Thursday, February 9, 2012
Oscar Countdown: Art Direction & Costumes
Posted by Curt Holman @Curt_Holman on Thu, Feb 9, 2012 at 9:47 AM
In advance of the Academy Award ceremony on Feb. 26, Screen Grab will predict the winners in all categories.
Art Direction: The Artist, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, Hugo, Midnight in Paris, War Horse. Art Direction is kind of a combined category that represents both production design and set decoration. Previous year's awards have recognized fantastical films like Avatar and Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland and Sweeney Todd, so Deathly Hallows Part 2 might have one last shot here. Like Costumes, this might be the kind of category that pits the two most-nominated films against each other. The Artist superbly replicates the sets and locales of Hollywood circa 1930, while Hugo presents a kind of fairy-tale vision of Paris from about the same decade.
Prediction: Hugo's two Italian art directors, Dante Ferretti and Francesca Lo Schiavo, are both movie veterans who've won Oscars before, so I think they have the edge over The Artist's relative unknowns.
Costume Design: Anonymous, The Artist, Hugo, Jane Eyre, W.E. Who would have guessed that a film directed by Madonna would be nominated for something other than Best Song? Given the history of the category, it may not be a long shot, given W.E.'s interest in King Edward VIII's abdication of the British throne, and the categories fondness for royalty: the winners from 2006-2009 were Marie Antoinette, Elizabeth: The Golden Age, The Duchess and The Young Victoria. Incidentally, Hugo's Sandy Powell has three Oscars already.
Prediction: The Artist, I guess. I don't know anything about clothes and this category often recognizes films snubbed in other categories, so anything goes. The Artist has more historical formalwear than Hugo's street urchin outfits, so I'd give it the inside track.
Incidentally, the New York Times has an interesting article about the nominees in the "Crafts" categories (Art Direction, Costume and Make-Up) which mentions the challenges for The Artist to find costumes that would look good in black and white, and how Hugo planned around the high-def 3-D cinematography.
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