The Oscar season is in full swing with the award night due in two weeks. Strangely, there is no one to host this time. There are plenty of surprises and some snubs. Nonetheless, the good things outweigh the bad as for the first time we have a Netflix film nominated for the Best Picture. Not just nominated but also leading the charts by securing 10 nominations.

We also have a superhero movie in the Best Picture race for the first time in the history of cinema. Whether it wins or loses is a different conversation but its nomination is a statement that the Academy wants to alter their definition of a Best Picture worthy film. We also have some veteran actors (Glenn Close, Sam Elliott) who have a chance to get recognition as also performers like Amy Adams, who have been Oscar favorites since forever but have never taken home the trophy. Here are all the 27 categories and, in my opinion, the likely and the deserving winners:

 

Best Picture

1) Black Panther
2) Blackkklansman
3) Bohemian Rhapsody
4) The Favourite
5) Green Book
6) Roma
7) A Star is Born
8) Vice

Likely Winner: Blackkklansman
Deserving Winner: Roma

Apart from Black Panther and Vice, all the six nominees have a chance of winning the Best Picture. My bet, however, is on Blackkklansman. It is Spike Lee’s best film in a long, long time that has a provocative ending. Secondly, if the Academy finds it perplexing to award Roma, both in Best Picture and Best Foreign Language Film categories, and they can’t pick between Green Book and The Favourite; they are sure to honour Spike Lee’s joint. Also, if Cuaron gets the Best Director Oscar, this will be another way to acknowledge the film. Otherwise, Cuaron’s masterpiece deserves all the love. All of it!

 

Recommended: Oscar Best Picture Snubs: 10 Biggest Omissions Of All Time

 

Actor in a Leading Role

1) Christian Bale – Vice
2) Bradley Cooper – A Star is Born
3) Willem Dafoe – At Eternity’s Gate
4) Rami Malek – Bohemian Rhapsody
5) Viggo Mortenson – Green Book

Likely Winner: Christian Bale
Deserving Winner: Christian Bale

While all the performances were amazing, the real competition lies between Rami Malek and Christian Bale for Bohemian Rhapsody and Vice. Both the actors have won Golden Globe for their performances. It’s hard to pick the winner considering how committed they were in their particular roles, elevating their films through their work from being just about average to worth watching. Still, I believe it will be Christian Bale who will take away the trophy. The Academy has always loved transformational performances and Bale excels at it. He always does.

 

Recommended: 66 Best Movies Of 2018: ‘Roma’ To ‘The Insult’

 

Actress in a Leading Role

1) Yalitza Aparicio – Roma
2) Glenn Close – The Wife
3) Olivia Colman – The Favourite
4) Lady Gaga – A Star is Born
5) Melissa Mccarthy – Can You Ever Forgive Me?

Likely Winner: Glenn Close
Deserving Winner: Yalitza Aparicio

Glenn Close is another DiCaprio – who has never won an Academy Award, in spite of receiving six nominations prior to this one. Since, it is a packed category with all the nominees having strong performances to back themselves, it is likely that the Academy will take the safe route and honour her over others.

However, I will be happy if Yalitza Aparicio gets the award for her astute, affecting performance as a maid working for a middle-class family. It’s her first acting credit and her Oscar win will inspire others to commit to their roles and trust the vision of their directors.

 

Actor in a Supporting Role

1) Mahershala Ali – Green Book
2) Adam Driver – Blackkklansman
3) Sam Elliott – A Star is Born
4) Richard E. Grant – Can You Ever Forgive Me?
5) Sam Rockwell – Vice

Likely Winner: Sam Elliott
Deserving Winner: Adam Driver

Mahershala Ali is poised to win his second Oscar. But my bet is on Sam Elliot, for his powerhouse performance in A Star is Born. His equation with Bradley Cooper gave us some of the most rousing moments in the film. Considering this is Elliot’s first Oscar nomination and his recent Golden Globes snub, he is likely to get recognition from the Academy.

Although if the Oscar goes to Adam Driver, it will be a big, welcoming surprise. Driver’s impressive body of work needs appreciation and for his stellar work in Blackkklansman, the film in which he stole every scene he was in, deserves winning more than anyone.

 

Actress in a Supporting Role

1) Amy Adams – Vice
2) Marina de Tavira – Roma
3) Regina King – If Beale Street Could Talk
4) Emma Stone – The Favourite
5) Rachel Weisz – The Favourite

Likely Winner: Regina King
Deserving Winner: Amy Adams

This is another category stuffed with great performances. It’s hard to pick a winner. I loved how good Marina De Tavira was in Roma. I loved how ably Emma Stone and Rachel Weisz handled their complex characters. But since I must pick one, it’s Regina King’s work that is likely to get an Oscar. An industry veteran, her performance was the reason behind the most striking moments in the film. Her win will be a redemption for If Beale Street Could Talk not earning a nomination in the Best Picture category.

