Vince's Journey

So I'm just about to head out the door and get on the road to St. Louis with the family. we are going to visit Aaron and see The Book of Mormon tomorrow. Should be a fun trip - with Aaron scheduled to graduate in May this may be one of our final trips to the Gateway to the West - at least for a while. I put my Academy Award predictions up on another site and thought I'd cut and paste them for your reading pleasure. I also started to put them on Facebook but didn't have the time to finish - so Facebook readers, here are the rest of my predictions. we enjoy watching movies at home and the Academy Awards show is like another holiday...so have a great weekend and I'll check back in on Monday to recap the Oscars, the Book of Mormon and anything else that might be going on.... Here are my predictions for Sunday night - similar to the annual bowl contest, I'm doing in order from most confident to least confident....here we go.... Best Supporting Actress Sally Field, Lincoln Jackie Weaver, Silver Linings Playbook Anne Hathaway, Les Miserables Amy Adams, The Master Helen Hunt, The Sessions I think this one is a slam dunk. I'll be shocked if anyone but Anne Hathaway walks away with this one. She has won every other Best Supporting Actress Award this season and the Academy loves an actress who sings. Couple that with the fact she cut all her hair off on-screen and you have the supporting actress moment of the year. Only on screen for 18 minutes, her acceptance speech will probably be longer!! Best Actor Joaquin Phoenix, The Master Bradley Cooper, Silver Linings Playbook Hugh Jackman, Les Miserables Daniel Day Lewis, Lincoln Denzel Washington, Flight I think this one is probably a safe bet, too, but there are a couple variables that leave a crack for someone else to walk away with the Oscar. First, no actor has ever won 3 Best Actor Awards...Nicholson has 3 but one of his was a supporting award, Walter Brennan has 3 and ALL of his were supporting. Tracey has 2, Hoffman has 2, Brando has 2, Penn has 2...no one has 3. In addition, while 4 have been nominated (Raymond Massey, Anthony Hopkins, Frank Langella and Alexander Knox) no actor has ever won for playing an American president. I think Day Lewis's performance was the best of the year but is the academy ready to do something historic that the names mentioned above were not able to achieve. I think they should but I dont have a vote. If someone does sneak by Day Lewis, I think it will be Hugh Jackman...and a HUGE mistake. Best Picture Argo Silver Linings Playbook Lincoln Zero Dark Thirty Les Miserables Django Unchained Beasts of the Southern Wild Life of Pi Amour I've listed these in my order of preference. I have not seen Amour. I truly believe Argo was the best movie of the year. The trouble is, Ben Affleck did not receive a Best Director nomination. The last time a film won Best Picture without picking up a Best Director nomination was 1989 when Driving Miss Daisy won. That was 24 years ago. Ironically, Affleck has won Best Director at just about every other award show and Argo has swept every other best picture award. Given that Affleck is also a producer on the film, I think he'll get the last laugh when they call Argo as best picture about 1:15 am Sunday night/Monday morning. If Argo isn't the winner - I think any of my top 5 could win...if Amour wins I may quit watching the Oscars. Best Actress Emmanuelle Riva, Amour Jessica Chastain, Zero Dark Thirty Jennifer Lawrence, Silver Linings Playbook Naomi Watts, The Impossible Quvenzhane Wallis, Beasts of the Southern Wild Whlie she was pretty amazing for a 5 year old girl, Quvenzhane Wallis is just too young to win Best Actress - besides, I can't e and Nven pronounce her first name! Naomi Watts is just along for a great seat at the show. That leaves Chastain, Riva and Lawrence. Lawrence is the youngest actress ever to be nominated for 2 best actress awards - she is only 22. Riva is the oldest actress ever nominated at 85 (and Wallis is the youngest). I've picked Lawrence from the beginning, her performance was the heart of the movie and if they are going to recognize anything about SLP, it should be her. But I have a gut feeling that says the Academy is going to go with Riva. She appears to be gaining momentum based on her win at the BAFTA's. I hope I'm wrong and Lawrence gets the award but the Academy has a history of awarding foreign language roles and it would not be a shock if Riva wins. I'm still going with Lawrence, though. Best Supporting Actor Alan Arkin, Argo Robert DeNiro, Silver Linings Playbook Tommy Lee Jones, Lincoln Christoph Waltz, Django Unchained Phillip Seymour Hoffman, The Master I could see any of these guys winning and they've all won before. The leaders appear to be Waltz and Jones - they have been the one's recognized at previous award shows. I'd like to see Robert DeNiro win - it's been over 20 years since his last nomination. And I thought Arkin stole the show in Argo. Hoffman would appear to be the guy destined for fifth place. So who wins, it's just a guess but I'm going to say Tommy Lee Jones for Lincoln. Waltz played a similar type a role just a few years ago in Inglourious Basterds and won and personally I thought his role was more of a lead actor - he was on screen almost the entire film. So it's between Jones and Waltz but DeNiro or Arkin would be a pleasant surprise. Best Director Michael Haneke, Amour Steven Spielberg, Lincoln Benh Zeitlin, Beasts of the Southern Wild Ang Lee, Life of Pi David O. Russell, Silver Linings Playbook The person who should win, Ben Affleck, is not nominated. And there's something about all of the above that suggests they could win...Amour is making a late surge with Riva so perhaps that plays into Haneke's hands, Ang Lee is an Academy favorite having won before for Brokeback Mountain, Zeitlin coaxed some brilliant performances out of relative amateurs and his film was the art house favorite, Russell made a brilliant comedy about an entire cast of people suffering from mental illnesses and Spielberg brought one of America's greatest political icons to life in Lincoln. It would have been a lot easier had they nominated Affleck but I'm going to go with Spielberg to win with Michael Haneke being the most likely to pull the upset. We'll see how it goes Sunday night!