{"id":1039,"date":"2014-02-17T22:01:06","date_gmt":"2014-02-17T22:01:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/geneseymour.com\/?p=1039"},"modified":"2014-02-18T00:52:41","modified_gmt":"2014-02-18T00:52:41","slug":"seymour-movies-handicaps-the-2014-oscars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/geneseymour.com\/?p=1039","title":{"rendered":"Seymour Movies Handicaps the @#%&%* 2014 Oscars!!!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ellen DeGeneres has nothing whatsoever to be nervous about. The show will spillover past midnight and nobody will be completely happy with the overall results. Oh, and somebody will dare to tell a Seth MacFarlane joke that dies a horrible death with the audience \u2013 which didn\u2019t hate him last year nearly as much as some of you did. So much for what I\u2019m sure<\/em> will happen. What follows is what I suppose<\/em> will happen. (Predicted winners are in\u00a0bold.<\/strong>)<\/p>\n

Best picture<\/strong>
\n“12 Years a Slave”<\/em>
\n “The Wolf of Wall Street”<\/em>
\n “Captain Phillips”<\/em>
\n “Her”<\/em>
\n “American Hustle”<\/em>
\n “Gravity”<\/strong><\/em>
\n “Dallas Buyers Club”<\/em>
\n “Nebraska”<\/em>
\n “Philomena<\/em>”<\/p>\n

It\u2019s axiomatic that whatever the Producers\u2019 Guild goes with as best-in- show grabs the Big One at the end of Oscar Night, no questions asked. But this year\u2019s producers\u2019 vote ended with both 12 Years a Slave<\/em> and Gravity<\/em> in a dead heat. In case you\u2019re wondering, or scoring, that\u2019s never happened before. So in at least this case and, maybe, one other below, there\u2019s some genuine suspense invited to this year\u2019s barbecue.
\nAt times like this, Past History is your only guide. And what Past History tells you, with its arm around your shoulder and an avuncular, if apologetic intimacy, is that given the choice between voting its hopes or its fears, Hollywood always \u2013 always<\/em> \u2013 chooses hope.<\/p>\n

Those who insist on seeing moviemakers as unilaterally hard-core liberals have good reason to suspect 12 Years a Slave<\/em> will be awarded Best Picture if for no other reason than as a corrective to decades of demeaning, evasive depictions of antebellum slavery in American cinema. I\u2019d like to think so, too, even with my own guarded enthusiasm for the movie itself.
\nBut for those who believe Hollywood carries an impregnable missionary spirit either to right historic wrongs or to reward scathing socio-political criticism, I give you, from many available and appropriate examples, 1976: A year that submitted for the academy\u2019s approval the following Best Picture nominees: All the President\u2019s Men, Bound for Glory, Network, Rocky <\/em>and Taxi Driver.<\/em> Quite a list, you\u2019ll agree, even from this vantage point; each of these movies, even the still-relatively undervalued Bound for Glory<\/em>, can be viewed today as exemplars of what American movies can do when they reach beyond convention, which is why they all have lasting value almost 40 years later.
\nSo given the choice between, in order, a recapitulation of a newspaper\u2019s role in bringing down a U.S. President, a biopic of a leftist troublemaking troubadour, a scathing (and, in retrospect, prophetic) takedown of the commercial television industry, the feel-good story of a South Philly leg-breaker who wills himself to the threshold of boxing immortality and a feel-bad (and, in retrospect, prophetic) story of a sad little New Yorker who enlarges himself into a deluded would-be assassin\u2026well, even if you weren\u2019t alive at the time, you either know or already guessed how this turned out. Rocky<\/em> was the eventual and (as Past History will acknowledge with a melancholy nod) inevitable winner.<\/p>\n

You know what that means this year? I do. I\u2019m pretty sure I do, anyway.<\/p>\n

