A Pinoy Blog About Nothing

UPDATE 8:25 PM Ang Lee won for Best Director for Brokeback Mountain, Crash won for Best Motion Picture.

In a few hours they’re announcing the winners of the 78th Academy Awards and is in the past years (2001, 2002, 2004, 2005), I try to guess who the Academy picks to get the Oscar. Why? Wala lang. Often they don’t exactly give it to the best performances of the year but something more like a ‘career achievement’ award. Denzel Washington’s Oscar comes to mind. Training Day was a good movie but not Washington’s best. And of course there’s Titanic.

Also this year, we see the first Filipino to be nominated for an Oscar: Pia Clemente, along with Rob Pearlstein, for “Our Time Is Up” in the Best Live Action Short Film category.

And so, my picks this year (and a bonus Oscar Drinking Game for you):

UPDATE 8:16 PM Brokeback Mountain won for Best Adapted Screenplay, Crash won for Best Original Screenplay.
UPDATE 8:03 PM Reese Witherspoon just won Best Actress for Walk the Line. Memoirs of a Geisha won for Cinematography.
UPDATE 7:49 PM Hillary Swank just gave the Best Actor Oscar to Philip Seymour Hoffman for Capote. Best Foreign Language Film of the Year is South Africa’s Tsotsi and Crash won for Best Achievement in Editing.
UPDATE 7:33 PM The King Kong team just got another Oscar for Best Achievement in Sound Editing and another one for Sound Mixing. “It’s Hard Out Here For a Pimp” from Hustle and Flow won for Original Song.
UPDATE 6:53 PM March of the Penguins won for Best Documentary and A Note of Triumph for Best Short Documentary. Memoirs of a Geisha won for Best Achievement in Art Direction and Gustavo Santaolalla for Brokeback Mountain for Best Original Score.
UPDATE 6:09 PM Steve Carrell and Will Ferell presented the Best Makeup category. Funny bit. Chronicles of Narnia won. Morgan Freeman just gave the Oscar for Supporting Actress to Rachel Weisz.
UPDATE 5:57 PM Owen and Luke Wilson awarded the Oscars for Best Short Film, which went to Six Shooter beating out Our Time is Up. Chicken Little and Abby Mallard awarded Best Short Film, Animated to The Moon and the Son. Memoirs of a Geisha won for Best Costume Design.
UPDATE 5:43 PM Reese Witherspoon just gave Best Animated Feature to Wallace & Gromit. Ben Stiller gave the Oscar to Best Visual Effects to the King Kong team. Dolly Parton is apparently still alive. She gave a rousing performance of the theme from Transamerica.
UPDATE 5:25 PM Nicole Kidman just gave the Best Supporting Oscar to George Clooney for Syriana. Nice speech.
UPDATE 5:18 PM Oscars has a nice OBB this year. Jon Stewart pulls off the opening quite nicely.

Performance by an actress in a supporting role

Amy Adams in “Junebug”
Catherine Keener in “Capote”
Frances McDormand in “North Country”
Rachel Weisz in “The Constant Gardener”
Michelle Williams in “Brokeback Mountain”

Who’ll win it: Rachel Weisz
Who should get it: Rachel Weisz
While Frances McDormand is a veteran actress and has won an Oscar for Fargo, and Catherine Keener is also getting better roles in the past few years it’ll be Rachel Weisz’s crusader from The Constant Gardener who’ll clinch it. She’s been picking up that award from other award giving bodies and she has the momentum going for her.

Performance by an actor in a supporting role

George Clooney in “Syriana”
Matt Dillon in “Crash”
Paul Giamatti in “Cinderella Man”
Jake Gyllenhaal in “Brokeback Mountain”
William Hurt in “A History of Violence”

Who’ll win it: Matt Dillon
Who should get it: Jake Gyllenhaal
Like Weisz, Dillon has the momentum going for her. I think Dillon wasn’t able to pull the nuance needed for his character in Crash. It needed to be sympathetic but he there was just something lacking there. Gyllenhaal (and Heath Ledger’s) performance in Brokeback Mountain is something which should be applauded although the subject matter might be too hot to handle for the normally conservative Academy.

Performance by an actress in a leading role

Judi Dench in “Mrs. Henderson Presents”
Felicity Huffman in “Transamerica”
Keira Knightley in “Pride & Prejudice”
Charlize Theron in “North Country”
Reese Witherspoon in “Walk the Line”

Who’ll win it: Felicity Huffman
Who should get it: Felicity Huffman
While Witherspoon stood out in Walk the Line, the movie’s lack of impact might diminish her chances. Again, the momentum is on Huffman’s side and she might be on top of the voter’s minds. I don’t think it’s time yet for Knightley for an Oscar and Theron already got her statuette.

Performance by an actor in a leading role

Philip Seymour Hoffman in “Capote”
Terrence Howard in “Hustle & Flow”
Heath Ledger in “Brokeback Mountain”
Joaquin Phoenix in “Walk the Line”
David Strathairn in “Good Night, and Good Luck.”

Who’ll win it: Philip Seymour Hoffman
Who should get it: Philip Seymour Hoffman
Hoffman is due. Although I found the movie a bit one-note, Hoffman did an awesome performance. Phoenix still has better perfomances in him so this might not be it for him just yet.

Achievement in directing

Ang Lee for “Brokeback Mountain”
Bennett Miller for”Capote”
Paul Haggis for “Crash”
George Clooney for “Good Night, and Good Luck.”
Steven Spielberg for “Munich”

Who’ll win it: Ang Lee
Who should get it: Ang Lee
While Spielberg did a good job in Munich, it wasn’t on the level of Schindler’s List. Of the movies nominated, Lee’s Brokeback was most beautifully shot, working with Canadian vistas to stand in for the wilds of Wyoming. Lee also got pretty good performances from his actors.

Best motion picture of the year

“Brokeback Mountain”
“Capote”
“Crash”
“Good Night, and Good Luck.”
“Munich”

Who’ll win it: Crash
Who should get it: Brokeback Mountain
Normally, whoever gets the best director award also gets the best picture. Probably not this year. While I think Brokeback is a far superior movie as a whole, Crash’s theme is less controversial. Munich is also a dark horse to win since it’s the only big studio production in the lot composed of independently-produced movies

Bonus pick:
Best animated feature film of the year

“Howl’s Moving Castle” by Hayao Miyazaki
“Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride” by Tim Burton and Mike Johnson
“Wallace & Gromit in the Curse of the Were-Rabbit” by Nick Park and Steve Box

I’d love to see Miyazaki win this one although Howl isn’t his best. Wallace & Gromit might walk away with it.

The Oscars Drinking Game:

For everytime host Jon Stewart mentions Bush take a shot. Two shots if mentioned in the same breath as the war in Iraq.
For everytime host Jon Stewart mentions Cheney take a shot. Two shots if mentioned in the same breath as his shooting accident.
For everytime anyone makes a joke about Brokeback Mountain’s gay cowboys, take a shot.
For everytime a winner says thank you to their agent, take a shot.
For everytime a winner says ‘I wasn’t expecting this’, take a shot.
For everytime a winner gets takes too long in their thank you speech and gets played out by the orchestra, take a shot.