This image released by Warner Bros. Pictures shows Ryan Gosling, left, and Margot Robbie in a scene from "Barbie."Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures/The Associated Press
Even with the Emmy Awards and Golden Globes in ratings free-fall, the 96th Academy Awards might mark the Oscars big comeback year.
For the first time in ages, the biggest box-office performers of the year are also leading the Academy’s nominations, with Oppenheimer scoring a massive 13 nods, including Best Picture and Best Director for Christopher Nolan, and Barbie netting eight, including Best Picture (but not, noticeably, Best Director for Greta Gerwig). Perhaps audiences will tune in to an awards show that celebrates films they’ve actually seen.
See full list of Oscar nominations
But while Barbenheimer and several of the other non-portmanteau’d front-runners secured their expected nods Tuesday morning – including Yorgos Lanthimos’s critically adored dark comedy Poor Things, which got 11 nominations, and Bradley Cooper’s ambitious Leonard Bernstein biopic Maestro, which snagged seven nods –there were still a number of surprises that reveal more about the current state of Hollywood than the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences might prefer to admit.
Here are the best, worst and strangest things about the 2024 Oscar nominations.
Bye, Barbie
Is the Academy run by Ken? That is the only excuse that could be offered for snubbing Greta Gerwig in the Best Director category (she still got a nod alongside Noah Baumbach for Best Adapted Screenplay). Simply put: The entire Barbenheimer phenomenon as we know it – you know, the one that single- or perhaps double-handedly saved movie theatres this year – would not exist were it not for the subversive imagination and incomparable wit of Gerwig. Sure, she now has a vast personal fortune and a lifetime pick of future projects as consolation prizes, but some official Academy recognition would be nice, too.
Oscars Not So Male?
Celine Song arrives at the Governors Awards on Tuesday, Jan. 9, 2024, at the Dolby Ballroom in Los Angeles.Chris Pizzello/The Associated Press
Gerwig’s directorial snub aside, the Academy made gender history this year by nominating three movies directed by women for Best Picture: Barbie, Celine Song’s Past Lives, and Justine Triet’s Anatomy of a Fall. That’s a rather depressing precedent to set, but at least it’s something, bringing the all-time number of women-directed Best Picture nominees to a (hardly) whopping 22.
Happy fictional ending
A slightly more under-the-radar bet going into Tuesday, Cord Jefferson’s lit-world satire-meets-rom-com American Fiction managed to snag a whole lotta hardware, including Best Picture. That sound you hear is the folks over at the Toronto International Film Festival celebrating that, once again, the fest’s People’s Choice Award winner turned out to be an Oscars favourite.
The zone of surprisingly strong interest
This image released by A24 shows Sandra Hüller in a scene from "The Zone of Interest."The Associated Press
Jonathan Glazer’s chilling and uncompromising Holocaust drama The Zone of Interest is, by any comparable measure, the finest cinematic achievement of 2023. But it is also a purposefully challenging one, which is why expectations were slightly muted for its chances with the Academy. Yet the Oscars surprised, in the best kind of way, by awarding the film five nominations, including Best Picture and Best Director.
Past Lives lives!
Despite premiering way back in January, 2023, at the Sundance Film Festival – a lifetime ago in the short-term-memory awards-race cycle – Korean-Canadian filmmaker Celine Song’s Past Lives continued to earn awards buzz all through the year, as more and more audiences discovered the romantic drama’s quiet charms. Some especially hopeful pundits are even predicting a Best Picture triumph. And they were right, even if Oscar voters weren’t as in love with the lead performances from Greta Lee and Teo Yoo. (They did, however, toss Song’s feature debut a Best Original Screenplay nod, too.)
BlackBerry blackballed
Matt Johnson's critically acclaimed comedy "BlackBerry"HO/The Canadian Press
This year’s Best Supporting Actor race has been a ridiculously competitive one. So while I won’t dismiss the work of any of the final five fellas up for the award – Sterling K. Brown (American Fiction), Robert De Niro (Killers of the Flower Moon), Robert Downey Jr. (Oppenheimer), Ryan Gosling (Barbie) and Mark Ruffalo (Poor Things) – it is still a crying, screaming shame that Glenn Howerton didn’t make the cut for his tremendous, towering performance as frequently furious tech titan Jim Balsillie in Matt Johnson’s Canadian comedy BlackBerry. And while we’re at it, could the Academy not have tossed Johnson and his writing/producing partner Matthew Miller a Best Adapted Screenplay nod, too? It’s America’s iPhone vs. Canada’s BlackBerry battle all over again.
Willem Dafoe is no longer Mark Ruffalo’s Willem Dafriend
Speaking of the Best Supporting Actor traffic jam: It was always going to be the case that the stacked cast of Poor Things was going to cancel itself out in some form. And so Mark Ruffalo, who plays a caddish lover in the dark comedy, triumphed over his co-star Willem Dafoe, cast as a Dr. Frankenstein-like physician with a heart of rotted gold. Poor thing, indeed.
Do you remember May December?
Going into the awards race, Todd Haynes’s meta-fictional melodrama May December had all the critics swooning, with many predicting all three lead performers would lock up Oscar nominations: Best Actress Natalie Portman, Best Supporting Actress Julianne Moore, and Best Supporting Actor Charles Melton. All went home empty-handed. But that meant they had all the more capacity to carry so many hot dogs.
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Strangers to the Academy
Despite earning near universal acclaim since it debuted on the fall festival circuit, Andrew Haigh’s queer drama All of Us Strangers failed to get any Academy recognition at all, including presumed Best Actor front-runner Andrew Scott (best known to some as the Hot Priest from Fleabag). It’s a history-missed moment, too: If Scott had been in the mix with nominee Colman Domingo (Rustin), it would have marked the first time two openly gay men were nominated in the same category at the same time (for playing any kind of role, not just a queer character).
The Color Purple nearly erased
It has been an up-and-down journey for The Color Purple musical. The sorta-remake broke box-office records when it opened Christmas Day, only to drop off the charts sharply the following week, eventually ending its theatrical run painfully short of its production budget, to say nothing of Oprah-sized expectations. And despite there being enough word-of-mouth for perhaps a few under-the-line awards, only supporting actress Danielle Brooks managed to snag a nomination.
An untold Origin story
Despite a last-minute awards-campaign push featuring everyone from Cher to Ben Affleck to Guillermo del Toro to Frances Fisher (the latter being the actress who was instrumental in helping To Leslie star Andrea Riseborough cross the nominations finish line last year), Ava DuVernay’s challenging race-relations drama Origin failed to earn any Oscar nods.
Director Christopher Nolan's epic biopic Oppenheimer tops all Oscar nominees with 13, while Barbie snags eight.
The Associated Press
Barry Hertz