Only three days until Oscar nominations are announced! It’s so weird to have them this early … I feel like I barely predicted at all this year. Nonetheless, it’s time to lock in my final picks! Today, it’s one last glimpse at the leading acting categories.
See my predictions for Best Original Screenplay and Best Adapted Screenplay.
See my predictions for Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress.
Best Actor
- Daniel Day-Lewis, “Lincoln“
- Hugh Jackman, “Les Misérables“
- Bradley Cooper, “Silver Linings Playbook“
- John Hawkes, “The Sessions“
- Denzel Washington, “Flight“
I was wrong, this is Daniel Day-Lewis’ race to lose. My gosh, he is winning everything! Look at this chart of dominance. It turns Anne Hathaway’s dream to shame.
He’s going to come charging into the Kodak Theatre to get that record-setting third Oscar for Best Actor. This is like Phillip Seymour Hoffman for “Capote,” Forest Whitaker for “The Last King of Scotland,” and … well, Daniel Day-Lewis for “There Will Be Blood” levels of momentum.
If anyone takes him down, though, it’s going to be Hugh Jackman. He had many doubters until the film was unveiled, and he’s taken the big three nods from BFCA, SAG, and HFPA. He will almost certainly win the Golden Globe. Maybe, just maybe, he can stage an Adrian Brody-esque upset.
The nomination will likely be the win for Bradley Cooper, who has triumphantly exceeded expectations in “Silver Linings Playbook” and likely redefined how the industry sees him. Well done, sir. I’m pleased that a clear path to a nomination emerged with Critics’ Choice, SAG, and Golden Globe recognition. I thought it might be a more uphill climb, but I have been very pleasantly surprised.
Beyond DDL, Jackman, and Cooper, my certainty stops. I am almost positive the final two nominees will be John Hawkes for “The Sessions” and Denzel Washington in “Flight.” They were feted by BFCA, SAG, and HFPA. Joaquin Phoenix, on the other hand, missed with SAG and will likely be left out in the cold (much to my chagrin).
I’m on the record as being nonplussed by Hawkes and Washington, though I greatly admire many other performances by the two actors. For my money, Phoenix was the best performance of the year. Several others have seen what I have seen, and he’s picked up a few critics’ groups notices. He was also nominated by the Golden Globes, albeit in the segregated drama category, and the Critics’ Choice Awards, which had six nominees.
Sadly, it looks like Phoenix will follow the trajectory of Michael Fassbender’s work in “Shame,” my favorite performance of 2011. Fassbender and Phoenix were both winners of the Volpi Cup for Best Actor at the Venice Film Festival. Their work was widely acclaimed, and their movies were polarizing. They won Best Actor from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association among several other prizes. They picked up key nominations from BFCA and HFPA, but their SAG snub raised some red flags.
Phoenix’s journey will likely end the same way Fassbender’s did. Repelling the Academy, Fassbender was left on the outside looking in at the Best Actor category. Phoenix shouldn’t mind being put in the same position, however, because he hates awards season and thinks the Oscars are BS.
So it looks like I’ll be predicting the SAG nominees to repeat five-for-five. Boring, disappointing, I know. But there’s nothing screaming to go against conventional wisdom here.
I don’t think Richard Gere for “Arbitrage,” Jack Black for “Bernie,” Denis Lavant for “Holy Motors,” Jean-Louis Trintignant for “Amour,” or Anthony Hopkins for “Hitchcock” really have much of a chance. Each has a few respective laurels, but the frontrunning five are just too strong for there to be a major surprise.
Then again, last year gave us not only Demian Bichir but an out-of-nowhere nod for Gary Oldman. So we’ll just have to see. Maybe the Academy has a few tricks up its sleeve in 2012 that we just have no way to forecast.
