It’s the question on everyone’s mind as they tune in (in record numbers) to A&E’s drama series “Bates Motel,” the “before” to Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho. As we approach the series finale (airing Monday), are we any closer to identifying the source of Norman’s otherness—or at least a probable catalyst which makes Psycho a credible “after” for one of the most prominently disturbed characters in cinema history? At what point does a slightly awkward, attractive, brainy do-gooder of a teenager become a sexually confused, murderous social deviant?  The answer has yet to be found within “Bates Motel,” which is just beginning to find its legs as a drama as we come to the conclusion of its first ten-episode season.

If Psycho is Hitchcock horror at its finest, “Bates Motel” is a few Asian sex slaves ahead of being a watered-down Nancy Drew mystery, with the ending already set in stone nearly fifty years ago.

Psycho teaches us that evil has an inherent home within his mother, after all.

…that has to be it, right? We need someone to blame, and if Hitchcock’s extensive filmography has taught us anything, it’s to never trust a woman.

But, the assumption that Norma’s ways are cloying and possessive (damagingly so) has implicated her since the release of Psycho. “Bates Motel” hasn’t exactly shown us otherwise, and for good reason. It’s a classic argument made against the infamous maternal presence in Norman’s life, which is never anything more than a corpse and sloppy-drag incarnate in Hitchcock’s horror masterpiece, but a much more tangible presence in “Bates Motel,” as Norma Bates’ relationship with her son serves as the framework for the series instead of a thematic crutch. If “Bates Motel” were in clumsier hands, the ideology of the 1960 classic might have bled into the contemporary cloth. Norma isn’t worth exploring as a character; she is now and has always been the pre-established burden of femininity; the bane of Norman’s existence; the origin of blame and the source of Norman’s life and his demise. But it’s time we view such analysis as archaic, much like Alfred Hitchcock’s objectification of women in nearly every film he ever made. It’s time to move past old assumptions because, frankly, “Bates Motel” is in some ways the worst potential multi-season narrative ever conceived. With a conclusion that’s become common knowledge far outside just the film community, how does a series earn its legs as a prelude for an already-exposed ending? The answer lies in its treatment of gender and its disregard for Hitchcock’s ideologies.

“Bates Motel” doesn’t incriminate Norma as a woman, but rather as someone on, in the simplest terms, an intense power trip. Having the series set amidst a modern backdrop (complete with iPhones and high school raves) alleviates the foreboding presence of old-timey perspectives on the issues of transvestitism, motherhood, and gender identity which made Psycho at once a blessing and a curse for the queer identity in cinema and society. The time is here and the time is now; dressing Norman up in women’s clothing simply wouldn’t have the same immediately-othering effect as it did in the 60s.

The strength of “Bates Motel” lies in its insistence on not equating anything, from convoluted morals to pure murderous evil, with gender. Whereas Hitchcock’s Psycho epilogue seeks to explain, bit by bit, Norman’s psychological and gender-based transformation from a man’s mentality to a woman’s, “Bates Motel” instead sifts through the psychobabble bullshit and delivers a pure representation of actions without generalized implications.

The series begins as Norma (Vera Farmiga) and Norman (Freddie Highmore) move to the fictional town of White Pine Bay, Oregon (a town with a local economy supported by Marijuana distribution and patrolled by corrupt police officers staking a cut), to start afresh after the demise of the family patriarch. Norma is a woman, but she’s also in a position of power, enough power and conviction to move her son across the country to build a placid state of blissful isolation from the past. Here, “mother” is not inherently synonymous with “possessive,” but Norma’s relationship with Norman is, at least we’re to believe, almost solely responsible for his social ostracizing in White Pine Bay. When Norma is in trouble (which happens shortly after the move), Norman’s life is put on hold. He needs to “be there” for her, as he often explains, which often gets in the way of his social land sexual progress. Norma is raped in the first episode of the season, and Norman aides in the fending off (and eventual death and disposal of) the attacker. Norma hides the evidence, and Norman assists. Norma is found out, and Norman puts his life on hold to assure her freedom. Whatever the circumstance, Norman is implicated alongside Norma by pure choice.  It isn’t until the midway point that we come to understand that Norman’s clingy behavior is predisposed. He has a mental deficiency, one which makes him hallucinate, to see things that aren’t there. Often, it’s images of his mother telling him what to do. We’ve come to observe in waking life that Norma is far more subtle in her controlling ways. She likes to imply, to suggest, and to coax, but never command Norman to do her bidding. Their bond is assumed, and Norman has simply grown to subconsciously accept it as normal, even in the face of strong opposition to the relationship from his brother, Dylan (Max Thieriot), and English teacher, Miss Watson (Keegan Connor Tracy). Norman is constantly overshadowed by people far more influential than he. Acting on the advice and whim of others is Norman’s specialty.

There’s only one explanation (or exposition, one might argue) for this that’s been given thus far. After guiding our suspicions onto Norma for the death of her husband, it is revealed midway through the season that it is Norman, in a fit of all-encompassing psychotic rage after his father harms Norma, who commits murder. This had apparently been going on for quite some time as Dylan, who left the family a few months prior to escape Norma’s manipulative ways, consistently reminds her of the turbulent marriage and its damaging effect on her sons. While Norman is directly responsible for his father’s death, he only did so because of Norma’s involvement. It is a subconscious trigger which fondles Norman’s psychotic nerve to protect his mother, manifesting itself in other ways in his conscious state, particularly within his skepticism regarding her relationship with Officer Shelby (Mike Vogel). The bond is psychological, physical only to the extent of Norma’s keen insistence that her son’s proximity remain consistently close. The bond is not gendered, but rather familial. Would these implications against Norma be any different if the roles were reversed? If Norma had been the physically abusive spouse instead of her husband? Understanding the bond and its balance between mental and physical (and Norman’s inability to accept casual affections from anyone else including Bradley, his crush and first sexual partner) is key to understanding the effects of possession itself versus lumping everything into the category of maternal smothering.

Although Norma is obsessively possessive of Norman, her power as a character is derived from her strong-headed will and conviction to her actions, not solely based on active sexual power or pull on Norman’s sexuality or any other man’s. We’ve been given enough information at this point to know that she’s more than capable of getting herself out of complex situations where coupling is only a loose connection versus a binding commitment. Shelby is a sexual deviant (he traffics sex slaves in and out of his house) Norma sees fit to use for her benefit only after he initiates an attraction. Norma falls into the right line of attraction at the right time. She doesn’t proposition him and serve her vagina with a side of deception, rather it is Shelby who pursues a relationship while Norma falls for him outside the net of intent she’d originally cast by complying with his advances; she grows more invested than simply indulging his desire for her own gain (and the opportunity he presents, on the opposite side of the law but willing to do things like steal incriminating evidence from the storage room to ensure it won’t be used against her), so her power over him transcends both of their sexual desires into something emotionally-based. He wants to protect her, and she is more than willing to accept the help without lording sex over his head; she doesn’t have to. “I love you, you idiot,” he tells her in Episode 4, and she smiles; they kiss as Shelby pushes Norma against her car amidst a backdrop of the misty bay. It’s almost sickeningly reminiscent of a romantic melodrama of the 1950s, indicating that Norma is able to have “real” relationships outside of the one she has with Norman. While sex might be a component, it’s not the definition. And Norma’s frustrations about her son’s budding sexuality seem to stem more from her knowledge of how she experiences sex as a would-be tool for manipulation rather than an all-out attempt to smother him. Again, this is not inherently a “gendered” issue, working against Hitchcock’s insistence on adorning Norman in women’s clothing and a wig as an immediate sign of othering.

