It’s the New Year, and that means we’re getting into awards ceremony.
The big date, as always, is Oscars night - this year, falling on February 24th. Nominations haven’t been announced yet (that’s on January 22nd) and we’ll get a better picture once we know what’s won other awards such as the big prizes at the Golden Globes. But already the field is shaping up nicely, and we can start guessing what films we’ll be talking about a lot in February.
What follows is not an exhaustive list - there’ll be plenty of other films and performances in contention (the likes of Melissa McCarthy in Can You Ever Forgive Me?, Nicole Kidman in Destroyer, Robert Redford in Old Man & The Gun, or John C Reilly / Steve Coogan in Stan & Ollie). There’s also the newcomers and outside bets that could gain traction - keep an eye on young Elsie Fisher from high school drama Eighth Grade.
However, there’s a few films likely to feature across multiple categories, a few of which will almost certainly take home multiple awards. Here’s a couple of them...
The Favourite
Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos’ films have perhaps been a tad eccentric for Academy voters in the past - as delightfully dark as Dogtooth, The Lobster and Killing of a Sacred Deer are, they definitely lack mainstream appeal. That’s set to change with The Favourite (out today in Ireland). While this is still as darkly comic and distinctive as the rest of his work, it looks set for more widespread success. That’s in large part down to the Olivia Colman, Rachel Weisz and Emma Stone - all three actresses have secured Golden Globe nominations for their work here.
Colman is the one to really keep an eye on: the Peep Show star and soon-to-be star of season three of Netflix’s The Queen has received widespread acclaim as Anne, Queen of Great Britain here. She’s long been considered one of the UK’s best actresses across TV & film, and this could well be her time to take home an Oscar.
A Star Is Born
A clear, comfortable favourite across various categories. Bradley Cooper is surely a shoo-in for best director and probably actor nominations, while Lady Gaga is among the likely best actress contenders (not bad for a first leading role). It’d prove a popular choice for the top award, with the film having already proven to be a bit of a cultural phenomenon. At the very least, Best Original Song has to go to Shallow, right?
Green Book
Green Book is an ‘Oscars film’ through and through. Based on a true story, The Washington Post describes the film as focusing on an Italian-American “who learns about tolerance while driving an African American piano player from concert to concert across the South”. I mean, in the past you could probably hand the film the statue right now. Whether it can compete in a crowded field is an entirely different matter, and the Academy has surprised us a few times in recent years. Definitely among the favourites, but perhaps not as much so as it would once have been.
It does have the advantage of winning the People’s Choice award at the Toronto Film Festival - often considered a likely sign of Oscar success to come...
Roma
Roma has all the ingredients of an Oscar success - an acclaimed director; a stunningly-realised period setting; a brilliant lead performance; breathtaking black & white cinematography; a wildly enthusiastic critical reception. The only problem? It’s a foreign language film - which, sadly, remains something of an obstacle to Academy success.
It’s a clear favourite in the foreign language category and could well secure a Best Film nomination… but, as deserving as it, it’s something of a dark horse for the top prize. Stranger things have happened, mind, and it’s still among the obvious favourites for a Best Director prize. If Roma does win anything major, it'd be a major success story for Netflix as the streaming giant has so far struggled to gain much awards traction with their original productions.
Black Panther
A Marvel superhero film in contention for Best Picture?! Don’t rule it out. Whether it can possibly win against more traditional Oscar fare is an open question, but Black Panther's massive box office success and cultural significance in the US could well secure it a nomination at the very least. If the Academy hadn’t swiftly abandoned its much-maligned plans for a ‘popular film’ category, this would have been the runaway favourite there.
Vice
Prolific comedy director Adam McKay surprised many with his 2015 comedy-drama about the economic crash, The Big Short. It only took home one Oscar in the end, but it scored a confident five nominations. Vice - a biopic of former US vice president Dick Cheney - has received a more muted, mixed reaction from critics so that has perhaps limited its awards potential. But it received Golden Globe nominations in the top categories, and the Academy always loves Christian Bale going through a radical physical transformation for a role.
If Beale Street Could Talk
Barry Jenkins’ Moonlight pulled off the Oscars upset of the decade when his gorgeous, understated romance Moonlight won Best Picture (despite La La Land initially being announced as the winner in the live TV disaster to end all live TV disasters). Can his follow-up sweep the awards? An unlikely prospect at this stage despite the film’s enthusiastic reception, but could prove another welcome upset.
BlacKkKlansman
It's been some time since a Spike Lee joint enjoyed the sort of profile BlacKkKlansman received - the searing comedy-biopic about a black policeman who poses as a member of the Ku Klux Klan as part of an undercover operation. But Lee’s film is his most accessible in a while, without losing the righteous fury that has made so many of his films cult classics. It’s a film that also clearly flags the story’s parallels with modern America, and that cultural relevance might just give this an edge in a crowded, competitive field.
Bohemian Rhapsody
A true box office phenomenon, the Queen biopic is exactly the sort of film the Academy falls far even if the critics have been less kind than the audience. Rami Malek is a safe bed for a nomination for his take on Freddie Mercury. Some behind the scenes drama, however, meant credited director Bryan Singer left the production before filming finished - something likely to damage the filmmaker’s chances at a nomination (his replacement, Dexter Fletcher, didn’t receive a director credit as per directors guild rules).
Mary Poppins Returns
The long-in-the-making Mary Poppins sequel hasn’t quite been the critical darling that others on this list have been. Still, it’s a lively, colourful musical (always a favourite among Academy voters) and directed by veteran awards nominee Rob Marshall. Emily Blunt is also likely to receive a nomination for her sterling work as the eponymous nanny, while Lin Manuel Miranda could also see himself donning a tuxedo for a night in February thanks to this film.
First Man
This is another strange one - a film that by all accounts should have been a fairly confident favourite. But despite a reasonably warm reception, it hasn’t picked up much traction in the early awards season (and not just because of the bizarre controversy over the American flag in the moon landing sequence). Claire Foy is perhaps the film’s best chance of picking up one of the major awards, but after that it might be in the more ‘technical’ categories such as original score and cinematography that this has the best chance of success.
