Ten for the Road: Oscar Nomination Prediction, 2023

E: It’s a new Oscar landscape once more – so many people are set to get their first ever nomination Tuesday morning, from total newbies to grizzled old vets. There’s wonderful diversity among the actors, but among the directors and films themseelves, not so much, and after two years of women taking that prize, it’s back to white male director land. Biggest news of all, there’ll be ten best picture nominees, after many years of a vague “somewhere between 6 and 10” guestimate. That probably doesn’t matter to people who don’t make the movies or try to guess the nominees, but it’s a big deal for me!

Let’s face it; the Oscars seem to really have hit peak irrelevance, after decades of ignoring popular movies and apparently competing with itself to honor the most obscure films it can find. Thirteen years ago, for example, I predicted that critics prizes favored The Social Network, but the guild award (given by industry members) would slide back to more “middlebrow” populist taste, with the Oscar going to The King’s Speech instead, and so it did. These days – the days of surprise wins for Midnight and Parasite, fantastic movies with tiny audiences – there’s no such course correction. I’m not saying that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is honoring the wrong movies – last year they tried with the lovely crowdpleaser CODA – but it’s chronically ignored the movies that most of the movie-going audience has seen and cares about. There are so many reasons for this – Harvey Weinstein and the Miramax effect, the boredom of awards voters with the same old movies, a genuine desire to promote works with that show diverse viewpoints – but the result doesn’t seem to be drawing viewers back.

And not only have box office numbers failed to recover after the pandemic, but studios are making fewer and fewer sorts of movies aimed at adults – fewer thrillers, fewer mysteries, fewer family dramas, virtually no romantic comedies, fewer historical epics. This trend has gone on for years, but the pandemic brought it in to full flight; for the second year in a row, filmmakers have tried and failed to force people into theaters to see their work, and it’s not happening. People are leaving their comfortable home theaters only for a movie or two each winter – there’s not enough spectacle in West Side Story, but Spiderman: No Way Home definitely fit the bill. After all, going to the theater has only gotten more expensive as the theater chains try to bring in customers with IMAX screens and 4D upgrades. It just reinforces the reality that makes theatrical viewing more important for movies with spectacle, and too pricey for a movie that’s easy to appreciate at home in three months.

Now, despite great reviews, Oscar has had no interest in last year’s Spiderman; in fact, AMPAS has been aggressively anti-superhero. Which is to say, the industry has been winnowing down the types of movies they make to the biggest money making sort – but they don’t respect those films, and it shows during awards season as they hunt for smaller and smaller movies with emotional heft. Look for a bit of a course correction this year with a jump toward blockbusters like Top Gun:Maverick – but is it too little, too late? Will the event known to advertisers as the women’s Superbowl make a recovery, or are these shows really on the way out?

Here are the movies and people I see the film community coming together around this year:

Best Supporting Actor

The Overwhelming Frontrunner:

Ke Huy Quan, Everything Everywhere All at Once

After wins at both the Critics Choice and the Golden Globes, Ke Huy Quan – the child actor best known as Short Round from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Data from The Goonies – has finally become a grown up success. And what a role it was that took him there! Like all the actors in original multiverse adventure Everything, Quan plays many iterations of Waymund Wong, from a nebishy, down on his luck dry-cleaner to a suave movie star to a universe-hopping hero, and he’s a miracle in each one. His charming Golden Globes acceptance speech can’t be hurting his chances here, either. Whether or not the movie proves too peculiar for AMPAS, it’s going to come up with a few wins, starting right here.

Everybody Agrees Here:

Brendan Gleeson, Banshees of Inisherin

Barry Keoghan, Banshees of Inisherin

Ah, these two. Brendan Gleeson, that giant animated cliff face, that grumpy mountain of a man, will finally receive his first nomination on Tuesday, and is the only person who can beat tiny fluttering Quan to the Oscar statuette. He plays Colm, the Irish villager and musician whose decision to essentially divorce his best friend serves as the plot engine for the film’s comic and tragic turns. Like Quan, he’s been nominated by BAFTA, the Critics Choice, the Golden Globes and the Screen Actor’s Guild – the big quartet of significant precursor awards. He’s a lock.

Young Barry Keoghan seems to be riding the elder stateman’s coattails for his role as dim-witted, innocent, foolish Dominic, bumbling toward misadventure and disaster with wide eyes, terrible instincts, and good intentions. Best known for his roles in Eternals and Dunkirk,

I Refuse to Believe He’s a Lock:

Eddie Redmayne, The Good Nurse

I’m not sure why I have to be the one to say this, but who is possibly taking The Good Nurse seriously? This is vintage 90s Lifetime Movie stuff here, the beloved nurse who murders his patients by poisoning them. It’s such a cliche, and there’s nothing about this movie that looks transformative. I just cannot believe Redmayne’s going to make the cut and I’m going to have to watch his stupid, terribly-looking movie. He’s a tremendously skilled and appealing actor and I love seeing his work appreciated, but come on. This is just ridiculous. I know he’s made all the major short-lists except the Critics Choice, and Oscar likes him to the tune of one win and two nominations, but I just cannot believe he’s going to get any further. I doubt I’m alone in this feeling. I’m calling him as this year’s big snub.

The Mix:

Paul Dano, The Fablemans

Judd Hirsch, The Fablemans

Brad Pitt, Babylon

So, that leaves us Brad Pitt’s fading movie star (four time nominee, one time winner nominated this year by the Globes), Judd Hirsch as Stephen Spielberg’s uncle (honored by Critics Choice), and Paul Dano as Stephen Spielberg’s repressed but caring dad – the engineer yin to Michelle William’s artistic yang, honored with a SAG and a Critics Choice nomination. Both the Critics and – weirdly – the British Academy of Film and Television Arts nominated six people this year instead of five, muddying the waters considerably. If I’m going to use instinct to overrule the math on Redmayne, I might go back to the math and suggest Dano has the edge here, but really, it’s all about what movies catch Oscar’s fancy. BAFTA, for example, fell for All Quiet on the Western Front and nominated one of its actors (Albrecht Schuch) here, a feat I would be shocked to see Oscar repeat. Will they love Spielberg’s autobiographical Fablemans? Could Babylon, which showed well at the Globes but has since petered out, surge back?

Funny note: Keoghan is a young looking thirty, six years younger than craggy Hirsch was when he first began acting; that august gentleman will turn 88 this March.

My picks: Dano, Gleeson, Hirsch, Keoghan, Quan. I’m guessing that Hirsch’s decades of good will in the industry will result in his first ever nomination. Oscar’s a sucker for a sweet old guy. Maybe I’m a fool for counting out Redmayne, but The Good Nurse just doesn’t seem like the type of movie Oscar will take seriously, even with its knock out cast.

Best Supporting Actress

The Queen Who Rules the Rest:

Angela Bassett, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever

One Tuesday morning, Marvel Studios will get its first ever acting nomination. I happen to think there’s been good work in a lot of their movies, and hate the backlash against their success, but I’m glad it will be Queen Ramonda who breaks that barrier. Who has more natural charmisma and authority than Angela Bassett? It’s been far too long since she’s been nominated, and a crime that she’s never won. In an ideal world, would this be the role that takes her to the mountain top? Maybe not. But it’s great that she’s going. Like Quan, she’s been nominated everywhere (even BAFTA, which is something of a miracle) and she’s won the all the awards that have aired. All hale the queen! It’s quite funny, though, that the most locked category for a win seems like the most open for nominations between a really large group of equally possible candidates.

They’ve Made Every Shortlist:

Kerry Condon, Banshees of Inisherin

Jamie Lee Curtis, Everywhere Everything all at Once

Hollywood royalty/OG Nepo Baby Jamie Lee Curtis has been a star for decades, but has yet to be nominated for an Oscar. I don’t ever remember her being in real contention, to be honest. That almost certainly ends here. Kerry Condon (a SAG ensemble winner for her bit role in Three Billboards in Epping, Missouri) delivers a pretty straight, heartfelt performance in Martin McDonagh’s funny and gutting Banshees, and is poised to join three of her male costars as Oscar nominees.

The Mix:

Hong Chau, The Whale

Dolly De Leon, Triangle of Sadness

Stephanie Hsu, Everything Everywhere all at Once

Carey Mulligan, She Said

Chau, De Leon and Hsu are virtual unknowns and certainly awards season neophytes. Any of them could be nominees – but which ones? The Whale is a festival darling, and Chau may be pulled in on Brendan Fraser’s coattails – but his early buzz with critics hasn’t translated to precursor dominance. EEAAO, it must be said, is profoundly strange; the multiverse isn’t the shocking concept many seem to think, but this film is odd even within sci fi limits. It remains to been seen whether this will be a plus or a minus with the Academy. It’s likely to do incredibly well in general, but do they like it enough to nominate two supporting actresses, and four acting nominees over all? Triangle of Sadness is an entirely different sort of beast – that would be deliberately giving someone else a chance, one of only a few possible nominations for her movie. And the fact that she has two major precursor nods means you can’t count her out.

Oscar clearly likes two time nominee Mulligan, and she’s received nominations from BAFTA (who favor the British) and the Golden Globes (who might as well). If we’re picking the best known, clearly Mulligan has the advantage – but her movie never sparked the interest it was expected to, another of those grown up movies no one felt the need to see on the big screen and producers failed to make available online. (I hate that the lesson production companies are going to take out of this is to not make such movies, rather than to stream them. Maddening.)

In short – De Leon and Mulligan were on the BAFTA and GG shortlists. Chau and Hsu made SAG and Critics Choice. BAFTA is the most comparable group to AMPAS, and has the most membership cross-over; the Golden Globes and the Critics Choice have almost no overlap, while SAG does represent the largest voting block at the Academy, but is so much larger than AMPAS that it’s not a clear predictor. BAFTA and the Critics Choice each have six nominees, which further complicates our winnowing down process. Chau, who plays Brendan Fraser’s nurse, also costars in buzz horror flick The Menu and has the advantage of having two top tier projects in Oscar voters minds right now. Palme d’Or winner Triangle of Sadness satirizes the lives of the super rich as a super yacht pleasure cruise goes awry; veteran Filipino actress De Leon is the third Asian in contention here, which is certainly an usual and exciting development, and her film might appeal to the many fans of another recent “eat the rich” black comedy, Parasite. It’s hard not to notice that her support comes from European-centric groups in a very pretentious-seeming European film, however.

Which is Complicated Further By:

Jesse Buckley, Women Talking

Janelle Monae, Glass Onion

The Critics Choice pulled two more women into this unusually crowded field, and neither can be ignored. The incandescent Janelle Monae has a relatively short but still attention-grabbing resume, and hasn’t been nominated yet despite buzz for her roles in Hidden Figures and Midnight. Glass Onion has a lot of public support, but will that matter to the Academy? It didn’t with the many fantastic performances in Knives Out. Buckley grabbed a left field Oscar nod last year, and if the Academy really likes Women Talking, or at least doesn’t want to be seen as totally ignoring it, she could benefit.

All this is to say that any of these women are plausible nominees. The awards-giving community likes them all.

My Picks: Bassett, Chau, Condon, Curtis, Hsu

Spoilers: Mulligan, Monae, De Leon

Best Actor

Vying for the Win:

Colin Farrell, Banshees of Inisherin

Brendan Fraser, The Whale

So far, Colin Farrell has the upper hand in the battle for the win, having taken home the Critics Choice and the Globe, but that’s a battle for another day. As a morbidly obese writing professor and father seeking to reconnect with his only child, Brendan Fraser has broken (and mended) a lot of hearts. Colin Farrell, darling of critics awards groups since exploding onto the scene in 2000’s Tigerland, has never been nominated for an Oscar despite flirting with awards season for 20 years. Neither has Fraser, better known for goofy comedies like Encino Man and George of the Jungle and comic adventure in The Mummy, despite a near miss with Gods and Monsters. In fact, Fraser’s a bit of a cause celeb as the industry and public considers how to feel about a matinee idol getting too soft around the edges; his role as a man defined by his weight feels very appropriate.

Welcome to the Academy, lads.

He Won’t Win But He’ll Definitely Make the List:

Austin Butler, Elvis

The former Nickelodeon child star took home the Golden Globe for Lead Actor in a Drama (the Globes and their categories, seriously) and is seen as a lock for a nomination. Elvis is a big role to chew on, and not an easy one to pull off, and where ever his career might go from here, Butler will at least get some grade A schmoozing done as he’s feted at various ceremonies.

The Nest Most Likely:

Bill Nighy, Living

Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day as written by Kazuo Ishiguro? That’s the vibe I get from this lovely looking period film about a dour, honorable civil servant who decides to stop sleep walking through his life, and take a day off. I’m dying to see this one, and thrilled at the idea of wonderfully grizzled old vet Nighy getting his moment in the (awards) sun; it seems like a delightful case of life imitating art.

