On Sunday, March 27, The 94th Academy Awards will take place at Los Angeles’ Dolby Theater and air on ABC at 8 p.m. E.T. Comedians Regina Hall, Amy Schumer, and Wanda Sykes will host the event.
Pulp Fiction (1994) Oscar nominee Samuel L. Jackson will be the Honorary Lifetime Achievement Award recipient. Expect an homage paid to the 50th anniversary of The Godfather (1972) as well, and (hopefully) an overall return to the constant showing of clips throughout – a regular component curiously done away with at last year’s ceremony.
The following are the 10 Best Picture nominees, listed in order of where they fell on our overall 2021 ranking. Included with each entry: where to stream each movie, impressions, creative and technical standouts, and additional nominations each film will contend for on the night of cinematic overload.
CODA
free to stream on Apple TV+
Whereas 2020’s Sound of Metal, chose a “deaf becomes him” approach, culminating in the wisdom gainer turning his back on his new community in exchange for an unguaranteed surgical solution, the latest Oscar-approved outing to rely heavily on American Sign Language tackles the inverse: a New England family full of hearing-deprived fishes out of water.
Fitting, as the family pack – a father and son fishermen duo, and doting family accountant mother – keep the family business afloat despite their plight, with much reliance on their lone hearing CODA (Emilia Jones, in a breakout leading role) – ‘Child of Deaf Adults’ – as the stalwart interpreter.
However, while their operative exploits face more threats now more than ever, it’s become high time for the high school senior to recognize her natural singing talents can afford her a scholarship out of town. Her family, in turn, must accept that while society may have decided their identities for them, she stands a chance to live a different story – beyond them – for a change.
Emotional containment is not likely. See it with the whole family as a humble reminder as to what makes one in the first place. Also nominated for: Best Adapted Screenplay (Sian Heder) and Best Supporting Actor (Troy Kotsur)
BELFAST
Amazon Prime/On Demand for $5.99
Kenneth Branagh’s intimate, semi-autobiographical love letter to his family that fought to stay together amid the “Troubles” of 1960s Northern Ireland is a beautifully black-and-white, tension-filled yet tears-of-joy producer. Forget just Shakespearean sensibilities, this man knows storytelling.
The 98-minute historical drama is also nominated for: Best Director (Branagh); Best Original Screenplay (Branagh); Best Original Song (“Down to Joy” by Van Morrison); Best Sound (Niv Adiri, Simon Chase, James Mather, Denise Yarde); Best Supporting Actor (Ciarán Hinds); and Best Supporting Actress (Dame Judi Dench)
DRIVE MY CAR
free to stream on HBO Max
Three hours, yet believe the hype: you will be clamoring for more of this golden dialogue-laced, subtitled delight – a thorough study on grief and art as a healing agent – by the time the Covid-set epilogue concludes.
Though not nominated, Toko Miura (as Misaki, the young but skilled company driver hired to chauffeur a recently-widowed stage actor/director) and Masaki Okada (Koshi, said director’s unpredictable leading man, and one-time muse/worshiper/ lover of his deceased screenwriter wife) sit atop the rankings of our supporting actor and supporting actress leaderboards, respectively.
Meanwhile, Hidetoshi Nishijima’s leading performance is not far behind Andrew Garfield’s tick, tick… BOOM! efforts. Like Garfield, Nishijima too plays a renowned creative who needs to relinquish, or rather adjust the grand routine to see the bigger picture and plow ahead with the mission at hand. Also nominated for: Best Adapted Screenplay (Ryûsuke Hamaguchi, Takamasa Oe); Best Director (Hamaguchi); and Best International Film (Japan)
LICORICE PIZZA
Amazon Prime/On Demand for $19.99
Another ‘70s period piece. Another born-showman Hoffman. And another leading reason why we love the movies. This is Paul Thomas Anderson’s Rushmore.
More inviting than any film he’s made, ‘PTA’ still crafts despair-filled characters here, as per usual. The only caveat is: his leads are blinded by their youth enough to find solace in life’s uncertainties – thereby making believers out of their jaded-by-default audiences along the way.
With too little screen time to contend for awards, but too much to be considered a cameo, Bradley Cooper, at one point, arrives as an off-the-rails, damn-near set-intruding recreation of real-life wild man super-producer (and ex-boyfriend of Barbara Streisand), Jon Peters. He charges paths with the leads: an overly confident child actor-turned-waterbed entrepreneur (Cooper Hoffman, son of the late Philip Seymour Hoffman) and his aspiring actress crush (Alana Haim), both of whom were Golden Globe-nominated for their performances in what was their first film.
Also nominated for: Best Director and Original Screenplay (Anderson)
WEST SIDE STORY
free to stream on HBO Max and Disney+
Steven Spielberg and Tony Kushner delivered a remake for the ages that largely remains loyal to the original musical and 1961 film adaptation, with greater emphasis on authentic Afro-Latina casting where applicable.
