The list of nominees is provided here.
BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Michael Fassbender-12 Years a Slave
Runner Up: Ryan Gosling-The Place Beyond the Pines
This was the toughest category to pick, as this year had so many great performances. In the end, though, Fassbender's Edwin Epps is such a terrifying, but at the same time vulnerable and real character, that I felt he truly merited the award. This role is powerful and unlike any role he's done before. Fassbender is a tremendous and talented actor with a great career ahead of him and Steve McQueen truly brings out the best in him.
BEST ACTION/FIGHT SEQUENCE
Pacific Rim-The Hong Kong Rumble
Runner Up: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug-Barrel Chase
A great year for action cinema included several creative fights, including a fight on top of a 300 mph train and a long chase and fight sequence along a river wherein many of the combatants are riding in barrels. In that regard, the winner; giant robots fighting giant monsters; may seem rather straightforward. Pacific Rim's second act fight, however, is anything but, as it makes the most of its premise. Easily the highlight of the film, this fight has great effects, intensity and clever attacks from both robots (Boat bat!) and monsters (Acid breath!). What makes this the winner is scale. More than any other film, this truly feels like a battle of titans, and that was enough to put it ahead for the win this year.
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Gravity-Emmanuel Lubezki
Runner Up: 12 Years a Slave-Sean Bobbitt
A very clear choice. Gravity's cinematography is beautiful and awe inspiring. The film has many long takes with lots of movement and beautiful imagery. Sure a lot of it is CGI, but that does not change the amount of time or effort that went into coordinating the movements of the camera and the movements of the actors to create an image that could hold people's attention for minutes at a time.
BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug-Eric Reynolds, David Clayton, Joe Letteri, and Eric Saindon
Runner Up: Gravity-Tim Webber, Chris Lawrence, David Shirk, Neil Corbould, Nikki Penny
I am a bit disappointed with the overuse of CGI in films today, and I feel as though The Hobbit films are the most recent culprits of using CGI when they do not have to. However, I must still admit that their effects are almost universally excellent. While almost is a key word, there are definitely some wonky effects in the film, what really seals this category for the film is the titular dragon. Smaug is not only a good looking effect, he is a photorealistic, majestic and truly awe inspiring creation. It is, in my opinion, the greatest CGI creature ever created, and that more than makes up for a few iffy effects here and there in the film.
BEST COSTUME DESIGN
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire-Trish Summerville
Runner Up: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug-Bob Buck, Lesley Burkes Harding, Ann Maskrey, and Richard Taylor
The Hunger Games: Catching Fire proved to be an improvement over the first film in many ways, one of which was in its design aspects. Catching Fire fleshed out the world in a way the first film failed to, and the costumes were a huge part of that. Whether it be to establish the glitzy and gaudy capitol, or the dreary and poor districts, the costumes were an attractive and cleverly designed window into the world of the film, if not a subtle one.
BEST MAKEUP AND HAIRSTYLING
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug-Peter King, Richard Taylor, and Rick Findlater
Runner Up: American Hustle-Evelyne Noraz and Lori McCoy-Bell
The Hobbit continues The Lord of the Rings' tradition of excellent makeup and effects. From the dwarves, to the men of Lake Town to (some of) the orcs, the makeup in these films creates characters with unique and personal looks and help to set the world of Middle Earth apart from other fantasy worlds. While I wish they would rely on makeup more often than they do, I cannot deny that the makeup that is used is incredibly strong.
BEST SOUND MIXING
Gravity-Niv Adiri, Christopher Benstead, Skip Lievsay, and Chris Munro
Runner Up: All is Lost-Gillian Arthur, Micah Bloomberg, Steve Boeddeker, and Brandon Proctor
The sound work in Gravity is brilliantly quiet. The film takes advantage of the "No sound in space" rule to great effect, utilizing near silence to create haunting sequences where we can hear very little. A huge part of sound is knowing when to hold back, and Gravity shows that it knows how to do that very well.
BEST SOUND EDITING
All is Lost-Steve Boeddeker and Richard Hymns
Runner Up: Pacific Rim-Scott Martin Gershin
All is Lost has almost no dialogue. As such, the soundscape of the film is filled with all of the little sounds that surround the lead character throughout his journey. Perhaps it is more noticeable due to the lack of dialogue, but the film's sound work is all around incredible, complex, and very detailed (it came very close to winning mixing as well).
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Lupita Nyong'o-12 Years a Slave
Runner Up: Jennifer Lawrence-American Hustle
Lupita Nyong'o appears about halfway through 12 Years a Slave and immediately draws the viewers sympathy. Quiet and subtle, Nyong'o's performance is filled with sadness and draws the viewer's empathy immediately. One night-time scene with Chiwetel Ejiofor shows just how much Nyong'o committed to the role and truly became Patsy.
BEST FILM EDITING
The Wolf of Wall Street-Thelma Schoonmaker
Runner Up: Captain Phillips-Christopher Rouse
It may surprise people that a 3-hour long film is winning best Editing, and there are many who believe that the film is less a story than a series of anecdotes of poor behavior from adult males. In truth, though, this is a film that is made in the editing room. Schoonmaker, one of the greatest editors of all time, truly shows her skills here, keeping the film flowing through the life of Jordan Belfort without feeling like it's just a series of anecdotes. It is truly the editing that gives this film its forward momentum and allows the film to become more than it otherwise could have been.
BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug-Dan Hennah
Runner Up: 12 Years a Slave-Adam Stockhausen
The Desolation of Smaug added several new locations to the world of Middle Earth. The earthy and majestic land of the wood elves. The twisted and run-down lake town. The empty and magnificent dwarven halls. These locations are all beautifully and brilliantly realized in such a way that shows the amount of care and effort that went into the creation of these films.
BEST ORIGINAL SCORE
Man of Steel-Hans Zimmer
Runner Up: All is Lost-Alexander Ebert
The score for Man of Steel is inspiring and heroic, everything the film tried (and arguably failed) to achieve. The score is easily the best part of the film, and raises the film up higher than it would otherwise have been. It may follow in the footsteps of previous superhero films, whereas All is Lost and Place Beyond the Pines really forged their own path, but Man of Steel's score easily contributed the most to its host film and expanded and improved upon previous similar ventures.
BEST ORIGINAL SONG
Stay Alive-The Secret Life of Walter Mitty-Jose Gonzalez
Runner Up: We Own It-Fast and Furious 6-2 Chainz and Wiz Khalifa
This category is perhaps the most dissociated from the quality of the films involved. Many of these songs play over the credits of their films, rather than in the films themselves. As such I was able to pick the winner simply by listening to all of the nominees over and over. In the end, the choice was simple: Stay Alive was the song I enjoyed the most. It's a great song and it fits within the film as well, which is a real added bonus.
BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
12 Years a Slave-John Ridley
Runner Up: The Wolf of Wall Street-Terence Winter
Adapted screenplay is a much weaker category than original this year. That does not, however, take away from the accomplishment of the screenplay for 12 Years a Slave. Managing to tackle a tough concept and treat it with realism, rather than manipulation. This film knows you agree that slavery is bad and does not try to force it down your throat, rather it tries to simply show a more full and accurate view of what this life was like. It's a different method than is usually used, and one that is even more effective.
BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
The Place Beyond the Pines-Derek Cianfrance, Ben Coccio and Darius Marder
Runner Up: The Way Way Back-Nat Faxon and Jim Rash
I really respect ambition in film, to the point where I will forgive a movies flaws if they try to accomplish something truly great and unique. The Place Beyond the Pines is far from flawless, but like last year's Cloud Atlas, it is an ambitious and unique film that I simply have to respect. Whereas I gave the lion's share of Atlas' credit to the directors who took on this job and made the stories all feel seamless, for Pines the credit really must go to the writing. A gutsy and unique script which will prove to be a challenge for some people simply due to its structure, the story of the film really impressed me. It is put together carefully and to the filmmaker's vision. It tells the best story, rather than the easiest one, and I have a lot of respect for that.
BEST ACTRESS
Sandra Bullock-Gravity
Runner Up: Melonie Diaz-Fruitvale Station
This category was tough this year. I simply did not see enough films with strong lead female performances, and thus had a few possible cases of category fraud in order to keep from nominating mediocre performances. Nonetheless, Bullock's performance in Gravity is a powerful performance that manages to keep the audience from suspending their disbelief, even in the case of some really bad dialogue. And she anchors much of the movie by herself, which makes it even more impressive.
BEST ACTOR
Chiwetel Ejiofor-12 Years a Slave
Runner Up: Matthew McConaughey-Dallas Buyers Club
For much of 12 Years a Slave protagonist Solomon Northup, played by Ejiofor, is a quiet observer to many other, more outspoken and powerful characters. It is entirely to Ejiofor's credit, then, that Northup never loses the audience's attention. It is a subtle performance that, nonetheless, is never stolen, even by fantastic actors who could steal scenes even from other talented actors. Ejiofor becomes Northup, and we feel for him the entire way. We hope with him, and we see him as a real person, rather than a character, and that is truly the greatest praise you can give an actor.
BEST ENSEMBLE CAST
12 Years a Slave-Ejiofor, Fassbender, Nyong'o, Paulson, Benedict Cumberbatch, Paul Dano, Paul Giamatti, Brad Pitt, Alfre Woodard
Runner Up: The Way Way Back-Rockwell, Collette, Liam James, Steve Carell, Allison Janney, Annasophia Robb, Maya Rudolph
The cast of 12 Years a Slave is huge, and every actor delivers a wonderful performance. This is the kind of film that I added this category for: a movie with too many performances for me to nominate individually, but one wherein almost all of the performances deserve nominations. 12 Years a Slave's cast easily stands out, as these strong actors all deliver awesome performances, some even the best of their career.
BEST DIRECTOR
Steve McQueen-12 Years a Slave
Runner Up: Alfonso Cuaron-Gravity
McQueen's direction on this film is more mainstream than his previous efforts. This is not saying much, however, and still leaves a film that is much, much more subtle than just about any other "important" topic films. One has only to look at the hanging scene to realize how powerful McQueen's restrained hand can be, and how that truly sets him apart, in a good way, from many other directors. He trusts his audience, and that creates a truly great connection.
BEST PICTURE
12 Years a Slave
Runner Up: The Wolf of Wall Street
I'm sure this is not a surprise by this point, as the film had won 6 awards before this one. However, often when there is an obvious winner, there is a reason. 12 Years a Slave is easily the greatest and most powerful film of the year. I unfortunately have not seen Her as of this point, but otherwise 12 Years a Slave has very little competition for this category. I hope it repeats this feat at the Oscars, but I still have a few films I missed, like Her and Nebraska, and will be sure to let all of you readers know if this film gets unseated in any way, but that would take a truly tremendous feat.
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