My 2003 Oscar Ballot

Earlier today we finished up our look at the 2003 Oscar races, with me seeing every film that Oscar cited for all of its narrative, feature-length categories.  But before we head into our next year (we'll kick it off tomorrow), the tables are turned and I get my say.  I have spent much of the past 10 weeks not only rewatching a few of the movies listed below, but also seeking out films from 2003 that Oscar ignored but that peaked my interest.  A few of the films listed below, as a result, are recent viewings while others were films I saw for the first time in a darkened theater some 19 years ago.  While I can't possibly see everything, I feel that I have done my due diligence on 2003, and this is the stellar group of nominees I have amassed.  Enjoy!

Picture

Cold Mountain

Elephant

Finding Nemo

Kill Bill: Volume 1

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Lost in Translation

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

Peter Pan

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Something's Gotta Give

Gold: As you might've noticed, I was very, very close on this one, as there are actually four movies that sit on my personal Top 100 films on this list (making 2003 one of, if not my top favorite year on said list).  But I can't look away from the majesty of Peter Jackson's magnum opus, even in what I'd argue is the least of the three films-it's a gigantic, gorgeous ode to cinema, and I drank it all up.

Silver: Close behind is Lost in Translation, a beautifully romantic picture (and another ode to cinema), with Sofia Coppola giving us a brief moment of transcendence in the lives of two divergent figures, and showing us in the process how precious all of life is.

Bronze: A tight race, but I'm going to go with Peter Pan, a movie that fills my whole heart with joy, in a slight bid over Pirates, which is another movie that I feel encapsulates the best parts of the theatrical experience.  Both are pirate-themed adventures that take on a fantastical element, so it seems fitting they're linked, but Pan carries me away just a little bit more in its opening moments (again, razor thin edge though that I might change on a different day).

Director

Sofia Coppola (Lost in Translation)

PJ Hogan (Peter Pan)

Peter Jackson (The Return of the King)

Quentin Tarantino (Kill Bill: Volume 1)

Gore Verbinski (Pirates of the Caribbean)

Gold: An easier competition for me.  Peter Jackson deserves massive credit for not just making his films feel like full films on their own, but also interconnected stories that can exist simultaneously apart & together.  The gigantic final battles are a wonder-to-behold, and he gives each character their due.

Silver: Sofia Coppola's job isn't easy.  She has to make it feel like a lifetime's worth of connection passes in the confines of a few days, while also making sure we know that this is fleeting, and cannot last.  Her direction makes every spare moment count (and the fact that she did this on a shoot that lasted just a few weeks is all the more amazing).

Bronze: I'm going to switch this one up and give it to Verbinski.  It's not easy to take what could've been something of a joke film and make it feel totally quality AND have a great popcorn aspect.  Pirates is partially about letting the actors do what they want, but it's also about Verbinski keeping the action spry & moving forward, which he does.

Actor

Johnny Depp (Pirates of the Caribbean)

Jude Law (Cold Mountain)

Viggo Mortensen (The Return of the King)

Bill Murray (Lost in Translation)

Sean Penn (Mystic River)

Gold: The performance of a lifetime, Johnny Depp's first characterization was so good you honestly don't care about the diminishing returns on the sequels.  Drawn from nothing but his own interpretation of the figure, Depp makes Captain Jack Sparrow one of the great cinematic characters, and I love every second of it.

Silver: A really strong field, Bill Murray would've been a worthy winner (albeit I'm not pulling the "razor close" card again here-this is Depp's trophy, fair and square).  Murray lets go of some of his comedic crutches while letting others (like his impossibly good timing) take center stage, and he has terrific, never-too-chilly chemistry with Johansson.  You understand why his Bob Harris has been a public favorite for decades.

Bronze: We'll finish off with a third Oscar nominee (and in this case Oscar's winner), Sean Penn.  Penn's performance is the truly great part of Mystic River-you see a man who has taken advantage of the system for decades faced with an impossible, unrelated consequence, and watch as he shreds his world apart looking for absolution.

Actress

Jamie Lee Curtis (Freaky Friday)

Rachel Hurd-Wood (Peter Pan)

Scarlett Johansson (Lost in Translation)

Diane Keaton (Something's Gotta Give)

Uma Thurman (Kill Bill: Volume 1)

Gold: Johansson had been working for several years in Lost in Translation, but Coppola knew that she'd only get to make her breakthrough once.  The perfect encapsulation of "young, but not at heart" and still unsure of what to make of the world, her Charlotte is radiant & captures the film's spirit.

Silver: Few actors have the ability to make physical humor as personal & emotional as Diane Keaton.  In Something's Gotta Give, she shares a woman who had closed off her heart, and when it opens she doesn't know how to handle it, and whether that sort of raw energy is worth shaky ground.  In different hands she'd have appeared cold or a bit of a joke, but Keaton knows Erica is just unpracticed.