Then It Gets Tricky:

Tom Cruise, Top Gun: Maverick

Paul Mescal, Aftersun

If we’re going with the critics, it’s the little known Irish actor Mescal of Normal People and The Lost Daughter. If we’re trying to connect with the public, it’s obviously megastar Cruise. If we’re talking about the industry’s jealousy, that might cut both men out – at 26 Mescal is young and good-looking, which AMPAS likes to celebrate in a lead actress and avoid in a lead actor. (Butler gets a pass on this because he’s playing a historical figure and isn’t playing young and attractive the whole time – but how many passes will they hand out in one year?) And of course Cruise is tremendously successful, and also tremendously controversial. He hasn’t be nominated since 1999’s Magnolia, and not for lead actor since 1996’s Jerry Maguire. (Wow, that takes me back. Remember the days when people got nominated for quality romantic comedies? Remember the days when they MADE quality romantic comedies? Obviously calling myself out as old here.). Mescal, Butler, and Keoghan weren’t even born when Cruise received the first of his three nominations for Born on the Fourth of July in 1989.

They Wouldn’t Pick a Horror Movie, Would They?

Ralph Fiennes, The Menu

Seriously, I couldn’t believe this got attention from the Globes and I will be utterly shocked if it puts the ever excellent Fiennes back in the game. Don’t make me see this movie, people.

Why Don’t They Like Him Anymore?

Tom Hanks, A Man Called Otto

The book is a juggernaut. So why is there no love for Hanks as a suicidal widower? This kind of pedigreed, feel-good dramedy has Oscar of yore written all over it. No buzz these days, though, for that sort of movie or for Hanks himself.

Dark Horses:

Diego Calva, Babylon

Daniel Craig, Glass Onion

Adam Driver, White Noise

Hugh Jackman, The Son

Jeremy Pope, The Inspection

Adam Sandler, Hustle

A desperate father and a gay soldier: the Globes fell for them both, and Pope made Time’s list of the top ten performances of the year. Do they have enough buzz to push past the other contenders? Pope is the only actor of color anywhere near making this year’s nominations, making Best Actor the only all white slate among the four acting categories. I think AMPAS pays more attention to diversity than in the past, but I don’t know that it would be likely to boost him on to the (unusually thin) list. Really, considering that the Best Picture contenders are a very male dominated lot, it’s surprising how few male leads there are with a clear consensus around them.

Sandler may make the big dance someday, but I expect it will take a lot of buzz to push the comedian over the top, and Hustle does not have that. He’s had many roles that put him closer; this is one that SAG pulled out of left field. Craig got a well deserved Golden Globe nod for Glass Onion, but I fear the Academy won’t take the delightful detective seriously. Adam Driver’s an unlikely pick as a suburban dad dealing with problems mundane and extraordinary in the 80s.

The fact that I can list all these people means one thing: Hollywood has agreed on four men, and then hasn’t come anywhere close with the final slot.

My Picks: Butler, Cruise, Farrell, Fraser, Nighy. I think a shocker could be likely here.

Spoiler: Mescal or Pope

Best Actress

Universally Praised:

Cate Blanchett, Tar

Viola Davis, The Woman King

Danielle Deadwyler, Till

Michelle Yeoh, Everything Everywhere All at Once

Blanchett (as an orchestra conductor) , Davis (an African ruler), Deadwyler (the unintentional civil rights activist) and Yeoh (incompetent business owner, movie star, inattentive wife, harridan mother, savior of the multiverse) have appeared basically everywhere – Globes, Critics Choice, SAG, BAFTA – making this the most stable category of the year.

Next Up:

Ana De Armas, Blonde

Margot Robbie, Babylon

Michelle Williams, The Fablemans

In a sheer numbers game, De Armas ought to be the fifth nominee; her turn as Marilyn Monroe has gathered awards attention from SAG, BAFTA, and the Golden Globes. But there’s so much discomfort with the movie – not her portrayal, but the way the movie itself looks at Monroe – that I’m really hesitant about it. Considering that almost all the precursors honor more than five people, it’s pretty difficult to know just who this last person will be. It could be the glamorous rising starlet played by Robbie – after all, Hollywood does love its Hollywood stories, and she got attention from the Globes and the Critics Choice. It could be Williams, as a beautiful artist and mom who might have the edge, depending again on how much the Academy wants to laud Spielberg for telling his own origin story. She’s got the Globes and the Critics Choice in her corner, she’s been nominated for an Oscar four times already, and there’s no way AMPAS is going for Emma Thompson’s BAFTA nominated work in Good Luck to You, Leo Grande instead.

You Cannot Count Her Out, Ever:

Olivia Colman, Empire of Light

They love her. They really love her. They love her to the tune of three nominations and one leading statuette in a mere five years. You can’t deny it. Colman may have only a Golden Globe nomination, but if she boots out someone with more precursor love, don’t be too shocked. She wasn’t a lock last year, either.

Generally I’d say it’s nice that there are a lot of roles here from top movies. Often we have to cruise tiny films to find great female performances, because Hollywood doesn’t make a lot of film starring women anymore. We can look at this list and say Till is the only obscure movie on it – or we can say that Tar and Everything are obscure movies with an oversized awards presence.

My Picks: Blanchett, Davis, Deadwyler, Williams, Yeoh. My gut says Spielberg, but I know I’m out on a limb here. De Armas is more likely on paper. And it’s very possible that newbie Deadwyler gets booted for them both. None of these women will be a surprise, though.

Best Director

On Everyone’s Shortlist:

The Daniels, Everything Everywhere All at Once

Martin McDonagh, Banshees of Inisherin

Stephen Spielberg, The Fablemans

I am never more cynical than when I talk about the director’s branch. Just a warning.

Again, let me say – do they want to bother with Spielberg when audiences didn’t even flock to his movie? For his most personal film ever, one made not to please his parents but to lionize his own genius, explain where he comes from? Generally Hollywood loves a Hollywood story. Spielberg missing out here would be the story of the whole year. His lifetime tally stands at 19 Oscar nominations, with 2 wins as director out of 8 nominations. McDonagh’s movie is streaming and therefor immune to box office worries; he’s smart and obscure and the directors branch love that. This will be the playwright’s second nomination for directing, after Three Billboards in Epping Missouri. He has four in total, including a win for the live action short Six Shooter, The Daniels, as writer directors Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert are known, produced a fun and original flick with deep themes, a structure of byzantine complexity, and excellent performances all around.

Almost as Certain:

Todd Field, Tar

Multi-hyphenate Field has been nominated for Oscars as a writer and producer for In the Bedroom and Little Children, but never as a director. Though his movie about the rarified world of orchestra conductors is an unlikely winner, he should finally make the most coveted shortlist of all.

The Next Most Likely:

Edward Berger, All Quiet on the Western Front

Now, maybe it’s an aberration that BAFTA just adored his movie, but the Director’s branch of AMPAS really loves their left field folks – not just the Daniels and indie stalwart Todd Field over blockbuster directors like James Cameron and Ryan Coogler left field, but really out there. I feel like Edward Berger is just the sort of left field they like, reminiscent of recent International Film winners and directing nominees Thomas Vinterberg, Rysuke Hamaguchi and Michael Haneke. To revert to their biggest preferences, he’s a (white) man who’s skilled but not lavished with box office returns. I feel like it hits their sweet spot dead on.

Now, the Unlikelies:

James Cameron, Avatar: the Way of Water

Ryan Coogler, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever

Joseph Kosinski, Top Gun: Maverick

Baz Luhrmann, Elvis

Gina Prince-Blythewood, The Woman King

Sarah Polley, Women Talking

According to my metric above – and we’ll see how right I am, and how much they might have changed with an influx of new members – Cameron, Coogler and Kosinksi have movies that are too successful, and Prince-Blythewood and Polley are too female. (If you think I’m kidding, look at the facts. Sure, the first two winners in this decade have been woman. But that brings the total to three female winners, and a mere seven nominees. Ever. Out of a nominee total that’s nearing 500. That’s ridiculous, right? The stats for black men are even worse – just six. Two of those men helmed Best Picture winners, but didn’t get to take home the directing prize. There have been no black women at all – and no, don’t even say it, it’s not because they don’t make good movies.) Even more, none of those five directors are obscure enough to be shocking; all of these movies are in strong contention for a Best Picture nod. Luhrmann is much too mainstream now to be properly shocking, even if his movie’s over the top. It’s all absurd, and any would be deserving. All got nominations from the Critics Choice, and Cameron made the (status and stardom obsessed) Golden Globes list. His name recognition and money will likely work against him here, though. Kosinski has the fifth Director’s Guild nod, so again, the white men are more plausible than the women and men of color.

Dark Horse:

S.S. Rajamouli, RRR

Critics Choice nominee Rajamouli might just make the cut for his outsized epic; he fits the left field model, and based on awards show applause his film has a lot of industry buzz. Like Baz Luhrmann, however, his movie might too be too far over the top.

My Picks: Berger, The Daniels, Field, McDonagh, Spielberg I’m going with the BAFTA shortlist, but I never feel secure in predicting the director’s branch. Everybody, and maybe five guys I haven’t even thought of, are possible spoilers here.

Best Picture

Generally Agreed Upon:

Banshees of Inisherin

Everything, Everywhere All at Once

The Fablemans

The Academy cuts up their voting into blocks. Cinematographers vote for cinematography, actors for acting, composers for music – but everyone votes for Best Picture. So it matters that a movie has good sound effects and make up and can impress across the board. These three do, and have appeared on every short list – not just BAFTA, Critics Choice, Golden Globes and SAG, but also at the Directors Guild, Producers Guild, the AFI Top Ten, National Board of Review, and so many more. The winner will be one of these three, though which one is not clear yet.

Nearly as Certain:

Elvis

Tar

Again. Basically universally lauded by critics and guilds, Film Twitter and all the rest.

This Year’s Hot Foreign Film (Maybe):

All Quiet on the Western Front

This movie just overloaded BAFTA with 14 nominations, without the benefit of being in English or having well known stars. That’s 14 nominations and only one for acting, a place where several films here will pick up multiple nods, some in the same category. AMPAS and BAFTA don’t love all the same things, but they’re close. I don’t see it reaching 14 nods, but I think it could do extremely well.

Now, the BAFTA nods may have come too close to the AMPAS ballots being due to have an influence. What I suspect, however, is that they show an cross the board interest in

Blockbusters Getting in on the Action:

Avatar: The Way of Water

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever

Top Gun:Maverick

The Producers Guild favored all three, but then they tend to respond more to movies that make money than AMPAS does. I expect Top Gun has it (which is so weird to say) but I’d be more incline to say one of the other two could be left off. Based on precursor nods, it’s Avatar that will make the grade. But I wouldn’t rule Panther out either.

The Little Things:

Babylon

Glass Onion

RRR

The Whale

The Woman King

Women Talking

Hollywood excess roaring twenties flick Babylon has actually got a lot of traction, and ranks pretty highly against the others. It’s hard to argue against Chazelle, the time period (sure to get it extra notice for costumes and production design, etc) or the stars. Think piece Women Talking does as well, with puzzle box mystery Glass Onion and historical epic The Woman King. There’s a lot of buzz around gonzo Indian epic RRR, and The Whale touched the hearts of festival attendees.

There’s a lot out there that I’m excited to see – The Whale, Living to name a few – and a decent amount I’ve seen already (Glass Onion, Everything, Avatar, Panther) that I enjoyed.

My Picks, In Order of Likelihood Rather than The Alphabet:

Banshees of Inisherin, Everything Everywhere All at Once, The Fablemans, Top Gun: Maverick, Elvis, Tar, Avatar: The Way of Water, All Quiet on the Western Front, Women Talking, Babylon. As usual, 3 out of these 10 have female main characters.

Spoilers: First Glass Onion, then The Woman King, Black Panther, or RRR

And there it is. I don’t have strong feelings about this year’s Animated films or Original songs, which is unusual for me. Usually I’ve already seen most of the animated features, in fact, but this year not a one. Is it a bad year for animation, or just that my kids are all teens now? I’ll be curious how everything plays out tomorrow morning, and look forward to seeing quite a few more of these films. I hope there’s something out that that makes you feel excited, too.

Do We Dare? Oscar 2022

E: It definitely has not been a normal year at the movies. America is still not seeing movies – at least not outside of the house – so that’s been an adjustment. We didn’t have a Golden Globe show at all. Most of the movies haven’t been tested by audiences, so the critics’ and insiders’ views reign supreme. Would we have a different Best Picture race if audiences had returned to theaters? I absolutely believe it.

