Could movie buffs beat Vegas?

The house always wins.

Well, not quite always, but often enough that casinos are multimillion dollar businesses and thousands of people have to seek treatment for gambling addiction, because making bets has ruined their lives. The house makes a fortune and gamblers file for bankruptcy, because the house knows more than the bettors. Casinos are built by exploiting the common person's ignorance about statistics. Almost every game puts the gambler at a massive disadvantage. When the house doesn't have a built in advantage like when taking sports wagers, they try to stay ahead of the public by having far more information. Bookmakers hire highly intelligent people who have a level of expertise no ordinary person can match. When a casino sets the odds for a wager, they have put massive amounts of research into predicting both the likely outcome and the probable distribution of bets they will receive. If you want to make a living wagering on sports, you better have a high IQ and work ethic to match. Just scratching out wins on fifty-three percent of your bets would put you in an elite class of gambler. However there may be a few rare situations where the sharps in Las Vegas don't have the most information.

For special events bookmakers will accept bets outside their normal purview of sports. They will occasionally offer up odds on things happening in pop culture, like reality show outcomes or awards ceremonies. Suddenly a business built around some of the sharpest sports experts in the world has to venture out of their comfort zone where others know more than they do. This gives bettor a rare chance to gamble on a somewhat level playing field. If the casinos aren't the experts, then maybe you could be the expert, or at least find someone who is to advise you.

I believe the annual Academy Awards offer such an opportunity. Plenty of people love movies, and some of them enjoy having the chance to gamble on the highest of Hollywood honors. Casinos gladly accept their action knowing it doesn't take much information to beat the hoi polloi. However a very few film buffs may have the advantage over Vegas. For those of us who study and scrutinize the Academy Awards like religious texts, we can spot those special situations that professional gambler's refer to as value. Sometimes the bookmakers misjudge the odds they should offer for a particular outcome. That means bettors can earn a payoff disproportionate to the actual likelihood of the result occurring. The most clever and committed Oscar watchers know that upsets do occur with some regularity. Actors, writers, directors, and even whole pictures have bested expectations and won when someone else was presumed to have the golden statue coming their way.  So it could pay off to lay some money on the Oscars, if you have reason to believe the reward outweighs the risk. For anyone who may be interested I will provide -FOR ENTERTAINMENT PURPOSES ONLY- my assessment of the major awards and where I think the sharps may have it wrong. Remember these are not my predictions of who will win, though I may mention that, this is about getting the best value for your betting dollar.

We'll start with the "major" categories, for which gambling odds are readily available.

BEST LEADING ACTRESS-

The Nominees:
Marion Cotillard for Two Days, One Night- 60/1
Felicity Jones for The Theory of Everything- 40/1
Julianne Moore for Still Alice- 1/9
Rosamund Pike for Gone Girl- 25/1
Reese Witherspoon for Wild- 8/1

Best Bet: Bettors can gain an advantage by exploiting an area of ignorance. When the bookmakers or the general public don't have a full picture of the contenders for the award the odds can get skewed. We all know that the kinds of movies that win Oscars usually only get a limited release and few people see them. This is especially true for foreign language films. As such most people know nothing about the film Two Days, One Night. While I haven't seen Marion Cotillard's performance, I have seen the results of film awards that usually forecast the results of the Oscars. So far Mme. Cotillard is the only actress other than the favorite Julianne Moore to win a major award for starring in a movie while being female. In my estimation that should give her the second best odds. Casinos prefer to have money spread among all options, so no matter what happens they never stand to lose too much. Since no one saw the movie, no one is betting on Cotillard, so the bookies have to offer longer odds to attract action and spread out the risk. That gives you a great chance to make a value bet on Marion Cotillard.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS-

The Nominees:
Patricia Arquette for Boyhood- 1/7
Laura Dern for Wild- 28/1
Keira Knightly for The Imitation Game- 25/1
Emma Stone for Birdman-  12/1
Meryl Streep for Into the Woods- 15/1

Best Bet: Patricia Arquette's dominance of the preliminary awards may make you think putting money on her is a safe bet. That may be true, but that does mean putting a lot of cash on the line for a small payoff. If an upset happens does happen, you'll be in the hurt, and you'll have missed out on a great money making opportunity. To select a dark horse most likely to surprise the field I looked to a few key factors. Remember that the Academy is mostly composed of older men. When they decide which actress they want to bestow an award upon, they tend to pick the woman they would most want to sleep with. (Hey, don't blame me, it's the Oscar voters who are sexist.) That narrows the race to Keira Knightly and Emma Stone as the two youngest and prettiest nominees. Between them only Knightly has been previously nominated. That indicates she already has the respect of some AMPAS members. I like the potential of earning a big prize if the obvious favorite doesn't come through, so I'd bet on Keira Knightly.

BEST LEADING ACTOR-

The Nominees:
Steve Carell for Foxcatcher- 30/1
Bradley Cooper for American Sniper- 75/1
Benedict Cumberbatch for The Imitation Game- 20/1
Michael Keaton for Birdman-  5/6
Eddie Redmayne for The Theory of Everything- 11/10

Best Bet: Though Michael Keaton seems to be the heavy favorite, there's a strong chance that he'll have some tight competition. While Keaton took the Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Comedy, Eddie Redmayne snared the parallel award for Drama. That would make Redmayne the most likely contender to beat Keaton, but that doesn't mean betting on Eddie gives you the best value. With a bet of $10 only returning $11 in winnings, that's a pretty small payoff for what are likely some long odds of an upset. (Also there's the chance the voters will see Redmayne's re-dic-u-lous performance in Jupiter Ascending, and squash his hopes like a post-Norbit Eddie Murphey.) If you want to bet on an upset bet on one that can reward you proportionate to the odds. For this category, I like Bradley Cooper as a long shot for a few reasons. First, Cooper has now been nominated three times in three years. That indicates a lot of voters like him and some may think he's due for the award. Second he has to portray a character that many people already know. Chris Kyle was on our TV screens just a couple of years ago. Keaton plays a fictional person (who is really just a fictionalized version of himself, so where's the challenge there). The people played by Carell and Cumberbatch are both obscure figures of whom voters won't have preexisting impressions. Redmayne does portray the world famous Stephen Hawking, but mostly during the period of his life before he became the man we recognize. Trying to recreate a living person when we can compare Cooper's performance to our memories of that person is a risky move. Sometimes the Academy likes to reward those kinds of risks. Finally, American Sniper has become the biggest box office hit of all the films up for Best Picture. There are members of AMPAS who like to reward financial success. Some of the glory for the film as a whole could give its star a much needed bump in the voting.