Bronze: Uma Thurman gets the role of a lifetime as a revenge-seeking bride who is intent on destroying everyone who disintegrated her life.  Few performances from Quentin Tarantino's pen have felt so complete, or so at home in the mouths of his actors, as what Thurman does here.

Supporting Actor

Sean Astin (The Return of the King)

Jason Isaacs (Peter Pan)

Ian McKellen (The Return of the King)

Andy Serkis (The Return of the King)

Geoffrey Rush (Pirates of the Caribbean)

Gold: First off, look at this list, then look at Oscar's, and tell me this isn't better.  And then explain to me why Sean Astin, the heart of the Lord of the Rings trilogy who gets some unbelievable monologues in this installment of the series is somehow ignored by Oscar for, what, Alec Baldwin in The Cooler?  Come on...

Silver: Geoffrey Rush is an actor that I don't always gravitate toward (I think he plays his characterizations too big), but there are parts that are perfect for him, and toward the top of that list is Captain Barbossa, which he plays with villainous intent and campy delight.

Bronze: They're all so good, how do you pick?  I'll give my final medal to Andy Serkis, who while he doesn't have the sheer jaw-dropping delight of The Two Towers here, makes up for it by giving us more range in Gollum's characterization, his potential road to redemption and ultimate path to hell.

Supporting Actress

Ellen Degeneres (Finding Nemo)

Anna Faris (Lost in Translation)

Marcia Gay Harden (Mystic River)

Miranda Otto (The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King)

Emma Thompson (Love, Actually)

Gold: I'm going to give this one to Harden, I think (honestly, 2003 has left me with more "close call" races than any My Ballot we've encountered so far-there's a lot of love being poured into these choices).  I think hers is the most complete from A-to-Z characterization, and similar to Rush, she fights some of her broader choices as an actress to make a potentially bombastic character feel like a real one.

Silver: It's hard sometimes to remember that there's an entire movie where Emma Thompson is consistently strong as a woman who believes her husband is having an affair.  When Joni Mitchell's "Both Sides Now" starts to play upon the confirmation, though, Thompson completely nails the characterization, unforgettably stealing a holiday classic from a cast of pros.

Bronze: Vocal performances are sometimes hard to judge-they don't have the advantage of giving us some of an actor's greatest tools (eyes, hands, facial moments).  But the best vocal performances, like what Ellen Degeneres does in Finding Nemo, find a way to impart that-you can see in Dory every facial tick & pull.

Adapted Screenplay

Cold Mountain

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Mystic River

Peter Pan

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Gold: Peter Jackson may have put slightly too many endings onto The Return of the King but that's about the only fault I can find in this script.  A beautiful sendoff for a group of beloved characters, one that never feels like it's insulting or short-changing any favorites while feeling too indulgent.

Silver: JM Barrie's tale of the boy who never grew up is timeless, but it almost always struggles in translation.  PJ Hogan's take, though, is loyal to the original source and it pays off with a genuine sense of classical adventure, never winking, but always a joy.

Bronze: Taking a Disneyland ride (albeit my favorite Disneyland ride) and turning it into a true tale of adventures on the high seas that would translate into four more movies and, well, a revamped Disneyland ride is truly an achievement, so well done on Pirates.

Original Screenplay

Finding Nemo

Kill Bill: Volume 1

Lost in Translation

Love, Actually

Something's Gotta Give

Gold: "Make it Suntori Times"...Lost in Translation is brimming with so many great, quotable lines that it could honestly get this trophy just on that alone.  That it also tells a romantic tale of friendship, and two lost ships finding each other in the night is just icing on the cake of the best writing of 2003.

Silver: Pixar was kicking into truly high gear with the tale of a lonely dad running across the ocean in hopes of finding his son.  Great dialogue (particularly from Degeneres' Dory), and a tale full of heart & substance-there's a reason it had a hit sequel thirteen years later-people were engrossed by this tale (pun intended).

Bronze: Quentin Tarantino's revenge fantasy is full of so many great touches (particularly starting in the middle of the list rather than at the beginning-I love that), and great lines...Tarantino is always filled with fun, and this was still in the days when he had Sally Menke to make his scripts tight.

Animated Feature Film

Finding Nemo

Piglet's Big Movie

The Triplets of Belleville

Gold: In a weak year for this category, Finding Nemo stands apart even more.  As we've already mentioned, it's filled with fine vocal work (not just from Degeneres, but also Allison Janney & Willem Dafoe are strong too), looks beautiful (those blues & oranges...it's hard to imagine that on the other side of the studio Disney was making something as ugly as Chicken Little while this was happening), and is full of imagination.

Silver: It might occasionally be a bit too long, but Belleville makes up for it with an ear worm of a main song and a lot of inventive, clever jokes within the animation, particularly the way that the titular triplets are so connected as to almost be a glob by the time we reach them in their old age.

Bronze: I am a sucker for anything at the Hundred Acre Wood, and Piglet getting his first titular outing feels like a perfect place to applaud.  I like that it isn't particularly cutesy or updated, but instead feels authentic to the classic 1970's Milne incarnations from Disney.

