After having gone over Best Actor, Best Actress, and Best Director, it’s time for the granddaddy of them all: Best Picture. So if you don't mind, allow me to wax a little poetic and tell you my thoughts on each of the nine movies nominated in this category. 

BEST PICTURE
Arrival
Fences
Hacksaw Ridge
Hell or High Water
Hidden Figures
La La Land
Lion
Manchester by the Sea
Moonlight
 
Fences isn't so much a movie as it is a play put onto film. I doubt it deviates much from the TONY award-winning Broadway play, but telling the story on film allowed director Denzel Washington to show us so much more than he did. We could've seen the other woman in his character's life, or his son playing football, but he decides to faithfully adhere to the source material. The performances are great and both Washington and Viola Davis deserve Oscars for their work in the movie. I also like that the August Wilson play is shown as the writer intended and that the audience might get to see a form of storytelling they may otherwise never get to see, but without using the film medium to its full extent it has little chance to win the top prize.
 
Hidden Figures is a wonderful story that needs to be shared; these three women serve as an inspiration for what we could achieve through perseverance in the face of such hatred. However, the execution of the story feels a little too safe, a little too Disneyfied. This feels like a movie that the studio wanted to be inspiring to the audience but also nice enough to be seen by the whole family. And there is nothing wrong with that kind of movie-making, especially when it comes to a story like this that should be seen by a lot of people, especially young people. But with other movies taking more dramatic risks in its storytelling, Hidden Figures seems like a long shot to win. 
 
Lion may actually be my favorite movie of the bunch but I'm not sure if that's me talking or the gallons of tears that I poured out watching this movie. The narrative hit me in all the right spots, especially the part of the story dealing with the adoption. Eight-year-old Sunny Pawar plays the younger version of Saroo and he is great; he probably deserved to be nominated more than Dev Patel. There are times it felt like the filmmakers were just trying to make me cry, and if so, job well-done but I don't know if that's enough to win the best picture.
 
Hacksaw Ridge and Hell or High Water are both very good genre movies. Each has the potential to reinvigorate the war movie and the western respectively and I hope it does. Hacksaw shines in moments of gruesome, choreographed violence and also tells a story that seems almost unbelievable. To be a conscientious objector is one thing, but to believe in a cause so much to go into a war without a way to defend yourself is remarkable. Meanwhile, Hell or High Water furthers the trend of modernizing the western with present-day settings.
 
Arrival was incredibly done on several levels. The story is so interesting that it could only be executed and written in a precise way for it to work. There are very few times I feel surprised when I go see a movie but I was by this, and for that, I can't stop singing its praises. Amy Adams was also spectacular as the lead character despite not being nominated for her performance. Arrival is a good-looking movie; it's kind of impressive how far we've come in the terms of CGI that these aliens look this lifelike.
 
Manchester by the Sea spoke to me the most emotionally and it felt like the story was the most honest. I never felt manipulated. It shows emotions people go through when dealing with death and tragedy and it's not always grief; sometimes for whatever reason there is laughter, or the need for a violent outburst mixed into whatever sadness you may feel. Manchester by the Sea deals with emotions that everyone can identify with highlighted by magnificent actors. This movie should be higher on the list as a possible winner. 
 
While all those movies are great, the best picture race has effectively boiled down to two: Moonlight and La La Land. Moonlight is told from a perspective we've never seen on such a big stage; it is from the point of view of a gay black man. Given everything that's going on in society and how so many people feel disenfranchised, I think this movie can speak to that sense of abandonment that some people are feeling in this political climate. And I think people in Hollywood understand that—maybe not the old, white men who used to vote for the Oscars; you know, those responsible for the hashtag #OscarSoWhite. Perhaps this class of voters is more forward-thinking and sees the depth and beauty in this movie. Moonlight has all the makings of an upset victory.
 
La La Land has won the BAFTA, the SAG, the DGA, the PGA, seven Golden Globes, and it is tied for the most nominations in Oscar history—Hollywood people love this movie. Plus, it also happens to be very good. La La Land has been nominated for its acting, music, writing, cinematography, costume design, directing, editing, production design, and sound production. If a great movie is the sum of its parts then these parts have been recognized as outstanding by the Academy and I don't know how you wouldn't reward that. 
 
La La Land is a movie about how great Hollywood is and you know who's voting on the Oscars; people who like movies and who think Hollywood is pretty great. La La Land is a movie for a person that enjoys movies and the spectacle of being at the theater. It reminds you how fun movies can be, how good they can feel yet still be a little heartbreaking all at the same time.
 
