Oscars 2007: The nominees

So what do we make of them? As fortune would have it - and it's not a given - I'm up to date with most of the big hitters this year. Here is the partial shortlist for the 79th Academy Awards (I don't really have anything to say on Best documentary short of Best makeup), to be held at the Kodak Theatre, Los Angeles on 25 February:

Best picture
Babel
I am a huge admirer of Alejandro Gonzalez Inarittu, having loved Amores Perros and his English-speaking debut 21 Grams, but I can't help but think he's stretched the chewing gum too far with this globetrotting epic. As with his previous films, it's a number of seemingly disparate stories interlinked by a tragedy (I'll say no more), a format I am a sucker for, but in playing it this time across three continents, he's overloaded the film. It's beautifully made, and he elicits warm-blooded, powerful performances from his actors, but in aiming for global significance Inarittu veers into narrative artifice. One of the connections is so obvious, you'll guess it before it happens, and another is so tenuous it's almost laughable when it's revealed. This is a pity, as he's clearly a highly intelligent, valuable talent to have knocking about in Hollywood. I just say Babel isn't quite as profound as it thinks it is, and he's in danger of becoming an arthouse M. Night Shyamalan.
The Departed
Again, you've gotta love Marty, but let's be brutal, he went off the boil some years ago. After Casino. It's criminal that he's never won best director out of five goes so far, but it would be equally wrong if he won it this year for what is a fairly standard retread of the violent ethnic gangster movie which he made his own. Yes, the action moves to Boston, and to Irish-American thugs as opposed to Italian-American ones, but in doing so we jettison a good deal of grace and style. What director worth his salt would have allowed Ray Winstone to get away with such a ropey American accent throughout the film? It's so offputting, and undercuts the power of the drama unfolding around him. Jack Nicholson is just Jack Nicholson. I didn't much like Gangs Of New York either, finding it full of bluster and self-importance. I hope Scorsese finds his mojo again, and I sincerely believe he will, but honouring him for The Departed, with that animated rat scuttling across his Boston skyline, would only encourage him to coast.
Letters From Iwo Jima
Seeing this on Monday.
Little Miss Sunshine
It's heartening to see a low-budget, Sundance-bought indie hit nominated for the big one, and I wish it well, but it's nobody's idea of best picture. It's entertaining, and smarly-scripted, and it took five years to make, but at the end of the day, it's a kooky road trip. Mind you, it's certainly conservative enough to win awards. I enjoyed it, but it cops out of commenting on the creepy junior beauty pageant around which its story revolves, and descends into slapstick as if it's run out of ideas.
The Queen
By default - and assuming Iwo Jima is as emotionless as its companion, Flags Of Our Fathers - this is my choice for best picture. You know I like it, and it's good to see Stephen Frears back on top form after Mrs Henderson, but it would be an underwhelming Oscar year if this won. It's just a film about the Queen. It's hardly Gandhi or Chariots Of Fire now, is it? Helen Mirren deserves every accolade they can throw at her, however.

Best director
Clint Eastwood, Letters From Iwo Jima
Stephen Frears, The Queen
Paul Greengrass, United 93
I'd love to see Greengrass win this, although I suspect he won't, not with poor old ungarlanded Marty hanging around, looking old and needy. The usual argument: how can a film be nominated for best picture and not best director? Surely if it's one of the five best pictures, its director is one of the five best directors? If Greengrass is one of the five, why isn't United 93 (which you'll know was one of my favourite films of 2006)? His Hollywood career is just starting, so he'll live to wobble a Steadicam another day if he doesn't win.
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, Babel
Martin Scorsese, The Departed

Best actor
Leonardo DiCaprio, Blood Diamond
I will make an effort to see this during the week. It appears he's nominated for doing an accent.
Ryan Gosling, Half Nelson
Strike me down and take away my privileges, but I don't even know what this is!
Peter O'Toole, Venus
He will win, whether he deserves to or not, mark my words.
Will Smith, The Pursuit of Happyness
I think there's an outside chance that I will never watch this film. I'm not sure I could take it.
Forest Whitaker, The Last King of Scotland
Magnificent, and in a year without a 74-year old legend in the category, it would be in the bag. This is a terrific film: the combination of documentary-style realism and Hollywood thriller works, and Whitaker's turn as Idi Amin is terrifying and full-bodied. There's a little grandstanding, but that seems in character. (I shall declare an interest - one of the film's producers is connected to something I am working on right now.)

