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The Academy about to give us back-to-back Best Picture winners that were box office hits, casuals responded well to, cinephiles and critics loved, and were the popular picks by many as their fav of the year.
The Oscars are back baby.
Motherhood is a different beast. Amy Adams stars in NIGHTBITCH. Written and directed by Marielle Heller, based on the best-selling novel by Rachel Yoder. In select theaters this December.
#Nightbitch
Watching the new Lee Daniels (The Deliverance) and Glenn Close truly is always on her A-game. No matter the assignment. No matter the quality of the film.
Comparisons to BABYLON are an insult to that movie. Even right off the bat that movie had its passionate defenders coming out of the screenings.
Everything I'm reading about MEGALOPOLIS makes it sound like this year's arthouse version of MADAME WEB.
Film Twitter needs to remember PAST LIVES now has to beat THE HOLDOVERS which is just as beloved.
BARBIE now has to overcome a bunch of heavyweights, including the Best Picture frontrunner.
All these "Song about to win her Oscar! Barbie wins Adapted!" takes are way too cocky rn
Not only am I now convinced 'Anatomy Of A Fall' is a Top 5 Picture contender, but I think its currently competing against 'Holdovers' and 'Poor Things' for what might be
#2
.
1. Because less showy, less physically transformative, roles tend to not win unless they sweep the industry
2. Lead actor in the Best Picture winner hasn't happened in a decade-plus
3. No, there wasn't a conspiracy against him by pundits/predictors
@ZoeRoseBryant
Same sorta thing happened with De Niro and Thurman. Played lovers in MAD DOG AND GLORY, then played father/daughter in THE WAR WITH GRANDPA
The NFL accounted for 93 out of the top 100 most-watched broadcasts in 2023, via
@Sportico
.
No other sport besides football made the list.
There’s dominant, then there’s this:
I'm kinda' overwhlemed at *how* dominant EEAAO has been.
I thought it could go all the way, but I thought it would be an underdog type, last second surge path.
I wasn't expecting one of the all-time Picture sweeps in awards circuit history.
We don't even have a
#2
...
- Oppy love all over the board again
- Maestro did better than Film Twitter said it would...again
- Major red flag for Barbie that it missed Best Film. Rare to win without being in the BAFTA 5
- Holdovers is super strong aside from the SAG miss
- Lilly is in *deep* trouble
Ya'll keep underestimating MAESTRO & it keeps getting big nom hauls & a bunch of guild mentions.
Prepare yourselves for a good showing on Tuesday morning. I can see up to 7-8 noms on its best day.
Audiences may be mixed on it, but industry people are loving it as much as I did
@admcrlsn
Never in history has a President come back from approval ratings this bad to win re-election this far out. Its over barring a historic image comeback for a sitting incumbent of the likes never seen. Even Truman had less to come back from (-4 Versus Biden's ~-20)
I wanna see how things look after it opens wide and older voters start screening it, but as someone who was doubtful about how audiences would receive it, POOR THINGS so far has audience scores that are much better than BARBIE and up there with OPPENHEIMER & 'Spiderverse' 👀
RT Audience score dropped from 81% to 75% overnight even after verification. But at an impressive 4.2 on Letterboxd.
That B+ Cinemascore is making sense. Clearly, a movie a certain type of film fan loves, but general audiences seem less over the moon.
- EEAAO has the post 2010s Noms leader curse to overcome
- Banshees/TAR don't strike me as preferential ballot wins
- Fabelmans underperformed with some major guilds, lacks BAFTA love
- Top Gun has missed some key precursors and lacks Acting nom
So *as of today* my answer is:
Ya'll have a week to sway me on what to predict.
My mind keeps flipping back and forth.
I'd argue this may be even harder than Yeoh V Blanchett was to figure out.
The older Oscar pundits are really trying to make 'All Quiet' winning a thing.
Folks a movie with no major guild noms, no Directing/Acting/Editing noms is not going to win Picture.
If you're desperate to find a
#2
, go with one that at least hit most of those.
- Big underperformance from BARBIE but it can still bounce back with a big CCA showing
- Watch out for Anatomy
- Oppy remains movie to beat
- Don't get too comfortable with these Acting race frontrunners just yet. Remember JLC?
