Oscars (and other awards), 2/18.

By David Hudson on 02/18/2009

The only Oscar preview you need, really: AS Hamrah for n+1.

"Announced 80 years ago this week, the first-ever Academy Awards for the 1927-1928 business year were decided upon not by a large voting pool but a small cabal of judges in a smoke-filled room, handpicked by Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences founder (and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studio chief) Louis B Mayer. The surprising thing is that the winners really were some of the best cinematic achievements of the year." Brian Darr at Daily Plastic. Somewhat related and very much ongoing: "The Silence After Sound: Hollywood's Last Silent Movies" at Not Coming to a Theater Near You.

Sean Baker has two films in the running for the same John Cassavetes Award at this year's Spirit Awards: "Take Out" and "Prince of Broadway." Michael Tully interviews him for Hammer to Nail.

"[F]or at least the last three or four years," writes Andrew O'Hehir in Salon, "those of us who love to complain about the docu-Oscars have pretty much been forced to put a sock in it. It's a sad state of affairs, but there's no avoiding it: The best-documentary category has become almost respectable!"

"It would feel like a dream, or at least an elaborate joke," writes Josef Braun. "Indeed, if I were to suggest a candidate for the single strangest possible moment that could transpire during next Sunday's Academy Awards broadcast, it would have to be the vision of Werner Herzog, preferably in a tux, receiving an Oscar."

"Encounters at the End of the World" "cannot help but be informed by the director's career-long consideration of modern man's relation to the on-screen moving image," writes Ben Simington in the Auteurs' Notebook. "The broader question at the core of Herzog's life-long film: what does our relation to this mirage reflect about our collective dependence on visual sensory perceptions to provide the final word on reality and being?"

Shooting Oscar's breeze: Sean Burns and Matt Prigge in the Philadelphia Weekly.

Predicting Oscar's moves: DVD Talk and Slant (ongoing).

Reading Oscar's entrails: Andrew O'Hagan in the London Review of Books.

The Telegraph's Sukhdev Sandhu argues the case for "Milk."

Steve Heiser talks with Viola Davis about "Doubt."

James van Maanen talks with Tom Grant about the nominated short documentary he's produced, "The Final Inch."

"More than 2.4 million Germans saw 'The Baader Meinhof Complex' when it came out, to mixed reviews, last September, and now it's in the running for Best Foreign Language Film." A brief primer from William Boston in Time.

The first Sunday night live blogging event to announce: GreenCine's, of course.

What'll you be drinking on Oscar night? Chicagoist Rob Christopher has a suggestion: "Francis Coppola named his sparkling wine, Sofia Blanc de Blancs, after his daughter. It's light, crisp and refreshing. In other words: perfect for punch."

Online viewing tip. The Observer's Jason Solomons talks with Jonathan Demme.

Tags: Oscars, Sean Baker, Werner Herzog