And the 2015 Oscar Goes To...

After thinking I would never get through this year's Oscars roster, New England was covered in heaps of snow and I stayed indoors and marathoned my way through the year's finest films. Without further ado, here's my second annual wishlist of who should get a golden statue on February 22nd.

Best Picture & Best Director: Boyhood is the lock for Best Picture. It was a unique, never-before-seen revelation of a movie and the sheer audacity of making a movie over twelve years and crafting something meaningful out of that experience is worth a dozen Oscars for both the movie and director, Richard Linklater. In terms of the other nominees, the only one that gave me as much of a thrill would be Whiplash, but it simply doesn't stand a chance against the Boyhood juggernaut. For Director, Linklater is the only one I can imagine giving the award to. While Wes Anderson has made many fine films, and it's great that the Academy is finally giving him some love in this category, The Grand Budapest Hotel was certainly not my favorite Anderson movie. Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu is the only really stiff competition here, for creating the technically brilliant, one-shot marvel of Birdman, but Linklater still has the edge for creating something both skillful and stirring.

Best Actress: Julianne Moore is guaranteed the Oscar, and she fully deserves it for her devastating performance in Still Alice. However, the women she is up against also put forward simply astonishing performances, and I would be perfectly happy to give the Oscar to any one of them. This category is an abundance of riches, and while Moore will walk away with the prize, I urge you to watch all 5 performances, because they are indescribably wonderful. Reese Witherspoon and Marion Cotillard showcased exactly why they have already won Oscars through their jawdropping performances in Wild and Two Days, One Night. And after seeing their phenomenal work in The Theory of Everything and Gone Girl, this certainly won't be the last time Felicity Jones and Rosamund Pike are nominated. Check these women out, because they are going to be astonishing us for a long while yet.

Best Actor: This one's a doozy. It's shaping up to be a battle between Michael Keaton for Birdman and Eddie Redmayne for The Theory of Everything. While early on it seemed like Keaton was the favorite, the tide has been shifting in Redmayne's favor (much to the chagrin of fellow Brit and nominee, Benedict Cumberbatch, I'm sure). Keaton is the acting veteran who is overdue for recognition, while Redmayne is the bright, young thing. In the end, I think the Academy's penchant for dramatic performances about people with disabilities will win out over its need to celebrate a comic performance by someone who has been in the business for a long while. Given the choice, I would pick Redmayne myself, as his performance moved me far more than Keaton's. The only other actor I would secretly root for in this category would be Steve Carell, but that's more because I want Michael Scott to get an Academy Award. I'm still smarting over Bradley Cooper's nomination - while he does a fine job in American Sniper, it is unthinkable that David Oyelowo would go unrecognized for his work in Selma, or that Cooper could also edge out Timothy Spall's performance in Mr. Turner. Perhaps this field needs to be expanded like Best Picture.

Best Supporting Actor & Actress: These are pretty clearly going to J.K. Simmons for his scary and fantastic performance in Whiplash and Patricia Arquette for her moving and marvelous performance in Boyhood. Both were performances I loved and I can't think of two more deserving actors. They have slogged in the industry for a good long while and fully deserve this recognition. I wouldn't really pick anyone else for Best Supporting Actress (if the Into the Woods nomination had been for Emily Blunt instead of Meryl Streep I might have felt more torn). For Supporting Actor, I do have a soft spot for Ethan Hawke, and Edward Norton was hilarious in Birdman. But again, no one came close to J.K. Simmons.

Best Original & Adapted Screenplays: For Original, my money's on the wildly inventive and twisty Birdman, though The Grand Budapest Hotel certainly has a shot. For Adapted, I really hope it's Whiplash. This screenplay is only in the Adapted category because it is based on a short film Damian Chazelle did in order to drum up funding for the full feature film. Hopefully, that will now give him the edge, because this script is a fresh, original work of art, that is fully worthy of an Oscar.

My other miscellaneous picks include Big Hero 6 for Best Animated Feature (full confession, I've only see 2 of the nominees, and this is the one I liked best), and Dick Pope for Best Cinematography for Mr. Turner, although he has stiff competition from Birdman's Emmanuel Lubezki. I would be happy with most wins, except anything for American Sniper would be a travesty. Fortunately, this year's race seems fairly predictable, and it looks like the right people are going to win for truly splendid work. While that may be boring, it's still worth celebrating.

And forgetting the nominees for a second, the whole thing will be hosted by Neil Patrick Harris. Surely that's worth tuning in all by itself? So I'll see you on Twitter on February 22nd. It is bound to be a bloated, overlong, stuffy affair, but some great people will win awards, NPH will (hopefully) sing and dance, and we can finally bid adieu to the people and movies that delighted us over the past year.