SAG Predictions - Let's Make 'em

The Screen Actors Guild Nominations will be held tomorrow at 5 PM PST and broadcast live on TNT and TBS and we'll probably live blog as we do. Who will the 100,000+ actors vote for? Voting ended earlier today at Noon so there's a quick turnaround between voting and the actual prize. So let's jump right in because yours truly is feeling daring. And don't make fun of me should I biff on ALL of these because I've never claimed to be any good at predicting anything other than Oscar.

ENSEMBLE - This is always the best category in theory and the least satisfying in practice (for many reasons). But who will win? With Spotlight and The Big Short battling it out for the Oscar's Best Picture prize they're obviously the safe money bets and I kind of want to go out on a limb with a no guts no glory call and suggest that Straight Outta Compton rides the constant tidal wave of the #OscarsSoWhite discussion for a surprise win and yet more editorials. So that's my alternate pick. I'm going to go with SPOTLIGHT in a tight finish with both Compton and The Big Short. But here's why I'm leaning this way: It's easy to picture it winning this even it loses the Oscar. I can't same the same thing in reverse for The Big Short. If the Big Short wins this it's all over and The Big Short is the locked Best Picture winner. 

BEST ACTRESS -BRIE LARSON
BEST ACTOR - LEONARDO DICAPRIO
No sense debating these two as they're wholly locked up for Oscar wins at this point, no matter who they're battling it out with on the ballot. 

SUPPORTING ACTRESS - As a reminder Oscar nominees Mara, Vikander, McAdams, and Winslet are competing with the non-Oscar nominated Helen Mirren (Trumbo) for this prize. This is a tough cal since literally none of the films are real "hits" and you could make an argument for anyone really. While the Oscar's voting body, which is heavily older and male, seems likely to pick Vikander, the new "it girl" for the gold on February 28th, SAG might feel differently. Might Winslet repeat her Globe win? My guess: KATE WINSLET (in a close race all around with Vikander or even McAdams right behind.)

SUPPORTING ACTOR - With current Oscar frontrunner Sylvester Stallone out of the contest this should be interesting. Stallone's dominance has made Mark Rylance (Bridge of Spies) look like an also ran so maybe the heat for the former thought-to-be frontrunner will have dissipated? Wouldn't it be crazy to see both Room actors pick up trophies and have little Jacob Tremblay win? My guess is a surprise win for IDRIS ELBA -- since they loved Beasts of No Nation (consider that absolutely bizarre "Ensemble" nomination for a film with only 3 really substantial roles) with Rylance as alternate. 

What are your predictions? Will you be watching? 

London Calling. Kate wants Leo to win his Oscar

The London Film Critics Circle Awards were held last night across the Atlantic as something of a calmer arthouse alternative to the multiplex-lusting Critics Choice Awards here in the States, though they did share one winner: George Miller took Best Director for Mad Max Fury Road. We're trying not to think of him as the frontrunner here at TFE because it would be the most anomalous Best Director win of our lifetimes and too satisfying. Could it actually happen?

Judging on photos of the event, Kate Winslet was the main attraction of the night.

The Winners 

• FILM: Mad Max: Fury Road
• BRITISH/IRISH FILM: 45 Years
• DIRECTOR: George Miller, Mad Max: Fury Road
• ACTRESS: Charlotte Rampling, 45 Years
• ACTOR: Tom Courtenay, 45 Years
• BRITISH/IRISH ACTRESS: Saoirse Ronan, Brooklyn
• SUPPORTING ACTRESS: Kate Winslet, Steve Jobs
• SUPPORTING ACTOR: Mark Rylance, Bridge of Spies
• YOUNG BRITISH/IRISH PERFORMER: Maisie Williams, The Falling (supposedly this girls boarding school drama headlined by the Game of Thrones star will be released in the USA by Cinedigm)
• BRITISH/IRISH ACTOR: Tom Hardy (for multiple roles: Legend, London Road, Mad Max: Fury Road, and The Revenant)
• SCREENWRITER: Tom McCarthy and Josh Singer, Spotlight
• TECHNICAL ACHIEVEMENT: Ed Lachman, for the Cinematography of Carol
• FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM: The Look of Silence (nominated for the Doc Oscar)
• DOCUMENTARY: Amy (also nominated for the Oscar)
• BRITISH/IRISH SHORT: Stutterer, Benjamin Cleary (it's also nominated for the Oscar)
• BREAKTHROUGH BRITISH/IRISH FILMMAKER (The Philip French Award): John Maclean, Slow West

