I'm just not feeling it for Frost/Nixon beyond acting. It's Ron Howard! Replace it with TDK.

Fuck it, I'm predicting W.

The Dark Knight
Gran Torino
W.
The Wrestler
The Reader

Decided that with three Best Actor centric films, The Soloist, Frost/Nixon, and Milk would have a tougher time getting some. So went with a female orientated one (The Reader).

I think

The Dark Knight
Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Milk
Gran Torino

and either
Reader/Australia/Slumdog Millionaire/Revolutionary Road/Frost Nixon/Doubt

is probably the most realistic line-up anyone can come up with. We use the word lock A TON around award circles but assuming Gran Torino delivers, I think those 4 are very safe locky bets.

The pundits that are not predicting TDK (surprisingly, almost every award website) are fooling themselves. Curious Case and Milk appear to be real no-brainer choices.

It's that 5th slot that's really up for debate. Will Australia limp in? Will Reo Road or Reader coast to a BP nom with mass acting noms? Or will Slumdog charm the fuck out of everyone?

It looked as though the Rudin/Weinstein thing had gone away after Patrick Goldstein reported that they had agreed to settle on a handshake for the sake of the film, The Reader. After that, Harvey Weinstein wrote to the NY Post where he challenged Nikki Finke to produce the email that accused him of pressuring Sydney Pollack on his death bed and various other sorts of things. He said he would give $1 million to charity if she could produce it. One thing people should know about Nikki Finke, contrary to what I’ve read on lesser read sites about her: she doesn’t lie. She might give more drama to a situation than it deserves, throw around words some people find distasteful but she tells the truth, for better or worse. Perhaps Harvey Weinstein didn’t know this about her and assumed that, as most people do, because it comes from a blog it is suspect.

Well, of course she produced the email and now says that Scott Rudin admitted to her that it was his email. Now the story is exposed for all to see, including Matt Drudge. What does it say ultimately? It says that Harvey Weinstein will do anything to fight for his films, including pressuring a dying a man. That is either a good thing or a bad thing depending on who you are and where you’ve come from. What is the probable fallout of this?


Here’s the thing about Oscar voters. The same way that animals will find higher ground before anyone knows a tsunami is about to crash on shore so do voters run for cover at the slightest whiff of controversy. This is why The Kite Runner had no shot and why Lynn Redgrave didn’t win her Oscar and why Julia Roberts postponed her breakup with Benjamin Bratt until after she won her Oscar. In the voting booth, if you aren’t obligated to vote because of friendship or business, you are voting on instinct. Usually this means that you will shy away from any sort of weirdness, whether rational or not. In Oscar’s case bad publicity isn’t good publicity. That means that The Reader now has to work all of that out before it can launch a full scale Oscar run. The way I look at it, though, the movie is roughly in the same spot as if it had waited to be released in 2009. It would still be way off of Oscar’s radar.

On the other hand, if the story goes away - like if Rudin and Weinstein appear together and laugh about it, the story deflates significantly. I would suggest an in-depth confessional on Charlie Rose or else a lighter version on Shootout.