These FURIOSA reactions make me think its definitely still in the running to sneak into the Best Picture 10 with the right perfect storm.
Getting vibes of a movie I'll be seeing in a lot of people's personal Top 10s
Best Picture *feels* like there's less room for the final slots than this time last year, no?
Locks:
- Oppy
- Killers
Very Likely:
- Poor Things
- Holdovers
- Barbie
- Probably In:
- Color Purple
- Maestro
- American Fiction
Spots 9 & 10 feel like what's up for grabs
Kinda wild that Emily Blunt has 3 BAFTA Nominations, 5 SAG Nominations including a win, 7 CCA Nominations, 7 Golden Globe nominations, and is just now about to get her first Oscar nomination
I really hope the Harris campaign is aggressive in making sure they get to define Walz before the right does.
The online bubble loves him but the public opinion data on swing voters, and normies I talk to, tell us almost everyone has absolutely no clue who he is. It is
Just a reminder that the last few years a film that wasn't seen as a top-tier contender at this stage of the awards season started to surge when we got to the industry stage of things and finished at least top two (1 won).
This thing still has plenty road left until Oscar night.
I don't watch like almost any TV so I just realized the EEAAO crew is all over the place these past few days on morning and late shows plus magazine/website interviews.
A24 really keeping their foot on the pedal during the voting period 👀
If its the next LOTR it would likely be awarded for the final instalment now that this looks like a trilogy from Denis. So I *highly* doubt this.
That said its kinda' wild with how bad 2024 in film has started we already have our 1st Picture contender of the year.
I know it seems like we're walking into an incredibly predictable Oscars, but more than a few races are still somewhat to really competitive:
- Actress
- Adapted
- Animated Feature
- Animated Short
- Costumes
- Doc Short
- Live Action Short
- Makeup
- Prod Design
- Sound
- VFX
MAESTRO is showing up so much among the industry in these below the line categories that I once again warn folks to stop underestimating its Noms haul potential.
I miss Tom Cruise’s “I’m the biggest movie star in the world so I can do challenging, weird, big-swing stuff” era (1998-2004 approximately). We’re not ready for his late-stage circle back to that time.
Yes, the first major Best Picture player of 2025 is here and it's Dune: Part Two. The first Dune got 10 Oscar nominations. The second one will get more and Austin Butler may earn one of them. My thoughts:
Per
@NextBestPicture
precursor board...
- Farrell still ahead, but Fraser has started to show life
- Yeoh is starting to pull away from Blanchett after a tight start
- Condon leading, but Hsu & Monae aren't too far behind
- Quan could probably beat the ghost of Jimmy Stewart
*A lot* of caveats to go around with this, but I'm 20 anonymous Oscar ballots in and if you were hoping these would paint a brutal picture for EEAAO in Picture, you're going to be a little disappointed...
@NextBestPicture
Literally was going to have the key to Hollywood handed to him by the industry this year.
The biggest franchise going today put all their cards on him being the foundation of their movies the next few years.
There's an uncomfortable story here that some want to ignore or aren't ready to talk about on how a group of white actors pushed for a white actress in a tiny film over two black actresses that got Noms elsewhere.
Andrea Riseborough made Best Actress! Her indie TO LESLIE was barely released, but she relied on a network of famous pals — among them, Edward Norton, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Sarah Paulson — to swarm social media and tout the movie en masse just as voting for the Oscar noms began.
ANORA has won the Palme!
Sean Baker's movies tend to have a ceiling come awards season, so I remain skeptical it makes the Oscar 10, but this might just be the one that proves to be more accessible than his past stuff was.
If you told Dems mid-Summer that they'd only lose 7 House seats, potentially gain a seat in the Senate, and have a net gain Govs, there would have been a full blown party in DNC headquarters and rightfully so
NBC is projecting a 219-216 GOP majority in the House. The GOP went into the election w/ 212 seats. That would mark a single digit, 7 seat gain for the party out of power. I mean that's truly awful - historically speaking.
Can't do a formal review of
#TheColorPurple
.