However, the world will be delighted if the Academy acknowledges Amy Adams’ performance (as Dick Cheney’s wife in Vice). Like DiCaprio, prior to his Oscar win, Adams has been nominated five times but has never made the cut. Will she do it the sixth time?

 

Animated Feature Film

1) Incredibles 2
2) Isle of Dogs
3) Mirai
4) Ralph Breaks the Internet
5) Spiderman: Into the Spider-Verse

Likely Winner: Spiderman: Into the Spider-Verse
Deserving Winner: Spiderman: Into the Spider-Verse

Competition is always high in this category. Every year, it always boils down to a 50-50 condition where two films are favorites to win the Oscar. Although, this year one film has surpassed all the other animated films by a big, big margin. Spiderman: Into the Spider-Verse introduced a new kind of animation that felt as trippy as it was effective in precisely capturing the comic-booky feel and the world of the web-slinger, for whom the extreme amount of love and respect got restored.

 

Recommended: 10 Best Animated Movies 2018 Ranked: ‘Mirai’ To ‘Spider-Man’

 

Cinematography

1) Lukasz Zal – Cold War
2) Robbie Ryan – The Favourite
3) Caleb Deschanel – Never Look Away
4) Alfonso Cuaron – Roma
5) Matthew Libatique – A Star is Born

 

 

Likely Winner: Alfonso Cuaron
Deserving Winner: Alfonso Cuaron

The year belonged to Black and White photography. And this Oscar belongs to Alfonso Cuaron. If anyone comes close to his exemplary work in Roma, it’s Lukasz Zal. But that too, through black-and-white photography. Both the films feature astounding work behind the camera. Cuaron wins the race by capturing the toughest yet easy looking shots that are lustrous and very, very hard to forget.

 

Costume Design

1) Mary Zophres – The Ballad of Buster Scruggs
2) Ruth Carter – Black Panther
3) Sandy Powell – The Favourite
4) Sandy Powell – Mary Poppins Returns
5) Alexandra Byrne – Mary Queen of Scots

Likely Winner: Black Panther
Deserving Winner: The Favourite

This is one of the excellent categories where every nominee is deserving. The one most likely to win is Ruth E. Carter for Black Panther. The award will not only be given for her modernized African attire but for the sake of awarding the film in, at least, one category. Otherwise, its Sandy Powell, who rightfully deserves the trophy for all her layered, monochromatic robes.

 

Directing

1) Spike Lee – Blackkklansman
2) Pawel Pawlikowski – Cold War
3) Yorgos Lanthimos – The Favourite
4) Alfonso Cuaron – Roma
5) Adam Mckay – Vice

Likely Winner: Alfonso Cuaron
Deserving Winner: Alfonso Cuaron

There’s no denying Cuaron deserves to win Oscar for his outstanding work in Roma. Each frame of the film speaks how much he cares about the project and particularly, cinema. From fabulous black and white cinematography to well-extracted performances, he has displayed his best work as an auteur. And he totally deserves the honour. Spike Lee, Pawel Pawlikowski are just substitutes, in case the Academy swears not to give Cuaron his second Oscar.

 

Documentary (Feature)

1) Free Solo
2) Hale County, This Morning, This Evening
3) Minding the Gap
4) Of Fathers and Sons
5) RBG

Likely Winner: Free Solo
Deserving Winner: Free Solo

Had the Academy nominated Morgan Neville’s Won’t You Be My Neighbour, it would have been my pick for the deserving film. However, of the nominated ones, the sensational Free Solo deserves and is likely to win. A jaw-dropping IMAX spectacle, it has garnered enough popularity and acclaim that is enough to appease the Academy to honour to Team Solo.

 

Documentary (Short Subject)

1) Black Sheep
2) End Game
3) Lifeboat
4) A Night at the Garden
5) Period. End of Sentence.

Likely Winner: Lifeboat
Deserving Winner: Period: End of Sentence

Each film in this category has the right to win an Academy Award for their robust content. Be it A Night at the Garden depicting the Nazi Rally, or the stirring Lifeboat addressing the refugees of war-driven nations. All the films are high on content. However, my heart goes out to the affecting story of our own women, who didn’t have access to sanitary pads. Period. End of Sentence. deserves recognition.

