The Oscars 2009 - Sunday 25th February
Just a bit of fun - my tips for the Oscars and who I'd have voted for if I could.
I promise I won't change my predictions after the winners are announced! I must admit I haven't been following things as
closely as usual this year so they might be all wrong ... don't go betting on my predictions! And if you do, don't use
Betfair. Betfair recently gave away 9 grand of my winnings to someone pretending to be me and they claim they have no
liability - they are even refusing to provide details of the crime to the police! They are a bunch of crooks and your
money is not safe in their hands.
Previous years' tips:
2005, 2006, 2007,
2008.
Best Picture
Nominees: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,
Frost/Nixon,
Milk,
The Reader,
Slumdog Millionaire.
My prediction: Slumdog Millionaire.
My opinion: Kung Fu Panda, with second place going to
In Bruges.
Was I right? Yay!
Best Leading Actor
Nominees: Richard Jenkins (for The Visitor),
Frank Langella (for Frost/Nixon),
Sean Penn (for Milk),
Brad Pitt (for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button),
Mickey Rourke (for The Wrestler).
My prediction: Oh lawks, I'm having trouble with this one. The bookies think Mickey Rourke but I'm
plumping for Sean Penn.
My opinion: Not sure. Maybe Tom Wilkinson for RocknRolla.
Was I right? Yes! Beat the bookies on that one.
Best Leading Actress
Nominees: Anne Hathaway (for Rachel Getting Married),
Angelina Jolie (for Changeling),
Melissa Leo (for Frozen River),
Meryl Streep (for Doubt),
Kate Winslet (for The Reader).
My prediction: A two-horse race between Streep and Winslet and hard to pick a winner - I'll plump for
Kate Winslet.
My opinion: Meryl Streep.
Was I right? Yes!
Best Supporting Actor
Nominees: Josh Brolin (for Milk),
Robert Downey Jr (for Tropic Thunder),
Philip Seymour Hoffman (for Doubt),
Heath Ledger (for The Dark Knight),
Michael Shannon (for Revolutionary Road).
My prediction: This is the Helen Mirren of the year - it can't go anywhere but
Heath Ledger, sadly.
My opinion: Brad Pitt, Burn After Reading.
Was I right? Yep, but that one was easy.
Best Supporting Actress
Nominees: Amy Adams (for Doubt),
Penelope Cruz (for Vicky Cristina Barcelona),
Viola Davis (for Doubt),
Taraji P Henson (for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button),
Marisa Tomei (for The Wrestler).
My prediction: Well, I've got a hunch on Viola Davis, but I'm going to ignore it and plump for
Penelope Cruz.
My opinion: Amy Adams.
Was I right? Yes
Best Director
Nominees: David Fincher (for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button),
Ron Howard (for Frost/Nixon),
Gus Van Sant (for Milk),
Stephen Daldry (for The Reader),
Danny Boyle (for Slumdog Millionaire).
My prediction: Danny Boyle for
Slumdog Millionaire.
My opinion: David Fincher.
Was I right? Yes again.
Best Animated Feature
Nominees: Bolt,
Kung Fu Panda,
Wall-E.
My prediction: Wall-E.
My opinion: Kung Fu Panda.
Was I right? Yes
Best Original Screenplay
Nominees: Frozen River,
Happy-Go-Lucky,
In Bruges,
Milk,
Wall-E.
My prediction: Milk.
My opinion: In Bruges.
Was I right? Yes!
Best Adapted Screenplay
Nominees: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,
Doubt,
Frost/Nixon,
The Reader,
Slumdog Millionaire.
My prediction: It's the wrong winner, but I reckon it'll go to
Slumdog Millionaire.
My opinion: Benjamin Button.
Was I right? Yes, sadly. Slumdog's a really good movie, but the
screenplay was very much a weak link.
Best Cinematography
Nominees: Changeling,
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,
The Dark Knight,
The Reader,
Slumdog Millionaire.
My prediction: Slumdog Millionaire.
My opinion: I agree, Slumdog.
Was I right? Yes
Best Art Direction
Nominees: Changeling,
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,
The Dark Knight,
The Duchess,
Revolutionary Road.
My prediction: Benjamin Button.
My opinion: The Spirit. I'm quite surprised that
Slumdog Millionaire wasn't nominated in this category.
Was I right? Yes
Best Special Effects
Nominees: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,
The Dark Knight,
Iron Man.
My prediction: Benjamin Button.
My opinion: All three of these deserve to win, but the originality gives the edge to
Benjamin Button. I think I would've kicked The Dark Knight off the list and
replaced it with Hancock.
Was I right? Yes, that makes me feel slightly better about
The Golden Compass shockingly "winning" this award last year.
Overall results
Twelve right from twelve predictions! Not quite sure how that
happened, but I got them all right! Annoyingly, it's the only year I haven't been able to bet on them, because of the
Betfair fiasco ... bugger!
The Bernard Matthews Award
What was 2008's Turkey of the Year?
Well, I haven't seen a lot of bad movies this year - nothing got below a 2 all year, which is a first.
Quantum of Solace wasn't totally awful, but deserves a mention
here as it fell so far below expectations, as did Street Kings.
I'm sure there were worse movies, but I'm going to give the turkey trophy to
Twilight for achieving the impossible and making a vampire movie boring. But if you want to
see a truly horrible movie, see if you can find a copy of Auto Recovery - that movie was so impossibly bad that I couldn't
face sitting through it to review it.
Highlights of the Year
The movie industry continues to churn out quality stuff. Surprise of the year was probably
Death Race - that movie had no right to be as good as it was. The same goes for
You Don't Mess With the Zohan, which proved Adam Sandler is still learning
and getting better. The Liam Neeson thriller Taken was undoubtedly the sleeper hit of the year - I must get around to
reviewing it...
Other movies that tickled my viewing pleasure-muscles this year and deserve your attention are
Son of Rambow, RocknRolla,
Burn After Reading, The Orphanage,
Hancock and The Incredible Hulk. And if you haven't seen
Tropic Thunder yet, go and rent it just so you can laugh heartily at Tom Cruise as a
lardy baldy-man. Priceless.
Coming up in 2009
The movie highlight of 2009 has to be the new Star Trek movie. Simon Pegg as Scotty - surely it can't
go wrong... can it? With the unfortunate news of Spy Hunter hitting more problems, at least we have Transformers:
Revenge of the Fallen to look forward to - that'll be an effects-fest if nothing else - then there's Watchmen, which is
surely going to be brilliant, the Da Vinci Code sequel Angels & Demons, then the year rounds off
with Guy Ritchie's Sherlock Holmes, featuring both Robert Downey Jr and my current favourite Mark Strong. I can't wait.
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