2015 Oscar Nominations

Best Picture

• American Sniper – Clint Eastwood, Robert Lorenz, Andrew Lazar, Bradley Cooper, and Peter Morgan
• Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) – Alejandro G. Iñárritu, John Lesher, and James W. Skotchdopole
• Boyhood – Richard Linklater and Cathleen Sutherland
• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Wes Anderson, Scoot Rudin, Steven Rales, and Jeremy Dawson
• The Imitation Game – Nora Grossman, Ido Ostrowsky, and Teddy Schwarzman
• Selma – Christian Colson, Oprah Winfrey, Dede Gardner, and Jeremy Kleiner
• The Theory of Everything – Tim Bevan, Eric Fellner, Lisa Bruce, and Anthony McCarten
• Whiplash – Jason Blum, Helen Estabrook, and David Lancaster

Want to Win: Theory of Everything, because it was my absolute favorite of those movies.  Imitation Game being a close second.

Will Probably Win: I’m slightly leaning towards Birdman, with Boyhood being the obvious second. Odds are one of the two of them will get it.  I think Imitation Game is the dark horse that if there was a surprise, that would be it.

Actual Winner: Birdman

Actor in a Leading Role

• Steve Carell in “Foxcatcher”
• Bradley Cooper in “American Sniper”
• Benedict Cumberbatch in “The Imitation Game“
• Michael Keaton in “Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)“
• Eddie Redmayne in “Theory of Everything“

Want to Win: Eddie Redmayne

Will Probably Win: Eddie Redmayne

Actual Winner: Eddie Redmayne

Actress in a Leading Role

• Marion Cotillard in “Two Days, One Night”
• Felicity Jones in “The Theory of Everything“
• Julianne Moore in “Still Alice”
• Rosamund Pike in “Gone Girl”
• Reese Witherspoon in “Wild”

Want to Win: I don’t have any strong feelings in this category, but I did very much enjoy Rosamund Pike in Gone Girl.  So we’ll go with that.

Will Probably Win: Julianne Moore

Actual Winner: Julianne Moore

Actor in a Supporting Role

• Robert Duvall in “The Judge”
• Ethan Hawke in “Boyhood“
• Edward Norton in “Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)“
• Mark Ruffalo in “Foxcatcher”
• J.K. Simmons in “Whiplash”

Want to Win: Edward Norton

Will Probably Win: Probably J.K. Simmons with Edward Norton being a close second.

Actual Winner: J. K. Simmons

Actress in a Supporting Role

• Patricia Arquette in “Boyhood“
• Laura Dern in “Wild”
• Keira Knightley in “The Imitation Game“
• Emma Stone in “Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)“
• Meryl Streep in “Into the Woods”

Want to Win: Emma Stone was awesome in Birdman, and I would choose her if it wasn’t for Patricia Arquette who should win this and would absolutely deserve it.

Will Probably Win: Patricia Arquette

Actual Winner: Patricia Arquette

Animated Feature Film

• Big Hero 6 – Don Hall, Chris Williams, and Roy Conli
• The Boxtrolls – Anthony Stacchi, Graham Annable, and Travis Knight
• How to Train Your Dragon 2 – Dean DeBlois and Bonnie Arnold
• Song of the Sea – Tomm Moore and Paul Young
• The Tale of Princess Kaguya – Isao Takahata and Yoshiaki Nishimura

Want to Win: It doesn’t have a chance, but I’d love it if Boxtrolls won.  I loved going back to the claymation styling, and thus would love it if it won so that we’d maybe see more of these types of movies start to come back again.

Will Probably Win: How To Train Your Dragon 2 (which I thought was great, so I have no issues with it winning, either).

Actual Winner: Big Hero 6 (not going to lie, I was surprised, everything seemed to point at HTTYD2).

Cinematography

• Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) – Emmanuel Lubezki
• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Robert Yeoman
• Ida – Lukasz Zal and Ryszard Lenczewski
• Mr. Turner – Dick Pope
• Unbroken – Roger Deakins

Want to Win: Birdman – I think the cinematography is part of the reason the movie was so cool to watch, so I think it should get it, but I also admit I haven’t seen the last three movies in the category.

Will Probably Win: Birdman

Actual Winner: Birdman

Costume Design

• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Milena Canonero
• Inherent Vice – Mark Bridges
• Into the Woods – Colleen Atwood
• Maleficent – Anna B. Sheppard
• Mr. Turner – Jacqueline Durran

Want to Win: Lolz Maleficent just to watch people be confused as to what the hell happened.