Granted, both Gravity<\/em> and 12 Years a Slave<\/em> feature protagonists who eventually survive, if not exactly triumph, over seemingly hopeless odds. Both movies are, in their respective manner, harrowing, riveting, well conceived and wonderfully acted. But few, if any, have accused Gravity<\/em> of turning history into a horror movie as some have criticized 12 Years<\/em> for. Moreover, as much as Hollywood constantly yearns for a do-over on its historic mistakes, it doesn\u2019t always like to stare directly at what its evaded or shortchanged. It knows, Lord, how it knows what needs to happen \u2013 and sooner rather than later. But does it have to be, like, right now? This minute? The movie\u2019s out there; it\u2019s had an impact. We\u2019ll do more. We promise. And next time, we\u2019ll have a full-scale blowout and really celebrate\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

Blah. Blah. Blah\u2026<\/a>
\nI should add that a Gravity<\/em> win wouldn\u2019t break my heart at all. It was an even better, braver movie in terms of narrative tactics than most critics have acknowledged. Its director (see below) has been one of the world\u2019s best for some time now and the movie\u2019s anointment would be a worthy acknowledgement of his previous best. And besides, the movie\u2019s theme — that somehow, no matter how scary things get for us when there\u2019s no air or weight or light, we\u2019ll figure something out \u2013 is the kind of bolstering we can use in this present-day miasma we call The New Normal. So fine, Hollywood, vote your hopes and we\u2019ll gladly take them to heart, too. But you\u2019d better greenlight Nat Turner and Kindred<\/em>, like, yesterday. A promise is a promise.<\/em><\/p>\n

Best director<\/strong>
\nSteve McQueen — “12 Years a Slav<\/em>e”
\nDavid O. Russell — “American Hustle<\/em>”
\nAlfonso Cuaron — “Gravity<\/em><\/strong>”
\nAlexander Payne — “Nebraska<\/em>”
\nMartin Scorsese — “The Wolf of Wall Street”<\/em><\/p>\n

Whether his movie wins Best Picture or not, Cuaron\u2019s had this one sewn up since last summer when the world first beheld Gravity<\/em> through 3D glasses. I could spend a few seconds of my allotted time complaining that he should have received such recognition for Y Tu Mama Tambien, The Children of Men<\/em> and even Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban<\/em>. But I wont. Virtue and virtuosity are usually their own rewards. And, for a change, both of these are given proper acknowledgement at the right time in a director\u2019s career.<\/p>\n

Best actor<\/strong>
\nBruce Dern — “Nebraska”<\/em>
\nChiwetel Ejiofor — “12 Years a Slave<\/em>”
\nMatthew McConaughey — “Dallas Buyers Club”<\/em><\/strong>
\nLeonardo DiCaprio — “The Wolf of Wall Street<\/em>”
\nChristian Bale — “American Hustle”<\/em><\/p>\n

What looked at the outset to be this category\u2019s widest-open race in decades has by now nestled into a predictable groove. Oh, there were scattered scowls let loose into the digital ionosphere because of McConaughey\u2019s loopy Golden Globes acceptance speech <\/a>\u2013 which ultimately was, in Ralph Kramden\u2019s deathless expression, \u201ca bag of shells.\u201d Dallas Buyers Club<\/em> is the kind of Oscar candidate whose virtues are best absorbed through the small screen. (See Argo<\/em>, if you can remember that far back.) However dazed-and-confused McConaughey comes across off-screen, you can easily imagine how his touching, physically invested on-screen rendition of a shabby-hustler-turned-impassioned-crusader captured voters\u2019 hearts on all those DVD screeners. As Hollywood prefers to see itself as a mob of hustlers-with-hearts-of-gold, do you really think its citizenry will bypass this opportunity to pay tribute to its own self-aggrandizing heroic fantasies? It never has before, and it wont now.<\/p>\n

Best actress<\/strong>
\nAmy Adams — “American Hustle”<\/em>
\nCate Blanchett — “Blue Jasmine<\/em>“<\/strong>
\nJudi Dench — “Philomena”<\/em>
\nSandra Bullock — “Gravity<\/em>”
\nMeryl Streep — “August: Osage County<\/em>”<\/p>\n

