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Chris's Best Picture Oscar Predictions 2003

Written: 26 January 2004

Oscar nominees to be announced: 27 January 2004

 
Earlier than ever, I offer you my predictions for the 2003 Best Picture race at the Academy Awards. For the first time ever, the nominees are being announced in January – and the awards themselves will be given out in late February. Whew!

A quick recap, for those who haven't been with us before: I've been doing these Best Picture predictions for just under a decade. Why? I've decided that it's more fun than trying to predict the ultimate winners at the Oscar telecast, and I enjoy watching award-caliber flicks in the dead of winter. I focus on the Best Picture contest because it's the prestige award, and because the stakes are highest – a Best Picture nomination can double a film's box-office take, and the pre-nomination lobbying is fierce.


Valenti's Folly

What a strange year! As if the Academy's angst-inducing decision to move the awards back a month didn't make the race stressful enough, a simultaneous war on online piracy has further exposed the dirty business of the Oscars to the public.

The source of the crisis? It's all about "screeners," those tapes and discs Academy voters have come to take for granted. Jack Valenti, chief of the Motion Picture Association of America and, let's face it, a technological oracle, decided that pirated videos were taking down Hollywood faster than you could say "Kazaa!" and had the Academy ban them.

Oscar voters whined. Critics howled. Directors protested. Pundits whispered "conspiracy." And, finally, independent film companies sued – they rely on screeners to reach awards voters who don't live in New York or L.A.

The lawsuit succeeded, and screeners were reinstated in early December. But the damage was done: several critics' groups had to vote without them, and bitter recriminations were passed between independent executives, directors and producers and their big-studio counterparts. The big guys say the indies don't care enough about piracy (which, let's face it, has a bigger impact on The Lord of the Rings than on Whale Rider). And the indie guys say the big studios are conspiring to swing the Oscars back in their favor, after nearly a decade of indie dominance.

What does this mean for the Oscars? Who knows? For us Oscar-predicters, it's kind of a wash: the temporary screener ban may have limited voters' access to indie movies somewhat; but that handicap could be countered by voters who want to reward the indies for Fighting The Power. Two months ago, reading about the daily battles over screeners in Variety, I figured my five Best Picture picks would be all big-studio product this year. But enough indies have picked up steam that I'm actually predicting that at least two "small" movies will make the final five. Go figure.

Before I offer my picks, I should mention that these are predictions for Oscars, not a top-five list of my favorite movies of 2003. For the record, if it were up to me, the five Best Picture nominees would be Lost in Translation, Spellbound, A Mighty Wind, Dirty Pretty Things and School of Rock. Which just proves I have no sway over the Oscars – see below.

The Assured

 

1. THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING — Even your grandmother probably had the Best Picture of 2003 picked out – back in December 2001. Who didn't know it would end this way? The last film of Peter Jackson's Tolkien trilogy has owned pole position in this race ever since The Fellowship of the Ring opened to universal acclaim 25 months ago. It's a predictable Academy story: the Oscar as lifetime-achievement award. It's not so much a gold man as a gold watch. That's not to imply that this film doesn't deserve it. Can Mr. Jackson get an Amen for making the only Chapter Three in film history that doesn't suck? (You Search for Spock fans can sit back down now.) I also don't want to imply that the whole Lord of the Rings project doesn't deserve it. Jackson deserves a gold watch and then some for making so many moviegoers – Tolkien geeks or not – so happy. Won't next Christmas seem a little emptier without a new Rings film? Finally, I shouldn't imply that Return of the King has the Best Picture statue in the bag. Not quite, anyway: Jackson's Best Director trophy is a total lock, but Academy members have never given Best Picture to a fantasy film, unless you count dreck like Around the World in 80 Days (or fantasies like Driving Miss Daisy). There's also been some grumbling out there, that King is just a compilation of the best moments the other two movies: the vistas of Fellowship, the battles of Two Towers. There's complaints about the erratic acting – after all, the film is stolen by two supporting players, Sean Astin's Sam and Andy Serkis's Gollum. And then there's the movie's interminable length, and that pileup of endings in the last half-hour. ("Okay, great ending...no, wait, the hobbits in the pub, that's the end...no, wait, Frodo finishing the book...Sam and his wife...um...sheez, what time is it?") I don't have to pick the ultimate winner here, just the nominees. But I'll go out on a limb here and say, optimistically, that King is going all the way. People in Hollywood love, and are proud of, these movies – a hat trick of Best Picture nominations means something – and they won't let this chance to reward the whole ensemble pass them by. Besides, the last Best Picture upset, 1998's Shakespeare in Love over Saving Private Ryan, was about Academy members forgetting a summer blockbuster, not the triumphant conclusion of a three-year epic. And my #2 pick is no Shakespeare in Love...