Best actress
Penelope Cruz, Volver
I hope she wins, otherwise the much vaunted Latino revolution this year shall amount to very little. It's always cockle-warming when a foreign-language film lands in the mainstream categories, and despite her Hollywood dalliances and relationship with the Scientologist, Cruz came from Spanish cinema and always seems at her best there. If you want a juicy female part, Almodovar's always been your man, and this one was a gift. Even if she does mime the singing bit.
Judi Dench, Notes on a Scandal
There's no doubting the power of the Dame's characterisation in this bourgeois potboiler - her avenging lesbian is both sad and scary - I just worry that the film, with all the right credentials, is being slightly overrated. Also, try to avoid seeing the trailer, as it literally shows the entire film in precis, including the ending. I think that's such a cowardly own-goal, and I suspect it's the studio's fault. Let the people see the film and enjoy the story unfolding! It's a good film, but a little too tasteful, and for my money, they make a dash for the end which saps it of its dramatic heft. (Can you sap heft?)
Helen Mirren, The Queen
Meryl Streep, The Devil Wears Prada
The film is shallow but entertaining as hell. Streep is actually more restrained and subtle than you might guess, and a worthy enough nominee, but it's not a winner. Not up against Her Majesty.
Kate Winslet, Little Children
A very fine American accent, and an honest performance, one of Winslet's best. I'm not sure why this didn't make the best picture list. It's a beautifully constructed story, with a few surprises that aren't given away in the trailer. Perhaps the reliance on narration was a minus, but overall, a quality act.

Best supporting actress
Adriana Barraza, Babel
She plays the Mexican nanny, and really goes through the mangle. A fine performance, but even though I've not seen Dreamgirls, because it's not nominated for the other top awards, and because Jennifer Hudson was on American Idol, I feel she may clinch this category.
Cate Blanchett, Notes on a Scandal
No more or less than we've come to expect from the excellent Cate Blanchett, her willowy art teacher is entirely credible, if blown off the screen by Judi Dench.
Abigail Breslin, Little Miss Sunshine
Terrific, precocious turn from the nine-year-old (she must have been seven or eight when she made it). If she wins, it will be stunt voting, but she could. I expect she's down to a size zero by now and has had her face lifted.
Jennifer Hudson, Dreamgirls
Rinko Kikuchi, Babel
A curious segment the Japanese one, but there's little doubting the skill of this newcomer's turn as a deaf mute teenager trying to lose her virginity and cope with her mother's death. That's two non-English performances in one category if you count sign language. Truly, the Oscars are growing up. (I don't think she's a deaf mute in real life. Is she?)

Best supporting actor
Alan Arkin, Little Miss Sunshine
Fun, but too easy to give an old guy an Oscar for playing a comedy, drug-taking granddad.
Jackie Earle Haley, Little Children
This is what a supporting actor is all about, a little-known character player, previously seen in Maniac Cop 3, in his forties, essaying the hardest part in the film: the paedophile. If there's any justice, he'll win it.
Djimon Hounsou, Blood Diamond
Eddie Murphy, Dreamgirls
Mark Wahlberg, The Departed
Another turn with great impact, and lots of swearing, but I don't see him winning. Haven't seen Eddie Murphy or Djimon Hounsou, but I'd say the latter has carved a good career out for himself since Amistad and might have the Academy's vote.

Best adapted screenplay
Borat
Although "adapted" from a character on the telly, and from improvisations, it's Borat's only nomination, and might earn Peter Baynham and pals a walk up the aisle. I hope it does. It's a brilliant film. It's not the best adapted screenplay though, is it? Not really. Hard to know how to judge this category unless you've read the books the screenplays were adapted from.
Children of Men
I'd plump for this, as the film is a smart piece of work (again, ruined by the content of its trailer), and adapting a book about the future written in 1992 is a task in itself.
The Departed
Little Children
Notes on a Scandal
Some great lines and speeches in this, but did Patrick Marber just lift them from the book? And does that matter? Never having adapted a book into a screenplay, I'm guessing it's fucking difficult.

Best original screenplay
Babel
Letters from Iwo Jima
Little Miss Sunshine
Here's where this film should be, winning an award for its script, which is very witty and full of invention, even if the ending is a cop-out.
The Queen
Pan's Labyrinth
Haven't seen this, despite being ordered to do so by more than one person. I can't generate the enthusiasm. All those funny looking monsters. I will wait for the DVD and catch up. I hope Mark Kermode isn't reading this.

Best visual effects
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest
Poseidon
Even though I hated this and everything it stood for, there's little doubting the quality of the CGI. When the wave hits, I mean, wow.
Superman Returns

Best cinematography
The Black Dahlia
Children of Men
This looked stunning, I thought, in its muted greys. Really miserable. I'd be happy if it won, but I have only seen one of the other nominees, The Prestige (what a disappointment that was), so I cannot realistically judge.
The Illusionist
Pan's Labyrinth
The Prestige

Don't hold me to my predictions. It's just a game.