And The Oscar Goes To......

[forever1267]

This doesn't seem right, but the Screen Actors Guild Awards are LIVE!!! tonight on TNT at 5 PM Pacific Time / 8 Eastern Time. IMDB notes that Avatar and Up in the Air are not nominated for Ensemble Cast, so we'll have another Top Film winning, changing the game again. Perhaps The Hurt Locker?

[lpatrice]

Jan 23, 2010 19:53:21 GMT -4 forever1267 said:

This doesn't seem right, but the Screen Actors Guild Awards are LIVE!!! tonight on TNT at 5 PM Pacific Time / 8 Eastern Time. IMDB notes that Avatar and Up in the Air are not nominated for Ensemble Cast, so we'll have another Top Film winning, changing the game again. Perhaps The Hurt Locker?

Please let it be The Hurt Locker -- I really want it to win Best Picture at the Oscars too, but I just have this bad feeling it won't. If THL does not win the Oscar, I'd pretty much be okay with any movie but Up In The Air getting it at this point.

[Deleted]

“Hurt Locker” Beats “Avatar” At PGA Awards

Kathryn Bigelow’s “The Hurt Locker” upset “Avatar” at the Producers Guild of America’s annual awards, handed out tonight at the Palladium in Hollywood. The film significantly increased its best picture chances with this win - suggesting “Avatar” is not as sewn up a winner as some had suggested. Though in the last 20 years, the PGA honoree has went on to win the Academy’s Best Picture trophy 13 times - which is certainly not a perfect record.

So this means that so far the only thing Avatar has gotten is the Golden Globe, if Kathryn Bigelow gets the DGA Award her chances improve dramatically.

[Atreides]

I think whoever wins DGA will help settle the race but this is how I see it at the moment:

Best Picture - Avatar or The Hurt Locker
Best Director - James Cameron or Kathryn Bigelow
Best Actor - Jeff Bridges
Best Actress - Sandra Bullock
Best S. Actor - Christoph Waltz
Best S. Actress - Monique

With Avatar taking the bulk of the technical awards. I'd say that Bigelow has a better chance of winning Director than her movie has of winning Picture. Will the Academy give its top prize to a movie that has only made $16 million versus one that will make north of $2 billion? No Best Picture winner in modern history has ever made that little money. And it's already out on DVD/Blu-ray so a theatrical re-release may not even be feasible.

[Deleted]

I'll co-sign that list, although I think Meryl still has a slight chance to take it. It's either her or Sandra for sure. No one else has a chance.

I keep going back and forth on Avatar. On the one hand, it's gotten rave reviews and made truckloads of money. On the other hand, it's still a sci-fi movie. I just don't know if the Oscars will see past that like they did (finally) with Lord of the Rings. LotR had a nice literary pedigree behind it which I think helped. Titanic was based on an actual historical event. Avatar has neither of those things.

But I don't know what will win Best Picture if it's not Avatar. I can hope for The Hurt Locker or Star Trek all I want but I don't see it happening for either of them.

[divasahm]

Here's a question--if Sandra picks up any more of the guild awards, do you think the Academy voters might decide to give Meryl the Oscar to even things out?

[Atreides]

Jan 25, 2010 11:57:42 GMT -4 divasahm said:

Here's a question--if Sandra picks up any more of the guild awards, do you think the Academy voters might decide to give Meryl the Oscar to even things out?

The BAFTAs are the only major awards left until the Oscars and Sandra is not nominated there as The Blind Side doesn't come out in the UK until March. I'd say Meryl or Carey Mulligan will win the Best Actress BAFTA.

Meryl won the SAG last year for Doubt but lost the Oscar to Kate Winslet. However, Winslet was nominated for Revolutionary Road in the Lead category, which most people saw as her lesser film of 2008. Winslet got a bullshit Supporting Actress nomination and win for The Reader, which was clearly a lead performance, as she won the Best Actress Oscar for that movie a few weeks later.

[huntergrayson]

Two of the more reasonable arguments I've heard against an Avatar win are (a) many members of the Academy tend to watch the films as DVD screeners. Unless Fox is shipping all of AMPAS huge HD TVs & 3D glasses, something will be lost in the translation and (b) the Academy's biggest voting block is actors. Are they really going to reward a film starring virtual unknowns in computer-generated/enhanced performances? I mean, isn't Avatar almost a step in eliminating actors completely? Or rendering them far less important?

A couple critics have foreseen an Inglorious Basterds upset. It did win SAG ensemble, which is generally a good predictor of Best Picture. Also, it was a blockbuster success, is a WW2/Holocaust film, has a big cast, and Tarantino has never won Best Picture. The actors are pretty much a lock at this point except for Meryl or Sandra. But I think picture/original & adapted screenplay and director could be divided in several different ways between Avatar, Up in the Air, Basterds and The Hurt Locker. Of these, I've only seen Up in the Air, so I probably need to hit up the Cinerama Dome and Netflix.

I think one of the reasons why ROTK won was because both previous films had been nominated and lost. It was a "finally"/makeup award (LOTR: TTT is the best in the theatrical cut, IMO). Otherwise, scifi/fantasy isn't really that well received by Oscar.

[normadesmond]

Convincing analysis hunter, and one more thing about The Return of the King is that Peter Jackson had never won before, Best Picture or Best Director. James Cameron has. If there was no Titanic triumph in his past, he'd actually have a better chance now.

But what do I know? You never really know what they'll do. There's nothing stopping actors from voting for the small, actor-driven ensemble for Best Picture, as opposted to the big sweeping big-budget historical epic, and yet they rarely do.

I actually think, whatever happens, that Sandra Bullock just might win an Oscar anyway. If she loses to Meryl this year, I could easily see her doing some good supporting role and winning, Judi Dench fashion in the near future. She's so popular and well-liked, and she's a good actress in her own way, that she easily could win an Oscar even if she doesn't get it this year.

[Martini Girl]

I still come back to the fact that 2000 people were employed on this film over a whatever year period (15?) That is a major factor-- not just for the technical awards, but for the film as a whole. Everyone seems to know someone who worked on this film!

Folks out here tend to vote with what's popular. (sad but true). And Avartar is being back by (IMO), the best publicity crew during awards time.(Fox) They are relentless. That movie will be every where from now until the Oscars-- and so will Cameron.

I just got the Avatar screener, and I'll try to watch it tonight or tomorrow night. (I've already seen it in 3D). I'll let you know how it translates on my 13 inch TV!

As for best actress, I do wonder why Meryl hasn't won a 3rd Oscar recently (the last one was almost 30 years ago). Does the Academy just not "really" like her?

Meryl has 42West helping with her awards campaign (many are Miramax-trained publicists.) I don't know much about Columbia's PR team. Sandra has Warner Brothers helping her as well as Rogers and Cowan, so she's in good hands. Unless something radically happens, I think the momentum is in Sandy's favor.