Sound Mixing

Kill Bill: Volume 1

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

Peter Pan

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Gold: Once again bringing Howard Shore's mountainous score to life amidst battles and shifting worlds, Return of the King uses perfect dialogue mixing to get some of the series' most crucial moments, particularly Sam's "I can't carry the ring!" and Eowyn's "I am no man!" to maximum effect.

Silver: I mean, all of Quentin Tarantino's movies, mixing in music alongside a host of practical action/fight sequence noises, is the stuff the whole industry must pay homage to.  Kill Bill sounds sensational.

Bronze: The use of practical vs. actual effects in Master and Commander represents a host of challenges for the sound mixers, who have to find ways to make the dialogue in the battle sequences not feel drowned out by the literal, well, drowning (this isn't easy-just ask Christopher Nolan).  That it all sounds splendid is a testament to this team.

Sound Editing

Finding Nemo

Kill Bill: Volume 1

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Gold: To this day, I don't know what Oscar was thinking snubbing Return of the King here.  The battle scenes, particularly the ones at Gondor, are so specific & filled with noise coming from every corner-it's brilliant stuff, and deserved not just a nomination, but a win.

Silver: Pirates of the Caribbean is so good at making it feel as if we're all transported to the high seas.  The clanking boots & bones of the dead crew on the Black Pearl make a routine noise sound totally specific, which is what great sound editors can do.

Bronze: Finding Nemo might be the high-water mark when it comes to Pixar's sound editing team.  Particularly strong points for realism (notice the constant hum of the aquarium in the dentist's office) and the way that the gnarly turtles make you feel like you're being pulled along for their ride.

Original Score

Cold Mountain

Finding Nemo

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Peter Pan

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Gold: One of the cardinal sins is when a score replaces the narrator...but there's an exception to every rule, and Pirates of the Caribbean is that exception.  This music would become shorthand for these characters, and really for the franchise as a whole-instantly iconic, swashbuckling & escapist.

Silver: Gabriel Yared's sparing score in Cold Mountain is deceiving.  Initially viewed as an undertone to the rest of the strong song score, it instead telegraphs much of what we're about to see-the romance of this journey, but the brevity of it as well.  Cold Mountain is not a place where happiness can sustain.

Bronze: Howard Shore is obviously borrowing from himself here, but there's much to offer in Return of the King that we haven't necessarily encountered already.  Particularly the lighting of the beacons stands out as an iconic moment enhanced by the specific music playing in the background.

Original Song

"Belleville Rendez-vous," (The Triplets of Belleville)

"Into the West," (The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King)

"A Kiss at the End of the Rainbow," (A Mighty Wind)

"The Scarlet Tide," (Cold Mountain)

"You Will Be My Ain True Love," (Cold Mountain)

Gold: Despite it being an end credits song (which I tend to shy away from), "Into the West" gives us searing vocals and a moment for us to just settle into the 10-hour journey we've concluded.  Lennox so well-matches the story at hand (having Howard Shore do the music helped) that it feels less an end credits number and more a final ending to add to the list.

Silver: In an otherwise routine Christopher Guest movie, A Might Wind brings us a reminder of why the music movement at the center of this story touched so many people at the time-given the opportunity to play for a laugh, "A Kiss at the End of the Rainbow" instead solemnly reminds us that love can last across any divide.

Bronze: Picking between the songs in Cold Mountain is tough, but if forced to choose I'd probably go with "You Will Be My Ain True Love," which well-matches the rough realism of the movie, while still indulging its romantic sensibilities.

Art Direction

Girl with a Pearl Earring

Kill Bill: Volume 1

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Peter Pan

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Gold: Even with some of the scenes borrowed from previous movies, it's hard to deny Return of the King yet another gold medal here, with the white city of Gondor and the battle scenes laying waste to it one of the more titanic moments throughout Jackson's opus.

Silver: The scale of Peter Pan is the first thing you notice about its set design...notice the flight to Neverland and how it almost feels like they're flying into a storybook.  There's something just a little bit staged about this that I love so much, that it always feels a touch unreal (honestly, if that's a trick of the budget then more films should be denied their CGI).

Bronze: I could tell you the dimensions, rooms, & even seating arrangements aboard the Black Pearl by heart-that's the kind of specificity that Pirates of the Caribbean brings to its look at a Caribbean at the height of the golden age of buccaneers.

Cinematography

Cold Mountain

Girl with a Pearl Earring

Kill Bill: Volume 1

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Lost in Translation

Gold: Painting like Vermeer, Eduardo Serra borrows heavily from his film's own subject in Girl with a Pearl Earring, giving us a Dutch countryside filled with an almost supernatural glow of white light.

Silver: Andrew Lesnie's glorious third act in Return of the King is accentuated by several key scenes that need a long lens that knows the story well.  The lighting of the beacons, in particular, stands apart as a scene that you needed to build toward.  Yes, Lesnie is borrowing from some past work, but it's more building off of it with callbacks that accentuate the drama.

