Cloudy awards season picture is clearing

Last year at this time, “Slumdog Millionaire” was such a prohibitive favorite that at some point all the other contenders seemed to take the rest of the season off.

This year hasn’t been nearly as predictable, nor as uniform. Favorites have had a shakier hold on their categories, and no movie has spread as widely across ballots as “Slumdog” did. That’s why pundits (at least until recently) had whipped themselves frothy about the prospect of a left-field success.

But as the awards season moves from confusion to clarity -- as it began to do when “Avatar” won best film and best director prizes at the Golden Globes Sunday night -- it also risks veering into certainty. It increasingly looks like this year won’t have a “Crash” or a “Departed,” which each made late (read: post-Globes) surges to win best picture at the Oscars. That’s not a good thing, as awards season thrives on suspense.

Pundits note that a few areas could see some drama. By handing best actress prizes to both Meryl Streep and Sandra Bullock, the Globes cleared up nothing on that two-woman race; until SAG chooses between them this weekend, it’s impossible to handicap a winner. Kathryn Bigelow remains a strong candidate to take the director Oscar away from ex-husband James Cameron, especially if the Directors Guild endorses her on Jan. 30.

There’s a full week between the Hollywood Foreign Press Assn.’s Globes announcements and the deadline for academy nomination ballots, which means that the HFPA could stir the pot by getting “The Hangover” back on voters’ minds and into that 10th best picture slot. Which, given that it could mean Mike Tyson holding court at the Kodak Theatre, may or may not be a good thing.

But those are, as a rule, dramas of an underwhelming sort. For all the shrugging and upturned palms coming out of the New Hampshire primary of awards season, the Toronto International Film Festival, the surprises are dwindling. Oscar prospects for actor (Jeff Bridges), supporting actor and actress (Christoph Waltz and Mo’Nique), original screenplay (“Inglourious Basterds”) and adapted screenplay (“Up in the Air”) are pretty much sure bets. There appears be no Jets-like upset in the making here.

Then again, as counterintuitive as it may seem, “Avatar” represents a comeback story of its own. Sure, it’s not exactly “Slumdog” -- Fox gave its director just a little bit more leeway (and money) than Warner Bros. did Danny Boyle. And the movie didn’t require a last-minute bailout from another studio to see the light of day.

But given that Cameron disappeared for more than a decade with barely a playful hint as to his professional life outside an “Entourage” story line, there’s something oddly left-field about its candidacy too. And given initial skepticism about whether his movie would be a commercial and awards season smash -- let alone match the insanely high bar of “Titanic” -- the 3-D film’s success lends it a distinctly “Slumdog”-ish, beat-the-odds quality.

“At the time of ‘Titanic,’ when we won the Golden Globe and we were on our way to being number one, I’m thinking ‘Enjoy this ride; it’s never going to happen again,’ ” Cameron said backstage at the Globes Sunday night. “With ‘Avatar,’ we thought it was a shameless engine of commerce. We’re not going to try to impress the critics. And here we are again.”

Given the growing inevitability of this race, that’s true in more ways than one.

steve.zeitchik@latimes.com