American Hustle – Here we have a great ensemble featuring Christian Bale, Amy Adams, Bradley Cooper, and Jennifer Lawrence, and yet, the only individual acting nomination the film could muster up goes to the one in the group that doesn’t really deserve it. Lawrence was fully deserving of her awards last year for her tremendous performance in Silver Linings Playbook, but as I’ve said before, her performance in American Hustle is not very memorable, leading to complete puzzlement as to why she has been the focus of many of the film’s acting awards.
That being said, it’s interesting to note that all four of them received Oscar nominations the other day. Does that mean something special? Perhaps. Perhaps not. It terms of it winning the Best Picture Oscar, it should be noted that only two films out of 14 that have received all four acting nominations have won the top prize, but in terms of it winning Best Ensemble from SAG, I think it’s a little telling that it only got one individual acting nomination.
At this point, you might be saying, “Hey wait, didn’t Argo only get one individual acting nomination?” Well, you’d be right. Alan Arkin was the only one nominated for that film, and he didn’t win. Yet, the film went on to win Best Ensemble. The explanation for this is simple: last year, SAG used the category as a Best Picture award instead of a Best Ensemble award. If they had used it as it was meant to be used, we would have seen Les Miserables or Lincoln take it easily over Argo, a film that, as I’ve already pointed out, doesn’t have much of an ensemble.
Coming back around to American Hustle, the film does have a very good chance of taking Best Ensemble because most of the performance are very good. There’s also the fact that it won the Critics’ Choice award for Best Ensemble, which has matched SAG’s 8/12 times. Gold Derby is even currently predicting that Russell’s film will emerge as the winner, but I find it very hard to stray away from the last of the nominees, the one that seems the most likely to be victorious at the end of the night.
12 Years a Slave – No other ensemble has impressed me as much this year as that of 12 Years a Slave, which features compelling performances from Chiwetel Ejiofor, Lupita Nyong’o, Michael Fassbender, Benedict Cumberbatch, Paul Giamatti, Paul Dano, Sarah Paulson, Alfre Woodard, and Brad Pitt. Granted, I thought the film was decent (I don’t think it’s really deserving of Best Picture), but the reason why it gets up to the level it does is because of this phenomenal cast. I don’t want you to think I’m just basing my guess on personal feelings though, so let’s look at the evidence to support 12 Years a Slave taking their big prize.
It’s no secret that SAG was quite taken with the film as well, nominating it for three individual performances (there’s no lead actress in the film), in addition to Best Ensemble. You may recall from last year that Lincoln had the same number of nominations, and in the same categories too, but failed to win. However, as I’ve already explained, last year was a bit of an anomaly that led to a film winning that shouldn’t even have been in the category in the first place. That being said, should they choose to use the category as a Best Picture award again, that would more than likely lead them straight to 12 Years a Slave, which has been far and away the most popular choice throughout awards season, including recent Best Picture wins at the Golden Globes and the Critics’ Choice. Therefore, my simple prediction comes down to this: 12 Years a Slave will most likely win because of its incredible cast, multiple nominations, and the fact that it’s heavily favored for Best Picture, but beware of American Hustle, for it may just be able to pull an upset.
So, there you have my best predictions as to who will win later tonight at the Screen Actors Guild awards. I’ll be live-blogging the winners as the ceremony airs, so be sure to check back here for an up to date list of who’s taking home the awards for film and TV. As always, feel free to let us know who you think should/will win each of the categories in the comments section.
