And the Nominees Are:

Okay it’s that time of the year again, Oscar time!  The nominations for the 82nd annual academy awards came out to day, Whoa, Oscar you are getting old!

As I reported before, the Academy has decided to include ten nominees in the best picture category this year.  Everyone seems to have their own ideas for the reason behind this.  I actually heard a morning news commentator say that the reason the academy expanded the number of best pictures spots was to get mainstream moneymaking films more recognition and a chance at awards?  Huh?  Shouldn’t it be the opposite?  Regardless if this is true or not, you can bet the reason is monetary and not artistic. The Oscars have been losing more and more of their television viewing audience year after year.  This is one of the reasons the telecast has been moved from late March to late February – this year they are actually on Sunday March 7--to compete more with the other award shows such as SAG and the Golden Globes. 

The Academy Show producers suspect that movie award show viewers, unlike football fans, will grow tired of the same old thing and therefore wouldn’t tune in for the seventeen-hour Oscar telecast two months after the Golden Globes.  Lower ratings means lower commercial rates for ABC and the number three network doesn’t need that – at least it isn’t number four –can you say NBC? Furthermore, by bumping the awards up earlier in the year, there is a chance that more of the ten nominated films will still be playing at the theater.  This too seems a bit idiotic; If an Oscar win can boost ticket sales (more than a nomination) than the chances of a best picture win for a movie that is only in the best picture category and no other category because these other categories haven’t been expanded to ten nominations are slim to none. 

The real reason why the expansion to ten films is a bad idea is because there are rarely ten films good enough to be nominated in any given year.  How long will it take them to realize this?  I shudder at the forthcoming nominations. 

Okay, the actor categories mirrored the SAG nominations 95%.  This isn’t a surprise as both groups are nominated by fellow actors.  The only anomaly was in the Best Supporting Actress category. Diane Kruger’s (Inglorious Basterds) SAG nomination was replaced by the ever reliable Maggie Gyllenall, a previously overlooked Oscar participant.

The Oscars are pretty easy to predict, if you follow the award scene as I do.  Perhaps the biggest upset in recent years was Marion Cotillard’s win over Julie Christie for Best Actress a few years back.  I am still getting over that one, as Julie Christie is one of the most brilliant, subtle and intelligent actresses of her generation.

Jeff Bridges will win Best Actor for Crazy Heart.  Mo’nique will win Best Supporting Actress for Precious and Christoph Waltz will and should win Best Supporting Actor for Inglorious Basterds.  But who will win best actress?  Of course, we know I want Meryl Streep to win for playing Julia Childs, but lately Sandra Bullock has been creeping in as a possible winner.  How can this be?  I haven’t seen The Blind Side so I can’t judge this individual performance, but can anything be as brilliant as Streep’s iconic turn as the tall French Chef?  I am just wondering if Bullock’s work in “The Blind Side” is as good as the work she has had done on her face?  She has obviously visited a plastic surgeon.  There seems to be a backlash against Streep lately, as she gets nominated so often.  She has sixteen nominations altogether. She should be nominated all the time.  She is great all the time.  Furthermore, I think people forget that it has been nearly thirty years since she won her last Oscar.  I would be a sad state of affairs if Jack Nicholson, Walter Brennan, Ingrid Berman and Katharine Hepburn were the only performers to win at least three Oscars.  I mean come on, Streep has won two and Walter Brennan (who?) has won three.

I rest my case.