Nom Reactions Pt 1: Brilliant Acting, Good Surprises, Underperformers & "Snubs"

As is our habit we polled the team here plus some friends of the site about their Oscar nomination reactions and wanted to share those little blurbs with you! Would LOVE to hear you answer the same questions in the comments. Here's the first set of questions. 

Andrea Riseborough in "To Leslie"

1. Fav Acting Nomination?
2. What Shocked You the Most on Oscar Nom Morning (in a Gleeful Way?
3. Share your 'Ode to a Snub' 
4. Any Theories as to why ______ underperformed?

Would LOVE to hear you answer the same questions in the comments. But first here are our answers...

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ICYMI - Best Picture "Split Decisions"

The "Split Decision" series was created by the Team here because we realized nobody ever fully agrees on any movie; That's part of their fascination and the fun of awards season (if you keep it civil of course... which the internet tends to struggle with). The series will return soon with the final episodes on Top Gun Maverick and Women Talking but if you're just rejoining us we've already covered the other eight Best Picture nominees so we'd love for you to join the conversations on All Quiet on the Western Front (on Netflix), Avatar (in theaters), Banshees of Inisherin (in theaters and on HBOMax) Elvis (on HBOMax)  Everything Everywhere All At Once (on Showtime and rentable), The Fabelmans (in theaters & rentable), TÁR (rentable) and Triangle of Sadness (rentable).

When we started the series we didn't know what would be Best Picture nominated so we also discussed Babylon and The Whale. How far do you suppose they were from the Academy's top 10 vote getters? Or was something else vying for 11th?  Should we do the Split Decisions series again in the future? We'd love to hear your input. 

Split Decision: "The Banshees of Inisherin"

Team Experience is pairing up to debate the merits of each of the big awards season movies this year. Here’s Abe Friedtanzer & Eric Blume on one of the Oscar frontrunners...

ERIC:  Abe, here we are again with another split decision.  But unlike our discussion about The Whale, which you loved and I didn't, we're swapping sides for The Banshees of Inisherin.  I absolutely loved this film.  I'd go as far as to say it's close to a masterpiece.  It's a piercing and painful meditation on loneliness, a heartbreaking and lyrical stare in the face at death.  Martin McDonagh is tackling The Big Themes with ferocity and honesty, and I was deeply moved.  But let's start with why you didn't care for the film...

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Oscar Volley: Beyond the locks, Best Picture is hard to predict

Team Experience is discussing each Oscar category in the lead up to the nominations. Here's Nathaniel Rogers, Cláudio Alves and Nick Taylor to talk Best Picture...

EDITORS - NOTE. THIS DISCUSSION WAS HELD OVER A TWO+ WEEK STRETCH WHERE A LOT OF THINGS HAPPENED. SO THINGS SHIFT WHILE WE'RE TALKING...

 NATHANIEL: Hello teammates. I thought I'd throw you a little unexpected curveball in our last volley. Rather than starting with frontrunners or longshots, let's talk philosophies of selection for a brief moment. When the AFI selects their list annually (depressingly reading like Oscar predictions) the guiding principle is. film that are "culturally and artistically representative of this year’s most significant achievements in the art of the moving image. When the Library of Congress does their annual retroactive National Film Registry list they choose based on "cultural, historic or aesthetic importance to preserve the nation’s film heritage."

That cultural / aesthetic double-side strikes me a LOT like the very first year of the Oscars when there were two separate Best Picture categories " Outstanding Picture (which went to Wings) and Unique and Artistic Picture (which went to Sunrise) .If we want to get really reductive about it -- which we should so that this conversation doesn't go 10,000 words -- it also strikes me a lot like Commerce vs. ART which has always been the tension of Hollywood itself and by extension, the Oscars…

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Team Experience Predictions Chart - Round 4 - Post Holidays, Pre Awards Shows

We're polling the Team Film Experience on where the Oscar race stands. This week Best Picture, Director, and the Acting and Writing categories.

It has been over a month since we’ve checked in on the directing, acting and writing categories. Since then, Avatar has soared at the box office, Babylon has flopped and both the Golden Globes and Critics Choice Awards have announced their nominations. Some categories look completely different than they did at the end of November. Others, funny enough, remain the same. One category has a contender who is unanimously on the top of everyone’s predictions… and it’s not the one you think. 

Check out our predictions after the jump…

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