Last night I was lucky enough to get into a free preview screening of Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World, the new film from director Edgar Wright, who also co-wrote the screenplay of this comic book adaptation. That’s Edgar ‘Spaced’ Wright. Edgar Shaun of the Dead Wright. Edgar Hot Fuzz Wright.

So those were my reasons for being OH SO VERY excited about seeing this movie – I hadn’t read the comic book or kept up with the pre-production gossip online, instead I’ve just spent a couple of months treasuring the lovely warm prospect of a new Wright film, and hoping that makes me laugh halfway as much as his previous collaborations with the glorious Pegg and Frost team. As I’m still utterly buzzing 12 hours after watching it, any fans worried that the hop across the pond may have meant a move away from the quirky, charmingly silly humour his previous British comedies were characterised by- well they can just start getting ridiculously excited instead.

As you’d expect from the trailer, we follow Scott Pilgrim in each of his visually awesome battles with the seven demented exes. Afterwards, we all agreed that Michael Cera was absolutely the perfect match for Scott’s dialogue, which was often very, very funny, but made hysterical by Cera’s faltering, understated manner. So many throwaway lines keep coming back to me that on paper just wouldn’t, but were perfect little moments that took me by surprise. I never want to see him in another Judd Apatow comedy- they’re not bad, but it would ruin the memory of him in this infinitely more quick-witted film.

The supporting characters in Scott Pilgrim’s world are far more hilariously drawn that I had any right to expect. You’re whipped into the quick-fire sarcasm of his bandmate friends, (who are endearing and are refreshingly not teeth-grindingly quirky as in so many indie flicks) and this made me more than happy to suspend my disbelief when all the really silly stuff kicked off. And boy does it ever kick off.
The action fits surprisingly well into the snowy Toronto setting, provided you’ve left enough of your cynicism at the door. Rather than realistic martial arts, expect instead to be left gawking at the comic book-capery it does so well. As far as I could see, no actual blood and gore will be strewn about in the final edit, which is entirely in keeping with the tone of the film and something I’m quite relieved about. Gore is all well and good in its place, but I felt the increasingly tragic zombifications towards the end of Shaun of the Dead really jarred with the slapstick at times.

Another thing we were agreed on was that the humour was far less exclusive than other slacker comedies, or indeed action comedies we’ve all seen recently. While the whole film is essentially both a very funny computer game AND comic book up on the big screen, with in-jokes to tickle die-hard nerds of either persuasion, none of this stops anyone else laughing. It didn’t matter in the slightest if you didn’t know where a pixelated gaming sight gag came from (for there are many) came from, it was still funny to me and every other person who can’t even play Mariokart successfully. There aren’t jokes for the lads, and token ones for their girlfriends, there is just joke after joke that will leave both sexes weak and spluttering at the memory long after.

Scott Pilgrim sets out to combine action, comedy and romance and does a damn fine job of blending the three throughout so that no aspects feel tacked on. Romance does however suffer slightly from a lack of screen-time- although Scott battles each evil ex for the love of the apparently too-cool-for-anything Ramona, I did wonder what exactly was so great about her that he would get beaten up seven times in a row. But the relentless action and humour didn’t leave me much time to ponder this, or the other issue that has since started to niggle at me. Will anyone else agree with me that maybe having our hero fight the exes for ownership of his girl is a little off-colour? Feisty though she is, Ramona falls victim to the ‘Bella Swan paradox’- the story revolves around her, but it’s largely the blokes who get to do all the fun action stuff. There is a wicked girly fight (calm down) but Buffy this ain’t.

The music gives the fight scenes some real fire power in my opinion, and is as integral to the film as the offbeat ‘kerpow!’ and ‘zap!’ animations that pop up at just the right moments to punctuate the very ordinary Toronto. To those literally-minded/boring people who may complain that this, and the action sequences are too zany and unrealistic, I will say that the weirdness of Scott Pilgrim’s world all comes directly from how teenage and 20/30-something slacker gamers might view things from a sideways angle. They spend days and nights solving puzzles, arming up and beating each level, a pattern which is seamlessly integrated (God knows how, it’s an utter miracle) into this story. The end result is gorgeous on screen, even to my pixel-blind eyes.

