My Official and FINAL 2007 Oscar Winner Predictions!
:[ February 19th, 2008Predicted winner in BOLD
BEST PICTURE
Atonement
Juno
Michael Clayton
No Country For Old Men
There Will Be Blood
BEST ACTOR
George Clooney, Michael Clayton
Daniel Day-Lewis, There Will Be Blood
Johnny Depp, Sweeney Todd the Demon Barber of Fleet Street
Tommy Lee Jones, In the Valley of Elah
Viggo Mortensen, Eastern Promises
BEST ACTRESS
Cate Blanchett, Elizabeth: The Golden Age
Julie Christie, Away From Her
Marion Cotillard, La Vie en Rose
Laura Linney, The Savages
Ellen Page, Juno
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Casey Affleck, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Javier Bardem, No Country For Old Men
Philip Seymour Hoffman, Charlie Wilson’s War
Hal Holbrook, Into the Wild
Tom Wilkinson, Michael Clayton
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Cate Blanchett, I’m Not There
Ruby Dee, American Gangster
Saoirse Ronan, Atonement
Amy Ryan, Gone Baby Gone
Tilda Swinton, Michael Clayton
BEST ANIMATED FILM
Persepolis
Ratatouille
Surf’s Up
ART DIRECTION
American Gangster
Atonement
The Golden Compass
Sweeney Todd The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
There Will Be Blood
CINEMATOGRAPHY
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Atonement
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
No Country for Old Men
There Will Be Blood
COSTUME DESIGN
Across the Universe
Atonement
Elizabeth: The Golden Age
La Vie en Rose
Sweeney Todd The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
BEST DIRECTION
Julian Schnabel, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Jason Reitman, Juno
Tony Gilroy, Michael Clayton
Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, No Country for Old Men
Paul Thomas Anderson, There Will Be Blood
BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
No End in Sight
Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience
Sicko
Taxi to the Dark Side
War/Dance
BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT SUBJECT
Freeheld
La Corona (The Crown)
Salim Baba
Sari’s Mother
FILM EDITING
The Bourne Ultimatum
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Into the Wild
No Country for Old Men
There Will Be Blood
FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM
Beaufort (Israel)
The Counterfeiters (Austria)
Katyn (Poland)
Mongol (Kazakhstan)
12 (Russia)
MAKEUP
La Vie en Rose
Norbit
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End
ORIGINAL SCORE
Atonement
The Kite Runner
Michael Clayton
Ratatouille
3:10 to Yuma
ORIGINAL SONG
“Falling Slowly” from Once
“Happy Working Song” from Enchanted
“Raise It Up” from August Rush
“So Close” from Enchanted
“That’s How You Know” from Enchanted
ANIMATED SHORT FILM
“I Met the Walrus”
“Madame Tutli-Putli”
“Même Les Pigeons Vont au Paradis (Even Pigeons Go to Heaven)”
“My Love (Moya Lyubov)”
“Peter & the Wolf”
LIVE ACTION SHORT FILM
“At Night”
“Il Supplente (The Substitute)”
“Le Mozart des Pickpockets (The Mozart of Pickpockets)”
“Tanghi Argentini”
“The Tonto Woman”
SOUND EDITING
The Bourne Ultimatum
No Country for Old Men
Ratatouille
There Will Be Blood
Transformers
SOUND MIXING
The Bourne Ultimatum
No Country for Old Men
Ratatouille
3:10 to Yuma
Transformers
VISUAL EFFECTS
The Golden Compass
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End
Transformers
ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
Atonement, Screenplay by Christopher Hampton
Away from Her, Written by Sarah Polley
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, Screenplay by Ronald Harwood
No Country for Old Men, Written for the screen by Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
There Will Be Blood, Written for the screen by Paul Thomas Anderson
ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Juno, Written by Diablo Cody
Lars and the Real Girl, Written by Nancy Oliver
Michael Clayton, Written by Tony Gilroy
Ratatouille, Screenplay by Brad Bird; Story by Jan Pinkava, Jim Capobianco, Brad Bird
The Savages, Written by Tamara Jenkins










The best films should ignite something. Passion, debate, laughter, thought, wonder, thrills, chills, goosebumps, tears, or any other deep-seated emotional, spiritual or intellectual response. A great film should move you, in some way. There Will Be Blood had all the promise of a great film. Yet all it delivers is lost potential.
There’s really nothing worse than a word that’s overused. Especially in Hollywood, where it happens a lot. Hyperbole and exaggeration seem to be the rule, not the exception here, which makes it even harder for me to say what I’m about to say.
I imagine it would be difficult, as a writer/director, to constantly try to live up to what many refer to as your “masterpiece.” As an artist, you would want to move on, try new things, break new ground, explore different directions. Joel and Ethan Coen might have been at such an artistic crossroad.
My favorite time of the year. Football season has begun, baseball playoffs have begun, and, even better, the Red Sox are in the postseason!
Animated movies have certainly come a long way. In the beginning, they seemed to be about fairy tales, like Snow White and Cinderella. Even when they made their comeback, they were still fairy tales, like Beauty and the Beast and The Little Mermaid. Then they got digital and a whole new world of animation opened up and the little computer-animation-company-that-could, Pixar, blew Disney out of the water. Films like Toy Story and Monsters, Inc. and Finding Nemo and The Incredibles and Cars not only furthered the genre, but gave it a new level of respectability, even proving to be the catalysts behind the Academy creating an entire new category for the Oscars: Best Animated Feature.