By contrast, what seemed a mortal lock in this category, even as early as last summer, has within the last few weeks morphed into something terribly, even poignantly vulnerable. The re-energized furor over Farrow-v-Allen may have subsided for the time being. But no one can really know how it affected voting until The Envelope is opened, which all of a sudden makes this disclosure worth staying awake for on Oscar Night. I\u2019m going to presume that nothing changes — mostly because, whatever academy voters feelings about Dylan Farrow\u2019s open letter and\/or Woody Allen in general, they don\u2019t like to be put into a corner. My onetime Entertainment Weekly office mate Mark Harris\u2019s spider-sense<\/a> is strong enough to intuit what might contribute to these voters\u2019 collective grievance \u2013 and resentment:<\/p>\n

“Oscar voters are, ludicrously, being asked to serve as jurors in a trial by op-ed: Is a vote for Blanchett to be treated as de facto indifference about the nightmare of child molestation, since Dylan Farrow has publicly contended that for a long time, she felt that any awards for Allen\u2019s films \u201cwere a way to tell me to shut up and go away\u201d? More to the point, is there any conceivable way to ask or answer that question without acknowledging that something horrible is being inappropriately trivialized and something trivial is being inappropriately transformed into a crisis of situational ethics<\/em>? (ITALICS MINE) I\u2019ve heard people say they think this controversy is useful because it opens up a larger discussion. I hope that who should win Best Actress isn\u2019t the discussion they mean.”<\/p>\n

To repeat, I\u2019m betting it isn\u2019t Still, the foofaraw went on just long enough for many pundits to pose the heretofore unthinkable question: If not Blanchett, then who? Given my own misgivings towards Blue Jasmine<\/em><\/a> and, to a lesser extent, Blanchett\u2019s performance, I would lean towards Adams if I had a vote. There\u2019s even been some chatter about Dench\u2019s crafty (in all senses) work in Philomena.<\/em> But I suspect if anyone would benefit from a backlash against Blanch\u2026I mean, Allen, it would be Bullock since she\u2019s so widely beloved, and so was her movie. It\u2019s still Blanchett\u2019s to lose. But not by as much as was once believed. Whatever happens, it\u2019ll be a chew toy for all media to deconstruct and, quite likely, dismember.<\/p>\n

Best supporting actor<\/strong>
\nBarkhad Abdi — “Captain Phillips<\/em>”
\nBradley Cooper — “American Hustle<\/em>”
\nJonah Hill — “The Wolf of Wall Street<\/em>”
\nJared Leto — “Dallas Buyers Club<\/em>“<\/strong>
\nMichael Fassbender — “12 Years a Slave<\/em>”<\/p>\n

Always the wildest card on the table, unless there\u2019s a veteran involved who\u2019s never received his due \u2013 and none can be found anywhere in this quintet. Leto was the early favorite and despite what some believed to be a more inappropriate Golden Globe acceptance speech<\/a> than McConaughey\u2019s, still owns the edge. (Again, think of how easily his movie hums into a living room with a home video player.) Still, there\u2019s always a chance a newcomer like Abdi will repeat the precedent set by the late Haing S. Ngor in 1985 for The Killing Fields<\/em>. (In both cases, there was a sense of heroism above and beyond the movie itself.) BAFTA did surprise Abdi (and us) with its own Supporting Actor prize. Then again, I\u2019m not sure Dallas Buyers Club<\/em> has crossed the pond yet. Fassbinder, for whatever it\u2019s worth, would have been my pick. But if DiCaprio\u2019s sadistic slaveholder in last year\u2019s Django Unchained<\/em> didn\u2019t win (and it was a more magnetic performance than Christoph Waltz\u2019s winning turn as the sympathetic bounty hunter), then neither shall this far more unhinged variation.<\/p>\n

Best supporting actress<\/strong>
\nJennifer Lawrence — “American Hustle<\/em>”
\nLupita Nyong’o — “12 Years a Slave<\/em>“<\/strong>
\nJune Squibb — “Nebraska<\/em>”
\nJulia Roberts — “August: Osage County<\/em>”
\nSally Hawkins — “Blue Jasmine<\/em>”<\/p>\n

