In 2006, Roger underwent surgery to remove cancer near his jaw. There ended up being some pretty serious complications and Ebert is no longer able to speak. He’s also unable to eat or drink. But he can write.

Can he ever write.

In my opinion, Roger Ebert is one of the best film critics in history — from both an academic and populist perspective. His reviews and commentary easily best the most revered film journals (and as someone who spent way too many years in college studying film, I honestly have to say, academic film writing can be really, really irritating), yet his coined thumbs-up, thumbs-down approach can bring the film forward for the non-academic film follower.

I have always admired Ebert’s writing and his approach to film criticism. Despite losing the ability to physically speak, Ebert’s voice hasn’t disappeared. If anything, his writing — already a cut above — has become even better. Maybe it’s one of those senses things. Like how your sense of smell and hearing can be elevated if you lose your sight?

I don’t know, the man is incredible. I wasn’t planning on my first Project 52 entry, I had another draft planned. I’ll just publish that tomorrow or Saturday. I read this blog entry of Ebert’s (thanks @highsign) and just had to link to it — but I wanted to also try to say something more.

I dreamed. I was reading Cormac McCarthy’s Suttree, and there’s a passage where the hero, lazing on his river boat on a hot summer day, pulls up a string from the water with a bottle of orange soda attached to it and drinks. I tasted that pop so clearly I can taste it today. Later he’s served a beer in a frosted mug. I don’t drink beer, but the frosted mug evoked for me a long-buried memory of my father and I driving in his old Plymouth to the A&W Root Beer stand (gravel driveways, carhop service, window trays) and his voice saying “…and a five-cent beer for the boy.” The smoke from his Lucky Strike in the car. The heavy summer heat.

But really, read this. What more can you say. What an amazing person (with an amazing family and support system), what an amazing writer.

Read this. The man can’t physically speak (not that computers aren’t great), yet he has said more than some individuals — no matter how loquacious — could in a lifetime. Roger Ebert, you are my hero.

Essentially, a little girl, dying of a rare form of cancer, really wanted to see Pixar’s “Up.” Sadly, she was too sick to get to the theater when it was released. So her mom cold called Pixar, Disney, whoever, and managed to reach someone who sent a REAL PERSON to their door, with the movie, some toys, etc. and allowed the family and the little girl to watch the film together. A few hours later, she passed away.

If you haven’t seen the film, I won’t go into too many spoilers, other than to say, it is the very essence of life, death, hope and rebirth. It’s a beautiful, beautiful film and while some might find its subject matter a bit macabre for a last wish (especially since the trailer really didn’t make it out to be what it is), I think it’s perfect.

The fact that this little girl hung on, just so she could see her last movie — a movie she had wanted to see — and the fact that Pixar sent someone to the girl’s house with the movie, so she could watch it, perfectly encapsulates why movies are so important.

Throughout my life, but especially in college, I’ve often had conversations with people who just don’t understand why I’m so passionate about film. The importance of film is easier to argue than the importance of television (in that, the academic study of film is so parallel to the academic study of literature, whereas the basis for television study often depends on the sociological aspects of television, rather than the textual content of the shows themselves), but I know many, many people who undermine or dismiss its significance. I truly believe that film can have a transformative effect greater than any other medium.

I saw “Up” last week with Grant and Nik Fletcher, who visited with us for a few days before going to The Big Nerd Ranch. The UK doesn’t get “Up” until October, so Grant and I waited to see the film until Nik arrived.

It was worth the wait. The film is perhaps the most “adult” Pixar film to date (though WALL-E is certainly close), on so many levels. I’m sure kids love it, but it is truly an example of a film made for adults. It is wonderful.

After hearing Matt rail against it on The Flickcast, and hearing from others that it was depressing, I was slightly nervous it might break the streak of “awesome.” Of course, I was wrong. For the tenth time, I sat in a theater and watched a Pixar film on the big screen. For the tenth time, I walked away overjoyed. This time, I also had tears in my eyes.

To be sure, “Up” is a tear-jerker, but it is also immensely beautiful and powerful. I saw the film two days after what would have been my grandparents 64th wedding anniversary, and the day after the third anniversary of my grandfather’s death. I was reminded so much of my grandparents in the film — especially seeing Carl adjust to life without his beloved Ellie. When my grandmother died in January 2005, my grandfather was by her side the entire time. For the majority of the few days leading up to her passing, I was with him. Sitting next to him as he held her hand. It was heartwrenching, yet beautiful. Seeing someone say goodbye to his wife of nearly 60 years. Seeing real love as it exists at the very end of life.

