The 2011 Oscar Contest Thread

[Still Servant]

Well, today is the day. This years Oscar nominations have been released. Make your predictions now. I will make mine after a little bit of thinking.

All in all, I'm happy with the nominations. I'm a little disappointed that Nolan didn't get nominated. I was also hoping to see Garfield get a best supporting nod for his work in The Social Network. I think he steals the film. I was very happy to see Mark Ruffalo get a nomination. He's always been a favorite of mine. I have also been ranting recently how Benning and Moore seem to be the only ones getting attention for The Kids Are All Right.

Also, this thread can be merged with the other Oscar thread if you want.


Best Picture
“Black Swan”
“The Fighter”
“Inception”
“The Kids Are All Right ”
“The King’s Speech”
“127 Hours”
“The Social Network”
“Toy Story 3″
“True Grit”
“Winter’s Bone”

Best Direction
Darren Aronofsky for “Black Swan”
Joel Coen and Ethan Coen for “True Grit”
David Fincher for “The Social Network”
Tom Hooper for “The King’s Speech”
David O. Russell for “The Fighter”

Actor in a Leading Role
Javier Bardem in “Biutiful”
Jeff Bridges in “True Grit”
Jesse Eisenberg in “The Social Network”
James Franco in “127 Hours”
Colin Firth in “The King’s Speech”

Actress in a Leading Role
Annette Bening in “The Kids Are All Right”
Nicole Kidman in “Rabbit Hole”
Jennifer Lawrence in “Winter’s Bone”
Natalie Portman in “Black Swan”
Michelle Williams in “Blue Valentine”

Actor in a Supporting Role
Christian Bale in “The Fighter”
John Hawkes in “Winter’s Bone”
Jeremy Renner in “The Town”
Mark Ruffalo in “The Kids Are All Right”
Geoffrey Rush in “The King’s Speech”

Actress in a Supporting Role
Amy Adams in “The Fighter”
Helena Bonham Carter in “The King’s Speech”
Melissa Leo in “The Fighter”
Hailee Steinfeld in “True Grit”
Jacki Weaver in “Animal Kingdom”

Adapted Screenplay
Danny Boyle and Simon Beaufoy for “127 Hours”
Aaron Sorkin for “The Social Network”
Michael Arndt, story by John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton and Lee Unkrich for “Toy Story 3″
Joel Coen and Ethan Coen for “True Grit”
Debra Granik & Anne Rosellini for “Winter’s Bone”

Original Screenplay
Mike Leigh for “Another Year”
Screenplay by Scott Silver and Paul Tamasy and Eric Johnson. Story by Keith Dorrington and Paul Tamasy and Eric Johnson for “The Fighter”
Christopher Nolan for “Inception”
Lisa Cholodenko and Stuart Blumberg for “The Kids Are All Right”
David Seidler for “The King’s Speech”

Animated Feature
“How to Train Your Dragon”
“The Illusionist”
“Toy Story 3″

Art Direction
“Alice in Wonderland”: Robert Stromberg (Production Design), Karen O’Hara (Set Decoration)
“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1″: Stuart Craig (Production Design), Stephenie McMillan (Set Decoration)
“Inception”: Guy Hendrix Dyas (Production Design), Larry Dias and Doug Mowat (Set Decoration)
“The King’s Speech”: Eve Stewart (Production Design), Judy Farr (Set Decoration)
“True Grit”: Jess Gonchor (Production Design), Nancy Haigh (Set Decoration)

Cinematography
“Black Swan”: Matthew Libatique
“Inception”: Wally Pfister
“The King’s Speech”: Danny Cohen
“The Social Network”: Jeff Cronenweth
“True Grit”: Roger Deakins

Costume Design
“Alice in Wonderland”: Colleen Atwood
“I Am Love”: Antonella Cannarozzi
“The King’s Speech”: Jenny Beavan
“The Tempest”: Sandy Powell
“True Grit”: Mary Zophres

Documentary (Feature)
“Exit through the Gift Shop”
“Gasland”
“Inside Job”
“Restrepo”
“Waste Land”

Documentary (Short Subject)
“Killing in the Name”
“Poster Girl”
“Strangers No More”
“Sun Come Up”
“The Warriors of Qiugang”

Film Editing
“Black Swan”: Andrew Weisblum
“The Fighter”: Pamela Martin
“The King’s Speech”: Tariq Anwar
“127 Hours”: Jon Harris
“The Social Network”: Angus Wall and Kirk Baxter

Foreign Language Film
“Biutiful”: Mexico
“Dogtooth”: Greece
“In a Better World”: Denmark
“Incendies”: Canada
“Outside the Law (Hors-la-loi)”: Algeria

Makeup
“Barney’s Version”: Adrien Morot
“The Way Back”: Edouard F. Henriques, Gregory Funk and Yolanda Toussieng
“The Wolfman”: Rick Baker and Dave Elsey

