Oscar Preview: The Power of Ten

I just got my issue of Twilight, er, Entertainment Weekly, and it’s their fall preview issue, so that can only mean one thing—it’s time to start thinking about what movies will be up for the Oscar. This year there is a new wrinkle that will change the landscape of prognostication: there will be ten Best Picture nominations, doubling the field. Oscar hasn’t done this since 1943, too long ago to be relevant to how it will affect this year’s nominations. As Grace Slick said forty years ago this weekend at Woodstock, “It’s a new dawn, people.”

There is two ways this could go. Sid Ganis, president of the Academy, opined that it might mean that more different kinds of pictures would be nominated: comedies, foreign films, documentaries. Fat chance. I think it may allow more boffo box office adventure films in (surely a ten-picture field last year would have included The Dark Knight), but I don’t envision voters creating in their minds a comedy slot, a documentary slot, a foreign film slot. Instead, I’m guessing what we’ll get is more of the same—instead of five films of a certain prestige released late in the year, we’ll get ten.

So on to my annual wild-ass guesses. In past years I came up with ten possibilities for five nominations. I’m going to stick with ten guesses, but of course I’ll probably only hit about five on the head. If I do more than that I’ll be pleased with myself. In alphabetical order:

Avatar (Dec. 18, James Cameron) The Academy has given a cold-shoulder to sci-fi/fantasy, but opening it up to ten may help here. If this film is as visually dazzling as everyone thinks it is, that could be the ticket into the top category. It certainly should earn lots of tech nominations.

An Education (Oct. 9, Lone Scherfig) Lots of good buzz about this one, about a British teenager in the early 1960s who is courted by an older man. Certainly a lock for a Best Actress nomination for newcomer Carey Mulligan. Could be the critical sleeper of the year.

The Hurt Locker (July, Kathryn Bigelow) This may be wishful thinking on my part, since the film has been disappointing at the box office and will be hurt by a summer release. But damn it’s a good movie.

Invictus (Dec. 11, Clint Eastwood) A no-brainer: Clint Eastwood directs Morgan Freeman as Nelson Mandela. Don’t know if it’s any good, but it certainly will give the Academy a huge boner. The only downfall will be that it’s too earnest (see Cry Freedom).

The Lovely Bones (Dec. 11, Peter Jackson) Got pushed back specifically to be awards bait, this could be dreadful but Jackson is certainly an Academy favorite. Adapted from a novel by Alice Sebold, it’s about a girl who is murdered and then watches over her family from a heaven-like place. If the movie takes the weird sexual turn the novel does, it could be too disquieting for Oscar.

Nine (Nov. 25, Rob Marshall) Ever since Chicago won Best Picture every year another musical comes along and it’s touted as the presumptive Oscar favorite. But more and more it’s looking as if Chicago was an aberration, not the start of a trend. Phantom of the Opera, The Producers, Rent, Dreamgirls, Sweeney Todd—zero Best Picture nominations among them. Nine, based on a Broadway musical that was in turn based on Fellini’s 8 ½, certainly has a good pedigree—there are six Oscar-winners in the cast. I’m putting it on the list, but wouldn’t be shocked if it underwhelms. And what’s with all the movies with that particular numeral in the title? We’ve got Nine, 9, and District 9.

Shutter Island (Oct. 2, Martin Scorsese) Scorsese’s been on an Oscar roll—he’s had three Best Picture nominations in the seven years. This one is a genre picture, reminiscent of Cape Fear, but you can’t count Marty out.

The Tree of Life (Dec. 25, Terrence Malick) Sean Penn and Brad Pitt bring the star power, and the mystical Malick directs. Don’t know much about it, but it must be remembered that the difficult Thin Red Line got a Best Pic nod (of course The New World was ignored).

Up (May 28, Pete Docter) This is problematic. No way Up is nominated if there are only five nominees, and it may still get overlooked because animated films are ghettoized in their own category. What could happen is that if it does get nominated, and the Academy sticks with ten nominees, it may be the end of the Best Animated Film category, as it may be deemed unnecessary.

Up in the Air (Dec., Jason Reitman) George Clooney as a businessman who practically lives in the air. Clooney has a knack for picking good projects, and Reitman comes off the big success of Juno. Smells like a hit and Oscar-friendly to me.

There are a lot of films that I’ve left off that are ripe for nomination, including films by Steven Soderbergh, the Coen Brothers, Jane Campion, Pedro Almodovar, and Alejandro Gonzalez Innaritu. There’s even one, The Road, which I had on my list last year that got bumped to this year. I guess the thing I’m most hoping for is that many of these films are good.