A little warm up for tonight. Here we go!

– Kris Tapley has Natalie as his “will win” and “should win” picks. Bening is filed under “could win”.

The frontrunner has been as much for months now, and that’s Natalie Portman in Darren Aronofsky’s “Black Swan.” Here’s a bolt of lightning from clear blue sky, a performance of emotional and physical intensity from an actress we’ve watched grow up on the silver screen for over 15 years now. Add to that a baby bump that gets a little bigger every time she takes another awards show stage and you have a story built for Oscar. She may have gotten a bit snippy at press recently regarding the usual mundane questions, but who can blame her? It’s possible she gets edged out by the Hollywood royalty card, but in all likelihood, voters see this as the best and most sensible place to honor the film (which is also a Best Picture nominee) on their ballot.

– 12 of the 15 Guru’s Of Gold think Natalie will win in their final predictions.

– We know Natalie is the clear favourite, having picked up every award under the sun, but take a look at these comments from actual voting members, courtesy of Deadline Hollywood.

Actress in her 50’s: “Also, sorry, but I don’t really get the Natalie Portman thing. I thought she was over the top in Black Swan. I did like Annette Bening but I am voting for Jennifer Lawrence who was remarkable in Winter’s Bone. There was a special, very authentic, quality to that performance that touched me.”

Former studio head: “For Best Actress, definitely Annette Bening.”

Marketing person with uncanny knack for voting winners: “I loved Black Swan and will definitely vote for Natalie.”

First time voter: “And Annette Bening for actress.”

New York based voter: “And the feeling I get is Best Actress will be Natalie Portman, but I thought Nicole Kidman was extraordinary in The Rabbit Hole.”

Veteran publicist: “As for Best Actress, I hate the campaign for Bening that says ‘This is Annette Bening’s Year’. It’s almost like saying we have to give it to her, but I will probably vote for her anyway.”

– Dating service Zoosk polled their members about the Oscars. 37% of men chose Natalie as their ideal dinner partner and 31% of women feel the same. Black Swan also came on top of the best date movie question, with 22% of the votes. While 41% of singles chose the Nat-Mila sex scene as the steamiest of all the Oscar nominated sex scenes.

– Popsugar has a nice little Road to the Oscars piece on Natalie.

– The Popsugar crew has their own predictions for the major categories.

– And finally, now for something completely different.