From ‘Avatar’ to ‘The Hurt Locker’: HollywoodChicago.com Picks the 2010 Oscar Winners

CHICAGO – Content Director Brian Tallerico and Staff Writers Matt Fagerholm and Patrick McDonald have merged their movie-loving minds and come up with the ultimate Oscar preview. Win your office pool, impress your friends, and propose a toast to the nominees that should have been when The 82nd Annual Academy Awards are broadcast on Sunday, March 7th, 2010 at 7pm CST. And be sure to use the in-feature links to see our coverage of all the nominees.

BEST PICTURE

The Hurt Locker
Photo credit: Summit Entertainment

“Avatar [5]”
“The Blind Side [14]”
“District 9 [7]”
“An Education [4]”
“The Hurt Locker [15]”
“Inglourious Basterds [9]”
“Precious [13]”
“A Serious Man [2]”
“Up [16]”
“Up in the Air [17]”

The general consensus is that “Avatar” and “The Hurt Locker” are competing for the big prize of the night with some predicting a dark horse win for “Inglourious Basterds”. For the other seven nominees, just being nominated will have to do. The staff of HollywoodChicago.com barely gives the edge to “The Hurt Locker” with Patrick and Brian thinking that Summit Entertainment will lay claim to their first Best Picture. Matt goes with the popular favorite “Avatar”.

As Patrick says, “I would have no problem with “Avatar” taking the gold, but The Hurt Locker represents so much more – and even though it wasn’t in my Top Ten – can touch more souls than the previously mentioned fare.”

Brian would have a bit more of a problem with “Avatar” winning but expects that “it won’t happen as the film has proven a bit too divisive and the new preferential voting system should favor films more universally loved like “Hurt Locker” and “Basterds”. “Avatar” is probably #3.”

Matt sees the recent hubbub about inappropriate emails about “The Hurt Locker” as the deciding factor in a close race — “…co-producer Nicholas Chartier’s reputation-tarnishing email (begging Academy members to vote for his film) may cause the picture to unjustly lose the top prize. Plus, money talks in Hollywood, and “Avatar” has just crossed the $700 million mark domestically.”

Ironically, all three writers agree that “The Hurt Locker” should win the big prize and even agree as to the film that should have been nominated instead of one of the other nine choices - Spike Jonze’s “Where the Wild Things Are”. It was Mr. Tallerico’s best film of 2009 and both McDonald and Fagerholm pick it as the film that history is likely to regard more positively than at least half of the nominees.

BEST ACTOR

Jeff Bridges in Crazy Heart
Photo credit: Fox Searchlight

Jeff Bridges [18], “Crazy Heart [19]”
George Clooney [20], “Up in the Air”
Colin Firth [21], “A Single Man [22]”
Morgan Freeman [23], “Invictus [24]”
Jeremy Renner [25], “The Hurt Locker”

Last year’s tight race between Sean Penn and Mickey Rourke has been supplanted by a clear frontrunner as all three writers predict a win for The Dude. Jeff Bridges has been nominated five times. He’s not going home empty-handed this time.

Brian thinks Bridges is actually deserving of what some may call a Career Achievement Award but Matt and Patrick point to a newcomer to the category and his excellent work in one of this year’s least seen nominees, Colin Firth in “A Single Man”. Patrick praises his “difficult emotional journey” while Matt cites his “richly layered and revelatory turn”.

As for who got snubbed, Mr. Fagerholm reaches back to an arguably career-best work from Joaquin Phoenix in “Two Lovers,” Mr. Tallerico thinks that Sam Rockwell is quickly becoming the new “most underrated actor alive” now that Bridges can no longer claim that title and that he should have landed a nod for “Moon,” while Patrick looks at an iconic turn in a popular film - “Zachary Quinto as Spock in “Star Trek.” He took a virtually impossible role NOT to caricature and made it as “human” as possible.”

BEST ACTRESS

Sandra Bullock in The Blind Side
Photo credit: Warner Brothers

Sandra Bullock [26], “The Blind Side”
Helen Mirren [27], “The Last Station [28]”
Carey Mulligan [29], “An Education”
Gabourey Sidibe [30], “Precious”
Meryl Streep [31], “Julie and Julia [32]”

Once again, unity reigns in the “Will Win” department as we have all given into the likelihood that Sandra Bullock will win an Oscar for the wildly successful “The Blind Side”. And all agree that she’s shouldn’t be the winner with Matt and Brian pointing to Carey Mulligan’s star-making turn in “An Education” and McDonald rooting for La Meryl to win for the first time since “Sophie’s Choice”.

