The high cost of Oscar

If Hollywood studios will fork over $70 million to market a movie, should it come as a surprise that the majors will shell out upwards of $15 million in the all-consuming quest for major awards?

Ever since Harvey Weinstein, back in the Miramax days, started his tsunami-like Oscar wave, everyone's wondered just how that's done.

For a rare peek under the kimono of the Specialists, that would be those awards publicists who craft Oscar campaigns that can lead the obscure to the gold, spending a lot of dough along the way, go here.

In other pre-holiday bits today:

For those who thought the full monty Jason Segel was the most memorable moment in "Forgetting Sarah Marshall," well then, you just didn't see the same movie we did. Nor could you have been as moved as we were by "Dracula's Lament," where the unceremoniously dumped character let his (horror) musical flag fly.

The instant camp classic is one of 49 songs eligible to compete in February's Oscar race for best original song. Among the others: Clint Eastwood's raspy "Gran Torino" from the drama of the same name, Bruce Springsteen's "The Wrestler" from the gritty Mickey Rourke grappler story, "Rock Me Sexy Jesus," one of the best things about "Hamlet 2," and a whole boatload of "High School Musical 3: Senior Year" ditties. Full list here.

If there's such a thing as a Queasy Underage Sweepstakes for this season's awards flicks, we'll step up and declare the winner. It's "The Reader!" Kate Winslet's misguided justifications be damned, this is hands down the child molesting-est film -- Awards Caliber or otherwise -- that we've seen in a very long time. Ick! And by the way, you don't even want to know what this trophy looks like.