Saturday, February 21, 2009

Guess who's taking home Oscar

While there are perhaps more 'sure things' at this year's Academy Awards ceremonies than usual, Oscar is notoriously fickle, and the unexpected should always be expected.  That said, here are my wholly unscientific predictions for the big night:
Best Picture - Slumdog Millionaire (I continue to vacillate between this and Benjamin Button as my pick for the top prize)
Best Director - Danny Boyle, for Slumdog Millionaire
Best Actor - Sean Penn, Milk
Best Actress - Kate Winslet, The Reader
Best Supporting Actor - Heath Ledger, The Dark Knight
Best Supporting Actress - Viola Davis, Doubt
Best Adapted Screenplay - Slumdog Millionaire, Simon Beaufoy
Best Original Screenplay - Milk, Dustin Lance Black
Best Animated Feature - WALL-E
Achievement in Art Direction - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Achievement in Cinematography - Wally Pfister, The Dark Knight
Achievement in Costume Design -  The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Best Documentary Feature - Man on Wire
Best Documentary Short Subject - The Final Inch
Achievement in Film Editing - Chris Dickens, Slumdog Millionaire
Best Foreign Language Film - Waltz with Bashir
Achievement in Makeup - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Achievement in Music - A.R. Rahman, Slumdog Millionaire
Achievement in Music (Original Song) - 'Down to Earth' from WALL-E, Peter Gabriel
Best Animated Short Film - Presto
Best Live Action Short Film - The Pig
Achievement in Sound Editing - Iron Man
Achievement in Sound Mixing - The Dark Knight
Achievement in Visual Effects - The Curious Case of Benjamin Button


2 comments:

Anonymous said...

So what's the difference between "sound mixing" and "sound editing"?

Dan said...

That's a good question.
With very few exceptions, everything that you hear in a film other than dialogue has to be seperately recorded, and is often created from scratch. The Sound editor responsible for sound effects works with the director to develop what the movie should sound like, then oversees a team that collects, creates and manipulates sounds that are then edited together to make up the soundfield of every scene. This requires an immense degree of creativity, as the Sound Editor must decide not only what sounds are needed to support the visuals, but also what the world of the film should sound like, and must anticipate what an audience would be expecting to hear, realistic or not. Sound editing work is also done on dialogue and music, often by seperate editors.

Sound Mixers take the soundfield created by the Sound Editor's team and manipulates levels and directionality to ensure the whole thing doesn't sound like a muddled mess.

That's a simplified version, anyway.