Watching all the
Movies nominated for the Top Oscar Awards as a tradition started in 2011, I
followed it up in 2012 and continued this year as well. But this year there was
a major difference – I had watched majority of the movies even before the
nominations were announced & that was heartening to see! Thanks to being in
Kuwait where almost all
major Hollywood movie release simultaneously with the US!
2012 was another
tremendous year for Hollywood;
many brilliant movies were released and many of them made mind-boggling amount
of money! Most notably The Dark Knight Rises, Skyfall and The Avengers – all 3
made it to the Billion Dollar Club and The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey wasn’t
too far behind (made 956 Million USD!) 2012 has the record for the most number
of films making it to the top 50 with eight films, breaking 2009's record of
seven films. It has also tied the record of 2011 for the most number of films
crossing the $1 billion mark, with three films, and has beaten its record for
the most number of films earning more than $500 million, with thirteen films.
It is the only year to have all the top 10 highest-grossing films earn more
than $600 million worldwide.
The James Bond
series celebrated its 50th anniversary, Spielberg made a Biopic, Tarantino was
back & how, Affleck once again proved he is a Master Class director, Kathryn
Bigelow was back with another War thriller, Les Misérables was made again
(yawn!), David O. Russell was back after “The Fighter”, Jennifer Lawrence
proved that she is one of the finest actresses of this generation, De Niro got
ANOTHER Oscar Nomination and Meryl Streep didn’t get any (now that’s BIG)!, Daniel
Day-Lewis looks strong for his 3rd Oscar & would join a very
special club, Ang Lee shows his class & splendid range again with the
awe-inspiring Life of Pi, Six box-office blockbusters from previous years
(Beauty and the Beast, Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace, Titanic,
Raiders of the Lost Ark, Finding Nemo, and Monsters, Inc.) were re-released in
3D and/or IMAX.
I finally
finished this selection yesterday when I watched the last 2 pending ones –
Frankenweenie & Wreck-It Ralph (both nominated for the “Best Animated
Feature” Oscar)
Some snippets
from this year’s Oscar Nominations –
The interesting
ones to begin with:
- Film with Maximum nominations - Lincoln with 12 followed by Life of Pi (11) and Les Misérables and Silver Linings Playbook (8 each)
- Amour (French) became the first
film in twelve years to be nominated for both Best Picture and Best
Foreign Language Film; the last film to do so was Crouching Tiger, Hidden
Dragon (Mandarin) in 2000
- Emmanuelle Riva, at 85, became the
oldest nominee in the Best Actress category for the film Amour
- Quvenzhané Wallis, at age 9,
became the youngest nominated actress in the Best Actress category for the
film Beasts of the Southern Wild
- Jennifer Lawrence (for Silver
Linings Playbook), at 22, became the youngest Best Actress two-time
nominee, having previously been nominated in 2010 for Winter's Bone.
- Silver Linings Playbook became the
first film in 31 years to receive nominations in all four acting
categories; the last film to do so was Reds in 1981.
- Silver Linings Playbook also
became the first film in eight years to be nominated in the "Big
Five" categories; the last film to do so was Million Dollar Baby in
the 2004.
- For the first time in the history
of the awards, the Best Supporting Actor category consists only of
previous winners. Alan Arkin, Tommy Lee Jones, and Christoph Waltz have
each won Best Supporting Actor; Phillip Seymour Hoffman has won Best
Actor; and Robert De Niro has won in both award categories.
And now the
misses:
- The most controversial and the
most talked about is Ben Affleck not getting nominated for the “Best
Director” Oscar; every other award ceremony leading has awarded
Affleck. Maybe because the Oscars won’t & can't.
- Surprisingly and shockingly Wes
Anderson, Quentin Tarantino and Kathryn Bigelow: Not nominated for Moonrise Kingdom, Django Unchained and Zero
Dark Thirty respectively
- I was disappointed not to find
“The Dark Knight Rises”, “Moonrise
Kingdom” and “The
Master” getting nominated for the Best Picture category. – 3 brilliant
movies but which missed out!
- Another big surprise was the
omission of the French film ‘Untouchable’ in the Best Foreign Language
Film category; it was such a wonderful film!