But thanks to vaccines and boosters and Omicron BA1 subsiding, we will at least get a pretty normal awards show tonight. Glitz, glamor, broken records, emotional acceptance speeches, political causes, jokes perfectly calibrated for the precise amount of lameness, actresses who were initially dissed and then promoted to presenters – this year will have it all. So let’s talk Oscar!

Best Supporting Actor

Nominees: Ciaran Hinds (Belfast), Troy Kotsur (CODA), Jesse Plemons (The Power of the Dog), J.K. Simmons (Being the Ricardos), Kodi Smit-MacPhee (The Power of the Dog)

Your Winner: Troy Kotsur

How Sure Am I?: 80%

If Not Him, Then Who?: Kodi Smit-MacPhee

This year’s Supporting Actor winner will be someone who’s worked in movies for a long time, and almost certainly a first time nominee. 2014 best supporting actor Oscar winner J.K. Simmons was typically wry and acerbic in Being the Ricardos, mostly sniping at the Ethel to his Fred, but occasionally offering compassion and even sage advice to leading lady Lucy. (Like others in that film, he gets double points for playing the actor and the classic tv characters they play.) His was a surprise Oscar nomination, and he hasn’t been actually won any of the awards that come earlier in Oscar season, so he’s the least likely to triumph here. Ciaran Hinds – a family favorite since his impassioned letter-writing in Persuasion as one of my favorite Jane Austen heroes, Frederick Wentworth – exudes the wisdom of age as Belfast‘s charming, twinkle-eyed Irish grandfather. Unlike Simmons, he’s been buzzed about and feted all season, nominated by the Hollywood Foreign Press for a Golden Globe, the Screen Actor’s Guild, a BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Awards) and the Broadcast Critics for a Critics Choice award; evert top tier group that could nominate someone chose him. It’s lovely to see him finally get noticed after decades of wonderful work, and hopefully some day he’ll actually win one of those awards – but this isn’t that day.

Though fellow first time nominee Jesse Plemons is much younger than Hinds, his first IMDB credit dates from 1998; the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences loves acknowledging those who’ve paid their dues. Well-intentioned blunderer George sparks the action of The Power of the Dog by unexpectedly reaching out for happiness with widow Rose (played by his wife and costar from the television show Fargo, Kirsten Dunst); while they share the movie’s few moments of tenderness, it’s also his inability to act on her distress and confusion that drives the film’s action to its conclusion. It’s a measure of the Academy’s love for this film that his more subtle work was noticed here when most groups overlooked it. (Four acting nominations from one film is a notable achievement; I’m not sure it’s happened since 2013.)

It’s Plemons’ costar and fellow child actor Kodi Smit-MacPhee (The Road, X-Men) who has been the marquee name in the Supporting Actor race until very recently. Playing the son of widow Rose, Smit-MacPhee’s Peter’s cerebral and artistic nature makes him the immediate target of George’s sadistic brother Phil, but the movie surprises with the complexity of their interactions and with the unfolding of their characters. Smit-MacPhee’s performance begs for a second viewing to fully appreciate his choices, our assumptions, and his character’s hidden truths. Like Hinds, he’s been nominated everywhere. He won the first major award of the season, the Golden Globe, and it seemed assured that he would take the season.

Then came the SAG awards.

Now, here’s one thing about awards shows and Hollywood: general consensus matters, and public appearances matter. A good awards speech can swing a race in a huge way. This can be an almost Byzantine thing – people love a winner until they get bored with them and suddenly don’t, people love awarding a veteran until they see a shiny new thing, audiences require pandering until suddenly they want an actor who refuses to talk to them. (Witness last year’s surest thing, the posthumous Best Actor being assured for Chadwick Boseman until suddenly it went to Anthony Hopkins – who has so little skin in the awards game that he didn’t even Zoom in to the ceremony, shocking the producers who had made Best Actor the last award of the night with the idea that Boseman’s widow Simone would provide the evening’s emotional highlight.)

Anyway. The Power of the Dog, it must be said, is an absorbing drama, but also a grim one that focuses on the ugliness aspects of human civilization – the way we hurt others because we’re hurt ourselves, the way we break our hearts to fit into the roles society expects from us. It’s smart and gorgeously made, but it’s not exactly something you enjoy. And CODA? That’s the stuff most people – not just critics – don’t just like but love. CODA is heart. CODA is real people trying to connect, and succeeding, despite the obstacles in their way.

And of course, CODA is also a shiny new thing – it’s the story of a hearing girl and her deaf family, both specific and universal in the way the best stories are. And the rollicking, hilarious, beating heart of that movie is Troy Kotsur, the main character’s horny and hard-working dad. When Kotsur unexpectedly took the SAG award, the veteran actor’s speech moved the audience to both laughter and tears. If you’ll remember, the Golden Globes took themselves off the air in repentance for their history of racism and graft, and so Smit-MacPhee had no opportunity to show audiences (and more importantly Hollywood insiders) if he was charming or not. With Kotsur’s surprise SAG win, it might be too late – we’re already in love with someone else. Kotsur went on to win the Critics Choice and the BAFTA (the body which shares the most members with AMPAS), and seems well on his way to being the first deaf man not just to be nominated for an Academy Award, but to win one.

Now, like I said, Oscar is fickle. Glenn Close had been widely hailed 4 years ago as the inevitable winner for her astonishing turn in The Wife; after so many years and so many nominations, it was finally going to be her turn. NOPE. So Smit-MacPhee could still pull this out, especially if a lot of people voted early. But he’s a very young man, and the Academy doesn’t like to reward them if they can help it; he’s got time, they reason, while Kotsur and his unusual industry connections (he created sign language for The Mandalorian, among other things) has captured the momentum. And he gets away with arguing for middle aged men’s sexuality (in the sense that the disabled are usually required to be saintly and inspirational in films, rather than well rounded), which you know the men of the Academy must love.

To sum it up, I’m both hoping to see Kotsur win, and expecting it. I’ll be very, very disappointed if he doesn’t, even though Smit-MacPhee is also deserving.

Best Supporting Actress:

Nominees: Jessie Buckley (The Lost Daughter), Ariana Debose (West Side Story), Judi Dench (Belfast), Kirsten Dunst (The Power of the Dog), Aunjanue Ellis (King Richard)

And the Oscar Goes To: Ariana Debose

How Sure Am I?: 100%

Spoiler: No one

Dame Judi Dench took the spot everyone assumed would go to her costar Catriona Balfour, who had received all the precursor nominations mentioned above, while the generally beloved Dench had no buzz at all. Clearly, we can never count Judi Dench out, even when she spends only 5 minutes on screen; I suppose it shouldn’t have been such a shock, because she was barely in Shakespeare in Love, for which she won her Oscar. It looks like the Academy would rather watch her peel potatoes than anyone else weep and rail. This is her eighth nomination, but she won’t pick up a second award tonight.

As with Supporting Actor, there’s one winner in the field and four first time nominees. (A funny note: the supporting actor nominees had 6 nominations between them, while the actress have 12; the difference is all Dench.) Kirsten Dunst, whose career began with Interview with a Vampire, Little Women and Bring It On, who shared one of cinema’s most famous kisses with Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man, has finally arrived the industry’s highest table. Her wounded Rose is the prize in the center of The Power of the Dog: she’s the loved one to be protected, saved from hurtful words and the expectations that drive her to drink. It’s not her turn now, but she’s exactly the sort of person around whom that sort of consensus might arise. Someday. Not today. For now, I hope it’s just a great day to be Kirsten and Jesse, to know they’re respected and valued, and to celebrate a job well done (the kind of job that might get them the chance to do more good work later).

Jessie Buckley has been flirting with awards season for a while, even though she’s mostly unknown to mainstream American audiences. In The Lost Daughter, she plays main character Leda in flash back, a college professor who chooses her career and personal happiness over her family. The movie explores the idea that motherhood isn’t a natural instinct, as most people assume, but rather a subjugation of self which takes a lot of work and is damn hard to do, something that not all women can do even when they think they want to. I missed out on Wild Rose, but I did think Buckley was a stand out in the excellent Judy Garland biopic Judy. I’m pleased for her, but I’ll admit that I’m surprised (there’s no flash in those flashbacks, just subtlety), and that she wouldn’t have made my own short list. She wasn’t nominated by most of the precursor awards, and she won’t win here.

A lot of groups did nominate veteran tv actress Aunjanue Ellis, though – SAG and BAFTA among them. She’s had a long, if not showy career; I know her best as the police captain on The Mentalist, but she’s had significant parts in Get On Up, If Beale Street Could Talk, NCIS: Los Angeles, Designated Survivor and Lovecraft Country where you might have seen her too. She excels as the Queen to Will Smith’s King Richard, fierce and supportive, a coach as well as a mother, and wife who calls her husband on his excess while also supporting his outsized dreams for their children. Though she won’t win, I hope that this boosts her profile and her paycheck; Oscar is often (and should be!) the ticket to doing more exciting work, and I wish for that for her.

The absolute star of this season, however, is the incandescent Ariana Debose, who sings and dances with such fire in West Side Story. 60 years ago Rita Moreno started her path to becoming the first EGOT winner with a Supporting Actress statuette for the role of Anita, and tonight Debose – perhaps best known as “the bullet,” a featured ensemble member in the original Broadway cast of Hamilton. If you checked out Apple +’s musical sitcom Schmigadoon! this past summer, you’ll remember her as the strict but sweet schoolmarm vying for Keegan-Michael Key’s attention. She exploded like a supernova onto the scene, winning every possible precursor and an outsized share of critics prizes. It’s a sterling role (sexy, funny, grieving, brutalized and furious) and Debose brings every moment to such vivid life; there is no containing her. Her acceptance speeches, too, are powerful and endearing. A win tonight will I believe make her the first openly queer actress to win an Oscar, and the possibly first Afro-Latinx one as well. She’d get my vote if I had it, just like everybody else’s.

If there was anyone I wish had been nominated here, it’s probably Rita Moreno, whose inclusion in West Side Story as the Puerto Rican widow of store-owner Doc was a thoughtful addition to the new film, and a bridge between the two sides. Without giving it away, she sings an iconic song that’s normally assigned to other characters, and those words from her present a new, larger meaning.

Oh, and if you haven’t? See the dang movie. It’s so incredibly good.

Best Actor:

Nominees: Javier Bardem (Being the Ricardos), Benedict Cumberbatch (The Power of the Dog), Andrew Garfield (tick, tick, BOOM!), Will Smith (King Richard), Denzel Washington (The Tragedy of Macbeth)

Your Winner: Will Smith

How Sure Am I? 100%

Who’s Beating Big Willy? No one

Like Supporting Actress, this is an easy one. Will Smith has been around Hollywood a long time, first as a musical phenom and then as an actor. I’m pretty sure that 1993’s Six Degrees of Separation was the first film that garnered some awards chatter for him, that made people aware he was more than just a hammy sitcom star. He didn’t receive a nomination until 2001, however, for the title role in Ali, a role that fit his swagger, verbal dexterity and larger than life persona. He was nominated again in 2004 for The Pursuit of Happyness, based on the true story of a smart single father struggling with homeless while finishing an unpaid internship that will bring him riches and stability for his young son. Now, 18 years later, he plays another down-on-his-luck father, a night watchman who spends his days coaching his two youngest daughters in the hopes of making them tennis superstars. Like all of his most successful roles, it’s a true story that trades on his personal ebullience, energy and optimism; Richard’s a smooth talker looking to fulfill his dream with grit and determination alone. More than any other role he’s played, any other time I’ve seen him, I was less aware that I was watching Will Smith, and more caught up in the story of a man who turned out to be crazy like a fox, whose strong belief in his dreams gave agency to others.

Will Smith is well liked in the industry. He has a producing nomination for King Richard to add to his Oscar total. He’s won everywhere – even at the BAFTAs, which doesn’t generally respond to Black American films. This is his role, and his moment.

If there was anyone else I’d vote for, it’d be Benedict Cumberbatch, the thinking woman’s sex symbol, whose ferocious turn as the promising intellectual who traded Harvard business associations for a chaps and a job leading the cowboys at his family’s Montana ranch in The Power of the Dog. Mercurial, terrifying Phil is the dog of the title – he tears into everyone around him, manipulating them with his outsized cruelty, turning the attention always to what he wants them to see, bullying relentlessly, longing for connection but only able to take it on the most prescribed of terms. It’s rather surprising that this is only his second nomination, but it’s highly unlikely to be his last.

