Oscar Volley: Best Original Screenplay is the Battle of the Auteurs

In this Oscar Volley, Eric Blume and Cláudio Alves discuss the Best Original Screenplay race…

HARD TRUTHS, Mike Leigh

ERIC BLUME: Hi Cláudio, I put us together on this one because I love arguing with you.  Hope that's okay.  Plus, I am curious to get your takes on some of these films and scripts.

Best Original Screenplay has a lot of strong contenders this year.  What I find particularly interesting is that eight of these feature scripts written by their directors - Seed of the Sacred Fig, A Real Pain, The Substance, September 5, Anora, The Brutalist, All We Imagine as Light, and Hard Truths.  That has to be some kind of record? 

CLÁUDIO ALVES: With the growing connection between the big European film festivals and the awards season, auteur cinema is on the rise as an Oscar gold magnet. And many of those selections favor director-forward productions, often where the folks in the director's chair also penned the script. Indeed, from the octet you mention, only A Real Pain and Hard Truths premiered outside Cannes or Venice. And with Mike Leigh's latest, it wasn't for a lack of trying on his part…

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The Oscar Shortlists for the 97th Academy Awards

by Nathaniel R

EMILIA PÉREZ © Shanna Besson

Today the Academy released the shortlists for the 10 categories that use this system, wherein a large number of eligible movies or narrowed down to a more manageable size for the voters in those categories. You can be sure we will be updating the Oscar charts as a result (and you'll find we already have for the other categories!) The lists are usually revealing, fun, disappointing, surprising, and energizing in roughly equal measure. This year though they skipped the "surprising" factor altogether, unless you count the variety in Best Original Score. Emilia Perez led the pack with six citations, but that wasn't surprising since the Spanish language trans cartel drama musical was eligible in most of the categories whereas most of its best picture competitors were not.  

Okay let's look at what they selected in each of those categories...

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Weekend Awards Wrap-Up: Regional Critics Groups Galore

by Cláudio Alves

Adrien Brody is on his way to his second Oscar nomination. Maybe his second victory.

When those critics honors start coming, a trickle quickly turns into a tsunami. There's so much to go over, but here's the general state of the race. Best Picture is a mess, with at least four contenders nabbing multiple top prizes this past week. Still, Anora and The Brutalist lead the pack. Adrien Brody and Mikey Madison are the critical frontrunners of their respective races, but Colman Domingo and Marianne Jean-Baptiste are trailing closely behind. Kieran Culkin is sweeping the Supporting Actor awards (even though he's a co-lead), but it's not a Da'Vine Joy Randolph-style sweep. After all, Maclin, Borisov, Pearce, and Washington have all won something. In Supporting Actress, chaos reigns…

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The Costume Designers Guild loves themselves some Witches

by Cláudio Alves

Paul Tazewell is dancing through the season, toward an Oscar win for WICKED.

PGA this, DGA that, SAG whatever. The most important guild in my heart is the Costume Designers Guild (CDG), formed by those great artists who clothe our movie stars and style the pictures we love so dearly. This year, they're feeling especially witchy with their nominations, somehow bestowing three nominations on Agatha All Along and two for the Dune universe and the formidable Bene Gesserit sisterhood. And, of course, there's Wicked with its aesthetically opposite duo – green does go well with pink. I imagine Paul Tazewell is about to win his first Academy Award for the blockbuster musical, this CDG nod and likely victory a stepping stone on his path to Oscar gold. 

But enough about magical women. Let's assess the complete CDG nominations…

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"Conclave" and "Wicked" Lead with Critics Choice Nods

by Nathaniel R

The Critics Choice, hot on the tail of the Golden Globe nominations, have weighed in on the cinematic year choosing the Pope-selection thriller Conclave and the first half of Wicked based on both the Broadway phenomenon and the lengthier best seller that inspired it as the "most" awards worthy title. They each amassed 11 nominations. [Full disclosure: I remain a member but trust that my ballots are not generally reflected in the consensus which always feel -- at least to me -- closer to Oscar predictions than passion ballots.]

BEST PICTURE... 

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