Bronze: John Seale makes a war-torn South feel all too real in Cold Mountain, giving us a combination of wide-angle shots of the Civil War, almost setting the world into a different kind of hellscape, while also giving us arguably the best-lensed sex scenes in a prestige American film (what-it's true!).

Costume Design

Cold Mountain

Down with Love

Girl with a Pearl Earring

Kill Bill: Volume 1

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Gold: Sometimes a nomination here comes down to a series of costumes trying to tell a story...and sometimes it comes down to one outfit.  There are a ton of really iconic looks in Kill Bill (Elle Driver & Gogo both became go-to Halloween costumes for a reason), but come on...when you think of this movie, you think of Uma Thurman's iconic banana yellow jumpsuit, using costume as shorthand for a character.

Silver: Largely forgotten today, the delicious Rock-and-Doris looks on display in Down with Love are scrumptious.  The best trick is the yellow and black-and-white checkered mirroring done by Sarah Paulson & Renee Zellweger, but there's no scene in this movie that doesn't feel cheeky & bold with its costume design.

Bronze: Return of the King may be borrowing from past incantations, but the realism in the battle scenes combined with some of our newer looks (particularly King Aragorn & Queen Arwen and really everything about the freshened colors of the coronation scene) make it impossible to deny it one of my medals.

Film Editing

Elephant

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Lost in Translation

Peter Pan

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Gold: The Return of the King's sharp action scenes are obviously the calling card here, but for me it's honestly the way that the editing team manages to make every character feel like they've had their farewell without it dragging too ferociously (or feeling too repetitive).

Silver: Kind of on the opposite end of the spectrum than Return of the King (with its gargantuan runtime) is Lost in Translation, making every second feel like it's being plucked out of time.  When you're doing a "ticking clock romance" you need to feel that time is fading away, and that's what the editing team in this movie ensures is happening (you always want more).

Bronze: A techical feat, the final twenty minutes of Elephant are horrifying, feeling like they're happening in almost real time as we understand who will live & who will die in this shocking, brutal drama.

Makeup & Hairstyling

Girl with a Pearl Earring

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Monster

Peter Pan

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Gold: Two incarnations in particular stand out as new to Return of the King that makes any other victor feel impossible.  First we have the transformation of Smeagol into Gollum, a combination of decrepit makeup and special effects that is a sight-to-behold.  Second, we have the distinctive character of Gothmog, standing apart as the movie's most distinctive & important orc.

Silver: Honestly, Charlize Theron owes half of her Oscar to the un-nominated makeup team of Monster. I never know quite how to feel about deglamming (I think the recent conversation about this is an earned one), but there's no denying that Theron's transformation is a driving part of her character, letting us see the changes in her appearance as the film continues.

Bronze: A dirty (but pretty) Johnny Depp would inspire countless cosplays in the years that followed, but the entire crew of Pirates of the Caribbean is playing to win here from Keira Knightley's ridiculous coif to Orlando Bloom's sweeping mane...looking pretty is also worthy of an Oscar if the makeup team is helping the cause.

Visual Effects

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

The Matrix Reloaded

Peter Pan

Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

Gold: So many of the best visual effects of Lord of the Rings show up in Return of the King.  The marching elephants, the Army of the Dead, the melting ring at Mordor...these are all iconic for the series for a reason...they all look exact.

Silver: Rather than going cheesy, the effects team behind Pirates of the Caribbean took their jobs deadly serious.  Think of the way that the fights at sea feel so realistic, so as to better accentuate the crew of the damned (with particular points to the undead versions of Geoffrey Rush, Johnny Depp, and that monkey).

Bronze: Part of visual effects is finding a way to draw you into the story (it's not always about the most or even the most realistic).  This is the case for the storybook world of Peter Pan, which gives us illusions from a dream, rather than trying to make it feel like a mud-and-all take on Neverland.

Also in 2003: Picture, Director, Actress, Actor, Supporting Actress, Supporting Actor, Adapted Screenplay, Original Screenplay, Foreign Language Film, Animated Feature Film, Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, Original Score, Original Song, Art Direction, Cinematography, Costume Design, Film Editing, Visual Effects, Makeup, Previously in 2003

Other My Oscar Ballots: 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2018, 2019

OVP: Picture (2003)

OVP: Best Picture (2003)

The Nominees Were...

Barrie M. Osborne, Peter Jackson, & Fran Walsh, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Ross Katz & Sofia Coppola, Lost in Translation

Samuel Goldwyn, Jr., Peter Weir, & Duncan Henderson, Lost in Translation

Robert Lorenz, Judie G. Hoyt, & Clint Eastwood, Mystic River

Kathleen Kennedy, Frank Marshall, & Gary Ross, Seabiscuit

My Thoughts: Frequently when I look at a list like this, after spending weeks and nineteen articles talking about the movies themselves, the eventual winner for Best Picture (in my mind, maybe not in yours dear reader), is relatively anticlimactic.  Usually Oscar chooses maybe 2-3 nominees that I'd put in my personal Top 10, and then the rest are films that show the clear dividing line between my taste & Oscar's, and to a degree that is true this year (this full list isn't going to repeat with me, even with me choosing ten nominees), but this year...I don't honestly know which movie I'm going to pick at the beginning of this article, and so we're going to have a bit of a conversation as I try to convince myself before we get to my eventual "My Ballot" choices this afternoon.

