Review: "Nightmare Alley" only in theaters

by Matt St Clair

Nightmare Alley, Guillermo del Toro’s anticipated follow-up to The Shape of Water, is quite a risk for the Oscar-winning auteur. Del Toro ditches the phantasmic monsters he’s known for in favor of human monstrosity, the beasts within all of us that drive our carnal needs. As with the original 1947 noir, Nightmare Alley is an exemplary exercise on the folly of man and what happens when the line between man and beast becomes blurred. 

The main anti-hero who toes that line is Stan Carlisle (Bradley Cooper), a carny with a knack for manipulating people. His subjects include fellow carny and eventual love interest/accomplice Molly Cahill (Rooney Mara), Paul Krumbein (David Strathairn) and his fortune teller wife Zeena (Toni Collette), and a wealthy fearsome widower Ezra Grindle (Richard Jenkins). Cooper's piercing eyes and bewildering smile make him a perfect casting fit for the manipulative con man. He is a man of few words which is just as well; the words when they come are lies and deceit. It is in Cooper’s expressive face where we see Stan’s constant fear of his troubled past resurfacing...

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Will black-and-white dominate Best Cinematography?

by Cláudio Alves

I don't know about you, but I love how démodé film styles are slowly making a comeback. Black-and-white cinematography and Academy aspect ratio, for instance, have become something of a fad. I'd love for it to persist until the techniques go beyond boutique indie distributors and prestige awards bait, returning, at long last, to the forefront of mainstream moviemaking. Sure, it's a bit of a pipe dream, but one can hope. At the very least, AMPAS is enamored by the trend. Their last Best Cinematography winner, Mank, was in silvery monochrome and, for the past three years, there's been at least one black-and-white film nominated in the category. Considering the prominent contenders of the season, this year will surely prolong the tendency.

Indeed, we might even have a majority of black-and-white movies in the Best Cinematography lineup. Don't believe it? Check this out… 

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Oscar Predictions: Who will compete for Costume Design and Cinematography?

by Nathaniel R

"Cyrano" with Peter Dinklage was a hit Off Broadway. Will this musical version transfer well to the screen?

By now you've gotten a sense from the predictions for most of the craft categories which films we think Oscar voters might be fond of come January when they're voting on nominations. Now let's talk more in depth about two of our favourite races to keep eagle eyes on each year: Costumes and Cinematography.

BEST COSTUME DESIGN
Of Oscar's four favourite living costume designers --  Sandy Powell (15 nominations and 3 wins), Colleen Atwood (12/4), Jenny Beavan (10/2), Milena Canonero (9/4), and Jenny Beavan (10/2) -- only Colleen Atwood is sitting out this cinematic year...

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93rd Academy Awards: Black-and-White edition

by Cláudio Alves

Despite some semi-shocking results in the major categories, this year's Oscars were relatively surprise-free. Sure, the Best Original Song choice was unexpected, but there are very few precursors for that particular category, leaving it always a bit up in the air. Only one "below the line" or "technical" category managed to shock me. That was the Cinematography race. While David Fincher's Mank had nabbed the ASC prize, I assumed Nomadland would get an easy win on Oscar night. After all, it swept the critics' prizes, won the BAFTA the production went into the ceremony as the Best Picture frontrunner. Nomadland even won that last one. Nevertheless, Joshua James Richards' poetic landscapes were ignored in favor of Erik Messerschmidt's silvery monochrome for Mank...

The conclusion to this specific race is even crazier when one considers that the Fincher flick was Messerschmidt's first feature. That being said, Mank's in black-and-white, making it part of a trend to (over?)reward grayscale cinema at the Oscars. If you want to win a Cinematography Oscar, don't forget to drain the color out of your picture. Would Nomadland have won if it had been shot in black-and-white? Last year, I explored how AMPAS has been infatuated with monochrome cinematography, going so far as to nominate such a hostile, complicated art film as The Lighthouse. Furthermore, because Parasite was re-released in black-and-white, I also made a photo collection examining how each Best Picture nominee would look in glorious black-and-white. Inspired by those past write-ups, here's a collection of screenshots from the other Best Picture nominees, four of which were defeated by Mank in this category...

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Westerns and the Best Cinematography Oscar

by Cláudio Alves

With News of the World nominated for the Best Cinematography Oscar, I started thinking about the relationship between the western and this particular craft and awards category. My relationship with the intrinsically American genre hasn't always been one of admiration, and for years I counted it among my least liked genres. However, some historical research and the watching of many fascinating classics made me reappreciate the possibilities of the western. I gained a new respect for its importance. The wondrous feats of cinematography had a lot to do with it… 

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