Operation Oscar 2015

It's not Monday and there will be no mention of slow carb recipes in this edition but I wanted to do a quick post telling you what my favorite movies are this year for the Academy Awards.  First, I watched Inherent Vice last night which was the only movie I had left to watch.  It is nominated for Adapted Screenplay.  The only positives I have for this is that there are a multitude of familiar faces in the film and Joaquin Phoenix is a convincing stoner who does find himself in a couple funny moments.  Other than that, I was not a fan of the movie at all.  It's super slow and long at almost 2-1/2 hours and I never really know what's happening, nor do I care.  Also, the woman who narrates the movie has an annoying voice and talks too much and is irrelevant.  I wasn't a fan.  I give it a C-.

Now then, I've officially watched all of the movies nominated for Best Picture, Acting, Directing and Writing.  I won't bother with predictions because I don't keep up with it enough to make an educated guess but I did order my favorite movie/performance in each category with number one obviously being the one I liked the most.  If you are interested in predictions and just more commentary on the movies in general, check out Jordan's post: http://jordangpittman.blogspot.com/2015/02/operation-oscar-2015.html


Adapted Screenplay (top 3 are all very close)
1. Theory of Everything
2. The Imitation Game
3. Whiplash
4. American Sniper
5. Inherent Vice

Original Screenplay
1. Boyhood
2. Birdman
3. Nightcrawler
4. Foxcatcher
5. The Grand Budapest Hotel

Directing
1. Birdman
2. Boyhood
3. The Imitation Game
4. The Grand Budapest Hotel
5. Foxcatcher

Supporting Actress (the last 3 are all pretty close)
1. Patricia Arquette-Boyhood
2. Laura Dern-Wild
3. Emma Stone-Birdman
4. Meryl Streep-Into the Woods
5. Keira Knightley-The Imitation Game

Supporting Actor (4 & 5 were really close)
1. J.K Simmons-Whiplash
2. Edward Norton-Birdman
3. Ethan Hawke-Boyhood
4. Robert Duvall-The Judge
5. Mark Ruffalo-Foxcatcher

Actress
1. Julianna Moore-Still Alice
2. Rosamund Pike-Gone Girl
3. Reese Witherspoon-Wild
4. Felicity Jones-The Theory of Everything 
5. Marion Cotillard-Two Days, One Night

Actor
1. Eddie Redmayne-The Theory of Everything 
2. Benedict Cumberbatch-The Imitation Game
3. Michael Keaton-Birdman
4. Bradley Copper-American Sniper
5. Steve Carell-Foxcatcher

Best Picture (some of these are very close but the first four stood out the most to me)
1. The Imitation Game
2. Whiplash
3. The Theory of Everything
4. Birdman
5. Boyhood
6. Selma
7. American Sniper
8. The Grand Budapest Hotel

I will say that I agree with the critics that the Oscars lack in diversity some years.  I think Carmen Ejogo was snubbed after her performance in Selma. I think she was just as good if not better than Meryl Streep, Keira Knightley and Emma Stone.  There have been more powerful selections of movies over the years as I would more than likely only watch my first 4 choices ever again and I would probably only purchase Whiplash because I enjoyed watching it.  This year, for me, it was about the individual performances.  Eddie Redmayne, Benedict Cumberbatch, Michael Keaton and Julianne Moore did some serious acting!

Either way, I can't wait to eat food and watch all this go down with Jordan.  I may try to sneak in some smaller category stuff on Netflix before Sunday if I can.  I've seen one animated short called Feast, Guardians of the Galaxy and The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies. There's no way to watch everything but maybe I could sneak a couple more shorts in or maybe a documentary.  It's going to be a fun night.