Shortlist Choices Offer Clues and Surprises in Oscar Race
‘Barbie,’ ‘Oppenheimer’ and ‘Society of the Snow’ gain momentum
Narrowing down a field of more than 300 movies is far more daunting than awards enthusiasts assume.
On Dec. 21, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences unveiled the shortlist in 10 categories for the upcoming Oscars: international feature, documentary feature, original score, original song, sound, makeup and hairstyling, visual effects, animated short, documentary short and live action short film.
As expected, major Oscar frontrunners were among those included on these lists. Leading the way was Greta Gerwig’s metacomedy “Barbie,” which racked up five mentions across three categories, including three for its original songs — “What Was I Made For?” (by Billie Eilish and Finneas), “I’m Just Ken” (by Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt) and “Dance the Night” (by Dua Lipa). Despite a snub in the makeup and VFX categories (also spots that last year’s best picture winner “Everything Everywhere All at Once” missed), its slot on the sound shortlist (where musicals such as “The Color Purple” are absent) is a sign of strength for 2023’s highest-grossing film. It’s noteworthy that it’s been 20 years since the biggest moneymaker took home the Academy’s top prize: “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.”
There were three movies tied for the second-most mentions on the shortlist, with four each: Apple and Paramount’s “Killers of the Flower Moon,” Netflix’s “Society of the Snow” and Sony’s “Spider-man: Across the Spider-verse.”
Among awards analysts, there’s been a semi-agreed-upon top four in the race for best picture, with varying odds attached to each: “Barbie,” “Flower Moon,” “Oppenheimer” and “Poor Things.” The only category featuring each of the top four entities is original score — Ronson and Wyatt, the late Robbie Robertson, Ludwig Göransson and Jerskin Fendrix each made the list. With award competition as cutthroat as ever, and more than 20 movies having a feasible shot at landing a best picture nom, we could be seeing the hints of potential snubs and surprises coming our way, especially in a race this close.
“Oppenheimer,” Christopher Nolan’s biopic about the man who created the atomic bomb, has also shown its popularity with moviegoers, earning more than $952 million at the world
wide box office, third overall for the year behind “Barbie” and “The Super Mario Bros. Movie.” Aside from a notable omission in visual effects (likely brought on by Nolan’s remarks regarding the use of CGI, which didn’t help with branch members), its inclusion in sound and original score — two spots that feel betrothed to those artisans — makes it virtually impossible to not see this film clearing the double-digit tally on Oscar nomination morning.
There were other flexes performed by contenders throughout the shortlist.
Spain’s international feature submission, “Society of the Snow,” from director J.A. Bayona, could duplicate the playbook of last year’s late-surger, Germany’s “All Quiet on the Western Front,” which netted four statuettes. Netflix is bullish on the movie, which tells the harrowing true story of a soccer team whose plane crashes on a glacier in the Andes, possibly being another Netflix best picture nom after Todd Haynes’ “May December” and, most prominently, “Maestro” from Bradley Cooper. The latter landed two expected sound and makeup shortlist mentions.
While the Academy has encouraged a more diverse membership and is working towards closing loopholes in campaigning and voting practices, the next big issue on the docket should be opening preliminary documentary voting to other Academy members who want to opt-in, as they do with international feature, animated feature and live action short.
With dozens of glaring omissions in the last few decades — i.e., “Good Night Oppy,” “Won’t You Be My Neighbor” and “Hoop Dreams” among them — there are too many nonfiction submissions for branch members to sift through to properly consider.
This year, 167 titles vied for the 15 spots on the shortlist, including some of the year’s best, such as Matthew Heineman’s “American Symphony” and Kaouther Ben Hania’s “Four Daughters.” However, the absence of films helmed by Black women, notably “Little Richard: I Am Everything” by Lisa Cortes, and “Kokomo City” by D. Smith, was pronounced. Seven of the 15 docs on the shortlist were directed by women.
When the Academy expanded the nominees for best picture from five to 10 in 2009, following the snub of “The Dark Knight,” the organization suggested that this would offer a better opportunity to recognize animated, international and documentaries in the lineup. Only one of those has yet to break through: documentary. With about 650 branch voters, a fraction of the nearly 10,000 industry professionals, we’ll never see that dream become a reality if there isn’t an incentive for other branches to weigh in on the discussion.
Three of the 15 movies on the international feature shortlist are documentaries, including Ukraine’s “20 Days in Mariupol” and Tunisia’s “Four Daughters,” both also on the documentary slate. The other is Morocco’s “The Mother of Lies.” While there are a few disappointments, such as Morocco being the only African country represented despite a big push for the Lupita Nyong’o-executive produced “Goodbye Julia” from Sudan, there’s a nice mix of genre, subjects and diversity of filmmakers.
Speaking of the diversity of genres, the animation medium got a massive boost with “Spider-verse” landing in song, sound, visual effects and score, the latter of which also had Gkids’ “The
Boy and the Heron” composer Joe Hisaishi. With Sony putting a concerted effort to get the fourth animated best picture nominee, which would also be the first non-disney movie, it is one step closer to that ultimate goal.
And finally, and what has become a bit of my mantra, if something appears on the shortlist that is deemed “shocking” and stands out, that tends to point to an eventual nomination for that movie. Look at examples such as past makeup and hair nominees “The 100-Year-old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared” (2015) and “A Man Called Ove” (2016). This year, that honor goes to Universal’s summer vampire horror movie, “The Last Voyage of Demeter,” starring Corey Hawkins. Admittedly, I didn’t have the movie listed on my list of eligible contenders, let alone ranked to come within earshot of a nomination via the hair and makeup shortlist. Heike Merker, nominated for her work on “All Quiet on the Western Front” last year, is among the below the line team on “Last Voyage.” Some goodwill might be left over for her; an “afterglow” nom could be forthcoming.
The next time any Academy members will cast ballots is when nominations voting opens Jan. 11. Until then, we look to the clues of the correlating major guild awards and influencing bodies with membership overlaps like BAFTA.