There’s even some agreement as to who should have been nominated. Brian gets nearly apoplectic when he even considers the number of snubbed performances better than Bullock’s - Abbie Cornish in “Bright Star,” Melanie Laurent in “Inglourious Basterds,” Maya Rudolph in “Away We Go,” and, especially, Tilda Swinton in “Julia” spring to mind. In fact, both Fagerholm and McDonald point to Cornish as well, clearly the most snubbed actress of the year.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR

Christoph Waltz in Inglourious Basterds
Photo credit: The Weinstein Company

Matt Damon [33], “Invictus”
Woody Harrelson [34], “The Messenger [35]”
Christopher Plummer [36], “The Last Station”
Stanley Tucci [37], “The Lovely Bones [38]”
Christoph Waltz [39], “Inglourious Basterds”

Like the rest of the world, there’s nothing but agreement here, as the staff at HollywoodChicago.com thinks the Academy will get it right and give the breakthrough male star of the year an Oscar for his internationally acclaimed work in “Inglourious Basterds”. Christoph Waltz started winning awards for his multilingual turn as Hans Landa in Tarantino’s epic back at Cannes and that’s not going to change on Oscar night. It may be the most locked award of the night.

An interesting tidbit courtesy of Mr. Tallerico - the last three winners for Best Supporting Actor comprise three of the most legendary villains of the new millennium - Landa in “Basterds,” The Joker in “The Dark Knight,” and Anton Chigurh in “No Country For Old Men”. Nice guys truly do finish last.

There may be complete agreement on who will win and who should win this category but who was snubbed produces different responses, indicating perhaps a lack of complete enough agreement to get these poor fellas nominated.

Patrick McDonald praises the entire ensemble of the great “In the Loop” but points to James Gandolfini as “a perfect example of an actor’s presence game-changing a role and the film.” Tallerico would have loved to see Gandolfini’s stunning vocal work in “Where the Wild Things Are” cited over “In the Loop,” but most regrets the absence of either of the supporting men of “An Education” - Alfred Molina and Peter Sarsgaard.

Fagerholm says, “Yet with so many fresh faces being recognized, Christian McKay’s exclusion from this category is an absolute robbery. He didn’t play Orson Welles so much as channel his larger-than-life soul. Like Streep’s Julia Child, one wishes McKay’s Welles was the central subject of his own picture. He may have been a force to be reckoned with in the lead actor category.”

Continue on to page two for the screenplays, director, and supporting actress:

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS

Mo’Nique in Precious
Photo credit: Lionsgate

Penelope Cruz [40], “Nine [41]”
Vera Farmiga [42], “Up in the Air”
Maggie Gyllenhaal [43], “Crazy Heart”
Anna Kendrick [44], “Up in the Air”
Mo’Nique [45], “Precious”

Who would have guessed just a few years ago that Penelope Cruz would be the veteran in this category with her third nomination in just a few years for her excellent work in “Nine”? Brian thinks that the most snubbed Supporting Actress is Cruz’s co-star in “Nine,” the great Marion Cotillard, who could have been nominated for either Rob Marshall’s film or her even better work in “Public Enemies”. Both performances are better than the one for which she won in “La Vie en Rose”.

As for who will win, it’s another crystal clear, unanimous pick with the entire staff going with the safe choice of Mo’Nique for “Precious”. That’s four for four with arguably the most predictable acting winners in Oscar history. Both Matt and Pat think Mo’Nique deserves the trophy while Brian thinks her mommy dearest act goes a bit too far in the final reel and would award Anna Kendrick for taking a part that could have come off as a cool cliche and doing so much with it.

Pat and Matt agree again on who got snubbed - arguably the best actress alive without an Oscar - Julianne Moore for her work in “A Single Man”. As Matt says, she “delivered the very definition of stellar supporting work as Firth’s boozy former lover” and Pat praises her for taking “a smaller, less defined portrayal and [making] it her own.” Brian would have certainly gotten behind that choice as well.

BEST DIRECTOR

The Hurt Locker
Photo credit: Summit Entertainment

Kathryn Bigelow [46], “The Hurt Locker”
James Cameron [47], “Avatar”
Lee Daniels [48], “Precious”
Jason Reitman [49], “Up in the Air”
Quentin Tarantino [50], “Inglourious Basterds”

The glass ceiling of one of the Academy Award categories never won by a woman will finally shatter when Kathryn Bigelow takes home the trophy for her amazing, tension-filled work on “The Hurt Locker,” yet another category agreed upon by all three critics, even Matt who’s predicting a split between Picture and Director.

As Matt notes, “Even Cameron hopes Bigelow will prevail in this category. Her film got closer than any previous Iraq war drama to placing the viewer within the psyche of the American soldier. Though it will be wonderful to see Bigelow be the first woman in history to claim the Best Director prize, it will be another breakthrough the day a female director finally wins for her portrait of a woman’s inner life.”

