Oscarology, 1/31.

How's your Oscar history? Good? Good. Edward Copeland's conducting another survey and there're just hours to go before ballots are due: "In 2006, we did a survey to determine the best and worst of the Oscar-winning best pictures. Last year, we turned our focus to the best and worst of the leading ladies. This year, it's the leading men's turn."

Updated through 2/3.

Meanwhile, any suspense there might be over the questions of who'll win what is out-suspensed by the question of what sort of night Oscar Night'll actually be. David Carr has the latest: "The Oscar ballots went out yesterday, and contingency plans for the show are in the works, just in case Hollywood is still beside itself come Oscar time."

At the Film Experience, Brian Darr has an overview of the Oscar-nominated documentary shorts.

The San Diego Reader's Duncan Campbell is pulling for the Coen brothers.

In the predictions game: Ed Gonzalez.

Update, 2/1: "In a country where the ebb and flow of movie releases constitutes a kind of liturgical calendar (right now, we're in Lent), there's something profoundly destabilizing about the concept of a year without an Oscar ceremony," writes Slate's Dana Stevens. "The writers' strike... attacks the Oscars from the inside. It reminds us that the show is an artifice, an object created by human effort, and hence something that conceivably might not happen."

Updates, 2/2: Edward Copeland posts an annotated ballot for his survey. The Self-Styled Siren posts hers, too.

TCM has begun its "31 Days of Oscar" and the site for it is pretty fun. Jonathan Lapper picks out several highlights.

At Movie Morlocks, Jeff lists his "Favorite Oscar Embarrassments."

Update, 2/3: "Who needs the Oscars, anyway, other than the chosen few nominees and the hangers-on who love them?" asks Marc Peyser in Newsweek. "The fact is, the Oscar telecast (scheduled for Feb 24, assuming some sort of miracle) is the worst three hours and 27 minutes on television, and it has held that distinction for years and years and years."

Posted by dwhudson at January 31, 2008 6:53 AM