Like everyone else in the blogosphere, I'm telling you my Oscar picks...

...but mine actually matter. Of course.

This year’s Oscars are, in my opinion, one of the most competitive years in quite some time. They really have the potential to either be an all-for-one snoozefest (like 1997 when The English Patient won every damn thing) or an actually competitive show (like 1998 when we somehow had Good Will Hunting, Boogie Nights and As Good as it Gets...oh...and Titanic). No matter who wins, I know it should be entertaining enough to watch Chris Rock play nice with network TV as this year’s much-needed host.

Unlike the Grammys (which, as you’ve read, I no longer have any regard for), the Oscars tend to follow the lines of both public taste and artistic merit. There’s always a mix of movies no one between LA and New York has seen and a few big blockbusters…and, wonderfully enough, you never know who really could win. But everyone tries to guess anyway. Just like me:

Best Supporting Actor

Thomas Haden Church, Sideways
The artist formerly known as Lowell Mather is the funniest foil of the year. He plays a philandering asshole to the point you almost love him. And he’s a makeup nominee for Paul Giamatti.

Dark Horse: Jamie Foxx, Collateral
If he wins this, it’s because he didn’t win for Ray and the Oscar voters just felt guilty.

Best Supporting Actress

Cate Blanchett, The Aviator
Playing a real person is one thing, but playing a real person who was a beloved and distinctive actress is something different. Blanchett’s Katherine Hepburn was the most well-rounded ans fleshed-out character in the film and honestly, her portrayal was so good, so painfully honest and real that I occasionally forgot another actress was on the screen.

Dark Horse: Virginia Madsen, Sideways
She was the soft gooey center of this whippersnapper of a film….and she has a helluva monologue. Not so much Dark Horse here as “almost a tie.”


Best Actor

Jamie Foxx, Ray
Ok, so this year produced five nominees that actually each deserve this award equally, all but one of them (Clint Eastwood) for playing a real person. But anyone who has seen these films knows that Foxx’s portrayal of Ray Charles is almost unsettling and uncanny. Some may call it mimicking, but I call it wow.

Dark Horse: Clint Eastwood, Million Dollar Baby
Oscar is notorious for pulling this sort of makeup crap. Especially for an aging actor that everyone loves. “It may not be his best role, but he’s Clint Eastwood, dammit.” That sort of thing. Watch out.


Best Actress

Hilary Swank, Million Dollar Baby
Swank came in late in the year with a wide release film that involves sports, bad Midwestern accents and death. That’s practically a formula for an Oscar win, even if she was once the Next Karate Kid.

Dark Horse: Annette Bening, Being Julia
Call this Hilary vs. Annette, Part Deux. Swank beat her performance in American Beauty out of nowhere with a little indie film called Boys Don’t Cry. Maybe Oscar voters regret that.

Best Director
Martin Scorsese, The Aviator
This man made Taxi Driver, Age of Innocence, Last Temptation of Christ, Color of money and Raging Bull. Give him a fucking Oscar, dammit. Not only that, but this movie is absolutely beautiful and a spectacle within a spectacle…no one else could have pulled it off.

Dark Horse: Clint Eastwood, Million Dollar Baby
Hey, he’s done it before (see Unforgiven).

Best Picture
The Aviator or Million Dollar Baby
I can’t decide. These movies are completely different, but the same in that they have “Oscar Winner” written all over them. I deliberated for entirely too long about this and just put it up as a tie, so sue me. These movies were the best two I saw this year (and I saw all of the nominees, for once) and both are equally deserving.

Dark Horse: If someone on the committee drops acid prior to their vote, they might try to be hip and vote for Sideways