Will Probably Win: Grand Budapest Hotel, but equally as likely as Into the Woods.  I just think Into the Woods has so much inspiration from the stage show already, and there aren’t many costume changes between the main characters, that meh.  I don’t care for it to win.

Actual Winner: The Grand Budapest Hotel

Directing

• Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) – Alejandro G. Iñárritu
• Boyhood – Robert Linklater
• Foxcatcher – Bennett Miller
• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Wes Anderson
• The Imitation Game – Morten Tyldum

Want to Win: Boyhood

Will Probably Win: Boyhood

Actual Winner: Birdman (again, the other one I was surprised with, obviously)

Documentary Feature

• CitizenFour – Laura Poitras, Mathilde Bonnefoy, and Dirk Wilutzky
• Finding Vivian Maier – John Maloof and Charlie Siskel
• Last Days in Vietnam – Rory Kennedy and Keven McAlester
• The Salt of the Earth – Wim Wenders, Juliano Ribeiero Salgado, and David Rosier
• Virunga – Orlando von Einsiedel and Joanna Natasegara

I haven’t seen any of these :(.  I fail.

Actual Winner: CitizenFour

Documentary Short Subject

• Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1 – Ellen Goosenberg Kent and Dana Perry
• Joanna – Aneta Kopacz
• Our Curse – Tomasz Śliwiński and Maciej Ślesicki
• The Reaper (La Parka) – Gabriel Serra Arguello
• White Earth – J. Christian Jensen

I haven’t seen any of these either, I fail again!

Actual Winner: Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1

Film Editing

• American Sniper – Joel Cox and Gary D. Roach
• Boyhood – Sandra Adair
• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Barney Pilling
• The Imitation Game – William Goldenberg
• Whiplash – Tom Cross

Want to Win: No strong feelings on what I want to win here.  I think Boyhood is kind of a cop out because they had *so* long to work on it.  Yes, that doesn’t mean that their work wasn’t great, just you had 12 years to edit your movie when others had one or two.

Will Probably Win: Boyhood

Actual Winner: Whiplash

Foreign Language Film

• Ida – Poland, Pawel Pawlikowski
• Leviathan – Russia, Andrey Zvyagintsev
• Tangerines – Estonia, Zaza Urushadze
• Timbuktu – Mauritania, Abderrahmane Sissako
• Wild Tales – Damián Szifron

The only one I’ve seen is Ida, so I can’t make a very good decision on this category.

Actual Winner: Ida

Makeup and Hairstyling

• Foxcatcher – Bill Corso and Dennis Liddiard
• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Frances Hannon and Mark Coulier
• Guardians of the Galaxy – Elizabeth Yianni-Georgiou and David White

Want to Win: Guardians of the Galaxy.  Because aliens.

Will Probably Win: Not sure, so I’ll just stick with Guardians of the Galaxy.

Actual Winner: The Grand Budapest Hotel

Music – Original Score

• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Alexandre Desplat
• The Imitation Game – Alexandre Desplat
• Interstellar – Hans Zimmer
• Mr. Turner – Gary Yershon
• The Theory of Everything – Jóhann Jóhannsson

Want to Win: One of the few categories I’ve seen the majority of the movies!  The only one I remember “diskling” the music was Interstellar, just becuase it was so obvious normal Hans Zimmer stuff that it actually distracted me from the movie.  I just saw Imitation Game, and thought the music was great at times.  I also remember the music in Grand Budapest Hotel standing out to me in a positive way.  So basically, I just want one of Alexandre Desplat’s to win.

Will Probably Win: I don’t know.  Grand Budapest Hotel? Let’s go with it.

Actual Winner: The Grand Budapest Hotel

Music – Original Song

• “Everything Is Awesome” from The Lego Movie – Shawn Patterson
• “Glory” from Selma – John Stephens and Lonnie Lynn
• “Grateful” from Beyond the Lights – Diane Warren
• “I’m Not Gonna Miss You” from Glen Campbell… I’ll be me – Glen Campbell and Julian Raymond
• “Lost Stars” from Begin Again – Gregg Alexander and Danielle Brisebois

Want to Win: EEEVERYTHING IS AWESOMEEEEEEEE EVERYING IS COOOL WHEN YOU’RE PART OF A TEEEAMMMMMM

Will Probably Win: I have legitimately no idea.  Let’s give our prediction to “Glory” from Selma, since they have to let it win something.

