Oscar 2015: What Will Win, What Should Win

The 88th Annual Academy Awards are tonight! It's basically New Year's Eve for me and many others, a sentiment expressed many times by The Film Experience, but also texted to me by friends and said out loud by co-workers.

I've told you what I'd want to win in a perfect world -- let's talk about what I think will win in the actual one.

BEST PICTURE: The Revenant
My personal rankings for the nominees:
1. Spotlight (*****)
2. Brooklyn (*****)
3. The Revenant (****)
4. Mad Max: Fury Road (****)
5. Bridge of Spies (****)
6. The Martian (*** 1/2)
7. The Big Short (***)
8. Room (**)

Complete predictions, and rankings, after the jump...

The Men of Spotlight, the Look of Mad Max: 2015 Hollmann Awards, Day One

Here we are! It's February 2016, but we're officially starting the Hollmann Awards of 2015! For the next three days, I'll give you my picks for the best of the year in eighteen different categories.

Today: Makeup, Supporting Actor, Visual Effects, Original Song, Cinematography, and Editing!

BEST MAKEUP/HAIRSTYLING

5. Carol
Jerry DeCarlo, hair department head
Patricia Regan, makeup department head

 Therese's makeup tutorial. Carol's blonde locks and sophisticated lips. Abby's whole thing.

4. The Throne



Prince Sado's progressively sallow skin, sunken eyes, and cracked lips as he slowly starves to death. The wizened white slowly taking over King Jeongjo's beard and hair. The careful hairstyles of the ladies of the court.

3. What We Do in the Shadows
Don Brooker, special makeup effects/prosthetics designer
Roger Murray, makeup effects designer
Dannelle Satherley, hair designer



The vampire ball.  The lifeless complexions, spattered with blood. The varying hairstyles and facial hair denoting the location and era of a vampire's "turn." And then there's Petyr.

2. The Revenant
Graham Johnston, makeup department head
Sian Grigg/Duncan Jarman, key makeup and prosthetics for Leonardo DiCaprio
Audrey Doyle, key makeup and prosthetics for Tom Hardy
Adrien Morot, special effects makeup department head
Robert Pandini, hair department head
Kathryn L. Blondell, hair stylist for Leonardo DiCaprio



Hugh's gaping wounds following a bear attack. Fitzgerald's surviving patch from a past scalping attempt. The matted, bloody, snotty, icy beards and untamed hair of the pioneers.

1. Mad Max: Fury Road
Lesley Vanderwalt, makeup/hair designer
Damian Martin, prosthetics supervisor
Elka Wardega, senior prosthetics make artist

Immortan Joe's diseased self and flowing locks. Max's parched lips and sunburnt face. Furiosa's war-like patch of black. The scarred, pale, skeleton-like War Boys. The sand blown features of the Vuvalini.

Best Supporting Actor and more after the jump!

Predicting Tomorrow's Oscar Noms!

Ok, folks. I know I've been unusually mum about this Awards Season (with the exception of a theory that I'm about to place a lot of faith in). But it's to talk the Oscar Nominations. They are tomorrow. That is exciting. It's time to predict things.

I'm not in rooms with industry members who are "buzzing." I've been following the guilds and the Globes, but most of us seem to agree there's a general mix of consensus and confusion. Here, then, is how I think it could go down.

I have no clue with Foreign Film, Animated, Doc, or shorts. Don't ask me.

BEST PICTURE
Anywhere between five and ten nominees. I'm thinking ten.

The Big Short
Brooklyn
Carol
Ex Machina
Mad Max: Fury Road
The Martian
The Revenant
Room
Spotlight
Steve Jobs

BEST DIRECTOR
The exact DGA lineup.

Alejandro G. Iñárritu, The Revenant
Tom McCarthy, Spotlight
Adam McKay, The Big Short
George Miller, Mad Max: Fury Road
Ridley Scott, The Martian

More predictions, after the jump

The Awards So Far

Derelict in my duties, I have been! I haven't talked about the National Board of Review, the New York Critics, or the Los Angeles Critics. I don't remember if I have before, but I definitely keep charts of all three.