J-Law, a.k.a \u201cOur Brando\u201d, retains the post-position, and it\u2019s well deserved. Nyong\u2019o\u2019s poised, yet assertive campaign, however, appears to have wowed academy members and watchers alike. And I\u2019m starting to get the vague feeling that, whatever good will it carried at the season\u2019s start, 12 Years a Slave<\/em> could very well walk away from this thing empty-handed \u2013 and she\u2019s lately been the most visible beneficiary of whatever love remains for the movie.<\/p>\n

Best original screenplay<\/strong>
\n“American Hustle<\/em>” — David O. Russell and Eric Warren Singer
\n“Blue Jasmine<\/em>” — Woody Allen
\n“Her<\/em>” — Spike Jonze<\/strong>
\n“Nebraska<\/em>” — Bob Nelson
\n“Dallas Buyers Club<\/em>” — Craig Borten and Melisa Wallack<\/p>\n

Even before Dylan Farrow\u2019s letter landed in the New York Times\u2019 website, it was apparent that Allen \u2018s script had little chance in this crowd of worthies; the most \u201cwriterly\u201d of which is the romance between a man and his machine, which is kind of how writers see their lives these days. To repeat what historic precedent suggests: When in doubt, always go for the one that most aligns with its voters\u2019 self-image; besides which, there happens to be some gorgeous passages in Her<\/em>\u2026so to speak.<\/p>\n

Best adapted screenplay<\/strong>
\n“12 Years a Slave<\/em>” — John Ridley<\/strong>
\n“Before Midnight<\/em>” — Julie Delpy, Ethan Hawke and Richard Linklater
\n“The Wolf of Wall Street<\/em>” — Terence Winter
\n“Captain Phillips<\/em>” — Billy Ray
\n“Philomena<\/em>” — Steve Coogan and Jeff Pope<\/p>\n

As we do not live in a perfect world, Delpy, Hawke and Linklater will be unacknowledged by the academy for fashioning the most corrosive and incisive dialogue of any romantic comedy of the last twenty years. The Writers Guild has already rewarded Billy Ray, which makes him the logical favorite. But here, as elsewhere, I\u2019m going with my gut and insist that in this instance, the writers who vote in this category will want to make a statement, if not a stand, by rewarding an African-American writer for delivering a bleak, trenchant and hauntingly effective script about antebellum slavery. It\u2019s more hope than prophecy, but then so were black American civil rights once upon a time. (Oh, wait\u2026)<\/p>\n

Best documentary feature<\/strong>
\n“The Act of Killing”<\/em>
\n “20 Feet From Stardom”<\/em><\/strong>
\n “The Square”<\/em>
\n “Cutie and the Boxer”<\/em>
\n “Dirty Wars”<\/em><\/p>\n

In what it risked and how it succeeded, Act of Killing<\/em> was, as far as I was concerned<\/a>, the Movie of the Year. In an era more open to broad adventure and intellectual range than ours, it would have been a cult classic. It\u2019s done well enough during awards season. But I guess we had too many other things on our minds to pay close attention to the repressed memories of Indonesian death squads. I\u2019d be delighted if it won here, but somehow I\u2019m thinking the academy, as with the rest of The America, is looking for something to feel good about itself, even the long-deferred emergence of backup singers from the shadows of time and neglect.<\/p>\n

Best animated feature<\/strong>
\n“The Wind Rises”<\/em>
\n “Frozen”<\/em><\/strong>
\n “Despicable Me 2”<\/em>
\n “Ernest & Celestine”<\/em>
\n “The Croods”<\/em><\/p>\n

How I wish Hayao Miyazaki would be able to have a Mariano Rivera retirement moment on Oscar night and receive the award (and the standing ovation) he deserves for both his valedictory feature\u00a0The Wind Rises\u00a0<\/em>and his lifetime achievement! But Frozen<\/em>\u2019s success, creative and fiscal, is like one of those large obstructions on a narrow road that you\u2019ll just have to endure before being waved along.<\/p>\n