- The magnificent performances of
Samuel L Jackson and Leonardo in Django Unchained were overlooked but then
one single movie can’t have 3 Best Supporting Actor nominations for sure!
So these 2 had to sacrifice for the awesomely brilliant Waltz
And now all the
nominations, my predictions and my choices! I have also posted some of my
reviews as well….
Best Picture
Amour
Definitely
amongst the top movies of this year for me! A poignant tale of eternal love and
with a devastating ending, this movie made me cry 2-3 times just to see those
emotions pouring out of the female lead's eyes! The Cinematography of Darius
Khondji is par excellence and he has captured the scenes of the house so well!
Helmets off to the Director for he has got out brilliant performances from the
2 leads and his tight handling of the script which would have easily got too
melodramatic! Full marks to the 85-years old Emmanuelle Riva for acting so
well...I can’t imagine myself being so fit at that age!!! This one just can't
be missed...no wonder it is sweeping all awards too...my rating 4/5...
Argo
My favourite movie
from the weekend list! I always love movies based on real-life stories and when
they are based in the Middle-East it makes them even better! It is a story of
how a CIA Operative led the rescue of six U.S.
diplomats from Tehran during the 1979 Iran hostage
crisis...Ben Affleck is stupendous both in the direction and acting
departments! The movie stays true to the script and never loses direction and
that was the highlight for me! the suspense moments in the last scene were real
awesome too! I loved this movie and hope it wins some awards too! My rating
4/5...
Beasts of the
Southern Wild
I am not a big
fan of the Fantasy-Drama genre but this surely is an exception...it is a lovely
tale of a father-daughter relationship and about their miraculous lives!
Quvenzhané Wallis as Hushpuppy is the star of the movie and a true
revelation...superb debut performance...I am sure this would many Oscars and
Golden Globes this year! My rating 3/5...
Django
Unchained
DLed this in
early January but could not gather the guts to watch this as I hate the Musical
Genre plus the 158 Mins duration of this movie was another deterrent...the only
reason I wanted to watch this was due to it getting all those Oscar Nominations
& complete my 2013 Oscar Fiesta! So after gathering all possible patience
& guts I started this movie in the weekend but could not last 45 minutes!
The way all dialogues have been sung put me off so much that it became
intolerable! Finally decided to stop it and save myself....sorry folks...this
movie would always remain "not rated" for me!
It is not just a
movie...It is a cinematic spectacle in itself....poetry on screen! I loved this
movie to bits...the plot, cinematography, digital effects and the thrills! And
the IMAX View made it even more brilliant...I shouted 2-3 times during the
Tiger Jump scenes! Loved the ending too...the different interpretation...and
this movie reinforced one of my fundas - Never Give-Up! It is one of the best
of 2012 so far for me...my rating 4/5...
Lincoln
A Biopic Movie,
Daniel Day-Lewis and a historic plot...good enough reasons to watch this movie!
And yeah these were even before all those GG Wins and Oscar nominations...and a
brilliant movie for sure...DDL is simply superb - his dialogue delivery,
mannerisms and demeanor are near perfect! The movie covers the final four months
of Lincoln's life, focusing on his efforts in January 1865 to have the
Thirteenth Amendment (Abolition of Slavery) to the US Constitution...his
political maneuvers were superb and helped shaped one of the most important
law-changes for the US...I ended up doing a lot of research on his life and no
wonder he is considered one of the greatest! And DDL looks strikingly similar
to Lincoln
too...thanks to the awesome make-up...he definitely deserves his 2nd Oscar! My
rating 4/5...
Silver
Linings Playbook
One of the most
quirky love-stories I have ever seen and a real nice movie...has loads of fun
moments...it is a story of a man played by Cooper suffering from Bi-Polar
Disorder and how he gets into a love affair with the strange and equally quirky
Jennifer Lawrence...both Cooper & Lawrence are brilliant in the movie...and
then there is ROBERT DE NIRO - in one of his meatiest roles in recent times -
he is superb as always...I loved this movie! My rating 3.5/5...