Norma’s ability to have an onscreen sexual relationship with a man who isn’t Norman’s father only strengthens “Bates Motel” as a challenger of Psycho-era ideals of female sexuality. In 1960 her son is a social deviant, a feminized male demonized not only for his murderous ways but also because he kills under the guise of being a woman—of believing he is a woman, of actively making himself a woman. His mother, dead throughout the entirety of the film, lives on only in Norman’s mind. He becomes his mother, or whatever memory of her Norman keeps alive within his own psyche, an unimaginably taboo subject for an audience not nearly as socially evolved (or accepting) as the one watching “Bates Motel” today. With or without being a killer, Norman is othered purely by gendered deviance. The “normal” side of him is calculating and precise; he is fully aware that there is a hole in the parlor wall into the adjacent hotel room. He actively peeps through it, wanting to see a young woman undress, which ultimately triggers the maternal murders. The clothes don’t materialize on his body. It is Norman who puts the dress and wig on, who grabs the knife from its resting state, and plunges it into Marion Crane’s body. It’s a female-driven, female-executed act of male sexuality (even the word penetration resonates masculinity). In “Bates Motel,” we’re still exploring a Norman who is unquestionably uncomfortable with the murderous dreams he has of Bradley (Nicola Peltz), after she reveals that their one-night stand was in fact just a one-night stand. Norman still passively receives the thoughts from his subconscious.

Present-day Norman is not mentally unstable because his mother is a woman with similar mental complexes; it is authority, rather, and the convolution of authority above Norman, which contributes to his state of being. Norman’s father, as we glimpsed a few episodes back, is abusive; lazy; violent. His mother, pushed into a corner far too many times, retaliates. She wins. But she wins through Norman, as her victimization triggers Norman’s patricide. It is Norman rebelling against the male side he’s yet to fully explore (his budding sexual escapades with Bradley, confused emotional attachment to Emma, his acceptance of Dylan as a pseudo father figure, etc., each indicate that Norman is not yet a “man,” but very much still an inexperienced boy on the verge of technical adulthood). Gender plays a role in Norman’s transformation, but it is far from the defining factor of his psychological evils. Similarly, Norma’s relationship with Shelby is not deviant because it is sexual, but rather pathetic in its teetering between legitimacy and fraudulence. Norma enjoys the romantics, but the burden of murderous guilt (and the benefits screwing a crooked cop with ways to decriminalize her public name) prompts her to keep the relationship from gaining as much momentum as Shelby would like. Shelby desires a nuclear family. He wants to claim both Norma and Norman as his own. The problem is he already asserts himself as a dominant sexual force as a sex-slave trafficker. He owns “vagina,” but not “sexuality,” and Norma is far too concerned with preserving an ideal state of illusion to toy with a man predisposed with old-fashioned perspectives on female sexual and domestic possession.

I’ve heard many fans of “Bates Motel,” new to the world of Psycho or longtime Hitchcock savants criticize Norma’s newly personified presence in this TV series. “Sure, blame it all on the woman,” I remember reading on Twitter after the premiere episode, the budding feminist anger building to a slow boil as the show continues. If the viewer is angry that Norma is a convoluted person, or angered by the fact that she’s a woman, or interprets that anger as the show being anti-woman, that’s simply the viewer’s responsibility and lazy projection. Norma is not evil because she’s a woman. At no point does “Bates Motel” offer us any indication that women are inherently deceptive and smothering with the intent to turn their sons into serial killers; Norma’s gender is treated as happenstance, as an afterthought; she is simply Norma. Do we need someone to blame? Is Psycho going to be any less impactful if “Bates Motel” offers an alternative framework to the one we’ve believed for fifty years? More importantly, is it inherently evil of us to assume that a male’s source of deviant corruption can only come from his mother? She’s a mother with questionable parenting skills, but skills which can’t be seen as the sole ingredient in the murderous monster mix of an adult Norman Bates—that is, perhaps, until season 2.

I’m coming back. Soon.

(I promise).

- J

A mere nine hours from now, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences will have awarded Argo its top prize, making it statistically one of the weakest winners in the history of the Oscar ceremony. It heads into the Best Picture race without a foreground position in other key categories, most notably without a Best Director nomination.

Only three other films in the 85-year history of the Oscars have reigned supreme over their respective year without a Best Director nomination; Wings (1927/28), Grand Hotel (1931/32) and–most recently–Driving Miss Daisy (1989/90). Argo will become only the fourth exception to the Director nomination/Picture win rule, but lacks the cultural relevance and staying power of those it joins the ranks of. By next week, after Argo‘s rental profits are raked into their respective hawker’s pockets, the film will fall into obscurity, becoming notable only for the reasons it won Best Picture versus its legs as a quality film. Argo‘s legacy is already sealed as a film that made a late-season sweep at the biggest industry pity-party on record. The “snubbing” of the film’s helmer, Ben Affleck, has unfortunately translated into industry backlash against the Academy’s Director’s Branch, which simply didn’t think his work was strong enough to warrant a nomination. If he’d made it into the category, would Argo still win Best Picture? The 2012/2013 Awards Season would appear vastly different if so, with Lincoln likely taking top honors at precursor ceremonies and guild awards alike. This year’s Oscar race is reaffirming only in the sense that Ben Affleck’s likability within the industry, strong enough to guarantee his subpar film the industry’s top honors, will prove beneficial to continuing his transition from mega-star to definitive auteur. Affleck’s skills as a director are undeniable. The Town and Gone Baby Gone reek of quality craftsmanship which, to some degree, is partially why Argo is such a disappointment. Where the two Boston-set pictures reflect a director with a keen sense for location (Affleck is personally connected to the city), culture, and dramatics, Argo feels like a massive exercise in painting-by-numbers, with easily interchangeable direction without a personal mark. Argo will be forever known as the procedural that could, a film with merits based only on the misfortune of its director, who really didn’t deserve anything in the first place. The film’s successes tonight will be empty, remembered only for the pitiful circumstances surrounding them.

What we must remember, however, is that the Academy’s decision is not binding–at least in a cultural sense. Crash might have trumped Brokeback Mountain in 2005, but where the latter gave a nation perspective, the former gave us a  Showtime series cancelled after the first season. The Kings Speech might have been the perfect frame for its actors to shine, but The Social Network held a mirror to a generation. The Academy has a tendency to make in-the-moment decisions that don’t necessarily highlight the “important” films of their respective eras. Audiences and academia have embraced such films as the “better” offerings of their respective years, making them the unofficial “Best Picture” in their own right. We remember Brokeback Mountain and The Social Network–hell, even Black Swan, Juno, There Will Be Blood, Mulholland Drive, etc. have all taken on more prestige and cultural prevalence than their respective year’s Academy-designated Best Picture.

