And now, we get to the good stuff. Having already analyzed the technical categories at this year’s Oscars, both large and small, it’s time to dig into the races that you really care about. Today, we’re looking at Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress; tomorrow, we’ll move on to the lead actors.
Ladies first:
BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
NOMINEES Maria Bakalova—Borat Subsequent Moviefilm Glenn Close—Hillbilly Elegy Olivia Colman—The Father Amanda Seyfried—Mank Youn Yuh-jung—Minari Read More
We’re running through the 20 feature categories at this year’s Oscars. Yesterday, we analyzed seven categories that receive a relatively low profile. Today, we’re moving on to five additional below-the-line fields that are somewhat more significant. I mean, they’re significant in my eyes; you might care more about Best Costume Design than Best Film Editing, but this isn’t your website.
BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
NOMINEES Judas and the Black Messiah—Sean Bobbitt Mank—Erik Messerschmidt News of the World—Dariusz Wolski Nomadland—Joshua James Richards The Trial of the Chicago 7—Phedon Papamichael Read More
It’s mid-April, and this year’s Oscars still haven’t been held yet, which raises two questions: What is time, and what is Time? I’m not a capable enough philosopher to answer the first, but I can tell you that the second is one of the five nominees for this year’s Best Documentary Feature award. And so, even with the COVID-19 pandemic wreaking havoc on the cinematic landscape and the Academy’s schedule, it’s (ahem) time for everyone’s favorite time (oh come on) of year: our annual Oscar predictions.
You know how this works. Over the next week, I’ll be filing a series of pieces that briskly walk through each of the 21 20 feature categories (sorry, short subjects, I care for thee not), with predictions, preferences, and assorted thoughts. Does any of this matter? That’s up to you. The Oscars are a gaudy ceremony of self-congratulation, often better remembered for what they got wrong than right. They’re also significant as a marker of history, and they tend to honor some pretty good movies. There are more important things in the world, and more important things to complain about, too.
Today, we’re running through seven categories that are rather less high-profile than other races. But if you want to win your office pool (do people do office pools for the Oscars? Do people still work in offices?), this is where you can separate yourself.
BEST ANIMATED FEATURE
NOMINEES Onward Over the Moon A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon Soul Wolfwalkers Read More
Yesterday, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced their nominations for the 93rd Oscars. The list was met with the usual cacophony of bitterness, gratitude, and exasperation. The selections were all terrible, except for the ones that weren’t; the omissions were egregious, except for those who were justly excluded.
Same as it ever was. It remains to be seen how the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic will affect the actual telecast of this year’s Oscars (scheduled for April 25). And of course, the disease’s devastating yearlong spread carried significant consequences for the movie industry; the trickle-down effects surely included how voters perceived the various contending films (or how many they even watched). But for one day, at least, normalcy was restored in our collective outcries and appreciations.
Is this a sign of a return to the Before Times, or an isolated blip amid a continuing shift in the industry? We’ll find out. In the meantime, here’s some quickie analysis of our predictions in 13 major categories, and where the respective races currently stand. Read More
Oh look, it’s time for another Oscars. Business as usual, right?
As I’ve written in the past, the upheaval that the film and entertainment industry has suffered at the hands of COVID-19 is perhaps one of the pandemic’s less significant calamities. But the turmoil that it sowed for the Oscars strikes me as self-inflicted. Last June, after surveying an uncertain cinematic landscape where theaters were closed and new releases were being continually postponed, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced that the eligibility window for this year’s Oscars—which typically covers films that came out during the prior calendar year—would be extended to February 2021, and that it was correspondingly delaying the ceremony itself until late April. (Nominations will finally be proclaimed on Monday.) The theory, I suppose, was to broaden the pool of potential nominees, as though flipping the datebook from December to January would magically herald the sudden arrival of high-quality pictures that were heretofore unavailable.
This was, of course, nonsense; 2020 was already a terrific year for cinema, and in widening the window, the Academy implicitly derided the fertile crop of existing releases. Beyond that, the decision carried the unfortunate consequence of further prolonging the interminable period colloquially known as Awards Season: the annual ritual of critics’ groups and governing bodies bestowing honors on various films and artists, culminating with the Oscars’ ultimate crowning of the best of the best. Hell, by the time 2020’s Best Picture is announced, campaigns for 2021 Oscar candidacy will practically be underway.
So be it. It’s still the Oscars, meaning it’s still relevant in terms of the historical record; if the Academy’s actual choices for the best movies of 2020 scarcely matter, that’s no different from any other year. With that in mind, per tradition, here are MovieManifesto’s predictions for the nominations in 13 major categories of the 93rd Academy Awards: Read More
