[wilfredpickles Joined: Jul 15th, 2017 Topics: 1 Posts: 432 View Predictions]

#1205331364

I’ve only gone out of my way to watch the animated contenders this year. Here’s my ranking:

1. Ice Merchants – Stunning animation; an emotional story told perfectly. I hope it wins.

2. An Ostrich Told Me… – Clever concept and I enjoyed the execution. However the ending is a bit messy, I think it could’ve used another few minutes to reach something more definitive. (This is of course easier said than done in animation.)

3. My Year of Dicks – The changing animation styles are very eye-catching. At first I thought the content might be a bit too uncomfortable (even though I know it’s based on a memoir) but the ending is surprisingly positive.

4. The Boy, The Mole… – This somehow manages to be both too cloying and deeply cynical. As others have mentioned, every single line of dialogue feels ripped from a motivational poster of a greeting card. It looks gorgeous, I’ll admit, but the dialogue and especially the length makes it a real chore to sit through.

5. The Flying Sailor – The opening is fun, but ultimately too slight to make a lasting impact.

I know Apple have smelled blood in the water and been giving The Boy, The Mole… the same kind of post-noms push they gave CODA, but I could see Ice Merchants pulling off the win based on the precedent of The Windshield Wiper last year. It also has pretty strong critical buzz so maybe that helps. I’d rather go out on a limb and predict the upset.

Predicting: Ice Merchants

Will win: The Boy, The Mole, The Fox and The Horse

Could win: Ice Merchants

X

Reply

[wilfredpickles Joined: Jul 15th, 2017 Topics: 1 Posts: 432 View Predictions]

#1205251396

Bonehead Is Afraid wrote:

We’ll never know though, so it’s not really a productive debate topic.

And yet it’s the only part of my comment (or wolfali’s and kamila’s) you chose to engage with because it’s the easiest to dispute by just saying “we’ll never know”.

I wasn’t trying to reignite the debate on CODA’s strength. I simply wanted to chime in with wolfali’s point that I agreed with, but can never resist the opportunity to mention how fed up with the pundits I was last season. Apparently I should’ve tried harder so I could spare myself the condescension from you.

[wilfredpickles Joined: Jul 15th, 2017 Topics: 1 Posts: 432 View Predictions]

#1205251302

wolfali wrote:

Well CODA had a late surge and would probably have gotten into categories like editing if nominations voting took place a couple week later so using it as precedence to go down the “stats are irrelevant” angle is… self-defeating lol.

100% this. I think it’s too soon to say we’ve learnt any ‘lesson’ from CODA except that the industry is happy to decide its favourite after nominations have been announced. And even that is arguably just an extension of the idea that the early critics’ favourite won’t always be loved by the industry, which we’ve seen many times.

I found it frustrating that pundits kept saying things like, “Well, what other Oscar nominations was CODA supposed to get?” when as we now know, it was as simple as not enough people seeing it in time.

[wilfredpickles Joined: Jul 15th, 2017 Topics: 1 Posts: 432 View Predictions]

#1205149590

cannastop wrote:

I have heard buzz that Inside Out came close to outright winning the Original Screenplay category in its year, but I don’t know how one would verify that.

Inside Out was probably second or third that year, depending on how strong you think of Bridge of Spies was (it did perform shockingly well at BAFTA for a film that the industry seemed cool on at first, and of course Rylance won the Oscar). Having said that, the momentum was behind Spotlight in screenplay from quite early in the season so I don’t think anything was going to overtake it.

I think Spiderverse should’ve easily made it into Adapted Screenplay over The Ballad of Buster Scruggs.

X

Reply

[wilfredpickles Joined: Jul 15th, 2017 Topics: 1 Posts: 432 View Predictions]

#1205148302

Nuebert wrote:

But sadly they gave the Oscar to the blandest between the nominees last year, in both categories

I suspect both of those wins were helped by the fact that winners are voted on by the whole academy, not individual branches (somewhat less so with CODA since it was peaking at the right time and also won WGA and Bafta). The other most controversial screenplay win of recent years – Green Book – was definitely helped by this system too.

[wilfredpickles Joined: Jul 15th, 2017 Topics: 1 Posts: 432 View Predictions]

#1205148112

Bonehead Is Afraid wrote:

I think there’s a chance that the writing branch don’t appreciate the screenplay’s lack of conventional structure and go for 5 other films

I’d say that EEAAO’s content is more unconventional than the structure. Even on a surface level, it reminds me of the screenplays for The Favourite (which has multiple ‘acts’ with intertitles) and The Father (where it’s sometimes deliberately unclear which ‘versions’ of characters are in a scene to build on the film’s themes and conceit).

In general, I’d say the writers are one of AMPAS’ most adventurous branches and have been for a while. They readily nominate non-English and genre films, or even something like Logan.

