1. John Ridley - 12 Years a Slave2. Julie Delpy, Ethan Hawke, and Richard Linklater - Before Midnight3. Billy Ray - Captain Phillips4. Terrence Winter - The Wolf of Wall Street 5. Steve Coogan and Jeff Pope - Philomena (Alt: Tracy Letts - August: Osage County) Best Adapted Screenplay is usually the more chock-full of the two writing categories and Best Original Screenplay is typically more lean, but the roles have definitely been reversed this year. John Ridley better be preparing his acceptance speech, because he is not only assured of a nomination for his adaptation of the autobiography 12 Years a Slave, but he is almost a dead certain lock for the win. Before Midnight has been a favorite of critics since it debuted at Sundance last January and the element of the film that has been most constantly praised has been its screenplay, so like its predecessor before it, Before Sunset, I expect to get a nod from the Writers branch. Billy Ray's script on the Somali pirate kidnapping incident from a few year's back should also be secure of a nomination given the popularity of the film. The next two entries sit on a little bit shakier ground. Terrence Winter, former Sopranos writer and creator of HBO's Boardwalk Empire, will likely be the beneficiary of the success of The Wolf of Wall Street, but I wonder if the excesses of the film's script (and I'm not talking about the characters' behavior in the film) will play negatively with the writers. Then there's Steve Coogan and Jeff Pope's script for Philomena. The film feels a bit light-weight for the type of movies this branch typically nominates, but it's mixture of comedy and drama is a formula that could definitely tickle the writers' fancy. The Writer's branch is more adventurous than almost any other branch of the Academy, so I do think the screenplays for films like The Spectacular Now and Short Term 12 do have a shot, but it just doesn't feel like those films have enough buzz behind them to make the final cut. The hardest omission to accept though is that of Tracy Letts. Letts adapts his own award-winning script for the film adaptation of August: Osage County, and even though those who have seen both the play and the film say the film compares negatively, a writing adapting his own work seems like something too tempting for the Writers branch not to nominate. However, since The Wolf of Wall Street and Philomena have a better shot at making a dent on the Best Picture race, I'm going to stick to those scripts.
A film fanatic at a very young age, starting with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle movies and gradually moving up to more sophisticated fare, at around the age of ten he became inexplicably obsessed with all things Oscar. With the incredibly trivial power of being able to chronologically name every Best Picture winner from memory, his lifelong goal is to see every Oscar nominated film, in every major category, in the history of the Academy Awards.
