Here’s a story that broke yesterday but has continued to pick up steam through the movie blogs today: The Weinstein Co. is planning to release box office champ Inglourious Basterds on DVD by the end of the year in order to use the discs for a cheap but aggressive Oscar campaign. This isn’t surprising news considering Harvey Weinstein’s Oscar addiction, but it has suddenly made me aware that Basterds is both deserving of and sure to receive a nod for Best Picture, which would be Quentin Tarantino’s first such nominee since Pulp Fiction 15 years ago.

Seriously, if we can be talking about District 9, Star Trek and other genre movies for the top category now that it will include ten contenders, how couldn’t Basterds be seen as a likely nominee? People have celebrated Christoph Waltz’s performance since Cannes, and he’s sure to garner a Best Supporting Actor nod, but few have noted how the film itself is a lock, too. Certainly if Weinstein can get The Reader a surprise Best Picture nomination with only five available slots, he can get this film onto a ballot double the size.

Don’t forget the Holocaust rule; how could the Academy ignore a movie that features vengeful Jews assassinating Hitler and 300 other Nazis all at once in a blaze of glory? Never mind that they didn’t get some of the worst offenders involved in the genocide.

Could Basterds garner more than the two obvious nominations? I doubt Tarantino will receive recognition for either directing or screenwriting, but who knows? Any other performances worthy? Any tech fields? Variety has an interesting article today on the costume design by Anna B. Sheppard. She’s been twice nominated for, interestingly enough, Holocaust films (Schindler’s List and The Pianist), but this time she was presented with more of a challenge. I have a feeling this third Holocaust-related project could be the one to get her the Oscar.

Check out what the other film blogs are saying about Basterds‘ Oscar chances after the jump:

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As if this year’s Oscars ceremony wasn’t abnormal enough, next year’s telecast is sure to be even weirder. Today the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences announced that it’s increasing the number of Best Picture nominees from five to ten. This isn’t a totally odd idea, since the Academy Awards used to nominate ten films for the big prize, but the last time we saw so many candidates was 65 years ago, when Casablanca beat out nine other titles for the win.

The first thing that I thought — and I’m sure I’m not alone — was, “are there actually ten great films made per year?” Certainly we’re a far, 70-year cry from 1939, considered to be the peak of American cinema, when Hollywood released such masterpieces as Stagecoach, The Wizard of Oz, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, Ninotchka, Dark Victory, Wuthering Heights, Of Mice and Men, Love Affair and Goodbye, Mr. Chips, all of which ran up against and lost to Gone With the Wind.

The second thing I thought is that the Academy is really slapping both The Dark Knight and WALL-E in the face with this change. Now, comparatively, should Star Trek and Up really be the ones to make up for those “snubs”? They’re good, but they’re not that good.

Check out the rest of the film blogosphere’s reactions after the jump:
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The first trailer for Rob Marshall’s film adaptation of Nine has arrived online, and I think as of this writing it’s already received 13 Oscar nominations. Yes, that is the trailer, not the movie. I think we have to wait until November to find out if the actual film is any good, but it’s probable that it too will be nominated for at least as many as Chicago, if not also as many as 8 ½. If it wins as many as both those films put together, that’s only 8, though, and it would be far more appropriate that it be awarded 9 Academy Awards. One thing is for certain: it unfortunately will not win everything it’s up for, because only one of the five actresses from the film nominated for Best Supporting Actress will be allowed to win. Wait, no, I do believe there’s a chance of a five-way tie. Otherwise, I’m hereby predicting Dame Judi Dench gets the trophy for sporting Catherine Zeta-Jones‘ Oscar-winning bob (only grayer).

I must admit that at first I thought I was watching a music video for Daft Punk’s “Aerodynamic.” I know, the tone of the bell chimes isn’t the same, but it’s close. After that, though, I was in heaven. Who knew that remaking Fellini as a Fosse-like production could be so gorgeous? And, sure, I mostly mean the women — even Nicole Kidman looks beautiful again — but I also mean everything else. Of course, all I really remember is Penelope Cruz’s legs, Kate Hudson’s shake, Marion Cotillard’s neck and, sure, even Fergie’s cleavage. Could this be the movie that gets straight men (besides me) to go see a musical?

Other bloggers’ responses after the jump:

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In case you haven’t heard (even though most people were talking about this yesterday — sorry today is that slow), next year’s Oscars will return to the month of March, due the Academy’s need to get out of the way of the Winter Olympics. For some of you, this may mean you have extra time to see the nominees. For most of you, this also means you’ll have more time to complain about how the Academy snubbed Wolverine, Avatar, Up or whatever other movie you think deserved a Best Picture nod. As for us film bloggers, the delay gives us additional time to speculate, predict and otherwise cover awards season to death.

As if this year’s Oscars didn’t seem over-blogged enough, I can only expect there will be even more movie sites, including those specializing in the Oscars, next year. And therefore I can only expect that by the time the Oscar telecast airs on March 7 I will be so sick of the whole film awards concept that I’ll almost not even live-Tweet the big night.

