Borders DVD Staff on Who Should & Will Win at This Year's Oscars

The Borders DVD team has made their Oscar predictions in 11 key categories on the scorecard below, along with a some personal thoughts on what or who should win.

After the Oscar telecast, the DVD team will check back to do one or more of the following things:

• Gloat unabashadly about their masterful award-picking prowess;
• Acknowledge sheepishly their prognosticating stumbles;
• Lament the unfairness of it all for some deserving non-winners;
• Celebrate those of you who got it right.

Who or what do you think will win? How many can you get predict?

Check out our picks, then fill out your own scorecard with your own opinions.  Make your picks now and check back in after the telecast.

 Here now, the picks:

1.  Best Motion Picture
Will Win: The Departed
Should Win: Little Miss Sunshine

2006 brought some outstanding performances to the table, but when I look back at the movie that entertained the most, it was hands-down Little Miss Sunshine. While a comedy winning an Oscar is rare, the cleverness and quirkiness in the portrayal of the dysfunctional Hoover family should give it the edge it needs. The Departed was action-packed and intense, but who can forget those awkward family moments in Little Miss Sunshine that had us laughing out loud in the theaters? Spoiler Alert! Young Olive might not have won the award for Little Miss Sunshine, but the film definitely deserves to take home Best Picture.
   -Megan Hinterman, DVD Assistant Buyer

2.  Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role
Will Win: Helen Mirren for The Queen
Should Win: Helen Mirren for The Queen

All hail Helen Mirren, who morphs so effortlessly into Queen Elizabeth II that you feel like you're watching a documentary. Unlike many contemporary actors who rely on prosthetics to help them play their parts, Mirren does more than simply mimic Her Majesty through a costume of tightly coiffed hair and sensible shoes. With one withering look or purse of her lips, she communicates the power, tradition, and defiant obsolescence of the house of Windsor. Mirren's biggest triumph, though, is making us see just how human a heart beats below those fusty pastel dresses.
   -Emily Mathews, Visual Presentation Specialist: Copywriter

3.  Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role
Will Win: Forest Whitaker for The Last King of Scotland
Should Win: Ryan Gosling for Half Nelson

Let me preface this by saying that I'm ecstatic that Forest Whitaker is getting the recognition he deserves-it's long overdue. However, I like to root for the underdog, and with other contenders like Leo, Will, and Peter in the race, Ryan Gosling needs a little love. Gosling's performance in Half Nelson as an inner-city junior-high teacher who is also a self-destructing crack addict is terrifyingly realistic. His ability to play strong yet vulnerable characters (see Believer, Stay, United States of Leland) is a talent that will continue to bring him success. While the King's reign will probably rule on Oscar night, I'm casting my vote for Ryan.
   -Megan Hinterman, DVD Assistant Buyer

4.  Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role
Will Win: Jennifer Hudson for Dreamgirls
Should Win: Rinko Kikuchi for Babel

While Jennifer Hudson's performance in Dreamgirls was spectacular and her songs truly show-stopping, Rinko Kikuchi's understated work in Babel deserves this award. She gave the most brave and emotionally baring performance of the year. In her daring portrayal of a sexually confused, deaf-mute teenager, Rinko conveys a sense of loss, desperation, and yearning in her search for compassion and companionship. The fact that she pulled this off without the use of words-through facial expressions, body language, and learning sign language for the role-only further illustrates her talent and the idea that, sometimes, it isn't always words that are capable of moving an audience.
   -Mike Lee, DVD Category Manager

5.  Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role
Will Win: Eddie Murphy for Dreamgirls
Should Win: Alan Arkin for Little Miss Sunshine

"Jimmy gots soul" sang Eddie Murphy in Dreamgirls, and Eddie may win an Oscar for his spot-on portrayal of James "Thunder" Early, the R&B shouter who gives a break to the Dreamgirls. His performance was nuanced and his singing was spectacular, enough to make you forget "Party All the Time." This is Alan Arkin's third nomination for an Academy Award, and while the Academy often awards career longevity (see James Coburn and Jack Palance), Arkin's performance as a substance-abusing, porn-loving grandfather is indeed Oscar worthy.
   -Dan Bogucki, DVD Buyer

6.  Best Achievement in Directing
Will Win: Martin Scorsese for The Departed
Should Win: Martin Scorsese for The Departed

