ACADEMY AWARDS 2018: PLAYING THE PREDICTIONS GAME

Here we go again.  In my humble opinion, The Oscar will go to:

Best Picture: (Hope I am wrong, Get Out is satire, horror and comedy rolled into one)
Call Me By Your Name
Darkest Hour
Dunkirk
Get Out
Lady Bird
Phantom Threads
The Post
*The Shape of Water
Three Billboards in Ebbing, Missouri


Best Actor:
Timothée Chalamet: Call Me By Your Name (don't think so despite a superb performance)
Daniel Day-Lewis: Phantom Thread
Daniel Kaluuya:  Get Out
*Gary Oldman:  Darkest Hour (because great past performances have been overlooked)
Denzel Washington:  Roman J. Israel, Esq.


Best Supporting Actor:
*Willem Dafoe:  The Florida Project
Woody Harrelson:  Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Richard Jenkins:  The Shape of Water
Christopher Plummer:  All The Money in the World
Sam Rockwell:  Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (favored to win, but I'm going out on a limb here with Dafoe since his performance was superb)

Best Actress:
Sally Hawkins:  The Shape of Water
*Frances McDormand  Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Margot Robbie:  I, Tonya
Saoirse Ronan:  Lady Bird
Meryl Streep:  The Post


Best Supporting Actress:
Mary J. Blige:  Mudbound
*Allison Janney:  I, Tonya
Lesley Manville:  Phantom Thread
Laurie Metcalf:  Lady Bird
Octavia Spencer:  The Shape of Water


Best Director:
Paul Thomas Anderson:  Phantom Thread
*Guillermo del Toro:  The Shape of Water
Greta Gerwig:  Lady Bird
Christopher Nolan:  Dunkirk (A++ job)
Jordan Peele:  Get Out (another A++ job, but think its del Toro's year)


Best Adapted Screenplay:
Scott Frank, James Mangold and Michael Green; Story by James Mangold:  Logan
*James Ivory:  Call Me By Your Name
Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber:  The Disaster Artist
Aaron Sorkin: Molly's Game
Virgil William and Dee Rees:  Mudbound


Best Original Screenplay:
Guillermo del Toro and Vanessa Taylor, Story by Guillermo del Toro:  The Shape of Water
Greta Gerwig:  Lady Bird
Emily V. Gordon and Kumail Nanjiani:  The Big Stick
Martin McDonagh:  Three Billboards in Ebbing, Missouri  (may take it from Peele, but I hope not)
*Jordan Peele:  Get Out


Best Original Song:
Mighty River (Mudbound)
Remember Me (Coco)
Stand Up For Something (Marshall)
The Mystery of Love (Call Me By Your Name)
*This is Me (The Greatest Showman)


Best Original Score:
*Alexandra Desplat, The Shape of Water
Carter Burwell, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
Johnny Greenwood, Phantom Thread
John Williams, Star Wars: The Last Zedi
Hans Zimmer, Dunkirk

Best Animated Feature Film:
The Boss Baby 
The Breadwinner
*Coco 
Ferdinand
Loving Vincent


Best Animated Short:
*Dear Basketball
Garden City
Lou
Negative Space
Revolting Rhymes


Best Visual Efforts:
*Blade Runner 2049
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2
Kong: Skull Island
Star Wars: The Last Jedi
War for the Planet of the Apes


Best Feature Documentary:
Abacus: Small Enough to Jail
*Faces Places
Icarus
Last Men in Aleppo
Strong Island


Best Short Documentary:
*Edith + Eddie
Heaven is a Traffic Jam on the 405
Heroin(e)
Knife Skills
Traffic Stop (may be a surprise winner)


Best Foreign Language Film:
*A Fantastic Woman (Chile)
The Insult (Lebanon)
Loveless (Russia)
On Body and Soul (Hungary)
The Square (Sweden)

The Greatest Showman, All The Money in the World, Molly's Game

Hugh Jackman as P.T. Barnum

Every one of us is special.  Nobody is like anyone else - that's the point of our show."