2. MYSTIC RIVER — Here's this year's The Hours – the acting showcase, the adult drama, the cast of greats. And as with The Hours, I found it dramatically overwrought. I was generally captivated by Clint Eastwood's Beantown tragedy, but I found the ending trite – like Return of the King, the flick could've ended 15 minutes earlier – and felt the entire enterprise was somewhat spoiled by its own self-seriousness. But since when did self-seriousness hurt a movie at the Oscars? Mystic River was the most critically acclaimed movie of 2003 (only American Splendor received more plaudits). And it's the closest thing to a Rings spoiler in the Best Picture race, beloved by those ever-important senior citizen voters – who, by the way, are not enamored of Frodo and Gandalf. Also, let's be fair: Mystic River's stellar cast really does yeoman's work. The only surer winner than Peter Jackson this year is Sean Penn, whose Best Actor Oscar is already engraved. (Sorry, Bill Murray.) I still wish Penn were winning for something like Dead Man Walking or Sweet and Lowdown; his Mystic performance is less about him than the part, which comes with built-in chewy scenery. Truly, Tim Robbins delivered the better, more surprising performance. Hell, they'll probably both win, and the affection Hollywood feels toward Eastwood means the film is a shoo-in to compete for Best Picture. The only interesting question is whether Rings naysayers decide to gang up on the Hobbits and back Dirty Harry's little tragedy en masse.

The Pedigreed

 

3. COLD MOUNTAIN — Most years, there's a high-toned book adaptation up for Best Picture, sometimes two or three. But there were so many "tasteful" literary adaptations last year – Seabiscuit, Master and Commander, Under the Tuscan Sun – that I only expect one of them to make the final five. The easy pick is this faithful adaptation of Charles Frazier's Civil War–set bestseller. So why does Cold Mountain feel like such a shaky bet? By now, Anthony Minghella's Miramax-produced epic should have been taking victory laps, basking in the glow of its to-die-for cast. Nicole Kidman (absurdly miscast, but never mind) is the reigning Oscar queen, Jude Law is everyone's favorite pretty-boy-who-can-act, and Renee Zellweger – bridesmaid at the Oscars for two straight years – is a near-lock for Best Supporting Actress this year. (Personally, I'm rooting for my favorite actor in the film, the White Stripes' Jack White, to take an odds-defying Best Supporting Actor nod.) That's the problem with Cold Mountain, though: everything's too perfect. This is the movie everyone respects but no one loves, from the director who brought you the much-beloved, now-derided English Patient. To be sure, Minghella has his fans, and Harvey Weinstein spent too much money on Cold Mountain to let it go unnominated. Miramax's Oscar machine is, no doubt, working its magic on voters as I type. So Cold Mountain will make the final five the same way Miramax's Gangs of New York did last year: out of obligation, not of love. And like Gangs, it will get lots of nominations but probably go home empty-handed on Oscar night, unless it's finally Zellwegger's turn at the podium. For what it's worth, she deserves it – she single-handedly roused the film from its pedigreed stupor.

