One Category at a Time: Best Art Direction

There are lots of past Oscar winners and nominees in the mix this year. Among them are Martin Scorsese's frequent production designer Dante Ferreti and set dresser Franscesca Lo Shiavo (winners for The Aviator and Sweeney Todd). With Scorsese's Hugo Cabret, they'll recreate 1930's Paris. With Rob Richardson behind the camera, you know the sets are gonna get the best possible presentation.

Will this finally be the year the Academy awards Stuart Craig for the Harry Potter series? Having been nominated for three of the seven films thus far, including last year's installment, many are suggesting that AMPAS may want to tip their hat to the franchise with a win, and this upcoming year is their last chance to do it, and no category would be more appropriate than Art Direction.

Jack Fisk and Jim Erickson (nominated for There Will Be Blood) are heading the production design and set decoration of Water for Elephants, based on the bestseller set on a Depression era traveling circus. The period detail of 1930s America and the sparkly glitz of the Greatest Show on Earth might prove a winning combination with the art directors branch.

Finally, Mark Ricker and Rena DeAngelo will produce the look and feel of 1960s small-town Mississippi in The Help. DeAngelo's Emmy-winning work on Mad Men proves she has the detail of the period down pat, and if it ends up a popular film, design nominations could fall into place.

War films don't intuitively come to mind when one thinks about art direction, but it requires just as much work and creativity. Rick Carter (who won two years ago for Avatar) is designing the sets for Steven Spielberg's War Horse. If the movie turns out to be a big hit with the Academy, a nomination here would not surprise me.

Predicted five:
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2
The Help
Hugo Cabret
War Horse
Water for Elephants

Also consider: Albert Nobbs, Captain America, The Conspirator, A Dangerous Method, Jane Eyre, Pirates 4, Sherlock Holmes 2, The Tree of Life.

One Category at a Time: Best Costume Design

This is always a depressing category for me. Five years running the winner here has been a terrible movie. That may not bother me so much if I ever thought the costumes were deserving, but the Academy's "more is more" philosophy often clashes violently with my own tastes. But I remain hopeful we might see a film of quality (or at least quality costumes) reclaim the throne this year.

Sandy Powell will be looking for her tenth career nomination via Martin Scorsese's Hugo Cabret, set in lavish 1930s Paris. Powell is a versatile designer who excels no matter the film's period or genre, and she is certainly respected by the costume branch.

Michael O'Connor won this category a couple of year's ago for The Duchess, and could be back for another British corset-fest in the form of Jane Eyre. But has it been released too early? It may well be forgotten by year's end, but you can always count on the costume branch to throw a bone to forgotten movies (I Am Love for instance).

Jacqueline West, last nominated a couple of years ago for Benjamin Button, has two solid opportunities this year in The Tree of Life and Water for Elephants. In spite of its spring release, I'm guessing she stands a better shot with the latter, which allows her to combine the sparkly glitz of the circus with the dusty drabness of Depression era America.

David Cronenberg's sister, Denise, has been designing the costumes for all his movies since The Fly in 1986. She has her most awards-friendly project to date with A Dangerous Method, Cronenberg's period piece about Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung. If the film catches on with the Academy, I wouldn't be surprised to see its design elements earn some love.

Sharen Davis is no stranger to styles of the 1960s, having earned Oscar nominations for Ray and Dreamgirls. She'll be outfitting the many women of The Help, set in 1960s Mississippi, with period-appropriate and class-defining threads. Again, if the movie tickles the Academy's fancy, I'd say she has a decent shot at nomination number three.

Predicted five:
A Dangerous Method
The Help
Hugo Cabret
Jane Eyre
Water for Elephants

Also consider: Albert Nobbs, The Conspirator, My Week with Marilyn, Sherlock Holmes 2, The Tree of Life, Wuthering Heights.

One Category at a Time: Best Original Score / Song

I'll get these categories out of the way early because there simply is no logical way to go about predicting the nominees until the music has been heard. For Best Original Score, it isn't unreasonable to just pick Best Picture nominees or films with notable composers.

I get the feeling Alexandre Desplat was real close to winning this year for The King's Speech, but it ended up going to Reznor and Ross, whose work was more deserving anyway. Besides, Desplat will have many more opportunities. He scores so many films a year it's hard to keep count! He already has four lined up for 2011, including Terrence Malick's much anticipated The Tree of Life.

John Williams hasn't been nominated in a while (2006 for Memoirs of a Geisha and Munich), but he's got two Spielberg films to garner him some attention from the music branch, including possible Best Picture contender War Horse.

Could the elegant tones and orchestrations that helped Dario Marianelli to nominations for Pride and Prejudice and Atonement (which he went on to win) help him gain some traction for Jane Eyre? The early release is a hindrance, but sometimes a film from the first half of the year can survive it to the nominations.

Were it not for his Oscar-winning score to Up last year, I think Michael Giacchino may have still been in the running for his work on Star Trek. He's got another chance this summer to get our pulses racing with J.J. Abrams Super 8, which has many a movie fan shivering with excitement. If not that, maybe Cars 2?

James Newton Howard is still waiting for his first Oscar after eight nominations, the most recent of which came two years ago for Defiance. He's got a few titles in the running this year, including the adaptation of the bestselling Water for Elephants.

Predicted five:
Jane Eyre
Super 8
The Tree of Life
War Horse
Water for Elephants

Best Original Song is anyone's guess. Who knows what films will have songs? Animated features often feature one or two, so I suppose I'll guess:

Cars 2
Happy Feet 2
The Muppets
Winnie the Pooh