It’s pretty obvious from the first that The Tragedy of Macbeth is a Coen brothers movie; the fish eye lens, the high contrast cinematography, the three witches who aren’t really three. Theirs is an oddball vision which isn’t for everyone, and this Macbeth was not for me. Denzel Washington, though? He’s captivating, bringing real depth to his ambitious tortured killer. Denzel is just one of those actors who really gets Shakespeare; from the Duke in Much Ado About Nothing to this Macbeth, his portrayals lack the stuffiness sometimes associated with the Bard. Like the Shakespearian-sounding King Richard, his titular character is a real man.

Oh, Andrew Garfield. I’m so happy to see you pick up your second nomination. Even though you’re younger and cuter than AMPAS usually likes their Best Actor candidates, you star in a theater story, and Hollywood is a sucker for movies about making art. The clock ticks away as Jonathan Larsen struggles to decide how much time to devote to his current project and to his ambition of writing musicals for Broadway. How much life do you give a dream? When do you take a steady job that might give you time for a life with your girlfriend instead? I adored this movie (I’m still so peeved it got overlooked for Best Picture) and Garfield was the perfect choice; he earnestly splatters his fears and his doubts and his dreams and his very heart all over the screen. So, okay. Maybe he’s the one who would have gotten my vote, if I had it to give.

But I don’t, and it wouldn’t matter – tonight we’ll celebrate Big Willy style, just like it says in the song. Will Smith will be likable as ever, and we’ll all feel good about his win.

Best Actress:

Nominees: Jessica Chastain (The Eyes of Tammy Faye), Olivia Colman (The Lost Daughter), Penelope Cruz (Parallel Mothers), Nicole Kidman (Being the Ricardos), Kristen Stewart (Spencer)

Taking Home the Trophy: Jessica Chastain

How Sure Am I?: 70%

You Can Make A Good Case For: Nicole Kidman

Here’s our one moderately open category. What’s particularly great about is that until recently, there weren’t really a lot of women’s performances that Oscar was willing to consider. Maybe 6, tops. This year (as last year) there were a much higher number competing for these five slots. These five, obviously, but there was also SAG nominee Jennifer Hudson, BAFTA nominees Alaina Haim, Tessa Thompson and Emilia Jones, and Golden Globe nominees Jennifer Lawrence and Rachel Zelger, all with realistic claims for Academy attention. And then there was Lady Gaga, who seemed assured of a nomination for her melodramatic turn in House of Gucci.

And now that we’re here, narrowed down to five nominees, it’s still hard. The precursors haven’t been clear. Most of the early critics prizes went to Kristen Stewart, but then she missed a lot of precursor nominations and hasn’t had any wins. It’s obvious even from the trailer what an extraordinary job Stewart does bringing the late Princess Diana to the screen – the way she tilts her head, the hesitation in her speech – but the film itself (dreamy and plotless) failed to connect with audiences. That isn’t a dealbreaker for a Best Actress nominee where it would be for an actor, but it’s not ideal. Back in January it didn’t seem likely that she’d even receive an Oscar nomination at all, but here she is, testament to the Academy’s occasionally long memory with her first career Academy nod. Stewart, who is bisexual, joins Debose as the two first out actress nominees. It’s unlikely she can win, but it’s great to see yet another former child actor do well this year. Anyone who’s moderately aware of entertainment and celebrity news knows what a long, hard road Stewart has had to this point, and it’s good to see her make headlines for her impressive acting skill rather than her dating life.

Taking up the mantle from Stewart was five time nominee and 2003 winner Nicole Kidman, who won the Golden Globe for drama. I’ll admit, I was in the crowd who doubted Kidman’s casting as Lucy in Aaron Sorkin’s imagining of a hard week on the set of classic sitcom I Love Lucy. Though Kidman is a wonderful comedian, her work tends to be dark and satirical. Physical comedy is not her bag, while it was Lucy’s. What the film taught me, however, is that Lucy wasn’t actually a fun or funny person to work with, as I’d assumed; that she worked hard to look silly and wacky, thought her way through each beat, pinpointing what approach to any given moment would be the funniest. Though Sorkin’s chronology wasn’t accurate, everything I’ve read suggests that the depiction of Lucille Ball’s character was. It was surprising, but utterly fascinating, and Kidman executes it brilliantly. The scenes where we watch her think through a bit (losing her ring in the grape vat, being surprised by Ricky as she sets the table) are the best in the film. I was happy to accept her second win, and still will be if it happens.

But wait! Then there’s SAG, Critics Choice and BAFTA winner Jessica Chastain., who plays the title character in The Eyes of Tammy Faye, which takes its title from a documentary about real life televangelist Tammy Faye Baker. After a hard childhood, Tammy becomes enchanted by the health and wealth gospel as preached by her college classmate and future husband Jim Baker (Andrew Garfield, continuing to have a very good year); she’s captivated by the idea of a God who blesses the faithful with money rather than only punishing His children for their sins. As was widely publicized, Tammy and her good intention and weird thinking was blessed and punished both, and the film takes on both her willful blindness to financial abuse as well as her husband’s infidelity, and also her courage in promoting love and acceptance for all, particularly members of the gay community and those suffering from AIDS. Three-time nominee Chastain (and genuinely I’m shocked she doesn’t have more) brings us Tammy Faye in all her peculiarities, at her most child-like and her most quietly insistent. It’s a fascinating story and terrific performance, in a much more accessible movie than Spencer. It’s quite clear she has the momentum,. I’ve been rooting for Chastain for a long time, and I’d be happy to see her finally seated at the winner’s table: if you can give an award to a new person, why not? All things being equal, that’s how I’d vote.

Heck, it’s even hard to count out Olivia Colman, considering how deeply the Academy has fallen for her over the last four years – three nominations and one win! Well, I count her out, but Entertainment Weekly think she’s going to take the whole thing, so there’s that. College professor Leda, on vacation in Greece, becomes fascinated by a loud, possibly criminal family of Americans staying at the same resort, particularly Dakota Fanning’s glamorous Nina, who seems just as disinterested in motherhood as Leda was in the flashbacks where she’s played by Jessie Buckley. One day on the beach Nina loses track of her daughter, and Leda finds the little girl, leading to a very peculiar series of entanglements between Leda, the other guests and the staff. Leda is an uncomfortable, prickly woman who both is and isn’t interested in being liked, and Colman gives us that, beautifully. Like her incredible supporting work in last year’s heartbreaking dementia drama The Father, it’s hard not to wish that Colman got her Oscar for something grounded and real like this, rather than the screeching, over-the-top melodrama of The Favourite. That’s not to say I would like her to win, or that I think she will; I wouldn’t and I don’t. I’m still just mad that she has Glenn Close’s Oscar.

I do feel very comfortable leaving out Penelope Cruz (four time nominee and supporting actress winner for Vicky Christina Barcelona), whose nomination for Parallel Mothers (the misnamed story of two women who give birth to daughters at the same time) was a bit of a shock. The story, as is true of Cruz’s best work, is a Pedro Almodovar effort, and as such the story that follows that set up is fairly bonkers. As photographer Janis, Cruz grounds the film, letting the wild twists of the story unfold around her, mature, confident and thoughtful. Okay, so she’s a little crazy too, but Cruz makes even Janis’ weirder choices seem plausible. Though again, I’m not sure’d be my choice for this slot, she pulls it all off with a lot of grace.

Whoever wins – which is most likely to be Chastain but could provide a bit of drama – it’s a happy year with so interesting female led stories; may the trend continue, and the quality continue to improve.

Best Director:

And the Nominees Are: Paul Thomas Anderson (Licorice Pizza), Kenneth Branagh (Belfast), Jane Campion (The Power of the Dog), Ryusuke Hamaguchi (Drive My Car), Steven Spielberg (West Side Story)

And the Winner Is: Jane Campion

How Sure Am I?: 95%

If Not Her, then Who?: Steven Spielberg

In 1994, Steven Spielberg’s magnum opus, Schindler’s List, beat out Jane Campion’s The Piano. The two faced off in best director. This time, the outcome will be reversed. Australian Campion (famous for producing roughly a film a decade) has won everywhere this year – Golden Globes, BAFTA, Critics Choice, you name it. She’ll become the third woman to win this prize (she’s already the first woman to be nominated twice), and it’ll be two female-lead movies in a row. I’d rather like the movie, but with the Oscars you can only hope for so much. Even if something shocking happens and her movie loses, Campion is even more locked to win.

This is Steven Spielberg’s 8th nomination for Best Director: he’s won twice, first for Schindler’s List and then for Saving Private Ryan (yet another assumed winner that suffered winner fatigue and lost in a surprise upset to it’s opposite, a light and enjoyable comedy). He’s captured Best Picture once, and has received a total of 19 nominations. His West Side Story takes a classic I didn’t think could be improved and gives it new brilliance and depth, rooting it in urban upheaval and change, the waves of immigrants replacing each other and resenting the newcomers in their turn, a glittering fusion of color and light. It is in every way worthy of Best Picture, but so are many, many films. It and he are unlikely to take the day.

Kenneth Branagh, too, takes a city block and wrecks it, shows us a futility of neighbor against neighbor, the way any difference at all can drive a wedge, can be space for grasping men to exert power over others, the way joy creeps up through the cracks in the sidewalk even so. I’m so happy to see him back in this game after so many years; I remember the bright blast of his first appearance on screen, the vibrancy and wonder of him.

A fun note for this category: Kenneth Branagh makes a little history in 2022: he’s now the person nominated in the most categories. Get ready for it! He’d already been nominated as a director (Henry V), in both lead (Henry V) and supporting actor (My Week with Marilyn), for adapted screenplay (a head-scratching nod for his famously uncut production of Hamlet), and for a Live Action Short. This year he adds two to his total first as a producer of a Best Picture nominee, and another for original screenplay.

Licorice Pizza was a pleasantly oddball fantasia, and set a mildly enjoyable tone. I don’t for a minute buy it as reality (a fifteen year old kid who can rent a storefront for an arcade? rent trucks, run various businesses? successfully woo a 25 year old woman? no), and I don’t see it as Oscar-worthy, but I didn’t hate it, which in the year of the Dog counts for a lot. In case you haven’t seen it (and you don’t have to, but some people – not all – might enjoy it if they do) licorice pizza is a euphemism for a record, and has no relevance to the film at all except as a general reference to the 70s. Paul Thomas Anderson has a wide range of tones and styles in his films. The best I can say is that he usually pulls good performances out of his actors, and here, working with Cooper Hoffman, whose father he guided to brilliance in The Master, he’s once again an inspired touch.

I’m still patting myself on the back for guessing that AMPAS would nominate Ryusuke Hamaguchi. Now that I’ve seen his movie, I’m okay with it; the story alternates long periods of silence with play rehearsals and occasional bursts of pure exposition – dialogue delving deep into the characters’ innermost truths. It’s not for everyone, but it was for me, and I definitely enjoyed it, and I’m pleased to see him on this list.

For the record, The Lost Daughter is an interesting, well crafted film; I didn’t particularly enjoy it, but I respect it – exactly how I feel about The Power of the Dog. I look forward to seeing what Maggie Gyllenhaal does next, and I hope AMPAS takes her seriously as the artist she is.

Best Picture:

The Academy’s Top Ten: Belfast, CODA, Don’t Look Up, Drive My Car, Dune, Licorice Pizza, Nightmare Alley, The Power of the Dog, West Side Story

And the Winner Is: The Power of the Dog

Can This Nightmare Be Stopped?: Unlikely. 80% sure.

This Year’s Dark Horse: CODA

My Personal Top Five: Belfast, CODA, Spider-man: No Way Home, tick, tick, Boom!, West Side Story.

The toxic masculinity themed Western The Power of the Dog is a beautifully made, almost hypnotic story about awful people doing awful things and hurting nicer people. The acting is great, the characters have depth, it’s hard to look away from, it was way more interesting than I expected – but it’s still just a rotten story. I’m not sure what Oscar’s obsession with awful is (Parasite, really? No Country for Old Men? What gives?) and I know I’m not the only person out there who’d love to see a good old fashioned crowd pleaser triumph some time. That’s not where we are today, though. The Power of the Dog took home the Golden Globe, the Critics Choice and the BAFTA (which, again, includes the most crossover with Academy membership). Dog boasts the biggest nomination count of the year with 12, which shows it has broad support across the membership branches. The movie with the most nominations usually wins, but not always – not in the last several years, actually but still most of the time.

If there’s any hope for something more cheerful to triumph here, it’s CODA, the story of a hearing high schooler with pressure to join the family fishing business, but also dreams of a singing career of her own. Now, I have to tell you, I watched CODA with my high school student daughters, and they ripped to shreds its depiction of both high school and especially high school music groups, something they’re both heavily involved in. Allowing for dramatic license, however, we all enjoyed the film, and its story of family – of holding close and letting go – spoke strongly to everyone I know who’s seen it. But there’s something more here – Dog was inexplicably ignored for SAG ensemble and CODA won, to the rapture of the crowd; then CODA (which stands for Child of Deaf Adults) took home the Producers Guild Award in direct competition with Dog. I still think it’s more likely that Power of the Dog will triumph, and I admit it’s a better made film, but I will cheer like a mad woman if CODA pulls off a surprise win.