Which films from 2012 will we have to look for to fortify the year’s presence for future generations? Films like Beasts of the Southern Wild and Amour are too small-scale with little commercial appeal, as they’re difficult to grasp in many ways (Beasts for its artistic oddities, Amour for its insistence on eliciting negative reactions combined with a complex structure). Django Unchained will be remembered as an interesting blip on Tarantino’s map, but withstanding little beyond that. Lincoln is a film drawing more on an audience’s affections for its real-life subjects than its strengths as a film, and Les Miserables is eye and ear candy with built-in nostalgia, forgotten beyond the late-night rooms of aspiring drama majors until the next incarnation of the it-needs-to-die-already musical comes along in 15 years. This leaves us with Silver Linings Playbook, Zero Dark Thirty, and Life of Pi. Silver Linings Playbook and Life of Pi are both based on previous works of fiction, already with built-in audiences. Both films offer fresh takes on their source material (crafting “cinematic” casings for them) and yielding high box-office returns (both grossing over $100 million domestically). They’re quality productions and will prove popular at retailers after their DVD releases, but Zero Dark Thirty will emerge as 2012′s crowning achievement as future generations look back. The film is notorious for its depiction of our government using torture as a means to gain information, but it doesn’t lead to much. The only thing the death of Osama bin Laden proves–at least in the world of Zero Dark Thirty–is that steady enduring unrest doesn’t have a solution solvable by putting a bullet into human flesh. So, then, where you “want” to go (as a nation, as a society, as a world power) becomes an issue, as there is no foreseeable place to go. The next target gives us no time for celebration, and the uncertainty of the United States’ position in the world is a questionable state of reality future generations will be living as they reflect back on Kathryn Bigelow’s film.

It’s difficult to accept the Academy as a cultural preservator for this reason, or maybe films that withstand years and decades have simply disappeared from production slates. When was the last time we saw a Bonnie & Clyde, a Sunset Boulevard, a Casablanca, a Psycho? Only time will tell if our spectacle-laden society has actually produced anything worthy of standing the test of time next to such classics, but Argo and its industry pity-win will be lost in the shuffle come April.

I’d also like to present my personal film awards for the prior cinematic year. Every film I’ve seen (released in the United States from January 1st through December 31, 2012) had its fair shot at breaking into one of the categories I’ve designated below. I’ve limited the number of nominees in some categories and expanded them in others (*makes jack-off motion at Academy*), but for the most part I’ve kept the numbers pretty standard. The bolded people and films are the winners. Enjoy.

Motion Picture

1 – Zero Dark Thirty

2 – Beasts of the Southern Wild

3 – The Master

4 – Silver Linings Playbook

5 – Celeste and Jesse Forever

6 – Holy Motors

7 – Seven Psychopaths

8 – Life of Pi

9 – Django Unchained

10 – The Impossible

Close Calls: Flight, Rust and Bone, Amour, Your Sister’s Sister, The Sessions, The Dark Knight Rises, Looper, Prometheus, Magic Mike, Damsels in Distress, The Grey, Pitch Perfect, The Deep Blue Sea, The Hunger Games, Les Miserables

Actress

Jennifer Lawrence – Silver Linings Playbook

Jessica Chastain – Zero Dark Thirty

Quvenzhane Wallis – Beasts of the Southern Wild

Rashida Jones – Celeste and Jesse Forever

Naomi Watts – The Impossible

Close calls: Marion Cotillard (Rust and Bone), Rachel Weisz (The Deep Blue Sea), Emmanuelle Riva (Amour)

Actor

Hugh Jackman – Les Miserables

Denzel Washington – Flight

Denis Lavant – Holy Motors

Joaquin Phoenix – The Master

Matthias Schoenaerts – Rust and Bone

Close Calls: Daniel Day-Lewis (Lincoln), Jack Black (Bernie), Colin Farrell (Seven Psychopaths), John Hawkes (The Sessions), Bradley Cooper (Silver Linings Playbook)

Supporting Actor

Phillip Seymour Hoffman – The Master

Dwight Henry – Beasts of the Southern Wild

Christoph Waltz – Django Unchained

Matthew McConoughey – Magic Mike

Tom Hiddleston – The Deep Blue Sea

Close Call: Guy Pearce (Lawless)

Supporting Actress

Sally Field – Lincoln

Kelly Reilly – Flight

Anne Hathaway – Les Miserables

Emily Blunt – Looper

Rosemarie DeWitt – Your Sister’s Sister

Close Call: Ari Graynor (For a Good Time, Call…)

Director

Benh Zeitlin – Beasts of the Southern Wild

Paul Thomas Anderson – The Master

Kathryn Bigelow – Zero Dark Thirty

Leos Carax – Holy Motors

Quentin Tarantino – Django Unchained

Close Call: Gary Ross – The Hunger Games

Screenplay

Silver Linings Playbook

Celeste and Jesse Forever

Zero Dark Thirty

Amour

Your Sister’s Sister

Seven Psychopaths

Close Calls: Flight, Django Unchained, Beasts of the Southern Wild

Cinematography

The Master

The Impossible

Rust and Bone

Life of Pi

Beasts of the Southern Wild

Close Calls: Django Unchained, The Hunger Games, Les Miserables

Production Design

Anna Karenina

Beasts of the Southern Wild

The Impossible

Les Miserables

Prometheus

Close Calls: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, Lincoln

Visual Effects

Life of Pi

Prometheus

Looper

Rust and Bone

The Impossible

Costume Design

Anna Karenina

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

Django Unchained

Lincoln

Les Miserables

Close Calls: The Girl, Life of Pi

Hair, Makeup, Prosthetics

Holy Motors

Hitchcock

Lincoln

Les Miserables

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

Close Call: Prometheus

Editing

Silver Linings Playbook

Holy Motors

Zero Dark Thirty

The Master

Django Unchained

Foreign Film

Rust and Bone

Holy Motors

The Deep Blue Sea

Amour

It’s a fitting conclusion (and how very “Academy,” too) to one of the most unpredictable Oscar races in recent memory. Argo, the standard procedural helmed by big-name Hollywood power player Ben Affleck, has emerged as the clear frontrunner for the Academy’s top prize after garnering major recognition from the likes of SAG, BAFTA, the HFPA and the DGA, all organizations with Academy crossover membership.

It’s putting a glum damper on my awards season because  Argo, a film which pales so miserably in the face of the other nine nominees, is merely succeeding on the misfortunes of its director-star. After the Academy “snubbed” Affleck out of the Best Director category, a sort of bourgeois, first-world rage swept through the voting community and they began lobbing awards at him like he was Peter O’Toole in Venus and everyone thought he was going to die before they had a chance to nominate him for anything ever again.

I can’t remember a time a snub was so actively met with reactionary sympathy. It’s tough for a community to accept that one of its most successful members simply wasn’t liked well enough by the branch of Directors who decide the Academy’s Best Director nominees. So, then, what makes the Academy favor Argo more than, say, Zero Dark Thirty, a film with massive pre-awards season buzz (and five Oscar nominations to its credit this year) but also went without individual Academy recognition for its director, Kathryn Bigelow? Where Argo is a slick by-the-numbers procedural which reinforces stereotypically souped-up “American” ideals, Zero Dark Thirty uses the frame of one of the most momentous manhunts of all time to tell a much larger story about gender politics and the dangers of letting faith linger in the hands of the powers that be, forcing us to confront an uncertain future and false sense of security–an idea Argo works against. Where Zero Dark Thirty ends with its “climax” putting no one at ease and forcing our nation down a path with nowhere to go and no end in sight, Argo literally drapes an American flag behind a picture-perfect nuclear family standing on the porch of their suburban paradise. Argo creates idealized fantasy out of actuality, Zero Dark Thirty uses cinematic fiction to force us into a state of consciousness.

