Time Out looks to awards season

Who we would like to pick up prizes at this years BAFTAs and Oscars

Well, the BBC World Cinema Awards are in the bag (well done ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’!), and the Golden Globes, well, we think they may have happened in a cabin in the Mojave desert, or something, but the BAFTAs are just round the corner, then shortly after is the Oscars.

Daniel Day-Lewis seems to have sewn up the Best Actor award for both with his fire-and-brimstone central performance in PT Anderson’s masterful ‘There Will Be Blood’. When we spoke to him recently, he admitted to taking quite an insouciant approach to the role.

If, through some crazy, crazy administrative blunder and/or natural disaster, DDL doesn’t stroll to glory, we’d like to see Ulrich Mühe pick up a BAFTA for his role in ‘The Lives of Others’ and Viggo Mortensen pick up an Oscar for ‘Eastern Promises’ – contrary to critical opinion, we rather enjoyed his Russian accent.

It’s a sad fact that there haven’t been many great female lead performances this year (perhaps due to a surfeit of male-dominated filmmaking?), but Julie Christie must be a shoo-in for her heartbreaking turn in Sarah Polley’s ‘Away from Her’. As long as neither Ellen Page receives an award for her precocious turn in ‘Juno’ nor Cate Blanchett is given the nod for re-stepping into Queen Elizabeth I’s shoes for ‘Elizabeth: The Golden Age’, we shall all sleep soundly.

Best Film and Best Director are difficult calls for both the BAFTAs and Oscars, but it’s really a two-horse race between PT Anderson and the newly-revitalised Coen brothers for their scorched neo-Western, ‘No Country for Old Men’. Read what Joel and Ethan had to tell us about their experiences making the film. For the BAFTAs, we wouldn’t mind seeing Paul Greengrass given the nod for ‘The Bourne Ultimatum’, and for the Oscars, we think Julian Schnabel could be in with real a shot (read our interview with him) for 'The Diving Bell and the Butterfly'.

Looking over the nominees again, we think there were snubs a-plenty. Australian Andrew Dominik certainly deserves credit for his direction of ‘The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford’ (read our interview with Dominik). Similarly, 84-year-old stalwart Sidney Lumet showed he’s still got the magic touch with his bleaker-than-bleak thriller, ‘Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead’ (read what he had to say). And while we’re on directors, there was no love for Todd Haynes for his glorious sort-of Dylan biopic, ‘I’m Not There’ (read more).

Check back to see who picked up what.

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