2009

In 2009, the Academy decided to change how nominations took place.  Since 1944, it had been 5 Best Picture nominees.  They felt if they expanded it out to 10 nominees, then maybe a blockbuster might make the list and improve the ratings of the Oscar telecast.

The way nominees are chosen is that every member of the academy lists their top five choices for Best Picture.  The top choice from each voter are tallied and any movie that received 20% plus one of the votes is an automatic nominee.  Any movie that doesn't reach a certain threshold is eliminated after this first round and the second choice votes are redistributed (if they met the threshold).  This continues, round by round, until there were five movies that meet the 20%+1 level, or until all the five choices on each eliminated ballot are gone through and then the highest chosen movies fill out the list.

In the new system, the level needed to be a nominee is 8.9%, and the minimum threshold to stay on the ballot is 5%.  However, in the new system, the mininum number of nominees is five, but the odds are that from now on, probably at least seven movies will be nominated each year.

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Best Picture Nominees:

Avatar
The Blind Side
District 9
An Education
The Hurt Locker *
Inglourious Basterds
Precious:  Based on the Novel "Push" by Sapphire
A Serious Man
Up
Up in the Air

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Avatar - The first of the blockbuster nominees.  This movie ended up outgrossing Titanic (largely due to more expensive ticket prices and more expensive 3-D viewings).  An interesting new story with new beings.  A lot of motion capture acting, hence the name.  This was the favorite to win, but ended up winning three technical awards.

The Blind Side - A heartfelt story about a black football playing teen adopted by a white family who ended up making it to the NFL.  Based on a true story, this featured Sandra Bullock in a role that ended up garnering the Best Actress Oscar.  This is a great story and fun to watch.

District 9 - A (relatively) low budget South African film about aliens that land and have a difficult time of it and how they interact with humans.  Another blockbuster but not as good as Avatar.

An Education - A coming of age film about a young girl from University who has an affair with a con man, and grows up quite a bit. Some good performances by Carey Mulligan and Rosamund Pike.

The Hurt Locker - Story of bomb defusers in the military and how they deal with their stressful lives. Marked the jump up to stardom by Jeremy Renner, and also the first (and only) win by a female director.  This film put me to sleep, so makes me think it was an opportunity to give a female director of a good film Best Director award for a film that not typically directed by female directors.

Inglourious Basterds - Quentin Tarantino take on World War II, with an alternate history of attempted coups on Hitler.  Marked the breakout of Christoph Waltz, who won the Supporting Actor Oscar.  Tarantino films are hit or miss, but this is slightly more a hit for me.

Precious: Based on the Novel "Push" by Sapphire - Good acting by most of the cast, which garnered nominations for Mo'Nique (who won the Supporting Actress Oscar) and Gabourey Sidibe, in her acting debut.  I enjoyed this movie, but I'm not a big fan of Mariah Carey or the story.

A Serious Man - A Coen brothers comedy (I guess) about the travails of a Jewish man en route to a divorce.  This movie also put me to sleep.  I'm not sure about this 10 Best Picture rule.  Seems to be including a lot of films that no one has seen (or should see).

Up - The second animated feature to be nominated for Best Picture, this is a fun picture about a flying house, grumpy old man, a helpful kid, and talking dogs.  It's also charming and I would love for this to have won Best Pic.

Up in the Air - George Clooney vehicle about a company-downsizer-for-hire who is always on the road.  A comedy, somewhat charming, but probably not exactly Best Picture fodder, either.

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My ranking of the Best Picture nominees:

1.  The Blind Side
2.  Up
3.  Up in the Air
4.  Inglourious Basterds
5.  District 9
6.  An Education
7.  Avatar
8.  The Hurt Locker
9.  Precious:  Based on the Novel "Push" by Sapphire
10. A Serious Man