I have to confess - I'm one of those who stays up all night and cuts himself loose of the rest of society once every year when the spring is looming on the calendric horizon. In no more than three days I will once more follow this protocol boldly as my fierce appetite for movies will come to its more than somewhat commercially slanted conculsion. I hereby call forth a round of predictions as to precisely who and why anyone will get their golden statuette in '10. Click to see the list of nominees. (most relevant categories only) Best picture The Hurt Locker Runner-up: Up In The Air My choice might be mildly bland and general, but I really do feel like this year we could be getting our first Best Pic by a female director. Thumbs crossed. Actor in a leading role George Clooney - Up In The Air TBH when I went to see this on a date I fought against it because I thought it was a premature sequel to that Pixar animation (as I was lagging behind with my movie-buff gene after a half-year period of isolation). But I came out of the theater totally thrilled at how bloody well-executed the whole thing was. I couldn't say this too often, but Clooney never seems to fall below above average and there are cases (notably Michael Clayton, O Brother, Where Art Though?, Good Night And Good Luck, to an extent Syriana and this flick) where he can totally blow everyone flat out of the water. Oh, did I miss Sparky the Dog in South Park? Actor in a supporting role As I've seen too few titles to make an educated guess, my gut tells me it's probably Christopher Waltz (Inglorious Basterds) or Woody Harrelson (The Messenger) Actress in a leading role Same as above, but Meryl Streep (Julie & Julia) Actress in a supporting role I'd seriously consider Anna Kendrick (Up In The Air), but I doubt that's going to happen, so I give my vote for Vera Farmiga or Penelope Cruz (Nine). I think it's probably going to be Farmiga, though. Animated feature Coraline I never go to see a movie more than once unless my friends make me to or there's something special about it. I went to see Coraline thrice in the theater and I've seen it two more times afterwards. I'd really like to see Fantastic Mr Fox because I think it's as close anyone's going to get this year, but Coraline proved that Pixar and CGI are so yesterday. Like, sooooooo yesterday. Best cinematography Since Avatar has no real cinematography as such to speak of, I think the Oscar goes to Inglorious Basterds with The Hurt Locker being a close runner-up. Directing The Hurt Locker Best Visual Effects I have nothing against Cameron - I think he's one of the these geniuses that can't really fail (he hasn't done so thus far anyway), but I really do feel like the kind of imagery Avatar has owes 80% to a fantastic use of 3D (a directorial choice) and 20% to innovative use of actual CGI. So my vote goes to District 9. What they did to Star Trek was nothing short of what Spielberg and Lucas did to Indiana Jones. The fact that Leonard Nemoy went along with it, at best, makes me doubt his sanity. If there was any CGI in that film then it wasn't memorable enough to kill the disappointment in me. This movie will forever be on my very short blacklist. Best writing (adapted screenplay) My first choice WOULD be In The Loop, but unfortunately aside from the jokes therein the story lacked so much (or should this matter for adaptions?) that I'm inclined to go with, in this order, The Education, Up In The Air, District 9. Best writing (original screenplay) The Hurt Locker followed by Inglorious Basterds The fact that Up is on the list kind of insults the list, though, IMO. Taking a brief look back, however, one can easily notice the Academy's tendency to step outside of the bounds of a particular category and focus-fire on a single title or group of people each year (last year being a somewhat notable exception) - eg remember the LOTR series, which got best visual effects for parts 1 and 2 and then canned the whole show with the final film? Or how The Matrix cashed in on everything, as did American Beauty or Slumdog Millionaire (wth?). With this in mind I think this year is going to be like 2005 with Jamie Foxx and Ray wreaking havoc, the most memorable moment being

">Foxx's rather emotional acceptance speech and also

">Penelope Cruz's arguably even more emotional speech in '09. This year, I predict, will be the year of the woman. Kathryn Bigalow will rule and The Hurt Locker will demolish. As a side note: I went to see Shutter Island today and I dare predict Scorsese has a real (and I mean a real) shot at an Oscar in 2011. [Edited by - irreversible on March 6, 2010 9:08:41 AM]

I've heard that Ghost Writer is a better movie than Shutter Island.

