If I Had an Oscar Ballot…

This Thursday morning, J.J. Abrams, Alfonso Cuaron, and Chris Pine will announce the nominations for the 87th Annual Academy Awards. In an unprecedented broadcast, the trio will announce the nominees in all twenty-four categories. Voting for the categories themselves closed on Friday, and following Thursday’s nominations, many fates will start to be (literally) sealed for Hollywood’s favorite night, which be held in the Dolby Theater on February 22^nd.

I, unfortunately, take no part in the voting process on either end of the nomination announcements, but it’s a fun time of year regardless. You hold out for dark horse favorties that you’ve had throughout the entire year, wishing that you could be so lucky enough to check off their names on a ballot and move them one inch closer to securing, at the very least, an Academy Award nomination. In an effort to indulge my own personal fantasy, I have borrowed an exercise from Kris Tapley at Hitfix.com and have constructed my very own Oscar ballot. Below you will see my picks in every category with a write-up justifying my choices. The write-ups, as can be expected with me, might be a bit lengthy, so feel free to skim and read as you see fit. And, of course, this functions as if I were playing God and had the ability to vote without restriction over every single category regardless of branch.

Reel Reactions’ Best of 2014: Mike Murphy’s Top 10 Films

Back so soon.

Compared to previous years, 2014 proved to have more films than ever in contest to make my final Top 10 tally. Both 2012 and 2013 were packed to the brim with marvelous films, but for me 2014 felt like it was overflowing. My initial whittle, that discarded all of the duds and middle-of-the-road films that I had no problem leaving behind, numbered just under fifty films! Chopping that list in half was no easy feat, but I’m sure that films I let go will pop up on my co-critics’ lists so they’ll thankfully get their due. However, I know I can’t include everything and even with that being the conclusion I come to terms with each year, accepting that was harder than ever this year.

AFI Film Festival Score Card

All film enthusiasts dream about getting to attend a major film festival. I can’t tell you the amount of times I’ve wondered what it’s like to be at Sundance or Cannes or TIFF, hopping from screening to screening, catching so many different types of films and being able to experience giant world premieres with no expectations. I had only attended one film festival before and it was the Boston Film Festival. A very small event, just a weekend long, showing mostly unknown independent fare with a few larger pictures squeezed in for good measure. It was hardly an event of note, but still an experience like what I had always dreamed of just on a diet level. It felt like a nice precursor to something of a Venice or Berlin level, a preface to an experience I would maybe be lucky enough to have sometime down the line. That festival was over two years ago now, and while I haven’t yet been to Toronto or France or Park City for any of the major film festivals, I did get to jump up to something far larger than the Boston Film Festival.