As I was glancing over the films that are slated for this year, it occurs to me that, despite our complaining about it, the ten nominees thing DOES make room to honor films that don’t fit the “Oscar movie” template. When you have movies like The Blind Side, District 9 and A Serious Man sharing the slate with Avatar, The Hurt Locker, Up in the Air, etc. you have wide open possibilities. That means, as I look over the list, one can start Oscar-watching fairly reliably earlier and throughout the year.
The other thing I learned this year is that you can’t trust just one group in terms of sussing out a film with Oscar potential. Bad reviews don’t necessarily derail a film’s chances, as we saw with The Blind Side, and mediocre reviews didn’t much hurt Inglourious Basterds in terms of the awards race. It always helps to have great reviews, but it’s possible that a film can be rescued provided it has the right stuff – in other words, audiences eat it up.
Here’s to keeping an open mind heading into Oscars 2010.