Is Kathryn Bigelow’s star not bright enough to warrant her vastly superior film taking precedence over megastar Ben Affleck’s? The sympathy votes for Argo that have been pouring in over the past month will carry it to Best Picture greatness on Sunday, but with that decision, are we deviating too far away from the medium itself? Industry politics have trumped the Oscar voting process for decades, but we can justify the Weinsteins campaigning for films like Silver Linings Playbook and The Artist because they’re products of quality. Argo‘s only legacy will not be that it was the best film of 2012; it will merely be the film that won because its director was snubbed; the film that is forgotten as soon as the ceremony is over, as it is a tool to award sympathy on behalf of a voter base that sees Affleck as invaluable. That’s all fine and perfectly acceptable, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it.

It’s not like the Academy’s next best in line is any better, as Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln is a difficult pill to swallow at this year’s Oscars as well. Sure, its depiction of a nation intensely divided might have coincidental implications on contemporary (equally-split) societal mentality, but I find it difficult to accept that people are falling in love with the film as a film and not merely loving the historical events and happenings the film depicts. We can all agree that Abraham Lincoln’s dedication to ending slavery is admirable, but do we need a film to reaffirm our acceptance of the man and funnel such feelings into passive, built-in acceptance of a basic film structured around it? By default, Spielberg’s direction will take the top prize in the Best Director category, as will the film’s lead, Daniel Day-Lewis, for his portrayal of the ill-fated President. Expect some technicals to be thrown Lincoln‘s way as well, categories where its superiority as a production outweigh its strengths as a film.

We’ve all known we’ll have to endure another acceptance speech/irritating assault on what used to be an intense love for Anne Hathaway as she wins Best Supporting Actress, but the Best Actress race is still precarious even to speculate upon, as its seems a new frontrunner emerges every day. After leading the race for months with Jessica Chastain hot on her tail, Jennifer Lawrence now faces a battle with Emmanuelle Riva, whose performance in Amour has seen its female lead ascend from the mere novelty of being the “oldest Best Actress nominee ever” to the ranks of a serious threat to win the category after her BAFTA win last week. Anthony Breznican’s survey of anonymous Academy voters in last week’s Entertainment Weekly also proved surprising as many of the interviewees indicated that they’d be voting for Naomi Watts’ brilliant performance in The Impossible. In fact, if we’re going by Breznican’s research polling, Watts is the frontrunner (and this is from the mouths of actual Academy voters). Seeing as Watts has been passed over countless times before and due to the fact that she hasn’t won a single major precursor award, I’d say she sits solidly in a position to upset both Lawrence and Riva (Chastain’s hunt is, unfortunately, all but dead at this point).

The Writers Guild Awards this past Sunday threw us for a bit of a loop when they announced Mark Boal as the winner for Best Original Screenplay for his Zero Dark Thirty script, whereas the Best Adapted Screenplay award went to Chris Terrio’s script for Argo.  If the Weinstein push has any power this year, it will be either in the Adapted Screenplay category or Best Supporting Actor, where Silver Linings Playbook has a shot at upsetting Lincoln or Argo on both accounts. Original Screenplay will go to Amour if the controversy surrounding Zero Dark Thirty gets in its way of winning, as the media shitstorm stemmed largely from its script’s inclusion of torture scenes, many of which the masses have unfortunately come to misinterpret.

And that’s that. As we close out yet another Academy Awards, I can’t think of words more fitting to describe how I feel about this wildly unpredictable, fiercely enjoyable mess of an awards season; Argo fuck yours–wait, no: Argo, kindly go fuck yourself.

Predictions:

Best Picture: Argo
Best Director: Steven Spielberg – Lincoln
Best Actress: Jennifer Lawrence – Silver Linings Playbook
Best Actor: Daniel Day-Lewis – Lincoln
Best Supporting Actor: Robert De Niro – Silver Linings Playbook
Best Supporting Actress: Anne Hathaway – Les Miserables
Best Original Screenplay: Zero Dark Thirty
Best Adapted Screenplay: Argo
Best Film Editing: Argo
Best Animated Feature: Wreck-It Ralph
Best Foreign Language Film: Amour
Best Original Score: Life of Pi
Best Cinematography: Life of Pi
Best Visual Effects: Life of Pi
Best Sound Editing: Zero Dark Thirty
Best Sound Mixing: Les Miserables
Best Costume Design: Anna Karenina
Best Hair/Makeup: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
Best Documentary: Searching For Sugar Man
Best Production Design: Les Miserables
Best Original Song: Adele – “Skyfall” in Skyfall

You’d think after two seasons of getting it wrong, Hannah Horvath would at least have a slight grasp on how to put one foot in front of the other. Instead, Girls creator/writer/director super-hybrid Lena Dunham continues to put the character in situations which yield little crop for Hannah’s ambitious quest to acclimate into the “real” world.

The only problem is that Hannah’s interpretation of the real world is often clouded by her insistence on seeing it like a child, a self-made roadblock to the fullest extent. She knows what she wants to do; become a writer, and we assume she’s a great one (although we’ve only been treated to glimpses of her work), otherwise we wouldn’t have a running goal to frame an entire television series around. But, making “it” happen takes time, a diligent work ethic, and money, each of which–living in the fast-paced, expensive New York City–Hannah just doesn’t have.

Sunday’s episode of Girls registers as one of the most polarizing of the entire series. Social media was aflutter, as was my phone’s inbox, with people either complaining about the episode’s drastic shift in tone from the rest of the series, or praising it as one of the most uniquely impressive entries into the show’s already-impressive repertoire.

I fall into the latter category, but let me explain myself.

Season 2’s fifth episode sees Hannah developing a whirlwind attraction for a 42-year old who lives just down the block from the coffee shop where she works. Josh[ua, as he keeps reminding Hannah when she shortens it], played by Patrick Wilson, is upset because someone from the coffee shop is placing their trash into his cans. Hannah invites herself into his home after leaving work, shares in a glass of lemonade tinged with basic conversation topics, and, you know, has sex with him.

The midday affair turns into a two-day sexfest, with Hannah and Joshua both calling off work the next day to stay home and cuddle, eat steaks from the grill, muse about his aging, and have sex after playing a few dozen sets of naked ping pong (the game table facilitates the fun stuff, of course).

The tone of the episode mirrors its content. The framing is stationary, almost static at times, and highly claustrophobic. We are treated to countless shots of Hannah and Joshua fit tightly into compositions which read more like 18^th century portraits versus moving images from a 2013 television series. At once this functions as a means to isolate Hannah from the outside world, seeing as she’s indulging in a sex fantasy come to life. But, on the other hand, we can also read these shots as Dunham’s insistence on attempting to push Hannah into a frame of normality, which simply doesn’t work—and for good reason.

Hannah learns that Joshua is a doctor (hence the fabulous house, standard-sized in any other part of the country, but a small-scale castle when placed into the arena of New York City housing prices), recently separated (but not divorced) from his wife, who now lives in San Diego. “What did you do? I mean, to make her leave?” Hannah asks him, with all the terrible experience of her former loves building to a head in that very moment.

