Oscar Post-mortem

Where to begin on last Sunday's Academy Awards?

Obviously The Artist was the big winner, taking five trophies including Best Picture, Director, Actor. Hugo matched that tally with five craft wins, while the dreadful Iron Lady won two (gak!), and the list of one-win wonders includes The Help, Beginners, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, and The Muppets (becoming the first Muppet movie to win an Oscar! YAY!)

Surprises were few and far between, and those that we did get were decidedly unpleasant ones if you ask me. The biggest of said unpleasant surprises was no doubt Meryl Streep's victory in Best Actress, but don't let me give you the impression that I'm vindictive. I'm as big a fan of the lady as the next man. Year after year, Streep continues to solidify her claim as the greatest actress of her generation with consistently excellent performances, unfortunately often in films less-than-worthy of her gifts. If there's any living thespian deserving of three Academy Awards, it's her...

...but why did it have to come at the expense of Viola Davis? This was clearly her year, and hers was clearly the best performance of the five. Not to pontificate too hard on the Academy's (and Hollywood's) demographic tendencies, but when is she going to have an opportunity like this again? I wonder if this might be Oscar's most severe mistake in years.

One Category at a Time: Actress

Before the SAG Awards dropped I was pretty conflicted in this category. Based on the distribution of precursor attention, it seemed that we had a tight three woman race for the Oscar, but now that the Actors have had their say, it looks like the frontrunner has a more comfortable margin. The Oscar lineup is mostly the same as SAG’s, except that Rooney Mara (one of the best performances of the year) slid in over Tilda Swinton (THE best performance of the year!). Oy vey. She really is the anti-Meryl Streep; consistently brilliant performances every year but rarely an Oscar nod to show for it. I suppose we should be thankful on her behalf that she has one for Michael Clayton, because she honestly doesn’t care about awards. Right on, Tilda.

Anyway, the nominees – all five of whom I predicted for nominations back in April!:

One Category at a Time: Makeup

By the time it gets boiled down to three nominees, this race is usually a pretty easy one to call, but I'm having unspeakable difficulty in deciding upon a winner this year. It's essentially a two-horse race between extensive fantasy work on a successful, beloved, but decidedly familiar series, and superior but subtler work on a reviled film with a high profile acting nomination. But let's begin with the nominee bringing up the rear.

My Awards nominations: Hair and Makeup

In this digital age it always does me good to see that this dying art is still kicking its legs. The best Hair and Makeup achievements of the year are:

Captain America: The First Avenger
(David White, Lisa Westcott):

Redskull is a creepy and iconic creation, but let's not forget all the detailing that goes into those WWII battle scars and period hairdos.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows 2
(Nick Dudman, Amanda Knight, Lisa Tomblin):

Okay, so not everybody was convinced by the epilogue aging, but that doesn't diminish the quality and quantity of the other fantastical character designs.

Green Lantern (Joel Harlow, Felicity Bowring):

Wonderful alien creations and Peter Saarsgard's pronounced forehead are appropriately cartoonish but also convincingly done.

The Iron Lady (Mark Coulier, Marese Langan):

Nuanced aging work takes us through Thatcher's glory days to her desiccated "golden years" with tangible authenticity.

Thor (Luisa Abel, Janice Alexander):

The frost giants are particularly elaborate designs, but let's not forget all that robust Asgaardian facial hair.

Just missed: Captain America, Harry Potter 8, Hugo, War Horse

One Category at a Time: Best Actress

Even from this early vantage point, it's clear that 2011 is not at a lack for juicy leading female roles with big awards potential.

One of the most obvious contenders on everyone's radar is perennial favourite Meryl Streep in the role of former British PM Margaret Thatcher in The Iron Lady. Biopic roles are always held in Oscar's favour, even when the movie itself is not. Given Streep's incredible later-career popularity and the nature of the part, I'd say she's a very strong bet.

But perhaps she'll have some stiff competition from five-time nominee Glenn Close, a bonafide member of the "overdue club". She plays a woman who poses as a butler in 19th C Ireland in Albert Nobbs, which she also co-wrote. Sounds interesting enough to me, but will Oscar bite?