My vote would have gone to West Side Story. I honestly didn’t see any way that it could even equal the 1961 version, and didn’t know why Spielberg would even try, but I got it when I saw it. It feels like a truer read on the same story; the inclusion of Spanish language dialogue, the past fleshed out for Tony, the uncertainty that goes with a neighborhood on the cusp of gentrification, the wrecking ball that shatters buildings and lives. For me, this film hits the sweet spot of brilliant film-making that doesn’t ignore human darkness, but isn’t suffocated by it, either.

Belfast walks the same line so ably. I would have expected West Side story to win over more audiences as inspired spectacle, but the war torn streets of Belfast during the Troubles, and Van Morrison’s smooth vocals, should have charmed audiences had any been willing to go to the theater. I understand the impulse to try and force movie goers back, but we’re just not ready. I truly wish this film could have had the audience it deserves, and then we might again have had a different outcome.

I can’t help looking at all these movies and thinking that COVID has brought us where we are; I don’t think The Power of the Dog would have made particularly good box office, while I’d guess that both CODA and West Side Story would have in a year where it didn’t feel like going to the theater would threaten your life. Oscar used to be really responsive to box office numbers: small movies can win Oscars, but movies can fail because audiences disliked them, or because they didn’t connect to the level the industry expected. Even now, I believe that West Side Story is paying the price for this; experts assumed that audiences would turn out for West Side Story, when they’re just not ready to. There’s only been one theatrical hit during COVID (No Way Home, enthusiastically embraced by critics and roundly and unjustly ignored by the Academy as most superhero movies are) and most people just weren’t willing to risk theaters twice. Because box office experts hoped and thought they might, the films chances have suffered. In another year, I firmly believe it would have been the main contender.

The other movies are a mix of genres and styles (and levels of quality). With it’s appealing stars and true story, King Richard could have been a bigger contender if it had a normal year’s box office to back it up. Audiences love an inspirational sports story, and this tale of a father’s determination to turn his daughters into the world’s best athletes is definitely that. Triumph over overwhelming obstacles? Check. Sure, it takes some licks because it focuses more on Richard Williams than his prodigy progeny, but the film was made with the assistance of the Williams family, and if they don’t mind, should we? And let me tell you, it will make you question all your parenting choices for sure.

As I’ve said, Drive My Car isn’t for everyone, but it’s an absorbing story of moving on after loss; a man struggles to deal with both his wife’s death and the strange intricacy of their relationship, finding a way to move forward through his evolving friendship with his driver (a young woman dealing with her own traumas) and his late wife’s last protege, set through a multi-language production of Chekov’s Uncle Vanya. It’s one of my favorites of the year, probably number six after the five above.

I devoured the Dune novels when I was in high school, and though the series is of uneven quality, this rendition of the first half of the first book isn’t. Granted, most of the action will come in the second installment, but I was intrigued by what I saw. The Duke of House Atreides, his concubine and their son (his heir) arrive on a desert planet sparely occupied by rebellious sand warriors and but ruthlessly mined for the ore that makes space travel possible, the characters are immediately embroiled in clan politics on a galactic scale. It’s an epic saga with calls back to Greek tragedy, ably made and deserving of its place at the table.

Now, Licorice Pizza seems like much less of an Oscar story to me; it doesn’t say much about human nature, it’s not an epic saga, it’s not even rational as a love story. Alaina Haim’s naive character isn’t believable as a 25 year old, which is ironic because she’s even older. I was very excited to see Guillermo del Toro’s Nightmare Alley, which details the trajectory of a con man who moves from a 1930s circus side show to elegant society marquees and back, but the stylish psychological thriller telegraphs most of its twists far in advance.

Finally there’s end of times comedy Don’t Look Up, which satirizes climate change, Donald Trump (as riffed on by Meryl Streep – and why weren’t we talking about that this year?), corporate culture, profits over everything, the media and so many other things. That wouldn’t make my ideal list, but it definitely didn’t put me to sleep, I’ll give it that much, and the ensemble cast was wide and wonderful.

10 movies. 2 contenders. Who will win? Who should win? We’ll know tonight for sure.

Speaking of the ten nominees, I’ve heard some Oscar-watchers calling for a return to the 5 nominee slate in this category. That number was originally expanded in the hopes of bringing in movies that audiences actually cared about, but as you can see from this year’s slate, there aren’t many, and the most popular – let’s call it CODA and Dune – could have made a top five anyway. The expansion hasn’t made it easier for say, No Way Home to get a nod. So what’s the point? It’s an interesting question to consider.

Smaller categories:

The stunning cinematography of The Power of the Dog should earn it a win – really the only win I’ll actually be happy about: if hers is the name that gets read, Ari Wegner will become the first female cinematographer to win an Oscar. Insane, right? No woman had even been nominated until Mudbound‘s Rachel Morrison a mere four years ago. The cinematography was definitely my favorite part of this movie. The Tragedy of Macbeth‘s Bruno Delbonnel is her biggest rival, although I personally found the high contrast black and white gimmicky (not to mention the fish eye views) and much prefer Janusz Kaminski’s work in West Side Story; Spielberg and Kaminski are a legendary partnership, and their work has rarely been sharper or more stunning.

The Dog may have a leg up on editing – Best Picture and Best Editing used to be lockstep, but lately that hasn’t been in the case. I wouldn’t holler too loudly over that one if it happens, because as I’ve said the film is lovingly made, but I’d much prefer tick, tick, Boom! get it – that movie is put together beautifully, and the editing really makes the visuals one with the music. The explosive tennis scenes from King Richard took the ACE Eddy (the guild for editors) and relatively showy sci fi epic Dune triumphed at the Critics Choice, so this could be a category to watch.

Animated Feature may be the most popular Encanto, Disney’s Colombian extravaganza about refugees and generational trauma (or in lighter terms, a magical family with a magical house) but it’s no runaway victory: both Raya and the Last Dragon and The Mitchells vs. the Machines have picked up awards along the way. OR they could decide to give Flee the win here and not in documentary – more on that in a minute.

Encanto boasts the biggest movie music since Frozen in “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” but that number 1 hit wasn’t submitted for consideration (largely because it contains dialog and so in dependent on the context of the film) and so instead, the sweet, soft “Dos Orugitas” (the first all Spanish-language nominee) will face 4 songs that play over the credits of their various films. I have to tell you, this boils my blood. First off, that dialogue didn’t stop the song from topping the Billboard charts, and second, I’d rather have a song that’s pivotal to the film win than something tacked on at the end! It’s no secret that I’m a huge Lin-Manuel Miranda fan, and that I wish they’d just let him just get his damn EGOT already, but the win is more likely to go to Billie Eilish’s serviceable (but rather generic) Bond theme, “No Time to Die.” It’s a little funny: I have a lot of opinions about this slate, but I don’t love any of them. My favorite of the five is definitely Beyonce’s “Be Alive” from King Richard, so at least that promises to be an exciting performance. It galls me that Diane Warren’s twangy ode “Somehow You Do” made the list rather than the unsubmitted but vastly superior “Bruno” or Encanto‘s other hit, “Surface Pressure,” even if I can understand Disney fearing that offering up two songs from the same musical would result in vote canceling.

Most precursor awards honored The Power of the Dog for it’s score, so that’s the favorite going in. I guess I won’t begrudge that one either (it’s moving, but repetitive – nowhere near the level of The Piano, one of my favorite scores of all time, but good), although I’d prefer Encanto.

Screenplays are tricky to call, partly because not a lot of groups give out screenplay awards, and those who do might not divide them into adapted and original, or might have super persnickety rules about who and what qualifies, so you rarely get a look at Hollywood groupthink before the event. At least that makes something suspenseful! Belfast has a very solid shot of taking original and I hope it does; it doesn’t seem like it’s going to win anything else, and it’s too good a movie to be ignored. Adapted seems to be a fascinating two way race between Sian Heder’s CODA and Jane Campion’s initial frontrunner, The Power of the Dog. Winning this category would make Campion the first woman to write her way to wins in both adapted and original screenplays (the latter coming 18 years ago for The Piano), but Heder has the momentum coming out of her win at BAFTA, which did see the two go head to head in the body that most closely resembles AMPAS. Perhaps voters wanted to spread the wealth, or appreciated all the care taken with the deaf community’s portrayal in the Apple + heart-warmer. (Would that she’d taken more care in accurately representing high school!). A tie-breaking underdog might be the quietly heartbreaking Drive My Car. It’s worth noting that three of this year’s nominated screenplays were adapted by women (The Lost Daughter‘s Maggie Gyllenhaal being the third).

Drive My Car is obviously going to win International Feature – you don’t get nominated for Best Picture and lose that one. The shorts (always difficult for non-Academy members to see) are a toss up as usual; I’d have had a hard time choosing between the charming Queen of Basketball (a brief bio of utter delight Lucy Harris, contemporary of Magic Johnson and Larry Bird, NCAA basketball powerhouse and Olympic medalist as well as the first woman ever offered a spot in the NBA) and the lyrical and searing Lead Me Home, which focuses on the homeless popular in urban California. Usually the animated shorts are a sweet, sugary buffet, but not this year. I’ve no idea what will win, and didn’t really like any of what I’ve seen.

Refugee memoir Flee is perhaps the most high profile of the documentaries – and clearly made an impression as it’s nominated for Animated Feature and International Feature – which suggests it’s the one to beat in this category as well, although Summer of Soul (the glorious, previously unseen footage of a concert series in Harlem in the summer of 1969, brilliantly placed in historical context) has won it’s share of attention. It’s unusually upbeat and also offers chance to honor Black excellent and joy, something the Academy has historically ignored. I’ll be watching this one with great attention – though since I’m a fan of both, I’ll be happy either way. See what you can! I learn a lot from these docs and just wish I’d been able to see them all; Writing With Fire, about female journalists in India, is a gaping sore in my 2022 Oscar viewing. It looks amazing, and those reporters (seen in the trailer surreptitiously filming angry mobs with their cellphones) brave and impassioned.

11 time nominee Jenny Bevan’s extravagant, cartoony designs for Cruella are the favorite to take costumes; it would be her third win, showing her range between the romantic period detail of A Room With a View and the post-apocalyptic grunge of Mad Max: Fury Road. Mad, eh? Makeup and Hairstyling might go the same way, or it could fall to The Eyes of Tammy Faye, the very title of which brings makeup to mind. Awful makeup, but still. Tammy Faye uses more effects make up to age up leads Andrew Garfield and Jessica Chastain; other nominees (Cruella, House of Gucci) are more notable for their fantastic hairstyling and beauty shots while weirdly Coming 2 America does both. I’d expect the most technical of categories to split between Dune and The Power of the Dog, but if it were me I’d give Sound (which this year combines what used to be Sound and Sound Editing) to West Side Story, for recalling the original while managing to feel current.

And that, my friends, is that for now. I’ve a packed day tomorrow but I’ll get you a wrap up as soon as I can, once all the answers are finally revealed.

Always Expect Judi Dench: Oscar Nomination Reactions, 2022

E: Well, that was somewhat surprising. Actress and supporting actress were definitely the categories where I did the worst, but the lead race especially had never been clear. More than anything else, these nominations show you: do they like the movie or don’t they? Well, they like 12 time nominee and likely winner The Power of the Dog,a lot. They liked Dune and Being the Ricardos a lot, but not enough to acknowledge the men who made them. Belfast they liked a lot, too (though perhaps not in the way we expected). They definitely liked Drive My Car, Encanto, Flee and Parallel Mothers. tick, tick, BOOM!? Not so much.

Supporting Actor: 4/5

My Guess: Affleck, Hinds, Kotsur, Plemmons, Smit-McPhee

Oscar nominated: Hinds, Kotsur, Plemmons, Simmons and Smit-McPhee

There you have it – AMPAS is not, in fact, ready to let Ben Affleck to the table. Better luck next time? I still maintain that Simmons – while always wonderful – didn’t do anything unusual for him in Being the Ricardos. The dude plays a curmudgeon for a living – witness him taking the character of J. Jonah Jamison across both Marvel and Sony iterations of Spider-Man. The movie picked up three acting nominations, so they definitely liked it, even if it wasn’t enough to get it in for Best Picture.

