Rex On The State Of The Race
LW’s Oscar specialist Rex Okpodu has surveyed the results from the Venice and Toronto Film Festivals. After the jump, he offers his thoughts on how these fests impacted the upcoming Academy Awards race.
Best Picture:
Little came out of the Toronto Film Festival aside from the fact that although The Social Network did not show there, it was previewed for online critics hence the current buzz. The Social Network is slated to open the upcoming New York Film Festival this Friday.
Ben Affleck’s The Town opened to strong reviews this weekend and its box office is expected to be very good. Whether this goes beyond a strong opening weekend, propelling it to being a likely contender for a best picture nomination will be interesting since this was exactly what increasing the list to 10 was meant to do. For now, I have included it as a likely contender.
Going into the fall, we have the top contenders (in no particular order) for best picture as:
The Social Network
Inception
The King’s Speech
127 Hours
Black Swan
The Kids Are Alright
The other 4 will come from the following:
Toy Story 3
Another Year
Blue Valentine
Conviction
Winter’s Bone
Secretariat
Fair Game
Biutiful
True Grit
The Town
Best Director:
5 nominees from this list:
David Fincher,The Social Network
Danny Boyle, 127 Hours
Tom Hooper, The King’s Speech
Darren Aronofsky, Black Swan
Christopher Nolan, Inception
Doug Liman, Fair Game
Mike Leigh, Another Year
Lisa Cholodenko, The Kid Are All Right
Debra Granik, Winter’s Bone
The Acting Categories:
Sally Hawkins’ and Miranda Richardson’s performances from Made in Dagenham were singled out in Toronto. The former was already on our list and I have included the latter.
There has been some talk about the likelihood of Helena Bonham Carter missing out a nomination because unlike her previous roles, her “King’s Speech” work is very subtle, but I still thinks she might get in as the category is weak this year and “King’s Speech” will definitely be a multiple nomination contender.
“Rabbit Hole” got picked up by Lionsgate and got terrific buzz out of Toronto, bringing Nicole Kidman and possibly, Aaron Eckhart into contention in their respective categories
Best Actor:
5 nominees from this list:
Leonardo Dicaprio – Inception
Colin Firth – The King’s Speech
James Franco – 127 Hours
Ryan Gosling – Blue Valentine
Mark Wahlberg – The Fighter
Sean Penn – Fair Game or Tree of Life
Javier Bardem – Biutiful
Jeff Bridges – True Grit
Best Actress:
5 nominees will emerge from this list:
Annette Bening – The Kids Are Alright
Noomi Rapace – The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
Sally Hawkins – Made in Dagenham
Lesley Manville – Another Year
Anne Hathaway – Love and Other Drugs
Jennifer Lawrence – Winter’s Bone
Nicole Kidman – Rabbit Hole
Michelle Williams – Blue Valentine
Natalie Portman – Blue Swan
Diane Lane – Secretariat
Best Supporting Actor:
5 nominees from:
Geoffrey Rush – The King’s Speech
Vincent Cassel – Black Swan
Christian Bale – The Fighter
Sam Rockwell – Conviction
Mark Ruffalo – The Kids are Alright
Andrew Garfield – The Social Network
Aaron Eckhart – Rabbit Hole
Best Supporting Actress:
5 nominees from:
Mila Kunis – Black Swan
Helena Bonham Carter – The King’s Speech
Julianne Moore – The Kids Are Alright
Miranda Richardson – Made in Dagenham
Melissa Leo – The Fighter
Barbara Hershey – Black Swan
The Screenplays:
Original Screenplay:
5 nominees will come from:
Inception
The Kids Are All Right
Another Year
Black Swan
Blue Valentine
Somewhere
The Conspirator
Everything You’ve Got
Next Three Days
Conviction
Adapted Screenplay:
The 5 nominees will come from:
127 Hours
The Social Network
The King’s Speech
Winter’s Bone
Never Let Me Go
The Town
Toy Story 3
How to Train Your Dragon
True Grit
For Colored Girls
Love and Other Drugs