Best Picture: Avatar
Best Director: Kathryn Bigelow
Best Actor: Jeff Bridges
Best Actress: Sandra Bullock
Best Supporting Actor: Christopher Waltz
Best Supporting Actress: Monique
Best Animated Feature: Up (maybe Coraline)
Best Original Screenplay: Inglorious Basterds
Best Adapted Screenplay: District 9
Best Foreign Language: The White Ribbon (maybe A Prophet)

I really don't care much about whomever is the best actor, etc, but I'll have to comment on this:

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Best Visual Effects
I have nothing against Cameron - I think he's one of the these geniuses that can't really fail (he hasn't done so thus far anyway), but I really do feel like the kind of imagery Avatar has owes 80% to a fantastic use of 3D (a directorial choice) and 20% to innovative use of actual CGI. So my vote goes to District 9.

How do you define innovation in the use of CGI ? CGI is a steadily evolving technology, and it's rare to see any real quantum leaps here. But if there was anything coming close to such a leap, then Avatar it is. Avatar uses CGI to its absolute perfection, within todays technical possibilities, and certainly pushing them further. The lighting, the ambiance and details of the texture and modeling art, the shaders, the compositing of CGI and real imagery - everything is absolutely top notch. None of the other choices nominated come even close to this.

I mean, Star Trek. You have to be freaking kidding me.

Quote: Original post by Yann L
How do you define innovation in the use of CGI ? CGI is a steadily evolving technology, and it's rare to see any real quantum leaps here. But if there was anything coming close to such a leap, then Avatar it is. Avatar uses CGI to its absolute perfection, within todays technical possibilities, and certainly pushing them further. The lighting, the ambiance and details of the texture and modeling art, the shaders, the compositing of CGI and real imagery - everything is absolutely top notch. None of the other choices nominated come even close to this.

Technologically most of what Avatar does has been done times and times over again. I don't know what you consider good visual effects, but to me Blackhawk Down had good visual effect. District 9 had above average visual effects (which happen to be mostly CGI), simply because it didn't jump in your face as CGI (in fact Blackhawk Down has probably the best visual effects I've ever seen because they're totally completely transparent; and BHD realies pretty heavily on visual effects). If you want some really fantastic set design and visual effects, check out Legend by Ridley Scott.

As a side note - it seems we're both mixing CGI and visual effects here as if they were the same thing. They're not. Avatar is a cartoon. I'm pretty sure popular vote would have Avatar as the prime contender, but TBH District 9 impressed me more.

I can't recall the name of a rather dated Japenese film from the first half of the previous decade that was made 90% on green screen and incorporated a crapload of visual effects, including CGI. Take the inflation of innovation in the field and 8 years of maturing and it reduces a $280.000.000 budget to nothing more than a lot hard labour. I guess my main point is*:

shaders != visual effects

*incidentally how would you rank Transformers 2 (2009) vs Avatar (ignore the fact that Avatar was 3D)? And why? Because T2 was nominated but won jack.

>> I mean, Star Trek. You have to be freaking kidding me.

Might turn this into my new sig.

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Technologically most of what Avatar does has been done times and times over again.

Technologically Avatar is significantly more advanced than any other movie I have ever seen. Of course it conveys a certain artistic style. But style != CGI technology.

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I don't know what you consider good visual effects, but to me Blackhawk Down had good visual effect.

BHD created a very dense and immersing atmosphere, especially due to camera angles, editing and directing - and also due to its sound effects. Visually it was impressive, but not due to the CGI. Technically, Avatar is vastly superior, even though it has a very different style obviously. A lot of the technically really challenging parts of Avatar (rendering of the very large scale natural scenes, for example) were not applicable to BHD.

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As a side note - it seems we're both mixing CGI and visual effects here as if they were the same thing. They're not. Avatar is a cartoon. I'm pretty sure popular vote would have Avatar as the prime contender, but TBH District 9 impressed me more.