The Beloved

 

4. LOST IN TRANSLATION — My favorite film of 2003 inspires unrestrained affection in certain moviegoers, and uncontrollable eyerolling in the rest. But affection like that scores Oscars, and this year, Sofia Coppola deserves them. There are lots of reasons why, karmically, Lost in Translation shouldn't be nominated for Best Picture. Some want to nominate Coppola's film to rectify the Oscars' embarrassing gender imbalance: only two women in history, neither of them American, have ever been nominated Best Director (Lina Wertmüller in 1977, Jane Campion in 1993). Some feel affection for Coppola as a Hollywood legacy – and as a comeback kid, who survived the ignominy of acting in her dad's worst epic. None of these are good reasons to reward Lost in Translation. The reason Translation will make the final five is that people genuinely love it. I felt it in the theater the night I saw it, feel it when I talk to friends or read blog posts, sense it when I read reviews. And I sure as hell felt it watching the Golden Globes, where Translation not only dominated the comedy-or-musical category – that's easy – but even won Coppola the Best Screenplay award, over...hello! Mystic River and Cold Mountain! Maybe Bill Murray deserved that screenplay award – I don't doubt that the improvisational, loose-limbed comic god gave the movie better raw material than Coppola had on the page. Which means, what? Coppola was, at the very least, smart enough to cast Bill Murray. She was also smart enough to get It Girl Scarlett Johanssen on the upswing. All that has to count for something. There are plenty of naysayers out there: the tut-tutting PC police, angered by the portrayal of the Japanese (which I think is affectionate, but never mind), and veteran actor John Hurt, who claims he'll resign from the Academy "in protest" if Coppola's film wins anything, and my beloved film columnist Jeffrey Wells, who's been thumping this flick for months. Know what? They can all go take a flying leap.

 

5. IN AMERICA — In this Year of the Screener Ban, the tough-to-call fifth slot should probably go to a studio flim – a Last Samurai, a Big Fish, a Seabiscuit. But something tells me that the same affection that's falling Sofia Coppola's way is going to smile on Jim Sheridan and his heartfelt In America. Call it a director's comeback: Sheridan, previously nominated for My Left Foot and In the Name of the Father, has been quietly toiling on "little" films for a decade now and is returning to the spotlight with a big Oscar push. Call it the multicultural vote: After a year awash in chest-thumping Yankee pride, this is the closest thing to a beloved foreign film in U.S. theaters right now (if you don't count that New Zealand flick about Middle Earth). And what's more flattering to patriotic Oscar voters than a story of immigrants who so desperately want to be American? Or, simply, call it an act of love: I have been overwhelmed by the warmth critics and audiences feel toward In America, especially its two young actresses. There are lots of things wrong with the movie: the period recreation is pathetic, the plot about the artist neighbor (Djimon Hounsou) hopelessly tacked on. And maybe I just hang out with too many New Yorkers. But if this makes the final five, I may be one of the few who isn't surprised.

The Near Misses

 

MASTER AND COMMANDER: THE FAR SIDE OF THE WORLD — I enjoyed this movie tremendously, and so do audiences and critics. If any of my bottom three picks doesn't make it, I expect Peter Weir's meticulous adaptation of the beloved Patrick O'Brian book series to slip right in. Right now, Master and Commander is contending with two reputational issues: (a) it's an expensive semi-flop, and (b) it's too male. Both are stupid criticisms – the movie has grossed nearly $100 million and is a flop only in relation to its cost; and the absence of women aboard that boat has not prevented many female moviegoers from enjoying the flick. Still, the buzz on this film, while never terribly negative, has remained a dull roar, limited to a devoted core of boosters. We'll see how big a group of boosters that is when the nominees are announced.

