Oscars 2014

I do this every year, expect on some mystical level that the Oscars might mean something... something more than a commercial gathering of film makers essentially lauding the types of films that mostly created for the sole purpose of plaudits. Don't tell me they aren't, it's not about the best films of the year, it's about the most shrewdly marketed and the correct people with the correct positioning. Of course I'm not a complete cynic as I continue to partake religiously in watching the award nominated films and usually they are pretty good!  But I just wish the Academy would surprise me with their choices sometimes... It's all so predictable! So in light of that, here we go:

Best Actor
So, blatantly obvious but Matthew McConaughey is going to moonwalk that one. Lost a load of weight, played someone with a terminal illness in a true life story about redemption? All those boxes are ticked and accounted for - insta-win, and as it stands it's been working pretty well for him so far scooping most of the big awards. I know he deserves it, MM has been gradually building up a portfolio of 'serious' more 'difficult' roles making him a 'real' actor, all I can say at this point is it's his to lose.

Chiwetel Ejiofor on the other hand scooped the BAFTA so perhaps that might tick the odds in his favour, I highly doubt it though. Ejiofor's performance was soulful and heartbreaking but wasn't nearly bombastic enough to garner more votes.

What really hurts is the lack of attention James McAvoy has received for what I do declare, was the best male performance of the year in Filth. The fact that he hasn't picked up more plaudits genuinely astounds me, even the BAFTAs completely snubbed him. Absolute travesty.

Best Actress
Cate Blanchett, without a doubt.

Sorely inexplicably overlooked, Julie Delply. How could that woman not being showered with praise and glory for Before Midnight and why in the hell has that film not been nominated for every award going?

Supporting Actor
Jared Leto starring alongside McConaughey as a HIV transgender lady. Well that would do it...

I know I probably say this every year but Michael Fassbender is in spitting distance of the Oscar he so desperately deserves, if wasn't for Shame it had to be for his conflicted powerful disturbing portrayal of a plantation owner in 12 Years a Slave. It's easy to play the evil characters they say, but how about playing them as wrecked human shells? How about playing someone who blatantly goes against what we in modern society would call right and justifying it through the power of ACTING. Fassbender is the only man I will shout 'ACTING' at and truly mean it, because I don't think there are many who are better than him.

Supporting Actress
It's probably an unpopular opinion but I really want Sally Hawkins to get this (no chance whatsoever...) because she was simply wonderful standing toe to toe with Cate Blanchett. Obviously this is a two horse race between Lupita N'yongo, a lady who's name I see in print so often now I've memorised it, she is humble and witty and incredibly sweet and her performance is truly heartbreaking in 12 Years a Slave, every cry she emits was torture for me... But then Jennifer Lawrence was charisma through and through playing the bored psychotic housewife in American Hustle, clearly she was having the time of her life being ridiculous over the top insane, it suited her so well, plus her rendition of Live and Let Die with the marigolds was worth the ticket price alone...

Damn it's a tough category...

Best Director

Alfonso Cuaron. I wouldn't dare argue with that undeniable fact.

Best Film
Inevitably it'll go to Gravity for giving me the most bizarre sense of sea-sickness in a cinema, or at least the closest you can get to it whilst floating in space. At the time I wasn't wildly impressed with the story-telling devices that were used to frame the beautiful panoramic tracking shots of space and to best honest that hasn't changed. It was innovative in it's visuals but the things I see a film for was not really all there with Gravity, I passionately love films that evoke a strong emotional response, hence most of my blogs are about how I personally feel about films... Gravity was a shrug and a shower and gone. 12 Years a Slave was also... Not as powerful as I had anticipated and left me cold in a way I did not expect.

So. My best film, because it's in the category and I simply adored it will be Nebraska. But! If we were picking films that were not nominated and sorely overlooked my best film of last year without a doubt was Before Midnight.