If I had a vote I would vote for La La Land and I think it will win, but I won't be surprised if Moonlight wins because that is the movie that probably should.

Best Director
Damien Chazelle, La La Land
Mel Gibson, Hacksaw Ridge
Barry Jenkins, Moonlight
Kenneth Lonergan, Manchester by the Sea
Denis Villeneuve, Arrival
 
The directing category is often the indicator of what movie will win Best Picture, but this year it may actually be the reverse. Every time there has been an award show La La Land has walked away with the night’s biggest prize. La La Land has also tied the record for the most Oscar nominations of all time with Titanic and All About Eve. It seems that every person eligible to vote for an award loves La La Land. Not only that, but Damien Chazelle just won the Directors Guild award, which coincidently contains many of the same voting members who will be picking the Academy Award for best director. 
 
Who Should Win: The director of Moonlight, Barry Jenkins, has the best chance of taking the night's honor from Chazelle. Jenkins' movie deals with much deeper themes and is more artistic, even poetic, in its storytelling. His story is also incredibly original, I can’t think of any other movie with a gay black male character as the lead, let alone one that is hiding his sexuality in a poor, urban setting. Jenkins was also able to get magnificent performances out of all of his actors including a few without much–if any–experience on the big screen.
 
Who Will Win: Damen Chazelle has the edge due to La La Land's visual storytelling, the terrific performances from his lead actors (both of whom are nominated for their acting), along with all the awards the movie has already won. He is able to gracefully switch the tone of the movie between terrific musical numbers and softer, emotional moments at his will. We've seen many people try to make quality movie musicals, but very few are compared to one of the all-time greats Singing in the Rain. Additionally this movie doesn't come from Broadway or some other adaptation; this is a completely original musical. That kind of creation, storytelling, visual spectacle, and the fact that everyone in Hollywood loves Chazelle’s style are all the reasons why he will win.
 
On Friday – the big one – Best Picture

ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
Viola Davis, Fences
Naomie Harris, Moonlight
Nicole Kidman, Lion
Octavia Spencer, Hidden Figures
Michelle Williams, Manchester by the Sea

Any other year Michelle Williams would have won the Oscar. Williams only has four scenes in the movie after all, and gives a heartbreaking performance as the ex-wife of Casey Affleck’s character in Manchester by the Sea. She matches and reflects the pain of the lead actor and elevates his performance, which is the true job of any supporting actor.  Not only that, but she's been nominated three other times so some might say she is due, but it doesn't look like it was meant to be. 
 
Who Will Win: That is because the award for supporting actress is the biggest lock of the night. Viola Davis is 100% guaranteed to win this award, and she's deserving of an Oscar, but she should be in the lead performance category. She has just as much screen time and importance to the story as her co-star Denzel Washington. However, nominees are allowed to pick which category they compete in. You could argue that Fences revolves solely around her husband's character, Troy and that is why she considers herself a supporting actress. But the bigger reason for this decision may have been due to her 2008 loss for Doubt and her 2011 loss for The Help. It's possible she got in her own head and thought she wouldn't be able to win Best Actress. 
 
Who Should Win: Not only did Viola Davis give a better performance than any of her female counterparts competing in the lead category, she may have given the best performance of the year. Davis was amazing in this movie and she's had an amazing career so far. This Oscar is a long time coming. 

ACTRESS IN A LEADING ROLE
Isabelle Huppert, Elle
Ruth Negga, Loving
Natalie Portman, Jackie
Emma Stone, La La Land
Meryl Streep, Florence Foster Jenkins
 
With Viola Davis not competing as a best actress, who is going to win the big award? The best actress category is filled with nuanced performances such as the one from Ruth Negga in Loving. Even Natalie Portman's performance in Jackie is softer performance than the category is used to, despite the notorious Boston accent she has to put on. So all the sudden the competition comes down to Emma Stone and Isabella Huppert for Best Actress. (I'm not really considering Meryl Streep because yes she is good, but do we really have to nominate her every time she stars in a movie?) 
 
My problem is it is currently impossible to see Elle. Unless you're living in New York City or LA, or happened to catch it the one week it was in theaters. I tried and I couldn't do it. I guess it's tough to get the local theaters to play a French foreign movie about a rape victim when they could just add another Lego Batman screening. So if I have to go with a performance I’ve seen, I guess I'm going with Emma Stone. I don't feel bad about the decision. She is great in La La Land and has cleaned up at the other award shows, winning at the SAGs, BAFTA, and the Golden Globes. It just would’ve been nice to see all the contenders.
 
