82nd Academy Awards (Oscar Predictions) February 23, 2010

I’ve put this off for a while for a few reasons, the first of which is: This will be a damn weird year. There are ten Best Picture nominees, but also there is a weighted ballot system (rank your films from 1 to 10, as opposed to check your favorite and that’s it). Plus, I’m in Korea so it is unlikely I will be able to watch the Oscars live, so I may as well have some fun with my predictions this year.

It’s also a weird year because the movie winning most of the awards if ‘The Hurt Locker’, which made practically zero money, and the movie winning almost no big awards, ‘Avatar’, made the most money ever. Here’s a rundown of what I think will win and what I would vote for.

Best Picture
Prediction: The Hurt Locker
My pick: Avatar

There are plenty of good movies, but everything nominated has flaws. I’ve listed them elsewhere so I won’t retype them here. ‘Avatar’ deserves to win because it was the most seen movie of the year, by far, and it will be remembered (by some, spitefully) many years from now. I do have a feeling, though, that ‘Inglourious Basterds’ may be closer to the top prize than most think….

Best Director
Prediction: Kathryn Bigelow (for ‘The Hurt Locker’)
My pick: Kathryn Bigelow

She deserves it, she was the best director of the year, give her the Oscar.

The Hurt Locker December 21, 2009

There is plenty of finesse in the way ‘The Hurt Locker‘ unfolds. Superficially, it is merely a string of anecdotes about bombs; however, our commitment to Sgt. Sanborn and SSgt. James intensifies everything so much that we feel like we’re part of their Company.

Sanborn is all about the rules, and James is all about the adrenaline. Putting opposites on the same team is not a new story-telling technique, but the execution of this particular story is what makes it so good. People get into trouble. People die. James and Sanborn brawl while drunk and hit each other nearly hard enough to break some ribs. This is gritty and the characters have some problems, yes, but when put in front of a bomb, James is nothing but the best. His methods, however unorthodox, work.