Best foreign feature<\/strong>
\n“The Hunt” (Denmark)<\/em>
\n “The Broken Circle Breakdown” (Belgium)<\/em>
\n “The Great Beauty” (Italy)<\/em><\/strong>
\n “Omar” (Palestinian territories)<\/em>
\n “The Missing Picture” (Cambodia)<\/em><\/p>\n

Since I\u2019m almost always wrong about this category, I figure, WTF, I may as well go with my heart on this one. I loved La Grande Bellezza<\/em> for both rational and irrational reasons and will entertain the even crazier hope that its success in this venue will jump-start American appetites for discursive, leisurely and philosophical storytelling. Once more with feeling: WTF.<\/p>\n

Best music (original song)<\/strong>
\n“Frozen”: “Let it Go<\/strong><\/em>” — Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez<\/strong>
\n“Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom”<\/em>: “Ordinary Love” — U2, Paul Hewson
\n“Her”: “The Moon Song<\/em>” — Karen O, Spike Jonze
\n“Despicable Me 2”: “Happy”<\/em> — Pharrell Williams
\n“Alone Yet Not Alone”<\/em>: “Alone Yet Not Alone” — Bruce Broughton, Dennis Spiegel<\/p>\n

No idea whatsoever. The dart lands on Frozen<\/em>. Any of the others could win. I guess. How did they come up with five nominees anyway?<\/p>\n

Best music (original score)<\/strong>
\n“Gravity<\/em>” — Steven Price
\n“Philomena<\/em>” — Alexandre Desplat
\n“The Book Thie<\/em>f” — John Williams
\n“Saving Mr. Banks<\/em>” — Thomas Newman
\n“Her”<\/em> — William Butler and Owen Pallett<\/strong><\/p>\n

Isn\u2019t Saving Mr. Banks<\/em> sort of leaning on an older musical score and\u2026No matter, because it won\u2019t win anyway. Her<\/em>\u2019s music was as lyrical as the rest of its soundtrack.<\/p>\n

Best cinematography<\/strong>
\n“Gravity”<\/em> — Emmanuel Lubezki<\/strong>
\n“Inside Llewyn Davis<\/em>” — Bruno Delbonnel
\n“Nebraska”<\/em> — Phedon Papamichael
\n“Prisoners”<\/em> — Roger Deakins
\n“The Grandmaster”<\/em> — Phillippe Le Sourd<\/p>\n

Each of these boasted striking visual conceptions. But as my faculty club friends often say to each other at odd hours of the day: \u201cDuh.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ellen DeGeneres has nothing whatsoever to be nervous about. The show will spillover past midnight and nobody will be completely happy with the overall results. Oh, and somebody will dare to tell a Seth MacFarlane joke that dies a horrible death with the audience \u2013 which didn\u2019t hate him last year nearly as much as […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[124],"tags":[418,449,452,454,456,317,316,451,459,430,460,453,438,450,455,433,457,307,445,461,458,315],"class_list":["post-1039","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie-reviews","tag-12-years-a-slave","tag-2014-oscars","tag-alfonso-cuaron","tag-bafta","tag-barkhad-abdi","tag-blue-jasmine","tag-cate-blanchett","tag-dallas-buyers-club","tag-frozen","tag-gravity","tag-hayao-mizazaki","tag-jared-leto","tag-jennifer-lawrence","tag-matthew-mcconaughey","tag-michael-fassbinder","tag-sandra-bullock","tag-spike-jonze","tag-the-act-of-killing","tag-the-great-beauty","tag-the-wind-rises","tag-twenty-feet-from-stardom","tag-woody-allen"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/geneseymour.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1039","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/geneseymour.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/geneseymour.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geneseymour.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geneseymour.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1039"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/geneseymour.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1039\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1053,"href":"https:\/\/geneseymour.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1039\/revisions\/1053"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/geneseymour.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1039"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geneseymour.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1039"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/geneseymour.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1039"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}