Tom Hooper with the Director's Guild of America Award for "The King's Speech"
Okay. I admit it. I am surprised. And I am getting excited.
After ranting about the predictability of the pre-Oscar awards season, the tide has turned. I was ready to bet the house on a Best Picture win for "The Social Network", and I was resigned to enduring another Oscar telecast in which the final outcome would be a personal disappointment. I swore I would not let myself become too closely identified with any film this year, so that an eventual loss would not be a personal devastation. I stated that "Black Swan", "The Kids are All Right", and "The King's Speech" were great films and personal favorites, and would remain so even if none of them won any awards.
I still feel that way.
But now that one of these--"The King's Speech"--has surprised everyone and picked up three important precursor awards in one week (The Producer's Guild, The Director's Guild, and the Screen Actor's Guild), which are accurate predictors of an eventual Oscar win, I am excited in spite of myself.
And once again I run the risk of getting too emotionally attached to my favorites, and too anxious about their chances of losing, especially Annette Bening, David Seidler, Geoffrey Rush, and "King's Speech". It seems impossible that "The Social Network" is now an underdog, and I can't bear to speculate that somehow its sudden losses have all been engineered to make it that way, and thus draw it the "sympathy" votes needed to....
Wow. There I go. It's 2006 again, and that sure thing for my all-time favorite, "Brokeback Mountain", was horribly stolen, and I was feeling depressed for days afterward...Once again I'm setting myself up for a huge disappointment. Time to let my new-found wisdom take hold of me again. Best to enjoy the glory that is the "King's" for the moment, and just sit back on February 27 and let whatever happens, happen...
Time now to retreat back to 1970 for a final look...at the Nominees for Best Picture...
Anything can happen...
ReplyDeleteBut unlike Crash which may have sneaked through by emotionally manipulating the audience Social Network only stimulates the audience intellectually so is unlikely to get sympathy votes. I expect Speech is safe for the best film award.
I still see The Social Network winning, but I think Tom Hooper wins Best Director. The Academy has split the two awards in recent years, so that scenario is likely.
ReplyDeleteI'm hoping for either The Fighter or The Kids Are All Right for Best Picture.
People are going to be so pissed, which makes me want TKS to win even more (and it's not even my favourite of the nominees)...but god, an Annette win would send me over the top of euphoria.
ReplyDeleteSigh.
I was thinking that if TSN is suddenly the underdog, it has plenty of time to stage an odd "come from behind" victory....odd because I stil think it never really lost the edge for the victory, in spite of the Guilds.
ReplyDeleteBen, I hope you are correct; Bill, so far I see it your way. Andrew, it would be a treat to see Annette win it this year...although Natalie Portman is a worthy competitor...