In essence, Joshua represents the ideal life for someone like Hannah, who has unrealistically dropped into her lap like a Godsend from straight girl heaven. He’s attractive, tall, sensitive, loaded, and the fact that he’s “separated” and not “divorced” adds a little bit of scandal (if harmless) to the whole affair, something we’re to believe a girl in Hannah’s position (penniless, struggling liberal arts major, twenty-something with big ambitions and no means for which to accomplish them) would jump at. He could provide her with stability, money, and good sex—things she isn’t used to (or at least things she’s only been used to in parts, but never all together at the same time). The cinematography in this episode shifts from merely isolating Hannah from the rest of the world in a bubble of sexual satisfaction to attempting to shove her into sort of picture-perfect, portrait-style framing of a typical life she could have so very easily if she were to be with a man who supports her. The problem is that Joshua is distracting Hannah from living. Having no money and trying to make it on your own in one of the most expensive, dream-crushing cities in the world is a task which takes an independent to succeed, and an even greater one to fail. Hannah realizes this when she’s revealing some of her deepest thoughts to him after sex, and the spark that was once in Joshua’s eyes dims mid-conversation. He’s not interested in feelings or philosophy. He doesn’t understand Hannah’s mind, he merely understands her body as a placeholder for the emptiness he feels having lost the “stable” part of his adult life. Hannah might be 24, but she’s by no means an adult; her experiences are yet to be had. “I just want to feel everything,” Hannah tells him, not realizing that at 42 he’s felt close to the “everything” she speaks of.

We’ve already seen Jessa get herself into this situation, and both times now we’ve seen that the “ideal” life for a New York woman is not, as it would seem, that of a rich housewife sitting at home using her husband’s money to hone her craft. It’s artificial.

After indulging in a few last-minute housewife experiences, however, after Joshua goes to work (browsing his huge closet, reading The New York Times at an outdoor breakfast nook while eating the finest organic jams his pantry has to offer), Hannah leaves the house, taking out the trash (her “growing up,” so to speak) and fitting it into a garbage can once plagued with trash from the coffee shop. She leaves the “sex vacation” behind and makes her way to the street. In a single shot (which breaks the stagnant framing of the interior) the camera becomes mobile and pans over, watching Hannah her make her way out of the static confines of immature passions (and constrictive framing) to the bustling road at the end of the stagnant avenue she’s on, towards a life where she’ll have to work for her stability. She leaves a life of ease and makes her way towards one where she has to work for herself in order to “feel everything,” not let some man from a dream world she doesn’t have the right to inhabit yet give it all to her based on a whirlwind bout of sexual passion.

The episode does something we’ve rarely seen in Girls before, a true turning point for Hannah as a character. We’re used to seeing her make a fool of herself. At 24, she makes a sincere proposal to her parents to support her writing at $2,000 a month until her book is finished. She does cocaine because a shitty blog editor tells her it will be a “good experience to write about.” Hannah has no filter between what’s conductive to her career and what’s simply an immature decision made out of desperation and destitution. Hannah generally fails to see herself for what she is. She knows she’s broke, but we get the sense that she sees that as more of a beautiful “struggling artist-chic” sort of thing than a “I have a shit job and can’t pay my rent” kind of thing. In this episode, Hannah confronts the side of her that makes her pathetic and, hopefully, had her sights on getting it together as she made her way out of Joshua’s house and down that long road back to the coffee shop. She realizes that staying with Joshua would only be indulging the child in her that relishes in the fantasy of not having to work, being with a rich man, and having it easy on Park Avenue for the rest of her life.

For once Hannah grows up, and Lena Dunham’s genius writing couldn’t have made the process any more satisfying–for us, at least.

The year was 2009. Just as Rafiki brushed his thumb against Simba’s forehead, whispering his name, a stoic Phylicia Rashad caressed my love/hate trigger as she stared into the camera and delivered her lines. “I am Phylicia Rashad, and I am an actor” she said, surrounded by gaggles of peers amidst the 15th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards. Live coverage then cut from actor to actor sitting in the same room, each new face (from Meryl Streep to Anne Hathaway) delivering the same line, none as self-serving (with a subtle hint of “This is how you do it, Beyonce) as Phylicia’s. It was one of the most embarrassing openings of any awards show I’ve ever witnessed, but it came as no surprise; This is an actor-on-actor lovefest; The SAG Awards; The Martha Stewart Home Accents Collection of awards season.

And it’s beautiful.

The SAG Awards can either be the strongest litmus test for the acting categories at the Oscars (think 2010) or throw a few curveballs that reflect a much more deserving (selected by a voting base that’s better informed and in tune with the craft than the Oscars’) batch of winners (think 2008).

In what has already shaped up as one of the most heated and upredictable Oscar races in years, the SAG Awards will most likely play out as they did for the 2011 calendar, at least in the Lead Actress category. Lawrence is poised to take the top spot from Jessica Chastain tonight, although the latter’s extensive body of work in such a short amount of time might prove impressive enough to SAG voters to push her to a win. If Chastain wins here, she’ll probably get the Viola Davis treatment at the Oscars (she won here last year, only to be upset by Meryl Streep at the hands of the Academy). Lawrence’s performance is much more Academy-friendly (commercially receivable and appealing) and it’s in a Weinstein film. If Naomi Watts has a chance at winning any major award this season, it’s here, and she’ll do it here if she’s lucky (she’s got major acting powerhouses campaigning for her this year). I usually trust the SAG voting base a bit more than I trust the Academy’s, considering it’s made up entirely of actors judging their own craft. Once nominations are in, the Academy opens the categories up to the entire membership, leaving more room for politicized votes. A win for Chastain here tonight indicates a better performance in a film unfortunately marred by politics.

The other categories will play out pretty much in-line with the rest of the precursor awards. Tommy Lee Jones should take Supporting Actor, Anne Hathaway will take Supporting Actress (although Sally Field is certainly in a position to upset), and Daniel Day-Lewis will take home a statue for his Leading performance in Lincoln.

If there are no surprises tonight, we should have a somewhat clearer idea of who will be taking home Oscar gold on February 24th. Hell, I’ll be happy if Phylicia Rashad gets another opportunity to give some gif-able diva face.

Film Predictions:

Lead:

Daniel Day-Lewis (Lincoln)

Jennifer Lawrence (Silver Linings Playbook)

Supporting:

Tommy Lee Jones (Lincoln)

Anne Hathaway (Les Miserables)

Ensemble:

The cast of Lincoln

It was in the way a few audience members clapped as Osama bin Laden is shot to death, and how more applauded immediately after the final cut to black. I just can’t wrap my head around why someone would feel such a celebratory impulse immediately after viewing Zero Dark Thirty, a film rooted deeply in the middle eastern conflict, whose focus is not the gratification one might feel about the idea of eradicating the most well-known terrorist of the modern era. Rather, it’s a film built on the foundation of certainty–one woman’s, in particular–that ends in an ominous haze of uncertainty. Uncertainty of our future, of our security, of our position as a noble force in the fight to defend our country. For those reasons, it makes the jeers, hoots, and applause (an indication of acceptance) from the audience which surrounded me all the more disturbing. For, you see, Zero Dark Thirty is not a reaffirmation of America in white, Middle East in black; it fiercely calls into question American morals just as often as it castigates those we fight against. Killing Osama bin Laden was a small battle won in a much larger war, and certainly isn’t presented as an end-all, be-all point of closure within the film. Zero Dark Thirty is, in direct conflict with what so many Americans want it to be, a most anti-”America, Fuck Yeah” film.

