Forecasting the Oscars ® since 2003

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AND WE'RE OFF: FIRST PRECURSORS INAUGURATE OSCAR SEASON 2007!

Juno's Ellen Page is one of the first winners of this year's Oscar Season...

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By Joey Magidson

Now that the Independent Spirit Awards have announced their nominations and the Gotham Awards have been given out, the beginning of the precursor season is underway. This is only the tip of the iceberg, but we can finally start to see what films are going to end up racking up awards and moving on towards an Oscar nomination. In a few weeks the National Board of Review will announce their top 10 films of the year and the race will begin to clear up even more but for the moment, these two award ceremonies give some insight into where the independent films factor in for the race this season.

The Independent Spirit Awards

The ISA nominations came out and due to some odd restrictions on what films are eligible (budget limitations, whether a film was screened in the proper place or not, and so on) there are some odd snubs (though you never know if a film that’s not eligible would have even been nominated if it had been deemed eligible) but for the most part the nominations went a long way towards showing off some of the films and performances that may have been previously forgotten about.

The films that we already know are deep in the race (like Juno, I’m Not There, and The Diving Bell and the Butterfly) got a nice little boost to keep their buzz alive while some films that nobody had really been talking about as a Best Picture contender (like Paranoid Park, A Mighty Heart, and The Lookout) got their names thrown out there for the first time in a while. A win for Juno or I’m Not There would put them on track towards being the “indie” pick this year, while if “Diving Bell” wins it might make the foreign language pic even more appealing for voters.

The actors and actresses that benefited most were, starting with the ladies: Angelina Jolie and Marisa Tomei (who are looking like more of a sound bet then they did a few weeks ago), Ellen Page and Cate Blanchett (who are seeming more like locks everyday), and the group of Tang Wei, Sienna Miller, and Jennifer Jason Leigh (who put their names back into the race to an extent). When it comes to the gentlemen, we have Phillip Seymour Hoffman solidifying his case for a nomination for ONE of his three films this year, Frank Langella feeding off of his tremendous buzz as of late and people like Don Cheadle and Steve Zahn, who got their names mentioned for the first time in a while and in the process breathed some life into their films as well (Talk To Me, and Rescue Dawn, respectively).

Special Note: The first annual Robert Altman award was given out and it went to the entire production of I’m Not There. This struck me as a sort of “Honorary Oscar” type award, and while it didn’t hurt the film’s buzz at all, it may mean that the voters are going to look elsewhere for their winners when it comes time to vote and were looking to compensate the film early on.

Gotham Awards

Unlike the ISA noms, the Gotham Awards actually named a winner at their ceremony. The Best Feature field had two well buzzed about films in competition (I’m Not There and Into the Wild), a fading film that needs some help (Margot at the Wedding) and a well received forgotten film (The Namesake). In perhaps an upset, Into the Wild walked away the winner, fueling its buzz supply for a bit and giving the film the type of early recognition that it will certainly need.

Documentary Feature went to Sicko, making it seem even more of a safe bet for a nomination while the Ensemble Cast award ended up in a tie. Before The Devil Knows You’re Dead and Talk To Me were the co-winners, and that bodes well for both films. BTDKYD got early recognition and Talk To Me found its way back onto people’s radar.

The other award that has Oscar implications was the Breakthrough Actor field. Both Emile Hirsch and Ellen Page were in the field, and Ellen Page came away with the award. She’s looking more and more like not just a safe bet for a nomination, but someone who I’m willing to go out and call the “frontrunner”.

Overall: If I had to say who the biggest winners so far are, I’d say that they were Juno (this year’s Little Miss Sunshine perhaps) and Into the Wild (the Best Feature win was a definite coup). Things are still rather murky in the Oscar race, but by this time next month, things will be much clearer and we’ll be well on our way to knowing who this year’s crop of nominees will be.

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