[wilfredpickles Joined: Jul 15th, 2017 Topics: 1 Posts: 432 View Predictions]

#1205146183

Remember last year how Feinberg had Jude Hill as a Best Actor frontrunner right up until Oscar nominations were announced with no explanation? Looks like he’s going to be doing the same thing with Gabriel LaBelle.

[wilfredpickles Joined: Jul 15th, 2017 Topics: 1 Posts: 432 View Predictions]

#1205096303

WB always campaigned Stanfield as lead that year, they clearly weren’t attempting fraud with him (Kaluuya is harder to judge for me, they’re probably co-leads).

However, that nom did remind everyone about the quirk in the Oscars’ nomination system where voters aren’t locked into voting for someone in a specific category during round 1 (like Winslet in The Reader).

Supporting Actor was so barren that year. Voters loved the late-breaking Judas (it picked up a random extra win in Song and was very popular in anonymous ballots like The Father), and Kaluuya was such a strong frontrunner that it seems to me like voters simply put down different combinations of him and Stanfield across the two male acting categories. It just worked out that both of them:

(1) received most of their round 1 votes in Supporting

(2) received enough round 1 votes to be in the final 5.

X

Reply

[wilfredpickles Joined: Jul 15th, 2017 Topics: 1 Posts: 432 View Predictions]

#1205092266

I think CODA is a perfectly lovely movie, but for me its win will always feel a bit gross because I associate it with pundits constantly whining about how Power of the Dog didn’t feel like a Best Picture winner from like, November onwards.

I know that in reality we often see last-minute momentum changes and early frontrunners losing steam, but it was a really draining year to follow the Oscars.

X

Reply

[wilfredpickles Joined: Jul 15th, 2017 Topics: 1 Posts: 432 View Predictions]

#1205082513

I wasn’t sure where else to put this, but it was really satisfying to see Michael Keaton finally win one of the big industry awards even though he was obviously going in as the favourite for months. He’s been on such a hot streak since Birdman and deserves something to show for it (Ensemble prizes notwithstanding, of course).

I’ve always been annoyed that he fell short at the Oscars for Birdman and genuinely think if voters had known what we was going to do next (especially compared to Eddie Redmayne) that race would’ve gone differently.

X

Reply

[wilfredpickles Joined: Jul 15th, 2017 Topics: 1 Posts: 432 View Predictions]

#1205063992

kat_ebbs wrote:

I’ve gone with Arcane, too. I know they’re very inclined towards the old guard here but I felt the nomination was half the battle?

Not only is getting nominated for a first season really unusual, but I think it’s also been announced that Arcane won 3 juried awards. Those are always a good sign and probably what sets Arcane apart the most from Netflix’s past contenders in this category. I love BoJack Horseman but it seems like it and Big Mouth are thought of as acting (or maybe writing in the former’s case) achievements first.

X

Reply

[wilfredpickles Joined: Jul 15th, 2017 Topics: 1 Posts: 432 View Predictions]

#1205059932

Can someone refresh my memory, has Macfadyen been nominated without Culkin anywhere or won over Culkin anywhere? I think either the two of them split votes again, or Culkin wins because of his increased prominence in season 3.

[wilfredpickles Joined: Jul 15th, 2017 Topics: 1 Posts: 432 View Predictions]

#1205040887

This week’s episode would be yet another great submission in Writing – the shopping montage is one of the dumbest scenes they’ve ever done but I loved it.

I really hope the show manages to hang on at the Emmys next year and maybe even win somewhere, I have a feeling it’s going to be one of my favourite Comedy contenders again.</p>

X

Reply

[wilfredpickles Joined: Jul 15th, 2017 Topics: 1 Posts: 432 View Predictions]

#1205030056

I just realised it would be kind of crazy for Bateman to end his run on Ozark with a Directing Emmy and never winning at DGA, but no acting wins despite having won at SAG. Bill Hader for Barry currently has the same distinction but I imagine a lot of us are predicting him for Directing this year.

Also since he won the Emmy I’ve been a bit confused about Bateman’s DGA loss. I read that when he first joined the guild he was their youngest member ever, so directors must know his work and respect him more than I realised, which in turn helps explain why that branch of the TV Academy has always embraced Ozark.

[wilfredpickles Joined: Jul 15th, 2017 Topics: 1 Posts: 432 View Predictions]

#1205018757

JV wrote:

This is getting ridiculous

All of these Yellowstone takes really just sound like the pundits are upset they got one wrong.

The PGA and SAG combo convinced a lot of predictors (myself included), but no one ever gets a perfect score predicting the nominations. These things happen every year. Unless Yellowstone is actually one of your favourite shows, there’s no reason to keep going on about the ‘snub’.