Reactions to the Academy’s announcement from other Oscar bloggers after the jump:

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“The best part about the 81st annual Academy Awards on Sunday night—y’know, besides Zac Efron, OMG!—is that once it’s over, we’ll never have to think about Slumdog Millionaire again.” — Christopher Rosen, at The New York Observer.

As the last weekday before the big event, today seems to be filled with more Oscar bloggery than all previous awards-season days combined. There are last minute predictions, last minute commentary and, most enjoyable, last minute Oscar nonsense. Are you ready? Are you bored? Are you so behind that you really need to attend tomorrow’s Best Picture nominee marathon at your local AMC theatre?

Whether or not you care about who or what wins on Sunday night, you may enjoy some of the following stories, quotes and video:

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Two more days until we find out who wins this year’s Academy Awards! Okay, so the exclamation point is more than forced. It’s been quite awhile since we’ve had even an ounce of excitement about the Oscars. But we mustn’t let predictability get us down. Sure, even the still-uncertain races (Penn vs. Rourke; Winslet vs. Streep; Man on Wire vs. Trouble the Water) are anything but interesting, because the everyman of 2009 couldn’t care less about who gave the year’s better performance and would probably be fine shrugging his shoulders at the TV screen in the event of a tie (or, better yet, irresolution). However, there’s one thing people keep forgetting about the Academy: they’re full of surprises.

So, rather than just go with the easy, “predictable” predictions, we attempted to guess who and what will Crash the Oscars this year with a surprise victory — preferably the kind that adds an “ing” to “upset.” And once again, we’d like to extend the forecasting fun to you. What surprises do you expect and/or hope for? Or, if you’re down with the boring route, what “certain” winners do you truly believe in? And why? The most accurate comments will be reprinted in our final Oscar column on Monday.
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Never mind all those Oscar predictions posts out there. If you really want to make some money in the office pool, look no further than a random blog created specifically to leak the winners of this year’s Academy Awards. Think it’s a hoax? I guess we just won’t know until Sunday, will we? And by then you’ll be out hundreds of dollars because you didn’t bet on The Reader for Best Adapted Screenplay.

Okay, so who cares if it’s real or not, particularly in this predictable a year, anyway? The real betting should be on who the telecast producers have wrangled to be those “top secret” presenters. Oh wait, it seems the big names, those that obviously should be revealed in order to attract their audiences, have also come out.

Ah, but what are they saying about either leak on the interweb, you ask? As usual, check out the quotes/links after the jump.

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When Milk wins the Oscar for Original Screenplay on February 22, it will be the first biopic to take the award in 26 years. Back then Gandhi faced some stiff competition, including two fellow Best Picture nominees, Tootsie and E.T.: The Extra Terrestrial, as well as An Officer and a Gentleman and Diner. And three of these opposing titles were 1982’s three top grossing films. Gandhi’s main obstacle, though, was not one of the other nominees. It was the difficulty of winning a category that’s typically associated with originality. Plenty of movies based on true stories have been nominated for Original Screenplay, but that “based on” factor can be a drawback, and the Academy tends to favor scripts born completely out of the imagination here.

Unfortunately for Milk, that Academy disfavor has been strong for the past three decades, passing over such ‘nonfiction’ films as The Queen, Shine, Nixon, Braveheart, Bugsy, Hotel Rwanda, Erin Brockovich, The Aviator and Good Night, and Good Luck for more “creative” efforts like Little Miss Sunshine. But this year, the ‘fiction’ films nominated for Original Screenplay are not strong candidates, whether for critical, commercial or political reasons. So fortunately for Milk, screenwriter Dustin Lance Black will partly win the Oscar by default. Not all voters will be choosing Milk in a process of elimination, though. Some will actually see that Black has penned a great “original” biopic and that it is indeed the most deserving of the nominated screenplays.

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With Danny Boyle’s DGA win over the weekend, Slumdog Millionaire achieved a near-impossible feat; it became even more favored to win the Oscar for Best Picture. Once thought to be an underdog, Slumdog has been pretty much unstoppable throughout the awards season, even picking up the undeserved top honor at the SAG Awards, and has never fallen from its position of frontrunner since it took the lead months ago. Yet last week, the internet was populated by talk of a Slumdog backlash, and for the first time in weeks, other Best Picture candidates were seriously being discussed as slightly plausible victors. The two titles considered most likely to be a threat to Boyle’s film are The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and Milk, with little concern for either Frost/Nixon or The Reader. However, while the former candidate is probably a sure thing to lose, the latter film should not yet be dismissed.

Before the Academy Award nominations were announced last month, The Reader wasn’t even thought to be a contender for any major category except Best Supporting Actress. Now, among its five nominations, it’s up for three higher-tiered Oscars, including Best Picture. So, we can’t rightly continue underestimating its potential. This isn’t to say that we are predicting The Reader to win Best Picture; Slumdog is still the safest bet for the top prize. But odds for The Reader do need to be adjusted, as its chances are a lot closer to, if not better than, secondary favorites Benjamin Button and Milk. Of course, as the it stands now, the film should be an appealing choice for any gamblers out there, because a surprise Best Picture win for The Reader would pay out big time. So, our immediate apologies to betters if the following seven factors have any influence on professional oddsmakers out there.
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In 10 out of 14 years, the winner of the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role has gone on to win the Academy Award for Best Actress. If this year marks the 11th such congruence, Meryl Streep will take home the Oscar. Yet there is an odd circumstance with the Academy’s nominations that hurts Streep’s chances. Another one of the Academy’s Best Actress contenders also received a SAG Award Sunday night: Kate Winslet, who won the supporting actress trophy for The Reader. At the Oscars, this role has been recognized as a lead performance, one that is likely a favorite to win.

