Life of Pi won last year. Avatar won a few years ago. Gravity seems a lock this year.

Compare those to the nominees for 2007:

There Will Be Blood – Robert Elswit
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford – Roger Deakins
Atonement – Seamus McGarvey
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly – Janusz Kamiński
No Country for Old Men – Roger Deakins

or 2003:

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World – Russell Boyd
City of God – Cesar Charlone
Girl with a Pearl Earring – Eduardo Serra
Seabiscuit – John Schwartzman
Cold Mountain – John Seale


I like my photography to be actual photography.

For example,

They did, but they were still lagging. The very next year, Oliver! won (2001 wasn't even nominated). Midnight Cowboy was certainly a major step forward, but The Sting was pretty middlebrow compared to say Mean Streets, Serpico, and Don't Look Now (again, none of which were nominated that year, though the entirely forgettable rom-com A Touch of Class was).

Also they had no problems handing out Best Picture nominations to those hacky disaster films like Airport, The Poseidon Adventure, and Towering Inferno (entertaining movies, don't get me wrong) but ignoring masterpieces like Rosemary's Baby, The Last Detail, Fat City, Two-Lane Blacktop, three Altman greats (McCabe & Mrs. Miller, The Long Goodbye, California Split), and pretty much all of Peckinpah and Cassavetes, though that was their prime.

And don't forget Rocky beat out Taxi Driver, Network, Bound for Glory, and All The President's Men.

I thought it was a fun movie but way overrated and some of the acting is lolbad.

I'd almost like to see Gravity win just to prove a 90 minute movie can still win. Most movies today are 30-60 minutes longer than they need to be. High Noon is almost a perfect movie, clocks in at 1:25. If they remade it today it would probably be 2:10 easy.

See in that list it depends what you mean by CGI. I'd guess ~all of those movies were touched up rather significantly in post and many of them likely contain quite a good amount of actual CG shots. Nothing to the extent of Gravity, Avatar, Life of Pi, of course.

How is a movie with a ~20M budget that probably only ever goes to production because Brad Pitt took interest in getting it made (he can get a lot of things made) that is a completely demoralizing story about bodily suffering with no uplifting triumphalism Oscar bait? What am I missing? If you say "because Brad Pitt wants an Oscar" that's an awfully cynical take given the projects he's willing to invest in.

Huge difference between "touched up" and "created out of whole cloth."


Compare "Seabiscuit" or "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford" to "Life of Pi" or "Gravity".

Am I the only one who watched Gravity on demand and wanted my money back half way thru.
Pure aids

Gravity had to be watched in 3D on a big screen to be considered a halfway decent movie. But if you did, it was awesome. Should it win the best picture? No way.

There's no had here. It still HAS to be seen on a big screen in 3D. Nobody who watches it in their home is even watching the movie. They're experiencing something, I don't know what. If you didn't see it as intended you haven't seen it and have nothing intelligible to say about it.

Completely agree. I did see it in 3D, on a big screen TV and enjoyed it. But I think that if a movie is just average if you see it on your home TV then it doesn't deserve "Best Picture". There are award categories for special effects.

Wow that was amazing

Movies are foremost made for movie theaters, otherwise they would all be on TV there would be no to such thing as the movie theater. This is like one of the strongest cases for Gravity. I mean, its not like 12 Years a Slave was made to be seen on TV either it's just you can do it without losing much in the process (you do lose a decent bit even here).

Then the Best Picture should always be given to the movie with the best special effects or best sound engineering since those are the ones that benefit most from the big screen. Since this clearly isn't the case I think the metrics for awarding a Best Picture Academy Award include things other than "it looks cool".

Paid $30 to see it in 3D with my daughter and we walked out of the theater about 2/3 through.

i always find anecdotes like this to be so strange

i'm no huge fan of gravity, but thinking it's so bad that you can't sit there for 30 more minutes and take in the technology just seems super weird

Holy **** at 1976: Network, All the President's Men, and Taxi Driver all lost? And it wasn't a travesty exactly, Rocky is legit if not as good as those movies.

The point... you missed it. Remember when I said ~all movies are designed to play in theaters? I wasn't kidding. Every single one of these nominees were made with this in mind. Special effects have **** all to do with anything at all.

I wish this had a more interesting host. I'd more tempted then to stay up until 4AM to watch it if it did.

You missed mine. I'm saying that if a movies biggest redeeming quality is that "it looks cool" on a big screen but otherwise has an average script/isn't all that entertaining off the big screen it doesn't deserve to be Best Picture no matter what their intentions were.

My rankings:

Best Picture:
1. Her
2. 12 Years a Slave
3. Gravity
4. Nebraska
5. Wolf of Wall Street
6. Dallas Buyers Club
7. Philomena
8. Captain Phillips
9. American Hustle

I enjoyed all of these movies. Any of the top 3 winning would be fine with me.


Best Director:
1. Cuaron
2. Scorsese
3. Payne
4. McQueen
5. Russell

I don't really see how you can not give this to Cuaron.


Best Actor:
1. McConaughey
2. Ejiofor
3. DiCaprio
4. Dern
5. Bale

Strong field. I'd honestly be okay with any of these winning.


Best Actress:
1. Bullock
2. Blanchett
3. Adams
4. Dench
5. Streep

Substantially weaker field. Only the top two make any sense to me.


Best Supporting Actor:
1. Fassbender
2. Abdi
3. Cooper
4. Leto
5. Hill

I'm probably in the minority putting Leto in the bottom half here. Good performance, but I didn't see anything super-special.


Best Supporting Actress:
1. Hawkins
2. Nyong'o
3. Lawrence
4. Squibb
5. Roberts

I don't really feel too strongly about this, as long as Julia Roberts doesn't win.


Original Screenplay:
1. Her
2. Nebraska
3. Dallas Buyers Club
4. Blue Jasmine
5. American Hustle

I feel the most strongly about this category. Her is far superior to the other four here.


Adapted Screenplay:
1. Wolf of Wall Street
2. 12 Years a Slave
3. Captain Phillips
4. Philomena
*Didn't see Before Midnight

I wish I had seen Before Midnight, just to round out the big categories.

You really liked 'Her' that much? I loved the concept but thought it turned out rather dull.

Hawkins was great...that's also my favorite of those 5. I'm glad she got nominated after missing out on a nom for Happy-Go-Lucky.