Oscars, 2019: Random Thoughts & Trivial Pursuits

Best Picture Nominees, Class of 2019

It seems that the drill the last few years following the announcement of the Oscar nominations is to spill a lot of ink (virtual or actual) on who or what wasn't nominated as opposed to who or what was nominated. Much righteous indignation is expressed, "hashtags" are created, boycotts are threatened... it all gets a little repetitive and more than a little tedious. So there will be no talks of "snubs" here (we'll save that for our "Egregiously Overlooked" section in our annual "If We Picked the Oscars" piece next month), just some general observations, trivia and the like on the artists and films that did receive nominations for the 92nd Academy Awards.

Best Picture Spotlight:

• At 209 minutes, The Irishman is the longest Best Picture nominee this year and the sixth longest Best Picture nominee of all time.
• Joker is the second movie based on a comic book to be nominated for Best Picture, following Black Panther last year.
• 1917 is the only Best Picture nominee with a number for its full title. If it wins, it will join Gigi (1958) and Argo (2012) as the Best Picture winners with the shortest titles.
• Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood is the only Best Picture nominee to have... an ellipsis in its title.
• Parasite is the first South Korean film to be nominated for Best Picture as well as the first to be nominated for the International Feature category, a.k.a. the category formerly known as Foreign Language Film. It is also only the 6th movie to be nominated in both of those categories and the 11th non-English-language film to be nominated for Best Picture.
• Every Best Picture nominee this year has at least four nominations, while every other nominated movie this year has less than four nominations, a feat that has never happened before in Oscar history.

Five guys, a girl and a pizza

Acting Spotlight:

• This year's first time acting nominees are Antonio Banderas, Cynthia Erivo, Scarlett Johansson, Jonathan Pryce and Florence Pugh.
• Adam Driver is the only nominee this year (for Marriage Story) who was also nominated last year (for BlacKkKlansman).
• With her two nominations (Best Actress for Marriage Story and Best Supporting Actress for Jojo Rabbit), Scarlett Johansson becomes the 12th actor to be nominated in two acting categories in the same year. The odds are in her favor to win; seven of the the 11 previous actors in this scenario won.
• The Irishman's Al Pacino and Joe Pesci are the 19th co-stars from the same movie to both be nominated for Best Supporting Actor. The odds of one of them winning aren't very high though; only six times in the past has one of the actors in this scenario won.
• All five of this year's nominees for Supporting Actor are previous Oscar winners. Tom Hanks, Anthony Hopkins and Al Pacino all won for Best Actor (Hanks twice), while Joe Pesci won for Supporting Actor. The only nominee who has not won an acting award is Brad Pitt; his Oscar win was as one of the producers of 2013 Best Picture winner 12 Years a Slave.
• In addition to the five Supporting Actor nominees, previous winners in the acting categories are Kathy Bates, Leonardo DiCaprio, Charlize Theron and Renée Zellweger.
• Nine of the twenty acting nominees played real people: one Best Actor nominee (Jonathan Pryce as Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio in The Two Popes), three Best Actress nominees (Cynthia Erivo as Harriet Tubman in Harriet, Charlize Theron as Megyn Kelly in Bombshell and Renée Zellweger as Judy Garland in Judy), four Supporting Actor nominees (Tom Hanks as Fred Rogers in A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, Anthony Hopkins as Pope Benedict XVI in The Two Popes, Al Pacino as Jimmy Hoffa and Joe Pesci as Russell Bufalino in The Irishman) and one Supporting Actress nominee (Kathy Bates as Bobi Jewell in Richard Jewell).

Scarlett fever

Double Features:
In addition to double acting nominee Scarlett Johansson, who starred in Avengers: Endgame as well as Marriage Story and Jojo Rabbit, several other of this year's Oscar nominated artists acted in more than one nominated movie this year, including:

• Laura Dern in Marriage Story and Little Women (both Best Picture nominees)
• Adam Driver in Marriage Story and Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker
• Tom Hanks in A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood and Toy Story 4
• Al Pacino in The Irishman and Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood (both Best Picture nominees)
• Brad Pitt in Ad Astra and Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood
• Margot Robbie in Bombshell and Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood
• Taika Waititi in Avengers: Endgame and Jojo Rabbit

Milestones:

• Martin Scorsese is now the most nominated living director with his nomination for The Irishman, his ninth nomination for Best Director.
• With his 52nd nomination this year (his 47th in a score category) for Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, John Williams extends his own record as the living person with the most Oscar nominations. The all-time nominations record is held by Walt Disney, with 59 nominations.
• With the nomination for How To Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World, the How To Train Your Dragon series is the only animated trilogy to receive a nomination for Animated Feature for each of its three parts.
• Honeyland is the first movie to be nominated for both Documentary Feature and International Feature, a.k.a. the category formerly known as Foreign Language Film. 
• 63 women are nominees this year, a new record.

Big Sister

Shorts and Soundtracks:

• Two of the short film nominees have practically identical titles: Sister in Best Animated Short and A Sister in Best Live Action Short.
• Two of the Best Picture nominees feature Stephen Sondheim songs: "Send in the Clowns" from A Little Night Music in Joker and "Being Alive" and "You Can Drive a Person Crazy" from Company in Marriage Story.
• Meanwhile, two nominated movies — The Irishman and Pain and Glory — feature Édith Piaf singing "La Vie en Rose" on the soundtrack.

A Little Woman Is Born:
Believe it or not, Little Women is this year's A Star Is Born, as it is the third remake of a Best Picture nominee from the 1930s that is also nominated for Best Picture in the 2010s. In fact, there are several similarities between the four Oscar nominated versions each of both stories:

• Both of the original versions, 1933's Little Women and 1937's A Star Is Born, were nominated for Best Picture and Best Director, and both won a Writing Oscar.
• The generally regarded "worst" versions, 1949's Little Women and 1976's A Star Is Born, each won one Oscar, while the widely regarded "best" versions (at least prior to this century, arguably), 1994's Little Women and 1954's A Star Is Born, both received multiple nominations but didn't win any Oscars.
• The newest versions, this year's Little Women and last year's A Star Is Born, are/were both nominated for Best Picture, Best Actress and Adapted Screenplay. This A Star Is Born won one Oscar; we'll have to wait and see if this Little Women matches or bests that on February 9th.

