Update: Deadline Extended to Wednesday, Jan 14th, Midnight Pacific Time
For the 7th year in a row, to help us better understand the Academy’s voting system, we’re running a Simulated Oscar Ballot built by our own accounting wizard, Rob Y. AD readers represent a demographic that doesn’t match the AMPAS — and yet, in spite of our differences, the results of past years have shown surprising alignment with the choices of Oscar voters. We always want to tell our voters that we’d rather you fill out your ballot with your own preferences rather than try to guess what the Academy might do. Rob says it best: “Pretend you are an honorary member of the Academy, and you are asked to nominate films in their respective categories. Make your selections accordingly.” Simple as that. Have at it!
Voting for the nominations phase will close on January 11 at 10:00 PM PST.
How do I vote Whiplash in Adapted Screenplay, like at the actual Oscars?
My only qualm with your list is the list.
If you really insist on extending the deadline, I might actually use the time to watch the films I’ve voted for…
Antoinette, my only qualm with your list is there’s not enough Scarlett Johannson!!!
My ballot.
Best Picture
Exodus: Gods and Kings
Interstellar
Captain America: the Winter Soldier
The Hobbit: the Battle of the Five Armies
Lucy
Best Director
Christopher Nolan
Alejandro González Iñárritu
David Fincher
Jeremy Saulnier
Wes Anderson
Best Actress
Scarlett Johannson, Lucy
Scarlett Johannson, Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Scarlett Johannson, Under the Skin
Marion Cotillard, The Immigrant
Anne Hathaway, Interstellar
Best Actor
Tom Hardy, Locke
Andy Serkis, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes
Martin Freeman, The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies
Jake Gyllenhaal, Nightcrawler
Michael Keaton, Birdman
Best Supporting Actress
Mackenzie Foy, Interstellar
Tilda Swinton, Snowpiercer
Agata Kulesza, Ida
Viola Davis, Get On Up
Carrie Coon, Gone Girl
Best Supporting Actor
Benicio Del Toro, Inherent Vice
Josh Brolin, Inherent Vice
Joel Edgerton, Exodus: Gods and Kings
Riz Ahmed, Nightcrawler
Edward Norton, Birdman
Best Cinematography
Exodus: Gods and Kings
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes
Interstellar
Unbroken
Godzilla
I ordered them strategically. And I skipped the writing categories.
I have the same problem; I have not been able to see American Sniper, Whiplash, Foxcatcher, Selma, Most Violent Year, etc. I was lucky that I saw “Birdman” during the ONE week that it was playing locally, and Boyhood came and went so quickly missed it. (I am watching right now as I type this.) Due to my Herculean persistence and grand expenditure of time (8 seconds), I somehow was ale to leap past the favorites to pick Ida, Two Days, One Night, and Unbroken for a few categories.
My tpp few for each category:
Best Picture: 1) Gone Girl 2) Birdman
Director: 1) Linklater, 2) Inarritu
Screenplays: 1) Birdman 2) Grand Budapest, 1) Gone Girl 2) Imitation Game
Best Actress 1) Rosamund Pike, 2) Marion Cotillard—I didn’t see her in the Dardennes film but wanted it to be recognized. I voted for Jones and Adams as well, both of whom I’ve seen.
Best Actor: 1) Michael Keaton 2) Eddie Redmayne
Supporting Actor: 1) JK Simmons 2) Edward Norton I didn’t see Simmons but didn’t love anybody else enough to put them tops. My 4 and 5 were Matthew Goode and Charlie Cox.
Supporting Actress: 1) Jessica Chastain 2) Agata Kulesza in “Ida”
Cinematography: Deakins, Birdman, Ida
It’s rough when I haven’t seen all the films. The preferential ballot really makes you more likely to pick people you think might not get in otherwise. I can see even more clearly how Affleck and Bigelow may have gotten snubbed.
Wait, I just realized: Are you talking about the Denis Lavant JOURNEY TO THE WEST directed by Ming-liang Tsai? Or the Stephen Chow JOURNEY TO THE WEST? I only saw the Chow one.
Regarding everyone’s complaints above:
These were the times I had to scroll all the way down into the master list:
1. To put WE ARE THE BEST! in my number 3 spot for Best Picture
2. To put Marion Cotillard in THE IMMIGRANT in the top spot for Best Actress
3. To put Agata Kulesza in IDA in the number 4 spot for Best Supporting Actress
4. To put Robert Pattinson in THE ROVER in the number 5 spot for Best Supporting Actor
5. To put NIGHTCRAWLER in the top spot for Best Original Screenplay (this one DID admittedly feel strange. How is that not a frontrunner?)