“Up” captured that kind of love. It encapsulated what it is like to witness that kind of love.

The movies matter because they have the ability to take the most personal and difficult of experiences — losing a loved one (or even watching someone lose a loved one) — and put it on screen for the lessons and the feelings of that experience to be absorbed by everyone in the theater. Movies are larger than life, but the power is that they can bring the real emotions from life, to a much bigger place.

I’m rambling at this point and losing my coherency. Regardless, I can’t think of a more perfect film for that family to watch together. I hope little Colby enjoyed it.

We recorded episode 4 earlier today (well, technically yesterday) and our shows go live on Wednesday’s. So we’re three weeks in. While the response has been really positive (and love it or hate it, we’d love to get your feedback), we’re realists and know that building any sort of audience or momentum will take some time.

So imagine my surprise when I got an e-mail from Matt a few minutes ago with the subject: “HOLY SHIT!!” and the photo below featured (click for full-size):

Yeah. That’s us. In the TV & Film section of iTunes Podcasts. Under New and Notable. That sound you just heard? It was me waking up my obnoxious upstairs neighbors (who sound like elephants, despite being quite small in stature and get home from work after midnight so they make it hard to go to sleep), because I was whooping like a hyena.

SCORE!!

The ego-centric nature of this post made me question whether or not I should post this, but then I thought, what’s the point of having a blog if you aren’t going to be all navel-gazing and self-aggrandizing?

Exactly.

YAY!!

Because they moved the Showcase to a larger auditorium, there was a problem getting the first film (Milk) ready to show on time, so they had to switch it with The Reader instead (and we watched Milk second). This actually worked out quite well because Grant had no interest seeing The Reader and probably would have left after Milk. As it turned out, The Reader was fantastic and Grant is really glad he stayed.

The Reader was a real surprise. I had wanted to avoid it because it seemed trite and overly praised, and frankly, seemed as if it would bore me. Far from it. The film asks really interesting questions about guilt, complicity, love and forgiveness. The idea of morality as opposed to the system of law was juxtaposed against a just post-WWII Germany, where in the decades just after the war, the country was still struggling to deal with the Holocaust and each individual’s complicity in the system. To be clear, it’s not a Holocaust film — it goes far beyond that — but that was the perfect backdrop for this type of film, as it fit so well with the overall message.

Kate Winslet was astounding and David Kross who plays a young Ralph Fiennes (and looks so much like he could actually BE a young Ralph Fiennes that the casting director should totally win some serious awards) was phenomenal, especially for such a young actor. Kate’s performance was nuanced and stoic and sold more on her expressions and her eyes rather than the words that she spoke. Really, really excellent.

Of the five, The Reader was the most thought-provoking in a sense; if I needed to write an academic essay or a journal submission on a nominee, I’d choose The Reader because there was so much textual complexity. Like almost every other film nominated for Best Picture, it was an adaptation, and while I haven’t read the book, I know want to.

Milk, was unsurprisingly excellent. One of my all-time favorite documentaries is The Times of Harvey Milk and Milk is essentially a dramatic reenactment of that story, with some additional background details of Harvey’s love life and more on his interactions with Dan White. Having watched the documentary so many times (I think I discovered it on IFC or Sundance a few months before the 25th Anniversary DVD was released, the first home video release of the doc if I recall correctly), I was familiar with the players and the story, so I can’t really judge how well the film fleshed out some people and some characters — but I think it did a good job, as my mother, who has never seen the doc (I showed it to Grant last summer), really enjoyed it and was riveted by the story.

Gus Van Sant is still dead to me because of the Psycho fiasco, that said — this came as close as anything to absolving him from that greatest of cinematic sins.

Sean Penn has received the bulk of the acting buzz around the film, but I really think Josh Brolin was the real standout. Obviously, Harvey IS the film — and Penn’s performance is both excellent and exacting. The voice, the affectations and mannerisms were spot on with the real guy. That said, Josh Brolin’s beyond eerie transformation into a spitting image of the real Dan White was what took me aback when I first saw the trailer for Milk last year (I regret we weren’t able to see it when it was in theaters — so much was going on at the end of the year though) and it was an incredible performance by an actor that has really come out of nowhere in the last two years (first No Country for Old Men, now Milk and W.) to transition from “son of a famous guy” to a really stand-out actor in his own right.

