We've delivered the hot takeaways, mourned the snubs, but now let's get positive. I polled Team Experience about what made them happiest this morning and which category is the best overall. I hope you'll chime in. An unexpected consensus emerged straightaway in their answers. More after the jump...
Which nomination made you happiest?
Tim: Kubo and the Two Strings for Best Visual Effects. It's a great movie that deserves as much as it can possibly get, and also a good reminder to keep our conceptions about what "counts" as film craft as broad as possible
Laurence: Kubo and the Two Strings for Visual Effects. After the Ex Machina win I got the sense that branch was becoming more interested in awarding outside the box effects, so I bet on this nomination happening early. It's stunning work even by Laika standards...
Steven: I was ecstatic to see Kubo cross the animation hurdle and nab a nomination for Best Visual Effects. I have said it before, but the most impressive visual effect I saw this year was the scene where Kubo calls upon the autumn leaves to build a ship. It's intricately, immaculately rendered. The whole film is mesmerizing and I'm so happy for Kubo's effects team. I don't expect or need it to win, the nomination is achievement enough.
Mica LeviManuel: Mica Levi's Best Score nomination. While Jackie clearly didn't connect with the Academy (either for its prickliness, its chilliness, or its Actressyness), I was so happy to see Levi's dizzying compositions getting the recognition they deserve.
David: I squealed at my desk when Mica Levi opened up the Original Score nominees. Fear that that famously insular branch wouldn't go for such a dissonant, bold score was all too real, but it turned out to just be the cream of a very diverse crop of almost entirely new nominees. (And Thomas Newman.)
Matthew: Cue the Whitney! In the months leading up to these nominations, I foolishly allowed myself to get nervous about the Foreign-Language chances of Maren Ade's glorious Toni Erdmann, which I worried might be too weird and unruly for most tastes. But then I remembered that this same body of voters sprung for Dogtooth not too long ago and I rightfully calmed down. Like Yorgos Lanthimos' breakthrough oddity, Toni Erdmann represents an utterly singular cinematic vision whose rapturous reception from those not named George Miller continues to please and surprise.
John: Delighted to see the writers branch assert its routine and often unmatched intelligence with 20th Century Women and The Lobster nominated, and an "Umm no," to Tom Ford's garbage script.
Dancin Dan: 20th Century Women in Best Original Screenplay. I'm so glad the film didn't walk away empty-handed, and this is a good place to honor Mike Mills's warm, thoughtful, beautiful film. The fact that it makes up for Beginners's snub in this category is just icing on the cake.
Nick: The Editing nomination for Moonlight. This is the kind of superb, risky, art-driven editing that doesn't always get recognized, but it's a huge part of what makes the movie work so well. And seeing the first-ever black female nominee in contention here is totally fabulous.
Deborah: Costumes for La La Land. Those costumes were perfection, they told a story and set a tone, and it is so rare for costumes to get nominated outside the realm of period piece of scifi/fantasy.
Glenn: Tanna for Best Foreign Language Film. It's not only the first every nomination in this category for my home country of Australia, but it's a great and unique film to boot. Asia Pacific cinema is so routinely forgotten by the world at large that seeing the spotlight put on this beautiful film set and filmed in Vanuatu is even more special than its historic nature. If more people now seek it out, then it's all worth it.
What's the best category with no weak link nominees?
John: As ever, Best Actress, even considering Bening's heartbreaking snub. I would've nominated Amy Adams over Emma Stone, but I'm fine with her sitting this one out, and Meryl deserves this nom more than for Into the Woods or The Iron Lady. Ruth Negga is a surprising yet completely satisfying addition.
Matthew: It's hard to look at that Best Actress roster and not feel infinitely frustrated about all the brilliant women who didn't make it into this final five, including Bening the Great, obviously, but also those who hardly had a shot, like Sonia Braga, Sandra Hüller, Kate Beckinsale, and, even farther afield, someone like Dheepan's Kalieaswari Srinivasan, whose film had hardly anyone in its corner. I would say there are definitely some sizable gaps in quality between the amazing work done by Huppert (unreal) and Negga (splendid) and the very good if not quite exemplary star turns of Portman, Streep, and Stone, in that order. On the whole, however, this is a worthy and way above-average field of performers, each of whom worked hard on behalf of films that were either risky propositions (Elle, Jackie, La La Land) or not quite risky enough (Florence, Loving, and also, in a way, La La Land). It's impossible to imagine each of these finished products without the engrossing woman at its center and that, in itself, is an achievement worth lauding.
Glenn: The writing branch yet again came through, as did the visual effects and editing voters. The best, however, is Best Cinematography. Lifting the group 5/5 from the guild awards, there isn't a weak one in the bunch. Not only that, Greig Fraser and Bradford Young (only the second black nominee ever) finally broke through with their first nominations after film after film of deserving work.
Dancin Dan: Cinematography, for the second year in a row, has a diverse set of films in terms of genre and style that represents absolutely the best of cinema today. Yes we can quibble with some of the people left out (my heart weeps for Jackie's Stephane Fontaine), but there's no denying that each of these five films is beautifully and uniquely shot.
David: Hands down, Cinematography - what an absolutely gorgeous bunch of movies. It's also shows such a wide range of approaches to the craft, from the sensual blues of Moonlight and the humble reserve of Silence to the colourful splash of La La Land and the bold graphical imagination of Arrival. (And Lion, which I must admit I haven't seen but I hear it's great so it gets a pass.)
Laurence: Perennial nominee Thomas Newman aside - rolling my eyes at that one as much as I am Meryl's - Best Score is a pretty terrific set of nominees.
Lynn: Gotta go with Supporting Actor. All worthy nominees, though admittedly a bit of category fraud w/ Patel. But he's so good in Lion.
Steven: Easily Best Original Screenplay, in which the nominations are richly diverse in story, style, and setting. It's nice to see truly original work be rewarded in this category, that can sometimes be swallowed up but best-picture also-rans.
Manuel: Viola's wounded dignity; Naomie's histrionic mothering; Nicole's warm tenderness; Octavia's quippy efficiency; Michelle's bottled grief. I have to say I am in love with the Supporting Actress lineup, which is just beautiful and a wonderful cross-section of characters and performance styles.
Tim: Visual Effects. Deepwater Horizon, Doctor Strange, and The Jungle Book all managed to actively surprise me with the grandeur and physicality of their effects work, which I've long since assumed would never happen again, and outside of Zombie Peter Cushing, there's not a missed step in either of the others.
Your turn, dear reader. What Oscar development this morning made you smile from ear to ear?