Academy Award season is always exciting for Malibu residents, especially with so many locals receiving nominations. Among them, Patricia Arquette, who took home the award for best supporting actress in “Boyhood.”
Though awards season may be over, the buzz continues with a three-way tie for first place in The Malibu Times Oscar Ballot contest.
Local residents Mike Levine and Brad Smith and L.A. local Mark Blake each correctly guessed 16 out of a possible 20 categories, earning all three the title of The Malibu Times Movie Guru.
In addition to the coveted title, the three winners will receive a one-year membership (or renewal) in the Malibu Film Society and dinner at Duke’s.
All three correctly guessed that “Birdman” would win best picture.
“I really liked ‘Birdman’ a lot,” Levine shared. “It grew on me after I watched it twice. I liked the way they did the camera movement so that it looked like one shot the whole movie.”Blake shared that “Birdman” was his favorite movie of the year as well.
And while the three winners seem to know who would be taking home awards, all three incorrectly guessed what would win for animated film. They selected “How to Train Your Dragon 2” when “Big Hero 6” won.
Levine correctly guessed that “Ida” would win for best foreign film.
“I thought it was a well-deserved win,” he said.
But he felt that “American Sniper” and “The Grand Budapest Hotel” should have received more attention on Oscar night.The only thing that surprised Blake was that Eddie Redmayne beat out Michael Keaton for best actor.“I thought Michael Keaton would win,” he shared.
Smith said of the Oscars, “The biggest surprise is that there were no surprises.”
Most surprising of all is the amount of Academy Award-nominated films Smith saw over the past year: Zero.
“You might take the prize away from me,” Smith joked. “I did not see any of the nominated films this year. I just listened to comments from friends and made my predictions from there.”
Smith was correct when he guessed that Milena Canonero would win best costume design for “The Grand Budapest Hotel” and Graham Moore would take home best adapted screenplay for “The Imitation Game.”
He felt that “Cake,” “Night-crawler” and “Gone Girl” were overlooked when it came to Oscars.
Levine was most surprised that Tom Cross for “Whiplash” beat out “Boyhood” for best film editing.
“I really thought ‘Boyhood’ was going to win for editing since they did it over a 12-year period,” he explained.
Levine is entering his second consecutive year with the Movie Guru title. He won last year in a three-way tie with George Carr and Sherry Weinstein, who all answered 20 out of 20 categories correctly.
