The Oscars are Sunday, and as usual we’ll be live blogging them, so I thought tonight would be a good time for us to discuss what we’ve seen, what we liked, who are rooting for and to have a little contest. You can find a list of nominees here on the official Academy Awards site, and we’ve a got a few clips up as well.
I love the costume design awards, if only to see what the winners wear. Remember the dress made of American Express Gold Cards?!
Once again, there are ten nominees for Best Picture and five in every other category. I have no strong favorite for Best Picture, though my fingers are crossed for several very disparate films to win the highest honors. Winter’s Bones is about meth, its ravages in the Ozarks and a heroine struggling to save to her family. Made for $2 million, and written and directed by women, Winter’s Bone won the Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic Film at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival. It also is nominated for four 2011 Academy Awards in the categories of Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Actress and Best Supporting Actor, proving that a huge budget and mega-stars do not a a great film make.
And then there’s The Social Network. I’m a huge David Fincher fan, and love the subject matter. And True Grit! The Coen Brothers are awesome, but I’m sad that Matt Damon didn’t get a Best Supporting Actor nomination. But Hailee Steinfeld, who was wonderful, was nominated for Best Supporting Actress as the determined 14-year-old out to get justice for her father’s death.
James Franco is super cute, but there was no way I could see 127 Days…too painful and nerve wracking. The King’s Speech swept the BAFTAs, but will it win Best Picture at the Academy Awards? I’d love if Colin Firth won, just cuz he’s sooo cute. (I know, shallow!)
Oh and the contest: In comments tonight, list who you think will win
1)Best Picture
2)Best Director
3)Best Screenplays (adapted)
4) Best Screenplay (original)
5) Best Actor
6) Best Actress
7) Best Supporting Actor
8) Best Supporting Actress
And to make it a little challenging:
9) Best Sound Mixing
10) Best Foreign Language Film
11) Best Short Documentary
Winner/s will be announced on La Figa. There is a prize…and it’s not an Edible Arrangement!



20 Comments





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Welcome ot Oscar preview night on FDL..
As usual please refresh you browser every minute or so to see new posts, questions and comments. My question–what have you seen that ended up nominated? DO you think it should have been? What do you think missed a nom?
I am rooting for Winter’s Bone,but I sort of think it may be The Social Network.
And why is a nominee HOSTING? That seems kinda weird and worng.
Lisa, does financially good or artistic film traditionally win best film??
This is easy: Waste Land. Best documentary. Jeez.
Well “good” is subjective. I think it goes to a film that have a lot of good stuff in it, and complete package (look at Titanic). One that changes how we see movies or our world…
Absolutely love the Coen Brothers, how could you not?
A film that has made $$$$ certainly gets noticed and it does seem the big box office films often win. But is that because they are awesomeand thus get seen. Or because there is a huge push behind them as they cost a bunch, so people go because it’sa tent pole movie? hard to say.
True Grit was AWESOME. I would be thrilled if it won. They made a completely fresh version of True Grit.
Winter’s Bone is poverty porn. Never bought a nanosecond of it. Where did this pure-as-the-driven-snow heroine come from? Mars?
Last year’s best American film was Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench.
Did anyone see the 127?
I saw Winter’s Bone a coupla nights ago and was very impressed..
Heroism can often be found in the unlikeliest of places and unlikeliest of people. Try any war zone.
Poverty is the ultimate war zone.
Pretty sure I couldn’t take it….just too much. I really did love The King’s Speech….the 3 main actors were amazing, I thought, really perfect in the parts.
It may sweep
GASLAND !
if I haven’t said it here already, Fox has done with GASLAND exactly what a documentary is supposed to do – educate and inform millions !
I watched it’s effect in real time in a HuffPo thread several months back – ol TBoone frontin’ his poison in the wake of the Gulf disaster – except by then GASLAND had been on HBO for a month – he was literally booed off the threads :D
and apparently the Extractionists are sliming and ratfucking the work in Industry trades – yeah I know, I’m shocked as well
Winters Bone is the best movie of 2010..Director of film should win as well. but Social Network will probably win. Fincher will win. Annete Benning will probably win but I would like to see the young extraordinary performance of heroine in Winter’s Bone win. Screenplay…Alan Sorkin or King’s Speech writer. Melissa Leo will win for fighter. Colin Firth probable winner and Haille. The remaining categories..I have no opinion and haven’t seen some of those nominated.
To the person here that thinks Winters Bone is Ozark Porn,I doubt they’ve ever been to the Ozarks and parts of Appalachia where this is pretty much what is in pockets of these areas. And worse. I have driven through these areas and seen this kind of deterioration. This is the other end of “The Grapes Of Wrath” in a different time.
The Oscars are meaningless and have been so ever since they gave one to Julia Roberts. They were ruined forever when one was bestowed on Reese Witherspoon for a “portrayal” of the then-living June Carter which had absolutely nothing in common with Ms. Carter – the walk, the talk, the clothes, the hair, the ‘accent’, the singing voice, NOTHING resembled June Carter! They fact that they even dared to have a ceremony after that travesty shows how much nerve they have. I won’t ever watch again but will bask in Oscars awarded during the 20th century which were actually deserved, say like, oh… Hattie McDaniel.
June Carter Cash died 15 May 2003, well before Reese Witherspoon won the Oscar on 5 March 2006.
I saw 127 Hours. Franco is as babe-a-licious as ever, but the story? So what?
I’m quite familair with the fact that life isn’t pie in the Ozaks. I’m questioning the plot of that homey little fantasy. I’m also questioning its dramatic emphasis. It was made for those of us who’d never dream of settign foot there. It’s a peep show.