It was my #1 at the end of the year (and still is after seeing a bunch of films I missed) but I thought it might at least get nods for sound or score.
Annihilation really needed to be seen in the theater with a decent sound system for all its impact to come across. I wonder how many of the voting members even saw it, and saw it on the big screen.
I saw Never Look Away during TIFF and while it is well-made and kept my interest despite almost 3 hr run time, I'm surprised to see it get the Best Foreign Language Picture nom, plus Cinematography. Or maybe not surprised. It is a very old-fashioned Oscar baity type film, a love story set in the background of several decades of historical turbulence in Germany, in the vein of The English Patient or Dr. Zhivago. MUCH more conventional film than Lee Chang Dong's Burning for sure (which I was kinda rooting for to get nominated, although not at the expense of Shoplifters, probably my #2 film of the year.)
Foreign-language films are always a toss-up but I generally trust the final five since there's a curated shortlist and one has to have seen all of the shortlist to vote on nominations. Although these days I'm not sure how that is enforced.
I haven't seen
Burning
yet but I've heard great things. The 3-hour running time made me say "Hell no!" to
Never Look Away
until I heard it was by the guy who did
The Lives of Others.
And the cinematography is by Caleb Deschanel who has been nominated before multiple times but never won, so I think that's at play there.
Now hearing Sam Elliot saying "Do you have to use so many cuss words?" in my head, which is cracking me up
Just saw Can You Ever Forgive Me, and it was so great! Among other things, it's so New York.
Spider-Verse fucking killed it at last night's Annie Awards, winning in all seven categories it was nominated. If it doesn't win at the Oscars, something is terribly wrong.
(Also, I'm thrilled for the Netflix show Hilda, which won in all three categories it was nominated).
Spider-Verse fucking killed it at last night's Annie Awards
I need to see that again. And harass my brother for not seeing it yet.
AMC theaters are doing a limited re-release of Black Panther with no admission fee for Black History Month.