Like its predecessors, the Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim music and lyrics-retained “Romeo and Juliet” pastiche has also become a starmaker. Live-action Snow White-to-be Rachel Zegler especially delivers the drop-dead goods as Maria for the new generation, as The Messenger first reported in its January profile of the Colombian-American overnight sensation.
Also nominated for: Best Cinematography (Janusz Kaminski); Best Costume Design (Paul Tazewell); Best Director (Spielberg); Best Production Design (Rena DeAngelo, Adam Stockhausen); Best Sound (Brian Chumney, Tod A. Maitland, Shawn Murphy, Andy Nelson, Gary Rydstrom); and Best Supporting Actress (Ariana DeBose)
DON’T LOOK UP
free to stream on Netflix
Hypocrisy, thy name is any type of agenda in the global warming – but really, disaster of all kinds– commentary that mocks more than the side of the aisle it claims to.
Societal lunacy is put on trial by the Adam McKay-elevated comedy starring a crash kingdom of celebrities behind its foremost “go-green” A-lister, Leonardo DiCaprio. He and Jennifer Lawrence play a pair of low-level astronomers who discover a planet-killing meteor headed for Earth. The floodgates subsequently commence with pie-to-the-face satire and stake-to-the-heartbreak.
It’s no Vice, nor is it nice; but it will more than suffice. Also nominated for: Best Film Editing (Hank Corwin); Best Original Score (Nicholas Britell); and Best Original Screenplay (Adam McKay, David Sirota)
KING RICHARD
Amazon Prime/On Demand for $5.99
Will Smith as Tennis stars Serena and Venus Williams’ father? The coveted Best Actor gold statuette is his to lose.
Also nominated for: Best Film Editing (Pamela Martin); Best Original Screenplay (Zach Baylin); Best Original Song (“Be Alive” by Beyoncé); and Best Supporting Actress (Aunjanue Ellis)
DUNE
free to stream on HBO Max
Film buffs will tender it necessary to consume Denis Villeneuve’s (Arrival, Blade Runner 2049) latest sci-fi epic on the big screen. The truth is, everyone can benefit from seeing the adaptation of Frank Herbert’s 1965 novel an additional time, and on a smaller one with subtitle and volume control capabilities.
Tasked with retconning David Lynch’s failed 1984 version, accidentally awakening its cult following in the process, the music – as we’ve frequently mentioned – is simply too good.
If you’re in the market for a $15- $30 ticket to a Hans Zimmer laser show-adjacent concert, by all means, catch it at a multiplex, perhaps even in iMax, while you still have a chance. But if you want to fully understand every aspect of what’s happening, it’ll most assuredly still put the ‘opera’ back in ‘space opera’ from the confines of your living room.
Also nominated for: Best Adapted Screenplay (Eric Roth, Jon Spaihts, Villeneuve); Best Cinematography (Greig Fraser); Best Costume Design (Bob Morgan, Jacqueline West); Film Editing (Joe Walker); Best Makeup/ Hairstyling (Love Larson, Donald Mowat, Eva Von Bahr); Best Original Score (Hans Zimmer); Best Production Design (Zsuzsanna Sipos, Patrice Vermette); Best Sound (Ron Bartlett, Doug Hemphill, Theo Green, Mark A. Mangini, Mac Ruth); and Best Visual Effects (Brian Connor, Paul Lambert, Tristan Myles, Gerd Nefzer)
NIGHTMARE ALLEY
free to stream on HBO Max and Hulu
After taking home Best Picture for 2017’s The Shape of Water, proud oddball filmmaker Guillermo del Toro is back at it – this time with a remake of a 1940s noir. Revolving around a ladder-climbing mentalist played by Bradley Cooper, the film forgoes horror in favor of the psychothriller energy created when revealing the man behind the curtain – him.
The “wonderfully weird world of carnies” exploration eventually delves into demonstrating how World War II posttraumatic stress paved the way for psychic reading entertainment to evolve from sideshow to main event spectacle.
Also nominated for: Best Cinematography (Dan Laustsen); Best Costume Design (Luis Sequeira); and Best Production Design (Tamara Deverell, Shane Vieau)
THE POWER OF THE DOG
free to stream on Netflix
Slow-paced and star-chased, Jane Campion’s (spoilers) considerably dogless western reaffirms Benedict Cumberbatch as a charismatic dramatic lead whose chops haven’t suffered post-boarding the Marvel Express.
Also nominated for: Best Actor (Cumberbatch); Best Adapted Screenplay (Campion); Best Cinematography (Ari Wegner); Best Directing (Campion); Best Film Editing (Peter Sciberras); Best Production Design (Grant Major, Amber Richards); Best Original Score (Jonny Greenwood); Best Sound (Richard Flynn, Robert Mackenzie, Tara Webb); Best Supporting Actor (Jesse Plemons, Kodi-Smit McPhee); and Best Supporting Actress (Kirsten Dunst)