Jo, Jo, rabbit

And speaking of Little Women:

• Of the four actresses who have played Jo March — 1933's Katharine Hepburn, 1949's June Allyson, 1994's Winona Ryder and 2019's Saoirse Ronan — only the latter two were nominated for Best Actress. However, Hepburn did win her first Best Actress Oscar in 1933, for her performance in Morning Glory.
• The 1994 Little Women received three nominations — Best Actress, Costume Design and Original Score — which are three of the six categories that the 2019 version is nominated in.
• Thomas Newman was nominated for his score to the 1994 Little Women and is also nominated for Original Score this year for 1917, competing with the 2019 Little Women score by Alexandre Desplat. In 1994 the Original Score Oscar didn't go to Newman, it went to The Lion King, which was also remade in 2019.

And speaking of A Star Is Born:
Wait, Bradley Cooper is a producer of Joker? It actually isn't that unusual once you remember that Joker director Todd Phillips directed all three Hangover movies, starring Cooper, and Warner Bros. is the studio behind both A Star Is Born and Joker (not to mention all three Hangover movies).

And speaking of Little Women and Joker:
In addition to Saoirse Ronan being nominated for playing Jo March, a character that was previously played by Winona Ryder in an Oscar nominated performance, this year also sees Joaquin Phoenix  nominated for playing the Joker, a character that was previously played by Heath Ledger in an Oscar winning performance.

A pair of jokers

And furthermore... because Phoenix is nominated in the Best Actor category and Ledger won in the Supporting Actor category, if Phoenix wins the Oscar it will be the opposite of the only other time two actors won Oscars for playing the same character. In 1972, Marlon Brando won Best Actor for playing Vito Corleone in The Godfather, followed two years later by Robert De Niro winning  Supporting Actor for playing a young Vito Corleone in The Godfather Part II. Interestingly, both Joker and Corleone are "criminal masterminds" and, bringing it full circle, De Niro co-starred alongside Phoenix in Joker.

All in the family:
Cousins Randy Newman and Thomas Newman are competing with each other in the Best Original Score category, for their work in Marriage Story and 1917, respectively. And indie power couple Noah Baumbach and Greta Gerwig directed two of the Best Picture nominees, Marriage Story and Little Women; and while neither were nominated for Best Director, they are both nominated for Writing Awards, Baumbach for Original Screenplay and Gerwig for Adapted Screenplay.

"Over the Rainbow", 80 years apart

Original Songs Redux:
Twelve previous nominees for Original Song (including four winners) were reprised in nominated films this year:

• "Over the Rainbow" (winner) from The Wizard of Oz (1939) and "The Trolley Song" from Meet Me in St. Louis (1944) in Judy
• "I've Got a Gal in Kalamazoo" from Orchestra Wives (1942) in Ad Astra
• "Unchained Melody" from Unchained (1955) in Walk Run Cha-Cha
• "A Time for Love" from An American Dream (1966) in Marriage Story
• "Take My Breath Away" (winner) from Top Gun (1986) in Corpus Christi
• "Be Our Guest" from Beauty and the Beast (1991) and "Circle of Life", "Hakuna Matata" and "Can You Feel the Love Tonight" (winner) from The Lion King (1994) in The Lion King
• "You've Got a Friend in Me" from Toy Story (1995) in Toy Story 4
• "Let It Go" (winner) from Frozen (2013) in Frozen II

And speaking of Original Song:

• With "You've Got a Friend in Me", "When She Loved Me", "We Belong Together" and now "I Won't Let You Throw Yourself Away", Randy Newman has had a Toy Story tune from each of the four  movies nominated for Original Song.
• For the past three years, three actress/songwriters have received two nominations – in an acting category and for Original Song –for the same movie: Mary J. Blige for Mudbound, Lady Gaga for A Star Is Born, and now Cynthia Erivo for Harriet.
• And listen to this year's nominees here...

My favorite nominations this year:
The three that made me go "yes!" when they were announced were: Scarlett Johansson in Jojo Rabbit for Best Supporting Actress, Antonio Banderas in Pain and Glory for Best Actor and Little Women for Best Picture.

Thanks for playing:
Several high profile contenders were surprisingly left empty handed post-Oscar Nomination Morning, including Apollo 11, Dolemite Is My Name, Downton Abbey, The Farewell, Hustlers, Just Mercy, Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Uncut Gems, Us and Waves. Parting gifts will include a bag of sour grapes, a Starbucks gift card and/or an Independent Spirit Award.

And finally, I'd like to thank the Academy:
For not nominating Dark Waters, Gemini Man, Her Smell, A Hidden Life, Motherless Brooklyn and The Painted Bird, films I really had no desire to see and if they had been nominated I would have been forced to watch them. Having to sit through Breakthrough will be hard enough.

Stay tuned to Movie Dearest for more Oscars, 2019.

Men on Film: If We Picked the Oscars 2014

Artwork by Olly Gibbs

 

Borrowing a page from Siskel and Ebert back in the good ol' days, Movie Dearest's very own Men on Film — Chris Carpenter and Kirby Holt — are presenting our own version of "If We Picked the Oscars". These aren't predictions, but what movies, actors, directors, et al that we would vote for if we were members of the Academy. We're also chiming in with our picks for the "egregiously overlooked" non-nominees as well as the "Worst Nominations of the Year"; plus: Oscar Trivia! So without further ado, the envelope please...