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR-

The Nominees:
Robert Duvall for The Judge- 30/1
Ethan Hawke for Boyhood- 12/1
Edward Norton for Birdman- 10/1
Mark Ruffalo for Foxcatcher-  14/1
J. K. Simmons for The Theory of Everything- 1/5

Best Bet: This is another category with a heavy favorite. So all we need to find the best value bet is determine which of the nominees has the best chance of upsetting J. Jonah Simmons. Robert Duvall may be deeply respected, but very few people are passionate about The Judge as a movie. All the other nominees have past nominations and respectable reputations, so they're all even there. I think Edward Norton may have an edge though. Part of the appeal of Michael Keaton's performance in Birdman comes from the winking nature of an actor famous for playing a superhero in a movie that mocks superhero movies. Well Edward Norton once played the Hulk, and famously had a contentious split with Marvel studios over their designs for the character. Now he plays the "pure" theater actor who serves as the foil to Keaton's former blockbuster star. It's a roll that many Oscar voters imagine themselves playing in their real lives. If AMPAS really wants to flip the bird* to all the comic book inspired films that dominate the box office, they could give the trophy to Norton.

BEST DIRECTOR-

The Nominees:
Alejandro G. Iñárritu for Birdman- 7/1
Richard Linklater for Boyhood- 1/6
Bennett Miller for Foxcatcher- 45/1
Wes Anderson for The Grand Budapest Hotel- 22/1
Morten Tyldum for The Imitation Game- 18/1

Best Bet: This one honestly confounds me. I know Richard Linklater walked away with the Golden Globe award, but in 5 of the last 7 years the Oscar didn't go to the Globe winner. Also, I know that for most of the Academy Award's history the prizes for Best Picture and Best Director went to the same movie, and most people assume that's still the case. In the last couple of decades that has changed dramatically. Of the last 16 years the winner of Best Director didn't direct the Best Picture 6 different times! Boyhood may very well win Best Picture, but that by no means makes Linklater a lock. Based on the buzz, I would make Alejandro Iñárritu the favorite to win. Since Vegas gave him the next best odds after the presumed favorite, they seem to agree. When I can win $7 for every dollar bet on someone I judge to be the favorite, I call that a value bet.

BEST PICTURE-

The Nominees:
American Sniper- 75/1 
Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)- 18/1
Boyhood- 2/5
The Grand Budapest Hotel- 9/1
The Imitation Game- 7/1
Selma- 20/1
The Theory of Everything- 30/1
Whiplash- 60/1

Best Bet: You could actually make an argument for a few of the nominees as good value bets. Because American Sniper has a turned into a box office sensation, there will be some AMPAS members who feel that sort of popularity should be rewarded. On the other hand Chris Kyle's story has stirred up some political controversy, and the Academy has distanced itself from similar films in the past (e.g. Zero Dark Thirty). After Selma missed out in almost every category, there came a major backlash against what many perceived as a racially charged oversight. Historically the Academy has underrepresented minorities among their nominees and winners, but that's changed in recent years. More black nominees have won Oscars from 2001 on than won in the previous 73 years of award's existence. There may be enough voters rallying behind Selma to pull of an unexpected win, similar to what happened with Argo a couple of years ago. Though the odds of that happening are probably longer than the 20 to 1 pay out the bookmakers are offering. I believe Birdman represents the best value bet. It has favorable odds to win Best Actor, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Director. A film that wins all of those prizes is actually pretty likely to win Best Picture. Certainly it's more likely that 18 to 1. So you have a great opportunity to win big by betting on Birdman.

Now I will give a brief (relatively for me) rundown my selections for the best bets to win all of the other categories.
  
BEST VISUAL EFFECTS- Dawn of the Planet of the Apes may have more fans among Oscar voters than any of the 3 nominated super-hero movies and the divisive Interstellar. The film made major strides improving motion capture technology, which is probably the future of special FX.

BEST SOUND EDITING- American Sniper successfully recreated the chaotic sounds of battle. That's an impressive feat that usually garners awards

BEST SOUND MIXING- Whiplash had to incorporate the sounds of musical instruments in realistic, but nuanced ways. I expect the voters will respond more to those subtleties than to the louder competition.
 
 BEST LIVE ACTION SHORT- "The Phone Call" is an emotionally powerful little fil- y'know what? No one cares about this category. Let's move on.

BEST ANIMATED SHORT- "Feast" has the advantage of being paired with a widely scene and loved Disney movie. Plus you should never bet against a movie featuring a cute puppy.

BEST DOCUMENTARY SHORT- "Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1" has an incredible one-two punch of being emotionally wrenching and urgently topical. That's like catnip for Oscar voters.

BEST PRODUCTION DESIGN- The Grand Budapest Hotel was skillfully and intricately produced to such a gorgeous degree, its visual splendor even stand out among Wes Anderson's oeuvre.

BEST HAIR & MAKEUP- The Grand Budapest Hotel; see above

BEST COSTUMES- The Grand Budapest Hotel; see above above

BEST ORIGINAL SONG- "Glory" from Selma will win what I suppose you could call a token award.

BEST ORIGINAL SCORE- The Theory of Everything had to lean on its score a lot. How else are going to milk a lot of emotion about a guy who spends most of the movie unable to move?

