Oscar upset?

Tarantino.

The name is legendary in Hollywood, even though the guy behind the mystique only has eight films to his credit and most people haven’t seen them. But they’re hip films – fast paced violence drenched stories with unexpected plotlines and lots of sharp dialogue. They’ve earned him a load of admirers in the film community and an ardent fan base of comic con attendees, but not a whole lot of mainstream attention.

Until now. With Inglorious Basterds Quentin Tarantino appears to be positioned to knock Katheryn Bigelow and James Cameron right off their Best Picture front runner pedestals. For one thing, Harvey Weinstein produced the film and he is working the Oscar voter crowd – the tireless Weinstein is known for successful Academy Award campaigns. And even though there’s general agreement that Hurt Locker is a better movie than Avatar, the little Iraq movie that could hasn’t made much money; in fact, by most standards it’s a box office dud. Oscar voters are generally leery of rewarding poor financial performance. But they’re suspicious of box office hits, too, and that doesn’t bode well for the tall blue people movie. Basterds, on the other hand, brought in a respectable 120 Million, so it’s kind of a compromise. Beyond that there is the notion that the ground breaking Pulp Fiction deserved better than it got back in 1994 – in other words, the Academy owes Tarantino one.

And then there’s the preferential ballot.

New this year, Academy members are asked to rank the best picture contenders, with their favorite first and least favorite last, and all the other ones lining up in between. This is how nominations have always been decided, but it’s a first for the final vote; in years past, you put a check mark next to your fave, sealed the envelope and sent it on its way. With the preferential thing, second and third place votes could make the difference in a close race, so a dark horse could sneak in.

And that would be pretty cool. Inglourious Basterds is a great grand goof of a movie, a World War II film made by a guy whose inspiration is other World War II films. There is little in this picture that is historically accurate – the ending is a bold, cinematic roller coaster ride not remotely connected to real events – but Tarantino isn’t trying to teach a lesson here, and you don’t go to a Tarantino film to learn one. You go for fun, to be entertained by – as the breathless comic con dude sting next to me said– "a movie making master." What could be more Oscar worthy than that?

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Whether his film can win the top prize or not, there is no question that Tarantino has some buzz. Yesterday on her show, MSNBC host Rachel Maddow announced the winner of a contest she was running, to find a shorthand name for the process where the minority party in the Senate threatens a filibuster whenever the majority party brings a bill to the floor.

The winning entry was “The Tarantino.” It kills bills.