In My Humble Opinion

 Neytiri and Jake Tully in "Avatar"
courtesy of 20th Century Fox
“And the Winner Is…….”

In the past few years enthusiasm for the Academy wards has been waning. The ratings for the ABC show are down along with the interest of the general public. In an attempt to perk things up the Academy decided there would be ten nominees for Best Picture this year. They hoped this would allow for some big blockbusters (“Avatar”) and also some audience favorites (“The Blind Side”). It seems to have worked.

This year they also managed to get Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin to co-host. These two men are really funny and should do a great job. The main thing though is to keep the show as short as possible. Since it is on a Sunday night (March 7) there are a lot of us who have to go to work the next morning.

As for Best Picture I think “Avatar” is going to win. It is truly unique visually; it made more money than anything ever; it attracted fairly good critical reviews, and it has the magical name of James “Titanic” Cameron attached. “Hurt Locker” is probably its closest competition but its popularity came too late.

I don’t think James Cameron is going to win as Best Director. That honor will go to Kathryn Bigelow, his ex-wife, for “The Hurt Locker.” Bigelow is only the fourth woman ever nominated for Best Director and she did a smashing job with her film. Plus Cameron’s movies are popular but the man himself isn’t. That “I’m the king of the world” comment when he won for “Titanic” still haunts him.

Popularity will be the key ingredient in the Best Actor Award going to Jeff Bridges. Everybody loves Jeff and though he has been nominated multiple times he has never won. His performance in “Crazy Heart” caps off a career that has included many great performances. His talent, popularity and his aggregate performances should make him a shoo-in.

Popularity should also be enough to bring Sandra Bullock into the winner’s circle as Best Actress. Critics may carp about the entertainment value of “The Blind Side” but audiences ate it up. And they loved Sandy in her role as Leigh Anne Tuohy. She was more than just a funny face in this one. She made you feel her emotions and she won all our hearts. That, I think, means she will also win the Oscar. Besides Meryl Streep, her closest competition, has won enough awards and had enough nominations for a while.

Popularity has nothing to do with my predictions for the Supporting Actor and Actress awards. Mo’Nique doesn’t appear to be the most popular person in Hollywood these days. She doesn’t play the game that Hollywood wants her to play. Still her talent is so substantial and is so much on display as the evil mother in “Precious” that I don’t think she can be denied the award. The only other person I can consider giving her any competition is Maggie Gyllenhaal in “Crazy Heart” and she blossomed too late in this role.

Christoph Waltz has all the buzz going for him in “Inglourious Basterds.” No one knows much about him so they don’t know if he is being himself, so to speak, or acting brilliantly in the film. Audiences and critics alike have decided to go the brilliant route so he should be an easy win. Woody Harrelson seems to be his biggest competitor for “The Messenger” but nobody saw that movie. Plus Harrelson is one of my least favorite actors in any role.

So there we go – Avatar, Kathryn Bigelow, Jeff Bridges, Sandra Bullock, Mo’Nique and Christoph Waltz. It is a good collection of talent and should make for a very interesting show. I’ll be watching on March 7, will you?

  WHAT DO YOU THINK?
 

 

 

 

 

©2009 Jackie K. Cooper

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