The nominees for Best Picture are: American Sniper, Birdman, Boyhood, The Grand Budapest Hotel, The Imitation Game, Selma, The Theory of Everything and Whiplash
And our winners would be:
CC: I must go with Boyhood, Richard Linklater's groundbreaking, 12-year exploration of family life that also serves as a stunning testament to its cast's and crew's dedication.
KH: It's about time a straight-up comedy took the top Oscar, and The Grand Budapest Hotel was a mirthful delight worthy of the gold.
Egregiously Overlooked: Edge of Tomorrow and Interstellar, two of the smartest and best-made science fiction films in several years. - CC
Oscar Trivia: You have to go all the way back to 1951's Decision Before Dawn to find another Best Picture nominee that, like Selma this year, received only one other nomination outside of the major categories.

The Grand Budapest Hotel by Malika Favre

The nominees for Best Actor are: Steve Carell in Foxcatcher, Bradley Cooper in American Sniper, Benedict Cumberbatch in The Imitation Game, Michael Keaton in Birdman and Eddie Redmayne in The Theory of Everything
And our winners would be:
CC: I don't consider myself a "Cumberbitch," as his fans are known, but Benedict Cumberbatch's subtly heartbreaking performance as the persecuted gay genius Alan Turing stands out for me here.
KH: Up against a quartet of biopics, Michael Keaton gave a truly original, totally raw performance in Birdman as a washed-up movie star best known for a superhero franchise (how meta) desperately trying for a comeback while barely holding onto his sanity.
Egregiously Overlooked: Channing Tatum, going full out dramatically as Foxcatcher's neglected central character, deserved a nod, especially since both his co-stars were nominated. - CC
Oscar Trivia: This is Bradley Cooper's third nomination in a row. Other actors to achieve this feat include William Hurt, Russell Crowe and Marlon Brando, who was actually nominated four times in a row, from 1951 to 1954 (ending with his first win, for On the Waterfront).

The nominees for Best Actress are: Marion Cotillard in Two Days, One Night, Felicity Jones in The Theory of Everything, Julianne Moore in Still Alice, Rosamund Pike in Gone Girl and Reese Witherspoon in Wild
And our winners would be:
CC: I love Julianne Moore but consider her sure-to-win turn in Still Alice overrated. I would go with first time nominee Rosamund Pike, deliciously twisted as the allegedly abused and murdered wife in Gone Girl.
KH: She really should have one (Far from Heaven) or two (Boogie Nights) of these already, so I say give it to Julianne Moore already!
Egregiously Overlooked: Jennifer Aniston gives a truly transformative performance in Cake that every other major awards group recognized. - CC

The nominees for Best Supporting Actor are: Robert Duvall in The Judge, Ethan Hawke in Boyhood, Edward Norton in Birdman, Mark Ruffalo in Foxcatcher and J.K. Simmons in Whiplash
And our winners would be:
CC: Ethan Hawke's performance as the emotionally-maturing father is for me the glue that holds Boyhood's 12-year storytelling arc together.
KH: Oz's evil Nazi. Juno's befuddled dad. J. Jonah Jameson. The yellow M&M. J.K. Simmons is one of the most popular and talented character actors around, and it's his turn in the spotlight for his blistering turn in Whiplash.
Egregiously Overlooked: No matter how historically accurate the then-president's political stance may be in Selma, Tom Wilkinson's Lyndon B. Johnson offers a strong, believably conflicted portrayal. - CC
Oscar Trivia: At age 84, Robert Duvall is the oldest supporting actor nominee ever. He is also the most nominated male actor of this year's nominees, with seven career nominations.

Whiplash by Mike Lemanski

The nominees for Best Supporting Actress are: Patricia Arquette in Boyhood, Laura Dern in Wild, Keira Knightley in The Imitation Game, Emma Stone in Birdman and Meryl Streep in Into the Woods
And our winners would be:
CC: I haven't been a big fan of Kiera Knightley but I was blown away by her in The Imitation Game. It is a great part for any actress but Knightley invests in it fully and makes it her own. A revelation.
KH: Since her Emmy-winning days on Medium, I've been a big fan of Patricia Arquette, easily the best thing (for this non-fan) about Boyhood.
Egregiously Overlooked: Anna Kendrick is splendid as Sondheim's decidedly insecure but still singing Cinderella in Into the Woods. - CC
Oscar Trivia: Meryl Streep breaks her own record with this, her 19th career nomination. She is also the first actress nominated for playing a witch.

The nominees for Best Director are: Wes Anderson for The Grand Budapest Hotel, Alexandro G. Iñárritu for Birdman, Richard Linklater for Boyhood, Bennett Miller for Foxcatcher and Morten Tyldum for The Imitation Game
And our winners would be:
CC: Richard Linklater is the standout for me and hopefully for the majority of Academy voters for his masterful cinematic odyssey.
KH: For crafting an incredibly unique world, Wes Anderson gets my vote.
Egregiously Overlooked: Ava DuVernay, who proves herself a talented and assured director with Selma, only her third narrative feature film. - CC
Oscar Trivia: Bennett Miller's nomination is unusual due to the fact that since the change in the Best Picture category in 2009 from five to up to ten nominees, it was expected that all the nominated Best Directors would be of Best Picture nominees.

The nominees for Best Adapted Screenplay are: American Sniper, The Imitation Game, Inherent Vice, The Theory of Everything and Whiplash
And our winners would be:
CC: Damien Chazelle's Whiplash is a terrific screenplay (expanded from his earlier short), but I give a slight edge to Graham Moore's The Imitation Game for shining a light on its long neglected, real-life gay hero.
KH: The liberties taken regarding historical accuracy have somewhat tainted The Imitation Game for me, so I'll go with Whiplash.
Egregiously Overlooked: Edge of Tomorrow's clever, intricately-plotted and exciting screenplay, adapted from a Japanese graphic novel. - CC

The Theory of Everything by Malika Favre

The nominees for Best Original Screenplay are: Birdman, Boyhood, Foxcatcher, The Grand Budapest Hotel and Nightcrawler
And our winners would be:
CC: Wes Anderson's fanciful and funny script for The Grand Budapest Hotel is one of his best to date.
KH: I second that with another vote for The Grand Budapest Hotel.
Egregiously Overlooked: I am partial to Patrick Tobin's Cake, not only because the screenwriter is a member of my church but because his script manages simultaneously to be unapologetically acerbic and wholeheartedly compassionate. - CC

The nominees for Best Cinematography are: Birdman, The Grand Budapest Hotel, Ida, Mr. Turner and Unbroken
And our winners would be:
CC: This might be the toughest category to decide since all these films feature breathtaking camera work, but Unbroken remains for me the most hauntingly memorable.
KH: Ida features breathtakingly beautiful black and white images that are hard to forget as well.
Egregiously Overlooked: Into the Woods, another gorgeous movie. - CC
Oscar Trivia: Unbroken is Roger Deakins' twelfth nomination in this category, which he has yet to win.

