Oscars: Heart and Mind Picks
The Golden Globes do one thing perfectly year in and year out; they encourage winners for films in a specific category. The Emmys sometimes get the nominations miscategorized between comedy and drama but they also encourage more winners. The Oscars encouraged more nominations for the Best Picture statuette but what they have really done is create the possibility for more losers. It would be ideal if the Oscars took the longtime lead of the Golden Globes and categorized them into comedy and musical and drama. But, they haven’t and they probably won’t. Change is hard to introduce to a membership that feels like they have the best awards year after year.
So, sometimes there are a few closely contested races and if we use last years nominees as an example “Lincoln” seemed to be the favorite going in and Ang Lee won Best Director for “Life of Pi” and “Argo” due to tremendous momentum coasted to a win and may have been the result of Ben Affleck’s glaring snub for director.
This year there is a familiar tone to the race. I believe it’s a four horse race with the possibility of an upset between the following films: “12 Years a Slave,” “Gravity,” “American Hustle” and the momentum film and latest released “The Wolf of Wall Street.” “Dallas Buyers Club” is a film that may have won any other year and “Frozen” should have been nominated and may not win its animated category.
“12 Years a Slave” was a tremendously amazing film to watch in quiet horror in a dark theatre but what it did for me was beg the question: “Was it better than last year’s “Django Unchained?” I don’t think so. “Gravity” seemed more real than the footage shown of actual space missions and it was such a groundbreaking film technically it will earn its place in Hollywood history but at an hour and a half was it too short for its own good? David O. Russell will win an Oscar someday it just may not be this year. The film was an epic’s length and it was another back to back Oscar trivia answer for at least one nomination in all the major categories which hadn’t been done since Warren Beatty’s “Reds” in 1981 and Mr. Russell is an actors director and that should mean more than it does at Oscar time. However, the elephant in the room is the momentum of “The Wolf of Wall Street.” Martin Scorsese is going to be remembered for directing some of the best films in American history about American periods of history. His lone win for “The Departed” a film unworthy of a second look compared to : “Raging Bull,” “Good Fellas,” “Taxi Driver” and “The Aviator” to name a few. ‘Wolf’ captured the time period it was about perfectly. It is a long film and does have nudity and curse words but the core of the picture was the accurate depiction of American greed and I wish people had been more mindful of the times and loosened up a little.
My heart picks “The Wolf of Wall Street” and my head picks “Gravity.”
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