Best Actress
- Jessica Chastain, “Zero Dark Thirty“
- Jennifer Lawrence, “Silver Linings Playbook“
- Naomi Watts, “The Impossible”
- Marion Cotillard, “Rust and Bone“
- Quvenzhané Wallis, “Beasts of the Southern Wild“
The dynamics at the top of the race have changed little over the past month. It’s still a Chastain vs. Lawrence cage match, and I think we won’t really know until the envelope is opened. They will go head-to-head at the Critics’ Choice Awards and the SAG Awards, but Viola Davis won both of those last year and lost the Oscar. The Golden Globe will do nothing to clear up the picture as they will compete in separate categories. I give Chastain the edge now.
But below Chastain and Lawrence, so much is fluctuating. This is the most fluid acting category of the four in 2012, capable of many unsurprising surprises. And if any race is suggesting that conventional wisdom and historical precedent simply won’t do, this would be it.
It would seem that Naomi Watts and Marion Cotillard would be assured nominations for “The Impossible” and “Rust and Bone,” respectively. They’ve scored the BFCA, SAG, and HFPA hat trick of nominations, just about the best safety net you can have. Both also look to be the only nominations for their respective movies as “The Impossible” missed the cut for visual effects and France chose “The Intouchables” over “Rust and Bone” to compete in the Best Foreign Language Film category.
I’m much more bullish on Watts, a prior nominee for “21 Grams” back in 2003, perhaps because I haven’t seen the movie yet and can visualize her more as a statistic (sorry for the bluntness, but that’s the name of the game). I’ve read that “The Impossible” has really played the guild circuit, ginning up admiration for Watts and the cast along the way. She got a high-profile shout-out from a mere acquaintance, Reese Witherspoon, in Entertainment Weekly that a lot of people saw.
For whatever reason, she just seems very strong to me. The movie seems like the emotional tour de force they look for in leading performances for women.
Having said that, Marion Cotillard shows the same level of emotional devastation, just on a more subtle level. If she hadn’t won for a French language performance, I’d be hesitant to think she could be nominated for one. But she has, and I feel a hunch that the Oscars won’t snub her brilliant performance. Apparently, the Academy voters really responded to “Rust and Bone,” and if that’s the case, why wouldn’t they nominate its star?
So I’ll go ahead and predict that Watts and Cotillard make it, although I could see a foreseeable outcome where one gets knocked out. I doubt they slap these precursors in the face so hard that both get turned away.
SAG’s fifth nominee was Helen Mirren for “Hitchcock,” who also landed a Golden Globe nod. Mirren has become a recent darling of the Academy. I got fooled once by not predicting her in 2009 for “The Last Station,” and a part of me thinks I might be making the same mistake again. Check out how eerily similar these two cases of Helen Mirren in Best Actress contention are:
“Common sense would say it is going to Helen Mirren for ‘The Last Station.’ She has the respect; we know because she won this award three short years ago. She has been nominated by the SAG and the Golden Globes, two very crucial precursors. But she has no victories and, more importantly, no passionate supporters.”
Going back and reading this is actually kind of scary because this year, she has SAG and HFPA in her corner … and basically no one else, unless you put a lot of stock in the prognosticating abilities of the Washington DC Area Film Critics Association. The movies even received the same lukewarm reception: “Hitchcock” got a 66% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes, while “The Last Station” scored a 70% fresh.
I fear that the British contingent, which was a major part in making a Best Actor nomination for Gary Oldman in “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy” a reality, might be muddling our ability to make a prediction here. Will this sizable portion of the Academy come through and give Mirren a fourth nomination in seven years? I’m not picking Mirren because a 5-for-5 match with SAG just doesn’t feel right for this field rife with contenders. (And especially with the men looking likely to perfectly align with SAG.)
Perhaps that same European bloc of voters will be split among several other contenders from across the sea. The French Cotillard could steal some European love, as could the British-Australian Watts. Emmanuelle Riva could also make a play for that contingent for her work in “Amour.”