James Franco was really impressive, and Emille Hirsch, who I cannot stand was also quite good. The film felt authentic and the mixture of the real home movies from the ‘70s with the recreated clips were just awesome. Ending with the actual footage of the candlelight vigil across San Fancisco from November, 1978 was the perfect, perfect touch. That imagery was the most haunting and memorable part of the documentary and it was a perfect way to end the film.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button was an exercise in proving me to NEVER DOUBT DAVID FINCHER. Now, I love me some David Fincher, LOVE, but I let the “it’s three hours and boring and blah blah blah” bullshit turn me off the movie. Again, fucking excellent. The pacing was great, the cinematography was superb and although I think it is going to get shut-out of everything big, if it doesn’t win Best Makeup, there’s a fucking problem.

Cate Blanchett who I normally can’t stand was excellent. Brad Pitt was great and the supporting cast of characters was equally wonderful. Now, I’ve heard a lot of Forrest Gump comparisons, but that’s an insult to Fincher, et. al. Zemekis is a director, Fincher is an auteur. there’s a difference in skill, in talent and in scope. The lessons of love and loss and to quote Pony Boy by way of Frost, “nothing gold ever staying,” were really remarkable.

It was so different from a typical Fincher film, both in substance and even in style. His characteristic cinematography flourishes were there, but the color palette was more expansive and lush — and not just dark.

It was really, really solid and while I don’t want to see it again immediately, I’ll totally watch it when the DVD is released with Grant.

Slumdog Millionaire is the big pick to win, and for good reason. It is different, it is touching, it is uplifting — it’s just a great movie. The film has the full range of emotions, and none feel forced — and the fact that Danny Boyle directed such a film is astounding. The actors were amazing, especially for people so young. The child actors especially were just amazing. And the girl who plays Latika — what a phenomenal beauty. Like, she’s the Angelina Jolie/Vivien Leigh/Grace Kelley kind of beauty — like totally transfixing and perfect.

I don’t want to say too much because although the story has complexities and is certainly not shallow, even going into the premise ruins a certain element of the flow. You know how the film is going to end as soon as it starts (the title tells you), but the journey to get there is great. And the music fucking rocks.

Frost/Nixon was better than I had expected, but I still think The Dark Knight, The Wrestler or a host of other films could have claimed its spot for Best Picture and Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay nods. I read the play, and the film played better than the stage directions read. My only real criticism in a sense is that Nixon came off as tragic, sympathetic and human. And that’s fine, but I don’t think that was really the intention of the play or the film. Frost/Nixon succeeded where Oliver Stone’s Nixon utterly failed.

Part of that is because they got the right actor to play Nixon. Nothing against Sir Anthony Hopkins, but he was just a horrible choice for Stone’s film. But Nixon comes across as sympathetic, and I don’t know how I feel about that. The man did so much harm in the name of power, authority and winning a political game. Until George W. Bush, he was the most corrupt of all our Presidents. I don’t really like feeling sympathetic towards him, especially after the plethora of Nixon books I’ve read over the years. I’ve read so many books, listened to many of the tapes, watched documentaries — it was odd that this film, which isn’t substantively very strong, would make me uncomfortable in seeing the guy as human.

OK — so Predictions:

Best Actress

Kate Winslet

Best Actor

I want Mickey Rourke to get it, I think he deserves it — and though Sean Penn has a certain advantage, I think the rawness of Mickey’s performance outweighs the accuracy of Sean’s Method perfection.

Best Supporting Actor

Heath Ledger will surely be the third posthumous Oscar winner. I’m not sure how I feel about that. He was brilliant in Dark Knight, but I’d like to see Josh Brolin win.

Best Supporting Actress

It’s a toss-up between Amy Adams and Viola Davis for Doubt. Still, Marissa Tomei Penelope Cruz have a chance, toss-up.

Best Original Screenplay

WALL-E should get this. I hope it does.

Best Adapted Screenplay

Slumdog Millionaire

Best Director

I’ll say Danny Boyle, but I’m unsure — David Fincher might pull it out.

Best Picture

Slumdog Millionaire

Woo — I’m done!

