The 91st Oscar Lead-Up

Hello and welcome to my long, long, delayed award season coverage. Sorry I haven’t been doing my usual coverage of award season, but I’ve been a little busy. The Oscars are this Sunday, and what better time to start my award season coverage (December or January would have been the ideal time)? I’m going to begin with the ceremony itself. Now as mentioned in a previous blog, there is no host. Ever since they decided to go hostless, the ceremony has been plagued with some other minor issues and poor decisions. First of all, in an effort to save time, they decided to only perform 2 out of the 5 best song nominees. That decision immediately came under fire with the Academy’s music branch and some people online. They have since backtracked and they will be performing all the nominees. But in my opinion I can understand the Academy’s decision to only perform two, because performing all of them is a bit much. However, allowing only two is a bit unfair - you either need to do ALL or NONE. They did not ask the acting winners from last year to present the award this year - as is tradition. Allison Janney said she was heartbroken about the decision - thus enraging the internet.The Academy backtracked yet again and invited all four of last year’s acting winners. Perhaps most irritating of all, if you remember the old Best Popular Film category, in that announcement they also announced there will be categories that will be presented during commercial breaks. They were going to be Live Action Short, Makeup and Hair, and Editing and Cinematography. Just to let you know, editing and cinematography are artforms that are unique to cinema. You wouldn’t have a movie without them. If you did not have editing and cinematography, you would only have a play (for the record - I have nothing against theater). Most people agree with me as the membership of the Academy freaked out along with the guilds.  Aside from the potential of a lackluster ceremony based on the decisions and walk-backs of the Academy, the races this year are some of the most fascinating and nail-biting in a long time. And I will be predicting all 24 categories, so I can tell you what to put in your Oscar pool.

Best Animated Feature: 

I have seen all but one of the nominees. Based on my personal opinion,
Spiderman- Into the Spider-Verse should win the Oscar and it will probably win
the Oscar. Spiderman will probably win the Oscar because it won the Golden
Globe, Critics’ Choice Award, BAFTA, Producers’ Guild, and all 7 Annies it was
up for. I am a little leary of The Incredibles 2 because it was a traditional and
good movie and the Academy often likes to award Disney and Pixar.

Best Supporting Actor:

Mahershala Ali (Green Book) has this in the bag. He has won the Golden Globe,
the BAFTA, the SAG, and the Critics’ Choice Award. There’s a chance for Sam
Elliott or Richard E. Grant (for A Star is Born and Can you Ever Forgive Me,  respectively). 

Foreign Language Film: 

Roma is a lock. Enough Said.

Best Editing:
Bohemian Rhapsody will probably win. There’s a small chance Vice could take it
out. Bohemian Rhapsody was basically saved in the editing bay.

Best Visual Effects:

Avengers Infinity Wars will probably take it, but this is a very tough category to
predict. There’s room for an upset from Ready Player One and First Man. Solo
and Christopher Robin don’t have much of a chance of winning so your options
are Avengers, Ready Player One and First Man.

Best Makeup and Hair:
Vice is pretty much a lock, just look at pictures of Christian Bale as Dick Cheney
and compare Christian Bale to the way he normally looks. Vice is easily going to
take it.

Best Supporting Actress:
This category is one of the toughest to predict. I have Rachel Weisz (the favorite) 

winning. Most people have Regina King (If Beale Street Could Talk) winning.
This race is eerily similar to the Sylvester Stallone and Mark Rylance race from a
couple years back, where if you don’t know (long-time readers of my blog will
probably remember the race, but new readers probably won’t), Sylvester
Stallone’s performance in Creed was winning every award he was nominated for.
However, he was not nominated for SAG or BAFTA. SAG went for Idras Elba,
who was not nominated for the Oscar, and BAFTA went for Rylance. At the
Oscar’s, Rylance pulled out a surprise upset. This year Regina King was not
nominated at SAG or BAFTA. SAG went for Emily Blunt (A Quiet Place) and
BAFTA went for Rachel Weisz. Blunt is also not nominated for an Oscar either.
So based on the similarity between Rylance and Stallone, it is very likely that Regina King will lose this also to Rachel Weisz.

