Best Picture: It pains me to predict this but Gravity will probably win, despite the lame-ness and the wrongness of such a choice. Should win: Wolf of Wall Street or 12 Years a Slave. I know I’ve predicted 12 Years to win but…I don’t know what’s going to happen. But a gut feeling is telling me to prepare for the worst.
Best Director: Like everyone else, I’m expecting Alfonso Cuaron to come out on top. Not for directing one of the boldest and finest films of the 21st Century, Children of Men, but for directing a technically dazzling “Sandra Bullock in a haunted house but the haunted house is space” movie. Should win: Martin Scorsese for Wolf or Steve McQueen for Slave.
Best Actor: Dallas Buyers Club‘s Matthew McConaughey, of course, but Leonardo DiCaprio‘s balls-out performance in The Wolf of Wall Street is more deserving.
Best Actress: Cate Blanchett, of course, for her work in Blue Jasmine. Should win save for the fact that she wasn’t nominated: Blue is The Warmest Color‘s Adele Exarchopoulos.
Best Supporting Actor: Dallas Buyers Club‘s Jared Leto, although there’s no question in my mind that WoWS‘s Jonah Hill gave the richer and more vivid performance.
Best Supporting Actress: The most deserving nominee is 12 Years A Slave‘s Lupita Nyong’o but I fear that American Hustle‘s Jennifer Lawrence will take it nonetheless. The Academy that gave Christoph Waltz two Oscars for playing more or less the same kind of character twice in two Quentin Tarantino movies is more than capable of blowing off Nyong’o.
Best Adapted Screenplay: John Ridley‘s 12 Years A Slave will take it. (I think.)
Best Original Screenplay: Spike Jonze‘s Her. (I think.)
Best Animated Feature: Frozen (Chris Buck, Jennifer Lee, Peter Del Vecho).
Best Cinematography: Gravity, Emmanuel Lubezki.
Best Documentary Feature: 20 Feet from Stardom.
Best Foreign Language Film: The Great Beauty (Italy, d: Paolo Sorrentino). Should win: Omar (Palestine, d: Hany Abu-Assad).
I don’t care about the rest or winning a ballot competition or anything along those lines.