For those of you not in the US (or even if you are in the US, if you haven’t heard about this before), this is what is becoming an annual tradition from AMC, where essentially, the day before Oscar night, movie fans have the chance to watch all five Best Picture nominated films back-to-back in one afternoon. For $30 you get unlimited popcorn and a ticket to each movie — plus you can come and go as you please. Sitting in a movie theater for 12 hours, watching five movies back-to-back = bliss!

This will be the third year that my mom and I will be attending the Showcase, however, this year there are a few changes. First, Grant will be coming with us. It was sweet of my mom to include us in what has traditionally been “our” thing — but we know he’ll enjoy it. Second, this year I get to liveblog the whole experience! AMC’s PR people contacted me a couple of weeks ago and asked if I would be interested in live blogging/tweeting/flickring the event, in exchange for two free passes. Since I would have done all that anyway, I jumped at the chance. I haven’t quite figured out how I’m going to parse all the info (my thought is that I’ll have an RSS feed tomorrow for a post that shows my tweets, flickr stuff and other thoughts — or I might just try to blog from my BlackBerry.

I’ll definitely be tweeting about the event and uploading photos to a Flickr group that @giannii created. All of the bloggers attending the Best Picture Showcase throughout the country will be using the #amcbps hash-tag so you can follow that feed to stay up to date (or to contribute).

I really think AMC totally went about promoting the even this year the right way. In years past, Entertainment Weekly has mentioned the event (that was how I found out about it the first year), and there has been some newspaper coverage or ad space, but this year they really did a good job of getting the word out using social media. A lot of this is because AMC had the foresight to hire @jpgardner as their Social Media Manager. I’ve been following Justin on Twitter for I don’t know how long (feels like forever in Twitter time) and he has a real handle on how to community engagement the right way.

Let’s look at how and why AMC Entertainment has succeeded:

• They approached bloggers and Twitter users with both an interest in film and with community connections I don’t know if I was approached because of my Twitter following or because I blogged about the Best Picture Showcase last year, but the fact that they contacted me shows that they were doing their homework. I’m a nobody, but a nobody who loves film and who interacts with a lot of other film fans.
• They really focussed on the excitement of the event The reason my mom and I will be doing this for the third year in a row (and the reason Grant is coming with us), is because this is one of the most fun movie going experiences you can have. If you’re a movie fan, there’s nothing better. Even if you are the type of person that can’t imagine spending 12 hours in a theater, this is still a great event. You’d be surprised how much time flies when you are seeing really quality flicks back to back. Plus, the AMC staff has always been incredibly great at accommodating patrons and making the experience as much fun as possible. That level of fun and excitement came through with the social media campaign.
• It’s clearly not (just) about the money A lot of companies fail at social or interactive marketing and community outreach because it is clear they just want people to shill for their stuff. This isn’t the case here. Sure, part of the campaign was to raise interest in the event through word of mouth and online channels, but it was clearly about more than that. The focus on tweeting during the event, taking photos, blogging, really making it a fun experience that you can share with your friends all over the place — makes it clear this is just about money. If it were just about money, why encourage people to interact when the event has already started? No, by doing this, not only does AMC make it clear that they aren’t wanting people to just shill for their event, they are showing that they understand that engagement is what keeps people coming back. I’ll say this — even before being approached this year, there was no doubt in my mind that I’d be doing the Best Picture Showcase this year. None. The experience has been so great in years past, it was a given. Not only that, but the experience has only increased my brand loyalty to AMC. I can’t always go to AMC because the theater down the street is a Regal and the indie theater down the street is a Landmark, but when I do have the choice, I’ve always preferred AMC. The fact that they do events like this and really try to makes stuff special only cements that loyalty.
• The price is right  As with years past, the price of a ticket is only $30 ($25 if you are a Movie Watcher card member and you buy at the box office). Five movies and unlimited popcorn for $30 is unheard of. You can get a soda with unlimited refills for about $4, and that makes the whole thing that much better. I’ll be at the newly renovated Buckhead Fork and Screen (formerly the Buckhead Backlot, also known as the place I lost my awesome Diesel hat and the place I left my cell phone in 2001 — got back the phone, not the hat ), where they serve alcohol (beer, wine) and actual food — so my experience will be even nicer than it was in the past. In this economy, $30 for a day of entertainment is a really great value. Not to mention, it’s a great way for movie lovers on a budget (and that includes me — I just moved into a bigger place and got engaged, our going to the movies budget took a backseat to new furniture, the new TV and my beautiful engagement ring). Plus, it’s an awesome way to get geared up about the Oscar’s the following night.