Brian loves that a woman will finally get an Oscar for Best Director - and especially the woman behind “Point Break,” “Near Dark,” and “Strange Days” - but hopes the gender story doesn’t overshadow the fact that she absolutely deserves it no matter her sex. “The Hurt Locker” was the best directed film of the year, period. It just happened to be made by a woman.

There’s agreement in the HollywoodChicago.com office yet again about who got screwed in this category with Matt and Patrick picking the same talented man. We’ll let Matt say it - “No filmmaker is more in touch with his inner child than Spike Jonze, and his mind-boggling, audacious approach to adapting Maurice Sendak’s book made for one of the year’s most magical and rewarding moviegoing experiences.”

Brian wishes that the Academy had gone out on a limb and recognized one of the most deliberate, talented filmmakers alive - Michael Haneke and his remarkable work on “The White Ribbon”.

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY

Up in the Air
Photo credit: Paramount

“District 9” by Neill Blomkamp by Terri Tatchell
“An Education” by Nick Hornby
“In the Loop” by Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Armando Iannucci, & Tony Roche
“Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire” by Geoffrey Fletcher
“Up in the Air” by Jason Reitman & Sheldon Turner

Brian thinks nearly every Oscar pool is going to be won in the screenplay categories as they’re the most, no pun intended, up in the air.

As for what will win, Brian and Matt think “Up in the Air” has the narrow edge, largely due to having won the most precursor awards and because it’s likely to be the only trophy it takes home. As Matt says, “Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner’s script could not have been more timely, considering the current economic climate, and it brought Clooney his most haunting and resonant performance to date.”

Pat is willing to go out on a limb and predict something that Brian thinks is definitely a possibility in that the emotional pull of “Precious” will lead to a somewhat surprising screenplay win.

Mr. McDonald and Mr. Fagerholm think “In the Loop” was the best adapted script of the year while Brian loved the snappy banter and brilliant subtlety of what Nick Hornby did with “An Education”.

As for what should have been nominated, Tallerico and McDonald point to “Where the Wild Things Are” once again with Pat saying, “Spike Jonze and Dave Eggers took a classic and made another classic, no mean feat.” Fagerholm looks to “A Single Man” - “Let’s also not forget Tom Ford and David Scearce’s masterful adaptation of Christopher Isherwood’s novel, which included some of the year’s most beautifully written sequences, often in the form of heightened moments observed by a protagonist intent on drinking in every last drop of life.”

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY

Inglourious Basterds
Photo credit: The Weinstein Company

“The Hurt Locker” by Mark Boal
“Inglourious Basterds” by Quentin Tarantino
“The Messenger” by Alessandro Camon & Oren Moverman
“A Serious Man” by Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
“Up” by Bob Peterson, Pete Docter & Thomas McCarthy

Brian thinks this is the toughest category of the night. The Coens and “The Messenger” are out of the running but none of the other three would be a surprise. If “The Hurt Locker” sweeps, it’s the easy pick, but “Inglourious Basterds” clearly has a lot of fans as well. If you think “THL” is going to win Best Picture, you might want to know that it’s been five years since a film won that prize and did NOT take home screenplay. “Sideways” stole it from “Million Dollar Baby” - clearly a beloved, critical choice, much like “Basterds”. Brian is going with Tarantino, but just barely, and mostly because he thinks “IB” deserves the win as well.

Patrick goes with “The Hurt Locker” train leading to a screenplay win although he wishes “Basterds” will take it and that his favorite film of 2009, “(Untitled)” had at least been nominated.

Finally, Matt agrees that “Inglourious Basterds” will win it all although he’s rooting for “THL”. Clearly, the two are neck and neck (which could even cause a split and allow “Up” to sneak in). As for snubs, he notes that, “It’s a shame that the wonderfully cathartic rom-com “(500) Days of Summer” was completely shut out this year. The script by Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber was both marvelously inventive and remarkably insightful, proving that not every feel-good Fox Searchlight charmer needs a straightforward happy ending.

As for snubs, Brian thinks they got this category remarkably right - moreso than any this year - but Haneke’s “The White Ribbon” would have been a wonderful inclusion if they could have picked six.

What did we get right? What did we get wrong? Tell us what you think will win, should win, and should have been nominated in the space below.

[51]	By BRIAN TALLERICO [52] Content Director HollywoodChicago.com brian@hollywoodchicago.com [51]

[53]	By MATT FAGERHOLM [54] Staff Writer HollywoodChicago.com matt@hollywoodchicago.com [53]

[55]	By PATRICK MCDONALD [56] Staff Writer HollywoodChicago.com pat@hollywoodchicago.com [55]