Yesterday (9.5) Sasha Stone updated her Best Picture Oscar predictions. Within brackets I’ve placed a boldfaced HE next to the 13 titles I’m especially interested in or enthusiastic about. If you ask me (and what do I know?) I think it’ll come down to Mank, Nomadland, Hillbilly Elegy, Stillwater, The Trial of the Chicago 7 and West Side Story. What am I overlooking?
Tenet is a definite contender, I feel. Maybe, probably. On one hand an emotionally cool Chris Nolan head-trip movie can only travel so far with Academy and guild members, and yet it delivers action scenes that no one’s ever seen before and is quite the conceptual landmark in this sense. Elizabeth Debicki could land a Best Supporting Actress noms…yes, she’s that good. The Playlist‘s Greg Ellwood believes Tenet could land a Best Picture nom by way of industry gratitude. “If Tenet helps usher back moviegoing across the world it’s going to mean something to many members of the Academy,” he writes.
Prime Hotties (an HE designation — Sasha calls them “top tier”):
David Fincher‘s Mank (Netflix) / [HE]
Aaron Sorkin‘s The Trial of the Chicago 7 (Netflix) / [HE]
Paul Greengrass‘s News of the World (Universal) / [HE]
Chloe Zhao‘s Nomadland (Searchlight) / [HE]
Steven Spielberg‘s West Side Story (Fox) / [HE]
Liesl Tommy‘s Respect (MGM)
Joel Coen‘s The Tragedy of Macbeth (A24) / [HE]
Sofia Coppola‘s On the Rocks (A24) / [HE]
George Clooney‘s The Midnight Sky (Netflix)
High Potential, Major Threats, Who Knows? (Sasha calls ’em “high potential”)
Tom McCarthy‘s Stillwater (Focus) / [HE]
Chris Nolan‘s Tenet (WB) / [HE]
Ron Howard‘s Hillbilly Elegy (Netflix) / [HE]
Taika Waititi‘s Next Goal Wins (Searchlight)
Francis Lee‘s Ammonite (Neon)
Michael Showalter‘s The Eyes of Tammy Faye (Searchlight)
Mike Mills‘ C’Mon, C’Mon (A24)
Dune (WB)
Aaron Schneider‘s Greyhound (Apple)
Kevin Macdonald‘s Prisoner 760 (BBC)
George C. Wolfe‘s Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (Netflix) / [HE]
Lila Neugebauer‘s Red, White and Water (A24)
Lee Daniels‘ The United States vs. Billie Holiday (Paramount)
Ryan Murphy‘s The Prom (Netflix) / [HE]
Regina King‘s One Night in Miami (Amazon) / [HE]
Florian Zeller‘s The Father (Sony Pictures Classics)
Wes Anderson‘s The French Dispatch (Searchlight) / [HE]
