The Oscars are tonight and you could make some serious money from the Academy Awards 2011.

That might sound like a very bold prediction for an online poker magazine - and it is.

But then, we tipped a mega treble for the Golden Globes last month...and if you backed that, you'd already be on your Carribean island by now.

So, without further ado, here is This Time Next Year's tip for printing money at the Oscars 2011...and it's a Lovely SIX-WAY accumulator!

Best Picture: The Social Network (1/10)
Best Actor: Colin Firth (1/12)
Best Actress: Natalie Portman (1/6)
Best Director: David Fincher  (1/10)
Best Supporting Actor: Geoffrey Rush (6/1)
Best Supporting Actress: Melissa Leo (8/11)

The smarter ones among you will immediately spot the obvious: Five of the six are odds-on chances and have already won Golden Globes.

True. And given the sparsity of talent in each category this year, it would be a major shock if they didn't repeat the trick next month.

That gives us a very solid base for a 'single risk acca' - and the rabbit in the hat is Geoffrey Rush.

Christian Bale has cleaned up at all the big awards ceremonies so far for his very genuine performance in The Fighter. But will he land the big one?

Two major factors could count against him.

One is history. Until this year, Bale had never received a single Academy Award nomination. For somebody who started acting in major movies aged 13, that's quite a record.

It's a superficial fact, and on the face of it unimportant - plenty of first-time nominees win. Until you consider his main rival.

Those same Academy members who completely ignored Bale in American Psycho, The Machinist and the The Dark Knight have a much softer spot for Geoffrey Rush.

The Australian is already considered a great by many in the Academy and already has a Best Actor gong for his role in Shine in 1996. He was also nominated again two years later for playing Philip Henslowe in Shakespeare in Love.

He has since picked up both an Emmy and Golden Globe award himself and is much loved inside the American movie industry - which brings us to the second point.

It was just two-and-a-half years ago that Christian Bale launched his now infamous on-set attack at Shane Hurlbut, director of photography for Terminator Salvation.

Consider this: Just 93 members of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA) vote in the Golden Globes. The Critics Choice Awards are also decided by a relatively small voting fraternity which features precisely no professional filmmakers.

And the Academy Awards? Not a bit of it. Nearly 6,000 voting members comprising of directors, actors, and writers.

In other words, professional popularity within Hollywood matters, if you want to win an Oscar.

Will the industry have forgiven Bale for his elongated rant? Quick reminder...

"I'm going to kick your fucking ass! I want you off the fucking set, you prick. No, don't just be sorry. Think, for one fucking second. What the fuck are you doing? It's the second time that he doesn't give a fuck about what is going on in front of the camera, all right? I'm trying to fucking do a scene here, and I am going 'Why the fuck is Shane walking in there? What is he doing there?'"

The concensus, surprisingly, is yes. Outbursts are routine in Hollywood - if not usually so prolonged - and Hurlbut clearly breached accepted practice by wandering onto the set during a scene.

But Bale has had a reputation for being very highly strung - both before and since that incident.

Factor that in, along with the obvious observation that both his performance and Rush's are of close to equal merit, and the waters muddy.

Ask yourself. If you were an established member of the Academy, would you vote for someone you have long respected who has maintained his professionalism and dignity over decades and yet again turned in a stella performance in a beautifully constructed, moving, historically important film...or a highly-strung upstart with form for kicking off at members of your own union?

Exactly.

So, on balance, we believe the value in this year's Oscars is in backing all the favourites tonight in one massive, fat accumulator - and Geoffrey Rush.

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