6. To put LOCKE in the number 5 spot for Best Original Screenplay
7. To put SNOWPIERCER in the top spot for Best Adapted Screenplay
8. To put EDGE OF TOMORROW in the number 4 spot for Best Adapted Screenplay
9. To put WE ARE THE BEST! in the number 5 spot for Best Adapted Screenplay
10. To put THE IMMIGRANT in the top spot for Best Cinematography
I only felt confused about NIGHTCRAWLER not being on the top tier for Original Screenplay, otherwise the movies I was choosing that didn’t fall into the frontrunner column (WE ARE THE BEST!, LOCKE, THE IMMIGRANT, THE ROVER, EDGE OF TOMORROW, SNOWPIERCER, IDA) seemed perfectly reasonable being absent there. Nobody’s talking about them, which is exactly why I want to go out of my way to do just that. And for the record, there is a Second tier in most categories that DID feature LOCKE and SNOWPIERCER and several other movies not in the main conversation (like OBVIOUS CHILD).
And for the second concern:
Here are the things I wanted to vote for but could not due to eligibility:
1. THE BABADOOK would have made my top 5 for Best Picture
2. Jennifer Kent for THE BABADOOK would have made my top 5 for Best Director
3. Essie Davis for THE BABADOOK would have made my number one choice for Best Actress
4. Julianne Moore for MAPS TO THE STARS would have made my top 5 for Best Supporting Actress
5. Evan Bird for MAPS TO THE STARS would have made my top 5 for Best Supporting Actor
6. MAPS TO THE STARS would have made my top 5 for Best Original Screenplay
I know Paddy cited NORTE, THE END OF HISTORY, GOODBYE TO LANGUAGE, NYMPHOMANIAC, THE MISSING PICTURE, JOURNEY TO THE WEST and CONCRETE NIGHT as films he would have included. I’ve only seen one of those (JOURNEY TO THE WEST) and it would never occur to me to include that in any of the major categories (perhaps some technical ones) we vote on here. I absolutely want to see the rest of those films, and won’t speak to their worthiness until I do, but NYMPHOMANIAC is a problematic situation anyways. Surely you can’t count it as a whole, since it was split into 2 parts well before an extended Director’s Cut was released, right? And then it becomes an issue of: do you reward Von Trier/Gainsbourg/et al for Part 1 (which was considered a must-see) or Part 2 (which I am told was a great big Fuck You to the audience in the grand tradition of Von Trier Fuck Yous)? I’m assuming Part 1 would be the stronger candidate, but isn’t Charlotte Gainsbourg more of a supporting performance in that before taking the lead in Part 2? And is Stacy Martin worthy of sitting in the top 5 lead actresses this year? Is Von Trier’s work in Part 1 SPECIFICALLY good enough for him to make the final 5 in Director or Screenplay? Best Picture for Part 1? I’m playing a bit of Devil’s Advocate here, honestly. If you think it’s worthy of making the 5, I won’t argue with you. There were only 2 movies this year I couldn’t reward that I felt worthy to be in the conversation. BABADOOK in particular was one of my 5 favorite films of the year. It kinda sucks but it also means I got to spotlight some other underappreciated things instead, like Pattinson in THE ROVER or LOCKE in Original Screenplay. I say bypass the frontrunners and find something else that isn’t getting enough love and feature it in the place of the ones you can’t. That seems like as good a response to this issue as any.
Antoinette – I’m in a decent-sized city (Omaha) and Inherent Vice is only playing in the little art house/indie theater where Alexander Payne serves on the Board of Directors. If not for that theater, which has only been around 12 years or so, this city would never get half these movies when they are reportedly “in theaters everywhere.” The way that indie films are distributed to theaters is broken. I wish they would just charge $12-15 or something for an on-demand rental so I could watch these at home. I see that as being realistic for indies made on a low budget (and they could still release in theaters in major cities to recoup costs). To date, Omaha hasn’t gotten “Foxcatcher” or “Whiplash.” I’m livid about it.
for what’s its worth
Best Picture:
1. Boyhood
2. Whiplash
3. Birdman
4. Interstellar
5. Inherent Vice
—
6. Gone Girl
7. The Grand Budapest Hotel
8. Foxcatcher
9. Selma
Best Director:
1. Linklater
2. Inarritu
3. Chazelle
4. Fincher
5. Miller
Rob, thank you for your explanation and your “it is outweighed” comment because I think that’s a fair way to defend your decision. I also appreciate your acknowledgement that there is in fact a bias.
And thank you LC, too, for adding a second voice to an opinion I was starting to feel alone on.
🙂
Well I was waiting until I could see INHERENT VICE but guess what? It’s not playing here. Apparently where I live is not considered “everywhere”. So…. fuck ’em. I’ll do this later this morning.
I, for one, appreciate the front-runners and second-tier films at the top of the drop-down menus. If you know the film you want (be it X-Men or what have you), you can simply start to type that movie and it comes up for you anyway. There’s a reason that AD is actually a decent simulation of the real Oscar nominations ballots and not just a “fantasy ballot” type of thing. We are all plugged into the awards races and awards season here, not just people who are regulars of IGN or Marvel message boards who have organized a campaign to jump over to this site en masse and throw the AD balloting system for a loop.
“an unfair advantage in picking up votes from the indecisive voters”
We don’t have indecisive voters at Awards Daily.
I encourage everybody to scroll all the way the alphabetical list, consider all 323 titles, and give Mom’s Night Out your fair unbiased consideration for Best Film of 2015.