ICYMI Year in Review

We'll finish up our Year in Review lists with Nathaniel's Top Ten List (and with it the daily Film Bitch Award Nominations in all Oscar-like and beyond categories) in the next couple of days but until then, please catch up with all the lists we've already made celebrating this amazing film year while the Academy starts filling out their ballots (today's the day). 

Surely you missed one of these lists or forgot to share your favorite on social media (hint hint *shameless* plug plug)

Movie Cats of the Year 
From The Legend of Tarzan's nuzzling pride on to Isabelle Huppert's pussies.

Grief and Letting Go 
Kubo and the Two Strings, Manchester by the Sea and more dealt with losing parents...

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What's your favorite Jane Wyman?

It's Jane Wyman's Centennial.  The actress was born on this day in Missouri in 1917 as Sara Jane Mayfield.

Like many major stars her legacy rests on a period that's only about a decade long -- in Wyman's case the mid 40s through the 50s, or more specifically the Best Picture winner The Lost Weekend (1945) through the Douglas Sirk classic All that Heaven Allows (1955) a period in which she specialized in childlike women and their inverse young widows-- but her career was long, stretching from bit parts in the early 30s through TV stardom in the 80s.

Her greatest hits and Oscar triumphs after the jump. Which is your favorite?

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W Magazine's 2016 Best Performances

Chris here. Have you seen this year's W Magazine "Best Performances" spread yet? Each year the photo collection features Oscar hopefuls and breakouts alike in one massive treat, and this year is as sprawling as ever. Previous years have ranged from the avant garde to the candid, but this year seems to spark inspiration straight from the loins. No seriously, its actually titled "Come Together", winks at gender and self-love, and recalls 90s lesbian chic supermodels on more than one occasion.

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Writers Guild Nominations

Manuel here bringing you the latest guild awards courtesy of the writers in the industry. As with SAG and DGA, what the writers enjoy and choose worthy of a nomination helps those of us intent on predicting the Oscars see what might be in the running not only for the screenplay categories but also what films are gaining steam enough to see the across-the-board support that nets them a Best Picture citation. 

A few caveats, though. Given the Writer's Guild rules, there are a number of high profile screenplays that weren't even in the running for their award and thus their absence should in no way be taken as a slight on their quality or a notch against their potential come Oscar nomination time. As usual, animated fare and foreign language (and foreign-produced) films are the ones least likely to show up here given the eligibility requirements—one must be a member of the WGA in order to be nominated.

Without further ado, find the nominees below with some quick commentary. Scroll further down still if you want to see the TV and New Media categories which were announced back in December.

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Oscar Balloting Begins. What are your top three FYCs?

Tomorrow's the day awards-freaks, January 5th, 2017. Oscar nomination balloting begins. Where the buzz falls now is where the buzz settles. AMPAS branch voters have just 8 days to finalize their ballots (they're due by the 13th). January 14th through 23rd then becomes our awards purgatory and on the 24th when nominations are read we learn who goes to heaven and who is cast out for good, forever doomed to be considered a "snub" to their future fans. Pardon the tortured analogy but the Oscars are our religion!

This past week has been a very strong week for La La Land and Fences with fantastic box office grosses for each as they went wide. The hottest titles from October and November (Manchester, Moonlight, Arrival) can also feel pretty safe about their potential nomination hauls. But there are several titles that are a bit harder to read in terms of possible Oscar love. Those are the titles that expanded too late for a definitive take from the precursors (20th Century Women, Lion, Silence, and Hidden Figures) and their counterparts, the titles that were too "old" (i.e. released before October like Sully, Hell or High Water, Florence Foster Jenkins, Captain Fantastic, Zootopia, Love & Friendship) for precursor season's problematic but blatantly obvious "shiny new toy" syndrome in which everything that's just opened must be prioritized above all else. 

If you had three FYCs and three FYCs to impress on Oscar voters this week, what would they be?