Zero Dark Thirty is based on “true accounts” from those directly (and some, perhaps more indirectly) involved with the killing of Osama bin Laden. It is not a “true” story as much as it is a true interpretation of events which most likely (but have not been proven) led to the extermination of one of the most hated men in the world. It’s true; Bigelow and Mark Boal (also her collaborator on 2010′s The Hurt Locker), spend a glaring amount of time focused on Americans using torture as a means to elicit information from captured Al-Qaeda members–as well as the boldfaced lies purportedly projected to the public regarding such tactics. It’s difficult to accept the events of Zero Dark Thirty as the truth, both morally and because the film is technically a work of fiction. Protagonist Maya (Jessica Chastain, giving the best acting performance of 2012) is a pseudo mash-up character birthed from various reports of individuals involved in the real hunt for Osama bin Laden, as are the events which lead to the payoff. It’s also, therefore, much easier to see the controversial scenes of torture as something beyond a simple endorsement, the same as Steven Spielberg’s reproduction of WWII-era death camps isn’t an endorsement of anti-Semitism. Spielberg wasn’t present for the Holocaust, and Bigelow wasn’t present during interrogations of captured Al-Qaeda members. That doesn’t, however, trivialize her right as an artist to include such scenes meant for greater effect.

If you’re looking to a film for truth, you’re simply misguided. As it is, it’s colossally difficult to reproduce the truth in a film like Zero Dark Thirty (or any film, for that matter) in the first place, as the vastness of its scope spans multiple countries, intelligence operations, and surveillance missions wrapped within a messy little ten-year timeframe. Thankfully Bigelow and Boal aren’t overwhelmed, able to pick and choose from their resources with what rings only as ease, crafting a remarkably effective collection of fictitious staging with real-world implications. As the film begins, we’re reminded of one of the defining events which set the entire mess in motion. An assemblage of audio from panicked phone calls placed at the World Trade Center on September 11th plays over a black screen at the beginning of Zero Dark Thirty, reminding us not only of the aura of facelessness which plagued that day (attackers, amassed victims, etc.) but also of the fear, a fear and uncertainty that can be heard in the voices of the callers that endures to this day. Our security is not guaranteed, even with the death of Osama bin Laden.

The actions leading up to Osama bin Laden’s death unfold through the eyes of Maya, who acts as a sort of conduit between the fiction of the film and the reality we endure in a world where the death of Osama bin Laden is more than just a narrative climax. She’s in constant conflict with herself, embodying a raging war of preserved morality versus getting results. She’s good at what she does, however, and the fact that she’s a woman in a male-dominated field doesn’t exactly help her showcase it. Her persistence and certainty is marginalized by the male characters in the film, who often mistake her youth for inexperience, her beauty as a distraction. But, as Maya tells a fellow officer who wishes to set her up with another agent, she’s “not that girl who fucks,” and isn’t one to take the influence of others (whether questioning her experience, her accuracy, or her sex life), even in a situation with all odds against her, to mean more than her certainty.

When her efforts lead her to an Abottabad compound where she believes Osama bin Laden to be hiding, Maya must endure a round-table of men who assess the payoff of her ten-year workload with a maximum “soft 60%” chance of yielding results. “It’s 100%. Ok, 95%, because I know certainty freaks you guys out. But it’s 100,” she butts in. Whether it’s sheer confidence or a diluted willingness to accept the best-looking outcome after ten years of tireless work isn’t necessarilly answered in the subsequent affirmation of her speculation. She was right, but the most powerful moment of the film comes at its conclusion as she’s being flown out of Pakistan. “Where do you want to go?” the pilot asks her as we cut to a close-up of her face, strained from sleepless nights and a decade of near thankless slaving. She remains silent, a few tears streaming down her cheeks as the film cuts to black, Maya never giving an answer. The power of these moments is colossal, and it’s here the film achieves its most profound effect. The world knows the gist of Osama bin Laden’s death. It matters that he’s dead, but the way he died is not entirely clear. Sure, it can be reduced to a bullet. But the process leading up to that bullet isn’t mapped out for us. We’ve seen one artist’s interpretation within Zero Dark Thirty, one which does not celebrate the would-be climax as a moment of pure ecstasy. This is not a film of triumph, but of fear and uncertainty; it’s an ugly pre, during, and post of the most notorious manhunt in history. The question the pilot asks Maya is one she can’t answer, for she knows firsthand that it is unanswerable. She’s seen ugliness on both sides. Torture from Americans, suicide bombings from members of Al-Qaeda. A neverending conflict of ruthless vigilance and moral duty, each defined differently by the sides who wield them. Yet, what yields results? Torture doesn’t lead to much, and the only thing the death of Osama bin Laden proves–at least in the world of Zero Dark Thirty–is that steady enduring unrest doesn’t have a solution solvable by putting a bullet into human flesh. So, then, where you “want” to go becomes an issue, as there is no foreseeable place to go. The next target gives us no time for celebration.

Zero Dark Thirty is most powerful when it is treated not as factual representation, but as a film, from which gleaning versus accepting should be your focus. It is, however, a film which seeks to insert itself into our reality, forcing us to question the parameters around us, and the morality of those in power. Immediately following one of the film’s many gruesome scenes of torture, we see a reassuring interview playing onscreen behind a few characters as he (within the diegetic realm of the film, mind you) lies about the country’s use of such deplorable tactics. There’s no proof that this is fact. Zero Dark Thirty might be fiction, but one with powerful reflective qualities. A mirror rooted in fiction, if you will. Do we gain greater meaning from the torture scenes? From seeing our President trying to cover up amoral actions performed for the preservation of the good of the nation? Are politicians complaining about the film’s depiction of torture because we’re uncomfortable that all of this might be true? The uncertainty is real whether in fiction or our reality, and forcing us to accept and confront the absence of closure following Osama bin Laden’s death is where the true terror of Zero Dark Thirty lies; It places us at war with ourselves.

Top 10 Films of 2012:

Note: The only film I haven’t seen that will most likely make an impact on this list is Amour, which I’ll be seeing on February 15th.

1 – Zero Dark Thirty
Directed by: Kathryn Bigelow

2 – Beasts of the Southern Wild
Directed by: Benh Zeitlin

3 – The Master
Directed by: Paul Thomas Anderson

4 – Silver Linings Playbook
Directed by: David O. Russell

5 – Celeste and Jesse Forever
Directed by: Lee Toland Krieger

6 – Holy Motors
Directed by: Leos Carax

7 – Seven Psychopaths
Directed by: Martin McDonagh

8 – Life of Pi
Directed by: Ang Lee

9 – Django Unchained
Directed by: Quentin Tarantino

10 – The Impossible
Directed by: Juan Antonio Bayona

And this, essentially, functions as my apology for hating on Kathryn Bigelow throughout the entire 2009-10 awards season. I still don’t like The Hurt Locker, but Zero Dark Thirty is a triumph of contemporary cinema.

I liken Ben Affleck’s direction of Argo to that of a monkey using a brush to paint a smiley face. For what I assume some of you might think are the “right” reason, that’s the worst comparison in the world. Affleck has proven himself as a skilled filmmaker both in front of and behind the camera, spinning webs of cinematic greatness whilst honing focused, almost dialectic perspective on his prior features based in Boston, a town he’s largely familiar with (he spent a great deal of his young life in Cambridge). Of course, I’m not likening Affleck’s aptitude to that of a zoo animal. I merely think it’s the reception of his latest work, however, that makes it hard to see him as anything but an awards season actor-turned-director spectacle. Something unexpected from an unexpected source (in this case, not an entirely unexpected source, just one on a much bigger scale than what we’re used to, considering Argo has grossed in upwards of $100 million).