Yes, it is a strange situation, one that shocked and confused Oscar prognosticators (especially this writer) on Thursday morning. Winslet’s Reader performance was campaigned as a supporting role, and she was recognized as such by the Golden Globes, the Broadcast Film Critics Association, the Chicago Film Critics Association and of course the Screen Actors Guild. A few organizations did nominate her for a lead award for The Reader, though few people take the Satellites seriously, and the BAFTA Awards are different than most in that they permit Winslet to compete against herself in the same category (she is also nominated for Best Leading Actress for Revolutionary Road).

Some now believe the Academy’s deviation will in fact cost Winslet the Oscar she could have won in the supporting field. Either voters will be confused about what film she’s nominated for (unless I’m simply less observant than elderly Academy members, which may indeed be the case), or she will now split the majority vote with Streep and thus allow Anne Hathaway or Melissa Leo to slip ahead (Angelina Jolie is believed to have no shot). Another idea is that voters will dismiss Winslet due to doubts over which category the performance belongs in. But since enough members of the Academy made it a point to nominate her as lead actress in the first place, this is hardly a reasonable theory.

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With a few more days left before the Oscar nominations are revealed, it is time to look at what the non-professionals anticipate will be among those contenders announced Thursday morning. Last Monday, we posted our own predictions for the Academy Award nominees and invited readers to weigh in with their own forecasts. A lot of comments concentrated on what shouldn’t happen, like The Dark Knight shouldn’t be nominated for Best Picture and Dustin Lance Black shouldn’t be nominated for his screenplay for Milk. And apparently The Curious Case of Benjamin Button could be this year’s Dreamgirls. However, there were some interesting trends among the many who chimed in. Check out some highlights after the jump.
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The Golden Globes have been handed out, and the last of Oscar ballots are to be postmarked by today. So, that’s it, the nominations for the 81st Academy Awards are being figured out as we speak, and campaigning is over until the official contenders are announced on January 22. Hopefully a few Academy members took notice of our unlikely last-minute suggestions, but it’s more probable that we’ll be looking at an unsurprising crop of films represented in the major eight categories. As you’ll see after the jump, we predict that two heavily-buzzed supporting performances will be snubbed. Of course you’re likely to disagree with these foreseen omissions. In fact, we welcome all you readers to make your own predictions in the comments section — what you think will be nominated, not what you want nominated. And on Monday, January 19, SpoutBlog will feature a post highlighting the best of these comments and predictions.

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We’re less than two weeks away from receiving this year’s Oscar nominations, and though none of the major categories are completely predictable just yet, each has at least three or four certain favorites. Meanwhile, the final slots for Best Picture, Best Director and the acting and screenwriting categories may be simply a random grab from small handfuls of rotating contenders. As of now, it doesn’t appear we’ll be seeing any huge surprises come the morning of January 22nd, when the Academy announces the nominees. The Dark Knight is sure to become the first comic book film up for Best Picture, and it won’t even be a shocker if animated feature Wall-E is listed alongside it in the same category.

But the ballots don’t need to be mailed out until Monday, so I’m taking one last chance to reach out to the procrastinators within the Academy membership. If you still don’t know who and what to write in, and you’re unwilling to go the safe route and nominate the expected bunch of films and talent, then consider some of these underdogs, under-appreciated and pretty much unlikely possibilities:
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The Academy’s list of 49 tunes deemed eligible for the Best Original Song Oscar this year seems like a lot for the Music Branch to pick through. That is, until you notice that more than one-fifth of those contenders are from the same film (High School Musical 3, which, thanks to a new rule, is only allowed, at most, two nominations in this category) and you recall that last year’s list included many more songs (59) to choose from. The talent involved this year, however, is tremendous, at least in terms of those performers who sing the tunes on the soundtrack (many of whom had a hand in the songwriting). These artists include Mariah Carey, Etta James, Beyonce Knowles (who played Etta James), Norah Jones, will.i.am, Jack White and Alicia Keys, Danny Elfman, Emmylou Harris, Chaka Khan and Regina Spektor.

Add to those big names such heavyweights as Bruce Springsteen and Peter Gabriel, both of whom are locks to be nominated, as well as tween favorites Miley Cyrus and Zac Efron (along with the rest of the cast from High School Musical 3), and you could have one hell of a concert if the Academy simply turned its awards telecast into one big celebration of the year’s songs written for the screen. Unfortunately for ABC, the Oscars aren’t just about securing viewers, so there’s no promise that the most popular artists will be among the five nominees. Rather, the true Oscar-worthy songs are those tunes that serve their respective films best — in terms of context as much as in the quality of their songwriting.

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