If We Had an Oscar Ballot 2015

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If We Had an Oscar Ballot 2015

What follows is a hypothetical scenario in which we are Academy voters who commit the ultimate sin of showing you our completed ballots. Never mind that ballots were due several days ago - we're professional procrastinators.

Note: Like many Oscar voters, we could go through the motions of voting in all 24 races, but, for the sake of honesty (and what we hope the real voters practice), we'll abstain from the categories where we have yet to see all the nominees. So no Animated Feature (though Inside Out might get a vote from us anyway), Foreign Film (where we'd possibly cast a vote each for Son of Saul and Mustang), or Documentary Short.

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CineDrunk: Final 2015 Oscar Predictions

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hanksoscardrink

A drumroll, please. But not from Whiplash, because it would be cruel to remind us of such things.

Nay, a drumroll to announce our final* predictions for the 88th Annual Academy Awards. Drinks in hand, we worked through all 24 categories in a magnanimous effort to help you win your office pool. No need to send us a cut of your winnings. Helping fellow Oscar-obsessives is what we do.

 
cumberbatchdrink
 

*Final means "subject to change." Set-in-stone predictions to be posted Sunday.

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The 2nd Annual CineMunchies: Honoring the Best of 2015 in Cinema

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The 2nd Annual CineMunchies: Honoring the Best of 2015 in Cinema

Last year we unleashed the CineMunchies upon the world, and now we're back with our 2nd annual edition. Take a look at the winners* below, and listen to the latest CineDrunk podcast for our extended thoughts. (ICYMI, we discussed our personal top ten films in last week's podcast.)

The task of reviewing an entire year in film called for a strong drink.

Masala Martini
(adapted from Saveur)
2 oz gin
1/2 oz lime juice
1/2 oz orange blossom honey
1/8 tsp. ground cumin
1/8 tsp. kosher salt
lemon slice

Add first five ingredients to a cocktail shaker and shake to incorporate honey. Add ice, and shake again. Pour into a martini glass and garnish with lemon slice. Watch the cumin grains scatter to the bottom of the glass, along with your hopes and dreams.

*For our Best Picture and acting awards, we attributed points based on our personal rankings, and those with the most points became our honorees. For other categories, we used a combination of secret ballot, tea leaves, and martini-fueled caucusing.

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CineDrunk: Best of 2015 - Top Ten Lists

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bb8

It's that time of year! We've seen more than one hundred 2015 movies, so it's high time we rank them--unmercifully.

Just kidding, we're as giddy as BB-8 to talk about this impressive crop of films. And we do just that in our latest CineDrunk podcast. Without further ado, our long-awaited top ten episode in which we are drunk on movies, lists, and celery martinis. Cheers!

Celery Martini
(adapted from Saveur)

2 oz London Dry Gin
1.5 oz lemon juice
1.5 oz dry vermouth
celery salt
lime wedge
celery hearts

Rim a martini glass with lime wedge and celery salt. Fill a cocktail shaker with ice and add gin, lemon juice, and vermouth. Shake vigorously and strain into rimmed glass. Garnish with a celery heart.
 

Watch the blog in the coming days for our full write-ups on the films that were most special to us in 2015. Want more? You can't possibly, but there's more anyway! Below is a short (we promise!) bonus podcast where we discuss even more films we loved from last year, though not quite enough to make any of our lists. Spiked hot chocolate is involved.

2015 Oscar Nominations Reactions

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2015 Oscar Nominations Reactions

They're heeeeere! Nominations for the 88th Annual Academy Awards were announced today, and it was The Revenant that came out on top with a whopping 12 nominations. Close behind was Mad Max: Fury Road with 10 well-deserved mentions. As is always the case with Oscar, there were a handful of surprise inclusions and a few jaw-dropping snubs. So let's dig in to see how I fared with my predictions and what the CineDrunk team thinks of it all.

Have a listen to our initial reactions below, and also subscribe to CineDrunk on iTunes. Read on for the list of nominations and prediction results.

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Final 2015 Oscar Nominations Predictions

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Final 2015 Oscar Nominations Predictions

The day we've all been waiting for has arrived! Or maybe just me and a handful of other nerds, I guess. The 88th Annual Academy Awards nominations will be announced Thursday morning in two batches beginning at 8:30am ET (you can view both announcements live at the Oscars website or the second announcement on most major news programs at 8:38am ET). The nominees will be announced live in all 24 categories by directors Guillermo del Toro and Ang Lee, actor John Krasinski, and Academy President Cheryl Boone Isaacs.

2015 delivered an abundance of quality films (we here at CineMunch will have our top ten lists and year-end superlatives ready for the public early next month), and I'm hopeful this year's crop of nominees reflect that quality. Knowing the Oscars though, they probably won't (I'm looking in your direction, Helen Mirren). Some of this year's categories are the most fluid and difficult to predict I've ever encountered in my 15+ years of prognosticating (Best Supporting Actor is wildly competitive), so there are bound to be some surprises.

Unlike my impressive performance last year (where I placed first on awards betting site GoldDerby out of more than 3,000 participants and experts), I expect to do considerably less well this year. I'll predict my overall prediction accuracy rate is somewhere around 72%. Look at me predicting my own predictions - someone stop me! Read on for my final nominations predictions.

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2016 Golden Globe Awards Predictions

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2016 Golden Globe Awards Predictions

'Tis the season! It's Golden Globes night! Hollywood's best and brightest stars of the screen, both big and small, will file into the Beverly Hills Hilton and get drunk for our amusement. Some awards will be handed out (as determined by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association), and host Ricky Gervais will likely make many in the audience uncomfortable. Denzel Washington will receive this year's Cecil B. DeMille Lifetime Achievement Award. So grab a drink or four, follow along with us on Twitter @CineMunch throughout the telecast (starting at 8pm ET on NBC), and read on for my foolhardy predictions for the 73rd Annual Golden Globe Awards!

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