Oscars 2014: 10 Movies The Academy Should Consider (But Won't)

2. Drinking Buddies - Best Picture, Best Director

This one's a longshot at best, but weirder things have happened. Drinking Buddies was a small film directed by Joe Swanberg starring Jake Johnson, Olivia Wilde, Anna Kendrick, and Ron Livingston; it debuted at the South by Southwest Film Festival early last year, before getting a small release and landing on Video on Demand. The movie is an impressive character piece, which focuses on two co-workers at a craft brewery in Los Angeles that struggle with feelings they have for each other, despite being in committed relationships with other people. Swanberg didn't have a solid script for the film, and instead gave the actors an outline and a breakdown of what needed to be accomplished from scene to scene. This gave the film a very real feeling and allowed the actors to not only improvise, but deliver incredibly subtle and natural performances. As I said, it's a long shot that the film will get any awards attention at all, and it certainly doesn't deserve to win best picture, but even a nomination would be a nice nod to one of 2013's most personal and unique films.