 

Film Editing

1) Barry Alexander Brown – Blackkklansman
2) John Ottman – Bohemian Rhapsody
3) Yorgos Mavropsaridis – The Favourite
4) Patrick J. Don. Vito – Green Book
5) Hank Corwin – Vice

Likely Winner: Bohemian Rhapsody
Deserving Winner: Blackkklansman

Three of the five nominated films have a strong chance of bagging the Best Editing Oscar. The most deserving is Spike Lee’s Blackkklansman. Barry Alexander Brown had a tough task of transporting the narrative from the cool, retro era to the grim, messed up present, specifically highlighting the Charlottesville riots. He did a superb job as the film featured one of the most hard hitting endings ever. However, I believe Bohemian Rhapsody will receive the most love from the Academy. Spanning from 1970 to 1985, the film showed 15 years of Freddie Mercury’s life. It missed out many crucial elements but whatever it had, felt glorious.

 

Foreign Language Film

1) Capernaum
2) Cold War
3) Never Look Away
4) Roma
5) Shoplifters

Likely Winner: Roma
Deserving Winner: Roma

Alfonso Cuaron’s magisterial Roma is destined to win in this category, irrespective of whether it wins or loses the Best Picture. It is the kind of film that isn’t made anymore. Comprising beauty in each of its black and white shot, Cuaron’s masterpiece hasn’t left any chance for competing films — which are equally excellent, if not more — to take home the trophy.

 

Makeup and Hairstyling

1) Goran Lundstrom, Pamela Goldammer – Border
2) Jenny Shircore, Marc Pilcher and Jessica Brooks – Mary Queen of Scots
3) Greg Cannom, Kate Biscoe and Patricia Dehaney – Vice

Likely Winner: Vice
Deserving Winner: Vice

There’s a lot more to Christian Bale’s transformation that made his performance so robust. The meticulous work done on him is sure to win Vice an Oscar. Easiest category to predict.

 

Music (Original Score)

1) Ludwig Goransson – Black Panther
2) Terence Blanchard – Blackkklansman
3) Nicholas Britell – If Beale Street Could Talk
4) Alexandre Desplat – Isle of Dogs
5) Marc Shaiman – Mary Poppins Returns

Likely Winner: Black Panther
Deserving Winner: If Beale Street Could Talk

The Academy missed out Justin Hurwitz (First Man) and clarified that they don’t care to award (or even nominate) the deserving composer. Of the nominees, Ludwig Goransson has a good chance of winning the Oscar. Wakanda is one of the popular compositions from last year. If Black Panther misses out the Academy for Costume Design, it’s likely to win here. However, for the same reason, Nicholas Britell’s wonderful score for Barry Jenkins’ If Beale Street Could Talk can get recognition.

 

Music (Original Song)

1) Kendrick Lamar – All the Stars (Black Panther)
2) Diane Warren – I’ll Fight (RBG)
3) Marc Shaiman – The Place Where Lost Things Go (Mary Poppins Returns)
4) Lady Gaga, Bradley Cooper – Shallow (A Star is Born)
5) David Rawlings and Gillian Welch – When a Cowboy Trades his Spurs for Wings (The Ballad of Buster Scruggs)

 

Likely Winner: Shallow (A Star is Born)
Deserving Winner: Shallow (A Star is Born)

The second easiest category to predict. Shallow is the song that narrated the entire story of A Star is Born in three minutes with bucketful of emotions and feel. It’s two people expressing the importance of diving into the deep end of love and refraining from getting stuck in the shallow. Any song that is meaningful to the film which pushes the story forward is the song that deserves Oscar love. It’s what that got Sam Smith an Oscar. Now, it will be Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper.

 

Production Design

1) Hannah Beachler – Black Panther
2) Fiona Crombie – The Favourite
3) Nathan Crowley – First Man
4) John Myhre – Mary Poppins Returns
5) Eugenio Caballero – Roma

Likely Winner: Roma
Deserving Winner: Roma

Irrespective of how visually dazzling the contenders seem, the detailing in Eugenio Caballero’s production is astonishing. From reconstructing the streets of Mexico door-to-door to tabulating what would be on the table, or the sofa, or the floors; he brought Cuaron’s childhood memories to life. The extensive detailing in the production made the film so grand, in spite of being produced on a miniscule $15 million budget.

 

Short Film (Animated)

1) Animal Behaviour
2) Bao
3) Late Afternoon
4) One Small Step
5) Weekends

Likely Winner: Bao
Deserving Winner: Bao

No second thoughts, this category belongs to Pixar. Not only for the masterful animation but also for the storytelling. The lucid execution of a stirring concept (the art of letting go) in just eight minutes is sure to get Bao an Oscar.

