You will never guess what this post is about
"Don't think twice, it's alright" -Timothée Chalamet
“Neel, you never post anything besides Oscars nonsense. Post something heartfelt. Something real. Something that might make us laugh. Make us cry. Make us think. Not more awards season predictions.”
No.
The Oscar nominations are out tomorrow morning at 8:30 ET, and like clockwork a few hours ago I heard this moribund blog calling out to me like a fading wisps of a memory. Like the Green Goblin mask taunting a hapless Norman Osborn, imploring him to give in to temptation and embrace his fate.
To be fair, I am midway through my first year of graduate school and do have some responsibilities that (if can you believe it) supersede those I have to my loyal, albeit disheartened and potentially quite exasperated readership. Hardly an excuse to say that my mind is filled with little but New Keynesian business cycle models, expected utility functions, and the two-stage least squares estimator, but that’s life!
So, Oscars. When Bowen Yang and Rachel Sennott get up on stage tomorrow, how many times will they say the words “Emilia Pérez” (too many) and “Challengers” (too few)? Will the expertly crafted smear campaign alleging AI-abetted production (gasp!) against Brady Corbet’s magisterial The Brutalist – now truly the Best Picture frontrunner – bite? (Not at the nominations, at least.)
More seriously, does anyone care about all this anymore, when I myself am struggling to? I don’t think it’s controversial to declare that 2024 was a weak year for cinema, with many heavily anticipated films not quite hitting the heights that I expected of them (Furiosa, sadly, and Robert Eggers’ Nosferatu as well, at least for me) and some missing the mark entirely (ahem, Gladiator II). Perhaps some of the weakness of the year’s offerings are a relic of production delays downstream of the 2023 writers’ strike; perhaps it is just randomness.
Or perhaps I am off the mark, and this feeling is idiosyncratic to me. On my end it was a year of dislocation and transition, with all of the spiritual and emotional upheaval that entails, such that I was not always in the right place to be embracing the magic of the movies.1 It was almost amazing to observe how wildly different my responses to art became as my circumstances changed – how things that had once left me cold began to resonate, and that which once filled me with wonder did little for me on a second glance. It was a year that taught me just how centrally important subjectivity is when it comes to art, and thus a year that made this whole enterprise of declaring what the “best” is look rather farcical. Who am I to judge if for some confounding reason Emilia Pérez is speaking to awards bodies’ voters?
My favorite film of the year was Alice Rohrwacher’s La Chimera, about a lost soul who is torn between spiritual fulfillment and material well-being, all while nursing profound grief that haunts him like a ghost and prevents him from moving forward in any serious way. (It features Isabella Rossellini’s best performance of the year, which is not the one she will receive a nomination for.) It will get zero nominations tomorrow. In years past this would have bothered me. In this one it almost delights me. Here is something that is mine, untarnished by the spotlight and discourse that follows around any awards contender. Just mine.
Farcical as this all might be, duty calls. Let’s take a look at the shape of the race in the eight major categories at the Academy Awards™.
Best Picture
Anora
The Brutalist
A Complete Unknown
Conclave
Dune: Part Two
Emilia Pérez
Nickel Boys
A Real Pain
Sing Sing
Wicked
Dark Horses: The Substance, September 5, All We Imagine as Light
If Only: Challengers
In the spirit of embracing the triviality of all this, I have allowed personal favorites to creep into predictions more than in past years. If things go right, great! If not, oh well. The movies that missed out are still magnificent. This is true in my above predictions with Sing Sing and Nickel Boys, two of the most wonderful and artistically daring films of the year. I think only one of these two will get in (probably Sing Sing, which is the more traditional of the two), with the other replaced by one of September 5 or The Substance. If it’s the latter I wouldn’t be upset; what a world we are in where a viscerally disgusting body horror film snags a Best Picture nomination! A Real Pain is the only another contender that is “on the bubble”; the rest are settled in place.
PS: I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the two films I noted are the ones on the chopping block.
Best Director
Jacques Audiard (Emilia Pérez)
Sean Baker (Anora)
Edward Berger (Conclave)
Brady Corbet (The Brutalist)
Coralie Fargeat (The Substance)
Dark Horses: James Mangold (A Complete Unknown), RaMell Ross (Nickel Boys), Payal Kapadia (All We Imagine as Light)
If Only: Denis Villeneuve (Dune: Part Two)
Audiard, Baker, Berger, and Corbet have run the gamut of nominations at relevant precursors, and are certain to be nominated. This leaves one spot open. The Directors Guild of America gave it to Mangold, whose work in A Complete Unknown is typically competent, though far from revolutionary. The Academy tends to be a bit more international (well, European, at least) than the DGA, and especially in recent years has reserved a spot for a non-American auteur. That’s why my money’s on Fargeat here.