The nominees for Best Production Design are: The Grand Budapest Hotel, The Imitation Game, Interstellar, Into the Woods and Mr. Turner
And our winners would be:
CC: I love The Grand Budapest Hotel's overall visual tone and campy design flourishes, like its Pepto Bismol-colored lobby.
KH: Everyone who has seen it wants to check into this Grand Budapest Hotel.
Egregiously Overlooked: True, it is chiefly animated but no film last year impressed me for its artistic design as much as The Lego Movie did. - CC

The Imitation Game by Malika Favre

The nominees for Best Costume Design are: The Grand Budapest Hotel, Inherent Vice, Into the Woods, Maleficent and Mr. Turner
And our winners would be:
CC: The Grand Budapest Hotel, natch.
KH: Although I love the fantasy drag of Maleficent, once again it is The Grand Budapest Hotel for me.
Egregiously Overlooked: I admired the futuristic "military chic" attire, especially on Effie, in The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 1. - CC
Oscar Trivia: Into the Woods is Colleen Atwood's fourth collaboration with director Rob Marshall and the fourth to garner her a nomination here, following wins for Chicago and Memoirs of a Geisha and a nomination for Nine.

The nominees for Best Original Score are: The Grand Budapest Hotel, The Imitation Game, Interstellar, Mr. Turner and The Theory of Everything
And our winners would be:
CC: Relative newcomer (at least to English-language films) Johann Johannsson's music for The Theory of Everything is lovely.
KH: I agree, The Theory of Everything score really caught my ear.
Egregiously Overlooked: Perhaps it wasn't all original music and therefore excluded from consideration, but Whiplash's jazz- and drum-infused score adds that much more tension and excitement to the plot. - CC
Oscar Trivia: All the nominated composers this year are not American, a first for this category.

The nominees for Best Original Song are: "Everything Is Awesome" from The Lego Movie, "Glory" from Selma, "Grateful" from Beyond the Lights, "I’m Not Gonna Miss You" from Glen Campbell: I’ll Be Me and "Lost Stars" from Begin Again
And our winners would be:
CC: Its hard to resist the delightfully catchy "Everything is Awesome," especially since my year-old nephew loves it, but the soaring "Glory" is obviously more significant.
KH: Like Once's "Falling Slowly" before it, "Lost Stars" is an excellent example of modern movie songwriting, perfectly capturing the theme of its film while still being able to stand alone as one damn good song.
Egregiously Overlooked: Chris picks Lorde's trance hit "Yellow Flicker Beat" from The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 1, whereas if I had my way, this category would be nothing but songs from the underrated gem Begin Again. But if I had to choose one, it would be "A Step You Can't Take Back", the simple tune that opens the film and sets the tone for all that follows. - KH
Oscar Trivia: "Lost Stars" co-composer Danielle Brisebois is a former child actress best known for playing Stephanie on All in the Family and its spin-off Archie Bunker's Place. She also originated the role of Molly in the original Broadway production of Annie.

Selma by Eve Lloyd Knight

The nominees for Best Film Editing are: American Sniper, Boyhood, The Grand Budapest Hotel, The Imitation Game and Whiplash
And our winners would be:
CC: Whiplash, hands down.
KH: Make that two for Whiplash.
Egregiously Overlooked: Chris says Edge of Tomorrow, while I have to say it was a big shock not to see Birdman, with its celebrated "one single shot" effect, not among the final five. - KH

The nominees for Best Sound Mixing are: American Sniper, Birdman, Interstellar, Unbroken and Whiplash
And our winners would be:
CC: Whiplash again.
KH: The entire soundscape of Birdman was a peek inside the fractured mind of its protagonist.
Egregiously Overlooked: The roaring, raging and aurally stunning Godzilla. - CC

The nominees for Best Sound Editing are: American Sniper, Birdman, The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies, Interstellar and Unbroken
And our winners would be:
CC: For a sci-fi epic, I appreciated the more understated use of sound in Interstellar.
KH: Birdman again.
Egregiously Overlooked: The completely, underservedly shut out Snowpiercer or the nightmare-inducing "bumps in the dark" that filled The Babadook. - KH

Birdman by Malika Favre

The nominees for Best Visual Effects are: Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, Guardians of the Galaxy, Interstellar and X-Men: Days of Future Past
And our winners would be:
CC: Interstellar's effects looked the most organic and least video gamey to me.
KH: With two of the five main characters convincingly visualized via digital effects, I gotta hand it to the super-fun Guardians of the Galaxy.
Egregiously Overlooked: Godzilla's massive monsters were amazing. They should go stomp on the Academy's Visual Effects branch for the snub. - CC
Oscar Trivia: Three of the five nominees — Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Guardians of the Galaxy and X-Men: Days of Future Past — are based on Marvel Comics' characters.

