Happy Awards Season

The Golden Globe nominations came out this morning, and something that I can't ever remember happening before has occurred. Ever since I started paying attention to awards season and seriously weighing the contenders against each other, the Golden Globes could be counted on to deliver a couple of nominations that felt like they came totally out of left field, and could only be explained by their wacky categorization rules (film nominees are split between Drama and Comedy or Musical categories) or their infamous reputation for being easily persuaded by aggressive campaigners.

Well, this year that didn't happen. Every single nominee in the film categories looks like an actual contender for the Oscars in a few months. The Comedy or Musical categories usually feature much slimmer pickings and often outright laughable choices like "The Tourist" and "Alice in Wonderland," but this year we've got "Amervian Hustle," "Her," "Inside Llewyn Davis," "Nebraska," and "The Wolf of Wall Street" in the Best Picture mix, the strongest group of nominees I've ever seen here. Even if you argue that some of the picks are dark horses, like "Philomena" or "Rush," these are pictures that have their supporters this season. Going through the acting categories, I couldn't find a single name that didn't deserve to be there, and quite a few I'm happy to see weren't overlooked, like Daniel Bruhl for "Rush." The "Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture - Comedy or Musical" is often a mess, but this year it's full of great work from smaller films: Julie Delpy in "Before Midnight," Greta Gerwig in "Frances Ha," and Julia Loius-Dreyfuss in "Enough Said."

The Golden Globes have definitely been getting more discerning and more serious about their choices in recent years, but it has to be said that we're look at a very good year for motion pictures. It's hard to feel bad that "Fruitvale Station" or "Blue is the Warmest Color" got shut out when you're looking at so many, many more good movies that did get recognition. Obvious studio awards bait like "the Butler," "Saving Mr. Banks," "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty" have been losing traction as the season progresses, though they're still in the conversation. A recent Variety article estimated that there are at least twenty films with possible Best Picture Oscar chances this year, and the Best Actor race is the strongest in years. It's been a running joke that Leonardo DiCaprio is overdue for an Oscar win, but it's not clear if he's even getting a nomination this year. The various Critics Circle awards have started coming out, and there's been a wonderful variety in the top picks. Boston and Washington D.C. picked "12 Years a Slave." New York picked "American Hustle." Los Angeles declared a tie between "Her" and "Gravity."

2013 has come up with such a bumper crop of good choices, it's difficult to make a bad one. The AFI Award nominations usually have one or two obvious older-skewing legacy picks that have no Oscar chances whatsoever. This year, the only weak link on their Top Ten list is "Saving Mr. Banks," which can be assured an Oscar nomination for Emma Thompson for Best Actress, and is very much in the running for a Best Picture nomination, considering the Academy's usual penchant for films about filmmaking and populist crowd-pleasers. And though there are certainly frontrunners this year, notably "12 Years a Slave" and "American Hustle," there's a nice lack of consensus that's making it difficult to tell who's likely to end up with a spot - especially since the Academy pulled out five nominees for "Amour" last year. We're going to end up with longer lists of snubs than nominees this time for sure.

This year I'm way, way behind on the contenders, so I'm not really invested in who wins and who loses. I'm just enjoying the ride, and looking forward to lots and lots of good movies coming my way very soon. I love award seasons like this because none of the films feel like obligations. Even titles like "The Butler," which look like such by-the-book prestige projects to the cynical eye, are firmly on my to-see list. Lee Daniels of "Precious" directed this one, remember, and Forest Whitaker just snagged himself a Screen Actors Guild nomination. Mediocre movies like "Diana" and "Jobs," which might have elbowed their way into the conversation with some good campaigning in previous years had their hopes dashed months ago. It's no wonder less visible prestige pics like "Grace of Monaco" and "Monuments Men" opted to delay their release dates and get out of the way of the scrum.

A competitive year also tends to make the awards themselves more fun too. At least, they're more fun for a movie geek like me who does still care about who wins and loses.
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