Countdown to Oscar Night: Best Production Design

Best Production Design:
Arrival
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them
Hail, Caesar!
La La Land
Passengers

A week out from the big night, and I have resigned myself to the fact I will not be able to see all of the nominees. Oh well, I did it last year. I am still planning to see the other two Best Pic nominees I haven't seen, and I'll need to cover the last 14 categories in the next 6 days.  Here goes!

Five very different films each with beautiful, original sets fill the Production design category. I was a little surprised Arrival got as many nominations as it did, but I don't think it has enough love to garner any wins. Beasts is probably the best of the bunch, but it'll probably succumb to what I expect to be a juggernaut of a night for La La Land.

My Ballot:
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them
La La Land
Hail, Caesar!
Arrival

My Pick to Win:
La La Land

Shamefully Snubbed:
Captain Fantastic

Countdown to Oscar Night: Best Makeup & Hairstyling

Best Makeup & Hairstyling:
A Man Called Ove
Star Trek Beyond
Suicide Squad

This category is so hard to predict. Do the voters like minimal makeup with "uglied down" hairstyling (Dallas Buyers Club, Les Miserables), crazy body paint (Mad Max), or face-changing prosthetics (The Wolfman)? Even the nominees are puzzling. For two years in a row, a Swedish team is nominated for ho-hum "old person" makeup. Usually you can just pick the best reviewed, highest box-office movie of the bunch, but that's complicated as well. Suicide Squad was the worst reviewed, but the most seen. Ove was the best reviewed, but nobody (except me of course) has seen it. So I guess I'll split the difference here and say that Star Trek repeats its 2009 victory.

My Ballot:
Star Trek Beyond
Suicide Squad
A Man Called Ove

My Pick to Win:
Star Trek Beyond

Shamefully Snubbed:
Florence Foster Jenkins

Best of '16: Sing Street

I think she's an amazing human being, never seen anyone like her. The way she talks and looks. She wears this sunglasses, and when she takes'em off, her eyes... are like the clouds clearing to let pass the moon...... Sometimes I just wanna cry looking at her.

An awkward Irish teenager sees an older "bad" girl, falls in love at first sight, so decides to recruit his classmates to start a band to impress her and win her heart. These are the types of movies that are made for people like me. I'm not a huge fan of the 80s music or aesthetic, but the soul of the film remains timeless. True, unabashed love can be victorious no matter what the odds. I really wish this little gem had received more attention on the awards circuit.

Countdown to Oscar Night: Best Sound Mixing

Best Sound Mixing
Arrival
La La Land
Hacksaw Ridge
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi

Screw this category.....  It should be one of my favorites because it is the category that awards mixing the live recorded sounds during filming. This is THE category of music-centered movies as past winners include Dreamgirls, Whiplash, Slumdog Millionaire, and Les Miserables. My problem centers around the nominators silly love of one Michael Benjamin Bay.... I have suffered through two Transformers movies and now 13 Hours because of this category....  Still, it should be a slam-dunk win for La La Land if just for the scene above. If you've seen the movie, you know what I mean. If you haven't, go see it... tonight...  Happy Valentines!

My Ballot:
La La Land
Arrival
Hacksaw Ridge
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi

My Pick to Win:
La La Land

Shamefully Snubbed:
Sing Street

Countdown to Oscar Night: Best Sound Editing

Best Sound Editing
Arrival
Hacksaw Ridge
Hell or High Water
La La Land
Sully

...And so it begins....As always, I'll take a look at each category, give a little background, my predictions, and where I think the voters got it wrong. I'm a little behind on where I'd like to be on my movie watching, but I'm acquiring and watching as fast as I can. I'm here to serve!

Sound editing is awarded to the movie with the best added sounds. Usually this category is full of gunfights, robots, and noisy vehicles. This year is no different. The one oddball is La La Land. I'm not really sure how that film is going to do in these technical categories. Musicals usually do well in Sound Mixing, but I don't really know of a single original sound effect that stood out in the Oscar juggernaut. That being said, it wouldn't surprise me at all for La La to sweep.

My Ballot (ranked from best to worst):
Hacksaw Ridge
Hell or High Water
Arrival
La La Land
Sully

My Pick to Win:
Hacksaw Ridge

Shamefully Snubbed:
Swiss Army Man

Best of '16: Other People

-Go, travel the whole world real quick... so you could just see everything.
-I get to see my whole world at dinner tonight.

Molly Shannon plays a mom dealing with terminal cancer. That may not sound like the best premise for a comedy, you may not recognize the director or any other actor, and that title is just about the worst (really... "Other People"... you guys couldn't have done any better than that??) but you'll just have to trust me. Life is scary, life is sad, life is painful, but life is also funny. I feel the best comedies don't pull any of those punches. This movie also points out the importance of the Independent Spirit Awards. I would've never given this movie a second though if it had not been nominated for four Spirit Awards.

Best of '16: Hunt for the Wilderpeople

Me and this fat kid 
We ran we ate and read books 
And it was the best.

Earlier I wrote that Swiss Army Man was the most original film to be released in 2016. I stand by that assertion, but that movie isn't very accessible to the passive film-fan. If you still hunger for originality but aren't quite ready for Paul Dano riding a flatulent Harry Potter like a jetski, this is the movie for you. Set in the beautiful wilderness of New Zealand (I expected a hobbit to pop out at any time), this is the story of a young foster child and his grumpy reluctant guardian as they run from the law in search of freedom. Touching, funny, and exciting, I have no reservations suggesting this movie to pretty much anybody. It's in the redbox right now! Go get it!