Although Edgar Wright was sitting RIGHT THERE in the cinema as I left the post-preview screening market research interview, there was something I just couldn’t bring myself to go up to him and say. So here it is:

“Edgar Wright, your television and film work has given me so much joy and will be forever embedded in my life. So much so, that a like, if not a love for ‘Spaced’ is an essential requirement for any boyfriends, past and future- I am completely incapable of sleeping with someone who hasn’t seen ‘Spaced’ and laughed like a fool with me at it.”

Ahem. While I can’t yet declare the same obsession for Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World, it has pretty much blown his previous films out of the water. The same amount of love and attention to tiny funny details has gone into the film that made ‘Spaced’ so infinitely re-watchable. If Edgar Wright does not become a very rich man there is something very wrong with the world’s film viewing public.

On the show, ‘The Good Doctor’ (Kermode) discusses the week’s new film releases with Simon, engaging in witty banter and the like, all of which is as amusing and heartwarming as it is informative. No wonder over 10,000 people download the podcast every week.

Today, whilst resting my mysterious neck/shoulder injury, I happened to be listening live to the review show. When Simon and Mark were going through the UK box office top 10, I had an email read out! How exciting. It was concerning ‘Up In The Air’ and a certain particular moustache…

Visit http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/kermode to hear it, click on the second part from Friday 5th February 2010.

Actress in a supporting role
Mo’Nique in Precious
Vera Farmiga in Up in the Air
Penélope Cruz in Nine
Anna Kendrick in Up In The Air
Maggie Gyllenhaal in Crazy Heart

Actor in a supporting role
Christoph Waltz in Inglourious Basterds
Christopher Plummer in The Last Station
Matt Damon in Invictus
Stanley Tucci in The Lovely Bones
Woody Harrelson in The Messenger

Actress in a leading role
Meryl Streep in Julie & Julia
Sandra Bullock in The Blind Side
Helen Mirren in The Last Station
Gabourey Sidibe in Precious
Carey Mulligan in An Education

Actor in a leading role
Morgan Freeman in Invictus
Jeff Bridges in Crazy Heart
George Clooney in Up in the Air <<NO WAY does that performance warrant a nomination
Colin Firth in A Single Man
Jeremy Renner in The Hurt Locker

Animated feature film
Up
The Princess and the Frog
Coraline
Fantastic Mr Fox
The Secret of Kells

Foreign language film
Ajami (Scandar Copti and Yaron Shani, Israel)
A Prophet (Jacques Audiard, France)
The Secret of Her Eyes (Juan Jose Campanella, Argentina)
The White Ribbon (Michael Haneke, Germany)
The Milk of Sorrow (Claudia Llosa, Peru)

Directing
Avatar (James Cameron) << dear God, NO.
The Hurt Locker (Kathryn Bigelow) << please please please
Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino)
Up in the Air (Jason Reitman)
Precious (Lee Daniels)

Writing (adapted screenplay)
District 9 (Neill Blomkamp and Terri Tatchell)
An Education (Nick Hornby)
Precious (Geoffrey Fletcher)
Up in the Air (Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner)
In the Loop (Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Armando Iannucci and Tony Roche)

Writing (original screenplay)
The Hurt Locker (Mark Boal)
Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino)
A Serious Man (Joel and Ethan Coen)
Up (Pete Docter and Bob Petersen)
The Messenger (Alessandro Camon and Oren Moverman)

Best picture
Avatar (James Cameron and Jon Landau, producers) << Again, please NO. Let us not be blinded by visuals and forget that 3D wizardry does NOT a good film make!!
District 9 (Peter Jackson and Carolynne Cunningham, producers)
An Education (Finola Dwyer and Amanda Posey, producers)
The Hurt Locker (nominees to be determined)
Inglourious Basterds (Lawrence Bender, producer)
Precious (Lee Daniels, Sarah Siegel-Magness and Gary Magness, producers)
A Serious Man (Joel Coen and Ethan Coen, producers)
Up in the Air (Daniel Dubiecki, Ivan Reitman and Jason Reitman, producers)     << NO WAY
The Blind Side (nominees to be determined)
Up (Jonas Rivera, producer)