 

Short Film (Live Action)

1) Detainment
2) Fauve
3) Marguerite
4) Mother
5) Skin

Deserving Winner: Skin
Likely Winner: Skin

Grim themes run through this category as all the live-action shorts depict some truly harrowing stories. Skin is the strongest contender of the lot. Based on the death of James Bulger, a two-year old kid who was killed by 10-year old kids – it’s a dreadful experience that speaks volumes on American racism.

 

Sound Editing

1) Benjamin A. Burtt and Steve Boeddeker – Black Panther
2) John Warhurst and Nina Hartston – Bohemian Rhapsody
3) Ai-Ling Lee and Mildred Iatrou Morgan – First Man
4) Ethan Van der Ryn and Erik Aadahl – A Quiet Place
5) Sergio Diaz and Skip Lievsay – Roma

Likely Winner: First Man
Deserving Winner: A Quiet Place

Damien Chazelle’s First Man, in spite of being technically flawless, didn’t get enough appreciation, both from the audience and the Academy. Justin Hurwitz’s masterful score and use of zero green screens guaranteed an unprecedented cinematic experience. Considering the lack of nominations in other categories (Best Picture, in particular), it is sure to bag the Oscar.

Although to me, John Krasinski’s A Quiet Place deserves the honour. It was fairly overrated, having decent amount of suspense to make up for a satisfying experience but nowhere close to the massive hype it garnered on social media. The sound editing, however, was absolutely impeccable. The plot was centered entirely on the lack of noise. As a result, the use of sound became the most important aspect. And it was skillfully deployed.

 

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Sound Mixing

1) Steve Boeddeker, Brandon Proctor and Peter Devlin – Black Panther
2) Paul Massey, Tim Cavagin and John Casali – Bohemian Rhapsody
3) Jon Taylor, Frank A. Montaño, Ai-Ling Lee and Mary H. Ellis – First Man
4) Skip Lievsay, Craig Henighan and José Antonio García – Roma
5) Tom Ozanich, Dean Zupancic, Jason Ruder and Steve Morrow – A Star is Born

Likely Winner: First Man
Deserving Winner: A Star is Born

Again, Damien Chazelle’s First Man is the one likely to bag the Oscar. All the nerve wracking test flights, the Gemini-8 sequence to the historic moon landing owes direct debt to the fabulous sound mixing. The rocket blasts felt as real as was the silence of the Moon. However, the most immersive experience I had was when I watched A Star is Born in a Dolby theater. Having seen plenty of musicals without ever attending any concert, the film electrified me from the moment Black Eyes started playing out loud. It was like being at a concert, fully overwhelmed. And it took me mere seconds to fully dive into the world of Jackson Maine.

 

Visual Effects

1) Avengers: Infinity War
2) Christopher Robin
3) First Man
4) Ready Player One
5) Solo: A Star Wars Story

Likely Winner: Avengers: Infinity War
Deserving Winner: Ready Player One

Ready Player One deserves all the accolades for what it is — a jaw dropping, visual marvel — encompassing hundreds of iconic pop culture characters altogether. From creating the bright and vivid Oasis to paying homage to Stanley Kubrick’s stellar The Shining, it reached the pinnacle of VFX wizardry. Unfortunately, Avengers: Infinity War is bound to take home the trophy considering Marvel has never won an Oscar.

 

Writing (Adapted Screenplay)

1) Joel Coen & Ethan Coen – Ballad of Buster Scruggs
2) Charlie Wachtel & David Rabinowitz and Kevin Willmott & Spike Lee – Blackkklansman
3) Nicole Holofcener and Jeff Whitty – Can You Ever Forgive Me?
4) Barry Jenkins – If Beale Street Could Talk
5) Eric Roth and Bradley Cooper & Will Fetters – A Star is Born

Likely Winner: Blackkklansman
Deserving Winner: Blackkklansman

While the category is stuffed with brilliant adaptations, the finest of them all is Spike Lee’s Blackkklansman. Encapsulating plethora of fascinating ideas and boisterous dialogues in particular, it deserves all the love.

 

Writing (Original Screenplay)

1) Deborah Davis and Tony McNamara – The Favourite
2) Paul Schrader – First Reformed
3) Nick Vallelonga, Brian Currie, Peter Farrelly – Green Book
4) Alfonso Cuaron – Roma
5) Adam McKay – Vice

Likely Winner: The Favourite
Deserving Winner: Green Book

The Favourite is sure to win an Oscar, primarily, for telling a sumptuous historic tale unlike any other and for being the consolation prize. But if it loses the Best Picture; Green Book deserves to win for being an extraordinary road trip film that delivers the much needed lesson of racial harmony. Considering the times we live in, acknowledging such films is highly necessary.

By Mayank Nailwal

 

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