Brian's Predictions for the 83rd Annual Academy Awards

It's that time of year again. The 83rd Annual Academy Awards will air on ABC at 7 p.m. central on Sunday hosted by James Franco, nominee this year for 127 Hours, and past nominee Anne Hathaway.

It doesn't seem there will be a lot of, if any, surprises on Oscar night, but you never know. It looks as if all major categories are locked or down to two possible winners. For instance, Best Picture is down to The King's Speech or The Social Network and Best Director is between the directors of those two movies, Tom Hooper and David Fincher, respectively. I'm hearing a lot of talk that The King's Speech has a fair chance at racking up 8-plus awards, which is certainly enough to consider it a sweep.

The safest bet in the major categories is Colin Firth for Best Actor. Natalie Portman also seems pretty safe in the Best Actress category. The supporting awards are both coming down to the wire. At Best Supporting Actor you have, early favorite, Christian Bale (The Fighter) duking it out with Geoffrey Rush (The King's Speech). Veteran Melissa Leo (The Fighter) and new-comer Hailee Steinfeld (True Grit) are head-to-head going for Best Supporting Actress.

I managed to see 46 out of the 56 nominated movies, only missing two Documentary features, three Foreign Language films and all five Short Documentaries (I'm still not quite sure how to see those).

I said there wouldn't be a lot of surprises this year, but there are a lot of two-nominee races thus there were a lot of tough calls. I feel pretty good about my choices, so without further ado, I will now make my Oscar predictions.

Best Picture

Sunday will likely be the night of The King's Speech. It's a crowd pleasing story, with world-class acting. The Social Network was rolling for a long time, but started falling a bit once The King's Speech won the producer's guild award. If The Social Network came out later in the year, I think it would've won for sure. It still has a decent chance however. Inception probably would have benefited from a later release as well. I will be rooting for Toy Story 3 or Black Swan to shock the world and win the big prize, but I'm not counting on it. If there is a surprise, it'll be either The Fighter or True Grit, but all signs point to The King's Speech.

Best Director

In the 82 years of Oscar, only 21 films have won Best Picture, but not Best Director. I think 2010 will make it 22. I think David Fincher will win his first directing Oscar for The Social Network. If The King's Speech sweeps, I'll likely be wrong, but I think the voter's will agree Fincher was more important to his movie than Tom Hooper was to The King's Speech. I thought Black Swan was the best directed movie of the year, so I would have voted for Darren Aronofsky, but I don't think he, nor the other two nominees (Coen brothers for True Grit and David O. Russell for The Fighter) has a chance.

Best Actor

This is, without a doubt, the easiest to predict of the major categories. It will go to Colin Firth, as Edward VI in The King's Speech, who is pretty much locked in already. Jeff Bridges, because he won this award last year for Crazy Heart, is probably least likely to win. Though in a perfect world Firth would have won last year for A Single Man and Bridges this year for True Grit. At least they will both have Oscars in the end. I really don't think there's a chance for a surprise, so I won't name one.

Best Actress

At one point this seemed like a two-horse race, but the lovely Natalie Portman (Black Swan) has been pulling away from Annette Bening (The Kids Are All Right) lately. As I've said before, I think Portman is sensational in Black Swan, and I think it's the best performance of the year.

Best Supporting Actor
This race is so much tighter than it once was. I'm still sticking with Christian Bale    (The Fighter) even though Geoffrey Rush (The King's Speech) has had serious buzz lately. I think the reason some people are picking Rush is because he's as important, maybe more important, to The King's Speech as Colin Firth. I don't disagree with that, but Bale was nominated for The Fighter when the lead (Mark Wahlberg) wasn't nominated. So I think it's safe to say Bale was more important to his movie as well. And I still think the fact that Rush already has an Oscar (Best Actor for Shine in 1996) will work against him. However, if Rush does win he'd be only the 10th actor or actress to have a win in both the leading and supporting categories.

Best Supporting Actress
Probably the most interesting race of year. This is the only major category where any of the nominees could possibly pull off the win, though it's mostly between Hailee Steinfeld (True Grit) and Melissa Leo (The Fighter). As of right now, I'm giving the slight edge to Melissa Leo because she's a respected veteran actress and this is her second nomination in three years. If 14-year-old Steinfeld wins, she would become the third youngest person to win a competitive acting Oscar (the two youngest being Tatum O'Neal, 10, for Paper Moon in 1973 and Anna Paquin, 11, for The Piano in 1993). The other three nominees, who all could possibly upset, are Amy Adams (The Fighter), Helena Bonham Carter (The King's Speech) and Jacki Weaver (Animal Kingdom).

Best Picture
Will Win: The King's Speech
Should Win: Toy Story 3

Best Director
Will Win: David Fincher for The Social Network
Should Win: Darren Aronofsky for Black Swan

Best Actor
Will Win: Colin Firth in The King's Speech
Should Win: Firth
Should Have Been Nominated: Ryan Gosling for Blue Valentine

Best Actress
Will Win: Natalie Portman in Black Swan
Should Win: Portman
Should Have Been Nominated: Lesley Manville for Another Year

Best Supporting Actor
Will Win: Christian Bale in The Fighter
Should Win: Bale

Best Supporting Actress
Will Win: Melissa Leo in The Fighter
Should Win: Hailee Steinfeld in True Grit

Original Screenplay
Will Win: David Seidler for The King's Speech
Should Win: Mike Leigh for Another Year

Adapted Screenplay
Will Win: Aaron Sorkin for The Social Network
Should Win: Michael Arndt, John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton and Lee Unkrich for Toy Story 3

Animated Feature
Will Win: Toy Story 3 (Probably the biggest lock of the night)
Should Win: Toy Story 3

Art Direction
Will Win: The King's Speech
Should Win: Alice in Wonderland
Should Have Been Nominated: Shutter Island

Cinematography
Will Win: True Grit
Should Win: Black Swan
Should Have Been Nominated: Shutter Island

Costume Design
Will Win: The King's Speech
Should Win: The King's Speech

Makeup
Will Win: The Wolfman (Best Makeup shouldn't mean Most Makeup)
Should Win: Barney's Version

Film Editing
Will Win: The Social Network
Should Win: Black Swan
Should Have Been Nominated: Scott Pilgrim vs. the World

Sound Editing
Will Win: Inception
Should Win: Toy Story 3

Sound Mixing
Will Win: Inception
Should Win: Inception

Visual Effects
Will Win: Inception
Should Win: Inception

Original Song
Will Win: "Coming Home" from Country Strong (I hope not)
Should Win: "I See the Light" from Tangled

Original Score
Will Win: The King's Speech
Should Win: How to Train Your Dragon

Animated Short
Will Win: The Gruffalo
Should Win: Day & Night, though I did thoroughly enjoy The Gruffalo

Live-Action Short
Will Win: The Confession (My least favorite film from last year's nominees won, so I'm picking my least favorite from this year to win)
Should Win: God of Love, though I wouldn't be opposed to Wish 143 taking it either

Documentary
Will Win: Inside Job (I couldn't find a way to see this film, but of the three I did see I like Exit Through the Gift Shop the best)

Foreign Language Film
Will Win: In a Better World (Again, I didn't see it)

Documentary Short Subject
Will Win: Strangers No More

So that's that. Feel free to make fun of me if I do horribly. I've never gotten 20 right, so that's my goal every year, though since there's only 24 categories, that seems tough. Thanks for reading. I hope you enjoy the show!