Sonic Youth wrote:No editing nom? Maybe Inception wouldn't have been nominated in a five Best Picture slate.
This does mean one thing: Best Picture comes down to Black Swan, The Fighter, The King's Speech, 127 Hours or The Social Network. No other film has a chance.
So True Grit won't win, nor will Inception.
Wesley Lovell
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both." - Benjamin Franklin
Hurt Locker (9 nominations, tied for most nominated with Avatar) Slumdog Millionaire (10 nominations, Benjamin Button had 13) No Country for Old Men (8 nominations, tied for most nominated with There Will Be Blood) The Departed (5 nominations, four other films had more with Dreamgirls tops at Crash (6 nominations, Brokeback Mountain had Million Dollar Baby (7 nominations, The Aviator had Return of the King (11 nominations, lead) Chicago (13 nominations, lead) A Beautiful Mind (8 nominations, Fellowship of the Ring had 13) Gladiator (12 nominations, lead)
From a numerology standpoint, 12 is a good number. Gladiator, The English Patient, Schindler's List, Dances With Wolves all won Best Picture. You have to go back to Reds in 1981 to find a 12-nominee that didn't win.
Now, I'm still predicting Social Network to come out on top because this last decade, the Academy has shown most nominated does not always mean Best Picture. Before that, it was actually very rare. In the last 30 years, only 9 films have won Best Picture and not either lead the nominations or been tied for most. 5 of those were this past decade.
Bardem's nomination was mildly surprising, but I'd rather see him in the line-up instead of Robert Duvall, whom many of you were predicting. I used to like Duvall "back in the day" to coin a popular phrase that I hate, but in the last two decades he's either been over-the-top or out-to-lunch, either completely overwhelming his films and characters or almost sleepwalking through them.
I agree with Flipp that Andrew Garfield was the emotional core of The Social Network and without him Jesse Eisenberg's performance doesn't work. John Hawkes' nomination is, for me, in a class with Michael Shannon's what-the-heck nomination for Revolutionary Road.
Hailee Steinfeld nominated in support after all the boruhaha is mildly surprising, but is in keeping with the retrograde aspect of the year's overall nominations, i.e. the notion that kids belong in the lower category regardless of size of role.
Seems there are more old farts in the Academy than I thought with old-fashioned films like The King's Speech and True Grit leading the nominations. If we adhere to the general rule of the film that has the most nominations wins the big prize, then I suppose there is the possibility that The King's Speech will win, but I still think it will split the old fart vote with True Grit and the populist vote with True Grit and The Fighter while The Social Network sails to easy victory.
Best thing about the nominations: the limit of Black Swan to five, especially its exclusion for Best Original Screenplay.
Biggest shocker is no Waiting for 'Superman' in Documentary Feature. I was a bit surprised Andrew Garfield and BOTH Black Swan ladies got snubbed but those were possibilities.
Christopher Nolan now has 3 DGA nominations but 0 Oscar nominations.
Ouch? It was never going to lead the nominees. You expected it to get Costume Design or Art Direction? I think I predicted it for 9 nominations. I predicted Garfield for a supporting actor nomination, so it was nominated for pretty much everything I expected it to be nominated for (sans Garfield). The Departed, Million Dollar Baby, and Crash had fewer nominations than The Social Network and I think it matched the count of No Country for Old Men. It's fine.
"Young men make wars and the virtues of war are the virtues of young men: courage and hope for the future. Then old men make the peace, and the vices of peace are the vices of old men: mistrust and caution." -- Alec Guinness (Lawrence of Arabia)
The King's Speech received 12 nominations. Because, you know, it broke all the laws of physics in its presentation of the world and our perception of it.
True Grit- 10 noms
Social Network - 8 noms (ouch)
Inception - 8 noms (but no director, ouch)
The Fighter - 7 noms
Black Swan - I can't count that low.