It’s hard to not compare Affleck’s awards season run these past few months to that of Kathryn Bigelow’s during the 2009-10 pre-Oscar period. Bigelow’s nomination and subsequent win for Best Director not only marked the Academy’s first official recognition of a woman in that category, but, for me, cemented the Academy’s existence as a purely cyclical machine of self-generating, self-whoring, pathetically pandering publicity. I assume this isn’t a surprise to many. I just wasn’t so readily accepting of Bigelow’s triumph that year as the rest of Hollywood seemed to be. At every commercial break, I recall the announcer touting the category for all it was worth: “Will Kathryn Bigelow become the first ever female to win for Best Director? Find out in thirty minutes.” Her gender became the go-to talking point of that year’s Oscars. Does that make her any less worthy? In some cases, yes. The Academy, perhaps nominating her based on merit alone, placed her there in a collective vote. But, her gender was marketed and exploited to generate hype which would eventually become self-fulfilling. In essence, her gender was her defining trait that night (It’s also interesting to note that Bigelow was given the cold shoulder from the Academy this year, indicating that the initial excitement of decorating a woman who directed a decent film four years ago has long since worn off).

While Affleck possesses little in the way of such “unique” aspects to define his presence on the awards circuit, his actor-turned-director status as well as his general likeability within the industry undoubtedly contributed to his name being thrown around this Oscar season. Alas, he wasn’t nominated in the category he was (at one time) largely expected to win (or at least give Steven Spielberg a run for his money). So, what went wrong? It’ll be interesting to see how Affleck’s combined Oscar snub/Globes takeover plays itself out, seeing as (as much as I don’t want to admit it) the earlier-than-usual deadline for Academy nomination ballots most likely played a huge factor in his lack of a nomination.

The Globes usually hold little influence over the direction of awards season. They rarely have power to dictate what gets nominated at the Oscars, but often reaffirm the direction Academy members should take as they cast their ballots by reflecting what countless other guilds, critics circles, and Oscar season awards shows already have. Since Oscar voters weren’t able to see who won at the Golden Globes before voting, a very prominent piece of the usual awards season puzzle was missing. I’m not saying the Globes and Academy are mutually operational, it’s just that Affleck’s “snub” seems too huge to ignore when Argo gobbled up major accolades on Sunday (Affleck won for Direction, the film won in the dramatic category). If the timetable for the Globes ceremony and Oscar voting was “normal” this year, I think we’d be looking at a very different Oscar picture, one that included a lot more Ben Affleck and a lot less Benh Zeitlin.

So, does Globes success bode well for Argo at the Oscars? Maybe. Arguably, Argo is a more, how shall I put this, “worldy” film than Oscar juggernaut (and current frontrunner for Best Picture, Director, Screenplay, and Actor) Lincoln, its appeal stronger as a “Globes” film than an “Academy” film. The Academy will most likely still side with Spielberg, but the outpouring of anger from various Oscar pundits, critics, and general audiences alike has me infinitely baffled. It’s one thing to create something new out of source material as David O. Russell did with Silver Linings Playbook. It’s another to competently direct a glorified Wikipedia article, which is exactly what Argo is. It’s universally appealing, superficially suspenseful, reaffirming of traditional American values (that last shot? Come on.), and ultimately an adequate procedural. Argo does what it needs to do; it tells a fascinating story. It doesn’t however, take a historical occurrence and give it a “new” face for the medium as, say, The Impossible has done with its retelling of the events surrounding the 2004 tsunami. The Impossible uses the frame of true events to tell a much larger, cinematically rich story, making connections a simple A-leads-to-B recreation can’t. And that, my friends, is a choice of direction. Although, it’s unfair to hate a film for what it hasn’t accomplished, for what it hasn’t done, and what it is not.

If anything, the HFPA’s love for Argo could very well act as a major catalyst for the first write-in Oscar since Hal Mohr’s win for Best Cinematography in 1935. Is it allowed right now? Nope. But, there’s buzz within the industry that that’s just what Academy voters are planning to do for Affleck, but I’m not so certain the push is strong enough to overthrow Spielberg’s current position out front, or to warrant a compete overhaul of voting rules since write-in voting hasn’t been allowed for decades. For starters, Argo isn’t exactly filmmaking of the highest order–even its most vocal supporters would agree to that. It’s certainly not a film that will define an era as, say, films like Citizen Kane or Bonnie and Clyde. It’s not a monumental achievement for the medium, and certainly not worthy of taking away recognition from the likes of Zeitlin, Lee, and Russell. People seem to be more frustrated that their predictions were off thanks to one-two sucker punch snubs of two early Oscar frontrunners. At most, Argo has the potential to gain some sympathy votes in the Best Picture category, making it a viable contender to take on Lincoln and Silver Linings Playbook, the latter of which I think is poised to upset as well (the power of Weinstein got Jacki Weaver and David O. Russell surprise nominations in their respective categories. It can’t be denied).

I just so desperately want to think of Ben Affleck as a brush-equipped platypus or sloth; now that’s impressive.

The Globes have traditionally functioned as more of a glorified, drunker, less frilly Oscar forecast. Each of the major categories usually share winners with their Oscar brethren, essentially securing a nomination at Hollywood’s most prestigious night for those already in contention with the Guilds (which contain actual Oscar voters, mind you).

The HFPA winners generally reaffirm Oscar voters’ nomination ballots; however, this year Oscar voters submitted their ballots prior to the announcement of the Golden Globe winners, leaving the HFPA’s very public forum with little influence over who the Academy chose to nominate.

It’s not like the opinions of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association are of any legitimate value. After all, to be a voting member you must have, as Scott Weinberg of FEARnet pointed out on Twitter earlier today, a minimum of four published articles a year. That’s not much, considering most industry trade papers circulate on an average weekly basis.

The Globes is an exercise in good fun, whether intentional or not, because no one (even those present, well, maybe except Claire Danes) seems to take the HFPA as seriously as the HFPA does. They offer little innovation beyond shining light on a few faces which go unrecognized at the Oscars (this year: Rachel Weisz, Helen Mirren). The Guilds contain Academy members, breaking down specifics of the films they nominate as judged by peers who make films all year long, not by a few journalists who publish a single article quarterly.

Perhaps part of the problem lies within the insistence on funneling films into two different categories and treating them as polar opposites. Take, for example, Les Miserables, an undeniably grim drama whose script consists nearly entirely of sung dialogue and sweeping musical numbers. It faces off with a film like Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, a comedy by definition (albeit possessing some sharp dramatic edge). The former certainly a musical, but bearing no resemblance to the comedic (or tonal) structure of the other. Jessica Chastain and Jennifer Lawrence, widely considered two frontrunners for the Best Actress Oscar, don’t compete directly tonight for their Golden Globes, as Chastain is the clear victor in the drama category, Lawrence easily trumping her fellow nominees in the comedic category. What benefit will be reaped tonight aside from reaffirming both ladies as Oscar frontrunner? The HFPA surely can’t take themselves to be the most important industry awards show, so perhaps a revamping of the categorical nomination process would widen their scope as a legitimate game changer instead of a complimentary excuse to hand out more awards to the same people.

The Globes is merely a flex of industry redundancy, its members attempting to have their cake and eat it, too (and not in the beautifully charming way Lena Dunham did in the Season 1 finale of “Girls”). But at least they’re giving us an excuse to indulge in three hours of Amy Poehler and Tina Fey this time, which is more than enough incentive for me to crack some wine with friends and enjoy the mess.