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM- Ida deals with the aftermath of the Holocaust in Poland through the lens of an individuals profound story. And as Kate Winslet taught us Holocaust movies win Oscars!

BEST DOCUMENTARY FEATURE- CitizenFour has won just about every preliminary award, so I expect the Academy to follow suit.

BEST ANIMATED FEATURE- How to Train Your Dragon 2 will likely win, because major releases from US animation studios have a heavy advantage in this category. I know the Academy usually doesn't honor sequels, but I figure How to Train Your Dragon 2 won't be punished for that as much as Big Hero 6.

BEST FILM EDITING- Boyhood is your likely winner. Usually the awards for Best Film Editing goes to the film that wins Best Picture. So with Boyhood favored to win the top prize, you should bet on it winning in this category too.

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY-  Birdman pulled off an astounding feat by filming the movie so that it appeared as if most of it was done with one continuous camera shot. Any director of photography who can pull that off deserves an award.

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY- The Imitation Game would be my pick. This category can get confusing, because apparently no one can agree on what it means for a screenplay to be "adapted". Whiplash was considered an original screenplay by the Writers' Guild, but is an adapted screenplay according to to AMPAS. So be warned that this is my least confident prediction.

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY- The Grand Budapest Hotel has the key preliminary awards under its belt. I expect that to continue. The Academy has a habit of rewarding young-ish auteur filmmakers with a screenplay award. After two past nominations, look for Wes Anderson to finally land an Oscar.

Those are my predictions. I wish you all the best of luck with your Oscar pools. Remember if any of you do wager money on these predictions, you owe me 10% of your winnings.

Number Crunching the Oscars

There are many things a person can do in anticipation of the annual Academy Awards telecast. Plenty of people make plans to hold or attend an event filled with fellow cinephiles and much merriment. Some will immerse themselves into the prediction game, reading magazines and blogs about all the behind the scenes politicking and buzz mongering. Hopefully, quite a few people will use the attention the Oscars shine on the nominees as an inspiration to take in some of the talked-about films. Then there is that tiny and bizarre minority -no, minority is too generous, splinter faction is probably more accurate- that decides the best way to celebrate the year in movies is to do a bunch of math.

In my defense, I blame the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences for my recent rush of calculations. They recently adopted a few changes in the Best Picture category that have greatly complicated matters. First they decided to double the number of movies nominated for the top prize from five to ten. Okay easy enough, just print bigger ballots. Then they noticed that a movie could garner as little as 10.01% of the vote and win the most coveted award in Hollywood. Put it in other words, given the Academy has about 6,000 members, 5,400 of them could hate one of the ten nominated movies, but if 601 people vote for it it would be recorded as the best film of the year.

Rather than allow a highly fractured vote lead to an embarrassing result, someone proposed a new kind of ballot called "preferential voting" or "instant runoff". This basically means the Academy members rank the ten nominated film from their number one choice down. (On a personal note, I recently participated in an instant runoff election, and I can say from experience it was fun, easy and seemed like it could work in more elections.) Once the ballots are collected, the fine folks at PriceWaterhouse Coopers -a barrel making firm if I understand the definition of cooper correctly- then check to see if any film got a majority of the first place votes. Unless a film is an instant winner (unlikely to happen unless one film has an overwhelming level of support), the tabulators start weeding out the nominees that received few first place votes and redistributing their votes among the remaining films.

Since this is all a little confusing, I think it might be best to walk through a simulation of how the vote might break down among this year's Best Picture nominees. The inimitable Nate Silver -the only other person on Internet I could find nerdy enough to mix math with the Oscars- performed a similar exercise already. However he crunched his numbers before the nominees were announced, though he did accurately predicted nine of the ten. Also he used critics rankings, because he could find reliable data for them, instead of attempting to gauge the opinion of the AMPAS voters, a much trickier proposition. Fortunately for you, I don't have Silver's commitment to accuracy to worry about or his stellar reputation for predictions to preserve, so I can make a foolhardy attempt to predict how members of the Academy might rank the films. I will combine my knowledge of past Oscar races, my understanding of the AMPAS membership, and a watchful eye to the current dynamics of the awards season to estimate the level of support each nominee can expect.

We can begin breaking down the vote distribution by breaking down the membership of the Academy. Between the 6,000 AMPAS members and the 15 branches within the Academy, I can identify 4 major voting blocs, each based on different definitions you can use to determine the Best Picture of the year.

First you have those voters who believe that the Best Picture award should go the grandest film of the year. They like seeing movies you could describe as "epic" winning the top prize, films like Gladiator and The Lord of the Rings. This group probably contains mostly producers and directors, with some cinematographers, writers and a few actors mixed in. I estimate these voters account for about 35% of the total number of Best Picture votes.

Balancing out the first group you have those who believe that "best picture" means "most moving". They want to reward the movies that have the strongest emotional impact. Recently these voters likely supported Best Picture winners like Million Dollar Baby and Slumdog Millionaire. I would say a lot of the actors in the Academy vote with this block along with some of the writers and directors, probably a fair number of the artistic members who do art direction, makeup, and costuming too. These voters seem to represent around 35% of the vote as well.

The third major group comes from the less famous branches of AMPAS, the ones who are nominated in the so called "artistic and technical categories". Since every member can vote in the Best Picture category this undervalued lot can have a powerful impact on the race. They tend to hold that the Oscar brand should fall to those films they deem the most well made or best crafted. The last two Best Pictures, The Hurt Locker and No Country For Old Men, seem to have had strong support from this bloc. All told they likely comprise 25% or so of the Academy.

Finally, you have a small group that can play a big role if there is ever a close race. These are producers, publicists, and studio executives who simply -some might say cynically- contend that the "best" movies are the one's that make the most money. So their rankings of the years films pretty much mirror the final box office earnings. Their support helped put Titanic over the top to earn a record number of Oscars. Last year they probably supported Avatar, but the other factions trumped them. They probably add up to no more than 5% of the votes available for Best Picture.

