The 2011 Oscars

BEST FILM
Well, it was a fairly unsurprising Oscars this year, I think all my predictions except for Best Film came true. My fiancee remarked during the broadcast that it all seemed to be the same films... I have to admit that widening the Best Film nominee category to 10 pictures hasn't really done much to widen the Academy's scope for recognising unsung films. Having said that, I think nearly all the nominees (with perhaps the exception of The Kids Are All Right) were really great movies, so we're all winners in the end.

The King's Speech (full review)
I think the lack of a clear defining frontrunner (at least in the eyes of the wider public... in my eyes it was Black Swan) left the competition open for The King's Speech to do a mini-sweep due to it's traditionalist approach to prestige movie-making. Say what you like about any of the films nominated for Best Picture, but I don't think you can argue against The King's Speech having the broadest appeal. It's the kind of film that a twenty year old could take his great-grandmother to see and they would both walk away loving it in equal spades... I don't think you could honestly say that about many films. As much as I would've loved to see something else win I can't really fault the selection of this as the Best Film as the largest share of the Academy just simply saw it as the best film - the one that was the most entertaining, had the most worth, and engaged them in a simple and joyful fashion.

The Fighter (full review)
I enjoyed this one a lot but it never 'broke through' for me in the way that a lot of the other nominees did. Maybe my expectations of David O. Russell were just too high after his last two films (I Heart Huckabees and Three Kings). Don't get me wrong, this is a great film with some top notch performances and a healthy anchorage in reality, I just don't see it as Russell's best work as a filmmaker.

Winter's Bone (full review)
The dark horse of the Best Film nominees, this film was never going to win anything but it's great that it's been given some exposure as it means more people will go out of their way to see it. This is an intense and carefully observed crime film that mixes a realistic approach to modern hillbilly culture and a classic film noir format. It's a one of a kind, and it's worth checking out if you're in the mood for a different take on the crime genre.

The Social Network (full review)
I feel that this film is greatly overrated (and it seems the Academy did too, the biggest awards it scooped up were Best Score and Best Adapted Screenplay) but it is a step in an interesting direction for films, and it's worth seeing. I don't really get the cult of fanboys that David Fincher has attracted, I don't feel like he's made any great films since Fight Club. His output in the last ten years has been solid and fairly dependable, but Fight Club and Se7en remain the peak of his work as a director and I'm yet to see him create anything else of that calibre. The Social Network isn't just a film about Facebook though, don't let the subject matter put you off, it's a genuinely fascinating story.

Toy Story 3 (full review)
They should probably stop bothering to put animated films in the 'Best Film' category. While there's still a 'Best Animated Film' category I can't really ever see an animated film actually winning the Best Film section. If you were a voter and you voted for Toy Story 3 as the Best Animated Film then you're hardly going to vote for it again against regular films... and if you vote for it as Best Film overall then you'd hardly going to vote for anything else in the Animated Film category. It's all a bit redundant, isn't it? Anyway, Toy Story 3 is a fantastic film and quite easily the best 'third' film in a series ever... I think it actually eclipses the first two Toy Story films.

The Kids Are All Right (full review)
Not a crap movie but hardly worthy of all its nominations. I'm over these sort of curly-mouthed pseudo-indie flicks getting noticed at Awards time... no one would ever seriously vote for this as their favourite film of the year. I would've bumped this nominee off in favour of The Town. It's faintly amusing and Mark Ruffalo is a cool dude but it's only just 'all right'.

Inception (full review)
All the clips of Inception at the Academy Awards reminded of what an amazing film this was. If the snow-bound action sequences had been tightened up then this might've been my pick for Best Film. Everything about Inception - the cast, the concept, the way it mashes the heist genre with sci-fi, the fantastic music, the spinning top at the end - it just strikes a chord with me as something free-standingly original and memorable. My prediction for the Oscars in two to three years time is that Christopher Nolan's third Batman film will see him finally get some credit for the great genre work he's been doing, much in the same way that Peter Jackson got what was owed to him with the third Lord of the Rings movie back in 2003/2004.