Music (Original Score)
“How to Train Your Dragon”: John Powell
“Inception”: Hans Zimmer
“The King’s Speech”: Alexandre Desplat
“127 Hours”: A.R. Rahman
“The Social Network”: Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross

Music (Original Song)
“Coming Home” from “Country Strong” Music and Lyric by Tom Douglas, Troy Verges and Hillary Lindsey
“I See the Light” from “Tangled” Music by Alan Menken Lyric by Glenn Slater
“If I Rise” from “127 Hours” Music by A.R. Rahman Lyric by Dido and Rollo Armstrong
“We Belong Together” from “Toy Story 3″ Music and Lyric by Randy Newman

Short Film (Animated)
“Day & Night”: Teddy Newton
“The Gruffalo”: Jakob Schuh and Max Lang
“Let’s Pollute”: Geefwee Boedoe
“The Lost Thing”: Shaun Tan and Andrew Ruhemann
“Madagascar, carnet de voyage (Madagascar, a Journey Diary)”: Bastien Dubois

Short Film (Live Action)
“The Confession”: Tanel Toom
“The Crush”: Michael Creagh
“God of Love”: Luke Matheny
“Na Wewe”: Ivan Goldschmidt
“Wish 143″: Ian Barnes and Samantha Waite

Sound Editing
“Inception”: Richard King
“Toy Story 3″: Tom Myers and Michael Silvers
“Tron: Legacy”: Gwendolyn Yates Whittle and Addison Teague
“True Grit”: Skip Lievsay and Craig Berkey
“Unstoppable”: Mark P. Stoeckinger

Sound Mixing
“Inception”: Lora Hirschberg, Gary A. Rizzo and Ed Novick
“The King’s Speech”: Paul Hamblin, Martin Jensen and John Midgley
“Salt”: Jeffrey J. Haboush, Greg P. Russell, Scott Millan and William Sarokin
“The Social Network”: Ren Klyce, David Parker, Michael Semanick and Mark Weingarten
“True Grit”: Skip Lievsay, Craig Berkey, Greg Orloff and Peter F. Kurland

Visual Effects
“Alice in Wonderland”: Ken Ralston, David Schaub, Carey Villegas and Sean Phillips
“Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1″: Tim Burke, John Richardson, Christian Manz and Nicolas Aithadi
“Hereafter”: Michael Owens, Bryan Grill, Stephan Trojanski and Joe Farrell
“Inception”: Paul Franklin, Chris Corbould, Andrew Lockley and Peter Bebb
“Iron Man 2″: Janek Sirrs, Ben Snow, Ged Wright and Daniel Sudick

[fernandito]

We talked about this Mike, but Nolan not being nominated for Best Director is a fucking travesty. That's one of the biggest injustices of recent memory, IMO.

[Mattrick]

Feev best director was a tough category and other worthy directors were also not nominated. It's not a travesty. Aronofsky, Hooper, The Coens and Fincher were all shoe-ins. That only left one spot with a half dozen of worthy talent. If there were ten best director nominees, Nolan would be in there. Just because you're a big Nolan fan doesn't mean it's a travesty.

[fernandito]

David O. Russell over Nolan for best director ? That's a travesty. And no, I'm not saying it's one just because "I'm a Nolan fan."

[ur2ndbiggestfan]

As usual, only one movie from my top 10 list was nominated for best pictue (INCEPTION). Just shows that the academy doesn't know what good movies are! I'm just joking, so please don't take this seriously!

[Mattrick]

David O. Russell over Nolan for best director ? That's a travesty. And no, I'm not saying it's one just because "I'm a Nolan fan."

I haven't seen The Fighter so I can't say how good he was at directing it and if you haven't seen it, neither can you. Just because Nolan is a bigger name doesn't mean anything. I like Nolan too. The Academy looks for certain things when choosing noms for best director and obviously they weren't looking for what Nolan brought to the table. Inception got 8 noms and including one for best picture. That's as good as any summer blockbuster can hope for. Same thing with The Dark Knight, sure Nolan did a great job with it but I probably wouldn't nominate him for Best Director for it either. I agree with the Academy's decision and I'm sure it was a hard one for them to make.

[Still Servant]

I have to disagree Mattrick. I've been of fan of O'Russell's Three Kings since it was released in 1999. I'm not saying he isn't deserving of the nomination, I just think Nolan is more deserving.

I haven't seen The Fighter yet, but from what I hear it's a pretty paint-by-numbers storyline that is elevated by outstanding performances from a great cast. I just don't think it takes as much skill to craft a great film out of what O'Russel had to work with.

On the other hand, Nolan was working with subject matter that is not exactly traditional. For him to weave a storyline through four different dream states and still keep the story easy to understand and captivating, is very impressive.