I do feel good about calling Jessie Plemmons, who was definitely a dark horse – of the major precursor groups, he’d only been nominated by BAFTA. Fellow BAFTA nominees Mike Faist and Woody Norman weren’t so lucky. But like I said, former child actor Plemmons has paid his dues, and even though his work is subtle (especially in comparison to costar Cumberbatch’s bombast), it’s worth celebrating.

Also? I wish Troy Kotsur – whose movie I watched after finishing my initial post – could win this category, which seems pretty locked for Smit-McPhee. His horny, heart-filled dad is a complete riot. I read an amazing article about the subtitles don’t even do justice to the extreme descriptiveness of his signing work, and yes, if you go back and look for that, it’s totally enriching. How absolutely lovely that he’s getting recognition on a large scale.

So, let’s see. Hinds, Kotsur, Plemmons and Smit-Phee each pick up their first nominations. Simmons adds one to his 2014 win. Troy Kotsur makes a little history as the first deaf man nominated for an Oscar.

Supporting Actress: 3/5

My Guess: Balfe, DeBose, Dunst, Ellis, Negga

Oscar Picked: Buckley, DeBose, Dench, Dunst, Ellis

Damn it. Lessons learned: I need to stop betting against BAFTA. And never count out Judi Dench.

I kid, really. The problem with BAFTA is that they’re different enough from Oscar that you can only tell when they’re going to match up after they, you know, match up. It’s not like their group of 6 nominees are the same as Oscar’s 5 – only Buckley, DeBose and Ellis are. Otherwise Catriona Balfe and Ruth Negga would have nominations today. And BAFTA’s sixth was Ann Dowd, who didn’t get any Oscar love either. Why is this the year that Oscar picks up on the Jessie Buckley love, after fluttering around the edges of the awards season for the last four or five years? I guess we’ll all to have check out The Lost Daughter to find out.

I will say, I was watching the trailer for Belfast over the weekend, trying to figure out how to describe Ciaran Hinds’ performance in a movie I hadn’t seen, and it was the first time I realized Judi Dench was even in the movie. And my immediate thought was, wow, why isn’t she in awards contention? Awards groups love them their Dame Judi. Who doesn’t? She used to get nominated for sneezing the right way. Of course, as I noted in my list in the previous post, Meryl Streep’s got a role this year (a very funny one, it turns out, as the Trump-like president in Don’t Look Up) and she didn’t have any buzz at all. As My Movie-Going Friend pointed out yesterday, Queen Meryl hasn’t been nominated since 2018! Outrageous! Anyway, what’s weird about this is not so much that Dench picked up her 8th nomination yesterday, but that she wasn’t nominated for everything else along the way. Seriously – not even BAFTA had picked her! I can’t feel bad for not calling that one, when the truth is, to switch up the classic line, you don’t always expect the Spanish Inquisition.

I do feel really, really badly for Catriona Balfe, who had every reason to hope she could call herself an Oscar nominee after yesterday; at least her sister in snubbing Ruth Negga can already do that. I would never have guess that they’d be our inevitable snubs. (Again, that’s what makes the surprises surprising.)

Buckley, DeBose, Dunst and Ellis pick up their first nomination – that’s 8 out of 10 supporting nominees.

Actor: 4/5

My Guess: Bardem, Cumberbatch, DiCaprio, Smith, Washington

Spoilers: Garfield

Oscar Chose: Bardem, Cumberbatch, Garfield, Smith, Washington

I can’t believe I talked myself out of the right slate of actors. I can’t believe that this is where Oscar played it safe. I’m thrilled for Garfield, even though I’m also a bit heartbroken for his wonderful movie. And that’s all I’m going to say about that.

In contrast to the supporting actors, all of these men have been nominated before: Bardem like Simmons adds one his win, Cumberbatch and Garfield pick up their 2nd as well, Smith now has 3, and Washington, the grand pooh bah of them all, 9 as an actor and one more as a producer. It’s unusual, but not new, for two black actors to be nominated in this category in the same year. It’s actually happened to these two actors before, when Will Smith was nominated for Ali and Denzel picked up his second win for Training Day in 2001. Twenty one years later, the roles might just be reversed.

Actress: 3/5

My Guess: Chastain, Colman, Gaga, Hudson, Kidman

Spoiler: Stewart

Oscar Nominated: Chastain, Colman, Cruz, Kidman, Spencer

Oh, the little monsters must be clawing at the walls. No Gaga? Really? Hudson’s snub is less surprising – this is the toughest slate to get on this year, and as I said before, it could easily have been one of about 9 women. I’m not surprised about Stewart – I figured it was 50/50 that Oscar voters would still appreciate her work, or if the momentum for her cause had passed. I think it will be absolutely fascinating to see if this gives her a second wind, and helps shift the win away from Kidman to her; there’s no way to know until Oscar night, since she’s not nominated by SAG or BAFTA. The funny thing is, though, not one of this year’s BAFTA nominees ended up with an Oscar nod. (This is why I say it’s so hard to tell when to listen to them and when to ignore!). I would have guessed BAFTA nominee Haim or Globe nominee Zegler before Cruz, but when you put Cruz with Pedro Almodovar, well, the Academy just swoons.

Kidman, Cruz and Colman are all previous winners; this is Kidman’s 5th nod, Cruz’s 4th, and Colman’s 3rd. Chastain has 3 – a surprisingly low number, considering how often she’s on shortlists – but Stewart, our fourth child actor making good receives her first nomination here. What a trend among this year’s nominees! Only 1 out of 10 is a first time nominee in the leading categories. Of the 20 nominees together, 14 come from the same 5 movies (Being the Ricardos, Belfast, The Power of the Dog, King Richard, and The Lost Daughter), and the 6 remaining slots go to actors from 6 individual films.

Director: 4/5

My Guess: Anderson, Branagh, Campion, Hamaguchi, Villeneuve

The Safe Choice: Spielberg, McKay

Oscar Nominated: Anderson, Branagh, Campion, Hamaguchi, Spielberg

I’m sorry to say I’m feeling extremely smug about correctly guessing Hamaguchi would be the directors branch’s left field pick. I just guessed it would be the overly blessed Spielberg, and not the guy making the astonishing sci fi epic, even though both of those things are strikes against the two men. As my brother puts it, we can’t be surprised that the Academy would ignore sci fi. Is it a little funny that the movie was nominated for 10 awards, mostly technical categories that require a director’s vision to put together, yet they found it unworthy of a directing nod? That this is the third time someone has tried to make a movie out of Dune, and the first time it’s worked? I guess we can’t cry too hard for Denis Villeneuve; he was nominated once for Arrival, and has two more nods this year for writing and producing.

Still. Silly.

Picture: 9/10

My Guess: Belfast, CODA, Don’t Look Up, Dune, King Richard, Licorice Pizza, Nightmare Alley, The Power of the Dog, tick, tick, Boom!, West Side Story

Oscar’s Nominees: Belfast, CODA, Don’t Look Up, Drive My Car, Dune, King Richard, Licorice Pizza, Nightmare Alley, The Power of the Dog, West Side Story

While I feel good about getting 9 out of 10, and feel like I called Drive My Car being big, I’m so bummed that my favorite of the Oscar movies I’ve seen was left off the list. Watch tick, tick, Boom! It’s wonderful. I mean, sure, I’m also bummed that Spider-Man: No Way Home and Encanto didn’t get a shot, but I didn’t expect they would.

I understand Stephen Spielberg made a little history; he’s been nominated for producing his 11th Best Picture nominee, the most of any person ever. Go you!

And now it’s time for me to go watch movies! Get thee to a streaming service, Drive My Car! Belfast, where are you? Let’s get this thing done!

Predictions: Oscar Nominations, 2022

E: Here we are, finishing up our second pandemic Oscar season. Our second full year of barely making it to theaters, except to see Spider-Man, which isn’t going to be nominated. Our second year of spare awards ceremonies, of masked faces, of schmoozeless Oscar campaigns. I’ve rarely felt so far away from a slate of nominees: the studios’ answer to the box office riddle of pandemic times is no longer to stream everything, but to put movies in theaters no ones visits, and ask for full payment for everything online up front. I don’t get the impression it’s working well; I think most audiences are just finding other content. Even Oscar obsessed me; I want a future with movie theaters, but I’m not ready for it yet, and I’m also not ready to buy movies I haven’t seen, even if buying one costs less than seeing it in the theater with my husband would have. It’s silly, maybe, but it’s too much of a paradigm shift. I’d call it a failed gamble, myself.

That said, let’s talk about the movies we haven’t seen and maybe won’t be able to see!

Best Supporting Actor

Consensus Candidates: These are the folks that everyone expects to see on Oscar’s shortlist. These are your guys whose omission would lead Snubbed lists, should they not get invitations to the big dance. This happens to somebody every year in a couple of categories, of course, but who will it be this time?

Kodi Smit-McPhee, The Power of the Dog

Ciaran Hinds, Belfast

Troy Katsur, CODA

Likely Contenders: As always, there are so many acclaimed male supporting performances that the precursor awards leave us a bounty to choose from. Here are the folks with two major nods.

Ben Affleck, The Tender Bar

J.K. Simmons, Being the Ricardos

With One Major Nomination a Piece:

Bradley Cooper, Licorice Pizza

Jamie Dornan, Belfast

Mike Faist, West Side Story

Jared Leto, House of Gucci

Stranger Things Have Happened:

Jessie Plemmons, The Power of the Dog

Just in case you’re wondering, awards season leading up to Oscar is filled with dozens of smaller, less prestigious awards, starting with city critic groups and the rather shadowy National Board of Review, through the glitzier critics group like the Broadcast Critics (Critics Choice) and the Hollywood Foreign Press Association (Golden Globes), moving on to the guilds for each area of expertise (most notably the Directors, Writers, Producers and Screen Actors Guilds, the latter known as the SAG awards), finally culminating in the BAFTAs, or British Academy Awards, which now have a wildly different nominating process, but also foresee shifting trends, like Anthony Hopkins and Frances McDormand winning the leading categories last year. All of those groups now have nominations out, and give us a picture of where the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) might be heading with Oscar.

The only group to give out their awards so far has been the HFP, and the Golden Globe for supporting actor went to the wide eyed, willowy young man most other critics groups singled out – Australian Kodi Smit-McPhee as the awkward aspiring doctor viciously mocked by his new step uncle and the other men on his stepdad’s remote ranch. At 26 Smit-McPhee’s young, but not too young to win a supporting statuette (they like to make men wait for a lead one), and even at that tender age he’s an industry vet, having started work at 10 and graduated to a major literary adaptation (post-apocalyptic drama The Road) at 13. He’s consorted with primates in Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, helmed a new horror classic in Let Me In, and even played an X-Man. He’s as certain as it gets.

This would be the first Oscar nomination for veteran British actor Ciaran Hinds, and as a devotee of his work since his turn as the swoony Captain Wentworth in 1997’s Persuasion, I’m absolutely delighted to see him getting long overdue accolades. You may know him as Aberforth Dumbledore in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, or Wildling leader Mance Rayder in Game of Thrones, just to name a few. After being recognized by all four major precursor awards (BAFTA, Critics Choice, Golden Globes and SAG), he looks to pick up his first Oscar nod as the charming old grandpa in Kenneth Branagh’s semi-autobiographical family story Belfast.

Troy Kotsur hasn’t been nominated for an Oscar either, and like Smit-McPhee and Hinds, he’s an industry veteran, but on a much more subtle scale. He developed a type of sign language for The Mandalorian characters to use, for example. He’s drawn acclaim since CODA won the Sundance Film Festival Audience Award for his fierce, loving fisherman, and is the first deaf actor nominated for a SAG award. After being nominated for all four major precursors, he seems like a lock.

Ben Affleck has done a lot in his four decades in Hollywood. (Yep, that’s right – his first acting credit is from 1981.) Since his career took off with 1997’s Good Will Hunting, he’s sold a lot of tabloids (marrying movie start Jennifer Garner, being engaged to Jennifer Lopez twice, doing various stints in rehab) but he’s also achieved a great deal more than being a largely reviled Batman or punchline Gigli; he’s won Oscars for writing and producing, he directed Argo to a Best Picture win, and he’s made some pretty darn good movies. What he hasn’t done – unlike bestie childhood Matt Damon and younger brother Casey – is be nominated for his acting. That may all change tomorrow.

Like Kotsur’s, Affleck’s tiny movie was filmed in Cape Ann, Massachusetts; that’s my beach, and my grungy old downtown serving as the background for his cool and wacky uncle to impress the main character in this nostalgic semi-memoir. The Tender Bar hasn’t drawn as much attention as CODA, but Affleck is its standout. He’s picked up both a Golden Globe and a SAG nod, which puts him in decent stead for that first big acting Oscar nod.