True Grit (full review)
Another fantastic film that I'd love to sit down and watch again. I want more westerns dammit, I want to see the genre treated with as much respect and enthusiasm as the Coen Brothers gave it in True Grit. This is a plum slice of all the best aspects of Americana, wonderfully performed and with a great eye for detail. I could never see a western winning Best Film anytime soon, but it's nice to see True Grit getting some notice all the same.

Black Swan (full review)
My pick for winner. A brilliant and multi-layered piece of innovative filmmaking, this is the only nominee that I've watched more than once. Every single scene, look, inflection, whatever, makes up a beautifully constructed whole. This is one of those rare things - a 'perfect' film. It won't be to everyone's taste but then again great art never is.

127 Hours (full review)
I really liked this film but it just felt like filler amongst all the other nominees... it looked like an odd film to be nominated, which I guess is a good thing (and I guess that's the point of the 10-picture decision for the Best Film category), but at the end of the day it just wasn't going to win anything when it's up against more traditional types of Oscar-recognised filmmaking. The best thing about 127 Hours is James Franco's performance, I love that a cast member from Freaks and Geeks has come this far. I think a lot of people will watch this film and really like it but it just wasn't 'big' enough to ever be a serious contender at the Oscars.


BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Christian Bale had this in the bag, though for some reason the Australian media kept going on about how Geoffrey Rush was our best hope for Oscar glory this year. Seriously... as fun as Geoffrey Rush is to watch, he already has an Oscar and his performance in The King's Speech isn't on the same level as what Bale did. It's like the Australian commentators didn't even watch any of the films. Actually, I'd go as far as to say they probably couldn't even name most of the nominated films.

Christian Bale (The Fighter)
I never really liked Bale that much (and it's got nothing to do with his offscreen behaviour), he always seems a little bit too attention-seeking as an actor. The Fighter is no exception to this rule, but the level of commitment he invested in this character is pretty hard to fault. It's almost a certainty that Bale is now on the pathway to a Best Actor Oscar at some point (both Kevin Spacey and Robert De Niro won Best Supporting Oscars before claiming the ultimate award), I guess I'll try to watch his future performances with an open mind but his voice is just so damn annoying sometimes! He also needs to stay away from turdish pap like Terminator Salvation (I actually liked this movie but Bale was the worst thing in it).

John Hawks (Winter's Bone)
Great to see this underrated television actor getting some attention but he was never going to win, was he? His performance in Winter's Bone was more subtle than his competitors but perhaps of a slightly higher quality. How do you measure these things? Hopefully his nomination will open up a few more opportunities for his talents. At least his loss means he'll probably be available for more episodes of Eastbound and Down.

Jeremy Renner (The Town)
Did he really get nominated again? He didn't stand out for me in The Town, there were easily better supporting turns that deserved the nod this year (Ben Mendelsohn in Animal Kingdom would've been nice, though I don't think it's a performance that Americans really 'get'). Renner's nomination was one of those self-vindicating follow-up nominations that the Academy is so fond of giving.

Mark Ruffalo (The Kids Are All Right)
I've always had a soft spot for the Ruffster ever since I saw him in The Last Castle about a decade ago. He hasn't always appeared in the best films, but everything he appeared in was better for having him in it. He just has one of those charismatic faces and an earnest demeanour (that he did well to play against in The Kids Are All Right) that just pulls me into his performances... he always makes it all look so easy.

Geoffrey Rush (The King's Speech)
Another entertaining performance from a brilliant character actor, it's nice to see Rush still getting notice as he's been plugging steadily away at a great range of roles since his breakthrough performance in Shine back in the 1990s. I think Geoffrey Rush's style of acting is very remniscent of the great British theatre giants (Laurence Olivier, Ralph Richardson, John Gielguld, etc) when they took to film... they had a unique flair for visual and vocal shorthand that always made their characterisations rather distinct. I'm a fan of it, and Rush appeals to that in me.


BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
I didn't really want to nail my predictions down for this one but I kind of thought that Leo would get it... she's getting on in her years and the other nominees were either foreign (Weaver and Bonham-Carter) or still young enough for voters to treat the nomination as a prize in itself (Adams and Steinfeld). It's predictable that Leo would get it, but when has the Academy ever really voted in a truly objective fashion? (IE. Without consideration for the actor's background).

Melissa Leo (The Fighter)
Another heartfelt and believable white trash performance from Leo. She was previously nominated (to everyone's shock) in the Best Actress category two years ago for the largely-unseen Frozen River. It's heartwarming to think that after slumming it in tiny supporting roles for at least two decades that she's now been flung into an elite pool of actors and actresses - it's something that will probably actually improve her career prospects. The role she plays in The Fighter is often hard to watch, she'll make you want to throw things at the screen, and in some ways the character is similar to Mo'Nique's Oscar-winning turn from last year.

Helena Bonham-Carter (The King's Speech)
Maybe I'm alone here but I just didn't really get the fuss over Bonham-Carter's performance in The King's Speech. Aside from a vague resemblance to the young Queen Mother there isn't really anything amazing about it. She does a good job, and she's generally a fairly underrated character actress, but I felt like her role was fairly throwaway (and justifiably so, the film's about the King and his speech therapist).

Hailee Steinfeld (True Grit)
I was hoping she might win but the Academy is pretty safe with the way that they vote these days. Hopefully she doesn't slide into obscurity like Haley Joel Osment has, her work in True Grit is wonderfully bright and unusually crusty for a girl of her years. The memorable nuances of her character seemed to come so naturally to her... she was the unexpected highlight of True Grit.

Amy Adams (The Fighter)
I don't really see this as all that worthy of a nomination. Adams' best work is still her naive nun from Doubt. Her white trash angel routine in The Fighter isn't particularly noteworthy but it's always fun to watch people like Adams climbing up the tiers of stardom. A few years ago nobody knew who she is... she isn't quite a household name yet, but her exposure in a broad range of performances (just compare Julie and Julia to The Fighter) should see her break into the A-list relatively soon.

Jacki Weaver (Animal Kingdom)
It's just amazing that she even got nominated. An Oscar nomination will probably be enough to change her life completely, she's the only actor nominated in any category at this year's awards who's never made a film in America before and that may well change now. Her role in Animal Kingdom was pretty cool but everything about that movie was pretty cool so it was strange to see her get singled out. Hopefully this nomination at least meant a few people went out of their way to see Animal Kingdom when they normally wouldn't have.


BEST ACTOR
For the briefest of brief seconds I thought that it was going to be one of those Oscar 'upsets' where someone like James Franco or Jesse Eisenberg gets it, but the old Firthster got his turn. You know, five years ago I would never have guessed that Colin Firth would get an Academy Award for Best Actor, so it's kind of cool in a way that he has this moment of glory. I think Eisenberg could've been bumped for Ryan Gosling's work in Blue Valentine, Gosling has been working pretty hard the last few years to push himself in interesting directions and Blue Valentine was some pretty huge work on his part. The only nominee in this category that I can't comment on is Javier Bardem, as I haven't seen Biutiful.

Colin Firth (The King's Speech)
His role as the King was a culmination of all his inherently British characterisations in past films combined with a rare opportunity to truly shine. I loved his performance in The King's Speech, it really got you punching the air for him. It wasn't a bland performance but it also wasn't a 'big' or 'showy' performance, it was just great acting from an actor who doesn't always get the sort of roles that would best showcase his ability.

James Franco (127 Hours)
As I mentioned earlier, I love that a cast member from Freaks and Geeks is now an Oscar nominee. That's a pretty cool career trajectory. Franco's performance is so central to 127 Hours, the film depends on him from start to finish and he handles it with such wry aplomb and likeable humanity. I'm glad he didn't win because I know that he's capable of so much more and I'd love to see a few years of that hunger for an Oscar driving more interesting role choices in the near future. You should totally check out 127 Hours though if you haven't yet, Franco will make it a great experience for you.

