Saturday, September 24, 2011

84th Oscar Best Picture Updates (2011-2012 Awards Season) (9/24/11)

Here are today’s predictions for the 84th Oscar Best Picture race (2011-2012 awards season.) Many people are predicting War Horse or The Descendants for the win, but Spielberg has missed before, and the trailer for the Descendants doesn’t look like an Oscar winner to me, despite what critics who have seen the movie say, so I’m going with The Artist for now. More fun thoughts: I still say that Tree of Life can get 5% of the necessary votes; I wonder if voters will have a difficult time correctly writing the Extremely Long and Incredibly Complicated title; and if The Descendants gets in but The Ides Of March misses, does that mean the academy thinks that Clooney should stick to acting instead of directing?



1. The Artist (Predicted Winner) (previous rank 6)
2. The Descendants (previous rank 8)
3. War Horse (previous rank 2)
4. The Help (previous rank 21)
5. J. Edgar (previous rank 5)
6. The Ides Of March (previous rank 4)
7. Extremely Loud And Incredibly Close (previous rank 9)
8. The Tree Of Live (previous rank 3)

Then:
9. Moneyball (previous rank 14)
10. Midnight In Paris (previous rank 13)



Alternates:
11. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (previous rank 18)
12. Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows Part 2 (previous rank 7)
13. The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo (previous rank 12)
14. A Dangerous Method (previous rank 1)
15. Martha Marcy May Marlene (previous rank 23)
16. My Week With Marilyn (previous rank 26)
17. Young Adult (previous rank 24)
18. Hugo (previous rank 10)
19. The Iron Lady (previous rank 11)
20. Contagion (previous rank 15)

21. We Bought A Zoo (previous rank 22)
22. Like Crazy (previous rank 17)
23. Carnage (previous rank 16)
24. Drive (previous rank 38)
25. Warrior (previous rank 50)
26. Shame (previous rank 41)
27. La Piel Que Habito (The Skin I Live In) (previous rank 19)
28. The Adventures Of Tintin: The Secret Of The Unicorn (previous rank 28)
29. We Need To Talk About Kevin (previous rank 29)
30. Super 8 (previous rank 20)
31. Albert Nobbs (previous rank 27)
32. 50/50 (previous rank 43)
33. In The Land Of Blood And Honey (previous rank 45)
34. Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes  (New)
35. Melancholia (previous rank 40)

36. Take Shelter (previous rank 36)
37. Pariah (previous rank 33)
38. Coriolanus (previous rank 39)
39. Jane Eyre (previous rank 32)
40. Rampart (previous rank 420
41. The Rum Diary (previous rank 37)
42. Wuthering Heights (New)
43. Anonymous (New)
44. Take This Waltz (New)
45. In Time (New)
46. The Lady (New)
47. Beginners (previous rank 30)
48. Win Win (previous rank 31)
49. One Day (previous rank 34)
50. Red Tails (previous rank 35)

As always, check the Tracker Pages in the upper right hand corner of this blog for the most updated predictions in all categories!
See Best Picture predictions for other years HERE.
See predictions for other categories at the 84th Oscars HERE.
Switch to another year: 84th,  85th,  86th,  87th,  88th,  89th  

10 comments:

  1. WTF... I mean, WTH?!
    O.K, The Artist might get some love from the academy, but you expect it to WIN BEST PICTURE?!
    Look, silent film is maybe an artistic concept, but it also too unconventional and non-commercialized for audiences.
    Just as much as there are academy members who thinks that Sci-Fi is to 'Futuristic", there are members who will think that silent movie is a very old and strange thing to so today (Infect, i think you can count the number of members that already born in the silent movie era on one hand).
    My current guess for this category looks like this:

    1. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
    2. War Horse
    3. The Descendants
    4. Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
    5. J. Edgar
    6. Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close
    7. Moneyball
    8. The Help
    9. Contagion
    10. My Week with Marilyn WIN BEST PICTURE?!

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  2. While I haven't seen The Artist, all of the critics that have seem to think that it is right up the Academy's alley. Remember that these are the same folks who voted for The King's Speech,

    I may be off, but I can't imagine both Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and Dragon Tattoo getting in. Maybe one of them, but two genre films seems like too much.

    And Contagion is already being forgotten here in the sates, so I don't see it happening.

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  3. The reason i think that "Dragon Tattoo" will be nominated is because it has David Flincher guy which the academy has an unfinished business with, after he was robbed last year for "The Social Network". This film also has SCOTT RUDIN, and as we all know, he is basically the new Harvey Weinstein, so i think he won’t have any problem in securing few nominations for the film. "T.T.S.S" is maybe a spy movie, but in he's basics, it's a British Drama - just like "The King Speech". Plus, it is apparently became on of the most critically acclaimed films of the year (97 % on RottenTomatoes).
    You also said "but two genre films seem like too much". Ah? What about 2009, when they putted 2 Sci-Fi films in the top 10? Or 2010, when they putted a Sci-Fi, an Animated movie, a western, a Romantic comedy and a thriller in there? Yes, maybe in this year they could have only 8 or 7 spots in best picture, but this are enough for "Dragon Tattoo" and "T.T.S.S" to get in. besides, "The Artist" is a genre film itself.