A Fun Titanic Takeaway
Kate Winslet, who can add the London prize to her Golden Globe this year, doesn't seem to be thinking about her own Oscar run for Steve Jobs. Perhaps she doesn't care about a second statue (and Alicia Vikander could be tough to beat -- the advantage of being a leading lady in a supporting category... *sigh*).

With the cameras shoved in her face (seriously back off reporters) Kate is just loving on Leonardo DiCaprio in The Revenant (it's clear where her Oscar vote is going). There are also props to her current co-star Michael Fassbender in Steve Jobs as well.

7th Time the Charm for Cate & Kate

Murtada here to celebrate the nominations for Cate Blanchett and Kate Winslet. It's the 7th nomination for both. Blanchett for Best Actress in Carol and Winslet for supporting actress in Steve Jobs. (Which means they're both moving up that Oscar Hierarchy) .

The two have always been linked since they have (essentially) the same name and started winning the hearts of cinephiles around the same time in the mid 90s.

Although younger by 6 years it was Winslet who first made a splash in Heavenly Creatures (1994) and received her first Oscar nomination a year later for Sense and Sensibility (1995). Three years after that Blanchett announced herself as a force to be reckoned with - and got her first nomination - with Elizabeth (1998).

Winslet’s other nominations are for Titanic (1997), Iris (2001), Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004), Little Children (2006) and The Reader (2008). Blanchett’s are The Aviator (2004), Notes on Scandal (2006), Elizabeth: The Golden Age (2007), I’m Not There (2007) and Blue Jasmine (2013).

Let’s have fun with 7 anecdotes after the jump...

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The Seven Best Ladies of the Globes

Chris here with a post-Globes actress love hangover. Sorry boys, but unless your name was Denzel, you didn't do much during the ceremony to win our attention. Here are the seven women who won the evening (and we're not even talking best dressed yet. In no particular order, except for this golden girl.

C O N S I D E R

Let's hear it for Brie Larson! After earning accolades for Room and keeping her social media game on point, she's finally got a big prize to set her apart from tough competition. Add in a charming speech where she credited the Room team above and below the line (including best friend Jacob Tremblay), and we've got the once-supposed frontrunner securing that status for real.

Oh and speaking of that winning speech...

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Leo & Kate Rising. Plus Globe Darlings of Yore

Updated/Revised

While the Golden Globes are famous for not repeating themselves when it comes to TV honors (and thus earning our love because the world desperately needs the anti-Emmys). But this is not to say that they don't have favorite performers. The Globes, like every other awards body, have their personal pets, their default players, and their great loves. The names just don't totally line up with any other awards body... which is how it should be. Any awards group that seeks to share the same taste with another group (or predict it) would be immediately dismantled in a perfect awards world.

The Reunion. Why can't they make a movie together every 5 years or so?

We had a reminder last night of four performers who know Golden Globe Love biblically. They know its scent, its desperation, its passion, its tenderness, even its cool rebukes (well, not Jennifer Lawrence yet. So far it's all rose petals and til death do us part promises). Denzel Washington received his third Golden Globe (the Cecil B Demille), Jennifer Lawrence received her third consecutive Globe for working with David O. Russell. And those Titanic lovebirds Kate Winslet & Leonardo DiCaprio received their fourth and third Globe trophies respectively.

The single best bit of the night actually skewered our obsession with more and more that awards shows and statistical madness thrive on. Jim Carrey was killing it as he perpetually described himself as two time Golden-Globe winning actor Jim Carrey.

More...

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