Jeff Bridges (True Grit)
Even though he won the Oscar last year there's still no denying the great work he did this year as Rooster Cogburn in True Grit. To take such an already iconic role and then own it so completely is no mean feat, and Bridges has entered a golden twilight in his career that's made him more well-known and revered than ever.

Jesse Eisenberg (The Social Network)
As mentioned, I'm not sure this performance was worth a nomination but I do like Eisenberg as an actor, even if he is the thinking man's Michael Cera. His work as Zuckerberg in The Social Network is interesting and uncompromisingly grey, but it's problematic because the character (as written) has an impenetrableness that keeps him at a distance from the audience. I'd like to see Eisenberg playing more roles of this calibre though... at the least it'll differientiate his body of work a bit more from Michael Cera.


BEST ACTRESS
I felt like this was a shoe-in for Natalia Portman but I found it hard to watch Annette Benning at the ceremony because she probably felt like it was her turn to win it after being nominated three previous times. I know that's silly because I don't know these people, but I always feel bad for most of the losing nominees, especially if they've been around for a while like Benning has. I'm really happy that Portman won though, her work in Black Swan is one of the greatest screen peformances of all time.

Natalie Portman (Black Swan)
Portman's career has been all over the place... from a memorable beginning as the 13-year old assassin in Leon to some frankly appalling work as Queen Amidala in the Star Wars prequels, she hasn't exactly had a focused career. I didn't really appreciate her talents until I saw Garden State, where her acting was so quirky and alive that it was hard to believe she had been so wooden and flat in The Phantom Menace. Her work in Black Swan is simply astounding, I forgot that it was an actress most of the time because her character felt so real... the amazing part is that this film borders on fantasy/horror territory in such a way that it relies entirely on her performance to be convincing as a serious film. The level of commitment Portman invests in her character's physicality can't be underestimated either, it would've been very hard to nail the ballet aspect in such a professional manner.

Jennifer Lawrence (Winter's Bone)
Winter's Bone is a great film, and Lawrence is suitably understated as it's heroine, but it's the kind of performance that doesn't seem all that impressive unless you see the real life Lawrence (a typically bright young Hollywood thing). Her character in Winter's Bone is an astute observation of reality, she underplays at every turn because it reflects how this character would really react if the film was reality. I like that the Academy can recognise stuff like this.

Annette Benning (The Kids Are All Right)
Benning is a great powerhouse of an actress but her characters always inevitably annoy the crap out of me, so I'll never be on board with her fanbase (if she has one). She does a believable strong-willed lesbian in late-middle age, but it's the sort of character that feels designed to showcase her particular set of talents. As much as she probably deserves an Academy Award at some point (and it would need to be soon as her star has faded somewhat in recent times) I think I would've hated it if Portman had been overlooked in favour of her.

Nicole Kidman (Rabbit Hole)
Kidman gives it her best shot in Rabbit Hole but I find it hard to get past the Hollywood 'glam' that she brings with her to the role. I think Kidman will find it very difficult in the imminent future to remain in the A-list (she's already slipped a bit) due to her inability to let her looks fade with age. The work she's had done on her face and her inbuilt aloofness will lock her out of high quality films if she doesn't find a way to become a more identifiable figure for regular audiences.

Michelle Williams (Blue Valentine)
Williams does a great job with a hard role in Blue Valentine, her nomination was probably reward enough - the film she's in and the kind of performance she gives isn't the sort of thing that's 'big' (sorry to keep using that word) enough to gain appropriate notice, but hopefully this means she'll continue doing work of this calibre.


BEST DIRECTOR
I don't know about Tom Hooper getting Best Director... I would've picked him as the least likely choice for Best Director. People are talking about David Fincher's 'snubbing' as being of Martin Scorsese-like proportions, but I think David Aronofsky did the most revolutionary and inspiring work of the nominees. As great as The King's Speech is, the direction is fairly bog-standard for the most part. I think the Academy voters sometimes have a hard time seperating 'Best Film' from 'Best Director' (which is the fault of the directors for continuing to trumpet auteur theory as evidence that they are a film's ultimate author) but what can you do?