Tomorrow morning.

You know.

We all get up at the ass of morning and wait for the announcement – Oscar nominations. There will be a lot of white-knuckling tonight. But not from Melissa Leo. Love her. When I talked to her on the carpet last night at the Red State premiere, she was like – it’s an honour, but just like an audition, you have to put that away, you have to know there’s more to this than that kind of recognition. Coming from her, I believe it. She’s winning this thing. Best Supporting Actress. The others?

Well…

Natalie Portman wants it. She cotton balled our faces with her wanting of it.

What about Andrew Garfield?

He took his girl Shannon Woodward to the movies last night in Hollywood. Maybe to get his mind off of it. Garfield has an outside shot at a Best Supporting Actor nod. No chance to win, of course not, but a chance to make the five, sure. After Christian Bale and Geoffrey Rush, considered to be locks, Mark Ruffalo for The Kids Are All Right, Jeremy Renner in The Town, and John Hawkes in Winter’s Bone. If I had to choose, with all due respect, because I do like the young actor, and he does look kinda hot here, I’d pick Hawkes over Garfield.

Teardrop was one of the best characters in film all year.

Anyway, thought I’d give a stab at predicting the nominees for the first time on my blog. As you know, I love to gamble. No fun in safe bets. Tomorrow morning we’ll see how it shakes out.

Best Picture
The King’s Speech
The Social Network
Toy Story 3
Winter’s Bone
The Kids Are All Right
The Fighter
Another Year*
Black Swan
True Grit
Inception*

*I’m very torn here about Another Year, Inception, and 127 Hours. It was a tough choice. Feels like either way, it’ll be a bad beat. All of these are at minimum full house hands.

Best Director
David Fincher
Tom Hooper
Darren Aronofsky
David O Russell
Christopher Nolan

*Yep. I took Nolan over the Coen Brothers who are beloved by the Academy. If I’m at the poker table, I am sweating this raise.

Best Actress
Annette Bening
Natalie Portman
Jennifer Lawrence
Michelle Williams
Lesley Manville*

*This is HUGE a gamble. Manville has been nominated for, like, nothing. And Nicole Kidman has been nominated for, like, everything. But it’s so boring picking the same list as everyone else. And I’d rather go all in on an outsider.

Best Actor
Colin Firth
James Franco
Jesse Eisenberg
Jeff Bridges
Ryan Gosling*

*Part of me is really pulling for Robert Duvall over Ryan Gosling who. The experts say it’s Duvall for sure. But Harvey Weinstein has worked SO hard for Blue Valentine. And he can bluff with the best of them.

Best Supporting Actress
Melissa Leo
Hailee Steinfeld*
Amy Adams
Helena Bonham Carter
Jackie Weaver

*Steinfeld should really be in the Best Actress category. Some say she’s splitting her own votes. Like Aces! You have to do it, even against a face card. Also, the Academy likes putting kids in Supporting slot.

Best Supporting Actor
Christian Bale
Geoffrey Rush
Jeremy Renner
Mark Ruffalo
John Hawkes*

*This is the same list as the Screen Actors’ Guild. Sounds right to me, even


Photos from Flynetonline.com