So if you divide the Academy into these four groups, you likely can guess which groups would vote for which nominees, and therefore how much support each nominee has. It is important to remember that each group will likely vote for more than one film, and many nominees will receive votes from more than one group. Also, I will assume that each group has a selection of movies that they all rank above the others. So you when a movie that had a share of the "most touching" vote is eliminated it's votes will probably go the other emotionally powerful movies before they go anywhere else. With all of that explained, I think we can begin breaking down the actual votes.

Grandest Picture Bloc- 35% of the total 1st place votes
- The King's Speech: 35% of the bloc vote = 12.25% of the total vote
- The Social Network: 30% bloc = 10.5% total
- Inception: 20% bloc = 7% total
- True Grit: 10% bloc = 3.5% total
- Winter's Bone: 5% bloc = 1.75% total
These are all the options from among the nominees which seem to portray a grand vision, or tell an ambitious story. In some cases this is because of the amount of work involved (for period pieces like True Grit or The King's Speech). Sometimes it its because of the level of technical sophistication that the filmmakers employed (such as in manking The Social Network or Inception). Also a film could just have overachieved and accomplished a lot with relatively meager means (as I believe some will argue Winter's Bone managed to do).


Most Powerful Movie Bloc- 35% of the total 1st place votes
- The King's Speech: 40% of the bloc vote = 14% of the total vote
- The Fighter: 20% bloc = 7% total
- Black Swan: 15% bloc = 5.25% total
- The Kids Are All Right: 10% bloc = 3.5% total
- Winter's Bone: 5% bloc = 1.75% total
- Toy Story 3: 5% bloc = 1.75% total
- 127 Hours: 5% bloc = 1.75% total
Among this group you can find the nominees that have been most praised for the emotional power the convey. Here you will notice some overlap with the first group, most notably The King's Speech. While other films from the first group have been left out. I am yet to hear anyone call either Inception or The Social Network "the most touching movie of the year".

Best Made Film Bloc- 25% of the total 1st place votes
- The Social Network: 30% of the bloc vote = 7.5% of the total vote
- The King's Speech: 20% bloc = 5% total
- The Fighter: 15% bloc = 3.75% total
- True Grit: 15% bloc = 3.75% total
- Inception: 10% bloc = 2.5% total
- Winter's Bone: 5% bloc = 1.25% total
- 127 Hours: 5% bloc = 1.25% total
Now all of the nominees have to have been well crafter movies to even be considered for an Oscar. However, I believe this list contains those pictures who derive the biggest chunk of their merit from their technical values. Each of these nominees has impressive filmmaking elements that made it stand out from the other movies released in 2010.

Biggest Hit Bloc- 5% of the total 1st place votes
- Inception: 60% of the bloc vote = 3% of the total vote
- Toy Story 3: 40% bloc = 2% total
Finally this group has only two movies with big box office earnings to vote for. In most years I would imagine the vote might be pretty monolithic -whichever nominee earned the most gets the most votes. However this year I think the voters will split between the highest grossing movie of the year, Toy Story 3, and the biggest money-maker among the live action films. I say this because some members of the Academy still believe that animated films should not be compared to live action films. They involve different kinds of filmmaking and they generally aim to accomplish different goals. Therefore any method of comparison, even total grosses, can't be easily evaluated between animated and live action films. Do you reward Toy Story 3 for selling so many tickets, especially when you earn less off a children's ticket? Do you support Inception for bringing droves of adults to the cinema, something Hollywood has struggled to do for years? There's no easy answer, so I predict a split vote here.

Let's put all that information into one chart, so you can see how much of the vote each nominee received.

Total Vote- Round 1
- The King's Speech: 31.25%
- The Social Network: 18%
- Inception: 12.5%
- The Fighter: 10.75%
- True Grit: 7.25%
- Black Swan: 5.25%
- Winter's Bone: 4.75%
- Toy Story 3: 3.75%
- The Kids Are All Right: 3.5%
- 127 Hours: 3%

None of the nominees have a majority, though The King's Speech has a huge lead over all the others. That means there is no instant winner and the voting no goes to multiple rounds. In each round the film with the lowest share of the 1st place vote is eliminated it's votes are then redistributed to those nominess that remain. The votes are spread out by going down the ballot to the highest ranked film still in contention and giving that film an additional 1st place vote.

The first film to go is 127 Hours. I know it feels like losing an arm to lose one of these nominees (rimshot!), but that is how the process works. We start by identifying where the votes for 127 Hours came from then determine which of the survivors profit from the departure of this film.

Some of the Most Powerful Movie vote, 5%, went to 127 Hours, so we can split that among some of the other touching films in contention. This is how I expect those votes to break down:

1st Place- 127 Hours
- Black Swan: 30%
- The Fighter: 30%
- The King's Speech: 20%
- Winter's Bone: 20%

To clarify what these numbers represent, I am dividing up just 1.75% of the total 1st place votes. When I say The King's Speech gets 20% of the votes from people who judged 127 Hours to be the emotionally touching movie of the year, I am say one-fifth of 1.75% of the Academy's 6,000 members, or about 21 people, would now have their 1st place vote go to The King's Speech instead of their original pick.

Of cour 127 Hours got some votes for being the best made film of the year as well. Here I have a different pool of films among which to divide the 1st place votes. I would predict the votes would spread out like:

1st Place- 127 Hours
- The Social Network: 30%
- The Fighter: 30%
- Winter's Bone: 20%
- The King's Speech: 10%
- Inception: 10%

After I calculate the effect these changes have on the total 1st place vote distribution, I can make an updated chart of the standings.

