Need help filling out your Oscars pool ballot? Tuesday Night Movies has you covered! Supporting Actress: Lupita Nyong’o from 12 Years a Slave pulls a win over Jennifer Lawrence. Supporting Actor: I feel like Jared Leto has a lock on this one. Actor: See what I wrote about Leto for Supporting Actor, but replace his name with Matthew McConoughey. Actress: Oscars 101: Never bet against Meryl Streep. Except this year. Bet against Meryl Streep. August: Osage County has been panned, and everyone seems to adore Cate Blanchett in Blue Jasmine. Cate Blanchett with the win as the David to Streep’s Goliath. Adapted Screenplay: 12 Years A Slave, though I’d personally like to see Philomena take it. Original Screenplay: Her. This seems to be as much a lock as the male acting categories. Director: Cross out all choices except for Cuaron and McQueen. Now flip a coin. Or go with Cuaron. I’m going with Cuaron. Best Picture: Again, I think it’s Gravity vs 12 Years a Slave. While I think Cuaron will beat out McQueen in the directing category, I think 12 Years a Slave will take home Best Picture. As long as American Hustle doesn’t win, I’m happy. Cinematography: Emmanuel Lubezski – Gravity Editing: This is another one that I think will come down to either 12 Years a Slave or Gravity. Like Director, I think this one will fall to Gravity’s side. Score: Gravity Song: I LOVE Pharrell’s Happy, but Let it Go from Frozen is a juggernaught that can’t be stopped. Let it Go – Frozen. Foreign Language Film: The Great Beauty – Italy. Documentary Feature: 20 Feet from Stardom Animated Feature: Frozen with a lock. Documentary Short: The Lady in Number 6 Live Action Short: Just Before Losing Everything Animated Short: Get a Horse! – More like get a broom; Disney sweeps animation this year. Make-Up: Dallas Buyer’s...

Out of all the movies nominated for Best Picture at this year’s Academy Awards, Philomena may be the most charming. At first look, you might not expect that. Philomena is the real life story of an Irish woman forced by nuns to give up her infant son to adoption, and her quest 50 years later to find him. It’s a story full of heartbreak, but screenwriters  Steve Coogan and Jeff Pope encase that story in a screenplay full of wit and wry humor. The seriousness of the subject matter is never in doubt, but Pope and Coogan’s humor provides a much needed pressure valve on a heart-wrenching story that could sink into despair in the hands of less capable writers.  Philomena is my pick for Best Adapted Screenplay at this year’s Academy Awards. Coogan also stars in the movie as Martin Sixsmith, the real life BBC journalist who reported the story that this movie is base on, “The Lost Child on Philomena Lee”. Sixsmith is flawed, but he’s driven. And when it comes time for a reconciliation between the protagonists and the church, it’s Sixsmith that boils over with the outrage felt by probably everyone in the audience over Philomena’s plight. Hint: Forcibly taking her baby and putting him up for adoption is just the first in a list of trespasses by the church against Philomena. Dame Judi Dench plays Philomena with a subtle grace. Philomena comes across the way your grandmother probably would if they made a movie about her. As Sixsmith describes her in one scene, she’s like a walking issue of Reader’s Digest. She comes across both intentionally and unintentionally funny, and I can’t decide which scenes I like better. But it’s Philomena’s grace that really comes through when it’s time...