My first Oscar predictions!

[dws1982]

Because this thread seems most active right now, the Virtual Cinema at Lincoln Center has some tickets for virtual rentals for Minari available. These have been sold out. Tickets are $12, you buy them for a specific day between today and next Thursday, and you have a viewing window that evening to watch the film. It's how I watched Nomadland last night.

[Reza]

A great review of Let Them All Talk. This is the kind of movie I’m happy the pandemic has allowed to shine.

A nomination and win for Candice Bergen would really make my day.

[Reza]

- Pinocchio
I'll believe it when I see it. The longer window helps it. Does anyone... like... want a new Pinocchio? I don't.

Very true, but then I never wanted to see another version of A Star is Born, and that went on to rake in nominations

[Big Magilla]

How many Trumpers are in the Academy really?

Not many. That wasn't my point which was that after his departure it would a good middle finger goodbye to him.

[Sabin]

Big Magilla wrote
The trailers for these two films are very strong. Pinocchio reminds me of Pan's Labyrinth. The Mauritanian, like Minari, is the kind of film Trumpers will thumb their noses at, which means conversely that they are the kinds of film Hollywood's liberal contingent will be happy to throw their support behind. With no real frontrunner, The Mauritanian is the kind of film that could pull off a Million Dollar Baby - Hurt Locker type win.

- The Mauritanian
Look, you saw Million Dollar Baby coming when nobody else did. It just sounds like the kind of movie everybody always gets their hopes up about and never ends up liking.

- Pinocchio
I'll believe it when I see it. The longer window helps it. Does anyone... like... want a new Pinocchio? I don't.

How many Trumpers are in the Academy really?

[Big Magilla]

I think Magilla is off about Pinocchio. It won't factor in.

The Mauritanian's best shot is a longer window for viewership to help it get in, but my gut tells me it will be a non-factor.

The trailers for these two films are very strong. Pinocchio reminds me of Pan's Labyrinth. The Mauritanian, like Minari, is the kind of film Trumpers will thumb their noses at, which means conversely that they are the kinds of film Hollywood's liberal contingent will be happy to throw their support behind. With no real frontrunner, The Mauritanian is the kind of film that could pull off a Million Dollar Baby - Hurt Locker type win.

[Sabin]

mlrg wrote
Tenet should be considered for Razzies, not Oscars

Haven't seen it, so I can't weigh in. Since The Dark Knight, Christopher Nolan's four movies always figure into the Oscar race save for The Dark Knight Rises (0) and there is curious overlap between all of the down-ballot nominations. They all mostly get the same nominations.

Best Original Score:
Best Cinematography:
Best Film Editing:
Best Production Design:
Best Sound Mixing:
Best Sound Editing:
Best Visual Effects:


- The Dark Knight was ineligible for Best Original Score but picked up Supporting Actor and Makeup (8)
- Inception was curiously omitted for Film Editing but picked up Picture and Screenplay (8)
- Interstellar did fairly weak by his standards and missed noms for Cinematography and Film Editing (5)
- Dunkirk missed Visual Effects but picked up Picture and Director (8).

Clearly, Tenet's reception was closer to Interstellar but in a weak year, I could see it picked up nominations for all of these categories giving it a grand total of seven nominations without a Best Picture nomination. This would make it the first movie to hit seven nominations without Best Picture since the lineup was expanded and the most without Best Picture since Dreamgirls.

That said, simply getting in the running for this many nominations, clearly puts Tenet in the running for Best Picture in some capacity.

[flipp525]

A great review of Let Them All Talk. This is the kind of movie I’m happy the pandemic has allowed to shine.

Though it may strike some as claustrophobic and compartmentalized, “Let Them All Talk” speaks to and is somewhat representative of the current era we are living in, which finds us sandwiched between a global pandemic and political mayhem, and has left most of us feeling suffocated and closed off from the world, each other, and even ourselves. Along with Spike Lee’s severely underrated “Da 5 Bloods,” this is one of the best films of the year, and one of the best films Meryl Streep has been a part of in over a decade, maybe more.

Streep’s performance as Alice Hughes, an affected and effected celebrated author at the cusp of true physical and metaphysical transcendence, is sublimely subtle, reflective, and moving, though never pandering, Alice is the kind of woman who would, as she herself admits to her nephew toward the end of the film, spend her time “polishing the vase when the house is falling down.” This is a quietly heartbreaking turn by Streep and already ranks as a favorite of mine.

Dianne Wiest and Candace Bergen are equally brilliant as her estranged friends, the former comforting and contemplative, the latter spiteful and vengeful. Bergen illuminates the pain, regret, and flaws of her character, Roberta, with dark wit and sensitivity, reminding us, especially during a scene in which her character desperately attempts to capitalize on a stolen journal, of the fine line between victim and assailant; humanist and capitalist. She is superb.

Wiest’s Susan is an empathic and generous friend with a withheld truth and opinion of her own, and the actress conveys acres of wisdom with just a glance. During a pivotal moment in the film, she stops the increasingly tense dinner proceedings to point out how far removed and detached from reality we have become: “Do you even know what happened yesterday, when we were out of communication with the world?” she asks. “Elon Musk sent many, many telecom satellites into the sky that look exactly like stars… So now, when humans gaze at the sky, they won’t know if they’re gazing at a star or at a machine, and we, at this table - at this very little table - we are among the last, the very last ever to have seen the actual real, the honest, truthful night sky from the ocean. We saw stars; just stars.” It is a moment that thrusts you into a contemplative state that lingers.

