

It's odd to think that Paul Giamatti only has one nomination to his name (and for Cinderella Man of all things), but the Academy will have a chance to remedy that if he delivers in George Clooney's A-lister-filled drama The Ides of March. But will internal competition keep him from attracting enough attention? There are lots of possible Supporting Actor candidates in the film.

This category is often kind to respected veterans whose best work is behind them, but whose longevity and versatility allows them to continue working. After garnering his first career nomination last year, Christopher Plummer could return for another shot with Mike Mills' Beginners.

Meryl Streep has the tendency to steal her costars' spotlight, but recall Stanley Tucci's warm turn as her supportive turn in Julie & Julia probably helped him earn his nomination last year (although for a different movie). Maybe Jim Broadbent can win some awards love by playing her supportive husband in The Iron Lady?

For a few years Philip Seymour Hoffman was ubiquitous, first winning his Oscars for Capote and then following it up with two consecutive Supporting Actor nods. He's been absent a couple of years now, but Aaron Sorkin and Steve Zaillian have probably written him a plum role in Moneyball. The film is being made by Bennett Miller who directed Hoffman to that Capote Oscar.

And for a really off the wall prediction, how about Kenneth Branagh in My Week with Marilyn? I always forget that he has four nominations (in four different categories!), although the last one was in 1996 for adapting Hamlet. Perhaps there's a chance he can nab a nod for playing Laurence Olivier.

Predicted five:
Christopher Plummer in Beginners
Paul Giamatti in The Ides of March
Philip Seymour Hoffman in Moneyball or The Ides of March
Jim Broadbent in The Iron Lady
Kenneth Branagh in My Week with Marilyn

Also consider: Vincent Cassal in A Dangerous Method, Daniel Craig in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Thomas Hayden Church in We Bought a Zoo, Hal Holbrook in Water for Elephants, Sean Penn in The Tree of Life, Brad Pitt in The Tree of Life, John C. Reilly in We Need to Talk About Kevin, Christoph Waltz in Water for Elephants

Best of the Decade #1: Moulin Rouge! (2001)

No film this decade embodies the passion, excitement, innovation, power, and sheer magic of cinema quite like Moulin Rouge!, Baz Luhrmann's spectacular spectacular reinvention of the movie musical for the 21st century. It is an unparalleled triumph. Taking a simple premise of star-crossed lovers and a seemingly random collection of pop music hits (featuring everything from the "Can-Can" to "Like A Virgin"), Luhrmann gives us a work so original and unforgettable, to compare it with any other film would completely defeat its purpose. This is a movie to treasure and experience for the pure joy, sensuality, and romance with which it drips. Not to mention that incredible eclectic score! This is why we go to the movies.

Where other films would buckle under the weight of such stylistic excess, Moulin Rouge! thrives off of it. The sets and costumes are more dazzling than you could even conceive in your imagination, so vibrant and colourful that they can survive Luhrmann's quick-moving camera and wild editing and come out just as sparkly on the other side. Even more importantly than the visual design, it's the performances that really light up the screen. Nicole Kidman is sassy yet heartbreaking, the tragedy of her character cracking through her sexy exterior more and more as death slowly overcomes her. As her fresh-faced and idealistic lover, Ewan McGregor bursts forth with an enthusiasm that, had it not been as overacted as it was, could have sabotaged the whole project. But McGregor knows the exuberance his part calls for, and he and Kidman play beautifully off each other, making their fairytale love seem real and believable in an unbelievable film. The supporting cast members are all aces, with special mention to Jim Broadbent as the gargantuan showman Harold Ziegler.

To claim the decade's best film is perfect would be false, but its imperfections are its charms, its eccentricities are why we love it. We love it for its frenetic humour, its energy, its ingenious use of music, its utter beauty, but most of all, for its tear-jerking and indelible love story, the least gimmicky and most beautiful thing any film could boast.

A Masterpiece.

Here's my favourite scene not only from Moulin Rouge!, but from any movie of the decade:

Thus concludes my year-long countdown of what I considered the best movies from 2000-2009. I'll officially wrap things up on New Year's with a specialawards ballot indicating the decade's greatest achievements in all the usual categories (I'm just geeky that way).