157-Minutes long
& we didn't move from our couch even for a second! thats how how gripping
this movie is...full of thrill & engaging moments...coupled with superb
editing and cinematography...the plot talks about one of the most important
encounters of our times and the painstaking research & intelligence efforts
which went to achieve the near-impossible! It also shows the dark side of
torture showered on the inmates but then that is a stark reality! It isn't easy
to get the truth out! Kathryn Bigelow's direction is surely Oscar-worthy!
Now the Indian
Connection - Osama Bin Laden's role is played by an Indian! The co-producer of
this movie - Megan Ellison (daughter of Oracle CEO Larry Ellison) owns a
company named - Annapurna Pictures :) and "Being Human" Tee is
visible in one of the scenes! My rating 4/5 for this movie...go watch it
folks...I am sure you would like it too...
Only 3 films
have ever won best picture without best director, the last being "Driving
Miss Daisy"…
And now my say:
Will win: Argo
Could win: Lincoln
MY CHOICE: Zero
Dark Thirty
______________________________________________
Best Director
Haven’t watched
any of his previous movies but what a masterpiece this movie is; kept me
intrigued & glued throughout in spite of the fact that the plot was
supposedly a slow & boring one plus to make such old-aged actors work such
effortlessly! This movie made my eyes moist but at the same happy very happy
just because of the sheer class of the entire crew!
Ang Lee – Life
of Pi
One of the
Directors having a splendid range! One can see that just looking at his
repertoire - Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Hulk, Brokeback Mountain
and now this movie which is an artistic masterpiece! A movie best enjoyed if
watched in 3D IMAX (which I luckily did); the opening sequence on that huge
screen made my money worth! I haven’t read the novel so can’t compare the two
but still this definitely is a part of the movies which wowed me
cinematically!
David O. Russell
– Silver Linings Playbook
I loved his last
movie – The Fighter and this one was no different! The similarity between these
2 movies was the awesome lead cast! It is no easy task for a relatively young
Director to line-up such brilliant actors/actresses for one movie! And read
this: His next movie’s cast - Christian Bale, Bradley Cooper, Jeremy Renner,
Jennifer Lawrence, and Amy Adams.
Steven Spielberg
– Lincoln
He is a legend,
enough said! He brought back Lincoln
to life in his period drama with effortless grace inspite of the length &
pace of the movie! But then he had an awesome cast to help his cause! The
tremendous DDL, TLJ and others too…He is a definite frontrunner for this award!
Benh Zeitlin –
Beasts of the Southern Wild
The Darkhorse of
this category! A Debutant Director getting this nomination is a huge
achievement in itself! It is a beautiful movie and very-well made! His chances
look quite tough for this award but maybe he can win the Best Adapted
Screenplay award where he is co-nominated!
Will win: Steven
Spielberg
Could win: Ang
Lee
MY CHOICE: Michael
Haneke
______________________________________________
Best Actor
Bradley Cooper –
Silver Linings Playbook
The most unusual
choice for this casting considering his previous works but he did a tremendous
job playing the Bipolar character! IMHO has no chance of winning this award but
then the Oscar Jury have done stranger things in the past!
Daniel Day-Lewis
– Lincoln
The clear
front-runner for this award! He is pretty much one of the best actors of the
current generation with 2 Oscars [My Left Foot (1989) and There Will Be Blood
(2007)] already under his belt – definitely up & ready for a threesome!
Hugh Jackman –
Les Misérables
Please give me a
break!
Joaquin Phoenix
– The Master
My clear choice
for this award but sadly he won’t win it afterall! It was a demanding &
excruciatingly difficult role and he did with aplomb! By far one of his best
performances IMHO…
Denzel
Washington – Flight
The most
undeserving nomination of the Oscars I say! He was below average rather
sleepwalking through the entire movie. I feel sad for John Hawkes (The
Sessions) and Jean-Louis Trintignant (Amour) who missed out!
Will win: Daniel
Day-Lewis
Could win: Bradley
Cooper
MY CHOICE: Joaquin
Phoenix
______________________________________________
Best Actress
Jessica Chastain
– Zero Dark Thirty
She is real nice
in the movie but definitely doesn’t deserve the Golden Statuette! Many other
actresses would have done an equally good job in her place! Deserves the
nomination nod but not the Oscar IMHO
Jennifer
Lawrence – Silver Linings Playbook
The Darkhorse
nominee and one of the finest actresses of this generation – she was awesome in
2010's Winter's Bone and in this one too! To hold her stead in front of all
those master actors was simply too good!
