My Academy Award nominations analysis (I'm a film major, you should trust me)...

I love the Academy Awards and now that the nominations are out, I get to think about them, and then challenge my dad in a betting pool. (Any other takers?) But I thought I'd look at the nominations first and share my thoughts on them, first!

Best film: I have to say, with this new 10 film system, best film gets a little sloppy. I mean, Inception was good, but not that good. They should just stick with 5 and stop tainting the pool. My top 5 choices for best picture would probably have been:

The Social Network. I still haven't seen it, but it's getting really good reviews and it did well at the Golden Globes. Since I haven't seen it, it's not the one I want to win (yet) but I think it probably stands a good chance at the Oscar.

I was so surprised that this wasn't nominated for best drama at the Golden Globes! Stop ignoring animated films! Especially good ones! Not my choice to win, but I was just happy to see it get a well-deserved best picture nomination.

Once again, I haven't seen this. But it too has been getting glowing reviews and took home a Golden Globe. This is probably my dark horse choice for best picture.

Saw it, loved it. Amazing acting, amazing story and amazing overall film. Would be my choice to win overall, but probably not the Academy's. But once again, a well-deserved nomination.

And of course, Black Swan. Need I say more? I think the race will be tight between this and The Social Network, much like Avatar and The Hurt Locker last year. The Social Network won the Golden Globe, will it take the Oscar too, or will it split again this year? The Academy has leaned toward more independent, artistic feeling films in the past few years, and this is more fitting to those criteria than The Social Network.

Best Director: My bid personally would go to David Russell, but once again, it will probably be a closer race between Darren Aronofsky and David Fincher. My guess at the Academy's pick would be Aronofsky (Black Swan). Plus, it was nice to see the Coen brothers get a nomination. Minnesota represent!


Best Actor: Most likely a tough race between Jesse Eisenberg and Colin Firth. I want to lean towards Colin Firth, but I haven't seen either movie, so I could be completely off the mark. Kudos to Franco for getting a nomination (he's really, really nice to look at) and it's pretty cool to see Bardem get a nom for a foreign film as well.

Best Actress: Natalie Portman probably has this locked in. Dark horse to Annette Bening. Nice to see Nicole Kidman in the race, though.


Best Supporting Actor: The Academy snubbed The Social Network! Which makes the choice a lot easier, I suppose. Christian Bale won against The Social Network in the Golden Globes, I think he can take the rest of the field without it in the Oscars. It was cool to see Geoffrey Rush, though, more power to The Kids are Alright!

Best Supporting Actress: I personally think this is a great race. Two nominations for The Fighter and Helena Bonham-Carter is always fair game. My personal pick would be Amy Adams, but Melissa Leo walked away with the Golden Globe. And it's always great to see younger faces in the race, as well (Hailee Steinfield)!

Best Animated Film: Do I really have to answer this?


Best Original Screenplay: WOW. What a great field! I don't even know where to start, except to eliminate Another Year (haven't seen it, or heard of it, not saying it's bad, but the other nominations are just so good). Inception should win just because it took someone completely insane to think of the plot and put it together into a comprehensible screenplay. The Fighter or The Kids are Alright should win because they were both great stories. And once again, The King's Speech is just getting glowing reviews from everyone, so it probably stands a chance. This category will be revisited.

Best Adapted Screenplay: The Social Network will probably win, but I want Toy Story 3 to win. Heard good things about 127 Hours, but probably not comparable to TSN or TS3.

Best Art Direction: Just because I love art, I'll throw my five cents in. Alice in Wonderland wasn't that great of a movie, and the art and feel of it was good, but not good enough to compensate for a weak story, in my opinion. I wasn't floored by it at all, and I would be sad to see an almost completely animated film win. I do think that Harry Potter stands a chance. It was beautifully shot and the animated sequence was flooring. Inception was cool but the art didn't stand out to me, probably because I was too concentrated on the story and trying not to lose my train of thought. Haven't seen King's Speech but Victorian movies are always contenders in art categories. True Grit? Interesting choice.

Best Cinematography: I'm always wrong when it comes to this category, but I'd like to see Inception win just because of the awesome shots in the film. I don't want to try and analyze the rest of them because I really don't know that much about it.

Best Costume Design: I'd like to see Alice in Wonderland win (costumes were one of the only things I actually liked about the film) but the award will probably go to The King's Speech because the award almost always goes to some sort of Victorian-era film. I am Love? The Tempest? There's always interesting films in this category.

The only other category I really know anything about is best original song. They snubbed Burlesque which was a surprise, seeing as how it garnered two Golden Globe nominations. They also left out Chronicles of Narnia, which was sad, but expected. I think Toy Story should win this, because everyone loved Toy Story and the song at the end of the movie made me cry.

I'll post my final ballot closer to ceremony time, and then I'll get a ranting post on here shortly after (or quite possibly during) and justify my losses. Disagree? Comment. Agree? Comment. Have a good point you want to put up for debate? Comment.