Want to win an Academy Award? Then quick -- come out with a flick where you're dying, surviving, or crazy. Or maybe all three. Here are the most prevalent types of Oscar-bait films aiming for the gold in the coming months, below.
PSYCHOSES
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J.K. Simmons is really good as the sadistic conductor in Whiplash. To get a performance out of his musicians, he throws a chair at their heads, slaps them, and generally treats them like caca. If you don't keep playing, "You're fired."
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Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike have gotten raves for playing counter-manipulating marrieds in Gone Girl. I won't give away the twists -- but believe me it's twist-ed.
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Steve Carell has won acclaim for portraying a paranoid schizophrenic killer in the true story of male bonding gone awry, Foxcatcher. He's even more disturbed than in Despicable Me.
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Julianne Moore stands out in Maps to the Stars as an actress with very little grip on right or wrong as she desperately vies for a movie role. Everyone else in the film is nuts too, so maybe they'll all get nominated.
DISEASE
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The wonderful Julianne is also garnering kudos for Still Alice, in which she plays a cognitive psychologist diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer's. In the old days, Susan Hayward would have played the part and won an Oscar for it. Can't see why Julianne won't do the same.
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Shailene Woodley has cancer in The Fault in Our Stars, and even though this basically amounts to wearing a small tube and coughing once in a while, she's pretty affecting.
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Eddie Redmayne gets a surefire nomination for The Theory of Everything, in which he's physicist Stephen Hawking, who's paralyzed due to a motor neuron disease and talks through a speech generating device. But Eddie's fully able to speak at various podiums.
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So is Robert Duvall. In The Judge, he's only pretending to have stage-four cancer and memory loss. And he's brilliant.
SURVIVAL
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In Wild, Reese Witherspoon hikes over 1000 miles of the Pacific Crest Trail, all by her lonesome. Sort of like after her last divorce.
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Here's the background for Reese's other Oscar flick, The Good Lie: "They were known simply as 'the Lost Boys'. Orphaned by the brutal civil war in Sudan, these young victims traveled as much as 1000 miles on foot in search of safety. Fifteen years later..."
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In The Homesman, Hilary Swank plays a spirited wench with the task of transporting three women by covered wagon to Iowa, during which time "she soon realizes just how daunting the journey will be." By the way, the women have been driven mad by pioneer life, so we're talking psychoses too!
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In the Angelina Jolie directed film Unbroken, a war hero and two other crewmen survived in a raft for 47 days, only to be captured by the Japanese and sent to a prisoner of war camp. You know the drill.
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In Fury, starring Angelina's hubby Brad Pitt -- and Shia LaBeouf's intense method acting -- "Wardaddy and his men face overwhelming odds in their heroic attempts to strike at the heart of Nazi Germany." Will they survive?
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The Jon Stewart-directed Rosewater is based on the novel Then They Came For Me: A Family's Story of Love, Captivity, and Survival. 'Nuff said.
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And in Tracks, Mia Wasikowska plays a young woman who leaves her home to schlep alone through almost 2000 miles of Australian desert. She's definitely got Reese Witherspoon topped -- though to be fair, she did bring a dog and four camels for company.
So there you have it, Oscar watchers. Let the arduous trekking to the Dolby Theatre begin.
PSYCHOSES
J.K. Simmons is really good as the sadistic conductor in Whiplash. To get a performance out of his musicians, he throws a chair at their heads, slaps them, and generally treats them like caca. If you don't keep playing, "You're fired."
Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike have gotten raves for playing counter-manipulating marrieds in Gone Girl. I won't give away the twists -- but believe me it's twist-ed.
Steve Carell has won acclaim for portraying a paranoid schizophrenic killer in the true story of male bonding gone awry, Foxcatcher. He's even more disturbed than in Despicable Me.
Julianne Moore stands out in Maps to the Stars as an actress with very little grip on right or wrong as she desperately vies for a movie role. Everyone else in the film is nuts too, so maybe they'll all get nominated.DISEASE
The wonderful Julianne is also garnering kudos for Still Alice, in which she plays a cognitive psychologist diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer's. In the old days, Susan Hayward would have played the part and won an Oscar for it. Can't see why Julianne won't do the same.
Shailene Woodley has cancer in The Fault in Our Stars, and even though this basically amounts to wearing a small tube and coughing once in a while, she's pretty affecting.
Eddie Redmayne gets a surefire nomination for The Theory of Everything, in which he's physicist Stephen Hawking, who's paralyzed due to a motor neuron disease and talks through a speech generating device. But Eddie's fully able to speak at various podiums.
So is Robert Duvall. In The Judge, he's only pretending to have stage-four cancer and memory loss. And he's brilliant.SURVIVAL
In Wild, Reese Witherspoon hikes over 1000 miles of the Pacific Crest Trail, all by her lonesome. Sort of like after her last divorce.
Here's the background for Reese's other Oscar flick, The Good Lie: "They were known simply as 'the Lost Boys'. Orphaned by the brutal civil war in Sudan, these young victims traveled as much as 1000 miles on foot in search of safety. Fifteen years later..."
In The Homesman, Hilary Swank plays a spirited wench with the task of transporting three women by covered wagon to Iowa, during which time "she soon realizes just how daunting the journey will be." By the way, the women have been driven mad by pioneer life, so we're talking psychoses too!
In the Angelina Jolie directed film Unbroken, a war hero and two other crewmen survived in a raft for 47 days, only to be captured by the Japanese and sent to a prisoner of war camp. You know the drill. 
In Fury, starring Angelina's hubby Brad Pitt -- and Shia LaBeouf's intense method acting -- "Wardaddy and his men face overwhelming odds in their heroic attempts to strike at the heart of Nazi Germany." Will they survive?
The Jon Stewart-directed Rosewater is based on the novel Then They Came For Me: A Family's Story of Love, Captivity, and Survival. 'Nuff said.
And in Tracks, Mia Wasikowska plays a young woman who leaves her home to schlep alone through almost 2000 miles of Australian desert. She's definitely got Reese Witherspoon topped -- though to be fair, she did bring a dog and four camels for company.So there you have it, Oscar watchers. Let the arduous trekking to the Dolby Theatre begin.