The nominees for Best Makeup & Hairstyling are: Foxcatcher, The Grand Budapest Hotel and Guardians of the Galaxy
And our winners would be:
CC: The Grand Budapest Hotel, and not only for aging Tilda Swinton so decrepitly.
KH: Two of the other three main characters of Guardians of the Galaxy owe their far out looks to the film's expert makeup designers.
Egregiously Overlooked: Snowpiercer, says Chris, for another radical transformation of Swinton. I say Maleficent, for making the always stunning Angelina Jolie even more stunning. Those cheekbones! - KH

The nominees for Best Animated Feature are: Big Hero 6, The Boxtrolls, How to Train Your Dragon 2, Song of the Sea and The Tale of Princess Kaguya
And our winners would be:
CC: The Boxtrolls kinda grossed me out and I've only seen Big Hero 6 out of the other nominees, so Baymax, Hiro & friends are my pick.
KH: Time for Hiccup, Toothless and the makers of How to Train Your Dragon 2 to finally soar home with an Oscar.
Egregiously Overlooked: Chris wonders if  the infamous snub of The Lego Movie is because it wasn't 100% animated; like the also not-nominated The Simpsons Movie, I think it was too commercial for the more "art"-minded animation branch. - KH
Oscar Trivia: If How to Train Your Dragon 2 wins, it would be the first sequel to win without its nominated predecessor winning.

Foxcatcher by Matt Murphy

The nominees for Best Foreign Language Film are: Ida (Poland), Leviathan (Russia), Tangerines (Estonia), Timbuktu (Mauritania) and Wild Tales (Argentina)
And our winners would be:
CC: Ida tells the most potent story and in gorgeous black & white.
KH: Hauntingly powerful, Ida it is.
Egregiously Overlooked: Xavier Dolan's emotional roller coaster ride Mommy.
Oscar Trivia: These are the first nominations for Estonia and Mauritania. Poland has the most previous nominations, with ten total.

The nominees for Best Documentary Feature are: Citizenfour, Finding Vivien Maier, Last Days in Vietnam, The Salt of the Earth and Virunga
And our winners would be:
CC: Virunga for its important and sadly necessary save-the-gorillas plea.
KH: Sometimes the subject of a documentary seems to win the award more than the actual film (An Inconvenient Truth, any one?), so I heartily agree with Virunga, which not only has a compelling story to tell but does so in an engrossingly cinematic way.
Egregiously Overlooked: It doesn't strictly qualify as a documentary, which is likely why it wasn't nominated, but The Circle is illuminating and compelling. - CC

The nominees for Best Documentary Short Subject are: Crisis Hotline: Veterans Press 1, Joanna, Our Curse, The Reaper (La Parka) and White Earth
And our winner would be:
KH: Our Curse, about a baby born with a life threatening condition, is heartbreaking, inspiring and unforgettable.

Boyhood by Malika Favre

The nominees for Best Animated Short Film are: The Bigger Picture, The Dam Keeper, Feast, Me and My Moulton and A Single Life
And our winners would be:
CC: Disney's sweet Feast.
KH: Feast it is, but I also really dug The Dam Keeper and Me and My Moulton.
Egregiously Overlooked: That Glen Keane, the legendary Disney animator behind such iconic characters as Ariel, the Beast and Aladdin, wasn't nominated for the absolutely lovely Duet is (to me at least) the biggest Oscar snub of the year. - KH
Oscar Trivia: Feast was released theatrically with Best Animated Feature nominee Big Hero 6.

The nominees for Best Live Action Short Film are: Aya, Boogaloo and Graham, Butter Lamp (La Lampe Au Beurre De Yak), Parvaneh and The Phone Call
And our winners would be:
CC: Its rare for a film to be heartwarming while making a political statement, but Boogaloo and Graham is such a short.
KH: Funny and charming, I'm all for Boogaloo and Graham as well.

And now for our own special category of dishonorable mention, the Worst Nomination of the Year:
CC: I really can't single out a particular nomination or category this year, which is unusual, but I do feel there is excessive love for Birdman. From its pretentious subtitle — Or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance) — to its über-insider sense of humor and pretty baffling conclusion, I just don't get it. I will protest, or at least roll my eyes dramatically, if it wins Best Picture.
KH: For me, the most overrated film of the year is Boyhood. Yeah yeah yeah, it was filmed over 12 years. I get it. But you would think that Richard Linklater would have been able to craft a more compelling story during that dozen years instead of the string of coming-of-age clichés that comprise his script, an Original Screenplay nominee.

American Sniper by Orlando Arocena

And so the final march to Oscar glory begins. Tune in to the Big Show, hosted by Neil Patrick Harris, on ABC this Sunday to see who wins, as well as which nominees are rocking the best (and worst) gowns, most attractive escorts and most heartfelt acceptance speeches.

By Rev. Chris Carpenter, resident film critic of Movie Dearest and Rage Monthly Magazine, and Kirby Holt, creator and editor of Movie Dearest, The QuOD: The Queer Online Database and the Out Movie Guide.

Men on Film: If We Picked the Oscars 2013

Borrowing a page from Siskel and Ebert back in the good ol' days, Movie Dearest's very own Men on Film — Chris Carpenter and Kirby Holt — are presenting our own version of "If We Picked the Oscars"! These aren't predictions, but what movies, actors, directors, et al that we would vote for if we were members of the Academy. We're also chiming in with our picks for the "egregiously overlooked" non-nominees as well as the "Worst Nominations of the Year", plus: Oscar Trivia!

So without further ado, the envelope please...

The nominees for Best Picture are: American Hustle, Captain Phillips, Dallas Buyers Club, Gravity, Her, Nebraska, Philomena, 12 Years a Slave and The Wolf of Wall Street.
And our winners would be:
CC: Out of all the Best Picture candidates, I most enjoyed the smart, sexy and zesty American Hustle and in any other year would probably vote for it. 12 Years a Slave though demands my vote as well as all Academy members’ votes, I feel, for its necessarily painful yet purgative and maybe even redemptive depiction of the darkest chapter in our nation’s history.
KH: No other film last year (actually, for many years) has been as viscerally powerful as the majestic, awe-inspiring Gravity. Emotionally draining and edge-of-your-seat thrilling, the box office sensation and instant classic is a filmmaking triumph on all levels (in other words, expect to see me name it a lot in the categories to follow).
Egregiously Overlooked: Prisoners.