Art direction
Avatar (art direction: Rick Carter and Robert Stromberg; set decoration: Kim Sinclair)
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (art direction: Dave Warren and Anastasia Masaro; set decoration: Caroline Smith)
Nine (art direction: John Myhre; set decoration: Gordon Sim)
Sherlock Holmes (art direction: Sarah Greenwood; set decoration: Katie Spencer)
The Young Victoria (art direction: Patrice Vermette; set decoration: Maggie Gray)

Cinematography
Avatar (Mauro Fiore)
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Bruno Delbonnel)
The Hurt Locker (Barry Ackroyd)
Inglourious Basterds (Robert Richardson)
The White Ribbon (Christian Berger)

Costume design
Bright Star (Janet Patterson)
Coco Before Chanel (Catherine Leterrier)
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (Monique Prudhomme)
Nine (Colleen Atwood)
The Young Victoria (Sandy Powell)

Documentary (feature)
Burma VJ (Anders Østergaard and Lise Lense-Møller)
The Cove (nominees to be determined)
Food, Inc (Robert Kenner and Elise Pearlstein)
The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers (Judith Ehrlich and Rick Goldsmith)
Which Way Home (Rebecca Cammisa)

Documentary (short subject)
‘China’s Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province’ (Jon Alpert and Matthew O’Neill)
‘The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardner’ (Daniel Junge and Henry Ansbacher)
‘The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant’ (Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert)
‘Music by Prudence’ (Roger Ross Williams and Elinor Burkett)
‘Rabbit à la Berlin’ (Bartek Konopka and Anna Wydra)

Film editing
Avatar (Stephen Rivkin, John Refoua and James Cameron)
District 9 (Julian Clarke)
The Hurt Locker (Bob Murawski and Chris Innis)
Inglourious Basterds (Sally Menke)
Precious (Joe Klotz)

Makeup
Il Divo (Aldo Signoretti and Vittorio Sodano)
The Young Victoria (Jon Henry Gordon and Jenny Shircore)
Star Trek (Barney Burman, Mindy Hall and Joel Harlow)

Music (original score)
Avatar (James Horner)
Fantastic Mr Fox (Alexandre Desplat)
Up (Michael Giacchino)
The Hurt Locker (Marco Beltrami and Buck Sanders)
Sherlock Holmes (Hans Zimmer)

Music (original song)
‘Almost There’, from The Princess and the Frog by Randy Newman
‘Down in New Orleans’, from The Princess and the Frog by Randy Newman
‘Loin de Paname’, from Paris 36 by Reinhardt Wagner and Frank Thomas
‘Take it All’, from Nine by Maury Yeston
‘The Weary Kind’, from Crazy Heart by Ryan Bingham and T Bone Burnett

Short film (animated)
‘French Roast’ (Fabrice O Joubert)
‘Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty’ (Nicky Phelan and Darragh O’Connell)
‘Logoramam’ (Nicolas Schmerkin)
‘The Lady and the Reaper’ (Javier Recio Gracia)
‘A Matter of Loaf and Death’ (Nick Park)

Short film (live action)
The Door (Juanita Wilson and James Flynn)
Instead of Abracadabra (Patrik Eklund and Mathias Fjellström)
Kavi (Gregg Helvey)
Miracle Fish (Luke Doolan and Drew Bailey)
The New Tenants (Joachim Back and Tivi Magnusson)

Sound editing
Avatar (Christopher Boyes and Gwendolyn Yates Whittle)
The Hurt Locker (Paul NJ Ottosson)
Inglourious Basterds (Wylie Stateman)
Star Trek (Mark Stoeckinger and Alan Rankin)
Up (Michael Silvers and Tom Myers)

Sound mixing
Avatar (Christopher Boyes, Gary Summers, Andy Nelson and Tony Johnson)
The Hurt Locker (Paul NJ Ottosson and Ray Beckett)
Inglourious Basterds (Michael Minkler, Tony Lamberti and Mark Ulano)
Star Trek (Anna Behlmer, Andy Nelson and Peter J Devlin)
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (Greg P Russell, Gary Summers and Geoffrey Patterson)

Visual effects
Avatar (Joe Letteri, Stephen Rosenbaum, Richard Baneham and Andrew R Jones)
District 9 (Dan Kaufman, Peter Muyzers, Robert Habros and Matt Aitken)
Star Trek (Roger Guyett, Russell Earl, Paul Kavanagh and Burt Dalton)

My predictions are given in red.