To delay the inevitable, let's focus on the three films that won't be getting Best Picture (spoiler alert, though if you look at our links to all past races at the bottom of this article, you're going to know that this isn't much of a spoiler).  This isn't because they are unworthy.  After all, Master and Commander has grown on me the past ten weeks quite a bit, both in terms of me rewatching it for these write-ups and truly appreciating the way that it really paints a beautiful, complete picture of life on the high seas.  With solid performances from Russell Crowe & Paul Bettany and Peter Weir's steady hand, it might not always win every battle (I think the character development beyond Crowe & Bettany needed a bit more growth), but it's steadfast & a nominee that has aged well.

Seabiscuit is the clear "fifth nominee" not just in my rankings, but in terms of Oscar's preference.  In the days before the ten-wide fields, there was usually one film that was a crowdpleaser that otherwise couldn't make it in Best Director, and for 2003 it was Seabiscuit.  For me, it's just an underdog sports movie.  It doesn't have any of the heart you'd need to make it rise above cliche, and it doesn't have the kind of sentimental click that occasionally works for me in a field like this (when we get to 1999, you'll find I'm going to be a bit kinder to a movie like Cider House Rules which I connected with more than I did Seabiscuit even though they're cut from the same cloth).  It's not a terrible movie (though I don't even know if it's a good one), but when you put it next to some of 2003's best...it feels woefully out-of-place.

Mystic River is a solid thriller, and speaks to what Clint Eastwood does best (or at least used to do best), turning antiheroes into complicated leading figures that the audience has to deduce where the ethical boundaries lie.  I do feel that the beginning & endings of this movie hide that the middle is a bit rougher; the dialogue is good, but I feel like the treatment of Tim Robbins' character of Dave feels off, partially by some of Robbins character choices & also by Eastwood's treatment of him as the director.  But this is a decent movie, and it's not embarrassing-I get what Oscar fell for here, and even if I wouldn't join them, I respect it.

Which brings us to the two movies I am going to nominate for Best Picture.  Lost in Translation is a wonderful movie, one that is filled with a lot of wisdom that becomes clearer the older you get.  Thoughtful in the way it's romantic but rarely sexual (it would have been a nightmare to make Charlotte & Bob feel like lovers rather than spiritual soulmates), it shows the way that we value different things as we age, our bodies getting older slightly before we do, and how youth becomes elusive, but in brief moments something we can capture for a night or a moment.  If I'm being picky (and I've gotta be at this point), some of the humor feels dated (it's intended to be cringe territory, but I suspect Coppola would today avoid it all-together because there's a mocking element to it), but that's really my only complaint.  I love Lost in Translation.

The problem is I also love Return of the King.  It's honestly hard for me to compare the two in part because when you combine Lord of the Rings, which you do subconsciously even if you try not to, pretty much nothing beats it.  Lord of the Rings came out when I was a teenager, and became so synonymous with movies for me that to reward anything else for Best Picture feels like blasphemy; as a collective, it's certainly my favorite film franchise and possibly my favorite movie, period.  But, we are only rewarding Return of the King here, not the entire trilogy (that's the point of the OVP), and like Lost in Translation, if I'm being picky, I think the endings of Return of the King feels like a weak point (which, in contrast, the ending is one of Lost in Translation's finest scenes).  They are also very, very different pictures, so it's hard to grasp how you compare one with the other.

Other Precursor Contenders: The Globes separate their categories into Drama and Musical/Comedy (a tactic I'm envying right now), with The Return of the King winning the former against Cold Mountain, Master and Commander, Mystic River, & Seabiscuit while the latter went to Lost in Translation against Bend It Like Beckham, Big Fish, Finding Nemo, and Love Actually.  BAFTA also went to Return of the King atop Big Fish, Cold Mountain, Lost in Translation, and Master and Commander, while the PGA picked Return of the King against Cold Mountain, The Last Samurai, Master and Commander, Mystic River, & Seabiscuit.  In terms of sixth place, I think it's either City of God (Oscar nominations for Best Director, Editing, & Writing), against Cold Mountain (Oscar cited for Directing, Editing, & two acting trophies, plus the PGA/BAFTA/Globes triumvirate).  I know it's tempting to think it's City of God solely on that Best Director nomination, but I'm going with Cold Mountain-it was a genuine stunner when the Weinsteins couldn't get this movie in in 2003, and I think it was a close call, probably against Seabiscuit.

