Ryan's Movie Blog: Review Special: Oscar Predictions 2017

Hello All,

Sorry for the lateness, my life has been weird lately and I honestly blanked on the Oscars coming up, and I have honestly been unsure on what will win so I originally decided to say nothing. However, upon reviewing the nominees, and this being one of the rare years I’ve actually seen most of the nominated films, I decided late is better than never, so let’s get to it.

I will only review the categories where I have seen at minimum over half of the movies.

I will do a short list for each of the following:

What I think will/should win
What I would want to see win
The surprise upset

Sound simple? Okay, we’re going straight down the list in the order the academy has on their own website which you can read here: http://oscar.go.com/nominees, and I would actually recommend having that open while reading this, because I will save us all a lot of effort by not retyping all of the nominees for each one, instead going straight to my opinion.

Best Picture

Will win: Moonlight - I did really like Moonlight, and as much as it didn’t make my year end list, I think it’s probably the most important film made in 2016, and would certainly cement the academy’s effort to try and make the changes people have been wanting them to make.
To See Win: La La Land - I’m probably going to lose some popularity in certain circles, but goddamn it La La Land was really good, and it deserves all the praise it’s been getting. Since my number one film didn’t even get nominated, I want to see the feel good musical get some goddamn oscar gold.
The Upset: Manchester by the Sea - We’ll talk about best actor further down, but I honestly think that since people have been talking about the acting so much, it’s not too farfetched to see this win, but it will still be a shock if it did.

Leading Actor

Will Win: Casey Affleck - I truly think this is Casey’s best effort ever, and he’s been mostly killing it in the awards race so far (I think). It’s his year hands down.
To See Win: Casey Affleck - See above.
The Upset: Ryan Gosling - If only because of, again, all the hype La La Land has been getting.

Leading Actress

Will Win: Emma Stone - She has been dominating the awards scene, again for La La Land, and again it’s well deserved. She really has the bigger emotional and character arc in the film and she pulled it off near flawlessly.
To See Win: Ruth Negga - She was charming as the wife who just wanted be able to love her husband in peace in Loving. She was tremendous in the film, and I would honestly love for her to win the golden statue.
The Upset: Natalie Portman - Okay, her playing Jackie Kennedy is an easy call to make, but I honestly think Black Swan, which she did win for, was her better performance, as good as both films were.

Supporting Actor

Will Win: Mahershala Ali - While only in Moonlight for a third of the film, his brief time was memorable as the surrogate father of our main protagonist, and he dominates the limited time he has on screen.
To See Win: Lucas Hedges - This is a star making performance, and I’m glad he got the nomination, but I would argue he deserves his win almost as much as Affleck does for his.
The Upset: Jeff Bridges - In an overall awesome film, Jeff Bridges was still the most awesome thing in it.

Supporting Actress

Will Win: Viola Davis - Honestly, for me the will win and to see win categories are almost interchangeable, but Viola gets me vote for this one because my lord she was incredible. Just the range of emotions that woman goes through is just astounding.
To See Win: Octavia Spencer - She has this great quiet dignity about her that she brings into every film, and it would be nice to see her snag another win for this film.
The Upset: Michelle Williams - I still maintain she was underutilized in her film, and honestly in such a tight category, she just doesn’t stand out for me.

Animated Feature

Will Win: Zootopia - In a year of heated racial politics, leave it to Disney to try and remind us that we need to look beyond our own prejudices in order to truly get to know others. And that’s all I’m really going to say about that.

To See Win: Kubo and the Two Strings - Because it’s a cool adventure, that also teaches us an important lesson about life.
The Upset: The Red Turtle - I haven’t seen the film, but if it won, it would literally make people upset that Your Name (which I also didn’t see) didn’t get nominated at all. So call this one a case of the quite literal meaning.

Cinematography

Will Win: La La Land - Boy I’m starting to sound like a broken record. It’s a gorgeous film, that manages to have such a wide scope of colours and looks to it that some scenes are just mind blowingly beautiful.
To See Win: Silence - Scorsese’s brutal depiction of a Japan in the midst of a purge is just this terrific mixture of beauty and haunting imagery that it just leaves you speechless by the end of it.
The Upset: Arrival - The cinematography did a great job of capturing the mood of every scene in arrival, and it’s hard to argue with emotional perfection sometimes.

