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Oscar Eye: Predicting The Winners Following Precious's Giant SuccessBy Katey Rich: 2009-11-09 17:51:27
It's not often that much of anyone looks at the top of box office charts for the Oscar predictions, but here's a little-known fact for those of you who think of Oscar candidates as tiny movies that nobody sees: Best Picture winners are usually hits. At least by the time they wrapped up their theatrical run, most Best Picture winners of the last 10 years had made over $100 million, and those that didn't-- No Country for Old Men and Crash-- were hits on DVD. Audiences matter when it comes to who takes home the gold, no matter how many dour indies like The Reader come in for attention in a given year.And while it's all well and good for a movie to become a hit after it gets critical acclaim, it's a slam dunk when audiences embrace it from the beginning. So when Precious: Based on the Novel 'Push' By Sapphire made $1.8 million this weekend, from just 18 screens, Oscar pundits all over immediately sat up and, if they didn't put Precious at the top of the Best Picture heap, at least acknowledged it as an even stronger contender than previously imagined. Precious, of course, has Oprah and Tyler Perry pushing it, and a crack marketing campaign that's kept the buzz going since Sundance. But this weekend's $100,000 per-screen average puts it in the rarefied company of Dreamgirls and Brokeback Mountain as one of the only films to pull off that feat-- and both movies, you remember, were in the thick of the Best Picture race even if neither won. With stellar reviews and only a mild backlash at this point, Precious is now the frontrunner by far-- but as both Brokeback and Dreamgirls can attest, being the early frontrunner can backfire miserably as well. The other big news for the race itself in the last week came with Fox Searchlight's decision to give Crazy Heart, a Jeff Bridges vehicle described as "the country music The Wrestler," a December release date. Some pundits like Kris Tapley are already convinced that Bridges has what it takes to finally win a Best Actor statue, while Maggie Gyllenhaal, who plays Bridges' love interest in the film, is now in the thick of the Best Actress race as well. I haven't seen the film to know whether or not the movie itself could compete, but it must be a boon for Fox Searchlight, which was faced without a real Oscar pony once Amelia tanked. Good to see the studio back in the race after all. But there's been one bit of news that might affect your decision to watch this year's ceremony more than any other-- Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin have been picked to host the awards together, guaranteeing us a night full of stone-faced one-liners, silly voices, and maybe some banjo playing and dancing. The two strike a nice balance between old-school appeal and modern-era snark-- it's like they wanted to hire Tina Fey, realized she was too young and unfamiliar to movie audiences, and hired the two closest movie stars to her sense of humor. It's a win all around, giving us all something to look forward to come Oscar night no matter how the awards themselves shake out. In terms of upcoming releases in the Best Picture race, Precious has the month of November practically to itself, giving it plenty of time to build up buzz before the next serious contender, Up in the Air, shows up December 4. But many of the big players, including Nine and The Lovely Bones, will be screening in the coming weeks, meaning that we critics will finally have a chance to wrap our brains around some of the biggest unknowables of the Oscar race. I'm practically the last critic in the world to not see Up in the Air yet, but this week I'll be seeing The Last Station and Everybody's Fine, both of them featuring various performances that may pop up in some acting categories. So the charts, for now, remain mostly the same. It would be crazy to alter last week's general predictions about the nominees, given that I've seen nothing in the last week that would change them, and though I've added a few contenders in various sections, the status quo is pretty much holding firm as I can see it. Even with Precious's success, it was already a pretty solid frontrunner. We're going to have to wait 'til December to see things really start to shake up.  I'm sticking to my guns on everything here, though a new trailer for A Single Man makes it look like a powerful long-shot possibility.
 I added Oren Moverman for The Messenger, mostly on the strength of the reviews for the movie's performances. No changes here otherwise, though after finally catching up on that New Yorker article about James Cameron, I'm more anxious than ever to see him back in the fray.
 Given the limitless potential for Precious' success, Sidibe may very well be the winner here. It will be a while before someone else shows up to steal some of that buzz.
 With Plummer now in Supporting, I'm thinking it's Sarsgaard who will be bumped-- Molina has the stronger performance in An Education, and there probably isn't room for both no matter what.
 Paula Patton has been added as a longshot, because even though her performance isn't really much, a Precious steamroller could mean anything is possible.
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