Films I Would Have Nominated: You'll find out later today. 😉

Oscar’s Choice: There was no stopping Return of the King-it won all eleven trophies in a steamroller effect.

My Choice: Let's work backward.  Seabiscuit is in last, and I'll go Mystic River in fourth.  Master and Commander is a fine bronze, and it's the movie that most grew on me throughout this retrospective.  As for the winner?  My head is saying Lost in Translation, my heart is saying Return of the King...if ties were an option I'd probably tap into that right now, but since they aren't I'm going to go with my heart.  Return of the King defines so much of what I love about movies that I can't bear to give it a loss, even if there are certainly days I'd pick Lost in Translation instead.

And there you have it-another OVP in the books.  Later today we'll do the My Official Ballot, but in the meantime-where did you land?  Do you think that Return of the King is a landslide winner (like it was with Oscar) or are you barely giving it the edge (like me)...or did you choose something else all-together?  And overall-what is your favorite movie of 2003?  Share your comments below!

Also in 2003: Director, Actress, Actor, Supporting Actress, Supporting Actor, Adapted Screenplay, Original Screenplay, Foreign Language Film, Animated Feature Film, Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, Original Score, Original Song, Art Direction, Cinematography, Costume Design, Film Editing, Visual Effects, Makeup, Previously in 2003

Past Best Picture Contests: 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2018, 2019

OVP: Director (2003)

OVP: Best Director (2003)

The Nominees Were...

Sofia Coppola, Lost in Translation

Clint Eastwood, Mystic River

Peter Jackson, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

Fernando Meirelles, City of God

Peter Weir, Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World

My Thoughts: We're going to be moving into the final two races of 2003 this weekend.  I'm not entirely sure what pace I'll be doing this at after this (we likely won't do them daily, though I will be honest that I'm going to be doing them at a sharper speed than two-a-week as part of a still-secret project I'm trying to accomplish for later in the year).  Today, we're going to move into a pretty solid Best Director lineup.  It is not often that I can say that I'd give a "thumbs up" to all five of the movies in a list, but here I definitely would.  Of course, if you're competing for an Oscar nomination, you should be able to do better than just a thumbs up, and a few of these filmmakers don't quite get far enough, in my opinion.

One of them is Clint Eastwood, who was using Mystic River as a way to tee up a comeback in 2004 for Best Director, followed by a decade of major successes, both artistic & (increasingly more importantly to Eastwood) commercial.  Mystic River is the rare one of these movies that he didn't star in, but you've got the Sean Penn character taking on the obvious Eastwood trope of "man against the law."  Mystic River is a good movie that sometimes feels a bit lost in the middle stretch, coasting off of what is a dynamite ending by not focusing enough on where some of the characters (specifically Tim Robbins' Dave) needs to go.  Eastwood is a bit of a lightning rod amongst progressive cinephiles these days due to his conservative politics, but I'll admit that isn't really the problem with Mystic River in the way that it would be years later with American Sniper (which for the first two-thirds is about as strong of a "conservative vantage point" to a political issue as I've seen in a movie, and then totally derails in the final forty minutes).  It's more that it becomes just a film of a few great moments, without enough substance in-between.  If he weren't competing for an Oscar, I wouldn't complain (it's a good movie), but when you're trying to be the best of the year, details matter.

This is also my problem with Fernando Meirelles' City of God-it's too reliant on big moments.  Meirelles has some key sequences that are jaw-dropping, and though this film was mimicked ad nauseam in the years that followed (including by Meirelles), it deserves credit for being the first of this style/visual palette of filmmaking.  City of God, though, relies too often on increasing shock value to get its point across, and that's a problem when the story is as repetitive as it is.  You understand as the film continues which characters are going to escape & which ones won't, and while it's jaw-dropping to see this group of violent teenagers put in unspeakable situations, Meirelles uses the same types of stories repeatedly to the point where it feels like the movie needed editing.  Picky, I know, but again-it's for an Oscar.

Sofia Coppola knows how to make her time judicious.  Even from the opening moments of Lost in Translation, time hangs over the story as a way for us to understand that everything between Bob & Charlotte is precious (but also, that all of life should be treated as precious).  Coppola achieves a sort of "cinematic" approach to Lost in Translation (I'm not entirely sure that's a descriptive enough adjective, but hopefully it comes across), making it feel warm & like this complete vision (she used film, rather than digital, to make the movie, and I wonder if that helps make it look a bit softer onscreen).  Everything about the way that she resists certain romantic impulses, making sure that the framing is perfect in key moments (especially the karaoke scene)-it all just works beautifully.  It was her breakthrough film, and while she's made great ones since, it's still her best.

Oscar-winner Sydney Pollack once said Hollywood's view of the director's job is "less an artist, more a damage containment expert."  This might explain why so many directors get cited for epics, including our final two nominees-both are trying to make sure a gigantic sequence is kept onscreen without sprawling too badly.  Both men pull this off, though.  Peter Weir's film occasionally veers too much into the "handsome, but not enough character development" column for my taste, but it looks great & I think the battle sequences are gorgeous.  Master and Commander also, as we've mentioned a few times, seamlessly combines sound stage, CGI, & real world sequences all into the same film without ever feeling like you can tell them apart, which is certainly a credit to its director.

