93rd Academy Awards: On the Best Animated Feature nominees

by Tim Brayton

With a day between us and the Oscar nominations announcement, it’s time to start digging into some of the categories that fly under the radar a little bit without the proper love and attention. For now, I’d like to walk you through the five films nominated for Best Animated Feature, ranked in order of how good I think their chances are of winning the big prize...

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Best Picture Nominees - Who's Up? Who's Down?

by Christopher James

Is Nomadland still looking like the clear winner for Best Picture?

Oscar nomination morning changes everything. What it takes to be nominated for an Oscar and win an Oscar are very different. As we enter this new phase for the Oscars, who is best set up for success on April 25th? The eight Best Picture nominees were all the most nominated movies of the year. Mank led with ten nominations. The rest of the nominees all had relatively good days, each earning six nominations except for Promising Young Woman, which received five nominations. Among non-Best Picture nominees, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom led with five nominations and News of the World with four nominations.

With the Oscar mainly coalescing around the eight Best Picture movies, which of them benefitted? Were any movies disappointments, despite a Best Picture nomination? Can anything beat current frontrunner Nomadland?

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Gay Best Friend: Dolly Pelliker in "Silkwood" (1983)

 a series by Christopher James looking at the 'Gay Best Friend' trope 

This is a place for legends only.All roads lead to Cher.

Her second major drama role after Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean the year prior, Cher won accolades and an Oscar nomination for Silkwood. As Dolly Pelliker, Cher brought humanity, warmth and vulnerability to Mike Nichols’ whistleblower drama. On the surface, she reads as the template for the lovesick, sad lesbian lusting after her best friend. However, in stretching herself for the role, Cher brings added dimension to what could’ve been a thin side character...

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Lunchtime Poll: Oscar omissions... the ones that sting?

by Nathaniel R

A lot of people -- including me! -- wanted to see Delroy Lindo nominated

Cláudio will be sounding off on the "almost there" class of 2020 soon but until then, let's get the disappointments out of our system before we concentrate on enjoying the rest of the Oscar race, which has now entered it's second phase. 

Here's to the fallen! Which misses on Oscar nom morning -- our Christmas! -- are the closest things to coals in your stocking? I'll start with the five I (virtually) weep for outside of the acting categories...

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New Oscar Records!

Refresh your screen for updates as this post is in progress. It's always fun to look at new records or trivia after nominations. So let's go! 

 ACTING

• Anthony Hopkins is now the Oldest Best Actor nominee ever at 83 years of age and the first octogenarian ever nominated in leading actor. Previously the oldest nominee record in the category was held by Richard Farnsworth in The Straight Story (1999) who was 78.

• Chadwick Boseman becomes the first black actor to be nominated posthumously.

• Maria Bakalova is the first Bulgarian actor ever nominated.

• Riz Ahmed is the first actor of Pakistani descent to ever be nominated as well as the first Muslim actor nominated in the lead category...

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