Predicted Winners:
Motion Picture, Drama: Lincoln
Motion Picture, Musical/Comedy: Les Miserables
Actor, Drama: Daniel Day-Lewis
Actress, Drama: Jessica Chastain
Actor, Musical/Comedy: Hugh Jackman
Actress, Musical/Comedy: Jennifer Lawrence
Supporting Actor: Tommy Lee Jones
Supporting Actress: Anne Hathaway
Director: Steven Spielberg
Original Score: Lincoln
Screenplay: Lincoln
Original Song: “Skyfall”  by Adele
Animated Feature: Brave
Foreign Film: Amour

The bad taste 2011 left in my mouth lingers no more, with a bounty of 2012’s films offering up plenty of fantastic contributions to the medium.

The most interesting race this year is between the leading women in a category which still feels wide open. Jessica Chastain and Jennifer Lawrence seemingly lead a race that’s included names of industry mainstays (Rachel Weisz, Helen Mirren) and fresh (literally) newcomers (9-year old Quvenzhane Wallis). Naomi Watts picked up some steam when she garnered SAG and Golden Globe nominations for her brilliant turn in The Impossible (alongside an impressive cast of supporting men, including Tom Holland and Ewan McGregor), and will likely see her much-deserved (albeit long overdue) second Academy Award nomination come tomorrow morning. The remaining slots pose a dilemma. Emmanuelle Riva seems likely to take at least one for her performance in Amour, a film many are predicting as this year’s Oscar dark horse. Marion Cotillard, highly recognized already for her work in Rust and Bone, is poised for the other. That leaves Wallis’ fate in jeopardy. If recognized, she’d be the youngest in the history of the category. Her work is deserving, but it’ll take a lot for the Academy (comprised overwhelmingly of people triple, double, quadruple, her age) to herald a mere child over the immense talent of other actresses (like Riva) who have paid their dues on a career clock that’s already begun ticking.

Over on the men’s side, things are considerably less exciting. In a year when Daniel Day-Lewis competes, rarely does anyone but Daniel Day-Lewis win; he’s poised for yet another nomination and win this year for his performance in Lincoln, also the frontrunner in the Picture, Director (Steven Spielberg), and Supporting Actor (Tommy Lee Jones) categories. Sally Field will earn a Supporting Actress nomination for her role in the same film, although the likes of Anne Hathaway, Helen Hunt, and perhaps Nicole Kidman will give her some stiff competition, Hathaway likely taking the win in February.

The Best Director category is also problematic this year. Just yesterday, five directors were recognized by the Directors Guild of America with nominations; Kathryn Bigelow (Zero Dark Thirty), Steven Spielberg (Lincoln), Ang Lee (Life of Pi), and Ben Affleck (Argo) claimed expected nominations from the DGA, although Tom Hooper’s inclusion for his work on Les Miserables left the placement of fellow Oscar contenders Quentin Tarantino (Django Unchained), David O. Russell (Silver Linings Playbook) and Michael Haneke (Amour) in the category at tomorrow’s nominations in question. According to GoldDerby, only two films (Hamlet and Driving Miss Daisy) have won Best Picture without their directors being nominated by the DGA, making the top prize even more of a distant dream than it already was for the likes of Django Unchained, Amour, and Silver Linings Playbook.

The Best Picture race has settled a bit on Lincoln, after fluctuating from Argo to Les Miserables and Zero Dark Thirty. I’m still not satisfied labeling Spielberg’s historical drama the winner this early, as Zero Dark Thirty was able to pick up considerable amounts of audience and critical appraisal (not to mention a heaping of Guild nominations, many for Jessica Chastain, Kathryn Bigelow, and Mark Boal) prior to the closing of Academy voting.

I’m in a  growing minority in feeling The Hurt Locker’s success with the Academy was due largely in part to director Bigelow’s gender, considering it was touted left and right in advertisements and mid-presentation announcer cliffhangers three years ago (“Will Kathryn Bigelow be the first woman to win the Best Director Oscar?” I remember so clearly being teased before every commercial break) as a means for the Academy to create their own newspaper headlines the next morning. Alas, picking apart films based on the gender of those who crafted them is inherently sexist. I sometimes question the act of separating the acting categories by gender; why not, then, separate the female directors from the male directors? The female screenwriters from the male screenwriters? Can it not be argued that the appeal of a film like Bridesmaids, written by two women and nominated in the Original Screenplay category just last year, is a film by and “for” women? Its overwhelming success (and the fact that it was directed by a man) prove otherwise; so why, then, is Bigelow such a hot topic? Her films have undoubtedly been shaped by male hands, too, considering Boal’s co-writing on Zero Dark Thirty’s script is likely to be recognized this year in the Best Original Screenplay category. I’m a fan of Bigelow’s work (can you really argue with Juliette Lewis’ badassery in Strange Days?), but I feel like the pressure for her to deliver anything above mere adequacy (which, by all means, is all The Hurt Locker amounts to) has been fulfilled within Zero Dark Thirty. I’ve yet to come across a quintessentially “female” agenda (does one even exist? I’ve never heard of anyone getting up in the middle of a screening and yell “ME SMELL WOMAN BEHIND LENS”) in any of her films, only the agenda of the Academy touting her gender as a pawn to diddle its own skittle for awarding a woman its top prize. That, my friends, is not sexist thinking; it’s merely pointing out exploitative bullshit of which the Academy is often guilty of parading, and why Kathryn Bigelow only won because she’s a woman.

My full predictions below:

Best Picture:

Lincoln

Les Miserables

Argo

Silver Linings Playbook

Amour

Beasts of the Southern Wild

Skyfall

Life of Pi

Django Unchained

Moonrise Kingdom

Alternates: The Master, Flight

Best Actress

Jessica Chastain – Zero Dark Thirty

Jennifer Lawrence – Silver Linings Playbook

Emmanuelle Riva – Amour

Marion Cotillard – Rust and Bone

Naomi Watts – The Impossible

Alternates – Quvenzhane Wallis, Rachel Weisz, Helen Mirren

Best Actor

Daniel Day-Lewis – Lincoln

Denzel Washington – Flight

Hugh Jackman – Les Miserables

John Hawkes – The Sessions

Bradley Cooper – Silver Linings Playbook

Alternates – Joaquin Phoenix

Best Supporting Actress

Anne Hathaway – Les Miserables

Sally Field – Lincoln

Helen Hunt – The Sessions

Ann Dowd – Compliance

Amy Adams – The Master

Alternates – Nicole Kidman

Best Supporting Actor

Tommy Lee Jones – Lincoln

Alan Arkin – Argo

Christoph Waltz – Django Unchained

Robert De Niro – Silver Linings Playbook

Philip Seymour Hoffman – The Master

Alternates – Dwight Henry, Leonardo DiCaprio, Matthew McConoughey

Best Director

Kathryn Bigelow – Zero Dark Thirty

Steven Spielberg – Lincoln

Ben Affleck – Argo

Ang Lee – Life of Pi

Tom Hooper – Les Miserables

Alternates – Michael Haneke, Quentin Tarantino, David O. Russell

Best Original Screenplay

Zero Dark Thirty

Amour

Django Unchained

Moonrise Kingdom

The Master

Alternates – Looper

Best Adapted Screenplay

Beasts of the Southern Wild

Lincoln

Argo

Silver Linings Playbook

Life of Pi

Alternates – The Perks of Being a Wallflower