Peter Jackson won this Oscar nominally for Return of the King but really for his entire brilliant Lord of the Rings series.  I can only count it for Return of the King, though, so I will admit that I have to dock a point or two off for the slightly repetitive nature of the film's endings.  That being said, the rest of the film is such a treasure you won't care.  Particularly strong points for the way that Jackson manages to make the anticlimax of some of the battles (there are very few major character deaths in LOTR, certainly compared to something like Game of Thrones, which makes the stakes feel less high) by giving such detailed emotional sendoffs to each of the primary characters.  Return of the King represents not just a high point for Jackson & 2003, but also for movies in general-few films stand apart quite in the same way that Lord of the Rings does.

Other Precursor Contenders: The Globes preferred Jackson (singling how easily he'd win the rest of the season, as the Globes are pretty genre averse) against Coppola, Eastwood, Weir, & Anthony Minghella (Cold Mountain), while the DGA went with Jackson as well against Coppola, Eastwood, Weir, & Gary Ross (Seabiscuit).  BAFTA favored Weir as their winner, the only blip in Jackson's run (Return of the King did win Best Picture there, for the record), against Jackson, Minghella, Coppola, & Tim Burton (Big Fish).  In terms of sixth place, it's between Minghella & Ross, and while Ross hit more of the hallmarks we associate with Best Director (i.e. Seabiscuit is up for Picture, Screenplay, & Editing), I feel like it was slightly more Minghella, as I think that Cold Mountain feels more like a directing branch preference than what Ross is doing.

Directors I Would Have Nominated: I'll have my My Ballot out tomorrow, so I won't spoil the contenders quite yet.  Suffice it to say, this is a good list...that I plan on totally upending.
Oscar's Choice: After two years of misses across all of the categories he was cited in, Peter Jackson was inevitable.  Not even Academy favorite Clint Eastwood could give him a race.

My Choice: I'm a bit closer than AMPAS both because I'm not giving this award for the full series and because I do think that Return of the King is the weakest of the three Lord of the Rings films AND it's competing against a movie as flawless as Lost in Translation.  But Jackson wins this-he manages to make it 3/3 in Grade A quality for a film series which is next to impossible to do, and I will argue that Lost in Translation is slightly more a writer's/actor's triumph than it is a directing one (it's close though-both are being mentioned tomorrow).  Behind them would be Weir, Eastwood, & Meirelles, in that order.

Those were my thoughts-how about yours?  Does everyone cosign the Peter Jackson gravy train or does someone want to stand apart?  Do we think that Sofia Coppola, whose filmmaking style has slightly fallen out of favor with Oscar, will ever get back into this lineup again?  And was it Ross or Minghella who was just out-of-reach in sixth place?  Share your thoughts in the comments!

Also in 2003: Actress, Actor, Supporting Actress, Supporting Actor, Adapted Screenplay, Original Screenplay, Foreign Language Film, Animated Feature Film, Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, Original Score, Original Song, Art Direction, Cinematography, Costume Design, Film Editing, Visual Effects, Makeup, Previously in 2003

Past Best Director Contests: 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2018, 2019

OVP: Actress (2003)

OVP: Best Actress (2003)

The Nominees Were...

Keisha Castle-Hughes, Whale Rider

Diane Keaton, Something's Gotta Give

Samantha Morton, In America

Charlize Theron, Monster

Naomi Watts, 21 Grams

My Thoughts: I sometimes feel like an old man (which depending on your birth certificate, I may well be) when I talk about old Oscar races, but it's hard to impress how wild of a ride 2003's Best Actress race was.  Even compared to recent fields (like this year's crazy, frontrunner-less year), 2003's nominations got bonkers with only two names showing up in most of the precursors (and not a single name landing in all of them), and the remainder feeling totally influx throughout the season (just wait until we get to the precursors below).  We'll start with the two names, though, that never felt in doubt with Oscar all year long.

Charlize Theron, it's hard to remember in 2003, was not considered a particularly compelling actress.  Beautiful, yes, but she had largely stuck to "girlfriend/wife" roles until that point, and when she saw her break playing totally against type in Monster, she took it.  Theron has been called one of the great performances to ever win this award, and to some degree I find that to be hyperbole.  I think she's excellent, inhabiting Aileen Wuornos & humanizing her in a way that probably works better in fiction than in a biopic (the sympathy for serial killers angle always feels like a tightrope considering the lives they ended up destroying even if they started out from sheer horror like Wuornos clearly did).  I don't think she lands the romantic arches with Christina Ricci (there's not enough chemistry there), and I also feel like some of her shock appeal is the makeup doing heavy-lifting because we know what she really looks like, but this is a worthy nomination, even if I don't think it's an all-timer.

