Golden Globes 2012 Predictions

The Golden Globe Awards celebrate excellence in both film and television. The group of voters is called the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HPFA). The HPFA is made up of working journalists who cover the United States Film Industry in Europe, Asia, Australia, and Latin America. The first Golden Globes ceremony was held in 1944, so this year is the 69th Annual Golden Globes.

The Golden Globes is considered a very prestigious awards ceremony, but there is often a fair amount of controversy surrounding the nominations. Many believe the Golden Globes has become a popularity contest. Now, that can be said of almost any awards show (Sandra Bullock winning an Oscar for The Blind Side?), but it is most prevalent at the Golden Globes.

The HPFA loves big movie stars. They love having as many huge faces as possible in their audience. Because of this, many famous actors receive nominations that they might not have gotten if they were less well-known. For example, last year Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp both received acting noms for the film The Tourist which was widely acknowledged as one of the worst films of the year. The HPFA has a bit of a love affair with Depp. He has received 10 nominations in the last 11 years.

That being said, the HPFA and the Golden Globe Awards are still highly respected. In Hollywood, being a Golden Globe winner is second only to being an Oscar winner.

Now for my predictions:

The Golden Globes cover a lot of ground. They are for both films and television (which means shows, miniseries, and made-for-TV films), and there are separate categories for Drama and Comedy or Musical.

Now, I don't watch very much television, so I'm not going to predict every category. For example, there is no way for me to make an informed decision for "Best Actor in a Miniseries or Motion Picture Made for Television" because I haven't seen any of the nominees.

And one final disclaimer: I'm usually not very good at predicting the Golden Globe winners for two reasons:
1) The minds of the HPFA members are totally different from that of an American teenager and their choices are often baffling to even Hollywood experts.
2) I have only seen about half of the these films. I usually use the Golden Globe winners as a guide for what films to see before the Oscars next month.

So, here we go. I've put my number one choice in green and my runner-up in purple.

Best Motion Picture- Drama

The Descendants

The Help

Hugo

The Ides of March

Moneyball

War Horse

Best Motion Picture- Comedy or Musical

50/50

The Artist

Bridesmaids

Midnight in Paris

My Week With Marilyn

Best Director

Alexander Payne, The Descendants

George Clooney, The Ides of March

Michel Hazanavicius, The Artist

Martin Scorsese, Hugo

Woody Allen, Midnight in Paris

Best Actor- Drama

Brad Pitt, Moneyball

George Clooney, The Descendants

Leonardo DiCaprio, J. Edgar

Michael Fassbender, Shame

Ryan Gosling, The Ides of March

Best Actress- Drama

Glenn Close, Albert Nobbs

Meryl Streep, The Iron Lady

Tilda Swinton, We Need To Talk About Kevin

Rooney Mara, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

Viola Davis, The Help

Best Actor- Comedy or Musical

Brendan Gleeson, The Guard

JeanK Dujardin, The Artist

Joseph Gordon-Levitt, 50/50

Owen Wilson, Midnight in Paris

Ryan Gosling, Crazy, Stupid, Love

Best Actress- Comedy or Musical

Charlize Theron, Young Adult

Jodie Foster, Carnage

Michelle Williams, My Week With Marilyn

Kate Winslet, Carnage

Kristen Wiig, Bridesmaids

Best Supporting Actor

Albert Brooks, Drive

Christopher Plummer, Beginners

Jonah Hill, Moneyball

Kenneth Brannagh, My Week With Marilyn

Viggo Mortensen, A Dangerous Method

Best Supporting Actress

Berenice Bejo, The Artist

Janet McTeer, Albert Nobbs

Jessica Chastain, The Help

Octavia Spencer, The Help

Shailene Woodley, The Descendants

Best Animated Film

Arthur Christmas

Puss in Boots

Rango

The Adventures of Tintin

Cars 2

Best Screenplay

The Descendants

The Ides of March

The Artist

Moneyball

Midnight in Paris

Best Foreign Language Film

The Flowers of War

In the Land of Blood and Honey

The Kid With A Bike

A Separation

The Skin I Live In

Best Original Score

Ludovic Bource, The Artist

Abel Korzeniowski, W.E.

Trent Reznor, Atticus Ross, The Girl WIth The Dragon Tattoo

Howard Shore, Hugo

John Williams, War Horse

Best Original Song

"Hello Hello" Gnomeo and Juliet

"The Keeper" Machine Gun Preacher

"Lay Your Head Down" Albert Nobbs

"Living Proof" The Help

"Masterpiece" W.E.

Best TV Series- Drama

American Horror Story

Boardwalk Empire

Boss

Game of Thrones

Homeland

Best TV Series- Comedy or Musical

Enlightened

Episodes

Glee

Modern Family

New Girl

Best TV Actress- Drama

Claire Danes, Homeland

Mireille Enos, The Killing

Julianna Margulies, The Good Wife

Madeleine Stowe, Revenge

Callie Thorne, Necessary Roughness

Best TV Actor- Drama

Steve Buscemi, Boardwalk Empire

Bryan Cranston, Breaking Bad

Kelsey Grammar, Boss

Jeremy Irons, The Borgias

Damain Lewis, Homeland

Best TV Actress- Comedy

Laura Dern, Enlightened 

Zooey Deschanel, New Girl

Tina Fey, 30 Rock

Laura Linney, The Big C

Amy Poehler, Parks and Recreation

Best Supporting Actor in a Series, Miniseries, or Motion Picture Made for TV

Peter Dinklage, Game of Thrones

Paul Giamatti, Too Big to Fail

Guy Pearce, Mildred Pierce

Tim Robbins, Cinema Verite

Eric Stonestreet, Modern Family

 

Fun Film Fact 08/10/11

THE SOCIAL NETWORK (2010)
In one of the deposition scenes Divya Narendra says, "Mark was the biggest thing on a campus that included 19 Nobel laureates, 15 Pulitzer Prize winners, 2 future Olympians, and a movie star." The movie star mentioned is Natalie Portman. The screenwriter, Aaron Sorkin, contacted Portman for help on the script. She was able to tell him what the vibe on campus was like when Facebook exploded.

