The Oscars are almost here, so as we close in on the biggest showbiz party of the year here are some of my thoughts and predictions for the 85^th Academy Awards, which take place Monday 25^th February (NZ time).

The Oscars are almost here, so as we close in on the biggest showbiz party of the year here are some of my thoughts and predictions for the 85^th Academy Awards, which take place Monday 25^th February (NZ time).

From a Kiwi perspective, the best thing about the awards this year is that apart from Amour (which screened in the NZIFF last year and will be released on February 28th) all the nominees in the Best Picture category have had a local theatrical release. So there’s no reason why we can’t all have a view on who’s going home with the golden statues, and I look forward to hearing those opinions!

First of all, a few things to remember about The Oscars:

1. The Oscars are a marketing exercise (akin to a US Presidential election campaign) and it’s all about buzz, not peaking too early, and gaining the support and sympathy of the more than 6000 Academy members.

2. Therefore, those who should don’t always win.

3. Only 3 films have ever won Best Picture without a Best Director nomination (the last film was Driving Miss Daisy in 1989), this is something Kathryn Bigelow and Ben Affleck will have been thinking about in recent weeks.  

4. Lincoln has the most nominations (12), but the film with the most impressive list of nominations is David O. Russell’s Silver Linings Playbook. This is the first time in 31 years (since Warren Beatty’s Reds) a film has been nominated in all four acting categories, as well as getting nods for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay and Best Editing. It doesn’t get much better - so while I’m not sure it’s Best Picture material it is certainly the leading underdog!

5. Out of the nine films nominated for Best Picture only one film came in at less than 2 hours duration (Beasts of the Southern Wild) – let’s hope the 2.5 hour long epic remains a trend rather than becoming a standard.

6. Overall, I see this year’s competition as being between the somber and serious historical dramas Lincoln and Zero Dark Thirty, that have the added bonus of being rousingly patriotic, verse the more entertaining and broadly appealing Argo, and the performance driven comedy/drama Silver Linings Playbook.

This is how I see it playing out:

Best Picture:

Will win: Argo

Possible spoilers: Zero Dark Thirty, Silver Linings Playbook

Snubbed: The Master

Best Director:

Will Win: Steven Spielberg for Lincoln

Should win: Michael Haneke for Amour

Possible spoiler: Ang Lee for Life of Pi.

Snubbed: Kathryn Bigelow and Ben Affleck. As “shocking” as Hollywood found this snub, I was thrilled to see the Academy honour the unique vision of Benh Zeitlin (Beasts of the Southern Wild), as well as the extraordinary work of Austrian director Haneke.

Best Actor:

Will and should win: Daniel Day-Lewis for Lincoln.

Best Actress:

Will win: Jennifer Lawrence for Silver Linings Playbook

Should win: Emmanuelle Riva for Amour

Possible spoiler: Jessica Chastain for Zero Dark Thirty.

Best Supporting Actor:

Will win: anyone of them!

This is the closest race at the Oscars this year – if I had to put money on it I’d probably go for Tommy Lee Jones (Lincoln) or Christoph Waltz (Django Unchained) but then, Robert de Niro is back in great form in SLP and Philip Seymour Hoffman is his usual exceptional self in The Master…

Best Supporting Actress:

Will and should win: Anne Hathaway for Les Miserable

Best Adapted Screenplay:

Will and should win: Silver Linings Playbook

Possible Spoilers: Argo, Lincoln

Best Original Screenplay:

Will and should win: Django Unchained

Possible Spoilers: Zero Dark Thirty

And more briefly…

Best Documentary: Searching for Sugar Man (please note, I haven’t seen all the nominees in this category)

Best Foreign Film: Amour (please note, I haven’t seen all the nominees in this category)

Best Animation: Brave

Best Editing: Argo

Best Cinematography: Life of Pi

Best Visual Effects: Life of Pi

Best Production Design: Anna Karenina

Best Costume Design: Anna Karenina

Best Makeup and Hairstyling: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

Best Original Score: Life of Pi, music by Dario Marianelli

Best Original Song: Skyfall, music and lyrics by Adele Adkins 

What do you think? Do you think there is a standout Best Picture winner in this mix? Let me know.