Who Will Win: Emma Stone
Who Should Win: Emma Stone?
 
Wednesday we’ll take a look at the five men up for best directing.  

​ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE
Casey Affleck, Manchester by the Sea
Andrew Garfield, Hacksaw Ridge
Ryan Gosling, La La Land
Viggo Mortensen, Captain Fantastic
Denzel Washington, Fences
 
Usually I find myself talking about how good all the actors are in this category, but this year the nominees don’t seem as strong. The biggest indicator of this may be that Viggo Mortensen got nominated for Captain Fantastic. I actually liked the first half of Captain Fantastic a lot, but I don’t know if Mortensen’s performance is up to the usual Best Actor standard. Though if pressed I don’t know who else I would put in the fifth spot.

I really liked Ryan Gosling in La La Land (obviously). But he is up against two heavy-weight performances this year, and having gotten a lot of hate for his singing and dancing in a movie that requires a lot of singing and dancing, Gosling seems like a dark horse to win at best.

When all this Oscar talk started Casey Affleck seemed like an absolute lock to win Best Actor. Affleck played a Boston janitor who is wracked with personal demons and depression in Manchester by the Sea. He won the Golden Globe, the Critics’ Choice Award, and the BAFTA. But the further we've gotten into award season the more people are writing about his past, including sexual harassment charges, and in that light the support for his performance is waning. 
 
Other years (or other actors) may have been able to win despite all this, but it just so happens that Affleck is up against Denzel Washington, who is amazing as a sanitation worker in Fences. It was a powerful performance and one that Washington felt very comfortable in, having played the part previously on stage and winning a TONY for his role. 
 
Who Should Win: Both of these actors put on tremendous performances and each have a case when it comes to who should win. Based solely on performance I think Casey Affleck was slightly stronger, as he was somehow able to add humor in a much darker role. 
 
Who Will Win: But when it comes to the Oscars there are a lot of politics, and with two virtually equal performances and Denzel Washington being far more likable and less embroiled in scandal, I think he will win his third Oscar. 

ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
Mahershala Ali, Moonlight
Jeff Bridges, Hell or High Water
Lucas Hedges, Manchester by the Sea
Dev Patel, Lion
Michael Shannon, Nocturnal Animals
 
Who Will Win: It seems like Mahershala Ali is all but guaranteed to walk away with the win for Best Supporting Actor. Ali plays a Miami drug dealer named Juan in Moonlight and meets the film's protagonist at a very young age. His interaction with the young boy is clearly why he is a deserving nominee and winner in this category. 
 
I can't help but note that I didn't think Ali gave the strongest performer in that movie. I thought all three young actors who played the movie’s protagonist at different stages in his life were comparable if not better than Ali in this movie. However, none of these young actors have the resume and career that Ali does, so I think he became the de facto nominee in a movie full of potential Best Supporting actors. 
 
Who Should Win: Lucas Hedges turned out a terrific performance in Manchester by the Sea even if it wasn't as meaty as Casey Affleck's. But God help me my favorite role had to be Jeff Bridges in Hell or High Water. Bridges has the advantage of having considerably more screen time than Ali in Moonlight. But Jeff Bridges’ performance is also just more fun, and there's a broader range to it. He has moments of sincerity mixed with moments of seriousness and is funny throughout the movie. 
 
Up next I’ll take a look at Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress

50 Shades Darker knows what kind of movie it is and what its audience is looking for. After all, this is a movie about female sexuality, from a woman who just wanted to imagine a kinkier world of Edward and Bella and share it with the world via fan fiction. So why not give the people what they want? And I'll tell you now, by the amount of hooting and hollering going on in the theater, I would say the audience got it.
 
50 Shades Darker takes place a couple months after the events of Fifty Shades of Grey. Anastasia Steele (Dakota Johnson) has moved on and is now working for a different company. But Christian Grey (Jamie Dornan) hasn't been able to let go and will do anything to get her back, even if that means giving up his lifestyle of S&M for a more vanilla kind of relationship. 
 
Both actors do better this time around, and for the first half of the movie they actually possess a little chemistry. In terms of on-screen presence, Dakota Johnson is definitely the strength of the movie. No question she's a very charming actress and is able to vary her performance from meek to emboldened depending on what that page of the script she was on. While she shares some sparks in the beginning of the movie with her co-star, somehow by the end of the movie it runs out, as does Jamie Dornan's sense of believability. For whatever reason Dornan regresses to his previous performance-style and he becomes not only stiff but a bit comical. 
 