The nominees for Best Actor are: Christian Bale in American Hustle, Bruce Dern in Nebraska, Leonardo DiCaprio in The Wolf of Wall Street, Chiwetel Ejiofor in 12 Years a Slave and Matthew McConaughey in Dallas Buyers Club.
And our winners would be:
CC: This is for me the strongest category this year, even if I wasn’t enamored by Dern’s turn in Nebraska. The other nominees turned in exceptional, risk-taking performances but none so much as Matthew McConaughey as a real-life straight Texan battling AIDS and his own homophobia in the riveting Dallas Buyers Club. His weight loss, though striking and much discussed, was the least of McConaughey’s dramatic achievements here. He’d get my vote.
KH: Surmounting a factually-questionable script, Matthew McConaughey is near unrecognizable, not just as his character (a desperate, dying man stubbornly hanging on to his life), but as the erstwhile Hollywood hunk of rom com fame.
Egregiously Overlooked: Terence Stamp in Unfinished Song.

The nominees for Best Actress are: Amy Adams in American Hustle, Cate Blanchett in Blue Jasmine, Sandra Bullock in Gravity, Judi Dench in Philomena and Meryl Streep in August: Osage County.
And our winners would be:
CC: Cate Blanchett will be a deserved winner for her wrenching turn as a self-delusional southern belle in Blue Jasmine but I would be inclined to vote for Amy Adams, who shows her vast range as an actress in American Hustle. Whether hilarious, hostile, seductive, vulnerable, at the top of her con woman character’s game or on the losing end, Adams impresses more in 135 minutes than in all her previous films combined (with the exception of displaying her musical chops in Enchanted).
KH: Although it's hard to ignore Sandra Bullock's career best work, Cate Blanchett's role of a lifetime — a woman literally on the verge of a nervous breakdown — demands she get her inevitable (yet inarguably wholly-deserved) lead actress prize.
Egregiously Overlooked: Emma Thompson in Saving Mr. Banks.
Oscar Trivia: Meryl Streep continues her reign as the most nominated actor in Oscar history with this, her 18th nomination. 

The nominees for Best Supporting Actor are: Barkhad Abdi in Captain Phillips, Bradley Cooper in American Hustle, Michael Fassbender in 12 Years a Slave, Jonah Hill in The Wolf of Wall Street and Jared Leto in Dallas Buyers Club.
And our winners would be:
CC: No discussion or, I feel, justification needed: Jared Leto, revelatory as Dallas Buyers Club’s unforgettable, heartbreaking Rayon.
KH: Jared Leto brings a tender humanity to his haunted, haunting performance as one of society's lost souls who just can't escape her own demons.
Egregiously Overlooked: Hugh Jackman in Prisoners.
Oscar Trivia: As opposed to last year, when each of the nominees in this category was a previous winner, this year's batch is comprised of actors all awaiting their first win.

The nominees for Best Supporting Actress are: Sally Hawkins in Blue Jasmine, Jennifer Lawrence in American Hustle, Lupita Nyong'o in 12 Years a Slave, Julia Roberts in August: Osage County and June Squibb in Nebraska.
And our winners would be:
CC: Like most of America, I loves me some J. Law and would vote for her neglected housewife with claws in American Hustle… if she hadn’t won the Best Actress Oscar just last year. But as I ponder the nominees in this category, I feel inclined to vote for Sally Hawkins, who did exceptional work as the less privileged but more resilient of the two sisters in Blue Jasmine.
KH: Heartbreakingly raw, newcomer Lupita Nyong'o quietly but powerfully stands out in the otherwise all-star cast of 12 Years a Slave.
Egregiously Overlooked: Oprah Winfrey in Lee Daniels’ The Butler.

The nominees for Best Director are: Alfonso Cuarón for Gravity, Steve McQueen for 12 Years a Slave, Alexander Payne for Nebraska, David O. Russell for American Hustle and Martin Scorsese for The Wolf of Wall Street.
And our winners would be:
CC: I could be inclined to vote for David O. Russell’s terrific work on American Hustle but ultimately must go for Alfonso Cuarón’s technically and visually groundbreaking direction of Gravity, which still wisely kept the focus on Sandra Bullock’s very human reluctant cosmonaut.
KH: Alfonso Cuarón brilliantly crafted something truly unique: an intimate epic.
Egregiously Overlooked: Paul Greengrass for Captain Phillips.
Oscar Trivia: History will be made in this category if either of the front-runners wins: Cuarón would be the first Latino winner, while McQueen would be the first black winner.

The nominees for Best Adapted Screenplay are: Before Midnight, Captain Phillips, Philomena, 12 Years a Slave and The Wolf of Wall Street.
And our winners would be:
CC: John Ridley brings Solomon Northup’s long-forgotten memoir 12 Years a Slave to frighteningly vivid life.
KH: Although I found the florid period language off-putting at times, there's no denying the harrowing potency of 12 Years a Slave.
Egregiously Overlooked: Blue is the Warmest Color.

The nominees for Best Original Screenplay are: American Hustle, Blue Jasmine, Dallas Buyers Club, Her and Nebraska.
And our winners would be:
CC: Written somewhat like an updated, racier version of Oscar winner The Sting, American Hustle is endlessly entertaining yet has some timely things to say about integrity, trust and survival.
Egregiously Overlooked: Gravity.
Oscar Trivia: With 16 nominations in this category, Woody Allen is the most nominated screenwriter in Oscar history. 

The nominees for Best Cinematography are: The Grandmaster, Gravity, Inside Llewyn Davis, Nebraska and Prisoners.
And our winners would be:
CC: Gravity made one feel they were floating in space right alongside Sandra Bullock and George Clooney thanks to Emmanuel Lubezki’s breathtaking 3D achievement.
KH: Emmanuel Lubezki, previously nominated for such films as Children of Men and The Tree of Life, is long past due for the gold, and his stellar work on Gravity will finally bring it home for him.
Egregiously Overlooked: 12 Years a Slave.