So here’s the big question. How much does AMPAS like The Power of the Dog (alternatively titled Toxic Masculinity: The Western)? Because BAFTA – which failed to nominate almost anyone who’s under consideration in Hollywood – likes Jesse Plemmons, the polite, more genteel ranch owner George just trying to keep the peace between his new wife and his possessive brother, reaching out for happiness but trying to keep a lid on so many simmering tensions. Plemmons, like Smit-McPhee and like his wife Kirsten Dunst, is one of the rare actors to make a successful transition from child star to working adult – without ever being the glamorous matinee idol his wife was. Instead his path from The Mighty through She’s All That, from Daredevil to Fargo has been solid and respectable. It would be his first nomination.

Maybe I’ve been burned too many times of late by ignoring the BAFTAs, but I think they’re right in saying the man has a shot. If the Academy likes his movie as much as their British counterparts do (and the two groups do have a large overlap) then his less bombastic work could follow the coattails of his flashier costars. I think so in part because Being the Ricardos – which could bring love to Oscar winner J.K. Simmons as the acerbic but insightful lush William Frawley playing Lucy Ricardo’s neighbor Fred – doesn’t seem to have found the traction I might have liked, and also because the work that won Simmons his Oscar in Whiplash was so harrowing and transcendent, I’m not sure this variation of his usual schtick can compare to the memory.

Or, who knows, maybe they’ll love Belfast, which fared so well on the film festival circuit, and double up on nominees from there, bringing in Critics Choice nominee Jamie Dornan. Granted, he’s young and exceptionally handsome, which definitely counts against him with AMPAS, but he shines as Branagh’s idealistic father. (Why, why is this movie not available for me to see somewhere? I’d risk a theater for this, now that Omicron is finally mellowing out. It looks amazing.) I can ask the same question about BAFTA nominee Mike Faist, who plays Riff in West Side Story (another movie Omicron made it too difficult for me to see in theaters, which also isn’t streaming), SAG nominees Bradley Cooper as yet another memorable 1970s eccentric in Licorice Pizza, and an entirely unrecognizable Jared Leto in House of Gucci – how much do you like those movie, AMPAS voters? That’s the real question here, and we’ll be able to answer it when the nominations come out; it might even give us a new Best Picture frontrunner. Again, only Cooper and Leto have acting nods in this crew – Cooper 4 as part of his total of 8, and Leto just the 1 – only that one resulted in a win.

I’m asking it again; why can’t I see those movies anywhere? I really want to, damn it.

My Guess: Affleck, Hinds, Katsur, Plemmons, Smit-McPhee

Spoiler: Cooper, Leto

Best Supporting Actress

Consensus Candidates:

Ariana Debose, West Side Story

Caitriona Balfe, Belfast

Likely Contenders:

Kirsten Dunst, The Power of the Dog

Aunjanue Ellis, King Richard

Ruth Negga, Passing

You Can’t Count Out:

Cate Blanchett, Nightmare Alley

Jesse Buckley, The Lost Daughter

Ann Dowd, Mass

Marlee Matlin, CODA

Rita Moreno, West Side Story

Stranger Things Have Happened:

Nina Anandas, Being the Ricardos

Alia Shawcat, Being the Ricardos

Why Haven’t We Heard About:

Meryl Streep, Don’t Look Up

All the shortlists give us Balfe (Branagh’s lovely, worried mother) and Debose (Anita in West Side Story, the role that won Rita Moreno her Oscar). Neither has been nominated for an Oscar before. Balfe’s famous, of course, as the lead in tv’s romantic time travel saga Outlander rather than any film work, while the magnetic, epically talented DeBose – who has to be considered the frontrunner after winning this year’s Golden Globe – is even newer to the movie awards scene. If you know her at all, it’s from Apple +’s comic musical Schmigadoon, or from Broadway’s original Hamilton cast, where she was a featured ensemble member. They should receive their first nods tomorrow morning.

The best bets to join them are slightly less assured. SAG swapped Nightmare Alley‘s glamorous femme fatale Cate Blanchett for King Richard‘s determined mom Aunjanue Ellis, the Critics Choice passed up Passing‘s Ruth Negga for Rita Moreno, double dipping in West Side Story, and BAFTA passed up Kirsten Dunst for The Lost Daughter‘s Jesse Buckley (who essentially splits the lead character with Olivia Colman) and Mass‘s grieving mother Ann Dowd. Otherwise Dunst, Ellis and Negga have three of the four majors each, and a very solid shot at a nomination. If I’ve picked the five nominees correctly, they’ll only have 1 previous nomination between them all – Ruth Negga’s, for Loving. Gerund titles seem to do well for her!

As with the men, the real story will be how much AMPAS likes each movie, since this year the possible candidates haven’t gotten the chance to wine and dine and schmooze with Oscar voters. I’m inclined to write off Jesse Buckley’s nomination because BAFTA just likes her a lot (this is her third nod in 4 years, with no Oscar nods yet), and Moreno because her role is too small (and possibly too nostalgia-dependent) in a movie truly hurt by pandemic box office politics. Matlin, who became the only deaf Oscar winner before SAG gave awards, shines in a rare role that allows her to sign with other deaf actors, and Dowd punches above her celebrity level, but not her talent, entering this conversation for a tiny movie which would have benefited from a streaming platform’s reach. I could see either of them spoiling, but it will be a spoiler – there’s not a lot of basis to predict it on. If there’s real affection for Being the Ricardos, we’ll see it with a nod for Nina Anandas, playing Vivian Vance (playing neighbor Ethel) with heartbreakingly smothered ambition – but if there is, it will be localized in AMPAS, and not the Hollywood community as a whole, since she hasn’t been nominated anywhere else.

My guess: Balfe, DeBose, Dunst, Ellis, Negga

Spoilers: Dowd, Matalin

Best Actor

Consensus Candidates:

Benedict Cumberbatch, The Power of the Dog

Will Smith, King Richard

Denzel Washington, The Tragedy of Macbeth

Likely Contenders:

Javier Bardem, Being the Ricardos

Leonardo DiCaprio, Don’t Look Up

Andrew Garfield, tick, tick, BOOM!

You Can’t Count Out:

Peter Dinklage, Cyrano

Mahershala Ali, Swan Song

Stranger Things Have Happened:

Anthony Ramos, In the Heights

As is usual with lead actress (and sometimes lead actor), we have six top contenders for five slots. Who’ll make it through? Now there’s the question.

Cumberbatch, Garfield, Smith and Washington have all be nominated for the Critics Choice, the Golden Globes and SAG. All four are well respected and have been nominated before – although Garfield (nominated previously in supporting for The Social Network) is a mite younger than AMPAS likes their leading men, and could be vulnerable. Washington, on the other hand, is the most nominated actor of his generation with 8 nods in acting so far (and another as a producer) and wins in both the supporting and lead categories. Joyous multi-hyphenate (and two time nominee) Will Smith is your frontrunner as the driven father of champions Venus and Serena Williams, while brooding, brainy and brawny Benedict Cumberbatch (shockingly nominated only once) helms the best picture frontrunner, mesmerizing as a smart, mean cowboy with a puzzling past and a flair for performative cruelty.

Does AMPAS like the frantic energy of musical tick, tick, BOOM!, soundstage drama Being the Ricardos, or the Coen’s extreme artifice in black and white (but colorblind cast) Macbeth? Stage-y stage adaptations like Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom and One Night in Miami fared poorly last year, with attention given to more naturalistic pieces like Nomadland and Minari – but The Father was a stage adaptation, too. Macbeth and Ricardos are less likely to garner Best Picture nods, and the Best Actor contenders usually match with that field. That could count against those contenders. Three time nominee Bardem has been nominated with less frequency (both this season and in general) than Washington, but AMPAS certainly likes him. His ebullient Desi Arnaz still a good bet, but is it the best?

Which category does classic love story Cyrano fall into, acceptable adaptation or not? I’ve yet to see it, but the trailer feels more like a classic costume drama, and as such more forgivably stage-y; the movie hasn’t been widely seen, but Peter Dinklage has paid his dues and does lots of interesting work. Casting him in this movie – instead of just putting a big prosthetic nose on a handsome actor – grounds his Cyrano de Bergerac in a way we’ve never seen. Dinklage’s closest brush with Oscar previously was for 2003’s The Station Agent. How much longer can an actor of his calibre go without a nomination? He strikes me as the sort of actor who’s just missing the right role, and when he gets it he won’t just be nominated, he’ll win. Costume dramas seem out of fashion these days, though, and I’m afraid this isn’t his year.

Of course, AMPAS also really likes BAFTA nominee Mahershala Ali, to the tune of two Oscars to Bardem’s one. He wouldn’t be as exciting or unusual a choice as Dinklage; unless you count four foot nine inch Linda Hunt, and it doesn’t sound like you should, no little person has ever been nominated for an Oscar. There’s a lot of press in breaking down a barrier, although I’m not sure that motivates most Academy voters. Anyway, Swan Song has been on Apple + for a long time, and I can’t help thinking if it was going to take off, like CODA, it would have already.

And then there’s Leonardo DiCaprio, who’s definitely an enjoyable part of Don’t Look Up‘s massively talented ensemble. He’s been 6 nominated times as an actor, he’s won once, they like him, and he picked up one of the ten Golden Globe slots as well as a BAFTA. Maybe they’ll pick both Bardem and DiCaprio, and it’s the young buck Garfield (despite his previous nomination) that they’re not ready to let over to the big boy’s table. If I trust the numbers, I should keep Garfield. He also ticks the box for auteur no one appreciates, a favorite Oscar type, and like Bardem and Smith gets points for playing a real person. But remember what I said about Oscar going its own way, the way someone you thought was a lock always ends up getting passed over? Maybe this year it’s (the utterly delightful) Andrew Garfield in the trash can.

Yeah, I just talked myself into a new position on this one. Here’s me hoping I’m wrong.

My Guess: Bardem, Cumberbatch, DiCaprio, Smith, Washington

Spoilers: Garfield

Dark Horses: Ali, Dinklage

Best Actress

Consensus Candidates:

Nicole Kidman, Being the Ricardos

Olivia Colman, The Lost Daughter

Lady Gaga, House of Gucci

Likely Contenders:

Jessica Chastain, The Eyes of Tammy Faye

Jennifer Hudson, Respect

Kristen Stewart, Spencer

Rachel Zegler, West Side Story

You Can’t Count Out:

Penelope Cruz, Parallel Mothers

Alaina Haim, Licorice Pizza

Stranger Things Have Happened:

Emilia Jones, CODA

Jennifer Lawrence, Don’t Look Up

Tessa Thompson, Passing

Last year, we had no idea who was going to win best actress. This year, it’s the field of possible nominees that’s unusually flexible. This problem thrills me; usually Oscar struggles to find enough lead roles to field a slate of five nominees. This year, the field puts previous nominees and winners into contention against a group who has yet to be acknowledged. It’ll be fascinating to see if we have a 2004 on our hands, where more establishment candidates like Nicole Kidman were left off the list in favor of fresh new faces.

That said, your surprise frontrunner is actually Nicole Kidman for thinking her way through making I Love Lucy, giving us Lucille Ball’s deeply cerebral creative process amid a veritable flotilla of personal and professional dramas. It’s a really interesting, unusual sort of performance, and definitely not what I thought it was going to be. She’s a safe bet to pick up nomination number five, and maybe win number 2.

Lady Gaga seems likely to pick up her second career nod for playing the villainously ambitious Patricia Gucci; in addition to receiving nominations from the Hollywood Foreign Press, the Broadcast Critics, and SAG, she’s the only previous nominee to score a BAFTA nod.

Kristin Stewart is yet another child actor made good, though with rather infamous bumps along the way. If you had asked me or any other Oscar watcher back in early December, we’d have told you she was a lock for the prize itself for perfectly embodying the people’s princess – and then she didn’t win the Golden Globe, and then she didn’t get nominated by SAG or BAFTA. By all accounts she gives an astonishing performance in a movie no one likes; perhaps dislike of the film, combined with lukewarm feelings towards the actress, has overcome the general love for Princess Diana.

Zegler, the rising star who plays Maria in West Side Story, and is already set to play the lead in the upcoming Disney live action Snow White, won the National Board of Review’s Best Actress prize, the first of the season. She also picked up the Golden Globe Best Actress in a musical or comedy, an award which doesn’t have consistent influence on Oscar nominations but can’t be outright dismissed. Newcomer Alana Haim was one of ten nominees at the Golden Globes and six at the Critics Choice. Will AMPAS like her enough to make a top five, over so many established stars? BAFTA did, over Hudson, Stewart, Kidman, Chastain and even their perpetual favorite Olivia Colman. Even given the oddness of the new BAFTA jury system (which allows a small body to pick most of the nominees, rather than relying on the traditional membership vote) she’s a very real threat.

