The Best Picture Race

       

Before I get to my predictions, here are some thoughts on the expansion this year.

 The Best Picture race this year will feature 10 nominees instead of the traditional 5. This is something I don’t like. I am not sure what reason the Academy is officially giving for this change, but the real reason has to be ratings given. I guess I can’t blame them for that. Oscar telecasts have notoriously been losing its viewership over the years. One popular theory is that because most of the nominees for Best Picture are lesser known films, the public has less of a reason to see who wins. This seems logical enough. Also logical would then be the theory that by adding five more movies to the category, there is a greater chance people will have a reason to watch. However, I don’t think it will add any real drama to the race. Whether they nominate 5, 10, or 100 films for Best Picture, it will end up coming down to two or three movies by Oscar night.


          This change will actually make announcement day less exciting. It was always interesting to see what movies got snubbed. That drama is gone with the new rule. The good news is that any movie that should remotely be considered for Best Picture should get its chance. The bad news is that it skewers certain trivia questions. It’s similar to how an extra two rounds of playoffs in baseball means that you cannot accurately compare today’s stats with those from the 50s.

Now that 10 movies are going to be nominated, there should be no doubt that the following will be competing for Best Picture:

Avatar
The Hurt Locker
Inglorious Basterds
Up In The Air


If the race was down to 5 movies, I’d be pretty sure these were going to be four of them. Now that the race is increased to 10, I’m almost 100% sure they will be in the running. If this was a normal 5 movie race then I’d go with Precious for the 5th spot. Since we’re dealing with 10 movies I’d add the following to my list of “ehh, I’m somewhat confident it’ll get nominated” list:

A Serious Man
An Education
Invictus
Up
The White Ribbon

I’m not sure if they’ll ignore Up since it will be nominated in the Best Animated Film category. Even though the nominees for Best Picture will double this year, Best Director is staying put at 5. This category usually goes hand in hand with the films nominated for Best Picture. By looking at the Best Director category, we’ll get a good idea at what would have been nominated if the Academy stuck with tradition. Here’s my final list of Best Picture nominees in order of confidence level:

Up In The Air

The Hurt Locker
Avatar
Inglorious Basterds
Precious
Up
A Serious Man
An Education
Invictus
The White Ribbon

What do you think?