Cinema Audio Society Preview and Predictions

[There is no Soundworks collection for Moneyball but the other nominees, either for CAS or Oscar, after the cut]

Tonight the Cinema Audio Society awards dinner will be held around 8pm at the Millennium-Biltmore hotel.

The nominees for film are:
Hanna
Hugo
Moneyball
Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides
Super 8

Just to show you how weird this year has been overall, only two CAS nominees went on to be nominated for Oscar. I’m not sure why this is – there was a disconnect, big time, between the guilds and the Academy. For instance, Dragon Tattoo did really well overall with the guilds but didn’t get a nomination here. It did get an Oscar nomination for sound. The only two films here that are Oscar nominated are Hugo and Moneyball.

Since this represents the occasion where the least amount of films matched Oscar it is really hard to tell how it will go. One suspects, though, that the winner has to be either Hugo or Moneyball. That is usually what happens. Getting the Oscar nom puts a shimmer on.

While the CAS winner and the Oscar winner don’t always match – in fact, they mismatch more often than they match – four times since they began in 2000.

But in all of those times the winner of the CAS was at least nominated for an Oscar in sound. That leaves only two. Of course, since this is a weird year it’s possible the CAS will go rogue and just pick a winner that isn’t nominated. It’s entirely possible, in fact.

Still, because of that you have to figure there can only be one of two winners.

Hugo or Moneyball?

While I’m no sound expert, I liked the sound on both films. Overall, the mix is probably more complicated on Hugo. I loved the crack of the bat in Moneyball and all of the subtle ways they play with natural sound in the film, from the managers meeting to the locker room to the baseball field. But you have to figure the more complex mix was on Hugo.