Newcomer Emilia Jones – the title character of CODA (a Child of Deaf Adults) – managed to score a BAFTA nod after hovering around the edge of the conversation all Oscar season, as did with a more established actress otherwise without Oscar buzz, Tessa Thompson of Passing. Thor’s Valkyrie Thompson has received mild buzz in past years (Dear White People, Creed) but will likely still be waiting for her turn after this year’s announcement, too.

Parallel Mother‘s Penelope Cruz is beloved enough to have three nominations and one win (Vicky Christina Barcelona), and AMPAS adores her frequent collaborator Pedro Almodovar, so she’s not a clear fit for my “previous nominees vs newcomers” binary. She’s unlikely to push through this crowded field, but she can’t be counted out. Oscar winner Jennifer Lawrence, too, is just as unlikely to add a fifth nomination to her life time total, but if there’s overwhelming love for Don’t Look Up (and AMPAS can surprise that way sometimes) it could boost her in. Even Frances McDormand could sneak in if The Tragedy of Macbeth turns out to be Oscars very favorite, but is it remotely likely? Nope.

In all, I think this is going to be a very, very interesting category to watch. This time I’m going conservative, with the SAG slate of previous nominees. We’ll see if that was the way to go.

My Guess: Chastain, Colman, Gaga, Hudson, Kidman

Spoiler: Stewart

Dark Horses: Haim, Zegler

Best Director

Consensus Candidates:

Paul Thomas Anderson, Licorice Pizza

Kenneth Branagh, Belfast

Jane Campion, The Power of the Dog

Steven Spielberg, West Side Story

Denis Villeneuve, Dune

Critic’s Favorite/Left Field Choices:

Ryusuke Hamaguchi, Drive My Car

Stranger Things Have Happened:

Maggie Gyllenhaal, The Lost Daughter

Lin Manuel-Miranda, tick, tick, BOOM!

Adam McKay, Don’t Look Up

Aaron Sorkin, Being the Ricardos

I’m going to tell you straight out: I don’t care that the Globes and the DGA have a consensus on who the top candidates are in direction. The Director’s Branch of the Academy spits in the eye of consensus. Where there is consensus, the Director’s Branch laughs. I have to remind myself that these are not people I know, because it’s quite easy to judge what comes across as a sort of pretentious, hypocritical coolness; give them a slate of folks the industry has decided are clearly the top, and they’ve got to dig under the surface for something more obscure, for someone new (but not so new as to be, say, a Black woman). I don’t think there’s any way that the five directors everyone else has chosen will make it into these too-cool-for-school’s It List. As The Princess Bride‘s Vizini would put it, I can clearly not pick the five directors in front of me.

But just as trying to determine which goblet contained the iocane powder, trying to anticipate the Director’s branch’s capriciousness brings madness. Definitely one and possibly two will fall off. Both Spielberg and Branagh tread new ground for them, but they’re establishment enough to feel vulnerable. Notoriously unfilmable epic Dune is a director’s movie, so that may depend on how much the Directors liked it, but I generally feel like they’ll respect the effort? Campion (who takes about a decade to make each of her finely crafted films) is our frontrunner for now, and her movie is a visual and acting triumph, so … she stays? I think? Anderson is kooky and they like him; he’s not so successful as be threatening, like Spielberg (or even Lin-Manuel Miranda). Hamaguchi, though? He fits into the pattern of Thomas Vinteberg and Bong Joon Ho.

My Guess: Anderson, Branagh, Campion, Hamaguchi, Villeneuve

The Safe Choice: Spielberg, McKay

Spoilers: Gyllenhaal

Dark Horses: literally anyone

Best Picture

Consensus Candidates:

Belfast

CODA

Don’t Look Up

Dune

The Power of the Dog

Likely Contenders:

King Richard

Licorice Pizza

tick, tick, BOOM!

West Side Story

Don’t Count Out:

Being the Ricardos

The French Dispatch

House of Gucci

The Lost Daughter

Nightmare Alley

The Tragedy of Macbeth

Stranger Things Have Happened:

Cyrano

Drive My Car

Encanto

This year’s a little different than recent past years, in that (due to a rules change) we know we’re going to have ten nominees. It’s probably – maybe – a little easier to predict when you know what you’re aiming for.

Ten nominees is a lot to manage, though. If you break it down, only a single movie appears on the BAFTA shortlist, the Golden Globes, the Critics Choice, the Producer’s Guild, the SAG and the AFI Top Ten, and it’s probably not the one you’d expect: I give you (drum roll please) gonzo end times comedy Don’t Look Up. We can safely start our list there.

That’s right, SAG dissed frontrunner The Power of the Dog for its ensemble prize after nominating four actors for individual awards, a peculiar omission. Did they think that was reward enough? AFI left off Belfast, CODA makes every list but BAFTA’s, and sci fi spectacular Dune is (predictably) only missing a SAG ensemble. We can still reasonably put those four on the list.

The next five slots are a bit harder to pin down, but not much. There are ten nominees on the Producers Guild and Golden Globes lists, as well as (obviously) the American Film Institute’s Top Ten. Comparing those brings us to traditional biopic King Richard, wacky memoir Licorice Pizza, musical about making a musical/the life of an unappreciated genius tick, tick, Boom! and that classic of stage and screen, West Side Story.

So what to pick for that tenth slot? All the short lists differ by a film or two, and various films have made up the difference; Cyrano at the Golden Globes where they (like me) love Joe Wright, love stories and costume dramas, star-studded House of Gucci at SAG, Macbeth sneaking in at AFI. It’s Nightmare Alley – the glamorous, star heavy thriller about a carnival medium from Oscar’s favorite weirdo Guillermo Del Toro – that gets that slot from both the Critics Choice and AFI, however, and its broad appeal through cinematography, music, production design, hair, make up and costumes might put it over the edge.

Being the Ricardos started the Producer’s Guild list, and can’t be counted out; Oscar moves a movie about Hollywood, and Hollywood has a love/hate relationship with Aaron Sorkin, so the movie’s in the conversation, but far from a sure thing. What’s more classic than Shakespeare’s Macbeth? Well, maybe the hyper stylized way it was shot, which is either going to thrill or annoy voters. (I landed on the annoyed side, for the record, which may be causing me to underestimate it.) Also treading the line between love and annoyance is Wes Anderson; his French Dispatch hasn’t made any shortlists, so it’s very unlikely to surprise, but that’s what would make it surprising. The murderous House of Gucci was expected to score with both audiences and critics: it may be down the pandemic (and its theaters only release) that it didn’t make more of a splash. The Lost Daughter found its audience with critics on Netflix, but hasn’t galvanized the larger imagination. Is it the name, as with Glenn Close’s astonishing The Wife? Growl.

Even though almost no one in America has seen Drive My Car, it’s been topping a few critics lists, so it can’t be entirely discarded out, especially given the recent track record of foreign (especially Asian) films with Oscar. After all, this has been mostly a story of the numbers, an attempt to see patterns and consensus in a chaotic landscape. In the end, the Academy has a small set of voters, and the heart wants what it wants. What does Oscar’s heart long for? What do enough voters feel passionate enough about to put on top of their weighted ballots? We’ll find out tomorrow.

My Guess: Belfast, CODA, Don’t Look Up, Dune, King Richard, Licorice Pizza, Nightmare Alley, The Power of the Dog, tick, tick, Boom!, West Side Story

Spoilers: Being the Ricardos, The Tragedy of Macbeth

Dark Horses: Drive My Car, The French Dispatch

Other Categories

I’m looking forward to a few other potential nods. Will “Dos Orugitas” give Lin Manuel-Miranda his shot at finally completing that EGOT? If it does, I’ve read it will become the first solely Spanish language song so nominated. Will Flee be nominated in both the feature documentary and animation categories? (Likely other nominees in animated feature include the most buzzed about movie of the moment, Encanto, as well as Luca and The Mitchells vs. the Machines; I’m hoping for Raya and the Last Dragon to make it in, myself.) Will Cruella (a favorite for costumes and hair) receive more nominations than 2021’s only box office hit, Spider Man – No Way Home? Will streamers like CODA, Don’t Look Up, Dune and The Power of the Dog receive more nominations than the movies Hollywood asked viewers to pay for individually like Belfast and West Side Story? I think we all know the answer to that last one.

It’s a New Day: Oscar Predictions, 2021

E: Most years I start this post talking about the glitz and glamor of it all, my anticipation of the speeches and the dresses and the skits and all the trimmings.

This year, I can’t do that. All the award shows up to this point have been Zoom affairs. Though the nominees will be live for the first time, they won’t be sitting together in a packed theater listening to a host attempt to spin jokes at their expense – they’ll be distanced in Union Station, with the performances off site at the Dolby Theater. The producers are hoping to have as much show as possible – but still, this isn’t the year for hobnobbing and schmoozing and a top-of-the-stairs Cinderella moment. This year isn’t about that.

This year (the longest Oscar year ever, with 16 months from the start of 2020 and 14 from the last ceremony) I’ve seen exactly one movie in the theaters, and as luck would have it that was Animated Feature nominee Onward back in February of 2020. Yep, I haven’t been to a movie theater in 14 months, and coming as I do from a family of cinephiles it is surely the first time that’s happened since I graduated from pre-school. Of course this is a small, sad thing to miss among the many things that the COVID 19 pandemic stole from us, but it’s been a big change.

This year, however, has done something else for people like me who love the movies, and that’s been a strange and wonderful gift. This year, I was able to do something I’ve never in all my (many, many) years of tracking Oscar and trying to see all the movies, and wow, I can’t even believe I’m saying it.

This year, I actually saw all the movies.

Yes, I really, really did. Because all we can do is stay home and watch TV, and because people made movies that nobody could go to theaters to watch, almost everything ended up on streaming services. Documentaries. International films. International documentaries. International films that got nominated for songs that played over the end credits. International movies that were nominated for makeup. These are the kind of movies that normally don’t get a run in theaters outside the obligatory eligibility runs in New York and L.A.. In a normal year I do pretty well, and make a priority of the top six categories, but this year I (like a criminal) had the time and the opportunity, and I took advantage of both. I have seen every single one of the 41 full length movies (20 of which only had a single nomination), and also 13 of the 15 shorts. (And hope springs eternal about those two missing animated shorts!)

That’s more exciting for me than you, but where it does affect you is that I have even more opinions than usual. Fair warning!

The 2021 Oscars will be set apart for a few reasons, and after the awkwardness of a hybrid show, and the inability to get butts in theaters, there are a few other issues. First, the lack of butts in theaters is more than just a curiosity: it means that box office is unusually insignificant to this year’s race. Size doesn’t matter. Now, obviously box office and Oscar success are not the same thing, but usually if a movie that’s expected to do well flops in theaters and not just with critics, it makes a difference. But now we’re mostly relying on critics to tell us what’s good or not, or word of mouth/online reviews. Far from the giddy days when a Marvel movie or Lord of the Rings or Star Wars would open with more than 100 million dollars in a weekend, proclaiming our love for those (not usually Oscar-winning) films all over the heavens, only two movies made more than that in the entirety of 2020. Indeed, plenty of films, from likely blockbusters to prestige dramas, have been shelved in hopes of happier returns ahead, which means that Oscar 2021 will see the triumph of “small” films. Historically the Oscars exist to drive box office – but if you have no box office, if there are no stats on who watches what on Hulu or Prime or HBO Max, how do you even know what films found real audiences or flopped? If you’re watching them all on Netflix or buying them on demand, then how big is the difference, really, between Nomadland and Tenet?

And that brings us to the other big issue. Awards seasons are usually characterized by groupthink. Hollywood loves to back a winner, so once the critics awards have brought us the general contenders, the industry awards give us a pretty clear view of what everyone has decided on. This year has been very steady in some cases, but unusually confusing in others. Most years actors work the circuit, with in-person charm campaigns and private screenings with Academy members, interviews and magazine covers and TV interviews. This year? It’s a lot harder to network. Meanwhile, there’s the continuing effects of our reckoning with gender and racial bias. Most awards groups made an effort to enlarge their membership or change up the rules to provide for more representative nominees, to give more scope than the same old same old. Perhaps in part because of that, all the groups that give the so called “pre-cursor” awards had wildly different nomination slates, and in some categories many different winners.

Which is bringing us to a bunch of interesting possible winners. Word to the wise: representation matters (in the absence of money). Hollywood can claim to really care about the underrepresented, to respond to #MeToo, #StopAsianHate, and #OscarsSoWhite. It remains to be seen how lasting a change this is, but when there’s less to lose, it’s easier for them to swing for the fences. To the predictions, then!