Total Vote- Round 2
- The King's Speech: 31.725%
- The Social Network: 18.375%
- Inception: 12.625%
- The Fighter: 11.65%
- True Grit: 7.25%
- Black Swan: 5.775%
- Winter's Bone: 5.35%
- Toy Story 3: 3.75%
- The Kids Are All Right: 3.5%
- 127 Hours

Since we still lack any nominee with over 50% of the total vote the process continues. Next on the chopping block we have the critically acclaimed dramedy, The Kids Are All Right. Since this fillm got all of it's support from one bloc of voters, the Most Powerful Movie crowd, it is pretty easy to divvy up the votes appropriately. I imagine that the supports of The Kids Are All Right, a largely comedic film with an indy vibe, will have ranked other films that are humorous or independent highly. Thus:

1st Place- The Kids Are All Right
- The King's Speech: 50%
- Toy Story 3: 30%
- Winter's Bone: 20%

That brings our updated standings to:

Total Vote- Round 3
- The King's Speech: 33.475%
- The Social Network: 18.375%
- Inception: 12.625%
- The Fighter: 11.65%
- True Grit: 7.25%
- Black Swan: 5.775%
- Winter's Bone: 6.05%
- Toy Story 3: 4.8%
- The Kids Are All Right
- 127 Hours

Now we move on to Toy Story 3 and it's supporters. The folks who voted for it because it was the highest earning movie of the year are easy to account for. All of their 1st place votes would just go to the next big money maker, Inception. The people who held it as the most touching of the nominees will require a more involved breakdown. This block no longer represents just the 1.75% of the Academy that gave it a 1st place vote originally. Now we also have to spread out the votes it received as a result of other films getting dropped. That means we now have 2.8% of the vote to work with. (I know that's a staggering amount of change to deal with. You might want to take a second and catch your breath before you move on.) Here is how I would imagine the votes are divided among this group:

1st Place- Toy Story 3
- The King's Speech: 70%
- The Fighter: 10%
- Black Swab: 10%
- Winter's Bone: 10%

Factoring in those adjustments, and the earlier bump to Inception's standings, we have these updated standings:

Total Vote- Round 4
- The King's Speech: 35.435%
- The Social Network: 18.375%
- Inception: 14.625%
- The Fighter: 11.93%
- True Grit: 7.25%
- Black Swan: 6.055%
- Winter's Bone: 6.33%
- Toy Story 3
- The Kids Are All Right
- 127 Hours

In an interesting twist, Black Swan, which started with more of the 1st place vote share than Winter's Bone, is actually the next movie eliminated. Please note that all of this has been my speculation. I cannot actually know if more members of the Academy ranked Winter's Bone high on their ballot than did for Black Swan. I do however believe that this sort of change in the standings is possible, and even likely, once you start eliminating nominees and redistributing the vote. Having said that and remembering that only films still active can receive new 1st place votes, this is how I break down the vote:

1st Place- Black Swan
- The King's Speech: 60%
- The Fighter: 20%
- Winter's Bone: 20%

Those adjustments mean these are the new standings:

Total Vote- Round 5
- The King's Speech: 39.068%
- The Social Network: 18.375%
- Inception: 14.625%
- The Fighter: 13.141%
- True Grit: 7.25%
- Black Swan
- Winter's Bone: 7.541%
- Toy Story 3
- The Kids Are All Right
- 127 Hours

The changing share of the votes bring another intriguing change. Winter's Bone has now lept True Grit as well. This is mostly because True Grit has not gained any new votes from the eliminated movies. Part of this is because a lot of the movies we've dumped drew their support from different sources than True Grit. Another factor is that some films may be widely liked, but not widely loved. This year True Grit seems to be a good example of that. Without many people outside of it's ardent supporters ranking it highly on their ballot, it doesn't stand much of a chance of winning Best Picture.

The voters who considered True Grit the biggest and most ambitious movie of the year probably split their other top votes like this:

1st Place- True Grit
- The King's Speech: 40%
- Inception: 30%
- The Social Network: 20%
- Winter's Bone: 10%

While those who rated True Grit as the best crafted film likely have their support spread like this:

1st Place- True Grit
- The King's Speech: 30%
- Inception: 30%
- The Social Network: 20%
- The Fighter: 10%
- Winter's Bone: 10%

I would like to note that in this round I assumed Inception would benefit strongly from the elimination of the only other film with strong action/adventure content. That means the new standings look like this:

Total Vote- Round 6
- The King's Speech: 41.593%
- The Social Network: 19.825%
- Inception: 16.8%
- The Fighter: 13.516%
- True Grit
- Black Swan
- Winter's Bone: 8.266%
- Toy Story 3
- The Kids Are All Right
- 127 Hours

Now we have to finally cast aside Winter's Bone. Since it is being removed that means we have a few points to consider when spreading out the ballots it had gained. First we can see that the Grandest Picture bloc has begun to shift. Because the people who rated Winter's Bone high likely are comfortable voting with a smaller skill picture that has a big vision, I predict The King's Speech will benefit more than Inception or The Social Network. Also I expect that the voters in the other corner will favor The King's Speech over The Fighter. I say this because I can look to the trends in the earlier vote distributions. Anytime group of voters that gave a boost to Winter's Bone tended to favor The King's Speech pretty strongly. That translates to a big boost The King's Speech compared to modest gains for the others.

The Grandest Picture vote would divide like this:
1st Place- Winter's Bone
- The King's Speech: 60%
- The Social Network: 30%
- Inception: 10%

The Most Powerful Movie vote would divide thusly:

1st Place- Winter's Bone
- The King's Speech: 70%
- The Fighter: 30%

This is what would happen with the Best Made Film vote:

1st Place- Winter's Bone
- The King's Speech: 40%
- The Social Network: 20%
- The Fighter: 20%
- Inception: 20%

Which means our updated standings would now be this:

Total Vote- Round 7
- The King's Speech: 46.6067%
- The Social Network: 20.83%
- Inception: 17.385%
- The Fighter: 15.1783%
- True Grit
- Black Swan
- Winter's Bone
- Toy Story 3
- The Kids Are All Right
- 127 Hours

Finally we have reached a point where a movie is within easy striking distance of the 50% mark. That means this next round should be enough to give The King's Speech the golden man-shaped trophy. This is especially true when you acknowledge that The King's Speech is the only film left that had the support of the Most Powerful Movie Bloc, so it now has 35% of the 1st place votes all to itself.