The Critics’ Choice nominee has quite a case to make for her nomination. At 85, she’s a respected figure from the French New Wave that many recognize and respect. Sony Pictures Classics has even gotten her to do some press for the film, including an in-depth session with The New York Times that’s well worth a read. Many critics’ groups have aligned behind her, including such notable groups from Boston, Los Angeles, New York Online, and the National Society of Film Critics. Perhaps worth noting, she won the European Film Award for Best Actress.
But why did SAG and the Golden Globes overlook Riva? Neither are particularly xenophobic; the Globes’ dramatic actress category has seen a number of foreign-language nominees, including a rather strange nod for Kristin Scott Thomas in 2008 for “I’ve Loved You So Long.” And at her age, it would seem that the SAG would want to bow down at her feet, and at the very least nominate her!
I can’t predict Riva with these two high-profile misses. Perhaps she will be the exception, but I think her nomination is a pipe dream of critics. She’s the Sally Hawkins for “Happy-Go-Lucky” of the year, a nominee that they try to make happen but just doesn’t click with the Academy.
Even less likely is British actress Rachel Weisz, in play for “The Deep Blue Sea” thanks to the New York Film Critics Circle reminding voters that her movie exists. A March release automatically faces an uphill climb for a nomination since it has to fight to be remembered, and the Golden Globes did reward her performance. Perhaps she’s the big surprise, but a SAG nomination would have been the more helpful precursor notice to pick up.
Also feted by the Golden Globes was Judi Dench for “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel.” This wouldn’t really be worth mentioning if it wasn’t … well, Judi Dench. However, the movie is more likely to see recognition in the Best Supporting Actress category for Maggie Smith. For that matter, Dench is more likely to see recognition in that category as well for her work in “Skyfall.”
And now, we arrive at our final contender, Quvenzhané Wallis for her extraordinary performance in “Beasts of the Southern Wild.” Now 9, the pint-sized but spunky Wallis would be the youngest Best Actress nominee ever. Even more impressive is that she was 6 when the movie was shot.
However, at the moment, she’s going virtually unnoticed. Could Scott MacDonald have been right in his article on The Atlantic?
“Though she’s nine now, she was a mere six when the film was shot. To put it another way, she was not quite seven, which is the year developmental psychologists like to refer to as the age of reason: when kids start making decisions based on logic and causality. I’m no psych expert, but it seems to me this might be the sensible cut-off point for acting plaudits.
Acting requires some intentionality on the part of the actor, some conscious effort to adopt a persona other than his or her own. Even adult actors who get criticized for “playing themselves” are engaged in a series of more or less conscious decisions about how best to be themselves onscreen. A young child, meanwhile, likely isn’t thinking at all about how to be herself, let alone a character. She’s a kid, and she just ‘is.'”
So is that it? Have most considered her too young and written off her candidacy? MacDonald did note that 8-year-old Justin Henry was nominated for “Kramer vs. Kramer,” so a nomination wouldn’t be entirely unprecedented. But all she’s netted is a Critics Choice nod for Best Actress and a handful of breakout performer awards.
We will never know if she had a shot with SAG because the non-union production “Beasts of the Southern Wild” was ruled ineligible to compete. However, the novelty of her contention should have been enough to attract the Golden Globes, but they totally snubbed the entire film. I already floated the “too American” rationale for its exclusion, citing “True Grit” as an example, but the snub is really troubling.
The Oscars do love young nominees, though. There have been plenty of pre-pubescent nominees in Academy history, most recently Abigail Breslin for “Little Miss Sunshine.” Saiorse Ronan and Hailee Steinfeld, though quite a bit older than Willis, nonetheless were nominees. And in 2003, lest we forget, 13-year-old Keisha Castle-Hughes’ performance in “Whale Rider” knocked out Nicole Kidman for “Cold Mountain” and Scarlett Johansson for “Lost in Translation.” The young are often a force to be reckoned with at the Oscars.
