One of the worst aspects of awards season is watching group after group barely deviate from the same small group of names all prognosticators seem to have in their pool. (Are those folks good at predictions, or are awards bodies just too lazy to look past the punditry?)
On the other hand, one of most exciting aspects of awards season is the rush of satisfaction when an awards-giving body manages to defy conventional wisdom and select a performance that hasn’t arrived pre-anointed as a certified Oscar contender – potentially bringing that work a great deal of additional attention. Almost every year has a dozen or more candidates worthy of this recognition in the acting categories alone; all they need are awards voters willing to take notice (or, barring that, viewers to seek them out anyway).