 

 

SEABISCUIT — Universal is certainly pushing this one hard, and has been since its release last July. Summer releases are always a risky strategy for Oscar fare, but recent history (Gladiator, Braveheart) has shown that the Best Picture doesn't have to come out in the last two weeks of the year. The trouble with Seabiscuit is that the very people who'd be most likely to vote for it probably liked the Laura Hillenbrand book much, much better. So did critics, and while the movie made plenty of money – commercially, at least, the summer strategy for the horseracing flick was smart – there's no getting around that almost everyone who saw Seabiscuit was either disappointed or underwhelmed. That's not going to provoke strong enough feelings to overcome six months of Academy forgetfulness.


 

 

BIG FISH — This Tim Burton picaresque is starting to look a bit like (I don't mean to sound as bad as it does) Patch Adams: hated by critics, loved by audiences. Or maybe it's a Shawshank Redemption: a populist, middle-American fable underrated by big-city types that surprises everybody later with an upset. Forget all that – what Sony wanted Big Fish to be was this year's Forrest Gump, the blockbuster it most resembles. But Fish's reception would have had to have been more rapturous for it to make the final five, methinks. It also should've come out faster. Sony's slow-and-steady release strategy – it only went "wide" a couple of weeks ago – would have been perfect in the old days, when Oscar-voting dragged into February, but it's the kiss of death with this year's accelerated schedule. Poor Burton; one day, he'll get the misunderstood-genius award he richly deserves. Just not this year.

 

 

HOUSE OF SAND AND FOG — Boy, did DreamWorks take their eye off the ball this year. This is their only serious Oscar contender, and it's not an easy sell, to say the least. This unsparing film – like In the Bedroom, an adaptation of an Andre Dubus story – is a showcase for three stellar performances: by previous winners Jennifer Connolly and Ben Kingsley, and new-to-us Shohreh Aghdashloo. The latter two will likely receive nominations, but having seen House of Sand and Fog, I just can't comprehend how this overheated tragedy – not nearly as smart and satisfying as Bedroom – will make the winners' circle. A couple of months ago, before anyone had seen House, it had serious buzz as DreamWorks' ace in the hole, but audiences' lukewarm reactions have cooled the film's buzz considerably.

 

 

AMERICAN SPLENDOR — Can I confess somthing? I didn't love this film. Liked very much, yes; was terribly amused by, had a fine time at, sure. But the fact that this was the most critically acclaimed film of 2003 – seriously, check the critics' charts in Entertainment Weekly – just tells me critics need to get out more. The story of unlikely cartoonist Harvey Pekar, American Splendor is basically Howard Stern's Private Parts with more wit and a better cast. The film came out in the dog days of summer, missed much of its audience in theaters and needed a special push from screeners, which, this year, probably arrived too late. Anyway, Paul Giamatti and Hope Davis richly deserve nominations for their acting, but I'd be shocked if the film received much more Oscar attention than that.

 

 

 

21 GRAMS — If critics could will this to a Best Picture nomination, they would. But they don't pick Oscars, sentimental Hollywood types do, and this is not the year for Alejandro Gonzalez Innaritu, despite 21 Grams's first-rate performances. Even those won't help, since Sean Penn is going to win for Mystic River, and Benicio del Toro already got his Oscar three years ago for Traffic. That leaves the deserving Naomi Watts, who may well get a nod, but I doubt it goes much further than that.

 

 

SOMETHING'S GOTTA GIVE — It's hard to call a Nancy Meyers comedy a "dark horse," especially after it's made more than $100 million. But this is the only film I can think of whose apperance in the Best Picture category would truly stun me, and the pundits. Mainstream comedies, in the classic box-office sense, are pretty rare in the Best Picture race, and while I didn't love Something's Gotta Give, it is a better-made movie than 75% of the so-called comedies out there. Critics were not universally kind to the flick, but its exploration of middle-aged romance is, however absurdly, considered "provocative." Plus, Diane Keaton is a lock for a Best Actress nomination, and affection for her in Hollywood is so strong, she could well drag the entire movie into the winners' circle with her.

Other films that are too flawed or underhyped to take seriously but shouldn't be ruled out:

Thanks for reading. As always, I welcome your own predictions – write me at chris[at]molanphy.com with your five picks.

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