For the past three years I’ve set out to watch every Best Picture nominee before the Oscars. It’s sort of a complementary mission to my Life List’s “Watch every Academy Award Best Picture winner,” not because I want to see every movie ever nominated but because I like to make the most educated judgment on the Academy’s decisions that I can make. I can’t rightly say one movie deserves the win if I haven’t seen all of its competition, right?

This year, by the grace of God and Regal Entertainment Group (based in Knoxville — what up!), I completed that mission for the first time. So now, I present to you my thoughts on each BP nominee plus who I think will win and who I think should win. Unfortunately, I think my mission has backfired on me as I’m as muddled on my opinions as ever. I ran out of time to cover all the movies included in the Best and Supporting Actor and Actress categories, so I’ll just give general thoughts on those.

Amour: Winner of the Palme d’Or at Cannes and awards at many other international festivals, Amour is a story of a dying woman and her husband who serves as her caregiver. It is intense, it is beautiful and it is incredibly sad. I managed to hold it together after it ended until I reached my car, and then I cried ugly, ugly buckets of tears on the 15-minute drive home. Worthy of Best Picture? Absolutely, but the Academy will give it Best Foreign Language Film and leave it at that, and that’s OK with me too.

Argo: Argo has gotten all the pre-Oscars love. I saw it when it first came out, which means I’ve seen a lot of movies since then — which is probably hurting Argo in my brain. It’s a fantastically great movie, but I think it’s hurt a bit by a mediocre performance by Ben Affleck. Alan Arkin? Give me more of him please or Argo fuck yourself. While I’d place it in my top three or so, it wasn’t my favorite.

Beasts of the Southern Wild: I love many things about this movie. The storyline has a subtle charm that I think is the mark of a great movie. For as much as I know about the poor parts of cajun country, this depicts life there pretty dang well. The fact that Quvenzhané Wallis was five and six during filming and gives an incredibly convincing performance makes me consider giving my vote for Best Actress to her and Best Director to Benh Zeitlin for coaxing that performance from her and a mostly untrained cast. I don’t think it has a chance in hell of winning, but I think it’s a must-see regardless.

Django Unchained: Let me start by saying I’ve been a pretty faithful Quentin Tarantino fan. Obviously Pulp Fiction is a great movie, and I was particularly impressed with Inglorious Basterds. But Django Unchained turned out to be the one movie of this year’s nominees that I absolutely hated — and I didn’t decide that until more two hours into it. I’m not a huge fan of violence, but I live with it as long as it doesn’t become greater than the plot. By the last hour of Django Unchained, the violence had gotten to be too much and erased everything I enjoyed about the bounty-hunting plot and Christoph Waltz.

Les Misérables: I very much enjoyed Les Mis, but I very much do not think it’s worthy of the BP win. The performances were, at best, uneven. Anne Hathaway’s was strong but brief. Hugh Jackman’s started off a little weak — and there’s too much transformation in Jean Valjean’s life at that point to allow a weak performance — but got better and better as the film progressed. Russell Crowe was so hesitant and unconfident while singing that it ruined an otherwise great performance from him. The rest of the cast was pretty good, but when you tie it all together it was a movie that was enjoyable to watch but not much more than that.

Life of Pi: I’m having a hard time evaluating this one. Life of Pi is my favorite book. I love the exploration of religion, reality and survival. Even though the surprise is no longer, I re-read the ending of the book just to revisit the lessons. So do I love the movie Life of Pi because it’s my favorite book or do I love it because it’s an incredible movie? I don’t know the answer. I do know that Ang Lee took a book that obviously was not easy to transform into a film and made a fantastic film.

Lincoln: As a former political reporter, I enjoyed the inside baseball that was depicted in Lincoln and the fact that the movie was more about getting the 13th Amendment passed than it was about Lincoln itself. It didn’t over-glorify the president, which I appreciate, and the performances were strong across the board. I think it’s got all the makings of a Best Picture winner, and I’d be totally OK with it winning.

Silver Linings Playbook: This was the film that I enjoyed the most. I think Bradley Cooper killed it, and Jennifer Lawrence did almost as good of a job. I love when a film gives a twisted take on an otherwise generic love story. I also love when it can deliver both dark and happy without making you feel like either of the main characters in Silver Linings Playbook. Do I think it will win? No, and it probably shouldn’t because most enjoyable doesn’t necessarily mean best.

Zero Dark Thirty: This was the movie I didn’t want to see and didn’t want to like. And it completely won me over. The torture tactics were tough to watch, but fortunately they did not become the whole point of the movie. I appreciated getting a sense of how Bin Laden was hunted down (however accurate it was) without having politics rammed down my throat.

Predictions

• Will win: Argo — it’s hard to deny the buzz and all the pre-Oscars awards Argo has won.
• Should win: I’m going to go with Lincoln, though Zero Dark Thirty and Life of Pi would make this a decision that would keep me up at night.

Other Categories

• Best Director is a weird category because of who wasn’t nominated. Steven Spielberg seems to be the favorite, but I would give it to Ang Lee, Michael Haneke or Benh Zeitlin. Spielberg’s cast was so seasoned it could have directed itself in that film. I think Lee, Haneke and Zeitlin pulled off far greater feats.
• Best Actor has been all but declared for Daniel Day-Lewis for like four months. He was very good and is plenty deserving, but I’d like to see Bradley Cooper win. His performance dominated Silver Linings Playbook, and throughout that movie I forgot it was Bradley Cooper I was watching — an award-winning achievement in and of itself. (I did not see The Master or Flight)
• Best Actress appears to be Jennifer Lawrence’s to lose, and I’m ok with that. I think Jessica Chastain and Emmanuelle Riva are equally deserving, so I have a hard time calling this one for any of them. (I did not see The Impossible)
• Best Supporting Actor is one of the hardest to choose. Of the ones I saw (Philip Seymour Hoffman being the exception), I thought all did a great job. I think I’d give it to Christoph Waltz as he was an incredibly likable part in a movie I otherwise hated, and he stole the show.
• Best Supporting Actress was already given to Anne Hathaway, right? I don’t think there’s any discussion to be had here. (I did not see The Master or The Sessions)
• Best Foreign Language Film has to go to Amour, right? Because it was an incredibly worthy Best Picture nominee, and the Academy will want to spread it around this year with so many good options. The film No looks very good and is on my list to see, but I think it has hardly any hope as a spoiler. (Amour is the only of these I’ve seen)
• Best Cinematography goes to Life of Pi, because I think it was the most visually stunning of them all, though I think Skyfall is a worthy contender. (I did not see Anna Karenina). Life of Pi also gets Best Visual Effects, because Richard Parker. (Only saw Life of Pi and the Avengers)
• Best Animated Short — throwing this one in since I managed to watch all these. The bets are on Paperman winning, but I preferred Head Over Heels and Adam and Dog. All three were good, however.

I’ll fill out my ballot tomorrow afternoon and let you know how I do.