http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2015/01/jennifer_aniston_in_cake_how_cinelou_turned_a_bad_movie_into_a_likely_oscar.html

The Oscars are a spectacle of such hollow pageantry that they make politics look like a meritocracy, and yet it’s nevertheless both flabbergasting and vaguely sinister that Cake—a smarmy and self-satisfied drama starring Jennifer Aniston as a woman suffering from chronic pain—has become the Cinderella story of this year’s awards season. Cake is so unappetizing that Cinelou Films (the upstart production company responsible for its financing) had to grow its own distribution arm in order to ensure the film’s release, effectively buying its own product. And yet, after three months in which the movie didn’t chart on a single critic’s top-10 list and remained hidden from public scrutiny following its Toronto International Film Festival debut, Jennifer Aniston’s unvarnished lead performance has received SAG and Golden Globe nominations for Best Actress. How on Earth did one of the very worst films of 2014 become a near–shoo-in for an Oscar nod?