Paramount has just thrown an interesting little wrench in the Oscar works and added yet another title to the Christmas Day release slate by announcing Ava Duvernay‘s Selma — the story of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s historic struggle to secure voting rights for all people — will have a limited release in the U.S. on Christmas day and will open wide on January 9, 2015. Considering I haven’t updated my Best Picture Oscar predictions since May 5, it makes sense now is as good a time as any to shuffle the ranks.
Of course, one of the most difficult thing about predicting so early are the number of films I haven’t seen, those that have been seen (but I haven’t seen) and those I have seen and then doing my best to sort through my personal bias and trying to come to some conclusion as to how I think the Academy will vote. That said, for now I have to stick to my previous #1 pick, that being Angelina Jolie‘s Unbroken. It’s positioned as a major Oscar player and Universal is preparing for a massive push this awards season, a push that, in many ways, has already begun.
My #2 remains the same as well with Bennett Miller‘s Foxcatcher, but the described dark nature of this one gives me a little bit of doubt as to its chances to win the whole thing. However, many of the possible, and potentially lighter players in the game that are stacked up behind it, haven’t been seen just yet, which is why it remains here at #2.
From there it goes like this:
- Wild (dir. Jean-Marc Vallée)
- Trash (dir. Stephen Daldry)
- A Most Violent Year (dir. J.C. Chandor)
- Selma (dir. Ava DuVernay)
- Boyhood (dir. Richard Linklater)
- Interstellar (dir. Christopher Nolan)
- The Grand Budapest Hotel (dir. Wes Anderson)
I know what some of you are yelling, “What about Tim Burton‘s Big Eyes?!?!” and “What about Birdman?!?!” and “You do realize Paul Thomas Anderson has Inherent Vice coming right??!?!” and “You’re an idiot Brad, predicting the Oscars before you’ve seen the movies is so dumb! I only clicked on the headline because I hate myself.” All valid statements, but there are only so many slots and it’s a matter of seen vs. unseen, due vs. too new, comedy vs. drama, etc., etc.
I will say my one big reason for not including Birdman among the nominees right now, which I’m sure will be the one prediction most will disagree with, especially over Grand Budapest, is because it’s described as a dark comedy. Comedy in general has a hard time getting a nomination, and a dark comedy sounds like it would have an even harder time. Oh, and don’t give me the “quality” argument, as we know, quality is not a huge determining factor at the Oscars.
The inclusion of Grand Budapest is due to the omission of Moonrise Kingdom from the 2012 Best Picture field and due to the response it has received, many considering it Anderson’s best. Obviously its release date is a problem and if I were betting I would probably bet it wouldn’t make the field at the end of the year, but it is Fox Searchlight and hopefully they have a trick or two up their sleeves.
A lot of factors obviously go into a film getting an Oscar nomination and I’m sure you can rattle off a multitude of reasons as to why my list is wrong — “IFC won’t give Boyhood the support it needs, it will get a lot of Spirit Awards though” and “Grand Budapest came out too early in the year.” Again, all fair statements and don’t think I haven’t considered them because I obviously have based on the sentence right before this one.
But it’s a long race and, to be honest, this early in the race I sort of like pushing some of the films I particularly believe to be the best the year has to offer. As I’ve written in the past, I don’t think I’ll see a movie better than Boyhood the rest of this year. Does that mean it will win an Oscar? Most likely not, and I won’t be surprised if it isn’t nominated either. That’s not on me, that’s on the Academy, but it’s also proof logical arguments or arguments of any sort always have a perfectly reasonable counter argument when it comes to Oscar predicting, especially this early in the game.
That said, please don’t be shy about sharing your arguments in the comments below. I would love to be swayed one way or another so tell me what you think will make the cut and what won’t and your reasoning behind your choices.
You can find my full field of all 28 contenders right here, I’ll be updating additional categories shortly in light of the Selma announcement.