All in all, this is one of those movie events I look forward to the entire year. Save seeing Vertigo followed by Psycho in glorious 70mm at the Fox Theater on Hitchcock’s 100th birthday, it is my favorite movie experience ever. To quote Ferris Bueller, “If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up.”

Above: Paul Newman with Robert Redford in October 2004. Photo by Evan Agostini/Getty Images.

As with Sydney Pollack and Tim Russert, this is one of those entries I really hate having to write. Paul Newman, died on Friday at age 83, after a long battle with cancer.

Paul Newman was more than just an actor, or even a star; he was a legend. In today’s increasingly here today, forgotten tomorrow era of celebrity, being a legend is extremely rare, and Hollywood has lost one its remaining few.

More than just a great actor and artist, Newman was also a humanitarian and a genuinely good person. All that money from Newman’s Own went to charity. He started camps and charity funds for terminally ill children. He was married to Joanne Woodward for 50 years — something almost unheard of, Hollywood or anywhere else.

A few years ago, Robert Redford sponsored this thing for Sundance called “Iconoclasts”, where celebrities interview people they consider icons or personal heroes. Redford interviewed Newman, and I remember watching that program and walking way with even more respect for both men.

George Roy Hill (who would direct Newman in both The Sting and Slap Shot) directed my favorite Newman film, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. I first saw “Butch Cassidy” in high school, and it resonated with me in a way few films have. The parallels between Butch and Sundance’s realization that their way of life is ending and the turbulence and end of idealism of the 1960s remains one of the more subtle, and I think powerful, messages in all of cinema.

Paul Newman owned that role. He owned every role he every played. Whether it was Brick, the alcoholic and tortured (and tortuous) husband in Richard Brooks’ adaptation of Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, or his roles as anti-heroes in Cool Hand Luke and The Color of Money and The Hustler, Newman made roles his own.

And the man was funny! In addition to “Slap Shots,” Newman was brilliant in The Hudsucker Proxy, you know, “for kids.”

My cousin’s son LOVED him in Cars — the last film he did any major press for.

Just looking at his filmography, it is clear that the man was just flat out good.

Still, it was his personal contributions to help children, the sick and the poor that really stand out. He was on Nixon’s Enemies List — something of which he was very, very proud, and was never embarrassed to be labeled “a liberal.” If more people like Paul Newman would embrace the liberal label today, we might be able to fight back from the stigma assholes like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly try to attach to that ideology.

Paul Newman was a legend, IS a legend, and his presence will be missed.

Rest in Peace.

I’d like to thank David Chen and Devindra Hardawar for inviting me to join them — I can’t wait! Oh — for anyone who isn’t familiar — Dave and Devindra are responsible for the uber-awesome Always Watching blog. It kicks total ass!

So again, tonight, 10 PM EDT — join us live in the UStream.tv chat. I’ll post the podcast link later in the week when the recorded version goes live.

On Twitter, Mike Doe asked me to name my five favorite Pollack films. I had to look up his filmography to get a full perspective and I was taken aback at how many fantastic films he not only directed, but also starred in or produced. Pollack was truly an auteur and an artist.

So now, in no particular order, five Pollack films you should rent:

1. Tootsie — Funny doesn’t begin to describe it. Dustin Hoffman is brilliant and the movie remains extremely watchable, even after 25 years. Pollack’s understated direction that allows Hoffman to shine without trying too hard is pitch-perfect.
2. Out of Africa — Meryl Streep and Robert Redford. What more can you say? He won two Oscars for it (Director and Best Picture) and it’s just one of those great films.
3. The Way We Were — God I love this film. One of the best and most heart-wrenching relationship movies of all time. Barbara Stresisand and Robert Redford are magical together. Love. love, LOVE.
4. Husbands and Wives — This is one of my favorite Woody Allen films (it’s such an interesting character drama) and while Pollack has a supporting role, he is excellent.
5. Michael Clayton — I saw this twice in the theater (when it came out, and then during the Oscar marathon) and even though it comes at the expense of Three Days of the Condor and They Shoot Horses, Don’t They?, I’m including it. The pacing was magnificent — and again, though his role was small — Pollack was excellent. The acting was uniformly fantastic in this film (Tilda Swinton was so good — geez!) and Pollack was a producer as well as an actor. As a producer, Pollack had an eye for good projects, and Clayton was no exception.

