Is "Lincoln" Nervous About Losing SAG?

Early "Lincoln" SwagThis just in. A SAG voter shot me a note yesterday after received a Lincoln screener at the tail end of voting -- the Awards are this Sunday night -- wondering if the Lincoln team was nervous about losing the SAG Ensemble prize to one of its formidable competitors in the seemingly wide-open Best Picture race. 

It was sent last minute, priority mail envelopes, clearly put together quickly.  It wasn't on the initial list of screeners or downloads so it was a last minute decision, it would seem."

It seems weird to hear "put together quickly" about a Lincoln screener since mine was artfully packaged and I received it a month ago. Truth: Lincoln has been the most active movies in terms of continual swag at least at my house: I've gotten Spielberg books, Presidential cookbooks, a screener, a hardcover script (those are rare) and more... but it is a significant expense to send screeners to SAG voters as compared to 6,000ish AMPAS members and 300ish BFCA since members since the Screen Actors Guild has so very very many voting members. 

Do you think Lincoln is nervous about a potential Ensemble loss on Sunday... and thus less momentum heading into the final month of Oscar voting?  

I'm torn myself as to which film I think is winning: Momentum is with Argo, but Silver Linings Playbook is definitely a hit with actors and is campaigning hard. Maybe Lincoln wouldn't have had so much to worry about if they hadn't abused their ensemble by leaving out some of the best players... and not even campaigning for Supporting Actor for audience favorites like James Spader (dear god I never thought I'd write the second half of that sentence). 

only seven -- SEVEN -- members of Lincoln's sprawling awesome cast are nominated in the "Ensemble" category. That's less actors than are in most of the scenes! In contrast: Argo has 13 nominees; Les Miz has 12; Best Exotic has 8; Silver Linings Playbook has 6

P.S. For what it's worth if I were a Screen Actor (I am... not) I would probably vote for Lincoln in this category but not happily since the award would not go to many of the colorful performances featured.

Fun Facts About This Year's Best Picture / Director Nominees

The Official Best Picture and Best Director pages have been posted. I'm brainstorming some way to make the charts less static this year so you can enjoy returning to them whenever the mood strikes you. So now that the pages are up, you can vote on your choice of best (not your prediction) and read about the nominees. Let's spitball fun facts!

Box Office

You mean to tell me a sober drama about old age and death hasn't outgrossed The Avengers? 

• I believe Amour is the lowest grossing Best Picture nominee ever (with under $350,000 in the can at the US box office as of this writing). At least for now! Box Office Mojo used to have before and after nomination box office gross charts for the Best Picture nominees of each year though I can't seem to find them now. The lowest previous pre-nomination gross I can personally recall was Clint Eastwood's Letter From Iwo Jima (2006), also a subtitled picture in miniscule release before the nominations arrived.

Acting

• Silver Linings Playbook becomes the first film since Reds (1981) to win nominations in all acting categories
• No Spielberg directed performance has ever won the gold -- no, not even Ralph Fiennes in Schindler's List (only one of the greatest performances of all time) -- but Daniel Day-Lewis and maybe even Tommy Lee Jones may well break that unlucky stat in February.
• The Best Director Nominees have all directed actors to nominations: Haneke & Zeitlin (1 each), Lee (5 nominees), Russell (7, two of which have won), Spielberg (11 nominees)

Genre

• Les Miz is the first musical nominee since Chicago (2002), which won and it received the same # of nods as Dreamgirls (2006), though Dreamgirls missed BP (back when there were only 5 nominees)
• Lincoln is the first biopic nominee sinc --- kidding! We don't ever go a year without.

Trends & Stats

• 5 of the 9 nominees have terrifying scenes involving drowning/flooding/watery-death (more on that here)
• Les Misérable's Fantine sings about tigers and Life of Pi stars a tiger. Coincidence?! ;) 
• Benh Zeitlin is the 8th youngest ever at only 30 years of age and also the first with an extra h in his name. He's also the 8th youngest nominee ever in this category at 30 young years.  The youngest is still John Singleton who was 24 when his debut film Boyz n the Hood made him a nominee.  

"Previously On..."

