Golden tickets handed out
Carol tops a widespread field selected by the Hollywood Foreign Press
Though the Golden Globes spread its nominations around, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association swooned hardest for Todd Haynes’ 1950s romance Carol, which landed a leading five nominations including best drama film.
In a widespread f i eld announced Thursday in Beverly Hills, Carol solidified its growing Oscar hopes with nods for its two stars, Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara, and for Haynes’ direction. Also surging was Adam McKay’s finance farce The Big Short, which earned four nominations, including best picture, comedy, and nods for Steve Carell and Christian Bale.
Also with four nods is Alejandro Inarritu’s followup to his Oscar-winning Birdman, the frontier epic The Revenant, which was nominated for best picture, drama, and best actor for Leonardo DiCaprio. A fourtime Oscar nominee (and onetime Globe winner), DiCaprio is gunning for his first Academy Award.
Tied with four is the Aaron Sorkin-scripted Steve Jobs, though it failed to join the best picture nominees. Along with Carol and The Revenant, they are: Mad Max: Fury Road, Room and Spotlight.
Streaming series from Netflix (which led television with nine nods), Amazon and Hulu dominated the TV side of the Globes, which jumped all over the dial. Six shows tied for the most nominations: Fargo, Mr. Robot, Outlander, Transparent, American Crime and Wolf Hall.
In an awards season that has so far failed to produce a definite heavyweight, Tom McCarthy’s acclaimed Boston Globe drama Spotlight came into the Globe nominations as the Oscar favourite. While it took three top Globe nominations Thursday, including best director for McCarthy and best screenplay, its ensemble cast is failing to stand out from the pack.
After the Screen Actors Guild Awards passed over Michael Keaton and Mark Ruffalo Wednesday, the Globes did, too. Ruffalo, however, was nominated for best actor in a comedy for his performance as a bipolar father in Infinitely Polar Bear.
Most of the expected contenders came away with something to show from the Globes, including the scientific space adventure The Martian (including nods for star Matt Damon and director Ridley Scott), David O. Russell’s matriarch portrait Joy (best picture, comedy and best actress Jennifer Lawrence), George Miller’s apocalyptic romp Mad Max: Fury Road (including best director for Miller) and Room, the Emma Donoghue novel adaptation starring Brie Larson (nominated for best actress, drama) as a captive mother.
Left largely on the outside were Steven Spielberg’s Cold War thriller Bridge of Spies, which was nominated only for Mark Rylance’s supporting performance; the Irish immigrant drama Brooklyn, just nominated for Saoirse Ronan’s leading performance; and Straight Outta Compton, the popular N.W.A biopic, which landed nothing the day after the SAG Awards gave it a best ensemble nomination.
Will Smith, whose upcoming Concussion has drawn headlines for its depiction of head trauma in football, joined the best actor, drama, nominees. Also nominated were Michael Fassbender (Steve Jobs), Eddie Redmayne (The Danish Girl), DiCaprio and Bryan Cranston (Trumbo). Apparently displaced was Johnny Depp’s chilly Whitey Bulger in Black Mass.
Alicia Vikander, the ubiquitous star of 2015, joined the best dramatic actress field for The Danish Girl, as well as the supporting actress one for her performance as an artificial intelligence in the sci-fi indie Ex Machina.
Others also landed multiple nods. Rylance added a second for his TV role on the costume drama Wolf Hall. Idris Elba also spanned both film and TV with nods for his West African rebel commander in Beasts of No Nation, as well as the British crime series Luther.
Though younger stars like DiCaprio and Lawrence are the leading acting contenders, a number of esteemed veterans joined the nominations, too. Al Pacino (Danny Collins), Maggie Smith (The Lady in the Van), Lily Tomlin (Grandma), Jane Fonda (Youth) and Helen Mirren (Trumbo) all earned nods.
So did Sylvester Stallone for Creed, giving him a nomination for the same character (Rocky Balboa) who first earned him a Globe nomination in 1976 for Rocky.
Along with Elba and Rylance, the supporting actor category was rounded out by Paul Dano (Love & Mercy) and Michael Shannon (99 Homes).
“The most amazing thing when these things happen, because the phone just goes insane,” Shannon said. “Like it just vibrates and makes all kinds of noises. I assumed when it started doing that, that either something very good or very bad had happened. And it was very good.”
Ricky Gervais will return as host for the Globes on Jan. 10. His third time in the gig follows three straight years of Tina Fey and Amy Poehler as hosts. Last year’s NBC telecast dipped slightly from 2013’s 10-year high, drawing 19.3 million viewers.