What I can say is the songs are great, the film has incredible emotion/soulfulness, the ensemble is a powerhouse, & this is a really good "watch with a crowd" movie.
Best musical since IN THE HEIGHTS for me.
Film Twitter: WE DEMAND MORE FROM OUR ANIMATED MOVIES! Here's a click bait article that proves it!
The Real World: Had a blast, awesome experience! No bonus notes.
The difference I've seen in how this movie has been embraced in the real world VS on here continues to astound me.
And all three made the BAFTA 5 Best Film slate.
BUT only Oppy and Poor Things got into DGA.
BUT only Oppy got SAG Ensemble.
The stats are just so heavily in Oppy's favor.
@brianslionsblog
@the_shoe_yes
Bingo. The poli science, the electoral outcomes, and the political environment since 2016 has been perfectly normal versus previous political eras. And that's the scary part, we've had a paradigm shift and the electorate still treats all this like its normal
@DrewSav
Thinking about all those Biden supporting, more socially liberal, suburbanites who ran to the arms of this guy because they were scared by anti-CRT talking points nonsense
We blew him up with a bomb, we hit him with an oxygen destroyer when he was about to take care of Ghidorah, we built a machine that made him look like the bad guy.
I'm surprised he hasn't had it up to here with us yet.
The Good News for Oppy: No clear
#2
emerged today
The Bad News for Oppy: BAFTA/Oscar Picture rarely align
That good news is a big deal though. SAG/PGA weekend is the last ditch effort for the field.
Best Picture vibes check; pre-fall festivals
-
@GoldDerby
user consensus
-
@NextBestPicture
site consensus
-
@withbrotherbro
's Awards Expert app community consensus
Will be interesting to see how these age in the coming months. Lots of agreement at the moment save for a few
My instant Critics Choice reactions:
- 'Avatar' is for real
- 'Elvis' is for real
- 'Babylon' has come back to life
- EEAAO remains strong
- RRR!!!!!!!!!!!!!
- Bassett is in the hunt
- Deadwyler, Hsu, and Monae needed this
- 'The Whale' is just a Fraser thing after all
These stunt crews raised the bar for action 💥 Congratulations to our Outstanding Action Performance by a Stunt Ensemble in a Motion Picture nominees!
#SAGAwards
The obsession by some to try and rehabilitate Polanski's image is one of the most bizzare and disgusting things I've ever witnessed.
From the push to give him an Oscar back in 03 to the victim blaming, nothing will change the fact he will die as and be known as a rapist.
- For those who were playing silly games that MAESTRO could miss in Picture, it just had a solid showing here
- Very concerning that Godzilla missed VFX. I get it, it's BAFTA. But would've felt better for its chances if it got in here.
- May December just took a massive hit
Next up? DGA where Oppy is heavily favored.
After that? BAFTA where Oppy will likely show strength with international voters.
After that? SAG where it could be 1 ensemble win from ending this all together.
After that? PGA where the preferential tests frontrunners
We all knew
#MarioBrosMovie
was gonna make bank this week, so the movie I'll be keeping an eye on box office wise will be
#AIRMovie
. I really hope there's enough room for it to be a hit as well.
THE COLOR PURPLE staying in the Picture race (It never left doubters) is a hit to the "Barbie will win Picture" truthers. This will have a diverse cast that could perhaps win Ensemble and could replace it as the joyous musical crowd pleaser to get behind. Will feel fresh/new too.
The
@NBRfilm
Top Films Of The Year:
- Aftersun
- Avatar: The Way of Water
- The Banshees of Inisherin
- Everything Everywhere All at Once
- The Fabelmans
- Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery
- RRR
- Till
- Top Gun: Maverick (WINNER)
- The Woman King
- Women Talking
Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (directors of 'Everything Everywhere All at Once') will host a screening of
#Oppenheimer
in Los Angeles at the Directors Guild of America (DGA) on December 5, followed by a conversation with Christopher Nolan.
Following up on my previous QT, for all the claims SAG is gonna' love THE COLOR PURPLE there has been 0 evidence any other guild has.
Also, SALTBURN sure seems to be hanging around with all these mentions of late👀