• Lincoln is almost an exact carbon copy of Schindler's List in terms of Oscar noms. 12 nominations for each and the only difference is Lincoln has Supporting Actress in place of Schindler's List had "Makeup". Schindler's List eventually won 7 Oscars... can Lincoln replicate that success?
• Life of Pi, with 11 nominations, becomes the great Ang Lee's most nominated picture. Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon won 10 nominations in its year, also without any acting nods
• The only other film version of the Victor Hugo novel Les Misérables to win Oscar attention was way back in 1935. It received 4 nominations. 
• I keep starting trivia sentences about Kathryn Bigelow only to remember she was not nominated, the director's branch nominations being the Most Shocking of the Morning. 

Final Nomination Predix: Big Day Ahead for Lincoln, Life, Les Miz

And here we are again.

I was amused to find myself named one of the 'Nate Silvers of the Oscar Race' today on Salon but Thursday morning will undoubtedly make the comparison less apt even if though we'll still share a first name (Nathaniel... why do people go by "Nate"?). In my soon-to-be needed defense it's a lot harder to successfully predict 120ish nominees in 24 categories that dozens of different groups are voting on (nominees, though not winners, are determined only by peers: actors voting for actors, directors for directors and so on) than it is to read an electoral map with only two candidates. Nor is their endless polling to guide us. Oscar voters aren't supposed to tell people who they're voting for. And even when they're willing to, filling out a weighted multi-named ballot is a lot different than checking a box for Candidate A or Candidate B when it comes time to let slip your favorites.

But I digress. Whatever the chaotic, agenda-driven, polarizing and exhausting race to Oscar nominations has in common with politics (quite a lot) we'll ditch the analogy now in order to dig in. I've never been one to care too deeply about statistics apart from the generalities they underline. So in the end I play my hunches.

PICTURE
Locks: Lincoln, Argo, Les Misérables, Zero Dark Thirty, Silver Linings Playbook

But What Else Will Be Nominated? infinite hand-wringing after the jump....

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Things to Ponder Before Making Finally Final Oscar Nom Predix

I'm trying to decide how much to alter some of my current predictions when I post my final predictions (Tuesday night).  Here are some things I'm pondering. Ponder with me in the comments. It's a Ponder Party!

The Academy ♥ Tarantino? OR...
The Internet ≠ The Academy
The Globes ≠ The Academy
Quentin Tarantino is indisputably a god of the internet. Were the internet a person it would be his insatiable whore, his dresser, his boyservant, his entire yes man entourage. But the Academy is not the internet. They never have been. (If they were Chris Nolan would have five directing nominations and not zero and The Social Network and Brokeback Mountain would have trounced The King's Speech and Crash). Consider: zero nominations for Kill Bill Vol. 1 (my choice for his best film and unarguably worthy in technical fields even if you don't much care for it as a whole). Zero nominations for Kill Bill Vol. 2. One measly nomination for Jackie Brown. "But they loved Pulp Fiction (7 nods, 1 win) and Inglorious Basterds (8 nods, 1 win)" - shouts everyone in the universe. They did, it's true. [more...]

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Had Your Self a Misérable Little Christmas?

Another big cash grab day is ahead for the movies as New Year's Day approaches. But for this weekend the winners are clear. Django Unchained & Les Misérables much ballyhooed "Sad Off" was a true contest for wintry dollars with Tarantino's controversial slavery comedy revenge fantasy eventually pulling out in front of the musical. But the war for profit puts Les Miz in winner's position since it's already equalled it's budget in just the first six days. Django has a ways to go for that milestone but let's not nitpick as they're both true hits. 

Box Office Chart repurposed from Box Office Mojo

In fact, it's been a good box office year for Oscar-buzzing players. Affleck and Spielberg's pictures were both $100 million grossers with Lincoln still going strong. Pi & Playbook have solid sales - they didn't embarrass themselves. Of the front-running Oscar six only Zero Dark Thirty has been little seen but that's a function of timing and platforming rather than audience choice. If Zero Dark Thirty doesn't delay its expansion for too long it seems certain to demolish The Hurt Locker's gross in no time.

Did you see both Django & Les Miz over the break?

I almost went to The Hobbit but abruptly changed my mind and tweeted as much:

Just realized I am not actually *required* to see The Hobbit. Ever. And shan't. My memories of Lord of the Rings will live unsullied.

— Nathaniel Rogers (@nathanielr) December 30, 2012

Oh sweet relief! I really do feel it.