The Greatest Showman, inspired by the most familiar aspect of the multifaceted life of P.T. Barnum, is a well adapted musical (story by Jenny Bicks, screenplay by Bicks and Bill Condon) with a tight narrative, strong cast and fleeting moments of energetic, engaging visuals.  Director Michael Gracey does not over-tell the story, and without prolonging the inevitable or overstating the obvious, he exposes Barnum’s unusual yet innate sense of humanity and perseverance.  We are given enough to get a feel for Barnum’s gift for orchestrating the spectacular, pulling off the near unbelievable and creating innovative performances that spawned a worldwide show business phenomenon.  In the midst of hoaxes and other effective persuasive devices are candid vignettes on his keen imagination, resilience and family life.  There is also a healthy, albeit short, glimpse into the complex offstage lives of circus performers whose experiences are typically minimized in film through monolithic portrayals as mere sideline fillers, jokers or freaks.  P.T. Barnum’s climb from poverty and social inconsideration to financial success and worldwide recognition is told succinctly through a strong performance by Hugh Jackman, whose dramatic scenes and musical numbers are delivered equally well, and contributions from a credible support cast led by Michelle Williams, Zac Efron, Zendaya and Keala Settle.  While the history-based narrative itself is original, much of the choreography is reminiscent of well-known Michael Jackson dance routines, although the sequencing and execution are adapted to the story and delivered in ways that would probably please the King of Pop himself.  I was not blown away by the film (Jackman came close), but I was entertained and respect its overall quality. In the end, that, perhaps, may be what matters most.

B+

Christopher Plummer as J. Paul Getty, Sr.

"I have 14 grandchildren, and if I pay a penny of ransom, I'll have 14 kidnapped grandchildren."

All The Money in the World is a crime thriller directed by Ridley Scott, written by David Scarpa and based on John Pearson’s book Painfully Rich: The Outrageous Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Heirs of J. Paul Getty (1995). The film is based (taking some liberties) on the 1973 kidnapping of 16-year-old John Paul Getty, III (Charlie Plummer) and the desperate attempts by his mother Gail (Michelle Williams) to persuade his billionaire grandfather (Christopher Plummer) to pay the ransom.  Williams gives a strong performance as a woman pushed towards the edge by greed from both sides of the equation with her son’s life on the line.  Challenged by Getty, Sr.’s refusal to pay, threats from the abductors and mobs of reporters who do not buy the story that she is broke, Gail finds an unexpected ally in Getty’s trusted advisor J. Fletcher Chase (Mark Wahlberg) as the race against time and emotions intensifies.  Williams is convincing and impressive as the pressured ex-daughter-in-law of the wealthy investor, with Wahlberg holding his own as a support character.  But it is Christopher Plummer, with his utter consumption of the role of the tenacious senior Getty, who holds the ultimate key to the film’s suspense, and underscores how the abduction brings to the forefront the billionare's complex, uncompromising philosophy of life, love, family, loyalty and wealth, with the greatest of these being wealth.  Boundaries between winning and losing are blurred along with connections between causes and effects not fixed in monetary terms. What, if any lessons were learned remain unclear.  As for the movie, Plummer will likely be rewarded for his fine performance, with some form of recognition possibly being afforded Williams as well.  

A-

Jessica Chastain as Molly Bloom

"...because it's my name. It's all that I have."

Molly’s Game is the true story of competitive skier Molly Bloom (Jessica Chastain), who went from being an Olympic-class athlete to running the most exclusive high-stakes underground poker game in the world. With players that included powerful, elite and famous figures in Hollywood, Wall Street, the sports world, and (unknown to her), members of the Russian mob, she was arrested in the middle of the night at her home by FBI agents after ten years of operation. Her reluctant criminal defense lawyer Charlie Jaffey (Idris Elba) becomes her sole ally and quasi-therapist who discovers her tabloid-driven public image falls tremendously short of the real Molly Bloom. Chastain and Elba are superb, and although Kevin Costner gives a strong dramatic performance as Bloom’s conflicted father, it is the on-point candor, timing and chemistry between client and attorney that brings weight to this film. Written and directed by celebrated screenwriter Aaron Sorkin, this overview of Bloom’s response to loss, the need for self reinvention and risky, difficult choices against the backdrop of family dysfunction and professional secrecy will likely bring him recognition in directorial terms as well.

B+