If I Were An Academy Voter - 2004 Part II

Best Art Direction
Academy Winner - The Aviator
My Pick - Finding Neverland

Commentary - Finding Neverland's set directors and designers perfectly captured the time period, as well as the quaitness and colloquialism of J.M Barrie's world. While The Aviator was good, I did not think its sets were anything special.

Best Cinematography

Academy Winner - The Aviator

My Pick - A Very Long Engagement

Commentary - This was a tough one for me, but A Very Long Engagement was so beautifully shot, that even The Aviator could beat it, in my humble at least.

Best Costume Design
Academy Winner - The Aviator
My Pick - Finding Neverland
Commentary - Damn, it must really seem like I hate The Aviator. I acutally did appreciate the movie, but found that all of these technical awards seemed to have better competitors. For me, I thought that the classical, but not over the top costumes of Finding Neverland made more of an impact, than the 20th c. garb of The Aviator.

Best Film Editing
Academy Winner - The Aviator
My Pick - Million Dollar Baby
Commentary - Ok, so I may be getting a little ridiculous, but even though I love me some Thelma, I don't see how that overlong, repetitive (yes I know there was a purpose for it, but it got on my nerves) film managed to win film editing. I would have gone with Sideways, but alas, I guess I'll go for my second place vote of Million Dollar Baby, which never lingered, which I think helped provide the emotional knockout (pun intended).

Best Makeup
Academy Winner/My Pick - Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events
Commentary - Out of these three nominees, I think the Academy got it right for the excellent makeup job of an otherwise eh? movie.

Best Original Score
Academy Winner/My Pick - Jan A.P. Kaczmarek "Finding Neverland"
Commentary - The other four movies are complete crap, so I think the Academy made the right choice with this buoyant and effective score.

Best Original Song
Academy Winner - "al otro lado del rio" from The Motorcycle Diaries
My Pick - "Accidentally In Love" from "Shrek 2"

Commentary - Ok, this is a personal vote because for me and my friends, Accidentally in Love is a great sing-along song that is fun to belt out at the top of your lungs. It may not be an informed or quality based choice, but I like it anyway.

Best Sound Mixing

Academy Winner - Ray

My Pick - The Incredibles

Commentary - I understand why Ray won this award, but the sound, the crispness and clarity that filled the theater during The Incredibles, was state of the art in sound design.

Best Sound Editing

Academy Winner/My Pick - The Incredibles

Commentary - See Above

Best Visual Effects

Academy Winner/My Pick - Spider-Man 2 

Commentary -  Definitely the best of the franchise to date, the arms of Doc Oc were cool enough to win the award, not including all of Spider-Man's cool, high flying tricks.