Oscar Nominee Reaction: I foresee Netflix in my mailbox

Well, 37 out of 45 doesn't sound all that bad when you've added five more Best Picture nominees. Looking over my nominee predictions, I obviously underestimated The Blind Side (some pundits did call that, but I had my own doubts) in the Best Picture race and mentioned my skepticism about how A Serious Man had been received. While Star Trek was a popular bet among many of the other picks I had seen, I knew The Hangover was a gamble probably influenced somewhat by my anticipating the opportunity to use that particular nomination lecture others on how the Best Picture race has been diminished by adding more nominees.

But enough with that noise, I guess.

I now realize that I have a recurring habit of beginning my Oscar-related posts by talking about how much more up-to-date I was on the film industry and what had been released over the year. And seeing as this past year was the end of another decade's worth of films (most have called it "the Aughts," although I preferred the tag title of "the Zeroes"), I typically would have been greatly looking forward to composing a Best of the Decade list, much like my Best of the 1990s list I published somewhere on here and want to revise now just thinking about it.

The point is that I certainly have bought into the Oscar hype, and am already trying to finagle my way into catching all 10 nominated films before the telecast—for which my next concern will likely be finding a good party to attend. I've got plenty of theater gift certificates I've accumulated, although it's a damn shame most of them are for one of our distinctly ghetto theaters.

But beyond that, my living space these days is the cleanest it has been since I moved in—check that, it's even cleaner than when I moved in. And now with all that shit I had let take up space on my floors for so long finally gone, there's the temptation to really do some redecorating—although entertainment for myself and any guest usually relies on my DVD player. And while my collection remains fairly impressive in size and scope, they're all films I've already seen all the same and now the time seems more appropriate than ever to look into getting another online rental program.

I went through Blockbuster for a while, but dropped them a few years ago. In recent years, I've become a pretty big fan of Redbox, almost entirely because of my perceived convenience of knowing the disc has been returned safely and I can often get away with seeing a movie for only a buck.

But the problem with Redbox, of course, is that I'm at the mercy of what's available in the machine. And if my guest for the evening is standing beside me at the Redbox, then I'm really at the mercy of what sounds good to her unless there's something I really make an impassioned case for (which is not all that often).

It would be nice to have some say in the manner again. Something like a wish list, you know. Or a queue, I think they call it.

I have less than a month, but I'm hoping to have a little more personal opinion about the films and the performances when it comes time to post my predictions. Considering I've liked the three Best Picture nominees I have seen so far, I'm more optimistic than usual.