Breaking down the votes from the people who named The Fighter the best crafter movie of the year, I estimate this is how things would stand:

1st Place- The Fighter
- The King's Speech: 40%
- The Social Network: 40%
- Inception: 20%

Add it all up and you finally have a clear winner.

Total Vote- Round 8
- The King's Speech: 58.86%
- The Social Network: 27.78%
- Inception: 18.36%
- The Fighter
- True Grit
- Black Swan
- Winter's Bone
- Toy Story 3
- The Kids Are All Right
- 127 Hours

What can we learn from any of this? (Other that I am a very odd duck to devote so much arithmetic to such a trivial matter) The first thing that strikes me is that asking one of ten nominees to get a majority of the vote means it is unlikely any movie will ear the Oscar after only a few rounds of voting. Further I find it interesting that the three films left standing, The King's Speech, The Social Network, and Inception, can each point to an area where they had a strong body of support, the Most Powerful vote, the Best Made vote and the Biggest Hit vote respectively. It would seem those campaigning for any of the nominees would be well served by targeting a demographic that can give you a solid block of votes, then hoping that as films get eliminated you will rise up. Also, I like the fact that in this exercise we saw how Winter's Bone was able to climb the standings by being broadly supported if not having the level of high profile support the others did. This suggest to me that any high quality film could wind up winning Best Picture even if it doesn't have the box office numbers or publicity of other movies.

So does any of this mean anything? Not really, it was mostly an exercise I came up with to amuse myself and hopefully my audience. The only way to know if I am correct in my estimations, and that The King's Speech will walk away as the big winner is to tun in and watch the Oscars on February 27th. I know I'll be watching, and I hope you do to.

Tony's/NBA Live Blogging Pt. 4

In a test to see if anyone else besides me cares about both pro-basketball and show tunes, I am live blogging about the Tony Awards and the NBA Finals. We have a close game heading into the 4th and some top awards still to be announced, so it should be an exciting end of an evening here. Let's get back to it . . .

10:00- Another award goes to God of Carnage. This time it's for Marcia Gay Harden's performance. It's nice that she has another award to accompany the Oscar she won and everybody forgot about.

10:03- Kobe makes some free throws to push the Lakers lead to 3. Of course with the way Orlando loves shooting from outside, a 3 point lead is essentially no lead at all.

10:05- Over on Broadway, the cast of Billy Elliot is putting on a dance number so psychedelic it makes me think I have been hitting my gin a little too hard. Either that or this is just some number from Hair that I don't recognize because I repressed the memory of it along with most of my memories of that musical.

10:09- I love that the Magic brought back their injured star point guard, Jameer Nelson, for the Finals after the back up point guard, Rafer Alston, got them this far by performing superbly in the playoffs. Now as Game 2 winds down and they trail L.A., they have neither of those players on the floor. Instead, Stan Van Gundy is playing chronic underperformer J. J. Redick at point. In Broadway terms this would be like if your star had to bow out half way through the show's engagement, then the understudy steps up admirably, then on closing night in the final act you send out some chorus member in the leading role.

10:14- Harvey Fierstein comes out to present an award and creep out Middle America.

10:15- The prize for revival of a play goes to The Norman Conquests, and it looks their producers account for half the people in the audience. I don't think there were that many people on stage for the opening number.

10:19- Sure enough God of Carnage takes the award for Best Play. They promptly ask the writer to say a few words in her humorous foreign accent.

10:20- Oooooh, a tough call goes against the Lakers and Jack Nicholson (The No. 1 celebrity Laker fan) looks like he's going to reenact the last half-hour of The Shining. Maybe the officials were told to make sure this series goes more than 4 games so the NBA can earn back the money they lost by not getting the LeBron v. Kobe match-up they wanted.

10:24- Well the player the Magic were using to defend Kobe Bryant just fouled out with 3 minutes left to play. I think Kobe is about to set a record for most points scored in 180-seconds to end this game. Right now he only has 20 points. How much you want to bet he'll end the game with at least 30?

10:26- Over at the Tonay Award they are presenting a life-time achievement award to Jerry Herman. This is the sort of thing that should come much earlier in the broadcast, but the producers put it off because they didn't what to weird out too many prime time viewers with an effeminate elderly man in an ill-fitting tuxedo.

10:30- As the NBA game hits 2:40 left, Kobe Bryan manage to turn slipping on his own feet into a trip to the free throw line.

10:32- Then the Magic make two good shots to regain the lead with less than 90 second to go. I'm so tense I might have to empty the gin bottle. Not because alcohol clams me down, but because I might need an empty vessel convenient so I don't pee my pants.

10:34 and 40 seconds- I flip back to the Tony's and see that the cast of Hair is putting on their showcase performance.

10:34 and 45 seconds- I flip back to the basketball game, even though I know they're at commercial right now.

10:36- After the Lakers tie the game, the Magic suffer for not having a true point guard on the court as players are forced to create their own shots and one of them winds up forcing up a bad attempt and effectively giving the ball back to the Lakers with the game tied.

10:38- Kobe goes for the game winner. It's blocked from behind! THEN THE MAGIC GRAB THE BALL AND CALL TIME OUT! THE BEST JUMP SHOOTING TEAM IN THE LEAGUE REGAINS POSSESSION WITH 0.6 SECONDS LEFT!!!! Uh, where's that bottle?

10:43- The Magic will try to inbound the ball to make a game winning shot. The ball is in . . . It's up . . . And it just barely rims out. We're going to overtime, but only because the fates have decided this game is too much fun to stop now.

10:45- David Hyde Pierce comes out to give the award for Lead Actress in a Musical and receives some gentle ribbing from Neil Patrick Harris. I imagine things have been tense between them ever since they Pierce stole Harris' whole "I go by my full name" gimmick.

