Oscar Volley: Biopic Breakout or Heartfelt Comeback in "Best Actor"?

Team Experience has been teaming up to discuss the various Oscar races. Here's Christopher James, Abe Friedtanzer and Nathaniel R...

CHRIS: It's been a while since Best Actor was the most exciting and unpredictable race of the evening. Heading into last weekend, it was truly a three man race between Austin Butler (Elvis), Brendan Fraser (The Whale) and Colin Farrell (The Banshees of Inisherin). Now that both BAFTA and SAG have made like Brendan Gleeson and passed over Farrell, I sadly feel like he has dropped out of contention for the win. Of the nominated five, he was my personal vote. He knows how to dramatize Pádraic's hurt, while also finding the comedy in his tragedy. With just the crinkle of an eyebrow, he communicates such emotional vulnerability, a level to which we don't often see men rewarded for showing.

The race is now a photo finish with BAFTA/Globes winner Austin Butler and SAG/Critics Choice winner Brendan Fraser. This mirrors the 2011 Best Actress showdown, where Meryl Streep (The Iron Lady) had both BAFTA and Golden Globes wins and Viola Davis (The Help) took home SAG and Critics Choice prizes. In the end, Streep won, which is hopeful for Butler. However, the SAG/Critics Choice combo was a successful path to victory for Jessica Chastain (The Eyes of Tammy Faye) last year, so Fraser is certainly not out of the running...

Click to read more ...

Film Bitch Awards - Best Actor (and more)

by Nathaniel R

Though all of us have our differences of opinion with Oscar, but sometimes the stars align and we get an Oscar lineup we adore. I'm quite fond of Oscar's Best Actor list this year (have you voted today?) to the extent that my own ballot is 80% similar. That happens about once a decade (the last time was 2016). The one difference is my inclusion of Franz Rogowski, one of Europe's greatest actors, for the Austrian prison drama Great Freedom. It was an Oscar finalist last Oscar season in Best International Feature but wasn't nominated and then got a small US theatrical release in 2022. So while the film is now "old" (haha) it's been impossible to shake for over a year now. Thanks in large part to Rogowski's work. He outdoes himself with this portrait of a man so implacably committed to his own desires that you begin to wonder where the prison walls truly are. In short: he sells that alarming challenge of an ending.

Click on over to the awards to see the reasoning behind the rest of the ballot and the list of finalists and semi-finalists  which includes a lot of performance that Oscar would not have deigned to look twice at. It was a strong year for rising actors but Oscar generally likes their contenders already famous and well into their leading man years.

As a bonus, the "Best Actor in a Limited Role or Cameo" is also posted for your pleasure or scorn depending on your feelings for these performances. This time there's an actual Oscar nominee present since Judd Hirsch took a spot in Supporting Actor with the Academy. Love that for him as he packs such a punch in his two scenes. The other honorees are Tyler Merritt, David Lynch, Louis-do de Lencquesaing, and Julian Glover.

BAFTA goes its own way and shakes up the race

by Cláudio Alves

After it earned 14 out of 15 possible nominations, we should have known that All Quiet on the Western Front was a major threat as far as the BAFTAs were concerned. And yet, this seemed like The Banshees of Inisherin's time to shine. Well, the British Academy has announced their victors, and though they loved Martin McDonagh's latest, it couldn't defeat Edward Berger's Netflix juggernaut. The German Oscar submission won seven awards, including Best Film and Director. Banshees had to settle for four prizes, the same number of wins Elvis amassed. Beyond those three, no other title managed to take home more than one statuette, not even the the Oscar frontrunner Everything Everywhere All At Once.

But what does it all mean? Let's assess after the jump…

Click to read more ...

Nom Reactions Pt 2: Lovely Craft, Headscratching Honors, Default Diane, and Sexiest Shortlist

We polled the team plus some friends of the site about their Oscar nomination reactions and wanted to share those little blurbs with you! (Here's the first four of eight questions if you missed those). Today's questions are...

1. What was your favourite non-acting nomination?
2. Which nomination was the biggest headscratcher?
3. Can anything be done about Diane Warren?
4. The sexiest category is ______

Our answers are after the jump and yours go in the comments...

Click to read more ...

Split Decision: Elvis

Team Experience has been pairing up to debate the merits of each big awards season movie. Here's episode 11 with Chris James and Glenn Dunks duking it out over Elvis. The series resumes will resume for a few final episodes after the nominations.

CHRIS: Well, well, well, Glenn. We meet again. Excited to talk about Elvis with you. Previously, I was a sourpuss about the cinematic excesses of Babylon. While I have mixed thoughts on Elvis, I think the excesses of this movie are more in service of the film and its titular subject. I went with a few friends to the Chinese Theater in Hollywood to watch it on opening night and had a blast reacting both with and at the movie. As a friend said to me, "maximalism is meant to provoke a response, even laughter." At the very least, Elvis is an enjoyable watch.

It's always good to see a movie for adults become a box office success, especially in the post-pandemic era...

Click to read more ...