I saw most of the films nominated for the Oscars this year. But to be honest, I kind of gave up at a point. The pool wasn’t that deep this year and there is so much good television and web content to keep up with that my dance card fills. Film is in trouble, people. Know this. Anyway, here’s what I think of this year’s Oscar nominations.

Best Motion Picture of the Year
Will Win: Inglourious Basterds
Should Win: A Serious Man
Should’ve Been Nominated: Away We Go
Going way out on a limb here with my pick. Partially just to shake things up. But there is method in my madness: the Academy changed the voting method this year. Now members rank the films from 1st to 10th and give out 10 points for every 1st place vote, 9 for every 2nd place and so forth. Inglourious Basterds will not be everyone’s first choice but it will be in everyone’s top 5. If the voting had not changed, I would say it’ll be The Hurt Locker.

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role
Will Win: Jeff Bridges, Crazy Heart
Should Win: Colin Firth, A Single Man
Should’ve Been Nominated: Michael Stuhlbarg, A Serious Man / Sharlto Copley, District 9
Jeff Bridges definitely deserves to win an Oscar. Not this one necessarily but he’s playing a drunken Country music singer. Gold.

Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role
Will Win: Sandra Bullock, The Blind Side
Should Win: Carey Mulligan, An Education
Should’ve Been Nominated: Maya Rudolph, Away We Go
Sandra Bullock is currently the most successful female actress in Hollywood. And she’s good in this film. And it’s uplifting. And she’s American. And (hopefully) Carey Mulligan will come up again. And you should all find Carey Mulligan’s Doctor Who episode entitled “Blink”. It’s Earth-shatteringly good science fiction. Seriously, it’s Rod Serling good.

Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role
Will Win: Christoph Waltz, Inglourious Basterds
Should Win: Christoph Waltz, Inglourious Basterds
Should’ve Been Nominated: Keith Powell, Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian
A deserved win.

Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role
Will Win: Mo’Nique, Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire
Should Win: Anna Kendrick, Up in the Air
Should’ve Been Nominated: Samantha Morton, The Messenger
Mo’Nique is great in the most depressing motion picture based on the novel Push by Sapphire. If only Anna Kendrick had been based on the novel Push by Sapphire. Then maybe she’d have a fighting chance. Seriously, I’ve applied to be based on the novel Push by Sapphire just for the perks.

Best Achievement in Directing
Will Win: Kathryn Bigelow, The Hurt Locker
Should Win: Kathryn Bigelow, The Hurt Locker
Should’ve Been Nominated: Joel Coen & Ethan Coen, A Serious Man
She won the DGA Award, the BAFTA, & the Critic’s Choice. She’s gonna win. It’s a great film. And check out her earlier masterpiece Point Break. 100% pure adrenaline.

Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen
Will Win: The Hurt Locker, Mark Boal
Should Win: A Serious Man, Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
Should’ve Been Nominated: Away We Go, Dave Eggers & Vendela Vida

Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published
Will Win: Up in the Air, Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner
Should Win: District 9, Neill Blomkamp & Terri Tatchell
Should’ve Been Nominated: The Informant!, Scott Z Burns

Best Achievement in Cinematography
Will Win: The Hurt Locker, Barry Ackroyd
Should Win: Inglourious Basterds, Robert Richardson
Should’ve Been Nominated: The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, Nicola Pecorini
But watch out for The White Ribbon for the steal here.

Best Achievement in Editing
Will Win: The Hurt Locker, Bob Murawski & Chris Innis
Should Win: The Hurt Locker

Best Achievement in Art Direction
Will Win: Avatar
Should Win: The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
Should’ve Been Nominated: The Hurt Locker / A Serious Man

Best Achievement in Costume Design
Will Win: The Young Victoria
Should Win: The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

Best Achievement in Makeup
Will Win: The Young Victoria

Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Score
Will Win: Up, Michael Giacchino
Should Win: Up

Best Achievement in Music Written, Motion Pictures, Original Song
Will Win: Crazy Heart, “The Weary Kind”, T-Bone Burnett, Ryan Bingham

Best Achievement in Sound
Will Win: The Hurt Locker

Best Achievement in Sound Editing
Will Win: Avatar

Best Achievement in Visual Effects
Will Win: Avatar
Should Win: District 9
This isn’t Star Wars vs The Matrix, quantity will win over quality.

Best Animated Feature Film of the Year
Will Win: Up
Should Win: Up

Best Foreign Language Film of the Year
Will Win: The White Ribbon (Germany)
The only one of the five nominated for other awards.

Best Documentary, Features
Will Win: The Cove
It’s won every Documentary award so far this year.

Best Documentary, Short Subjects
Will Win: China’s Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province
Title alone here.

Best Short Film, Animated
Will Win: A Matter of Loaf and Death
Wallace & Gromit!

Best Short Film, Live Action
Will Win: Kavi
Indian boy tries to escape oppression. Winner!

Good night, everybody.

This entry was posted on Friday, March 5th, 2010 at 5:00 am and is filed under Unknown Penguin News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.