You already knew this, but you may have never thought of it in these terms, but should Avatar win Best Picture it will obviously be the highest grossing film to ever take the top honor at the Academy Awards. At the same time, should The Hurt Locker take home the prize it will be the lowest grossing Oscar Best Picture winner.
Strangely enough, even though The Hurt Locker‘s box-office gross was so low I don’t hear many people complaining about not having seen it. It’s been on DVD and Blu-ray since January, which is most likely the reason, and while I have seen some commenters saying they don’t think it deserves to win Best Picture, I haven’t seen many people actively disliking it. It’s a strange year for Oscar when the two Best Picture front-runners are films audiences seem to have legitimately enjoyed. And the current third film in the race, Inglourious Basterds, just happens to be Tarantino’s all-time highest grossing film and another feature I think I can safely say at least the majority of people that saw it, at the very least least, didn’t hate it.
So what’s your pick? Are you firm in your predictions for Best Picture, Actor, Actress, Director, Cinematography, Costumes, etc.? Yes? No? Either way I am here to help you make up your mind.
Once again I present the Oscar Overture, a late season addition to my Oscar Updates and a feature that will be prominently featured in the run up to the 2011 Oscars. For now it is miniaturized and I have had to remove the Los Angeles, New York and Chicago Film Critic Associations to make way for the addition of the Costume Designers Guild and the Visual Effects Society in today’s update. I have also added the winners of the American Society of Cinematographers and the Cinema Audio Society as they were announced over the weekend and not yet available last week.
The Oscar Overture gives you a chance to look over the specific guilds and associations and how they voted to help you predict each category, or at least get a grasp on each category and sound much smarter at whatever Oscar party you may be attending. Or even if you are just sitting at home reading my live blog of the events this Sunday night.
So, without further chatter, check out the 16 guilds and associations below. I have added a couple of necessary notesat the bottom to help sort out any confusion.
As of right now, if you would like to see how specific critic groups voted you can click here and check out our critical round-up, but that too will be getting the upgrade next year in an effort to make it far more user friendly.
Next is when I typically begin giving you my updated predictions, but not today. I have sent in my final predictions for Best Picture, Actress, Actor, Supporting Actress and Actor, Director and both Screenplay categories to The Envelope at the Los Angeles Times, but they haven’t updated their list yet. As for the rest of the categories I will be listing my final predictions on Thursday, March 4.
I am doing this because starting tomorrow I will be asking for your predictions in all 24 Oscar categories, just like last year and I don’t want to sway voters in any way… at least not for the first 24 hours. After all, my opinion is slathered all over the site, if you wanted it you most likely already got it.
So say what you will in the comments, let your thoughts be known and be prepared, tomorrow is Judgment Day.
