My 2021 Oscar Picks (Spoiler: MINARI)
Give all the awards to Youn Yuh-jung and this perfect film. Do not pass go.
I rarely blog anymore, but this was important:
We actually watched most of the Oscar-nominated films this year!
How to do this, pandemic edition:
1. Subscribe to Netflix, Amazon, Apple+, Disney+. (If you work in a creative field like we do, these subscriptions are write-offs. That is my defensive argument for watching too much TV.)
2. Rent a short-film package. The Playhouse — Hamilton’s best theatre and I miss it more than I miss friends. No offence, friends. — had a short-films package available that included ALL of the nominated short live-action films, short docs and short animated films. It was 6 hours of AMAZING storytelling. The highlight of my film-watching this year.
3. Rent the rest. We rented Minari, Promising Young Woman and Sound of Metal. Because we don’t go out anymore and we deserve nice things.
We couldn’t watch EVERYTHING. For time-related reasons. We missed Best Picture noms The Father and Judas and the Black Messiah. We didn’t watch all the feature documentaries or foreign films.
BUT…we DID see:
Mank
Minari
Nomadland
Promising Young Woman
Sound of Metal
The Trial of the Chicago 7
Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom
One Night in Miami
Onward
A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon
Soul
Wolfwalkers
Da 5 Bloods
Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga
Time (feature doc)
ANIMATED SHORTS:
Burrow
Genius Loci
If Anything Happens I Love You
Opera
Yes-People
LIVE-ACTION SHORTS:
Feeling Through
The Letter Room
The Present
Two Distant Strangers
White Eye
SHORT DOCS:
Colette
A Concerto Is a Conversation
Do Not Split
Hunger Ward
A Love Song for Latasha
And now I have thoughts.
Minari isn’t just my pick for Best Picture. It’s one of the Top 10 films I’VE EVER SEEN. I will defend it, promote it and love it until I die. It’s an immigrant story. An American Dream story. A perfect human story. Tears and goosebumps and white knuckles and fuzzy feelings. Youn Yuh-jung will win Best Supporting Actress on Sunday. I would bet everything on this.
Now that that’s out of the way…
Sound of Metal was stunning. It should win Best Sound. Maybe Best Editing. And I’d give Riz Ahmed a “Go straight to Best Actor” pass if Chadwick Boseman wasn’t a fellow nominee. It’s a tough category and Boseman gave his all WHILE HE KNEW HE WAS DYING and his performance is bone-chilling.
Delroy Lindo should win Best Supporting Actor for Da 5 Bloods BUT HE WASN’T EVEN NOMINATED. (First time I’ve cried over someone in a MAGA hat. Spike Lee knows what he’s doing.) I’m rooting for Sound of Metal’s Paul Raci. What a lovely subtle gift he was to that film.
I loved Promising Young Woman waaaay more than Matthew did* and that was Emerald Fennell’s intention, I’m sure. (I do understand the criticism of the ending, but I loved it. Just as it was, for what it was.) I’d love to see Carey Mulligan take home Best Actress on Sunday. And Fennell take home Best Original Screenplay.
*Correction: Matthew did, in fact, love Promising Young Woman. But while I found it empowering, he found it sobering. We’re both big fans, though.
The heavyweights DID NOT impress me this year. Someone compared The Trial of the Chicago 7 to an HBO movie and I agree. It was good, but not Aaron Sorkin good. And it was an Aaron Sorkin movie. So that’s a problem.
And Mank did nothing for me. In a year where female directors really shone, this one felt especially…masterbatory, a word I usually reserve for the narcissistic slop by my arch nemesis, Quentin Tarantino. A lot of Hollywood white dudes were too excited to make this movie and it shows. There’s no nuance. More than two hours of Gary Oldman stumbling around drunk in the (literal) dark. Amanda Seyfried is the stand-out performance, but she doesn’t stand a chance against my favourite grandma (not related to me) of all time: Youn Yuh-jung.
(Did I mention that I loved Minari?)
Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom and One Night in Miami… were both adapted from plays. And it FEELS like they were both adapted from plays. I was a theatre kid and loved them. But…you might not? (Also: One Night in Miami… is a fascinating history lesson. And Regina King is a director to watch. And as mentioned above, Chadwick Boseman’s performance in Ma Rainey’s was beyond.)