Actual Winner: “Glory” from Selma

Production Design

• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Adam Stockhausen (Production Design); Anna Pinnock (Set Decoration)
• The Imitation Game – Maria Djurkovic (Production Design); Tatiana Macdonald (Set Decoration)
• Interstellar – Nathan Crowley (Production Design); Gary Fettis (Set Decoration)
• Into the Woods – Dennis Gassner (Production Design); Anna Pinnock (Set Decoration)
• Mr. Turner – Suzie Davies (Production Design); Charlotte Watts (Set Decoration)

Want to Win: I watched a feature on the set design of Grand Budapest, so I’m slightly biased towards it.  However, I love how realistic the world of the Imitation Game felt.  Into the Woods I still always felt like I was on a “stage”, and I didn’t really like that.  So not that one.

Will Probably Win: The Grand Budapest Hotel

Actual Winner: The Grand Budapest Hotel

Short Film – Animated

• The Bigger Picture – Daisy Jacons and Christopher Hees
• The Dam Keeper – Robert Kondo and Dice Tsutsumi
• Feast – Patrick Osborne and Kristina Reed
• Me and My Moulton – Torill Kove
• A Single Life – Joris Oprins

Guess which category I failed at?

Actual Winner: Feast

Short Film – Live Action

• Aya – Oded Binnun and Mihal Brezis
• Boogaloo and Graham – Michael Lennox and Ronan Blaney
• Butter Lamp (La Lampe au Buerre de Yak) – Hu Wei and Julien Féret
• Parvaneh – Talkhon Hamzavi and Stefan Eichenberger
• The Phone Call – Mat Kirkby and James Lucas

Oh hey this is the last one I suck at, I swear.

Actual Winner: The Phone Call

Sound Editing

• American Sniper – Alan Robert Murray and Bub Asman
• Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) – Martin Hernández and Aaron Glascock
• The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies – Brent Burge and Jason Canovas
• Interstellar – Richard King
• Unbroken – Becky Sullivan and Andrew DeCristofaro

Want to Win: Interstellar, because I feel like a lot of the space sounds you have to really work at creating and figuring out what kind of sounds you need, that might not already be “out there”.  Like the Hobbit, we have cool battles, but we’ve had cool orc battles for 5 other movies.  With American Sniper, there have been countless war movies.

Will Probably Win: I’m not sure, honestly. I’ll stick with Interstellar, because I don’t have a better reason why one of the others should win.

Actual Winner: American Sniper

Sound Mixing

• American Sniper – John Reitz, Gregg Rudloff and Walt Martin
• Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) – Jon Taylor, Frank A. Montaño and Thomas Varga
• Interstellar – Gary A. Rizzo, Gregg Landaker and Mark Weingarten
• Unbroken – Jon Taylor, Frank A. Montaño and David Lee
• Whiplash – Craig Mann, Ben Wilkins and Thomas Curley

Want to Win: Whiplash

Will Probably Win: Whiplash

Actual Winner: Whiplash

Visual Effects

• Captain America: The Winter Soldier – Dan DeLeeuw, Russell Earl, Bryan Grill and Dan Sudick
• Dawn of the Planet of the Apes – Joe Letteri, Dan Lemmon, Daniel Barrett and Erik Winquist
• Guardians of the Galaxy – Stephane Ceretti, Nicolas Aithadi, Jonathan Fawkner and Paul Corbould
• Interstellar – Paul Franklin, Andrew Lockley, Ian Hunter and Scott Fisher
• X-Men: Days of Future Past – Richard Stammers, Lou Pecora, Tim Crosbie and Cameron Waldbauer

Want to Win: X-Men, because I’m an X-Men whore and will always pick X-Men for anything.

Will Probably Win: Interstellar

Actual Winner: Interstellar

Writing – Adapted Screenplay

• American Sniper – Jason Hall
• The Imitation Game – Graham Moore
• Inherent Vice – Paul Thomas Anderson
• The Theory of Everything – Anthony McCarten
• Whiplash – Damien Chazelle

Want to Win: The Theory of Everything or The Imitation Game

Will Probably Win: The Imitation Game

Actual Winner: The Imitation Game

Writing – Original Screenplay

• Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) – Alejandro G. Iñárritu, Nicolás Giacobone, Alexander Dinelaris, Jr. and Armando Bo
• Boyhood – Richard Linklater
• Foxcatcher – E. Max Frye and Dan Futterman
• The Grand Budapest Hotel – Screenplay by Wes Anderson; Story by Wes Anderson & Hugo Guinness
• Nightcrawler – Dan Gilroy

Want to Win:  Here’s where, despite the fact that I didn’t much care for Birdman, I think it’s the most deserving to win in this category.  So I’m choosing it, over Boyhood, which they had 12+ years to write/rewrite/rework, etc.  So no fair to them.

Will Probably Win: Birdman or Boyhood.

Actual Winner: Birdman