Revisiting "Spotlight" on Netflix

Please welcome new contributor Juan Carlos Ojano

As the 88th Oscars neared its conclusion, the anticipation for the Best Picture winner was high: The Revenant had previously won the DGA and three Oscars including Directing, The Big Short had momentum, the PGA win, and an Oscar for Adapted Screenplay, and Spotlight had previously won SAG and on the big night Original Screenplay. Meanwhile, the critics had rallied behind Mad Max: Fury Road and it just kept winning Oscars that night. But ultimately, it was Spotlight that prevailed, winning the top prize. With the film now streaming on Netflix, it's worth a revisit...

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10th Anniversary: The Kids Are All Right

by Deborah Lipp

In the second year of Oscar’s expanded, ten-nominee slate for Best Picture, the change proved its worth. The occassion was the nomination of The Kids are All Right, a film of such perfection that there can be no doubt of its worthiness, yet who could have imagined its inclusion? In 2010, we definitely weren’t ready for a queer picture to win, and ten years later, it seems like we’re still not ready for a female-centric film to win. But inclusion is victory, and anyone who watched The Kids are All Right solely because it was nominated was also a winner.

The Kids are All Right is an intimate and human movie. Everything and everyone here has skin that is fully lived-in, fully human, and perfectly, adorably messy...

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Ten Best Picture Nominees Again!

by Nathaniel R

Ah... the annual tweaking of the rules is upon us again. The Academy has been frantically trying to keep up with societal changes and has made quite a few strides with their gender parity and racial diversity inititiatives over the past handful of years. We've also seen Best Picture winners that would have seemed impossible ten years before like Moonlight (2016) and Parasite (2019). The Academy is continuing with their diversity initiatives over the next five years which you can read about here  we won't attempt to summarize it as it's definitely in the planning rather than implementing stages. But a lot of it sounds really smart like unconscious bias training and screenings and discussions and industry-focused inititatives (as we've long said, the Academy can only vote on the films that Hollywood actually makes!). 

Nevertheless there are two concrete pieces of news we must discuss...

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In defense of "The Artist"

by Cláudio Alves

For Oscar obsessives, it's no news that to win big at the Academy Awards can be a curse rather than a blessing. The reigning champions are more discussed and overtly scrutinized than the defeated, their triumph like sweet nectar, attracting the bees of discontentment, resentment, and retroactive bashing. The tides of time can also make an atypical choice seem like a perfunctory one. Notice how some of our strangest Oscar champions of recent vintage have gained the fame of being boring winners when they're anything but. You might not like The Shape of Water, for instance, but a love story between a mute woman and a fish-man is not your run of the mill Best Picture winner.

The same can be said about The Artist, a romantic tale with comedic overtones that, in 2012, became the first silent film to win the Oscars' top honor since 1928…

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April Foolish Predix Pt 4: Best Picture Contenders?

We'll finish up our April Foolish' work with the acting categories this week but for now all the other pieces of the prophetic (or not) puzzle are in place. You can see it all at the Prediction Index. We're usually about half right about Best Picture this early on but... which half? And of course this year is wildly different. It's the only time we've ever had a nationwide movie theater shutdown. Georgia plans to reopen movie theaters this month (medical experts think any such reopenings of crowd venues are premature) but most States aren't eager to risk it just yet.

About the current crisis and the Oscars....

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