Costume Design

Will Win: La La Land - Call this another case of this category and to see win being interchangeable, but again La La Land will probably get it. It created an amazing mix of both modern and classic clothing designs to bring together this quite unique looking style to it’s film.
To See Win: Fantastic Beasts - This one I’ll admit seemed like the harder challenge, matching the wizarding style of Harry Potter with the looks of post first world war fashion, and for the most part I think they did a brilliant job with it.
The Upset: Jackie - The film does a fantastic job capturing the style of both the first lady and the era she lived in, so this one wouldn’t surprise me too much if it won.

Directing

Will Win: La La Land - Jesus Christ I am a broken record. For musicals, being able to transition from song to reality, and sometimes cross huge stretches of time while keeping the story in line and making it all flow seamlessly is tough, but Damien Chazelle nails it here and again, it’s well deserved praise.
To See Win: Arrival - Speaking of keeping everything in order, Denis Villeneuve pulls that off in Spades with Arrival, and while it wasn’t one of my personal favourites, the sheer amount he had to keep inline and the fact that he made a film that complex easy to follow without sacrificing its intelligence is just a sight to behold.
The Upset: Hacksaw Ridge - It’s a great return to form for Mel Gibson, but I think it’s just too soon. Happy to see it nominated though.

Did not see any of the documentaries listed, so we’re skipping those.

Film Editing

Will Win: La La Land - Okay, I know I might be putting a lot of eggs into this basket, but again every scene in this film flows amazingly well, and the editing keeps up perfectly, especially in the way there might be more editing in it than you might realize, especially in some of the longer scenes.
To See Win: Hacksaw Ridge - The war scenes in the film were hectic as hell, and the fact that the film manage to both show the chaos and yet allow us to follow what’s going on perfectly is always a feat.
The Upset: Hell or High Water - Same thing as Hacksaw Ridge basically, except more for the shootouts and robbery scenes.

Didn’t see any foreign language films, so moving on.

Makeup and Hairstyling

Okay so there’s only three films nominated, yet I only saw two of them so we’ll just do this instead. As much as Suicide Squad had some really cool aspects in this category, Star Trek always dominates in this category, so consider Star Trek my choice to win, and Suicide Squad my upset.

Alright Folks, for the rest of the technicals, we’re going speed run style. I will simply state which one gets my vote and why, so let’s begin.

Music (Original Score): La La Land - Like the musical isn’t going to win at least this one?

Music (Original Song): Audition (The Fools Who Dream) - My favourite song from La La Land, mostly because of it’s raw, and unflinching passion for life and love.

Production Design: Arrival - I did like the designs of anything alien related, because it was hard to find anything else to compare them too.

Didn’t see any of the short films, moving on

Sound Editing: Deepwater Horizon - The sounds throughout the film are just epic and capture the intensity of the situation well.

Sound Mixing: Hacksaw Ridge - A tough call, but I’m leaning towards this one. Again, those battle scenes are just intense as hell, and that film nails it.

Visual Effects: Kubo and the Two Strings - That whole film was stop motion. That alone makes it the clear choice in my mind.

Writing (Adapted): Moonlight - Only getting nominated for adapted instead of original on a technicality, I just think it’s a well told story done right.

After looking over the choices for the last category, I had to switch back to my original format in order to explain myself a bit better.

Writing (Original)

Will Win: Manchester by the Sea - I think in lieu of Best Picture, it’ll pick up best writing. I almost gave it to La La Land, but I think Manchester was the better story, La La Land was just executed better.
To See Win: Hell or High Water - A Western set in the modern day just seems like a cool idea, and a win would potentially lead the way for more films with ideas like this.
The Upset: The Lobster - Because Swiss Army Man didn’t get nominated, I think the weirdest film in this category winning would suffice for that.

And that’s it. I will be watching the Oscars tomorrow (at the time of writing this) and I will be live tweeting throughout, so apologies in advance, and let’s find out how wrong I am.

Next: No Idea. Probably Logan, but it’s still early in the week.

Links:

Want to read more? Click above for my last review. Hint: The only film that came out this week, but also probably one of the best so far this year. You can read that here.