Art Directors Guild winners

Overall, there were few real surprises to be found in the ADG winners. Sarah Greenwood (Sherlock Holmes) and Rick Carter and Robert Stromberg (Avatar) make auspicious starts to their potential Oscar wins by by taking out the Period and Fantasy categories respectively. It’s definitely telling that Avatar and Sherlock Holmes, the sole Oscar nominees from the 15 films nominated by the Guild, both managed to pull off wins here.

The real talking point was in the Contemporary category, with Karl Juliusson’s austere work on The Hurt Locker edging out more accessible fare like The Lovely bones and Up in the Air. I’m definitely an enthusiastic supporter of Locker (it was my number two film of 2009 after all) but its art direction was certainily nothing to write home about. Chalk it up as a repeat of 2008 where Slumdog Millionaire, last year’s widely-admired Best Picture frontrunner, steamrolled the guild circuit (and was awarded the gong from the ADG in the contemporary category as well). With a win from the ADG, Locker seems to be mustering up as much support as Slumdog did last year – and that culminated in a Best Picture win for Danny Boyle’s crowdpleasing hit. Let’s hope lightning strikes twice this year for a thoroughly more deserving film.