Hands down the best part about the movie is the soundtrack. By now most of us have heard the Taylor Swift and Zayn Malik song, “I Don't Wanna Live Forever” but the entire soundtrack is full of sultry, contemporary hits. Any time there is a long shot of a romantic setting or our lead characters are about to bang, the filmmakers slide in a song to let us know how exactly to feel. Normally this would annoy me, but the music was so good and matched the tone so well I’m going to give it a pass because it accomplished exactly what it set out to do. Kudos. 

The movie does its best to inject a little conflict into the story: some past exes are introduced, possible romantic rivals, and something about a helicopter. But everything gets explained away so fast that it’s almost like director James Foley is telling you, “Listen we know they're going to be fine, so let me just get back to the sex.”
 
We all know what you came here to see. It’s the same thing I was looking for when I turned on HBO as a young teenager, and that is some softcore porn. And this movie has it in spades. But if I can offer one suggestion, I would tell you not to sit next to your older co-worker and her husband who happened to also get movie passes from your radio station. If this happens, then you will have to watch him squeeze her upper thigh every time it’s about to get kinky. (As we were walking out they told me they really enjoyed the movie.)
 
Without a doubt the weirdest part of the movie, weirder than whatever happened in the Red Room and the amount of Dakota Johnson breasts we see, is that for some reason in his childhood bedroom Christian Grey has a movie poster for The Chronicles of Riddick. This is a character that grew up in a lavish home where he could have anything. So why The Chronicles of Riddick? It must have been clear from a young age that he was really into torturing himself. (D; C+ if you are into this sort of thing)

We are a little over three weeks from the Oscars and there is a chance that you may not be able to see all the nominees in the time that remains. I would go out on a limb and say there are some of you that haven’t seen ANY Oscar nominated movies. With such little time and so many movies to see, allow me to break down what’s worth prioritizing.

Honorable Mention – Hidden Figures

A long shot to walk away with any awards on February 23rd, but Hidden Figures is delightful. Currently in theaters this movie did just happen to win the SAG Award for Best Ensemble, so you could make a case for it as a dark horse contender, but it’s up against some heavier hitters. Still, no one does inspirational in a lighthearted way quite like Disney does. Hidden Figures also happens to boast three terrific performances from its trio of leading ladies. I have never before been worried whether or not John Glenn made it back to Earth after his orbit, but while watching this there was a moment of doubt and that is a credit to the movie makers.

5) La La Land

Okay let’s get this one out of the way because it’s the most obvious movie you should see. For starters, La La Land is the odds-on favorite to win the Oscar for Best Picture. It also happens to be the movie that everyone loves to hate, due in part to the fact that it is the front runner for so many awards and people love hating on the favorite (go Falcons). It doesn’t help that a ton of movie snobs (myself included) have been yelling from the rooftops, trying to tell you how good this movie is. La La Land is still in theaters and probably will be for the next month, but if you want to be involved in the Oscar conversation you have to see this movie.

4) O.J. Made In America

I am one of those people that thought, “Well, I saw The People vs O.J. Simpson, do I really need to watch O.J. Made in America?” While both series deal in the same subject matter, O.J. Made in America takes a more in depth look into the subject. The series expands on his rise to fame before the murders and the aftermath. The last episode focuses entirely on what happened after O.J.’s victory in court, both personally and how the court case affected the country. While the total run time is a daunting seven and a half hours, it is currently streaming on both Hulu and the ESPN app. Not only that but it is the favorite to win Best Documentary (3 to 10 odds).

3) Manchester by the Sea

Manchester by the Sea is certainly in contention for the night’s biggest prize, but it is much more likely to win Oscars for Best Original Screenplay and Best Actor for Casey Affleck, though Denzel is catching up to him. Manchester by the Sea is currently in theaters but at 50 to 1 odds to win Best Picture this movie will be in increasingly fewer theaters as time goes by, so see it while you can.

2) Moonlight

If any movie is going to beat La La Land it is going to be Moonlight. Not only is it currently sitting on 14 to 1 odds to win Best Picture, but it also happens to be the favorite to win a Best Supporting Actor for Mahershala Ali, Best Adapted Screenplay, and is a serious contender for Best Director. If your goal is to see all the Best Picture nominees, Moonlight should be one of the first two you see, possibly even priority one given the limited number of theaters it is playing in.

1) Zootopia