The favorite to win the Oscar for Best Picture is The Artist, but who does America want to win? The Harris Poll conducted an only survey with over 2,000 adults and they’ve released the results.

The Help is the overwhelming favorite for Best Picture with 21% of the vote. War Horse, Moneyball and The Artist follow with 9%, 7% and 6% respectively. This makes sense as The Help is a damn good movie that will appeal to most of the American public. Females preferred The Help  overwhelmingly while males split The Help with Moneyball.

As for actor, 23% favor George Clooney in The Descendants, 16% favor Brad Pitt for Moneyball and 10% favor Gary Oldman for Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. Good job America, Gary Oldman love! Jean Dujardin, who’s been favored for The Artist, only has 7% of the vote.

Best Actress is a split, with 22% for Meryl Streep in The Iron Lady and 23% for Viola Davis in The Help. Men favor Streep while women favor Davis. Women favor Davis 28% and Streep 21% while men favor Streep 24% and Davis 18%. Rooney Mara comes in third for Girl with the Dragon Tattoo at 11%.

Perhaps people are happy with what they know, but people are liking the idea of Billy Crystal as Oscar host. 50% of people say Crystal will be better than the hosts of the past couple years, 4% say he’ll be worse and 26% say it’ll be the same. This makes me wonder what it would be like if Eddie Murphy were still host. Would people be more excited? Less?

Overall, about 54% of people say they’ll watch the Oscars and 46% say they’ll skip it. Of course, this poll isn’t supposed to 100% accurate, but it is interesting to note. The people I’ve talked to have all loved The Help, George Clooney and Viola Davis this year, so I’m not surprised to find that those three are the favorites in the hearts and minds of people. At least from the current nominations. I’m sure there would be more love for films like Drive, Thor, Captain America and Fast Five had the nominations accurately represented people’s tastes. It is, however, very fun to look at these numbers and try to get a finger on the pulse of America, isn’t it? [Harris]

america, oscars