Ken's Oscar prediction: The king shall rule as he speaks
There is no doubt I am addicted The Academy Award(Oscar). Only two days left till the award show. Ever since the nominations were announced, I have been rushing to download(Malaysia is slow) all those movies have been nominated.
If I were still doing “If We Picked the Winners” with Gene Siskel, my preference for best film would be “The Social Network.” It was not only the best film of 2010, but also one of those films that helps define a year. It became the presumed front-runner on the day it opened, but then it seemed to fade. Oscars often go to movies that open around November. It's called the Persistence of Memory Effect. Last year's movies(2010) kind of disappointing for me, you imagine the year of 2009 you have Avatar and The Hurt Locker competing side-by-side and The Hurt Locker totally swipe Avatar away from the Oscar. It does shocked me.
OK, here are the few categories I am interested:
Actor in a leading role: Colin Firth for “The King's Speech” is sure going to win, this is no doubt to it. Jeff Bridges for "True Grit"? well maybe not, and although James Franco did a heroic job when he amputating his arm with dull knife in “127 Hours,” I was just too convinced a British fellow with an accent can stammer well and I was into it and inspired by his masterful role as King George VI.
Actress in a leading role: Natalie Portman has emerged as the consensus choice. She is very good in “Black Swan”. It maybe a close race between her and Annette Bening as a lesbian role in "The Kids Are All Right" but she(Portman) gets to act the must stronger, where I am emotiolly into her role where she is full of crazy and ambitious fuelled depression with or without her ballet slippers.
Actor in a supporting role: A failed boxer. A failed actor. A bad bank robber. A bad uncle. A pretty cool sperm donor. But this Academy Awards field for Best Supporting Actor are more likely be a contender between Christian Bale versus Geoffrey Rush or the fail boxer versus the fail actor. I am going to say the fail actor, Geoffrey Rush will win because the year "The King's Speech".
Actress in a supporting role: I just want to say Helena Bonham Carter as the king's wife, mother of Queen Elizabeth II was splendid, as she almost always is, the role wasn't showy. But I have say the newcomer will win Hailee Steinfeld because she's steely in True Grit. Steinfeld is actually, kinda, sorta her movie's lead actress(maybe they don't want her to compete against Natalie Portman).
Directing: Well, here I'm more or less forced to choose Tom Hooper of “The King's Speech” because he won the Directors Guild Award, and you know the mantra: The DGA winner wins the best director Oscar 90% of the time.
Writing (original screenplay): Again, “The King's Speech,” by David Seidler. When a film becomes the chosen one, its glories trickle down, and I expect this to be a royal year.
Writing (adapted screenplay): Here “The Social Network” will win its one major Oscar, although Black Swan' Aaron Sorkin's brilliant dialogue and construction were wholly original deserving more.
Animated feature film: “Toy Story 3". It a close call between "How To Train Your Dragon". “Toy Story 3" is more emotiolly into depth effected me and is a rare sequel that really works.
Cinematography: Roger Deakins has been nominated nine times. This is the year he will win, for the magnificent look and feel of “True Grit.”
Film editing: “The Social Network” was all but brought to life through the skills of Angus Wall and Kirk Baxter, who took a complex group of interlocking plots, events and times, assembled them at breakneck speed and made the sucker play.
Art direction: Tim Burton is famous for the look of his films, and the work by Robert Stromberg and Karen O'Hara was magical in his “Alice in Wonderland.”
Costume design: Any good “Alice” starts with the costumes. Colleen Atwood dressed “Wonderland.”
Makeup: I have to this to "The Way Back" 's Edouard F. Henriques, Gregory Funk and Yolanda Toussieng. Imagine you travel 4000 miles from Siberia to India with hostile terrain that makes your lips crack, leg blister, lack of water, severe starvation. You'll see what you'll imagine.
Music (original score): The most effective score in foreground terms was by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross for “The Social Network” and I would like Hans Zimmer to win but I believe a “King's Speech” year will also sweep up this Oscar, for Alexandre Desplat.
Music (original song): This category has tended to be dominated by animation, and Randy Newman will take home the Oscar for “We Belong Together,” the heartfelt dirge of forgotten playthings in Disney/Pixar's “Toy Story 3.”
Visual effects: Continuing to apply my theory that in the “lesser” categories the winners tend to be the most visible in the most-seen films, I think this is where the sensational film “Inception” wins. It rolled up an entire city.
Sound editing: “Inception,” for its skill in negotiating dreamscapes and levels of reality. Not nominated was “The Social Network,” which juggled all those rapid-fire conversations.
Sound mixing: Also known as “Sound Design,” this is the category that creates the space that our ears sense around characters. I expect the winner to be “The Social Network,” which created intricate conversations in challenging locations like a Silicon Valley club.
