Getting near December cut-off for films to be eligible for an Oscar.
Seems to be a pretty dismal year so far, or am I forgetting some good films that came out earlier in the year?
Any early predictions or nominations on your part?
There’s been plenty of talk about Ray.
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
In the animation category I guess we can expect The Incredibles and Shrek 2. I’ve heard comments that Incredibles should be nominated in the main best picture category; I haven’t seen the movie myself.
There’s also Best Actor talk of Johnny Depp in Finding Neverland, which seems sort of outside to me, as does Christian Bale in The Machinist. Liam Neeson for Kinsey sounds good. I seem to remember talk about Jeff Bridges in A Door in the Floor.
The Incredibles will certainly get nominated for Best Animated Feature, and hopefully win over Shrek 2 and A Shark Tale. The Aviator’s going to try for Best Actor for Leonardo di Caprio, as is Alexander for Colin Farrell.
I’d like to see Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind nominated for Original Screenplay. I’d also like to see Dodgeball up there next to it, but I don’t think that’s going to happen.
Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban will probably get nominations for effects or whatever that category is.
As far as Best Actress goes, I say Imelda Staunton will be nominated for Vera Drake. Maybe Uma Thurman for Kill Bill Vol. 2. I’m usually bad on predicting anything for Best Actress.
The Incredibles has been hyped by Disney/Pixar as “for your consideration” for Best Picture in the Hollywood trades, but nothing more.
I’d love to see it nominated (and win!) BP, just for the fun of it. 
This seems odd because the film was so formulaic, but Kurt Russell all kinds of nailed the part of Herb Brooks in Miracle.
What, no love for Garden State?
Yeah, but I think Russell gets a pass on the formulaic-ness of the movie, because the true life events that inspired the movie gave rise to most of the formulas ;).
Thomas Haden Church and Virginia Madsen in Sideways. I knew Paul Giamatti would be great but they really surprised me.
I think Kate Winslett deserves a nom for Eternal Sunshine.
Not that it’ll win anything (I’m a pessimist) but this was going to be my suggestion. It should be nominated for every award applicable and win.
Just my opinion, of course.
They’ll never get nominated, but David Gulpilil in The Tracker and So-ri Moon in Oasis are extraordinary.
The tops among fiction English-language films for me are Eternal Sunshine and Sideways, but I’d love to see…
An Art Direction nomination for Team America: World Police, a cinematography nomination for Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter…and Spring, an editing nomination for Miracle, and any number of nods for Sky Captain.
I really hope he gets nominated, because I loved that performance and I have always thought that Russell was one of those very good hard working actors who kinda gets passed over (yes, he has made some clunkers).
I want to echo Eternal Sunshine as Best Picture, and Best Original Screenplay.
I agree with Kurt Russell in Miracle but I think it might fly under the radar because people who aren’t terribly familiar with Herb Brooks (who is an icon up here in Minnesota) aren’t going to realize how spot on Russell nailed him.
They better do it right with Al. They just did piss-poor job with Troy.
Given that everyone (but me) really liked Big Fish, I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s up for something.
I think The Incredibles should get a Best Picture nomination and Eternal Sunshine should win it. Beyond that, I dunno. It has been a kind of slow year.
Am I the only one looking forward to The Aviator? Somebody’s been needing to do a Howard Hughes movie for a long time, and Scorsese is just the guy to pull it off, IMHO. What’s the early word?
A. You are not alone.
B. It already lost last year (music score).
Last year was just great, lots of good films. But this year is looking pretty crappy. (Even taking into account that many good films will be released in NY&LA in the next month.) No “Lost in Translation”, no “American Splendor.”
When there is a lack of small good films, expect the Oscars to go with Big Budget Major Studio Films. So look at the year end box office winners and those’ll be your winners. And even sorrier to say, that list so far is ugly.
I don’t get it. The movie played in a couple of places like LA & NYC in December, but didn’t play in the rest of the country until January 9th, so why do films like this get “counted” for a year in which there was only a very limited release?
End of December is cut off to be eligible for nomination. Studios put out their films as late as possible, with the hope that one or more of their films will be nominated. Then if there is a pre-Oscar “buzz” and it will do wonders for boxoffice. With the right timing, a film will go wide just as it is being nominated for an Oscar and people will go see it based on the nomination(s). Timing is everything in film marketing.