Oscar Volley: Best Supporting Actress has a lot of wiggle room

The Oscar Volleys are back! Today, Cláudio Alves and Nathaniel Rogers discuss Best Supporting Actress...

Teyana Taylor is Nathaniel's frontrunner for ONE BATTLE AFTER ANOTHER | © Warner Bros.

CLÁUDIO: It's that time of the year again, the beginning of the awards season proper, and all the punditry that comes with it. So, let's talk predictions. After all, it can't be reviews and festival coverage at The Film Experience all of the time. Because we're actressexuals at heart and lovers of actressing at the edges, it seems appropriate that the first of these volleys would be about Best Supporting Actress.

And let me tell you, having just returned from the London premiere of Wicked: For Good, still reeling from Diane Ladd's death, two thoughts are at the forefront of my mind. Ariana Grande is going to be a force to reckon with this season, as she sinks her teeth into an expanded and, in some ways, deepened version of Glinda. Nevertheless, it's hard to consider her case without thinking about what the late great Ladd was so adamant about fighting - CATEGORY FRAUD…

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"No Other Choice" Deserves its Blue Dragon / Gotham nods!

by Nathaniel R

Byung Hun Lee in "No Other Choice" from CJ ENM / NEON

I had the pleasure of seeing No Other Choice by Park Chan wook shortly before its three well deserved Gotham nominations. I was especially happy to see Lee Byung-hun nominated for Best Lead Performance. I recognize that he has an uphill battle ahead of him for Best Actor Oscar consideration but if it were a merit based contest alone he'd be a shoo-in. At least he's worked in Hollywood regularly so he won't have the 'no one knows them' campaign problem some overseas stars encounter when they do award-worthy performance. Still, we know that the acting branch is quite resistant to Asian actors even when they're in an actual Best Picture powerhouse-- Everything Everywhere All At Once being the miracle exception -- and that's such a pity. The star is truly inspired here with a continuously surprising performance full of physical comedy, emotional undertows, and tonal command.  I can safely guarantee you that far less deserving performances are bound to suck up a lot of oxygen in the forthcoming awards race.

Frankly, I will be furious if No Other Choice isn't (at least) Oscar nominated in Best International Feature Film at the Oscars. No Other Choice won't be a lock but it has a shot...

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Gotham Awards Revue: "The Perfect Neighbor"

by Nick Taylor

Geeta Gandhbir’s The Perfect Neighbor has to be one of the most widely accessible films nominated at this year’s Gotham Awards, premiering only a few weeks ago on Netflix. With a title so banal as to signal immediate dread, the true-crime subject matter made it priority viewing to some even before it received this citation. My own queasiness with the genre kept me from watching it until now, and it's an intriguing object to consider in how it relates to other activist documents. Assembled almost exclusively of footage collected from police bodycams, security cameras, drone footage, news archives, and court tapings, the film chronicles the boiling tensions in an Ocala, Florida neighborhood over two years that culminated in the killing of Ajike Owens by Susan Lorincz on June 2, 2023. It’s an upsetting document of an all-too-familiar American tragedy, streamlined into a more broadly resonant object but possibly verging on exploitative and under-contextualized in the process . . . . 

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Diane Ladd (1935-2025)

by Cláudio Alves

INLAND EMPIRE (2006) David Lynch | © StudioCanal

This past Monday, cinephiles worldwide were met with the news of another painful loss. Diane Ladd died at her home surrounded by loved ones, including her daughter, Laura Dern. She was 89 and leaves behind a remarkable body of work that spans from the 1960s Roger Corman cheapies to the 2020s American indies, a panoply of TV projects dating back to the medium's genesis in the post-war era, a rich legacy on stage, and multiple memoirs. Among actressexuals and awards nuts, she's mostly known for her three Oscar nominated performances in Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore, Wild at Heart, and Rambling Rose, the latter of which made her part of a very exclusive club of mother-daughter duos honored by the Academy. 

Let's take a look back at Ladd's career, enjoy some memories of past glory and even celebrate a couple of deep cuts worthy of attention. After all, there's no better way to honor a beloved artist than to appreciate their art…

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Gotham Awards Revue: "Familiar Touch"

by Nick Taylor

First, let me express how happy I am that, at least from my filmgoing corner, the Gotham nominations have encouraged more people to watch some of their lower-profile selections. The number of folks I’ve seen log Familiar Touch and Lurker and East of Wall on Letterboxd this past week has been extremely heartening. Hell, I never would’ve prioritized Familiar Touch without Nick Davis’s glowing review, I finally got our own Cláudio Alves to watch it last night, and now everyone who’s going to see it after today will obviously have done so because of me, so trust the power of good word-of-mouth reception! If anything I should have had Sarah Friedland’s film on my radar after she won the Someone to Watch award at the most recent Indie Spirits. Oh, and the three prizes the film won in the Orizzonti selection of last year’s Venice Film Festival.  

Friedland’s clearly got a great pedigree even before factoring in the Best Feature and Breakthrough Director nominations from the Gothams. Luckily for those of us who’ve caught up to Familiar Touch, this adulation is fully deserved, and the crafty, intelligent film is proof enough of her talent . . . .

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