BAFTA Winners + Precursor Consensus = No Surprises on Oscar Night?

by Nathaniel R

Kaluuya wins "Rising Star"With only 13 days left until Oscar, the race in most of the marquee categories is sadly settled. BAFTA, held today in London, cemented the frontrunners honoring the exact same actors as the Critics Choice Awards, SAG, and Golden Globes. It's Gary Oldman, Frances McDormand, Sam Rockwell, and Alison Janney for the Oscars. Engrave the statues now. That's just too much consensus for Oscar to overthrow though we're personally baffled that none of that quartet's strong (and arguably better) competitors managed to put up a fight. What's more it's the first time in history when there's been no variation whatsoever in the prizes despite none of that foursome winning any of the top critics awards (NYFCC, LAFCA, and NSFC). Usually there's at least one 'we're-doing-our-own-thing' moment within the four categories in the televised precursors. Not this year. What happened to the tough battle we were suppose to have in Best Actress for example with Saoirse Ronan, Margot Robbie, and Sally Hawkins all seeming possible early on as victors. 

The only real question on Oscar night given this lock-step agreement from all of the major precursors is within the rare categories wherein there wasn't total agreement...

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Beauty vs Beast: Sibling Rivalry

Jason from MNPP here wishing us all the happiest Lovely Laura Linney Day! Today Linney is celebrating her 54th birthday, which means we're celebrating as well because she's a national treasure that one. But that happiness and celebration might not last long, I ruin everything, because I'm about to force a horrible choice on you with this week's "Beauty vs Beast" contest and ask you to consider choosing between the siblings of Kenneth Lonergan's 2000 sibling masterpiece You Can Count On Me -- Linney's hometown mama and boss-schtupper Sammy versus Mark Ruffalo's home-crashing money-grubbing seatbealt-wearing Terry. Vote and then tell us why you voted how you voted down below in the comments!

surveys

PREVIOUSLY Last week's Best Actor contest handed Timothee Chalamet a win as sound (to the tune of 87% of the vote!) as his trounced competitor Gary Oldman's eventual win at the Oscars next month is assured, so let's just enjoy us getting it right anyway. Said hepwa (and this is a fine list that I'd love to hear if anybody has any of their own to add to this list, too):

"There are five great young male performances in the past forty years, in chronological order: Dennis Christopher in "Breaking Away", Michael O'Keefe in "The Great Santini", Timothy Hutton in "Ordinary People", River Phoenix in "Running On Empty" and now Timothee Chalamet in "Call Me by Your Name"."

Beauty vs Beast: The Darkest Elio

Jason from MNPP here with this week's "Beauty vs Beast" contest - we've been more or less working our way through the year's big awards contenders over the past few weeks, with a Three Billboards here and a Phantom Thread there, and knowing what you know about my oft-expressed personal... predilections... you'd be forgiven for expecting a proper Call Me By Your Name showdown at some point. But I can't do it! I can't pit (haha like a peach) Elio against Oliver. I refuse!

Thankfully the awards season has offered me an alternative. (For once the awards season doing me a favor!) While Timothee Chalamet's been racking up the critics prizes for his performance it's been widely assumed that the Oscar already has Gary Oldman's name engraved on it and has since the very first photograph of him in Churchill drag was revealed. But where would your vote go, I wonder...

find bike trails

PREVIOUSLY Last week was the aforementioned Phantom-Thread-off, and finally some much deserved attention for Vicky Krieps, whose Alma plucked up about 70% of your mushrooms I mean votes. Said Claran:

"I thot Krieps is a discovered gem!! She matches DDL every step of the way n emerges the winner, well sorta... Its no an easy feat acting opp such icons like DDL or Manville n she holds up pretty well!! I'm surprised tt she din land a best newcomer mention w the BAFTA or NBR or any other critics group. She's the find o 2017, if u asked me."

Does 2017 = 2005 in Best Actor?

by Ben Miller

Film blogger Jordan Ruimy posited an observation a month ago on Twitter: 

In 2002 Gary Oldman would have been a cinch to win Best Actor, in 2017 he's a major question mark. The Oscars have changed.

While the awards season definitely shifted thereafter, his tweet remains at least partially true. Look at the history of the Best Actor Oscar.  From 1990 to 1997, every winner had a specific ailment (criminal insanity, alcoholism, AIDS), while 1998 to 2001 had a run of death scenes.  Of the past 16 years, starting with Adrien Brody in 2002, 10 winners have been for portrayals of real people (Casey Affleck's win last year broke a four-year run of biopic winners). There are always patterns to Oscar behavior.

This year’s slate of Best Actor nominees has an interesting parallel with the Best Actor race of 2005.  Let’s take a look back at the lineup...

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TIFF: Notes on Oscar hopefuls "Darkest Hour" and "Downsizing"

Detroit may have bombed but the letter "D" could still reign come Oscar time with Dunkirk, Darkest Hour, and Downsizing all potential Best Picture players. Though it can sometimes feel gross to discuss rich movies from an Oscar perspective before they've even been considered as films, it happens to us all this time of year and the films invite it with their slow rollouts from festival reviews that result in months of discussion and speculation before the public can buy tickets. In other words: Look what they made me us do!

DOWNSIZING
After 'miniature masterpiece' style reviews at Venice the critics got considerably chillier with Alexander Payne's latest once it hit Telluride. Now the film is playing in Toronto and the reviews continue to be mixed. This could spell trouble for the film, but be patient. Initial reviews are only part of the Oscar equation...

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