Enough with the Music Biopics!

by Cláudio Alves

What has BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY wrought?!

Over the past five years and across nearly a thousand write-ups for The Film Experiences, you might have denoted my slight distaste for biopics. To be fair, "slight" might be an understatement. I bring this up to admit my bias against these projects, often conventional to a fault and dripping with mercenary intent. But even if you're a fan of them, you must admit there's been a disproportionate influx of these productions in the past few years, especially in the context of dramas about musicians. It's likely a consequence of Bohemian Rhapsody's immense success at the box office and with awards groups, generating a thousand copycats that may not reach the depths of its ignobility but still plateau at a level of miserable mediocrity.

As Timothée Chalamet is hounded by paparazzi on the set of his Bob Dylan biopic, the Bohemian Rhapsody editor announces his directorial debut, and Back to Black spits on the memory of Amy Winehouse in theaters, let's discuss…

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Oscar Trivia: The Beloved Losers Camp gets a new member!

by Nathaniel R

KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON marks a third time for Scorsese to reach a particular Oscar stat

Most die-hard movie fans can tell you who the "all time biggest losers" are in Oscar history though they'll usually cite actors (Peter O'Toole, Glenn Close, etcetera) rather than films. The film list is interesting because usually when Oscar really loves a movie they'll find a way to give it at least one Oscar. Yet sometimes they really love you only on the first ballot but are over you when it comes time to pick winners. In the past ten years this list of "losers" had grown. Please take the term "loser" in good fun as being nominated for tons of Oscars is still a rarity in the grand scheme of Hollywood releases. 

After the jump all of the films with 8 nominations or more that won nothing on Oscar night... 

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Best Picture in Black-and-White: 2022 Edition

by Cláudio Alves

Remember when Bong Joon-ho and NEON did a special re-release of Parasite in black-and-white? Since then, it's been an awards season tradition to imagine what the Academy's Best Picture nominees would look like devoid of color. This exercise is based chiefly on silly fun since there's more to black-and-white cinema than just turning the saturation dials down. However, it sometimes reveals exciting things about the films at hand. Whose cinematography relies the most on chromatic contrast? What picture would survive the best in monochrome, mayhap even excel? Last year, The Power of the Dog proved a silvery revelation, calling to mind midcentury revisionist westerns. Let's see if this batch of nominees includes a similar success…

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Oscar Volley: Oscar's Choice for "Best Cinematography" (and more)

The team is pairing off to discuss each Oscar race. Here's Glenn Dunks and Eric Blume...

ELVIS Cinematography by Mandy Walker OSCAR NOMINATED

GLENN: Hi Eric, let's talk all things camera and light—it's Best Cinematography. Can I just start by asking one big question regarding this particular category. What happened to Top Gun: Maverick here? Claudio Miranda, previous Oscar winner for Life of Pi, was supposed to be our runaway favorite and yet on nomination morning, Lydia Tár claimed one final scalp amid her reign of terror. And a second question, I suppose. Did that Top Gun miss just hand this trophy to All Quiet on the Western Front? As much as I am craving a win for Mandy Walker (for many reasons including how historic it would be), I just can't see anything but the German war movie coming out on top here.

ERIC:  Glenn, two excellent questions.  Let's tackle the first...

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Oscar Volley: Will it be Period Perfection or Fantastical Visions as the winner of "Best Costume Design"?

Team Experience is discussing the various Oscar categories. Here's Chris James and Juan Carlos Ojano discussing Costume Design.

CARLOS: Hi, Chris! I would like to confess that I am terrified to talk about this category. For the last few years, I have just made my picks without actually articulating specific reasons. Maybe I don't have the necessary vocabulary or real-life knowledge in costuming or maybe because I'm still working on veering away from my preconceived notion of "Best" as "Most" or "Prettiest". But that fear also makes this exciting, and to do this with you - huzzah!

All right. Let's get down to business. What do we have here? Two Best Picture nominees, two Best Picture-adjacent films, and a lone nominee from a favourite designer in this category. In the expanded ballot era, a time where a lot of the categories have gone (or in some cases, defaulted) to Best Picture nominees alone, this category has demonstrated a level of independence. Out of the past thirteen winners, seven were non-Best Picture nominees (that's 54%, more than half!). So if you're predicting the winner, stats aren't necessarily helpful...

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