I’ve taken somewhat of a backseat to much of this year’s Oscars and how they’ve unfolded. Maybe I don’t have as much time on my hands anymore, or perhaps I’m getting a little bit lazy. However, there’s also the immutable fact that this is, without a doubt, the weirdest Oscars I’ve ever bore witness to. Pundits like myself have bitched and moaned for years about the Oscar race becoming a predictable formality. Now, we’ve had so many wrenches thrown into the works that all of the precedents, reason and logic have just gone clear out the window. 2012 is the ultimate crapshoot.

Perhaps it’s a good thing, overall. Because while this year’s awards season has spiraled into an enormous whirlwind of indecision and confusion, I believe we can all find a consensus in the overwhelming class and quality that was on display in filmmaking during the past year. I can’t have enough good things to say about 2012 and I believe it will go down as shining star in the chronology of cinematic history, up there with the likes of 2001, 1980, 1976, 1960 and, of course, 1939. I also believe that, in some way, the less focus on awards and accolades, we can foresee that it’s ultimately the movies that we’ll remember decades from now, while fiasco over the gold will simply be an afterthought.

Nevertheless, at it’s roots, this is an awards site and it’s time to get down to business. Bottom line, the award for Best Picture (and more than a few others) was completely thrown for a loop the morning that the nominations were announced, when two of the year’s biggest heavyweights were absent from the shortlist. Ben Affleck and Kathryn Bigelow being left in the cold was perhaps the strangest occurrence in this category since Ang Lee and Ron Howard failed to receive nominations for their respective work back in 1995 (“Apollo 13″ and “Sense and Sensibility”). Yet, this may have overall worked in Affleck’s favor, for since that morning, every critic, actor, producer, director, grip, PA and their mother has seemed to fall head over heels for the film. At this point, it seems that enough voters will sway towards “Argo” for the Best Picture, out of sheer sympathy, more than anything else. It doesn’t hurt that it’s also a fantastically entertaining and uplifting piece that pulls at Oscar’s heartstrings like a toddler on a hoop earring.

Meanwhile, there’s a flip-side to every equation. “Argo” may have taken every award since that fateful morning, yet that doesn’t change the fact that the snub still happened. Affleck missing out on Best Director makes a huge statement. It has to be more than just a fluke or the notion of the Academy leaning so heavily on what the guilds have done in the past. Plus, while one can compare the strangeness of this year’s circumstances to ’95, it’s important to be reminded how that year turned out, with neither Lee or Howard taking home the big prize at the end of the night. For now, I’ll go with the odds-on favorite, but can easily see the winds shifting. This weekend’s WGA will may be a largely determining factor.

Alas, my first round of winner predictions for the 85th Academy Awards:

BEST PICTURE: “Argo”

alternate: “Lincoln”

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