As counter point to those two established actresses, there's a chance newcomer Felicity Jones (who received strong reviews out of Sundance for her performance in Like Crazy) could be the ingenue of the year. But it's a small film, and whether or not it gains Jones any traction may come down how much critical favour it can curry.

A role which could garner some attention is recent nominee Michelle Williams as the singular Marilyn Monroe in My Week with Marylin. Hollywood enjoys seeing Hollywood take on old-Hollywood, and playing that era's iconic sex symbol gives Williams a great opportunity to impress. But is she a lead or a co-lead? Vote-splitting could hurt.

Finally, I'm taking a bit of long shot on Rooney Mara (who I loved, if ever so briefly, in The Social Network), who will be tackling the role of Lisbeth Salander in David Fincher's remake of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. The same role earned Swedish actress Noomi Rapace some awards consideration just this past year. Can the American version improve?

Predicted five:
Glenn Close in Albert Nobbs
Meryl Streep in The Iron Lady
Felicity Jones in Like Crazy
Michelle Williams in My Week with Marilyn or Take This Waltz
Rooney Mara in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Also consider: Anne Hathaway One Day, Jennifer Hudson Winnie, Keira Knightly A Dangerous Method, Robin Wright Penn The Conspirator, Emma Stone The Help, Tilda Swinton We Need to Talk About Kevin, Charlize Theron Young Adult, Rachel Weisz The Whistleblower

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

One Category at a Time: Best Picture (part 1)

Now that the 2010/11 Oscar season is a comfortably distant memory, I suppose I'd better toss up some early guesses as to who the nominees will be for next year's awards. I must confess that I'm struggling to fill my ten Best Picture predictions somewhat. There only appears to be a handful of awards-bait projects lined up for a 2011 release, and I somehow doubt that we'll see an animated feature or summer blockbuster up for the big prize this year. I gladly invite tiny independent films to surprise me, because for the moment, I can't pretend I'm that excited about many titles this year.

But on to the predictions. The biopic has always been a decent threat for Oscar's crown, and one with potential is David Croneneberg's A Dangerous Method, starring Michael Fassbender and Viggo Mortensen as pioneering psychiatrists Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud. The screenplay was adapted by Christopher Hampton from his own play, an approach which netted him an Oscar over 20 years ago for Dangerous Liaisons. It's period setting and focus on historical figures makes this project prime bait, but... with David Cronenberg at the helm? I'm actually a bit intrigued.

Alexander Payne hasn't made a feature film since winning his Oscar six years ago for Sideways. His long-awaited followup, The Descendants, headlines George Clooney as a powerful landowner in Hawaii who tries to bond with his two wild daughters in the wake of a tragic accident involving his wife. Sounds like a downer, right? Wrong. The novel on which the film is based has been praised by critics for its balance of audacious comedy with emotional heft, a style for which Payne has a proven talent.

Getting back to more traditional Oscar bait, it's hard to argue that Dreamworks' upcoming take on the popular novel The Help seems to fit the bill. Set in a 1960s Mississippi, it tells of an aspiring writer (Easy A's Emma Stone) who shocks her tightly-knit Southern community by interviewing African Americans who have spent their lives in servitude of the wealthy white. Gently rocking the boat on racism as appeased Oscar before (even as recently as 2009 with The Blind Side), and the film's formidable female ensemble sure looks enticing to me.

Besides The Descendants, George Clooney is involved in another potential awards pony this year called The Ides of March, in which he stars and directs. He also co-wrote and co-produced it with Grant Heslov, the man alongside whom he was nominated for Good Night, and Good Luck (2005). The film is a political drama also starring Ryan Gosling, Paul Giamatti, Marissa Tomei, Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Evan Rachel Wood, and Max Minghella. Can you say, "SAG Ensemble award"?

Will Meryl Streep finally get that third Oscar this year? It's certainly a possibility given that she'll be staring as Margaret Thatcher, Britain's first – and heretofore, only – female Prime Minister, in The Iron Lady. Having the air of "Importance" is always helpful when courting Oscar, and this subject offers a plethora of such "Important" issues to touch on. Combine that with what many are anticipating will be yet another charismatic performance from Streep, and I'd say there's potential.

Five more Best Picture predictions coming Monday.