Favorite Movie Scores: "Charlie Wilson"

As I've said before, I LOVE movie scores. Currently, my iPod playlist titled Movie Scores has 512 songs, but it is constantly growing.

Music is an integral part of a film. Without music, a film feels incomplete. A piece of music can completely change the way a scene plays. The best movie scores are ones that don't force you to feel emotion. The movie's score should enhance the already existing emotion.

Because I love movie music so much, I've decided to regularly highlight a favorite piece of music. This probably won't be daily thing like my Fun Film Facts, but I'm going to do it as often as possible.

First up, the main theme from Charlie Wilson's War (2007) called "Charlie Wilson." If you haven't seen Charlie Wilson's War, here's a brief description. It's based on the true story of Charlie Wilson, a partying, womanizing, Texas congressman, who was the main driving force behind the covert war that helped the rebels in Afghanistan beat the Soviets in the 80s. The film's tagline reads "When the world wasn't looking, he changed it forever." Tom Hanks plays Wilson and Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams, and Julia Roberts costar. It's directed by Mike Nichols (The Graduate, Catch 22) and the script is written by Aaron Sorkin.

I really love this piece of music because it encompasses all the aspects of Charlie Wilson's character. It starts out sounding Middle Eastern and then shifts into that twangy electric guitar riff that sounds very Texan. At 1:15 it moves into a soft melody played by a solo instrument. That melody is then picked up by a number of violins. This change from a solitary instrument to many instruments symbolizes how Charlie's covert war started as just himself and an idea and then grew into this enormous historical moment. I find the violins incredibly beautiful. As this series of posts continues you'll find that I tend to enjoy pieces of score that heavily feature strings as opposed to other instruments.

If you haven't seen Charlie Wilson's War check out the trailer.

The movie is very relevant these days because of the War on Terror. There's a quote from Charlie Wilson in the movie that goes: "These things happened. They were glorious and they changed the world... and then we fucked up the endgame." It means that we helped Afghanistan drive out the Soviets and then we stopped caring about them and look what happened...

Coming This Fall: Moneyball

The first trailer for the new film Moneyball came out this week and it got me very excited. I've been tracking this movie for a while because it's Aaron Sorkin's latest project. It's based on the book of the same name by Michael Lewis, who also wrote The Blind Side. The premise is this: It's the story of Oakland A's general manager Billy Beane's successful attempt to put together a baseball club on a budget by employing computer-generated analysis to draft his players. (Thank you IMDB for that quick description.)

Basically, the Oakland A's had a very small budget, thus they could not get big players who demanded big salaries. (The A's had a budget of about $41 million while the Yankees had a budget of about $125 million.) Billy Beane put together a team of excellent players who were cheap because they were undervalued. In the trailer the team is referred to as The Island of Misfit Toys. In many ways, the success of this theory changed the game of baseball. Here's why I'm so excited about the movie:

• The Writers: Moneyball is co-written by Aaron Sorkin and Steven Zaillian. Aaron Sorkin is one of my favorite writers and he just won the Academy Award for Best Screenplay for The Social Network. His other films include Charlie Wilson's War, The American President, and A Few Good Men. He's also written three of my favorite television shows: Sports Night, The West Wing, and Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. If you've seen any of those movies or shows, you know that Sorkin's dialogue is musical. It is usually very fast-paced and it has a certain rhythm to it. Steven Zaillian has written Schindler's List, Mission: Impossible, A Civil Action and Gangs of New York to name a few. It will be really interesting to see how both writers' styles mesh together.

• The Director: This is only Bennett Miller's second feature film, but his first film, Capote, was SO good. I have high hopes for this film as well. Aaron Sorkin dialogue in the hands of the wrong director can be disastrous, but I think Miller has what it takes to pull it off.

• The Cast: Brad Pitt (Billy Beane) is not exactly my favorite guy in Hollywood (his public persona sometimes makes it hard for me to take him seriously) but there's no denying that when he's given a great character, he can be a great actor. Jonah Hill plays Peter Brand, the wiz kid who comes up with the low-budget-team theory. Jonah Hill is a great comedic actor. He's been in a lot of Judd Apatow movies. It will be interesting to see him in a more serious role. And I've saved the best for last: Philip Seymour Hoffman. He plays Art Howe, the manager of the A's. Philip Seymour Hoffman played Truman Capote in Capote, so he knows Miller, and he also had a role in Charlie Wilson's War, so he knows Aaron Sorkin as well. Philip Seymour Hoffman rarely chooses bad films, so the fact that he's in this movie makes me happy.

The film is still 3 months away, but it's already getting Oscar buzz for its acting and writing. Aaron Sorkin could become the first writer to win two years in a row.

The movies opens on September 23.