Contest for Academy Awards’ Best Picture too close to call
Most Oscar seasons we give ourselves a puncher’s odds at picking the big winners on the night.
Maybe we won’t quite get it right, and Best Film will go to our pick for Best Director or vice versa. Or some absolute bolter will make a mockery of us all. But this year I reckon you’re fooling yourself if you even claim to have a clue.
It’s the technique and bombast of Dunkirk versus the perfectly sketched miniature of Lady Bird. The formality, relevance and sheen of The Post versus the unvarnished smarts and anarchy at the heart of Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri and Get Out. The delicacy and shimmer of Call Me By Your Name versus the chilly intellect of Phantom Thread. The poetry and passion of The Shape of Water versus the, errr, poetry and passion of Call Me By Your Name.
Even odder, of the nine Best Picture nominees there are probably eight I would be quite happy to see win.
I don’t think the Churchill biopic Darkest Hour really deserves to be on the list. Gary Oldman should get every award under the sun for his lead performance. But the film around him was too contrived by far to really measure up. Seeing a lowbudget gem like The Florida Project on the list in place of Darkest Hour would have made my year.
My pick? Yeah, nah. I really have absolutely no idea. So, Best Director. Surely a straight out fight between Paul Thomas Anderson for Phantom Thread and Christopher Nolan for Dunkirk. It’ll probably go to Nolan. His control of the pace and the sheer mechanics of Dunkirk was overwhelming. Or, it will go to whoever the Academy thinks was hardest done-by at not getting Best Picture.
My pick: Guillermo Del Toro. Because Shape of Water is still my favourite of all the contenders.
Best Actor is where Darkest Hour gets its consolation prize in the shape of Gary Oldman for his thunderously good caricature of Churchill. He’s the clear favourite. Daniel Day-Lewis is astonishing in Phantom Thread, but he’s already won three times
My pick: Timothee Chalamet for Call Me By Your Name. Just cos.
It’s hard to imagine anyone other than Frances McDormand going home with the Best Actress statue. Margot Robbie is terrific in I, Tonya, but she’s not as good as McDormand in Three Billboards. Meryl Streep is similarly fantastic in The Post, but the entire world will implode out of sheer boredom if Streep wins anything again, ever.
My pick: Saoirse Ronan for Lady Bird. But only because Bria Vinai (The Florida Project) and Vicky Krieps (Phantom Thread) weren’t even nominated.
Supporting Actor should go to Willem Dafoe. He’s never won an Oscar, he’s apparently a popular and respected figure in Hollywood and it’ll remind the voters that The Florida Project is at least as good a film as last year’s big winner Moonlight. Maybe even better.
My pick: Woody Harrelson for Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. Because Harrelson is simply fantastic in that film. But don’t act surprised if Christopher Plummer picks it up for replacing Kevin Stacey in All the Money in the World.
Best Supporting Actress is tougher. Maybe Alison Janney for I, Tonya or Lesley Manville for Phantom Thread are the favourites. Personally, I’d give it to Mary J Blige for Mudbound. Because every awards night needs at least one serious upset.
Which leaves Get Out to pick up Best Original Screenplay as a totally deserved consolation prize and Call Me By Your Name, The Disaster Artist or Molly’s Game to get Best Adapted Screenplay. Well, that’s how it plays in my head anyway.
The Academy, as always, can be relied on to muck it up.
Quite right, too. Imagine how boring the world would be if they got it right every year.