The rest of the cast is excellent, too, as are the production values, and Steven Soderbergh directs this with confidence, subtlety, and grace.

In the end, “Let Them All Talk” is really a sensitive rumination on emergence: the emergence of truth, of the spite and vengeance, of the humanist and capitalist, of the pain and regret, and ultimately, of the life and love in us all.

“It’s impossible for me not to think, ‘What a miracle it is that this universe emerged. What a miracle it is that consciousness emerged,’” declares Streep’s Alice halfway through, and in a perfectly placed flashback, at the end of the film. To paraphrase her character, what a miracle it is that this film, with its totally improvised dialogue and cast of brilliantly sensitive actors baring the truths and experiences of their characters so purely, could reach across time and space and my television screen, and reach into my heart and consciousness. That is a miracle; one that I blissfully welcome during these oppressive and unpredictable times.

[mlrg]

Reza wrote
Off the top of my head:

Da 5 Bloods
Mank
The Mauritanian
Tenet
The Trial of the Chicago 7

I have a feeling Best Picture and editing are not going hand in hand this year.

Magilla or somebody else may come up with more accurate predictions.

No, I think Magilla is off about Pinocchio. It won't factor in.

The Mauritanian's best shot is a longer window for viewership to help it get in, but my gut tells me it will be a non-factor.

I think these are good choices. Nomadland remains the biggest question mark to me. Slow movies rarely get nominated (which is why they lose Best Picture) but if passions are high for it, why not?

Da 5 Bloods, Mank, Tenet, and The Trial of the Chicago 7 are good bets. I think Da 5 Bloods is a terribly edited movie but if Academy voters like it, it's in. I also think Mank is a dull mess, but same. News of the World is edited by William Goldenberg (Argo, Zero Dark Thirty) so I think it should be considered in the running as well.

Tenet should be considered for Razzies, not Oscars

[Sabin]

Reza wrote
Off the top of my head:

Da 5 Bloods
Mank
The Mauritanian
Tenet
The Trial of the Chicago 7

I have a feeling Best Picture and editing are not going hand in hand this year.

Magilla or somebody else may come up with more accurate predictions.

No, I think Magilla is off about Pinocchio. It won't factor in.

The Mauritanian's best shot is a longer window for viewership to help it get in, but my gut tells me it will be a non-factor.

I think these are good choices. Nomadland remains the biggest question mark to me. Slow movies rarely get nominated (which is why they lose Best Picture) but if passions are high for it, why not?

Da 5 Bloods, Mank, Tenet, and The Trial of the Chicago 7 are good bets. I think Da 5 Bloods is a terribly edited movie but if Academy voters like it, it's in. I also think Mank is a dull mess, but same. News of the World is edited by William Goldenberg (Argo, Zero Dark Thirty) so I think it should be considered in the running as well.

[Big Magilla]

I would love to see Candice Bergen nominated for the first time since 1979.

[flipp525]

Best Supporting Actress

There seems to be a late-breaking push for Candice Bergen to be nominated for Let Them All Talk which drops today on HBO Max which no one watches so she's probably not a real threat, which is good because I don't know which of these she would knock out at this point.

I think Candace Bergen is fantastic in Let Them All Talk. Her character, Roberta (who is the inspiration for the main character - named “Rowina” - in Meryl Streep’s character’s most popular, Pulitzer Prize-winning novel) is kind of like if you took the Sandy Dennis role from Another Woman and extended it beyond a cameo. She has some of the best moments in the film, and some of them are just the character having these amazing face-offs with Meryl.

Bergen would be totally deserving of a nomination for this.

[Reza]

Best Picture
Pinocchio has been nominated for 15 David awards including one for the insufferable Benigni. You may be right the film may just slip in. And if so there will be many nods down the line as well.

Best Actor
I don't think Oldman is going to get left off the list. I know Mank is not well liked here but I have a feeling that it's going to do well with the Academy.

Has anyone seen Riz Ahmed's film? I'm going to watch it tonight. Have heard good things about his performance. I think Ahmed and Yeun from Minari will battle it out for the 5th spot with Delroy Lindo just below in 6th.

Best Actress
Yes Mulligan is getting good notices. And let's not rule out Streep in the Soderberg film.

Supporting Actor
If Pinocchio gets good reviews in America then Benigni will get in. Scratch off Strathairn and I would love to see Frank Langella get in for Chicago 7. I actually liked him more than Sacha Baron Cohen, Mark Rylance or Yahya Abdul-Mateen. Tahar Rahim may get in as he's playing the sympathetic and wronged innocent.

Supporting Actress
I forgot about Candice Bergen. If she gets in she will replace the old biddy from Minari. If the one from The Farewell couldn't make it then this one won't either. Foster, in the trailer, seems very strong.

Best Director
I think the five I mention will be the finalists with Spike Lee in the 6th spot.

It appears that diversity is REALLY going to rule at the Oscars this year.

[Reza]

What would be your predictions for Best Film Editing at this juncture?

Off the top of my head:

Da 5 Bloods
Mank
The Mauritanian
Tenet
The Trial of the Chicago 7

I have a feeling Best Picture and editing are not going hand in hand this year.

Magilla or somebody else may come up with more accurate predictions.

[Reza]

I’ve seen Nomadland and David Strathairn is a complete non entity. Full screen time might be under 3 minutes.

I think you or somebody else already mentioned this here before. But I was watching YouTube videos where a number of critics, who had also seen the film, were predicting a nod for Strathairn. If it's just a bit part then you must be right and he won't show up on the list.