Evan D. Remember the Oscars? Believe it or not, more than 13 months have passed since Bong Joon-ho and his masterwork cleaned up at the Academy Awards. To some Parasite winning Best Picture is still the last good thing to happen in a since ravaged world. The film year that took place in those intervening months saw theaters closed and many would be awards contenders pushed back. Despite the migration of prestige films to 2021 and beyond, plenty of great films find themselves in contention this year. With nearly every title accessible at home in some form, the 93rd Oscars may be the toughest to prognosticate yet.
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Evan D.For film buffs, Oscar nomination day can be a bit of a roller coaster. Coming on the heels of the frequently wacky Golden Globes there is always a flicker of hope that the Academy will make good choices. Far more often than that though, the nominees are exactly what everyone pessimistically predicted plus a few surprises that are also usually bad.
2020 was no exception as beloved films such as ‘Knives Out’ and ‘Little Women’ underperformed while ‘The Farewell’ and ‘Uncut Gems’ were excluded entirely. Conversely the film that led all others in total nominations was the highly divisive ‘Joker.’ It wasn’t all bad news though, the Documentary branch nominated 4 women and 4 foreign language films in their category and ‘I Lost My Body’ found its way into the animated feature nominees after being snubbed by the Golden Globes. Just like last year, I’m breaking down the nominations in the major categories. If you’re interested in how I did last year, check it out here. Without further ado, the nominees are: Evan D. When Julia Roberts, star of Ben is Back, opened her envelope and announced Green Book, the first emotion to come over me was relief. Sure it was bad, Green Book is problematic in a number of ways, but it could have been worse. At least it wasn’t Bohemian Rhapsody, right? But in the minutes and hours after the Oscars ended, a deep sense of disappointment set in. Not only because the best picture winner was deeply undeserving of that moniker, but because it managed to cast a pall over a night in which the Academy was finally recognizing a diverse, progressive set of films and filmmakers.
Evan D.The Oscar nominees were announced this morning marking the beginning of a month of lobbying and speculation about who will win what. With everything fresh in mind let’s take a look at the big categories (Best Picture, Director and the four acting categories) to see who has the inside track, who surprised with their nomination and who inevitably was left out.
Evan D. Before we dive into ‘The Shape of Water,’ (see what I did there?) I wanted to start with a quick thank you for checking out my film review site! I started this little blog on the urging of a twitter poll, it was overwhelming in support of publishing my movie opinions, no need to check just take my word for it. Anyways, as I put this site together, I spent a lot of time thinking about a good movie to start with. As you can see, I came to the conclusion that there is no better launching pad than the most recent Academy Award winner for best picture. So without further ado:
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