My clear choice
for this award! Her 85-years age could not be even a minor hindrance in giving
this masterful performance…minimal dialogues but maximum effect! She is simply
exquisite in the movie and I am sure without her this movie would have been
well…just average! Just read her latest interview:
"This
adventure, this gift, in the last stage of my life - it's not easy to measure
up - but it's the exact moment in my life when I could do it. Before would have
been too early. Later might have been too late. But it's a great treasure to
participate in this film.I am very calm in the face of all of this. I am 85 years
old. I am not going to flop about like a fish. What makes me nervous is these
hours on the plane. Frankly, it seems like a hell of a journey to me. It's so
long. But I will do things to the end. I will fall in someone's arms if I need
to."
Quvenzhané Wallis
– Beasts of the Southern Wild
The youngest
person ever to be nominated as Best Actress & definitely a deserving one!
An electrifying performance…Hushpuppy was the real life of this new-age disaster
movie!
Naomi Watts –
The Impossible
The weakest contender
for this award – but I am clearly not undermining her performance! It was
brilliant but the other 4 nominees were far better!
Will win: Too
close to call
Could win: Jennifer
Lawrence
MY CHOICE: Emmanuelle
Riva
____________________________________________
Best Supporting Actor
Alan Arkin –
Argo
He definitely
didn’t deserve his first Oscar in Little Miss Sunshine nor does he deserve to
win this one! A good but nothing spectacular type of performance in this movie!
There were far better ones in 2012!
Robert De Niro –
Silver Linings Playbook
My favourite
actor of all-time and no other actor can match my levels of affection! Hope he
wins again! This is his seventh Oscar Nomination (he has won twice already)! He
was awesome in this movie – a role tailor-made for De Niro that’s why I think
he won’t win it!
Philip Seymour
Hoffman – The Master
Another top
performance from this master class actor – I love him to bits! He has already
won an Oscar for “Capote” and has earned 2 other nominations in the past! He
was ruthless in this movie and played the perfect foil to the crazy Phoenix!
Tommy Lee Jones
– Lincoln
One of the top
frontrunners for this Award for his restrained and classic performance in this
Period Drama! His role is one of the most instrumental ones after the lead
character and he played it with effortless ease – like he always does!
Christoph Waltz
– Django Unchained
My clear choice!
And yeah even without my Tarantino Bias! All we Hollywood lovers are so glad
& lucky that Tarantino found him and pulled him out of the German Cinema!
He was flawless, brilliant and crazily awesome in my favourite movie of 2012!
His dialogue delivery class is unmatched IMHO!
Will win: Tommy
Lee Jones
Could win: De
Niro or Seymour
Hoffman
MY CHOICE: Christoph
Waltz
______________________________________________
Amy Adams – The
Master
She has given
much better performances in the past and is one of my top favourite female
actresses but just didn’t deserve this Award! Was strictly good – nothing
spectacular!
She would always
remain Forrest’s Mother in “Forrest Gump” for me! Definitely got to watch her “Norma
Rae” for which she won the Best Actress Oscar in 1979 and she was really nice
in Lincoln for
sure!
Anne Hathaway –
Les Misérables
Please give me a
break, would you? All this hoopla for that blink & miss role! She has won
all those applause but in my books she just doesn’t deserve to be here!
Helen Hunt – The
Sessions
Clearly the
winner in my books for her unblemished & masterful performance in this
awesome movie which sadly just got this solitary nomination – definitely
deserved more of them! Definitely one of my top female Hollywood
actresses; hoping she wins this one!
Jacki Weaver –
Silver Linings Playbook
Another
deserving nomination – she was playing the wife of De Niro in this movie and
that;s not a mean feat in itself!
Will win: Anne
Hathaway
Could win: Sally
Field
MY CHOICE: Helen
Hunt
______________________________________________
Best Writing – Original Screenplay
Amour – Michael
Haneke
Definitely
deserves this nomination; for this simple yet so brilliant somber storyline!
Django Unchained
– Quentin Tarantino
I love the way
he writes Boy! Enough said…
Flight – John
Gatins
Really? I mean
is this for real?