10:46- The award goes to Alice Ripley and she starts bellowing into the mike for no good reason. I really think they should tell the nominees to limit the yelling during acceptance speeches, if only to protect unwary home viewers with powerful sound systems.

10:49- The prize for Actor in a Musical goes to the three kids that play Billy Elliot. Now I'm really confused first one person can get multiple nominations, then three people can share one nomination. This is getting confusing. As you might imagine the acceptance speech involving three boys starts pretty awkwardly then transforms into one of the most touching moments of the evening.

10:52- Now that the NBA game is in overtime, Derek Fisher decides it's about time to start playing like a veteran and makes a steal on a key play. Hey Fish, so nice of you to show up. I though Kobe was the only Laker that cared about winning a championship.

10:53- I check back in with the Tony's and discover that the cast of Jersey Boys is performing for the usual no good reason. I turn back just in time to watch Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol team up for a 3-point play. I'm really not sure why I'm not paying more attention to the basketball game.

10:56- Hedo Turkoglu who took the ball away from the Lakers at the end of regulation pulls another great defensive play. This gives J. J. Redick a chance to make his second field goal of the game. Again this guy is playing in overtime over any of their more experienced better qualified players.

10:59- Great timing! I turn back to the Tony Awards just in time to see Billy Elliot win the award for Best New Musical. It's so nice to see that the American Theater Wing have the courage to give a musical adapted from movie from 9 year ago a prize for being "new". Then again they could have given it to the musical version of Shrek (based on a movie that's 8 years old which was adapted from a kids book from 1990), or the jukebox musical that's pretty much a compilation of rock hits from the 80's. I guess what I'm saying is Next to Normal got robbed

11:00- Great timing part 2! I return to the b-ball in time to see the Magic nail a 3-pointer shot to get the game back to within three, which again for Orlando is pretty much like being tied.

11:03- While the refs endlessly review whether or not that shot was a three pointer I return to the Tony's and watch NPH finally get his chance to sing. He's singing a tribute to the winners to the tune of "Luck Be a Lady Tonight". I figure he demanded a chance to sing, and the producers were so desperate for any host other than Nathan Lane they gave in.

11:05- Free throw shooting down the closing stretch has given the Lakers a lead in the final seconds. The Magic's last second barrage fails to produce any points and the Lakers hold on to win Game 2, and continue their potential sweep. I was pleased to see that the Magic played well enough to at least make a game of it. Let's hope that they can take it up another level in the next couple games, and actually turn this into a competitive series.

11:11- Well the credits have run for the Tony's and the basketball players have given their post-game interviews. I guess that means it's time to go to bed before the local news sucks me in with some human interest story to video of a high-speed chase.

Thank you for reading this. Be you a drama fanatic who harbors a soft-spot for hoops, or a Kobe fan that likes to hum show tunes, I'm glad this blog offers some place where people with diverse passions can come together. If the Super Bowl and the Oscars are ever on the same night, we'll have to do this again.

Tony's/NBA Live Blogging Pt. 3

I am attempting a live blog of both the NBA Finals and the Tony Awards, an unforgiving labor of delusion. Thankfully the Finals are at half-time, unfortunately the Tony's don't have a half-time (unless you count the performances from the revivals). So let's get back to it . . .

9:12- Liza beats out Will Ferrell for yet another award. She then proceeds to give an acceptance speech where she pretends that she wasn't a mortal lock to win any award that she's nominated for. Liza, these are your people they love you way more that Will Ferrell or those crazy kung fu performance artists.

9:16- Wow, the Tony producers do a terrific job of handling some technical problems during a live musical performance. I think the Orlando Magic's coach Stan Van Gundy should learn a thing or two from them, because the Magic aren't doing much to adjust their game plan.

9:21- In fairness to the folks at the NBA, their color commentators do a much better job of faking camaraderie than the people presenting Tony's do when they are forced to banter.

9:30- It looks like it's going to be a big evening for Billy Elliot. I'm pretty sure that if they could they would give a separate award to each of the Billies.

9:32- So far the Tony Awards are loading up on my childhood heroes. We've already had John Stamos (Uncle Jessie) and Carrie Fisher (Princess Leia). If they find some way to incorporate that kid that played Data in The Goonies and Short Round in Temple of Doom, they'll have hit my personal icons trifecta.

9:39- I have been a little distracted by a phone conversation with my parents, but that slam by Kobe would make anybody pay attention.

9:43- Back in Radio City Music Hall, I guess NPH just told an inside joke that I didn't get, then followed it up with a joke about being inside Jessica Lange that she didn't like.

9:44- Dammit! Jeff Daniels loses to Geoffrey Rush. I guess the voters had to give it to him, since, according to the reviews, he's about the only thing making that play worth watching. If only they decided who made the NBA Finals using that criteria, then LeBron James would definitely be in, if only just out of pity for having to carry the Cavaliers, and the entire economy of Cleveland.

9:47- Over in the Staples Center, the Magic have actually been guarding a narrow lead for a little while here. I guess the Lakers decided they shouldn't break up their streak of taking prolonged periods off during each playoff game this year.

9:50- The Tony's are trying one of those in memoriam tributes like they do at the Oscars. The problem here is that every year at least a few people in the Oscar tribute will be legitimately famous. I don't think anyone outside of Radio City Music Hall remembers who any of the people these people were. Sorry theater nerds, but it is a pretty insular community.

9:53- I flip back to the b-ball and find the Lakers took the lead back (despite the fact that the last play I saw was Lamar Odom making a stupid foul). Immediately the Magic hit some jump shots and get back in front. I really don't know what you can do to stop the Magic when their shooters are hot. I mean other than spiking their Gatorade.

9:54- Kobe misses a 3-pointer to end the 3rd quarter. Is there any doubt that if this were the end of the 4th he would make that shot.

This seems like a good time to publish this update and get geared up for the 4th quarter/major awards. I just hope my giant bottle of gin will last.

