Jett, who tunes out on certain subjects every so often, just asked who the likely Best Supporting Actor winner will be, and when I said “Christoph Waltz, the milk-sipping Nazi Colonel from Inglourious Basterds,” he said “what?” He’s seen Quentin Tarantino‘s film and was okay with it, but the Waltz certainty shocked him. Write a fast piece about why you just said that, I suggested. He’s not responding so I guess not.

This was a banner year of Stephen Lang in Public Enemies and Avatar — why isn’t he in the loop? Peter Capaldi‘s potty mouthed rage-hound performance in In The Loop made him a major indie star. Alfred Molina‘s awkward English dad was wonderfully bent and vulnerable in An Education, and Peter Sarsgaard was curiously sly and winning as Carey Mulligan‘s odd-duck older boyfriend. Anthony Mackie and Brian Geraghty shone brightly in The Hurt Locker. Christian McKay in Orson Welles and Me! And James Gandolfini‘s In The Loop general turned me around like few smallish comic performances have this year. (Between this and Gandolfini’s comic vulgarian in God of Carnage, who knew?)

Why does it have to be Waltz, Waltz, Waltz and nothing but?