Here's what happened:

NATIONAL BOARD OF REVIEW: Mad Max: Fury Road won Best Picture; The Martian won Best Actor (Matt Damon), Best Director (Ridley Scott), and Best Adapted Screenplay (Drew Goddard). This immediately reminded me of my trip to South Korea, mostly because that's where I saw Mad Max, but also because the friend I was visiting at the time wound up loving The Martian so much, he saw it thrice (at least) in theaters. So that was interesting. Meanwhile, Brie Larson (Room), Sylvester Stallone (Creed), Jennifer Jason Leigh (The Hateful Eight) round out the actors; Quentin Tarantino wins Original Screenplay for The Hateful Eight.

NEW YORK FILM CRITICS CIRCLE: Carol, which I plan to see a second time this week, dominated with four wins, including Film, Director (Todd Haynes), Screenplay (Phyllis Nagy), and Cinematography (Edward Lachman). The big shocker: Michael Keaton winning Actor for Spotlight, an ensemble film full of supporting actors/actresses. Supporting Actor, instead, went to Mark Rylance for Bridge of Spies (deserved); Supporting Actress to Kristen Stewart for Clouds of Sils Maria (the only movie I saw during my one week in New York City, which I visited for the first time a week before South Korea); Actress to Saoirse Ronan for Brooklyn, a dream of a film, a phenomenal performance.

LOS ANGELES FILM CRITICS ASSOCIATION: Spotlight may be the best movie of the year -- certainly LAFCA thought so, since, in addition to Screenplay, that's what it won. Then the rest of the categories spread the love: Mad Max: Fury Road's George Miller for Best Director, Steve Jobs' Michael Fassbender for Best Actor, 45 Years' Charlotte Rampling for Best Actress, 99 Homes' Michael Shannon for Best Supporting Actor; Ex Machina's leading lady Alicia Vikander for Best Supporting Actress.

Joe Reid pointed out on Twitter that this is the first time since 1988 all three critics' bodies split in every category. By the way, Oscar awarded Rain Man for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, and Best Original Screenplay that year -- total mentions by any of these groups: 0.

In the morning, another group will announce their nominees -- the Screen Actors Guild. My predictions, after the jump.

First Half of 2015

A brief look at the film year so far.

I've only seen 38 films so far this year (not counting the retrospective flicks, of course), which is fewer than I had hoped -- though, if recent conversations are any indication, far more than the average. I mean, someone told me the last movie they saw in a theater was Gravity!

These are unranked choices, but they are grouped together in ascending order of affection. Directors and commentary follow each title, except in "Shan't See It Again", a sort-of Hall of Shame -- the guilty are protected in this instance.

Shan't See It Again 

Aloha
Child 44
The Con Artists
San Andreas
Seventh Son
Woman in Gold

Wish They Were Better

Fifty Shades of Grey (Sam Taylor-Johnson): Dakota Johnson a natural, goofy yet convincingly sexy, with a soundtrack that's on point; but Jamie Dornan is a wasteland, and the finale is ho-hummingly tame

Jupiter Ascending (The Wachowskis): fascinating world-building, but clearly hacked to pieces, and with a wan Mila Kunis at its center

Jurassic World (Colin Trevorrow): great fun as a monsters-run-amok flick (and I consider That Death a huge plus), but script is aggressively regressive re: sexual politics

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl (Alfonso Gomez-Rejon): surprisingly unsentimental lead a relief; in fact, most of the ensemble shines and convinces, despite suffocatingly twee conceits and sketchily-written adults

Serena (Susanne Bier): J-Law understated, intense, hypnotic; film should be a slow burn but it's actually a long sit

Guilty Pleasures

The Boy Next Door (Rob Cohen): deliciously scandalous, and it must be said: J.Lo is genuinely phenom in this

Mortdecai (David Koepp): I laughed more than once, love the song "Johanna" that plays over the end credits, and I think everyone should be aware that I am always Team Gwyneth

Positivity after the jump -- or as I like to call it, the Cold Stone Rankings.