academy award nominations
Now that the Academy Awards have been handed out, pundits have already started speculating about next year's Oscars.
As expected with any awards ceremony, the Oscars featured a plethora of surprises in such major categories as Best Picture and Best Actress.
The Best Picture award went to "Argo." The film won three awards including Best Editing and Best Adapted Screenplay.
On Feb. 24 the 85th Annual Academy Awards will be held at the Dolby Theatre.
The biggest television event of Hollywood takes place tonight when the Academy Awards are presented on ABC.
Oscar night is upon us. The votes are in, the stars have already picked their dresses and all that remains to be seen is whether or not the prognosticators and precursors made the correct picks.
The Best Actor Category is by far one of the easiest races to predict this year. One actor has swept virtually every award leaving no room for surprises. Past winners in this category are Jean Dujardin (The Artist), Colin Firth (The King's Speech), Jeff Bridges (Crazy Heart), Sean Penn (Milk), and Daniel Day Lewis (There Will be Blood).
On Feb. 15 the Academy Award nominated film "No" will be released in New York and Los Angeles. The Film stars Mexican actor Gael Garcia Bernal.
"Amour" represents the biggest surprise in the Best Picture Category. The Michael Haneke directed film received five nominations for the Academy Awards.
The Best Actress race has always been one of the most contentious categories in Oscar history as there are usually two front runners in the race. In 2012 Meryl Streep and Viola Davis split the critics and awards organizations and in 2010 Meryl Streep battled with Sandra Bullock. Other examples include the 2009 contest between Meryl Streep and Kate Winslet and the 2008 race featuring Marion Cotillard and Julie Christie. The ultimate winner was always the actress portraying a real life person or the winner of the BAFTA award. This year, three actresses have split pundits, critics' circles, and awards ceremonies.
A Connecticut congressman has a bone to pick with Steven Spielberg over his 12-time Oscar nominated film, "Lincoln."
Not too long ago, pundits expected Steven Spielberg's "Lincoln" to runaway with the Oscars. The film was nominated for 12 Academy Awards including the essential Editing, Director, and Best Picture nods. The director nomination was the major key to "Lincoln's" race as other front-runners "Zero Dark Thirty" and "Argo" were ignored in this race. However, "Lincoln" has not picked up the steam it was expected to garner and its chances of winning the Best Picture Oscar are looking increasingly slim.
The Best Makeup and Hairstyling award has been one of the most unpredictable awards to date, as there are barely any precursor awards. The academy usually picks the best makeup based on how much prosthetics are used throughout film and they never go for subtle makeup. The category also remains the only race in the awards to only chose three nominees. Previous winners include "The Iron Lady," "The Wolfman," "Star Trek," and "The Curious case of Benjamin Button."
The cinematography category has changed over the past three years as big Hollywood films have dominated the award. The accolade recognizes the exceptional camera work in a film. The Academy used to recognize art films like “Slumdog Millionaire,” “There will Be Blood” and “Pan’s Labyrinth.” However, recently it has swayed towards bigger films “Avatar,” “Hugo,” and “Inception.” Additionally, the past five winners in the category were nominated for Best Picture. As a result out of the nominees it seems that only three films have a chance of winning the category.
After Ben Affleck won his second major Best Director award this past Sunday at the Golden Globes, the press started questioning how it was possible that the Academy Awards ignored the thespian? Many of them suggested a write-in vote for the actor-turned-director.