The nominees for Best Production Design are: American Hustle, Gravity, The Great Gatsby, Her and 12 Years a Slave.
And our winners would be:
CC: There is much to appreciate in Baz Luhrmann’s underrated adaptation of The Great Gatsby but Catherine Martin’s gorgeous sets are obviously and deservedly award-worthy.
KH: The title character's sprawling, party-filled mansion was practically a character itself in the gloriously gaudy The Great Gatsby.
Egregiously Overlooked: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug.

The nominees for Best Costume Design are: American Hustle, The Grandmaster, The Great Gatsby, The Invisible Woman and 12 Years a Slave.
And our winners would be:
CC: American Hustle took me right back to the late 1970’s thanks in large part to its characters’ groovy attire.
KH: Catherine Martin's frenzied flapper frocks and dapper dan duds were sartorial triumphs in The Great Gatsby.
Egregiously Overlooked: Oz the Great and Powerful.
Oscar Trivia: Catherine Martin previously won in these two categories for Moulin Rouge!, also directed by her husband Baz Luhrmann.  

The nominees for Best Original Score are: The Book Thief, Gravity, Her, Philomena and Saving Mr. Banks.
And our winners would be:
CC: Alexandre Desplat’s resonant score was for me one of the few award-worthy aspects of Philomena.
KH: Relative newcomer Steven Price shows great promise with his atmospheric, evocative Gravity music.
Egregiously Overlooked: 12 Years a Slave.
Oscar Trivia: With 49 Oscar nominations, including this year's The Book Thief, John Williams is the second most-nominated person in Academy Award history, after Walt Disney (ironically, a character in competing film Saving Mr. Banks).

The nominees for Best Original Song are: "Happy" from Despicable Me 2, "Let It Go" from Frozen, "The Moon Song" from Her and "Ordinary Love" from Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom.
And our winners would be:
CC: All of the nominees in this category are worthy, even the later disqualified “Alone Yet Not Alone,” and I love Pharrell Williams’ catchy “Happy” despite its rather repetitive refrain. But Frozen’s “Let It Go” is truly masterful and signals a great crossover from theatre to film for married composers Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez (Avenue Q, The Book of Mormon).
KH: Not since "Hakuna Matata" has a toon tune broken out as big as "Let It Go"... see all the YouTube covers and parodies to prove it. A stirring "coming out" anthem (think about it) with show-stopping vocals by Idina Menzel that has us in "can't wait" mode for her live performance on Oscar night.
Egregiously Overlooked: "Love is an Open Door" from Frozen.
Oscar Trivia: With three Tonys, two Emmys and a Grammy already, Robert Lopez is poised to be the newest (and youngest) EGOT.

The nominees for Best Film Editing are: American Hustle, Captain Phillips, Dallas Buyers Club, Gravity and 12 Years a Slave.
And our winners would be:
CC: Captain Phillips was one of the most intense films of the year, second only to Gravity, largely due to its superior editing.
KH: I won't be defying Gravity of this one.
Egregiously Overlooked: Prisoners.

The nominees for Best Sound Mixing are: Captain Phillips, Gravity, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, Inside Llewyn Davis and Lone Survivor.
And our winners would be:
CC: I would vote for the cosmic orchestration of heavenly and earthly sounds employed in Gravity.
KH: We all know that in space, no one can hear you scream, so all we did and did not hear in Gravity is thanks to the expert sound crew.
Egregiously Overlooked: Frozen.

The nominees for Best Sound Editing are: All is Lost, Captain Phillips, Gravity, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug and Lone Survivor.
And our winners would be:
CC: I’m inclined to go with All is Lost because it is the only nomination this otherwise under-appreciated drama received.
KH: Got to go with Gravity again.
Egregiously Overlooked: Evil Dead.

The nominees for Best Visual Effects are: Gravity, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, Iron Man 3, The Lone Ranger and Star Trek Into Darkness.
And our winners would be:
CC: As much as I admire the villainous dragon Smaug and many of the effects in The Hobbit chapter 2, I gotta go with the spectacular Gravity.
KH: From Méliès' A Trip to the Moon to Kubrick's 2001 to the Star Wars saga, there has been a long history of cinematic space spectacles; you can now add Gravity to that list of watershed events in visual effects.
Egregiously Overlooked: Man of Steel.

The nominees for Best Makeup & Hairstyling are: Dallas Buyers Club, Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa and The Lone Ranger.
And our winners would be:
CC: While my vote is deserved, I would have to vote here for Dallas Buyers Club no matter what since I haven’t seen the other nominees...
KH: ... but I have (thanks, Makeup Branch; and while I have your attention, how about upping the nominees to five already?). Frankly, the makeup in DBC is a bit too subtle, so I'm left with the one of the two Johnny's. I'll go with Depp's Old Tonto in Lone Ranger over Knoxville's saggy scrotum in Bad Grandpa.
Egregiously Overlooked: American Hustle.

The nominees for Best Animated Feature are: The Croods, Despicable Me 2, Ernest & Célestine, Frozen and The Wind Rises.
And our winners would be:
CC: While I wasn’t as enamored of it as many, Frozen would get my vote since it is the most visually ravishing and tuneful candidate.
KH: Well, count me among those completely enamored with Frozen, the only computer animation from the Mouse House to match their traditional classics such as Cinderella and The Little Mermaid.
Egregiously Overlooked: Monsters University.
Oscar Trivia: A Frozen victory would, amazingly, be the first win for a Disney-made film in this category.

The nominees for Best Foreign Language Film are: The Broken Circle Breakdown (Belgium), The Great Beauty (Italy), The Hunt (Denmark), The Missing Picture (Cambodia) and Omar (Palestine).
And our winners would be:
CC/KH: We'd have to vote for The Hunt in this category since the other foreign nominees have somehow eluded us.
Egregiously Overlooked: Blue is the Warmest Color.