Moonrise Kingdom – Wes
Anderson and Roman Coppola
Consolation
Nomination by the Oscar Jury – this movie definitely deserved more!
Zero Dark Thirty
– Mark Boal
WTF…such a
recent event; it would have been the easiest script ever to be written IMHO!
But on a serious note I am sure that is the deserving reason as well as he had all the more pressure on himself to maintain the authencity!
Will win: Django
Unchained
Could win: Moonrise Kingdom
MY CHOICE: Django
Unchained
____________________________________________
Best Animated Feature
Brave – Mark
Andrews and Brenda Chapman
A thoroughly
enjoyable movie...I loved the graphics and the background score...and the 3D
Experience made it even better...a definite must-watch for fairytale
lovers...and the movie is fast-paced as well; never realized when it got
over...my rating 3.5/5...
Frankenweenie –
Tim Burton
Loved the
Graphics& the storyline! The B&W definitely added to the experience!
ParaNorman – Sam
Fell and Chris Butler
Lovely comedy
horror animated movie with awesome music and a nice storyline! Very skillfully
created in the Stop-Motion format.
The Pirates!
Band of Misfits – Peter Lord
Funny,
entertaining and skillfully animated! I loved the plot, humour and the graphics
plus the Background Score keeps the viewer engaged all the time...definitely a
must-watch for all animation genre fans! My rating 3/5...
Wreck-It Ralph –
Rich Moore
I didn’t like
this movie much except for the last 20 minutes or so! I am sure am the
exception out here as it is one of the clear favourites to win this!
Will win: Wreck-It-Ralph
Could win: Frankenweenie
MY CHOICE: Brave
____________________________________________
Best Foreign Language Film
Definitely
amongst the top movies of this year for me! a poignant tale of eternal love and
with a devastating ending, this movie made me cry 2-3 times just to see those
emotions pouring out of the female lead's eyes! The Cinematography of Darius
Khondji is par excellence and he has captured the scenes of the house so well!
Helmets off to the Director for he has got out brilliant performances from the
2 leads and his tight handling of the script which would have easily got too
melodramatic! Full marks to the 85-years old Emmanuelle Riva for acting so
well...I can’t imagine myself being so fit at that age!!! This one just can't
be missed...no wonder it is sweeping all awards too...my rating 4/5...
Kon-Tiki (Norway)
A definite watch
for all adventure & history lovers! It is a 2012 Norwegian historical drama
film about the 1947 Kon-Tiki expedition in which the lead character Thor Heyerdahl
and his group of fellow "sailors" travel 5000 miles on sea in their
raft to prove his theory! The Cinematography and the graphics are
brilliant...the thrill element keeps you rooted to the seat throughout! I love
watching movies based on real-life incidents and being a Travel enthusiast this
was a lovely experience...It is also nominated for the Best Foreign Language
Film at the Oscars this year...my rating 4/5...
No (Chile)
A Royal Affair (Denmark)
War Witch (Canada)
Could not get
hold of the other 3 films so this award selection is incomplete! Nonetheless my
say:
Will win: Amour
Could win: Either
of the other 4
MY CHOICE: Amour
______________________________________________
So these are my
prediction and winners; didn’t list the other categories as I have minimal
technical knowledge about them for example Best Writing – Adapted Screenplay,
Best Film Editing, etc etc!
And now the sad
part; clearly looks like that I won’t be able to watch the Oscars Ceremony LIVE
as we would be vacationing in Dubai and as per DST it would start at 3 AM – no
chance I would be awake at that time! Would check the updates once I get up and
then DL the ceremony for a proper view! Last 4 years I have watched the
Ceremony LIVE so it is going to be a big & sad miss!
Nonetheless 2013
has started on a grand note; not even 2 months have passed and I have already
watched 60 Non-Hindi movies! Augurs well for the remaining 20 months! Watched
271 Non-Hindi movies in 2012 – hope to match this number in 2013!
Thanks to
Wikipedia for providing me with almost all the inputs for this Blog Post; just
can’t thank Wiki enough – it is almost a lifeline!
So till the time we meet again……..
Cheers to life…
Till then ride safe and have safe sex…
Hasta la Victoria Siempre…
Jai BoP!
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