I’ll also add in a guilty pleasure: The Firm. I mean, yeah, it’s total popcorn — but it’s awesome. Tangentially — isn’t it great that Jeanne Tripplehorn is getting work again?

Anyway, I don’t have a lot of time — but I wanted to post something about Pollack’s death. He was a great artist and by all accounts, an excellent person. He will be missed.

Out.

Well, it looks like my predictions were pretty close — except for Best Actress/Supporting Actress. I was happy that No Country For Old Men swept (It won 4 of the 5 majors, and it wasn’t even eligible for “Best Actress” — though Kelly Macdonald was very, very good in her small, but pivotal role — and her accent was dead-on — had no idea she was Scottish!), because it really was, to me, the “best” Academy-esque film of the year.

Although there were a few really nice moments during this year’s telecast (Tilda Swinton’s win — and her absolute shock, was amazing; the beautiful Marion Cotillard’s win for Best Actress — as soon as I saw her clip, I had a feeling that would take it — makes me want to see La vie en Rose), my favorite moment was the performance and subsequent win for “Falling Slowly” from the film, Once. I’m not quite sure how I missed out on all the buzz for this film (actually, I take that back — pretty sure it happened while I was recovering from my eye surgery back in July/August), but as soon as they started performing, I got chills and was really hoping it would win. I thought Enchanted was great and I absolutely adore Amy Adam, but “Falling Slowly” was just such a beautiful song. Of course, while I’m watching the ceremony, I keep thinking, “I know that dude’s voice — I’ve heard him before somewhere” and sure enough, it turns out that both Glenn and Marketa contributed to the The Cake Sale (NOTE: Because I’m all about Full Disclosure, my Amazon.com affiliate ID IS included in that link, you don’t have to click it or buy it through that, just trying this out more than anything), a collaborative effort between a bunch of Irish musicians that I imported back in November of 2006 (and I couldn’t find the CD so I bought the Amazon.com download, as it was both cheaper than iTunes and without DRM, of course, I found the CD this morning. Whatever.). Glenn is in an Irish band, The Frames, which has opened for Damien Rice (one of my favorite musicians) on recent tours and also collaborated with Damien and the Bell X1 guys.

They were also on KCRW’s Morning Becomes Eclectic last summer and I actually had that podcast saved on one of my external drives. Neato.

Anyhoo, I was super excited that they won (as was the audience, you could tell that the crowd was really psyched for them to win) but more than a little peeved when the orchestra cut off Marketa before she was able to give her speech. I always think those things are so rude anyway, especially given how much time is wasted in lame joke set-ups and deliveries and fake montages (as Jeff pointed out in his comment on my last entry). So when they came back from commercial and let her come out and give her speech, I was really, really happy. I can’t remember that ever happening before, and I was very, very glad that that happened. After that, no one got the orchestra of death music again — I think the director of the show freaked the fuck out and basically refused to do it again. The show was short this year anyway (they didn’t have the traditional 2:30 montages for each Best Picture nominee, I assume because they weren’t able to get the WGA consent when all this was being planned — and there was no time to go back in and try to edit another 13 minutes into the show), so it wasn’t like it was needed.

For anyone who missed or wants to re-watch the performance,

Can you believe that chick is only 19?!?! Amazing!

I immediately bought both the Music From The Motion Picture Once and The Swell Season, which contains many of the same songs (slightly different) and is the name of the collaboration of the two.

Awesome, awesome stuff.

However, after sitting in the theater for nearly 12 hours and watching those five films back to back, I have admit it was a damn good year for movies. The theater was packed this year — which was different than last year, when it was kind of full, but not completely packed. On the one-hand, it was cool to see that many people turn out; however, most of the people were typical movie goers and not the big film fans that seemed to populate the theater last year. You know, people who stand up as soon as the credit sequence starts, obstructing the view of those of us who actually want to see the credits, and then just NOT even moving but staying in place. But those minor annoyances aside, it was a GREAT day.