To be continued . . .

Tony's/NBA Live Blogging Pt. 2

Let's keep this crazy experiment to merge the interests of Harlem and Greenwich Village. . .

8:23- Smart decision by the producers to front load the Shrek material before its target demographic's bedtime.

8:27- I get tossing in a jab at Wicked in the Shrek musical number, since Shrek is all about parodying fairy tales. I am just worried that might date the musical a little. It's going to be hard enough to revive the show once America turns on Eddie Murphy after he releases Norbit 2 and they have to completely rewrite all of Donkey's lines.

8:29- I know live bloggers aren't supposed to take sides, but I will go ahead and admit that I am rooting for Jeff Daniels over James Gandolfini tonight.

8:31- WOW! The legend Angela Lansbury wins it! I don't care what Tim Burton says; Ms. Lansbury will always be Mrs. Lovett to me.

8:34- The producers are obviously making an effort to cram as much popular material into the top of the broadcast as possible. I can't think of any other reason to include a performance from Mama Mia!, the musical that just had a hit movie spun out of it, when most of tonight's nominees haven't gotten much screen time yet.

8:38- Wait! I forgot I was also supposed to be watching the finals. Ack! I missed the first quarter already.

8:40- Okay I may not know everything about the Orland Magic's offensive game plan, but I am pretty sure that being tied at 15 after 12 minutes is not how they were hoping things would go, considering they need to seriously score a ton of points in a hurry to outpace the Lakers.

8:41- Checking back in with the Tony Awards, I notice Harris crediting Samantha Mathis as his first on-screen kiss. Does that also imply that mean she was responsible for his first thought of "Hmmm, something about this doesn't seem quite right."?

8:43- I have to say I am seriously disappointed that Will Ferrell didn't come out dressed ad President Bush in a flight suit.

8:45- America Theater Wing, you really want to nominate both Elton John and Dolly Parton for the same award then give it neither of them.

8:46- Since the NBA Finals are at commercia,l I will stick with the theater nerds and join my Mom in cheering the dude from In The Heights.

8:48- Back in the world of hoops, I just saw L.A.'s Andrew Bynum benefit from a foul that apparently was committed by someone on the grassy knoll. I would rate my surprise that the Lakers are getting favorable calls from the officials in L.A. as around a 0.00001 on a scale of 1 to 100.

8:51- Does it really benefit Orlando to try pushing the tempo at this point? It seems to me that just means they miss 3-pointers faster.

8:52- Well the NBA is taking a TV timeout with the score tied at 26. Something makes me think David Stern has sent in the order to keep this game close until at least 7pm Pacific so they can get all the west coast voters expecting a Laker's blowout to actually tune in.

8:55- Over on CBS, Susan Sarandon is giving Bernadette Peters a run as the leading lady in Broadway's "Over 50 and Looking Foxy" rankings.

8:57- Multiple nominations in one category for one person always leaves me confused. It seems to me that it is theoretically possible for one person to wrap up the win just by claiming every nomination. This is why I am going to write 5 brilliant plays then release them all in one year.

9:01- Sorry Tony's, but I am just not ready to put up with hair metal coming immediately after West Side Story. Note that I have no problem with it cleansing my musical palate after a sampling from Hair though. Draw your own conclusions from that.

9:05- Switching over to basketball again, I see the Magic have gone away from rapidly jacking up 3's pushing the temp and are now taking about two minutes to set up their bad shots.

9:08- After Rashard Lewis gets out the d-fib panels and revives Orlando's offense we go to the half Lakers- 40 magic- 35.

9:10- Since both channels are at commercial, I will use this time to publish this update and try calling my Mom (the person responsible for my enjoyment of live theater, so I guess she's partly to blame for this bizarre blogging experience).

To be continued . . .

Bold Live Blogging Event- Tony's/NBA

Well, I finally got my computer out of the shop. I can't think of a better way to celebrate than to try a little live blogging. Since I am always trying to expand the demographic reach of this blog - my current audience is principally white men, ages 18-35, who are blood relatives of me- I decided to make a bold attempt to ensnare as many people as possible. Tonight I will be simultaneously blogging about the Tony Awards and the NBA Finals. Since I may be the only person on Earth highly interested in both events I am hoping this event might bring together people from some pretty diverse backgrounds. At the very least I expect to create one of the most confusing combination of stream of consciousness notes ever created on Internet. So let's make it happen . . .

7:52- My Totino's pizza is in the oven. I have my buffalo wings on the way, and a giant bottle of gin ready to go. I can't think of a better way to watch "A Few Minutes with Andy Rooney".

7:54- The proceedings are interrupted by a phone call from my wife, who is out of town for the evening and thus spared the awkward experience of watching me give myself the first blogging related hernia in medical history.

8:00- The Tony telecast opens with what I guess are the three Billy Elliots, on stage together. Soon we're cross-cutting into the various musicals up for awards. And half of the audience that was watching 60 Minutes just felt a little queasy.

8:04- And my stupid digital TV tuner just lost the signal. Does anyone else find the digital "skipping" that comes with DTV much more annoying than plane old static?

8:08- So far we've had Elton John, Stockard Channing, Bret Michaels, Dolly Parton, and Liza Minnelli have all crossed the same stage within the span of a few minutes. Yet somehow I imagine the most excited home audiences got was when the small children who are watching this with their mothers saw Shrek.

8:11- Neil Patrick Harris everybody! You have to give it up to a guy with a generation of girls crushing on him to take the risk of becoming the most prominent openly gay American actor. Doogie, you'll never know how many girls would have let you play doctor with them.

8:15- We have our first award of the night. I like to try guessing which nominees are most likely to win based on the level of applause in the audience when their name is announced. This doesn't work at the BET awards where a large posse can throw you off.

8:17- Someone just thanked their mother. Everybody take a shot!

8:18- First commercial. Seems like a good time to post the first update and snag a little chow.

To be continued . . .