The success of Inception was directly on the shoulders of Nolan, whereas the success of The Fighter has more to do with the cast.

[Mattrick]

Yet half the director's job is to work with his actors and make sure they properly understand how they should be during scenes? I think a lot of people forget about this aspect of directing. Inception was hardly rested on Nolan's shoulders and the 8 nominations for Visual Effects, Art Direction, Sound Mixing, Score etc certainly proves that. And he had the biggest cast of the year. Nolan did a great job. Nolan DEFINITELY deserves his oscar nom for Best Original Screenplay. Inception was deinitely a well directed movie but there are so many aspects that take away from his direction, it doesn't stand out as much. Probably the main reason why he wasn't nominated. The nom I'm most surprised that Inception didn't get was for Editing, I thought it was amazingly edited.


Still Servant, it's hard to say since none of us seem to have seen The Fighter...I'm not too big on boxing movies for the most part, big deterent for me. But he may have done a remarkable job with his direction. I don't usually like to download movies but I would like to see most of these movies this year. My friends brining me over Winter's Bone and I'll download what I can...I want to have seen all the best picture noms for once dammit.

[ur2ndbiggestfan]

I've seen all the Best Picture nominees except THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT and think Nolan should have been nominated for Best Director. Except for THE SOCIAL NETWORK, which I found to be pretty mediocre, the others are all good pictures but nowhere near the outstanding cinematic effort of INCEPTION.

[Mattrick]

I've got the Fighter, King's Speech and Black Swan and 127 hours downloading now. I'll bring a better understanding of who deserves it when I'm done watching them all.

[Still Servant]

Yet half the director's job is to work with his actors and make sure they properly understand how they should be during scenes? I think a lot of people forget about this aspect of directing. Inception was hardly rested on Nolan's shoulders and the 8 nominations for Visual Effects, Art Direction, Sound Mixing, Score etc certainly proves that. And he had the biggest cast of the year. Nolan did a great job. Nolan DEFINITELY deserves his oscar nom for Best Original Screenplay. Inception was deinitely a well directed movie but there are so many aspects that take away from his direction, it doesn't stand out as much. Probably the main reason why he wasn't nominated. The nom I'm most surprised that Inception didn't get was for Editing, I thought it was amazingly edited.


Still Servant, it's hard to say since none of us seem to have seen The Fighter...I'm not too big on boxing movies for the most part, big deterent for me. But he may have done a remarkable job with his direction. I don't usually like to download movies but I would like to see most of these movies this year. My friends brining me over Winter's Bone and I'll download what I can...I want to have seen all the best picture noms for once dammit.

I know what you're saying, but I'm sure we can both name dozens of films that have great special effects and sound, but the movie is a piece of garbage. Those aspects certainly made Inception what it is, but if it wasn't for Nolan's skillful direction, Inception could have been a mess.

Also, I'm interested to hear what you think of Winter's Bone. I was mildly disappointed in the film. The acting is top notch, but the story kind of falls flat for me. I can understand the acting nominations (I was surprised to see Hawkes get nominated, he was very good though) I can't understand the nomination for best picture though.

[Mattrick]

It's just how the academy is now. Five of the movies are true best picture nominees like always, the rest are more throwaways, so it appears more diverse. Winter's Bone fills the indie film role, Toy Story the Animated, Inception the blockbuster (like District 9 last year). The Kid's Aren'y alright I'm sure is another sort of throwaway. To me the nominees that stand a chance of winning are King's Speech, Fighter, Black Swan, True Grit and The Social Network. Probably why they all got the best director nods as well. 127 Hours and Inception are the dark horses.

[pathoftheturtle]

Winter's Bone was a great piece of film-making, whether you liked the story or not.

[Mattrick]

Well so far I've watched Black Swan and 127 Hours. Boyle was well deserving of a nomination as well as Nolan was. Hard to say which one is more deserving of the two, very different films in terms of content. James Franco deserved his nom, don't think he'll win though.

[Mattrick]

Okay so I watched The Fighter and I enjoyed it. David O Russell is more than deserving of his oscar nomination and I can't help but support the academy. However, I would also support a Nolan or Boyle nomination as well. All three did a great job, kudos to all of them. Shame there weren't more nominees for this category because it is a full year for this.

My choices thus far judging from what I've seen:

Best Picture: Black Swan
Best Director: Darren Aronofsky
Best Actress: Natalie Portman
Best Actor: Hard to say...toss up between Franco and Eisenberg till I see the rest.
Best Supp Actress: Melissa Leo
Best Supp Actor: Christian Bale
Best Original Screenplay: Inception
Best Adapted Screenplay: The Social Network
Best Cinematography: Black Swan
Best Art Direction: Inception
Best Editing: 127 Hours
Best Visual Effects: Inception
Best Sound Editing: Inception
Best Visual Effects: Inception
Original Score: At the moment, have to go with Inception or 127 Hours

[Heather19]

Sorry I didn't hop into this thread sooner. But I'm with Feev and Mike on Nolan not getting nominated. I was pretty shocked by that and think he definitely deserves it. I saw The Fighter a few weeks ago (and this is just my opinion) I loved the film, but didn't think the directing was anything outstanding. I thought Nolan did a far better job with Inception. The one thing that Russel did do however was to get amazing performances out of his actors.