Here are my predictions for the big awards. You might now want to bet money on these predictions, but these are my thoughts nonetheless:

Best Actress in a Leading Role:

Yeah, Ellen Page isn’t winning this. Not a chance in fucking hell. And she doesn’t deserve it. I won’t quibble with the nomination (I did have to concede her performance was pretty awesome, I had forgotten that in all the hype that has generated since seeing the film the first time), but Best Actress? Yeah, not happening.

I think Julie Christie should get it for “Away From Her” — and I think that it’s a toss-up between she and Cate Blanchett for the win. I think Blanchett is severely overrated, at least in context with how many times she is nominated, but I wouldn’t count her out.

Still, I’ll say Christie gets the win.

Best Actor in a Leading Role

Before Movie Madness, I was pretty confident George Clooney AKA, Doug Ross, AKA, the object of my lust/desire for the last 13 years or so (wow…), AKA, the most suave guy EVER, would take it home for “Michael Clayton” — and that it would be deserved.

Now, I think Daniel Day Lewis will be getting it for “There Will Be Blood” — because he was fucking awesome and just completely acted the hell out of the part. Clooney was fantastic, Clooney is always fantastic — but Daniel Day Lewis was just the man.

Best Adapted Screenplay

Atonement is my pick, both personally and what I think will actually win. Seeing it again, wow, I really, really loved this film. Loved it. And with the novel being so celebrated and the adaptation so astute — yeah, this is my pick. I think that No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood both have chances too — but I’m going to go with Atonement.

Best Original Screenplay

If Juno wins anything, this will be where it wins. It swept the Spirit Awards, and like, that makes sense — the Oscars? Yeah, it’s going to get Best Original Screenplay and I predict nothing else. I loved Michael Clayton, but think Juno gets (and deserves) the win.

Best Director

This is TOUGH. Joel and Ethan Coen did a spectacular job with No Country for Old Men — like, it was unbelievable — but it’s so hard to say what was the better direction, this or P.T. Anderson for There Will Be Blood.

Anderson was so different stylistically than he has been in the past — it was a stylized film, but in a manner completely different from his other works (and I’ve been a fan of his since Boogie Nights, though I saw Hard Eight for the first time after I saw Magnolia in the theater and loved that too). Punch Drunk Love was a departure, but this was just so stylistically different in both structure and editing and overall aesthetic from what he has done before, I was totally, totally surprised and impressed.

Then you have the Coen Brothers — who always do amazing work, Intolerable Cruelty aside (and not a bad romantic comedy of sorts — I won’t lie, I’ll watch it if it’s on HBO and nothing else is on) — who totally brought it with No Country for Old Men. It was incredibly authentic in the same way Fargo was authentic, but with more nuance and restrained perspective. It was a masterpiece.

I’m going to split the difference with Best Picture and just say P.T. Anderson for There Will Be Blood. Truth be told, I think that if either wins, this category will be well honored.

Best Picture

Oh, the big one — wow. This is difficult. Seeing all five yesterday, I really loved them all. There Will Be Blood was probably the only film of the five that I couldn’t see myself frequently rewatching. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll get the DVD — it’s just not something like Atonement or Michael Clayton or Juno or No Country for Old Men (but primarily Juno and Atonement) that I could like, pop into the DVD player at random and watch and re-watch. Atonement will probably be the film I re-watch the most — just a great love story/adaptation, and Michael Clayton was a great thriller and I liked it the most the first time I saw it in the theater.

Still, for Best Picture, it’s all about No Country For Old Men and There Will Be Blood.

After thinking about it over night, I think No Country for Old Men will probably end up winning. It’s my personal pick for “Best Picture” anyway, in terms of academy aesthetic. It was just so incredibly well done — the pacing, the suspense, the absolute authentic nature of the location and characters, I mean, it was just astounding. It was the last of the five screened, and you know, after sitting in a theater for at that point, 10 hours, I was afraid that I was going to get tired and kind of zone out. I was expecting it to be slow. It wasn’t an action film by any means, but the pacing was such and the tension and suspense elements were such that not only was I full engrossed, but at the edge of my seat. My mom felt the same way. We were both utterly enthralled.

There Will Be Blood was magnificent too — but No Country For Old Men — wow.

Actually, all five were fantastic in their own way. I might have substituted Waitress for Juno (and yeah, I think Keri Russell was way better than Ellen Page), but that’s really just a minor quibble.

I love the Oscars. I love movies.

And now my battery is almost dead, so I’m out!