THE FAC'S OSCAR PREDIX FOR SIX CATEGORIES
We're coming down to the home stretch of Oscar Season. The BAFTA's were handed out in London last night (see below) and that's the last piece of evidence pointing us in any direction for what might happen on Oscar night itself.
Oscar final voting begins today and runs to Feb. 21. Of course, the envelopes are opened on Feb. 26. with today's installment of The FAC I'll have completed a set of predictions for all 24 categories in the last week. I'll update categories as we move through the next two weeks and have a final posting update in the Thursday, Feb. 23 posting. That said...
Here are the Oscar winner predictions for the last six categories that The FAC hasn't addressed in this last week: Cinematography, Costumes, Makeup/Hair and the Shorts: Animated, Documentary and Live Action.
As always The FAC uses the published predictions of the following experts to derive its picks:
Erik Anderson/Awards Watch
Clayton Davis/Awards Circuit
Greg Ellwood/The Playlist-Awards Campaign
Scott Feinberg/The Hollywood Reporter
Joey Magidson/Hollywood News
Nathaniel Rogers/Film Experience
Sasha Stone/Awards Daily
Kristopher Tapley/Variety-InContention
Anne Thompson/Indiewire
TFF #43 films are in Bold.
CINEMATOGRAPHY
1) La La Land
2) Lion
3) Moonlight
4) Arrival
5) Silence
Comment: Despite Lion's ASC win last week, La La Land seems fairly secure for the win here.
COSTUMES
1) La La Land
2) Jackie
3) Florence Foster Jenkins
4) Fantastic Beasts
5) Allied
Comment: La La leads here but it's a tight race with Jackie. This is one of about three or four categories (the others are probably Original Screenplay, Sound Editing and Cinematography) that will determine whether La La Land gets double-digit wins, ties for most Oscars won of all time (11) or, conceivably, breaks the record.
MAKEUP/HAIR
1) Star Trek Beyond
2) A Man Called Ove
3) Suicide Squad
Comment: A moderately close contest between Star Trek and Ove with the Treksters having a sight edge.
ANIMATED SHORT
1) Piper
2) Pearl
3) Borrowed Time
4) Blind Vaysha
5) Pear Cider and Cigarettes
Comment: This is perceived as a tight two horse race between Piper and Pearl. Off The FAC metric...I wouldn't be stunned by a win from either or even Borrowed Time.
DOCUMENTARY SHORT
1) The White Helmets
2) Joe's Violin
3) 4.1 Miles
4) Extremis
5) Watani: My Homeland
Comment: A dead heat between The White Helmets and Joe's Violin and that's no exaggeration. The two films were tied in The FAC metric with the tie broken in The White Helmets favor as it had one more pick at the top from The FAC professionals. This Oscar could easily swing to either film.
LIVE ACTION SHORT
1) Silent Nights
2) Sing
3) Timecode
4) Ennemis Interieurs
5) Le Femme et le TVG
Comment: The predictions in this category are all over the place. Any of the five could win.
Should The FAC be 100% accurate, La La Land would win another two trophies and added to the previous FAC predictions over this past week would give it a total of 10 trophies on Oscar night: Picture, Director, Actress, Film Editing, Cinematography, Original Score, Original Song (City of Stars), Costumes, Production Design and Sound Mixing.
La La would miss, according to the FAC, in Original Screenplay, Sound Editing, Best Actor and its other Original Song nomination. The loss to itself for Best Song means that 13 Oscars are the ceiling for La La and the loss of Ryan Gosling in the Best Actor category seems all but certain (to either Denzel Washington or Casey Affleck). That means that La La Land has to run the table of every one of its remaining nominations to set the all time record which seems a tall order.
I've been saying for a long while that I think La La Land ends the night with nine Oscars. A great night, but not record setting. Still, it would be the most since 2003's Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.
Currently The FAC has La La Land winning 10 Oscars.
Moonlight wins two.
Fences wins two.
Single Oscar winning films look to be:
Manchester by the Sea
Zootopia
O.J.: Made in America
The Salesman
Hacksaw Ridge
The Jungle Book
Star Trek Beyond
And the Shorts: Piper, The White Helmets and Silent Nights.
Total Oscars going to TFF #43 films: 14.
BAFTA NAMES ITS WINNERS
The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (sometimes referenced as the British Oscars) awarded their accolades for the 2016 film year last night (which was late afternoon here in the states).
Damien Chazelle's La La Land did well but it wasn't the blowout that the Golden Globes night was for the film. La La Land picked up five of the 11 BAFTA's it was nominated for. Of course, the five wins did include the biggest prize of the night: Best Picture. La La Land also won for Chazelle's direction and Emma Stone won Best Actress. It also won for Score and Cinematography.
Kenneth Lonergan's Manchester by the Sea won two honors for Original Screenplay and for Casey Affleck as Best Actor.
Denis Villeneuve's Arrival won the award for Best Sound (a trophy that many thought La La Land might well pick up.
Barry Jenkins' Moonlight surprisingly went home empty-handed. The film had been nominated for four BAFTAs.
Lion was the other surprise of the night winning two awards for Dev Patel as Best Supporting Actor and also winning for Adapted Screenplay.
Major (Oscar analogous categories) winners here with TFF #43 films in Bold.
Picture: La La Land
Director: Damien Chazelle/La La Land
Actress: Emma Stone/La La Land
Actor: Casey Affleck/Manchester by the Sea
Supporting Actress: Viola Davis/Fences
Supporting Actor: Dev Patel/Lion
Adapted Screenplay: Lion
Original Screenplay: Manchester by the Sea
Documentary: 13th
Foreign Language: Son of Saul (TFF #42)
Animated Feature: Kubo and the Two Strings
Original Music: La La Land
Cinematography: La La Land
Editing: Hacksaw Ridge
Production Design: Fantastic Beasts
Costumes: Jackie
Makeup/Hair: Florence Foster Jenkins
Sound: Arrival
Visual Effects; The Jungle Book
What does any of this mean for Oscar night?
Does it mean that La La Land is likely to fall short in film editing, production, design, costume or film editing?
Does Moonlight get shut out on Feb. 26th?
Most of the pundits seem to think that the BAFTA results might show a smallish trend away from the La La Land avalanche but that it's still solid for a number of wins including picture and director. It does seem less likely that it will tie or break the record of winning 11 trophies.
BAFTA coverage is here:
from Kristopher Tapley/Variety-In Contention
from Anne Thompson/Indiewire
from Pete Hammond/Deadline
from Paul Sheehan/Gold Derby
from Oliver Lyttleton/The Playlist
from Nathaniel Rogers/The Film Experience
That's a wrap for Monday. More to come on Thursday...
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