I’ll lay out that Wallis would be a shocking Best Actress nominee. If I was thinking by rules and precedents, the obvious pick would be Mirren. If I was attempting to focus on just this season, I might have to go with Riva. Yet I’m going with Wallis on little more than a gut feeling that maybe the Academy’s hearts were taken by a precocious tyke.
Check back tomorrow, January 8, to see my final predictions for Best Director!
Although, in the event of a “Lincoln” sweep (and me sticking my head in an oven), Sally Field could go 3-for-3 and win here for “Lincoln.” She’s certainly had her fair share of recognition along the precursor circuit, including a high-profile win from the New York Critics’ Circle.
On paper, the smart money would be on Nicole Kidman to snag a nomination. SAG is always the best indicator of actors’ sentiment, and she also has a key Globe nod.
Although don’t get me wrong, maybe they will not go with a perennial Oscar bridesmaid but rather a crowned Oscar queen.
Could it be Critics’ Choice nominee Matthew McConaughey for “Magic Mike?” He’s had quite the career turnaround in 2012, and a nomination would be a nice pat on the back. A nomination would be in the pattern of Robert Downey, Jr. in 2008 for “Tropic Thunder,” another unconventional comedic role from a resurgent actor.
Both DiCaprio and Waltz received nominations from the Golden Globes, but neither showed up on the Critics’ Choice list nor the SAG. The latter can be explained by a lack of screeners being sent to the nominating committee, but the former is troubling. I considered “Django Unchained” to be a non-factor in the season until it found some very vocal critical supporters and a large audience. So I have to think at least one actor from the movie will show up, but I don’t think there’s a consensus on who that should be.
I think this is probably the biggest no-brainer race of them all for 2012. It’s an extremely thin field, filled with several past nominees and winners. “Zero Dark Thirty” and “Django Unchained” will vie for the win; I think it’s Mark Boal’s to lose, but Tarantino could take it if they feel Boal’s win for “
As for that final slot, people (including myself) seem to have finally caught onto the fact that the writers’ branch sees foreign films and isn’t afraid to nominate them. Despite everyone declaring “
“Lincoln,” “Argo,” and “Silver Linings Playbook” are locks. Inarguable. If they don’t get nominated … well, I won’t finish that sentence since it’s a waste of time. IT’S NOT GOING TO HAPPEN.
In 2010, the category was 5-for-5 with Best Picture nominees “
The past two years have seen the leading man of the Best Picture winner take home Best Actor. So I’m going out on a limb for Hugh Jackman. I know it sounds illogical at the moment. But the hope is that in a few months, we will all look back at this post and say, “Wow, Marshall! I can’t believe you had such foresight!” Although it’s very likely that we also look back and say, “Wow, Marshall, you were really dumb not to see the steamroller of Daniel Day-Lewis coming a mile away.”
Though Bradley Cooper may be best known for “
It looks like her main competition will be Jessica Chastain’s gritty, steely CIA agent from “Zero Dark Thirty.” Chastain’s epic 2011 brought her an Oscar nomination for “The Help,” and her grace and cheer really went over well with everyone. As far as I’m concerned, she’s the new Amy Adams, who was the new Julianne Moore/Cate Blanchett/Kate Winslet.
Marion Cotillard deserves score a nomination here as well, and given the incredibly weak field, it shouldn’t be a problem. Upon seeing the film a second time last week, I realized that where “La Vie En Rose” was a total transformation, “Rust and Bone” is a radically different movie for her. She’s so much subtler and rawer. It’s enormously affecting. See it when you get the chance.
Philip Seymour Hoffman is just going for his second Oscar, but I think plenty of people would argue he’s an actor headed for the stature of Daniel Day-Lewis and Robert DeNiro. He will get to two, and maybe “The Master” will get him there. He won a prize at Venice (a tie with Joaquin Phoenix), and his co-lead status will help.