I didn't like the graphical style of D9 at all. Well, personal preference. Most visual effects are done through CGI nowadays, so one could say that the visual quality of the effects equals the quality of the CGI in some way. Of course this doesn't take artistic direction into account. Avatar is indeed a partial cartoon, as you said.

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*incidentally how would you rank Transformers 2 (2009) vs Avatar (ignore the fact that Avatar was 3D)? And why? Because T2 was nominated but won jack.

Haven't seen it.

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shaders != visual effects

As a graphics programmer, I obviously disagree [wink]

Incidentally, AFAIR BHD contains little to no actual CGI - it does, however, contain quite a bit of very skillful compositing. If you haven't seen it yet, try to find some time to watch the bonus material on the DVD - it explains quite a bit of what's really going on. I have to say when I went to see it in cinema I was completely and totally fooled.

The reason I mentioned Transformers 2, though, is that it is actually pretty similar to Avatar - no real stress on story, massive visual effects and integration with a real environment, considerable runtime and a whole lot of money spent. Not 3D, though, which IMO is a half-technical/half-directorial issue. 3D takes more time to shoot, but isn't necessarily inferior in its use of visual effects.

As is with all categories the "X for the sake of the story" requirement also applies to visual effects. To me Avatar is at best borderlining in that respect. I mean seriously - do you really need 2.5 hours to tell that story (although to be honest I loved the first part of the film the most where Cameron really takes things slow and allows the viewer to sink in with the main character). Nevertheless, Avatar, in many respects, is visual-driven that often need some justification to support the story itself. A matter of interpretation, I suppose. In any case, we'll find out in 2 days.

As for the artistic choices for D9 and Avatar, I have to say I liked and disliked both quite equally so I have no preference. Though, if I really had to choose one, I'd probably go with Avatar.


>> As a graphics programmer, I obviously disagree

I can't win this one, can I? :D

Thought

">this might be relevant. At the very least good for a chuckle. :)

I'd have to agree on your first prediction for the Hurt Locker winning best picture, cause it was a really good movie. Avatar was more like a fairy tale in comparison (yea, granted it had some amazing effects and all, but hey, come on, Avatar never was meant to be looked at as a story based movie). I really do think though that not giving Avatar best visual effects would be doing it no justice..............it did have some amazing effects, regardless of whether or not you think it's a cartoon or not, that last fight scene was pretty cool you know................I guess Star Trek does have it's merits, but District 9 wasn't that amazing (I didn't like the style too much, but hey, to each his or her own). The other thing about Star Trek is that it wasn't really matching up to Avatar (Avatar showed an entire world with really epic battles in the end, so it's really hard to argue against that....).

On another note, I'd have to agree on the Slumdog Millionaire thing, that the Oscars do tend to get fixated, it's a question of who it will be this year........................................................................

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As is with all categories the "X for the sake of the story" requirement also applies to visual effects. To me Avatar is at best borderlining in that respect. I mean seriously - do you really need 2.5 hours to tell that story (

Dude, who cares. Avatar is a $250 million, 2.5 hour long graphics demo ! How cool is that ? I loved it ! Story, acting, who cares. I was constantly thinking about how one could do that in realtime when I was watching it...

And if it doesn't get the best visual effects award, then something is seriously wrong.

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I can't win this one, can I? :D

Nope :)

Haha, machaira: worst bastardisation of scientific terms and principles :D

LessBread - yeah, I finally saw the trailer for The Ghost Writer and the premise looked really promising. I hope the movie lives up to the trailer though because Polanski is know to be capable of some really horrific stuff.

>> I was constantly thinking about how one could do that in realtime when I was watching it...

I guess that's one reason you will never be in the Academy on the deciding side :D

About Slumdog Millionaire - I actually rather liked it when I first saw it, but the way it won a slew of Oscars for the sake of political awareness was not much short of silly.


Any other predictions? The damn thing is less that one and a half days away!