As an aside, how strange it is that perhaps the best crafted movie of the year, and one which is certain to receive a Best Picture nomination, has absolutely no chance here. Poor Denis.
Best Actress
Cynthia Erivo (Wicked)
Karla Sofía Gascón (Emilia Pérez)
Mikey Madison (Anora)
Demi Moore (The Substance)
Fernanda Torres (I’m Still Here)
Dark Horses: Marianne Jean-Baptiste (Hard Truths), Pamela Anderson (The Last Showgirl), Angelina Jolie (Maria)
If Only: Lily Rose-Depp (Nosferatu)
Again, this is a game of the fifth spot. Erivo, Gascón, Madison, and Moore are settled. Of my listed dark horse contenders the strongest is Marianne Jean-Baptiste, who snagged a BAFTA nomination recently for her work in Mike Leigh’s long awaited return to cinema, though Pamela Anderson’s redemption arc narrative also has a bit of traction (SAG thought so, anyway). But do not doubt the sheer force of will of the Brazilian stans for Fernanda Torres and I’m Still Here (Brazil’s submission for Best International Feature and a likely nominee there), whose enthusiasm led to Torres taking home a Golden Globe a few weeks ago.
Best Actor
Adrien Brody (The Brutalist)
Timothée Chalamet (A Complete Unknown)
Daniel Craig (Queer)
Colman Domingo (Sing Sing)
Ralph Fiennes (Conclave)
Dark Horses: Sebastian Stan (The Apprentice), Jesse Eisenberg (A Real Pain)
If Only: Josh O’Connor (La Chimera)
Would you look at that: another race-for-fifth. And this is between just two serious contenders: Sebastian Stan and Daniel Craig. I give the edge to the latter, both because I prefer the performance and because I somehow can’t see the Academy wanting to touch the issue of the 45th/47th President with a ten-foot pole. Or at least, not so directly.
By the way: JOSH O’CONNOR LEARNED ITALIAN FOR LA CHIMERA.
Best Supporting Actress
Ariana Grande (Wicked)
Felicity Jones (The Brutalist)
Jamie Lee Curtis (The Last Showgirl)
Isabella Rossellini (Conclave)
Zoe Saldana (Emilia Pérez)
Dark Horses: Monica Barbaro (A Complete Unknown), Danielle Deadwyler (The Piano Lesson), Selena Gomez (Emilia Pérez), Margaret Qualley (The Substance)
If Only: Adria Arjona (Hit Man)
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Anything could happen here. The only fixed points are Grande and Saldana (the latter being almost certain to win come March 2nd). There are worlds where any permutation of the remaining three I’ve listed and the four dark horse contenders make it. Word on the street is that backroom shenanigans and extremely effective campaigning seems likely to get Jamie Lee Curtis back in this category after winning (abominably) two years ago. I’m betting on strength for The Brutalist, which is why Jones is in. And Isabella Rossellini is awesome. Very scientific process, as always.
Best Supporting Actor
Yura Borisov (Anora)
Kieran Culkin (A Real Pain)
Clarence Maclin (Sing Sing)
Edward Norton (A Complete Unknown)
Guy Pearce (The Brutalist)
Dark Horses: Jeremy Strong (The Apprentice), Denzel Washington (Gladiator II), Stanley Tucci (Conclave), Jonathan Bailey (Wicked)
If Only: Josh O’Connor (Challengers)
Maclin’s spot is the only one up for debate. He commands the screen in Sing Sing, playing a version of himself with a ferocity and rawness that is almost painful to watch in its authenticity; he is the film’s magic. It would be sad, but not surprising for the Academy to penalize him for playing himself, when many of the other contenders (including and especially the presumptive winner Culkin) are doing the exact same. I can see Jeremy Strong getting in instead, but I once again wonder whether the Trump of it all will dim people’s vigor for The Apprentice.
Best Adapted Screenplay
A Complete Unknown
Conclave
Emilia Pérez
Nickel Boys
Sing Sing
Dark Horses: Wicked, Dune: Part Two
If Only: The Bikeriders
And another heart over head, largely because I can’t decide which of Sing Sing and Nickel Boys is going to lose out to Wicked. Probably the latter, given its general lack of momentum in the awards season. Perchance to dream.
Best Original Screenplay
Anora
The Brutalist
Challengers
A Real Pain
The Substance
Dark Horses: Hard Truths, September 5, All We Imagine as Light
If Only: Juror #2
Almost sealed up, the Challengers spot notwithstanding. Original Screenplay has in the past been the category where the Academy deigns to nominate and reward interesting (read: edgier) films that don’t quite clear the bar for other categories, which is why I think Challengers may have a shot here even while it has been locked out of all other major categories. Fingers crossed! The movie is wall-to-wall entertainment.
A longer post for another day, perhaps… famous last words