Critics are losing themselves over Nomadland. And while I appreciate that director Chloe Zhao made a visual masterpiece and directed the heck out of that thing — the performances she gets out of non-actors are incredible — it just didn’t stay with me. Not like, say, MINARI did.
That said, Zhao for Best Director. I hope she wears overalls to the ceremony.
Best Foreign Film
Another Round will win. Because we all drink too much in lockdown and this film lets audiences watch a Bond villain (Mads Mikkelsen) spiral into a darkly funny midlife crisis. Also, its director, Thomas Vinterberg, scored a directing nod, giving this film a perceived/actual advantage. Bottoms up!
Best Documentary Feature
Time was a gorgeous — and painful — doc about a passionate advocate awaiting her husband’s release from prison. She waited two decades. (Non-spoiler: they’re Black and white supremacy is evil.)
I’ve heard good things about Crip Camp. (By Higher Ground Productions. The Obamas strike again!) My Octopus Teacher might take it because everyone wants feel-good movies right now. And because it’s been on Netflix for a while now and most Oscar voters don’t watch as much as I do. Ahem.
Best Animated Feature
I know Soul will probably take Best Animated Feature, but I will scream for joy and spill my martini if Wolfwalkers wins. It was probably my second-favourite movie of the year. (Minari was #1. In case you missed something.)
Best Original Song
Apply the same screaming and drink-spilling if Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga wins Best Original Song. Even though I won’t be mad if “Speak Now” from One Night in Miami… takes it.
Still bummed that the Academy overlooked Jingle Jangle: A Christmas Journey in this category.
Best Animated Short
While I hate to choose between Burrow and If Anything Happens I Love You for Best Animated Short, the latter made me sob. Twice. (It’s on Netflix and it’s short. You have no excuses. Don’t make me cry alone.)
Burrow is an absolute delight, though.
Best Live-Action Short
Live-Action Short is the most complicated category for me. Mostly because I’ve never cared about this category before and now I’m SO INVESTED. The Present (Palestine) isn’t the frontrunner — I read industry news because I’m tired of Peppa Pig — but it’s the one that really moved me. And made me want to tell stories. But it’s also a can’t-go-wrong category. No matter which film wins, I’m going to be, like, “Of course it won. It was phenomenal.” Such a special collection of films. (The Present is on Netflix. Hint hint.)
White Eye (Israel) is a one-take masterpiece. It took a while to shake this one. Powerful, uncomfortable stuff. A different kind of immigrant story.
If Two Distant Strangers wins, it’s because of its timeliness. Inspired in part by the death of George Floyd, it’s the nightmare version of Groundhog Day. Borderline trauma porn, it certainly packs a punch. Again and again.
Feeling Through might take it. It stars an (actually) blind and deaf actor. A gorgeous take on human empathy. And the only film in this category that doesn’t feature a uniformed officer in a leading or supporting role. (Cops are so hot/villain-y right now.)
Best Documentary Short
Odds-makers have their money on A Concerto Is a Conversation for Best Documentary Short. Of the five nominated films, this one was the sleekest and least…dark? Which is why I didn’t like it. It felt too polished. Break my heart with Hunger Ward (about the famine in Yemen) any day.
A Love Song for Latasha is another timely top pick. A teenager is killed for buying orange juice while Black. Devastating.
But Colette might take it. A French woman visits the concentration camp where her brother died. Not to sound cynical about award shows or anything, but…never vote against the Holocaust.
Phew. I think that’s it for me.
Also, I really loved Minari.
What were your favourite films of the year?
P.S. Here’s a link to Vanity Fair’s printable ballot if you’re doing things our way this year: Zoom Oscar party!
P.P.S. My least favourite film of the year was On the Rocks. And I ADORE Rashida Jones, would invite Bill Murray to any and every dinner party ever, and want Sofia Coppola’s wardrobe. But just thinking about it makes me so effing mad. What a disaster in trying to capture what a marriage feels like. Such a gross disservice to the women who have actually confronted their husbands’ cheating. But maybe a Chanel handbag turns emotional devastation into superficial comedy?
P.P.S. I hope someone fully embraces “Pandemic Chic” and wears a glorified blanket/mask/jammies combo on Sunday night. (Rick Owens’ latest would do the trick.)
This is the dress 2021 deserves.
