2008 OSCARS: Nominations Announced

Two days ago I posted my predictions for the 2008 Oscar nominations. This year I did pretty well, with 31/40, or 77.5% accuracy rate in the Top Eight categories. Last year I got 29/40 or 72.5% correct. These are both down from my stunning 36/40 accuracy rate in 2006. At least MadProfessah's three year average is 32/40 or 4/5 correct per category, which is better than your average Oscar prognosticator.

Best Picture

Atonement, Juno,

Michael Clayton, No Country For Old Men, There Will Be Blood.
MadProfessah's predictions: 5/5.

Take that, b*tches! *grin* I've seen all the nominees (3 of the 5 in the last few days), reviews will be following in the next few weeks. I'm very happy that Into The Wild was not nominated, and I do intend to see The Diving Bell and the Butterfly soon.

Best Director

• Paul Thomas Anderson, There Will Be Blood
• Ethan and Joel Coen, No Country For Old Men
• Sean Penn, Into The Wild Tony Gilroy, Michael Clayton
• Julian Schnabel, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
• Joe Wright, Atonement Jason Reitman, Juno

MadProfessah's predictions: 3/5.
The Academy usually loves to nominate actors as directors and Into The Wild had outstanding critical and guild acclaim. I do think it sucked. I tried to watch it three times (for free!) during my flight in business class from LAX to Frankfurt and I kept on switching back to Ratatouille. Having seen Atonement, I do think that Joe Wright should have been nominated. The Director's Guild list and the Academy's list usually varies by just one nominee but this time it varies by two. Jason Reitman, the director of Juno is just 30 years old and Juno is a comedy which usually gets no Oscar love.

Best Actress

• Julie Christie, Away From Her
• Marion Cotillard, La Vie en Rose
• Angelina Jolie, A Mighty Heart Cate Blanchett, Elizabeth: The Golden Age
• Keira Knightley Atonement Laura Linney, The Savages
• Ellen Page, Juno

MadProfessah's predictions: 3/5.
Oooooh, Angelina got snubbed! I'm *shocked*, but not upset, that Cate got nominated for Elizabeth. The Academy loves her. She becomes one of the rare actors to be nominated twice in the same year, although she may suffer Sigourney Weaver's fate and lose both nominations. The movie was not as well done as the first Elizabeth. The other surprising nominee is Laura Linney, who often does excellent work but the actors who are also in huge box-office hits and critically acclaimed dramas in the same year often get rewarded, and of course Keira Knightley was in the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. This time this was not enough to keep her slot. I thought that perhaps Amy Adams would get a nod for Enchanted.

Best Actor

• George Clooney, Michael Clayton
• Daniel Day-Lewis, There Will Be Blood
• Johnny Depp, Sweeney Todd
• Emile Hirsch, Into The Wild Tommy Lee Jones, In The Valley of Elah
• Viggo Mortensen, Eastern Promises

MadProfessah's predictions: 4/5.
I thought the last slot would go to Denzel Washington for American Gangster or possibly Russell Crowe for either American Gangster or 3:10 to Yuma. However, Tommy Lee Jones was universally acclaimed for Paul Haggis' Iraq war film, his first movie after winning Oscars for Crash and Million Dollar Baby but NOBODY saw In the Valley of Elah when it was released in September.

Best Supporting Actress

• Cate Blanchett, I'm Not There
• Ruby Dee, American Gangster
• Jennifer Garner, Juno Saoirse Ronan, Atonement
• Amy Ryan, Gone, Baby, Gone
• Tilda Swinton, Michael Clayton

MadProfessah's predictions: 4/5.
Jennifer Garner's nomination for Juno was just wishful thinking on my part, but if you really really like that movie (as I did), you have to come away thinking how excellent the supporting members of the cast were. However, Saoirse Ronan is astonihingly effective as the precocious child in Atonement who unknowingly sets the tragic events of the film in motion. She is the perfect embodiment of Briony, the character at the heart of Ian McEwan's novel. Ruby Dee becomes the only black actor nominated this year.

Best Supporting Actor

• Casey Affleck, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
• Javier Bardem, No Country For Old Men
• Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Charlie Wilson's War
• Hal Holbrook, Into The Wild
• J.K. Simmons, Juno Tom Wilkinson, Michael Clayton

MadProfessah's predictions: 4/5.
Again, I'm not mad at all that Tom Wilkinson took a slot from what could have been recognition for Juno's stellar cast. He is astonishing as the animating force in Michael Clayton, in fact he is good in everything that he appears in. But no one but Javier Bardem is going home with this Oscar.

Best Original Screenplay

• Judd Apatow, Knocked Up Nancy Oliver, Lars and the Real Girl
• Brad Bird, Ratatouille
• Diablo Cody, Juno
• Tony Gilroy, Michael Clayton
• Tamara Jenkins, The Savages

MadProfessah's predictions: 4/5.
This is always the most interesting category to pick and one of the most important. The writers started with a blank sheet of paper (or computer screen) and from their imagination alone, created characters and situations which inspired filmmakers to put those visions on the screen. Why the rest of Hollywood can't understand this and settle the damned writers' strike so that there is a real Oscars on February 24.

Best Adapted Screenplay

• Paul Thomas Anderson, There Will Be Blood
• Joel and Ethan Coen, No Country For Old Men
• Christopher Hampton, Atonement
• Ronald Harwood, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
• Steven Zaillian, American Gangster Sarah Polley, Away From Her

MadProfessah's predictions: 4/5.
I am pretty suprised that American Gangster could not get ANY love from the Academy (except for Ruby Dee's acting nod). I should have realized that since the Academy loves to nominate actors in other categories, they might have picked Sean Penn's script for Into The Wild but instead the actor they went with was Canadian Sarah Polley. This will be a tough category. The Coen Brothers (Fargo) and Cristopher Hampton (Dangerous Liaisons) have won this award before, which is the typical consolation prize if you're not winning the bigger prizes of Picture and/or Director. That may give Harwood the edge since it's unlikely his film will win in any other major category.

Total Nominations

1. No Country for Old Men, 8
2. There Will Be Blood, 6 EIGHT
3. Atonement, 6 SEVEN
4. Juno, 5 FOUR
5. Michael Clayton, 5 SEVEN
6. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly FOUR