Best Cinematography:

Roma is pretty much a lock. There is a small possibility of an upset from Cold 

War. Cold War is nominated for 3 Oscars. One is Best Director, but I see this as
the only category it could win.

Best Documentary Feature:
I am going with RBG only because of the political climate. The Academy might  want to make a statement and throw their support to Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
There’s a 49% chance that Free Solo could be an upset. Even though I have not
seen it, it does seem like more of a cinematic achievement. I have seen RBG,
and it’s an awesome documentary.

Best Score:
I’m going with If Beale Street Could Talk on this one. The composer, Nicholas
Britell was previously nominated for Moonlight, but he lost to Justin Gabriel
Hurwitz who did First Man this year and won the Golden Globe but is nowhere to
be seen on this list. This category could have any number of winners.

Sound Editing and Sound Mixing:
I hedging my bets and predicting Bohemian Rhapsody for both. This movie is
virtually a lock for sound mixing, however, sound editing gives us a major
possibility A Quiet Place (and it’s not nominated for Sound Mixing).

Best Original Screenplay:
t’s basically a two-way race between The Favorite and Green Book. The
Writers’ Guild gave us zero help in this category because they gave this
to Eighth Grade (which, in the biggest SNUB of the year, didn’t get any
nominations). It’s a very close call, but my gut says Green Book will win. 

Best Live Action Short:
This one is probably one of the toughest one to predict. I have barely any idea
who’s going to win, but my gut says Fauve, but any one of the nominees could
take it.

Best Costume Design:
Black Panther MAY pull this one out, but The Favorite is the big costume-period
drama that the voters seem to like in this category.

Best Actress: 

Glenn Close (The Wife) seems to be a lock for her very first Oscar. There’s a 

potential for an by Lady GaGa (A Star is Born) or Olivia Colman (The Favorite).

Best Song:
Shallow from A Star is Born will easily take it and give Lady GaGa an Oscar

Best Director:
Alfonso Cauron  is pretty much the favorite for Roma  . This will be
his second Oscar. He won his first for Gravity.

Best Production Design:
I am predicting Black Panther here, but The Favorite could very easily pull off
an upset.

Best Animated Short:
I am predicting One Small Step though Pixar’s Bao has a very good shot at
winning as well. Any of the others could also take it.

Best Adapted Screenplay:
BlackkKlansman will probably take it and give Spike Lee his first competitive
Oscar. I am leery of only because Can You Ever Forgive Me? because it won the Writers’ Guild.

Best Actor:
Rami Malek (Bohemian Rhapsody) is pretty much a lock. There is a small chance of an upset by Christian Bale (Vice)

Best Documentary Short:
I have actually seen all of the shorts nominated here. My personal favorite is
is End Game (not to be confused with the new Avengers movie coming out). And
I think it will win because it is directed by two-time winner Robert Epstein. Period. End of Sentence could pull off an upset because Lisa Taback, who is a former Harvey Weinstein associate, is now working for Netflix and has a very strong campaign for this movie (I believe she is also running the campaign for Roma).

Best Picture:
I have basically absolutely no idea who is going to take this. You can make the
case for five of them. BlacKkKlansman, Black Panther, Green Book, Roma, and
The Favorite are all legitimate contenders with a thin argument for A Star is
Born. From the research, your safest bet is Roma or Green Book. However, I
currently have BlacKkKlansman winning due to the fact it has directing and editing nods which are key to winning best picture. It was also nominated for SAG
Ensemble (their version of Best Picture) which usually catapults that film into

The Best Picture. The Shape of Water broke that tradition last year. On a
side-note, Black Panther won Ensemble this year.
With the preferential ballot, there are very few people that had a visceral reaction to BlacKkKlansman, so  they could have rated it highly. Any of those five could take it, and this
prediction could change many times between now and Oscar night.

Well, Oscar night is this Sunday. I beg you to give the Academy what they want - ratings, so we never need to hear about the best popular film or them removing categories from their broadcast again. There is still time to vote in my end of the year poll as well as the runoff for last year’s poll. You will find details in the events section in my blog. Due to a low number of submissions, I have extended the deadline to March 5. Goodnight, and Bee Happy!™ 

Mr.Bee 


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