Alan Arkin is likely in for “Argo,” but he’s only in the film for a handful of scenes. He makes them the most funny and entertaining scenes in the film, though. But I can’t help but wonder if he’s not as much of a shoo-in as some people think. He’s already earned his lifetime achievement award – I mean, Best Supporting Actor prize in 2006 for “Little Miss Sunshine.” And “Argo” may not be an actor’s movie. So we will see.
Thanks for coming, everyone. You did your best, but you weren’t good enough. Anne Hathaway apparently gives a performance for the ages and makes everyone cry. She has won. It’s over before it even began.
To quote “Les Miserables” itself, the time is now, the day is here. Tom Hooper’s film has finally been revealed to critics and awards voters – and all reports indicate they are eating it up. Shrewdly opening on Christmas Day, it will be an audience favorite undoubtedly as it opens wallets and tear ducts across the nation (and world).
Of the other likely nominees, only “Lincoln” really stands a chance of getting 10 or more (perhaps “The Master” if it comes back roaring). Everything seems to be going right for it at the moment. The box office is great, the reviews are great, the press is great, and the timing could not be more perfect. Spielberg struck a gold mine here.
That gritty, spunky Sundance/festivals quotient (“
The Academy also doesn’t seem bothered by picking novices over experienced directors well-regarded throughout the industry. They like what they like, and whoever delivers them the best movie is going to win Best Director. Truffaut would be smiling if he were still with us because his auteur theory is etched in stone in AMPAS mentality.
I still wouldn’t count out Ben Affleck to win, especially if “Argo” holds on and starts winning big. But if it’s “Les Miserables” and not Hooper, I think the Academy votes Spielberg over Affleck.
“The Master” just seems like the movie of the year to me from this distance. Tom Cruise has seen the movie and HATES it, that’s enough for me. If the movie is really going to take on Scientology, it could really be a pop culture centerpiece for the fall.
So I doubt they will think twice about nominating “Les Miserables” for Best Picture. The Tony Award-winning musical has everything that could possibly ever appeal to an Academy member: drama, emotion, catharsis, noble prostitutes, solid acting, historical setting, impressive craftwork … and it’s directed by Tom Hooper, the man who made them feel so good they gave him Best Director for a movie that required very little directing.
People have been raving about Ang Lee’s “Life of Pi” since its presentation of footage at CinemaCon back in the spring, and I think the coupling of a respected, Oscar-winning director tackling 3D will be the “
I’m feeling only six Best Picture nominees this year. (For those who don’t know about the new rules and regulations of the category, the Best Picture field is now an elastic number of nominees between five and ten. In order to be nominated for Best Picture, a movie needs to receive at least five percent of the number one votes.) The top five are very obvious.
The top three are rock solid locks. Woody Allen seems very inevitable given the widespread love for his movie and that the directors have nominated him six times before. The last slot could go any number of ways – Fincher like the DGA picked, Malick like every critic proclaimed from the rooftop, Spielberg if “War Horse” actually makes a strong showing, or maybe even Tate Taylor if they really love “The Help.”
The top three are locked in after getting nominations from the BFCA, SAG, and HFPA. Fassbender can’t be put in the same category since he missed with the SAG, the group with the most overlap with Academy voters, but he seems pretty safe given that the nomination would be a reward for his ubiquity just as much as his performance. In addition, physical commitment to a role always plays well with the actors branch; see nominations for James Franco in “
For the past 15 years, the SAG field has provided a clue to at least 4 of the 5 eventual nominees for Best Actress at the Oscars. The top four in the field – Davis, Streep, Williams, and Swinton – have all scored nominations from the BFCA, SAG, and HFPA. Then, the plot thickens. The way I see it, there are three actresses competing for that final slot. History says go with the SAG nominee, which is Glenn Close in “Albert Nobbs.” But Charlize Theron is also a threat for “Young Adult” after cracking the field for both the BFCA and HFPA.