What about The King's Speech? Has anyone here seen it? Honestly it doesn't interest me in the least, but I am curious about it, and wonder if it's as good as all the nominations it's received. Same goes for The Kids are All Right.

As for what I personally would like to see win. I'd love for Black Swan to win best picture, Darren Aronofsky to get director, and Natalie Portman to get best actress. I'm surprised this one didn't get a screenplay nomination. I'm counting on Bale for winning supporting actor, as that was hands down the best performance I saw out of any actor last year. And Leo for supporting actress. I can't comment on best actor since I haven't seen any of those films yet. And original screenplay should definitely go to Inception. That is easily one of the most original creative films I've ever seen.

Mike we should do what we did last year, and post our guesses for what we think will actually win.

[Mattrick]

It's just subjective on Best Director. Personally. O. Russell got more an emotional response out of me with him images which to me, is how I rate the direction of a movie. I was teary eyed with some shots. Only thing Nolan got from in terms of emotional response was the way he used Marianne Cotillard. I'd be happy with Nolan Boyle or O. Russell getting them and since it goes by votes for the oscars, majority simply won.

[Tito_Villa]

I saw The King's Speach last week, i really didn't want to go saying to my girlfriend that it wouldn't be my type of film but i was dragged along anyway. And i have to say that i am very glad that she did, one of the best films i have ever seen. I would advise everybody to go and see it!

[Mattrick]

They copy I downloaded was a wrong file type so I have to re-download. Winter's Bone, King's Speech, Kid's Aren't Alright and True are all I have to watch.

[Still Servant]

Sorry I didn't hop into this thread sooner. But I'm with Feev and Mike on Nolan not getting nominated. I was pretty shocked by that and think he definitely deserves it. I saw The Fighter a few weeks ago (and this is just my opinion) I loved the film, but didn't think the directing was anything outstanding. I thought Nolan did a far better job with Inception. The one thing that Russel did do however was to get amazing performances out of his actors.

What about The King's Speech? Has anyone here seen it? Honestly it doesn't interest me in the least, but I am curious about it, and wonder if it's as good as all the nominations it's received. Same goes for The Kids are All Right.

As for what I personally would like to see win. I'd love for Black Swan to win best picture, Darren Aronofsky to get director, and Natalie Portman to get best actress. I'm surprised this one didn't get a screenplay nomination. I'm counting on Bale for winning supporting actor, as that was hands down the best performance I saw out of any actor last year. And Leo for supporting actress. I can't comment on best actor since I haven't seen any of those films yet. And original screenplay should definitely go to Inception. That is easily one of the most original creative films I've ever seen.

Mike we should do what we did last year, and post our guesses for what we think will actually win.

Yes, I definitely hope everybody will make their predictions. Right now it's kind of early, so I will hold off. At first it seemed like The Social Network was going to run away with everything, but now I think The King's Speech is the one to beat.

Once I see The Fighter, I will have seen 9 out of the 10 films nominated for best picture. That leave The King's Speech as the only film I haven't seen. I really don't have any interest in seeing it, but since I would have seen everything else, I might just watch it.

[Still Servant]

Just to refresh your memory, here are the results of last years Oscar contest:

Heather - 15
Servant - 14
Turtlex - 14
Cody - 8
Seymour - 8
Odetta - 4

Feev, didn't make any picks? What the what?

[Mattrick]

I say we should have a cut off point for it, up until like Feb 20th to get in your picks. Some are going to be pure guesses. I plan on watching Biutiful and Dogtooth as well as Another Year so that might help my chances

[Erin]

I saw The King's Speach last week, i really didn't want to go saying to my girlfriend that it wouldn't be my type of film but i was dragged along anyway. And i have to say that i am very glad that she did, one of the best films i have ever seen. I would advise everybody to go and see it!

My mother-in-law saw this last week. She went into it on a whim, not really knowing what it was and said in the beginning, she considered walking out because she didn't think it would be the type of movie she'd enjoy. However, she stuck it out and has been raving about it ever since, saying it's one of the best movies she's ever seen.

[Mattrick]

I have King's Speech now. Not sure if I will watch it tonight because I've got lots of stuff to do and Monday Night RAW is on...might have to save it for tomorrow night.

[Ricky]

I was thinking about guessing Oscar winners this year, but it'd be cooler to do it with you guys. I agree we should set up a deadline.