Diane Keaton was having yet another comeback in 2003 (her last, to date, with Oscar), and like Theron, there are moments where it doesn't quite work.  I don't know that she had enough chemistry with Keanu Reeves late in the movie for my taste, never quite making it work the same way as with Jack (and there are moments it feels like she's playing Diane Keaton more than her character).  But this is minor quibbling about a terrific performance.  Playing a woman who has found immense success in every avenue of life except love, and then having that be a bumpy, fraught, vulnerable journey for her rather than a simple rom-com...Keaton sells a woman who had settled for her life, even if she always knew there could be more.  It's great stuff from one of the best of her generation.

I feel a little bad ragging on child performers, particularly since I know my brother reads this blog & will be guarding his beloved Whale Rider with mama bear arms, but Keisha Castle-Hughes doesn't work with me.  There's naturalism in a performance, and then there's just not emoting enough, and I think she's more in the second half.  It doesn't help that her script is hackneyed and filled with coming-of-age cliche that even the most skilled of performers wouldn't have been able to bring to life, but I wasn't into this the way that so many were...bonus points to the Academy, though, for putting her in the correct category as this is 1000% a lead performance.

Samantha Morton is better with naturalism in In America.  She plays her mother as a real, complicated figure, someone who can have horny sex with her husband (strong chemistry between Morton & Paddy Considine), while also having great anger toward him later in the movie & still make it feel believable.  Morton's work is informed by grief, her Sarah knows that she can never fill the void left by the death of her son, and just wants someone to blame because blaming no one is the worst punishment.  Morton was capping off a truly impressive run in the late-1990's & early-2000's with this her second (and final) nomination, and while it was a surprise, it was a pleasant one from Oscar.

Our final nomination cannot get the same compliment.  Naomi Watts has been nominated for a My Ballot Award before for King Kong and was in sixth place for The Painted Veil-I consider myself a fan.  But she is actively terrible in 21 Grams and I will never understand why Oscar chose this as the moment to honor her, one of the worst performances of her career.  She is constantly screaming, constantly angry, acting as if there's nothing underneath her hostility toward the world, nothing that existed prior to the confines of the movie.  This, like her nomination for The Impossible, feels like they're nominating the role more than the actress, and that these movies (and not something unique & film-fitting like Kong) are where she got her nominations will never not confuse me. 

Other Precursor Contenders: The Globes separate their nominations between Drama and Musical/Comedy, so we have eleven women nominated for these awards.  For Drama it's Theron besting Cate Blanchett (Veronica Guerin), Scarlett Johansson (Girl with a Pearl Earring), Nicole Kidman (Cold Mountain), Uma Thurman (Kill Bill: Volume 1), & Evan Rachel Wood (Thirteen), while for Comedy/Musical it's Keaton over Jamie Lee Curtis (Freaky Friday), Scarlett Johansson (Lost in Translation), Diane Lane (Under the Tuscan Sun), & Helen Mirren (Calendar Girls).  SAG gave us Theron as the winner over Keaton, Watts, Wood, & Patricia Clarkson (The Station Agent) while at the BAFTA Awards it was Johansson (Lost in Translation) winning over Watts, Johansson (for Girl), Thurman, & Anne Reid (The Mother) (due to release schedule issues, Theron wasn't eligible until the next year with BAFTA, which used to happen a lot more there than it does now, and she was nominated but lost that season).  All of this is to say-who the hell knows who was in sixth place...there are thirteen names just listed and only three of them made it with Oscar, and that's not counting that for much of the race Jennifer Connelly (House of Sand and Fog) was considered something of a favorite.  If I had to guess, thanks to Johansson's campaign being royally botched, it was probably Wood, but this was a bizarre race & one that I still can't figure out.

Actors I Would Have Nominated: Similar to our comments for Return of the King, it's hard to know where to put Uma Thurman's work in Kill Bill exactly since it's one great performance split in half, but it's a darned shame that Oscar didn't make room for her in either 2003 or 2004.

Oscar’s Choice: There was no beating Theron-that trophy was undeniably hers...Keaton didn't stand a prayer, and she was obviously in second.

My Choice: I'm going to go with Keaton, who gives the stronger character arc without the need for prosthetics to enhance the performance, against Theron (I also, to be fair, like Keaton's movie way better as I didn't like Monster at all and in a close race, that matters).  Morton is third, with Castle-Hughes & Watts falling behind.

Those are my thoughts, but now I want to hear yours!  Are you with Oscar & Theron, or do you dare to be different with Diane & I?  Why do you think that Oscar has the worst taste in Naomi Watts movies?  And who the hell was in sixth place here?  Share your thoughts in the comments below!

Also in 2003: Actor, Supporting Actress, Supporting Actor, Adapted Screenplay, Original Screenplay, Foreign Language Film, Animated Feature Film, Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, Original Score, Original Song, Art Direction, Cinematography, Costume Design, Film Editing, Visual Effects, Makeup, Previously in 2003

Past Best Actress Contests: 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2018, 2019