Cloudy With A Chance Of WTF?

So the Oscar nominations were announced this morning. This has been a so-so year for films and as a result the nominees have been pretty easy to pick. That's not to say that there weren't some pretty shocking omissions. OK let's move forward. I promise this won't be as tedious as my Golden Globes overview. I'll skip categories about which I don't have anything interesting to say.

Best Actor

Haven't seen The Visitor but I love Richard Jenkins so it's nice to see him on here. Though I would have liked to see Benicio for his great work in Che and WHERE THE FUCK IS CLINT!

Best Supporting Actor

Downey Jr actually did it! He got a nom for being the dude playing a dude disguised as another dude! Didn't care much for the film but that performance was awesome. This is one of the best categories in terms of quality. It's going to Heath though and deservedly so.

Best Actress

Who will win? Hathaway or Winslet? Or will they split votes and someone else wins? Hopefully not Angelina. Ooh the suspense!

Best Animated Feature

Some people thought Wall-E would follow in Beauty and the Beast's footsteps and get a best picture nomination. It's consolation prize will be winning this category.

Best Director

I love Fincher, Boyle and Van Sant though I don't know how I would feel about David winning for work that I found to be a little sub-par. What I do know is that Ron Howard doesn't need another Oscar (though he's a very nice guy and a capable picture maker). And what's the deal with Stephen Daldry? How did he squeak in over Christopher Nolan who's vision for The Dark Knight allowed it to soar above all other comic book films?

Best Foreign Language Film

Though I didn't see hardly any foreign films this year I do have an opinion on this category. Gommora, which many considered a front runner for the category, was passed over. I'm really looking forward to this film's American release. Was it too "genre" to make the cut? Speaking of genre...Sweden didn't even submit Let The Right One In so it had no chance. Why do we leave that up to a bunch of guys who are most inclined to pick the easy and sure thing? Risky stuff will never get a chance that way.  CORRECTION: apparently Sweden did not submit Let The Right One In because it wasn't eligable.  Since the film wasn't released in Sweden before October, it is ineligable for THIS year's Oscars, but could be eligable next year.  I'm leaving my original comments here because I think the points I make about bias against genre are still valid.

Best Makeup

I'm happy to see creature makeup finally getting some love! They passed up Hellboy the first time around. I guess the troll market forced them to take notice. This is an extremely tough category to pick. All the work here was phenomenal.

Best Cinematography

As much as I love Roger Deakins' photography I don't want him to win this year.  He deserves to have his first Oscar be for a film that he was on from start to finish.

Best Original Song

This is the first BIG "what the fuck?" category. Only three nominees? Has this ever been done before? I mean I'm glad I won't have to hear some Miley Cyrus song or something. And I'm totally stoked to see M.I.A up for a Golden Boy. But to pass up The Boss? Especially when he just won the Golden Globe? This stinks just as bad as that year when they passed up Mick Jagger. In some ways they're so old fashioned (Disney movies) yet also forward thinking (Eminem, Issac Hayes). I think this category will always be a mystery.

Best Picture

And now for the second BIG "what the fuck?"...The producers' guild, the directors' guild and the editors' guild ALL picked the same five nominees. One would think a phenomenon like that would result in those five films being the Oscar nominees. You just thought wrong. The Reader wasn't even supposed to be released until next year but Harvey Weinstein insisted on moving it to this year. This created all sorts of shock waves in the Hollywood community and prompted one of the film's producers to remove his name from it. And now it's up for best picture AND director? Something smells rotten in Denmark. Harvey is notorious for heavy handed campaigning. Did it finally pay off? Or maybe it has to do with the Oscar's continuing love affair with the Holocaust. I had some fairly serious misgivings about The Dark Knight but all in all it was a very ambitious and well executed film. I think this will be one of those hotly contested categories people discuss for years to come.

Best Sound Mixing & Editing

Winning these will be like giving Ben Burt a best actor award. His twitters and squeaks are what gave Wall-E it's heart and soul.

AND EVEN THOUGH IT WAS KNOWN WELL IN ADVANCE - NO HONORARY OSCAR FOR ROGER CORMAN...THIS YEAR AT LEAST

OK. Sorry.  No mroe rage.  For now. I'm really excited for Milk and Slumdog.

Catch you guys on the flip side.