I really liked The Favourite. I would love to see Roma win Best Picture.
Here are the Rotten Tomatoes scores for Best Picture. The first number is the critics percentage, followed by the audience score (in percent):
Black Panther 97, 79
Black Klansman N/A, 57
Bohemian Rhapsody 62, 88
The Favourite 94, 62
Green Book 81, 94
Roma 96, 75
A Star Is Born 90, 80
Vice 66, 56
The only one I have not seen yet is Black Klansman. For me, I think this list of Best Picture nominees is slightly weaker than usual.
I’ve only seen Black Panther. I wouldn’t give it any awards—good fighting maybe? Special effects?
I’d love to see Bohemian Rhapsody win. I can’t remember when I’ve enjoyed a movie more.
Yes, but I have the feeling that what people are enjoying is Queen’s music, not the movie-making, if you know what I mean.
@JanieWalker I’m aware of the concept of screeners - they tend to float around the dorms at this time of year. 
And I appreciate your impartiality. But I’m not sure that everyone is as diligent. The SAG award ballots are given to all active paid-up members of SAG-AFTRA which number over 100K. The Academy, in contrast, is about 7200 members, of whom ~1200 are actors. Even with the recent attempts to diversify, I’d posit that the Academy is not a statistically accurate sample size of all industry professionals.
If TPTB truly thought that voters would give equal consideration to films regardless of release date, there would not be the mad scramble to secure December release dates, not to mention the shameless “For Your Consideration” ads in Variety, et. al. Just my opinion, though.
I think Rami Malek probably is the favorite to win Best Actor.
@skieurope - first, it’s a shame there are screeners floating around your dorms. That’s a serious violation by the person who was mailed those screeners…we are supposed to guard them closely, and they are for the eyes of the voters only. Each year, more and more screeners are sent digitally, with timestamps and ways to track how many times they’ve been seen and by what IP address. This is a good idea in order to prevent theft and unauthorized sharing. In this day and age, physical copies aren’t necessary (and a waste of money to create and send).
As for voting – yes, the Academy members vote for all categories, regardless if the member is a director or an actor, etc. That being said, only actors nominate actors, only directors nominate directors, etc. But then yes, once the nominations are in place, the voters vote in all categories.
I am not convinced there is a mad scramble to secure December dates. Maybe it’s a feeling of wanting it to be considered for this year as opposed to next, just to move things along…? I could be wrong. The “For Your Consideration” ads pop up for the SAG Awards when the nominations themselves are being figured out, not just when the voters vote. It might be the same for the Oscars.? As someone who one year was on the SAG committee that chooses which films and which performances will be nominated, there are so many screeners and so many performances to watch within a very short amount of time, that I had no idea when the movie I was screening at the time had come out, nor did I care. I had 60+ movies to get through between late October and mid-December that year, in order to vote on which films etc should be nominated (and then I voted again for the chosen nominees in early January).
Also, for me and for those SAG members I know, we don’t go to the movies much during the year because we know we are going to have the best of the best delivered right to us for free later in the year. I did go see a couple movies this year my teens wanted to see, and I did see some things on Netflix, but beyond that, I never go to the movies anymore. This year, only Vice and The Wife were publicly released later than my screeners arrived. I think most of the movies were released earlier in the year…?
Things may be different for those Academy members who attend the premiers of movies – of course some movies they will therefore naturally see later than earlier. But I don’t think most Academy members go to all premiers…? So I still think most of them see all the screeners at once, just like the SAG members do. And they have far less to sit through, as SAG Awards include TV series as well. I don’t know this for sure though, just postulating based on my knowledge of the SAG Awards process.
I loved Roma. Beautifully shot. The connection to the childhood of director Alfonso Cuaron brought it alive for me.
We loved Roma too. The quality of the sound was fabulous (up for an award in that category) as well as the photography. Very moving.
I saw The Favorite today and loved it. The three actresses are fabulous. The run the show. I can see how people could hate it - it takes a lot of liberties, but I think it gets the emotional truth right. You have to be willing to put up with a certain amount of artiness (chapters, break dancing to a minuet), but I found that mostly it worked. I’d watched “The First Churchills” the Masterpiece Theater drama that covers a lot of the same material, so it was fun to compare the approaches.
I posted in the Seen Any Good Movies thread, echoing what @Midwest67 said.
^ Yes, to @gosmom description of this year’s Live Shorts. I was so uncomfortable I felt a strong urge to walk out.
I didn’t see Short Docs (not playing), but saw Animated Shorts. I liked one very much and the rest were just okay (IMO).
Nevertheless, Animated Shorts was a welcome palate cleanser, along with a visit to the theater BAR, after Live Shorts.
Wow. Rough. Very, very rough.
I have only seen Roma of the Beat picture movies. For some not clear reason I haven’t been to the movies much this past year. I did go see the other night the Oscar Shorts documentaries. I agree with @gosmom End Game would get my vote.
Some of my favorite awards are going to be awarded during commercial breaks.
That annoyed me too, @Nrdsb4. Why don’t they just cut out the lame banter between award presenters, which would probably give them 15 minutes to play with, during which time these professionals who are at the very top of their games could get 20 lousy seconds to make an acceptance speech. These are the folks who usually give quick, gracious speeches. If there’s no host, won’t that cut several minutes of monologue?
I thought the audience members used the endless commercial breaks to get to the bathroom. So now the winning cinematographer and film editor have to watch a stream of folks in the aisle from the podium? Try making a halfway-decent movie without good cinematography and film editing. Those are what make them movies!
Sometimes change is dumb.
You would think that without a host this year, there would be plenty of time to include these awards in the telecast.
Looks like all awards will be included in the broadcast after all.
I am not a good judge of Oscar movies so Roma will probably win (even though it put me to sleep). Of the past winners I also disliked The Shape if Water, Moonlight, Birdman and The Artist. So what do I know??
Is anyone else having a hard time going to older, independent, Art Deco, etc., theaters that do NOT have those large comfy reclining seats (as well as no heads blocking your view of the screen)? I saw Stan and Ollie today at an Art Deco theater that had the old velvet seats. Loved the movie but was agonizingly uncomfortable throughout…