Best film

Avatar

An Education

The Hurt Locker

Precious

Up in the Air

Leading actor

Jeff Bridges (Crazy Heart)

George Clooney (Up in the Air)

Colin Firth (A Single Man)

Jeremy Renner (The Hurt Locker)

Andy Serkis (Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll)

Leading actress

Carey Mulligan (An Education)

Saoirse Ronan (The Lovely Bones)

Gabourey Sidibe (Precious)

Meryl Streep (Julie & Julia)

Audrey Tautou (Coco Before Chanel)

Supporting actor

Alec Baldwin (It’s Complicated)

Christian McKay (Me and Orson Welles)

Alfred Molina (An Education)

Stanley Tucci (The Lovely Bones)

Christoph Waltz (Inglourious Basterds)

Supporting actress

Anne-Marie Duff (Nowhere Boy)

Vera Farmiga (Up in the Air)

Anna Kendrick (Up in the Air)

Mo’Nique (Precious)

Kristin Scott Thomas (Nowhere Boy)

Outstanding British film

An Education

Fish Tank

In the Loop

Moon

Nowhere Boy

Outstanding debut by a British writer, director or producer

Lucy Bailey, Andrew Thompson, Elizabeth Morgan Hemlock, David Pearson (directors, producers – Mugabe And The White African)

Eran Creevy (writer/director – Shifty)

Stuart Hazeldine (writer/director – Exam)

Duncan Jones (director – Moon)

Sam Taylor-Wood (director – Nowhere Boy)

Director

James Cameron (Avatar)

Neill Blomkamp (District 9)

Lone Scherfig (An Education)

Kathryn Bigelow (The Hurt Locker)

Quentin Tarantino (Inglourious Basterds)

* This for me is too tough to call either way

Original screenplay

The Hangover (Jon Lucas, Scott Moore)

The Hurt Locker (Mark Boal)

Inglourious Basterds (Quentin Tarantino)

A Serious Man (Joel Coen, Ethan Coen)

Up (Bob Peterson, Pete Docter)

Adapted screenplay

District 9 (Neill Blomkamp, Terri Tatchell)

An Education (Nick Hornby)

In the Loop (Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Armando Iannucci, Tony Roche)

Precious (Geoffrey Fletcher)

Up in the Air (Jason Reitman, Sheldon Turner)

Film not in the English language

Broken Embraces

Coco Before Chanel

Let the Right One In < would be a CRIME if Let the Right One In didn’t win this category, it is AMAZING

A Prophet

The White Ribbon

Animated film

Coraline

Fantastic Mr Fox

Up

Music

Avatar (James Horner)

Crazy Heart (T-Bone Burnett, Stephen Bruton)

Fantastic Mr Fox (Alexandre Desplat)

Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll (Chaz Jankel)

Up (Michael Giacchino)

Cinematography

Avatar

District 9

The Hurt Locker

Inglourious Basterds

The Road

Editing

Avatar

District 9

The Hurt Locker

Inglourious Basterds

Up in the Air

Production design

Avatar

District 9

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

Inglourious Basterds

Costume design

Bright Star

Coco Before Chanel

An Education

A Single Man

The Young Victoria

Sound

Avatar

District 9

The Hurt Locker

Star Trek

Up

Special visual effects

Avatar

District 9

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

The Hurt Locker

Star Trek

Makeup & hair

Coco Before Chanel

An Education

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

Nine

The Young Victoria

Short animation

The Gruffalo

The Happy Duckling

Mother of Many

Short film

14

I Do Air

Jade

Mixtape

Off Season
*unable to give a prediction, sadly not seen any of these films

The Orange Rising Star Award

(voted for by the public, nominations announced earlier this month)

Jesse Eisenberg

Nicholas Hoult

Carey Mulligan

Tahar Rahim

Kristen Stewart

Good luck to all the nominees, the winners will be announced at the awards ceremony at London’s Royal Opera House on 21st February 2010.