For God's sake, let him have it! He is one of the few American filmmakers who sees the world richly and is comparable to our best American novelists. He has also tirelessly promoted the preservation and conversation of American film as an art form, championing work by artists both large (John Ford, Vincente Minelli) and small (Nicholas Ray, Abraham Polonsky). These deeds should not go unrewarded.
   -Patti Russo, Multimedia Director

7.   Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen
Will Win: Little Miss Sunshine
Should Win: Pan's Labyrinth

Little Miss Sunshine created a dysfunctional family laced with humor, sadness and, ultimately, redemption. While the screenplay delivered many moments of laughter and created interesting characters, it was ultimately too contrived and forced as the story headed to its over-the-top conclusion. Guillermo del Toro's work in Pan's Labyrinth, though, is an original creation that defies categorization. Part WWII historical drama about a small band of rebels in Spain fighting the fascist government and part children's fairy tale of a young girl who escapes her harsh reality into a world of mythic creatures and adventure, the film creates a new world that blends elements of fantasy and reality until they overlap and become impossible to distinguish from one another.
   -Mike Lee, DVD Cat. Manager

8.  Best Animated Feature Film of the Year
Will Win: Happy Feet
Should Win: Cars

This is a tough category to pick. While Cars seems to have the inside track given its wins at the Golden Globes and Annies (the winner of the Annie has gone on to win the Oscar every year since the Academy created this category), Happy Feet has something that is hard to beat... penguins. Not just any penguins, but really cute ones to boot. That dance. Given the public's love affair with penguins and the fact that they are so darn cute leads us to pick Happy Feet to win against the odds. However, the real winner is the buying public, which is guaranteed viewing some great family fare, whichever movie they prefer. There are no losers here.
   -Dave Rassenfoss, DVD Buyer

9.  Best Foreign Language Film of the Year
Will Win: Pan's Labyrinth
Should Win: Pan's Labyrinth

Most foreign-language films are unknown to the viewers of the Oscars. This year, however, there is one film that stands out. Pan's Labyrinth is an exceptional film that intertwines the brutal realism of WWII with the fantastic elements of a fairytale underworld. Del Toro melds the two stories beautifully, carrying one story to the next and back again. All of the characters deliver the same sense of realism, from the cruelty of the fascist captain to the unnaturalness of the mythical Faun and the innocence of the young heroine. Similarly, the twisted nature of war is mirrored in the encompassing nature of the labyrinth. You find yourself so absorbed in the story that you even forget that you are reading subtitles.
   -Jason Smith, Multimedia Department Assistant

10.  Best Documentary
Will Win: An Inconvenient Truth
Should Win: An Inconvenient Truth

Hollywood loves causes, and the bigger the better. Global warming is a pretty big issue, and An Inconvenient Truth lays out the case for environmental climate change, why it's happening, and how we can get a handle on it without being preachy. The overall message is reasoned and supported by facts that are hard to refute. The best documentary of the year closes with things that can be done on a human scale to combat global warming.
   -Dan Bogucki, DVD Buyer

11.  Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material Previously Produced or Published
Will Win: The Departed
Should Win: Borat

"Is it a screenplay? Or was it improv?" This may be the very question that causes serious Oscar voters to hand the award over to The Departed as opposed to Borat. The writers of The Departed were able to seamlessly translate a Hong Kong thriller into a Boston psychodrama for the masses and add Scorcesean violence and character building into the script. However, I can only imagine that the rest of the Borat writing team was working 'round the clock to keep up with Sacha Baron Cohen throughout his trip across America while filming the interactions of our "tour guide" with the unknowing cast members. Their dedication and commitment to providing us with laughs and an introspective look at our individual and national views on tolerance of others gives them my vote.
   -Kristen Schaedig, DVD Buyer

12.  Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures, Original Song
Will Win: An Inconvenient Truth "I Need to Wake Up"
Should Win: An Inconvenient Truth "I Need to Wake Up"

Hollywood may love a cause, but it also loves a survivor. As the debate over global warming finally gains traction, every great and worthy cause needs an anthem. Melissa Etheridge (having survived cancer) provided a similar anthem for Breast Cancer with her "I Run for Life." Etheridge returns with another worthy anthem for another major cause. Igniting the spirit of hope with a song titled "I Need to Wake Up," the song pleads, "Have I been sleeping, Dismissing all the distant rumblings... Now I am throwing off the carelessness of youth, To listen to an inconvenient truth." What better way to rally the collective spirit into action than by offering a sign of hope through an inspiring anthem and an even more inspiring survivor.
   -David LeMaire, Music Buyer