At once, this is the most solid and the most fluctuating race this year. The frontrunner still is – and has been since June – Christopher Plummer for his incredible turn in “Beginners.” I don’t really think anyone else has a prayer because this is both a sentimental, Lifetime Achievement Oscar (think Morgan Freeman and Alan Arkin) and a consensus pick (think Tim Robbins and Javier Bardem). Of course, this assumes that he will steamroll to wins from the BFCA, SAG, and HFPA, a scenario which I think is incredibly likely.
BFCA/HFPA/SAG only agreed on Bejo, Spencer, and Chastain. This is the only category where, to my knowledge, getting all three of these nominations does not ensure a nomination. Last year, Mila Kunis missed for “Black Swan,” and Cameron Diaz missed in 2001 for “Vanilla Sky.” It happens, although I’d say that that was more of a character judgement disapproving of some of their other, non-Academy friendly projects. None of these actresses seem to be at risk for a similar fate.
Here is where I think the surprising “Bridesmaids” love – among the top movies feted by the AFI, SAG, HPFA, PGA, and WGA – will register. It’s a well-written movie where the comedy is so heavily in the dialogue and the plot; while Apatow movies have yet to show up here, there has to be a first time for everything.
“The Descendants” is about to lap the field here; barring a huge surge for “Moneyball” (which would make Aaron Sorkin a back-to-back winner), I don’t see anything standing between Alexander Payne and a second Academy Award win in this category.
If we thought 2010 was a year that people most needed cinema to make them feel good, 2011 looks to be even more so. That’s why it just seems right for a movie like ‘The Artist” to sweep in and take Best Picture. It’s got the happy factor, the B&W factor, the silent film factor, and the nostalgia factor all going for it. I have yet to see it, but even if I were somehow not to like it, I could still be content with this winning Best Picture because it would affirm the power of the prize. When they reward risky, out-of-the-box movies, Hollywood responds by thinking even more creatively. When they reward movies like “The King’s Speech,” studios start focus grouping the hell out of their contenders to perfectly calculate Oscar success.
Here’s where ballot manipulation will start to muddle the waters. Michael Hazanavicius, director of “The Artist,” is largely unknown, but Harvey Weinstein will have him making rounds on the circuit to cure lack of name recognition. He got Tom Hooper a win last year at the expense of widely renowned David Fincher. If “The Artist” appears headed for a sweep, it will have to take this category too.
Can the “he’s a leading man, not a supporting actor” logic prevail to give George Clooney another Oscar? I think that’s going to be the message from Fox Searchlight, and the starpower may be their only weapon to fend off the irresistible Jean Dujardin in “The Artist.” I suspect it may already be down to these two, and wouldn’t it be exciting if we had another showdown like Penn-Rourke in 2008?
My gut tells me that Streep will take the day here and win her first Oscar in 30 years. The role is baity enough, the time is right, we may have never appreciated Meryl more. But the fact that the film won’t open to audiences until next year makes it hard to gain audience support.
I’m counting on big love for “The Artist” to make the unknown Bérénice Bejo an Academy Award winner. Again, she has to battle unknown status, but her biggest challenger will likely be another unknown, Octavia Spencer in “The Help.” Since “The Artist” is much more likely to take home the big prize, I think Bejo is more likely to ride on her film’s coattails to victory. I’d hate to demean her with the term tack-on, but think Jennifer Connelly winning for “A Beautiful Mind” and Catherine Zeta-Jones winning for “Chicago.” To justify Best Picture, maybe voters will decide it needs an acting win as well.
It’s really a shame that even with the number of really impressive original screenplays this year, the Academy will likely settle for standard fare. I’m still counting on golden boy Woody Allen to pull through here, but if “The Artist” is poised for a sweep, I don’t see how it can not take an award for its writing. Only three films in the past decade have taken Best Picture without a win in the Screenplay category.
Scribe Alexander Payne is an Academy darling, winner in 2004 for his adaptation of “Sideways” as well as nominee in 1999 for his work on the script for “Election.” I think until otherwise informed, it’s not smart to bet against him.
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