Mary Poppins Returns

Oscars 2019 Predictions – Best Original Song, Best Original Score

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Two categories which go together hand-in-hand are Best Original Song and Best Original Score. Historically, nominees in the Best Original Song category have performed before the award is presented.

89th Annual Academy Awards - Backstage

Best Original Song

Will win: Shallow (A Star is Born)
Should win: Shallow (A Star is Born)
Also nominated: All the Stars (Black Panther), I’ll Fight (RBG), The Place Where Lost Things Go (Mary Poppins Returns), When A Cowboy Trades His Spurs for Wings (The Ballad of Buster Scruggs)

Lady Gaga and Mark Ronson’s Shallow is the odds-on favourite in this category, and rightly so. It is a song of great emotional resonance and truth, a conversation between two lost souls which builds emphatically to an earth-shattering climax and expression of self.

Unlike the other nominees and their relationships with their respective films, A Star is Born could not exist without Shallow. It is the beating heart of the film, the moment around which the story is built. In the few months since its release, it has become a cultural phenomenon, and the Academy Award for Best Original Song deserves to be its crowning achievement. This one isn’t even close.

Shallow

Dazzling and powerful, Lady Gaga’s Shallow from A Star is Born looks certain to win the Academy Award for Best Original Song.

Best Original Score

Will win: If Beale Street Could Talk
Should win: If Beale Street Could Talk
Also nominated: Black Panther, Isle of Dogs, Mary Poppins Returns

Nicholas Britell’s soundtrack for If Beale Street Could Talk has steadily emerged as the favourite to win the Academy Award for Best Original Score and, although the category is far from clear-cut, it’s easy to see why. The sadness of its piano chords and its slow, aching strings are uplifted by soft melodies which affirm the film’s message. As far as competition goes, Marc Shaiman’s soundtrack to Mary Poppins Returns is the obvious choice, but Terence Blanchard’s stellar work for BlacKkKlansman is certainly worthy of merit, even though it appears to have flown under the radar this awards season.

If Beale Street Could Talk

The soundtrack to If Beale Street Could Talk has slowly emerged as favourite in the Best Original Score category.

Oscars 2019 Predictions – Best Production Design, Best Film Editing, Best Cinematography

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In today’s look at the upcoming Academy Awards, we focus on three of the more prestigious technical categories: Best Production Design, Best Film Editing and Best Cinematography. The Best Film Editing category has historically provided a good indication of what will fare well in the Best Picture category.

89th Annual Academy Awards - Backstage

Best Production Design

Will win: The Favourite
Should win: The Favourite
Also nominated: Black Panther, First Man, Mary Poppins Returns, Roma

The world that Fiona Crombie and Alice Felton have created in The Favourite is deeply unpleasant (in the best possible way). It is dark, claustrophobic and disconcertingly eerie. Every corner holds secrets and all the walls have ears. It is the perfect realisation of Yorgos Lanthimos’ vision and would be a deserving winner in this category. The sprawling Wakandan paradise of Black Panther is its closest rival.

The Favourite PD

Dark and mysterious, the production design of The Favourite is the perfect realisation of director Yorgos Lanthomos’ vision.

Best Film Editing

Will win: Vice
Should win: Vice
Also nominated: BlacKkKlansman, Bohemian Rhapsody, The Favourite, Green Book

A few years ago, Hank Corwin was robbed of his Academy Award when his editing for The Big Short was overlooked in favour of Mad Max: Fury Road. Three years later, he is back and nominated again for his work on another Adam McKay film. With Vice, much like The Big Short before it, the editing is fast, snappy and an integral part of the storytelling process. It moves the film along at a whirlwind pace and makes complicated themes and ideas easily digestible. This is no easy thing to do, and his Oscar will be fully deserved and long overdue.

Vice

The masterful editing of Vice is an integral part of the storytelling process.

Best Cinematography

Will win: Roma
Should win: Roma
Also nominated: Cold War, The Favourite, Never Look Away, A Star is Born

Alfonso Cuarón’s direction in Roma is noticeably understated. When the camera moves, it is with a calm and considered slowness, and shots can linger for minutes. The advantage of this, as Cuarón well knows, is that it gives the viewer ample opportunity to marvel in the beautiful black and white cinematography of the film. It is gorgeously shot, to the extent that each frame could well be a photograph. Cold War, which also happens to be shot in black and white, is probably the next-best film in this category, but it is in a quite distant second.

Roma Cinematography

Oscars 2019 Predictions – Best Makeup and Hairstyling, Best Costume Design

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In today’s Oscar prediction post, we take a look at two technical categories that have always been closely linked.

89th Annual Academy Awards - Backstage

Best Makeup and Hairstyling

Will win: Vice
Should win: Vice
Also nominated: Border, Mary Queen of Scots

Christian Bale has undergone a lot of transformations over the years for the sake of his craft, but none are as impressive as his metamorphosis into the much maligned former-Vice President Dick Cheney in Adam McKay’s Vice. What Greg Cannom, Kate Biscoe and Patricia Dehaney have achieved here is truly remarkable. They have allowed Bale, Sam Rockwell (as President George W. Bush), Amy Adams (as Lynne Cheney), Steve Carell (as Donald Rumsfeld) et al. to utterly inhabit and become their characters in what is undoubtedly some of the best makeup and hairstyling work that has been seen in recent years.

Vice

Christian Bale undergoes a total transformation in Vice. Unrecognisable as himself, he is instantly recognisable as the menacing Dick Cheney.

Best Costume Design

Will win: The Favourite
Should win: The Favourite
Also nominated: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, Black Panther, Mary Poppins Returns, Mary Queen of Scots

Sandy Powell is no stranger to the Academy Awards. She already has three to her name and has even been nominated twice in this category this year, which is great testament to her dominance in this field. However, that’s not to say she doesn’t face tough opposition; Ruth E. Carter’s costumes for Black Panther have become iconic since the film hit our screens, and there’s a powerful opulence about Alexandra Byrne’s work on Mary Queen of Scots. But there is no competing against the glorious, extravagant Sandy Powell creations that can be seen in The Favourite.

The Favourite

Sandy Powell’s work on The Favourite is hotly tipped to pick up an Academy Award later this month.