The nominees for Best Documentary Feature are: The Act of Killing, Cutie and the Boxer, Dirty Wars, The Square and 20 Feet from Stardom.
And our winners would be:
CC: I was most impressed by the you-are-there immediacy of The Square, which chronicles first-hand the recent “Egyptian spring” uprisings.
KH: I'd be tempted to cast my vote for the vibrant 20 Feet from Stardom in the hopes that more entertaining, less somber nonfiction films would get some more love in this category in the future. Come on, Doc Branch, lighten up!
Egregiously Overlooked: God Loves Uganda.

The nominees for Best Documentary Short are: CaveDigger, Facing Fear, Karama Has No Walls, The Lady in Number 6: Music Saved My Life and Prison Terminal: The Last Days of Private Jack Hall.
And our winners would be:
CC: Facing Fear, a powerfully moving depiction of the accidental reunion of and eventual reconciliation between a gay man and the former neo-Nazi skinhead who beat him nearly to death decades earlier.
KH: It's a (somewhat indelicate) cliché that Holocaust stories always win in the documentary categories. Nevertheless, the uplifting The Lady in Number 6 stands out for me.

The nominees for Best Animated Short are: Feral, Get a Horse!, Mr. Hublot, Possessions and Room on the Broom.
And our winners would be:
CC: Disney’s stylistic mash-up Get a Horse! is a clever and very funny delight.
KH: In a year that includes an anime fable (Possessions), a hand drawn allegory (Feral) and the seemingly requisite annual steampunk entry (Mr. Hublot), it is nevertheless the most widely-seen (thanks to a theatrical pairing with Frozen) nominee, the entertainingly retro Get a Horse! that gets my vote.
Oscar Trivia: Although Walt Disney won a special Academy Award for the creation of Mickey in 1934, a cartoon starring the iconic mouse has never won an Oscar.

The nominees for Best Live Action Short are: Aquel No Era Yo (That Wasn’t Me), Avant Que De Tout Perdre (Just Before Losing Everything), Helium, Pitääkö Mun Kaikki Hoitaa? (Do I Have to Take Care of Everything?) and The Voorman Problem.
And our winners would be:
CC: The unbearably but deliciously intense Avant Que De Tout Perdre (Just Before Losing Everything), in which a mother and her children hide out from their abusive husband and father.
KH: It's a very strong field this year, yet I'm a sucker for bittersweet tales like the lovely, winsome Helium, which would easily get my vote.

And now for our own special category of dishonorable mention, the Worst Nomination of the Year:
CC: In a performance that is borderline camp, Best Actress nominee Meryl Streep embarrassingly chews the scenery in August: Osage County.
KH: U2's Mandela them "Ordinary Love" is just that: ordinary. I'd take the nominated-yet-not nominated "Alone Yet Not Alone" any day over this irrelevant mediocrity.

And so the final march to Oscar glory begins. Tune in to the Big Show, hosted by Ellen DeGeneres, on ABC this Sunday to see who wins, as well as which nominees are rocking the best (and worst) gowns, most attractive escorts and most heartfelt acceptance speeches.

Trivial Pursuits: Oscars 2010

Illustration by Pablo Lobato for The New Yorker
It's Oscar trivia time, 2010 edition!:

- Women at the Top: For the first time in Academy Award history, a lesbian-themed film — The Kids Are All Right — is nominated for Best Picture. It is also the first time that two Best Picture nominees — Kids and Winter's Bone — were directed by women (Lisa Cholodenko and Debra Granik, respectively).

- On the Other Hand: Three of the Best Picture nominees — 127 Hours, True Grit and Winter's Bone — feature characters with severed arms or hands.

- Top Toon: Toy Story 3 is not only the third animated film to be nominated for Best Picture (following previous nominees Beauty and the Beast and Up), it is also only the third "Part 3" to be nominated (following previous nominees The Godfather Part III and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King).  Plus, it is the only sequel to be nominated for Best Picture when the original film was not.

Illustration by Philip Burke for The New Yorker
- Head Games: Three Best Actress nominees — Annette Bening in The Kids Are All Right, Natalie Portman in Black Swan and Michelle Williams in Blue Valentine — were on the receiving end in steamy oral sex scenes in their movies. Their partners in said scenes — Julianne Moore, Mila Kunis and Ryan Gosling, respectively — weren't so lucky though; all strong contenders in each of their races, none of them were nominated.

- Join the Club: Speaking of Annette Bening, she now joins the ranks of acting nominees recognized for playing GLBT characters, a group that also includes her fellow 2010 nominees Javier Bardem, Colin Firth and Nicole Kidman.

- Double Down: With both The Social Network and True Grit nominated, producer Scott Rudin has twice the chance to take home another Best Picture Oscar; he previously won for No Country for Old Men.

Illustration by Luis Grañena for The New Yorker
- Best Actor Take 2: Jeff Bridges (True Grit) and Colin Firth (The King's Speech) are both nominated for Best Actor again after facing off last year in this category, where Bridges won for Crazy Heart over Firth for A Single Man. This year, Firth is the front-runner. Meanwhile, their competition from last year, Jeremy Renner (The Hurt Locker) is the only other repeat nominee, this time in the Supporting Actor category for The Town.

- Lucky Rooster: Speaking of Jeff Bridges, he is nominated for playing Rooster Cogburn in True Grit, the same role that won John Wayne the Oscar in the original Grit forty-one years ago.

- Two Times a Lady: For the sixth time in the past ten years, two performances from the same film were nominated for Best Supporting Actress: Amy Adams and Melissa Leo for The Fighter.

Illustration by Robert Risko for The New Yorker
- Music Man: If composer Alan Menken wins for his Tangled song "I See the Light", it will be his 9th Oscar, securing his status as the most Oscared person still living.

- Isn't That Special: For the first time since 1979, there are more than three nominees for Best Visual Effects.