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  4. Genre was probably a bad word to use, since everything has a genre, of course, even if that genre is "Baity Oscar Biopic". And I do have Tinker, Harry Potter and Dragon Tattoo in slots 11 through 13.

    You make a good case for Fincher, but Dragon Tattoo feels to me more close to Se7en, Fight Club or Zodiac, which didn't get nominations, than it is to Benjamin Button or The Social Network which did. I'll admit that I haven't seen the Swedish version or read the books, so I may be wrong. But I feel like when the Academy does unfinished business nominations for best picture, they have to be for something more in line with their normal tastes. As for Rudin, he's also producing Miller's Moneyball and Daldry's Extremely Loud.... So I wonder if three Best Picture nominees will be too much for him this particular year? But if Rooney Mara is really fantastic, or if the film is a big hit OUTSIDE of the fan base of people who already love the story, then it could definitely get in. While the trailer is WAY COOL, I could also see it turning a lot of academy members off.

    I think Oldman has a good chance at an acting nomination (I currently have him at #4), but I can see that and possibly some technical nods being the film's reward. Sure, they sometimes reward cop and spy thrillers (The Departed, Munich), but Alfredson isn't Scorsese or Spielberg. And let's face it, British spies may be cool but they don't carry the same weight as Stuttering British Kings! And I wonder if Tinker will have the same type of emotional impact and uplifting story as The King's Speech? Still, I do have it at #11, with another British film Harry Potter in #12, so it's possible for either or both of them to get a bump if they clean up at the BAFTAs.

    Plus, while we all talk about the "British vote," I wonder if The Artist, as a French film, might steal some of that thunder. Maybe that will fill the European slot instead?

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  5. I'm a reader of an Israeli Film reviews website, called fisheye, which is probably one of the oldest independent websites in the world. so when i asked in the article about the new dragon tattoo trailer, "why does everyone thinks that a film who looks like a mushup on 'No Country for Old Man' and 'The Last Tango in Paris' is the frontrunner for this years Oscars?", a guy nicknamed "The Penguin", probably the best Oscar predictor in Israel said to me:

    Right now it looks like that the movie who will bring Fincher the Oscar i "The Social Network". Even though it lost in the last Oscars, there is a growing effect when someone doesn’t win for a performance of directorial achievement which he got positive reactions for, while the award goes to someone less respected or less known.
    When the award and honor are not given in the right time, academy members remember the loss and try to compensate him in another opportunity. for example, you can say the Scorsese’s Oscar for the "Departed" was actually a late honor for "Goodfellas" and "Raging Bull" (and all this 3 films aren't considered as "Oscar Movies), or that Al Paccino's Oscar for "Scent of the Woman" was a compensation for not winning for "The Godfather" or "Dog Day Afternoon".
    "The Social Networks" raised Fincher's 'Stock Pries' to higher levels than ever. if "Dragon Tattoo" will be good enough, Fincher's lost when he was the favorite will lead to a "Light" above every project he's involved in.

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  6. I agree with the logic here, and think that Fincher is definitely on the radar and one to watch out for. I'm just not sure that this year will be the one that does it. Even in the examples you give, Departed is 16 years after Goodfellas and 26 years after Raging Bull. And Scent Of A Woman is 17 years after Dog Day Afternoon and 20 years after The Godfather, 18 after Godfather II and 2 years after Godfather III.

    I'm not saying that Fincher will never be recognized or never win, simply that I'm not confident that they'll give it to him this particular year for this particular project.

    But we'll see how Dragon Tattoo plays with audiences. It could turn out to be a huge hit and I could be totally underestimating it.

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  7. I don't think The Artist will win. The problem is I don't know who will win. War Horse seems like the best bet, but no one has seen it yet. With all of the other "Oscar" films failing, this film may be asked to live up to too much. The Descendants has the same problem as The Artist. They are both admired films, but not many seem to love these films. If the Oscars were held today I think The Help would actually win. However, I just can't picture that film winning in the long run. It will be an interesting Oscar for season for sure.

    I also don't think The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo will get nominated. It's very gritty material. You could bring up the fact that Black Swan got nominated last year (another very gritty film), but it was clear on nomination day that that film was not as loved by the Academy as we thought it was (it missed out on screenplay and sound nominations). It will have to be as big a hit as Black Swan to get nominated (The Social Network didn't even gross as much as Black Swan did).

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  8. I agree Ryan. There doesn't seem to be a real front-runner for the win. I went with The Artist, despite the possible backlash, because it does have Weinstein attached and it COULD hit big with audiences if it's a feel good movie like The King's Speech--although it's hard to say whether it actually will.

    Of the ones we haven't seen yet, Extremely Loud seems like a better bet over J. Edgar, and the academy clearly loves Daldry. But the whole 9/11 angle worries me, so I'm going to wait and see for now.

    "Gritty" is probably the word I should have used above instead of "genre" for Dragon Tattoo. I think it will be a cult classic, but it just doesn't have "Best Picture" written on it, from what I can tell. It will have some die-hard supporters, no doubt, but based solely on the trailers (which is what most of the public sees), Black Swan seemed more woman-friendly than Dragon Tattoo, which will impact its overall box office.

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